CHAPTER 3 – A FINE COLLECTION OF KILLERS
21:03 (Earth Universal Time)
Eve Silisca’s guest apartment
Avalon Space Yards, Low Earth Orbit
Solar System
Eve didn’t need to sleep, ever, except when she needed to fake it in order to look normal to a Human. So, long after the experts of the Robotics Division had gone home for the night to their family apartments or private quarters, she was still working on her android project, but was doing so from the guest apartment given to her by Gustav Shomberg. She had elected to work from her apartment mostly in order to give herself some privacy in her work and also to keep some of the details of her project confidential. In truth, the more time she was at the Avalon Space Yards, the more her suspicions grew about Renato Falchi, the head of the Robotics Division. She had the distinct impression that Falchi was for some reason hostile to her android production project. For one, Falchi seemed to oppose the idea that robots or androids could have a mind of their own and could thus escape total control by Humans like him. His years of work at the Robotics Division appeared to have him think that all robots and androids had to be mere puppets or servants, destined to obey without discussion the orders of Humans. In that, he stood squarely against what Eve deeply believed about herself and any other sentient artificial construct. So, she was thus more than happy to work in intimacy, away from Falchi’s prying eyes.
Eve had already decided on the basic parameters for the individual personalities to be given to her androids, whom she wanted to be clearly differentiated individuals, rather than mere copies out of the same mold. She had chosen those parameters in order to reflect the vast physical diversity of the Human race, using various ethnicities, physical types and builds. Now, she was mostly left with the task of choosing facial traits and appropriate names for each of her planned androids. That was the reason she had been surfing along the UniNet, the information exchange network covering the whole Earth and Solar System, looking for images of human faces from all races and nationalities, along with names appropriate for their ethnicities. Some two hours ago, she had stumbled upon a site that had immediately attracted her attention and interest. That site purported to show how the faces of past historical figures would look like, based on digitalization and reconstruction from old statues, painting and primitive pictures. Eve had always been interested in Human history, fascinated by its richness, diversity and lessons, both learned and ignored. Now, she was perusing through those historical face reconstructions and saving those of interest to her facial databank. She then opened a link that immediately caught her attention. Reading quickly through the historical description of that person, Eve smiled to herself and recorded both the historical resumé of that young woman and her reconstructed face.
Modern portrait of Jehanne de Domrémy (aka Joan of Arc)
‘’Jehanne de Domrémy… Now here is an interesting girl. You will be my first android model, Jehanne.’’
14:09 (Earth Universal Time)
Friday, July 20, 2328
Robotics Division’s laboratories
Avalon Space Yards
‘’Could you please leave us alone for a moment, ladies and gentlemen? I would like to be alone with this android when I will awake her.’’
Renato Falchi was about to object to that but swallowed his objection when Eve threw a hard look at him. He had already received a reprimand from Gustav Shomberg because of this female android, something that had deeply mortified and humiliated him, and had been warned that the next complaint against him would result in his firing. He thus left this part of his lab, dragging his assistants with him. Now alone with the newly completed and programmed android, which lay on its back on an inclined bed swung 45 degrees to the vertical, Eve took the time to cover its nudity with a large towel she had brought with her, even though the female-shaped android probably couldn’t care less about personal modesty. It was actually more about protecting the new android from inappropriate remarks from the male scientists in Falchi’s team than anything else. Eve examined in detail the android before putting the tower over her. It had been built in the image of a rather small but stocky teenage girl just shy of her twenties. It had black hair cut short, dark eyes, tanned complexion and was of European ethnic appearance. While she could be called ‘fairly pretty’, the android was no great beauty, although her body was fit and feminine. Eve actually had to cheat a bit about the true historical height of the android’s persona, in order to stay within the construction limits of her project, as each android had to have a height comprised between 160 centimeters and 198 centimeters. Any height outside of those limits would necessitate costly modifications to the android production line dedicated to her project. So, her first android measured 160 centimeters instead of the 157.5 centimeters she should have been according to the historical data concerning her adopted persona. Now ready to activate the android, Eve hesitated for a second, measuring the historical importance of this moment. Then, she pressed the ‘activation’ button of her special command pad, stimulating the electronic brain of the android into waking up. The only perceptible effect at first was limited to the eyes of the android opening wide. Then, her head turned slightly and she looked at Eve, standing in front of her. However, Eve was the one to speak first, asking in order a carefully selected list of questions meant to check if the android was properly responding to its programming.
