Emergent Behavior Ch. 01

There was nothing more Whitney could accomplish in the security office, so she went next door into the break room where off-duty Robcorp personnel were watching some SEXPO videos. One was called "This Year's Top Five SEXPO Amateurs." There were daring exhibitionists, elaborate body-paint, and one fellow had built a homemade sexbot on par with Orgamsa Inc's. Whitney chuckled at that. Someone had accomplished in their garage what had taken their rivals three years and millions of dollars to develop. Buzz on the internet applauded Aphrodyne's panel and it seemed the dolphin meme was finally dead and buried. Whitney had no small part in that, so she would find a way to reward herself later.

But the last entry in the video grabbed her attention and held it. Two dancing strippers invited a woman on stage who had been keeping up with them beat-for-beat. She seemed reluctant at first, then gave in with a huge smile and started gyrating against the two dancers' naked bodies. Finally, the female dancer spun the other woman around and she slid on her knees across the dance floor into the arms of the man, whose huge cock was waiting for her.

"Pause! Pause the video!" Whitney shouted to the men watching the scene, "Rewind it and play it back slowly." He nodded and started the scene from the beginning. Whitney paid close attention to the subtly unnatural way the woman's shoulders and legs twisted and then paused the video again when she was kneeling in front of the male stripper. Her eyes were in shadow in that shot, so Whitney could clearly make out their faint backglow.

"She's one of ours," Whitney said, "That's our missing robot. Wait, zoom in on the lower corner, right there." Her jaw dropped when she saw the man who had just come into the frame, his eyes filled with panic, and a little smear of blood on his chin.

"Give me your tablet!" she said. The man handed it over and she hurried back into the security office then thrust the device into Absalom's hands.

"First, that woman is our missing sexbot," she said, "See the backglow? Their eyes glow blue when they're aroused. Secondly, look who it is." She pointed to the bottom corner of the screen.

"Ben Stenneck," Absalom snarled, "I thought we'd finished him."

"My ex-brother-in-law is a professional," Whitney said, "If he finds out the robot's true nature, I don't want to think about what he might do next."

"Call corporate," Absalom ordered, "Tell them to allocate all available resources to find them. And I mean ALL, resources."

Whitney stepped in front of him and asked, "How's it feel knowing you're going to need my help?"

"What makes you think I do?" Mr. Crane said.

"Because that gynoid can theoretically be any woman on the planet. You don't know how to find her. I do. Secondly, I know my ex-brother-in-law. He's a creature of habit."

"Yes and I know the man well enough too," Mr. Crane said, "The day I need your help, woman, I'll ask for it. But this is not that day."

"Mm-hm," Whitney sneered, "What if I talked to corporate? I'm sure they'll love to hear from me, especially about where your fancy new car came from? What is it, a Corvette?"

"Ha, you don't have anything on me," Absalom said, "And what makes you think corporate even wants to hear from you?" Whitney glared at him and her cybernetic eyes glowed red with fury.

"At the end of the day, you're just a hooker with a Ph.D.," he whispered, "Corporate thinks so too."

"Sir, it's back, and it's trying to infect our systems," one operative said.

"Quarantine the servers and check our firewalls," Absalom ordered. Whitney clenched her fist as he walked away and imagined there was a gun in it. Then she blinked and her vision returned to its regular color.

If corporate wanted Ben so badly, they were sure to promote her when she found him. And chances were if she found him, she would find their missing droid too. Absalom may have had all of Robcorp's resources at his back, but she had some connections of her own.

She returned to the waiting area and handed the man back his tablet. Then she dialed her cyberphone and got a woman's voice.

"Hello?"

"Hi, Mom!" Whitney said feigning cheerfulness because she hated talking with her mother, "I was wondering if you've heard from Ben lately?"