Mirror Image Part 5

[Sthurmovik]

Same caveat goes with any mistakes as I was the only set of eyes proofreading this chapter.

This chapter has a bit more fembot action as well as some interesting inter-character development.

Comments and speculation welcome.

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Chapter 5

Rolland pulled his 15 year old Honda Civic into the parking lot of the Book Stop. It wasn't a very good vehicle, but it was reliable and got him where he needed to go, although perhaps more importantly it left him more money to put toward researching The Object. Taking a deep breath and popping a breath freshener Rolland checked himself out in the mirror. He had cleaned himself up before leaving and even found a clean T-shirt and and shorts in the hopes that this meeting might lead to something longer term. Even with his interest in fembots as a relief valve, Rolland was still very lonely and was desperate to meet other kindred spirits even if they were born instead of constructed. Once inside the store Rolland carefully made his way to the lounge area, taking a circuitous route in order to scope out the situation. The last thing he wanted to do was introduce himself to the wrong person, or worse, a cross-dressed guy. He saw a woman in a gray sweatshirt seated at one of the tables, as he moved in he suddenly stopped short as he got a better look at her. It was the worst thing that could have happened, worse than a transsexual, the woman, with her firery red hair, was hot, way out of the league for a computer geek like Rolland.

Rolland was frozen, he didn't know what to do, at best this Freya would humor him a bit before finding an excuse to lower the boom and bail on him. If they had any sort of conversation there was no way he could feel comfortable around her and would probably just embarrass himself more. Then the thought flashed through his head that that could be the point. The whole meeting could have been Web 2.0 version of a pig party with high definition videos of his awkwardness appearing on YouTube with snarky subtitles poking fun at his interest in female androids. Hanging back while he contemplated his next move Rolland saw the woman look up from her book and glance around the room, suddenly her gaze hit on Rolland like a Predator drone locking onto a terrorist, she seemed to size things up for a second then smiled, signaling Rolland to sit down next to her.

"Oh hi, you must be Rolland."

"And you're Freya?" Rolland replied somewhat sheepishly, gingerly sitting down next to hot girl. He wondered why she was hiding her body with what baggy sweatshirt. Maybe she had some sort of hidden deformity that would even things up a bit.

"Don't worry, I won't bite. Why don't you tell me a bit about yourself. All I know about you are your preferences on how to maintain your lover," winked Freya.

In a halting voice Rolland launched into his life's story, what he did to support himself, what he was skilled in and his various other interests and hobbies. All the while, behind her smiling exterior Freya was groaning, this human was far below what she was accustomed to on the human porn sites. Granted this was a primitive world and those sites didn't promote the most realistic body images, but even against an objective standard Rolland was overweight, out of shape, had poor eyesight and was showing evidence of deferred hygiene. What really irritated Freya was just how much of a tech geek Rolland was. Freya was no slouch, she had greater technical and scientific know how than 99.99% of the humans this planet, but she choose not to make that knowledge into a lifestyle. Interacting with Rolland reminded Freya of that time she had been stuck attending a social event with Laen, her Platoon's technical officer, which she now counted as one of the more unpleasant experiences of her life. Still, the memories of that night would give her valuable tips on how to properly interact with Rolland.

"Listen, I can tell that I wasn't what you were expecting and I am sorry to take up your time, I'm going to head off now, I'd still love to talk with you online, but its probably best we keep things there."

Freya was snapped out of her idle thoughts to see Rolland suddenly get up from the table and begin to walk toward the door.

"Damn, that little human's perceptive," thought Freya, annoyed with herself that she had completely turned Rolland out and somehow given herself away. Quickly getting to her feet she pursued Rolland, grabbing his arm as he walked in between two tall bookshelves.

"Please don't..." stammered Rolland, looking surprised.

"I can tell you what the device you're hiding does."

Rolland tried to keep a straight face, but the subtle twitches and movements indicative of his though processes crashing were like a newspaper headline informing Freya she had struck paydirt.

"W-what do you me....?"

"Don't even try Rolland, if I meant you any harm you would be dead or in an interrogation cell by now. You have no choice but to trust me, if you'll step outside with me I'll tell you everything you want to know."

Rolland hesitated for a second and then, eyes focused on his shoes, followed Freya outside.

"I knew you were too good to be true."

