by Roxy Mews
“Many androids and AI systems are voice responsive now. The programming is all done through voice commands and you are adept at explaining things to me before I have to ask the question. That familiarity with the programming modules is a marketable skill.” Coral smiled. “Especially if you are going to work in the magistrate’s office with me.”
“Huh?”
“We need someone to take applications, sort out appointments and be polite to everyone while still asking some personal questions. I need someone who is blunt, forward, and has no qualms about being nosy. I thought you’d be perfect.”
The majority of that sounded like it was an insult, but Paisley had to admit that working in the non-stabby part of downtown and earning a paycheck without changing the toilet paper rolls would be nice.
“I’ll take it.”
“I’m not offering you the job. I’m offering you the opportunity to interview.”
Paisley frowned. “You don’t get to choose your own secretary?”
“My position is officially a consultant, which makes me a third party vendor and not an employee. I can’t hire a government official. I can’t do any hiring, technically, with my humanoid status.”
More rules preventing her friend from being able to live her own life. This world had to come to grips with the fact that not all people were human.
And not all people knew what boundaries were.
“Have you made your yearly appointment for your sexy shot?”
Coral called the yearly STI preventative a sexy shot. When Paisley had explained the concept of sexually transmitted diseases and how humans had to worry about that sort of thing, she’d used the slang term. Once you gave a robot a definition, that was that.
Coral kept track of Paisley’s personal calendar. It could be super handy, but at other times it was like having a mother ask if you’d done your homework. “I got my STI preventative last week. I went ahead and paid the extra to get the pregnancy blocker as well.” Paisley raised her hand to her chest in mock horror. Her bestie was always upset when she didn’t remember something. And Paisley bet she knew why. “You didn’t know? Have you not updated your application software?”
Coral frowned and rolled her eyes back up into her head. Paisley waited for the pupils to return and focus on her. She knew her friend needed a minute to run the necessary software and check for updates.
“I missed my update notification again.”
“You mean, you and Quinn were having incredibly hot sex and he refused to stop for your updates, and you didn’t put in another reminder for yourself.”
“Precisely. I need to run a system’s check when I get home.”
Paisley waved her hand around the room. “You could always do it here.”
Instead of politely declining, Coral moved on and deemed the conversation closed. She bunched her brows like she did when she was evaluating something. “Why does it smell like lubricant in here? Did you already have sex in this room?” She sniffed again. “And was it that bad, that you needed that much lubricant? Or was it anal?”
Paisley lowered her résumé. The work on her job application process had obviously ended. There wasn’t any lube, but… “It must be the coconut oil you left in our room. I thought I’d try and do the skin routine you did. It didn’t work out too well.”
“That’s not the smell of coconut oil. And I took mine with me when I moved in with Quinn.”
Paisley went into the bathroom and grabbed the giant bottle with the pump on top. “See? It was under our sink.”
Coral looked at the bottle, unscrewed the lid and sniffed. “This is silicone-based. Definitely not coconut oil, like the bottle says.”
It was no wonder it was such a pain to remove. Paisley had scrubbed herself for the better part of an hour.
“You found this in our room?” Coral shrugged. “Silicone-based lubricant is excellent for anal sex. Just don’t use it with silicone sex toys.”
“I’m the one who taught you that.” Paisley grabbed the bottle back from her friend. She was going to toss it out, but lube was pricey. “Are you sure there wasn’t anything wrong with this?”
“Smells like that Platinum brand I use with Quinn.” Coral pumped a tiny amount onto her finger and tasted it.
Paisley made a face. Only her friend would taste something to learn chemical composition.
“Yes. It’s the same brand. If you don’t want it, I’ll take it.”
Paisley might as well hand it over. She wasn’t going to have much use for it working day shift at a government building. If she got the job. She handed Coral the bottle and her friend smiled so big, Paisley had to laugh.
“Okay. Now that you have enough lube to have a month-straight session of anal, can you help me prep for this interview?”
Coral’s eyes made a loud sound as she blinked. “Let me send a picture of this to Quinn first. He is going to be very excited.”
Chapter Seven
Paisley had her good outfit on. Her one good outfit. This was the one that she used when she had to do something professional. Which was a whole lot of never.
Suddenly, this interview seemed like a horrible idea. She would have to get a whole new wardrobe, and really, who had that kind of time to worry about the length of the hemline and modesty of the cut, and if the suit was too business casual for the position.
This would require a lot of shopping and she really, really didn’t have time for that. Or the money for it. A hall full of interviewees lined the walls around her. One person was called in at a time. They all walked out within ten minutes and not a single person came out smiling.
What the hell were they doing behind those doors? Paisley tried to peek in every time. No one else tried to look. They were all busy trying to out “proper posture” each other. One woman’s back popped as she rolled her shoulders, but she sat straighter still. Paisley turned her head from side to side and let the tendons crack in her neck. She was already tense, but this room was giving her serious issues.
