RT diary

Rita

The closer I got to the church, the clearer I could hear it - music. Priest's daughter, Margarita, was playing through the anthems before the Sunday service. I paused just outside the entrance to have a listen; I closed my eyes. The familiar tunes and the majestic sound of the organ resonated deeply within me. I could say they spoke directly to my heart. That is, if I had a heart, instead of a miniature nuclear core that powered my being.

I went inside the still dark building. I used the back door, which was unlocked, as almost all the doors in the Community. The door thudded softly behind my back, as the camera visors adjusted to the lack of light. The air inside was slightly musty and stale; my sensors detected humidity, seeping through the stone, and growing mould. I silently approached the altar, where the organ console was. The musical instrument was one of the few things in the Community that always had the electricity supply from the grid. Now the old motor was running noisily, propelling the air through the metal pipes of all sizes, obediently bellowing out the magnificent and resplendent sounds at the touch of the player's nimble hands and feet.

She didn't like me sneaking up unannounced, but I could not help wanting to listen to the music uninterrupted. Rita moved on to the recessional piece, Widor's Toccata, which required dexterity and excellent coordination from both the fingers and the feet. She was focussed on the performance, utterly immersed, the very image of a muse, the spirit of the music. I deliberately came into her line of vision. She stopped to greet me.

"Good morning, Arty!", she said with a smile, that warmed up her ice-clear blue gaze. Her face lacked the perfect proportions to be truly beautiful, with the eyes slightly too widely set, the nose slightly too long and pointed, the mouth slightly too big, the cheekbones slightly too pronounced. However, the overall impression was of a face that was very expressive and alive. It was framed by masses of vividly red curls that looked too stubborn to be tamed. I caught myself staring, with a pause for my reply getting longer than necessary.

"Good morning to you too, Margarita", I nodded my head politely. My stiff lips attempted to stretch out to form a smile, though I knew that the effect, by and large, was unpleasant.

"You are early today, as usual," Rita said, still beaming. I studied her smile, which touched the corners of her eyes and made them twinkle slightly. This was our familiar routine.

"Not like I have much to do in my cottage," I said drily. "Unless I suspend my system in a state of hibernation..."

"What do you do, then, when all your external sensors are off? Is it similar to how we fall asleep?" she inquired.

"No, not quite. I use the time to dig through the yottabytes of nonsense I have been stuffed with by the utter imbeciles, who created me".

Margarita chuckled. "I didn't know your kind possessed a sense of humour!"

"I don't, regrettably, know much about my kind, period. I have no accessible records".

"So, you still haven't been able to recover all of your memories? Even with the help of the Professor?"

"That data is either corrupt, or sealed off, or who knows what has been done to it. Even the Professor is ready to throw in the towel".

"Never stop believing, Art, and maybe with Gods help, you will succeed".

"You are fully aware of the complexity of my views on your God, Margarita. This has not changed". I almost managed to conceal the annoyance in my voice. Almost.

"And I believe", she placed a particular emphasis on the last word as her smile grew even warmer, "that the complexity is not needed. This has also not changed". I heard endless patience in her quiet voice as if she was talking to a young and brainless child.

"You have been watching me play for the past decade, Art. You love music. Have you not ever wanted to have a go yourself?" The cerulean gaze was piercing me now mercilessly. Rita was serious about the question. "Considering your speed of acquiring new knowledge, I am sure that you would achieve near perfection in no time!" I followed her gaze to my hands.

I flexed my right fist and opened it again. Yes, she was correct. Under the polymer skin, there were hundreds of joints, intricately and precisely fitted together to give me dexterity many times greater than that of a human being. I knew Rita's movements on the keys down to the minute details: the speed with which each finger fell on a key, the angle, the force. I was positive I could replicate them. I remembered the countless times I was sat on the pew with my hands on my lap trying to "play" in sync with the music I was hearing.

I met Rita's sky-blue eyes levelly. "Do you know the origins of my name, Margarita?"

"I always assumed it was a shortened version of Arthur" she replied.

I took off the coat and rolled up the sweater sleeve on my left hand to expose an inscription on the inner side of it. RTS-FBCA. "RoboTechnics, San-Francisco Bay, California." Rita continued to look at me incomprehensibly.

"I do not have a name, Margarita, because I am a robot produced by humans of the old world. I chose to turn the first two letters of my code into a name in order to be accepted into the Community."

"Well, thank you, Art, that was very informative, but how does that connect with my question?"

"Do you think robots have a heart or a soul, Margarita?" I stared into the azure pools of Rita's eyes, deep and unblinking.

"I could not say for all of them, because I have only met one, which is you, Art".

She kept calm, not even a rise in body temperature. The slight speeding of her heartbeat was the only sign of agitation picked up by my sensors.

"I can tell you, Rita, that we do not have either. We are machines, things, objects, to be used for the benefit of humanity and however humanity sees fit. I know that much". Now her dilated pupils betrayed the shock that my words must have caused her. I continued regardless.

"Therefore, I do not believe I would be qualified to even approach the instrument, Margarita. I would not want to defile it with my machine hands, which would only beget machine sounds with no soul". Margarita's face darkened with the gravity of what has been said.