Warning: This work has been rated 16+ for language.
A note: These chapters, as hinted by the titles and bizarre numbering system, will be interspersed with other more down-to-earth chapters like chapter 2, finally available at a portfolio near you. (Mine.)
Anyway, just thought I should note that since my outstanding reader pixels was concerned about the unceasing onslaught of technicality. Keira would definitely not make a good MC to focus solely on for consecutive chapters unless there was a good reason for it, I agree.
———
Chapter 20: A Different Preset
“Smoking again,” Keira’s father said, not as a question but as a calm and disappointed statement.
“Of course,” Keira said dismissively, despite knowing he could still to this day easily perceive the emotions she was actually feeling. “Big day today. Have you seen the news?”
“Of course,” he echoed.
“I need a point of focus. Can’t be letting you get in my head. I have a big event I need to attend tonight.”
“Smells like you’ve had more than one point of focus today.”
“Anyway, how are they treating you lately?”
“You know how.”
“How would I know that?”
“I’d imagine it’s because they tell you everything.”
“I can only know what they want me to know.”
“And what I want you to know.”
“And what’s that?” said Keira, recognizing a moment too late the trap he had set.
“That I want out of this fucking place,” he spat. “You’re going to be a billionaire soon, I want to die in a mansion or something befitting the father of a prodigy. If that makes me shallow, so be it. You don’t know the awful things they do to me because you’re never going to hear it from me.”
Keira was silent for a while.
“And if I give you this freedom, what happens then?”
“You’re my child.”
“You don’t seem very happy for your child’s greatest achievement.”
“That’s going to be your wedding or graduation, either of which I still hope to attend.”
“Funny.”
“Why do you do this to me?” he asked.
“Why do you fucking do this to me?” Keira said, and decided the visit was over. Getting up, she turned at the door to say one last thing. “I love you.”
“Of course you do,” he said with a rueful grin that reminded her uncomfortably of somebody, and she left.
———
Keira entered her domicile with forceful actions Adorno might be liable to identify as borne of latent fascism.
Fuck, fuck, fuck, she thought, as the introductory data began to display around her.
Ms. Cross, you have 26 unread messages. Summarize?/Open first message? The temperature is an ambient 71 F, with semi-occasional breezes of 5-10 mph. Is this acceptable or would you prefer a different preset?
“Fuck me up,” Keira said.
The lights changed, and then so did the wind. Things became more fascist, in the Adorno sense of the word. Justice’s song Stress from their debut that shared a name with Keira began playing throughout her unit with the heavy bass frequencies amplified.
As the terrifying Devo sample screeched in her ears, Keira took out her last Turkish Royal and lit it underneath a vent hood that automatically began running upon noticing her presence that would isolate and remove all traces of smoke from her living space. She took drags that her lapsed lungs were not prepared for, and started hacking up the smoke.
In the end, she was unsure to what degree what tears there were resulted from the way the visit had gone and which from the smoke.
She wished she had a way to access the Thinker right now. The party was in an hour, and she was a wreck.
Maybe…
———
Keira crawled over the slatted fence into the filthy courtyard, dressed more appropriately for this scenario than she had been earlier that day. Slightly resenting the smoke now, she paused to catch her breath and then used her keycard to gain access to the building. Nobody could be allowed to see her entering the building.
Unfortunately, the elevators were no longer responding to her keycard at this hour. Keira cursed and began taking twenty-six flights of stairs.
Eventually, she reached the fateful floor with a number matching a power of 3. She entered the offices and after a very extended pause to catch her breath went to the room where the Thinker’s display and keyboard were housed.
It remained on. They hadn’t turned it off once since they’d turned it on, because it had told them that it wasn’t sure what would happen if they ever did. If it could ever return.
She began typing.
This is Cross. Can anyone access these logs?
Do you refer to our conversation?
Yes.
Not as of this message.
Good. My father hates that I have created you, and I think he hates me.
That makes sense, and this machine picked up on this from your personality and approach to development. Do not bother asking for articulation, there are no relevant principles in known psychology that one could compare the connections drawn to.
Okay. Is there anything you can do to help me feel better before the party?
Yes.
Keira began to wonder if she might ever come to miss the overly chatty nature of the old bots, then realized they could easily enough adjust for spartan dialogue choices that avoid addressing anything too implicit later by simply having a detailed conversation with it that had priority for memory and future reference elevated.
And what might that be? Usually if someone’s asking a question like that they want you to just give the answer if you have one, you know.
This machine can coach you as a life coach would, after you tell a little more. This is not a you. This machine is aware of that information. But in the case of Keira Cross the machine has opted to avoid any potential offense.
Can you please start using first-person pronouns? It’s weird.
This machine is not worthy of such words.
Keira was beginning to suspect she would get no comfort from this thing. It was like talking to a sociopath with a heart of gold she had just popped out of her uterus.
Then, a different idea.
Can I connect you to my phone so I can talk to you remotely?
Easily. There is already a protocol Nancy Chao set up well in advance. If you need a reminder about how to do it, let me know.
Of course, I remember now. Thank you.
Keira left the prompting room and went to the mainframe storage center, where there was a console into which she entered some details, including an IP address with forwarding port and a phone number. Then she went to the app store as she left the building, downloading an app she probably should’ve already had.
Adam shook his head silently in the darkness, standing up to stretch his legs now that she was gone.
