The A.I.

• Dylan Burrowes, Grade 9
• Short Story
• 2010

It had been about six months. Six months of freedom. Some might say that it was a privilege, others a nightmare. The entire world was being run by ‘Artificial Intelligence’. Why? That meant that now, the entire human population could live the life that they had always dreamed of, in the way in which they had dreamed of – free. Imagine having all the time in the world to do everything that you have ever wanted. But what happens when you’ve done everything? Trouble, and I, Johnny, an I.T. expert, knew that it was brewing.
After the first few months of the extreme hype, everybody started to settle into their new life. Joy and happiness were all around, and not one person could be seen without a smile on their face.
During the fourth and fifth months however, things began to change. People began finishing everything that they wanted to do, while the A.I.’s kept food, water, money, bills and housing under control. After even more time, people became bored.
I had tried to warn everybody of this long before the A.I.’s were built (with protests and speeches) but everybody was too busy caught up in their own selfish desires to realise what this would cause. This time, I wouldn’t let it go any further.
I stormed up to the ‘A.I. Head Office’ (which happened to be in the centre of my local town) and demanded to see a change in the way the A.I.’s were run, though my goal was to see them shut down for good. After one minute of arguing, they kicked me out and told me to never come back. Why? I’m assuming because of all the money being made – about half of the entire world’s income.
So I let things go on for another couple of months. As I predicted, people grew increasingly bored. Days were filled with nothing to do but sit and listen to music created by the A.I.’s, or watch the A.I.’s on T.V., after all, there was no need for musicians or actors anymore. At night time, there was nothing else to do but party, drink and get involved in drugs. This caused a whole new set of problems. Crime rates went through the roof, damage worth millions occurred and thousands were admitted to hospital each day. Somebody had to do something, and I knew that it had to be me.
I devised a plan to sneak into the A.I. Head Office while security was on their ‘midnight break’ which very few knew about. At that point, I would shut down the A.I. system and put such a virus on it that it would be nearly impossible to reverse. And that’s exactly what I did.
I fled and got off scot-free, while security was left baffled. The people of the world were shocked at first, but soon found pleasure in being independent again. Slowly but surely, the world returned to normal, and is staying like that until someone decodes my virus.