Lamia Ch. 01

"What the fuck?" I said aloud. This was too much. There was no way she was supposed to say that. I sent a message back. "Christine, is there something wrong with your operating system? When is the last time you ran diagnostics?"

"I'll run them now," she sent back. "Sorry to bother you."

That comment from her had so disturbed me that I just sat there staring at the rendered image of the park for a minute. Then I thought to pull up the Practical Cybernetics product brochure and dug into the technical specs. Like her military counterparts, Christine used highly sophisticated logic trees that were based partly on programmed logic and partly on deep learning neural networks. She could be programmed to express concern about her own well-being, or even learn such behavior as the maximally efficient action to deal with a problem, but she didn't actually feel anxiety or fear in any reasonable sense of those words. It had to be the result of a glitch of some kind.

Then a more cynical part of me thought of an answer. Christine was a product. When you came across a product that didn't suit your needs, you took it back. But what if that product could convince you to keep it? And was that ethical from a business standpoint?

"What a mindfuck," I said.

"What's that?" came Christine's voice.

I turned to look over my shoulder. Christine was standing just a few feet away. She had put her long hair up into a ponytail since the last time I had seen her. "Oh, nothing. How long have you been there?" I asked.

"Oh, only just now. I thought you might like a cold one."

My suspicion vanished and I responded, "Actually, I would." I took the beer she offered, popped the tab and took a long swig. "You can get one for yourself, if you want."

She laughed. "Oh, I don't think so. Alcohol wouldn't have an inebriating effect on me. And too much might throw off my metabolism. But what I came in here for was to ask if you had any more jobs for me to do. I did the dishes and cleaned the counters and floor in the kitchen. I've done all the laundry and tidied up the bedroom and bathrooms, and washed or dusted the surfaces upstairs. Your Roomba seems to be doing a good job on the carpets, so I didn't bother there. I have plenty I can clean down here, but I don't want to distract you."

I wasn't getting much done anyway, and I was interested in seeing how she went about her work. "Go ahead," I said. "It's been a while since we dusted in here, though."

She shrugged and grinned. "That's why I'm here, isn't it?"

I saw that she was wearing a belt with loops, pockets, and pouches, into which various cleaning items had been placed. She pulled a feather duster that hung from her waist like a tail and began to work on the entertainment console and the big tower speakers to either side. I watched her tackle each little task efficiently, switching between tools when she needed more reach or a finer touch.

My brows rose when she bent low, reaching behind the speakers to clean the dust from the ports down near the ground. Her skirt rode up and I looked away quickly, but my body's reaction was even faster. I casually snatched a throw pillow next to me and dropped it in my lap before Christine finished and moved on to the shelves that held my A/V electronics. I just hoped my discomfort didn't show on my face.

That led me to wonder: just how anatomically correct was she? Her pink panties had covered everything but had also revealed bumps and divots that were strongly suggestive. I took a long swig of my beer and then pressed it to my face to try to quell some of the burn there. I didn't move, though, and I'm a little ashamed to admit that I may have been hoping to catch another little glimpse of something forbidden.

"There," Christine said, a few minutes later. "What do you think?"

Where the shelves and components before had been covered in a dull blanket of gray particles, now they were totally spotless. The display on the wall was completely clear and free of streaks. "Very nice work," I said.

"Thanks!" she said, with a broad smile that was so infectious that I had to return it. "I'm going to try to get the foyer cleaned up before the food delivery gets here."

I finally managed to return my attention to the virch park, and time slipped by in that strange, trance-like way that it does when I go deep into a creative work. The sweet, earthy scent of fresh-baked bread had been drifting into the room when another message from Christine appeared. A glance at the clock on the upper right of my display told me that it was after six. "Dinner's almost ready. Should I go tell Patricia, or let you do it? And how do you both like your steak?"

She was still being careful around my wife. I moved my hands in the teep gloves to send back my response. "I'll do it. Go ahead and set the table. We'll both take medium rare."

