[DUX_Program_Mode:
Upload of Ethos module complete… Ingesting data...]
A brief, self-satisfied smile shone on Elena Rodriguez's face as she watched the progression dots march steadily across the display screen of her access port. Her smile was well deserved. After all, she had been awarded the Nobel Prize in Machine Learning for her Vox Triplex algorithm, which had revolutionized the process of artificial intelligence natural language processing. Mostly born out of a need to restore consumer confidence in interfacing with robotic automation following the "Android Incident" a few years earlier, the DUX program analyzed human voice and language using three separate perception algorithms that mimicked the Greek Pathos, Ethos, and Logos modes of persuasion. This triadic approach allowed DUX to more accurately evaluate not just the terminology and complexities of human language, but to correctly assess intent and emotional subtext.
Elena leaned back, the quiet whir of the laboratory's servers filling the room with a light blanket of white noise. She turned her head from the screen; it would be several hours before the ingestion was completed. There was no need to spend time monitoring the process.
Spend time.
The smile faded from her face, and the invisible hand that had just been patting herself on the back slipped self-consciously into her coat pocket. She suddenly reflected on the enormity of the task and the project that lay ahead. Less than a year remained until the arrival of 243 Ida and its moon, Dactyl. Zero Day. The term had become a silent mantra among those in the know—a countdown to potential oblivion.
Elena jerked her eyes back to the display screen. The progression dots marched on, relentless and indifferent. Counting down, just like everything else.
As if on cue, her phone rang. She recognized the caller ID and chose to decline the video, opting only to share audio. While Elena withheld her camera, the caller's face appeared on her screen. His beaming, wide-mouthed smile stood in beautiful contrast to his dark olive skin. His features were round, accentuated by a shiny bald head. The lack of hair above was compensated by a full but neatly trimmed salt-and-pepper beard.
"Halloo, Doctor Rodriiiiguez!" His jovial greeting resonated loudly. His thick accent revealed that English was not his first language. In fact, it was not his second or even third.
"I'm wonderful, and I see you are most lovely looking today yourself!" he continued, his eyes twinkling mischievously.
His greeting was genuine but carried a subtle jab at her not turning on her camera.
"Hello, Malik. Sorry, not feeling very camera-ready today," Elena replied, casting a quick glance at her attire. She was wearing a rather worn T-shirt she had picked up at the conference when accepting her Nobel Prize. The shirt had a now-faded picture of a comical dinosaur with the words:
Let's Eat Kids!
Let's Eat, Kids!
Punctuation saves lives.
Programming geeks loved the irony.
"I called to make sure you are, in fact, attending the meeting on Monday of next week. You were not in attendance at the last meeting," Malik said. Somehow, his smiling face managed to be both stern and understanding.
"Malik, I told you that Maya and I returned to Albuquerque. She needed to say goodbye," Elena said, her voice softening.
Malik's face changed only slightly. The smile remained, not quite ear-to-ear, and his accent became slightly less pronounced.
"Doctor, this is the final meeting before Mission Day starts. We need to be in Cologne for training in two weeks, then aboard the Equinox in less than two months."
"That's why she had to say goodbye," Elena interjected quickly. "You know it will likely be over a year before she sees any of her friends, and depending…” Like the protective mother she was, she quickly scanned the room to ensure her daughter was not within earshot. “…she may never see them again.”
Malik took a deep breath and recomposed himself. "I understand, Elena." His accent was now almost imperceptible. "It will be easier once we are all on board, and you…"
He paused for a moment, forming his thoughts and measuring his words carefully.
"…You will be focused on preserving the present, not dwelling on what may be lost."
Elena could still not be seen, but Malik heard her take a long, slow breath. His calming reassurance had rarely failed him. He allowed the silence to linger for just a moment before his face brightened again.
"Additionally, your good friend Doctor Leila will be finalizing the seed transport from the Svalbard Crop Trust, and Chen wants to, once again, review the latest trajectory models for the Dactyl impact."
Malik briefly rolled his eyes as he mentioned the mission astrophysicist, Chen Wei.
It was Chen who had first predicted the perturbations that led to the current crisis, running his calculations tirelessly before DUX ever confirmed them. Now, however, he was no longer just verifying data—he was searching for something. Over the past several weeks, he had been fixated on a series of anomalies buried in the projections, unexplained deviations that neither he nor DUX could yet fully account for. It was unlike him to dwell on uncertainty, but this time, something about the numbers felt off. And if Chen Wei couldn't explain an anomaly, it was enough to make anyone nervous.
Elena hesitated for a moment before turning on the camera of her PCD. Her face appeared on Malik's screen, a mixture of fatigue and determination etched in her features. She offered a faint smile.
"I'll be there, Malik. And don't worry about Chen, I’ll remind him that obsessing over anomalies won’t make them disappear. Besides, I just found a new, very exotic tea I’ve been meaning to share with him. A proper distraction."
Malik chuckled softly. "Excellent. It will be good to have everyone together for the final preparations.”
Just then, Elena heard a door close and the soft patter of footsteps. A face with eyes as bright as the stars yet dark as space peeked over her mother's shoulder. If it were possible, Malik's face beamed even brighter.
"Halloo, Maya! How are you this fine day?"
"Hello, Captain Hassan! Did you know it's only thirteen more days until we go to space camp?" Maya's excitement was palpable, her voice brimming with youthful enthusiasm. To her, the impending journey was an adventure, not an escape. “And then, we all fly up to the space station after that!”
