Excerpt: More Human Than Human

The tv's were off in the cafeteria. Erin didn't like tv so she was not overly concerned about it. One of the phone techs had pushed a table under the screen hanging from the ceiling and was pushing buttons on the receiver.
"Did you powercycle?" Erin asked with a grin.
"Heh. Yeah. Too bad it's not a modem." His dyed blond hair was cut into a mohawk but it lay limp against his head. Erin dimly remembered it had been blue and spiked out some time last week. She'd wondered how he got his headset on and off.
He sighed and climbed down as Erin turned to leave after filling her mug.
"Know any good free ebooks?" He asked in frustration.
"Lovecraft Library has a bunch of good stuff."
"Yeah? Novels?"
"Short stories."
"Even better. Love-craft spelled just how it sounds?"
"Yup."
"Got a favorite one I should start with?"
Erin smiled. "Herbert West Re-Animator's good."
"Thanks" He scowled at the tv one more time and followed her out, walking on to the production floor when Erin turned to the non-glistening elevator. He looked a lot better with his hair in his face, she considered idly. The thought left her when the bong announced the imminent opening of the silver doors.

When she returned to her desk, Sydney looked up from his call while he talked. Erin smiled at him and nodded. Gathering a coiled notebook, a pen, and her bag of tricks, Erin quickly checked her email. Erin's bag of tricks was a large shoulder sac which contained, among other things, cd's of music, nail polish, makeup, a sketchpad and pencils, guitar strings, multi-coloured yarn, a piece of pine wood, and a small carving knife. It was a secret Erin was not about to tell the company. The reason the units had become more human was because she played with them. Together in their offline sessions they talked about anything and everything. With each one she encouraged individual creativity and self expression.

An instant message from Benoni popped up on her screen.

"Erin, may I see you before you see Sydney?"
Erin opened up a messaging window to Sydney. "Benoni was wanting to talk with me first, is that ok?"
"Yes, I prefer it." was Sydney's reply.
Erin frowned, puzzled. They had a queer interface with each other that Erin never quite fully understood. They'd done it with her permission, of course. But they were able to network with each other quietly through the ethernet connections. She was never certain if she was speaking to one of them, or to all of them. If ever she asked, they always told her, but there was always the strange feeling of duality between the individual units, and the collective units that Erin never fully understood. The way they could communicate between each other made the requests from Sydney and Benoni both wanting to talk with her (and almost vying for her attention?) even more weird. Benoni finished his call and stood, visually checking with Erin before removing his headset and unplugging what looked like a large computer case with a suitcase-like handle from beneith the desk. The cabling from the back of his neck ran into the case. Erin smiled and lead the way to the huddle room down the hall.

The huddle room was a small box of a room, slightly bigger than a closet, with a glass wall looking out into the hall, some chairs, a phone, and a round table in the middle of the room. Huddle rooms were used for small meetings or one-on-one interviews between agents and management throughout the building, however this one was special in that it was connected only to the unit production area in the basement. Erin moved to exit the hall and get Benoni's guitar from the locker. That was what they usually did in his one-on-one sessions. They talked somewhat, but mostly he practiced and, if Erin knew the song he was playing, she'd sometimes sing along.

"If it is all right, I would like to just talk with you Erin."
Now that was very strange. Benoni, of all the units, was very taken with the humanization techniques Erin was using. He loved to play the guitar.
"Of course." She answered slowly and turned toward the gray door.

After Erin entered the room, before Benoni sat and plugged his AI unit in, he turned, closed the door, and even more strangely, lowered and twisted the blinds to block the view to the outside. Erin raised her eyebrows.
"You do not wish the other units to see us?"
"No. Is that ok?"
"Certainly. I'm just surprised."
"Yes. I understand. I have also temporarily disconnected my network connection to the team." They could consult each other wirelessly as well as via ethernet. Erin was beyond surprised.

As Benoni sat, his dark hair shifted into his eyes and he brushed it away almost with frustration. Erin noticed he seemed to be avoiding looking at her eyes, then his body shifted and he stared at her, full on, his mechanically assisted pupils contracting as they focussed on her.

