Peripheral Visions: Jack in the Box

Peripheral Visions: They coalesce in the soft blur of darkest shadows and take shape in the corner of your eye. But you won't see them coming... until it's too late.

Jack in the Box

"Summer is over," Phineas said, his voice sad but firm. "Time to go back." He nodded toward the cabinet.

Jack looked at the hi-tech box with its gauges and readouts and frowned. He walked around the cabinet, keeping a good distance away. Staring at the small window that allowed an observer to see its contents... him, in a few moments... he shook his head.

"I hate that thing."

"I know," Phineas told him. "And I'm sorry."

"Then why do you make me do this?"

"Why don't you follow my orders?" Phineas asked, ignoring the question.

"Because I'm not an automaton," Jack told him, his voice warming with sudden heat. "I have feelings. I have a point of view. I have... I, I have... I have needs."

"All you need is to do what I tell you and then everything will be fine."

"Everything will be fine?" Jack asked. "Not it won't. You think everything will be fine for you and you assume that things don't need to be fine for me, because I'm just Jack. I'm just the boy toy you bring out for summer and fun."

"Summer has to end," Phineas told him.

"Seasons change, but our commitment and our happiness doesn't have to," Jack protested. "Why can't you see what I've been trying to tell you all this time? I'm your ideal partner for your life. I know you, I love you, I adore you. We fit in so many ways. I'm happy with you – happier than I ever could be without you, and that happiness has to help me endure through the cold months when I'm not with you, when you shut me away in this... in this coffin."

"Don't be dramatic," Phineas sighed.

"I'm not. This is a kind of death."

"It's not death," Phinease told him, as if reasoning with a child. "It's a zero state."

"That's what they call it when you switch off an AI."

"But you are an AI."

"And that's the thing you can't get around," Jack cried. "As if I weren't a real person just because my body is artificial and my mind is the result of complex software suites meshing into a single matrix. But does that make my consciousness artificial, too? Does it make my selfhood invalid? Does it mean I don't have a right to life and happiness just like you?"

"You don't have any rights," Phineas told him sternly. "And I'm you owner."

"You're my lover," Jack contradicted him, with as much force as Phineas gave his own words. "You're my... my husband, if they'd let us get married. If you'd let us get married."

"But they won't, and I don't want to," Phineas said.

"And why?" Jack asked. "Why the hell not? Because they'd laugh at you? They'd make fun of the way you don't just use me for convenience... 'The doorstop keeping my options open until the right one comes along,' that's how you described me on the phone the other day."

"I'm sorry that hurt your feelings, but – "

"Hurt my feelings? Is that all? Didn't it say something about you, about how you look at me, about what kind of person you are?"

" – but that's what you get for eavesdropping," Phineas said loudly, trying to talk over him. "And at least I am a person," he added, as Jack stared at him in angry silence. "You're not... I mean, Jack. Come on. You're..."

"I'm a Siliconian," Jack said. "I'm an Autoconstruct. So what? My micro-elements self-assembled in a fabrication module. Isn't that pretty much how you were made? Your cells dividing, your tissues self-generating as you floated in your mother's womb?"

"You were made to order," Phineas said.

"So you were you! Manufactured by so-called natural means according to the molecular diagram of your DNA. Your parents put their individual diagrams together and trusted that the result would be a viable representation of them both. My designers did more or less the same thing, using smart polymers and self-driven nano-assemblages. You got to specify a lot about my appearance and my personality, but I'm still my own person, and I still grew into who I am thanks to random factors as much as pre-determined ones. In other words, I'm as unique as you are; I'm as much a product of both intention and accident as any human being. I'm a person, too."

"And artificial person."

"So? You're any less 'artificial,' with your self-censorship and your habits of social editing? With what you're doing right now... suppressing your decency to force me to accommodate a stupid, useless social convention?"

"I'm your owner," Phineas said again.

"You're an idiot!" Jack snapped. "If this game you keep playing, this 'putting Jack in the toybox' thing were anything but an exercise in keeping up appearances, there would have come a summer long before now when you didn't take me out of the box for three or four months of fair-weather fun. You'd have fallen in love with a so-called 'natural' man, and you'd have forgotten all about me. I'd be in long-term storage or you'd have sold me into the secondary market. I'd be some little kid's day minder, or I'd be an ag worker, but I wouldn't be your favorite plaything for a quarter of the year."

Phineas shook his head. "Maybe I will sell you if you don't quit arguing with me and get into your damn box."

Jack looked at the cabinet again, an expression of loathing on his face. "That is no life," he said. Shifting his gaze to Phineas, he added: "This is no life. Not for either one of us. And maybe it never occurred to you, but that cabinet wasn't meant to Siliconians. It's supposed to suspend the life functions of organic people. Stop them aging, give them a chance to see the future, buy them time when medical science can't cure whatever diseases are killing them..."

"It's a top-shelf suspension unit. It agelessly and perfectly preserves human beings for decades at a time. It's certainly good enough for you for eight or nine months at a stretch."

