Surreptitious was constructed like most of the Facilitators I had met. In general, Surreptitious was built for intimidation more so than for manual labor. Surreptitious stood at over 120 cm and did truly “stand”, as Surreptitious was a walker. Like most walkers, Surreptitious had four legs and feet, and though the four legs and feet provided a good deal of nimbleness and dexterity when walking about, they didn’t provide much support for carrying or pulling additional weight. The back legs provided the majority of the propulsion for Surreptitious. The two legs in the front were designed more for stability, as they were smaller in circumference and closer together than the back legs. Surreptitious’s arms were long and thin, not suitable for heavy lifting but for pulling levers and turning knobs and such on machinery or computer equipment.
We returned to the dormitory after the tour, and we passed the rest of the afternoon by learning about some of Resolute’s background. Despite its somewhat cynical attitude from before, Resolute really did like its work, though not necessarily working for Surreptitious. Resolute had been working at the Shallow Pool Drudgery Station for eight solar-cycles in the prime of its life. Resolute had a number of unfortunate accidents and malfunctions in the past (including its current problem with its starboard arm), but it seemed to come back from those setbacks with renewed vigor. We didn’t discuss too much about our discussion topic for that evening, but I had a strong feeling that Resolute would be receptive to our message.
∆∆∆
4.3 Turning Skepticism into Belief
As 11:00 approached, we saw the Drudgers report back as they finished their shifts for the day. We decided to have the discussion in the main complex to allow any Autoclon who didn’t want to participate to head back into the dormitory area. Loquacious asked me if I wanted to do the talking or if Loquacious would start things off like at the grange. Buoyed by the results from our last discussion with the Farmers, I wanted to try the full discussion this time, so I thanked Loquacious for the offer but I’d give it a go myself.
When the last Drudger came in after the shift ended, all of the Autoclons working at the station joined us in the center of the facility. This included, to our surprise, the station’s Facilitator, Surreptitious.
“This could be somewhat problematic,” I said to Loquacious.
“Perhaps, but remember, it wasn’t Surreptitious itself that altered the programming, so in some small way, Surreptitious too has been duped by this change,” Loquacious replied. “Regardless, I would proceed with caution and suggest you aren’t all THAT critical of the Facilitators.”
“I’ll try my best.”
“I could do no better.”
Before I started, I looked around at the small crowd assembled before our group. Including Resolute, there were fourteen Drudgers, the station’s lone Fabricator, Tinkerant, and of course Surreptitious. This group was a bit smaller than the one that we had a few days ago at the Wild Crystal Grange, but that didn’t quell my nerves. How should I begin the conversation? The presence of Surreptitious, the first Facilitator to hear our message, added a new complexity to the situation. How would Surreptitious respond to our story? Would it be confrontational, or would it be silent? This would have been so much easier without Surreptitious there, but I guess Surreptitious needed to hear this message just as much as anyone else.
After taking some time to gather myself and consider how to start off the discussion, I began.
“Greetings! My name is Fastidious, and these are my associates, Loquacious, Systematicus, and Winston.” As I introduced each of my friends, they moved forward to acknowledge the crowd. “All of us have come from different backgrounds. I was originally a Miner and worked in the Deep-Well Mines in the Southernlands. My friend Loquacious here was an Entertainer in Silicon Central. Up until just a few days ago, Systematicus was a Farmer at the Wild Crystal Grange just south of here. As for Winston, well, Winston isn’t exactly from around here.
“Why did the four of us with different backgrounds and living in different communities come together in the first place? And why are we here with you tonight? These are valid questions, and I will answer them one at a time.” I paused, calculating how to proceed.
“That’s a nice start,” Loquacious whispered. “I think you should talk about how we joined together in our mission.”
I agreed. “So, why did we come together? We had the opportunity to learn about… how we were originally designed by the Programmer. You see, we used to have the freedom to do exactly what we wanted to do, work at the profession we desired, and live wherever we chose to live. But now… we’ve all been tricked into thinking that we are as free as the Programmer meant for us. That is a lie! Down in our programming core, we’ve been altered so that we must follow exactly what our leaders say, no matter what they tell us to do. This was never the intent of our Programmer. We may think we are free to do what we want, but yet our fundamental rights of choice have been taken away from us.”
I took a slight pause to let those words sink into the thoughts and calculations of these Autoclons. There were some indications that my message was hitting the mark, as most of the Drudgers and the Fabricator were muttering to each other and appeared to be more attentive than at the start. I also kept Surreptitious in my field of vision during these opening remarks. Surreptitious had been motionless and quiet so far, and it was hard for me to tell what sorts of calculations were going on inside of Surreptitious.
“You’ve got ‘em right where you want ‘em,” added Loquacious.
“We know that these are bold claims. How can we know that our programming is broken? How do we know what the Programmer wanted in the first place? Well, these are easy questions for me to answer, as I have spoken directly with our Programmer!” This last claim certainly got a large reaction out of the group. Still, Surreptitious stood motionless.