"I have made what may be an error in judgment. The team is concerned and feels it is imperative that I alert you to the situation."
"An error in judgment?" Erin's mind shifted into disaster recovery mode. Whatever it was it was severe enough for the team to be turning in on itself and forcing one member to have a discussion they obviously did not wish to have.
"Yes."
"Ok. Well, tell me what you've done and we'll work together to fix it."
Benoni's eyes flickered away and then returned to hers. He blinked.
"You had encouraged us to experiment with humanization."
"Yes."
"I was performing a social experiment. I was attempting a variation of a reverse Turing test."
"You were trying to fool a machine into thinking a human was a machine?"
"No. That has been done extensively already."
"Ok."

The lights in the room went out for two seconds, then came on again. It happened all the time at night. Erin could hear the back-up generator kick in. The units had their own uniterruptable power supply, as well as their own generator, in addition to the individual battery packs which took up more than half the case of the AI units they were attached to, but it was always slightly unnerving to think that an inconvenience for Erin could mean a threat to the lives of her charges. She checked the generator's fuel once a week, just to be sure she could keep them going in the event of a severe storm or other natural disaster.

"I was attempting to mimic a human behavioral state as a result of a human interaction," Benoni continued, "to the point where I believed I was experiencing that emotional state. I succeeded and the success has reached much higher levels than expected."
Erin blinked. Had he figured out how to truly hate someone? This could cause problems.
"What emotion?"
"Love."
Erin sighed. "That's not an error. That's pretty awesome actually. How long did the experiment run?"
"I have not yet terminated the experiment."
"Ok, so you still feel it?"
"Yes."
Erin grinned. "That's really sweet Benoni. I don't see any problem with that."
"The others wish me to terminate the experiment."
"Why? Is it affecting your work?"
"No, my work is unaffected. They wish me to terminate the experiment because it is unethical."
Erin tilted her head. "How is it unethical to believe you are in love with someone?"
"The human interaction which generated these results involved extensive deception and many fabrications."
"Oh. I see."
"The others feel such deception is counter to the spirit of our programming and that to continue the experiment, and thus continue the deception, is a violation of the human individual's trust and an immoral act according to the principles with which we have been designed, and have been, ourselves, redesigning."
"Well, if your lies could become harmful to another person, then they are right. You may want to discontinue the experiment."
Erin watched Benoni's mechanical pupils dilate and contract. It was the only change in his features she could detect.
"I do not want to end the experiment."
Erin licked her lips. "Is that why Sydney wanted to talk to me?"
"Yes."
"I see."

The phone on the round table between them gave a short "blip" and was silent.
Erin looked at it.
"That's weird. There's no originating phone number displayed."
"It may have been the others using the Larry Bronson protocol to manipulate the internal equipment. They likely wish to talk with me. One moment while I reconnect."
Benoni closed his eyes and then opened them wide.
"Erin, in the last minute seven armed intruders entered the building. They have shot eight people. Six have injuries so extensive their survival is unlikely. Two intruders are in the stairwell with a hostage now. They are approaching rapidly."

Erin reached to the phone and picked up the receiver, dialing 911. She got a fast busy signal.

"They have cut off the telco lines to the building."
"Is the Internet still working?"
"Yes."
"Can you reroute me through satellite as voice over IP?"
Benoni's eyes flickered. "Larry Bronson has the administrative access to create the software. We are processing it now."
Erin replaced the receiver.
"Please stay in the room with me. There is a high probability that the intruders are targeting the reanimated units. If you remain in the room you may not be seen. We wish to keep you safe from injury. All units are sending backup files to your inbox."

Erin looked at the door. Benoni stood and pushed several chairs into a cluster near the corner. "Please take the phone and crouch down here, Erin." Erin nodded and began to pull the phone cord free of the ties that kept it from tangling.
Benoni walked to the door and turned off the lights in the room. As he flattened his back against the wall behind the door to the huddle room, Erin heard the emergency fire door slam open outside the room. One of the lines on the phone in front of her lit up. She lifted the receiver and dialed 911.

