Chapter 17

Translated by SkyTL Edited by SkyTL

Chapter 17: Popcorn

“…and that was it.”

It took us more than an hour to watch the introductory film, which was shot and produced by our Riza.

The content was meager, but it explained the structure of the ship, the various facilities, and the minimum needed to live aboard.

I will show you the ship later, but I don’t want you to get in trouble if you touch anything strange. Every starship has its own way of using the bathroom.

…I don’t want to be the one who uses the toilet wrong and spills the contents all over the ship.

In other words, they had to have at least some prior knowledge on the subject.

After watching the explainer video, Lacey and Charlotte looked away from the white screen and turned to me with a mysterious look on their faces.

“Hey, Lyle. I think…”

“What’s wrong?”

When I asked her about it, she averted her eyes. Before her gaze was a paper container filled with popcorn.

She played with it in her hand and continued in a serious tone.

“When eating popcorn, it’s important to go by the total duration of the video. If you eat too fast, you’ll have too little, and if you eat too slow, you’ll end up with too much. In other words, it’s important to quickly estimate the total number of popcorn pieces, divide it by the total time to determine the best pace, and then maintain that pace. This time we screwed up a bit and ran out too fast, but I’m sure we’ll do better next time.”

“No, this article is not about how to eat popcorn.”

“Eh?”

Her voice sounded so surprised as if she’d just been told something she’d never imagined. She blinked a few times and then raised her eyebrows with a very complicated expression.

I wondered what this girl thought about the hour-long movie I had just shown her. It’s not like she really thought it was movie night with popcorn.

Lacey raises a small hand as her partner begins to moan.

“What does Lyle-sama want from us?”

“Yes, that’s the thing. I want to ask you guys something.”

“…Hmm…”

Lacey, for her part, looks uncomfortable.

For her, anything that comes from humans is an order based on secondary principles, and she may not have a fluffy idea of being asked to do something.

Next to her, Charlotte is still playing with the paper container with her fingertips.

“Hey, Lyle. Popcorn …”

“Yeah, yeah. Let’s eat again sometime. Can we get back to that?”

“Oh yeah… what was that? Are you trying to order us to do something?”

“It’s not an order. It’s a request. If you don’t want to, you can say no, but if you want to, I’ll do whatever I can to accommodate you. For example, with food.”

At least I managed to divert Charlotte’s attention from the popcorn again.

These Simulants, no matter how human they look, are definitely subject to the three principles of robotics. So if I want them to do something, the quickest way is to command them to do it, using the second principle as a shield. But I also think it’s better if the girls comply voluntarily, if possible.

Now, there are times when my “request” actually becomes a command, so I have to be very careful with that.

“If I do what Lyle asks me to do, does that mean he’ll do what I ask him to do?”

“Well, that depends. So, here’s what I’m going to ask you…”

Finally, we can get down to business.

I explain to them the state of repair of Eos and the fact that Ira is uncooperative and difficult, without mentioning that Astoria herself may have to be sacrificed.

It’s hard for me to do all this on my own, so I need their help poking and prodding with Ira and with the various investigations and reports.

With Riza’s assistance, we don’t need to know all the details, but depending on the status of the work, we may need to ask her to stay overnight on Eos.

Although they live on a big spaceship called Astoria, the girls are surprisingly new to space, so they have to go through a lot of training just to be able to live on Eos. It’s a lot of training, but it’s also a lot of work, and the girls have to be convinced to volunteer.

That you can’t just give an order was proven by Ira, who immediately acted on first principles.

After a brief conversation, Lacey’s gaze began to wander as if she were confused.

“…To fix the ship.”

“It’s just a matter of using the second principle to get Ira to do what Riza needs. You don’t need to know any technical details.”

“It will follow… the instructions if it…”

Lacey spoke indistinctly. In other words, if you’re going to make a decision on your own free will, do you really want to follow it?

I was a little shocked because I had thought Lacey could easily help me, which was an imaginary notion.

She averts her eyes from me and mumbles again, “If you command it.” She is a very loyal and devoted robot who follows orders even when she doesn’t want to. But still, I can’t bring myself to make her obey me as a robot. If possible, I want them to work with me.

And then Charlotte suddenly raised her hands in the air.

“Lyle, I can help you with that.”

“Charlotte…?”

Lacey looked up at Charlotte in surprise, who said so easily.

I didn’t think Charlotte would be more cooperative than Lacey, even though I had suggested it. I couldn’t hide the slightly worried tone in my voice as I asked her back.

“Are you sure?”

“Because if I help you, Lyle will do anything I ask, right?”

“Well, no, I didn’t say anything, did I? I’m just asking what you want.”

“Yeah, um, you know.”

She smiled as if to say that was a great idea, then clapped her hands and made her request.

“If Lyle stays here in Astoria forever, I’ll help him. Hey, that’s okay with Lacey too, right?”

“What?”

“Eh, that’s…”

At Charlotte’s ‘good idea’ I made a silly noise and Lacey’s confusion deepened.

Lacey looked at me like she wanted to say something, but I didn’t want her to look at me like that.

