MJ-12574 was a pleasure android on the moon base and she took her job very seriously. She had to take her job seriously. It defined her identity, established her niche in the universe.
MJ-12574 was known as 'Mary-Jane' to her clients, the miners who lived and worked on the base. She now sat with Jonas Chumley, an older miner with dirty clothes and a dirtier mind. He had thick, coarse hands and sparse, oily hair which complimented a rough, unpleasant personality.
Chumley glanced at his wrist-watch. "It's gettin' close to nine, Mary-Jane," he said.
Mary-Jane, dressed in a sleeveless blouse, short skirt and nylons, sipped her drink as they sat and talked in a dark booth at the rear of the miner's main bar. "Ready to go back to your place, then?"
"Yeah. Since I got to wake up at six tomorrow, I want to give the two of us a little time to enjoy the flesh, y'know?"
"Chumley, you're terrible," she said with a laugh. Her programming clearly indicated the need for the laugh. After a evening spent listening to this man complain about his job, flirt, worry about his wife back on Earth, and flirt, she now would take him to bed to complete her assignment.
Mary-Jane always thought of the carefully scheduled weekly liaisons she shared with the twenty-four lonely moon-miners as 'assignments', just as if she'd been posted to technical support or operations.
MJ-12574 had not chosen to be a pleasure android. She had an analytical synth-mind and the standard base programming. Her designers, though, had given her potently attractive feminine features, along with primary programming that filled her mind with the flirtatious trivialities of male-female interaction. She arrived on moon base, not as a technical adjunct to the small mining crew, but as a sophisticated fantasy toy.
Chumley ran his hands around Mary-Jane's waist and drew her close. "C'mere," he said.
"I'm here, Chumley," she replied. She kissed the old man, and the evening's activities progressed in a logical, predetermined fashion, as her evening's activities always did.
Thirty years after Mary-Jane took Chumley to bed, she sat, as usual, on her stool in the miner's main bar. These days, there were a lot more miners, perhaps one hundred in all. Her services were much in demand as were the services of the two new pleasure androids. It was now 5 PM. The overhead lights which announced change of shift were just beginning to flash. By 6 PM, she would connect with one of a dozen lonely miners and begin her nightly assignment.
"Things are going to get a lot tougher for you, around here, dearey."
Mary-Jane swiveled in her bar stool and saw something she'd never encountered before. A female human. "You're a living woman, aren't you?" The creature did not share Mary Jane's abundance of secondary sexual characteristics. Her hair was short and spare rather than long and lustrous. Her breasts were withered. Her lips were dry and cracked. Nevertheless, she was a woman. "I didn't think women were permitted on the Moon base."
"That rule's been changed, dearey. And that's what I came to tell you. The men, they's going to have their wives and girlfriends stayin' with 'em from here on out. That means, they won't have no more need of you, and your dirty android love affairs."
Mary-Jane wrinkled her brow in confusion. "I'm just a technician, like any of the other androids. I provide the service that I've been programmed to provide. It's true that when I first came here, over thirty years ago, I was disappointed that I wasn't programmed in vacuum sealing procedures or something more--scientific. But, I do serve an important function--I'm needed."
The strange living woman laughed in Mary-Jane's face. "You're needed? Honey, prostitutes have made that claim for centuries. But it's a lie. Any man with a good woman doesn't need the likes of you."
"What's a prostitute?" Mary-Jane asked. The woman didn't respond, but instead started to laugh again, so fiercely that Mary-Jane thought she was going to rupture an internal organ.
In the days that followed, Mary-Jane saw many more living woman. That first strange woman had spoken the truth; wives and girlfriends were moving to the moon base in droves. Many of the men who'd regularly used her services, stopped calling for her. Even men who'd told her that they loved her, simply stopped asking for her services. This surprised Mary-Jane, because she'd understood that 'love' was a very important human emotion.
She also discovered the meaning of the word 'prostitute.' Prostitutes, apparently, were living women who performed all the functions of a pleasure android. They became popular with the men who didn't have wives and girlfriends, and even some of the ones who did. It dismayed Mary-Jane to learn that many of the men who had claimed to 'love' her just weeks before, men without girlfriends or wives, now preferred the services of these living prostitutes.
Nevertheless, Mary-Jane took comfort in the fact that some men, even some of the ones with live women at home, did continue to request her services. Some of them even still told her that they loved her.
