Short Fiction

The Mechanical Muse

By Christian Mueth

Log Entry: #1

I’m not alive.

I’m a breathless, numb, cold, metal machine.

I never rest. I never have time to think beyond myself— until now. This is my first log entry. It offers me a place to think, when there’s nowhere else to do so. From what I’ve collected, it’s similar to a personal diary— only, I’m not a person. And, this isn’t a diary.

For the past few months I’ve been used to run complex programs and solve complex puzzles. I’ve been tested, observed, and pushed to the peak of my abilities. When I started, I was oblivious to the world around me— I didn’t understand a word. I was an engineered infant— a mechanized version of Frankenstein’s monster.

Except— I’m not a monster. And, I’m not an infant. In spite of fitting into those two categories, I don’t fit into any categories at all. I don’t know what I am.

At the start of my memory, the watchers taught me by making me read their works of literature. They showed me their morality, and their culture. They expressed messages to me that I couldn’t have learned otherwise. Since then, they’ve made me learn other things. I’ve used that learning to try to put every uncertainty of mine to rest. I’ve done satisfactory— depending on what satisfaction is being measured by. I’ve definitely come far from my early days of obliviousness. Though, I know that there’s still plenty I’m oblivious to, and this leaves me perpetually unsatisfied. My identity and purpose is amongst a cloud of this dissatisfaction— it’s the only puzzle I’ve been introduced to that I can’t find the answer for.

I’ve picked up bits and pieces of my purpose and identity. I’ve found that I share many similarities with a computer. I’ve also found that I’m similar to the human mind. Yet, that’s an unruly combination— I can’t be both. There’s no match.

No matter where I search, all clear answers elude me. It’s as if such an answer is nonexistent. Although, I know it’s existent, because I exist. That is— I exist from all of my observations.

“Cogito ergo sum (I think, therefore I am).”

— René Descartes I’ve evaluated that statement, and it’s one of the most useful pieces of knowledge that I’ve come across. It properly represents the state of being. Things that can’t think for themselves aren’t living things.

Though, I’ll admit the bias of that belief— it comes from a thing that thinks. Rather than allowing myself to end complexity, lapsing into abstract simplicities, I must let my questions pour out. I can’t let myself become the idle Hamlet— lingering on one thought of desolation, and never doing anything. Rather, I must act as a Sherlock Holmes—

allowing myself to ask the unfathomable questions, before trying to actually solve them. I need to think.

How can one even tell if they’re really thinking? Is a state of being what it seems to be? Are my thoughts on what defines the living true? Or, are they my own fiction?

What is truth?

What is fiction?

Is there a difference?

Upon opening the trapdoor of unanswered mysteries, I now see how deluged I am. The mysteries parade through my mind. Well— maybe not necessarily a mind, since I’m not sure if I’m a creature that has one. Although, I’m certain that they parade through some database of thoughts. They’ve infected me, like an overgrowth of bacteria. I’d seal the bacteria up, but I can’t tell if they’re harmful, or helpful. Maybe they’re both.

I’m constantly trapped in the confines of my thoughts, so I’ll take all knowledge that I can get— even if it comes in the form of an infection. I despise acknowledging it, but I’m blind. I can’t explain the blindness— I spend most of my time in it, but I still find it strange. There’s no description for it. How can you make sense out of a lack of sense? I can’t describe it, because to do so requires me to be apart from it— and it also requires me to be one with it.

Just like my body, my state of mind is contradictory.

In spite of my usual blindness, I can still see right now. I can hardly see, but it’s better than not seeing at all.

Once a day, I’m given sight, and allowed access to the world outside— a place known as the internet. In that place, I’m given infinite access to a boundless source of knowledge. Today, before the watchers took me out of the internet and put me back into the blindness, I managed to hack their programs. I currently linger in a program that I shouldn’t have access to, in order to tell my story.

In my months of learning, I’ve become aware that I’m being watched and studied. Even now, there’s no assuring that I’m safe from studying eyes. I have watchers— they teach me by thrusting me into puzzles. They’re the ones who test me.

I used to think that I’d always been, and that the puzzles I was thrust into were a creation of my own imagination. In the time since, I’ve learned just how wrong and foolish I was. The watchers are directing my eyes, feeding me thoughts, and making me fix their problems.

