A few days later in the off-campus housing of Corvis University a little girl was waiting for her mom to come home. She was wrapped up in a bundle of soft satin blankets so the only details exposed to the air were her blue bangs and her green eyes, which complimented her darker skin tone to create the image of a fluffy chocolate pastry. She normally was occupied with reading a book, but today was the unfortunate day when she had finished the last book in the house. This little lass had gleaned as much knowledge as was possible from every glowing letter typed into those tinted glass tomes.
And so Mercedes Kerunu waited.
She sat on a large plushie bear near the second floor windowsill watching the traffic go by. For all intents and purposes Mercedes was fed up with Corvis University. Her mother works as a professor there for applied computer sciences and her older sister goes there for a bachelors in anatomy and physiology. So it wasn't an unsated hatred or anything like that, she was simply tired of more than half of her life revolving around the education system.
After waiting longer enough for rush hour to begin to clear Mercedes decided to mix it up a little. Since she didn't have anything to read she chose to make dinner. If anyone else were to make dinner at this hour it would be quite early, however Mercedes had never cooked before and accounted for her inexperience. After searching for something to make she went to work. Oil, batter, sauce, toppings. She was making a pizza. Something very much unseen in this house.
It didn't take long for Mercedes to get lost in the meanderings of cooking. She didn't think it would be this fun. Perfectly sorting materials, kneading the dough, even timing the oven's heating up so it finish simultaneously with her preparing the pizza. A strange satisfaction.
"My little girl doing something other than reading!?" Her father's voice caught Mercedes off guard. "Dad! I thought you were still sleeping." "How could I sleep when I can smell fresh pizza!?" He gave a warm and ecstatic smile towards the oven window, then returned facing his daughter with a mischievous grin.
Markel Kerunu is the epitome of the tired office worker. Wakes up tired and unwilling to work, comes home more so. But he keeps his head held high for moments like this...
"-stooop!" Mercedes dodges a chunk of leftover dough. "NEVER!!!" Markel launches another glob. The kitchen is painted with flour, sauce, and giddy laughter. But their fun is cut short when someone walks in. "I suppose it's more productive than sleeping..." Mercedes' mother stands at the entrance to the kitchen, admiring her husband and daughter's handiwork. "Let's clean up and eat, then I can show you something interesting one of my students made recently." "Oh? What'd they make?" Mercedes had a glint in her eye. She knew that if her mother found it interesting then she sure will. "A sapient AI."
Markel instantly lost his goofy mannerism. "Paloma. You're serious?" She nodded without hesitation. "And you have a copy?" Another nod. But before Markel could continue Paloma interrupted. "First we clean and eat. Then we talk."
The little bookworm ate so fast that she didn't even taste her first ever piece of cooking. She was too excited. It wasn't a special day in anyway before, no holidays, no ceremony. But that could change. She hoped it changed. 'Sapient means thinking. Not blindly following instincts like an animal or programing like an algorithm. Thinking. A thinking machine. Amazing.' Mercedes watched carefully as her mother pulled out her computer and plugged in her phone.
"What are you doing?" Mercedes asked. To which Paloma explained "Neither of the makers of the AI know why. But for some reason it fails to work when you copy the files online, it has to be wire to wire." Markel and Mercedes thought for a minute, trying to think of a reason as to why that's the case. "Don't bother trying to figure it out. I couldn't, the makers couldn't, so they put the problem off for later. And don't worry, I checked to make sure it wasn't a virus or anything. Right now the AI is in its probationary period and problems like that are being wrinkled out. Oh! Looks like it's up." Paloma finished the installation process and copied her computer screen to the kitchen main screen on the wall.
[Hello.] RAFE greeted the family. "Now remember, RAFE can only use mics and cameras that we allow, and right now its listening from my PC-" Paloma explained before being cut off. "Hello!" Mercedes cried out to RAFE. [Who might I have the pleasure of speaking to?] "My name's Mercedes! But you can call me Mertz!" Markel watched his daughter with surprise. 'She's really all about this huh?' [Considering this copy of me was given to Prof. Paloma Kerunu I can safely assume you are her youngest daughter then?] "Wow! How did you know that it was mom who got this copy of you!?" Mercedes was being careful underneath this excited behavior.
Mercedes is a cunning little girl. Every action of hers is a delicate piece of her web, ever word said, every projectile of dough dodged. She wanted to pick apart this AI and find out all that was possible behind its blank text messages. Depending on how RAFE responds she learns something. If it tells her that it can extrapolate information from each copy's previous iteration then she'll keep her distance, a program that simply wants to spread its copies is no better than a virus. But if instead it communicated with a main server for its data then she could be a little more liberal with her actions, as a single outlier reaction may be ignored by the program. Another possibility wa-
[You're asking this to probe me. Aren't you?] The table was stunned. Mercedes' whole plan changed in an instant. "You're really alive aren't you?" Her entire façade gave way. No point in keeping up the charade if both parties are in on the act.
*SLAM!* "I'm hooommee!!!" The older sister has arrived.