Reuleaux's Portal

1 It was almost a year since the Sir Isaac Newton had returned to Earth with Coppélia, and everything on her home planet seemed pretty much the same as she remembered it. Some things had changed of course – almost one hundred years had passed since the android had left Earth – but the world was still more or less the same, just newer and, of course, more hi-tech. Sophonts were new to her and Coppélia could have been forgiven for feeling a little inadequate compared to this new breed of androids. Progress had marched onwards and the newer androids were stronger and had more advanced Artificial Intelligence capabilities than she did, but her own specifications were still formidable when compared to the organic limitations of humans. Nonetheless, everybody – both human and sophont – treated her with nothing less than the greatest respect, recognising her importance. Holly really enjoyed spending time with Coppélia, for it felt almost as if she were spending time with her grandmother. The bond that had been created between Karen and the android was obviously something very special and Coppélia clearly relished sharing stories of the experiences that she and Karen had shared together. The anecdotes that Coppélia told didn’t always align completely with what her grandmother had said, but that was perhaps to be expected; people always had their own version of events, although it must be said that Coppélia’s tales were drawn directly from recordings made at the time and, as such, were infallible. However, Holly found her grandmother’s occasional inconsistencies rather charming and thought they simply highlighted a quaint difference between the human and the android psyche. And so, one chilly December evening, Holly and Coppélia could be found sharing the stage of the Oslo City Hall, with the Norwegian Royal Family, the Mayor of Oslo, and the Head of the Norwegian Parliament. In a unique one-off diversion from Nobel Foundation policy, a special Nobel Peace Prize was to be awarded posthumously to Karen Chambers for her tireless work in integrating sophonts into society. It had not always been an easy task – humans had been fed a steady diet of doomsday AI scenarios, and the complexity of sophont technology had, at first, served to magnify fear and suspicion, but, with patience and a lot of hard work, she and her team from the Syber Industries Robotic Integration Foundation were able to win over most of the planet’s population to accept that humans and sophonts could live in harmony together. There were still those who opposed the integration and would never accept that sophonts should ever be anything but mechanical slaves to their human masters, but history had eventually taught most people to embrace diversity and look for the benefits. And those benefits were manifold. Sophont astronauts explored worlds and environments that were fatally inhospitable to humans. Sophont rescue teams had saved hundreds of thousands of human lives, and the field of medicine had advanced at a rate never before seen – thanks to integrated human-sophont research teams. Sophonts and their expanding use in all areas of the workplace could have been a recipe for disaster, but Karen had skilfully guided the integration process through several stormy seas and had been a major contributor to the peaceful state that society now found itself in. She certainly deserved the award. Facing Holly and Coppélia, down in the main floor area, sat representatives from the three major sophont manufacturers, the directors and assistant directors of various space agencies, representatives of various international rescue agencies that could not operate so effectively without sophonts, and a group of people who were only alive because of sophont rescues. Scattered among them were fifty sophonts who had been involved in those rescues. Many foreign dignitaries were seated on the right, and the left was occupied by the Norwegian Prime Minister and her wife, the Head of the Norwegian Supreme Court and many other Norwegian politicians. The ceremony began with a traditional Viking song, a cappella by a top Norwegian female vocalist, Tonetta Breivik. This was followed by an introductory speech given by the Leader of the Nobel Committee, Ragnar Aarskog, during which he described the part that Karen had played in the successful transition to human-sophont co-existence. This was followed by another musical interlude during which a holographically remastered vintage video of an early 21st-century band Jaga Jassist played, before Holly gave the gathered audience a potted history of what life had been like with such an amazing grandmother. It seemed only natural that Coppélia should receive the award on Karen’s behalf. In fact, Holly herself had suggested it. Holly was Karen’s granddaughter, but she felt that Coppélia had known her grandmother better than anyone else. Holly felt that this would be the best tribute to Karen – the relationship between Karen and Coppélia was the epitome of what her grandmother had stood for. Finally, it was time