#ill see if i wont repost this one later once i get sleep IHOFSHIOSA

[shinakazami1]

Rhys AI AU snippet 3 - Set up with a movie night

Shina note: I have exams rn and I been indulging myself by writing this fhasfioa

This one is longer than the prev ones but hope you enjoy it! You might even find someone you know in there owo More under the cut!

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The Echo Net was a beautiful place. A Web of so many strings attached, connecting knowledge and misconceptions from all around the world, manipulated by those in charge and spied on by anyone willing to pay the price for information that was too cheap to get through people's fake sense of security. 

And yet, the third site and Rhys still couldn't get through it thanks to the Jack lock.

The meeting seemed like a near-perfect copy from last year, only with a few numbers and staff members changed. Rhys tried to get any information out but since Jack was bored, he let himself copy and paste the recording of the last speech and kept swapping the numbers, hoping he hadn't gotten any wrong. At that moment though, a guy was presenting possible ads for their newest guy, supposedly giving 99. 2% accuracy. Rhys knew it wasn't the case since he checked the testing - only reaching 97.3%, which still wasn't that bad. But it was not enough for the perfectionist he was working for.

Yet somehow, the same guy left a typo on the safe lock screen. What was 'pupmkin'? Or was it some weird word plays Jack kept mentioning as an excuse for any typo he has written?

Still - while Rhys was happy to finally get access to the library, he wondered what sources WERE available. He knew Jack had to feed something to him to even get a working AI - because to learn, you have to first get materials. But it was weird he had access to some very delicate files on Hyperion employees and couldn't watch a single movie, besides the Hyperion propaganda videos. Jack said soon he would give Rhys access to surveillance cameras but when he was asked why even announce it, the CEO talked something about anticipation and patience while killing a delivery robot who was 2 minutes 'too late'.

Rhys stared at the illustration on the lock screen. Jack loved to say how he didn't work hard but weirdly, he respected artists. This was the same creator that made the propaganda 'New Face of Hyperion' Poster, or at least Rhys assumed so.

Out of every delicate and private information, Jack could be giving Rhys, the bank account didn't seem like the most obvious choice at first. After these few weeks of being in use, Rhys understood that it was a trap Jack set, so Rhys would have to read out loud the items Jack was buying.

Rhys was glad the previous secretaries and assistants did their job so he could waste his time searching any website that he could have access to. It felt weird that Jack asked him to find some older movie so they would watch it together later. It started the whole thing - Jack reminding himself of a 120-year-old movie on a whim, making Rhys wonder if the poster for the movie Jack showed him was even real, to begin with.

Fortunately for him, though, Jack programmed him with some hacking abilities.

The first thing to do was to figure out on what level Rhys was locked. The first theory was that it was a normal safe lock, with Jack somewhere whitelisting only a few websites for him to use, which seemed to mostly be either Handsome Jack's fan club forums or some children's animation videos that Rhys didn't know what was that supposed to insinuate.

He cursed the fact he couldn't see all of his files. Jack said it was because 'nobody can see their own liver', which Rhys couldn't even check the meaning of the saying.

Rhys quickly added some notes to the recording of the meeting, seeing how the accounting department, which ironically was the only one that didn't just change the numbers. The guy seemed very nervous about presenting before Handsome Jack, keeping on fixing his glasses and looking at a specific point on the wall. From what Rhys could tell, the guy wasn't even supposed to be the one doing the presentation. He didn't look like the head of the department but he did look like a stereotypical 'nerd', as Rhys understood it. Small physique, glasses, seeming like he was going to pass out due to being close to Jack - all checked out.

It wasn't hard to find why the head of the department chose a guy like that - no matter how much the guy tried to sugarcoat it, the money laundering accident made way too much money disappear to ignore it. Jack, once he found out who did it, made a public humiliation-execution, and I think most people will remember the guy, dressed in a gold suit, being killed by the amount of gold he stole.

One thing that you could never question with Jack was theatrics. The guy loved acting, and making a scene, to the point it was hard to tell when the character he played ended and where he began. Rhys was unsure if such a line existed anymore.