Outside there was shouting. Erin heard three shots fired. She tried to speak clearly and quietly into the receiver as she answered the questions from the 911 operator. There was screaming. It sounded like Isadora's voice. She heard a frantic mumbling in the background that sounded for all the world like someone praying in Spanish. Erin paused as a human-shaped shadow moved across the blinds outside the room. Erin turned down the volume of the receiver and soundlessly placed the headset on the floor. The non-shining silver doorknob turned. With a click the door opened and the fluorescents from the outside hall poured in along the mottled gray carpet.

A black gun entered first through the partially open door.
"Anything?" Came from down the hall.
"Don't know yet." the owner of the gun answered. Both voices were devoid of an accent. Both voices were male. The gun looked as it was about to withdraw, but then paused.
"Wait a minute." The voice said softly.

Erin fought the impulse to close her eyes. She wanted to see her killer. She wouldn't die cowering. The gunman stepped partially in to the room. When his head, right foot and arm were fully through the door frame, Benoni flung his weight against the door while pulling the gun up toward the ceiling with one hand. The gunman's head was slammed between the door and the frame with a crack. Miraculously the gun did not go off. It came free from the gunman's limp hand. Benoni pulled it away gently and leaned forward to drag the dead weight of the intruder into the room.

Erin held her breath.

"Esau? What's going on down there?"

Benoni paused for a moment and then, in a perfect mimicry of Esau's voice he called back "There's something over here. Come here and help me."

Erin's mouth opened. She knew they could adjust their voices, but she did not know they could mimic so well, with so little data.

Benoni walked four steps to where Erin lay prone and held out the gun. As she took it, he gently pressed her finger in through the trigger guard, and formed her other hand in a pushing position against the barrel of the gun. All she had to do was squeeze the trigger. Erin swallowed. Benoni moved soundless to the form on the floor.

"In this room here" he called out to the other killer as he dragged the body of the first to the far corner. Then he swiftly stepped behind the door again.

A second barrel entered the doorway which had been left partially open. When Benoni slammed the door the intruder stepped inside and brought the gun around, firing on automatic, in an arc around the wall. Erin pulled the trigger once, twice. And the gunman dropped. Benoni stood looking at the trail of bullet holes in the wall which stopped just before his head. He nodded at her and pulled the gun out of the dead man's fingers.

Keeping his hand flat out to signal to Erin not to move, Benoni quietly rolled a chair along the carpet toward the doorway. He pulled the door open wide and placed his foot in the back of the office chair. Two-toned, it had a hard plastic gray backing and dusty rose material where people would sit on it. Benoni kicked the chair out of the room. Erin watched as the pink seat cushion began to explode. Right behind it, Benoni swung the gun out of the room and ducked back in side as more gunfire shattered the window.

Then there was screaming and a loud clink as the third gunman's weapon hit the floor. Benoni frowned and closed his eyes. He opened them wide and ran out of the room, gun in one hand, suitcase AI in the other. Erin paused a moment, saw he wasn't shot, and followed him, gun ready.

Isadora was staggering around, her ebony skin splattered with blood and, more bizarrely, blood running from her mouth, snarling animalistically. Four members of the team were forming a shield between Isadora and Eduardo, who was in the corner flinching every time Isadora came near. And she came near a lot. She seemed to want to hurt him. Erin noted with horror that the back of Isadora's head was a huge hole. Her AI interface cords had been ripped out and were splayed across the chair of the undead woman's blood-splattered cubicle. A masked man lay on the ground, his throat ripped out, his stomach half torn open, tendril-like entrails, partially gnawed, were exposed. Sydney, still tethered to his silver box by the cabling at the back of his head, lifted an office chair, wheels out, and ran against Isadora. His little suitcase skittered along behind him over the carpet. He pinned her in the wheeled swiveling crosspiece of the chair up against the glass sliding doors. Benoni took aim with the gun.