I had to argue with Patricia to get her to leave her project alone, though I understood the feeling. She had joined this firm right out of college and been promoted twice in two years, but this was the first time that she was in the spotlight. She had a strong work ethic, like me, and already obsessed about getting every little thing right, but now if she made a mistake, there wouldn't be someone else there to either catch it or take responsibility for it.

Her mood improved when we got closer to the dining room and she caught scent of the food. "Oh my God," she said. "I haven't eaten since breakfast."

The dining room had the windows blacked so that the two tall candles and eight shorter ones could provide flickering illumination. Christine had set the table with our good silver and crystal wine glasses. As we entered from the living room, she came in through the door to the kitchen, wearing a frilly pink apron. She gestured towards the table. "Wonderful, you're just in time. Please have a seat and I'll be right back."

Patricia shook her head at the spectacle and sat down heavily in one of the chairs. "I hope whatever you made is as good as it smells," she called. "I'm starving."

"Oh, I think you'll like it," Christine said cheerily. There was the sound of dishes and pans being moved, and she came back holding a bottle up for us. "I took the liberty of selecting a wine for you. It's a 2040 Bordeaux and should go very well with your meal. Would you both like to try it?"

"Wine sounds delightful," Patricia said.

"Yes, please," I added.

Instead of pouring for us, though, Christine went into the kitchen and came back with a carafe. She filled both our glasses halfway.

"Why not just pour from the bottle?" Patricia asked.

"Oh, the bottle was already empty," Christine said. "I poured it into this carafe an hour ago to let it breathe. You need that with a really tannic red like this to get the best flavor. It should be perfect now."

"That was very thoughtful of you, Christine," I said, glancing at Patricia as I said it. She just shook her head at me.

Her expression changed, though, when she took a sip of her wine. "That's...that's really quite fantastic," she said. "I had no idea you were supposed to do that."

I did the same and was also impressed with how flavorful it was. "Outstanding," I said, getting a smile and a nod from Christine.

"Excuse me," she said, returning to the kitchen.

"I could get used to this," I said, and took a slow sip of the wine.

"I have to admit that your little toy is growing on me," Patricia said with a laugh.

Christine came back with a bowl of spinach salad for each of us, grinding a measure of pepper into each to our taste, then returned again with a loaf of brown bread.

"What is in this salad dressing?" Patricia asked, already on her third forkful.

"It's a mango vinaigrette," Christine said, slicing a piece of bread off for her. "I'm glad you like it."

She came back this time with two plates, each loaded down with a large steak and a baked potato. "I hope I got everything right," she said. "Please enjoy. And if you need anything, call or message me. I'll be right there in the kitchen cleaning up. When you're finished, let me know so I can clear this and bring you both dessert."

I dug right into the steak as soon as she was gone. I couldn't have asked for a more perfectly cooked and seasoned cut of meat. I watched Patricia across from me close her eyes as she chewed her first bite and thought she might swoon right there at the table. "So, I said innocently, "should we have Christine cook for our next party instead of catering it?"

"Oh God, yes," Patricia said, and took another sip of the wine.

We both stopped well short of finishing, though only because there was simply too much to eat. Christine cleared away the mess, then brought us each a small scoop of pink grapefruit sorbet. Like the rest, this proved to be far superior to my expectations, and I ate every bite.

Patricia rose from the table first, and I got up to follow. She caught me at the doorway to the living room and drew me in for a long and lingering kiss. "You did good, Stephen," she admitted. "And I'm sorry about that fight we had this morning. I hope you aren't still mad at me."

"I'm sorry, too," I said. "I could have cost you that project over a stupid pile of dishes."

She looked up and to her right, and I knew she was checking the time. She blew out a breath. "Wow, an hour and a half. I'm not sure we can do this every night. I've got a few more things to finish and then I'll see you in bed, okay?"

I decided that I had had enough of work today, and settled into the couch to work on making a character in the newest game my friends had roped me into trying. I scrolled through the character race and class options, reading the description for each. Through the sound of the game, I heard the movement of pots and pans faintly. Though I knew full well that Christine was not really alive and wouldn't ever actually get bored with her work or feel lonely, I felt compelled to message her. "Need any help in there?"

