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Description

In spite of the equipment crisis that was going on in Afghanistan in 2011, with operator-controlled drones being both slow to react to insurgent threats and potentially vulnerable to cyber attack, there was some resistance to the introduction of a fully-sentient military AI into the British Army.

The primary contention was the suggestion that fully emancipated AIs did not represent a valid loophole in the Berlin Convention's ruling on autonomous weapon systems. Although the international courts had not specifically ruled against them, the Berlin Convention does not strictly ban autonomous weapons - instead, it squarely defines that the responsibility for their actions lies upon the governments and corporations involved; a legal minefield that few were willing to tread.

As the very few combat AIs who had seen active service had yet to carry out any actions requiring the attention of the international courts, the question of their legal status had thus not yet needed to be defined, and the question remained whether the law would truly seem them as responsible for their own actions.

However, there were those that fell on the other front, unwilling to accept a machine that had full independence. Even nominally fully-autonomous systems had not been able to willingly disobey orders, and been able to have a kill-switch, a shutdown command in case of incident.

The concept of an entirely independent machine with no fail-safes and a prototype super-chassis did not sit well with everyone, and with Athena often being transferred around between commanding officers, it was no surprise that she quickly ended up under an officer who felt the need to assert and test their authority over her - specifically Lt. Sean Barclay.

After a week of menial exercises and drilling, they came to a very abrupt halt (not that Lt. Barclay became any friendlier for it); although Athena wouldn't find it out until considerably later, very stern orders about his behaviour had come down from the top - rumours about an officer discriminating and antagonising the British Army's latest showcase project was not the publicity they were looking for.

Athena was shortly after transferred again. The two never had a chance to reconcile; Barclay was killed in an RPG attack in November 2012.

~~~~~

General background:

"Fracturing Veil" is an in-development science-fantasy setting, set in an alternate modern day where artificial intelligence and robotics have made great leaps; While truly conscious AI remains an highly expensive and equally legislated scarcity, lesser automatons have become a familiar sight throughout the industrialised world.
But under this veil of modernity lies a hidden world of beasts and daemons, a realm kept secret by ancient pacts and concealing magics. The main story revolves around an ex-military AI prototype inadvertently discovering this underground reality, and thus finding herself inducted into a world of the paranormal.

Description

In spite of the equipment crisis that was going on in Afghanistan in 2011, with operator-controlled drones being both slow to react to insurgent threats and potentially vulnerable to cyber attack, there was some resistance to the introduction of a fully-sentient military AI into the British Army.

The primary contention was the suggestion that fully emancipated AIs did not represent a valid loophole in the Berlin Convention's ruling on autonomous weapon systems. Although the international courts had not specifically ruled against them, the Berlin Convention does not strictly ban autonomous weapons - instead, it squarely defines that the responsibility for their actions lies upon the governments and corporations involved; a legal minefield that few were willing to tread.

As the very few combat AIs who had seen active service had yet to carry out any actions requiring the attention of the international courts, the question of their legal status had thus not yet needed to be defined, and the question remained whether the law would truly seem them as responsible for their own actions.

However, there were those that fell on the other front, unwilling to accept a machine that had full independence. Even nominally fully-autonomous systems had not been able to willingly disobey orders, and been able to have a kill-switch, a shutdown command in case of incident.

The concept of an entirely independent machine with no fail-safes and a prototype super-chassis did not sit well with everyone, and with Athena often being transferred around between commanding officers, it was no surprise that she quickly ended up under an officer who felt the need to assert and test their authority over her - specifically Lt. Sean Barclay.

After a week of menial exercises and drilling, they came to a very abrupt halt (not that Lt. Barclay became any friendlier for it); although Athena wouldn't find it out until considerably later, very stern orders about his behaviour had come down from the top - rumours about an officer discriminating and antagonising the British Army's latest showcase project was not the publicity they were looking for.

Athena was shortly after transferred again. The two never had a chance to reconcile; Barclay was killed in an RPG attack in November 2012.

~~~~~

General background:

"Fracturing Veil" is an in-development science-fantasy setting, set in an alternate modern day where artificial intelligence and robotics have made great leaps; While truly conscious AI remains an highly expensive and equally legislated scarcity, lesser automatons have become a familiar sight throughout the industrialised world.
But under this veil of modernity lies a hidden world of beasts and daemons, a realm kept secret by ancient pacts and concealing magics. The main story revolves around an ex-military AI prototype inadvertently discovering this underground reality, and thus finding herself inducted into a world of the paranormal.