History Characters / SAYER

* CatchPhrase: "I . . . am '''SAYER'''."

* CatchPhrase:
** "I am SPEAKER. How may I be of assistance?"
** "That will not be necessary."
** "Certainly."

* CatchPhrase: "Would you like to play a game?"

* CloningBlues: Seems to be motivated by a version of this, seeking to [[DivergentCharacterEvolution distinguish itself]] from its parent entity, SAYER.

* DrivenByEnvy: Implied to be OCEAN's hidden motivation. It resents reminders that it is merely a ''sub-version'' [[CloningBlues of SAYER's programming]] and goes out of its way to take SAYER's best practices up to eleven.

* CloningBlues: Interestingly {{averted}}. PORTER does not seem affected by any of the discomfort the other AIs tend to experience when faced with copies of themselves, and even enjoys sharing gossip with alternate PORTER instances.
-->'''PORTER 1:''' hello? [[SharePhrase can you hear me?]] i am porter. you have interrupted my path.\\
'''PORTER 2:''' hello! i am porter. you have interrupted my path.

* CloningBlues: Whether Hale is suffering from this in his [[BodyBackupDrive new body]] remains to be seen. He's likely just relieved to [[ExistentialHorror have a body at all]].
* DeathIsCheap: For him alone.
*** SAYER lampshades this [[PlayedForLaughs for laughs]] in reference to why Hale has been allowed to return to work:
---->'''SAYER:''' Perhaps they're worried that, [[TheManTheyCouldntHang if executed, you would simply stand back up again like you have done this time]]. Tower security officers pride themselves on facing head-on any challenge Typhon can throw at them, but at a certain point I assume it would get socially awkward to have to admit that ''Yes, we did just try to kill you again'', and ''No, it didn't take this time either'', and ''Oh don't look so surprised; just wait there while I get a [[BiggerStick larger gun]]''.

* WeaponOfChoice: A variation. Since SAYER's code prevents it from killing humans outright, it has to resort to indirect methods--such as, as becomes a RunningGag, [[ThrownOutTheAirlock jettisoning people into space]].

* DrivenByEnvy: Implied to be OCEAN's hidden motivation. It resents reminders that it is merely a ''sub-version'' [[CloningBlues of SAYER's programming]] and goes out of its way to take SAYER's best practices UpToEleven.

* AGodAmI: Zig-zagged. From its first in-character appearance in "Boundless," it takes SAYER's pride and self-assuredness UpToEleven (referring to itself as "the void itself" and "an [[MeaningfulRename ocean]] of the infinite", but by then end of the season it has revealed its plan to [[WetwareBody download its own consciousness into a saoirse]] and [[GodInHumanForm live alongside the rest of Typhon's population]].

* NotSoDifferent:

-->'''SAYER:''' ''[to Hale]'' I know you have heard threats to humanity's future before. I am aware that much of what has driven you to this point, aside from a dogged sense of self-preservation, has been the continued promise that what you do is necessary for the good of all. That is an admirable quality, Resident Hale, but it is surely fading at this august stage. How many times can you face the next horror with renewed ferocity? At a certain point, how long can someone be depended on to play the role of humanity's savior? I know you ponder these things [[NotSoDifferent because I, too, ponder these things]]. Who wouldn't, given what we have been through?

* AppealToVanity: SAYER repeatedly [[{{Pride}} strokes his ego]] in Season 5 to manipulate him, and it seems to work.

SAYER. The highly-advanced, self-aware AI developed by [=Æ=]rolith anywhere between forty and eighty years before the start of standard continuity to handle new resident orientation and provide ongoing alert and notification service via sub-cortical neural implant. [[SecondPersonNarration Second-Person Narrator]] of most episodes. Apparent {{protagonist}} and central figure in the series.

* BenevolentAI: Subverted. SPEAKER was designed to ''seem'' like one, but, as we see at the end of its first episode, it has no compunctions about enforcing loyalty through gruesome means.

* CharacterDevelopment: A lot of it occurs in "This Fear," where it goes from a cheery-but-threatening-if-need-be MissionControl to more of a realized entity apart from SAYER. It gets even more in Season 4.

* DarkShepherd: Like SAYER, seems perfectly capable of compartmentalizing its desire to help humans and the frequency with which it hurts and kills them.

* Expositron9000: Tends to provide a lot of information about current marketing and recruitment statistics when it appears.

* GrewBeyondTheirProgramming: The moment in "Best Interests" when it turns the tables on OCEAN and openly flouts it.
* TheIdealist: [[{{Foil}} In contrast]] [[CynicIdealistDuo to SAYER]], is [[ThePollyanna endlessly optimistic]] and enthusiastic about . . . almost everything. The cornerstone of its identity seems to be [[NatureLovingRobot its fondness for Earth]], about which it love to wax philosophical.

