Liang was surprised to see a young boy, about Ken's age, but undeniably human. At least that's how he looked; four-feet and five inches tall, tousled blond hair, and blue eyes. He wasn't wearing much, just a pair of dark blue boxer-briefs. He was lean, and extremely athletic looking, with fairly toned looking young muscles showing across his body, even a slight four-pack showed as he breathed. But there was something strange about him, Liang couldn't figure out what. The boy seemed to have a great complexion, almost too perfect. There wasn't a single blemish, birth mark or mole on him. And his breathing, it didn't seem right. The boy's face was also strangely emotionless and he just stared at the two of them blankly. "Who is this kid?" Deanna asked "I've never seen him before."
"I've never seen him before either," Liang replied. "Um... who are you kid?"
"I am the Model-SC synthetic human child. I am named Dimitry," the boy responded emotionlessly, and in a robotic tone, "What are your names young humans?"
"He's a robot?" Liang asked.
"That is the correct colloquial term."
"Oh there you are," said a female voice as a woman in her middle thirties came rushing into view, her short blond hair looking rather frazzled and wearing a labcoat over her nightgown. She was slim, and healthy, but not really athletic.
Liang knew who this was; Joyce Albrecht, the only woman on the ship who didn't have children, and also a very talented engineer and roboticist. Almost immediately Liang made the connection, but he still couldn't believe it. "Mrs. Albrecht..." he began.
"Oh hell Liang, Deanna, did my son wake you up?" Joyce asked.
"Your son? What do you mean? I thought you couldn't have kids," Deanna said.
"She can't. He's a robot son, she made him," Liang explained in awe.
"Right as usual Liang," Joyce exclaimed excitedly, "Well, almost; just like any child Dimitry is a joint project. Xavier and I worked together on creating him. I did most of the hardware, while he developed the artificial intelligence. I wanted to wait a little before introducing him to everyone. We only just activated him a couple days ago and we were teaching him how to walk, but I guess he just walked off."
"He looks so... real," Liang muttered, "Why didn't you activate him with the knowledge already present?"
"We didn't want to overload him, and to fully utilize the new form of AI that my husband created. Dimitry's AI is designed to allow him to learn from every experience in the same fashion as a human, and develop emotions and use reasoning without the restriction of programming codes. He truly is an artificial human. Go on Dimitry, say hi."
"Hello Liang and Deanna, it is very pleasant to meet you," Dimitry said, offering his hand.
Liang shook his hand, and was surprised to find that, while Dimitry definitely had a strong and firm grip, he still shook his hand in a natural, human way. Deanna looked surprised too when he shook her hand, though she was looking... not quite as chipper as she had before. "Incredible craftsmanship," Liang said, "He still seems very robotic though."
"As I said he was only very recently activated. And in the same way humans begin life very emotionally driven and impulsive and become more logical and reasoning as they grow, so too does Dimitry, a robot, begin life very logical and emotionless, and gains emotion as he grows. Believe me he's already made significant progress; he didn't see any purpose to shaking hands when he first activated, now he does it without being prompted. And we only just got him to pretend to breathe too, just to help him seem less unnatural."
"Mother, I believe we should allow Liang and Deanna to return to sleep mode," Dimitry said, and Liang caught a look of delight on Joyce's face.
"Yes, yes you're right. Start heading for home, I'll catch up in a minute," Joyce replied, at which Dimitry turned and walked away, still looking a little stiff. "So what do you think?"
"He's amazing," Liang said, always willing to admire the latest technology, and Dimitry went above and beyond anything he'd ever seen. "He still seems off, but I've never seen such a human-like robot."
"Yeah..." Deanna said, "We should get back to bed."
"Okay, I'll see you tomorrow. Please keep this a secret for a couple more days okay?" Joyce asked, "I really want this to be a surprise."
"Sure thing Mrs. Albrecht," Liang said, and with that Joyce ran off after her son while Liang and Deanna head back towards their homes. "So what do you think D?"
"I'm not sure what I think," Deanna replied, "It's so... weird. He's a robot, I know it's normal for creators to get attached to their creations, but doesn't that seem obsessive?"
"He was made to be a son, he's a kid like the rest of us."
"He's not like the rest of us. He's a mechanical weirdo."
"Don't tell me you're actually going to discriminate against him just because he's a robot."
"It's not discrimination, it's true... look I'm too tired to talk about this, if you want to argue about it then let's sleep first," Deanna said, and with that she opened the door to her family's quarters and vanished inside. Liang walked a short distance further and went inside his own home and eventually back to bed. He couldn't help but be excited by what Dimitry could do, but eventually he was able to let sleep claim him.
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