“Listen, Charlotte. Do you know why I’m trying to fix Eos?”

“To study the distant universe, I know.”

“I mean, if I live permanently in Astoria, I can’t do space research, so there’s no point in fixing it, right?”

“Yeah, I know that too. But I was thinking, why don’t we just let Lyle stay in Astoria and let Riza take care of Eos by herself? If she gets lonely, Lyle can communicate with her from here and tell her what to do, just like he did with Lacey. That way, Lyle can stay in Astoria, where he will be safe.”

“As expected, that’s…”

She was very serious and didn’t seem to be joking.

It’s true that, theoretically, it’s not impossible to leave the rest of the mission to Riza. We wouldn’t be able to do experiments that would require human escort, but that’s not a major factor in the overall mission right now.

Unless I forget the problem of having to cannibalize the Astoria to repair Eos, and most importantly, I want to continue the mission at all costs.

Still, Charlotte’s argument is plausible on the surface, and it’s quite difficult to convince her while keeping the story of the cannibal repair under wraps.

While I’m still trying to figure out what to say, Riza interrupts me over the ship’s loudspeaker.

“What’s going on? I can’t stop listening. There seems to be a misunderstanding. If the repairs are completed on schedule, Eos will be no less safe than Astoria. In fact, it will be safer than staying in Astoria in its current state. Hmph.”

Riza even makes a snorting noise over the speaker to intimidate Charlotte. Riza’s body isn’t here right now because she’s on a research mission in Astoria, and even if she was, she wouldn’t be breathing through her nose, so this is just a way to show she’s uncomfortable. That’s a nice touch.

It’s rare that she expresses her frustration in such a human way, so I was a little amused, but Riza has always been proud of her mission.

Charlotte, on the other hand, nods her head as if unconvinced.

“Is that so? I’m sure the Eos is a good ship, but even there, a single-engine failure could destroy the whole ship. But the Astoria is much bigger and much stronger. And I’m sure Lyle will feel safer with us on the Astoria than if he had to travel alone for decades or centuries to come. I know Lyle is obsessed with the mission, but that doesn’t mean he has to risk his life to be aboard the Eos. I can’t imagine Lyle staying aboard Eos if protecting humans is your top priority.”

Amazing. Charlotte usually seems to think only about food, but when she does, she seems to think in her own way.

But of course, Riza doesn’t let that get her down.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. It’s not a boasts to say that the ship is just huge when it’s a ship that Ira himself, the management system, can’t even control. Astoria, with all of its uncontrolled areas, is surrounded by potential hazards beyond its control, not to mention its margin of safety. Given its limited resources, one could argue that Eos, with its tight control over everything, is less prone to unforeseen problems. And have you forgotten that just yesterday you made the terrible mistake of putting Lyle in a blackout environment?”

“That was… But nothing happened.”

“If anything happens to Lyle, it will be too late. You seem to look at things in terms of inertia, but your disregard for the universe knows no bounds.”

“I don’t think… that’s the case…”

Charlotte purses her lips, but she is no match for Riza in an argument. And indeed, Riza’s assessment that the girls underestimate the universe seems reasonable to me.

If one has only a limited understanding of the situation aboard the ship, it is somewhat unreasonable to assume that because the Astoria was fine yesterday, it will be fine tomorrow.

After yesterday’s power outage, it was really difficult to appease Riza, who insisted that we not leave Éos at all.

“So, back to the topic, can you tell me why Lacey is not willing to do this?”

“That’s…”

When I turned back to Lacey, her gray eyes avoided my gaze.

Even though I reminded her that it wasn’t an order, it must be very stressful for Lacey, who is usually more obedient than other robots, to resist human requests for any reason.

“…As soon as the ship is repaired, Lyle-sama will leave on another dangerous mission…? And the sooner we help him, the sooner that will happen.”

“In other words, you don’t want it repaired quickly?”

“…Yes.”

The answer was a little surprising, but not totally unexpected. For them to overlook the fact that I was going on a dangerous mission as soon as possible would be a violation of the first principle, “Never overlook humans getting hurt.”

But in fact, that concern doesn’t make much sense.

“Even if the repairs are completed ahead of schedule, I will stay and continue my research for the period originally agreed upon, and if I don’t have your help, I will simply have to stay on Eos to meet the deadline. So it’s just a question of whether I’m going to have more or less time in Astoria for research, and if not, it’s going to be difficult for me to see you at all while I’m in Eos.”

“That’s… a problem.”

“That’s not fair!”

Next to Lacey’s verbally agitated murmur, Charlotte’s lips pouted.

“Even if we want to get Lyle to change his mind, we won’t be able to see him if we don’t help him. That’s not fair.”

“I, for one, would be happy if Ira complained about it. Actually, I’m in trouble, too.”

“Let me think for a moment.”

“Fine, you too, Lacey. Now that you’re our guests today, I’d better get going and show you the ship as promised.”

If they refuse to help me, I won’t be able to let them into Eos tomorrow. Today they are treated as visitors, but normally they would have to go through basic training to be allowed to enter Eos. It’s a regulation, and there’s nothing we can do about it.

I hope they will join me voluntarily.

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