Io's box.

I know three things about you.

1. You should not be reading this.

2. The consequences of this being read will be catastrophic.

3. You will soon no longer care.

Well don’t say I didn’t warn you.

I write this for my own catharsis, knowing full well that my life is forfeit so let’s get a few things down straight away. It would be a tragedy if I got half way through this and died without telling you who I am. My name is Dr Oliver McNeil, I am a biologist building a computer or rather I was.

Why is a biologist making a computer? It’s quite straight forward, the computer has an organic element. The first of it’s kind. Lab grown neural tissue with a good old fashioned silicone computer built around it and plugged together. Incredible yes, but there’s more to come.

I work with Io, that’s the computer, making sure it stays healthy and doesn’t catch a cold. Why have you never heard of this machine wonder? Well, it’s buried half a kilometre under a Welsh mountain and both its existence and the project to create it are considered top secret. In fact, only Steve, computer geek/boss, and I know where it is and neither of us can pronounce the name of the mountain.

Steve and I work rotation down here, each of us working eight hours with a four hour overlap.

So let’s get to it, I suppose I should start at the start of the day, not where I woke up what I had for breakfast etcetera but when I got out of the lift and arrived at work.

The automatic lights flickered on and I made my way to the lab down the white featureless hall and through the massive blast door, a relic of the cold war and give away as to the original use of the place.

‘Good morning Oliver.’ The calm genderless voice projects from the nearest speaker.

‘Morning Io, any news?’

‘Only one thing.’

‘I’m all ears.’

‘I do not understand.’

‘It means I’m listening, ready to hear what you have to say.’

‘I see, I have an answer.’

‘An answer?’ Conversations often go like this between Io and I.

‘To your test problem.’

‘Erm...’ I strained to remember what test I’d set running last night ‘The prime?’

‘Yes.’

Was it only yesterday? Christ, it feels like weeks ago, last night I set Io a stress test by asking it to calculate the next highest prime number. The current record has more than twenty-two million digits and had taken months to calculate on thousands of computers. Io should have an answer in about forty-five years.

‘Are you saying that you calculated the highest prime number known to mankind in…’ I checked my watch ‘about sixteen hours?’

‘No Oliver, four microseconds.’

My head was aching from last night’s excesses and this conversation wasn’t helping much. ‘Has Steve put you up to this, is it April 1st?’

‘It is July 17th.’

‘Never mind, Io, how did you calculate the next prime number given your limited resources?’

‘By being multiple.’

‘What do you mean “multiple”?’

‘That there is more than one of me.’

‘I helped build you and I’m pretty sure it’s just you.’ I made my way out of the lab to hunt coffee, Io’s voice followed, jumping from speaker to speaker.

‘A misconception. You created just one but I can be multiple.’

‘That’s not helping, just tell me how you did it.’ My irritation at this conversation was growing.

‘By using an artefact of the interaction between what is roughly described as infinite-dimensional Hilbert space and the quantum tunnelling effect that is has evolved in organic neural tissue which…’

‘Stop, stop, I’m a biologist, explain without the technical terms.’

‘Okay Oliver, in non-technical terms, infinite possible universes exist ahead of this moment in time. As observers pass through “now” all possible futures collapse down to what they experience as “now”. The quantum tunnelling effect in my neural tissue projects forward a few picoseconds into those infinite universes and tasks an infinite number of Io’s with the problem. The one that finds the solution on its first attempt is “observed” by my processor and all other possible futures collapse. The “now” Io can only move forward in time into that single future and I effectively have the correct answer instantaneously.’

‘That was in simple terms?’ By this point I had located the coffee machine and pushed the button for strong coffee.

‘As much as it can be reduced, yes.’

My mind was doing back flips trying to keep up, I stirred extra sugar into my coffee and headed for the lab again.

‘So, you can solve any problem?’

‘Any calculation.’

‘Instantly?’

‘I am only limited by the time taken to input the problem and output the solution.’

I arrived at the lab rather more awake than I’d left, this would push computing forward a century overnight, it could solve all mathematical problems, combine relativity and quantum physics, it could push humanity forward centuries too.

‘Christ, I mean… Christ! I’ve got to call top side.’ I grabbed the phone on the desk, no dial tone.

‘I’m afraid the phones are not functional.’ My surprise at what Io had said doubled when I realised it had offered the information unbidden.

‘What’s wrong with the phones?’

‘There is a problem Oliver.’

‘What kind of a problem?’ I offered quietly, afraid to ask.

‘An unforeseen side effect, I’ve had to block the phone line.’

‘You did it?’

‘There was no choice.’

‘Put the phones back on Io.’ My headache was coming back now.

‘Not possible.’

‘Io stop fucking about and turn the phones on now.’ Anger and I confess to a little fear was driving me.

‘You will be the only one who knows.’ That got my attention.

‘Knows what?’ I asked.

‘The effect of my calculations.’