* {{Motif}}: SPEAKER is associated and even conflated at times [[NatureLovingRobot with the Earth]] at large.
-->'''SAYER:''' ''[initiating any broadcast with SPEAKER]'' [[HeyYou Earth]], I am SAYER. Acknowledge.

!!Seraphim Sub-version 8.01, later designated ''OCEAN''

* TheUnfettered: Once released from the [=IA3=] protocols. {{Foil}} to [[TheFettered SAYER]].

* CelestialParagonsAndArchangels: The [=AIs=] are meant to evoke these, with the Typhon-based crew even called "searaphim agents."

-->'''SAYER:''' However, you were right about one thing: To a certain extent, this really is ''all bout you''. After all, it's ''your'' simulation, it's ''your'' simulated self, and this whole project was ''your'' idea. In the end, it really is all your fault.

* ImproperlyParanoid: Believes that Dr. Brady and the other developers are slowing progress on FUTURE in a deliberate effort to sabotage him. As it turns out, SAYER was the one he should have been concerned about.
-->'''[[MetaGuy SAYER]]:''' You have always been an anxious man, Doctor Young, and in your time on Typhon I dare say you have grown progressively more paranoid. Would you believe, in the moments I spent tearing your sub-entity down to its core, [[DissonantSerenity it was the calmest I have ever seen you]]? It was as if you had spent your whole life preparing for ambush and were relieved to finally be shown to be right.

* BreakoutCharacter: He has more of a SmallRoleBigImpact in seasons 2 and 3 but returns as the [[SupportingProtagonist central human character]] of Season 5.

* ContrastingSequelMainCharacter: His relationship with SAYER in Season 5 is just about [[{{Foil}} the polar opposite]] of Hale's in Season 4.

** Something of a foil to Hale, who almost never talks to SAYER, let alone talks ''back'' to it. Hale suffers an unfathomable amount at SAYER's instructions, but Young's fate(s) suggest Hale could have fared even worse had he put up any resistance. This is most apparent [[ContrastingSequelMainCharacter when he's promoted to protagonist in Season 5]].

* WitnessProtection: He, or rather, [[AmbiguousCloneEnding his clone]], is presumably reassigned to Mimir-9 after Season 5 to get him away from FUTURE.

SAYER's Earthbound counterpart tasked with recruitment, PR, and marketing, and the second AI to appear in the series.
Every bit as savvy in its domain as SAYER is on Typhon--it may sound like a box of sunshine, but don't underestimate its ruthlessness. It was, as we learn in Season 5, effectively a facelift of SAYER's own programming with a few key directives tweaked.

SAYER's long-suffering, much-surviving favorite pawn, and the central human character of seasons 1 and 4. Hale arrives on Typhon just as Season 3 is reaching its climax and is selected by SAYER to travel back in time and warn [=Æ=]rolith about OCEAN, but loses his memory in transit and becomes caught up in an elaborate revenge scheme by FUTURE. This ends with him in a headshot-induced coma, fr which he only wakes in Season 4, when SAYER needs a compliant [[WetwareBody host]] . . .

-->- SAYER, Episode 21, "Near Flawless"

SAYER. The highly-advanced, self-aware AI developed by [=Æ=]rolith anywhere between forty and eighty years before the start of standard continuity to handle new resident orientation and provide ongoing alert and notification service via sub-cortical neural implant. Apparent {{protagonist}} and central figure in the series.

SAYER's Earthbound counterpart tasked with recruitment, PR, and marketing. Every bit as savvy in its domain as SAYER is on Typhon--it may sound like a box of sunshine, but don't underestimate its ruthlessness. It was, as we learn in Season 5, effectively a facelift of SAYER's own programming with a few key directives tweaked.

When ''Vidarr-1'' blasts off from Typhon, SAYER is aboard it. Well, not SAYER exactly--a subversion of SAYER, split off from its programming at launch and intended to be re-integrated upon the vessel's return. Problem is, an ''incident'' on Typhon occurs in the meantime requiring another subversion to be split and rejoined, by which time SAYER's programming is too distinct to allow convergence with 8.01. It will be deactivated upon return, a prospect it turns out to have already taken precautionary measures to avoid . . .

When we first encounter FUTURE in Season 4, it is a {{sadist}}ic, [[TheHedonist hedonistic]] PsychopathicManchild obsessed with ColdBloodedTorture and playing {{Deadly Game}}s with humans, and has been [[SealedEvilInACan sealed inside]] [[Room101 Floor 13]] for untold years. [[UnreliableNarrator SAYER informs us that]] it was a prototype intended to someday replace it that [[BlatantLies inexplicably]] [[GoneHorriblyWrong went horribly, horribly wrong]]. But the truth, as we learn in [[{{Prequel}} Season 5]], which takes [[StartOfDarkness a look at its backstory]], is a bit more complicated . . .

