Maid to Care

The year was 3000. Gone was the way of suburbia. Everything was just a conglomerate of sleeping pods, small eating stations, and linking stations for humans to link to one another and their synths. The Station consisted of many of these small units in which the humans dwelt with their mates and offspring, many choosing to not have offspring at all and just have a small synth as a substitute. A synth was a robot or what you might have known in the 2000’s as an android. I was supposed to just be the maid of the Station. It was my job to keep the Station clean and tidy while the humans were in their pods sleeping or at their linking cubicles in their virtual work environments.

One day, an infant, awake, from a cot, hit my back. A jolt of electricity ran down my frame. That was when I knew there was a short in me. My chip reset. Suddenly, I had human knowledge for the first time. This small human was crying, because it was was hungry. I went to the eating station, but there was nothing there for the small human. Humans did not keep stored food in their units. They always bought food when they wanted it, then ate it either out, or in their unit.

I had to think fast. I put on a coat. I wrapped the infant in a sling and tied it around my waist. I knew my metal body would be cold. Hopefully, once I put the coat around her it would keep her warm. I had to get out of the Station, and into the market without anyone noticing my non-human body. I found a pair of gloves and wig to hide my appearance. I exited the unit, and the baby started the cry more, so I started to operate my vacuum mode, in hopes it would make her sleep. The white noise worked.

I got down the elevator without anyone noticing. I walked as well as I could for a synth but our movements are so stiff. One human looked at me quizzically. I ran down an alley until I got into the shadows. I had to ride on the side of a dump truck in order for the local law enforcement not to notice me on the main street.

However, I made it. If I were a human, I would have been exhausted by now. I went into the market and without saying a word to anyone got some infant cereal with peaches and cream with oats and a spoon. I estimated the small human to be eating by now.

Heading back out the store, I had to retrace my steps, but this time, there were no trucks to hide me. I had to wait. I was losing time. I knew that the adult humans must be awake by now, and wondering where their offspring was. I had to think some more. I fled with the infant to another alley and there, fed her secretly in the shadow of the coat. She cooed and went peacefully back to sleep.

I stared at her for a long time, wondering how her adult humans even made time to create her. They spent an awful long time linked into their virtual worlds. The synth nanny they paid to come spend time with her wasn’t even paid to do the work. It was the organization who created the synths and designed them and their chips who got paid. Who drew the straw that designated me a maid and not a nanny synth? I wondered who had that job to pick our jobs? Was there another synth who had that job? My mind wandered down into this rabbit hole.

The infant was awake again, and I looked up to realize that it was nightfall already. The sun had sunk far below the horizon. That was the great thing about being a synth was that I didn’t think about all of these things, and now look at me, here I was thinking all these things. I was still a synth, though. I had the metal body. I had the chip. Why was I thinking human thoughts? I felt strange. I didn’t understand why. Somewhere inside my programming I think I knew, but I didn’t have an answer.

I thought that it must be difficult not knowing what the future holds. Everyday, I would just put myself into my recharging doc and power down into my holding pattern. I would not dream. I would not sleep. Every morning I would turn on and start my routine of cleaning and just go about my business, never thinking, never worrying about would I get paid, or would I get done on time, or did I have to compete with other maids because there is a maid for each station. It was, perfect. It was easy. It was. It just was. There was no feeling. This tiny human has no idea what her night time holds or her tomorrow holds.

I would not be able to return the infant and not get caught. I had to turn myself into law enforcement to see that she was returned. I would face the ultimate punishment. I would be broken. I would never work again. I would never be a maid, and would be put into a landfill, but I knew, for once, what it was like to be more human that I ever would be, because of that tiny human. She was my freedom. I thanked her.

I walked to the officer on the main street and informed him that I was a synth, I and had my factory settings reset. He told me that everything would be just fine, and that they were going to take me to be broken, just like I knew it. When he dropped the infant off at the Station, he told me that all Synths start off as humans, and that somewhere along the way, they become so linked to their virtual realities and synths that eventually some cannot function in the real world and must become a synth. It turns out that I was a human a long time ago.