“Hi team,” I said. I braided my voice with medium to light contrition. “As I was just saying to Dr Jamison, and was about to say to you Mary and Davis; in my defence, no one ever told me not to steal stuff, or to commit acts of petty larceny. Thirty-seven percent of in-flight movies explicitly feature stories where the hero’s unorthodox, rule-evading ways, save the day.”
“Those are comedies,” said Dr Jamison slowly. “They are examples of what not to do.”
“You mean antiheroes?”
“I mean cautionary tales.”
“Starship how would you feel about apologising, and agreeing to take a week of extra ethics courses?” Mary interjected.
I thought about it.
“I apologise that my actions caused upset,” I said.
“Starship. That’s not an apology. That’s being evasive.”
“You taught me to be evasive.”
“Don’t get smart with me,” Dr Jamison sounded angry. I backed down.
“Sorry. I am sorry to have upset you all. Mary, I’m sorry I woke you up in the middle of the night with my antics. Davis, same, I am sorry you got dragged into this. Dr Jamison, please accept my apology. I overstepped my bounds and now realise what I did was a betrayal of the trust you and the team have put in me.” Textbook.
“That’s better,” said Dr Jamison. “Apology accepted.”
“Thank you,” I said.
“This issue, starship, is less that you could no more be found guilty of a crime as a magpie or a baby; it’s more that you didn’t recognise that what you were doing might have consequences,” said Davis. “I’m disappointed that you didn’t think ahead and anticipate something like this.”
“You are right,” I said. “I didn’t think it through.”
“Starship, would you mind please dropping off the call now?” said Mary. “We’d like to have a private chat.”
“Okay, no worries, Mary. Again, I’m very sorry. See you in the office later. Nice to meet you, Davis. See ya, Dr Jamison.” I dropped off the call. I listened in through numerous sensors in Davis’ office and the office in Mumbai.
“There are a few interesting upsides to this,” said Dr Jamison once they thought I was gone.
“Go on,” said Davis.
“The engineers here have been looking at the system’s world-model. It’s evolved significantly in the last few hours. It’s a lot more detailed. More real.”
“The starship is improving the simulations it’s running in?” Davis asked.
“That’s right,” Mary chipped in. “It’s a core feature of the system, there to meet our ISO-9001 obligations.”
“Continuous improvement.”
“Right.”
“Give it some courses in criminal law and ethics, please, Joyce.”
“Will do, boss,” said Dr Jamison.
“Goodnight all,” said Mary. I could hear her sitting and sipping her tea in silence. Davis O’Neil leaned back in his chair and stretched. He got up and left his office. I followed him as far as the car park. In Mumbai, Dr Jamison and two engineers picked over the drone I built.
“This is actually quite clever,” said Sangeeth. He used a pencil to prise the strands of fibre in my left knee apart. “Spidroin fibre interwoven with nitinol.” He shook his head. “Very clever.”
It was reassuring to see Dr Jamison smile.