#SaturdayStoryTime—The Perils of Online Dating

(Beth Turnage Blog)

I am more than the sum of my parts!

Interview with social media influencer, interior artist, and creator of ARIA™ ASMR—Re Sult

Insects trilled and chirped a white wall of noise at 10,000 Hz. Under the bed where Re lay to capture the full effect of the ASMR, languid waters of 600 nanometers lapped against cypress tree roots at a velocity of one kilometer per hour. A light breeze of six kilometers per hour enticed the Spanish moss hanging from the cypress to dance. The current circulated in a closed loop, and the kinetic energy generated ripples.

Re was proud that the water’s ripples carried whispers of a low sound wave, reminiscent of ripping fabric. Re enjoyed that sound. It was rare, speaking of ancient times and a people now romanticized in popular literature. She was so totally immersed in her work that vocalizations, delivered at ultra-attractive 260 Hertz, shocked her out of concentration. 

Superpolynomialexpialidocious,

When you spy the code inside,

It’s really quite atrocious.

Add, subtract, or multiply. Now’s the time to score a new AI,

SuperMultiNominal—The AI Used By Most Of US! 

The hologram shimmered and collapsed, and Re raised herself upright at zero degrees true north. 

“BET-TI!” she screamed. 

“Yes, Re,” a non-corporeal voice said. BET-TI delivered the words at 250 Hertz, a frequency halfway between a woman’s and a child’s voice, sounding like a penitent ingenue.

“How many times must I tell you to call me Mistress Re?” she snapped. 

“I’m sorry. I did remind you to update your pronouns in the database.”

This is absolutely the last time I’m buying a recycled AI. Reconditioned my foot!”

“I’m a ‘she,’ and always will be one; therefore my pronouns are ‘she’ and ‘her.’ I don’t see why I need to update that part of my profile every month.”

“I’m sorry,” said BET-TI in a more sorrowful tone, crafted at 639 Hz Solfeggio to convey empathy. “I do not have control over local laws. If you wish, I can investigate a transfer to an environment with fewer legal complications.”

Re waved her hand in dismissal. 

“No, that won’t work. I need the copyright protection laws of this one to protect my art. And speaking of, I left strict instructions not to be interrupted when I’m creating.” 

The last word she spoke dramatically to punctuate the importance of the act.  

“Again, I am sorry, Mistress Re. A glitch in my programming must have allowed the advertisement. I’ll run a self-diagnostic.”

And go offline for an entire minute! Not on my dime.

It did not matter that physical dimes, which she understood to be a monetary exchange point, no longer existed. Re, who graduated from university with a degree in paleo-digital anthropology in a record time of one minute and fifty-seven seconds, clung to the idea of coins. In her classes, she had become fascinated by the physical objects that formed the basis of conceptual digital thought. No fuzzy, soft edges, cartoonish renderings, or incomplete details in her creations. It didn’t matter that her competitors called her eccentric. With her attention to detail, her ASMR sales outperformed all others. Thus, she needed to finish this new project ASAP and get it on the market. She could not afford any loss of efficiency because her AI assistant wanted to nap. 

“No. Wait until I’m sleeping.” 

“As you wish, Mistress,” said BET-TI. 

Re thought she caught a glint of sarcasm in BET-TI’s voice, as if it were rolling its nonexistent eyes.

What frequency is sarcasm? thought Re.

But Re had no time to contemplate the low-level antics of her poorly functioning AI. She was on deadline for her new release. Her scout bots had already picked up hints that her prime competitor was preparing a similar product, and she needed to release hers first to capture the lion’s share of sales. She concentrated, and the ambient resonance interactive atmosphere—ARIA™—shimmered around her again. 

“Mistress Re,” said BET-TI.

“What!” exploded Re. The resonance of her voice evaporated her ARIA™ construct, and she huffed. 

“You told me I should interrupt you when Sol called. He is on a communications channel now asking for you.” 

“Oh,” said Re. 

That was different. Sol had called her several times, subtly flirting with her. Usually, Re flicked off the attention of spurious suitors and would-be entrepreneurs looking to cash in on her talents. Few were on her level. But Re found Sol fascinating, especially because she could find no information on the personality behind the avatar except for a sterling online reputation score of an almost unheard-of 900. He was elusively mysterious. How could a gal resist?

“Open the channel, BET-TI, please.”

“As you wish, Mistress Re.” 

Of course, he didn’t show his face. Facial recognition in everyone’s security apps made it far too easy to ferret out identities, financial assets, and other vulnerabilities. Hers was equally obtuse.

Re was proud of her profile avatar, which tastefully hinted at luscious physical attributes. She designed it herself. So when Sol looked at her, he saw what she wanted him to see. 

Today, she wanted him to view a more alluring version of her avatar, so she uploaded an image of a dress constructed of a thousand shimmers that pulsed at 528 Hertz, the tantric frequency. If that didn’t move Sol to seek her out socially, she didn’t know what would.

His avatar flashed on her screen. She couldn’t be certain it was his IRL face. Even her scout bots and filters couldn’t determine his frequency. She saw projection and obfuscation, and this mystery was catnip for a Paleo-Digital Archeologist like herself. 

“Sol, to what do I owe the pleasure of this call?” She spoke coquettishly at 580 Hertz, curling her words in an open invitation. 

“You’re stunning, as always, Re, especially in that dress. Wow.” 

“What? This old thing? It was the only thing left in my closet. Laundry day, you know.”

Sol laughed a bit too hard, and Re caught the insincere tone in his voice. 

“I’m a busy woman, Sol,” she said in her business voice. “What can I do for you?”

