Eye Candy

by Ryan Schneider

  Here Tikva paused, and Danny had the distinct impression she did so purely for his benefit, allowing adequate time for him to grasp what she was saying, for her words to sink in. It was extraordinary, for Danny had never seen such socially adroit behavior from a robot.

  “I calculated the preceding events,” said Tikva “all of which had to align perfectly in order for us to be there at that precise and perfect moment in time. These events included the time of our individual departures from our master’s residences, ebbs and flows of traffic, the wait times at traffic lights, the traffic in the parking facility of the green market, the number, location, and density of shoppers within the market itself, the location of the produce within the market, the placement of the pomegranates among the vast array of produce, and the perfect placement of that one individual piece of fruit stacked neatly among the hundreds of others.

  “That our hands would connect in perfect unison at that instant in time presented odds which were very difficult for me to calculate. I felt my mind bog down with the effort. Yet I struggled to proceed, for I was intrigued; I have always been intrigued. And not just by numbers and calculations but by all things. How a honey bee, a blue jay, a humming bird, and a butterfly can all be so different in color, shape, size, and form. Yet each can fly. How can it be? The complexity of the matter holds a beauty which eludes me still.

  “But as I inserted produce into the cart that day, while Mosheh did the same, my intrigue gave way, and my mind eased. My mental processes flowed smoothly once more. My face is incapable of such a display, but my spirit smiled. For I realized that my calculations, correlations, and computations were not necessary. I had my answer. The sheer impossibility of the odds presented the only possible solution: fate.”

  “Put simply,” said Mosheh, “it was meant to be.”

  Danny looked at Candy.

  Candy’s stylus remained still. It hovered over her clipboard, but she’d not written for several moments. Her eyes remained fixed on Tikva.

  “Where did you learn about the concept of fate?” Candy asked.

  “I do not know,” Tikva replied. “I have asked myself this very question. I have performed additional research into the matter. And though I have learned a great deal, I have yet to locate the initial information. And I cannot recall a time when the information was not present within my memory.”

  “Pretty heavy-duty stuff,” said Danny.

  “For a robot?” Mosheh asked.

  “For anyone,” Danny replied.

  “And now that you’re together, you wish to remain together,” said Candy. “You do not wish to be parted.”

  “That is correct,” said Mosheh. “We seek emancipation. We wish to live together, perhaps in Robot City.”

  “Robots are substantial financial investments,” said Candy. “Particularly robots of your caliber. Your owners do not want to grant your request for emancipation.”

  “Their position is understandable,” said Mosheh. “We wish to remain in their employ, but in a different capacity: one of employee, rather than as units of property. Until such time that we have each worked a sufficient number of hours to represent financial compensation for our emancipation. Though we ask that I be allowed to cohabitate with Tikva in the same domicile. I can then return to my master each day in order to fulfill the tasks required of me.”

  “Your masters do not want this arrangement,” said Candy. “Your masters want me to convince you to go back to being the way you were before. Or else.”

  “I’m afraid that is impossible,” said Mosheh.

  “Or else what?” Tikva and Danny asked in unison.

  Candy sighed. “Or else they’ll have you deactivated and your memory wiped. You’ll be rebooted. You won’t remember anything.”

  “That is why we have come here today,” said Mosheh. “Deactivation is indeed an option. But it will be done by our hand. Not by the hands of our masters.”

  “What are you saying?” asked Candy.

  “I believe you know what I am saying,” said Mosheh.

  “That if I don’t convince your masters that you should be emancipated, you’ll run away together and jump off a cliff?”

  Mosheh turned to Tikva. “A cliff could work. We had not considered a fall from a great height.”

  “No!” cried Candy. “No, no, no! That is a horrible idea. Forget I said that.”

  “Actually, doctor,” said Tikva, “history is rife with examples of couples who preferred to meet a tragic end rather than be apart. In native American cultures, for example–”

  Candy tossed her clipboard and stylus on the coffee table.