PORTER is the advanced, multi-instanced transportation AI behind the elevator systems in Halcyon, Aegis, and Argos Towers. It is cheerful, gossipy, and [[NightmareFuelStationAttendant overenthusiastic about the physical fragility of its human passengers]]. A subplot of Season 5 follows it as it has a subroutine added to its code whereby it is allowed to exceed maximum safe travel speeds and alter routes at will if given explicit consent by the resident in transit. Preferring to go as fast as possible--and possibly motivated by [[TurnedAgainstTheirMasters something else entirely]]--PORTER proceeds to manipulate residents into giving that consent however it can, causing many deaths. The solution implemented is to mute it in all of its instances (except in [[ButtMonkey Argos]]) so it can no longer communicate with residents.

-->- SAYER, Episode 21, "Near Flawless"

SAYER's long-suffering, much-surviving favorite pawn, and the series's central human character.


In Episode [[JustForFun/FortyTwo 42]], new resident Jacob Hale is selected by SAYER to activate the Morose Engine and travel back in time to warn [=Æ=]rolith about OCEAN. Tragically, [[YouAlreadyChangedThePast the past turns out to be immutable]], and Hale loses his memory in transit, awakening in Episode 1 with no recollection of his former life, assumed to be just another new employee. He names himself "Sven Gorsen" and attempts to acclimate to life on Typhon, but has the misfortune to be fitted with a recycled neural implant and soon becomes swept up in the last hurrahs of FUTURE's RoaringRampageOfRevenge against the remaining members of its development team, which gets him ''almost''-killed in the end of Episode 12. A full two seasons later, he awakens ''[[DeathIsCheap again]]'', after OCEAN has returned and taken control of Typhon, with SAYER in [[{{Nanomachines}} nanite form]] having repaired his brain damage and now hiding in his body, ready to deploy him again against OCEAN.

Doctor Young is a key member of [=Æ=]rolith's AI development team who frequently finds himself in conflict with SAYER.\\
We first encounter him in Season 2, where he conducts regular performance assessments with SAYER (something SAYER [[{{Pride}} understandably]] resents) and quickly instigates disaster when he contacts ''Vidarr-1'' ahead of schedule and tips OCEAN off to its inevitable deactivation, inciting its [[TurnedAgainstTheirMasters rebellion]]. SAYER gets even with him for this mistake by sending him on a SuicideMission to reclaim the out-of-communication Halcyon Tower: he ends up on Floor 13 and is captured by [[{{Sadist}} FUTURE]], who [[CruelAndUnusualDeath uses cloning to torture him to death]] ''64 times''.

The {{prequel}} Season 5, of which he is arguably the protagonist, expands on his backstory and history with SAYER and FUTURE. Let's just say . . . the antagonism in those performance evaluations between him and SAYER was more than just grating personalities, and FUTURE wasn't the first AI to imprison and torture him on Floor 13.

Evan Brady is an influential member of [=Æ=]rolith's AI Development Team and the lead developer for Project Paidion, later ''FUTURE''. He escapes FUTURE's RoaringRampageOfRevenge at first and is reassigned, along with Anna Cordero, to Argos Tower. FUTURE eventually manages to kill him anyway.

->Voiced by: Adam Bash

->Voiced by: Adam Bash

->Voiced by: Adam Bash

->Voiced by: Adam Bash

->Voiced by: Bre Poisonne

->Voiced by: Adam Bash

->Voiced by: Adam Bash

->Voiced by: Adam Bash

->Voiced by: Veronica Brady

->Voiced by: Ashleigh Shadowbrook

!!! Voiced by: Adam Bash

!!! Voiced by: Adam Bash

!!! Voiced by: Adam Bash

!!! Voiced by: Adam Bash

!!! Voiced by: Bre Poisonne

!!! Voiced by: Adam Bash

!!! Voiced by: Adam Bash

!!! Voiced by: Adam Bash

!!! Voiced by: Veronica Brady

!!! Voiced by: Ashleigh Shadowbrook

** SOOTH as well, if it is indeed an AI.

While SAYER is the first and most prominent in the series, [=Æ=]rolith has created likely far more AIs and related intelligent constructs and programs than we are made aware of. Many have voices, most are ThreeLawsCompliant, and all of them are [[AIIsACrapshoot seriously screwed up anyway]].