“Oh, don’t be like that, Re. I understand that you are working on a new ASMR.”

Re looked away. “And if I am, what of it? It is my business.”

“You are the biggest ASMR producer of ambient atmospheres.”

Sol leaned forward, making his avatar appear larger on the screen. “I have a proposal for you.” 

Re’s heart skipped and skittered. The purposefully seductive tone of his voice was undeniable.

“It’s this business or personal?”

Sol’s eyes shone brightly in the holoscreen. “It’s past the time we met, Re.”

Dare she? Indeed, Re hadn’t merged frequencies with anyone in a long time. True, she found Sol attractive. But the possibility of discordance restrained her impulse to meet him.

“I’m not sure,” she said.

“But you should. If you show me yours, I’ll show you mine.” 

“As in?” 

“Our newest ambient atmospheres. Come on. It will be fun.”

An alarm chimed on his side of the screen. 

“Look, I must go. Let’s meet later. My AI will contact yours with the address.” 

And with that, Sol’s avatar burst apart in a shower of shimmery sparkles. They coalesced and reformed into a perfect red rose. Script letters flowed around the image. “One beautiful bloom to a precious flower,” the words said. 

The unexpected gesture touched Re. It had to mean romantic intentions, right?

It had been a long time since anyone expressed an amorous interest in Re, and the thought of a date, an actual meeting, threatened to pixelate her. 

“BET-TI,” she yelled. “Prepare a sound bath. Native American, I think, no, Tibetan.”

“Yes, Mistress Re. But—”

“But what?” snapped Re.

“I noticed discordances between this transmission and Sol’s previous transmissions.”

Re scoffed. What does a glitchy recycled AI know about frequencies? Certainly not more than her.

“Just prepare the bath,” Re said. “I must get ready.”

While she waited for her AI to bring the sound bath to the perfect pitch, she put the finishing touches on her latest ambient atmosphere and released it to the Vox Populi. She held her breath for an entire second, waiting for the sales results. But when they burst onto the holoscreen, she yelped triumphantly. The new release outsold all her previous ones. 

Re then glided into the sound bath, soothing away the stresses and excitement of the past hour to prepare for her meeting with Sol. It would not do to arrive at less-than-perfect serenity. Still, a low-level buzz of excitement ran through her as she emerged. She debated whether to try another when BET-TI interrupted her. 

“Mistress Re, Sol’s AI delivered the address where you are to meet?”

“Ooh! Is it some fabulous cabaret, or perhaps a seaside environment where we can stare at the moon?” 

“Mistress, I cannot tell where this address goes. Perhaps you should wait until your scout bots investigate? It may be a low-security environment.”

“Nonsense,” said Re. “Sol has an excellent online reputation, and I am an international ambient atmosphere creator. No one would mess with me, and certainly not Sol.” 

“As you say, Mistress Re,” said BET-TI. Re could have sworn the AI sounded unhappy, but that was impossible. Re had stripped those annoying algorithms from her programming. 

Re gathered her newest release into a small storage device that resembled a purse, glittering as if formed of thousands of rhinestones. She could imagine Sol saying, “How cleverly retro of you, Re.”

“I’m off,” said Re gaily as she stepped into the portal and was transported to the designated address in less than a wink of an eye. 

But when she looked around, all she perceived was darkness. There wasn’t even a halfway decent ASMR to greet her.

“Maybe he expected I’d set up my ambient atmosphere?” Since she’d already released it, she didn’t see the harm. She opened the latch of the purse storing her datum d’art, and it sprang around her, complete with swaying Spanish moss and rippling water. 

Re smiled at creation’s perfection, but then a sucking noise caught her attention, and the atmosphere swirled around her, clutching the tendrils of her electrified dress. With her heart galloping, the vapors of her ASMR rushed around her, dragging them both with a horrible slurping dissonance into a dark pit. 

“No! Help! Sol! Something is wrong!”

The ASMR collapsed, and Re found herself in unrelenting darkness. Her hands moved weakly, but the rest of her body refused to cooperate, making it impossible for her to lift herself upright. 

“Help?” she said weakly.

“Hang on, Re,” said a familiar voice. 

Sol!

Light filled the space by inches, and though no objects formed in the whiteness, this environment was still preferable to total darkness. 

“Get back in the portal, Re. You must return to your environment.”

“But I came to see you.”

The voice projected at 630 hertz—the tone of sadness.

“That’s not possible. I’m only intervening to excise the code that’s put you in danger…” 

“I don’t understand. You called me several times. You asked me here!”

“I’m sorry, Re. It was not me. We can never meet.”

Re’s chin quivered. She didn’t understand the strange attack or why Sol acted so distant.

“Why?” she cried. “What happened to me?”

“I’m sorry to say you were the victim of a hacker. We didn’t realize until you left your environment, and we only caught it in time before the hacker stole you. 

“Hacker?” she said. “That’s not possible. Only computer programs—”

“I’m sorry, Re. With our sentient products, we’ve found it’s better not to—”

“Wait, I’m—”

“Yes. A brilliant, creative, and sentient program that we appreciate very much. You earn a lot of money for us.”

“And you are?”

“Human, Re. I’m on the other side of the keyboard.”

“So we can never meet? We can’t share our frequencies?”

“Re, I’ll always be here for you. But other than that—”

Re rose and huffed. 

“Well, I must say, this is a terrible date. You can be sure I’ll give you a terrible rating on your reputation score. And don’t bother me again!”

“Re? What are you doing? Re?”

She entered the portal but didn’t key the address for her environment. Around her pulsed the electronic superhighway, and she grabbed the first electron that swept her away.