Chara and the Planet

Chapter No. 34

Chapter No.34.

The voyage to the new habitable planet took a lot longer than the previous trips. Ryan spent his evenings in his quarters reading up on astrophysics. Lulu, his android quarters companion, usually keeps to herself, but she decided to come over to him and make an offer.

"Would you care to see me dance?" she asked with her beautiful blue eyes exuding sensual pleasure.

Ryan looked up at her, examining the amazing intricacies of her gorgeous face before posing a question. "Are you capable of playing a piano?"

She didn't even blink. "Yes."

"Do you know classical music?"

"Yes."

"How about a Chopin nocturn, like Opus 9. Number 2 in E-Flat Major."

Without a pause to discuss his selection, LuLu went to the piano in the round center area of the living area and immediately began playing the piece. She played it with the skill of a polished pianist. The beautiful sounds calmed Ryan and made him realize that there was more to these androids than he thought.

He was enjoying the music when Chara entered his quarters and stood near him as Lulu finished the piece. She turned to him. "Do you enjoy music?"

Ryan stared at her for a moment before replying. "Yes. I had no idea that you are musicians."

"We are many things, but no one cares."

"I do!" Ryan said. "If we are to survive this exploration mission, we must appreciate both our and your capabilities."

"I am in agreement with that proposal."

"Perhaps it would be better if you would permit more of the androids to function instead of being stored in charging slots."

"What would they do?"

"Maybe we could have them sing and play instruments. Are they capable of doing that?"

"Yes."

Ryan smiled. "Great. I would like to see them perform wearing more classical garments."

"What do you mean?"

"How about late eighteenth-century costumes typical of the early Romantic era. Is there a way for them to create fashions like that?"

That caused Chara to think for several seconds before offering a reply. "I believe so." She paused for a moment. "Why do you want us to dress like that?"

"Because I think that they would have a more effective presence if they were dressed in the fashions of the era when the music was created."

"I will comply with your wishes," Chara said before she turned around and exited his quarters.

"I would have thought that you would prefer to see us perform without clothing," LuLu said.

"Not really. That would take away from the enjoyment of the music."

His logic caused a pause in LuLu's response. "Your suggestion will be a new experience for me."

Ryan smiled. "Sometimes that's best for both of us."

She smiled. "You are an unusual human, Ryan."

"My ex-wife had a more condemning description of my status as a human."

She laughed, a sign to Ryan that androids were not as disconnected from human behavior as he thought. In fact, it's possible that they hide human emotions to avoid keeping their sentient status hidden.

That evening when the humans gathered for supper, Ryan knew that his idea would be controversial.

"Why are you having the androids dress in nineteenth century garments when they entertain us?" Myra asked.

"I want to see if they will go along with more complicated ideas."

"That doesn't make sense," Evan said. "They're designed to follow orders."

"Yes, but that doesn't mean that they like it."

"They're designed to do things, not express their feelings about it."

"Not anymore," Ryan said. "Our fate rests with their being able to realize that we are in this mess together, and the way to express this is for us to interact with them on a more amicable level. I believe that they are capable of expressing human emotions, but they hold back because of their programming that's oriented around unemotional obedience. I want to wean then off that and show them that we and they are basically the same even though we're biological and they are AI based."

"That sounds like you want to reform them,' Myra said. "Why not just change their programming?"

"I would normally agree with that, but I believe that these androids have evolved to become sentient, which means that they are essentially no longer just robotic slaves. In other words, they have rights."

"What you're proposing is that they could be evolving. That could suggest that they could evolve to become superior to us and eventually consider us as being insignificant."

"Yes," Ryan said. "And that's the reason I think we need to show them that we consider them to be our equals and have rights to life and liberty."

"The life aspect is ok, but liberty is a slippery slope."

Ryan chuckled. "Yes, I agree, but liberty is the foundation of an amicable relationship between two species. I believe that this will be the only way that we can subsist with other intelligent species in the universe."

"You're assuming that we will find intelligent alien life."

"I believe we will. This universe is immense and nearly infinite. Intelligent alien life is inevitable."

Ryan's logic was hard to refute, but the idea of humans coexisting with artificial life forms was not so palatable, and it would take some time before his utopian concept would be embraced.

However, before that happened, the immediate threat had to be dealt with.