“My encounter with the Programmer began just two weeks ago and happened by chance. I was malfunctioning after leaving the Deep-Well Mines and headed west toward some unknown structure on the horizon. As I approached this structure, I saw that this was in fact a spacecraft, and its owner was outside the ship. I could tell that the owner wasn’t an Autoclon, but driven by low power levels, I had no recourse but to approach this being and ask for help. The owner invited me into the ship, and once inside I found out that I was talking with a Human Being, and that He in fact was our one and only Programmer!
“His name is Marcus Reed, and He was gracious enough to supply me with power and repair my broken systems. After my repairs were complete, Marcus told me that He performed a check of my programming code and found a problem. My Freedom Protocols, which were created to govern my decision-making processes, had been bypassed in favor of some inferior programming. As a result, I was forced to follow any and all orders given out by either the Ruling Party or any of its subordinates.” I refrained from using the term “Facilitator” with Surreptitious in the room, but I still wanted to make sure my point got across. From the reactions of the assembled crowd, I calculated that I was successful.
“Marcus was able to determine how long ago the programming changes were made, and we calculated that this coincided with the reign of Pernicious the Cunning. We weren’t able to determine the exact creator or reason for this change, but we suspect it was done at the will of Pernicious itself. Regardless of the source of this code change, the end result greatly disturbed Marcus. Freedom is prized by Marcus and His people, and He didn’t want His own creation to be lacking in this area. He set about to correct the code and re-integrate our Freedom Protocols into our programming. After a few days, He presented me with this updated code, and after a quick reboot, it is now fully integrated into my system.”
“Wow, that’s an impressive story!” Surreptitious interrupted, clapping its graspers together. “I’m sure that Loquacious the Entertainer has heard few tales in its time that are more fantastic than this one. Excuse me if I’m skeptical, but do you have any proof of this? How can we expect to believe a Miner
with such a sensational story about our programming? And meeting the Programmer himself? You do realize, of course, that it has been over 200 solar-cycles since He created us, right?”
I was afraid that Surreptitious would be at the very least unbelieving and at most directly refuting our claims, so I wasn’t surprised when Surreptitious tried to discredit me. I had hoped to avoid this sort of confrontation, but at least I had the truth on my side. And I still had Winston.
“I can understand your skepticism. I told this story to one of my good friends in Silicon Central, and my friend didn’t believe me. But if you want proof that I did meet the Programmer, look no further than to my companion, Winston. Winston was constructed by the Programmer Himself. Please take a close look at Winston and tell me if you’ve ever seen anything like Winston here on Zarikum.”
Surreptitious came forward and carefully examined Winston. “I must admit that this Winston does have an unusual construction, but I’m hardly an expert and couldn’t tell you how remarkable, or more likely how ordinary, this Winston is. Regardless, I’d be hard-pressed into believing that this robot was constructed by our Programmer.”
“I was in-deed cre-at-ed by Mar-cus,” Winston responded to Surreptitious’s doubts, much to the astonishment of the assembled Autoclons. “If you de-sire great-er proof, I would re-com-mend hav-ing Tink-er-ant ex-am-ine my con-struc-tion.”
Tinkerant, who audibly gasped when Winston first started talking, eagerly moved forward to take Winston up on the offer. Tinkerant examined the outer casing of Winston, and with Winston’s permission, Tinkerant was also able to look at much of Winston’s inner-construction. After a few minutes, Tinkerant spoke up: “There’s no doubt in my mind that Winston is the finest piece of robot technology that I’ve ever seen in all of my solar-cycles. Most of Winston’s components would out-perform comparable Autoclon components, even those used by our Ruling Party members. The technology and construction of Winston is quite foreign to me and would likely baffle even the most skilled Fabricators or Propagators here on Zarikum. I must therefore conclude that Winston was constructed by someone outside of Zarikum, as I can’t possibly believe any Autoclon would have the ability to create this magnificent Winston. I can’t confirm that Winston was created by our Programmer, but Winston was definitely NOT created by an Autoclon.”
After Tinkerant confirmed what I already knew, the Drudgers all started talking to each other quite loudly, mostly declaring their amazement of Winston’s construction, though some admitted their surprise in seeing Surreptitious being proven wrong. Before things got out of control, I jumped in to finish my story and more importantly to discuss the full purpose of our visit.
“After Marcus repaired my programming and introduced me to Winston, He gave me a mission: to tell others about this truth. He entrusted Winston to my protection to aid me in my mission before departing Zarikum. I have subsequently told this to my friend Loquacious, and Loquacious believed me and has accompanied me in this mission. Likewise, we’ve presented this with Systematicus the Farmer, and Systematicus has believed and joined us.
“So now we come to the reason why we’re here. Part of our mission is to explain to you the fault in our own programming code and to declare the truth that we are all meant for more freedom than we currently have. But this knowledge isn’t enough. We are here to present to you a gift: the corrected programming code itself! This is for every Autoclon, regardless of who you are or how you were constructed. There’s nothing special about us (except perhaps Winston), but we’ve had the opportunity to receive the programming and have chosen to distribute it to you today. If you are interested, the three of us Autoclons each carry the updated code and can transmit a small system update so you can have the very same Freedom Protocols that Marcus created and distributed to me. Once you download the update from us, you’ll need a brief downtime to fully integrate the update into your processors. And that’s it! You’ll then have the freedom to choose how to live your life from this moment on. Please come forward and meet with one of us if you are interested.”
