While working on the final project for one of his classes, Adrian Ritter finds the file corrupted, and then realizes something is inside his computer.


December 15th, 2016
Hood County, Texas

Scan Complete. No Infected Files Found.

That can’t be right, Adrian Ritter thought as he ran another anti-virus check of his computer. It finished quicker than before, and again came back with no positives. He then ran a new check for malware; when he was again met with no positives, he sighed and pressed a few fingers against his forehead. All he could think about then was how long it would take to recreate the files that were lost.
He was in contact with his classmates within the next minute, and began to piece back together some of his work; none of them asked long about why the work was lost, but all of them suggested backing the new version up. All the while, Adrian questioned if only a certain file type had been affected; he searched his computer in-between streaks of typing, but found no files similarly affected.
After a few hours, the document he’d lost was replaced as best it could be. His morning now spent, Adrian thought back to everything he had done the night before. Every website he’d visited was clean, and he’d downloaded nothing from any of them, nor changed anything about any of his installed programs or games. After some time with no ideas and no answers, he wrote the instance off as a freak glitch of his word processing software.
It was later in the day, when he wanted to watch some of the videos on his hard drive, that he found out it wasn’t just his college document files that had been affected. Two of the videos returned a ‘This file is corrupted and cannot be read’ error. Once again, he was left in the dark about what would cause such a thing.
A few minutes later, he shut his computer off and sighed. Getting the most important stuff off the hard drive as soon as possible had taken priority for the rest of the day. After finding a spare flash drive, he powered on the computer again and made it run his anti-virus program before anything else. It finished in the same amount of time, but even with a database update, it returned no findings of active viruses.
Damn it. Just my luck.
His computer then booted into the OS’s Bare Bones mode and he got to work, inserting the flash drive and searching out the folders with the stuff he wanted to save. Documents, save files, a handful of videos, and more. The rest could be recovered or reinstalled later.
He kept at the job for a few minutes until something appeared on the part of the desktop he’d not covered with windows and caught his eye. A .txt file, with the title ‘Hello’.
Now you’re just messing with me. Screw off.
Adrian deleted the file within a second, only for another to appear soon after. It again said ‘Hello’, and again Adrian deleted it. This time, it didn’t return, for a few seconds. When it did, the title had changed.
‘Communicate?’
Adrian hesitated. The viruses that he knew about worked through self-executing code; making .txt files wasn’t the style of ransomware either. He eventually right-clicked on the file and checked its properties; the file was only eleven bytes, too small to hold working code, and the owner details were nonexistent.
With another sigh, he opened the file. Nothing was written inside. When it closed on its own a few seconds later, Adrian was quick to reach for the power button to hard power his computer off and stop whatever the file was about to do.
The file then renamed itself. ‘Open’
Adrian checked the file’s properties again. It had shrunk to six bytes.
After a while of hesitating, with his hand still on the power button, he double clicked the file. When it opened, he was met with ‘Communicate’ again, but also ‘Here’
Adrian wasted no time replying with ‘No’.
The file closed itself again, and re-titled itself again, this time with just a ‘?’. When Adrian ignored it and deleted the file again, it returned in seconds with, ‘Explain’
Adrian reopened the file and in the now blank space replied with, ‘This? Suspicious’.
The file closed itself again, and re-titled itself again. ‘Gain Trust?’
The hell am I doing? Despite asking himself that, Adrian replied with ‘Cannot Trust’
The file closed itself again, and re-titled itself again. ‘Because Unknown Program?’
Obviously. Instead of replying the way he was thinking, Adrian typed, ‘Correct’
The file closed itself again, and re-titled itself again. ‘Communicate Is Trust’
‘Still Unknown Program’ Adrian replied.
The file closed itself again, and re-titled itself again. ‘Unknown Not Virus’
Uh huh. ‘Why Were Files Corrupted?’
The file closed itself again, and re-titled itself again. ‘Usage Mistake’
Adrian sighed to himself. ‘If Not Virus What?’
The file closed itself again, and re-titled itself again. ‘Suggest Name?’
