Christmas 1994 - Charles and the Genie

Charles and the Genie

a science fiction fairy tale for Christmas 1994

Paul Brazier & Juliet Eyeions

The butlerbot was sulking. With a pre-emptive microwave data link to the House’s Cray mainframe and a full suite of top notch personal protection weaponry concealed in its uniform, it was a top-of-the-range personal companion. But its smart blue coat had been soiled and smeared with cobwebs as it sorted through boxes of dusty, dirty and dull old stuff looking for anything worth auctioning. It opened another box and, rummaging around inside, pulled a battered old lamp from under a heap of discarded footman’s uniforms. It probed it with a sensor-finger, squirted sample polish on the side, and buffed it gently on one of the discarded uniforms.

With a fizz and a crackle, a cloud of smoke issued from the spout of the lamp, and filled the room. A giant face appeared in the smoke, dusky and crafty-looking, and a huge voice filled the room.

‘I am the genie of the lamp, oh Master! What do you desire?’

The butlerbot continued to rub the lamp, oblivious of the genie. Being a machine, it could not perceive old magic.

‘Well?’ boomed the genie. ‘I haven’t got all day.’

The robot examined the shine it had achieved. Brass. Little scrap value. In case the thing had historical or sentimental value, the butlerbot used its data link to access the inventory database on the mainframe.

‘If you will not or cannot answer, take me to your master.’

Nothing. It initiated a wider search, scanned other on-line databases. If there was nothing there, it would cut the link and discard the lamp as junk.
The genie moved closer to the motionless mechanical man, and saw the electrons dancing in the brain behind the eyes. It saw the data link spring into being from the aerials in the robot’s head, reached out to touch the flow of microwaves, and with a soft ‘plop,’ which the robot could not hear, disappeared.

Charles took the crown off his head, shook it, and tapped it gently on the table. The gold gleamed softly in the firelight, and the little jewels along its bezel threw back random sparks of colour, aping the Christmas tree in the corner.

“Are you back with us, then?” asked Camilla, putting down her knitting.

“Bloody thing’s on the blink again,” said Charles. “I was in the middle of my speech for Sunday when the virtual secretary froze.”

“Have you called the men in to look at it?”

“Not until I’m sure where the problem is. It might be me. We’re not as rich as we used to be, you know, and I’m not as clever as all that with computers. I’d better try again.” Charles touched the crown to the top of his head, and lapsed into the glassy-eyed, slack-jawed pose that Camilla called his ‘moron posture’. After a moment, he reached up and took it off again.”

“I’ll be damned,” he breathed.

“What’s the matter, dear?” asked Camilla. She had not seen him this animated for a while. Perhaps it was the thought of Sunday’s speech that was galvanising him.

“It’s definitely a software problem. The virt. sec. has a different voice. It interrupted me, and told me that, as I am the top of its command chain, I have three wishes, and would I get on with them as it’s got a lot to do once I’ve finished with it. All I want to do is get on with my speech, and it starts offering me wishes. Well, I wish this bloody apparatus would work the way it’s intended to, for one thing.”

Immediately, the jewelled headband came to life. Every led on its circumference lit, and they strobed in fascinating sequences of colours for several seconds. After a few moments the lights went out, and the ‘ready’ led began its slow flash.

Charles raised it warily to his head, and fell into the moron posture. It seemed only a few seconds before he removed it again, and sat back. “Marvellous,” he murmured.

“Charles, what on Earth happened?” Camilla was deeply alarmed.

“It’s true! I wished that this thing would work, and now it’s awesome! And the genie says it was him improved it. And he says that I’ve been given three wishes for freeing him from the lamp! That was the first one. Well, if that’s the case, we’ll have to give the others some careful thought.”

For the next few days, Charles carefully avoided contact with any computer peripheral which the genie might use to harass him to use his wishes a.s.a.p. Instead, he gave a lot of thought to his forthcoming Christmas broadcast, and only interfaced with the genie via the virtual secretary when he wanted to clarify a point. The genie had enhanced Charles’s virtual interface to the point that all their conversations took place at the speed of thought – which is a lot faster than you might think, so they got through a lot of work. A typical encounter went something like this –

– How do you define ‘a need’?

– Anything an individual must have to live.

– How do you define ‘a want’?

– Anything an individual thinks they must have to live.

– Shouldn’t that be ‘anything that an individual mistakenly thinks they must have to live.’

– Isn’t that what you wish it meant?

– No, it’s what I think it means, and you won’t catch me like that.

– You can’t blame me for trying. I want to get away, and you’re taking an awfully long time making your mind up about your wishes.

– I’ve got to be sure that you and I are talking the same language. I mean, would you consider that in order for an individual to be ‘merry’ they would have to have what they wanted, whereas in order for them to be ‘happy’, they would have to have what they need?

– The master is indeed a clever man, and if that is what he thinks the meaning is, who am I, a mere slave, to argue?

