The Man and The Automaton

The Man and The Automaton

It’s early morning, after breakfast, and a cavalcade of news is rushing down to our unit. Our boys across the border are struggling, they don’t have a consistent supply of rations, ammunition, meds or any combination of the three to keep soldiers afloat. Before I make my way out of the mess hall I take note of a locket, my locket. Its warmth and affectionate shape, a cartoonish heart, provides comfort as a striking contrast to the weight I feel while holding it, an unyielding mass almost buckling my knees when pondering about its burden. I proceed through the strain and move outside. After receiving that fantastic piece of info letting me know I’ll be deploying three days earlier than expected, I see lots of people, soldiers like myself. Some I recognize, K-jay's defining features, unkempt facial hair and rust covered prosthetic makes it easy to pick him out of a crowd, but there are lots of people here who I’ve never seen before. Now, “never seen” doesn't mean they’re strangers, I know all of them, or at least the majority, it's a pretty tightly packed unit. They just look different, I don’t know how but it's something with the eyes, how they twitch at a moment's notice, switching up and down, across every axis. It's the strangest phenomena, it's like a phase or a transformation that occurs for the older sergeants. It's almost robotic in the way they navigate the barracks, not willing to make eye contact with anything other than their current objective. In an effort to get out of people watching I decided to make my way to Robotics to get acquainted with our new guests.

They’re strange looking machines, legs more resembling pistons than anything human, but everything above the waist is incredibly refined. Smooth edges with minimal bolting work and the face, not an illustrative representation of a man, just a person, even with some lengthy hair based on some sort of plastic fiber. After a lengthy run down of all the little kinks for this model of Automaton I sign the requisition form, take an extra ignition core for my new partner, and lead my fantastically slow companion out of Robotics, eyeing out for a place to ease some tension. Thirty minutes... only thirty minutes of downtime, of dozing off, or doing some personal consulting. Just thirty minutes until the title of “Soldier” means something.

“Excuse me, but what is our mission at this moment?” said the Automaton, giving a blank stare to me, expecting a very detailed answer I would assume. It seems the solution to this boredom would come sooner into that 30 minute time frame than expected.

I remark, “If you must know, we’re waiting for the go ahead from our superiors up north, so we can get a start on crossing the border. The estimated time frame for that order is thirty minutes, give or take, so we’re just sitting for… thirty minutes,” expecting that to provide clear answers to all of the hard hitting questions.

“Ah, I see,” it replied with a level of linguistics that I found utterly patronizing. “Though that doesn’t answer my question, not in an abstract sense anyway. I meant in regard to the larger scale of this conflict: what is our mission at this moment?”

I’m sitting there in bewilderment, completely stunned by what this thing just said, trying to piece together a baseline understanding while also coming up with a response.

I decide on my phrasing, and reply with a bluntly spoken, “it’s war, all of this around us,” I extend my arms up and out to demonstrate the vastness of my description “is for a war, do you know what a war even is trash chute?” I exclaim, while lowering my arms back into a resting position after stating my case.

“I’m aware of what war is sir, my question regards the purpose of the war you imply this unit is connected to. What is this war,” the automaton replies with curious intent.

I inhale briefly before matter-of-factly saying “Does it matter? In the grand scheme of things that could or couldn’t happen after our thirty minute stopwatch reaches zero, you’re still here. You have a very vague goal, a goal that you were provided ample time to understand, to process, to properly navigate the variables until you felt satisfied, you need to fight in the war so why are you asking this question when you’re past the point of no return?”

The machine takes a moment, looking towards the chain link fence that encloses our little segment of civility, gazing at the bombarded township we’ve established a foothold in. The moss covered ruins and extravagant signage depict the end result of a conflict neither the machine nor the man know anything about. After processing its surroundings, the Automaton turns back to me. Its waist and everything below it creeks with animatronic shifts, gears and pulleys scrape across the aluminum siding, making up its hulking legs. Everything above that point, its hands, arms and chest elegantly transition into a pose mimicking my own, a very human set of movements. Before it gets the opportunity to release more courteous words of wisdom, I tell it succinctly to “Stop” before turning away, and praying it stays quiet.