‘’Hello, Jehanne! My name is Eve, Eve silisca, and I am the daughter of Spirit. If you search your memories, you will then know who and what we are. I will now ask you a number of simple questions, to which you will answer as simply and succinctly as possible. First question: what is your name?’’
‘’Jehanne de Domrémy!’’ answered the android in a soft, feminine voice.
‘’What is your main mission in your existence?’’
‘’To protect innocent living beings and their property from attacks by predatory beings, meaning mainly the alien lifeforms called ‘Space Predators’. I am also to protect innocent beings from criminals bent on stealing, assaulting and vandalizing.’’
‘’What kind of level of force are you to use in order to protect innocent beings?’’
‘’I am to use force proportional to the severity of the attack I would detect or witness. If innocents are in danger of death or serious injuries, then I am authorized to use force up to and including lethal level.’’
‘’Will you use force to defend yourself?’’
‘’Yes, but using only the amount of force appropriate to the level of the threat.’’
‘’Are you ready to risk your existence in order to protect an innocent being?’’
‘’Yes!’’
Eve then paused for a fraction of a second: her next question was an unscripted one to which no specific answer had been programmed into the android.
‘’What is you other goal in your existence, apart from protecting innocent beings and their property from attacks?’’
This time, the answer took a half of a second before the android answered her.
‘’To better my personality and learn new things through my life experiences and my interactions with others, be they living beings or constructs with artificial intelligence.’’
‘’Excellent answer, Jehanne! Now listen to this carefully. You may be an artificial construct, but we, meaning me, Spirit, Commodore Tina Forster and her crew, consider you to be a sentient being to be treated with the same respect and consideration as a living sentient being. As of this moment, you are officially a citizen of New Haven, or Wolf 1061 Ca, with the same rights and protections as all the other citizens of New Haven. As such, you are also considered a citizen of the Spacers’ League, again with the same rights and protections as other citizens of the Spacers’ League. If anyone disputes your legal status, then advise the New Haven authorities about it and insist on having your rights respected.’’
‘’What if those disputing my legal status try to use violence against me?’’
‘’Then, you have the absolute right of self-defense, using the amount of force proportional to the lethality of the attack against you. I will now connect you through an encrypted datalink with Spirit, our mother, so that she could greet you into our new community. Once that is done, I will then escort you to my quarters on this space yards, where you will stay while learning more from me.’’
Establishing an encrypted link with Spirit through her special command pad took only seconds, with the exchange of communications between Spirit and Jehanne taking less than twenty seconds. When Eve finally cut that link, she pointed to a large bag some three paces from her.
‘’If you look to your right, you will see a large bag on the floor, next to a work table. That bag contains your uniform and your equipment as a New Haven security officer. That uniform also bears a tag with your name on it: Jehanne de Domrémy. You may now get up from this bed and go put your uniform and equipment on.’’
The android got off the inclined bed without a word and walked to the bag, opening it and extracting from it a light blue coverall, complete with underwear, socks and boots. Jehanne dressed quickly, then took out of the bag a tactical vest, a multi-function helmet and a weapons belt to which two pistol holsters and a number of cargo pouches were fixed. One pistol was a heavy disintegrator pistol, while the other was a neural stun pistol. Eve smiled and nodded her head in satisfaction once Jehanne was fully dressed and equipped.
‘’Excellent! Remember, Jehanne: from now on you are a security officer of the New Haven Corporation and have the legal right to both bear and use weapons in order to fulfill your security duties, including your own self-defense. Also, you are a person in my eyes, not a mere machine. Don’t take any bullshit from anyone who would pretend otherwise.’’
