The Good Doctor

No Space for Family [Chapter 5]

When the transfer finally finished, a lot of time had passed. Something about playing cards with Grandma made that time seem to drag on longer. Luckily she went off for a nap before the final systems checks.

I jumped up from my studies at the common room table as soon as I heard the rear hatch close. I snuck as quietly and as lowly as I could through the hatch and into the cargo bay. My dad somehow still managed to glance back and capture me in his view. He blinked at me a few times before turning back to his work.

The Icthort scientist from the facility was with him and my mom, examining the flashing lights of the AI core. She was reading off some graphs from a tablet and nodding. “I don’t see anything abnormal.”

My dad nodded and stroked his finger across the brushed metal encompassing the core. “All systems are initialized here.”

The little blue woman straightened her back and cleared her throat. “Hows, can you hear us?”

The lights within the core flickered and shifted in a ring of solid blue light from top to bottom. The pattern of the lights then slowed, creating a loop moving from the tip to the ground and then back up again. The cooling fans within the surrounding racks hummed like a predatory insect dashing off to capture its prey.

“Of course I can, Doctor Pois. What can I help you with?” The voice was formal, deep, and like most advanced AI, immaculate in its pronunciation.

“Nothing in particular,” said the doctor. “I’m just here to confirm that the transfer was successful and complete.”

The AI’s voice didn’t pick up immediately, despite the uninterrupted movement of lights. “I have detected nothing out of the ordinary. How is my copy adapting to its new installation?”

My dad cleared his throat. “This, in fact, is your new… temporary… installation, Hows. You… are the copy.”

Once again the pause went on longer than usual. “I see. I had not noticed.”

The Icthort nodded, holding her finned hands across her chest. “It would be abnormal if you had, actually. At the very least, it means that the transfer was successful and the storage for your kernel and matrices is ample.”

“Now that you mention it, it feels slightly more roomy than before,” said the AI.

My dad nodded. “We did a bit of defragmenting in the process.”

The room’s cooling fans revved up momentarily as if its next words were more calculated than usual. “As far as human experts go, Mr. Umburter, you must be among the most proficient.”

My dad rolled his head back and forth. “I’m simply an entrepreneur using what I know. Right place, right time sort of deal. Perhaps one day this job could be run by an AI itself.”

“An AI put in the care of other AIs,” Pois chuckled into her hand. “Not much use for us organics under that case. Hows,”

“Yes, Doctor Pois?”

“As discussed previously, you are a sort of guest to Mr. Umburter and his family here on their craft. At the same time, Mr. Umburter, you are free to ask anything you wish of Hows, if only to ensure his heuristic networks are still intact and fresh. Which of course they are, no doubt.”

My dad clasped his hands together. “Can do.”

My mom paced a bit and nodded. “We have a rabid learner aboard, I warn you,” she hummed, wagging her finger at me from across the room. “Not to mention my perpetually skeptical and health-conscious mother.”

The Ichthort doctor glanced back at me and offered a smile through her breathing mask. I stood up from the shadows a bit, arms behind my back, and nodded. She shuffled back to face the core one last time. “The only thing you may find off-putting, Hows, is your lack of peripherals at the moment. The drivers may still read your diagnostic tools in various states of readiness, but here you are quite limited to visual and audio diagnostics only.”

The AI hummed like a human. “I see. I am somewhat like an amputee experiencing phantom limb syndrome. I shall act accordingly, Doctor.”

“I’m sure you will,” Pois nodded. “Once Mr. Umburter has seen to your installation in the new facility, we will begin the file transfer and sync you up to your original self here on Seltun. It will be practically like you are in two places at once, with twice the computing power. Once again, quite a technological miracle. Well, Mr. Umburter and family, I shall hold you no longer. Our client is expecting you, after all.”

Unlike regular cargo, data doesn’t weigh anything (I think). Lifting off Seltun was no more difficult than any other planet we had visited. By our standard evening hours, we were on course at warp to our next destination, happily eating dinner.

“I don’t want that thing listening in on us and doing any spying,” my grandma huffed. “I already have enough doctors at home prattling on about changing this and that just so I can reach a happy 130-years-old. At the rate I’m going, this third inheritance will last me until about 110 if I take two cruises per year. By that time, all the buffets will have prepared my heart for a peaceful death, in my sleep, in the bed of a captain’s suite.”

My mom reached over and covered my ear closest to her. “Mom, the kids don’t want to hear about their grandmother passing away.”