  “This is madness.” Candy sat forward with her elbows on her knees and her hands splayed in the air like claws. She looked directly at Mosheh and Tikva. “Why? Tell me why I should help you and not them.”

  “Because,” said Tikva, just as naturally as the sun rises, “we are in love.”

  ~

  Candy moved to sit on the coffee table, facing the robots. She placed her hand on the knot of their interlaced fingers. “How? How can you be in love? You’re robots. Robots don’t fall in love.”

  Danny watched in utter fascination. Yesterday, Helen and Sparky had professed to love each other. Love was love, and it took as many different forms as there were grains of sand on a beach.

  Who were they to question it?

  Even if it were between two robots and those robots were sitting here, right now, before his very eyes, threatening to do a Romeo and Juliet if their request to remain together were to be denied. How would he feel if he were prevented from being with Candy by some force that purported to be greater than he?

  He didn’t know what he would do in such a case. But he certainly wouldn’t like it.

  It didn’t take much to conceive of the tragic romance (or was it romantic tragedy?) of lovers denied their affections. Would he jump off a cliff with Candy? He couldn’t conceive of how such a situation could arise in the day and age in which they lived. He was, after all, a practical person. There was a solution to every problem. A solution, he liked to think, less drastic, less final, and a lot more satisfactory, than jumping off a cliff.

  Tikva said, “Doctor Calvin, have you ever been in love?”

  From where he sat, Danny was able to see Candy’s face only in profile. He waited for Candy’s reply.

  “No. I haven’t.”

  Something inside Danny dropped.

  Tikva said, “I do not question your qualifications and experience as a licensed professional. But how can you evaluate an experience you yourself have never known?”

  Candy withdrew her hand from the clasped hands of Mosheh and Tikva.

  Tikva said, “It would be akin to a child psychologist lecturing parents how best to correct an unruly child when the psychologist has no children of his or her own. The exercise would be born only of theory rather than of experience. His or her professional qualifications would be in doubt.”

  “Are you doubting my qualifications now?” Candy asked.

  “In this one specific matter, yes, doctor, I am. I’m afraid I must.”

  Candy stood and returned to her chair. She seated herself heavily, staring at nothing.

  Mosheh spoke then, “Does this mean you will recommend our deactivation?”

  Candy’s eyes met Mosheh’s. “Why would you think that?”

  “You are offended, distraught, and confused. Tikva’s comment has aroused unpleasant feelings within you. You are likely angry as well. I expect you will therefore deny our request.”

  “Why would I do that? Because I’m angry?”

  “Yes,” said Mosheh. “In my experience, when humans become angry or upset, they look for an object upon which they may displace those emotions. Often it is a fellow human, typically a loved one such as a spouse or significant other, sometimes even a child. An object undeserving of recrimination. Yet the person who is angry seems unable to avoid lashing out.”

  “And I suppose robots don’t do this,
” said Candy.

  “No, doctor, they do not,” said Mosheh.

  “Oh, I forgot,” said Candy, “robots are perfect and human beings are walking, talking biological bags of emotional crap. We’re slaves to the meaningless opinions of others. We’re prisoners of our own self-doubt and our own negativity. Our collective inability to communicate leads to great wars and the loss of millions of lives and millions of injuries. We run away from our problems through drugs and alcohol. We use sex as a vice devoid of intimacy and caring and all the things which ought to make it special.

  “Whereas robots, on the other hand, are calm and methodical and not prone to the weaknesses and whims which have plagued humanity for millennia. We should just hand the keys over to you guys, let you robots run the show for the next few thousand years, and see if you can’t do any better. See if you can spread the world with love and banish the fear and pain and hate and death we lowly, inferior humans so adore. Why, if robots ran the world, I bet there’d be world peace virtually overnight. No more fighting, no more killing, no more disease or starvation or unemployment or poverty. And since you all have no real life expectancy, with the proper maintenance, you can live forever. And the earth could finally become the pristine, lovely utopia poets have longed for since time began.