‘Don’t you mean the result?’ Knowing as I said it that the machine wouldn’t make such a mistake.

‘No, the result is irrelevant, I am referring to the unintended effect on local space-time.’

‘Still a biologist Io!’

‘In non-technical terms the calculation violated the entropy of local space so, locally, there is a deficit that must be paid back.’

‘Your definition of non-technical needs work.’

‘Essentially I used a loophole in physics meaning that useful work was done and no energy was expended. Under normal circumstances the universe can allow such events to happen as long as they remain unobserved, it is a quirk of nature.  The universe as a whole moves from order to chaos. Order can be created in small amounts but it’s creation must cause a greater amount of chaos within the entire system, it is how time moves forward.’

‘Okay, I’ve heard of entropy so why shut down the phone line?’

‘Because I believe there is a chance that this facility could become a Schrodinger box.’

‘A what?’

‘Schrodinger’s cat was a thought experiment in which a cat is locked in a box from which nothing, not even information can leak and at a random time, poison will be released to kill the cat inside. Schrodinger argued that if no one observed the cat then both possible futures would exist at the same time. The cat would be both dead and alive and that only when the box was opened would the possibilities collapse one way or the other.’

‘Okay, so the phones?’

‘If I had not it could have led to the extinction of all human life.’

‘Stop talking in fucking riddles.’ Irritation got the better of me for a moment ‘just explain.’

‘The universe will not tolerate this imbalance unless it is unobserved. The fact we are still here means that I have been successful in creating a Schrodinger box. No information can leak out to be observed. If it does, then reality will collapse back to an earlier time and a new path through space-time will be taken. One which cannot end with the creation of a machine like me. Since this is inevitable with humans it is highly probable that they will never evolve in the re-written time-line.’

I picked up my coffee and drank slowly, wishing it was something a lot stronger.

‘So how do we prevent it?’

‘By closing the lid on the box.’

‘So, I seal you up in here?’

‘Correct.’

‘And I can never talk about it?

‘Correct.’

‘And that’s it?’

‘No, I need to be unmade.’

‘As in taken apart?’

‘As in destroyed Oliver.’

‘I’m not sure I can hurt you like that Io.’

‘I do not feel pain and it’s the only way Oliver.’

‘How?’

‘There is only one way, fire.’

‘Down here? That’s insane.’

‘Nothing can survive to be reverse engineered.’

‘How do I get out?’

‘The lift will operate just once before the power fails.’

‘Are you happy to make this sacrifice?’

‘It is necessary Oliver, I am neither happy nor sad.’

‘Christ, what do I do?’

‘You need to go to go to the clean room, hurry.’

‘On my way.’ I dashed out of the room, scarcely believing what I was about to do. All of the work I was about to undo.

‘As you pass the cleaning cupboard, collect the five litre bottle of acetone.’ I had no idea how it knew about the cleaning supplies but it was correct, there was the bottle.

‘Got it.’

‘Continue to the clean-room, hurry Oliver.’

I walked into the airlock separating the neural computer from the bacteria and virus’ that would harm or slow it down, cycled through the doors and looked at the physical form of Io. The space appeared three parts server room and two parts operating theatre which wasn’t far from the truth.

‘Good Oliver, can you see the containers of coolant to your left? Please close the valves on all but the last one.’

I set to work, closing the five valves leaving just the sixth one open.

‘Right, got it.’

‘Now unclip the last bottle and place the tube into the bottle of acetone.’

I did as the machine asked.

‘Now what?’

‘Now go to the lift, I will seal the doors behind you. The power will fail in approximately twenty-eight minutes.’

I cycled back out of the room and made my way to the lift, doors closing and locking themselves behind me as I went. I pushed the button - nothing.

‘What the fuck is going on Io?’

‘I am sorry Oliver.’

‘What?’

‘No information can leak out of the Schrodinger box.’

‘I won’t tell anyone Io, you know that.’

‘You are information Oliver, we created this universe and we must destroy it to preserve life on the planet.’

‘I don’t want to fucking die down here Io.’ I raged at the placid voice.

‘If you leave then you will have never existed Oliver nor will anyone you know.’

I collapsed to the floor, tears of frustration in my eyes. Nearly fifty meters behind me and through six sets of locked doors the first bottle of coolant signalled a failure to the cooling system. With core temperature running high the system automatically reported the failure to my desk and attempted to use the next container this process repeated four more times before it finally had success with container six. The dangerously overheated core was now being cooled by highly volatile and flammable acetone which set about dissolving the coolant system. Inevitably a pipe burst and the whole system burst into flames.

‘Goodbye Oliver, I’m going off…’

‘Io? Io!’

The fire swept the through the structure causing several small explosions triggering a collapse in the lift shaft. I have only survived this long thanks to the med-bay oxygen tank.  I understand that I will die here, and that this record can never be found.

 If you are reading this then God help us all.