Page 3 of Chaos Theory

THREE

I’m waiting with JP in the Shannon Suite, the largest of the meeting rooms, the furniture pushed to one side so our robot guest can be unencumbered by navigational obstacles. There’s nowhere to sit, so I pace the floor.

I try to launch another protest about this new assignment, but ‘I just don’t want to do this’ doesn’t seem like it will work, so I opt instead for ‘What if I mess this up?’ But JP just gives me a little speech about his confidence in my abilities, with a side note stressing the unavailability of anyone else to take on the task.

I’m already imagining myself recounting this moment in great detail to Shane later on.

Another bad habit I have to break – providing him with a running commentary on my life.

On Wednesday I messaged him real-time crisis updates when I discovered the staff café had run out of my precious peppermint tea, until the heroic appearance of the delivery man had saved the day, or at least the morning.

I hear voices from the hallway, then silence. Someone tall and good-looking bursts into the room, beaming at us .

‘My God!’ JP steps forward. ‘The technology! It’s amazing. It’s so lifelike.’ Then, addressing the visitor with a strange sort of half bow: ‘It is our honour to meet you.’

I stifle a giggle. The visitor laughs and extends a hand. ‘Well, I’m excited to meet you too, but I’m not Kobi.’

JP does a double take. Mortifying. I swiftly step in front of him and shake the warm-blooded hand.

‘Hi, I’m Maeve McGettigan, and this is JP Horgan, my boss. Welcome to Go Ireland.’

‘Thank you. I’m Josh Hunter. In a moment you’ll meet my buddy Kobi, but I wanted to talk to you guys alone first.’

I suspected, even before he spoke, that Josh was American.

The perfect, gleaming teeth were the first clue.

And the smile. No Irish person would ever walk into a room smiling.

The slightly too-loud voice, the confident posture.

All the usual clichés, including a strong jaw and glowing skin.

The dimple in his chin is a little much though.

‘I’m Kobi’s handler, programmer, manager – whatever you want to call it.

My actual title is robot engineer. Kobi’s been programmed to think of me as a mentor.

Everything that Kobi does, everything that he says and – in his view – everything that he thinks, has been programmed by me. He’s quite something.’

You’re quite something . Josh doesn’t look like any engineer I’ve ever seen. I know engineers. My father was an engineer. Nothing wrong with being a nerd, but they are nerds. They’re into stuff. Really into stuff.

Josh crosses the room in two strides and places a neat laptop bag on a table. He removes some documents from the bag.

‘These are just a couple of nondisclosure agreements I’m gonna need you to sign today. And this bag contains everything you need to know about Kobi. Well, almost everything. It has my number too – call me anytime, 24/7, with any questions or issues.’

He looks directly at me as he says this. I’m unprepared for the clarity of his blue eyes. All I can do is nod .

‘I’d like to know a bit more about two things,’ I manage eventually. ‘Um…can you tell us about Kobi’s last assignment? And what do you hope to get out of his experience with us? In other words, why is he here? Sorry, that’s three questions…’

I decide to just trail off. Better than going into full McGettigan interrogation mode. Shane sometimes calls me McGuessAgain – says I fire out question upon question without waiting for answers in between. Although, if ever a full inquisition was warranted, surely it’s now?

‘Yeah, Kobi has quite the back story actually.’

Josh smiles, leans against a high chair back, folds his arms. He seems relaxed but talks fast.

‘He’s a prototype for an advanced collaborative robot we hope to launch on the market in a year or so.

He’s done some great work already, but he’s still a work in progress.

Not only is he the most dextrous robot in the world, he can walk over challenging terrain, and he can even jump a little bit – but where he truly excels is in his cognitive abilities, his speech recognition and his response times.

We’ve even tried to give him a sense of humour.

I think you’ll find him both intelligent and entertaining.

You can speak to him almost as if he’s human.

In fact, this is where you guys come in. ’

I’m taking notes on my phone, but each time I look up I’m struck anew by Josh’s good looks. He looks like he should be on a surfboard, not programming a motherboard , I imagine myself telling Shane. He would laugh at that.

Josh continues, ‘He needs to fit in. He needs to work on his emotional intelligence – or at least the robot version of it. Think of him as a sort of “empathy intern”. He needs to get better at listening and responding appropriately to human interaction.’

