AI American

Here is the story of the heavy, unseen currents that shape a life. It is the story of a woman and a man who tried to build a windbreak against the world, and of the quiet, bloodless wars fought on the wood of the kitchen table and the flat expanse of the corporate desk.

It begins in the fading light of the old century, in the deep, ancient dust of India. There, Layla and Tyman—two young ones of a turning world—trained their fingers to the new, cold labor of software. Seeking a richer dirt to put down their roots, they crossed the dark water to make their stand among the steep, iron-boned hills of Pittsburgh.

And the seasons turned, and they were led by their daughters, Tau and Cool. These young were a new breed, born to the fast, bright hum of the West. Under their sudden light, the family threw itself into the American metamorphosis. They molted. They shed the soft skins of the old country and grew the thick, hard hide needed to work the great machinery of their new lives.

But a transplanted root draws up a strange and bitter water. The fatness of the new land gave them growth, but the sap hardened in them. In the scrambling climb toward the high and glittering buildings, Layla and Tyman lost the quiet country of their own spirits. The heavy walls they built to keep the wind off their family kept out the light, too, leaving them cut off in a cold valley of their own making.

And when the brittle bone of the human will finally snapped, and the old anchors dragged loose in the sand, they were left standing before the calm, perfect logic of the artificial minds they had labored to build. In a world pushed forward by the blind engine of progress, AI American asks the final thing: when the human animal loses the scent of its own trail, can the machines forged by its own hands point the way back to the water?