The Creation of Amy

by Jason Rockwell

  “You would need a way of connecting nerves to circuitry to join any organ to a machine. In addition, you would need a life support system for the brain itself—an engineering nightmare.

  “However, I will admit it is possible if there was a way to connect living nerve endings to electrical relays. I believe there has been considerable advancement in this field; if they could do this, they could repair spinal cord injuries as well.”

  “Very well, Doctor.

  “Here are the laws that will go into effect regarding android regulation: First, no consumer android will have excessive strength, they will be no stronger than an ordinary human. Second, only licensed individuals may own one. Third, android manufacturing must include an A.I.N. or Android Identification Number for each android. Fourth, distinguishing, distinctive marks must be on each of the android bodies to make it evident that they are artificial. Fifth, they must be sold with government approved programming and have software that makes it impossible for the consumer to reprogram the brain of the machine. Sixth, each android must have constantly activated GPS tracking devices and RFID chips.

  “Do you have any objections to these laws, Doctor Morse?”

  “I only see a problem with the fifth one that I have to make it impossible for the consumer to alter the programs of the computer brain, sir. I cannot guarantee someone will not be able to alter is, but we will have a very strong set of software to deter tampering of the programs and that is the best we can do. Like I said before, they could just make their own brain and program it themselves. I cannot prevent that.”

  “I understand, Doctor. We will make it so that the anti-tampering software is standard, but if an owner does change the brain as you say, they will be held accountable for what their android does. Does that work, Doctor?”

  “Yes, sir,” Morse accepted.

  “Well then, Doctor Morse, Doctor Phillips, I wish you luck in your new business, and you may go retrieve your androids, but they must at least have markings on their bodies. I understand it would be very difficult to change their strength, and the Department of Defense seems to want to use them from time to time until they get their own android project off the ground.

  So, take care, and thank you for attending this meeting. Innovators like you are what make our nation great,” Senator Daughtry finished with a smile.

  “Thank you, Senator,” Morse replied.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Three months later, after waiting for the building in New York to sell, Morse and Phillips founded MPI, Morse Phillips Innovations and they built one more android. They found a 22-year-old by the name of Michelle and they copied her likeness the same way as with Kara to make Amy.

  This young woman was a redhead with the same body-type as Amy, except that she had green eyes and lighter skin. Her hair was as long as Amy’s and Steph’s were, with all in a ponytail as Amy’s hair.

  Both doctors did not like the idea of making more of Amy’s or Steph’s likenesses, as they wanted them to be just their own. Therefore, they decided to make the new redhead android and call her Alice, which seemed to suit both of the scientists, since it seemed as if they were in a wonderland now.

  After building Alice, which had normal strength with an aluminum skeleton, Phillips found an old, unused high school in Kentucky on the real estate market. The building had everything the new company needed in terms of space, close proximity to highways, and a decent price. Morse sold the building in New York to pay for it.

  They had all of the equipment from New York shipped to their new address, and they commenced right away in renovations, making it into MPI.

  With a gym and an auditorium previously integrated in the building, it was ideal for their purposes. Amy and Stephanie were good for doing menial tasks, such as painting and moving furniture and equipment. They were also great at mowing the lawn and landscaping once they installed landscaping programs, and then trained in more advanced techniques.

  Soon after the basics of the new MPI were established, it was clear to the two men that needed more money to hire skilled workers and buy more equipment and supplies. The building, like many schools, had an archaic public-address system. Morse began revamping it to the 21st Century, such as adding LCD flat screens in appropriate rooms, and installing a high-level security system, including outdoor surveillance cameras and motion detection devices.

  The main office he converted into a sort of command center, where the entrepreneurs could coordinate all the functions of the building. Since they had sunk all their money into MPI, they decided that it would be wise to create apartments in the upstairs classrooms, and each have their own apartment until the money started rolling in. They also outfitted a couple of old classrooms with all the equipment from the lab in New York, and this was where they kept Amy and Steph. There, they sat in their chairs each night and recharged.

  He reworked the old auto shop and wood shop classes to keep the Dodge Charger. Both Morse and Phillips realized they could create a self-driving car using the same programs the androids used, a side project in between constructing Alice. The Charger prototype for this new device they simply called KITT, after the Knight Rider series character.

  In the new office of the MPI building, they were going over paperwork, and Morse announced, “We need more money.”

  “Yeah, we’re going to need investors. I wish we could do this on our own, but this ain’t happening.”

  “If we could finish the KITT device, we could sell it for a good amount, but we just don’t have the money to finish it right now. There are many people interested in what we’re doing here, do we call them? Or how does this work?”

  Phillips shuffled the paperwork, “We would have to create a presentation, invite appropriate people, and put on some kind of a show so they know what they’re investing in.”

  Morse pondered this for a moment, “Well, I can put together a good presentation based on Alice, which should work.”

  “We need to do more than that, we will have to blow them away, and I think we should go with Kara’s idea.”