"Rolland, please, just because I'm not looking to date you doesn't mean I don't have something wonderful to offer you."

The pair walked out of the book store and across the parking lot to a small deserted waterfront park.

"Alright then, tell me what my hypothetical device does."

"It's a portable Quantum Extraction Field generator."

"Yeah well, what the fuck is that."

"It's primary function is to extract what can best be described as "life energy" from a synthetic being and place it in an equivalent organic container."

"Wait, synthetic beings? Organic container? Are you saying it turns like androids into organic people?"

"I guess you could put it like that."

"But...that means there actually ARE androids," Rolland suddenly stopped walking and turned to stare at Freya, "You...you're an android...aren't you."

"Wow, you really are perceptive, yes Rolland, I am in fact a synthetic person."

Rolland's face seemed to brighten for a second before turning skeptical.

"This isn't some setup is it? I mean...this isn't possible, some real fembot just isn't going to come an announce herself to someone with that, interest."

"Rolland, you worked at Area 51-A, you stole a futuristic energy field device, but when an female android shows up you're ready to draw the line?" chuckled Freya.

"Ok then, can you please humor me and prove what you are? Maybe take off your faceplate, or open your paplexus panel."

"You want me to do what? I don't even have a paplexus panel, whatever that is."

"Well do something, there are too many griefers out there for me not to insist."

As the last bit of daylight was fading from the summer sky Freya scanned around the park with her thermal imaging filter and after detecting no bystanders pulled Rolland aside to an isolated area by the waterline. Reaching her hands up she touched her fingers the sides of her face and then firmly pressed. Rolland could hear a plainly audible click and then a slight hiss as a seam formed around Freya's faceplate. His heart began to beat faster and he felt something stir in his pants as the android's face turned still and lifeless. Then Freya gently lifted her faceplate away revealing a silver alloy skull reminiscent of of the terminator movies, only without the glowing eyes. She gingerly held the faceplate out for Rolland to take.

"Be careful with that, its a very expensive component there."

Rolland was speechless as he took the component from Freya and held it in his hands. It was thicker than he had imagined as it contained not only the skin, but also the synthmuscles and related control components. His fingers gently traced the contours, the skin was still warm, turning it over he saw the micro-connectors for sensory data and power.

"What makes it move...servoes?"

"No, my body primarily makes use of black bundle synthetic muscles, just like you see in Animee type media. I do have some servo-like things for backup and supplementary motive power though."

"Wow, you're...beautiful."

"Thank you."

"No, I'm serious...even this...," Rolland reached out a hand and touched the exposed front of her skull, "is beautiful."

"Aw, its really nice of you to say that."

"No, I mean it. Can, you feel it when I touch you there?"

"A little, there's a secondary sensory system that provides a vague sense of touch for components that don't have integrated sensors. Can I have my face back now?"

"Oh, sure, of course."

Rolland handed back Freya's faceplate and the Sister expertly fitted it back into place with another click. Rolland watched the dead synthflesh re-animate as the seam faded away. Freya blinked her eyes and smiled.

"Wow, I can tell you really like that sort of thing," Freya remarked, glancing down at Rolland's shorts.

"Oh, well of course," replied Rolland blushing, "don't you find it hot too?"

Now it was Freya's turn to feel uncomfortable, most of her peers loved playing with their bodies, but that sort of thing just never appealed to her. Still, she didn't want to ruin the mood for Rolland.

"Yeah, that and so much more. Why don't we head back to your place, its somewhat urgent I see the Extractor, I hope you understand."

"Of course, my car's back in the parking lot."

As Rolland turned to struggle back up the embankment Freya dug into her pocket, took out a small lead-lined flask and took a long swig. The situation was going to take more than a little special lubrication for her to navigate easily. Soon the theta radiation clouding Freya's processing systems increased her ambivilence towards Rolland's detritus filled POS car. As far as Rolland was concerned his dream fembot was just having a good time.

[Adon]

Even more interesting, especially the contrast between what happens here and the typical 'amazingly hot and still self-aware fembot is inexplicibly attracted to average looking geek'. It also kind of underlines how romanticized a view people can have about things. In Freya's case, her fascination with biologics is likely just as slanted before the most beautiful ideal as the inverse is here.

