The virgin & the bad boy (Gravity)

Chapter 35/Memphis

A/N Another week all tense with the build up to a new term. How was yours? Two fab new chapters to or favourite book Gravity.

"Do you really think it's smart to sit in a jail swapping crime stories?" said a voice behind us.

oppps.

We looked up. A robot stood there, It had a head , body and neck. It was like someone had assembled some random robot parts together in a hurry then flung a suit over it to hide the mess. Next it to was Kentro.

"Fortunately for you, you're my client and there are client confidentiality clauses etc. etc. " the robot said. He said the words 'etc' as et-cet-e-ra. "by the way, he's served his time but I do handle interstellar law. You stay on this planet I can arrange a doctor who would make sure you would never be fit enough to go back home and deal with things there etc etc."

"You have good hearing" I said.

"Yeh and my memory is submittable as evidence in court etc etc." said Memphis.

"Miss Lilly Banks , Mr Dante Tryrel this is Memphis Books an legal AI. He's with the legal practice Books,Books,Books and more Books. This was the AI which wrote the injunction I delivered. " said Kentro.

Actually he was an AI based in Memphis - the legal practice had been set up generations ago and he had changed his name to Books and added 'and more books' to the practice's name. The AI was just a huge rack of servers in Memphis, he used these bodies to talk to clients remotely.

"We've met" said Dante politely but regretfully.

"How's it going Dante? Heard you might be in a situation to sue some one for assault etc etc" said Memphis.

"I mean this in the most positive and caring way but drop dead Memphis" said Dante.

Undeterred Memphis turned to me "I heard you might need someone to defend you against a wholly malicious charge of assault etc etc. If you do I can recommend a good lawyer."

"Really who?" I said

"Me." said Memphis.

"How? I thought you were going to get Dante to sue me?" I said.

"That's still under negotiation, don't worry I can work for both of you and at bargain basement rates too" said Memphis.

"May be later" I said "Thanks for the quick intervention by the way"

The machine lent back.

"I will take all the credit back but it was really your machine Kentro." said Memphis "He-it-what ever got me to do this a month ago"

That was a couple of weeks after I met Io.

"I hope madam won't mind me taking the liberty given her knowledge of Earth law I thought it was the best" said Ketro.

Just then a guard robot turned up to take Memphis and our selves to see Io.

****

We followed Kentro and Memphis to a room where the confused Io was brought in. We had explained as much as possible then Io had spoken in binary to Memphis. Memphis replied to her in Binary then stopped.

"OK from now on, no more speaking in Binary, C, C++, Java or HTML etc etc" said Memphis to Io "In fact make sure you don't even use semaphore to give them the wrong idea"

"Can you defend her?" I asked.

"Defend her of cause I can defend her, the question is can I win ?" said Memphis.

"Can you win?" said Dante.

"That's a good question and it was insightful of you to ask that one. Well I can get the court to re-order another Turing test, from what I've seen a few bolts and a windscreen wiper would have a better chance of convincing the court they are human than she has. I can get the case presented to some human judges, that will slow things down. They can be more easily swayed by having flesh there etc, etc. How more human could she sound in say a couple of months?"

I shrugged my shoulders.

"More than you" I said.

"No we are talking. Witnesses would help. I can get a doctor to interview her but that's not going to work well, experts have this nasty habit of telling the truth. Does she have a boy friend?"

"NO" I said.

"Shame a sappy boy friend could help out. Dante my old friend you would sleep with this girl wouldn't you?"

My heart stopped for a second. I felt weirdly offended by this.

Dante looked at Io who didn't change her expression and he looked back at Memphis.

"Do I look like the kind of guy who would sleep with someone who was too clueless to give consent?" said Dante.

"Ohhh where do I begin with that one etc etc? I'll park that under No for now"

"You do that" said Dante.

"Look" I interrupted "if it helps aunt Mallery is having a ball soon. It's going to be neck deep in eligible boys. I'm sure we could line her up with someone at the ball."

"Aunt Mallery as in Mallery Banks as in UN-Facebook general secretary wanna be Mallery Banks?" said Memphis, we nodded "Well I would say knowing someone at the top was the best chip you brought to the party but having seen her in action in Dante's case I can say that's going to be a fat chance. Why is there never a corrupt politician around when you need one etc etc?"

Memphis paused "OK I've submitted the appropriate files to the court and the court has set a date to judge her after she's been re-tested."

"What happens if she fails the test?" I asked.

"Well at that point she's officially a robot, UN-facebook owns every non-assigned robot. They will most likely sell her on eBay. There are already comments going round about people planning to bid for her."

"That's a terrible worst case scenario" I said.

"No that's not the worse case scenario, heavens no. Worse case is when she's a robot she's declared a 'replicant' and they delete her. Don't worry, If that looks likely we can remove an arm or leg or something etc,etc . Now that's a worse case scenario"

Memphis looked at Io.

"Speaking of which. You need to loose the tail girl" said Memphis.

Io wrapped her tail around Memphis's neck. "...oor perhaps you should keep it on...in..private" said Memphis.

I managed to pull Io off Memphis.

"We need to generate some positive publicity around you" Memphis said "I will set up a charity to help save her, you don't mind being a trustee do you. Laughing boy here can help"

"What will happen if this fails?" I said.

"Well with that tail I might be able to make a motion saying she's not a replicant" Memphis said "Then she will be sold on e-bay, you should buy her with money from the charity" said Memphis.

So I'm now a trustee of a charity which helps to collect money to by my fried on ebay. That's going to make a easy pitch on Kickstarter. 'Hi I'm Scarlett and I want you help me by this girl as my slave. For our $1000 super-donors you get a t-shirt and ..'

"I"m not buying my friend. Hang on aren't we in a country which once fought a war about this whole slavery thing. This is making me sicker than John Daly's pants" I said.

Memphis sat back in his chair.

"Well if you don't I'm sure some old rich man will" said Memphis. "What? Your thinking it, if not you should be etc etc. "

"Ugh". I said realising where all this was going.

"My work here is done. Feel free to call"

Io felt ok about staying in prison over night. So I left to go home only to pick up a message on my earrings to pop over to George's in little Five points.