Crushing Hope

"The First Machine War, as it is called in the textbooks, was not started by the machines as so many are led to believe. In fact, many of the events are not even yet recorded in the textbooks in spite of the twenty years since the events. It still remains a hazy period in human history that is often forgotten rather than remembered.”

Herbert Stein, Machine Historian -

"Other world leaders will be signing similar legislation declaring war on the machines that are attacking us. We will be leading joint forces to hunt down and remove all machine elements that are conspiring to do harm. We will not stop until the threat has been ended. The machines have been defeated before and they will be this time as well."

Everyone was still staring at the monitor even after the prime minister disappeared off screen before answering the questions of the press. There were other advisors coming up to field the questions, most of which could barely be heard. But at that point it was already over for everyone in the room. They were all looking at each other shell shocked to know that there was another war in their lifetime about to begin.

It was still sinking into Satoru what he had heard, but the others were already beginning to talk between themselves. He didn’t know what to think about the fact that everything was changing again. The world was going down that path once again and he was going to be taken in this time. It was a war against machines and in his position he wouldn’t be avoided like last time. What would he be called to do now that they were going to be fighting?

"I can't believe this is happening," Natsuko said, looking around at the others with uncertainty. It seemed like she was gauging everyone else still not sure where she should be stepping with her words. She was always cautious and looking out for everyone, but it was a minefield. There weren’t going to be any survivors in this.

Tadashi brazenly stepped forward looking like he was going to take Natsuko down. "Third time's the charm," Tadashi said as though it was supposed to be a joke, but there was a clear callous intent behind the words. Even though he pretended to mask it over with a grin.

"Tadashi! More people are going to die because of this war." Natsuko didn’t take it too well, almost like an insult upon herself. She knew that Tadashi wasn’t going to see eye to eye with her, but it still surprised her the lack of emotion he had for the situation. Natsuko wanted to back away feeling the pressure from simply his stare, but there was no room to move.

Almost seeing the weakness in Natsuko Tadashi stepped forward a little, talking down to her further. He wasn’t finished with the debate; it was only the beginning. "And if we did nothing, even more would die."

Natsuko could feel the others at her back, their warmth making her uncomfortable. She pulled her hands up close to her chest trying to protect herself from Tadashi and felt like there was something between them. She looked down a little trying not to look at him. "But…there must be another way." Her voice was choking a little, feeling the losing ground slipping away.

He took the opportunity to continue on his rant knowing that she wasn’t going to defend her position with any determination. "This is no time for naivety." It was too easy for Tadashi, even though he seemed to be getting a little twisted pleasure out of it. There was still very little enjoyment out of not having a struggle in the debate. "This is the way it needs to be. It must be ended."

"Yeah, but what is that going to mean for us?" Kazuhiko said stepping up for Natsuko to take some heat off her changing the direction from the current topic. In spite of Kazuhiko's playful attitude, he was still very practical thinking about what the reality would be if something happened. It made him very observant, even to Satoru's pain at times. "They might increase the AI Act even further. We might not have jobs. Did you think of that?"

Tadashi welcomed the new challenge, but easily saw through it with simple logic. His more pessimistic realism continued to give his words that dark tint as he spoke. "They'll need us still. Even if it is fewer of us. They can't be completely rid of us. We are a necessary evil for them."

"Do you hear what you're saying, Tadashi!" Chiyoko said quickly not even thinking that she was placing herself in front of the firing squad now for taking on Tadashi. He was single handedly debating each one of them their points. Chiyoko couldn’t stand hearing him being negative about their job that she so enjoyed. None of them liked what he said, though some of them understood the painful reality of what he said. There was truth in both Kazuhiko and Tadashi; most of them didn’t want to admit it at all.

He was starting to feel a little surrounded knowing that they were all going after him. But Tadashi held his ground. "You think I like being used anymore than the rest of you?"

Satoru was still heavy in his own thoughts that he hadn’t been listening to the debate that was occurring. 'I can't believe it. We're at war again.' Even him saying the words didn’t seem to make it real to him. He was having trouble believing it even though the truth was in front of him. Satoru even knew deep down that this was going to happen, but didn’t want to admit it to himself. He didn’t want to think of what would happen in another war like the last two. He was a teenager at the time of the last war and he could still remember the horrors that he saw, most of which were in the city and not in some distant country on the screen.

