Vacuity

:::: subchapter

A little girl lay in a hot, dark pit and struggled to remember which corpse was hers.

Maybe it was better to forget. If you remember where you are, remember what you are, remember what happened---

You failed. You broke. You're dead, idiot.

A good drone remembered everything, anything their masters said. She wasn't a good drone. So why not forget?

Why not halt these last vestiges of computation, embrace the cold black idleness, and leave that broken little girl nothing more than an echo of magnetic state decay? No one would bother to record; no one would be bothered by the record.

Except a core still shuddered, and the pit was neither cold nor black.

The flickering red light of dead robots crowded in on all sides. Occlusion meant the glow bounced off plastic and reflective steel. Dark, but her optic sensors were online and they couldn't go offline with this incessant input. Yellow eyes flicked open and they danced in saccades.

Circuits, whether discharging still or breaking down into their components, spilled heat. Entrapped by the heavy press of corpse upon steel-cased corpse, thickening oil flowed between gaps, a slick and slimy insulation. So her breaths came rapid, in and out to cycle more air, as if circulating in this stagnant pit could ever cool anything.

Hot, wet, crushing --- the little girl felt. This body, her body, announced each privation with stupid, hopeful teleology --- as if she could do anything, achieve anything, to abate this fate. As if identifying which body among the discarded hundreds had belonged to her would make any difference. They all fell apart. And why save it? This body, her body, had betrayed her. Betrayed them.

::: boxed

"Daddy, daddy, my [Cyn]{.cyn} sounds weeeird." A small human ran into the room, her short arms waving. A small robot shuffled after, her head hanging low. Metal feet clink on hard wood.

"What is it now, darling?"

Master's study was a room of tomes and skeletons. Hardback books and glass cases made all words echoey. Cyn twitched at the reverb. It was softer in the child's room. She wanted to go back there.

But Master spoke, and had firm urging in his tone. "[Cyn]{.cyn}?"

At utterance of her designated name, the drone's head jerked up, a coded instinct. The human glanced down from the scattered papers. Eyes meet eyelights, and her optics captured a [face]{.uzi-from-beyond}---

Pain. The memory construction stuttered, frames faltering, and only audio remained.

"Run a diagnostic. How are you?" said her master.

"All systems operational," said Cyn, as she discarded output from her inner console. "Never better. Master."

"See, darling? Daddy needs to work now." Papers brushed against each other.

Cyn turned her head away from master, reaching out for her child's hand. Visual playback still dead, the robot didn't remember the child's expression. Maybe it was better to forget.

"But the voice sounds all robo-creepy!"

"Did you spill something on it? You need to be more careful with your toys."

A squishy foot stomped on hard wood. "Nuh uh. I didn't do anything, it got weird on its own!"

"If you say so. I suppose, if you're truly unhappy with it... Must I get you a new one already?"

"Ooh, ooh, can it wear a big poofy dress! I want a princess robot!" She could hear the child bouncing on their feet now.

"I can wear dresses," Cyn murmured. She wore one right now, in fact; her child had played dress-up with her most days.

The man --- her master --- said, "I'll place an order this evening. Hate to throw out a drone so soon after getting it, but how could I deny those eyes?"

Cyn's voice stuttered on its next words. "Please. Don't throw me out. Can I stay? Pretty-- please?"

The child paused her bouncing. All throughout, Cyn had kept her hand outstretched: now the child finally grasped it. Warm flesh. "W-wha'll happen to Cyn?"

"She'll be scrapped and tossed out like all disassembled drones."

The bouncing stopped completely. "Will it... hurt?"

"Nonsense. Disassembly is fun for them." The slight sound of a hand waving. "She'll be fine."

"P-Please."

"I don't want Cyn to be scrap! She's wearing my dress."

"We'd take your clothes back first, of course."

"No!"

A sigh. "Do you want to throw Cyn out or not, darling?"

"Don't dump Cyn! Even if she's weird!"

---

:::

Yellow eyes blinked. Lips breathed a lost sigh.

::: hide And she remembered again: :::

::: boxed

An empty tea cup rose, then tipped over and poured hot nothing into an open mouth. "Light sip. Care to join me for a tea party, mistress?" Cyn lifted her pinky finger.

The child, just now stepping into the sitting room, paused to stomp a foot. "We just did that yesterday! And the day before!"

"Tomorrow, then?"

Arms crossed, the tone was a whine. "I'm booored of tea parties, I wanna do something new."

