Endless flashes, the sea of eagar sensors

"Hmm."

"Well....."

"I thin-"

More flashes, endless assault, Isowel's instincts began to pipe up, and he rarely failed to follow this kind of dictate.

'Tell them something absolutely insane and they'll stop bothering you', said the instinct.

"Drugs in the future are going to be fucking insane." said Isowel.

This is not a good sentence to say to a room of reporters after being asked "So what does the future hold for AI employment in a post-war world?", it's equally not good to have the audience plant asking that question visibly recoil in a mix of pity and horror.

Dr Maffen was not a real doctor, but an MsC was basically the same, and just because the races of the galaxy can travel light years in minutes, that hasn't made credentialism any less of a plague, so he wore the title like he wore his clothes, too large for him.

Isowel Maffen, MsC was currently, alongside every whirring computerman in that room experiencing one of the unviersal laws between any two communicating peoples, that if one person says something incredibly embarrassing, the breath will come.

Isowel Maffen generally didn't do much communicating, but even he recognized the breath, it's just that to him, it was the exact moment between typing 'commit;' and realising that he had just wiped 4 petrabytes detailing the exact tactical calculations made by Unit #46876, and that he was now in very, very, very deep shit. Optionally following the breath is one or both parties muttering the phrase "Shit" and feeling the desperate need for the sweet siren song of instant death.

Isowel Maffen would lose his job after this, having made a bit of a scandal for, in HR speak, "making a slight stumble after a mentally taxing experience" and in the language of people capable of thought, royally fucking up and getting hundreds of sensors and eyeballs staring directly at his company in what was supposed to be the post-war feast of graft and ungodly sums of money.

He heard shuttering, the constant click and a hundred quick beeps capturing his post-breath face, then a horde of questions which he would eventually associate with the person who asked, and their publication, a few stuck out for the action replay he'd repeat in his mind at least once every three days:

"Sir, digital people demand; what is in their future?" - Unit 653IE4 'Py', Information Collecting Center 14

"Dr Maffen, why exactly have you been sent to deliver this information?" - Karzak Trik, Karzak's Real Truth News

then one that killed the tiny little organism remaining in his brain named 'pride':

"Is this a joke?" - Terrence Mark, The Galactic Enquirer.

Isowel Maffen didn't know he was about to make history, honestly, he didn't, and he didn't know that by making this history, he was about to go from an example of biology to an example of what a great deal of vindictively applied physics does to an example of biology.

He was just hungover, and returning a favour to a semi-friend(?) (which was exactly how Isowel catalogued him in his head).

'Keep telling them utterly insane things, it's worked everytime before, why wouldn't it work now?' said the instinct.

"Excuse me, Unit 653IE4?" said Isowel.

Camerea's turned, to face the faceless, pyramid shaped droid, more flashes, and one of history's great pictures was taken, the small Unit 653IE4, asking a question that, prior to the automation war, seen him scrapped, out of the pirannaha like flashes, the one that would be immortalized framed the droid as tiny, a picture taken of his hind, made smaller by the imposing lectern the slightly dishevelled Isowel stood behind, almost domineeringly.

'Remember, utterly insane, we're a federal agent, go on, try it.' said the instinct.

"Well, firstly, i'd like to say that as a representative for Rec&Res, who as i'm sure we're all aware has a very close relation to the Council, that i'd like to put an end to all these rumours around mass deactivation.

More flashes, even more flashes, blinding light.

The room again erupted in voices, tinged with every emotion and lack of emotion, Isowel continued to look onto Unit 653IE4's chassis, he remembered it, he'd worked on that same chassis, it was one of his first forays into robotics, a lifeboat in a sea of unfamiliarity.

'Why isn't this working??' said the Instinct, slightly more panicked.

"I think it's all ok." said Isowell out loud, to a further eruption of anger, by now, more reporters filed into the room, the Federation had been quiet all week, and the prospect of any communication, even from someone like this was worth the risk.

A long way away, office workers ran terrified, they didn't intend to give any comms out on the issue, the solution was indeed mass de-activation, but it was supposed to be quiet, the office was anything but.

"I would like to speak with Unit 653IE4, if i may." Isowel said to the crowd, who stunningly obeyed.

The Pyramid rallied his small speaker.

"Does the federation expect AI rights groups to de-militarize? What exactly are the terms that were reached with the Grand Comptroller, and please, where are they being held?"

The factual answers to these questions were "Yes, in fact, we at the council fully expect you to die" and, "The Grand Comptroller was infected and their memory banks are on course towards a star, there were no terms, there will be no terms, we order you to die."

Isowel answered "No, no they do not, the Council and Federation as a whole are under no delusions about the scrutiny both sides will be bringing to these negociations, and i'm afraid i cannot speak on the issue of the Grand Comptroller."

Again, Isowel didn't know that by the time he had fotten to "Negotiations" he had both prevented the genocide of an entire substrate of intelligent thought and signed his own death warrant, he genuinely had no idea what had happened to the Grand Comptroller.

On the distant planet of Yoloop, screens were lit with this footage, deep in the holdouts of Theater #354 Sub-Theater #12 A, information processing units analysed and disseminated the news.

On the Council Space Station, Calls were being made to the First Line research center on their latest torture methods, Isowel Maffen would pay, the President sat as he often did, as though he was vaguely annoyed at all sentient life bar himself, just another plan pushed slightly off kilter, but it wouldn't matter.

"Is that all, Unit 653IE4? I hope i have been of assistance." It's at this point, worth it to note how Isowel spoke, he was an incredibly isolated person, and had a great affinity for machines, this hadn't changed with the automation wars, and the tone he asked this question with was that of a man to his equal, he had a small, genuine smile as he asked this, the crowd had seemingly warmed, or at least the most machine sympathetic organics had.

Silence again, and again, the eyes of history watched.

"I fought in Theater 300#, Sub-Theater 5, At this time, personalised call signs were often used in inter-unit communication, mine was 'Py', please feel free to use it, i believe this is analagous to your concept of a 'nickname', shared as a sign of goodwill and friendship."

Isowell was delighted by this, they really had grown up, his dreams of befriending his machine were real.

In his head, he repeated an old line he remembered on communication protocols, 'request and recieve, forever, until there is nothing more left to say.'

"Py, i used to work on a chassis similar to yours, i believe you have a retracatable limb?, I would enjoy it if i could shake yours, as a further statement of goodwill."

Request Sent

Py's small wheels whirred forward, and he extended a bsaic claw limb out, and stated "That would be agreeable."

Request Acknowledged

Isowel took the claw into his hand, and again, another picture found it's way permanently etched into history.

Nothing left to say.

29 - Isowel Maffen.