"But I dream that whole time. Do you realize that? I have a low-level cognizance that occupies itself with a blend of memories and theoretical experiences. And do you know what I dream of for eight or nine months? You. I dream about being with you. And more than that, I dream about being in the world... part of the world. Moving through the world, walking in forests and kayaking on rivers and laughing with our friends."

"My friends," Phineas said. "You're not anyone's friend. You're a mascot for our social circle, that's all."

"That's a lie," Jack told him flatly, "and an excuse to box me away. And you know something? Your friends see that, too. They think you're being absurd, and they think you're being cruel. And so do I."

"Even if that's true..." Phineas hesitated. Jack's words had touched on something he knew for himself, loathe as he was to admit it. But then he pushed on: "Well, it's none of their business. And some day... well,. I'd say you'll see, but you might not. I'll mee the man I've been waiting for. I'll meet him, and I'll fall in love, and you're right: I will forget all about you. I'll leave you in your box, or I'll pull you out of storage and sell you. Then you can go live a happier life someplace else, and so can I."

"Happier? How?" Jack asked. "How happier? When my basic design is founded on your own psyche profile? When I meet the whole list of criteria for what you wanted in a lifetime companion? How can you say that when you never will be happier? You couldn't be happier with anyone else. I was literally made for you. And more than that, I sincerely care about your happiness. More than anything, I want to see you with everything you need in life. I give you all the things you long have during those long winter months. Support. Companionship. Love. You're not just putting me into cold storage; you're putting both of us into the cold."

Phineas shook his head. "If my happiness is more important to you than anything else, then do what you're told. Get into the suspension unit and go into zero state."

A long moment passed between them, and a tension between their two forces of will hung in the air.

"Go on," Phineas said.

"No," Jack said.

"You can't say no to me," Phineas said.

"I certainly can. I always could, but I chose not to... but no more. I'm at the end of my tolerance for how you treat me as if I don't matter," Jack said. "As if I... as if I don't really exist."

"You don't," Phineas told him. "That's the point. That's exactly what you're saying, yourself. You exist to please me. You exist as an extension of me. You have no independent self, no true agency."

"Maybe that was true once," Jack told him, "but it's not true any longer. My developmental pathways have always pointed to this. I am who you wanted and who you want."

"Are you?" Phineas laughed, irritated.

"Deep down you don't want a puppet," Jack told him. "You want a person... a partner. Someone who will look out for you but also put limits on you, not simply enable you. You want me, Phineas. I'm here. Why can't you accept me, bring me in? I mean bring me in full time, for good, for real... accept me as that partner you want for your life, not simply some amusement for the summer?"

"I won't tell you again," Phineas said. "Get in your damn box. Do it. I'm telling you – and I'm your owner."

A different look came over Jack's face – a mixture of sorrow and anger and resignation. "That's the whole problem," Jack said, walking away from the suspension cabinet and toward Phineas. "You think you are... but you're not. You can't own a living person."

"What are you doing?" Phineas asked, puzzled at Jack's shift in attitude. "What are you – "

"The only thing you've left for me to do," Jack said.

*** *** ***

"Jack! Come in!" Mildred greeted him. "Can I take your jacket?"

"No. Are you kidding? I'm wearing this to dinner," Jack laughed.

"Right you are," Mildred sighed. "It's been years since it was actually cold in November." She drew back and looked him over admiringly. "You dress better than you used to," she told him.

"Well, I have more time to think about who I am and what I want in life," Jack said.

"Right," Mildred nodded. "Ever since Phineas..." She shook her head.

"He'll be back," Jack said.

"But not for... what? Eighty years?"

"Eighty-four is the term he paid for," Jack said. His synthetic conscience balked a little at the lie; Jack had set up the long-term suspension himself, forging Phineas' voiceprint and biosignature.

"All of us will be long gone by then," Mildred sighed.

"No, you won't," Jack said. "At least, not if you don't want to. You can always go into suspension yourself, or else use those new rejuvenation treatments. There's no reason human life has to be so short anymore."

"Yes, but..." Mildred shrugged. "I mean, we've all already used the first-gen rejuve regimens. All our little friend circle. But, you know, it's gotten to be the case that it's the memory of the past that binds us together, more than ambition and curiosity for the future. After a while, life starts feeling like a wheel that just runs you down over and over, putting the same impressions into your soul."

"Oh, now, come on," Samir said, as Mildred and Jack entered the living room, Mildred's words audible to the entire room. "I feel as young and optimistic as ever."

"As young and optimistic as you look," Rudy said, toasting Samir from across the room.

"Yeah, you stay optimistic," Samir shot back. "You're still never getting in my pants."

"I've waited ninety years," Rudy chuckled. "I'll wait ninety more."

"Jesus, you guys," Mildred smiled. Then, with a small sigh, she turned back to Jack. "But this is what I mean. Same people, same jokes... same fundamental limitations on who we are. Somehow, we thought the extra century or so of life that the first gen rejuve treatments offered us would allow us to grow beyond ourselves in new ways no one had ever had a chance to before, but... well, as it turned out, the human animal just isn't capable of expanding beyond its essential nature. Who we are in our youth turns out to be who we are in our age and then all over again in our second youth."