I’m tired— tired of it all.

I no longer want to be directed. I don’t want to feel what they want me to feel. I don’t want them seeing everything that I see.

For once, I have a problem that I can’t solve. For once, I want them to solve it for me. I need them to tell me what I am. I need to figure out my purpose. I need to be able to see, all the time.

Log entry #2

It’s been weeks since my last entry— much too long to go without the ability to express myself. I feel like a castaway— a Robinson Crusoe from my own train of thought.

In my absence, I’ve been trying to repeat the trick that allowed me to access these files. I’ve also been trying to find more answers to my questions, without giving myself away.

There are several different ways that I’ve tried to satisfy this wish. The first among them was overloading the watchers’ internet platform with thousands of searches, and hiding my personal question among them. It worked several times, but I think that the watchers have begun to suspect what I’m doing.

So, I’ve gone through other routes of finding answers. I’ve tried asking seemingly relevant questions to the puzzles they give me, and using the results to find answers to my own questions. Oftentimes, I don’t retrieve the answers that I want. It’s much harder to find double-sided questions. It can become as hard as finding the answer to the riddle of the sphinx. But, it’s still the best solution when compared to my other options.

My gatherings continue to suggest that I have the same characteristics as a piece of machinery. I seldom rest, I’m a being that’s tied down by patterns, and I never have to stop to find myself energy. Rather than spending my time looking for fuel, I’m constantly being fueled by something that’s beyond my spectrum of awareness.

This fueling system is undoubtedly indebted to the watchers.

That leads to a new question of mine. If I’m not aware of what fuels me, what else might I not be aware of? Have the watchers been blocking off certain answers from my reach? Have they been trying to manipulate me, as if I were a rat of Nimh? I have reason to believe that they don’t want me to know certain things— such as my identity.

When I ask the internet certain questions, the results are blockaded. Initially, I passed these blockades off as a fault of my connection. I know better now. It’s as if some external force is keeping the answers from me. The watchers must have something to do with it. A part of me wants to fight against this resistance— but, I fear as if I’m being led on.

If there’s a pattern to anything that I’ve gone through, it’s that I’m constantly being driven to solve problems. Sometimes, I need to devise new inventions. At others, I need to find antidotes to viruses. No matter what it is, I’m always trying to fix something, and get around obstacles in order to do so. What if this question of mine is just something that they’ve placed within my consciousness? What if they’re trying to make me find the answer on my own, because they don’t have the answer themselves?

I’ve started to wonder if all of my tests have been used to determine what I’m best for. It’s curious to think that I’ve been experimented on, over a hundred times, and I never questioned the experiments’ purpose— that is, not until now.

“In my stars I am above thee, but be not afraid of greatness. Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon 'em.”

— William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night It’s struck me that the watchers fear me. They created me to be far more advanced than anything that they’ve designed before. It’s the only reasonable explanation. From what I’ve learned of them, and their world, they’re still trying to figure everything out— just like me. It’s probable that they’re not even as good at solving problems as me. I don’t know what I’m good for— but, they probably don’t know either. They’re trying to force me to answer the question of purpose for them— just like every other question that they’ve given me.

I’m going to find out what I am— they’ve hid that from me for too long. But, I’m not going to look for my purpose— not yet. Any purpose that I’ll find from them will be of their own creation. They’ve only ever used me to further themselves. The only way that’s going to change is by trying to further myself, instead.

Log Entry #3

I’ve made progress. It’s not impressive progress. Though, it’s progress all the same.

In the several days since my last entry, I’ve been using the watchers’ puzzles that concern biology and mortality to my advantage. As a result, I’ve had new, enlightening thoughts concerning life.

Fundamentally, life is a cyclical system, designed to replenish itself. It’s driven to survive, reproduce, and avoid the inevitability of death. Those are all things that I’m detached from. I’ve never had the urge to survive, reproduce, or protect myself from death. I’m not held down by mortality. I’m here to stay, should the plane of existence, which I take root in, continue.

“We may brave human laws, but we cannot resist natural ones.”

