Page 28 of Smart Ass

Ben

Ben knocked on Evan’s hospital room door, then poked his head in just as a nurse bot was heading out. He could see another one still in the room, fussing over equipment and setting things up.

“Ben!” Evan grinned, but up close, he looked pale, his muscles tight with pain. He had a square bandage taped to his forehead, more gauze on one hand, and he was lying lax against the hospital bed.

Ben was relieved beyond measure to see him. Evan smelled all antiseptic-y and not like Evan at all, but at least Ben could check with his own eyes that he was alright.

“Hey, Evan. How’s it hanging?”

That got him a lopsided smile. “Could be better. Have you… They haven’t told me anything about Quincy.”

Ben could see the fear etched across Evan’s face.

At least this he could do something about. “Quincy’s okay. The police are holding him for questioning, but he’s talking and stuff. They took off the control mod.”

Evan smiled, and then started crying. Silently, with tears streaking down his cheeks, his lips still tilted up in joy.

Shit. Ben was not the best at these situations.

But Evan had been there for Ben when he’d cried in the equipment shed in sixth grade when the older boys had bullied him. And Evan had been there when Ben lost his grandmother two years ago, quietly standing by his side when none of his other family showed up.

So he could man the fuck up now and let Evan cry. He even patted Evan’s shoulder and gave him some little rubs, because he knew Evan liked it.

Ben wasn’t a touchy-feely sort of person, but Evan was, so he made exceptions. If Evan were feeling better, Ben would even let Evan wrangle him into a cuddle.

For Evan’s sake. Ben just, like, tolerated that stuff because of Evan.

Though it would be kind of nice right now.

Like, actually really nice.

He kind of squeezed Evan an extra time, just to feel how healthy and solid he was.

“Quincy’s okay,” Ben repeated. “I’ll know as soon as he’s ready to go, and pick him up and bring him here. And I’m gonna get him some good parts. Better than before.”

Evan nodded, eyes still sparkling with tears. “Thank you, Ben.”

Ben shrugged. Of course he was going to do all that stuff. It wasn’t like he needed to be thanked for it.

Fortunately, Ben didn’t need to answer because the nurse bot was ready to check Evan’s vitals. Ben stepped back while it went through a spiel about how to use the call bell and the lights and other shit that was obvious from the icons on the remote thingy.

Ben tuned it all out. Now that he was here and Evan was okay, his thoughts kept drifting back to Max, and how he could determine whether he was a spark.

There were 7 E’s required to be licensed as a SPARK, and Ben looked them up on his phone since he hadn’t studied this shit since college: emotions, existential questions, ethics, engagement, experiences, explanations, and empathy. Could he isolate each one and design a test for it?

Looked like… no. They didn’t work like that. Engagement, experiences, and explanations were all clustered together. A spark would be able to take the initiative to engage in their own activities, and filter their experiences through their own lens to give explanations. But you know what was also good at that shit? AIs. They could explain away anything, or go off on little side projects after a misunderstood command.

Was it more human, or more machine, that Max didn’t know why he’d been monitoring Ben’s heart rate? Were those hot and cold moments emotions or glitches?

Where did AI end and sentience begin?

If Ben went in all, Hey Max, been thinking about the meaning of life lately?, an AI could generate all sorts of rational-sounding but bizarre responses.

And what about emotions? That seemed like the biggest one. But Ben didn’t really want to start with, Hey Max, you’re kind of my best friend after Evan, and your voice gives me dirty thoughts because I’m kind of a perv and I programmed it that way. Wanna be my best friend and we can have tea parties together and talk about our feelings?

Ugh. This was why Ben liked engineering. You could design stuff and control it. You could isolate individual variables and test them separately. No messy thoughts and emotions all tangled together.

No pathetically wondering whether Max thought about him as much as he thought about the silly computer.