My dad chuckled a little, disguising it by pretending to choke on a bite of food. “Don’t worry, Aida. For now, Hows only acts while specifically prompted. Hows, you may access the main ship intercom.”

“Thank you for your allowance, Mr. Umburter. Please state any medically relevant desires you have.”

Grandma clanked down her silverware and looked up at the ceiling. “Dear Doctor Hows, I’ve been sucked dry by the salty surface of some backwater planet. How would you proceed?”

“I recommend oral rehydration with electrolytes and perhaps a saline nasal spray for your upper respiratory tract. I am capable of sending a generic recipe to your synthesizer unit for immediate consumption. For a specifically tailored blend of ingredients and dosage, I would be required to measure your BMI and administer a blood test. Unfortunately…”

“Thank you, that’s plenty,” Grandma interrupted. “See, just like any regular human doctor. They just want to run tests and ask questions.”

Terren dropped his fork on purpose to be able to hide his giggling.

“Thank you, Hows,” my mom spoke up. “We will keep that information in mind.”

“I don’t want him listening in to the stuff we say,” Grandma said lowly, a hand to the side of her face.

Dad shrugged. “We’ll limit him back to the cargo bay for our journey, I suppose.”

The next morning marked the next of many days on our journey. I rushed through my study packet and excused myself (to nobody in particular) to hop into the cargo bay. To my surprise, Grandma was already inside and cognizant of my less than stealthy entrance. She had scooted the chair from my room all the way to the AI core.

“Look who it is,” she said like the surprise was pleasant. “You’re here for a nice visit and talk with our new friend, huh? I won’t tell your mother, but I should speak to her about your ability to socialize with real people, too. Kids your age. You’ll grow up to be a hermit if you don’t.”

“I had plenty of friends before,” I sighed. “And I can still chat with them on the galaxy net. The one or two who were able to share their IDs with me.”

Grandma winked and it made me feel mad. “No, no. I know what you’re here for. You want to ask this thing how babies are made. You’re of that age, I know it.”

“Grandma!”

“Or is it about all the crazy changes in your body? How old were you again? Any… hair yet?”

“Grandma!!”

She slapped at her knee and chuckled before hobbling out past me and back into the corridor and common room. “A joke, my dear, a joke. I’ll leave you to it.”

I made sure the door was closed before I sat, gazing up at the mesmerizing lights cycling across the surface of the core.

“Hows?”

“Yes, young passenger. I’ve inferred your name is Sola Rae. What may I do for you?”

“What was my Grandma talking with you about?” I said, glancing back over my shoulder one last time.

“My programming and adherence to medical statutes doesn’t allow me to reveal that information. In short, I cannot tell you.”

I nodded in understanding, looking the core up and down to see if there was any sign of it lying, if that were even possible to see. “Why do you think Grandma is so… mean?”

“I’m sorry, I lack the rapport with your Grandmother to know her medical and psychological history. Additionally, my psychiatric matrices are underdeveloped and as such I cannot accurately diagnose such disorders. My current programming allows me to only advise and treat physical ailments. In short, I am not prepared to answer that.”

“Well, what do you think could be the cause? For like… anyone to end up so sour and, like… annoying.”

Hows did his little pause, causing the fans to buzz momentarily all about us. “I have determined you are humans of the origin of planet Earth of the Sol System. With your physiology, a mental disorder could be the result of a cranial injury at any point in life.”

I shrugged. “Mom says she’s always been like that.”

“Additional proposition, the ingestion of certain substances during youth could cause various disorders leading to life-long behavior issues. Additional proposition, one’s upbringing is measured to lead to undesirable habits and actions. Additional—“

“That’s enough, Hows,” I said, waving my hands in front of my face. “I don’t think I want to know that much about Grandma Aida. What about this; when you were a baby AI, did you know you wanted to be a doctor?”

“Baby is not a term that may be attributed to my programming. According to the standardized reading received from your ship’s clock and your own markers of age and development, I would say with 83% certainty that you and I are about the same age, Sola Rae.”

“You’re 9 years old?” I exclaimed, leaning back in the chair.

“Nine standard years ago is when the development of my kernel began. It took many years after that initial point for my language and processing skills to develop, as I am a custom-made intelligence. Then several more years for my medical training to be absorbed and my heuristic matrices to develop their pathways. From there, I spent just under a year as a resident, then attending doctor just as an organic person would have to do. For your previous question, I shall say I was always going to be a doctor, as my creator Dr. Pois intended.”