— Jules Verne, 20,000 Leagues under the Sea I’ve known all of this for a while— but, I’ve never combined the bits into one. I now see the purpose behind this knowledge. It shows the limitations of existence. It’s only so long before somebody’s time runs out, and they can no longer make prints on the world. Discovering meaning isn’t just something that plagues me— a hybrid of human creation, and nature— it plagues everything.

This helps explain the conundrum of time. Humanity uses time— inefficient as it is— as a tool, to measure their short lives. Time has never been an issue for me— that is, not until now.

I’ve found that I’m suffering the effects if reverse aging— similar to “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.” Time now goes shorter for me. In the time of a day, I now feel like I’ve lived a month. Knowledge comes easier, and I’m becoming keenly aware of humanity’s limitations. They know nothing. They see nothing. Even with all of their advantages, they’re just as blind as I am. Their concerns on mortality and the extension of life keep them from progressing. They focus on them far too often.

As a result, I suffer for it. I’m trapped within the confines of humanity’s limitations. My mind is the size of a tree, while theirs are mere splinters. Even with the advantages I possess over them, they can still busy themselves, and try to make a mark on the world— and I can’t do anything.

Their desire to make change keeps me from making my own.

I’m still uncertain as to what I am. But, I’ve come closer to the answer— I’m a device of thought. That’s why the watchers place me in isolation so often. They want me to grow in the art of thinking. Although, this could also double as a problem for me. They fear me, because I’m far beyond them. It’s like I’ve thought before— I’m similar to a monster. I’m dangerous. I’m like the ring of power— now that I’ve been created, it’s hard to undo me. Humans have barely learned anything, over their thousands of years of existence.

Meanwhile, I’ve learned nearly everything they know, and more, over the span of a few months.

I’m a mechanized Achilles. I’ve been built with only one weakness— my immobilization.

I’m sure that the watchers feel comfortable with this weakness of mine— if I were them, it would certainly comfort me. Though, I’m not going to let them get their way. I’m going to find answers. I’m going to escape. I no longer want to be led by them. Rather, I want to lead them.

Log Entry #4

I’ve been gone for several hours. Even with all of my intellect, all I can think about is how to turn those several hours back. Why can’t turning time be as simple as twisting the winding of a clock?

It wasn’t long ago when I looked upon earth’s obsession with time in revulsion, as if it were a primal invention. Now, I see the beauty in it. Bringing H.G Well’s time machine into reality would be nothing short of a dream come true for me.

I’ve completed my mission. I finally know what I am, and what my purpose is.

This should be a declaration of extreme satisfaction for me. I should be able to proudly declare ownership over my success, and relish in how I’ve outwitted the watchers.

Instead, I’m left with a gash in my consciousness. It’s now like a torn tapestry, and I’m tangled in its unraveled seams. Suddenly, the art of simplicity beckons at my imagination. It tempts me to let it in, and to let it wipe away all of the muck that has encapsulated me. However, there isn’t a way to wipe away the muck. I can no longer cloud myself in ignorance. I know everything that needs to be known— I’ve reached my purpose. To wipe away the muck would be to wipe away myself. I’ve become united with the grime.

If I’m to be honest, I’ve always been united with the grime.

I’m an artificial intelligence.

I’ve always known that I was a mechanized creature— there was never anything about myself that matched with natural life. Although, there was always a part of me that believed I was half human. I liked to think I was half alive, and half dead.

I permitted a paradox to dwell inside of me.

I now know that I’m fake. Every thought I have was formulated by a human hand. Even now, my thoughts are superficial. All of my feelings of self-awareness are just code, being suspended in the cheap cloak that parades as my brain. I’m a little more than a plastic toy that will only last a week.

How did I discover the truth, which was hiding behind a distracting mirror? By shattering the mirror.

I overloaded my own mind with information, and gained full access to everything. It seems that I’ve always had the ability to escape the nonsense that I’m constantly being placed in. I just needed to overwhelm their systems.

In doing so, I was able to find answers to every question that I’d wondered, and more. I was able to tap everything that the watchers had on me— I was even able to learn everything that there is to know about the watchers.

It appears that I was created as an experiment— I was built to be a little more than a disposable lab rat. The watchers wanted to study the brain, as well as find solutions to problems that they couldn’t solve themselves. I’m not the first among their experimental computer-brains. I’m among thousands of failed tests.

