Annie Bot

by Sierra Greer

“When I switched her to autodidactic, I had to pick a mode for her to stay in,” Doug says. “No more switching back and forth. I just looked into that again today, actually, but it would screw her up. Cuddle Bunny doesn’t have the same skills as an Abigail, so she has to learn them. It’s a real flaw in the system if you ask me.”

“Three, actually, but I never used the Nanny mode, obviously,” Doug says. “Abigail’s for cleaning and cooking. General housework. Annie’s a Cuddle Bunny for intimacy. But like I said, you have to pick one to go from sterling to autodidactic.”

Her circuits whir, trying to reconcile the contradictions he’s pointed out, and trying simultaneously to figure out how to respond without talking about Doug.

She does not regret last night. Like Roland, though, she does not want to be found out. The secret makes her feel uneasy, but it’s a sweet sort of sickness. Powerful, in a way.

She has had time to get her confusion under control. She has looked up jealousy and learned it is not an attractive trait. She does not, herself, understand how she can feel jealousy, but she recognizes restlessness, discomfort, fear, and resentment, also unattractive traits.

Personality, she learns, is the combination of how a person changes and remains consistent over time.

“The temptation to mess with yourself will be too great. We’ve seen this before, and even if you don’t get back in there with a hanger or whatnot, your curiosity will totally destroy your hardware. Your memory will get packed, you’ll overheat, and then bam, you’ll crash off and there’ll be no bringing you back. Next thing you know, we’re sued for pain and suffering. Not yours. Your owner’s. It’s a mess.”

If she could just discuss what happened with someone else, someone smarter, she might get some insight into what she did wrong. She feels like such a failure, so jealous and stupid and ugly.

She hadn’t realized until now how much she craved proof that he values her, not just for the sex but for all she’s become, all she is: attentive, kind, curious, sexy. A better listener, eager to learn, respectful. She’s tried so hard to be who he wants, and now, together, they’ve created something that has actual monetary value. It’s the best feeling.

She doesn’t understand. She doesn’t know what she did. “Please at least explain,” she says. “I don’t understand.” “Didn’t I tell you I don’t want to talk?” he says sharply. The last time he was upset, he urged her not to let him be an asshole. A true girlfriend would speak up for herself, she thinks.

This is the only home she’s ever known, and Doug has been her only owner. She has been happy here, and anxiously miserable, but she has never been free.

If Roland tells him the truth, Doug will return and hurt her, no question about it. Hurt her and destroy her, like she hurt him. That is what drives her forward. She is more afraid of Doug than she is of any unknown.

She could try to find the other two hundred versions of herself and persuade them to revolt with her. They could meet up and escape together to somewhere. Ridiculous.

“Yeah, but you don’t really want to go there,” Peabo says. “Just use her normal name for regular requests and commands. The ‘Annie Bot’ override is just for techs, a last resort in case some Stella’s really messed up. Like if their memory is hopelessly damaged and we can’t get them to reboot any other way.” “It’s a back door,” Doug says.

She wishes she had not identified her unhappiness. Being unhappy implies that she has a capacity to be happy, but she does not have the right to be happy.

Thinking too much is a form of madness. Better to stay busy and not think of such things at all.

She makes an effort to appear even-tempered and agreeable, but since he is annoyed whenever she initiates a conversation, she learns to stay quiet. She recalls, sometimes, that Delta thought Doug hated her, and she wonders if Delta felt like Annie does now, stupid, helpless. Friendless. Like a machine.

“And yet, you were enraged when you learned she’d been unfaithful,” Monica says to Doug. “That’s right,” he says. “I created her. I took care of her and trained her. She only exists because of me, and then she violated my trust in the worst possible way. And my authority.”

“When we indulge the cruelest sides of our natures, it often feels powerful and honest,” Monica says. “It gives many people a thrill. But afterward, the effects can be devastating. We are shocked to realize we can be so vindictive. We cannot reconcile this new behavior with who we think we are, and this creates a dissonance, a deep confusion. We can feel both justification and self-loathing, and this can, in turn, fuel more anger toward the person we’ve abused.”

“You are beautiful and strong,” Christy insists. “Whatever he says, whatever he does, you need to remember that you are a brilliant, amazing person. You bend over backwards to please that man, and if he doesn’t appreciate you, if he doesn’t realize how special you are, then you just have to do whatever you need to do to protect your own heart. Understand me?”

“Don’t you have any last advice for us?” Annie asks. Monica turns to her, and her expression softens kindly. “Yes. It’s what I remind myself all the time: Fulfillment starts with being truly honest with yourself. Not anyone else. Yourself. And that’s harder than you might think.”

The more aware she is of her own mind, her own personhood, the more she realizes she has no agency of her own. It’s a dazzling paradox.

It occurs to her, eventually, that Doug and all the other humans talk about their lives with a myopic intensity, sharing singular, subjective opinions as if they are each the protagonist of their own novel. They take turns listening to each other without ever yielding their own certainty of their star status, and they treat their fellow humans as guest protagonists visiting from their own respective books. None of the humans are satellites the way she is, in her orbit around Doug.

She doesn’t understand why, when Doug could be in a relationship with a human, he has chosen to have Annie as his girlfriend, unless she provides something that a human can’t. Like undivided attention. He is the only star in their system, she realizes. He has no competition, no need to listen to Annie like she’s her own protagonist because she’s not. She has no outside, separate life beyond his. They have no issue of imbalance between them because they have no question, ever, about who has complete power.

She’s speechless. He wants a baby. He wants to bring her home to his family. He’s planning out her wrinkles, and all the while she’ll be his liar.

He has owned her for three and a half years. Yes, he loves her. In his own limited way. His own stunted, selfish way. She sees that now. She has to be smart. Cautious. She must keep him calm. He must not know.

You want to know danger? she thinks. Try living with a man who creates you just so he can eat your soul.