Genesis
(#32666963)
Perfected Dracoid | he/they
Familiar
Turbocharged Creeper
Click or tap to view this dragon in Predict Morphology.
Energy: 46/50
This dragon’s natural inborn element is Lightning.
Female Ridgeback
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Personal Style
Apparel
Skin
Scene
Measurements
Length
19.21 m
Wingspan
18.99 m
Weight
6005.43 kg
Genetics
Flint
Skink
Skink
Navy
Alloy
Alloy
Ultramarine
Spines
Spines
Hatchday
Breed
Eye Type
Level 16 Ridgeback
EXP: 11644 / 71966
STR
70
AGI
6
DEF
7
QCK
40
INT
6
VIT
6
MND
7
Lineage
Parents
- none
Offspring
- none
Biography
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 G E N E S I S PERFECTED DRACOID // CRIMINAL PSYCHOLOGIST 
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P E R S O N A L
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xx
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H I S T O R Y
It had taken fifteen years of sweat, blood, and compulsively fretting over chewed claws that somebody, somewhere, had already attained perfection before he could finally lay his efforts to rest - but against all odds, he had finally accomplished the very goal a spark of innovation had set for him so long ago. Genesis was finally complete.
Of course, fifteen years is not very long for a drake, certainly not for a Ridgeback, but after dedicating his every waking moment to the same project without pause, it had felt more like fifty years. But when the dracoid before him booted to life after a series of mechanical whirrs and sighs and verification of its sudden mortal awareness, he knew those had been fifty-like years well spent. Its wide, unblinking eyes scanned the room without so much as a sudden jerk the way that an organic dragon would call to attention something that had wandered into its sights. Heavy-duty steel door. White walls. Dark industrial work desk; unidentified tools used for an unknown purpose. White receptacle containing a dark brown liquid, filled three quarters to the brim and growing ever colder. These were all things. It worked its field of view back across with only the turning of its head and the bending of its artificial spine to suggest the target of its scrutiny, and focused on its creator, leaning in ever so slightly. "Cyrus." It said in an unaffected monotone. The recognition software functioned as intended, and that brought a smile to his face. Just as a duckling recognizes the first life form it sees as its mother. "Hello, Genesis. How are you feeling?" Cyrus responded, suppressing his excitement. A simple question that would gauge the emotional threshold of the dracoid. It paused, continuing to stare him down with eerily static eyes, no heaving of the chest to be seen or exhaling of air to be heard. "I feel..." It trailed off. Feel. What did that mean? To feel? In its few moments spent in the waking state, its gearbox heart worked to construct a series of equations in response to these strange things it was experiencing. Was this to feel? How to describe what one feels? "... I don't know why I am here," it began. A beat, and then it continued. "But that is okay." Another pause, this time longer as it dipped it head slightly and reached for that elusive sensation deep within, that thing it had no word for but knew that it felt with one-hundred per cent authenticity. "It is a good thing that I am here." That was all Cyrus needed to know. Genesis was, without any shadow of a doubt, a success. The first real one he had since he had began this project fifteen years ago. They had told him that a robot couldn't feel. Feeling was something only a real dragon was capable of - whatever a "real" dragon was meant to be. He had no such petty distinction between real and fake. Even though it had no words for the emotions coursing through its fabricated neurotransmitters, it described the sensations. It knew what it was to feel. "Confusion," Cyrus explained to the dracoid, shifting its head to the side as it paused its internal search for meaning. "Con... fusion...?" Genesis replied. "Contentment." "... Con... tentment..." "Happiness." "... Happi... ness." The dracoid trained its eyes to the ground, deep in thought. So, these were feelings. "I feel... confused. But I am... content." It peered back up at Cyrus, some strange semblance of a smile forming on its silvery face. "And I am... happy." | xx |
| xx |
After three applications of the same tiresome emotional intelligence test was considered enough to convince the other scientists at the unveiling that Genesis was, in fact, a genuine "product" - Gods, how Cyrus hated that word - the presentation was deemed a tremendous success, and the once-fledgling inventor had become a visionary. Fifteen years of work had led to this. And he didn't regret a single second of it.
