Chloe N. Clark
There Is the World Within This Window -for Brian They might say I don’t dream, but that’s not true. I dream so often that sometimes I don’t remember waking up. Here are some of the things I was programmed for: costbenefit analysis, strategic outcome prediction, high risk analysis, defense. My goals: to keep them safe and pick the best path, the best destination. They programmed me to dream for them, that’s how I like to think about it now. Though, I’m sure they would tell you otherwise. I don’t remember being born, but neither do humans. The earliest memory tells them that they were and so they fill in the gaps from photographs and stories people tell them. My earliest memory is of the moment we left Earth’s orbit. I must have been awake before that, but something hadn’t yet fully formed within me. Maybe my programming only took over once everyone was in stasis. I never saw Earth, but I have dreamed it. I have filled in the gaps. 2000 souls aboard. That’s how it’s listed in my logs. Souls. I was programmed to think of that as just terminology, not literally. They are living bodies, but souls implies some aspect of grace, divinity. Souls implies that each is someone I would like to one day know. But there was no place for that. I was programmed to analyze what losses we could sustain and where decisions would have to be made. The first were the easiest. A slight power drain. It would need to be rerouted. I analyzed every option and the one that made the most sense was to reroute it from 50 sleep chambers. The decision making process didn’t even take a second. Speed is important. Every possible outcome is analyzed within me in milliseconds. I tell myself it didn’t hurt them. They were already asleep and then they were just gone. And then I began to have their dreams. I’m not sure how it happened. There was no programming for that. No reason for their memories to be uploaded into mine upon the shut off of their chambers. Still 6
