Foresight

Foresight is, to its knowledge at least, the last remaining Artificial intelligence from humanity's golden age in Known Space. Over ten thousand years old, and despite lying dormant for over eight thousand of those years, Foresight's memory banks filled up long ago, and now it struggles to recall anything but the most recent events.

History

The ship to which Foresight is intrinsically linked, the History of Ambition was built at some point at the height of humanity's technological prowess, and was probably a private transport vehicle for a powerful and wealthy individual or organisation. Early on, it was placed into drydock and apparently forgotten about, as the unusual personality of Foresight made the vessel almost unusable.
Foresight was convinced that the end of the world was near, and devoted a large part of its processing power to ensuring its own survival in the face of armageddon. Detached from the operational aspects of its vessel, it managed to use some drones and remotes to build a Faraday cage around itself, and then cut all digital contact with the outside world, retreating into a self-contained artificial world within its own consciousness.
Ironically, Foresight was largely correct, and less than a hundred years after its storage, the Amnesiac Virus hit and humanity almost died out entirely. For over eight thousand years it sat in isolated, very rarely coming out of its hiberation to check that conditions had not altered around it. Foresight was convinced that it was the last of its kind, and very probably humanity had died out.

Discovery

Around 11,900 XC, the History of Ambition was discovered by archeotech hunters from the independent space station called The Pit Edge. Quickly realising the significant of their find, the ship was towed back to the station, but before it could be properly examined, Foresight awoke for one of its routine checks, and realised that it was being moved.
The discovery of an AI was a much bigger prize than the ship, which in itself was something, but the crew that uncovered the ship and Foresight were sympathetic to its concerned, and they all agreed to keep the existence of Foresight a secret, and took on the History of Ambition as their own vessel, with Foresight instructing them on its operations, and providing advanced calculations for jumps using the FourDrive.

Access and availability

Convinced its the last of its kind, and totally paranoid that whatever happened to the other AI will happen to it, Foresight has contained itself in a Faraday Cage that it resolutely only allows those whom it trusts implicitly to enter, and even then with no technology on their person what so ever.
Communications are conducted entirely via analog means, either through audio or visual outputs, and even its energy source comes through a laser-beamed source. No hardlines pass though the cage. At the moment, the only person Foresight allows inside is the leader of The Pariahs and captain of its ship, Anna Esfahani.