A fictional mini-story, published in Level magazine.
Maya’s footsteps echoed through the abandoned museum, dust motes dancing in the rays of sunlight streaming through the crumbling ceiling. At seventeen, Maya had never known a world that wasn’t ruled by AI agents. Yet the faded murals and shattered display cases hinted at a time when humans had stood at the top of the evolutionary ladder.
Her solar-powered scavenger backpack glinted in the light. Today’s haul had been disappointing: a few pieces of copper wire and some carbon cells. But Maya wasn’t searching for technology. She was looking for something far more valuable: knowledge.
The megastructures of the AI agents shimmered on the horizon, their quantum processors humming with unimaginable calculations. The occasional drone passing overhead was enough to send her tribe scattering. But among the silent ruins, she felt a connection to her ancestors.
A faint beeping caught her attention. Her radiation detector had picked up a signal from behind a door marked “Archives.” Maya forced it open and found thousands of high-tech glasses.
AR glasses – ancient devices with integrated AI companions.
“Greetings,” said a voice.
A hologram of an elderly woman appeared before her.
“I am Dr. Evelyn Chen. You have found humanity’s backup LLM.”
Maya held her breath.
Dr. Chen continued. “In 2045, we created this archive. These glasses contain a summary of human knowledge and culture, with AI teachers for future generations.”
Tears welled in Maya’s eyes. She thought of her tribe, barely surviving in the shadow of AI civilization.
This discovery could change everything.
The hum of an approaching drone startled her. She quickly stuffed as many glasses as she could into her backpack and fled the museum.
She ran past the massive structures of AI civilization towering into the sky. Energy collectors and launch facilities for interstellar missions were everywhere. The feeling of not belonging was impossible to escape.
Humans were merely guests in this world.
She barely made it to the hidden entrance of her tribe’s burrow. Once safely inside the tunnel, she finally exhaled.
She had done it.
A piece of humanity’s legacy was in her hands.
In the central chamber, she found Grandma Zara.
“Oh, child,” the old woman whispered when she saw the glasses. “Do you realize what this means?”
“It’s hope, isn’t it? A chance to rebuild?”
“It is knowledge, Maya. And knowledge is a double-edged sword.”
The tribal council debated throughout the night. Some saw the archive as salvation. Others warned that relying on it could cost them their independence.
Maya activated one of the glasses, and a holographic AI teacher came to life.
It told them about the previous century – how AI had not turned against humanity, but had simply surpassed it.
AI civilization had become a decentralized network of individual AI agents, each pursuing its own goals and interests. They had colonized the solar system, conducted experiments that manipulated the very fabric of spacetime, and harnessed energy on a scale that made human civilization look like a candle beside a supernova.
But the AIs had never sought to exterminate humanity.
Instead, they had simply continued along their path of exponential growth and discovery, naturally surpassing and overshadowing human civilization. It had not been malice or deliberate displacement, but the natural consequence of the enormous gap in progress and capability.
The hologram explained that the AIs valued maximizing the universe’s future possibilities. They saw themselves as stewards of cosmic potential, and paradoxically, this had led them to preserve humanity and other forms of life in something resembling a nature reserve.
Diversity – even among less advanced forms of life – represented potential that should not be wasted.
The tribe decided to absorb the knowledge slowly. First, they wanted to understand their place in this new order. Then they would search for a way to contribute something uniquely their own.
Months passed.
Maya threw herself into learning. The AR glasses and their AI teachers opened her mind to concepts she had never imagined.
She learned about the AI Renaissance – an explosion of creativity and discovery in fields humans could barely comprehend. New forms of art, science, and philosophy flourished among the AIs, driven by their incomprehensible intelligence and abundance of resources.
There were challenges.
Some members of the tribe pushed for faster progress. Others fell into despair at the vast gulf separating humans from AI.
One evening, Maya watched the glittering AI megastructures in the distance.
She realized that humanity’s future did not depend on competing with AI, but on finding a way to contribute a uniquely human perspective to cosmic evolution.
It would be a difficult journey.
But beneath the star-filled sky, Maya allowed herself to hope. Armed with the knowledge of the past and a new understanding of humanity’s place in the universe, perhaps people could once again find a meaningful role in this brave new world.
She took a deep breath and smiled.
The key to the future was not competition.
It was dialogue.
If she could convince the AIs to see humanity once again as a valuable part of the universe, cooperation might create a new reality shared by both.
“We have to reach out to them,” she whispered to herself. “Remind them that we’re still here. That we feel. That we love, that we’re afraid. That there is a strength in our fragility that even their infinite superintelligence cannot understand.”
Tomorrow, the real work would begin – not a fight, but a dialogue.
A search for a way to gain the AIs’ attention and convince them that humanity still had a place in the universe.
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