The Ones We're Meant to Find(53)

“The bot starts off focused solely on survival.” A shell of a human, like Kasey herself. “But when conditions grow more favorable to re-habitation, the bot will seek fulfillment through other avenues. Goal-setting is one example. Goals give the bot a sense of purpose. Any progress toward a goal will be positively reinforced by the release of identity-reaffirming memories. Identity building will enable the bot to develop more abstract goals, such as those pertaining to the environment outside of itself, increasing fulfillment and the scope of what it can measure.

“This feedback loop will continue until happiness reaches a certain threshold and activates the final goal, in the form of a command. This command…”

The HAPPINESS MOTIVATIONS bar crept to completion, and the bot turned toward Kasey.





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IN A CAVERNOUS ROOM, SUFFUSED in blue light, I stand before a maze of walls. Each wall is an arm-span wide and spaced by narrow corridors. I have to angle sideways to fit.

As for why I’m trying to fit, I’m not sure. Not sure why I turn right, right, left, then right again, and come before the dead end that I do. I walk in closer. Faint lines run through the wall’s expanse, dividing it into uniform rectangles, imprinting upon it a pattern of man-sized bricks. My right hand, developing a mind of its own, shoots out and splays itself in the center of one of these bricks. Its outline glows blue. Then, slowly, the brick slides out like a drawer. It floats down, lowered by some invisible mechanism, comes to a rest on the ground, and I realize it’s no brick, but a casket, like the one I saw in my fragmented memories, when Hero choked me and I was lapsing in and out of consciousness. My gaze rises, to all the bricks in the wall before me, and around me. So many caskets. Are they filled with bodies? I don’t want an answer. Get out, screams every fiber of my being, but my feet remain planted on the ground, even when the casket that slid out hisses, releasing a cloud of chemical smelling steam. The topmost surface retracts like a lid and— And—

But there is no “and.”

“And” means incomplete. “And” means still searching.

Before, I was both. Incomplete and still searching.

But now—

Tears, hot in my eyes. They blur my vision. Still, I see her. I see her as clearly as I do in my dreams. Clearer. Because this isn’t a dream.

I choke back a sob and whisper her name.





30


KASEY STARED AT THE BOT, and the bot stared back at Kasey as best it could without real eyes. Outwardly, it was even more clumsily designed than a cleaningbot, but its core system was kilometers above.

It had a goal.

It could develop a plan for attaining that goal.

And in time, it’d have the memories to color the goal as congruent with its self-concept. That self-concept was key. The bot would see itself as a protector. Above its survival, it would value a person, someone they would try to locate, the moment Earth became re-habitable, because the thought of life without this individual would be unbearable.

Unlike Kasey, the bot would be the perfectly calibrated human. She’d make sure of it.

“This command,” she repeated as the bot rolled toward her, “is ‘Find me.’”





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TURQUOISE GOO SLUICES OFF HER body as she sits up in the casket. Her eyes stay closed. Is she okay? Is she hurt? I can’t tell; a skintight gray suit covers her from the neck down. It looks thin. She must be cold.

“Kay…” I reach for her, then stop. Now that I’ve fought back my tears, I notice she’s different from how I remember her. Older. Closer to twentysomething than sixteen. Her hair is short—shorter, I should say, than the bob I’m used to.

But what do looks matter? She’s Kay. My Kay. My mind floods—not with memories this time, but emotions. The pain of not being able to share her world, and the love in spite of it, when I realize we will always be there for each other when it matters most.

“Kay.” My voice wobbles. “Open your eyes, love.”

She does, and every fear I’ve had these last three years—about forgetting her or perishing before I find her—melts as our gazes meet and lock and she smiles.

“You’ve finally found me.”





32


AT THIS POINT IN EVERY presentation, all hell broke loose.

“A bot that can pursue happiness?”

“With emotions?”

“That’s a violation of the Ester Act!”

Trust people to always state the obvious.

“Would you rather it be a human?” The auditorium quieted at Actinium’s question. “Think of this as a clinical trial; the bot will test the treatment before it’s released to the masses. Does someone want to volunteer in its stead? Be the guinea pig?” Silence. “I assumed not.”

“The bot’s happiness is just a means to an end,” said Kasey, who had less patience for the audience than Actinium. The bot continued to roll toward her from across the stage. “Once it completes the ‘Find me’ command…”

The bot reached her.





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IN MY DREAMS, WE HUG. We cry. We hold each other so tightly our limbs become one.