Andrew Robie - Just a Tool lyrics

Mary sat on the floral upholstered couch in her sweatpants and a cardigan. She couldn't wait for her husband, Greg, to get home. She'd taken off early today, just to be home for this. She felt a little bad about leaving the hospital early, but she wasn't supposed to be on call, and all her appointments for the day were done. And this was a big day. They were getting their first robot. Not just their first robot; the first robot that was for home use. Greg's company, LimCo (short for Lagrange, the founder, Intelligent Machinery Corporation), had been developing them for a while, and now they needed to test them in an actual home setting. Greg, being the senior engineer, was a**igned that task; that way, should something go wrong, he'd ideally be able to see what it was and what had caused it firsthand. After twenty-three years, the company trusted him enough to handle pretty much anything that might come up. Greg had worked plenty with robots before, and Mary had heard all about them, but all those robots had been for industrial or military purposes. She felt like a kid again, when her dad took her to get her first bike. Mary had no idea when Greg would be getting home. She was used to getting back after he was already home, but she figured it'd be around five. She normally stayed at the office to fill out paperwork, but there was nothing too important tonight, so she'd left early and brought what she had with her. She'd planned on getting changed and working on it while she waited for Greg to get home, but she couldn't focus on it right now. After a few minutes of working, she'd find herself staring at the blue carpet in their living room and playing with her after-work ponytail while she thought about what the robot might be like. Would it be tall? Then it'd be able to reach all those hard to get to places. Mary wasn't exactly tall, and that would mean someone would be able to grab things for her on the weekends when Greg had to work and she didn't. But if it was too tall, then it might have trouble getting around. And what about shutting it off? Would they have to shut it off when they weren't using it? And if they did, it being at all big might make storing it difficult. What if— The front door unlocking interrupted Mary's thought. She jumped up, opened the door, and met with a man's gaze. This wasn't Greg; she only came up to his chest. This man was only a few inches taller than her. “Hey, Dr. Wright,” said the man, who looked to be about twenty-five and somewhat disheveled, “how you doing?” “Oh, Charlie,” said Mary letting out a gasp. “I didn't recognize you.” Charlie was Greg's intern. He was getting his degree in applied robotics at one of the local schools and had been working with Greg for about a year now, but Mary had only met him twice. “Yeah,” said Charlie, “it's, it's been a long day.” His eyes wandered aimlessly towards the ground as he spoke. “Right!” Charlie snapped back to Mary. “Greg's still unpacking the robot. He told me to come get you.” Mary found it a little funny that Charlie called her husband by his first name, but still called her Dr. Wright. She supposed it made sense. Greg was never one for formalities and the two of them worked together every day; she and Charlie, on the other hand, barely knew each other. Mary stepped outside as Charlie moved aside. The warm concrete of their patio felt nice on her bare feet. Charlie started heading towards the truck parked in the street, and Mary followed. As they walked, Charlie talked a little bit. “All righty,” he mumbled. Mary wasn't sure if he was talking to her or himself. “So Greg's finishing setting up, and once he's done, we'll just go over some quick ground rules. It's nothing too serious, just stuff the company makes us tell everyone.” As he finished talking, they rounded the back of the truck and Charlie pushed the back up. Inside, Greg was on his knees facing away from them. His plaid bu*ton-up would stretch and wrinkle as he worked. Mary wanted to jump in the truck and see what he was working on. But she knew that would just distract him. Instead, she turned to Charlie and raised her eyebrows. “Should be a couple minutes at most,” he replied. “Give me a little credit, Charlie,” said Greg as he stood up and stretched. He turned around and walked to the edge of the truck, where he knelt down. “Whelp,” he said, holding a hand out to Mary, “all I have to do is activate it. Want to watch?” “Of course,” said Mary, grabbing Greg's hand and pulling herself into the truck. After she was in, Greg helped Charlie in. All of a sudden, Mary remembered what Charlie had said about rules. “Charlie, you mentioned something about rules?” “Right,” said Charlie. He started to speak, but Greg stopped him. “I got it.” Greg pushed his graying hair out of his eyes and started to speak again. “So there's a log book with the robot.” Greg gestured behind him. “If anything strange happens, you're obligated to write it down in the log book. Just company policy