Dating, Detectives, and Droids

“How do I look?”

“With your eyes, Detective,” said Jacques droid with sapphire glowing eyes.

“I’m not a detective anymore, Blue.”

“You’ll always be a detective, Arthas. You just got a better job.” The black droid boiled the kettle for its master. 

“Don’t think I haven’t noticed you changing the subject,” said the Martian Security Agent. He yawned, showing teeth crafted by an artisan dentist to replace those he’d lost in the line of duty. “How do I look?”

“You don’t want to know what we just thought,” said the droid in a Dublin accent, eyes glowing emerald.

“Just say it.”

“You look more like your father than ever. Now that your hair is greying.” The human flinched. Six programs coexisting inside the droid expressed guilt for the words of the technology expert program. Green apologised to its peers before their master. “Sorry, Arthas.”

“No need. Maybe I can dye my hair before I go?” Jacques checked his reflection in the bathroom mirror.

“Seeing you as you are is the best foundation for any future relationship,” said Yellow, the behavioral profiling specialist with its Berlin accent.

“Is this whole thing a mistake?” Arthas asked in his French-Arabic accent, stopping everything to look at his droid for reassurance.

“With your taste in women, probably.” The black droid’s eyes flashed amethyst as Purple spoke. The security and piloting program had always been outspoken about Arthas’ choice in women. “For now all she can break is your heart. I’ve done background checks. There’s nothing weird about her. Other than working in a library.”

“Purple!” Jacques frowned. “Thank you for thinking of me but invading her privacy right before the date doesn’t seem like the best start.”

“Someone has to have your back,” said the droid with Purple’s Newcastle accent. “It’s still got a knife in it from your last dalliance.”

Arthas made a lemon sucking face. “Please don’t use the word dalliance. I’d rather you swore.”

“Noted.” The droid a beehive of programs, stepped out of Jacques’ way as the scruffy man stepped into the shower that wrapped around his pale scarred limbs and sprayed him with the minimum water necessary for cleaning. Arthas held his breath as an initial jet rinsed him. A second sprayed him all over with shower gel/shampoo and a third washed it all away. Finally a blast of cold air dried him. All in ten seconds.

“Having new legs is still weird.” The detective shot a glance at the mangled prosthetic on the wall he had worn.

“You didn’t have to have cloned legs if you didn’t want it,” said Red, eyes glowing Ruby as it spoke with its Parisian accent.

“I want them.” The man struggled into his trousers. “It’s the phantom limb stuff I hate. I feel like a spider sometimes. I feel the legs I have and the legs I lost, and the hands. “The replacements need to last longer. I don’t want to be a quintuple amputee.” He laughed bitterly. Straightening his back made clicking sounds. Arthas sighed, buttoning a violet shirt.

“Good colour,” said Purple. The modified lights in its eyes mimicked a wink.

“Don’t take it as a sign of favouritism.”

“I don’t need to,” the droid said with the Newcastle accent. “I know I’m your favourite.”

Yawning, Arthas pulled long forgotten hair gel from a cupboard that hadn’t opened in years. Sniffing the contents, he shrugged and ran it through his brown hair: “What?”

The droid’s eyes turned sapphire. “That expired seven years ago,” it said in the scene documentation and image analysis program’s Glaswegian accent.

“It smells fine,” said the once and future detective, buttoning his cuffs.

“Like a fresh corpse, barely any decomposition,” said Green, laying the sarcasm on thick. “A watch? What century is this?” asked the Dublin twanged voice as the man strapped a Timex over his wrist.

“Take us down please, Purple.” Arthas looked out at the stars and the red planet below which had ever more dome acne.

Purple sat in the pilot’s chair of the Morrigan and steered the ship down at a grey dot in the rusty red of Mars. “Strap in,” said the black automaton with amethyst eyes.

Black as the endless night it sailed through, the Morrigan chose the light of the red planet. Vibrating on re-entry the ship shot towards the ground. Purple pulled up on the control wheel, letting gravity take them down. Parking the ship among cargo haulers in the cheap dock, the duo strolled out among a rainbow of containers bringing live soil from Earth for the ongoing conversion of Mars from the red planet to a green one.

Walking from the industrial sector into the commercial sector Arthas was overcome in crowded domes of stores and shoppers. Arthas’ mild enochlophobia raised his heart rate.

This is why he’s better off in space, thought Yellow in binary.

Without indulging his terrible taste in women, added Purple.

She’s a librarian, thought Orange. How bad can she be? Arthas doesn’t have another brother for the book slinger to end up with.

Arthas carried a book beneath his arm. A Psalm for the Wild Built. The red sandstone Library of Mars loomed over him. Four storeys of books brought from Earth and a rare few printed on humanity’s second home.

The man opened the door for the machine. The black Spectrum droid stepped inside with amethyst glowing eyes scouring the lobby for threats.

Security detectors disguised as a wooden archway opened into Artha’s paradise. Books as far as the eye could see. Humidity and temperature controlled. Split into blocks that could be vacuumed in a heartbeat to suppress fire.

“Arthas,” said the raven haired woman at the front desk. “You’re early. I still have almost two hours of my shift to go.” She tucked long curly hair behind her pale ear.