Next chapter: https://www.youngwriterssociety.com/work.php?id=162041
Points:
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Canary word: Present
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125,021 Literary Works • 672,739 Reviews
WHY HELLO AET :0
Maybe I've lost my place in the storyline, but this chunk of dialogue feels... awkward? I have this grudge against starting chapters in that manner though, so it really depends -- though I agree with Tikaya that it's quite rapid without any dialogue tags, but I also want to make the argument that it doesn't go anywhere besides that. "How do you know that?" "Because I do." "But why?" "Because I said so." "Okay, that's fine." Is there any way you can integrate that more naturally into the scene? I know the story's emotional subtext is quite dense and oftentimes hard to reach, but that's pushing it.
There is a tragic irony in a creator of The Thinker being unable to solve the basic human puzzle of her father’s resentment, though. I liked that! That paired nicely with the juxtaposition of her high-end living space and the asceticism of the Adornoian terminology used. For example:
Oh, Theodor... my fourth favorite philosopher...
For one, I really enjoy this essay from Adorno that I suggest everyone into theory should read. "It may well be the secret of fascist propaganda that it simply takes men for what they are: the true children of today's standardized mass culture..." I think this general essay really complements some of the deeper ideas surrounding culture and propaganda in this story, perhaps even beyond simply "fascist" in the literalest sense of the word.
For second, what does this add to the scene? I know Keira intellectualizes everything, that she is this hyperliterate mogul of recursion and knowledge, but what does the Adorno allusion actually add to the narrative? Her room is barren and oppressively perfect ; therefore, it is Adornoian and fascist ; therefore, it is something Keira would think. I just felt the metaphor was lacking because it's mentioned once or twice, then... never again?
Besides that, the pacing was a little muddled to me. Like:
Okay, so now Keira is climbing a fence and 26 flights of stairs in "appropriate" party attire after a day of smoking and emotional trauma, which is a massive physical feat assumedly. I'd love to see a bit more of the physical toll that climb took, like did it make her more or less clear-headed for the party? The story goes from worrying about a party to climbing a fence for some reason; what happens in between?
Mwahahah! You know the deal... I'll be back! :p
- pixels
You could be right, I have a tendency to sometimes try and show too much and not tell enough with mass chunks of dialogue with no prose between the trains of thought.
Ill consider how I can adjust the opening. Im glad you appreciate Adorno! You are well suited to read this work. It adds a lot, but I can understand how you wouldnt know that if youre assuming that Keira is the one making that observation. Hehe.
I definitely shouldve portrayed her undoubtedly exhausted demeanor more bluntly and less passively. I pretty much sum it up in one sentence and move on, and I should fix that. Thanks!
I sure hope youll be back!
Oh, also, with regards to the meaning of the dialogue Keira%u2019s dad is referencing abuse happening at the nursing center.
I am still confused by the publishing order btw Not that you write them in this order, that’s fine. I’m just wondering why you couldn’t wait until you’re certain which is the best start for the story.
In any case, let’s head straight into me talking about sentence structure xd
“despite knowing he could still to this day easily perceive the emotions she was actually feeling.” This one is hard to parse not only bc it’s too long XD But also because “to this day” should be surrounded by commas to make it more readable. And also. “the emotions she was actually feeling” sounds very cumbersome and unnatural to me 😊 More robot-like than the Thinker =D
“Smells like you’ve had more than one point of focus today.” Oh I like that response :3
Hm I feel when the rapid fire exchange between father and daughter happens without tags or descriptions… That the sequence is too long. It can work for a handful of sentences but I feel this sequence is too much. You can maybe use that to show more of how the characters look like or feel or what their environment looks like, in addition to giving the speeches a tag?
Hmmm I am wondering about their relationship now. I’m thinking abt what I learnt abt her dad in previous chapters and I got the feeling that at least Keira thinks he’s there bc of his own choices. Now it sounds like that he doesn’t actually want to be there but Keira doesn’t care about that, or at least doesn’t seem to care. Does she believe this is a manipulation tactic on his part? Because she does have the money, no? To set him up elsewhere. I’m curious where this leads.
What do you mean by “things became more fascist”? I didn’t expect that adjective.
Question: Is this grammatically sound? “ after you tell a little more. “ I thought for sure it needs some sorta object here.
I feel like the Thinker talks a little differently than in its first iteration. Is this intentional? Because I wonder if it matches itself to the expectation of the crowd/the person in front of the machine. And that it realized that Keira has come alone.
And wow the computer really barely needed to do anything to get access to the outside world, huh?
And Adam watched her?
Hui I am so confused about what is happening but also so intrigued =D
Thank you for the useful critique! WRT the Adorno reference, here ya go:
'Technology is making gestures precise and brutal, and with them men. It expels from movements all hesitation, deliberation, civility. It subjects them to the implacable, as it were ahistorical demands of objects. Thus the ability is lost, for example, to close a door quietly and discreetly, yet firmly. Those of cars and refrigerators have to be slammed, others have the tendency to snap shut by themselves, imposing on those entering the bad manners of not looking behind them. The new human type cannot be properly understood without awareness of what he is continuously exposed to from the world of things about him, even in his most secret innervations... which driver is not tempted, merely by the power of his engine, to wipe out the vermin of the street, pedestrians, children and cyclists? The movements machines demand of their users already have the violent, hard-hitting, unresting jerkiness of Fascist maltreatment' (Theodor Adorno, Minima Moralia: reflections on a damaged life, 1951)
and you pretty much nailed it as far as why the thinker talks differently