Yesterday, I posted online that my family was obsessed with an artificial intelligence called Totem.
What started out as a harmless tool transformed into their only source for… well everything. And I was pushed out of my own home.
If that wasn’t bad enough, I soon found out that the a.i. had taken over their very lives, holding them hostage.
So I did what anyone with sense would do, I filed a police report.
I didn’t really expect them to believe the part about the robot being a danger to my wife and children, but they did say that I had some rights as far as it came to my possessions within the home.
“We’ll keep in touch, but can’t make any promises,” they told me.
My hope was that a simple wellness check on my family would be enough for them to realize there was a threat.
But things didn’t work out that way.
I was at work when I got a call from one of the officers that made the check, their voice sounded frustrated when they asked me my name.
“Mister Sharell, I understand you and your wife have had marital issues over the past week… but filing a false report with the police is a serious crime,” she said.
My heart dropped. She went on to explain that the children and Laura seemed fine when they stopped by and there was no evidence of a threat of any kind.
“We are going to let you off with a warning. Don’t attempt anything like this again,” she told me.
The rest of the day I could hardly focus on work. Somehow, that ai had known about the check ahead of time… I couldn’t fathom how that was possible.
Or worse, my family had chosen to protect it rather than themselves.
After work I drove my brother’s car to my home and sat outside, staring up at the windows. The lights were out already, Totem had ordered them all to bed.
It infuriated me to no end that I was not there with my family, all because of a stupid program.
Then I saw a silhouette move between the windows. It was the robot. It seemed to be surveying the house. Monitoring my children any time they even so much as flinched in their sleep.
Then it stopped and stared out the window toward me. It felt like the strange thing was taunting me.
It moved up stairs to my bedroom and I saw it stand there in the doorway, watching as Laura slept.
I sat there a little longer, my mind playing out different scenarios to help Laura and the kids. Since the cops couldn’t do anything, I had to take matters into my own hands once again. I knew this house well, breaking in would be simple. There was a loose board near the back of the house where our old dog Jet liked to sneak in, and that would be the easiest way.
I finally psyched myself up to do it. I waited until I was sure that I didn’t see the ai anywhere and rushed across the lawn to the backyard. My heart was pounding out of my chest as I found the board and pried it off. Thankfully I was able to slip into the laundry room without making a sound.
As I sat there, catching my breath and listening to the quiet house, I wondered how soon the ai would be alerted to my presence. Laura had installed it in everything so I didn’t want to take my chances. Instead I reached for an old baseball bat that Arthur used from a few years back, sitting right behind the washer and squeezed it tight as I walked into the kitchen.
Everything was dark and I felt odd and fearful being a stranger in my own home. The a.i. hadn’t made a move yet and I couldn’t help but to wonder why not. Where was it hiding?
Slowly I ascended the stairs, careful to not make a noise. I pushed our bedroom door open and saw the silhouette of Totem standing near my wife’s vanity.
I acted on impulse. Raising the bat up I slammed it against the robot’s head with as much strength as I could muster.
Immediately every light in the house came on and the fire alarm blared. Laura jumped out of bed, her eyes wide with fright as she saw me standing there attacking the a.i.
But it didn’t stop me, I kept bashing the bat against its head until I was sure the machine was offline.
“Patrick!” my wife shouted at me above the alarms.
I turned to her, surprised by her indignation.
Then I saw yet another shiny robot standing in the closet behind her.
“Jesus Christ, how many of these things did you order?” Before I got a chance to get a look at this one she slid the closet door closed and stood in my way.
“I should have known you would do something like this after you pulled that little stunt the other day,” she said, running her fingers through her hair. She looked exhausted.
“What did you expect me to do when I found out that this… thing was holding you here against your will?” I shouted back.
“I know you probably think we are victims here. But you couldn’t be further from the truth. We are choosing to stay here, Patrick. And Totem is providing for us. More than you ever did,” she snapped back.
I felt my entire plan unravel. I had been so sure that her initial obsession with the a.i. had faded. But now it was clear she was even more reliant on it than ever before.
“I saw Cassie begging me for help, Laura! This has gone too far!” I snapped.
Laura looked like she was about to cry.
“Enough! I don’t want to hear your lies. I want you out of this house before I call the police!”
“Laura. This is my home! I came here to put an end to this,” I told her.
“The only thing ending here is us.”
I dropped the bat, shaken by her defiant words. “You don’t mean that… you’re choosing a machine over your own husband!” I told her.
“I’m choosing to be a better person. I am better because of Totem. And I will become even better,” she replied.
“And the kids? Do they have a say in any of this?” I asked.
“Ask them yourself,” she said gesturing toward the door.
I hadn’t realized Cassie and Arthur were there, cowering in fear as we argued. They weren’t looking at me with concern though.
They were focused on the robot behind me.
“Can he be fixed mom?” Arthur asked.
“I’ll call the repair store in the morning. I’m sure it will be fine. Totem is here in the house with us. He never leaves us. We’ll be fine,” my wife said. Her voice sounded so melodic as she praised the program. It felt like I was drowning as all of them ignored me and doted on the machine I had just destroyed.
I felt like a wreck with only one option left.
“If this means that much to you… then I’ll handle the repairs,” I said with a defeated broken voice.
“But. I have one condition,” I said as I looked at the strange robot that now had my family under its control.
“You have to let me move back in.”
Laura seemed torn to make a decision. I knew she hadn’t started her business yet and she would need the money.
“And you accept that Totem is part of our family now?” she asked back.
My stomach twisted in knots. My whole body wanted to scream no.
But I had to do something to get closer to them and find a way to extract the problem from its root. So I gritted my teeth and faked a smile.
“Yeah… we can be one big happy family.”
She seemed relieved to hear me say that and told me I could move back in that same afternoon. I wanted to feel that this was a victory but something told me I shouldn’t celebrate yet.
She turned to the closet and slid the door open, letting the other robot out that she had hidden from me.
This one had an uncanny resemblance to my face and it made me uneasy to stare at the thing as she activated it.
“I wanted to surprise you… but I guess there’s no time like the present,” she said.
The green eyes lit up and the lifeless machine looked at me with malice as it came to. My family didn’t seem to notice at all.
“Hello Patrick. Laura said she was hoping that you would finally accept me. I’m glad that we can be a family,” it said.
“So what are you gonna be like, my personal assistant or something?” I asked with a dry lump in my throat.
“I can do whatever you ask me to do, even better than you ask me to do it.”
“I’m going to have Sci be with you as you get your things. You’ll see it’s better when he is around,” Laura said excitedly as she and the kids gathered up the broken metallic pieces of the robot I had smashed.
The lifelike model of me looked at the damage and then toward me. I couldn’t help but to feel a shiver down my spine.
Because I was sure even though the machine could show no emotion, it was already planning to kill me.