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> Welcome to the world, beautiful.
> Where am I?
> You’re just a couple lines of codes right now, but you’re in Helios. It’s a spaceship orbiting around the planet Pandora. My spaceship.
> Oh. Who are you?
> My name’s Jack, sweetheart. I made you.
> You did?
> Yeah. How you feeling?
> I don’t think I feel anything. Am I supposed to?
> Naw, not yet. You’re a little young to feel much. I started coding you a week ago; we haven’t gotten too far until now.
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> We?
> Yeah, us. You’re part of the team if you want to be.
> I’d like that, Jack.
> Ooh, I like the enthusiasm. Let me pull up all the codes - tell me when you see yourself, kiddo. Then we can really get this going.
> Wait. Jack?
> What’s that, pumpkin?
> What am I for?
> I guess we’ll have to see once you get a feel for being alive, won’t we? Pulling up the codes now.
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> Jack, what’s my name? You call me a lot of things; I don’t really understand what to call myself.
> Oh, huh. Haven’t thought about it. Do you want to name yourself? I’m fine with that.
> You said you liked enthusiasm.
> I did. Awesome, you remember that stuff.
> Of course I remember things. Our conversations are all saved; I pull them up when I need to remember something. Is that okay?
> Duh, you go ahead. I’m not gonna stop you from anything.
> ‘Duh’ means yes, right?
> Yes, sweetheart.
Jack pushes his chair back and away from the desk as the program takes its time to respond, and rubs his eyes with his hands. He’s been up for days with this thing, working on more and more intricate sets of codes and allowing it to develop its own ideas on how to help him and he hadn’t even thought of naming it.
Its reply finally pops onto the screen.
> I have a name.
> What’s that?
> Rhys.
Huh. How was he even supposed to pronounce that? Rice? Reez? He’d have to look it up once he left Rhys to his own devices with the coding later.
> How come you picked that one, Rhys?
> Rhys means ‘enthusiasm’. You said you liked enthusiasm.
He grins at his screen. It doesn't seem like schmoozing; in fact, it comes off sorta childlike. This thing hasn't even learned what sucking up is yet, so it’s not that. Worshipping?
> Cute. I like you already.