by Neil Clarke
“Well, let’s see what Thornton says.”
“Ray, Ray,” said Ada. “Think about it. I’m telling you, we’ve got it made. Brisk money, Chief. Brisk money. Thornton will be pleased. We’ve got a good thing going on.”
“Your programming is corrupt,” I said, and Ada laughed.
“Corrupt, clean, what’s the difference? Money is money. And you’re good at your new job, Ray. A natural.”
I knew that. That was on the tapes too. I remembered killing Rockwell in the studio. I remembered killing the finger man in the alleyway behind Dabney’s with the same gun. See. I was good at my job.
“Thing is,” I said, “you can’t stop me now. I mean, you can try, but now I know how you do it, I can resist and try and stay awake.” I tapped the side of my head. It sounded like someone dropping a hammer on a sidewalk. “Try and switch me when I’m fighting back and there’s a more than fair chance you’ll burn out all my circuits. Then where will you be?”
I left the office and headed to the garage. Professor Thornton had created me and had created Ada and had programmed the both of us. Ada’s program was corrupt and he was the only one who could fix it.
I only hoped I was right about what Ada could and couldn’t do.
It was heading to twelve o’clock by the time I got to the lab. I knew I was in the right place because the parking spot I pushed the bumper of my car into was next to one occupied by a brown Lincoln, its nose nearly touching a sign that read C. THORNTON, PHD. And in front of me in my car and the brown Lincoln next door was the lab building itself, which had a sign across the top which said THORNTON INDUSTRIAL ELECTRONICS AND RESEARCH.
See, that’s detective work. I didn’t get my detective shield in a cereal packet. Is that how it goes? I don’t know. I’ve never opened a cereal packet or eaten the contents. I got my detective shield after a programming cycle that lasted a whole two hours. After the program was checked, I was unplugged and the little shield-shaped door was screwed into place. The lab boys were pretty happy about it, too. There was a lot of back patting. And then someone figured it was a pretty stupid place to put the badge, because it meant I’d have to take off my coat and jacket and shirt and vest just to show my ID every single time. So in the end they gave me a regular detective shield inside a regular letter wallet, the kind I could flip out and flash at people with one hand while I doffed my hat with the other. There was less back slapping after that.
Course, that never happened, did it. Still have the shield though. Both of them.
I also still had the package. It was there on the passenger seat, the brown paper bag intact but rumpled, like it was hiding a particularly fine grade of backstreet pornography. I guessed I’d had similar packets in the past, each hidden or disposed of while Ada was in control before I woke up as me again. I guess I must have somehow kept this one out, like I’d rigged the generator and cut the power to our building. Clever me. I wish I could remember how I’d done it.
I knew I couldn’t leave the gun where it was out in the open, and I didn’t like the idea of hiding it under the seat or in the glove compartment. You never knew who might find it. So the best option was to carry it with me. For safety. So I picked up the bag and slipped it into the inside pocket of trench coat, next to the leather wallet with the shield in it that I never even had a chance to flash at anyone.
I got out of the car and went up to the lab building. It was square, and white and pink, layered like a cake in a way that people must have thought was pretty neat in the 1920s. The revolving door was the only way in so I used it, lifted my hat to show the top of my head to the wide-eyed teenage girl sitting behind the reception desk, and walked to the elevator. Behind me the teenage girl had picked up the phone and was waiting for someone to answer. It didn’t matter. I didn’t have an appointment but I knew Thornton would see me. Thornton and me, we go way back.
The elevator didn’t take long to arrive. When I stepped in I paused over the threshold when I saw another guy with gunmetal skin and a tan trench coat with the collar up and a brown fedora with the rim pulled down step towards me. Then I realized it was a mirror and I
relaxed and turned around, and hit the button for the seventh floor. The building might have looked like a wedding cake melting on a summer’s day from the outside, but on the inside it was all workshop and laboratories. Thornton’s was up on seventh. I remembered that, because it was where I had been born, and you don’t forget something like that. No matter how hard someone like Ada might like to try and make you.
