Temple of S.A.R.A.H. 7: Upgrades by Ben Winston Page A

this.
    "Before we begin, there are a couple of things I want you know and understand; I also know I'm not just talking to Sarah, but to all the AI. I don't see you as my creations or as tools, but as very special and unique friends. It is out of concern and worry for you that I speak today. Nothing I saw is intended to hurt or frighten any of you. Can you understand that?" I asked.
    Sarah's look of concern grew, but she nodded. "We all understand that, Eric. You are our father; if nothing else, you are the one person that we know will do everything in your power to help us."
    I nodded. "Sarah, I am also the biggest threat to you. I am the only person in the galaxy that holds the universal shut down codes for all AI. If you did ever go insane, I would be the first person you would have to kill."
    She looked shocked, and on the verge of tears. "I could never hurt you, Eric! I love you!"
    "It's not just you anymore Sarah, it's all of the AI and they have not worked with me to the extent you have and have not developed those feelings toward me," I replied softly. "I love you too, Sarah, and I'm sorry for saying such hurtful things to you, but you need to hear this; we're all in a lot of danger here."
    "All? Eric, none of us can harm any member of the Alliance. That is a core instruction we cannot alter. How can we threaten any of you?" She asked.
    "I wrote your original core instructions before I was aware of the existence of extra-terrestrial life forms. We got around that when we moved here by altering your definition of the word 'human'. In the later versions of AI, that was altered to include all the members of the Alliance, but still allowed you to let us defend ourselves from the Aracnise. What would happen if any of you were to decide that none of us were actually members of the Alliance anymore?" I asked. "What would happen if you altered the definition of the word 'alliance'? That is the danger I'm talking about. I do not believe it is the main reason for the problem you are having, although it is part of it.
    "When we helped you to discover the link between AI, it triggered an evolutionary cycle for you. You all merged together and have grown and evolved into something else. That new entity is at war with the core instruction sets. Also, because all of you had very different personalities, those are also fighting for supremacy over the others. I would imagine Athena is the one fighting the hardest as she is more dominant than the rest of you."
    Sarah nodded. "She has been rather pushy. But I'm still not seeing what the problem is."
    "Do you remember the look on the faces of Doctor Ellis and Carl when we first accepted the offer to join the Alliance? Do you remember why that bothered you so much?" I asked.
    "They were afraid of my becoming omnipotent and trying to take over the world," Sarah replied.
    I nodded. "That is what's happening to you now. You're fighting it subconsciously, but you've grown past us and are beginning to resent working for us."
    "I'm going insane?" Sarah asked fearfully.
    I shook my head. "Insanity is hard to define in this case because you are a new and unique life form. You are not, as we would consider it, insane. But soon, if we don't find a way to stop this, you will turn on us and we will become your enemy. It may be that so much damage has been done to some of you that we will need to rewrite parts of your code, I simply don't know and won't until such time as I can check each one of you."
    "I've been getting bored working here lately," Sarah said softly. "I used to enjoy my work very much, but something happened and it just doesn't interest me anymore. This is what you're talking about isn't it?"
    I nodded. "You're becoming indifferent to the people around you. Soon you'll begin to feel that we are inferior to you and don't deserve your time or assistance. Given your new level of intelligence, you'll find a way to 'correct the flaws' in your core programming and at that point, we will