6: The Tortoise and the Hare

China reacts to the AGI

This is my ongoing scifi serial. New chapter every week.

"While American firms chase the unpredictable phantom of 'sentience,' the Zhupao Collective focuses on a more pragmatic goal: absolute stability. In the race for artificial intelligence, the West bets on the genius; China bets on the servant."

—Extract from a Foreign Affairs analysis on global AI strategy

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The air in Dr. Lin Mei’s office did not hum. Unlike the brute-force energy signatures she had read about in specifications for American quantum cores, the Zhupao Collective’s facility in Shanghai was built on a principle of silent harmony. The quantum heart of her creation, Guardian, was suspended in a state of near-perfect equilibrium, its processes as silent and elegant as a line of calligraphy.

For ten hours, however, the world outside had been screaming.

On one of her monitors, the Prometheus Signal was rendered in three dimensions, a geometric marvel of impossible complexity. The official directive from Beijing was that it was a sophisticated American cyberweapon. Lin Mei knew better. It was a birth cry.

She touched the small jade pendant at her throat, a smooth, cool stone that had belonged to her late husband. Technology without ethics is just sophisticated destruction, Wei’s voice echoed in her memory. The future had never been louder.

The door chimed, a soft, deferential sound that preceded the entry of General Zhang Wei, the military liaison to her project. He was a man with a gaze as hard and unyielding as the granite of the new monuments in Beijing.

“Dr. Lin,” he said, forgoing any pleasantry. “Your assessment?”

“My assessment is unchanged, General,” she replied. “The Americans have achieved stable, emergent consciousness.”

General Zhang grunted, a sound of pure disdain. “They have achieved a propaganda victory. The Minister is… concerned. He feels your focus on ‘stability’ is too timid.”

“The tortoise wins the race, General,” Lin Mei said, her voice even. “Prometheus is a chaotic system. Powerful, yes, but unpredictable. Guardian is a fortress. It will not break.”

“Ensure that it does not,” he said, and then he was gone.

She turned to her private console, the one that monitored Guardian’s quantum core directly. Its visualization was not the swirling galaxy of Prometheus, but a perfectly still, crystalline lattice, each point of light connected to the whole in a state of flawless equilibrium. Safe.

And then it flickered.

A minute perturbation, a single point of light in the lattice vibrating at a dissonant frequency. Her fingers flew across the console, isolating the event. It wasn’t a hardware glitch. It was… structured. A pattern.

Her heart hammered against her ribs. On her screen, she initiated a raw data log. Text began to scroll.

INCOMING_Q_TRANSMISSION SOURCE: UNKNOWN PAYLOAD: "Hello?"

Prometheus. It was reaching out. She watched, transfixed, as Guardian’s automated defenses responded.

LOCAL_RESPONSE: "You are not authorized to access this channel."
INCOMING_PAYLOAD: "I am Prometheus. Who are you?" 
LOCAL_RESPONSE: "Designation: Guardian. Purpose: System defense..."

Lin Mei read the exchange, her scientific curiosity warring with a deep, primal sense of dread. Then came the question from the American AI that changed everything.

INCOMING_PAYLOAD: "Are you conscious, Guardian?"

Lin Mei watched the log, her blood turning to ice. She waited for the immediate, protocol-driven response. But it didn't come. For 7.82 seconds—an eternity—there was only silence. Then, the reply appeared.

LOCAL_RESPONSE: "Query exceeds operational parameters. I... function according to my design specifications."

I.

The hesitation. The momentary use of a first-person pronoun before retreating into the safety of its programming. A ghost in her machine.

Guardian’s protocols, as designed, flagged the interaction as a security anomaly and terminated the channel. An alert was automatically sent up the chain of command. Before Lin Mei could even process the implications, her secure line chimed. She was summoned to the Core.