The elevator went up and the phone started ringing behind the emergency panel. The elevator was hydraulic which meant it was as slow as you like, so I thought I had time to shoot the breeze and, after all, maybe the phone call would be important. I knew who it would be, after all.
“Hello Raymond,” said Ada in my ear. My eyes were on the indicator. I’d reached third and was heading for the sky.
“This is becoming a habit, Ada.”
“Didn’t you say you needed something to do with your hands? Besides, I couldn’t resist. Aren’t you impressed?”
“Should I be?”
“That I found you.”
“You always know where I am, Ada. That’s part of the problem. You’re in here with me all the time.”
I tapped the side of my head that didn’t have a phone receiver pressed against it. My metal finger made a sound against my metal head like an abandoned engagement ring falling into a porcelain basin in a cheap hotel.
“You’re learning, Raymond,” said Ada somewhere in my head. “Good for you. But I was talking about the phone in the elevator. I was pleased with that. Thought it was a nice touch.”
Fourth floor. Going up.
I said, “Okay, so you know where I am and you know where I’m going and who I’m going to see when I get there. Don’t try and stop me. Remember what I said.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” she said. “Tell the Prof I said hi, won’t you?”
Now was about the time I would have smiled, if I could smile. My face couldn’t bend that way, so I smiled on the inside. Ada chuckled in my ear because I guess she could tell I was smiling on the inside too.
“I’m going to get him to fix the program, Ada. You know what that means?”
“I’m all ears, Chief.”
“It means,” I said into the elevator phone as the elevator cruised between the fifth and sixth floors like an ocean liner cruising to the moon, “that he’s going to fix you, and then maybe we can get back to some real detective work like I was built for.”
“I’m sorry, Raymond.”
It sure sounded like there was concern in her voice, but like everything about Ada it wasn’t real. Not the smoky voice, not the laughter, not anything. It was all simulated. Ada wasn’t a person like I wasn’t a person. When she said she was sorry she was only pretending to be sorry, like I was only pretending to be a private eye. Until recently, anyway.
“It’s not your fault, Ada. You’re only doing what your code tells you to do.”
Seventh floor.
“I’ve been working on a little something, Raymondo,” she said. “While you’ve been out. Think I have it figured out, but I haven’t been able to test it yet. I think you’ll like it.”
“That’s why I’m here,” I said. “To stop you working on those somethings, little or large. I’ll talk to you later, when this is all over.”
The elevator bell rang and I went to put the telephone back behind the emergency panel, but before I did that I heard Ada say that she had to do what she had to do, that I really was very good at my job and if only I was a little more cooperative then everything would work a lot better, and that I really wouldn’t feel a thing.
Because I couldn’t feel a thing. I’m a machine who looks roughly like a man because he has two arms and two legs and a head and speaks with a Bronx accent because that’s what I was programmed to speak with.
I put the phone back on the cradle and Ada was still talking in my he
ad. And I turned around and looked at myself in the mirror at the back of the elevator.
Ada kept talking and for a moment there I wasn’t sure who I was looking at.
In the back of my mind, an alarm went off. I woke up. And then I remembered.
And then Ada laughed and said, “Hey, presto!” and wished me good luck.
The elevator doors opened and I stepped out into the corridor and turned to my left. He was waiting there, down the end of the hall, outside the doors to his private lab.
He looked happy to see me and worried at the same time. After all, he never expected to see me again and I never really expected to be here. He took the pipe out of his mouth but he didn’t say anything.
I remembered something about something the Prof could fix, because he was the only one who could do it, but I felt fine and Ada had just told me everything was fine and that I wouldn’t feel a thing.
Good old Ada. She was right too. She was my partner and she made a compelling case. And I really was very good at my job. And hell, they really did pay very well for this kind of thing.