for Coppélia’s speech. Wearing a figure-hugging emerald green dress, she stood up and slowly walked over to the lectern. She thought of clearing her throat (she had seen many others do this before making speeches) but everybody knew that she was an android so there was little point in mimicking this human characteristic. She started her speech without further ado. “Your Majesty, your Royal Highnesses, distinguished representatives of the Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, your Excellencies, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for inviting me to receive this wonderful award on behalf of my best friend, Karen Chambers. “When Karen and I first met, I was wary of her – after all, she was a police officer and I was an android that had broken the Three Laws of Robotics. But, as I got to know her, I was able to see past the authority figure and discovered the wonderful person behind the badge. Somehow, Karen could see beyond my synthetic skin and integrated artificial neural circuits to the person – yes, the person – that I was and still am today. She never saw me as ‘just a robot’ and treated me with nothing but compassion. She was a biological being and I was not, but that was never a barrier between us. She treated me as an equal.” Coppélia continued with anecdotal stories of their time together, of the fun and the occasional sad times that they had experienced together up until the day that the android left Earth for the exoplanet Proxima b. “I didn’t know when I left Earth that there were no plans to bring me back home, but I couldn’t imagine that Karen would abandon me – it’s not who she was. It was the hope that she would somehow come and find me that helped me cope with the ordeal. I could have de-activated myself – I would have found a way to do so – but I always believed that Karen wouldn’t have willingly left me on a remote planet, 4.24 light-years from Earth. She moved towards the side of the stage. “I’d like to show you a couple of holo-recordings downloaded from my internal memory. The first recording is of our first Space-Earth interaction. The unavoidable time-lag between our responses has been removed for brevity; otherwise, we’d be here all night.” Gentle laughter rippled around the room as two holograms materialised on stage, seated opposite each other. The hall became so quiet that a dropped pin would have seemed like a cymbal crash. “Hi, Karen. Over.” The audience watched as the Karen hologram stood up and approached Coppélia’s hologram. Some of them even jumped along with her as her hand went right through her friend’s body. “It really looked like I would be able to touch you. Over.” Coppélia’s hologram responded. “I’m approximately two hundred and fifty-nine million, twenty thousand, six hundred and seventy-two kilometres away. You’d need very long arms to give me a hug. Over.” Some of the audience members chuckled as Karen’s hologram enjoyed the joke. “That’s a b****y long way. Over.” “And we’ve hardly got started. When the VASIMR unit kicks in fully I’ll be going really fast, accelerating to 30% light-speed. Over.” Holly found watching such conversations between her grandmother and Coppélia enjoyable, although sometimes she felt like an eavesdropper intruding on a shared intimate moment. The conversation continued, enthralling the audience, for whom this was their first time of watching. Holly was looking forward to the playing of the second holo-recording where Coppélia performs a dance extract from the ballet ‘Coppélia’ for her grandmother. That was her favourite recording of them all. The first holo-recording disappeared and the real Coppélia stood up again. “To finish, I would like to show you a holo-recording that I sent to Karen as a gift to coincide with my landing on Proxima b. At the time, I had no idea if it would even reach her, but – if it did – I knew that it would make her happy, even though we were light-years apart.” A new holo-recording materialised. “Hi, Karen. Hi, Felipe and Lucas, and baby Carolina. I hope you are well. “Hello everybody. If everything has gone according to plan – you’ll have received this message on the day that I’ll have landed on Proxima b. I’m probably on the planet right now. Anyway, I have a gift for you Karen – a very special gift – something that I hope will bring back some fond memories.” The audience gasped as Coppélia’s hologram dissolved away but returned just as quickly. “Sorry about that, everybody. I had to get changed.” Coppélia was wearing a burgundy leotard and a pair of ballet shoes. “I hope you like the colour, Karen. It’s Hex #800020.” Holly had seen her grandmother’s copy of the holo-recording dozens of times before. It had been Karen’s favourite and was always played on her birthday. In fact, the family still played it on each anniversary of Karen’s birth, even though she was no longer with them. However, the rest of the dance performance was lost on Holly this time. She was distracted by three words that kept being repeated in her mind, playing in a never-ending loop. “This isn’t right.”