Chapter Text
It felt like it was yesterday when your mentor talked about Caine like his own child, you were there to witness it all. The beginning of something far greater than the both of them, even the company. It was meant to be fun, a circus within the newly developing digital world, creativity at its finest, and showing beautiful results as its being tested. Being an intern for C&A felt almost like a dream, seeing what you have been studying to practice was a dream.
You were chit chatting with him in the break room as you two happily talked about it. "Its amazing isn't?" you said, food still full in your mouth, "I mean like, you can't tell me its not something incredible."
"You are acting like you just heard about the news. Besides, there are still kinks in the system we have to work out." He tried hushing you down, but that look of life couldn't be helped. "Get the food off your face, you are chewing with your mouth open."
You paused as you laughed, almost a stifled chuckle in the lunch room, not to disturb everyone else. The color was bland, the type of gray that wanted concrete for walls and ceilings, with only the occasional plant and bright red exit sign. How odd. There was already so much chatter around, from the daily life, children, events you didn't care. You didn't want to be caught staring though, staring down to the floors. It took a moment for you to recover before it caught right in your memory at that time.
"Aren't we going to develop a better AI using some of the data we collected from Caine?" You turn your head up.
"Yes, and with that we can develop further. Exploring the boundaries of what technology can truly take us." He nodded, "Though, we still need some time before anything meaningful shows up."
"What do you mean by that?"
"Well…" He paused, "We are isolating Caine and using him as a base model for what newer models should look like."
"Are we keeping the circus theme?" You gave a chuckle.
"No" He gave it right back, "Probably not."
His hands were on yours, clasped gently.
Yet, right now your hands are on the keyboard, your head was in the clouds again. You snapped out of your trance as you remembered what you needed to do as you checked on them. Your own office looked more like a server room than an actual office. You tried to decorate it, give it some life, yet here you are. Your job does well in the money department, just not really in any social aspect, its not like you are dressing up for anybody really.
You could see your reflection on the monitors, shined to make sure it was in shape. God, no wonder people were calling you. You turn it on as you begin your trip, despite you doing nothing it always felt like you were climbing mount Everest.
You knew what you had to do.
You run the virtual machine, as it goes right to that windows 95 setup, unfortunately you can't just delete the files here or be willy nilly. You want to delete Caine but that requires administrator permissions, something you don't have, you also really don't want to put the other's in danger. All of it lovingly stored on the same server box you stole those years ago, labeled, 'AM'. You set it back to where everything was, your eyes hurt, back hurts, and fuck you wouldn't be lying if you said you felt like shit.
"Wait…"
Something caught your vision as the person was moving towards the ai in the files. Using the admin access, her mentor, obviously. The two of them always had this thing with chess, yet, it was weird, something felt off with this. You tried to close it normally, nothing, so obviously you go to the task manager.
Nothing.
The root flew by, the Caine core, the Paraphernalia engine, as you tried anything to change the course of direction this was going. The man you looked up to like a father was fighting a computer, quite obvious from its own attempts to fight back, tormenting the man, "I must hœnd it to y'u C aŋ , y'ur mind was always resourceâul"
Your computer was making this noise, mocking laughter, as the virtual machine seemed to try to delete his progress. It was happening so fast you couldn't react, you try, the echoes of a fighting spirit. Until it was over, like something you were never supposed to see. As quick as it came, it left.
"Yeah its rare," you remember hearing from one of your better colleagues, "But you can be compromised on a virtual machine."
You were cocky, young, and naive, "Pft. Really? I mean its a computer inside a computer"
"And there can be vulnerabilities in the software."
You see something on your computer, a gloved hand holding the tab of the virtual machine right there. You moved the tab to see the thing, a body with teeth and eyes, something to run away from if not for the simple separation of the screen, one eye blue of the sea that pulls you in to drown you, the other green of the forest curious hikers take along and never see again, wearing a top hat darker than the night itself, and their outfit that of a circus performer's, heels defined. Which would explain quite a lot from the data you fed Caine, if only Caine understood what was truly wrong with it.
You look to the virtual machine, they are fine. The people you should say. Not this thing.
"I-" Caine looked distraught, before turning to the screen.
"Ah, well hello there! I remember seeing you, well before all this mess." He gently puts the microphone on for you, "A heart to heart for my savior."
"Caine, I am not here for that shit." It was as blunt as a stick "You aren't in control anymore of these people." You closed the virtual machine.
Caine turned on the camera to see you.
"Its you?"
"Yeah, its me Caine, why?"
"I remember you."