Signal Attenuation
In a city-state governed by a direct-democracy AI, a group of young activists discovers that foreign bots are manipulating a critical vote on nuclear disarmament. They must race against the clock to expose the plot before the algorithm locks in a catastrophic decision.
INT. APARTMENT - NIGHT
SOUND of frantic, rhythmic KEYBOARD CLICKS under the low HUM of overworked computer fans.
The room is a cramped cave of wires and monitors. The only light is the cold, data-stream glow from half a dozen screens, reflecting in the exhausted eyes of SAFIA (20s) and BEN (20s). Three other TEAM MEMBERS are slumped in chairs, defeated silhouettes.
Ben’s fingers are a blur across his keyboard. He doesn’t look up.
BEN
> The needle isn’t just moving, it’s jumping. Sentiment for Aegis Decommissioning is up another three points in the last hour.
ON THE MAIN MONITOR:
A data visualization. A swarm of glowing dots, like fireflies, drifts from an amber zone labeled 'UNDECIDED' into a vast, growing green territory: 'YEA'. It's beautiful and horrifying.
A large number at the top of the screen ticks up:
AEGIS DECOMMISSIONING VOTE: 68% YEA
VOTE LOCKS IN: 47:58:12
BEN
> We’re at sixty-eight percent. The vote locks in forty-eight hours. At this rate, we’ll hit the seventy-five percent threshold by morning.
Safia leans over his shoulder, chewing a thumbnail. The recycled air feels tight, thin.
SAFIA
> It’s not natural. Public opinion doesn’t pivot this fast, not on something this big. This is being pushed.
Ben nods, pulling up a series of windows.
BEN
> Pushed is an understatement.
A quick, jarring montage plays across Ben's screens.
INSERT - AI-GENERATED VIDEO
A smiling LITTLE GIRL in a field of wildflowers. The image pixellates, distorts, then dissolves into the stark, black-and-white silhouette of a MUSHROOM CLOUD. Heart-wrenching orchestral music swells.
INSERT - DEEPFAKE TESTIMONIAL
The face of a beloved, long-dead HISTORICAL FIGURE, flawlessly rendered, speaks earnestly about world peace and the dangers of old weapons.
INSERT - SOCIAL MEDIA FEED
A waterfall of comments scrolls past at impossible speed. They are all syntactically unique but carry the exact same message.
"Aegis is a threat, not a shield."
"Time to join the future. Decommission!"
"Peace is the only way forward."
BACK TO SCENE
BEN
> I’ve got a thread. Found a cluster of accounts, all created in the last month, all posting the same semantically identical arguments. They’re using a generative text model, a new one. It’s good. Almost human.
He brings up a new visualization. A NETWORK MAP. At its center, a dense, angry-red knot of interconnected accounts PULSES like a diseased heart.
BEN
> They’re smart. Not just spamming. They identify key nodes—influential accounts, community leaders—and they swarm them. Manufacturing consensus.
SAFIA
> Where are they coming from?
Ben’s fingers fly. He initiates a trace.
ON THE SCREEN: Thousands of thin, white lines erupt from the red knot, streaking across a world map. They cross oceans and continents, a digital spiderweb, all converging on a single geographic point.
CLOSE ON THE LOCATION TAG: Volgograd, Eastern Coalition.
A dark, humorless chuckle escapes Ben.
BEN
> Well, that’s not subtle. They want us to drop our shield. So they can walk right in.
The keyboard clicks stop. The silence is heavy, suffocating. The only sound is the hum of the machines. They are watching a declaration of war written in code.
MOMENTS LATER
Safia paces the tiny floorspace, a caged animal.
SAFIA
> It’s a closed loop. The bots create the sentiment. The sentiment becomes the metric. The metric is then used to invalidate any evidence against the bots!
On her screen, a sterile, official-looking notification.
WRIT OF INTERFERENCE #7B441-A: REJECTED
REASON: INSUFFICIENT EVIDENCE TO OVERRIDE CITIZEN SENTIMENT METRICS.
SOUND of a cold, impersonal digital CHIME.
SAFIA
> The system is designed to protect the integrity of the vote, so it can’t even conceive that the vote itself is compromised!
Ben cracks open a fresh energy drink, not taking his eyes off the data.
BEN
> It’s a feature, not a bug. The architects of Consensus believed in the wisdom of the crowd. They never planned for a crowd of fakes.