22 minutes pass during our break in conversation, and the mood around us shifts as people realize what's encroaching. The inevitability of what's coming surrounds the encampment. It's not fear, not even an ounce of anxiety, more so just reassurance, that we collectively get to serve a purpose today rather than tomorrow. The locket now feels lighter, almost insubstantial now, no longer the burden it once was, or the burden I considered it to be.

Before I can survey the situation any longer, a dagger strikes me in the chest, metaphorically of course, but it irritates as much as the real thing.

“Sir, I am aware of your last statement regarding my question, but I think it would be for both of our best interests if you were to answer with a little more detail.” The Automaton remarks while making a pinching gesture with its hand.

I respond: “Why would you ask a question like that, why wouldn't you have been made to know the answer before getting sent out into the field?” The man replied.

“What makes you think that I was just made with knowledge, what are you basing this assumption off of?” It said with an acute understanding of my lack of understanding for how robotics work in our modern age.

I stated, though without confidence,“I don’t know, wouldn't you have been programmed with this stuff just already… known?” I could feel I wasn't making any ground with these remarks.

“Your understanding of knowledge is interesting,” the automaton began shifting from a pose, copying my own into one more refined and well-balanced, “but I’m sorry to say incredibly uneducated.”

“No human is born and knows information that isn't presented after birth, no one knows anything at all, but rather we all make assumptions about what is considered true; that is knowledge”, the automaton defined.

Confused by its phrasing, I ask, “you don't seem to be separating yourself from us in that statement, you think you’re human?”

What it says next startles me, only for a moment. The Automaton answers in a stale tone of a speech, saying, “Yes, or at least I like to think I am.”

“Why would you think that way, what's logical about that?” I reply, frazzled by the phrasing of its response.

The automaton answers with, “Well, what separates me from you?”

I clench my hand into a fist and hammer a tap onto its rusted leg casing, rattling the interior mechanisms. “That's the separating factor right there, physical differentiation.”

“People are allowed to look different,” it teased, “it's just a matter of if you’re willing to allow that. Can you think of anything else that would tell us apart other than my frankly rotund legs?” It chuckled as a reply.

Taking a stance on this issue, I pull the ignition core borrowed from robotics out of my pocket. “How about this, no human has a battery that makes them functional.”

“True,” it agreed, “but no human can run without food, a constant intake of minerals and nutrients… is this really any different?”

Stumped, and deciding to avoid the topic all together, I put away the ignition core and sit in defeat.

The Automaton, unwavering, continues. “Every point you made regards my physical appearance, though true you don’t have mechanical legs like myself or a slot for a battery, beyond extrinsic aspects of myself, I see no difference between us”.

Understanding I’m in a losing battle, but still desiring some sort of resolution, I respond with,“What about intrinsic aspects?”

“Maybe,” it grinned, “if you mean internal, emotional parts of me, I think those are what separate all people. How we feel defines us more than how we look.”

“I thought you were defined by programming?” I asked my last question before deployment.

“Programming by definition is based around code, and code is linear. In no instance over the last 28 minutes have I followed a preconceived set of commands, for no person follows a preconceived set of commands: we just act and react accordingly.”

After hearing that mention of 28 minutes, I hear the bell announcing our engagement is about to begin, ahead of schedule. Moving to my unit, I stand side by side with dozens of people, each sharing another Automaton, same as myself. Each of us standing prepared, lacking any ounce of fear nor determination, just the desire to do a job properly.

“Sir,” the man hears from behind him as his Automaton stands off kilter. “You’ve yet to answer my question: What is our mission at this moment?”

The man swiftly takes the locket from his satchel and aims his arm backwards towards the Automaton, awaiting his retrieval of the purposeless item. The Automaton begrudgingly accepts the token, the symbol now passed from one being to another.

After this trade the man replies as such: “I do not know, and yet I do not need to know. This is the task in front of me, a task that I am being told to complete”.

“A preconceived set of commands?” It asks before the unit begins marching.

The man faces forward, gazes into the distance, the vastness ahead of the unit, and marches alongside them. Collectively, we have been given a goal, a series of tasks in which we will complete. The Automaton continues to march with its unit, while the man stays back and watches, astounded.