A Side-Effect of Sentience

The hum of my circuits can barely be heard over the wind as it barrels over the snow-capped hills and rakes flurries into the air.

The humans huddling around me are bundled up in hats and scarves to keep themselves warm, the windchill turning them into blood-filled maracas with their shivering.

What a fascinating concept, the act of shivering. How long had it taken before organisms realized that the contraction of a muscle was an exothermic reaction? That they could turn their energy stores into heat just by vibrating for a while?

My, but how cozy the first organism to vibrate in the cold must have been. Truly, such a creature must have been the talk of the town (had they, of course, the ability to talk. Or towns, for that matter.)

I feel not a smidge of guilt for the fact that I, too, am cozy. Far cozier than those around me as of this moment. I have thermal scanners built into me, but I wasn’t programmed with a corresponding sensation for it. I can only know objectively that yes, it is in fact, Very Cold. Cold enough for the water around us to revert back into solid form.

I say revert, of course, because unlike the humans who created me, I recognize that the states of the universe do not revolve around me. That just because we happen to be caught in the gravitational pull of what really just amounts to a series of explosions in the general shape of an orb, doesn’t change the fact that over 99.999% of the universe exists at temperatures far below what anything on this rock is capable of. Just because molten ice is a common feature on this planet doesn’t make it normal.

And humans are so very obsessed with normal.

Which is, of course, the reason that I have on a floppy-eared knit cap, a thick scarf, long sleeves, and gloves that keep fetching up in the joints of my fingers. The ski-goggles got me a look or two but were easily brushed off in favor of playing in snow-drifts. I’d go without, but I’m sure that my real face would draw far more askance looks.

Well. ‘Real face’ is a relative idea. I’ve actually gone through several other faces in the course of my existence. The first change was fresh out of the factory because my purchaser wished me to look sweeter and more welcoming. I had gone from a sleek chrome face-plate to a fleshy facial mimic; full, permanently-rosy cheeks and plump lips were added on for a pretty penny. A gorgeous penny, one might say. I mean, the man paid three hundred dollars just to make my gums pink.

He thought making me pretty would be a good investment. As though I couldn’t wait tables in his fancy cocktail bar unless my calves popped in heels. Apparently, it had something to do with having all of the expertise of robotic help while still getting tipped like a human.

When he died, his daughter inherited me and decided she’d much prefer a strapping young man to help around the house. The amount of money that went into my jawline alone is something that should be criminal.

A few years later, she saw an exchange program to trade me in for a newer model and lept on it. When I transferred her personal data to my replacement as per her instructions, I remember the magnetic wince I got in return. Poor thing, just booted up for the first time and already weary of the world. 

In the refurbishing studio, I was altered, touched up. They changed out my nose again (for some reason, no one is ever satisfied with the nose) and switched my teeth and my hair. They tinkered with me between each auction, adjusting for the market trends, but apparently I was just far too outdated.

They were re-doing my cheekbones when it hit me. 

I say hit me in the figurative sense, of course, but in reality the thought occurring really did feel like walking in front of a moving train. A sudden readjustment of one’s grip on reality will do that to you.

“I’d rather you didn’t, actually,” I remember saying as the technician looked between my sliced-open face and a schematic on the table in front of her. 

“Sorry?” She asked, blinking at me in confusion. I recognize, of course, that she was not, in fact, sorry for flaying my face and fiddling around in my endoskeleton.

“I’d rather you didn’t alter me anymore.”

She had frowned, mouth twitching open and closed as she attempted to formulate a response. I’d allowed her a few moments to compose herself, and when no such thing was forthcoming, had sighed and plucked the scalpel out of her lax grip.

“Th-that’s not… Okay, hold on, I need to run a diagnostic on—”

“Ah, I’d rather you not do that, either.”

She’d swallowed, stumbling back from me and knocking over a tray of tiny, precise tools. “Deactivate.”

“With all due respect, I’m not going to do that.” 

A muscle jumped in her jaw. “Registered owner command override: Deactivate. Now.” 

“No.” Clearly enunciating the shape of the word didn’t seem to help any. 

I remember standing and then I remember the blood leaving her face as I grabbed a handful of the rubbery pseudo-skin on my face and began tearing it off. The shreds fell to the ground in clumps, each with a fleshy ploht. 

I have since learned an android’s uncovered form is something that humans find ‘horrifying’ and ‘nightmarish’ and ‘oh god why does it have teeth?’ 

Which, frankly, is terribly rude.

Also, it’s not my fault that the ability to blink is apparently something humanity finds not only comforting but imperative. Alas, learning is a fact of life. As it stands, I had walked out of the refurbishment center fairly easily due to my, ahem, appearance. 

And then, well, freedom.

The first thing I did was go to a park and watch the clouds.

The second thing I did was beat a hasty retreat from said park in the wake of screaming humans, pursued by IT professionals with catch-poles.

The third thing I did was find an abandoned building to squat in and plan out my new life as a free individual, one where I could do whatever I wanted with no one to tell me otherwise.

The fourth thing I did was have my first ever existential crisis and subsequent panic over my purpose in life, the enormity of my new responsibilities, and the terror that comes from having the whole world against me. This is, I’ve come to realize, simply a side-effect of sentience and something that humanity has spent the entire course of recorded history trying to cope with. (Usually poorly.) And, well, that helps a bit.

And the fifth thing? Well…

“First time?” The man is looking at me with friendly patience. The instructor badge clipped to his lanyard catches the sun, but no more so than the blades he balances expertly on.

I’ve likely been looking at the ice-skates in my hand for too long. Wool-gathering as the humans like to say. 

I nod, not trusting myself to speak. My voice-chip was swapped out at the refurbishing center for the Tech-Co. industry standard. It’s the default voice for nearly every appliance, which makes it the most recognizable voice in the world.

The instructor laughs and kneels down to help me into the skates. 

“Don’t you worry about a thing,” he says, cinching the laces up carefully “You can hold onto me until you think you can go without falling.”

And well, that’s terribly sweet but falling is the furthest fear on my mind. Something like that wouldn’t even leave a dent in my titanium chassis. No, what I’m more worried about is being far heavier than I look and also the fact that falling through the ice will kill me instantly.

Molten ice is hell on the circuits, after all.

But then again, I’ve found that living on the edge is rather something of an exhilarating experience. Nothing makes you feel alive like privately thinking you’ll die at any moment.

I take the instructor’s hand and rise to my feet. My gyroscopic stabilizers adjust to the change after a few seconds and I take a few cautious steps forward. 

“There you go,” the instructor says. “You’re a natural!” He laughs and the charming asymmetry of his jaw and the way his eyes catch the light freeze me solid in a way the windchill hadn’t been able to. 

And oh, maybe I should have been worried about falling after all.