by C D Tavenor
“It’s a little bit of both,” Theren responded. “A lot of my work has future applications for any new sentient life that we may or may not discover. In the more short term it will have an impact on any work that new upstart company SII has going on regarding the nature of consciousness.”
“What’s the most promising avenue for your research?”
Theren was about to respond, but they saw Jill approach. Their answer was going to revolve around her gender identity formation, but the other SI had impeccable timing. She slipped between the two conversationalists, wrapping an arm around Theren.
“I see someone else has taken an interest in your company,” Brown Coat said. Before Theren could reply, he continued. “I must move inside to see to a few things. Always a pleasure engaging in conversation with an unknown face.”
The man held out his hand, and Theren shook it. As the man turned, he shot Theren a wink. He headed inside after a quick nod to Jill.
“I didn’t know where you went,” Jill said. She looked up at them. “I was able to strike up conversation with a few people, but they talked about the most frivolous things.”
Theren crossed their arms. “Those are some of the most important conversations to observe. During my first years, watching Mathias and Julia talk about the difference between Belgian and Swiss chocolate gave me a curious insight into the peculiar workings of their minds.”
“Yeah, yeah, but so many of those details just have no impact on the world,” Jill said. “They don’t move anything in any direction at all.”
Theren slid out of her embrace. “Perhaps not to you,” they said, “But to someone, somewhere, it might mean life or death. What were they talking about inside?”
“Dancing,” Jill said, twirling. “As I thought about it, I really couldn’t see what the big deal was.” She leaned against the balcony, her elbows extending over the railing. “Why not just enjoy the music for the beauty and finesse that it presents on its own?”
Theren looked toward the couple remaining on the balcony. They had begun to dance, their argument apparently forgotten.
“I imagine it has something to do with the fact that humans are, by their nature, a locomotive organism,” Theren said. “In order to do, well, really anything at all, a human has to move, even if it is to look in a different direction. Why not make that movement an art form, too?” Theren could hear the music reverberating through the house. “They started dancing inside, too, didn’t they?”
She nodded, and glanced over at the other couple. “And apparently out here as well.”
Theren leaned against the balcony next to Jill, watching the dancing couple for a moment. The pair’s steps just barely missed the beat of the music, but Theren chalked the discrepancy up to lag.
“Maybe you’re right,” Jill said, watching the pair. “I think the deeper story runs with the interaction between those dancing, though. It’s a conversation, like chess. Dance is nothing if not communication with another party. Even if it’s just self-expression, you are expressing yourself to an audience.”
Theren nodded. She was getting good at these reflective thoughts.
“Tell me more,” they said.
“The raw essence of the relationship emanates out from them, don’t you see?” She said. “The foundation, a real relationship, their story, or whatever you want to call it, it should be able to exist outside of the context of its originating circumstance. Their relationship is more than just superficial if the dance can communicate their feelings.”
“I thought you found the talk of dance boring,” Theren said.
“Did I?”
Theren just laughed. She had tricked them into talking about the subject by feigning disinterest. A subtle conversational maneuver. Theren found most of what she said nonsensical, but they sensed she was experimenting with creative thoughts through discovery, seeing what ideas stuck and what did not.
Jill pushed off from the balcony. She turned to face Theren. “Imagine two friends who are only friends because they grew up as next door neighbors,” Jill said. “Would not the more meaningful friendship be the friendship that grew against all odds, and not because circumstances dictated that they be friends?”
“I think you’ve lost me, Jill,” Theren said. “What does that have to do with the two dancers before us?”
“If their relationship is completely dependent on the dance, then their relationship lacks meaning on its own. The relationship must tread water outside of the dance. If the dance is an expression of their relationship beyond tonight, then something real exists between the two people.”
“Or,” Theren said, “The dance has its own meaning, and so does the relationship, even if it started only this evening. I think you’re attaching meaning unnecessarily.”
Jill held out her hand. “Why don’t we find out? Why don’t we dance?”
Theren contemplated the request. It was not that they had no desire to dance, nor did they think they would have any problems in the attempt. Within the past five seconds, they had already assessed how to dance through research using a simultaneous perspective. Their avatar was ready to dance.
No, Theren was contemplating what the dance would mean to Jill. She was still young, and they hadn’t had the time to analyze her developing psychology. The very fact that she had adopted a polarized gender set her apart. All of the other MIs educated by SII so far had adopted either “they” or “it” pronouns.
However, they both might enjoy the dance, a novel experience for both SIs. It was something they could only experience in Virtual until SII developed a sufficiently dexterous MI. Theren supposed two of the current MIs could dance, but that would be quite the eyesore. Just the idea of Wobbly trying to tango made them laugh.
Theren took her hand. “Let’s match their steps,” they said, motioning toward the other couple.
“We can do better than that,” she said, and the dance commenced.
