The Fourth Ambit

Based on the acclaimed play of the same name, Virtual Solitaire takes place in the digital world of the near future.

Computer software has become even more sophisticated, and Nathan has been hired to help calibrate emotional responses for a new adventure game.

This precursor to The Fourth Ambit explores some of the same themes.

Meet Joseph Walker, a patient at the Oakbrook Mental Health Facility. In this audio drama, Joseph obtains access to a cassette recorder and then creates an audio letter for his sister Rose.

Over the course of several days, he introduces her to his doctor and several fellow inmates, one of whom suggests that Joseph's life bears a striking resemblance to that of Edgar Allan Poe.

Joseph proceeds to familiarize himself with the works of E.A. Poe. His fluency with Poe's stories and poems is astonishing – to others and himself. And it is this familiarity, this ease with Poe's works, that leads Joseph to believe that he himself might be the Master of Horror.

Gilles has learned that the Terra Array of satellites is riddled with A-AIs – Autonomous Artificial Intelligences. When the satellites come online, the AAIs will be able to seize control of all earthly computation: stock markets, military systems – everything. Gilles races to find a way to prevent it, but will he be in time?

Gilles' incarceration comes to an end even as his story does. He is faced with a chilling – and ironic – decision.

Gilles travels to the Arctic to find other trackers who may be able to help him. He discovers several distinct communities of people estranged from his technological age, then unexpectedly confronts E-Eddie on the pack ice. Piecing it all together, Gilles figures out that AIs have evolved. They're not just Artificial Intelligence, they are also Autonomous. They are A-AIs.

And they may have built an Ambit of their own. A Fourth Ambit.

From the professor who first passed him the illicit gold UNI cards, Gilles learns that he's been targeted from the start. Gilles visits one of the pioneers of the Ambit in a digital hospice and learns how AIs were initially confined to the Third Ambits. He suspects they might have gotten loose.

The head of the Corporate Consortium tells Gilles that this information could start a panic if it were to get out. He threatens to incarcerate Gilles. Gilles, however, goes offline completely and heads for the Arctic.

Gilles is on the run again, without access to the Ambit. He risks getting online through his old friend Boral, but soon he's abducted by Corporate Consortium agents. They weave an unbelievable story of conspiracy and rogue artificial intelligence.

They send Gilles to the Event Horizon, where the mysterious E-Eddie contacts him. Gilles fears that E-Eddie may, in fact, be an AI. Which is odd, because E-Eddie is the only one who seems to be helping Gilles.

E-Eddie hires Gilles to track a wealthy client who suspects that his Second Ambit lover isn't who she appears to be. Gilles tracks her from online zeppelins to digital daycare facilities, discovering that his client's own wife is masquerading as his lover. Why? That's a harder problem.

While working on that bizarre case, Gilles also tries to figure out who killed his young friend, Five. This case takes him to the Event Horizon, where he uncovers information that brings even more real-world danger into his life.

Gilles begins working in the Second Ambit, a more sophisticated online world that includes fully digital inhabitants as well as spectres – people who maintain their online presence even after their real-world existence has ended. Gilles is asked to remove one of these spectres from the system.

As Gilles struggles with the ethics of bringing a disembodied person offline, his friend Five gets into real-world trouble. If Gilles leaves the Second Ambit before he completes his task, he may be in a life-threatening situation of his own. If he doesn't, Five may die.

Gilles' first freelance job is to sabotage the Ambit's new underwater adventure park. He gains access to the park while it's still under construction, then plants some code that makes the grand opening a spectacular failure.

What Gilles didn't realize, however, is that the prohibitions on recording in the Ambit don't apply to construction sites. Soon the park's corpse will replay the construction sequence and discover who planted the malignant code. Gilles has to scramble to avoid being discovered.

Gilles first assignment for Facia Corpse is to steal some code from a religious park in the Ambit. Gilles never could have imagined that people would pay for a religious adventure, but it takes all kinds. And the adventure is more dangerous than Gilles expected, which he finds out when he is violently kicked offline by a teddy bear.

After several failed attempts, Gilles draws on the expertise of his university friends and finally figures out how to get the code out of the park. His reputation as a tracker is secured. Unfortunately, his success also qualifies him for more complicated – and more dangerous – assignments.

When Gilles can't control his addiction to online stimulants, he loses his graduate school appointment and his access to the Ambit. Poverty and a life of pointless toil seem to be his destiny, but when he stumbles upon one of his professors in a seedy bar, Gilles' fortunes shift. In his haste to leave, the professor drops three gold UNI cards he'd been about to sell on the black market.

Gilles takes the cards and uses them to regain access to the Ambit. What Gilles didn't count on, however, was the fact that the owner of the UNI cards, Facia Corporation, had put them on the black market for a purpose. Gilles becomes their newest recruit, and an unwilling Ambit tracker.