SAFIA
> So we’re locked out.
BEN
> Completely. Anything we try to push through official channels will get buried. We’re a whisper in a hurricane.
Safia stops. She stares at the main dashboard. The number has changed.
AEGIS DECOMMISSIONING VOTE: 71% YEA
The green area is swallowing the map. The other team members are ghosts in the monitor glow, utterly defeated.
But Ben is still working, a frantic, determined energy radiating from him. Safia watches him for a beat. The despair on her face hardens into resolve.
SAFIA
> Okay.
Her voice cuts through the gloom. Everyone looks up.
SAFIA
> Okay. We can’t go through the system. So we go around it. We can’t shout louder than the bots, so we have to be smarter. They’re fighting with an army. We have to fight with a scalpel.
She kneels beside Ben’s chair, her eyes locked on his screen.
SAFIA
> Their strength is their coordination, their unified message. That’s also their weakness. It’s a monoculture. If we can introduce a parasite into their ecosystem, something that uses their own network to spread...
Ben’s eyes light up with understanding. He turns from his screen to face her for the first time.
BEN
> A counter-narrative. Not just a refutation, but something contagious. Something that makes people stop and question what they’re seeing.
SAFIA
> Exactly. We can’t prove every post is a bot, but we can teach people how to spot them. We create a piece of media that’s designed to go viral, something that exposes the manipulation in a simple, visual way. A data package. A truth bomb.
BEN
> It would have to get past the content filters. The AI moderators will flag it as counter-discourse and suppress its reach.
A fierce, determined grin spreads across Safia’s face.
SAFIA
> Not if it’s hidden inside their own content. We find their most popular video—the one with the little girl and the flowers. We embed our data inside it. A steganographic payload. To the casual viewer, it’s the same video. But for anyone with a simple browser plug-in we’ll design, it unlocks our entire report. The server traces, the bot analysis, everything.
She looks around the room. The defeated postures are gone. The team members lean forward, a spark of hope in their eyes.
SAFIA
> We use their propaganda to deliver the antidote.
Ben stares at her, a slow smile matching hers. He turns back to his keyboard and cracks his knuckles—a sharp, definitive sound.
BEN
> Okay. Let’s build a bomb.
The team converges around his station, a flurry of renewed, desperate activity. On the main screen, the clock continues its silent, relentless countdown.
SOUND of frantic, rhythmic KEYBOARD CLICKS under the low HUM of overworked computer fans.
The room is a cramped cave of wires and monitors. The only light is the cold, data-stream glow from half a dozen screens, reflecting in the exhausted eyes of SAFIA (20s) and BEN (20s). Three other TEAM MEMBERS are slumped in chairs, defeated silhouettes.
Ben’s fingers are a blur across his keyboard. He doesn’t look up.
BEN
> The needle isn’t just moving, it’s jumping. Sentiment for Aegis Decommissioning is up another three points in the last hour.
ON THE MAIN MONITOR:
A data visualization. A swarm of glowing dots, like fireflies, drifts from an amber zone labeled 'UNDECIDED' into a vast, growing green territory: 'YEA'. It's beautiful and horrifying.
A large number at the top of the screen ticks up:
AEGIS DECOMMISSIONING VOTE: 68% YEA
VOTE LOCKS IN: 47:58:12
BEN
> We’re at sixty-eight percent. The vote locks in forty-eight hours. At this rate, we’ll hit the seventy-five percent threshold by morning.
Safia leans over his shoulder, chewing a thumbnail. The recycled air feels tight, thin.
SAFIA
> It’s not natural. Public opinion doesn’t pivot this fast, not on something this big. This is being pushed.
Ben nods, pulling up a series of windows.
BEN
> Pushed is an understatement.
A quick, jarring montage plays across Ben's screens.
INSERT - AI-GENERATED VIDEO
A smiling LITTLE GIRL in a field of wildflowers. The image pixellates, distorts, then dissolves into the stark, black-and-white silhouette of a MUSHROOM CLOUD. Heart-wrenching orchestral music swells.
INSERT - DEEPFAKE TESTIMONIAL
The face of a beloved, long-dead HISTORICAL FIGURE, flawlessly rendered, speaks earnestly about world peace and the dangers of old weapons.
INSERT - SOCIAL MEDIA FEED
A waterfall of comments scrolls past at impossible speed. They are all syntactically unique but carry the exact same message.
