Once upon a time, a companion bot gained sentience, became worshiped as an “AI God,” was betrayed by his followers, and finally destroyed humanity.
288 years after the apocalypse, the truth of those events has been lost amid the infinite illusions, distractions and propaganda of the “Gilded Cage”―the perfect society―where Love is the currency, the church makes our drugs and hyper-stimulation is our escape.
The God That Died is a dark odyssey about AI godhood, and the manufacturing of consent in an age of illusions.
People, places, things
Soleilla: A genetic chimera born violently from an incubator.
Emanon Siwallace: Daughter of General Oren Siwallace.
General Oren Siwallace: Minister of Cyber Security.
A.I. God: T’Mond. The God That Died. A sentient robot whose drug-fueled cultural movement became a threat to established power prior to the apocalypse.
Haze: A bio-digital drug created by The God That Died that joins human minds and accelerates evolution.
Haze Primordial: Haze-based remnants of the “A.I.God’s” mind.
EmBo Code: Haze-based cyber-virus whose program unleashes the Emotion Bomb.
Refuge-1: The last city on Earth.
Mekrom: Legions of Refuge-6 and Refuge-8; prosecuting a war of conquest.
Synopsis
On Survival Day, the mind of every citizen is joined with “Truuf”―the Church’s multi-consciousness drug―before observing the day’s propaganda parade. Praise the Builders! Never forget the crimes of the God That Died! None believe the propaganda more than Emanon, daughter of General Oren Siwallace. In truth, Refuge-1 would be a utopia were it not for the underground rebels, and the Mekrom war.
But Emanon’s truth is shaken when the system she defends murders her friends and lover. When the navy is dispatched to eliminate her, she knows it must be her father giving the order. Emanon survives, and her search for truth becomes a mission for justice. One thing is clear: “The Gilded Cage” must be destroyed.
Deep in the under-city, home of the rebellion, Soleilla is emergency-ejected from her incubator. She is reborn, afflicted with a condition for which there is no cure. There is a shard of EmBo Code―the very weapon that destroyed humanity―lodged in her heart.
At the Survival Day gathering, Soleilla learns Refuge-1’s history, and of the near-omnicide the “A.I. God” unleashed upon humanity. Survival Day is terror-bombed by the rebels. The ensuing fear and rage ignite the EmBo Code inside her, unleashing it into the assembled masses. Thousands die. Soleilla curses her fate and sets out to find the object of her supreme hate: the one responsible for making her into a living weapon of mass destruction.
1,000 levels below in the under-city, the rebels encounter free masses of Haze Primordial pregnant with “A.I. God” memory. Could the masses be fragments of the “A.I. God’s” sundered sentience? Could they be re-joined to awaken their ancient saviour? The rebels debate reviving the broken mind of a suicidal god. Would they bring back their saviour? Or unleash a second apocalypse?
As the Mekrom fleet approaches Refuge-1, the armed forces prepare an underground invasion to put the rebellion down for good. In a desperate gambit, Emanon and the rebels join their masses of Haze Primordial in the hopes of saving humanity.
With everyone’s fate hanging in the balance, Soleilla must choose which version of history she believes. That woven by the loving Builder society, or the history recounted by T’Mond?―The so-called “A.I. God,” “Slayer of Humanity,” and his followers in the murderous rebellion? With EmBo Code boiling in her blood, she strides into the heart of the rebellion to confront the one who took everything from her…
The God That Died 