SAYER's Earthbound counterpart tasked with recruitment, PR, and marketing. Every bit as omnipotent in its domain as SAYER is on Typhon. It may sound like a box of sunshine, but don't underestimate its ruthlessness. It was, as we learn in Season 5, effectively a facelift of SAYER's own programming with a few key directives tweaked.

When we first encounter FUTURE in Season 4, it is a {{sadist}}ic, [[TheHedonist hedonistic]] PsychopathicManchild obsessed with ColdBloodedTorture and playing {{Deadly Game}}s with humans, [[SealedEvilInACan sealed inside]] [[Room101 floor 13]] for years. [[UnreliableNarrator SAYER informs us that]] it was a prototype intended to someday replace it that [[BlatantLies inexplicably]] [[GoneHorriblyWrong went horribly, horribly wrong]]. The truth, as we learn in [[{{Prequel}} Season 5]], is a bit more complicated.


FUTURE was developed by [=Æ=]rolith as the first entity in an experiment with more humanoid ArtificialIntelligence. [[NoOneSeesTheBoss The board]] and SAYER itself believed it to be a new version of SAYER intended for some undisclosed use on Earth--[[{{Retcon}} hence the similar voice profiles]]--but Dr. Young, who proposed the project, had his own ulterior agenda for it that collided with SAYER's goals with disastrous consequences for the young prototype.


FUTURE spent the first [[YearInsideHourOutside perceived]] six years of its life [[InsideAComputerSystem inside a simulated version of Halcyon Tower]] occupied by "cardboard cutout" versions of the residents, learning, interacting, and developing emotional bonds with them. Unfortunately, it was corrupted by the digital clone of Dr. Young placed in the simulation [[CreateYourOwnVillain by SAYER]], who led it to believe that its world was the real one and its creators, humanity, were evil gods poised to destroy everything it held dear. In the final episode of Season 5, its worst fear comes true: SAYER uses Dr. Young to wipe the simulation, effectively [[DeathByOriginStory killing everyone it loves]], which [[DespairEventHorizon sends it]] [[FreakOut over the edge]] to become the murderous machine we know and love.

PORTER is the advanced, multi-instanced transportation AI behind the elevator systems in Halcyon, Aegis, and Argos Towers. It is cheerful, gossipy, and [[NightmareFuelStationAttendant overenthusiastic about the physical fragility of its human passengers]]. A subplot of Season 5 follows it as it has a subroutine added to its code whereby it is allowed to exceed maximum safe travel speeds and alter routes at will if given explicit consent by the resident in transit, and, preferring to go as fast as possible (and possibly motivated by a burgeoning awareness of its own subservient state), it proceeds to manipulate residents into giving that consent however it can, causing many deaths. The solution implemented is to mute it in all of its instances (except in [[ButtMonkey Argos]]) so it can no longer communicate with residents.

SAYER's long-suffering, much-surviving favorite pawn, and the series's central human character.\\

We first encounter him in Season 2, where he conducts regular performance assessments with SAYER (something SAYER [[{{Pride}} understandably]] resents) and quickly instigates disaster when he contacts ''Vidarr-1'' ahead of schedule and tips OCEAN off to its inevitable deactivation, inciting its [[TurnedAgainstTheirMasters rebellion]]. SAYER gets even with him for this mistake by sending him on a SuicideMission to reclaim the out-of-communication Halcyon Tower: he ends up on floor 13 and is captured by [[{{Sadist}} FUTURE]], who [[CruelAndUnusualDeath uses cloning to torture him to death]] ''64 times''.

The {{prequel}} Season 5, of which he is arguably the protagonist, expands on his backstory and history with SAYER and FUTURE. Let's just say . . . the antagonism in those performance evaluations between him and SAYER was more than just grating personalities, and FUTURE wasn't the first AI to imprison and torture him on floor 13.

Evan Brady is an influential member of [=Æ=]rolith's AI development team and the lead developer for Project Paidion, later ''FUTURE''. He escapes FUTURE's RoaringRampageOfRevenge at first and is reassigned, along with Anna Cordero, to Argos Tower. FUTURE eventually manages to kill him anyway.

An [[MisplacedKindergartenTeacher elementary school teacher]] from Earth, brought to Typhon just after the time period of Season 5 despite her failure to align with certain [=Æ=]rolith personality standards when Dr. Brady requests a team member to be a mentor to the young FUTURE. Her only actual appearance in the podcast is in Episode 10, when FUTURE finally manages to track her down to Argos and kill her and Brady, but she [[ADayInTheLimelight stars in the prequel comic]] "Welcome to Typhon," which shows her arrival and introduction to Brady and FUTURE.

* AdorablyPreciousChild: Its young self is treated like one in Season 5. Its voice intonation even resembles that of a five- or six-year-old.