It was another reason she should just leave. This wasn’t the place she was supposed to be. If she left now, she could head to the palace before lunch service and grovel for her job back. Maybe she could perform some kind of grounds work Matilda hadn’t bought a bot for. There would be very little interaction with people, which was probably for the best.
This wasn’t like the last time she started over. There was no brilliant moment of clarity. There was no earth-shattering revelation. There was no sign on the wall telling her what to do next. She was making decisions for herself based on logic. And she didn’t like it one bit.
Sitting in the hallway with everyone else in high-priced interview gear, Paisley decided she should just get out before she embarrassed herself. If all the expensive-suit people were failing miserably behind those doors, then she would make an absolute ass of herself. She stood up ready to make a run for it. She could pretend to head for the bathroom. It would have gone perfectly if—
“Paisley Compton?”
—someone hadn’t called her name for the interview at that exact moment.
She was already standing, so she walked toward the double doors of despair. She would have to tell Coral the interviewers were mean to her. Or that they didn’t want such an attractive woman working around the magistrate, because the boss’s wife would have been pissed. Something. She could think of that while she bombed the interview.
“That’s me,” Paisley said, and tried to walk with confidence, but ended up doing a horribly non-rhythmic strut she immediately abandoned when more than a few people stared. She looked like she was in the middle of a mild seizure.
“Right this way, please.”
Paisley entered a room that held a large conference table covered with robots. Some were small and on top of the table, and some were self-ambulatory.
The man who had called he
r name before motioned for her to sit in the lone chair on her side of the table. She was placed at a mechanical buffet. Too bad she felt like she was about to be eaten alive.
“We are doing something different for this interview, Miss Compton. As a secretary to Coral Sechshundert in the Department of Mechanical Affairs, you will need to interact with mechanical elements of all different types. Some will be bots that are owned by the building and some are beings who are applying for their certificate of humanity to become a full-fledged member of society with the rights allowed them. Please address each being in front of you as you would interact with them if they approached your desk.”
Paisley now understood why many people in the waiting area came out so quickly. Most of the smaller bots on the table were highly specialized mechanics. The general public most likely didn’t have a baseboard cleaning bot, or a window cleaner or a cobweb remover. The vacuum bot was a pretty common model, so that was the gimme of the group.
The first bot, which was sitting in a chair, didn’t have a head. That didn’t mean it wasn’t self-aware.
The first mistake people made when working with mechanics was assuming human appearance meant human inner workings.
No head did not mean no brain. No head just meant the designer did not see the need to make the bot appear more human. This bot was probably an industrial worker. Paisley noticed a speaker near where a human’s chest would be.
“Please forgive me if I’m being forward, but are you able to see me? Or should I speak with more detail if I have questions? I don’t see a visual data receptor.”
The bot immediately whirred to life. A series of clicks and an optical module ascended from the middle of its frame.
“Visual data receptor engaged. Please relay next command.”
Well, that one definitely wasn’t self-aware. Waiting for commands was a sure sign that it only performed based on a specific voice prompt and could not interpret different terminology.
She spoke as clearly as she could. “Disengage command prompt.”
The bot immediately retracted its ocular unit and slumped into a more relaxed state.
Moving onto the next bot, Paisley noticed its more human appearance. Eyes whirred to life as she moved in front of the android, letting her know it had focused on her.
“Hello. I’m Paisley. Are you being reimbursed for your time here? Or are you being forced into this?”
The bot triple-blinked and copied some of Paisley’s movements with its hands and posture. The mirroring was a tic of the artificial intelligence software gaining data.
“They have offered me an immediate review of my application for my certificate of humanity. Being that I have not been approved yet, I do not get to earn my own income.”
Paisley turned toward the man she was probably supposed to impress with this interaction and frowned. “You’re forcing a humanoid to be present like an exhibit without compensation? That’s shitty.”
The man sucked his lip in between his teeth and wrote something on his clipboard before he responded. “Might I remind you, Miss Compton, that you are here to interview for a position. I asked you to interact with the mechanics. I do not recall asking your opinion of our process.”
Paisley turned to the humanoid and, looking it straight in the eye, repeated, “That’s shitty. If I were you, I would keep track of the time you have spent in here for this project.” She leaned in, and once again the robot followed. “The government uses what they call consultants. They won’t employ robots officially until the laws are reviewed, but working here all day—I am assuming without a break—you will rack up some serious hours. I bet they would just pay you rather than address a lawsuit were you to sue them.”
The robot held still for a moment, and then replied, “All of that is duly noted. Thank you, Paisley Compton.”
“You’re very welcome.”
She went to the next chair without looking back at her interviewer. She’d probably already pissed this guy off. There was no need to continue the interview for the job, but she could show the dude up. Once a bot could tell it was being screwed over, treating it like an appliance was cruel.