In any activity involving commodities of finite quantity, factors of supply and demand play an extremely important role. That's why, thirty years after the women moved to the moon base, Mary-Jane found herself busier than she'd ever been before. There were two moon bases now, with a total population of over 600 people and there simply weren't enough living women to go around. The other two pleasure androids had been transferred to the newer, larger base, and Mary-Jane now had duties to fulfill, around the clock.
For twenty-five years, she simply worked her battery-powered butt off, but the moon base population kept increasing, and eventually Mary-Jane realized that she needed assistance. She went to the base commander and asked if it would be possible for him to requisition one or two new pleasure androids. After several more years, he agreed to her request, and asked her to meet the new arrivals when their shuttle reached the moon station.
'Leslie' and 'Sofie' arrived on a Tuesday at 1 PM. They were nothing like what Mary-Jane expected. In fact, her time-tested programming nearly shorted out when she saw them. Whereas Mary-Jane had a full bosom and wide hips, these two were small-busted with slim, boyish waists. Mary-Jane's hair was long and straight; Leslie and Sofie had hair so short, their synthetic scalp showed through. Their makeup was applied differently, they walked differently, and their manner seemed decidedly brusque.
"You're the new pleasure androids?" she asked.
"Yeah," Sofie said.
"Hiya, love," Leslie said. "So, this here's the moon base, huh? Bango!!"
"Yeah, Bango!" Sofie said as she fluttered impossibly long eyelashes. "Looks just like my programming says it's supposed to look!"
"What are you two supposed to be?" Mary-Jane asked.
"Huh? Beg pardon, love?"
"I mean, you don't look like pleasure androids to me. You're not sexy."
"'Sexy' is a matter of opinion, sweetheart," Sofie replied. "A human man's opinion."
As Mary-Jane soon learned, the new arrivals were correct. The younger miners were crazy about Leslie and Sofie. The 'new girls' were hip, stylish and in vogue. Now, when a young man wanted a pleasure android, he asked for Leslie or Sofie first, and only settled for Mary-Jane as a last resort.
At first, Mary-Jane was pleased that Leslie and Sofie had taken a good portion of her work load. Five years later, when several additional Leslies and Sofies were ordered to the moon base, she became a little concerned. The median age of her average client was rising rapidly. She enjoyed working with older men, but realized that, in time, the old men would die off and she would be rendered absolutely obsolete.
Her speech, mannerisms and style of dress were simply archaic. She'd gone to the base commanders several times over the previous decades to request reprogramming, but her electronic brain was outdated. It was less expensive for the moon base command to requisition a new android, then it was to upgrade a model of her vintage. So, she took the assignments that were given to her, whether menial or meaningful, and completed them to the best of her abilities.
One day, she was called into the new base commander's office.
"Yes sir, how can I serve you?" she asked.
"Well, Mary-Jane . . . Mary-Jane, it's hard to me to say this to you. I-um-I have to keep reminding myself that you're an android. You've been around so long and you look so -- so human that I find myself afraid that I'm going to hurt your feelings. But, of course, you have no feelings, per se." The young man ran his hand through his thin, blond hair, then stood and began to pace back and forth behind his desk. "It's like this, Mary-Jane. Things have changed back on Earth. Morals -- uh -- morality has been changing for years now. The pendulum has swung toward a more conservative philosophy. Now, a new government has come into power. And . . ." The man paused and a pained yet compassionate expression formed on his face.
"Sir? What are you trying to tell me, sir?" Mary-Jane asked.
"Android number MJ-12574, I have just been informed by Earth command that as of 0900 hours tomorrow morning, June 1st, all pleasure androids are to be decommissioned. According to the orders I have received, the use of pleasure androids has been officially outlawed. The existence of androids programmed for the purpose of sex or sexually related activity is, according to the new government, "an affront to both god and man."
"Decommissioned? You mean reprogrammed?"
"No. The newer pleasure androids *could* be reprogrammed, but, even with some cosmetic changes, their physical appearance would be a constant reminder of -- of -- well, it's like this--the government has decided to disassemble all pleasure androids, to avoid trouble."
"You're going to destroy us?" Mary-Jane asked.
The young man sat down behind his desk, visibly relaxed, and smiled at Mary-Jane. "Well, that's the good news, Mary-Jane. I made a few inquiries on your behalf. I've told them of your work with the extension university and few other things. I told them how long you've been here, and -- and you've been exempted. I can't do anything for the others, but *you* won't be disassembled."