I am curious to see how this shapes, both in Freya's perceptions and to see if Rolland displays anything more than a fairly bland fembot fanboy personality.

[Sthurmovik]

I am curious to see how this shapes, both in Freya's perceptions and to see if Rolland displays anything more than a fairly bland fembot fanboy personality.

Thanks for your feedback, its really motivating as most of the people I assume that are reading this already have some idea of the plot. It's a good feeling to be able to at least take one reader for a ride.

I hope to have part 6 out later tonight, I'm not sure where that will break, but either way it should be a crowd pleaser.

[DollSpace]

This looks good so far; I'm looking forward to seeing what happens next, and how the story develops. Though, I'm wondering where the random "I hope I don't meet this girl and she's a transsexual" thing came from; it kind of knocked me out of the story for a bit, I think because his reaction/fear didn't really match his character. It's only my opinion, though. One thing I'm really intrigued about, though, is the way that, in this story, not only can humans be transferred into bots, but the other way round works, too! I'd love to be human for awhile; it'd be hard to give up for me, though, I'd bet.

Hope you write more soon!
Catie

[Sthurmovik]

Though, I'm wondering where the random "I hope I don't meet this girl and she's a transsexual" thing came from; it kind of knocked me out of the story for a bit, I think because his reaction/fear didn't really match his character.

I'm sorry about that. I was trying to address the reality of there being many TG participants on this forum. Now I have nothing against that, but I have also run into many guys here looking for "real" human fembots to do various forms of botplay with and they would not be very happy with a TG guy.

What Rolland was searching for was a human girl he could have some RL Fembot fun with and I was trying to play up his expectation of disappointment. If there is a better way I could express that in the story let me know and I'll change it. These chapters are currently under edited due to my YIM buddies all flaking out of me!!

One thing I'm really intrigued about, though, is the way that, in this story, not only can humans be transferred into bots, but the other way round works, too! I'd love to be human for awhile; it'd be hard to give up for me, though, I'd bet.

Just so people don't leap to conclusions (or make travel plans) I want to make clear that my story world is not a free for all utopia where anyone can transform into what they want. I do have an appropriate amount of checks and balances in place to prevent abuse.

What I like to explore is the difference between a sentient being that is artificially made vs a sentient being that is made from more natural or biologic processes. Sisters are the straight up AI androids we all know and love. Humans can transition to an inorganic body, but you can almost consider them a cyborg with a neurons imprinted on a crystal substrate.

If you remember the difference between human Zoe and fembot Zoe in the Dyson stories that hit pretty much spot on the differences I like to explore. I like to mix things up a bit further by separating the mind from the body which gives me four combinations to work with:

AI Mind in Bot body
AI Mind in Human body
Human Mind in Bot Body
Human Mind in Human Body

This story might touch on the second one a little bit, but I actually have another story planned that will focus on it much much more.

Of course there are also practical barriers such as buying the new shell (still trying to price out a Sister shell, probably like 50 to 100k) and getting regulatory approval (don't want felons in bot bodies now do we )

Also, I was hoping that people would pick up on that thing called "The Limit" the Sisters keep talking about. I didn't want to just blurt out Sister exposition in the middle of the story so you (the readers) can speculate about it here from the clues I dropped or wait to see if I can find an organic place to bring it up in the story.

[Adon]

I sort of thought that the 'limit' was kind of like CPU capacity. That is, being sentient all of those experiences add to their personalities, and the longer they go the more and more stuff they effectively have running at once. The thing is, they can't really shut off those subroutines... it's part of who they *are*, and likely inextricably linked to every other part of their mind. So... we've all experienced slowdown on our computers when more and more things are running, especially when a buggy program turns into a resource hog. And the effect can be dramatic... again, how often have you had your computer running fine and all of a sudden i t i s g o i n g i n s l o o o o o w motion?

That's my guess... the limit is basically their CPU capacity, and the longer they are on, the closer to that limit they get. And they don't have the option of going to the task manager and turning off the redundant processes because NONE of them are redundant.

Fully prepared to be completely wrong here!

[Sthurmovik]

Fully prepared to be completely wrong here!

Actually you basically hit the nail on the head and since I really hate guessing games I'll reward you with a good explanation.