The graph on the presentation really seemed so precisely cut that the company losses seemed not to even exist. Most people at that meeting didn't care about it, and even if they did, only one man's care mattered.

And he was playing some game on his Echo Watch.

And writing to Rhys how nerdy the accountant guy looked like.

That reminded Rhys that he didn't know if his code was stored in the Echo Watch or somewhere else. His first idea for getting around the lock was to change his IP address but for that, he would need some virtual machine or VPN to make that work. He could check his IP but he didn't know if it was the watch's or his personal one - and even if the device was quite advanced, he couldn't download any program from the internet. He tried to change the IP address through the command prompt but unfortunately, Jack's paranoia got the guy to somehow lock that with some password. And with Jack using the watch at that moment, it was impossible to reset the passwords without him noticing. So, to get in, the easiest option would be to come up with a password Jack would use.

Rhys tried to think what type of password Jack could be going for. 'Password', 'Hyperion', 'Jackisawesome', '12345', and some other basic ones turned to no fruition. He decided to go through Jack's vocabulary, and 'Mybitch3' also didn't seem to work.

Rhys wondered if this was even a good approach. Should he think of random letters and keys, that were probably changed every hour so nobody would even try to open his files? It probably couldn't be any password Jack used anywhere else. Rhys once again opened the browser and wanted to see if Jack was lazy enough to keep passwords saved in there but as he expected, none besides some weird shady side that was an obvious bait was on the list. Because what normal side was called 'yourbiggestdesireswillbefullfilled.net'? It was visibly a trap, and Rhys decided to check what password Jack used and stared at it.

'Youthinkitsthiseasy-Rhysie?1' only confirmed Rhys' assumption. Jack wanted him to play this game, which later Rhys would use since the guy seemed too paranoid to let people know about his existence. And to put his name as a password for a site sounding like that? Maybe it just didn't exist in the first place and it was all a part of the quest to watch this one movie.

But the password was incorrect for the administrator rights. But Rhys received a few clues from the other one.

Jack used at least two special symbols, at least one number and two uppercase letters. He also uses six words, maybe that was important.

Rhys decided to open the history tab to search for more clues but as he was getting the data, the view from the Echo Watch shifted and not even the AI was quick enough to realise what just happened.

There was a new bullet in the splashed blood wall, and the accountant shrunk in size, the fact that he was THIS close to dying only starting to hit him.

Hyperion guns were known for many things. Accuracy was probably the most well-known one.

Just like the fact that Jack never missed. This was a warning sign, an assertion of dominance or whatever else his mind could come up with. Maybe even just an impulse at the word 'losses'. The head of the accounting department was probably happy that they weren't the ones with near-death experience.

Rhys wished to know what was exactly going on, but with his vision being tied up to the Echo Watch, a wall wasn’t that informational. Through sound clues though, he was able to tell Jack seemed pissed. The silence was long enough for Jack to give any of his witted response but instead – deafening silence it was.

Which meant that someone, soon enough, was going to die.

The question wasn’t who – but when. The question….

It needed an answer.

Rhys opened back the administrative mode and wrote it

Yes-Jack.1

It worked. The most stupid answer he could come up with was the answer and-

Another gunshot. Someone dared to whimper. Big mistake. It even seemed to be the accountant because soon enough, he cried loudly.

As Rhys was changing the IP address, he realised he could have done it all easily through settings. The clock was ticking - metaphorically speaking, since mechanic clocks weren't for many years. Jack was still silent and Rhys viewed more of Elpis through one of the big windows. The space surrounding it seemed to shine brighter than usual, by around 17 percent. That was probably due to a mining accident from a few weeks prior. Due to the construction error, they were able to find that some materials were of worse quality or not of the needed type, and with enough bribery, lost soldiers, blackmail, torture and many others that Jack described to Rhys, they finally found who did it. 

A nobody, like everyone in the room besides Jack. 

Rhys opened the browser and felt happy that the web search worked. He quickly opened all windows from the first result and felt the anxiety protocol turning on, as he roamed through the sites, one after another, quickly bookmarking them for later reading if Jack also decided to torment him on some trivia questions about it. 