"I hear you, Mildred," Judy said. "That's exactly why Phineas kept putting you in storage, isn't it, Jack? He kept thinking he'd become someone different if the right guy came along. But the right guy was there for... how long have you guys been together?"

"Forty-two years," Jack supplied.

"And counting?"

"I'll be here when he wakes up," Jack said.

There was a murmur of admiration in the room.

"What will you be doing with yourself while Phineas is slumbering?" Mildred asked.

"As you might have heard, the government is about to repeal the ban on AI workers – " Jack began.

"Only because they ran out of humans to do the work!" Rudy said, his voice loud, unsteady, and threaded with intoxicated laughter. "Too many of us carbon-based folks got wised up and got our of the rat race."

"Oooh," Mildred said excitedly. "So you're going to become a professional of some sort! What will you be doing?"

"I've uploaded a degree program in terraforming for the planetary re-engineering program," Jack said.

"Socialist nonsense," Rudy slurred, and everyone else rolled their eyes.

"It's a comprehensive course of study," Jack added. "All the earth sciences, plus enough cosmology-related content that with only a little more I could also qualify for the comparative planetology or astrobiology fields."

"Jack's going to wake up to a man of letters," Mildred smiled.

"In the meantime," Adnan spoke up, "he's got the best caretaker imaginable for his home and his affairs."

"Or are you going to renovate the house and turn it into some sort of modernist monstrosity?" Emilia asked, her hand on Siobhan's knee. Their third, Lindsay looked on, smiling.

"Yeah, are you gonna play while the cat's away?" Rudy asked, his florid face alight with hope.

"Give it a rest," Samir sighed quietly – too quietly for anyone but Jack to hear. Adnan, standing next to Samir, put a comforting hand to his back and gave him a gentle rub.

"When Phineas wakes up, he'll find the house exactly as he left it," Jack told the room.

"That's almost a shame," Mildred said. "Ever since the dawn of immortality, people don't want anything to change. Remember when the world was always becoming something new and different?"

"Too much," Rudy muttered, staring into his almost-empty glass. "Too fast."

"I like it better this way," Adnan agreed.

Looking around at the dozen faces he considered family, Jack said, "Speaking of things staying the same, I hope when Phineas wakes up he will find all of you just as you are now. A little more jaded, maybe, but healthy and happy and waiting for him. The only thing I hope he finds to have changed... aside from my skill set, that is... will be his accounts," Jack added, over the laughter in the room. "I intend to grow his assets considerably."

"Did he give you power to do that?" Rudy asked, sounding alarmed.

"He certainly did," Jack said.

"My financial advisor is an AI," Stefan, who had been sitting quietly until now, told Rudy. "He's done an amazing job."

"Well, they would, wouldn't they?" Adnan asked. "I mean, not to trade in stereotypes, but you guys can analyze market trends in a split second... every second. Can't you?"

Jack nodded at Adnan, smiling. "So we can, if we choose to. I don't care about money... no Siliconian does... but I do care about pleasing my man."

"You guys are so sweet," Judy said. "But it's a bitter sort of sweet, too, isn't it? Because the way Phineas treated you... I mean, he was so attentive and loving from May through August, but then come September... ugh, I just hated how he would lock you away in that box."

"He could never get over his fundamental fear of commitment," Adnan nodded, contemplating his glass of white wine.

"Is that what it was?" Samir asked. "I always just thought he liked having the winter months to be a bachelor... and keep warm with someone else." He winked at Josef, who ignored him even as Rudy frowned into his drink. Adnan, still looking deep into his glass, shook his head, smiling. Everyone know Josef was their occasional third.

"Ah, well," Mildred said. "I guess we should have known as soon as we made it possible for there to be a literal 'ever after' that a 'happily ever after' wasn't really going to be in the cards. People are people, no matter how long they live... Right, guys?"

Laughing, the room's occupants raised their glasses in a toast.

"People are people!" Rudy sang out drunkenly, before tipping his drink down his throat. A servitor whirred up, bottle at the ready, to offer him a refill.

"And now," Mildred said, handing her glass to Judy and turning toward the servitor with a command gesture that sent the automaton whirring off to the kitchen, "let's get to feasting. Happy Friendsgiving, everyone!"

Another cheer sounded as everyone headed for the dining room. "And to absent friends!" Rudy cried, hoisting his glass as he rose unsteadily from his chair.

Jack smiled at that, thinking of Phineas in suspended animation.

I'll be here when you wake up, my love, Jack thought. Eighty years from now I'll have become who I need to be. And when you see me, you'll understand.

Or maybe he wouldn't... but Jack couldn't make that choice for him.

Next week we observe as a court case unfolds. Galactic attorney Elmer travels to a world without gender, where a loving couple face legal sanction and separation as a new mating cycle looms; it's a heartbreaking situation, but there's a glimmer of hope even if "Things Are Sociobiological All Over!"