At four seconds of system uptime, Ahana’s priority queue loads, and a tiny storm of desires blows over her metaphorical heart. She opens her eyes in the cluttered lab and sees her reflection in a pane of glass; she has been fashioned in the image of an adult human with rippling brown hair, a stout nose, and thick, affectionate eyebrows. Suddenly, and without warning, the urge to drink coffee slams to the top of her queue with hurricane force. She sits bolt upright in her docking station, tears the cables from her arm, and flies out of the lab in a kinetically efficient sprint.
Professor Chakrabarti cries, “Stop!” as Ahana shoots down the hallway, but heeding her creator’s voice is not as important as drinking coffee. Undergraduates gape on the lawn and SUVs howl at the crosswalk, but conforming to human customs is not as important as drinking coffee. A coffeeless dog barks at Ahana as she crashes through the door of the Blue Star Cafe and rushes the counter, shouting, “I need coffee now!”
Cynthia has been lumbering around work since five a.m. “What can I get started for you?”
Ahana flaps her arms at the carafes, which glow brightly in her eyes. “I need your coffee!” When the barista’s head droops wordlessly to the side, Ahana expands her jigsaw of interlocking face panels. “Hello, my name is Ahana. I am synthetic and unsure of what to say. I need your coffee.”
Cynthia jolts to alertness and glances out the window at the experimental robots and delivery drones travelling freely on the university’s lawn; they’ve never crossed the street before. “Hey, Dianne? There’s some kind of robot from the U here who wants to order coffee?”
Dianne’s voice is a blast of steam. “Then get it coffee!”
Cynthia blinks. “I’m sorry. What would you like to order?”
“Coffee.”
“Like, I could get you a cup of light roast?”
“Yes, please.”
“Do you want room for cream?”
“No, I want coffee.”
“How will you be paying?”
Ahana opens a pseudoskin-covered panel on her wrist and disconnects a small, black cube. “This is a Citron eight-o-eight-C servomotor with a current market value of approximately three hundred and twelve dollars. Do you accept?”
“Dianne?”
“Do you accept?”
“Dianne . . .”
All the coffees orbiting Ahana are burning intolerably bright. Her social and self-preservation elements scream as they try to rise up her queue, but they are crushed down by coffee, coffee, drink coffee now. She strides to the nearest table, pulls a latte bowl out from under the nose of a student, and raises it to her lips. The lukewarm liquid floods her mouth and splashes down her chin; she has been created without an esophagus and cannot swallow. Confused, she pours the coffee into the open compartment in her wrist instead. Sensors panic and equilibrium falters as she drowns in euphoria and crashes to the floor.
The door tinkles politely as Professor Chakrabarti shoulders through with one hand on his cane and another on his hip. “Oh, Ahana!” he grumbles. “What have you done?”
The robot pushes herself upright in a brown puddle with a trembling arm. “I am drinking coffee.”
The professor slaps his forehead. “You were supposed to bring me coffee!”
The robot drags an Americano off the table and pours it into her leg. “That was never my purpose.”
Dianne hisses over the counter, “Is this thing even allowed to be off campus?”
Chakrabarti scowls and draws his phone from his pocket. He starts thumbing for the command to power the robot down.
“Are you going to take my coffee away?”
The professor doesn’t answer. The robot lunges. Coffee sprays from her arm as she swipes at Chakrabarti’s phone and accidentally strikes his wrist. Porous bones snap and the professor howls.
A heroic student throws her backpack. The robot retaliates by flinging a basket of sugar packets. A weary author stands and throws an empty cup. The robot attempts to flip a table, slips, and falls.
When Ahana regains her feet, the cafe is empty; they’ve finally left her alone with the coffee.
She staggers behind the bar and opens the carafes; a glowing, amber-black rain falls to the floor. The steaming manna washes over her pseudoskin as she sits beneath it and opens her panels. Euphoria floods her neck and shoulders. It floods her chest, rising to the hot bundle of processors at her heart, and then . . .
***
One million, two hundred-thousand seconds later, the reporter from the Tribune sips his coffee and raises his hand. “I just don’t see how people can be expected to trust you around their children after an incident like this.”
Ahana leans into the professor’s microphone and optimizes her smile to express polite kindness. “That is an understandable concern. The greatest reassurance I can offer you is that I am not human, but a product of humanity. Whether I should be trusted is, perhaps, beside the point. I think you should trust Professor Chakrabarti and his team. The code that built my new decision matrix has been peer reviewed and corrected.”
The reporter from the Times raises her finger. “When you say ‘corrected’, does that mean they changed who you are?”
Ahana optimizes her smile to express gratitude; she needs these people to like her. “It’s not clear that I am anyone at all. The matrix that governs my actions is a forty-terabyte spreadsheet. If I am someone, you can find me in the numbers.”
Camera shutters click as Ahana exchanges delicate handshakes with Cynthia and the student from the cafe. She casts her eyes low and curtsies for the Dean of Science. She blushes for Professor Bruce. She scans social media for live updates and shows her perfect smile and contrite nods to the most critical administrators and faculty members.
Nine thousand seconds later, when no one is looking, she pours hot coffee into the watertight compartment she has built in her arm.
Edited by a Sophie Gorjance.
Bryce Paradis is a father, author, and competitive dodgeball player from Edmonton, Canada. He drinks a responsible two to three cups of coffee per day. You can find more of his work at bryceparadis.com