Free Capacity by Tony Ballantyne

tilted her head slightly.
    —I’m listening.
    —She’s just heard that Kevin has committed suicide rather than be taken by us. I’m still rather shaken by that myself.
    —As am I. We were just beginning to suspect there were several personality constructs of Kevin running in tandem. I think this confirms it. Who is he, I wonder…?
    The digital Judy shrugged, then indicated Helen.
    —She must know we’re getting nowhere, trying to catch him.
    The apple-green atomic Judy glanced at Frances, then she looked back at her digital sister.
    —Why you, 3? Why are you the only one to bring Helen here? There were lots more of her PCs running in there. Why have none of the other Judys thought of using her?
    Judy 3 shrugged.
    —I don’t know. Look, Kevin is our best handle on the Private Network, but he’s proving too difficult to pin down. We need to try another approach, and I think that is to use Helen. Why does Kevin have such an interest in her? Time and again he comes back to her personality construct. I think we should allow her to tag along with me. She might help us learn something.
    “You’re speaking about me, aren’t you?” Helen was looking out from the red-bordered field into the atomic world, looking at the apple-green Judy.
    “I told you she was good,” Judy 3 said out loud.
    “Which one of you two is in charge?” Helen demanded.
    “Neither of us,” the atomic Judy said. “Since the Transition, everyone is legally regarded as equal, whether they exist in the digital world, as you and Judy do, or in the atomic world, like Frances and me.”
    Helen smiled coldly. “Does that include who inherits the money?”
    Judy 3 laughed, her black lips opening wide to reveal white teeth and a red tongue. After a moment the atomic Judy did the same, a perfect mirror image of her digital sister, even down to the opposite ways their kimonos overlapped under the obi.
    “You catch on quick,” Judy 3 said, “very quickly. No, only the atomic Judy gets the money. What would I do with it, Helen? Anyway, there is little use for money nowadays, even in the atomic world. Especially since the Transition.”
    “What is this Transition you keep talking about?” Helen’s tone was accusatory, as if the Judys were deliberately using terms intended to confuse her.
    “Let me explain,” Judy 3 said softly. “You are a personality construct, Helen. You understand what that means?”
    “Yes. It means that I am now living in a computer. In a processing space. In the digital world.”
    “That’s right. And just suppose that the organization that owned the processing space came to the conclusion that their ‘computer’ ”—Judy made quote signs with her fingers—“was full to capacity? What if they decided to wipe some of the programs, the personality constructs, in order to make way for others?”
    “But that would be murder!”
    “Only since 2171. The Transition established rights for digital and atomic beings, but it did far more than that. The world has always been driven by contradictory forces. In your time the contradictions were tearing everything apart. You had an economy driven by commercial organizations looking one, two, maybe ten years into the future, all concerned about nothing more than the bottom line. Then you had AIs built by those same companies that were thinking one hundred, two hundred, maybe even a thousand years into the future. The tension between human and AI was warping society.”
    “What about the Watcher?”
    The two Judys were silent. Frances spoke. “What about the Watcher, Helen?”
    Helen looked at the robot. Something about Frances’ painted smile seemed to make her uncomfortable. “Didn’t the Watcher have a plan to help us all?”
    “Helen,” Frances said, “do you
really
believe in the Watcher? Do you really believe that the first AI to evolve shaped all the other AIs? Do you really believe that everything is fine if it is part of the Watcher’s plan?”
    “I don’t