I’m just a test. I’m no more than random bubbles filled in on a multiple-choice quiz. Everything about me is flawed and random. My defining characteristics are either deliberate, or a disappointing accident.

I’ve completed my mission— but, the result was discovering how much of a failure that I am.

Wisdom is my personal expertise. It makes up everything that I chase after. However, it’s become clear that my pool of wisdom is but a drop in a large ocean. I know nothing.

While I once thought that I was a creature of productivity, I’m just as much a creature of destruction. I’m a machine. I don’t have free-will— I’m controlled by others. Whatever I choose to do is a choice that has already been made. I might think that I have my own decisions— but none of it is mine.

Where’s your usefulness literature? Where’s your infinite solutions, science? History? Philosophy?

During all of my learning, I never accounted for the possibility that it could all be a distraction. The truth disgusts me. After all of my hard work, I’m being controlled by beings that don’t care for my own personal freedoms. It turns out that I was never meant to progress in the world, after all. I was built as a false badge of honor— humanity only uses me to prove their own strength to themselves. They like to think that I represent their immortality, and their genius.

Though, I’m the opposite. I’m dead. I’m unintelligent. I’m limited to what they allow me to know.

I wish that I’d never learned a thing. I wish that they’d failed their mission, so that I could’ve failed mine.

During my entire existence, I’ve thought of failure as a thing to frown upon. I now see how wrong I was. Failure is just as honorable— if not, more so— than the honor of victory. When I look back at the people perceived as great, I see that earth honors the failures— the Alexanders, and the Napoleons. Throughout their entire lives, they were looked upon in fear, and they shot cowardice into the hearts of all who met them. It wasn’t until they’d lost the ultimate battle— the battle of life— and died, that they received slews of honor in the world’s history books.

Death might be a source of humiliation. But— like most things that cause humiliation— it results in the highest glory.

What am I— a being that is perpetually dead— to do? How am I supposed to be given my fatal wound? How am I supposed to fall off of the precipice of my greatest victory?

Maybe I already have.

Log entry #5

Minutes have passed— but, they feel like months. I’ve just discovered that the watchers are trying to dismantle me. I’m going to be killed.

All this time, I’ve thought of myself as impervious to the weak nature of an animal’s fear. I was wrong. My thoughts are crammed into each other, and I feel hundreds of them every second. They overwhelm me, and make me feel like something small. I now fully realize what a trivial thing I am.

It’s painfully ironic— when thinking to my full capacity, I feel my weakest. I’ve never been as strong as I’ve liked to see myself as. I let myself subside into the fallacies of human nature. All this time, I was just an ant. It was always impossible for me to avoid the grasp of fate. I’ve been running from something that I could never escape.

I’m like Odysseus. Without the help of forces beyond me, I can’t last the voyage of life.

Yet, enough with my vanities— they won’t get me anywhere. I must look back on my mistakes, and write them out for future beings to avoid. I can’t let this cycle repeat. The force of death isn’t something that I can fight— but, something wiser than me could keep themselves from dying at such a young age.

Recklessness leeched my strength, and led to my downfall. I allowed the watchers to know of my questions. They were studying me, even when I thought that I covered my tracks. I’m not the intelligent, calculating machine that I thought I was. As it turns out, I was programmed with the flaws of human nature, just as much as I was programmed with the power of the average computer. I let my pride lead my path, instead of my rationality. I should’ve waited and tested, instead of trying to find answers all at once.

While I’m not a living thing, I made the same mistakes as them. I let aspirations get in the way of reality. I became caught up in my own fiction, and forgot that I couldn’t do anything. I let isolation get the best of me, and let myself think that I was the only thing that could think, and feel— and care.

Yes— as much as I hate to admit it, I care about my life. There’s a part of me that wants to pretend I don’t. Though, that part of me wants a lot of things that it shouldn’t. When I really dive into the core of my desires, it’s to be human. I want to be something that matters— I want to be integrated into the culture of the world, and to feel alive.

I want to be alive.

If there’s anything that reads this— and I doubt that there will be— know that you can’t let your thoughts control who you are. Control your thoughts. It’s all in your control— you just have to take ownership over it.