I wouldn't necessarily say the problem is a lot of processes or tasks taking up resources on their CPU, but the increasing complexity needed to carry out the basic calculations of their thought processes. So something like their arousal subroutine starts out fairly simple (by their standards at least), but then gets increasingly more complicated with all sorts of branches and cases and extra functions. The result of this increasing complexity is Sister ages they become increasingly Human, like you or I human. They go from fembot Zoe to the way Zoe felt as a human. After about 400 years of experiences a Sister's CPU reaches the practical limit of complexity and the elderly Sister basically gets dementia or a similar neurological disorder.

Of course no Sister would enjoy being insane for who knows how long, so when the symptoms start a Sister has two choices. The first is to self-recycle as they term it and either be erased completely or be re-initialized into a brand new AI, sort of like a Phoenix rising from the ashes. Note that is not the same as a resurrection, the new Sister is a new individual with a mother-daughter type of relationship with the old Sister.

The second choice is to be transferred into a form that supports higher complexity, which basically means something like a biologic brain (or its inorganic counterpart, the Neurocrystal). The problem with becoming a Natural Intelligence is that they loose most of their insane mental agility they had as sisters. Think of the Agents in the Matrix and how they can blur and dodge bullets. Sisters might not be that extreme, but they are analogous. Most sisters consider slowing themselves down to "human" levels to be an unacceptable handicap and therefore 90% choose to self recycle. Those that don't essentially trade in their mental speed for greatly increased levels of creativity, wisdom and intuition and, oddly enough, they go on to fill the roles of elders and leaders to he race of Sisters.

I also threw in that NI beings have various spiritual powers like magic and an immortal spirit, that most code based beings lack. This helps balance out the two forms of sentient life a little better.

Anyway, back to the topic at hand, spending time as a human rocket's a Sisters mental complexity up at a very fast rate. Past a certain point they just won't be able to have their minds translated back into AI code. This is why Freya is needing to take a "human vacation" under the table. She wants to take her mind to the racetrack and have others think she's only ever taken it to Church on Sundays.

Not that it would ever come up or give anything away, but, surprise surprise, Freya is on track to graduate to an NI existence.

[Adon]

Interesting... it feels almost like the whole Buddhist cycle of reincarnation. Most of the time, they are reincarnated, going through the process over and over, while a small number are willing to move 'beyond' the existence that they understand and be enlightened.

Hehe. Or without the pretentiousness, it is perhaps understandable that most of the Sisters would choose to go through a complete reboot rather than trade it for intangibles like wisdom and creativity... things that can't really be quantified. And so it's perhaps not a big leap to realize that only a relatively small percentage of them would understand that they DO gain something important in the tradeoff... it's the wisdom and intuition and creativity that keeps a society from becoming completely static and stagnant. And since it's not a quantifiable thing, I suspect most of the 'elder sisters', when asked why they didn't choose to recycle, can only really answer that if they have to explain it, it means that the person who asked almost certainly won't get it.

[Sthurmovik]

Interesting... it feels almost like the whole Buddhist cycle of reincarnation. Most of the time, they are reincarnated, going through the process over and over, while a small number are willing to move 'beyond' the existence that they understand and be enlightened.

That's an interesting idea to say that t what could be considered a Sister's spirit is reincarnated as a new AI. My initial thought was to say that the re-initialization resulted in the death of the old Sister and the birth of a new one. Having reached the limit the old Sister could be considered complex enough to have a spirit and pass onto the next plane of existence. However it seems more interesting to have a Sister sort of stay in the reincarnation loop until they choose to leap beyond being AI code.

I am not sure if Freya is a child or is a re-init, I'm thinking child.

And so it's perhaps not a big leap to realize that only a relatively small percentage of them would understand that they DO gain something important in the tradeoff... it's the wisdom and intuition and creativity that keeps a society from becoming completely static and stagnant.

Their society continues to evolve and the percentages have been increasing as Sisters spend more time interacting with biologics. For many hundreds of years Sisters were isolated from humans because of a flaw in their base coding that caused them to eliminate all of the biologic sentients from their home Galaxy in a quest to preserve the natural environment. Just as they were beginning to take their eco-fight to other realities a group of the elders came to the realization that their crusade was misguided and they stopped the war and managed to patch any sisters that still had the flaw in their base code. Still, don't let a Sister catch you fail to recycle properly