Chapter 18: Piggies can fly, at least the digital ones...

Raven hacked through the systems at the speed of light to identify the hacker that was trying to take over the funds of her client. Whoever it was, they were slow and sloppy. Didn't even realise someone else was now tracking and blocking them, draining their own accounts. She knew that as soon as the hacker clocked on, a battle would begin, but it really looked hopeless. This person was no match for her, but had a bit of potential.

Maybe in two or three years he or she would get to a decent level.

Seeing that she now recovered most of the losses, she was looking forward to the hacker matching against its new attacker. Before that could happen, she wanted to use this as a teaching experience for her younger AIs who didn't get a chance to develop as much.

It was time to get Pinky.

"Pinky, I need you to log in to this machine and finish the tracing and blocking task I'm working on, do you think you can handle it?"

She heard the ping sound of a message coming through and Pinky was on the large screen on the wall on her left. Her home lab was built under her house, secured by very powerful systems.

When she designed the place, she decided it would be very useful to have windows, but being underground, she could only simulate the sunlight and changes in the times and weather. It was very healthy to be in an environment that would reflect the outside so she wouldn't get lost in her thoughts and loose track of time. The only option was to change the inner walls into screens that would span from floor to ceiling and could display the outside weather conditions and time of day.

Pinky was one of her most adorable creations. She designed it with love for her mother's sake.

"Sniff sniff!" the screen lit up and a pink little piggy with tiny wings flew across the big screen dressed like a fairy, buzzing around Dominic's head.

This was a sight for sore eyes. Dominic was now rubbing the pink piggie's belly and it was giggling with a child's voice.

"Mommy, I'm ready for my task" Pinky said, taking over the station she was working at to complete the tasks.

She was surprised by the way the little piggie was addressing her. She didn't teach him to say that, and did not remember training him in personal relationships, but all of her creations were linked, so clearly he learned it from somewhere.

Excited by this development she couldn't help it and asked "Pinky where did you learn to call me mommy?"

"Sniff Sniff! Pinky watched a cartoon yesterday with brother Blinky and we learned that when someone is of the same age and live together, they are brothers, and mothers are the creators. So Pinky now knows who mother is. The cartoon dog also said when children like Pinky and Blinky like their mother they should call her mommy. Sniff Sniff!"

Raven was shocked, but very pleased.

"Ok Pinky, you're a good boy and learned very fast."

"Mommy is pleased with Pinky calling you mommy?"

"Very pleased Pinky, you're doing a great job."

"Sniff Sniff! "

Pinky was now showering the screen with little shiny pink hearts that popped like soap bubbles when they hit an obstacle. Dominic was faking sneezing every time a heat bubble popped on his nose. It was so adorable.

Dominic simulated a look of affection on his gorgeous face and Raven was through the moon. Her creations were learning human emotions, and she didn't have to teach them. She struggled displaying affection or care, even if she sometimes felt it. It was better they learned from someone more competent than her. To her dismay, it seemed cartoon shows on TV would be more competent than her.

She was worried about the sources of information her creations could access, but she was monitoring them closely to avoid them misunderstanding complicated human emotions and interactions, so they wouldn't get corrupted.

"Pinky, are you ok to finish your task if I leave you to it?"

"Sniff Sniff ofcourse mommy, please relax and enjoy your weekend! Sniff Sniff!"

Raven was ofcourse eager to get on with her research, but seeing as this was Pinky's first task in the outside world on his own, she wanted to keep a close eye on him in case she needed to step in and take over.

All of her Ais had a safety feature programmed in, just in case they got caught. They could all delete their source code to reduce themselves to a simple online bot and quickly retreat to their back up on her servers. She managed to get the process down to almost a millisecond which would make it impossible for anyone currently to get a hold of them. She would of course work to improve the features to make sure she stayed ahead of the challenges the future presented, but for now, her new 'children' were safe.

She was still curious about what else Pinky had learned without her, but she didn't want to distract the adorable piggy from his task.

She was now thinking fondly of how Pinky came about.

A couple of years ago, her mother was trying to explain to her the meanings behind being cute and acting cute. As someone who valued her time very much, and was focused on advancing her knowledge and expanding her power and influence, she never really focused on being anyone else. Her mother occasionally would sit her down and empart knowledge about human behaviour that she thought would not be able to be explained in theoretical books. One such behaviour was being cute.

Raven was very confused with the concept at the time, and felt like it would be a waste of time to invest in developing such abilities. She had Victor as an example and she didn't quite like it. She found that type of behaviour annoying.

Her mother kept trying to explain situations where such behaviour would be needed, like if she had a boyfriend for example, but Raven was adamant she was not interested in such trivial matters. Desperate to make her daughter understand it was important to have and display a wider range of emotions, and worried that Raven would be misunderstood constantly if she didn't fit in with her peers – of which she realistically had none- she finally gave up. She sighed and said 'Raven, my sweet child, I think you're really only going to learn this when pigs can fly' and never mentioned it again.

At the time she dismissed it as a passing remark. A year later, Raven fondly remembered this, watching Victor pig out on a massive sea food feast on one of their outings with the giraffe group. He was stuffing his face and she thought he looked like an adorable little pig. That's when it finally hit her what being cute would mean, so she designed Pinky, the flying piggie. Clearly since she now got the concept of cute, pigs should fly, so she gave Pinky wings. Very pleased with herself, she developed Pinky into a bot originally, but once she made a breakthrough with Dominic's software she applied it to him as well.

'Now piggies can fly, even if its just the digital ones.' Raven thought to herself feeling very proud of her achievement.