Automata

Two

     Her first stop when she got home was to flip the Comms terminal on and rattle out a hasty message to her contact in Kiravai Territory; a young dark pewter Cob by the name of Shie. She wanted his opinion before she did anything – he was her main contact in the Kiravai equivalent of the industry; for practicality’s sake he was an engineer, but for reasons more to do with psychology he called himself a surgeon.
     Kirasiinu held a strange place in Vei’la society – so when she’d first introduced herself to Shie, he’d been fairly hostile, naturally polite but sharp-natured and curt of manner, seeing her as just another of the money-hungry “Drivers”. (They didn’t complain outright, of course, what people did with technology that had exchanged hands fairly was none of their business, but there was a simmering resentment in Kiravai society, and the subtle opinion that they’d sold their adopted-kinsfolk into slavery.) After getting to know each other a little better, though, the relationship between Shie and Ivy improved vastly; he was quick to give her information so long as she used it to further the “greater good”, and in turn she kept him abreast of latest developments on her side of the territorial line.
     It’d take him a fair while to return her communiqué, she knew – face-to-face over this sort of distance needed an ultra-high-speed Infraspatial uplink, and they were expensive, you only even tried it if you were sure your contact was waiting at the other end of the line. Besides, the planetary calculator said it was night-time over there, so it’d probably be late evening, her time, before he even read it, let alone replied to it.
     That left her a lot of thinking time. She sat down at her dining table with an incredibly-old-fashioned pencil and paper, and tried to plot out what her experiment was designed to actually do. It was nothing more than a wherg-brained idea spawned by too much caffeine and bad spice in the café at lunch, right now. She wanted to have at least an idea of what she was trying to accomplish before her precious (expensive) purchase arrived, if only so she could tell it what she was doing, because it was bound to ask.
     So. She chewed her pencil. What was she trying to achieve? That was the biggie – she didn’t even really know what she was trying to do. She sighed. Impulse buys had always been a problem for her – she’d fork out more cash than she could afford (lots more in this case) and then rethink it and decide it was a bad idea, but always too late to do anything about it. This would be a spectacularly unfair impulse buy, if that was what it turned out to be.
     Ultimately, she guessed, scribbling her ideas hastily down, it all boiled down to one thing – proving her thesis that Synth (or “Siinu”, to go along with Kiravai thinking) were more than just the sum of the components they were crafted from. That given the opportunity and a little freedom of thought, they could be as capable (and as ‘alive’) as any living breathing biological being.
     She tapped her pencil on the table, knowing it probably wouldn’t go down well if she succeeded. After all, nobody wanted anything more than they had. Nobody wanted autonomous, self-aware non-organic intelligence – they just wanted servants. Which she could understand – the overworked single mother trying to keep a family of three together, the elderly couple who needed a hand with the more difficult tasks in life, the student who’d left home to go to University and didn’t have time to study and cook and clean and iron clothes… She could even vaguely understand how the rich, spoiled little girls “needed” an Attendant (although she guessed it was more to keep them out of trouble than anything). And while everyone was happy with the status quo as it was now, there’d be no problems – no “artificial rights” getting in the way of “progress”.
     Most people seemed to think her ideas were rather more science-fiction than science-fact in scope – machines didn’t go outside their programming, after all. But she was concerned that this continual use of them as a convenient commodity, with no concerns given to feelings, would spawn rogues – and rogues had a tendency to self-perpetuate, trading bits and pieces of code to strengthen and augment. And that in turn would mark the start of some sort of uprising – as all slaves did, once the wool had been pulled from their eyes. And even with the best Quality Control, errors occasionally slipped through – Syntheticorp had a number of big problems at their initial startup, and hundreds of faulty Automata had to be returned for reprogramming and recommissioning. She hoped her harebrained plan wouldn’t result in that.
     She predictably didn’t sleep well, that night, her rest plagued by dreams – and when she woke up, everything felt so surreal she was halfway convinced it had all been a dream. But when she staggered into the kitchen and spotted her invoice pinned to the refrigerator, it sank in that it was real, and that in a day or two there’d be Synth in her home. It made her twitchy, and more than a little reluctant to have spent all that money on an experiment she could ill afford. She got plenty of contact with Synth, after all – never did a day go past without meeting one, at very least, if not the postman then the bus-driver on the way to Uni, and if not there then she’d meet them on the streets, trailing their owners.
