Ava and Aphrodite: The First Human in 8000 Years (Featured)

End Part 2: Rebuild the New World

It was starting to get dark, the city lit up and shone its ocean of lights far into the distance.

Ava's private shuttle shot across the sky on the railing suspended above. Just Aphrodite, the Major, and himself sat in the large and well-furnished carriage. All the multiple layers of Mars Central could be seen below. He looked out of the window to see if anything had changed in the past two months, anything visible.

Funnily enough, it did.

The streets were far away below him but even from where he was, it was visible: there was graffiti, littering, rioting. He'd never seen anything like it.

"...Did coming off the network cause this?" he asked. The Major, who was sitting next to him, looked out of the window too,

"Oh, it looks like we're passing over the Block-4 district. That place used to be where we stored all the worker Servs when they weren't in service," she said,

"What happened?"

"Well, with the network gone, we don't have a policing system. The Serv military has taken that role as well." she sighed, "we really need to sign up some more people though. It's just not enough."

"Wow. This is bad." Ava muttered,

"You think?" asked Aphrodite, "I don't think so."

"What?"

"Look," Aphrodite pointed at the graffiti that was lining the streets below, "you think the Servs would've had the artistry to create something like that before? You could argue that the price of civil unrest is a price too steep, but this shows you're one step closer to a creative renaissance."

Ava didn't reply. He looked at the mess below. Was this what the freedom of expression meant? He sensed a passion in the Servs that he'd never sensed before, but there was a volatility to it.

Maybe that was inevitable, at this point in time anyway. Not having a governing network would be hard to adjust to, after all.

As the shuttle moved on, Ava watched as buildings moved by, he was surprised to find that Servs were in their buildings, working far beyond their allocated working hours. There were districts that were definitely meant to be turned off by this point, but they weren't, Servs were still working.

"Funnily enough, Block-3 Servs have started to exhibit traits similar to Block-4s, or Evos." said Aphrodite, "at least, from what I can tell."

"Why?" Ava paused, the Evos, they worked themselves to death, their purpose was to work and hence they put a value on that over everything else. Block-3s were given allocated hours, usually, but it seemed like the freedom to work more hours somehow prompted them to do so.

It didn't make sense.

"I feel like this has all gone wrong," said Ava, "what's happening here?"

"It's human," said Aphrodite, "the desire to go beyond one's limits."

"Working late isn't so bad Ava," said the Major, "but the fact that these were traits that belonged to Evos does make you wonder where the line between being a human and being a robot really was."

Ava grit his teeth,

"Did I do the right thing?" he asked, "I mean... Freedom, humanity, emotion. It's what we needed, right?"

The Major crossed her arms,

"I stayed off the network because I believed that. I'm sticking to my guns too. You made an unauthorised choice but one that I'm not surprised you did. Even if being human means that we live in a state of torture, at least it gives us the opportunity to experience the opposite."