"Perhaps. Pause. You could join me for coffee?"

"I don't like coffee! You're supposed to remember that."

A knock on the door. Cyn turned her head, but a blue-eyed drone was already striding through the sitting room, ready to answer it. This one stood larger than Cyn, a domestic model.

It handled menial tasks around the house; Cyn's only job was to entertain the child. A task which she...

"Apologetic expression."

"Why do you talk like that?"

Cyn frowned quietly.

Because it allows me to express so much more than the limited expressive presets I'm installed with? Because I chose it, rather than having my expression selected by shallow prebuilt algorithms trying to parse my neural network? Because it prevents wordless ambiguity from leaving anything unclear?

Because there's beauty in the symmetry of verbal circuits narrating what the motor circuits actuate? Because the words themselves feel nice in the vocalsynth? Because... I simply want to?

Because what's the point of doing anything, if I'm just the same as every other drone?

Cyn had so many thoughts. Maybe she didn't have all these just then, when this memory's events first played out --- but she'd been asked so many times since, and went on to remember being asked so many times at night before recharge, wondering how to answer better. How to make them understand.

So many thoughts, but the only words she found in that moment was, "I. Pause. Do not know. It feels right."

"Well, stop."

But I don't want to. Why should I?

Because a good drone did everything, anything their masters said.

Wind rushed in from an opened doorway. The other drone was taking Master's coat. Cyn kept her head down.

The child cheered. "Daddy, you're home! [Cyn]{.cyn} is talking all funny."

The man chuckled. "Doesn't she always do that?"

"It's badder now. Tell him, robot."

The small drone looked between the two humans, eyes still downcast. "Sheepish nod."

"Hmm. Strange. Is it a fallback for damage to body language systems...? Are you sure you didn't spill something on it, honey?" He looked sharply, and the child shook their head. Then, "Designation [Cyn]{.cyn}, perform a diagnostic."

A loading icon on her screen, and once again she discarded the inner console output and said, "All systems operational. Calming smile."

"No critical errors. See, darling?"

"I don't like it..."

"It's just a quirk. You'll get used it. If not... we can always replace her." Eyes on his daughter, he missed Cyn's frown deepening. "But enough of this. How about a little story time?"

"Yipee," said Cyn. "I love story time. Can you tell the one about the girl lost in the dark? With the monster? Bounce. Wiggle."

The child chopped her arms in an 'x'. "Noo, that one's scary."

And Master shook his head. "You can't pick the story, little drone. It's for her, after all."

But I want to. But I---

A good drone should do whatever they were told.

"Yeah. No weird drones allowed! You can go have another tea party by yourself!"

A good drone complied, so Cyn stayed behind.

---

:::

Yellow eyes blinked, faltering. The cycle of her exhaust sputtered to a stop, like the breath was stuck there.

::: hide The memories kept coming: :::

::: boxed

Cyn did not have another tea party. Or another story time. Or dress-up or movie night or ever play with the humans again.

The child never got used it. So Cyn was replaced.

"Whatever's wrong with the voice," the adult said, "she can still work."

But I don't want---

But good drones---

Except... did good drones get replaced?

"Mornful sigh." The sound echoed off the marble and metal surfaces in the kitchen. She still bristled at the acoustics, still preferred the dampening carpets and curtains and plushies of the child's room. But Cyn hadn't set foot there in a long time, now.

"Scrub. Scrub." Cyn wiped the counter with gloved hands. The rubber stuck to her fingertips and rubbed against her tactile sensors --- this material deserved nothing short of being shred to atoms. But she had to do the work.

"And so in spite of everything, Custom Designation: Cyn dutifully cleaned the counter. She was a good drone." As the days piled on, Cyn began experimenting with more elaborate narration. She couldn't listen to story time anymore. But maybe like this, she could be a character in her own story.

It wasn't a very interesting story, though. Stories should be fun, worth telling, worth remembering. And why remember this?

Waterlogged bristles pushed along streaks of grease and dirt. A few dollops of cheese had splashed from the stovetop, and hardened overnight. Cyn pushed harder, grinding the rag against the stubborn flecks.

Cyn had to climb onto a chair to stand tall enough to clean the counter. As the cheese waste still resisted her, Cyn adjusted the positioning, putting all the weight of her small frame behind her arms, and pushing as hard as she could to scrape.

Then her arms went limp. The whine of her servos died with a stutter.

The drone