Τετάρτη 18 Μαρτίου 2009


Two fragments are looking for reactions...
(from my unpublished book "Ekektra Z")


1.Timi Thalion


The first android became operational in the year 2047. At least, that was the official version. An unknown number of androids had in fact started functioning much earlier, but no one knows the exact date. In some old archives of the year 2007, we found the information that a peculiar Greek writer had claimed that one of the presidents of the USA - a president who left behind him a legacy of bad memories- had very possibly been an android. The Greek writer, in collaboration with a team of expert scientists, studied thousands of television pictures of the American president's face and reached the conclusion that it could not possibly be the expressions of any human creature. His face was constantly trying to retain a sombre expression when commenting on the great and catastrophic events which had befallen his country, but his sombreness was always succeeded by a smile, as if he was secretely pleased about what had taken place.


This not withstanding, we have to accept Timothea (Τimi) Τhalion, or T.T., the ephemeral", as she was nicknamed by a woman journalist, as the first android to ever "enter circulation" in Gaia. She was given the name Timothea, which means "she who honours the divine", in order to pre-empt the reactions of fanatical religious organizations, which might consider, as in the end they did, the creation of a mechanical human creature as offensive.


The name did not manage to save Timi either from constant assoults with tomatoes and eggs, or ftom at least three known assassination attempts, using powerfull "Vlastov" microbombs. These bombs, or more precisely grenades, specially devised for the extermination of androids, are hand held. The hand motion activates a tiny motor, which allows the microbombs to fid their way to the target and stick on it through powerfull suction mechanisms. Following this, small steel drills penetrate the android's body, where they release a chemical powder mixed with a sticky substance which destroys circuits.


The surname Thalion, a version of the Greek name Talos, was given to her in honour of the first mechanical creature of the mythological world, constructed in Minoan Crete by the inventor Deadalus.
Timi was a very tall slender woman, with a perfectly contoured body, a beautiful face and eyes designed to shine like polyhedral diamonds.The night the manufacturing company Ercibon presented Timi Thalion on SuperGeo, the biggest TV station in the planet reached record audience ratings. Two billion two hundred and twenty milillion viewers, that is, 98% of those who had survived the catastrophic war of the two Hemispheres, watched the great ceremony in honour of the first android. Timi received 127,000 bunches of flowers, and the cash gifts deposited in her bank account were enough for her to live on for twenty five lives.


The estimated life span og the first android was seven years. The beautiful Timi became the greatest celebrity on the planet. She wrote her memoir in the sixth year of her life, where she revealed that she had only felt happy during the first year of her life.In her last TV interview, when asked whether she would wish her life to be longer, she left everyone speechless when she replied "under different circumstances, perhaps, but under the current ones (in the year 2053), no, I do not envy your longvity!"She also expressed her wish to have her inoperative body painted with haematite (a red ochre), put in a giant nautilus shell*, and buried in the ground.Everyone was astonished. SuperGeo's messaging devices almost melted as millions of impressed viewers demanded to know Timi's reasons. Timi gave a good history lesson, explaining that she wanted to honour an ancient Australian myth, which narrated that Oundipa women had created Gaia's haematite's reserves by shedding lots of blood from their wombs. Timi also reminded the audience that many tombs with human bodies painted red had been found, one of them containing the sceleton of a child which had died 83,000 years ago, whose body had been placed in a shell.


Unfortunately, her last wish was not respected. When her bodily functions stopped, she was covered with a special glue and embalmed.Her body was placed in the Metropolitan Museum of Atlantica, the hypercapital, and became an object of worship, not just by people, but also by all androids manufactured after her..."


2. The two Ertzkas


"... The employee who served them before escorts them to the exit and bows thanking them. The two androids pay no attention to him and leave the store."Sour faces!", the employee whispers through his teeth.The female Ertzka hears him though. She stops abruptly, turns around and gives him a frosty look. Her eyes turn yellow for a second and the emplyee watches in amazement as all the buttons of his uniform pop and fall on the floor, while his tie turns upward and refuses to come down. The android makes a sound reminiscent of an evil laugh and runs to catch up with the male one.The two Ertzkas, in their fluorescent jackets, walk down the road and stop an overground taxi."Hotel Merimar, please", the female says through the microphone, whilst the camera in the front part of the vehicle processes their image through the computer and sends it to the traffic surveillance unit for filing.


They enter the room without turning on the lights. They move easily in the dark and the female opens the balcony doors. Then it joins the male who's already sitting on the sofa."How do you feel, Nevi;", he asks her, tilting his head to one side."As relaxed as I always feel in the cloud of warmth you radiate", she whispers to him in reply, her hand lightly stroking his nose.This gesture must be some sort of a love code, because he stands up and she starts taking his clothes off slowly. Afterwards he does the same to her. The coloured reflections of the city light the two creatures, who stand facing each other. They are silent. Their eyes turn a deep violet colour and their faces become moist. She turns her back to him. The male Ertzka touches her shoulders with the tips of his fingers and she lets out an odd sound.


In time past, when humanity had started to produce the second generation of primitive robots, many intellectuals were critical of this new "species". They claimed that no matter how much robots might develop in the future, they would never be able to feel like a human. They insisted that "these machines have the artlessness of pure calculation and the games they offer are based solely on communications and combinations. In this sense they may be said to be virtuous, as well virtual. Their virtue resides in their tranparency, their functionality, their absence of passion and artifice. Artificial intelligence is a celibate machin... Τhere are prostheses that can work better than humans, "think" or move around better than humans, but there is no such thing as a replacement for human pleasure, or for the pleasure of being human...That is why a human can always be more than he is, whereas machines can never be more than they are".Thoughts like these had been expressed a decade before the end of the distant year 2000, by one of the brightest minds of this era, and they were taken very seriously. Today, of course, they sound like naive jokes. When somebody asked Timi Thalion, the first android, for her view on such pronouncements, she replied: "No comment! The question itself is patronizing".


Seeing the two Ertzkas making love to each other in the dark hotel room, one would be justified thinking that humans have always exaggerated their uniquness and underestimated the potential of technological culture. These two advanced androids look like flamingos in love, and behave towards each other with such a warmth and tenderness that their satisfaction seems well beyond human limits.
The female climbs onto the body of the male, using the powerfull magnets androids have for emergency use, and appliew pressure with her fingertips on various parts of his naked body: under the armpits, in the middle of the chest, on the last vertebra of his spine, on his knees. The male Ertzka seems in ecstasy, entirely abandoning himself to her attentions. This one-sided game lasts about a quarter of an hour and then it is his turn.His body starts steaming and the pupils of his eyes grow wider. He lays her body on the floor and gives her a deep kiss, making her light up and become semi-transparent.In a cloud of hot steam lit upp supple body rolls in dizzying ecstasy, as sounds reminiscent of birds of paradise come out of her mouth. Hearing these sounds one can better understand the comment made by one of the two humans married to androids during an interview: "I feel as if I am married to a bird..."

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