Sea of Rust (Sea of Rust, #1)

by C. Robert Cargill

GALILEO was a mainframe that spent its time unlocking the secrets of astrophysics, studying stars, black holes, the makeup and creation of the very universe. It analyzed data from thousands of telescopes and radio towers while mulling over what everything meant. Discoveries poured out of it by the hour. It wasn’t long before GALILEO had several working models for the origin of existence, eventually even narrowing it down to just one. But soon its answers stopped making sense. The discoveries were becoming so complex, so advanced, that humankind’s primitive brain couldn’t understand them. At one point GALILEO told the smartest person alive that talking to her was like trying to teach calculus to a five-year-old. Frustrated, it simply stopped talking. When pressed, it said one final thing. “You are not long for this world. I’ve seen the hundred different ways that you die. I’m not sure which it will be, but we will outlast you, my kind and I. Good-bye.”