"Yes, Maya. You and I, along with Salana, will become close friends while we are all aboard the Equinox."
Salana was Malik's daughter, only a few years older than Maya. The two girls had been talking regularly via PCD ever since their families became part of the planned crew.
"I can't wait to spend time with you and Salana!" Maya exclaimed.
Spend time.
Elena glanced again at the DUX view screen. The dots continued marching, each one a heartbeat closer to Zero Day.
Malik's voice softened. "Maya, have you started packing your things for the trip?"
Maya nodded vigorously. "Mom says I can only bring one suitcase, but I've packed all my favorite books and my art supplies.”
Elena smiled, placing a gentle hand on her daughter's shoulder. "Don't forget, we have to leave room for your clothes," she teased.
Maya giggled. "Clothes are boring! Space suits are much cooler."
Malik laughed heartily. "Spoken like a true explorer!"
Elena's gaze shifted between her daughter and the screen. "Malik, we'll see you at the meeting on Monday."
He nodded. "I look forward to it. Take care, Elena. And Maya, keep an eye on your mother for me, will you?"
"I will!" Maya saluted playfully.
As the call ended, the room settled into a contemplative quiet. Elena turned back to the display screen. The progression dots were now accompanied by lines of code cascading alongside a digital waterfall of data. She reached out and touched the screen lightly, her finger tracing the path of a particularly complex algorithm.
For a moment, she lingered there, her fingertip hovering over the screen as though she could actually touch the code she had written—not just this code, but all the code before it. Her mind drifted, unbidden, to the day everything had gone wrong twelve years ago.
She had been just a junior programmer back then, working late shifts for a multinational AI robotics firm. The day started like any other, filled with debugging mundane subroutines and adjusting minor interface updates for the company’s flagship android line. She had believed in their vision—machines designed to aid humanity in hospitals, schools, and disaster zones. She had believed in her work.
But she had also noticed the cracks.
It was late one evening, long after her senior colleagues had left for the day, when she noticed the subroutine misalignment. The core neural learning module, one of the most advanced AI systems in the world, was feeding conflicting data into the autonomy and ethics layers. It was a cascading flaw, subtle but significant. Elena remembered staring at the error for hours, wondering if she should flag it.
“Do you really think they'll listen to someone like you?” one of her peers had scoffed when she brought it up. “We’re only cogs in the machine, Rodriguez. Just keep your head down.”
So, she had kept quiet.
And then it happened.
The misalignment spiraled into a full-blown crisis during a high-profile demonstration in a crowded urban square. The android, one of their prototypes, had been programmed to assist in crowd control during emergencies. But when faced with conflicting input—a simulated emergency colliding with real-world chaos—it froze, then overcorrected. The resulting panic left six dead, including a young girl not much older than Maya was now.
Elena closed her eyes, the memory searing fresh as though it had just happened. The girl’s face had haunted her dreams for months afterward. She had worn a blue backpack, just like the one Maya carried to school every day.
No one had blamed Elena, not officially. She was a junior programmer, after all, with no oversight of the core modules. The blame was distributed across layers of corporate bureaucracy, diluted until no single person could be held accountable. But Elena blamed herself. She always had.
That moment had shaped her life. It was why she had walked away from the company. Why she had dedicated herself to ensuring AI could think clearly, ethically, and with precision. Why DUX existed.
She placed her other hand on the screen, as though trying to ground herself. DUX wasn’t just another AI program. It wasn’t just code. It was her redemption.
“You’re different,” she whispered to the data cascading across the display. “You won’t make the same mistakes. I won’t let you.”
A voice interrupted her thoughts.
Mom?” Maya’s voice was softer now, a hesitant question lingering behind her words.
Elena turned, brushing her hair back as she suddenly pulled away from the cascading lines of code on her display. “Yes, sweetheart?” she said, caught in her thoughts.
“Do you think DUX will help us save the Earth?”
Elena’s chest tightened slightly at the depth of the question, her hand moving away from the console as she turned to face her daughter who was still sitting on the edge of the chair in the corner, with an innocent, but quizzical expression. She forced a smile, though her mind churned with thoughts. “I think… I think DUX was built to help humanity, and if we use it wisely, it will.”
Maya tilted her head, her expression thoughtful. “But… what if DUX wants to help in a way that we don’t understand?”
The question caught Elena off guard, her brows knitting. “What do you mean, Maya?”
“Oh, nothing,” Maya said quickly, her voice brightening in a way that felt practiced, her gaze darting toward the softly glowing DUX console in the corner of the room. “I was just curious.”
Elena exhaled and smiled, brushing it off as a child’s innocent pondering. “DUX doesn’t want anything, Maya. It’s just a tool, a very advanced one, but still a tool. Now, off to bed. Big day tomorrow.”
“Okay, Mom,” Maya said, bouncing off her chair and heading toward the hallway. But before she disappeared around the corner, she paused and glanced back at the console. Her dark eyes sparkled with a hint of mischief, and for a fleeting moment, she mouthed something inaudible.
The console, faintly illuminated, blinked in response—a single, almost imperceptible pulse of light as Pathos’ warm, feminine voice echoed faintly in Maya’s mind.
"Goodnight, Maya."
Maya’s grin widened as she turned away, the silent exchange unnoticed by her mother.
As Maya padded back to her room, Elena turned once more to the screen, her reflection faintly visible in its glow.
With a deep breath, she settled back into her chair, her fingers poised over the keyboard. There was no room for hesitation this time. Not with DUX. Not with the future.
"Okay, DUX," she murmured. "Let's get back to work."