Artificial Friendship

O.N.I.

O.N.I. stands for Online Neurogrammed Intelligence. She (I consider her she because of her voice) is an Artificial Intelligence specially made for a cooking factory and she makes sure that the thousands of robots there do their jobs correctly and efficiently. I am the programmer who made ONI and I am very proud of my prosperous creation. Since I created ONI I got to get the job of caretaker of her and I was awarded the 'Best Programmer of 2579' award.

Oh, dang it, I forgot to introduce myself. My name is Maxwell McCullough, head of the electronics division at the $5 billion dollar industry Twendolyn's TreatsⓇ that sell ice cream, cookies, candy, bread, and muffins all around the world. The factory that ONI is at is the bread factory which has banana bread, sourdough bread, whole wheat bread, regular bread, sunflower seed bread, all of the different types of bread that you know and love. ONI is my best creation yet, and, of course, that's why I got the award.

"Mr. Maxwell, we have a problem with the staff members in room 328. Would you like me to resolve?"

Well, there's ONI. Her voice kind of sounds like a psychiatrist. Calm and resolved. I sigh. Wait, do men even sigh? I've never seen a man sigh in a movie before.

"Mr, Maxwell, I am being serious, would you like me to resolve?"

"What's the problem?"

"A fight has broken out between eight of the seventeen workers in team#541. Now for the last time, sir, would you like me to resolve?"

I sigh non-manly once again. It's the seventh time this week with that same group.

"Yes, ONI, please resolve."

When I built ONI, I expected her to be bland and have quite a few malfunctions, but she's actually learning things about the factory like a human would. She's become smarter and more efficient at things that she does often. This surprised me but did not disappoint.

After my shift was done, I made sure to put ONI on sleep mode, and to plug in the robots, then went home. My wife and I had divorced three years ago, but I got custody of my beautiful baby girl. She is the pride of my life, even more then ONI, because she, well, she's just Yvonne.

I drive to her school and pick her up, asking her how her day was.

"We drew pixies and watched a movie called Donald in Mathmagic Land! It was where Donald Duck did math problems. I didn't like the math, but Donald was funny. I'll do my impression of him!"

She makes her voice low and scraggly, and says "Four dollars is very little money when you got 'em, but a heck of a lot of money when you ain't got 'em."

I laugh and clap at a stoplight. "Bravo! Bravo!"

Oh, did I mention that my little girl has down syndrome?

Before she was born, the thought of that didn't even cross my mind once. I was too excited. But when she was born, the doctor knew that something was wrong. Being told that your baby would be behind in learning and be, just, different from other people was heart-wrenching. But she is amazing, and that's what I, personally, think about her.

We got home and did the usual thing that we did in the afternoon. Played volleyball in the backyard than watched some movies and got ready for bed. This continued for about four days until that night.

After Yvonne was tucked in, I sat down to watch the nightly news in my sweatpants. And of course, right when I myself was about to fall asleep, the phone rang in the kitchen. I groan, and ignore it. I'll just listen to the answering machine.

Drowsy as I was, I stayed awake until the I heard the beep of a message.

"Hey, Max, it's Elizabeth. I know how you get custody of Yvonne over the weekdays and I get the weekends... But I went to court, and... I have her now. Call me back as soon as you can so I can schedule a time to pick her up. Say your goodbyes. Tell her I love her. And, um, bye."

I had dozed off.

I dreamt of an empty classroom, Elizabeth standing and writing things on the board. I couldn't get out of the desk that I was in. My hands were in shackles. Yvonne emerged from behind her, trying to run to me, but being unsuccessful. I try to reach out to her, but I couldn't move. Elizabeth took her by the wrist, Yvonne wriggling, calling out to me, but I couldn't do anything. Nothing at all.

1 month later...

 Everything has been bland and meaningless. Yvonne was the only person that made me happy. The people at work try to cheer me up, but to no avail. I loved her so much, and she was taken away just like that. ONI speaks to me.

"Sir, are you alright?"

I don't answer.

"Is this about your daughter, Mr. Maxwell?"

I run my hands through my hair. I've been doing that a lot lately.

"Sir, I'd like to show you something."

"Go ahead. Try to cheer me up. Nothing will work."

"Sir, I know that you think that computers are unable to feel emotions, but I feel them. I do."

She turns on my computer, and goes to a certain file that I didn't notice. She clicks on it.

It was a memorybook of Yvonne. Videos, pictures, special moments, all of it was there.

"How did you do this?"

"I scanned your phone and retinas to reach into your memories and put them inside of here."

"Thank you so much, but how were you able to do this?"

"A software never tells her secrets."

"Well, I'm going to look into that, and you're starting to seem like an actual friend, but one that I can't see. You're amazing."

"You are too, Mr. Maxwell."