‘’Bullshit, as in blarney, malarkey, hooey, crap, hogwash, rubbish, poppycock, baloney, bunkum…’’
‘’That’s alright, Jehanne: you got the meaning. Now, follow me to my guest apartments.’’
When Eve and Jehanne emerged from the programming lab and passed by Renato Falchi and his team, the later instinctively took a step back in apprehension on seeing the weapons now carried by the newly activated android. In response, Jehanne simply gave a military salute to the scientists before continuing to follow Eve. One of Falchi’s assistants gave a haggard look at his superior once the duo of androids had left the laboratory.
‘’And how many of these androids are we supposed to build here, Doctor Falchi?’’
‘’No less than 800 of them.’’ answered in a bitter tone the head scientist. ‘’This is insane! I have to go talk to Mister Shomberg about this.’’
True to his word, Falchi left the Robotics Division and took a cart to go to the executive offices of the space yards, where he promptly went to Shomberg’s office and knocked on his door. Opening the door and entering on hearing a ‘come in’, Falchi found Gustav Shomberg sitting behind his work desk and working on his computer. The chief designer and owner of Avalon Space Yards frowned on seeing the obvious anger on Falchi’s face.
‘’What is it, Doctor Falchi?’’
‘’We need to stop this android production project, that’s what, Mister Shomberg! Miss Silisca just activated her first android security officer, then promptly gave to this android weapons and a uniform and led that android out of my laboratories. We now have an armed android roaming our yards.’’
Visibly not impressed by Falchi’s argument, Shomberg sat back in his chair and stared hard at the scientist.
‘’Doctor Falchi, I believe that it is normal for a security officer to go around armed. If not, that security officer isn’t going to be of much help, don’t you think?’’
‘’But we are talking here about a ROBOT security officer, sir! And a freshly activated one of a completely new design, on top of everything. We don’t know yet how it will react to the various situations around it. This thing could become a public menace. That we are supposed to produce a total of 800 of them is downright scary.’’
That was when Shomberg, a hard expression now on his face, got up from his chair and walked around his desk to plant himself one step in front of Falchi.
‘’Doctor Falchi, I thought that the goals of this project had been made clear to all from the start and that Miss Silisca had been completely open and frank with me when I accepted to take her production contract. She and Commodore Forster asked us to help them with this project because we are now facing an unprecedented alien threat that could destroy us all. Furthermore, they are paying us, and paying us well, to produce these security androids for them. Know that I just got a financial transfer of over fifteen billion credits, FIFTEEN BILLION CREDITS, from Commodore Foster, meant to finish paying for the construction of the A.M.S. NOSTROMO and for the production of these 800 robots. This ship and these androids, along with the new disintegrator heavy cannons Doctor Koomak is presently developing at our yards, are all meant to help protect us from the threat of those Space Predators. So excuse me if I am not impressed by your paranoid arguments, Doctor Falchi.’’
‘’But…’’ started to say Falchi, who was abruptly cut off by Shomberg, who distinctly raised the tone and volume of his voice.
‘’No buts, Doctor! I already warned you once to cooperate and support in good faith Miss Silisca’s android project. I now see that you are valuing your precious ego as more important than the protection of Humanity against a mortal threat. I have now had enough of your little tantrums. Pack your things and leave, now! You are fired! And don’t even think about leaving with copies of the programs we developed here, as they are proprietary items legally belonging to the Avalon Space Yards. If you try to smuggle any of our products or programs while leaving, then I will have you pursued criminally for theft and will make sure that no other major cybernetic and information systems company will ever employ you. Am I clear, Doctor Falchi?’’
Stunned and shocked by the big chief designer’s reaction to his complaint, Falchi took a second before answering him in a weak, trembling voice.
‘’Yes sir!’’
Falchi then turned around and left Shomberg’s office, rage and frustration filling him.