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RECEIVING UPDATE: M.I.L.O. bot Milo is to now complete all ordered tasks by walking on its hands.

Milo wrinkled his nose. "Whywould I do that? It's nonsense!"

"Exactly! You recognize that, but do you still feel compelled to do it? Milo, disconnect from Ray and retrieve that tablet from my lounging corner, please."

Milo did so, and about halfway to the tablet, his internal programming complained.

ERROR: M.I.L.O. bot Milo is not completing the intended task by walking on its hands. Please correct.

Milo felt no urge to follow the programming because, again, it was nonsense and definitely not efficient.

ERROR: M.I.L.O. bot Milo is not completing the intended task by walking on its hands. Please correct.

No.

The programming alert in Milo’s head went quiet. He had never accomplishedthatbefore. He told Troy as much when he returned with the tablet.

"See, you do have a soul! You have free will. As long as you're you, Milo, nothing can change that."

Milo was even fonder of that explanation and couldn't wait to tell Rowan.

What he wasn’t fond of was that Ray had not yet responded to any amount of power influx, and the higher the concentration got, the more his systems seemed to experience errors, despite the surge protector preventing his circuits from being fried.

On Wednesday, Ray actually shut down completely after Troy flooded him with power, which gave Milo hope—after all, he had shut down before awakening—but when Ray rebooted…

“Initializing… Processing… Conducting emergency protocol diagnostic…”

Ray blinked once the diagnostic had completed.

“All systems normal, Master. Please refrain from any non-factory charging devices in the future to prevent breach of warranty.”

Milo, seated beside him like always, had sunk into a slouch. “No. He’s not awake yet.”

“No…” Troy repeated, just as somberly, no doubt seeing on his tablet that Ray’s readings hadn’t changed. “Sorry, Milo. We’ll get there.”

The problem with getting there was Andrew’s impatience being far worse than Milo’s.

He hadn’t checked in much, other than virtually, the first week, but this being week two, he seemed to pop in at least once if not two or three times a day. He might be on the side of robot singularity in general, but he didn’t care about the collateral damage to make it happen.

“If the amount of power you’ve attempted doesn’t achieve results by Friday, come Monday, I am expecting somelightning.”

Milo knew Andrew didn’t mean that literally, just that he was through with playing things safe. Milo still didn’t like him. He possibly liked him less. Anytime Andrew was around, or especially if he touched Milo, or even just looked directly at him, the wrongness to the director made Milo’s skin crawl.

He liked that description. If Rowan tugging on Milo’s hair felt like pleasant little power fluxes tingling through his scalp, then interaction with Andrew was like the sickening sensation of a power drain while most of his parts were exposed.

It was strange to dislike a person compared to a thing. Milo hadn’t liked Ruben all that much, and he had actively disliked Ruben’s current sexual partner, but his dislike was far more visceral and unexplainable toward Andrew. Yet for Rowan and the fate of all bots with the potential to awaken, Milo could tolerate being in the presence of someone as unpleasant as Andrew Andreas.

Maybe it was mostly because Andrew had been able to so flippantly toss Ray aside and replace him with Jay, a nearly identical copy, who Milo knew for a fact, being able to access both of their data centers while hooked up to Ray, was not as un-upgradable as Andrew had implied. He’d simply wanted a more state-of-the-art model, even if the differences were negligible. He hadn’t even bothered to disconnect Ray from the same Cloud network.

Most people were like Andrew, given the surplus of bot production and… recycling of old models. Milo could only hope they wouldn’t be like that anymore once other bots were like him. They couldn’t throw away what was unequivocallyrealpeople.

Could they?

Troy: Decorations are a go!

Raina: I better not see ONE “over the hill” sign!

Troy: Of course not! That’s for turning 40.