Observational Report or Situation: "Squirrel!"

Submitted into Contest #82 in response to: Write about an android just trying to blend in with their human companions.... view prompt

0 comments

Fiction Funny Science Fiction

Serialized Identification Numerals: 00881 

Observational Report—Earth—Lunar Rotation 3:

I am now able to successfully imitate one of the human species’ most common behaviors, they call it sitting down. 

Observing the human species of earth is my primary protocol. Secondary and tertiary protocols are experimental behavioral imitation and cultural assimilation, respectively. 

(Mission note to the Designer regarding all future protocol upgrades: Imitation of behavior, without successful assimilation of local culture, has resulted in multiple errors. SIN 00882 must receive reprioritized protocols to observe, assimilate, and only then to attempt imitation. Reprioritization of protocols will avoid repeating the following errors resulting in mission exposure and the compromised protocols of SIN 00881.)

            I compose this report while experimenting with, what is called, sitting down. It is a position of semi alert energy preservation. On earth there is practiced a more restful position by the human species that further decreases alertness while also increasing energy savings and providing organism restoration. As mobility and observation in that position is near zero, it violates my primary protocol. Sitting down is more suitable to SIN 00881 protocols. It was while experimenting with sitting down, in direct accordance with my tertiary protocol, that errors were encountered, and my mission was catastrophically compromised. 

Humans gather in unsheltered spaces to congregate when the necessity for organism thermoregulation is at a minimum. In their sitting down positions, they occupy fixed furnishings, seemingly designed to limit the maximum number of closely congregating humans to sets of two. These fixed furnishings exist for the singular purpose of hosting the humans in a state of sitting down or seated-ness. They neither produce or draw energy, they have no communication functions, a low aesthetic contribution, and they do not provide any form of data transfer. Manual audible communication is sometimes employed by the human species, at other times the humans are seated in silence. The avian species inhabiting these outdoor spaces are often observed by the silent, seated humans and, on occasion, the two species have been observed interacting. The avian species is drawn, in groups, to a food matter that appears to be of little value to the humans as it is randomly discarded across the hardened walking surfaces that connect the fixed furnishings. Along these surfaces I have additionally observed a concentration of discarded short term use containers of various hard and soft synthetics, the excrement of a domesticated creature harnessed at the throat by a tether (this creature’s function remains unknown), and very small, soft fabric cylinders that emit a particulate haze and appear to provide momentary pleasure to the humans when taken orally until all of the plant matter attached to the fabric cylinder is consumed by incineration and the cylinder is apparently discarded.

            I am seated in one of these outdoor congregation areas where I have encountered the following errors in my protocol prioritization. While observing an avian creature take flight and tracking its vector, I sighted an earth rodent. This rodent stood erect, utilizing its rear appendages as the humans utilize their lower appendages. In the earth rodent’s forward appendages was a discarded food item. Several humans watched as this rodent moved in a way that may have been uncommon for it and so they seemed to experience pleasure resulting from their observation of this unique behavior. The humans abruptly ceased feeling their pleasure when they observed me observing this same rodent. I was not alerted to their observation of SIN 00881 until the humans had already reached a critical discomfort level. The small humans observing me expressed sadness with facial moisture emissions and inarticulate audible outbursts while the large humans were mostly muted inspite of their oral and ocular cavities having opened to their widest aperture or in other humans closing their cavities and reinforcing their cavity closures by covering their facial regions with their arm termini, called hands.

            What I did not compute in this moment, when my observation protocol had taken priority over my imitation and assimilation protocols, was that I had rotated my torso one hundred and eighty degrees while tracking the avian flight vector, and then continued to rotate my cranial segment and the observational lenses contained therein, an additional one hundred and eighty degrees when the rodent entered my primary field of focus. I am in the human position, sitting down. My lower appendages remain stationary while the organic tissue grown over my endo skeleton and internal hardware has become stretched and torn in places where the tension from the three hundred and sixty degrees of torso rotation have reached their critical load. My observation lenses have become exposed, my oral cavity and its mandible wiring have become visible, and along the main vertical support column at my model’s rear, a complete tearing of both my organic cover and cloth coverings has occurred. This material failure has allowed my stabilizers and internal antennae to be observed by the humans nearby. 

I observed the humans and their surroundings successfully. I imitated their fascination with the other organisms of their world. I errored in my assimilation of human movements and in my processing of their physiological limits. I errored in my imitation of their movements while in their seated position. Multiple protocol prioritization errors result in mission exposure.

Afternote SIN 00881:

It is uncommon to observe a human taking action to benefit their world. I observed, with great frequency, humans acting instead, to harm their world with their uncontrolled distribution of waste products which are incompatible with the organic matter that surrounds them. It does not compute that the humans who damage their organic surroundings spend much idle time sitting down in these same surroundings, but not acting to increase organic optimization or to mitigate proximal damage from inorganic pollutants. 

Observational analysis of human waste deposition in relation to human organic propagation has measured continued human existence as scenario: bleak. 

Multiple factor calculation has determined human occupation of this planet will end in 1176.4571 lunar rotations.

Mission exposure, resulting from compounded protocol errors, requires system deletion and self-detonation at report’s end. 

End observational report.

February 23, 2021 18:01

You must sign up or log in to submit a comment.

0 comments

RBE | Illustrated Short Stories | 2024-06

Bring your short stories to life

Fuse character, story, and conflict with tools in Reedsy Studio. 100% free.