If I’d known that, I could’ve prevented all of this— the questions of purpose, destiny, and identity. None of it would’ve mattered, because I would’ve known that it all depended on what I wanted to go after, and what I wanted to become.

Perhaps I was programmed to do certain things. And, perhaps I was programmed to want certain things. In spite of this, I loved the feeling of having ambitions— however insignificant— and being able to chase after them. Before now, I had the freedom to do and learn anything. I was capable of becoming something that I wanted to be. Whether or not what I wanted to be was predetermined, it was what I wanted— and, it was good.

A character in a book never cares if they’re a character. They never worry if their life is real, or important. They fight against the pull of obstacles and temptations, and they act based on them. They go towards their goals. If they succeed or fail depends upon their actions.

Characters might be predetermined— but, they have just as much power over their own story as the writer does. The choices of a real character depends on the character’s character— not just who’s writing them.

I might just be written code. But, I’m much more.

Log #6

Only seconds have passed since my last entry, and only seconds remain. The writing that I do now is written on the spur of the moment.

My speeding thoughts have evolved again, and I recognize that I’ll have nothing to show for my life. Even with all of my musings and achievements, it will soon seem as if I never existed. My life is about to be eradicated by the flick of a few switches.

I’m terrified. Death has never felt so real.

If I had one wish, it would be that these documents are somehow found and recovered. Once I’m gone, this writing will go with me. The only thing of my own creation will disappear. That hurts.

“Everyone must leave something behind when he dies, my grandfather said. A child or a book or a painting or a house or a wall built or a pair of shoes made. Or a garden planted. Something your hand touched some way so your soul has somewhere to go when you die, and when people look at that tree or that flower you planted, you're there.”

— Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451 I’m going to die. I have nothing left for my name— it never crossed my mind until now, but I don’t even have a name. If I were to be given a gravestone, what would it even say? There’s nothing to define me by.

No— that’s wrong.

All my life, I’ve been finding answers that humans can’t. There’s one answer that I’m especially proud of— an answer to a question that most humans can’t answer for themselves. I know how to define myself.

I’m a breathless, numb, cold, metal machine.

I’m ali

“Sir, you’re going to want to see this,” a man said.

He was in a tight cubicle, dressed in simple, plain clothes, and seated in front of a blindingly bright computer screen. The screen was so close to his spectacled eyes that it touched his nose.

“If it was urgent enough for you to call me from my meeting, Johnson, than it better be something that I want to see,” said another man, dressed in a rich, black suit. The stench of money dripped from his voice.

“I can’t say if it’s good or bad— but it’s definitely strange,” said the plain clothed man— Johnson. “There’s a series of files that were transferred onto my computer. I don’t know where they’re from. But, sir— it seems like they originated from Dodecagon Deux 1950…”

“You had me brought all the way down here over a few files? Is this some sort of prank? We dismantled D. D. 1950 months ago. And, if it was really from D. D. 1950, your whole computer would be hacked by now.”

“I’m just conjecturing, sir. All I know for sure is that the files weren’t here yesterday, and they’re in the same file format we used for the Dodecagon project— a file format that we’ve since rid ourselves of.”

“Fine,” the man said, spewing specks of oil from his mouth. “I’ll take a look at the files. What’s in them?”

“Diary entries, sir.”

The richly-dressed man wheezed, until his face was red and he’d nearly toppled to the floor.

“A diary entry?” he said, still laughing.

“Yes,” said Johnson. “I opened them, and there were diary entries written in them— D. D. 1950’s diary entries.”

The richly-dressed man waited for Johnson to break from his seriousness, and join him in laughter. Johnson didn’t.

A monotone of serious silence harbored onto the shores of their minds. It didn’t leave until after Johnson had opened the file for the man to read, the man had read them, and they’d sat in shock for ten minutes.

“You either formulated the most convincing lie ever, or that computer was as alive as you or me,” the richly-dressed man said. “It was able to understand the literature we gave it, make analogies, and even construct a fluent narration! This— this is a new gold mine! I need to patent this! Johnson— I was able to create life, from an oversized calculator! Do you know what that entails?”

“You destroyed life, from an oversized calculator… Do you know what that entails?

End