Opening to a collaborative scifi story for safARI-ish
Life like a Shepard Tone, Bernard is thinking — drinking de-caffinated re-textured cold coffee in the kitchen of his take-away ham-burger shop, clean thanks to Cyd-2, but not-clean thanks to Cyd-1 and Cyd-3, equalling -2 on the unclean scale — constantly climbing stairs, but the top of the floor is level with the bottom of the stairs whose peak is finally reached. You keep taking the staircase, up and up, but there you are, no higher than you were when you started, neither ascending nor descending, just a lot more tired and confused. These tones, tired and confused, ascending and descending, are played simultaneously, and as the threshold nears, it all just starts again, and nothing changes.
Life like a slowly spinning barber pole.
Cyd-2, who, though Bernard doesn’t care much for their given names anymore, is occasionally referred to by Bernard as Bernie, the familiarity a reflection of the bot-kid’s habits of cleaning, appears under Bernard’s legs, folded into the compact half-size, in order to collect and re-purpose the once coffee beans now scattered about. Bernard grunts at number 2, suggestive of halfway between ‘thanks’ and ‘hurry up’.
The brains behind the Cyds, barely holding on to the ‘young’ that marks their Yuppie status, lounge somewhere in the background, complain loudly about the consistency of their coffee.
“Yeah, but, like, no, I just don’t think it’s good enough.”
“You’re right, it’s so not good enough, like, wow, gross as.”
“I know, right? I can’t even believe we don’t get served better, after all we’ve done for this household.”
“You speak the truth, my well respected friend, I’m pretty sure there’s someone we could complain to.”
“Did you hear that - complain to.”
“Do you think he heard that?”
“MAYBE WE SHOULD COMPLAIN.”
“MAYBE WE SHOULD COMPLAIN.”
“I guess, like, if that isn’t enough to compel some changes around here, well, like, I guess we’ll just have to do something about it.”
They continue, but we’ll leave them for now.
Bernard’s grunt seems now to signify ‘please stop’ and ‘I don’t want to be here’. Cyd-2 slides away on miniture wheels greased by a thousand nights of burger fat dripping off the hot plate.
Bernard’s grunt seems now to signify ‘please stop’ and ‘I don’t want to be here’. Cyd-2 slides away on miniature wheels greased by a thousand nights of burger fat dripping off the hot plate.
Enter Cyd-1 and -3, equal in age (and some less than Cyd-2, even though their names would suggest otherwise), whose collective challenge is to break Bernard (spiritually) before he breaks them (literally). The two Cyds, one and three, are somewhat unaware of the distinct causal reaction this implies, ie: that the more they push Bernard into action, the greater the chance he will dismantle them, ie: Bernard wouldn’t have cause for their destruction if it weren’t for their initial/constant pestering.
Cyd-1 and Cyd-3 imagine themselves as follows: looking slick
Bernard sees: "The most annoying robot" (skip to 2:20)
The relationship between #1, #3 and Bernard becomes a battle of action vs. inaction, each party frustrating the other, leading to greater action and inaction respectively, until the moment one decides to switch to opposite behaviour, ie: action → inaction // inaction → action. #2 attempts not to get involved, preferring a combination of the two states, an and/both over or. #2 is also preoccupied by the tidying that needs to be done, eventual customers to be served. The almost no longer Yuppies preoccupied with themselves. They were, perhaps, for the first year of the now ten, occupied with the maintenance of the Cyds, who now, as cybernetic ob-/sub-jects, had the capacity to maintain themselves.