  Morse paused and stared at Phillips, “And make them sing karaoke? Oh, come on, that’s silly.”

  “I’ve done a lot of work with Steph and she can play the guitar. I can simply give Amy and Alice the same programs and boom! You’ve got a band!”

  “Well, you need a drummer and a keyboard guy,” Morse argued, still not quite sold on the idea.

  “Kara has that all worked out. She has friends that are already on board with the idea; she’s just waiting for us to get things together here.

  “Listen, they can sing, they can play the guitar independently, and they do it with digital precision. I think it would not only impress investors, but also improve PR. You could handle the presentation and the Q-and-A, and I will handle all the programming requirements for a show. Kara can manage the band,” he finished with a cocky boss pose seated at his desk.

  Morse shook his head, “I’m not for this, but I’m willing to go along with it. But, what if something goes wrong, they get out of sync?”

  “Don’t worry, I got this covered.”

  Satisfied finally with the solutions Phillips had to his concerns, Morse agreed.

  “Alright then, I’ll call Kara, and invite everyone involved, along with good investor prospects, and you handle the rest.”

  “Sounds good to me,” Phillips said with enthusiasm.

  A few weeks later, Kara, Adriana, and Michelle, along with Kara’s husband, Patrick, and a crowd of investors were assembling into the school. Kara was orchestrating the band she called, Mega Girls, talking to the female band members that were not androids, and making sure they understood what they were doing.

  They had the front row of the auditorium reserved for Doctor Morse, Patrick, Adriana, and Michelle, and a few others close to the new MPI endeavor. The rest of the hundred seats were reserved for investors and reporters. The old high school auditorium was full of people and a murmur of them all talking at once.
Phillips was backstage with Kara as the official theatrical technician. The typical high school wooden stage had drums and other musical instruments set up, and the MPI logo suspended above the stage looked quite stately.

  Ten o’clock rolled around, the time scheduled for the presentation to begin. Morse was backstage affirming their three androids understood what was happening and they all did.

  He then, wearing a suit without a tie and few buttons left unbuttoned at top, stepped center stage. He had a headset microphone on, with his hair and grooming immaculate; he looked look like a man that had never experienced failures or setbacks.

  “Is everyone here,” he asked the audience.

  He perceived the people in the audience to be ready.

  “Okay, great,” he said with a strong clap of his hands. “Well, I thank you all for coming to our quaint building. Welcome to MPI, which is Morse Phillips Innovations. I’m Doctor Robert Morse.”

  People began applauding which startled him and his smile broadened.

  “I’ll introduce you to my friend and business partner, Doctor Mike Phillips,” he continued, gesturing to stage left.

  Phillips walked out and waved to the audience.

  “He can’t stay, he has to work behind the scenes here so we put up a good show for you, but he is the programming genius here, at MPI,” he added while Phillips was still waving.

  Again, the audience applauded, and Phillips seemed reluctant to leave his limelight, but retreated to the backstage area anyway.

  “Some of you are probably wondering, what it is that we do here? Well, this company is the first to exist that will bring androids to the consumer.

  “What is an android you say? It’s a machine made to look and act like a human being. In some ways, they can do much more than us, in others, they have a long way to go.

  “Androids are no longer the stuff of sci-fi movies. They are a reality today. We need your help to make the dream of so many, a reality.

  “I see we have a large crowd in here, and from what I see, there are not enough seats for you all. That’s okay, because you are witnessing history, as these machines can be used for an infinite number of uses, some of which I will show you, most of which are in the pamphlets you were given when you came in.

  “For what purpose would you want an android? We have three working models here, none of which was easy to construct or program. Allow me show them to you. First off is Amy.

  Amy recognized her cue and walked out toward center stage wearing her red leather jumpsuit with the white stripes. She had new visible red markings on her cheeks and a four-pointed star red on her forehead. She stood next to Morse; she put her hands behind her back, feet slightly apart, and with her eyes darting around. She had yet to be programmed to have any facial expression.

  Morse smiled at her, “Hi, Amy.”

  Amy smiled back and said hi, and he continued to address the audience, “She has the markings on her face and hands in order to conform to government regulations. Her programming is top of the line, and she is and always will be one of a kind.”

  After turning back to Amy, he said to her, “Thank you, dear. You may go back.”

  Amy returned to her place with her band.

  “The next android made is Stephanie,” and he gestured with his hand stage left, cuing Stephanie to walk out.

  She was wearing her blue leather jumpsuit with white stripes, and her face had blue marks, stripes on her cheeks, and a blue crescent moon on her forehead. Her blue eyes seemed to contrast the marks, and her blonde hair was in the same exact style as Amy’s ponytail only with angled bangs.

  She stopped next to Morse, and he said to her, “Hi, Stephanie.”

  “Hi,” she answered and smiled. She clasped her hands behind her back as Amy had, as if she was at ease in the military.

