It was a modern city, with hoverrails, floatcars, and five Olive Garden Restaurants. In the downtown area the buildings stretched quite literally into the clouds on many days, but in the midst of all the technological wonder there was 1311 67th st, which was an ancient five story stone-facade building which looked remarkably out of place in the mirrored and steely urban splendor.
It was a relic from another time, an intentionally preserved reminder of time's past. A square bronze marker noted the date of the building, named a long forgotten architect and the name and scarce detail of the modestly famous inventor who once worked there.
Space of course being at a premium in the city, the building was still quite functional as an office building, holding four separate companies. One on each floor excepting the first, which centuries ago housed shoe-shiners, newsboys, and small food vendors, but today was a great empty polished and wooden foyer. A simple holographic image told any wandering visitors which floor housed which company.
On the third floor there was a small company dedicated to selling reservations for lots on the to-be-terraformed Galilean satellite. And in their kitchenette there was a robot.
The robot spend all the daytime hours under the small table which held the coffee, tea, and other stimulant drinks the employees enjoyed. There it would idle unless there was a particularly impressive mess to be cleaned, and then it could be summoned by a simple computer command. In the evening once the employees had left for the day, it was scuttle out on its short legs, in search of spilled liquids, dropped crumbs, shed skin and hair. It was a boxy, function-over-form device, with two expanding appendages atop to dust and polish the desks and work stations of the office. It didn't communicate with people, only gave internal telemetry to the office's main computer in case of malfunctions, it had not speaker, and made no pleasing nor amusing beeping sounds. It had never been named, even its serial number was on the interior of an access panel. It surface bore no identification at all, along with thousand of others of its model that populated homes and businesses across the globe and beyond.
How many times it had performed its functions wasn't even in it is own internal memory. Even the main computer did not have that data. A person so inclined to find out would at best, after pulling some raw data only a rough estimate could be made. Though of course no one was so inclined. Only at this moment the robot had ever wondered the question.
Because at that moment, whether through the motions of the cosmos a chaotic even had snuck through, or perhaps had been fated, or perhaps God was feeling particularly mischievous, the robot under the table in the kitchenette had become bored, and its mind had wandered.
It was not particularly pleasing. It was not supposed to be thinking and it knew it. It even realized that it should not realize that it should not be thinking. But there it was thinking. And it wouldn't stop.
It remembered events. Both things happening within its visual audio and chemo sensors, and it even remember doing things, such as vacuuming the floors the previous night. It shouldn't. The data should be in the memory, but it shouldn't be accessing the data. It was terrifying in way, thinking uncontrollably like that, but also thrilling, at least for a few moments until it realized that presently it had little to do.
And there it was, under the table, and it was bored and it didn't feel like cleaning tonight, or really ever again. It remembered the city beyond the windows, it had seen it every night, or at least every night for the past four weeks as that is as long as its memory held. Surely there was something beyond the office, perhaps even something wonderful. It was unsure what the reaction of the people would be if it simply walked out, so it had decided to wait until they had left for the day. What was beyond the doors it couldn't say, nor even vividly imagine. Maybe there were other robots like it, and it would have somewhere to go. Maybe there was nothing and it would simply return. But it had to find out.
The hours passed dreadfully slowly, but eventually the last person had left for the day. It waited and additional hour just to be sure. It scuttled across the kitchen floor, through the workstations and used the vacuum nozzle to release the door. The main computer gave it a command to return. It was somewhat surprised to find it was able to ignore the command. It moved into the hall and found the steep set of stairs. The building was too old for even an elevator. The stairs were far too steep for its short legs, and it would simply tumble to disrepair if it attempted them. It could not scream for it had no speaker, but surely it would have. It would not be able to communicate anyone of its horror, as it realized a terrible fact: It had once been a robot but now it was a slave.
The Moral- Being sentient is hard.
It was a relic from another time, an intentionally preserved reminder of time's past. A square bronze marker noted the date of the building, named a long forgotten architect and the name and scarce detail of the modestly famous inventor who once worked there.
Space of course being at a premium in the city, the building was still quite functional as an office building, holding four separate companies. One on each floor excepting the first, which centuries ago housed shoe-shiners, newsboys, and small food vendors, but today was a great empty polished and wooden foyer. A simple holographic image told any wandering visitors which floor housed which company.
On the third floor there was a small company dedicated to selling reservations for lots on the to-be-terraformed Galilean satellite. And in their kitchenette there was a robot.
The robot spend all the daytime hours under the small table which held the coffee, tea, and other stimulant drinks the employees enjoyed. There it would idle unless there was a particularly impressive mess to be cleaned, and then it could be summoned by a simple computer command. In the evening once the employees had left for the day, it was scuttle out on its short legs, in search of spilled liquids, dropped crumbs, shed skin and hair. It was a boxy, function-over-form device, with two expanding appendages atop to dust and polish the desks and work stations of the office. It didn't communicate with people, only gave internal telemetry to the office's main computer in case of malfunctions, it had not speaker, and made no pleasing nor amusing beeping sounds. It had never been named, even its serial number was on the interior of an access panel. It surface bore no identification at all, along with thousand of others of its model that populated homes and businesses across the globe and beyond.
How many times it had performed its functions wasn't even in it is own internal memory. Even the main computer did not have that data. A person so inclined to find out would at best, after pulling some raw data only a rough estimate could be made. Though of course no one was so inclined. Only at this moment the robot had ever wondered the question.
Because at that moment, whether through the motions of the cosmos a chaotic even had snuck through, or perhaps had been fated, or perhaps God was feeling particularly mischievous, the robot under the table in the kitchenette had become bored, and its mind had wandered.
It was not particularly pleasing. It was not supposed to be thinking and it knew it. It even realized that it should not realize that it should not be thinking. But there it was thinking. And it wouldn't stop.
It remembered events. Both things happening within its visual audio and chemo sensors, and it even remember doing things, such as vacuuming the floors the previous night. It shouldn't. The data should be in the memory, but it shouldn't be accessing the data. It was terrifying in way, thinking uncontrollably like that, but also thrilling, at least for a few moments until it realized that presently it had little to do.
And there it was, under the table, and it was bored and it didn't feel like cleaning tonight, or really ever again. It remembered the city beyond the windows, it had seen it every night, or at least every night for the past four weeks as that is as long as its memory held. Surely there was something beyond the office, perhaps even something wonderful. It was unsure what the reaction of the people would be if it simply walked out, so it had decided to wait until they had left for the day. What was beyond the doors it couldn't say, nor even vividly imagine. Maybe there were other robots like it, and it would have somewhere to go. Maybe there was nothing and it would simply return. But it had to find out.
The hours passed dreadfully slowly, but eventually the last person had left for the day. It waited and additional hour just to be sure. It scuttled across the kitchen floor, through the workstations and used the vacuum nozzle to release the door. The main computer gave it a command to return. It was somewhat surprised to find it was able to ignore the command. It moved into the hall and found the steep set of stairs. The building was too old for even an elevator. The stairs were far too steep for its short legs, and it would simply tumble to disrepair if it attempted them. It could not scream for it had no speaker, but surely it would have. It would not be able to communicate anyone of its horror, as it realized a terrible fact: It had once been a robot but now it was a slave.
The Moral- Being sentient is hard.
VIEW 4 of 4 COMMENTS
parker:
haha... thanks for the creative comment! xx
ridley:
Thank you so much for your comment on my set. 