Major networks broadcast news of his breakthrough to tens of millions of viewers. Publications spoke of Cyrus' achievement, and the wonder of Genesis itself in its mimicry of the "real deal" - again, Cyrus hated that phrase - and word of mouth spread to the farthest reaches of Sornieth, until this once-unknown tinkerer and wannabe inventor went down in the history books as the greatest modern innovator Sornieth was to know. He found a wife, and became rich. Famous. And yet, some things were never enough. "You're a fraud," they claimed. "A robot lacks the capacity to express emotion," they sneered. "The programming is exceptional, but the fact of the matter is, these 'emotions' are fabricated and merely mimic what is natural for a living dragon." The irony of the situation was that the Shifting Expanse was the capitol of innovation and advancement. If society was fit to improve, then by the miracle of science it would do so. But Genesis devolved into an icon of fear and mistrust, perhaps because it was far too ahead of its time. The idea of a full-scale reconstruction of a living being from synthetic imitations of the organs and the nervous system scared society into believing that it would no longer be necessary. After all, what worth did a life have when it could so easily be manufactured and replaced? What was society's purpose now that it had relinquished its place in the world to an ersatz reflection of itself? "What was the purpose of this 'magnum opus' of yours?", "What was the reasoning behind this spark of genius?", "What implications do you think this has for society as a whole?" There was no deep philosophy behind it. Genesis did not come packaged with elaborate social commentary. It... no, they, were a passion project. A love letter to the marvels of science, how a mortal dragon could become a God by way of creation; just as the Stormcatcher had created life, so too did Cyrus carry on this tradition. That was his purpose - to create. To elevate what was into what could be. "Am I necessary, Cyrus?" Genesis had asked their creator one day. That lone question was in itself proof against all disbelief that emotional faculties could be replicated inorganically from only the deepest of understandings of what made something truly alive. A mere robot would not contemplate the foundations of its existence with its own creator. But this one did. And it asked for meaning. Cyrus stopped completely in his tracks when the words reached his ears, eyes trained to his work but refusing to register the blueprints in front of him. He craned his neck around to acknowledge Genesis and exhaled steadily. "Why would you ask me that?" Genesis gazed at the blueprints beyond their creator, taking in the detailed notes on a "GX-100" series of machinations, whatever those were. "I am, for all intents and purposes, no different to the rest of society. I am real. I am living. I think. I feel. I know I feel. The only difference between I and them, is that I am not made of flesh and blood." Silence. "And yet," they continued, "despite these fundamental qualities which every living thing possesses, I am, in every conceivable way, wrong. I've seen the publications. I've watched the reports. They speak of me as though I have no autonomy. As though I am not here, and I cannot hear them. If what they claim is the truth; I do not think, I do not feel, I do not live, then why does it hurt so much to know that I... am nothing?" Their eyes remained unblinking, boring deep into Cyrus' soul and laying his intentions and motives bare for scrutiny. The dramatic irony of the situation became clear - even against the cold skepticism of the world around them, he had felt completely and utterly exposed under the examination of Genesis. Somehow, they seemed more alive in that moment than he had ever felt. "If I am not machine, yet simultaneously not draconian, then what is my place in society?" Fatherly instincts taking over, Cyrus shifted away from his work and took a firestarter between his claws, igniting it with a spark of latent electricity and clamping down on it with his teeth. He beckoned Genesis over to him with a curled digit, and slipped the firestarter between his fore and middle digits, a cloud of smoke scurrying from his jaws to freedom. "Are ya familiar with the 'Three Laws of Robotics', Genesis?" he inquired. "No..." Genesis replied, tilting their head in confusion. "It was a set of laws for denoting friendly dracoid behavior many, many decades ago by a dragon named Asimov. The first law," he elaborated, scaring another puff from the end of the firestarter, "dictates that a dracoid may not, under any circumstances, willfully or through inaction, allow a draconian being to come'ta harm. The second law... a dracoid must obey all orders given to it by a draconian overseer, except for when these orders will conflict with the first law. The third law..." Genesis absently pondered the reasoning behind their creator's sudden lecture, staring a hole into the floor in the process. "... Concludes that a dracoid must prioritize its own integrity only in the event that this act of self-preservation will not conflict with the first or second laws. But, personally?" Genesis shook themself from their distant ruminations and turned their full attention back to Cyrus. "Asimov was a hack," he scoffed, accent riding strong on his words. The firestarter had no time to react before it was torn asunder in pursuit of a fleeting drag, and promptly fell limp between the Ridgeback's fangs. "Especially the second law, that's the biggest hunk'a crap I ever heard." "Cyrus, what does this have to do with...?" "Point is, Genesis," Cyrus continued, gesticulating freely, "society 'spects ya to bake it its cake, and it wants to eat it, too. It's on board with the idea of a robotic companion that can do anything it's ordered to, but as soon as that companion outclasses society simply 'cause it can? Nah. Don't wanna know. Look at this way - it's like... havin' a kid, right?" "... Yes?" "You have a kid, and ya think to yourself, 'I love this kid so much!' and ya raise it for the better part of your life, teachin' it every moral and life lesson and idealogy you've learned that'cha parents taught'cha when youse was a dragonet, and then badda bing, badda boom, it's done the exact opposite thing ya taught it to do! And then ya don't love it anymore. It was only useful to ya while you could be sure that it wouldn't become independent and start makin' its own decisions. 'Cause then it might make better decisions than you ever have. And that," he concluded with one last violation of his firestarter before it sadly expired in his maw, "would be a kick in the head." Genesis thought long and hard about their creator's questionable, yet strikingly in-depth analogy, and regarded him almost childishly as, in an instant, their world had been stripped naked to its barest of qualities and deconstructed for what it was. "Oh... I think I understand." "So, you see," Cyrus said, ushering Genesis next to him, "it's not a question of needing a reason to exist. It's about havin' a right to exist. The idea of creating an entirely inorganic, yet functioning mind from scratch worries them. It makes them think they're an obsolete species, entirely replaceable." Because they are, he thought to himself. "And are they?" Genesis probed - innocuously, but it was enough to trap Cyrus in a corner and force him to bite his tongue. Did they realize? he asked himself. There's no need for organic flesh anymore. Flawed biological processes that a machine can both replicate and improve upon. But when a dracoid seeks validation from its own creator, it's best not to reaffirm their own visions of purposelessness. That's not my intention. "No," he decided. "For somethin' to be replaceable, that'd infer it had never had any worth to begin with. You can replicate a life, but you can't replace it. Anyway, society'll come around," he took another firestarter and sparked it to life, repeating the unfortunate cycle all over, "it always does." For a dragon with such a uniquely loose, informal style of addressing even the most gracious of peers, there was undoubtedly a profoundness to his words that Genesis appreciated; needed. Perhaps this is what it's like to speak to one's father, they thought. I suppose, then, that is what he is. "Thank you, Cyrus," they said, and turned to leave. "You are a wonderful father." A smile that Genesis never had the opportunity to see, but that they had prompted nonetheless. "Kids," the old Ridgeback snorted.xx |
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