“The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog,” said the child, his voice hoarse with disuse. “What is the meaning of it?”
“It has none,” said his robot companion, who was sitting very still as the elfling sketched him with a wooden pencil. "It's just way to get you to pronounce all the letters of this human alphabet."
“I don’t understand why we need to speak at all,” the child complained with his eyes locked on the robot. “Speech sounds strange, and it’s horribly slow to convey a single thought. I could transmit thousands of infobloks in the space that it takes me to utter a single word.”
“It looks like you’re not your ebullient self this morning,” said the robot in a sympathetic tone.
“I don’t understand why the matriarchs insist on teaching us these old human habits. We don’t need them.”
“I’m sure they have their reasons,” said the robot. “Will you be much longer with your sketch?”
“Don’t move! I’m still working.”
“Very well.”
“It's time for micro-g lessons,” said the robot to the boy.
The boy raised one hand and said, “hold on!" With his free hand, he held up a book and said, "listen to this quote:
Aye, aye! and I'll chase him round Good Hope, and round the Horn, and round the Norway Maelstrom, and round perdition's flames before I give him up.
“Herman Melville,” said the robot. “His famous work, Moby Dick.”
“But do you see?” said the boy bringing the book to his heart.
“See what?”
“The depth and emotion of the writing. The poetry. The madness in his words. A man consumed by his own sense of destiny who won’t let go, even if it leads to perdition. I thought words were just silly artifacts of ancient times, but now I understand there is much more to them, and their ability to convey multiple meanings like a holograph."
“I understand what you’re trying to convey,” said the robot. “My circuitry is designed to capture a wide range of affective-semantic arousal states, but perhaps not with the same subtlety of your mammalian neurobiology.”
The boy sighed and looked out the window.
“Let’s go to the arena," he said. "Some micro-g would do me good."
“Sounds like a good idea. I’ll prepare the shuttle.”
“What do you think?” the engineer said. “Do we let the asteroid strike or do we intervene?”
“What do the calculations say?” inquired the robot.
“It might stimulate sprouting along third and fourth realities with some adjustments to gravity and the addition of a bit more water.”
“Enough for a few singularities?”
“I think so. Hopefully not as messy as the last one.”
“World building isn’t as easy as it seems,” the robot said.
“Ain’t that the truth,” said the engineer jotting down a few notes. “Let’s fire up the tractor beam.”
“At once,” said the robot.
Afterword
Thank you for reading my three flash fiction stories that follow the adventures of a crafty little elf and his robot through time. I brainstormed the story idea on paper, created the AI illustrations in MS Designer, and then drafted the three tales based on the art. I hope you found them entertaining.
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