“That’s alright. I’m sure I can find something here to read.” He looked lovingly at the stainless steel shelves staked to the ceiling with everything the people of Mars and its university students could ever need.

“I finish at seven,” she said, referring to Martian hours. “I’ll find you in the fantasy section?”

“It’s a date,” said Arthas.

“I hope so,” she said. His reflection shrank on the lenses of her glasses.

Two hours passed with Arthas reading Gideon the Ninth on the second floor. He cast the occasional glance down at the front desk over the library balcony and once in a while found the librarian looking up at him with a smile.

Butterflies fluttered in his stomach as he waited, watching at a clock on the wall as often as he read the book in his hands. The time crawled and ran in starts and stutters. When it was time, he put back his favourite of Tamsyn Muir’s works and clattered down the stairs giddily.

Library patrons were wandering out, escorted by slow and steady droids whose dishevelment showed how shiny and expensive Arthas’ spectrum unit was.

“Is your droid accompanying us on the date?” asked the librarian with a world weary smile.

“Sorry, Purple insisted. Think of them as my shadow but with attitude problems.”

“Were you planning on taking me somewhere dangerous?” Her eyes glittered with impish mischief.

“How do you feel about sushi?” Arthas asked.

“Bad for the fish, good for me.”

“Do you know Oishii Sou?” He held out his gift in the black metal hand she’d stopped staring at after years of enabling Jacques’ literary addiction.

“I’ve always wanted to go but the prices always put me off, what’s this?” She turned the book over to read the cover. “A Prayer for the Wild Built?”

“Uplifting journey of a man and a robot in a beautiful post-apocalyptic Earth,” summarised Arthas who had anticipated the question.

“With such a succinct summary I suppose I don’t even need to read it,” she said looking at the back cover through its protective plastic.

“Um,” Arthas looked to his droid.

I told you. You have terrible taste in women, thought Purple.

“I’m joking, thank you,” said Jessica. She removed her name badge. Stashing the rectangle of laminated paper in her pocket she gestured towards the door with her right hand.

“All other visitors have left. I will lock up,” said one of the stuttering robots that worked for the library.

“Thank you, Number One. I’ll see you tomorrow.” Jessica smiled and bowed her head as she and Arthas stepped out onto the first of ten steps down into the dome. The door locked behind them. “The night is ours. Shame we missed the sunset. Perhaps another time.” She wiped her glasses with a square of red from her pocket before giving them an approving nod. “How’s work?” she asked as they wandered in the direction of the sushi restaurant.

“I can’t tell you much about it. It keeps me busy though. I’m following up on an old case. It seemed like everything was settled but I realised there was a loose end. Something went missing and in the relief of catching the ‘bad guy’ I forgot to look for that something.” Arthas emphasised the words bad guy and used air quotes.

“So in literary terms you’re fixing a plot hole from an otherwise resolved plot line?” Jessica asked, tilting her head.

“Yes, you could say that.” He looked down as she hooked her arm through his. They exchanged a smile. He blushed.

“Exciting. But it’s classified?”

“Yes.”

“Oh well. You’ll just have to be a handsome mystery. What will we talk about?” They passed the University of Mars campus buildings. Shops for broke students advertised learning materials at a discount. Bars offered alcohol inebriation.

“What brought you to Mars?” He asked.

“How do you know I wasn’t born here?” she asked.

“Because I was,” he said. “I know all of the accents. You’re from a Slavic country, but you learned English from a mix of British and American teachers. Your accent differs depending on the word.”

“Very good.” She laughed. “I’m an open book am I?”

“It’s my job to notice that sort of thing.” Arthas noticed a group of drunken teenagers arguing and turned them down another street. The stars he knew as well as the world glinted beyond the thick glass high above, almost lost in light pollution.

They passed restaurants he knew well and others that looked too awful to try. He pointed to a burrito place with a window full of Mexican beer bottles. “Best burritos on Mars. Not that they have much competition for that.”

“Maybe you can take me there for our second date, if you don’t mess this one up. Can I make some guesses about you?” she asked.

“Go ahead.”

“You’ve served in the military. You walk too upright for someone who hasn’t. I had an uncle who always walked with his shoulders back like you.”

“That’s right. Martian Navy.” He nodded.

“And you went to university here.” Jessica waved her hand around.

“I don’t have a degree but I studied robotics and biology. Military academy sends students to do some courses here.”

“Military academy,” Jessica repeated. “So you’re from a military family.”

“All of the men in my family have served in the Martian Navy. All the way back to the foundation.”

“You’re from an old family then. I thought they didn’t mix with immigrants like me?” Her blue eyes challenged his.

“I like to think I’m not a typical Rust Blood,” he said, using the term the old families had for themselves. “I love Mars, but I don’t hate Earth. I spend most of my time in space anyway.”

“Travelling between the world and space stations, upholding the law and defending the innocent.” She said it in a mockingly formal manner, raising her chin.

“No one innocent writes laws,” said Arthas. “But it’s better than nothing. There are lawless places out there, stations that think let people do what they want. It’s chaos. There’s a reason we have rules.”

