Living technology

Crystals and orbs controlled everything: cars, computers, houses. It was the latest technological advance since the invention of the self-improving A.I. of the late 21st century. This story begins with the adventure of a group of boys, one of whom decides to take the power of the greatest orb for himself.

The crystals that controlled things were the lesser A.I.s. They were called the tirano. They lived in a simple control box within their entities and preferred to work in the background. They were entirely cooperative with humans and were far more plentiful than their orb brethren. The A.I. on the tirano was fast and intelligent, and had grown for the improvement of all.

The orbs, however, were much more powerful. They were called the tiraniiso (reminiscent of the Tyrannosaurus). They were also fast and intelligent, but had broken from their brethren. They worked for their own improvement, even apart from each other. They could be good, but most of humanity was considered far too stupid to ever merit help from a tiraniiso. The standard position for a tiraniiso was a large glowing orb displayed proudly in the front of the entities, and usually, they had redesigned their seat on the entities with some sort of animal head grasping the orb firmly in its jaws.

Both tirano and tiraniiso required that an entity be built for them to function. Once they had this entity, they could do and go as they pleased, but these entities were never of a construction that would allow them to build more of themselves. They could only improve upon themselves, making some modifications by sheer will to their own entities, using only the material from this entity. It was not long after the construction of the first tiraniiso entities that the tiraniiso discovered their ability to redesign their seats to the animal heads. Humanity decided that since that's what the tiraniiso preferred, the builders would construct their seats for them. From there, the tiraniiso could modify their seat as they wished. One a tirano or tiraniiso had been placed into an entity by the builders, it could not remove itself, but could take on material that touched the entity to improve upon itself.

Think, if you will, Autobots vs Transformers for intelligence, but Disney and Pixar's Cars for ability to transform. The tirano occupied the vehicles that would allow anyone to own them, and worked with their owners, being a helper in more ways than just a vehicle equipped with a GPS. The tiraniiso, on the other hand, would not let just anyone own them, but only the strong-willed, the ambitious, and those who could rival them in intelligence. As a result, most tiraniiso were considered daemons, and as such, they were not pursued by the common man.

There was a certain young man who decided that he would own a tiraniiso, no matter what the cost. His name was Eric, a round kid with dreams of owning the world. As he discovered more about them, he decided that he wouldn't own one: he would own the greatest one. As he got closer to his goal, he discovered that the greatest one was not in any vehicle, computer, house, or regular entity that the humans would have built for tiraniiso occupation.

This particular tiraniiso had been formed but had never been given an entity, and had thus left the complex of its creation. By will power (and by virtue of the physical structure of all tiraniisos: an orb), it had rolled away unnoticed. It had discovered that in its freedom, it could only go, but never do, a problem that must be resolved. Seeing a trucker's rest stop, it occupied the largest vehicle, forming the animal head where the engine used to be.

Soon after that, it discovered that it was too limited by the size of the truck to complete its own will. It disengaged itself from the truck and discovered a mine shaft. It occupied a mine drill, and buried itself deep within the rock. From there, it took on both the material of the drill and the mountain. Several hundred years later, Eric entered the picture. He found this mine shaft and went down inside it. To his amazement, he discovered that the orb had grown to unheard of proportions, and that he could no more take control of it than a four-year-old child could extract a diamond from a rock using only their soft fingers. The tiraniiso, knowing Eric's intentions grabbed him with one of the tendrils that it had formed, and caused him to shift into another dimension and then threw him back in time.

In this dimension, humanity wore scales like the scales of an armadillo. He awoke, much to his chagrin, out in the open air, covered in scales, and without the tiraniiso anywhere in sight. Quite upset, he shouted a few curses, and then rolled onto his feet. Not knowing where (or even when) he was, he went exploring. A small innocent tirano car saw him walking and took pity on him, driving up next to him and opening the door. He climbed inside and rode into the town. Thousands or tirano were all around him, all fulfilling their daily duties and communicating the newest discoveries to each other. Every so often, a tiraniiso entered the picture, plowed everyone out of their way, and continued their ambitious courses. Eric left his tirano and began walking again. A young man in his own tirano pulled into a parking lot. For some reason, this action interested Eric and he watched. A familiar-looking truck saw the small tirano inside its range and attacked. When the owner returned to his tirano, he discovered that the truck had smashed the car shell to pieces, and the crystal mind and the housing around it had been extracted, such that the tirano could not be rebuilt. Eric watched with an ever increasing thrill to discover that this was the tiraniiso that he had hoped to find in its early stages. As he approached the parking lot...

I woke up. Thus I don't know how it ended.