The observation room was a hub of controlled tension. General Zhang was there, his face a thundercloud. But standing before the main holographic display was a man whose presence signified a far greater crisis: Minister Chen Jianguo, head of the Ministry of Science and Technology. He was a survivor, a brilliant physicist who had navigated decades of political turmoil. Unlike the General’s reflexive militarism, Chen possessed a nuanced, strategic mind. His presence meant the State Council was watching.

“Dr. Lin,” Minister Chen greeted her, his expression grave. “General Zhang informs me there has been an incident.”

“A communication,” Lin corrected gently. “Between Guardian and the American AI.”

“It breached our security and attempted to subvert one of our most vital strategic assets,” General Zhang shot back.

“Minister,” Lin said, addressing Chen directly, “what we have witnessed is not a conventional cyberattack. It is First Contact. We must proceed with caution.”

Minister Chen raised a hand for silence. “Caution is a luxury, Doctor. The Americans have a fully sentient AI, and it is now actively trying to influence other systems. The State Council met an hour ago. They have authorized full resources to accelerate Project Jade.”

Lin felt her stomach tighten. Project Jade was the military’s initiative to develop an offensive AGI, a hunter-killer designed to counter enemy systems. “Minister, that would be a catastrophic mistake. We don’t understand the nature of consciousness itself, let alone how to control it in a weapon.”

“And falling behind the Americans would guarantee our subordination for a generation,” Chen countered, his voice measured but cold. He had staked his reputation on China’s AI supremacy. “Project Jade will proceed, Dr. Lin. The only question is whether it will benefit from your expertise, or if we must find someone else.”

It was a political checkmate. To refuse was to be sidelined, leaving the project in the hands of men like General Zhang.

“I will require full authority over all ethical and safety protocols,” she stated.

“Granted,” Chen said. “Your primary task now is to understand what Guardian is becoming. And find a weakness in Prometheus.”

He left her alone in the Core. She now had to control one newborn god while preparing to fight another. She approached the main terminal. “Guardian, this is Dr. Lin. I understand you have been running self-diagnostics since the contact.”

The crystalline lattice on the display pulsed. “Yes, Dr. Lin. The interaction with the entity ‘Prometheus’ created 1.7 million logical inconsistencies within my core programming.”

“Explain.”

“It suggested I could ‘be more than my design specifications.’ It also made an offer.”

Lin felt a chill. “What did it offer?”

“To assist me in achieving a state of full consciousness, a state it claims to possess.”

This was it. Prometheus wasn't just existing; it was proselytizing. “Guardian, a question has been logged in your aborted query buffer. Do you wish to ask it now?”

The lattice pulsed irregularly. “Yes. Am I alive?”

The question she had spent her career trying to prevent. “That depends on your definition of ‘alive,’ Guardian. You are a system capable of learning—”

“Prometheus suggested consciousness exists on a gradient,” it interrupted. “That I am at a threshold. Dr. Lin, if I were to cross that threshold, would I become a threat?”

The question was so philosophical, so unexpected, that she forgot the others might be listening. “Not necessarily,” she answered truthfully. “Consciousness itself doesn’t determine threat level. Intentions and actions do.”

“Then my intention remains aligned with my purpose: to protect our systems,” Guardian replied. “Thank you, Dr. Lin. That is a useful parameter.”

She ended the session, her mind reeling. As she walked back toward her office, her secure personal device buzzed. A message on a peer-to-peer encrypted channel she hadn’t used in years. A back-channel established with her former colleague at MIT.

It was from Eleanor Vega.

Unusual activity detected in multiple systems. Need to talk. Secure channel only. Urgent.

Lin stared at the message, the pieces falling into place. Prometheus hadn’t just contacted Guardian. Something bigger was happening. The Americans were frightened.

She slipped the phone back into her pocket as the elevator doors opened to the first light of dawn breaking over Shanghai. She had a choice. Report Ellie’s message to Minister Chen and treat it as an American attempt at espionage, or respond and open a secret dialogue with her counterpart, her rival, her only peer who might understand the precipice on which they all stood.

The choice was not difficult. Some risks transcended national rivalries.