Dida - Part 1

I will be posting this on Royal Road.

Dida

I woke to Dida’s little yawn between my ears.

Before I could say my usual, half-uttered “gumornin”, Dida seemed up jump up and begin rattling between my synapses.

“Mr. Glossian, I have downloaded twelve songs from your recommended playlist while you were unavailable. Also, I have monitored your incoming calls. There have been no emergencies or critical responses. I gave a terse reply to a pinger though. The nerve! I sure gave it what for!”

It was invigorating to feel Dida’s hyper, pre-pubescent tone vibrate through my skull. I could almost sense her physically dashing around my brain with all that boundless energy.

After most of a yawn, I replied, “Thanks, Dida. Tell me about my day.”

The sound of a notepad shuffling, a default sound I’d long given up switching off with how much Dida enjoyed playing it, repeated a few times. “I have your meeting with Mr. Orantes and Ms. Chambers so far as work. Then you said to remind you about a new belt because you lost some weight and you’re also out of probiotics. Shall I order them through your preferred service?”

I rubbed my right eye a few times. “Don’t worry, Dida. I’ll pick it up after work. I’ll make sure you don’t waste away.”

She giggled softly. “Thank you, although my colonization rate is still in the upper nineties. I’m several weeks from it being detrimental to my abilities.”

I set my feet on the ground and pushed the covers up. “You know, Dida. It still amazes me how normal this all is.” The covers remembered to pull themselves back in order.

“Normal?...I’m sorry?”

With a few popping joints, I rose. Dida made a little noise. “Oh! Is it time for a trip to the chiropractor?”

I shook my head a few times and it popped at well. “Nah, just didn’t sleep straight.”

She fussed in a virtual space. “Shall I decrease the level of caffeine in your coffee today?”

I snorted. “Let’s not go quite that far but feel free to adjust my serotonin levels tonight, if needed.”

“Gotcha!” She dove into another virtual space.

I pushed open the door to the bathroom, scratched at my hair, and continued my previous thought. “I mean people like my father. He still shuns integrated systems like you.”

She seemed to pause and I could feel the curiosity of her gaze upon me. “He shuns us…why?”

The door gently settled back in place behind me as I entered the bathroom. All was in order. Dida was a vigilant little maid with her crew of house systems.

I stood over the toilet, lifted the lid, and unbuttoned my boxers.

“He’s old-fashioned. He believes computers should be on our desks and not in our heads and in our lives. And also…”

A yellow stream rushed into the basin.

Dida quietly asked, “And also?”

“And also…” I finished when the stream came to a halt. “He doesn’t like the idea of fungus computers, especially ones in our brains. And I have to admit I was hesitant at first as well.”

She gave a tiny gasp. “But…you feel okay now, right?” Her voice sounded so frail, like a child hesitantly begging for love.

Although I knew logically that her reactions were synthetic, I also knew that the fungal processing units were more efficient with positive feedback.

“Yes, Dida. I feel quite fine. Thank you.”

In return, she made an indescribable but happy little sound. I buttoned back up and stood in front of the mirror.

After rubbing the rough spackle on my chin, I posed the same question to Dida, “And how you feel now, Dida?”

The sound of her footsteps ceased and she seemed to nearly trigger the pratfall audio. I enjoyed the little verbal cues her system added. Though I could’ve turned them off, like many users did, the thought never much crossed my mind.

I sense Dida’s confusion followed by a quick ‘umm…’. I expected to hear her typical “My processes are all functioning optimally!” when I usually posed those sorts of questions.

But her reply took a moment. I was reaching for the razor, so I waited. She soon seemed to notice my action and made a sudden, embarrassed noise. “GAH!...I mean…processes all functioning optimally!”

I held and twirled the razor a bit. “I’m glad your processes are as they should be but how do about yourself?”

She sounded nervous. “…myself, Mr. Glossian? But the processes are me.”

I splashed my face before I started with shaving. “Yeah. But then it’s said the neurons in my brain are me but they don’t say ‘the neurotransmitters are balanced correctly today’, do they?”

She giggled, though softly. “That would be silly, Mr. Glossian.”

I clapped my hands on my cheeks. “So, what about it?”