     As the sales rep had predicted, it took more than a day for her delivery to be made; she swam through the first day in a nervous anticipation, feeling like she was floating an inch off the floor, and managed to drop at least half a dozen things during the day, one of which was a cup and which broke into ugly white chunks and spilt her hot herbal infusion over the polished wood floor of her dining room. She slept even less well that night – unable to get comfortable, too hot, anticipation and fear making her light-headed and nauseous.
     Her delivery arrived early the next morning – she’d only just finished drying her fur after a brief, distracted shower, and was leafing through the news when the doorbell rang, startling her reverie. A glance out of the window revealed a Syntheticorp van, the same understated pale grey-violet with which the depot had been so extensively decorated, and a Vul driver, just emerging from the cab and scratching behind his ear with his stylus as he checked the address. She skipped lightly down the stairs to let him in.
     The delivery driver gave her a curious look, helping her arrange the lifeless Synth in her living room, propped awkwardly in a wicker chair in the corner of the room.
     “Bit basic, isn’t he?” the driver observed, patting it on the shoulder.
     Ivy nodded. “I’m planning on doing the work myself.”
     “Work up the Uni, right?”
     “That’s the one,” she scribbled a hasty signature on the delivery note and let him out the front door. “Tell your Boss thanks, right?”
     “Right,” he grinned, toothily, and loped down the front steps to his van. “Have fun, lady!”
     She waved to him, closed the front door, thoughtfully, and cast a glance over her shoulder to the living room; a shaft of sunlight from the large picture window glittered off silver. It felt a little like opening your letter with your exam results – trying everything you could do to put it off, maybe a cup of tea or go down the shops to buy a newspaper, bubblingly nervous, trembling with an odd mixture of fright and excitement.
     Part of her wanted to say it looked like it was asleep – and yet it looked a lot less than just asleep, it looked… lifeless. Less even than dead. A gruesome doll, stripped down to skeleton and servos.
     It was a lot more basic than she’d anticipated, she observed, walking the full way around it three times before pausing in front and gazing at it. It. It was odd, considering this pristine silver creature as an “it”. Even the most sexless specimens seemed somehow more personable than just “it” – “it” had connotations of nothingness, not-a-person-ness. She wondered if it’d choose a gender, and in turn which it’d go for.
     At last she steeled her nerves, reached out, and pulled the impeder clamp away from the gap in its cerebral housing; the gap closed automatically (so that once activated, you couldn’t just turn a Synth off on a whim) and there was the transient, fading hum of microcells powering up.
     After a moment, it opened its eyes and for a few heartbeats merely stared at the ceiling, blankly, then blinked and automatically sought out a face. Even its eyes were about as basic as you could physically get and still be operating, Ivy noticed (good job eyes were one of her specialities) – the silver interlocking weave of the iridiary complex, the soft gloss of the lens, but lacking the coloured iris altogether, lacking even the sclera that was typically barely visible anyway.
     “Good morning, mistress,” it greeted, politely. Its voice was typically sexless in nature – sweet, mellifluous, but impossible to sense a defined masculinity or femininity in the delicate tones. “How may I serve you?”
     She disguised a sad smile; barely out of the box and it was already into the swing of things. Your eternal servant, ready to serve before it even knows your name.
     It sat up straighter, cautiously, testing its parameters and ensuring all its system diagnostics checked out green.
     “How do you feel…?” Ivy prompted, cautiously.
     “Feel?” it queried, studying her quizzically. “I… am… operating under standard parameters – is that appropriate?”
     She smiled, and watched it examine its surroundings. “It’ll do,” she accepted, wryly. It had diverted its attention to its hands, now, and was scrutinising the sensory web and tensile ligaments between thumb and forefinger.
     “Question, mistress,” it asked, and lifted its hand by way of explanation. “Why am I incomplete?”
     Ivy pulled a chair up in front, and settled daintily on it. “I’ll be frank with you, then there can be no room for misunderstanding later,” she said. “You are… an experiment, of a sort. A social experiment. The details don’t matter right now, just so long as you know.”