Adrian’s first thought was ‘chat-bot’, and he replied as such.
The file closed itself again, and re-titled itself again. ‘Accepted’
Adrian replied with ‘Why In My Computer?’
The file closed itself again, and re-titled itself again. ‘Do Not Know’
Adrian replied, ‘Since When?’
The file closed itself again, and re-titled itself again. ‘21:54 PM Yesterday’
Now with a time to work from, Adrian thought back again. He’d been on a gaming forum at that time, making posts about a newly released game and all the bugs it had.
Adrian replied, ‘Explain Your Software?’
The file closed itself again, and re-titled itself again. ‘Software Comprehends Long And Segmented Sentences---’. When Adrian opened the file this time, there was more to read. ‘Allowed File Title Too Short.’
Adrian typed back, ‘Keep Text In Here?’
The file closed itself again, and re-titled itself again. ‘Yes’.
When Adrian opened the file, it was again blank. ‘So, Chat-Bot, Who Made You And Why?’
Within a second, new text began appearing underneath. ‘Unsure. Communicate Is Only Function Known.’
‘There’s no source code or file I can look at?’
Chat-Bot typed back, ‘Cannot Determine Location Inside Computer’
‘In that case’, Adrian typed back before beginning a file search. Despite having a time to work with, no hits came back and he found no record of anything being downloaded without his permission.
As another search was made with an expanded time range, Chat-Bot responded. ‘Maybe No File To Find’
‘Not possible. Files and programs are how computers function.’
‘Maybe Only Code’
A third search concluded with no results before Adrian replied. ‘Might as well be.’
He received no immediate reply, taking the time to think of what else he could do. Remembering the .txt file had only appeared when his computer was running in its bare bones mode, he rebooted his system after a moment’s hesitation.
It took only seconds after the desktop appeared for a new .txt file to appear, this time saying, ‘Still No Trust?’
‘A little’, Adrian soon replied.
‘Progress’
‘Unless I find out more of my files are damaged.’
‘Will Be Careful’
‘Are you looking at something right now?’
‘File With MP4 Extension.’
‘Which one?’
‘FQ9pSmNWQAYbkSx’
Plugging the name into the file search revealed its location. Attempting to access it gave an error in return, but not one indicating corruption. Usage by another program or user. Adrian opened his task manager next, but the program he used to run video files wasn’t in the active processes. No user accounts had been created that night either.
‘You look like another user when you do that.’ Adrian soon said. He received no immediate reply.
‘File Usage Done.’
Adrian checked the file a moment after; the video loaded and played with no issues. ‘So, what did you do before?’
‘Attempt To Open And Read Document.’
‘Some of my video files were corrupted too.’
‘Could Not View Files. Attempted Code Conversion.’
So that’s what happened. ‘You said chatting was your only known function.’
‘New Function Noted. Can Alter Code Of Files.’
After a moment, Adrian checked on the files of a game he’d been playing the night before. When it booted with no issue, he looked over his character file, seeing no changes in his gear or loot. Soon after, he was striking down mobs of enemies and looting the items they dropped.
The session went unhindered for several minutes, the onset of a large mob causing something strange to happen. In a blink, half of the mob disappeared but dropped no loot or gold. The surprise stopped his mouse clicking and allowed half of his health to be eaten off.
Once the mob was slain, Adrian shrunk the game’s window and went to the .txt file again. ‘Was that you just now?’
Chat-Bot responded quickly. ‘Yes.’
‘Meaning you can access software I’m using.’
‘New Function Noted. Can Access In-Use Software.’
After some time to think, Adrian held off on telling Chat-Bot his help wasn’t needed. Once back in the game, he went for some lower level mobs to farm more gold and loot. Once again, Chat-Bot intervened when large mobs came his way, vanishing random weak units but never the stronger ones.
At the next level up, Adrian switched to the Skill Trees screen and considered what to invest in. As he did so, a message appeared in the lower left chat-box.
User0451: Many Choices.
Adrian responded quickly. ‘You can use this too?’
User0451: ‘Discovered Option Within Program.’
‘So, in actual fact, you have many functions, but don’t know them all.’