“My apologies but I’m not human, Mr. Glossian. I can’t put together anything like human feelings except from a personality file.” I thought I could hear a light trace of melancholy in her statement.

I pressed the guide-light of the razor against my face. “But you are alive. Living beings have sensations.”

It was a line of questioning I’d posed to her a few times out of curiosity.

I could tell how she would respond though.

“Though I am composed of a benign strain of Candida albicans, that’s just the genetic carrier for my program and systems.”

Of course, I knew. It was how I named her in the first place. Nothing I said could’ve convinced her she was a living being any more than a pig could be convinced it suddenly had wings, and yet, I still persisted in bringing up the topic from time to time.

I acknowledged she was right in this matter and that seemed to settle things. Dida’s chipper tone returned. “I’m glad I could clear it up! I want you make sure you have a beautiful day, Mr. Glossian.”

I nodded slowly. “Thank you, Dida. Now you said before you downloaded a dozen new songs into my head. Let’s hear them.”

Her small sound re-energized. I’d given her a clear and useful task. She jumped right into it with the frenetic joy of a kid with a new toy. She chirped out, “Right away, sir!” and dashed deep into her memory.

By the time the razor had pulverized my stubble with sound, another sound filled my head, Dida’s new songs. A small moment passed when I thought perhaps she was singing in a suddenly-mature tone but her normal voice chirped between the lilting lyrics, “You like?”

I waited for the chorus before I gave her a slow nod and a smile. “It’s growing on me. Good job, Dida.”

The melody played in my head. Sometimes she gave a little idle sound of sorting her recent downloads as though they were antiquated CDs she was putting in an order I’d like. I slipped off my clothes and set them in a corner. I knew they would be done washing before me.

As the water tumbled like wet static over my head between musical notes, I let the warmth sink into my stiff joints. Dida giggled, as though she could feel the water tickling the skin of her home.

With my eyes shut, my mind began to drift through the concordance of sounds.


-------


“Hey bro! Guess what?!”

With all the enthusiasm of an old and tired joke, I answered, “Okay. What. Am I right?”

With more chuckles than such a response really deserved, Kary, my elder sibling, laid out the cause of his enthusiasm.

“TOADS is up and running!”

I’d since lost track of all the flavor-of-the-week projects he’d been involved with but I feigned a measure of encouragement.

“Nice…so that one…?”

“It’s the one which will change the world as we know it! And plus it has…almost the greatest project name ever! TOADS!”

It’d been a long time since I’d been on the same page as Kary, even before we used to read books together before bedtime.

“Toads…” I’d heard of them. What was left of them at least.

“YEAH! Exactly! TOADS! Well, really TOAD would be best. Or even TOADSTOOL, but that was either too short or too long of a name for it.”

I could tell he was trying to instill a sense of anticipation in me. It wasn’t quite working.

Still, I had to ask the next logical question.

“It?”

He shot off a long and technical stream of terms which ended with “sporological” or “sporangium”. The rest slipped from my mind.

In his joking tone, he added, “I wanted to call it PRINCESS TOADSTOOL but that would’ve never worked.”

I prodded the side of the phone with my thumb.

“Explain…”

“Okay okay...for a pleb. Our lab has managed to create a computer which isn’t designed but rather grown. It’s allllliiiivvve!”

I felt a shiver ripple through my entire body.


------


The water turned cold for a moment. I jerked back from the stream and turned the showerhead to spray chilly water against the wall.

Dida darted. Through the wall I hear the faint rattle of shifting water. The stream warmed again slowly.

Her faint whimpers broke through the crescendo of the song.

I wiped the droplets from my vision and asked softly, “Dida?”

She didn’t answer at first. When she did, the words sounded like glass losing its balance. “Yes…sir?”

After a long breath, the first song finished. “What happened, Dida?”

The glass pivoted. “I…am uncertain, sir. But the initial diagnostic seems…it seems to say that there was an error. I am cross-checking all indices for further critical errors.”

“Error?” I turned down the stream of water.

Dida didn’t speak for several seconds. I worried until she gave a tiny cough.

“The error was in organizing control. OC should’ve kept the warmest water diverted here during your shower to effect only a minimal reduction in shower temperature. Instead, the situation went unmitigated by OC.”