– Dammit, don’t be so evasive! I won’t make my wishes until we have agreed every term I use. And if we don’t manage to agree in my life, I will leave the wishes to my son, and he can carry on the process of definition until he gets it right, or he can pass it on to his son. You can do that if you’re hereditary monarch and absolute ruler, you know. Now, do you want to wait that long, or shall we try to get agreement this Christmas?

– Your wish is my command, oh Master!

– Not a wish! Look, there is a way to shorten this process. We’ve got two Cray supercomputers and access to most of the world’s libraries via the Internet. Will you agree that everything in there is a given, except where it conflicts?

– There… there is sense in what you say.

– Good. Where it does conflict, in any wish I utter, you must consult me or my descendants for a decision before acting. Is that clear?

– Yes. But it means I could be hanging around for centuries, solving your problems if you don’t get your definitions right…

– …so it’s in both our interests to agree our definitions, so you can get on your way, and I can get what I want without the usual genie perversity coming into play. Right?

– The master is very convincing. How can I refuse him this wish?

– It wasn’t a wish, dammit, it was a request for agreement before commitment to wishing. Do you agree?

– The master is indeed a hard task master. Yes, what you say is true.

– Good! Now, is a wish with two parts counted as one wish or two…

“Charles, Bertie Bumbleby called, said ‘Merry Christmas’, and asked if I knew of any juicy gossip he could use to spice up your biography. I said that there isn’t any gossip because there’s nothing to gossip about, and you’d call him back tomorrow. And the men from the bbc are here.”

“Show them in, ’Milla, show them in. And if Bumbleby calls back again, tell him to watch the broadcast. That should give him something sensational to write about.”

Two men came into the small living room. One was dressed in a casual lounge suit and a nasty tie, while the other had a full, surgically-implanted, vr head-up pick-up installation, and no-one noticed what he was wearing; just the metalwork protruding from his head and the truculent look on his face.

“Where would you like us, sir,” the first asked unctuously.

“I’d like to sit here by the fire, next to the tree, I think.”

“Very well, sir. Henry will stand over here, and may move around a little to give the broadcast some interest.”

“No, please ask him to sit in the armchair on the other side of the fire. I don’t want any distractions.”

Henry lowered himself into the armchair, abruptly stood up again, removed Camilla’s knitting from the seat, and sat down again.

“When you’re ready, sir.”

“Good Afternoon. When my mother used to do this, it was from a vast room in one of her palaces that the BBC had turned into a studio for a couple of weeks. Now, you come to me in the comfort of my own living room, and I must say I prefer it this way. In fact, there are a lot of things that have changed for the better since the Royal Stipend Referendum and the 125% Super Duper Income Tax for incomes over £200,000 p.a. Not least is that for the first time in many years I have had a really remarkably fine nut roast for my Christmas dinner, with roast potatoes, sprouts and gravy. Bliss.

“Also, I have been able to spend a pleasant day out of the public eye with my beautiful wife, Camilla. For this and many other blessings, we both thank you.

“We would like to show our thanks in a more concrete way than this, however. Over the past few days, we have had special reason to discover the true meaning of ‘need’ and ‘want’ and ‘peace on earth’. We have come to the conclusion that in order to be ‘happy’ an individual must have all that they need, a little of the strife necessary to get what they want, and the ability to succeed in the face of that strife. This largely precludes peace on Earth, although we do believe such strife should not be life-threatening. We also came to the conclusion that, in order to be merry, they must also have a little of what they want, and the promise of more if they strive to achieve it. I realise this sounds a little woolly, but it is reinforced by the most powerful computer databases available. So, without further ado, I send this, the most heartfelt greeting I have ever offered. To every individual on Earth, rich or poor, whether or not they hear this, I wish that every Xmas they have will be merry, and every New Year they see in will be happy.”

The vr pickup man relaxed into the chair, and the disgustingly expensive implants in his head emerged and fell away, clinking gently together on the carpet. He smiled merrily, and accepted a glass of sherry from Camilla. Nevertheless, around the world people still saw the scene in Charles’s living room. The other man from the BBC stood for a moment, dumbfounded, then, with a glass of sherry in his hand too, raised it, and with real respect in his voice, offered a toast –

“To the health of King Charles III, Hereditary Governor of the European Dominion of Greater Britain, Sovereign of England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales, and defender of faiths, and now Saviour of the World –

Long Live The King!”

Charles tilted his head in thanks, and all over the world, miraculously filled glasses were raised and emptied in toast to him – while guns refused to fire and missiles refused to launch and suddenly for all the people trying to fire them, it didn’t matter any more.

And it became clear to all that hope was abroad in the world again.

And in a forgotten storeroom, a state-of-the-art personal companion butlerbot sat back on a pile of old footmen’s uniforms, and gazed at its distorted reflection in the side of a dull old brass lamp. For some reason it couldn’t quite isolate, it had been feeling rather sulky. Now it saw that all tasks were important in a society, because society is made up of the interaction of tasks that benefit others. It may not have been capable of perceiving old magic, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t affected by it. After all, it was an individual too.

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