The Unseen Servant forums

Quicksilver tilts his head to the side, eyeing the sad sister* behind the desk. He speaks out loud. "If you can give us an ETA, no message. If no such data is available, tell him we wish to discuss the aforementioned matter and meet us at Vee's after sundown."

* sad sister and broken brother: are what he calls pre-AI androids and other humanoid interfaces. Most are very old and ill-maintained.

Lance wrote: ↑Tue Apr 05, 2022 2:14 pm Quicksilver tilts his head to the side, eyeing the sad sister* behind the desk. He speaks out loud. "If you can give us an ETA, no message. If no such data is available, tell him we wish to discuss the aforementioned matter and meet us at Vee's after sundown."

* sad sister and broken brother: are what he calls pre-AI androids and other humanoid interfaces. Most are very old and ill-maintained.

"No message ... ok! Tell him " Quicksilver's voice comes back at him "we wish to discuss the aforementioned matter and meet us at Vee's after sundown ... ok! Message received!".

Lance wrote: ↑Wed Apr 06, 2022 7:36 am Oh, Christ, I don't know what's going on, this interface is too broken and I'm an asocial robot man!

I was hoping that this would be both amusing and somewhat frustrating ... has it veered too far toward frustrating?

tibbius wrote: ↑Wed Apr 06, 2022 5:46 pm

Lance wrote: ↑Wed Apr 06, 2022 7:36 am Oh, Christ, I don't know what's going on, this interface is too broken and I'm an asocial robot man!

I was hoping that this would be both amusing and somewhat frustrating ... has it veered too far toward frustrating?

No, I just literally don't know what's going on, maybe it's my english. Did it send the message? Did it not? Did it tell me my own message?

Lance wrote: ↑Thu Apr 07, 2022 7:32 am

tibbius wrote: ↑Wed Apr 06, 2022 5:46 pm

Lance wrote: ↑Wed Apr 06, 2022 7:36 am Oh, Christ, I don't know what's going on, this interface is too broken and I'm an asocial robot man!

I was hoping that this would be both amusing and somewhat frustrating ... has it veered too far toward frustrating?

No, I just literally don't know what's going on, maybe it's my english. Did it send the message? Did it not? Did it tell me my own message?

Your English is fine, the desk robot is confused - it heard "no message" and obeyed that, then it heard "tell him" and it obeyed that, so now it has recorded for the Sheriff the exact message that it just read back to Quicksilver!

Eyeless

Eyeless looks at Quicksilver and shrugs.

"Should we write a note too?"

Eyeless turns their attention to the others in the room and sees if he can glean anything of note from them. Their gruff shoulders suggest there might be delicate information we could use.

Violet

"Can't hurt."

Violet tries to see if she can overhear any of the conversation inside the office.

The desk robot cheerfully passes you a notepad and a ballpoint pen. The pen is scratchy and spotty but it's possible to write a note. What do you write?

Quicksilver repeats the message in writing. "A man repeating himself once has twice the chance to be understood."

Pushing forward by majority

When you return to Vee's shop, he is occupied with a prolonged sequence of metal cutting and bending. You hesitantly enter the coolness of the front room and make small uneasy movements as you try to decide whether to sit ... outside the afternoon sun glides down the western sky, as in the main room a band saw shrieks and bits of moderately thick sheet metal clank to the floor. After a pause, the clatter of the metal being moved from saw to press, and then the groaning noise of the press forming the metal into a curve. Then the clang as Vee deposits the finished piece into a stack somewhere on the concrete floor.

The noises repeat in sequence for a while. The sun touches the horizon.

What have you been doing as you wait around?

As I mentioned earlier, I want an upgrade against the heat

Quicksilver gets Vee's attention "It appears the heat is hindering my functioning in the daytime. Now, this is a perfectly normal thing, everybody is experiencing this. But as an android, I wonder if there's any way to improve my situation. Vents, coolants, heat-sinks, whatever you can think of..."

Eyeless

"Might I recommend increasing surface area?"

They point to the hole in their face.

Vee sighs and stretches his back and flips the switch to turn off the band saw. He picks up a rough red shop cloth and wipes the metal slivers from his slightly greasy hands.

"And I guess you want this right now?" he asks with a barely noticeable tone of annoyance. "Would you happen to carry around your OEM blueprints?"

[1d8]=1 mechanics

Quicksilver shrugs "No such documents available. My kind was designed for law enforcement, and while the contract fell through, the blueprints are confidential. But I don't need it right now, I just want to know if you can do it and what it costs."

Vee's eyebrows go up. "No blueprints? That's like denying a human their medical records and birth certificate ... wow." He shakes his head. "It's really hard to retrofit stuff without the original plans. It would take someone more skilled than me to ... basically do exploratory surgery, probably on your upper rear carapace. And, from a systems standpoint, I'm not sure what could be done for you about the ambient heat. Buildings here have air conditioning, but the condensers are a distance from the buildings so that the heat doesn't just radiate right back. I don't see a practical way to install an AC on your back that has the fins a meaningful distance from your body."

Time passes in the air conditioning. Vee goes back to cutting & bending. Just before sunset (it comes late this time of year), he desists. He comes back into the front room, bends down to open a mini-fridge you hadn't noticed before. "Beer?" he asks.

Outside the machine shop, a battered pickup with a crew cab and short bed whines to a halt. Moments later, the driver and passenger doors slam 1 - 2 as two people get out. They're both wearing greenish uniforms and big-brimmed hats. Pistols strapped to their hips. They approach the front room.

Like a vampire, the older man knocks on the glass door. Vee gestures for him to enter.

"Sheriff Dawkins," says the tight-lipped mouth beneath the bushy grey mustache. The face is hard and angular, the eyes... look like they've seen some dying. The man's thumbs rest lightly on his sturdy fabric gun belt. "Reckon you're the ones left me a message?"