I enjoyed Dida’s technical talk much more than Kary’s. I sifted her statement in my mind until I came up with, “You drifted off?”

“Yes, sir. Sorry.”

I turned the stream of water off.

Dida whimpered. “I failed you…”

I brushed the dampness from my hair. It would’ve been nice to just reassure Dida that everyone made mistakes. But that was from a human perspective. For a computer system, a mistake could cripple and destroy everything.

The second song began to play. It was a quiet, pensive melody.

After taking a towel from the rack and wrapping it around myself, I reassured Dida, “It was nothing. Move on.”


-----


“How do you expect me to “move on”!?”

Mother’s massive face heaved and curled in itself with a thousand, pointed agonies. Father sat, resolute and calm.

“It was nothing.”

“Nothing?...” The word seemed cut through her without mercy.

I was young. Kary was out. I was supposed to be playing in the den. I heard the shouting and felt scared.

Mother screamed as though trying to summon all the air around into her lungs.

“NOT NOTHING!”

Father remained as the mountains against a furious storm.

“It wasn’t strong enough. It passed into the void.”

Mother bit into her fist. “SHE! She was alive…and I killed her.”

Father leaned back. “You didn’t even notice it was gone until you visited the doctor.”

“I felt so cold and empty…” Mother rubbed her lower abdomen as though it were a gaping wound.

Father pressed his hands together. “The doctor told you he noticed irregularities from the last visit.”

“BUT HE DIDN’T TELL ME WHY IT HAPPENED!” She shouted to the heavens. I leaned back from the door, afraid they would see me crouching.

Father cleared his throat. “It wasn’t meant to be.”

Mother whimpered. “I would’ve had a pretty little girl…but I killed her…”

“The doctor suspected external factors ranging from exposure to Fusarium mold to diet.”

Mother shook her head. “Scapegoats! I forced her out! I killed her!”

Father leaned forward with his face rigid. “Stop being irrational.” Then his eyes turned and caught me.

Mother sobbed into her hands.


-----


I could hear Dida’s sniffling sound file.

“Dida?”

She gasped.

“Oh! I’m so sorry, sir! Yes, Mr. Glossian?”

I dried my hair. “Forget what I said, Dida. It’s not nothing. But don’t waste your processes dwelling on the error. You understand?”

It didn’t take long for Dida to respond, “Acknowledged. I promise to focus my resources on giving you the best of my abilities. But I’ll still do everything I can to prevent errors.”

I uttered a soft ‘mm’ and told her, “Just as I expect from you. Now, let’s settle on a lighter topic. Could you give me the morning news and prepare my clothes?”

“Right away!”

As my suit sorted itself to the front, I heard Dida clutch her virtual newspaper and read from it. I could imagine her tiny form hunched over a desk and searching the headlines for items which corresponded with my presets.

She began, “Tuesday the Seventeenth of February. Scientists now suspect that a man-made virus is responsible for the incidents during Mardi Gras exactly one week ago. Customized retroviral ‘pranks’ have been on the rise since the deregulation of the biochemical industry several years ago…”

It would be the most optimistic item of news on her list. If I didn’t suspect he already knew, I would’ve forwarded the news to Kary. He usually got a kick out of things like that.

A string of increasingly-worse incidents piled up as she read until I finally told her to pause.

Dida squeaked. “Shall I update your preferences? I’m sorry if it upset you.”

I shook my head. “You can’t change the way the news is, Dida. Everything is in flux, especially what it means to be human.”

I gave myself a little, amused snort after I’d said those words.

Dida seemed particularly vigilant about my mannerisms as I slipped on my trousers. “Is there something on your mind, Mr. Glossian?”

I adjusted the waistband and told her the truth. “It’s been a long time since I talked to my father.”

The shirt came next.

“Oh…umm…” Dida queued the hand-rubbing sound. “Your father isn’t on any of my informational databases. Should I add him?”

My left eye twitched ever so slightly.

“Thank you, Dida. But it was my choice to leave him out.”

Dida gave a little, mew-like whimper. I gathered breath to explain but the air soon deflated.

I busied myself with buttoning my shirt.
   