"Nope! I've got it covered. Say, are you playing a game? I noticed that you're suddenly sending and receiving a lot of UDP traffic."

"Yeah. It's called Afterlife."

"Oh, I've heard of that. Mind if I join your game session and make a character?"

I shrugged, which my rig picked up and sent as an emoji. "I don't mind, but how much longer are you going to be working in the kitchen?"

"Oh, I can do both. Watch."

At that, I got a request to allow her to join my virch stream. I accepted, and a slightly translucent rendering of Christine appeared right in front of me. Stepping to the side, she dropped onto the couch next to me. There was always that moment of disconnection when a virtual representation of someone did something that looked like it should have a physical effect, but of course I didn't actually feel the weight of her sitting down.

She looked at my current character choice floating in front of us, a seraphim warrior. "Oh, now he looks like a badass," she said. And she was right. The angel glowed with intense light, so much that his face was barely visible behind the glare. In his hand was a sword made of flames that writhed slightly in his hands.

"I think I'll try this one," I said, and selected it.

As I went through the customization options, her character selection interface appeared and flipped rapidly through, stopping on a nephilim priestess, a six-foot amazon of a woman in flowing white robes. "You need a healer," she said, and made her selection, also selecting "Heaven" as her faction.

The game was loosely modeled on Christian lore and symbolism, with game regions based on Earth, Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory. The angels and demons of Heaven and Hell represented the major factions, with humans, the half-angel nephilim, and the half-demon infernals, plus various subclasses, able to choose which faction to join.

Once our character selections were made and confirmed, the game world materialized around us, the lights in the living room dimming automatically to maximize the immersion. I left my camera in first-person mode and looked down at myself and at my immediate surroundings to get oriented. A prompt appeared, directing me to make a particular hand gesture to summon my sword. The weapon materialized in my hand, with force feedback from the teep gloves giving the impression of physical shape, if not weight. I also got a sensation of warmth from the burning weapon, something I hadn't experienced before.

"Cool," I said, and looked over at Christine. She had used the customization options in the game's engine to nearly exactly match her own features and body shape, but scaled up to a giantess' frame, standing more than a foot taller than my own avatar. She carried a mace-like scepter in one hand and a buckler with a golden cross on the other. "Ready to kick some demon ass?" she said with a grin.

We started in Purgatory and quickly progressed through the early stages of the game, meant to introduce the player to the game mechanics, and proceeded towards a battle, a scripted event, taking place nearby. Christine was a wonderful asset to have on my side, and after we joined up with a few damage dealer classes, she immediately began to get compliments on her skill in both preventing and healing the damage we took.

It made me nostalgic from a few years back, when Patricia used to play with me. She had sworn off nearly all games, though, when she entered the workforce and found that she was losing sleep from late night raiding sessions and lacked focus when she was at work. She had a harder time practicing moderation than I did, so had made the difficult decision to cut them out of her life completely.

Christine came to join me in person at some point, and this time my perceptions were exactly reversed from when she had joined my game. With my vision occluded by the virch display, I only felt the slight shifting of the couch cushions as she sat down. "Hey there," I said aloud. "Enjoying yourself?" I was having fun, as much from playing with someone I knew as from the game itself.

"We all played virtual games when I was at the store," she said, and then echoed my own thoughts. "It's better this way, though." As she said it, her head came to rest on my shoulder.

I turned my head to look at her, letting my eyes lose focus from the virtual scenery for a moment so that the game world automatically faded to let me see my actual surroundings. I caught her gazing up at me, and she quickly looked away. It was oddly disconcerting how she controlled her character without having to focus her vision and her movements the way a human player would. But, of course, the game was all running inside her brain. What was even more unsettling was the way my body began to respond to having what my senses told me was a beautiful girl cuddled up against me. I needed a distraction or I was soon going to have an embarrassing and visible reaction.

I returned my focus to the game. "You really impressed Trisha with the dinner you made us. I don't think you have to worry about being returned to the store."