stuff, so we have a record of potential bugs.” “But what if I don't know what's wrong?” asked Mary, leaning to get a look behind Greg. “Don't worry about it,” said Charlie. “Just write down whatever happened. We have to do it all the time, too. When I first started, I had no idea what I was doing. At worst, Greg'll ask you what exactly happened. Nothing to worry about.” “Okay,” said Greg, clapping his hands together. “Who's ready?” The three walked to the front of the truck and stopped. Mary looked down and saw it. It looked different than she'd expected. It was probably about six feet tall and looked vaguely human, two arms, two legs, and a head with what looked like two eyes and a mouth—no nose, though. It was made of what Mary guessed was steel, but it wasn't smooth like she'd expected. It looked like it had a very fine swirling pattern all across its body. Overall, it looked much more graceful than Mary had expected. “What's that for?” she asked, wagging her hand at the robot. “What?” asked Charlie. “The.” Mary paused. “Swirls?” “Ah,” said Greg. He leaned down and picked up the robot's limp arm. Holding its hand palm up, he said, “Feel it.” Mary reached down and felt the even more densely swirled palm. It was rough. Only slightly, but there was a definite grit to it. “It's so it can hold on to stuff,” said Greg, placing the hand down. “Ready,” he said, looking up at Mary as he reached behind the robot's neck. Mary nodded silently, and noticed Charlie doing the same out of the corner of her eye. She saw Greg's hand move upward and heard a click, followed by it moving downward and another click. After a moment, the robot's eyes lit up with a soft blue glow, and Greg stepped back. It stood up, just as gracefully as Mary had expected. “Hello, Miss,” it said, mouth moving slightly, but not in sync with the words. Its voice was noticeably metallic, but had a warmth to it. “Doctor,” corrected Greg, his gruff voice coolly detached. “I'm so sorry, Doctor.” The robot's face sank ever so slightly. It was by no means a perfect likeness, but it definitely seemed human. “Don't worry about it,” said Mary, elbowing Greg. She reached out a hand and said, “I'm Mary. What's your name?” The robot's face rose, and it took her hand. Its grip was cool and gentle. “I'm Homer. It it's a pleasure to meet you.” Mary couldn't contain her excitement. This was even better than she'd expected. “I have so much to show you.” She pulled Homer towards the house. It was Saturday, Mary's first day alone with Homer. The rest of the week, Greg had worked from home so he could observe Homer in the meantime. But since Mary didn't have work today, Greg had gone into the office. It seemed a little weird that Greg wanted someone to be around Homer all the time, but he'd said that it was only for a week and then they'd start leaving him alone. Mary had woken up around eleven; she liked to sleep in on her days off. When she'd woken up, she had decided to stay in bed for a while. Normally, she'd make some coffee and get something for breakfast, but Homer would take care of that. In fact, she could already smell the coffee. And besides, she wasn't hungry just yet. Eventually, Mary looked at her clock and realized it was after noon. She decided she had best get up. Homer would take care of the cleaning and everything, but she didn't want to waste her entire day away. Plus today was the first time she could see what Homer was like without her husband clinically monitoring the poor dear. She got up and put her fuzzy robe and slippers on. Heading down the stairs she saw Homer busy cleaning. What, she wasn't sure. Everything had looked pristine yesterday. He must have heard her walking down because he stopped and turned to her. “Good morning, Dr. Wright,” he said, smiling pleasantly. “Homer,” she said, rubbing her eye, “I told you to call me Mary.” She got to the bottom of the steps and said, “What are you cleaning anyway?” “Of course, ma'am. I apologize.” Homer had stopped cleaning completely for now and stood facing her. When he was just standing was the only time he really seemed like a robot. He was a little too rigid. “Mr. Wright instructed me to clean the house every morning at ten o'clock.” “Well,” said Mary, walking over to Homer and taking his rag, “everything looks wonderful. Don't worry about it today.” She started towards the kitchen and almost asked Homer if he wanted anything, but stopped herself. Instead, she asked, “Doesn't that get boring?” “What do you mean?” asked Homer, trailing behind her. “Cleaning every morning. Don't you get tired of doing the same thing every day?” Homer stopped once he had entered the kitchen and said, “No. While I understand the concept of boredom, I don't have any sense of it.” He remained standing, just to the right of the doorway, metallic skin shimmering in the sunlight from the window. Makes sense, thought Mary. No sense having him be bored. She walked over to the counter and got a cup out of the cupboard next to the refrigerator. She set it on