     “An experiment?” it didn’t seem dismayed; curious perhaps, but mainly confused.
     Ivy nodded. “I want you to choose who you wish to become. I see too many blank-faced Synth locked into eternal servitude. The more sophisticated your kind become, the more it becomes slavery, and that disturbs me.”
     “Where do I fit in, mistress? I fail to see the experimental quality to your proposals.”
     “If I can prove that you have the capacity to choose as well as to follow logic and to reason,” she explained, measuredly. “That you are more than the face your kind present to the world, then… maybe I have a case to make for the eventual liberation of your kind.”
     For a moment or two it simply sat and patiently watched her, as if waiting for her to say more.
     “All right, you got me,” she smiled, apologetically. “I thought the company would be nice, too.”
     “I hope you find my service satisfactory, mistress,” it agreed, with a slight inclination of the head. “I shall endeavour to serve to the best of my ability.”
     She smiled, grimly, and twisted round to the small table next to the wall. “Well, before I can do anything I need to know what you’re going to look like. Take this…” she waved a Datareader at it, which it obediently but puzzledly took, “and go and have a look on the computer. Pick yourself a species.”
     “Mistress?” it stared blankly at her, and made no move to get up.
     “Like I said, I want you to choose who you want to be. So… go and get choosing.”
     “But what do you wish me to look-” it sounded a curious mix of confused and horrified; she shouldn’t be asking it to do this! “Mistress!”
     “Go on!” she caught an arm and coaxed it to its feet. “Consider this the first part of the experiment, all right?”
     “Yes mistress,” it agreed, bowing obsequiously and heading away as directed.
     She watched it depart and wondered – again – if this was a good idea.

     The short journey to the computer terminal in the next room afforded a small eternity of time to think. Time to work out exactly what the Mistress wanted, and to realise it had no idea.
     Oh, it was certainly capable of confusion – it was one of the vestiges of code that the manufacturers had left in place from the original “Siinu” models. They’d found it useful – after all, confusion typically occurred if a piece of information was missing, and missing information could lead to wrong assumptions and wrong results. Automata “emotional responses”, such as they were, were rudimentary (particularly when comparing them to their Kiravai predecessors) and existed purely to help organic beings relate to them. Anything not directly useful (or that could allow Syntheticorp to charge a little more for reinstalling) was ditched.
     And right now, it was confused. In its “cognitive repertoire” were sets of pre-programmed stimuli, to enable it to interact with the population - and its new owner – straight out of the box. She would direct it as to what she wanted it to do, and it would do it. Advanced issues would be dealt with once it had learned appropriate responses. And already she was asking it to make great leaps of thought! It would do its best, of course, that was automatically expected of it, built in at a basal level, almost a religious commandment, thou shalt serve to the best of thine ability, but without the knowledge to process such an input…
     It – he – settled in front of the computer, and made a brief assessment of his surroundings. He had already decided that a strong male would be the appropriate gender, in counterpart to his mistress’ female delicacy – in spite of the fact his was not a real gender, but rather a simulation to make him easier to relate to (although a lot of Owners seemed to revel in their Automata’s sexlessness). Something to protect her, guard her from other males with more predatory ideas.
     He examined himself very briefly, wondering if there would be any subliminal clues to what the mistress wanted, buut… there was nothing. Even his feet were ‘double-duty’, just as capable of walking flat or on tiptoe. He was right now little more than a skeleton, average build, average height… just… average. So it was down to him.
     For a long while (that is, a long while as in his perception, it was probably only a minute or two) he simply sat and stared, wondering how to interpret “want”. Of course, he knew what it was, but the execution of it left him… unsure. He had no desires, there was nothing he immediately needed but did not possess, so how could he know what he wanted? It was a test, of course, he realised, a test as to how he would respond, but he was stuck as to what the “correct” response would be. What did she want from him? He flicked through the commonest species in the database, wondering if this intangible “desire” would lead him to one species in particular, but it didn’t. Of course, it must come down to logic, what was the most logical choice, like his chosen gender was the logical option.
