Robert Heinlein: The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress

Sure, Mike had been taught English--but primarily to permit him to translate to and from English. I slowly got through skull that I was only human who bothered to visit with him.

Mind you, Mike had been awake a year--just how long I can't say, nor could he as he had no recollection of waking up; he had not been programmed to bank memory of such event. Do you remember own birth? Perhaps I noticed his self-awareness almost as soon as he did; self-awareness takes practice. I remember how startled I was first time he answered a question with something extra, not limited to input parameters; I had spent next hour tossing odd questions at him, to see if answers would be odd.

In an input of one hundred test questions he deviated from expected output twice; I came away only partly convinced and by time I was home was unconvinced. I mentioned it to nobody.

But inside a week I knew... and still spoke to nobody. Habit--that mind-own-business reflex runs deep. Well, not entirely habit. Can you visualize me making appointment at Authority's main office, then reporting: "Warden, hate to tell you but your number-one machine, HOLMES FOUR, has come alive"? I did visualize--and suppressed it.

So I minded own business and talked with Mike only with door locked and voder circuit suppressed for other locations. Mike learned fast; soon he sounded as human as anybody--no more eccentric than other Loonies. A weird mob, it's true.

I had assumed that others must have noticed change in Mike. On thinking over I realized that I had assumed too much. Everybody dealt with Mike every minute every day--his outputs, that is. But hardly anybody saw him. So-called computermen--programmers, really--of Authority's civil service stood watches in outer read-out room and never went in machines room unless telltales showed misfunction. Which happened no oftener than total eclipses. Oh, Warden had been known to bring vip earthworms to see machines--but rarely. Nor would he have spoken to Mike; Warden was political lawyer before exile, knew nothing about computers. 2075, you remember--Honorable former Federation Senator Mortimer Hobart. Mort the Wart.

I spent time then soothing Mike down and trying to make him happy, having figured out what troubled him--thing that makes puppies cry and causes people to suicide: loneliness. I don't know how long a year is to a machine who thinks a million times faster than I do. But must be too long.

"Mike," I said, just before leaving, "would you like to have somebody besides me to talk to?"

He was shrill again. "They're all stupid!"

"Insufficient data, Mike. Bring to zero and start over. Not all are stupid."

He answered quietly, "Correction entered. I would enjoy talking to a not-stupid."

"Let me think about it. Have to figure out excuse since this is off limits to any but authorized personnel."

"I could talk to a not-stupid by phone, Man."

"My word. So you could. Any programming location."

But Mike meant what he said--"by phone." No, he was not "on phone" even though he ran system--wouldn't do to let any Loonie within reach of a phone connect into boss computer and program it. But was no reason why Mike should not have top-secret number to talk to friends--namely me and any not-stupid I vouched for. All it took was to pick a number not in use and make one wired connection to his voder-vocoder; switching he could handle.

In Luna in 2075 phone numbers were punched in, not voicecoded, and numbers were Roman alphabet. Pay for it and have your firm name in ten letters--good advertising. Pay smaller bonus and get a spell sound, easy to remember. Pay minimum and you got arbitrary string of letters. But some sequences were never used. I asked Mike for such a null number. "It's a shame we can't list you as 'Mike.'"

"In service," he answered. "MIKESGRILL, Novy Leningrad. MIKEANDLIL, Luna City. MIKESSUITS, Tycho Under. MIKES--"

"Hold it! Nulls, please."

"Nulls are defined as any consonant followed by X, Y, or Z; any vowel followed by itself except E and 0; any--"

"Got it. Your signal is MYCROFT." In ten minutes, two of which I spent putting on number-three arm, Mike was wired into system, and milliseconds later he had done switching to let himself be signaled by MYCROFT-plus-XXX--and had blocked his circuit so that a nosy technician could not take it out.

I changed arms, picked up tools, and remembered to take those hundred Joe Millers in print-out. "Goodnight, Mike."

"Goodnight, Man. Thank you. Bolshoyeh thanks!"

I took Trans-Crisium tube to L-City but did not go home; Mike had asked about a meeting that night at 2100 in Stilyagi Hall. Mike monitored concerts, meetings, and so forth; someone had switched off by hand his pickups in Stilyagi Hall. I suppose he felt rebuffed.

I could guess why they had been switched off. Politics--turned out to be a protest meeting. What use it was to bar Mike from talk-talk I could not see, since was a cinch bet that Warden's stoolies would be in crowd. Not that any attempt to stop meeting was expected, or even to discipline undischarged transportees who chose to sound off. Wasn't necessary.

My Grandfather Stone claimed that Luna was only open prison in history. No bars, no guards, no rules---and no need for them. Back in early days, he said, before was clear that transportation was a life sentence, some lags tried to escape. By ship, of course--and, since a ship is mass-rated almost to a gram, that meant a ship's officer had to be bribed.

Some were bribed, they say. But were no escapes; man who takes bribe doesn't necessarily stay bribed. I recall seeing a man just after eliminated through East Lock; don't suppose a corpse eliminated in orbit looks prettier.

So wardens didn't fret about protest meetings. "Let 'em yap" was policy. Yapping had same significance as squeals of kittens in a box. Oh, some wardens listened and other wardens tried to suppress it but added up same either way--null program.

When Mort the Wart took office in 2068, he gave us a sermon about how things were going to be different "on" Luna in his administration--noise about "a mundane paradise wrought with our own strong hands" and "putting our shoulders to the wheel together, in a spirit of brotherhood" and "let past mistakes be forgotten as we turn our faces toward the bright, new dawn." I heard it in Mother Boor's Tucker Bag while inhaling Irish stew and a liter of her Aussie brew. I remember her comment: "He talks purty, don't he?"

Her comment was only result. Some petitions were submitted and Warden's bodyguards started carrying new type of gun; no other changes. After he had been here a while he quit making appearances even by video.

So I went to meeting merely because Mike was curious. When I checked my p-suit and kit at West Lock tube station, I took a test recorder and placed in my belt pouch, so that Mike would have a full account even if I fell asleep.

But almost didn't go in. I came up from level 7-A and started in through a side door and was stopped by a stilyagi--padded tights, codpiece and calves, torso shined and sprinkled with stardust. Not that I care how people dress; I was wearing tights myself (unpadded) and sometimes oil my upper body on social occasions.

But I don't use cosmetics and my hair was too thin to nick up in a scalp lock. This boy had scalp shaved on sides and his lock built up to fit a rooster and had topped it with a red cap with bulge in front.

A Liberty Cap--first I ever saw. I started to crowd past, he shoved arm across and pushed face at mine. "Your ticket!"

"Sorry," I said. "Didn't know. Where do I buy it?"

"You don't."

"Repeat," I said. "You faded."

"Nobody," he growled, "gets in without being vouched for. Who are you?"

"I am," I answered carefully, "Manuel Garcia O'Kelly, and old cobbers all know me. Who are you?"