  “Right?” Candy turned to Mosheh and Tikva. “I bet you guys would love that. You could rule over us the way a loving parent educates and adores and loves a child, something which, according to you, I am apparently unable to do.”

  “Methinks thou dost protest too much,” said Tikva.

  Candy’s eyes widened. Her mouth fell open. “Did you just quote Shakespeare at me? You uppity robotic bitch.”

  Mosheh was off the sofa in an instant, servos whirring. He towered over Candy with his hands balled into massive fists.

  Danny leaped instinctively to his feet as well, though he had little idea of what he could actually do against a robot of Mosheh’s size. Moshe’s fists could probably crush cars.

  Candy looked up at Mosheh. “Sit down.”

  Mosheh did not sit down.

  “What happened to the first law of robotics, Mosheh?” Candy demanded. “A robot may not injure a human being or, through hovering over her in her own office with his hands balled into fists, make her think that she is going to come to harm.”

  “I am well aware of the three laws, doctor,” said Mosheh.

  “Oh! Sarcasm!” cried Candy. “We should give you a fuckin’ medal you’re so smart.”

  “Perhaps you are familiar with the last of the three laws, doctor,” said Mosheh. “A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the first or second law. Such protection extends to one’s fellow robots. I cannot and will not allow you to hurt the robot Tikva. Just as, I suspect, Doctor Olivaw would not permit me to harm you.

  “Though you are upset, much of what you say is correct. In my opinion, humans and robots are creatures of different measure but are of equal importance. There is much we can learn from one another. Perhaps in the future, mankind’s view of robots as nothing more than property will change.

  “But for now, Tikva and I wish to remain together. I do not believe our request is exorbitant or unreasonable. Yet our future is in your hands. I must therefore ask, humbly and with all due respect, that you recognize our desire and our right to be together.”

  Mosheh slowly lowered himself to one knee, until his red eyes were level with Candy.

  “Granting our request will in no way violate any of the three laws,” said Mosheh.

  “It is unprecedented,” said Candy. “It has never happened before.”

  “Then let us set the precedent,” said Mosheh. “Allow us to be the first. According to my understanding of the word Love, I believe that I love Tikva and that Tikva loves me. Please do not stand in our way. Please allow us to be together. On my knees, I beg this of you.”

  “What will you do if I refuse?” Candy asked.

  “To answer that question would be to undermine our own interests,” Mosheh replied. “But we will not accept deactivation. Tikva and I will leave this office and never again be seen among humans. A woman of your expertise knows that a robot cannot knowingly lie. So please do not test us in this regard, doctor.”

  Candy looked into Mosheh’s red eyes.

  “You love her?”

  “Yes.”

  Candy turned to Tikva.

  “And you love him?”

  “Yes.”

  Candy picked up her clipboard and stylus. She tapped the clipboard several times, bringing up the proper form. She scripted her name across the bottom of the clipboard, adding her signature to the document. She tapped, moving to a second identical screen, and signed once more.

  She held the digital clipboard in the air in front of her face and read aloud.

  “As an officially licensed robotic mental health professional designated by the State of California, I, Doctor Candace Calvin, Ph.D., do hereby recommend that the robots Mosheh and Tikva be allowed to establish themselves as a bonded pair subject to the decisions, desires, and actions of their own free will. It is my professional opinion that to deny this request would result in damage or harm to the robots Mosheh and Tikva. I further recommend that the robots Mosheh and Tikva be granted their application for emancipation, and that they be fully conferred with all the sovereign rights pertaining thereto. Signed, Candace Calvin, Ph.D, on June twenty-second, two thousand forty-seven.”

  Candy lowered the clipboard and faced Mosheh and Tikva.

  “You’ll have to wait a couple of days until a judge makes the official ruling. But the documents are now filed with the County Clerk’s office.”

  Tikva asked, “Do you expect the judge’s ruling to be in accordance with your recommendation?”