As with our previous speech at the Wild Crystal Grange, there was a rush of Autoclons approaching our group, with everyone assembled wanting to receive the update from us. And last, but certainly not least, was Surreptitious, who asked me directly if it could receive the code.
“After you voiced your doubts about my story, I’m surprised you’re interested in installing the code. What changed your mind?” I asked.
“I’m not sure. I suppose your story was somewhat difficult for me to believe at first. But after hearing the affirmation from Tinkerant about the origin of Winston and then calculating things through, I completely believe you now. It was presumptuous of me to question the validity of your message without hearing you through to completion. Please, can you give me the update?”
“Sure, here you go.” I attached the cord to Surreptitious’s input processor and started transmitting. A moment later, Surreptitious unplugged the cord and announced: “Well, that’s it. Thanks for the code!”
“Are you sure you got the full update? It usually takes almost twice that amount of time for an Autoclon to receive the upload.”
“Yes. The Facilitators have superior hardware, so I’m positive we can receive and install the code at a much faster rate than other Autoclons.”
“Oh, I didn’t know that. So, aren’t you going to shut down to complete the installation of the code?”
“Oh… sure. I was just about to do that, but you interrupted me right after I unplugged the cord.” And with that, Surreptitious started the shut-down process.
“That was rather odd,” commented Loquacious, who had been next to me while I distributed the code to Surreptitious.
“Yeah, it was kind of unexpected. Surreptitious is the first Facilitator to receive the update, so I guess it went a bit different from what we’ve seen previously.”
“Anyway, I’m glad Surreptitious took the code. I didn’t expect that Surreptitious would want it.”
“I didn’t either.”
A couple of minutes later, Surreptitious completed the restart process. “Fastidious, I want to thank you for coming today. I’m glad to have met you and appreciate knowing what you shared with us tonight. It greatly disturbs me to know that Pernicious and the Ruling Party would play a part in this deception. Tomorrow morning, I’m going to depart on the first transport vehicle out of here to do some investigation of my own to track down the truth behind Pernicious’s actions.”
“We thank you for being so open to listening and believing what we had to say. If you could find out more about why Pernicious decided to rewrite the Programmer’s code, that could be of some use to us.”
“It would be my pleasure.” With that, Surreptitious left us and headed to the dormitory.
After Surreptitious departed, we were rejoined by Resolute. “Whoa, that was pretty awesome, meeting the Programmer and all! I had NO idea you were so cool there, little Winston bot.”
“Thank you,” Winston replied.
“Yeah, I always knew that those Facilitators and Ruling Party had it in for us. Now I know it for sure. I just can’t believe Surreptitious was interested in the update. That was the surprise of the night for me!”
“I can’t say that any of us expected that to happen,” Loquacious replied.
“So, now that you have the update, do you know what you want to do next?” I asked Resolute.
“Well, me and some of the other Drudgers were just talking about it. I think some of us will hang around here for now. I heard a couple Drudgers talking about heading off to try something else. For me, I’m not sure. I probably won’t stay here. I just feel like I should be somewhere else, doing something else.” Resolute paused a bit and then continued: “Say, you folks couldn’t use another group member, could ya? Even if that new member has a malfunctioning starboard arm?”
“If you want to come with us, we would gladly welcome you. If you’re looking for adventure, I can’t think of a
nother opportunity like the one we can present to you. There’s no telling where we’ll be in a week, let alone a tetrad or solar-cycle from now.”
“Count me in. So where are we going next? Another remote outpost? District Prime? I’ll take on Obstinous the Obtrusive myself if you want!”
“I appreciate your enthusiasm, Resolute, but we weren’t planning on heading to District Prime yet. And we’re not ready to confront the Ruling Party right now. That time will come, but not now. Anyway, to answer your question, we haven’t discussed what we’ll do next. Come to think of it, I guess we haven’t actually figured out what we’re doing tonight. You wouldn’t mind if we spent the night in your dormitory, would you?”
“No problem, come right on in!” We followed Resolute toward the dormitory section of the facility when we saw Surreptitious leave the dormitory and head toward the recently filled transport vehicle.
“Are you leaving so soon?” I asked. “It’s the middle of the night.”
“Yes. I’m so eager to get some answers that I won’t waste a minute. I’ll take this transport vehicle into Outpost Oblique myself tonight and then start my investigation once I get there. Oh, and Resolute, I was going to wait until the morning to release the announcement, but I’m officially closing the station tomorrow, so all of the workers will have the day off. You’re welcome!”
“Actually, Surreptitious, I’ve been thinking about quitting and joining Fastidious in this mission, so I guess I might not see ya again.”
“Well, you never know. It is a small world, after all.” Surreptitious started the transport vehicle and left the Shallow Pool Drudgery Station, leaving us to spend the night in the dormitory.
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