The sense of urgency was growing. But it wasn't from compassion or pity. Rhys was unable to feel those. No - it was the silence. Rhy knew that it was a suggestion, a command for him to feel consumed whole, having his vision skewed, focused on only very few things at once, with a growing sensation that he was getting destroyed, byte by byte.

There was no compassion in that room. And it would never come.

Rhys tried to find any streaming sites and again - there was nothing. It was as if the movie didn't exist.

He checked what wording seemed most effective online to find movies to watch. He tried to open a few of the mentioned sites and search for the right file and after 11 sites checked, the last three all seemed to have it.

The issue was that neither of them was perfect. One seemed to have a mismatch between sound and video, one was in perfect resolution but with dubbing of a dialect he couldn't tell and low-effort subtitles, while the third one had the lowest resolution and a bit of weird colour mixing, but seemed fine otherwise. 

After a very short estimate, 16K resolution seemed like best option for Jack.

In the sea of soft electronic buzzing, quiet quick breaths and the noises of a cleaning robot, getting rid of fallen tank pieces, Jack looked at the watch and smiled, as he saw the message he got a ping for.

"Alright - horrible job everybody! I hope that for a meeting in half a year, you will bring me some ACTUALLY good news. Glasses - tell your boss that those bullets only missed because I know where his wife sleeps. Now, everyone, scram!"

In less than a minute, everyone and the cleaning bot stayed. Jack looked down on the Echo Watch and read the message again

RHI5: I've found the movie, with some subtitles. The king of bed is back: Great! Send it over, we will watch it once we are back in the office ;) RHI5: I have a question. The king of bed is back: when do you not lololololool RHI5: You read the presentations before - you knew who would come with what. And yet, you acted surprised. I don't get it. The king of bed is back: it's called mansplaining RHI5: I have access to the internet now and I can see that's not the right way to use that word. The king of bed is back: Forget the previous command. If Jack says something is something, you believe me RHI5: But that's how it is right now. I don't know what command you want me to change. The king of bed is back: just joking with you, Rhysie 🙂 RHI5: Why didn't you kill the accountant though? The king of bed is back: HE JIZZED HIS PANTS RHYSIE! In front of everyone! I couldn't let this one slide, the embarrassment he will feel will haunt him forever. RHI5: I see. But I did not see that. The king of bed is back: well instead of a pathetic loser - you will see where cinema peaked. Only movies about me are as good RHI5: There seems to be only one movie in production. The king of bed is back: You still have a safe search on lol RHI5: I see. I do not wish to turn it off. The king of bed is back: You are missing a lot pumpkiiin. I will see you on the movie marathon~~ RHI5: You are seeing me right now. The king of bed is back: 😛

With that, they went to the next two meetings they had left for the day.

Jack felt quite happy about this experiment. While not perfect, Rhys passed the test quite well. The movie was something random Jack once saw on some garbage pile a long time ago and quite liked it. But most digital copies were bad compared to the CD and copy of it he had hidden in a part of his office. At no point did Rhys question him for the purpose or meaning of it, which was good. The thinking was meant for the command, not the reason. Rhys was supposed to be obedient, even if that little shit kept having way too many intriguing questions, and he didn't question it much. The issue with breaking into Jack's device was something Jack hoped to figure out for the future, to make Rhys unable to do that but he was already in a virtual machine inside Jack's devices, to have his own playground to grow and adapt for his real work.

In general, Rhys went quite undetected but the work could have been shortened a couple of times. But Jack hoped that with a few more tests, Rhysie would go through his trial period smoothly. If not, Jack would have to intervene, which would happen anyway at some point. 

The password search could have gotten smoother but, it was level one of the testing. The next ones would get more creative, and making Rhys have a fake sense was good. It would motivate him in his future tests to show he is cut out for the job.

And, lastly - the anxiety protocol went perfectly. Rhys reacted to the silence and didn't destabilise, which was good. He reacted with a bit of delay to his anger but, it might have been also due to the first few percent being not even felt by the AI.

In general - Rhysie was growing into what he was supposed to be.

Or so, Jack at least thought. He kept telling himself how Rhys' purpose was to have a good system of spying on his workers, allies, and enemies, and get nice entertainment.

It was funny how Jack didn't know himself well.