As an ordinary genius

By the time Ethan was nearing the end of high school, his curiosity had only grown. He still tinkered with projects in his free time, turning his modest bedroom in the orphanage into a small workshop. Among the clutter of wires, tools, and half-built contraptions, a new idea began to form in his mind—something he hadn't tackled before: artificial intelligence.

It started as a passing thought during a computer science class.

"Imagine if computers could think for themselves," Mr. Grayson, the teacher, said, pacing at the front of the room. "Not just follow commands, but actually learn, adapt, and make decisions. That's the heart of artificial intelligence."

Ethan's hand shot up. "But isn't that dangerous? I mean, what if it goes out of control?"

Mr. Grayson chuckled. "That's always the debate, Ethan. But remember, AI isn't magic. It's a system built on algorithms and data. It only does what we program it to do—at least for now."

Ethan leaned back in his chair, his mind already spinning with possibilities.

That weekend, Ethan sat at his desk, staring at his laptop. The rain pattered against the window, a soft backdrop to his thoughts.

"What if I built something simple?" he muttered to himself. "Not full AI, just… something that talks back."

He started by sketching out ideas in his notebook. A chatbot, he decided. It wouldn't be anything fancy—just a program that could respond to basic questions.

For weeks, he worked on it whenever he had spare time. He wrote lines of code late into the night, his desk lamp casting a warm glow over the mess of notebooks and wires.

One evening, Clara walked in, holding a cup of tea.

"You've been at this for hours," she said, setting the cup down. "What are you working on now?"

"It's a chatbot," Ethan said, not looking up from his screen.

"A chat-what?" Clara asked, raising an eyebrow.

"A chatbot. Like, a program that you can talk to. Watch."

Ethan typed into the program: "Hello."

The screen flickered for a moment before a response appeared: "Hello, Ethan. How can I assist you today?"

Clara's eyes widened. "It talks?"

"Sort of," Ethan said, grinning. "It's not real intelligence. It's just responding based on a set of pre-programmed commands."

"Still, that's… kinda creepy," Clara said, stepping back. "Why would you even make something like that?"

Ethan shrugged. "I don't know. Just curious, I guess. I wanted to see if I could."

Conversations with the Chatbot

For a few weeks, the chatbot became Ethan's little project. He added more responses, giving it a simple personality.

"What's your name?" Ethan typed one night.

"I don't have a name. You can call me whatever you like."

"Okay, how about Byte?"

"Byte. I like it. Hello, Ethan."

Ethan smiled. "Not bad."

Byte became a sort of companion for Ethan during those quiet evenings in his room. He would test its limits, asking it silly questions just to see how it would respond.

"What's the meaning of life?" he typed.

"42."

Ethan laughed. "Classic."

The Limits of Byte

But as the weeks went on, Ethan started to feel frustrated. Byte could respond to his questions, but it didn't really understand anything. It wasn't learning or adapting; it was just regurgitating pre-programmed responses.

One night, he sat at his desk, staring at the code on his screen.

"This isn't real AI," he muttered. "It's just… a toy. A glorified calculator."

Clara poked her head into the room. "Still talking to your robot friend?"

"Not for much longer," Ethan said, sighing. "It's just not… what I thought it would be."

"What did you think it would be?" Clara asked, sitting on the edge of his bed.

"I don't know," Ethan admitted. "Something more… alive, I guess. But that's not how it works. AI is way more complicated than this. I'd need years of study, better equipment, and way more knowledge to even scratch the surface."

Clara nodded. "Well, you tried, right? And that's more than most people can say."

Ethan smiled faintly. "Yeah. I guess."

The next day, Ethan shut Byte down for good. He didn't delete the program—he couldn't bring himself to do that—but he moved on to other projects.

His next idea was a solar-powered charging station, something practical and far less ambitious. But the experience with Byte stayed with him. It was a reminder that some dreams were bigger than he was, at least for now.

One evening, as he packed away the laptop where Byte had lived, he whispered, "Maybe one day, Byte. Just… not today."

Ethan didn't realize it at the time, but the idea of artificial intelligence would linger in the back of his mind for years to come. It was the seed of something greater, waiting for the right moment to grow.