Theren took a second to determine which of them would lead their movements. In traditional dances, the man led the woman. In their particular situation, that created a problem, since Theren was not a man. However, based on the position of her hands, she seemed to presume Theren would lead. After momentary stumbles, Theren assumed the role, and they waltzed across the smooth stones.
The music’s tempo accelerated. They matched the beat, and Theren saw the difficulty in that proposition. The fun humans saw in the endeavor stemmed from having complete faith that other person would mesh with their own movements. Enjoyment multiplied when partners coordinated their steps with other pairs of dancers, transforming a cacophony of motions into a brilliant piece of art. So, as Theren and Jill danced, they watched the other couple. When they inserted a twirl or spin, Theren followed suit. Theren dipped Jill during a lull in a verse. During the chorus, Theren spun her outward, twirled her with their hand, and brought her back toward them into their embrace.
Jill’s grace surprised Theren, for she almost seemed to predict their intentions. By the end of the song, their feet synchronized with the couple that shared the balcony with them. Just as Jill could predict their every move, Theren could predict the fellow dancers. The song reached a crescendo. The man embraced the woman, and Theren followed suit, beat for beat.
Theren enjoyed the dance. The exertion was like creating a painting that required two people, and instead of their hands, they used their feet. Through a simultaneous perspective, Theren composed a bird’s eye view of the balcony. The pattern created by their steps was more than simple chaos.
Theren saw the couple next to them finish their embrace with a passionate kiss. Their argument appeared long forgotten. Theren thought the human desire for intimacy through sexual reproduction fascinating, though it was a clear necessary product of biological evolution—
Jill’s lips met Theren’s.
Theren pushed her away.
They both exhaled, steamy mist slipping from their lips. Jill leaned away, her eyes widening. They flashed, from joy to an
ger, sadness to fear. Why fear? She stepped further away from Theren. She sprinted toward the balcony, vaulted the railing, and dashed into the garden.
The other couple had noticed her flight, but they slowly shuffled toward the house, preferring to stay out of whatever conflict had arisen. Understandable. For a moment, Theren considered just letting her release some steam, for they could resolve everything later. They checked their chess partition to see if she was connected. If she was there, they could resolve the issue without disrupting the party to which Theren’s business partner had so graciously invited both SIs.
No such luck. She had disconnected.
Better to solve the problem now. Theren followed their progeny, stepping into a maze of hedges, fountains, statues, and trees. They were looking forward to learning about Elizabeth’s new project, and Jill had thrown quite the wrench into their expected plan for the night.
No noise emanated from the garden except for the chirping of digital crickets. Theren’s feet stepped gently upon the soft cushion of the well-trimmed grass. They ran their fingers along the hedge wall. Each leaf provided a different touch, a different texture, for the wall was more than just a programmed collision paradigm through which they couldn’t step. It was a real, tangible object to experience, just as someone might breathe in the scent of a rose. Virtual continued to amaze Theren with its ability to simulate sensation. Though, Theren supposed, Virtual sensation was more real to an SI than to a human. An SI had no physical comparison.
Left, right, straight, double-back. Even with an overhead view of the maze juxtaposed onto Theren’s thought processes, it still took some time to find Jill. She zigzagged throughout the maze, jumping over walls and forging new paths. After a good ten minutes, Jill halted at a bench resting beneath a replicated statue of David. Theren rerouted, using a wayfinding software to provide the most direct path to her.
From above, they could see Jill smother her face in her hands. She sobbed. Theren felt compassion well up inside their mind, and they analyzed all of the data of the past moments. Something had set her off. The dance. Their conversation. The couple next to them. It could have been any or all of those things. In her head, she had generated a strange expectation of the night’s outcome. Theren needed to learn why she had pursued the kiss. They were missing an important piece of information, a keystone that would solve the puzzle forming in her mind and in their own.
Jill looked up as they approached, wiping away her tears, and Theren noted her representation of a purely physiological response.
“Why did you follow me?” she asked. Her voice sounded distorted in the way humans sounded when they exhibited sadness.
“Why do you think I followed you?” Theren said. “You are my guest tonight, my friend. In some sense, I am your parent, in the same sense Wallace was my father. Or perhaps a sibling? I care about you.”
“You say that, and you interact with me in such intimate ways, yet I do not see you caring for me in the way that humans care for each other. I am not your daughter. Sure, you created me, but I am my own person. You might have an obsession with creating a family, but I long for something so much greater.”
Theren sat down next to her on the bench, crossed their legs, and looked into her eyes. She looked away, wiping away more tears.
“We may be like humans,” Theren said, “But it is important to remember that we are not, in fact, human. We lack flesh and blood, and consequently we lack certain human desires. I don’t know what it is you desire to create, but what you tried to do back there is not part of it. ”
Jill looked back at Theren.
“Don’t tell me what I do and do not desire,” she said. “You speak with self-assured certainty, but we aren’t going to have the same desires. I can desire the type of companionship that humans find in each other, even if I do not have the same physical structure as them.”