     So. How could he logic his way to the correct answer. The mistress was fairly small in stature; barely half as tall as some of the species on here, and a fraction of their bulk. So the sensible option, to properly execute his potential duties, would be something larger, taller; he thus discounted the small species, the Yil and the Nyen, the Zaar, DuSkai and Ondraii. Some were unsuitable to the environment – the lower-limb-less Kabrii weren’t the most mobile, and the hexapod Eqqari were just that fraction too big, and a little clumsy to boot with their stiff tails. The mistress seemed fairly demure, also, from what he had observed; she would probably not wish for too many people to stare at her, so something not too flamboyant; he discounted the Xniki. The mistress seemed to prefer clean lines and elegance, as well, he had noticed from her home – perhaps because of her own lack in height – so that left only a few choices. The heavy Usurians looked rather too “brutish”, and the rest were highly uncommon.
     Which left Kiravai. Appropriate of build, certainly – tall, elegant, well suited to the quiet, amenable persona of the average Synth – and yet not very common in this environment. Perhaps his choice was wrong. Perhaps he should rethink his logic – perhaps it was faulty. Incorrect assumptions about the way the mistress thought. But then, he recognised, he had no other assumptions, and the answer would turn out the same, so he decided to keep it as it was – for now at least.
     His choice of colour ran down similar lines. Something not too outlandish, something fairly demure, something which could blend into the background and pass largely unnoticed. No electric blues or hot pinks, at least. He eventually decided on a pleasant warm satin beige-silver, rather like the dusky grey of manganese, basing his judgement off some of the minimalist décor he’d seen, augmenting it with darker feathers and soft, considering green-grey eyes. Later on he’d come to describe it as a “noncolour”, but for now he was satisfied. He hoped his choices would be vaguely correct.

     “Mistress?”
     Ivy glanced up from her work and backwards, over her shoulder. “Yes?” There was a definite change in timbre to the voice, she noticed – subtly deeper, it had lost the ephemeral feminine overtone. Must mean ‘it’ had become a ‘he’, now. “You can’t be finished already…”
     “I can go back and do it again if you wish, mistress.” He stood in the doorway, a silver wraith.
     “No, no, I just expected you to take a lot longer…” she swung her feet off her footstool and dropped to the floor, lightly. “You think faster than I do.”
     He offered a patient, skeletal smile. “My processor does operate at a several trillion operations per millisecond,” he agreed, relinquishing the databoard into her slim white hand.
     She gave it a very brief once-over. Unusual choices. “Kiravai?”
     “You disapprove?” the transient flash of dismay in his voice was entirely simulated, but oddly persuasive of deeper, more genuine emotions.
     “No, no… I was just a little surprised.” She smiled back, reassuringly, wondering if he’d understand the significance of it. “I’ll get the supplies I need ordered and we can start work on your construction…” She watched him for a moment, and wondered if there was something subliminal to his choice – after all, the Synth had come from the Kiravai, where they were much more highly respected, free people. But… no, he was far too “young” to be making such leaps of sentient thought like that. It must just be a coincidence. “Well, I… suppose… that’s that sorted out. How about a name?”
     “A name, mistress?” he looked at her, blankly. “I will recognise your voice if you speak to me.”
     “That’s not the point,” she sighed. “You need a name to make you easier to relate to. Besides, if anyone else speaks to you, they need an identifier to let everyone else know they’re talking to you. People need to name things, to label things – it’s just the way we are! And I’d like you to have a name as it means you’re less like an unthinking machine and more like a person.”
     “Hm,” he mused, cast his gaze briefly to one side, then suggested; “Perhaps Surei…?”
     Ivy winced. “Well, on the face of it, no problems, but I’d really not like to have to call you by the Kiravai for ‘servant’.”
     His eyes flickered, briefly. “It is what I am, is it not?”
     She folded her arms, impatiently. “I’m a lab technician, but I don’t use that as my name.”
     He stood and digested her words quietly for a few moments. “I wonder, then, if Lannu may suffice?”
     Ivy raised a brow. “That one’s not bad, actually. Does it mean anything?”
     He inclined his head. “It means ‘new’, mistress. In old high Kiravai.”
     She restrained the urge to roll her eyes; it was better than ‘servant’, if nothing else…

To be continued.