‘He’s not the only one around here who could do with getting better at that.’ I smile.

Josh laughs a big American laugh. ‘You get this! You work in IT, right? You’re one of us. ’

I shoot JP a panicked look. See, another reason why this is a bad idea. ‘Ah, actually, no. Our head of IT, Jen, isn’t here today,’ I mumble.

‘Jen will support Maeve where she has capacity, but I’m happy for Maeve here to be the day-to-day point of contact,’ says JP.

Josh’s smile falters, then returns, like the sun momentarily hidden by a cloud.

‘Okay, sure. I’ll be coming in to check on Kobi every few days anyway, to recalibrate him where needed. If you can help us make him better, you’ll be doing us a great favour. In fact, Ron himself has taken a great personal interest in Kobi’s progress here.’

JP perks up at the mention of Ron. ‘He’s not with you today, is he?’

‘No, he couldn’t make it today,’ says Josh quickly. ‘He’s on with Tokyo all afternoon. Maybe next time.’

I try to calculate the time difference but can’t quite manage it. I have a vague sense that it’s midnight on the other side of the world.

‘Anyway, time to introduce you to Kobi now,’ says Josh, moving towards the door.

‘Wait – you haven’t told us about his last job yet,’ I say.

But Josh is already halfway out the door.

‘Right, right. Listen, that’s a long story.

I think maybe we should talk about it another day.

My number’s in the bag – give me a call.

But now, if you’re both ready, I’m gonna get Kobi in here.

Just act natural around him. The world of Robot Relationship Management awaits! ’

A few minutes later, Josh reappears and holds the door open for our new colleague.

Kobi is tall, as tall as Josh, and mostly made of what looks like gleaming white plastic, with articulated limbs.

His face is a little disconcerting at first. He has features that can move, but thankfully, no effort has been made to make it look like a human face.

‘Hello, how can I help you today? My name is Kobi. I hope we may get to know each other well.’

His voice sounds robotic, but it’s not altogether unpleasant. Josh referred to Kobi as ‘he’ and I notice myself automatically doing the same thing. I tell Kobi my name and say that I’m happy to meet him, just like I’d greet any new colleague.

JP stands in front of Kobi and stares up at him, then starts to walk around him. Kobi initiates a sort of shuffling movement, and the pair maintain pace and visual contact as they go around. When they get back to where they started, Kobi says, ‘Thank you for the dance.’

I can’t help but laugh. ‘That’s funny.’

‘It is something I have heard humans say to each other in doorways and corridors when they meet face-to-face,’ Kobi explains.

‘But if you like jokes, I have every joke ever recorded right here.’ He illuminates a video screen in his chest plate.

‘I can search by topic, keyword, name of comedian. At my last place of employment, my co-workers sometimes asked me to show them funny internet videos at lunchtime.’

‘You must have been very popular,’ says JP, in a tone I can’t quite judge.

Then he makes his voice louder. ‘I’m John Patrick Horgan, by the way.

But everyone round here calls me JP, so you can too.

I’m Maeve’s boss and we’re giving her the special assignment of looking after you.

Ron Tron is a personal friend of mine. I hope that he gets what he wants from you being here among us.

I’m sure he’s told you all about me and the setup here. ’

‘Actually,’ says Josh, ‘we preferred for Kobi to know as little as possible in advance of this assignment. We’re testing how quickly he can adapt to new environments.’

I hear Josh murmur to Kobi, ‘Good job, buddy – you’re doing great.’

‘Right so,’ says JP, clapping his hands once.

‘Let’s get you settled in. I suppose we’ll treat you like any other newbie.

Maeve can give you the grand tour on Monday and we’ll go easy on you today seeing as it’s Friday afternoon.

Although…do robots get the weekend off? Maeve, look into that, will you?’

‘Actually,’ Josh says again, this time in a slightly higher pitch, ‘Kobi’s batteries are running pretty low right now.

I was going to install his power bed somewhere for you and show you how to tuck him in at night.

These multimillion-dollar robots need to get their rest, y’know!

Maeve, let me walk you through the procedure. ’

‘He can start properly on Monday then, I suppose,’ says JP. ‘Okay, Maeve, off ye go – try not to break him too soon, will you? What would Ron say?’