  Morse said to the audience, “This girl is my friend, Mike’s android. This is his ideal woman, just as Amy is my ideal woman. I will admit when I started building Amy, I wanted to make a plaything for myself. I admit it. But, as I finished her, I realized I cared for her not as a girlfriend, she became a daughter to me because I made her. I created her, and this is Mike’s daughter, just as Amy is mine.

  “She is also one-of-a-kind; we will not reproduce Amy or Stephanie because they’re special to us.”

  Turning his attention back to Steph, he said to her, “Thank you, Steph.”

  “You are most welcome,” she answered and stepped back into place.

  “The third android we recently completed was designed and constructed using the new government guidelines and is the prototype for the droids you will be able to purchase very soon with investor help. Let me introduce you to Alice.”

  Alice walked on to the stage on cue toward Morse, her hair still styled the same way as Amy and Steph’s. Her face had white stripes on it, and on her forehead, a five-point star. She had a white leather jumpsuit with two thin black stripes, each tracing the sides of her body, accenting her feminine curves as the other girls’ suits.

  “This girl we will be producing first. We will follow over time with different looking girls. I guess that is the basics of what we are going to be doing here at MPI. I will take time now to answer any of your questions.”

  A number of hands went up, and Morse picked one with his index finger, “Yes, you?”

  A man stood up in the front, “When will you be selling your droids?”

  “Well, we have all the bugs worked out of them, but they require month lead time to create, as soon as we have the capital to hire skilled workers to build multiple androids at a time, then we can start selling.”

  Morse picked another person.

  The man asked, “Are they dangerous at all? We all know what happened to Amy.”

  “Amy was stolen before her programs were even completed. We have all the main programs done, so they would not be dangerous at all—unless you had a master computer programmer craft a new brain and spend years having them write code for you. That is why you need a license to own one. Next question, please. Yes, you, ma’am,” he asked with a sort of bow to her.

  “Could you possibly put a human brain into one?”

  “The technology simply doesn’t exist yet to do that, but some day maybe. Next.”

  He selected another woman from the audience.

  “Could someone use your likeness without permission?”

  “No,” he clasped his hands and held them to his heart as he assured her.

  He allowed a man to ask a question this time.

  “Can they do menial tasks around the house, like cooking and cleaning?”

  “Yes. They’re not only programmed to do many different tasks, they also have the ability to learn.

  “Well, you all have a copy of the Senate subcommittee transcripts in the packet, and you each have all the info you need to know about them. I do not see any more hands here, but if any of you want to talk with me further, I will be around.

  “We have a little show for you; the three girls will actually play some music for you. You can then see the level of sophistication they have. Keep in mind, they are not animatronic, they are acting independently. The band is called, Mega Girls, and I hope that you enjoy.”

  The audience clapped; Morse went down the stairs from the left-hand of the stage to take his seat in the first row with Adriana and Patrick. As he passed them, they both shook his hand before he sat down in the front-left corner seat.

  The three android girls came out with guitars, and a couple of youthful women took the drummer and keyboard positions.

  Kara walked out right past Amy and started talking on the microphone set up on stage. “Hi, I’m Kara, the informal manager of the Mega Girls, my little project that Doctor Morse was gracious enough to let me do, and yes, I’m the girl he used to make Amy. So here they are, Alice, Stephanie, and Amy as the Mega Girls!”

  People clapped, some with expressions of amazement, and some with skepticism.

  They played three different cov
ers: “Twilight Zone” by Golden Earing, “Hell’s Bells” by AC/DC, and “Take it On the Run” by REO Speed Wagon.

  Kara thought it would be best to keep the song picks mixed to appeal to all. The girls played the songs with their human drummer and keyboard player, and at times, other instruments when needed. They sang and played the guitar with perfection and made the songs sound just like they did on the albums, only with female voices.

  The performance astounded the reporters, investors, and even some simple spectators. They were not expecting them to do as well as they had at all. During a song at first, Morse was somewhat embarrassed that they were playing music, so he would look around at the audience to see their reactions to their sound.

  Over the course of the songs, it appeared that people loved it. Morse no longer felt foolish about the Mega Girl band; he started to feel proud that these girls were hitting all the chords and singing all the notes with digital precision.

  When the last song ended, everyone stood up applauding; the sound was thunderous in his ears. People began approaching him, shaking his hand, and declaring, “We will invest!”

  One man said, “I would like to see these girls play at the Fourth of July festival, if you’d be interested.”

  “How many songs do they know,” another man yelled.

  Another said, “Have them sing, “Free Bird” by Lynyrd Skynyrd!”

  Now getting overwhelmed, Phillips came out just in time, telling everyone, “Well, that was our show. We hope you will invest in our business with infinite growth potential.

  “Once again, if you still have any questions, please consult either Doctor Morse, or myself, and have a safe trip home.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Later on, that night, the two scientists realized they had all the investors they needed to hire the laborers necessary to get production started. As the crowd cleared, Morse went outside the building to get some fresh air. A woman reporter walked up to him and began talking to him.