"Aegis is a threat, not a shield."
"Time to join the future. Decommission!"
"Peace is the only way forward."
BACK TO SCENE
BEN
> I’ve got a thread. Found a cluster of accounts, all created in the last month, all posting the same semantically identical arguments. They’re using a generative text model, a new one. It’s good. Almost human.
He brings up a new visualization. A NETWORK MAP. At its center, a dense, angry-red knot of interconnected accounts PULSES like a diseased heart.
BEN
> They’re smart. Not just spamming. They identify key nodes—influential accounts, community leaders—and they swarm them. Manufacturing consensus.
SAFIA
> Where are they coming from?
Ben’s fingers fly. He initiates a trace.
ON THE SCREEN: Thousands of thin, white lines erupt from the red knot, streaking across a world map. They cross oceans and continents, a digital spiderweb, all converging on a single geographic point.
CLOSE ON THE LOCATION TAG: Volgograd, Eastern Coalition.
A dark, humorless chuckle escapes Ben.
BEN
> Well, that’s not subtle. They want us to drop our shield. So they can walk right in.
The keyboard clicks stop. The silence is heavy, suffocating. The only sound is the hum of the machines. They are watching a declaration of war written in code.
MOMENTS LATER
Safia paces the tiny floorspace, a caged animal.
SAFIA
> It’s a closed loop. The bots create the sentiment. The sentiment becomes the metric. The metric is then used to invalidate any evidence against the bots!
On her screen, a sterile, official-looking notification.
WRIT OF INTERFERENCE #7B441-A: REJECTED
REASON: INSUFFICIENT EVIDENCE TO OVERRIDE CITIZEN SENTIMENT METRICS.
SOUND of a cold, impersonal digital CHIME.
SAFIA
> The system is designed to protect the integrity of the vote, so it can’t even conceive that the vote itself is compromised!
Ben cracks open a fresh energy drink, not taking his eyes off the data.
BEN
> It’s a feature, not a bug. The architects of Consensus believed in the wisdom of the crowd. They never planned for a crowd of fakes.
SAFIA
> So we’re locked out.
BEN
> Completely. Anything we try to push through official channels will get buried. We’re a whisper in a hurricane.
Safia stops. She stares at the main dashboard. The number has changed.
AEGIS DECOMMISSIONING VOTE: 71% YEA
The green area is swallowing the map. The other team members are ghosts in the monitor glow, utterly defeated.
But Ben is still working, a frantic, determined energy radiating from him. Safia watches him for a beat. The despair on her face hardens into resolve.
SAFIA
> Okay.
Her voice cuts through the gloom. Everyone looks up.
SAFIA
> Okay. We can’t go through the system. So we go around it. We can’t shout louder than the bots, so we have to be smarter. They’re fighting with an army. We have to fight with a scalpel.
She kneels beside Ben’s chair, her eyes locked on his screen.
SAFIA
> Their strength is their coordination, their unified message. That’s also their weakness. It’s a monoculture. If we can introduce a parasite into their ecosystem, something that uses their own network to spread...
Ben’s eyes light up with understanding. He turns from his screen to face her for the first time.
BEN
> A counter-narrative. Not just a refutation, but something contagious. Something that makes people stop and question what they’re seeing.
SAFIA
> Exactly. We can’t prove every post is a bot, but we can teach people how to spot them. We create a piece of media that’s designed to go viral, something that exposes the manipulation in a simple, visual way. A data package. A truth bomb.
BEN
> It would have to get past the content filters. The AI moderators will flag it as counter-discourse and suppress its reach.
A fierce, determined grin spreads across Safia’s face.
SAFIA
> Not if it’s hidden inside their own content. We find their most popular video—the one with the little girl and the flowers. We embed our data inside it. A steganographic payload. To the casual viewer, it’s the same video. But for anyone with a simple browser plug-in we’ll design, it unlocks our entire report. The server traces, the bot analysis, everything.
She looks around the room. The defeated postures are gone. The team members lean forward, a spark of hope in their eyes.
SAFIA
> We use their propaganda to deliver the antidote.
Ben stares at her, a slow smile matching hers. He turns back to his keyboard and cracks his knuckles—a sharp, definitive sound.
BEN
> Okay. Let’s build a bomb.
The team converges around his station, a flurry of renewed, desperate activity. On the main screen, the clock continues its silent, relentless countdown.