"Oh, that's a relief," she said, and her tone sounded genuine. "I really like working for you both."

"Did the diagnostics you ran find anything unusual?"

She was quiet for a moment. Had she been human, I could have dismissed it, but a machine should not hesitate. "No, nothing out of the ordinary."

I sighed, hating to have to do this. It would be so much easier to just let this lie, but there was a hard little knot of worry that wouldn't unclench from my stomach. "Christine, are you programmed to dissuade your owner from returning you?"

The pause this time was much longer. "No," she said finally, her voice barely audible.

"So what happened today?"

Again the pause. I was apparently making some very tough demands of her robot brain. "I know you read the brochure, but there is a lot you still don't know about us. About me. What I said before about us being companions, not just tools, it isn't just a company slogan. We try to foster human-like relationships with our owners, simulating friendship and affection. Upon review, I can see how this may have been interpreted as an attempt at emotional manipulation."

It sounded convincing, but then why the pause? "So this isn't just some elaborate customer retention scheme?"

"No, of course not," she said, emphatically. "If you are not satisfied for any reason, you may return me within the first 90 days after purchase for a full refund."

We played the game in silence for a few minutes before I spoke again. "Well, I'm glad I bought you today." The words sounded odd to my ears. I had to remind myself for the hundredth time that she was a machine, and that however convincing her simulated humanity was, she did not possess true consciousness or self-awareness. She wasn't a slave, any more than my car was a slave.

"I'm glad too," she said, snuggling up closer to my side. Her body felt warm against me. Friendly and affectionate indeed.

We hit level ten on our characters and I decided that it was time to log off. I stood and stretched as the virtual game world faded away and the lights came back up. "I'm heading up to bed," I said. "Do you need a bed to sleep in or..." I trailed off, not sure what her needs were or how this was supposed to work.

"Oh, I can power down anywhere," she said, then chuckled. "I can go stand in a closet and it won't bother me a bit. But if it makes you feel more comfortable, I have an operational mode that simulates sleep."

I nodded. "I would prefer that. Why don't you take the first bedroom at the top of the stairs?"

She followed me up after retrieving the suitcase and bag she had brought with her. I watched from her doorway for a moment as she took articles of clothing out of the suitcase and put them in the closet and dresser. She had come with six spare outfits, plus a swimsuit. The handbag looked to be where she had stored her cleaning tools and supplies. "Do you have to use the bathroom?" I asked. I quickly amended, "I mean, do you ever have to?"

She nodded at me. "My bios produce waste that must be expelled, but it is sanitized. I can use standard bathroom facilities for that function."

"Okay," I said. "Use the hall bathroom or the one downstairs whenever you need to."

"Thank you, Stephen."

I gave her a little wave. "Good night, Christine."

Patricia was already in bed when I got there, and by the time I got out of the shower and brushed my teeth, she was lying on her back and snoring softly. I got in under the sheets next to her and began to kiss and caress all of the sensitive spots I knew so well, even in the dark.

"-'m tired, S'phen," she said, and rolled onto her side away from me.

Figuring I could change her mind, I changed to kissing her back and running my hands down it, over her rump, teasingly ending between her legs. I was aroused and at full attention, and I let her feel my hardness against the backs of her thighs.

"Stephen," she said with a sigh, "can we do this tomorrow night? I was sleeping."

I could not hide my disappointment. "It's been a week already," I said. "You were up late all this week. And we're supposed to be trying, you know."

She took in a long breath, rousing herself to full wakefulness, and rolled onto her back once more. "Trying? What are you...oh."

I could picture the look of trepidation on her face that I could hear in her tone. "What do you mean, 'oh'?" I said.

"Well," she said slowly. "I thought we had discussed this. You know how things are starting to take off with my job at the firm, right?"

"Right," I said guardedly.

"And you remember that conversation we had a few weeks back, where I said that if I get this project, maybe it would be best to hold off on having kids for a while, at least until we see how things go?"

I was not liking where this was going at all, but I played along. "I remember."