RoboNomics

Chapter 2

Chen is not a short man, but he's dwarfed by the wheeled cart that he pushes through my classroom door. I can see the black wheels of the cart where they peek out from under a drop cloth. Gasps of amazement come from my students but I already know what's under that beige cloth.

Normally, pushing wheeled carts of equipment into and out of classrooms would have been Yoric's job. But several years ago the school's janitor was replaced by an army of faceless floor waxing, screen cleaning, vacuuming automata. They move insect-like in buzzing swarms around the school after three o'clock. They were provided to the Toronto School District by the innovators at RoboNomics. It was a cost savings measure for the financially destitute schools. But I miss Yoric. The old man, with his pockmarked face and thin black hair combed over his red scalp, had frightened the children with his appearance. He had also been good to junior teachers like me.

Goodman strolls into the room behind Chen. She smiles at the students as she follows the Vice Principal up the main aisle. The children stare at the cloth-covered cart or whisper behind hands to each other. Chen deposits the cart beside my desk.

"Children, quiet please. Vice Principal Chen and I have something very important to tell you," Goodman waits with raised hands. The whispers persist. She begins to count. By the time she reaches five, there is silence.

"Today is a very special day because your class gets to be part of an important experiment," Goodman launches into a high-pitched explanation, talking to the students as if they are two years old. She probably doesn't even know the difference between four and eight year olds, I think to myself bitterly. But part of me knows it's not true. "And if you do well with the project, the whole school will get to participate. So your job is very important."

"What do we have to do?" Philip calls from the middle row. He's a boy with mischievous brown eyes set in pale skin. He would have raised his hand before he spoke if I'd been talking to my kids.

"Well," says Goodman with a flourishing gesture of her hands as she widens her eyes, "just what you've always done as good students. Your only job is to learn and be well behaved." She looks around at their small faces. "Any more questions?" The children stare up at her. One or two shift in their seats. "Vice Principal Chen, would you like to do the honors?" Goodman asks her colleague, who stands beside her.

"Of course." He jumps to the side of the cart as Goodman moves behind my desk. She is beside me now writing something on the screen. Her upper arm brushes against mine. I take a slight step away from her.

"Children," Chen is saying in the meantime, "say hello to your new teacher!" He whips the cloth up and over the cart and lets it go so that it sinks to the ground.

"Whoa," comes the collective childish gasp. "What is it?" cries one of the children. There she stands before me: the apparatus of my professional doom. For years they've had bots working in Special Education. Autism dolls and ADHD teddy bears. Friendly creatures with soft, bubbly bodies and eyes that light up with blue and green in faux emotion. She's not like any of those bots. She has poreless skin and shiny, deep brown hair. She's nearly six feet tall. She is like a human in every respect except for one: the dead eyes that sit awkwardly in their sockets. She's standing on the cart held in place with a brace like a life-sized doll on display. Her clothes are plain: khaki pants with a center crease, a mint sweater set, and an orange circle emblazoned with a silver insignia sits on her collar like a broach. I recognize it immediately. It's the logo of the corporation that made her: RoboNomics.

Some of the kids in the first few rows rush forward to inspect her. Chen tries to get them to stop poking at her and to sit in their desks. I feel dizzy and my finger hurts. I look down at it and realize that I've been playing with my engagement and wedding rings. Twisting them around and around until the friction burns. I inch towards the exit at the back of the room.

The letters "I I U" light up the screen on the wall behind my desk. "I bet no one can tell me what that means," says Goodman of the letters on the wall. The students stare at her or at the bot with wide eyes.

"I, I, U," Goodman prods at each letter on the screen as she talks. "It stands for Interactive Instructional Unit. From now on, you'll be learning from the I.I.U. But that's an awfully long name, isn't it?" she asks. The question does not elicit a response. "Well, you can just call her 'Teacher'," she writes on the desk and the nickname appears on the wall monitor. She turns and smiles broadly at the children who are being herded by Chen back to their desks.

"But," Natalie calls out, her thin arm flailing in the air.

"Yes?"

"What about Ms. Anderson? We're supposed to learn from her, remember?"

"Ms. Anderson is going to take a well-deserved break from teaching." Goodman eyes me sidelong. "Wouldn't you like to learn from a robot?"

"Yeah," Natalie admits quietly. I drop my eyes from my best student's face to the linoleum tile. I realize as my stomach lurches that I will not see her again. I no longer have the stewardship over her curious intelligence. What have I done? I think and wonder whether the Principals would still let me sign the new contract.

"Look!" calls one of the boys and he points at the bot. The machine blinks as it comes to life and twists its head from side to side.

Its uncanny eyes snap to the children. It is still braced on the cart and is not moving. "Good morning, class," it says. I feel sick. Its voice does not sound like the voice of a machine. It sounds a little like my voice. The children's eyes are riveted on the thing. No one notices when I rush from the room. No one hears me running to the nearest girls' bathroom and dry heaving.