Chapter Three: In Which Anatomical Correctness Ensues
By Iniquitus The Third
"It occurs to me that ninety percent of those who write of the joy of childbirth have yet to experience it. How else to explain the joyful light in which it is cast?"
- Unknown
A strange voice toned from under the sheet, a strong Austrian accent tinging the words.
"PRIMARY TERMINATION PROTOCOL ENGAGED. MISSION OBJECTIVE: ELIMINATE JOHN CONNOR."
Chao's face fell, and she gestured to Hakase. "Run the Skynet debug program."
Hakase nodded, somewhat disappointed in this and moved to punch in a series of numbers on the primary display unit.
As she waited for the program to run, Chao paced up and down. This was the third prototype she'd lost to that damned Skynet malware. She made a mental note to send this "Connor" a memo telling him to wear an armoured flak jacket the next time he went on a walk by himself, and drummed on the tabletop.
After an eternity, Hakase nodded to her and Chao returned to looming over the figure. "Come on, come on." She bit her lip, gazing down at the hand. If this didn't work...
The hand moved.
Before Chao's equally incredulous and joyous eyes, it moved up and gripped the edge of the sheet, pulling it back to reveal-
The robot - no, the being, looking for all the world like a nude fifteen-year-old girl, sitting up on the bench.
In a movement that for Chao seemed to take no time at all and yet an eternity, it turned its head to look at Chao. Hakase tore her eyes away from it to check the display screen, before looking back, not wanting to miss a second of their success. The head, short white hair (it had a nice mysterious look and was the in thing for nigh-on human robots) covering it, tilted as it examined Chao's face. The mouth opened, and the first words ever spoken directly via human methods by an AI capable of replicating a human perfectly were said.
"Goo goo gah?"
Chao boggled. It was a child of the age of zero hours and (she glanced at her wall clock) two minutes.
"Gabagah. Boog. Yabaga. Dagagadaba?"
It was a human in every possible way, and the program had taken that line literally.
"Talagah!" it gurgled happily and threw a sloppy embrace around Chao. "Mum-mah! Talagah!"
It was... It was...
Hakase smiled. "Congratulations, Miss Lingshen. It's a girl!"
Chao wiped a tear off her face and pushed the AI gently off her, beckoning Hakase over to her. The AI cooed again and began taking an interest in the laboratory around it.
"I finally made it! I surpassed my own expectations!" Chao began stroking her imaginary beard. "Truly, I have proven that artificial intelligence is capable of being a human in every possible way! I did it!"
"We did it," Hakase admonished, but she was smiling happily as well, and she took Chao into an embrace. She didn't even think of copping a feel right now, she was so happy. "You know, Chao... There's something I've always wanted to tell you... I have always lo-"
BOOOOM!
The two geniuses whirled in the direction of where the Dramatic Lightning Generator (TM) lay.
Or rather, the smoking crater where the Dramatic Lightning Generator (TM) used to sit. In its place sat the AI, gurgling happily and clapping at the pretty marks which covered the lab post-explosion.
Chao dropped to her knees. "Noooooooooo! Curse you! You learn faster than I predicted! You realized that the source of my power was the thing which allowed me to break the barriers of good taste, and took steps to eliminate the only thing which could ever have defeated you! WHAT HAS SCIENCE DONE?"
"Talagah!" The AI crawled over to Chao and poked her nose, looking incredibly excited. "Mum-mah!"
"Uhhh..." It occurred to Chao that being seen as it's - no, her – mother wasn't the best idea. Homicidal robots always went after the ones with the off switch first. She pointed wildly at Hakase. "No, um, that's your mum-mah."
"Mum-mah talagah?"
"No, mum-mah Hakase."
"Mum-mah talagah?"
"No, mum-mah-" Chao exasperatedly grabbed her, turned her to Hakase and pointed past her face at the bespectacled girl. "That's mum-mah. Got it?"
The girl-robot-human shook her head emphatically. It pointed at Hakase - "Mum-mah bagoolah." - and then to Chao. "Mum-mah talagah!" she said, with all the finality of holy writ.
Hakase knelt next to Chao, on the other side of the girl.
"Chao...I think we just gave birth," she remarked in a way that told Chao Hakase still hadn't fully absorbed what exactly was going on.
The naked girl-human-robot-except-not-really gurgled happily and seized both of the professors in an enthusiastic hug, pulling them both to the floor of the laboratory which still smelt faintly of the exploded remnants of a machine that made extremely good use of Uberwaldian environmental dynamics, viz, dramatic expositionally timed thunderclaps on a clear summer's day.
It was at that moment that the door opened.
"Miss Cha - erm, Science Goddess Lingshen! Are you all right?" The young man, an assistant still not out of school, poked his head into the laboratory. "I heard an explosion and I..."
The young man realized that Chao was currently on the ground underneath Hakase, with a naked girl he'd never seen before pinned between them, all three with red faces and slightly disheveled clothes (barring the naked girl, of course).
He smoothly changed tack.
"...Didn't see anything honestly I'll be going now thanks bye."
The door closed behind him as he fled.
"...Hakase?"
"Yes?"
"Why did we make her anatomically correct again?"
"Um..."
"Googalabah!"