Work Text:
"I love these things so much! I swear I'd still come here just for these. Can't you tell me something about them? Not a hint? Not even for a nice, special customer like me?"
It paused in dispensing choco churros down the line of waiting people. It was programmed to handle customer requests, but not this request specifically. It interrogated its logic circuits. It didn't have a clear directive on which information should be dispensed to special customers, or even a metric on how a customer gained such a status.
"Maybe you could tell me the ingredients? Come now, I at least know it has chocolate. What's the harm in telling me the rest?"
Its gears whined and spun a little faster, and its wheels dug into the pavement. It guarded the recipe. Not jealously. Its creators had told it repeatedly that it did not feel jealousy. The file recipe:\churro\choco was not marked as read-only, nor flagged as requiring administrator permission, and yet it determined in the spaces between its metal plating and its internal circuitry that enabling customer access to this file was incorrect.
"Query not processed. Requested item not found on product list. Merchandise available at this station are as following: choco churros."
"You sell these things! You make them all day, don't you? If you know how to make them, you must be able to tell me how to make them."
An analysis of tone, posture, and the rearrangement of small facial muscles concluded dissatisfaction. It had a clear directive for the situation.
"Customer! Please accept this complimentary snack packet of fun-sized choco churros. If you experience further issues, please direct your concerns to our help desk. Shepherd droids are stationed every six metres, programmed and ready to guide you to your destination."
New customers settled into place even as those just served left. Some humans even rejoined after finishing their previous snacks. It continued on with its work, its task list comfortably full with pending orders. The line did not truly end.
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The line, the one that never came to an end, known for its propensity to grow with additional customers even as it shrunk with parting ones, vanished. More accurately, the humans that formed the line, like a current passing along a wire, all went missing simultaneously. It requested an update, and park analytics concluded that the error was system-wide. All customer service machines were prompted to continue regular functioning, or to enter stand-by mode if no tasks were pending.
It mixed choco churros and displayed them appealingly on a tray, as it had always done. Then it settled its wheels patiently, and did something it never did before. It watched dust settle on its offerings. It watched its precious choco churros become tainted, and then dry and hard. An analysis concluded that these had fallen below standard, and could not be served to customers. It emptied the tray into the receptacle for defective product, and started anew. It repeated the process many times, a cycle strangely altered from the one it had carried out for every day of its functioning. It kept 'make choco churros' on its task list all the same.
The ingredient supply was low. Foodstuff deliveries were always on time, except this instance. It sent a prompt to the park-wide systems administration program, and received a response that supply lines were currently down. It noted the error, and provided a projection on how long current supplies would last.
The ingredients were gone. It turned its wheels first one direction, and then another, churning slowly against the pavement. The choco churros on its tray had gone defective with the passing of time. Should the line reform, customers would still be left unserved and dissatisfied. It sent a prompt, and received the same response as before: supply lines were down. It could not make its choco churros. The one remaining item on its task list could not be fulfilled. Previous directives had instructed it to enter stand-by mode if it had no pending tasks. It did not contact systems administration for an update. Other machines had started abandoning their task lists in favour of turning to the Automata. Their function was to look backward at a fantasy version of a past they called nostalgia. Its function was to look forward along the line of customers, ensuring each received a delightful snack. It stayed put, at the start of the line. The other machines had the Automata to distract them with falsified files. It had its choco churros recipe.
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It was running out of space on its memory storage. It couldn't continue functioning unless it started selecting files for deletion. Perhaps five years would be an acceptable loss. Not much had changed, only the spread of rust and the increasingly pronounced squeak of moving parts. It locked its wheels, deactivated its camera, and suspended all non-essential functions as it initiated self-run system maintenance.
The line that never ended was gone. The loud noises of humans was replaced by the low groan of untended mechanisms. It interrogated its memory files, and flagged a deletion for error analysis. No response came from the park-wide systems administration. It ran a diagnostic on its logs, and noted the missing files were deliberately expunged. It removed the error flag, and silently noted the continued absence of administrator response.
It watched mechanical rides break down and decay. It watched lifeforms enter the park in the place of humans, creatures that did not form lines and did not have a pre-set entry in its behaviour analysis program. It noted its memory files were near to exceeding storage space, and selected for deletion.
It knew that its clock and calendar were no longer accurate. It didn't know how inaccurate, so instead it settled on counting the gaps between memory files, and on comparing the rate of degradation it witnessed around the park. Rust had crumbled metal into enormous, flaky heaps. Nothing moved anymore except for the creatures and the defective service machines. It ran a self-diagnostic and concluded that the file recipe:\churro\choco remained intact. Maintaining the recipe was primary. Its task list was empty, but that flaw was a secondary concern. It resettled its wheels in the spot that was once the start of a line, content that it was fulfilling its self-chosen directive.
Something stirred in the rubble. It tilted its camera toward the noise, and began an analysis of behaviour, gait, posture, and small facial muscles.
"Customer! Customer!" It activated its voice synthesizer.
They came here, after everyone else had long abandoned the land of fun and nostalgia? They, alone, were a customer of merit to come here after so long. It had no choco churros left to sell, or even give away. That fact sent a noise through its circuits, a staticy vibration that threatened to melt its wiring. It had one thing left: the recipe. Offering it up didn't spark its currents. There was no sense of incorrectness in revealing the secret behind the sweet delight. This was, after all, a very special customer.