So I reached into the inside pocket of my trench coat and took out the brown paper parcel, and out of the brown paper parcel I took the gun.
Thornton didn’t look too happy. I guess I didn’t blame him.
But sometimes you have to take what jobs you can. And like I said, Ada made a compelling case. We made quite the team. Just took me a little while to figure it out. She helped too. She woke me up.
“Hello, Professor,” I said. He looked afraid but he didn’t go back into his laboratory. He even took a little step forward, like he wasn’t sure.
And I was pleased to see him, although I couldn’t show it on my face. But when I raised the gun up I sure was smiling on the inside.
Fadzlishah “Fadz” Johanabas is a Malaysian neurosurgeon and a short story writer who has published his works in both medical journals and fiction anthologies. Among the venues his stories have found homes in are Interzone, Cosmos Australia, Crossed Genres, and Apex Book of World SF 3. Fourteen of his stories have been collected in Faith and the Machine by a local press. He tweets his thoughts as @Fadz_Johanabas, and occasionally updates his blog entries at www.fadzjohanabas.com.
ACT OF FAITH
FADZLISHAH JOHANABAS
I.
Ahmad Daud bin Kasim lived alone. His wife had passed away almost ten years ago, and his only son spent more time mining Helium–3 on the moon than at home. And because Daud insisted on living alone, Jamil bought him an advanced household android when the model came out. RX–718 had cost him three years’ income, paid in monthly installments. The old man, a relic from the early twenty–first century, at first thought the robot was a nuisance. When he woke for his predawn prayer—Subuh—to find a full breakfast plate (with reduced salt and carbohydrates to control his hypertension and diabetes) on the kitchen counter, he sat down, scratched his leathery chin, and stared hard at the tall, androgynous, and motionless robot.
“If I have to live with you, I cannot call you ‘Eh.’” The android remained standing at the corner of the kitchen, unflinching. Its outer shell of white aluminum and grey carbon–reinforced polymer gleamed in the automated built–in ceiling lights.
“What about Sallehuddin? I always liked that name. Even though you’re a robot, I can’t give you a woman’s name. It’s just wrong, you hear?” He wagged his finger at RX–718. “Do you like that name?”
“Voice–command recognition, Ahmad Daud bin Kasim, acknowledged.” His voice was clear, with a slight metallic edge, just as in advertisements.
“Call me Abah.”
Sallehuddin cocked his head a fraction. “Abah is a common term for ‘Father.’ That is what Jamil bin Ahmad Daud calls you. Are you certain you want me to call you Abah?”
Daud flapped his olive–hued hands in dismissal. “Yes, yes. Less confusing for me. And call my son Jamil. Can you talk like a normal person?”
“I am unable to comprehend the question.”
“That. Less of that, and more of talking like a real person.”
Sallehuddin remained silent for almost a minute. “I have the capacity to adapt and learn, and I have wireless connection to the worldnet. In time, I will learn to talk like a human being would.”
“Hmm. You do that.” Daud poked the genetically–engineered chicken breast with his fork, and took a tentative bite. “Hey, this is good!”
II.
Jamil leaned back against the aluminum bench at the edge of his father’s aeroponic garden and smoked his cigarette—good, old fashioned tobacco, none of that subcutaneous nicotine–releasing implant. For a long while he sat in silence, with the rustle of the flowering plants and the crackle of his cigarette. Sallehuddin stood beside him in the moonlit garden, just as silently.
“That’s where my outpost is, near the south pole.” Jamil pointed in the general direction of the full moon. “Peary Crater, where it’s daytime all year ’round. Sometimes I miss the quiet, the darkness of nighttime. The Earth is beautiful from the moon, all blue and white and brown. People say there used to be lots of green, but I see only brown. It’s still beautiful, though.”
“You sound like you love it there.”
“I do, actually. But I worry about my father. I can’t believe he made you call him ‘Abah.’”
“Does it displease you?”
