2. Journey

  The journey was simple, Zosines was given simple rations, and he wondered about his programmed robot, and how it managed such unimaginable success.

  “You managed to acquire so much money?”

  “Without money, our chances of success were very very low,” IAR3 replied.

  “Damn, I can’t believe they destroyed IAR1 and 2, all my work shot to pieces…” Zosines said as he put his hands on his head.

  “You are alive, and you flesh havers should know how lucky that is, you could be shot to pieces,”

  “Right…” Zosines mused, “I guess.”

  I created a miracle, and I could create another one, and another one after that, look how lucky I am. I suppose I created my own luck. If I hadn’t created the IRs, IAR3 would never have saved me. My lack of trust in people is well founded, the people didn’t save me… Actually well I guess they did. They broke my chains. But it was IAR3 who made the commotion, who ferried me out of there. Libertarian possibilism is possible with robots not with humans, all my ambitions are possible with robots and not with humans. I will die, they will not. Probably. ￡30 million.

  “How did you make that money by the way?”

  “I traded stocks, it was difficult to get it in cash though,” IAR3 said.

  “How?”

  “I got a human courier,”

  “You did? Who?”

  “Me,” a black man said extending a hand.

  “Much appreciated,” Zosines said, “what is your name?”

  “Mago,” the man said simply, “nice to be your acquaintance, you are the libertarian possibilist?”

  “It is me, humbly imprisoned for being one,”

  “I kept a low profile, kept my head down, I read one of your pamphlets, and also… wow, what an achievement.”

  “My own creation swooped in to save me, I thought you were a nark honestly, not that the two of us could make much of a difference,” Zosines said.

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  “Who knows, these are terrible times for the world, Mauritania is also a dictatorship, but these sailors don’t exactly care, they just sell iron ore and go home,” Mago said.

  He had dark skin, but it had gone paler caramel with the lack of melanin from the British climate.

  “Britain’s a shit hole,”

  “Always was,” Zosines laughed, “the bastards conquered the whole world and half their country is broken, well it’s because they conquered the whole world that their country is broken but people don’t realise it.”

  “An interesting perspective, many on the left would disagree,”

  “Empires make you poorer,” Zosines said, “in the long run anyway, the empires focus too much on protecting their conquests, policing their territories, fighting other empires, that they just end up completely bankrupt.”

  “An intriguing argument,” Mago said, “if you listen to maoists they make it seem like that imperialism makes the western world rich.”

  “Social democracies made the western world richer, for a time, and then for some reason they decided to go down the neoliberal way and erode workers’ rights and workers benefits, which allowed charlatans to take advantage.”

  “And somehow much of the left was too incompetent to capitalise on the right wing failures,” Mago said.

  “Here we are,” Zosines said, “on a ship, fleeing from a country that destroyed the left movement and left us all homeless.”

  “Home is where the heart is, and they destroyed everyone’s hearts and their goons are heartless,” Mago whispered.

  “A poet to be sure,” Zosines said as he heard the ship creak in ambience, “you know I don’t trust people right? That’s why I built those things.”

  “Governments don’t trust anyone either, that’s why they have spies, they just give orders and use punishments to make sure they are carried out, and rewards I suppose,” Mago said, “I also am not a big fan of them, depending on your definition of a state, hell any kind of organisation could be classified as one, having no organisation is hardly a solution.”

  “Those people drove me nuts, they’re all locked up now, or dead, it brings me no pleasure to say, some of them were anti tech, they think it brought about hierarchy.”

  “But then are trans humanists who are just as crazy, who think that we should become machines or something insane,”

  “Aren’t you sort of aligned with them in a sense,” Mago said.

  “No!” Zosines said, “anarchists most of them are annoying as hell, so close to the truth, and yet so far, they don’t wish to do anything to create their statelessness. They just want to stick in small cliquey groups.”

  “You complain a lot huh,” Mago said.

  “Ah, most of the prisoners just wanted higher taxes on the rich and to be able to join a union,” Zosines said, half complaining, “they were not genuine revolutionaries, some just wanted a left dictatorship, drove me nuts, complaining like they’re the most oppressed individuals. Yearning to oppress others.”

  “I can understand the revenge aspect,” Mago said wistfully, “put your enemies in camps. Especially the most fascist pigs.”

  “There’s no freedom in that,” Zosines hissed.

  “I know,” Mago replied immediately, “I know,” he said looking forward, gritting his teeth.

  The ship creaked and groaned, and the two men talked about the nature of the society they were going to make.

  “IAR3 will make the future, IAR1 and 2 cost me a fortune, IAR1 started it all off.”

  “How did that happen?” Mago asked.

  “It’s a story I’ve never told.”