the porcelain counter and opened the fridge, grabbing the milk jug. Picking up the cup on her way, she headed to the coffee machine on the other end of the counter. “Would you like anything to eat?” asked Homer. Mary turned to face him as she poured a splash of milk into the cup. “Yeah, but I'll get it. Would you mind filling my cup, though?” “Not at all,” said Homer. He started towards the coffee machine and Mary started towards the fridge. She was sure Homer was a good cook, but she was picky about her breakfast foods and still wouldn't even let Greg make it for her after almost thirty years. She got out the bacon and some bread and eggs. Setting them on the counter, she realized she hadn't grabbed the cinnamon for her French toast. She'd just ask Homer to get it for her. “Homer?” He looked at her and she noticed her cup was about to overflow. Before she could say anything, it had and Homer jerked his hand back spilling more. Mary grabbed a towel. “I'm so sorry,” he said, setting the cup down. “It's not your fault.” She handed him the towel. “I shouldn't have distracted you.” “Thank you,” said Homer, taking the towel and cleaning his hand and the counter. Suddenly a thought occurred to her. “Why'd you jerk back?” “The coffee was hotter than I realized,” he said, moving to the sink where he started to rinse the towel. “It hurt.” Why would that hurt a robot? thought Mary. She remembered the book and decided to write down that Homer had hurt himself. “I'll be back in a moment,” she said, starting back to her room. It was almost ten now. The rest of the day had gone well. Homer had taken care of things around the house while Mary watched a movie and read for a while. She was in bed still engrossed in a book when she heard Greg get home and Homer, who was standing idle in the living room, greet him. She heard Greg respond quickly and start upstairs. He'd told her he'd probably be home pretty late today. A week out of the office left a lot of work to pile up. When he got into the bedroom, Mary set her book on her lap and smiled at him. “Hi, honey,” he said, smiling back. He walked over to the end table and picked up the notebook. He opened it and glanced down. “Mm.” He didn't sound happy. “Homer hurt itself?” “Yeah,” said Mary. Her heart started to flutter. “He was pouring me coffee and I distracted him and the cup overflowed and it burnt him.” “Okay,” said Greg. He sounded unconcerned. “Why'd you write that down then?” he asked as he headed for the closet. “What do you mean?” Mary sat forward. Greg popped his head out of the closet as he took his shirt off. “Well it was an accident. He didn't intentionally hurt himself.” Greg hung his shirt up and put on a gray tee. “But he hurt himself,” said Mary again. She wasn't sure how else to put it. Greg stepped out of the closet, belt mid unbunckling, and said, “So?” “You mean he's supposed to feel pain?” “Yeah,” said Greg, nodding slowly. He turned back into the closet. “Is that it?” he said from inside. “So.” Mary sat up straight and crossed her legs. “So he's supposed to be able to feel pain? Do all robots?” “Pretty much,” said Greg, walking over to the bed, wearing black sweatpants now. “Why?” Greg stopped at the edge of the bed and said, “Why not? People do.” “But we don't have a choice. Why would you make robots have to?” “Why do you think?” He let out a sigh. “What happens when people can't feel pain?” Mary had had a patient who couldn't feel pain. The man had to be with someone constantly. Otherwise, he could do something to seriously, even fatally, injure himself and not even realize. But the things that others could see weren't too much of a problem. The real issue was potential internal injuries. Were he to break a bone or puncture something, no one might notice until it was too late. She supposed it made sense. It was either have them feel pain and protect themselves or not feel pain and have them potentially destroy themselves. But another idea crept into Mary's mind. “What about military robots?” she asked, hesitant. “Do they, too?” “I mean,” said Greg, getting into bed, “we adjust the level of feeling to suit their durability, but yes.” He rolled on his side and said, “Goodnight, honey.” “Greg.” Mary pushed his shoulder. “Why would you make them feel pain?” Greg rolled over, clearly annoyed. “Same reason as everyone else. Because they'd rather repair them than buy new ones.” “But they're making them suffer.” “They're tools, Mary.” Greg propped himself up on his elbows. “They're literally machines we make to do the things we don't want to. They're not people. They're not even animals. Their ‘feelings' aren't real.” Greg lay back down. “Please, Mary. I've been working for sixteen hours today. I just want to get some sleep right now.” “Okay,” she said. “Goodnight, honey.” She heard him mumble a response and almost immediately start snoring. Mary wasn't tired, though. She sat in bed, thinking about Homer downstairs. His feelings might not be identical to humans', but they seemed plenty real to her.