The next robot was a simple serving bot. Most of the bot’s body was made up of welded points that showed no ability for additional movement. Artificial intelligence wasn’t installed on immobile units. They usually responded to basic commands.
“Power up,” Paisley said loudly.
The machine booted. “Service mode or removal mode?”
Paisley turned back to her interviewer. “Did you want me to offer you a drink?”
“Not necessary.” He took more notes.
“Power down.”
The bot turned off.
Paisley was at the end of the table. She could stall and make her interviewer more uncomfortable, but she needed to get out of here before she got Coral in trouble by association.
“Did you want me to try and run diagnostics on them? You only have one bot with artificial intelligence who would be a candidate for a certificate of humanity. A bot you aren’t compensating for its time.”
At that, the aforementioned bot leaned forward. “I gender identify as female.”
Paisley nodded. “That you aren’t compensating for her time.”
The interviewer held his ear, frowned emphatically, but his disapproval obviously didn’t matter, because he tilted his head as if someone had yelled at him and nodded.
He hung his clipboard on the wall and gestured toward a door on the opposite side of the room from where she’d entered. “After you, Miss Compton.”
Paisley looked at the solid door with a small translucent window. The glass was frosted and contained metal reinforcements. It looked like something that would keep troubled people locked away from sharp objects.
“You first,” she said.
The man sighed heavily and opened the door. He stepped through and held it open for Paisley. “Come on, please. This is heavy.”
Paisley walked through and saw Magistrate Ralph Winters himself seated at a long table, facing what was a two-way mirror. He had been watching her. So she not only annoyed the interviewer, she probably was going to be arrested or fined for messing up their deal with the droid.
“Have a seat, Miss Compton,” he said.
A heavily armed guard wearing mirrored sunglasses stood in the corner behind the magistrate, but other than that, they were alone in a soundproofed room.
“Oh hey, look, I didn’t mean to be so confrontational. It’s probably some kind of social disorder. I’ll get it checked out right after I get out of here.”
The door clicked shut. Her interviewer had escaped.
“I really don’t appreciate having to repeat myself, Miss Compton. Please have a seat.”
Looking around, Paisley saw the seat was alongside him rather than in front.
“Did you want me to move the chair?” she asked.
“No, I’d prefer you have a clear line of sight to watch the next interview. I want your opinion of what I’ve had to watch all day.”
Sure enough, one of the men Paisley had been in the hallway with stepped into the room she had just vacated.
“Can they hear us?” she whispered.
“No, the intercom you see is set up as a one-way communication. When I yelled at Mitchell, I pressed this button.” The magistrate pressed the button he pointed to, and spoke into the microphone in front of him. “Mitchell, please conduct the interview exactly as you did for Miss Compton. Don’t offer assistance to the next one.”
The man on the other end of the glass touched his ear and nodded.
Paisley never had more of an urge to help a fellow human. The person being interviewed immediately started sweating and then asked the baseboard machine if it was in need of any refreshments. Paisley shook her head, then cringed as the man tried to shake hands with
the serving bot. He pulled with too much force and the serving hand attachment disengaged. You’d have thought he slit a human’s throat with how horrified he looked.
“Are they all this dumb when it comes to mechanics?” Paisley asked out loud. She thought she’d mumbled, but the magistrate heard her.
“Every damn one of them.”
Paisley kept facing forward but slid her eyes over to keep tabs on the other two men in her peripheral vision.
The guard barely breathed, and the magistrate didn’t look at her. He clicked a few buttons on the portable panel in front of them. The sound coming into their observation room stopped.
Then he turned to her and she was really unsure what to do next, so she scooted her chair back a bit as she turned toward him. He wasn’t a small man, and she could definitely beat him to the door if he tried to have her arrested.
“I don’t like you,” he finally said. “Your priorities are not congruent with following government policies. I doubt I could get you to show up on time without a driving service picking you up.”
The guy had the nerve to say all of this while staring blatantly at her legs. Men. But his obvious internal monologue wasn’t as offensive as what he’d said.
“I know how to have a good time, but that doesn’t mean I’m irresponsible,” Paisley said loudly to redirect his gaze. “And you’re just as annoyed with all those paper pushers coming through those doors, aren’t you?”
The magistrate didn’t look at the interviewee sweating as he tried to use voice commands with the artificial intelligence droid. The droid was purposefully making it difficult on the douchebag. The magistrate was focused on insulting her work ethic.
Paisley had been at this song and dance before. “Shit. Those are exactly the type of people you want. I don’t know why you don’t just hire a bot. Then you could program them. Just make sure you don’t spring for the AI. That OS would learn to outmaneuver your shit in a second. If you want to label people by their appearance, you are no better than those idiots who can’t tell the difference between a service bot and a fully ambulatory humanoid.”