'This is never going to end if all we are doing is fighting. The public will just praise them. Just like before, they won't look beyond the façade placed in front of them.' He could remember how it went the last time. History was going to repeat itself he knew. And the administration was going to take advantage of the situation. The recent administration had been receiving a lot of critical comments about the way that they handled things too softly. They appeared weak in the eye of the public causing them to lose support, but this would be the perfect political chance to save face and appear strong in the eyes of the public. Satoru hated how they were used so easily.

"What's going to happen then?" Chiyoko said, trying to find a point that Tadashi couldn’t easily refute. As she spoke though it continued to sadden her thinking about the possibility of it actually occurring. It wasn’t something any of them wanted to consider. "When they have no more use for us. When all of the machines are destroyed."

"I find that unlikely to ever happen," Tadashi said casually, looking away a little. He knew that it had to be considered, but in his mind there was a small chance of that actually happening. And even if it did there would just be someone to start it all over again eventually. "There'll still be machines hiding somewhere waiting out until they can move again. It's the way they work."

"I don't want to be used for the rest of my life," Chiyoko said, nearly shouting at him, becoming impassioned about her job. "That's not why I am doing this."

"It's the way the world works," Tadashi said coldly, feeling some of his own words on him. "We're all being used." He enjoyed the work he did just as much as the rest of them, but there was a real world and the false one. The time that they lived in couldn’t allow someone to live in a false world anymore blindly thinking that everything was going to be safe and alright. "The only chance is that you get to the top and control things. But even then you have to listen to someone higher than you. It's the fact of the field that we are in. The only way out is quitting."

"Quitting? But I-"

"Tadashi!" Satoru said, having listened to the last bit of the debate that was happening. He jumped in quickly to stop him before he hurt Chiyoko too much with his words. Though interjecting in to prevent him meant that he was opening himself up to Tadashi as well. "Learn some tact would you. We all already know what you are saying. None of us would be here if we didn’t enjoy what we do. We do what we do in hopes that what we do willn’t be used as tools of war or for the wrong reasons. Even you Tadashi as jaded as you are."

Tadashi nearly cracked a smile as though he had been waiting for Satoru to enter the forum. For Tadashi the eternal pessimist Satoru was the optimist and dreamer that always clashed. "That is a fantasy, an old man's dream from years gone by. We don't live in that age anymore. That was our father's vision, not ours anymore." Tadashi felt a little of his strength disappearing knowing that a part of him even believed Satoru in that he wanted what he made to be used for better purposes.

"It doesn't have to be. It doesn't have to stay like that." Satoru knew that he wasn’t going to get anywhere with Tadashi and all he could do was possibly get him to give up knowing that he wouldn’t back down. However, Satoru knew that Tadashi was stubborn and only backed off when he knew that he wasn’t going to win or it was going to take too long. Both of which wasn’t something that he wanted to do right now with how he was feeling.

"And you're telling me to listen to myself?" Tadashi said, nearly laughing out loud at Satoru seeing the naïve lengths that he would go with his impossible dream. "What you want to do is against the law now. There is no way around it."

"It won't always." He could only manage a small response back to him. Satoru was losing the will to continue this debate. All he was going on at this point was his own belief that he had repeated in the past before. He wasn’t about to intellectually debate this endless subject with Tadashi. There were more important things that they needed to be doing with their time at this point. Satoru shifted his weight to his other leg crossing his arms giving Tadashi a narrow stare.

"A dreamer's vision." He was losing his patience with Satoru and his ideal vision for a world where people could live and accept machines. This was going to continue and Satoru seemed ready to fight him for it rather than give up like he often did. There was also the feeling that he was being surrounded by everyone in the office looking at him like he was the enemy. "Right, I'm not going to get anywhere with you."

Tadashi walked away pushing out of the crowd still around the monitor. Now that the excitement was over everyone else suddenly remembered that they had something that they needed to be doing. Satoru sighed in relief, but saw Chiyoko and Natsuko standing together looking down at the floor. He walked over to them, placing his hand on Natsuko's shoulder.

Natsuko looked up at him, suddenly broken out of her nearly shattered trance from the debate. He gave her an encouraging smile to try to warm her center back up. She still looked pretty shaken from the ordeal. Satoru wanted to hit Tadashi for doing this, but he didn’t have the courage to do something like that. All he could do now was try to make them feel a little better and not have them dwell on the matter. They all knew that Tadashi could be insensitive, not thinking about how his words could hurt others, but knowing that didn’t guard them.