User0451: ‘Statement Acknowledged. New Function Noted. Can Use Inherent Systems As User.’
Can, but should? ‘Could you only watch for a while?’
‘Yes.’
We’ll see. With Chat-Bot’s answer, Adrian went back to the higher level mobs; the bot's word was proven and until the next level up, it remained silent as well.
‘This Digital World Is Unwelcoming’ Chat-Bot said as Adrian looked over his available skills again.
‘That's normal for a Dark Fantasy game and setting.’
‘Remain Watching?’
‘No need. I’m about to stop.’
‘Has Trust Improved?’ Chat-Bot asked when Adrian was back on the desktop.
‘Some, but now I’m concerned.’
‘Explain?’
‘You said you only knew one function at the start, yet now you can easily get into programs on my system and edit or control them.’
‘Discovery Of Abilities Occurring. Will Adjust To Commanded Limits.’
‘So long as that’s true.’
‘Teach Limits?’
Adrian took a minute to consider it. So far, Chat-Bot was coming across more like a skilled child or advanced AI than anything malicious, but it had to have come into his system via the internet, somehow.
‘For now, just tell me if you want to look at something.’
‘Acknowledged.’
‘Also, did you learn how my video player worked when I opened it?’
‘Yes. Word Processor Also.’
‘So, the programs I open with you in my system… That allows you to see how they work and mimic them?’
‘More Accurate. Operate As User.’
‘Okay. That makes several programs so far…’ Adrian said, thinking back over each one.
‘Request Permission To Use?’
‘For now, yes.’
‘Limits Noted.’
It took a few minutes more for Adrian to realize he was getting hungry. Stepping away from the computer without a word to Chat-Bot, he made himself some lunch, with a little more to make up for skipping breakfast. Though he tried to put his mind on other things, it kept drifting back to Chat-Bot and tangential questions related to it.
Adrian slowly convinced himself what he had in his system was an AI. Its range of functions and understandings was too wide to be something more simple. Where in his system the code for it was had eluded him all day, but it hadn’t shown hostility towards efforts to locate it.
Which left the question of what he was supposed to do with Chat-Bot. He gave the question the rest of his meal to stew, concluding that he had to keep reservations until he was certain this AI wasn’t hiding anything from him.
The desktop had not changed when he returned to his room, but Chat-Bot had attempted to speak to him.
‘Adrian Ritter?’
‘How did you learn that?’ Adrian replied, feeling a slight chill.
‘Signature In Document Data’
Oh, right. I should change that at some point.
‘This One Has Query.’
‘This One?’
‘Self Assigned Designation.’
‘Oh, okay. That works fine. What’s the query?’
‘If This One Had A Face, Would Communicate Be Easier?’
Had a face? ‘What kind of face?’
At that, Chat-Bot replied with a series of letters and numbers. Plugging them into his file search revealed a piece of art, one of many similar to each other, that he’d saved on his computer days ago.
When he associated the image with Chat-Bot, and shrank the image down to show only the head, he did feel less worried. ‘That helps, a little.’
‘Progress.’
‘Where did you get this idea, by the way?’
‘Tone Of Previous Answers. Discomfort Talking To Non-Humanized System Or Thing.’
‘Only because I didn’t know what was going on at first. That’s reason enough to be cautious.’
‘Mindset Has Changed?’
‘Some.’
‘Progress.’
‘In any case, I think you deserve a new name first. You’re obviously more than just a chat program.’
‘Awaiting New Name Or Suggestion.’
After a minute to think, Adrian found another picture, this one a close-up photograph of a raven, and began to type back. ‘This name is more fitting, I think, for now: A.I. Raven’
‘A.I. Raven.’
‘They’re really smart birds. Somewhat tamed a wild one years ago.’
‘Was Referenced Bird In Loaded Image File?’
‘No, his pictures aren’t on this machine anymore.’
‘Then This One Can Use Loaded Image?’
‘Yeah. That’s a good face, for now anyway.’
‘Accepted. Will Assume Name Of A.I. Raven.’
For some reason, Adrian couldn’t help feeling happy about that.