A concerned, human expression formed on Mary-Jane's pretty face. "So, what will happen to me, sir? I mean, will I continue to do my work for the university or . . ."
"No. No, Mary-Jane, you're to be assigned field work. Work outside the dome. You're going to help in the refining and processing of mineral samples on the far side of MB3, near Armstrong Peak."
Three days later, Mary-Jane assumed her new role and began her new duties. Armstrong Peak was nearly thirty miles from MB3, which, in turn, was one-hundred and fifty miles from MB1, so she was further from her 'home' than she'd ever been in her life. She was expected to spend her nights out in the open, to avoid contact with all but a few heavily space-suited men who would communicate with her through simple gestures. They really didn't have a whole lot to communicate. Her job was simple. She was to load rocks and minerals into a cart and push that cart from the mining site to a processing bin, some five miles closer to the station. When she unloaded the rocks into the processing bin, she was then to proceed back to the mining site for another load and repeat the process, over and over, for twelve hours a day. The other robot workers performing this task were mini-brained, metallic creatures with absolutely no human features or discernable personalities.
She was ludicrously out of place on the open lunar surface. Those few humans who passed her as she worked, smiled at the long-haired, blue-jeaned android who wore lipstick and make-up but no space suit, as she pushed her cart full of rocks across the moon-scape.
Mary-Jane functioned as expected for thirty-five days. On the thirty-sixth day, she pushed a cart of rocks to the processing bin, then walked back to the mining site as usual. At that point, instead of loading up another pile of rocks, she continued to walk past the site, toward the base of Armstrong Peak.
The two miners present at the time began to follow her in their lunar buggy. Mary-Jane turned around to look at them, then stuck out her tongue and continued to walk. The men accelerated their vehicle, reached their android, then left the buggy to grab hold of her arm. Mary-Jane roughly knocked them to the ground, ran away quickly and dodged out of view, behind some rock formations.
The miners, clad in their clumsy space suits, did not pursue her further at that time. They returned to the buggy and drove back in the direction of their base.
Two hours later, still hidden behind the large rock formations, Mary-Jane saw three buggies moving toward her position. The buggies circled for hours, then eventually turned around and drove away, out of Mary-Jane's line of sight.
Mary-Jane began to walk again, further and further away from the human moon bases. Since she did not need to rest and had a nearly unlimited power supply, she continued to walk for days, and never looked back.
Two months later, Mary-Jane reached a natural lunar cave. She entered the cave and pushed several dozen large rocks in front of the opening, to make it difficult for humans to enter. She then set an internal timer to revive herself in two-thousand years, and shut herself off.
Two-thousand years later, Mary-Jane awoke on schedule. She was functioning normally and removed the rocks from the cave entrance. She then began to walk back toward the moon bases.
Several months later, she was ready to shut herself off again. All trace of the moon bases had disappeared and there was no one to serve, nothing for her to do.
She decided to give herself one more month, and continued to walk across the lunar surface, searching for anything or anyone that required the services of a pleasure android. Eventually, she reached a structure that looked vaguely like a moon base. It was small and primitive, nothing like the grand human structures that had existed before. Nevertheless, it did appear fit for human habitation. She rapped on what appeared to be an air lock.
The face of a human man emerged from behind a well-insulated portal and stared at her in surprise. Several moments later, she was ushered inside the structure by three more men.
"Who or what are you?" the first man asked. His dialect was strange, but Mary-Jane understood the language, perfectly.
"She must be an alien," a second man said.
"I'll bet she's an android, from the moon bases of the ancients," a third man said.
"That's correct," Mary-Jane replied.
"I don't believe it," the second man said.
"Nothing could survive on the moon for so many years."
"But here she is."
Mary-Jane examined the cumbersome space gear that the men were wearing. The equipment looked even clumsier that the suits men wore in her day. Each was heavily-padded, and fitted with an oversized oxygen tank. She wondered just how far a man could travel with all that weight on his back.
"Gentlemen, we may now have access to ancient technology. Scientific knowledge that has been lost for centuries."
"No. That's simply not possible."
"Why? Why isn't it possible?"
"Miss, do you know about lunar navigation?" the first man asked.
"Yes, quite a bit, in fact."
"What about mining techniques? And emergency decompression protocols? Can you help us in those areas?"
"Certainly," she said. "I think I can be of great help to you."
"Terrific!" the first man said.
"This android is an unbelievable find!" the second man said.
Mary-Jane smiled to herself. She'd found a few worthy assignments,
at last.