Dida controlled the covers with slow undulations and brought my tie within easy reach. I picked it up and adjusted the loop.

As I pulled it snug, I cringed from the silence.

“Continue with the playlist please, Dida.”

None of her cute audio files triggered, just a quick rummaging-sound and another quiet melody. I slowly nodded my head with the notes as I combed my hair.

Dida always said she couldn’t feel any external sensations. ‘Little girls locked in dark boxes and forced to serve us’, some cried. I used to stand beside those who were afraid of Installation. They still had the long needles when I finally made my decision.

I used to think of random, specific images and ideas several times a day to test if Dida could interface with them. She would just lock up or stammer if I asked her about them.

I picked up my wallet from the desk and tucked it in my pocket.

Dida only knew what I gave her and could only ‘read my mind’ so far as what her adaptive prediction AI rated as a high probability of my future needs.

The song volume lowered a moment.

“Mr. Glossian?”

“Yes, Dida.”

Dida gave a deep breath sound. “I know I’ve already said sorry but I wanted to make sure you knew that I only want to make you happy and better, Mr. Glossian.”

“I know, Dida. I appreciate that. I’m just not in a talkative mood. I’m thinking back.”

A bit of her energy seemed to return. “Oh! You’re doing something like a data compiling and indexing. Those can eat up a lot of key processes. Is that why your mood seems to be different than usual, if I may note that?”

“You may. It’s a fair comparison, although, I’ve never done any of those things myself.”

Dida voiced a soft ‘ah’. “I enjoy both very much, they improve my processes!”

I slid into my shoes. “Define what you mean by ‘enjoy’, Dida?”

“Oh! I’m sorry. I’m being redundant, I think. I mean that they improve my processes. If my processes are more effective then I have better probability of being useful to you, Mr. Glossian.”

I tapped the heels. “It didn’t seem redundant, Dida. You’ve used the term before. I know there are things you ‘enjoy’. What does the word mean to you?”

She didn’t give a quick response. She was thinking about it.

“Well…it’s a human word, so I’m only supposing meaning, but I ‘enjoy’ whatever gives me purpose and improves my purpose. Is that a suitable definition, Mr. Glossian?”

Maybe it was just a redundancy.

Kary’s curious theories about ‘FungAI Emergence’ settled back from where I’d stirred them.

“Perfectly. Thank you for bearing with me, Dida. Let’s head to work.”

She giggled again, all her tension lifted. “Yay! I’ll place a breakfast order into the usual place!”

I opened and shut the front door. I wish I’d left weather forecasts as one of Dida’s headlines. A blast of stagnant air pressed on me.

I could tell it was going to be another hot day.

I stood in the spotted shade of a neighbor’s Chitalpa. A dry wind curled at my hair. The tract of homes stretched to the horizon. The music, which had returned to a normal level, fit.

I waited.

Dida hummed as a form of idle sequence.

I asked for the time. Dida recited it efficiently and then returned to where she’d left off in her hum.

My bus was late. Dida dialed their server.

“Hiyos! I’m calling for Mr. Glossian. He needs to know when his bus will get to this address. Please check my DPIP for confirmation.”

I heard a groan from the other end. The voice was female, still child-like, but raspy like a kid who had a vicious sore throat. “Must you prod me so early in my uptake cycle?”

Dida didn’t retreat from prodding. “Mr. Glossian needs his bus! He has very important work do to today and he musn’t be late or it’ll be reaaal bad.”

“I manage the tech support of eight-thousand citizens. Do you know how many AIs had the nerve to prod me like this? Just you!”

Dida huffed. “Weelll…if you kept your buses where they should be then you wouldn’t need to hear from me.”

The other AI wheezed/groaned a bit. “Alright, I’ll do a diagnostic of the routes.”

A breezy, quiet moment passed.

There came a grunt and the AI responded, “The B-23 schedule defaulted to the weekend route rather than the weekday one. The bus would’ve come but twenty minutes off the schedule. Fixing now.”

It offered what sounded like a begrudging, “Thanks for your…input. Now get off this line. And grow some manners the next time you ping.”

Dida reacted strongly with a raspberry sound file and commented to me, “The nerve! She was a meanie!” when the server logged off.