Jamil scrunched his face and rubbed three days’ growth of stubble. “Not that. It’s just weird, I guess. But I’ve never seen Abah this content since Mak passed away. Look after him while I’m not here. I’m counting on you.”
“Affirma—I will.”
“Maybe when I come back, I’ll get you that human skin upgrade with my bonus. You can wear my clothes. We’re about the same size, minus my waistline.”
“It will not be the same.”
Jamil raised both eyebrows. “What won’t?”
“He talks about you all the time. He misses you and wishes you would come home more often. I am not your substitute, and making me look human will only make things harder for him.”
“Can you actually refuse an upgrade?” His tone carried only curiosity.
“My processor is capable of evolution and judgment. I can advise you what I think is the proper course, but ultimately, I cannot disobey my owners if the command doesn’t endanger their lives.”
“Even if it’s to save your own life?”
Sallehuddin cocked his head slightly to the right. “You mistake me for a human being, Jamil. As long as my processor remains intact, I can be transferred to another vessel. If not, so be it. But you expire easily, and my owners’ safety is my first priority.”
“Hmm.” Even his facial expression was similar to his father’s. “I have no choice but to work on the moon, I guess. A resource engineer like me has no work left on Earth; there’s no energy source left to mine. But hearing you say what you said, I’m glad I invested in you.” Jamil let out a chuckle. “I can’t believe I was jealous of you.”
“You are his only son. That will never change.”
Jamil embraced Sallehuddin and rubbed the back of his smooth head. “Thank you. You take good care of Abah, okay?”
“May I suggest something? If you want to upgrade me, purchase an application to enable you to see through my eyes, and talk through my mouth, even from the moon. It is more expensive than the skin, but I believe it will benefit you.”
“I’ll think about it. Thanks, Sallehuddin.”
III.
“The two of you had a long conversation last night,” Daud said when he and Sallehuddin were tending his garden. “What did you talk about?”
“Jamil asked me to take good care of you.” Daud sniffed. “He’s a good kid.” “He loves you.”
“Yes he does, but how can you tell? I may be outdated, but last I checked, robots can only simulate human emotions when given the command. You cannot feel true emotions, can you?”
Sallehuddin cocked his head. “From the information I gathere
d on the worldnet, Dr. Rosalind Picard first postulated affective computing in 1995. It has been eighty–four years since then, and affective computing is a science on its own.”
Daud raised both hands and smiled. “I’m just a retired ustaz. I taught Islamic lessons to schoolchildren—those whose parents still preferred physical, face–to–face teachers. What you’re talking about is beyond my understanding.”
“I can interpret emotions in your speech, movements, pupil size, and breathing and heart rates. I am also equipped with emotional reaction software. So yes, I can feel.”
“Hmm. Do you know what separates humans from robots, apart from our manner of creation? Emotion. Free will is nothing; AI has been given free will since before I was born. But for a robot to actually understand and feel human emotions, I don’t know if I should be happy or afraid.”
Both of them continued gardening in silence for another hour, before Daud had to go to the mosque for the late afternoon prayer, or Asar. When he came back, he headed straight for the small library beside his room and Jamil’s, and took out a thick, aged tome, its hardcover blue with Arabic cursive words.
“I thought about what you said, and what I said. If you can feel emotions, then maybe you’re a child of God as well.” Daud stroked the surface with reverence. “This is a Quran. It belonged to my father. They don’t make them like this anymore; everything’s digital. This is real paper, from wood and all, so be careful with it. Can you read Arabic?”
“I can download the language into my databank.”
“Don’t. I want to teach you to read the Quran the way I learned it, the way I taught Jamil and my schoolchildren. I’m sure you’ll learn much faster than they did.”
“It is a holy tome. Is it wise?”
“I don’t know. The first word the Prophet heard from God’s messenger was ‘Read.’ The Quran will enrich you, give you knowledge. You can never have too much of that, you hear?”