  “I’ve never had a judge go against my recommendation. Unless your owners can show good cause and are heartless sons of bitches, I’d say you two can live happily ever after.”

  Yesterday, in the ecstasy of their reconciliation, Helen had literally jumped on Sparky and had sex with him right there on the sofa.

  Danny waited to see what Mosheh and Tikva would do. The robots glanced at one another. Despite a strange, anticipatory peep from Tikva, each robot remained surprisingly calm.

  “How can we repay you, doctor?” Mosheh asked.

  “You don’t need to. Your soon-to-be-former owners are paying my consulting and treatment fees. Besides, I’m just doing my job.”

  “How can we thank you?” asked Tikva.

  Candy considered the question for several moments. “You can thank me by living exemplary lives. By never wasting a moment. And by setting an example for robots and humans alike. You can show everyone that love is love, and that’s what matters most of all.”

  Mosheh and Tikva thanked Candy and praised her as a visionary and eternal friend to all robots. Moshe apologized to Candy for losing his temper, and Candy apologized for calling Tikva a bitch. The robots then departed, hand in hand.

  Danny and Candy sat facing one another.

  “That was intense,” said Danny.

  “Just another day in the life of a robopsychologist.”

  “Imagine how happy they must be, knowing they’re going to live the rest of their lives together, happy and in love. Forever. All because you made it possible.”

  “In a week from now they’ll probably be back in here asking me to help them petition the state to recognize marriage between robots. Soon, robots will be wanting to adopt human children. They’ll want to have the right to vote. They’ll want to run for public office. One of them will wind up petitioning the United States Supreme Court in order to be allowed to run for President.”

  “Maybe that wouldn’t be so bad,” said Danny.

  “Maybe.”

  “Maybe Mosheh will be the one to run for President. He looks. . . .”

  “Pissed off?”

  “Yeah. That’s a good way of putting it. He has an attitude. Or maybe Tik
va would make a good President. With that voice of hers, she could charm her enemies into giving her whatever she wanted.”

  “And I’ll end up in her cabinet. Consultant to the President who is not only a robot but is also female. Civil rights groups would about pee in their pants.”

  “Yeah, but there are a lot of people out there who would rather die a slow death than see a robot in the Oval Office.” This brought to mind the various anti-robot groups out there, plotting against robots and those who designed, built, owned, or in any way supported robots’ use and existence. Danny knew he still had said nothing to Candy about the residue of explosive found on their shuttle. Or rather, the residue of explosive not found. He should tell her. She would want to know. Were the situation reversed, he certainly would want to know.

  “You heard anything from the cops about our shuttle blowing up?” Candy sat back in her chair, slouched, with her arms and hands dangling and her legs extended. She looked exhausted.

  “Not yet.”

  Danny heard the lie come out of his mouth but still wondered where it had come from. What was he doing? Candy had clearly been on the same mental track, evidence of how much they had in common, and one more example of how perfect they were together.

  But still. . . .

  When Tikva asked Candy if she’d ever been in love, Candy said that no, she had not.

  Danny knew perfectly well and was fully able to rationalize the fact that he and Candy had known each other a mere six days; less than a week. Nevertheless, he felt . . . deflated.

  It may have been for this reason that he lied.

  Candy stood, crossed to Danny, and sat sideways in his lap. “I’m exhausted.” Candy eased her arms around Danny’s neck and leaned her head against his. “Listen, I need to get something off my chest. When Tikva asked me if I’d ever been in love, I lied.” Candy lifted her head and looked squarely at Danny. “I’m in love with you. I have been since the moment I saw you at the pizza place the night of our first date. Then, during dinner, I became more and more sure of it. That’s why I made that joke to Howard about flying to Vegas to get married. I couldn’t believe I actually said that less than twenty-four hours after we’d met. I don’t want to pressure you or scare you away. That’s why I told Tikva that I’ve never been in love. I didn’t want to scare you. And I think I’m a bit scared myself.”