It's calmer in the morning. You're still in British waters, and the sun has been rising behind heavy clouds that look like rain. Right now, it's before noon, and still quiet, and you find yourself standing on the deck of the yacht with your eyes closed, enjoying.
Last night, as you sat with your brothers, you hooked yourself up with your charging unit, so physically, you're fine. But you haven't slept. You've been awake for a little over two days, and a lot has happened in between, and it's starting to show in the tired circles your mind is going in.
Last you checked, Turing was in your bed, skittering around under the blanket, chasing lint around. You should go check on him, curl up, switch on your sleeping simulation and conk out.
Oh, but you have so much to do.
Brobot looks better now. You took care of his hardware, the scrapes and dents and actual holes. You cleaned the grass stains off of him, and the ocean did the rest. But you're not done with him yet.
TT: The thing is, I want you to be able to make your own decisions, based on what you perceive as good or bad. That's what most of this has been about. To give you the opportunity to figure stuff out for yourself.
TT: But that means we have to get you a wide range compass for good or bad first.
TT: The ability to judge things as positive or negative.
TT: And I think.
TT: The best way, or at least the way that would give you the widest range of possible experiences, would be to introduce emotions.
You reread what you said to him, yesterday. Brobot was indifferent about it, because he's indifferent about everything, because that's the point. He said, “Do what you want to do.”
A light breeze hits you from the side and you open your eyes again. It's cold out here. That's good. You all function better in the cold.
Do what you want to do.
What you wanted to do was make things even with the kids who used to be your friends. You were the first to escape the dangers of your home timeline, unscathed. So it seemed only fair to give them the same opportunities you had. You reserve some resentment towards all of them, but you didn't want to just leave them there.
This included making sure that everyone had access to a functioning transportalizer. You even had a brief and very strange conversation with Jane's dad to make sure he was on board. As always, you needed to think of everything.
And it included giving Jake the means to leave his island, in peace. You have no idea if he'll do it, and you don't want to care. You just know that he can, and if he does, he deserves to build a life without getting stalked by a sparring bot wherever he goes. You figured it was time for Jake and Brobot to go their separate ways.
That's what you wanted to do.
And with Brobot's questionable, years old directive to train Jake removed, what else was there to make of him? You've been thinking it over for months and months, and there's no other outcome you can see yourself actually living with. This isn't about doing what you want to do, it's about doing what's right.
What were your options, really? Leave him on Hellmurder. With no purpose, no directive, nothing to do. Let him rust among the flora and fauna, until he's just a part of nature.
You couldn't.
And what else? Repurpose him, give him something else to do. Let him fight drones, the way he's already been doing. A completely pointless endeavor, in a timeline that's been deserted. Have him fight a useless fight for the rest of eternity, until he would eventually just fall apart.
You couldn't.
He's a robot with no purpose now, and usually, in a world distant from your understanding, those get scrapped. You know he wouldn't care. He doesn’t care about a thing in the world.
You do, though.
You’ve seen too much, been through too much, had to fight too hard, to deactivate one of your brothers just because he has fulfilled his purpose. You couldn’t live with yourself.
Do what you want to do.
What you want to do, you think, is give him the possibility to figure things out for himself. What you want to do is let him do what he wants to do.
Whatever it may take.
You turn, and walk towards your bathroom. This is making you feel sick in a place between your chest and your synthetic stomach, a sinking feeling that makes you want to lie down on the floor and scream for a while.
It’s fear.
You’re scared.
You are giving someone a life, a synthetic being, giving him feelings and sentience and an existence beyond following a single directive, and you can’t ask him if he even wants this, because he never wants anything. All power over this lies in your hands.
And that is precisely what happened in the flooded remains of Houston, five years ago. That is precisely how you came into being, and how Dirk met his demise.
You’re not scared that Brobot will end up killing you in some sort of tragic accident. It’s not that.
You’re scared that he’ll hate it. You’re scared that you’re creating another life as miserable as yours was until very recently, another life of identity crises and breakdowns, of never quite knowing who you are, where you belong, what your point is.
You’re scared of turning your situation around. You’re scared of being--
You pause after turning on the shower, and just sort of stare at it. You came here led by instinct, gently nudged Turing out the door and stripped and turned on the water, like every movement was preprogrammed. You came to take a shower because you need to think.
Programming Brobot’s emotions is going to be tricky. You can’t copy your own algorithms because a foggy amount of your feelings stems from being a literal brain clone, not just a program. It’s going to be an interesting, challenging project, and you’re going to need to think on it. And that’s why you came to take a shower.
A weak smile creeps on your lips, and you shrug to yourself. You step in, the water warm on your cool shoulders. It’s not like it’s wrong. It does help you think.
The sickness between your chest and your stomach does a little jerk. You’re still scared. You are scared of being like Dirk. Not because Dirk was a bad person--he was thirteen. You are scared of being like Dirk because you want to be yourself instead.
You’ve been learning that things aren’t always black and white. Inside your own digital mind, on your personal interface, you open your programming drafts. Then you close your eyes, and lean your forehead against the cool shower wall, the same way you did back when you were a different person and had to steer through multiple consciousnesses.
You can’t change where you came from.
Standing in the shower thinking about what to do with Brobot to make Jake’s life easier almost has you wincing. But it’s not all about Jake this time. You do what you want. You want your brother to feel as good as you felt when you first set foot on this yacht, or when your friends tell you they’re glad to have you around.
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brototypes replied to your post: brototypes replied to your post: ...
As the coded prime directive of }}SYSTEM:_BROBOTv0.0.0.1/HOT_POCKETS, it’s what I do.
Youre trying to tell me that somehow a starchy artificial pizza snack is involved in your peculiar robotics tomfoolery and that your prime objective is to wallop the ever living shit out of me.
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