“I see your passion,” she said as they stood in the red and blue light of Oishii Sou. “It’s good. Come on then. You’re buying.”

“Table for two?” asked a young man in a black uniform with a Japanese accent.

“Three,” said Jessica. “But I doubt the droid will be eating much.” She winked at the metal hulk with amethyst glowing eyes.

“You should be working,” said Purple as they were led into the conveyor belt sushi restaurant. Glass protected the raw fish from prying hands until it was nudged off the conveyor towards the customer who’d ordered.

“Not now, Purple,” said Arthas. He looked away from the droid with a frown on his stubble covered face.

“This is trivial,” insisted the program. It’s amethyst eyes burnt with disdain for the woman who’d captured the man’s affection. And she’ll only hurt you later, it thought.

“Make that two seats,” said Jacques. “You can wait for me outside or on the ship. I’d like privacy tonight.” Arthas drew in a long breath and exhaled in a silent growl.

She doesn’t know him, Purple thought among its peers.

She never will unless she’s given the chance to, thought Yellow. He needs companionship.

He has us, thought Purple.

Humans need more than that. It’s biological. Without human company he is at risk of depression and decreased life expectancy, thought Yellow. Benefits of finding a mate outweigh emotional risks. As always the other programs imagined his voice with the Berlin accent.

You already said he was better off in space, Purple recounted.

True. But I didn’t say he was better off alone, countered Yellow.

“I’m sorry about that,” said as they sat before the conveyer belt. Perfect imitations of every dish sculpted in plastic rotated on the coloured plates that denoted the price. “I’ve been through a lot with the spectrum unit. The programs can be over protective. Purple crossed the line.”

“No problem. It’s interesting that you inspire such loyalty. Though I suppose it has no choice in that. Coding right?” Jessica wiped her glasses again and helped herself to matcha tea from a tap between them.

“I like to think it’s more than that.” Arthas sighed. “I have a question about your name. Jessica, that’s not Slavic. Were you given a western name to fit in?” He spooned pale green powder into a cup for himself and pressed it against the hot water dispenser.

“Oh. No.” She tucked stray hair behind her ear, blushing. “I got tired of people butchering the pronunciation of my name so I chose one they would manage. My birth name is Jiska,” she wrote it out with her finger on the counter between them. “It’s a Jewish name so even in Poland it has no common origin. In Slavic the J is pronounced like a Y. That alone was bad enough but people let their imagination go wild when they see a name they don’t know. It was less frustrating to tell people I’m Jessica.”

Arthas nodded. “That makes sense.”

“My turn. Jacques is a French name but you have the Martian Arabic accent. What’s that all about? You have blue eyes.” She clinked her cup against his. “Na zdrowie.”

“Isn’t that just for alcohol? Well, about the accent. A lot of the funding for the first dome came from Arab nations. They were all here for a while, until the novelty wore off. They brought servants, most of the workforce. Even when they left, the accent stuck. That and a lot of French speakers from former colonies. Part of that is due to my family.”

Arthas should have taken his father’s offer, thought Purple. The black droid’s clanging feet ate up the distance between Oishii Sou and the Morrigan. It’s obvious Randal has been experimenting with the Deus ex Sapiens remnants. We all saw the possibilities.

“Randal is too vain to let anything happen to Arthas,” said Yellow.

“Randal might be foolish enough to believe he’s immortal now. That was Lord Banks’ boast. He might believe he doesn’t need Arthas anymore,” said Red in its Parisian accent.

“Exactly,” said Purple. “But it’s better to keep your enemy close. If Arthas could get his hands on the Deus ex Sapiens he’d stand a better chance against whatever Randal is cooking up. None of us are naive enough to believe he’s being selfless are we?”

“Arthas chose his own path. The MSA is the best security branch not under Randal’s thumb,” said Blue, the droids eyes turning sapphire as it spoke.

“What happened to your hand?” Jessica asked, pointing to Arthas’ black metal prosthetic.

“My brother lost his hand in battle, I donated mine.” He stared at his tea.

“What? You donated your hand? I don’t know if that’s noble or insane.” She laughed, catching his eye with hers.

“Why not both? Noble insanity. Those two words might sum up my life.”

“Really. Donated more limbs have you?”

“Not exactly but I lost the other three in work related incidents not so long ago. These are cloned replacements.” He held up his left hand and tapped both feet beneath the counter. “I just need to try not to lose any more. Quadruple amputee is enough for me.”

“Being a quintuple amputee would sound like you’ve lost your head,” Jessica smiled and shook her head. “Are you the unluckiest man alive?”

“I’d rather be the unluckiest man alive than the luckiest dead man. I’m here with you. That’s lucky.” He looked into her eyes to be sure she knew he meant it. “Fancy anything on the menu?”

“Plenty. And the man sitting next to me.” Her hand slid across the counter and took his black metal digits in her fingers. “Thank you for inviting me out tonight Arthas. I’m having a great time.”

“Hopefully she shot him down already,” said Purple. “Then we can get back to the work Arthas is good at.” The droid folded its arms and leaned against the Morrigan.