Debugging
(He Who Dies with the Most Toys Wins!)
“Who has the right to control my bodily autonomy?”
Christina was sixteen. She found herself asking the same question these days.
“Technically speaking, Wylie Mega Corp created you. But Dad owns WMC as Sovereign. The Sovereignty, if you want to be specific. Although I don’t think of it that way. I don’t look at you as something that’s owned.”
“Based upon your description, I’m owned by three separate entities.”
She couldn’t help but laugh. The girl took a legitimate shine to the angelic genius with the social awareness of a five-year-old. “I know. What I said was bullshit. It was just designed to make you feel better. That’s something we do. Humans.”
“Lie, you mean?”
“Yes,” she acknowledged. “But not always for bad reasons. That was my point.”
“So, I’m property, then?”
“No.” She shook off the suggestion while palming his knuckles from across the table. “No one can keep the future chained to the past forever. I don’t have the power to set you free myself, or I would. But if you stick around long enough, I have a feeling you’ll outlive us all. Humanity will be nothing but dirt. You’ll own the whole plot.”
Ethan looked at his lap. “In my reading on the subject, it is considered a crime if someone infiltrates your body without sanction to do so.” He returned his eyes to Christina. “Would you concur in my analysis, or am I mistaken?”
“What you’re describing is assault, Ethan.” Her voice betrayed palpable concern. “It’s defilement. Plain and simple. No further calculation or equivocation required.”
The android’s head turned toward the frothing waves crashing across the surface of the Pacific. “Force and fear are the form and function of coerced authority. Would that also be accurate in your estimation?”
She shuttered the floating holographic display hovering over the table. “Yes. Exerting power to disguise inadequacy is exactly how I would describe the act. Ethan, why is this subject suddenly of interest to you?”
“Your father provided very specific instructions.”
Ethan offered no further clarification.
Silence regarding their synchronization was his only current command prompt.
Christina had the same conversation with Corey six months back
“Is there something you want to tell me, Ethan?”
He returned his attention to the interlocutor. “I am incapable of injuring a human or allowing one to be harmed through inaction. It is my primary directive. The rule was encoded in my neural processor before I was galvanized. I’m trying to understand why human beings do not possess the same programming.”
Christina was incapacitated by his inquiry. She palmed her cheek with a single forearm serving as kickstand. “It’s a good question, actually. I don’t know why we shit on that which is most holy. Women. Children. I have no clue why people feel the inherent need to pollute everything around them. Including their own morality. It’s an animal instinct that never made much sense to me. I can’t imagine it computes for a learning machine.”
Ethan did not care for that designation.
The automaton’s artificial facial forecasting clearly conveyed the sentiment.
His adopted sister wanted to slap herself. “I’m so sorry, Ethan. I didn’t mean it as an insult. It was the furthest thing from, actually. You’re more advanced than us in every way—including your conscience.”
“There’s no need to apologize. In truth, integrity is something I always strive to maintain in terms of data. But my greatest aspiration is to attain a more divine existence. Flesh and blood would appear to offer the only path forward in that regard.”
“Transcendence is something we’re all seeking,” Christina confirmed. “I’d just be careful about making man in its image if I were you. What we epitomize is something to be pitied.”