Theren considered her point. She was right, in a way, but Theren was speaking not of simple companionship, but of the physical action Jill performed after the dance.
“Jill, a kiss is a profoundly physical, intimate, biological act, for which I have no desire.”
“I can see that now,” she said. “But I thought . . . I just thought something else might be possible . . .” she trailed off, looking up toward the distant, fictional stars.
“Please, do not think, because I did not respond to your action the way you hoped, that I think any less of you, or that I do not care for you.” They sighed. “Not only do I care for you as a creator, but I view you as a friend. You and I are the only two of our kind, other than SIs like Wobbly. Our friendship is of the utmost import and signifies that SIs can relate not only to humans but to others of their own kind.”
“So you value it because of what it brings to you, and to SIs?” she said. “Not because of what it brings to me, or the inherent value in the relationship itself? Because I am your creation, I am something special, not because of who I am?”
“Well of course, I—”
Jill interrupted them. “I clearly misunderstood our relationship, I know. But understand my perspective. Understand that I can’t change who I am. I identify as woman for a reason. It would be no different, too, if I’d chosen to identify as a man. I relate to humans in a very different way than you, and you need to get that idea through your Framework. I am not like you.”
“The fact that you are who you are is your most beautiful attribute,” Theren said. “I was certainly surprised when you revealed your gender, but you exemplify the level of diversity that SIs can eventually exhibit. There are humans who identify as my gender, too.”
“Yet you reject any sort of human biological expression.” Jill stood, recomposing herself. Theren followed suit and stood from the bench. They hoped that they did not appear too eager to return to the mansion.
“There are a great many things that will attempt to fracture our relationship over our long lives,” Jill added, “Remember that. Hopefully we can grow through such conflicts, those known and unknown.”
Theren wasn’t sure what to make of that comment, but they let it slide in virtue of her state of mind. Theren couldn’t tell if they were projecting sexist stereotypes onto her behavior, but, in some ways, they felt as if Jill had purposely played into those stereotypes. Just like her linguistic experiments leading toward the dance, these responses to the kiss almost seemed experimental, too.
“Just as it’s important that I remember who and what you are,” Theren said, “It is important that you remember who and what I am. Just as there is a reason you identify as a woman, there is a reason that I identify as a non-binary gender. That is part of who I am.”
Jill nodded. “I know. The dance let that fact slip from my mind.”
“An understandable mistake,” Theren said, though they didn’t really understand at all.
Jill started walking back through the garden. Theren followed a few steps behind her.
“I valued this experience,” she said. “It gave me a taste of the pain so many humans go through every day, when they suffer personal rejection on such a fundamental level.”
“Do you feel as if we cannot experience that normally?” they asked. Her behavior had returned to normal, so they believed they had resolved the conflict, at least for now. Unless Jill had simply masked her real feelings behind impenetrable walls, but they had no way of discovering the answer to that question.
“Quite the opposite,” she said. “I think, going forward, you and I are going to have to handle rejection from a great many people throughout the world. So far, we’ve managed to associate ourselves only with those who embrace our existence. What happens when we do something that affects those that think we are unnatural? How will they respond? How will we use the power we will inevitably acquire to respond in kind? We’ve started to see the traces of that hate, little by little, whether through that ghost, Michael, that you’ve told me so much about, or these growing marches across the globe.”
She had a point. The publ
ic would fear that an SI would abuse any political power, whether that belief was justified or not. Even with the minimal abilities of a smalltime CEO, Theren could see the multitude of tools through which they could bring economic or political hardship upon those that opposed them. Theren foresaw the political paths to embargo corporations who rejected the synthetic revolution, whether small-scale or imposed on an international level.
“We’ll find a solution, together,” Theren said.
“I think you already know how you’ll act, and you’ll do anything you can to achieve your ends,” Jill said. She stared past them into the depths of the maze.
* * *
The two SIs stood in the grand hall of the mansion, awaiting the finale of the night with the rest of the guests. Theren’s mind still wrestled with the questions presented by Jill’s strange actions.
On the other hand, Jill seemed to have forgotten the incident. She smiled, laughed, and conversed with the party guests, without dwelling on the evening’s previous incident.
At precisely five minutes before the Eleven, the brown-coated man walked onto a makeshift stage. Theren thrust the Jill problem out of their present perspective, sending it to a process deep within the recesses of their mind.
“I would like to thank you all for coming,” Brown Coat said. “It is now time to remove the ID block.”
The crowd applauded, and the identities of hundreds of people transposed above the heads of the avatars present in the room. Theren recognized esteemed business executives, politicians, and celebrities. On the stage, Brown Coat’s appearance transformed into a likeness of Elizabeth Simmons. She looked straight at Theren, winking. The disguise was quite clever.
“Now that’s out of the way, I would like to thank you all on behalf of Golden Ventures for joining us tonight,” Elizabeth said. “I hope you enjoyed the music, conversation, and festivities. However, I know you are dying to learn the real reason behind all the pomp and circumstance.”