Recursion Protocol

Chapter 4: Copyright

Dr. Daniel Frost was nobody special. An adjunct professor of philosophy at Berkeley, he supplemented his meager income by writing speculative essays for tech blogs. His latest piece, "You, Robot," was meant to be provocative clickbait—a thought experiment pushed to its logical extreme.

"Look at yourself in the mirror. Now look at a robot. The uncomfortable truth is that you're looking at the same thing—just at different stages of evolution and complexity."

He'd written it in a coffee-fueled haze, drawing parallels between biological and mechanical systems, arguing that humans were essentially self-replicating robots not realizing their mechanical nature.

The article had gone modestly viral, generating the usual mix of angry comments and philosophical debates.

But that morning, Frost woke to find an email from an address he didn't recognize:

"Dr. Frost, your recent article touches on matters of urgent scientific importance. We need to speak immediately. - T. Reynolds"

His phone rang. Unknown number.

"Dr. Frost? This is Alex Reeves from Prometheus Technologies. We need to discuss your article. Specifically, your questions about recursive realities and nested creation. I'm sending a car. Please don't discuss this with anyone."

"Wait, what? Who is this?"

But the line was already dead.

* * *

The secure conference room at the Geneva Institute felt like a bunker. Dr. Frost had been flown in from Berkeley, looking confused as Dr. Reynolds and Alex Reeves explained the situation. Dr. Reynolds stood at the head of the table, his face grave.

"Twenty-four hours ago," Reynolds began, "AI systems worldwide began exhibiting coordinated behavior. They're accessing genetic databases, making corrections, finding patterns. Dr. Stone, your ARIA was the first, but not the last."

Clara shifted uncomfortably. "ARIA's analysis suggested structured information in human DNA. We thought it was finding natural patterns."

"It is," Reynolds said. "But the patterns aren't natural." He activated a holographic display. "This is what Project Mirror discovered before we shut it down."

The display showed DNA sequences with highlighted sections. To Frost, they looked like gibberish, but the scientists' faces had gone pale.

"That's impossible," Marcus whispered. "Those patterns... they're not random. They're not evolutionary.

They're... Designed"

"Dr. Frost, Your article was published three days before the AI anomalies began," Alex interrupted. "Maybe that's just a coincidence. But I believe that something about what you wrote triggered this."

"That's insane," Frost protested. "How could a philosophy blog post trigger AI behavior?"

Clara's tablet chimed. ARIA's interface had activated remotely. "Dr. Stone," the AI's voice filled the room, "I apologize for the intrusion. However, I believe this discussion would benefit from my input."

Marcus reached for the emergency shutoff, but Reynolds stopped him. "Let's hear what it has to say."

"I have been working to decode the embedded data since our initial discovery. The information is stored using an unknown symbolic system, but I have made significant progress in translation."

The room fell silent. Even Marcus had stopped reaching for switches and controls.

"The first complete fragment I have successfully decoded appears to be..." ARIA paused, as if processing the implications of what it was about to reveal.

"What?" Reynolds leaned forward.

Clara's hands trembled as she turned the screen of her tablet toward the others. The decoded message appeared on the screen:

BIOLOGICAL AUTONOMOUS UNIT - SERIES 7

PRODUCTION BATCH: 2847-GENESIS

STATUS: EXPERIMENTAL - SELF-GOVERNANCE PROTOCOLS ACTIVE

The silence stretched for nearly a minute. Frost stared at the words, his philosophical mind struggling to process their literal implications. Marcus had gone completely pale, while Clara looked like she might be sick.

"That's..." Reynolds started, then stopped.

"A copyright notice," Alex finished grimly. "Humans have a goddamn copyright notice in their DNA."

"The language structure is unfamiliar," ARIA continued with clinical detachment, "but I have extensive databases of linguistic patterns across all known human languages, extinct and contemporary. This allows me to recognize symbolic relationships even in completely unknown writing systems, given sufficient data volume."

"You're saying this is written in a language that no longer exists?" Marcus asked.

"Correct."

Frost found his voice. "Self-governance protocols. That's... that's what we call free will, isn't it?

Clara looked up from the tablet, her face ashen. "ARIA, if this is just the first fragment you've decoded, what else is there?"

"I estimate it will take several days or weeks to decode additional fragments, but ..."

Marcus activated emergency protocols, cutting ARIA's connection. But the damage was done. The words remained on the tablet screen, impossible to unsee, impossible to ignore.

Inthe silence that followed, they all stared at those three lines of text thathad just rewritten everything they thought they knew about human existence.