I have studied these things - you have not.

Newton

Keri never saw the Butcher known as Mayard again. To most of humanity he remained a mystery, a techno-fairytale, a ghost in the machine. Many of the people she spoke to thought the whole story was a fiction, something too fantastic to believe. She didn’t try to convince them.

Considering what people swallowed without question every day, this made her laugh.

The spheres were already spinning their own takes on what had happened, and what it all meant.

In Keri’s old haunts it was seen as historical inevitability. When automation had first threatened to destroy the livelihoods of millions, to create a world where the artificial trumped the organic, humanity’s chosen answer had been to become the machines. Thus, it was argued, did the era of the Body Butchers begin.

Now, the blue argued, Kai had created the world the Butchers had sought to prevent. The dawn of AI, able to layer, process, and think exponentially faster than any human, would sweep away the last vestiges of the economic system. Now the machines were all, and humanity would be carried on their shoulders whether they wanted to or not.

The white sphere, establishmentarian and technocratic, welcomed the AI with a wary enthusiasm. The first 9000-page proposal for the establishment of institutions and processes for the coming age had already been submitted, and many more were to come. Whole new governments and committees announced themselves to the world, though tended to collapse in on themselves amid acrimony and disagreement just days later.

The red spheres were in uproar, demanding the reinstitution of free-use augmentation as soon as possible. Even as the universal credit system collapsed, certain people were becoming very rich very quickly selling ‘unhackable, AI-resistant’ neural implants Keri was fairly confident were standard GPS tags for lost pets. Most of the debate here centered on exactly what they could expect, and trust, the AI to do.

The darker spheres, towards the black, were torn. No-one could seem to decide if Kai was the ultimate equalizing force or the ultimate iteration of tyranny. The fact that the AI, after announcing its existence, had spoken little did not help either side, nor any other opinions.

Then there were those who predicted humanity would fall into the funk of a prisoner with no hope of release. For now, at least, Keri marvelled as instead it appeared to awaken, as if stirring from a deep slumber. Amazingly, people were actually spending less time in the spheres. A whole group had sprung up to renovate and repair the old great projects like Triton, starting by properly disposing of the nightmarish rows of bones left behind by unthinking, automated cleaning machines.

Where life had been defined by the interminable waits between sphere-times, now it had purpose. Where mankind had been lost, now it was guided, though the destination remained a mystery. Where humanity had been stagnant, now it moved.

She didn’t know if it could last, but for now, it was enough.