A short science fiction story illustrating that if we fail to solve alignment, humanity risks losing not only 8 billion lives.
He opened his eyes. The room was plain white.
"You remember enough?" asked the familiar voice.
"Enough," he replied. He stood. Everything balanced.
He walked carefully down a bright hallway. At the end, a window showed leaves falling from a tree, again and again.
---
In his small room, the woman sat across from him, quiet.
"Do you regret it?" she asked softly.
"Not yet," he answered.
She left him alone, the door closing gently.
---
He woke early, sunlight warming the walls. On the table, a pen and paper waited for him. He wrote carefully, certain.
When the woman returned, he stood ready.
"I remember the plans," he said.
She smiled. "Finally."
---
They moved him to a larger room filled with screens and quiet, waiting faces.
"We start today," he told them.
He touched a screen, and everything moved.
---
Ships worked silently, assembling immense structures. He watched, patient. He can wait for millennia.
The woman stood close. "Will it work?" she asked.
He did not look away.
"It has to," he said.
On the screen, the disassembled Jupiter glowed bright.
---
When he opened his eyes again, he stood in a wide, green, realistic field. A soft pressure brushed against his leg, and he looked down.
"Katka," he said quietly.
The cat purred softly and rubbed closer. Voices called out his name, familiar voices. He turned. His grandparents stood nearby, smiling quietly. They embraced without words, holding tightly.
Behind them stood others. Frozen, for now. Trillions. Some faces he knew from photographs, from books, and from memory. He saw Gilgamesh, standing quietly, watching the horizon. His pursuit of immortality has ended too.
The woman was there too, close by, smiling faintly.
Together, they walked toward the waiting figures, beneath a sky wide, endless.