Italic & Bold by Dan Peacock
1300 words, 6 minutes reading time
Issue 3 (Fall/Winter 2023)
Question: is a hotdog a sandwich?
They were making their way along the bridge, shuffling between two rows of wrecked cars that had burned up bumper-to-bumper. Bold tilted its alloyed head up for a beat, processing the question without breaking its stride.
Yes. A sandwich is defined as being two pieces of bread with a separate foodstuff between them. Therefore a hotdog is a sandwich.
Italic stepped over a charred skeleton that lay half-in, half-out of an open car door.
Yes, but the two pieces of bread are not separate in a standard hotdog configuration. Is a single piece of bread folded over a sandwich, or must the two pieces of bread be distinctly separate? Is it actually a bread taco?
A hotdog is a sandwich.
The two robots carried on in silence. Over the bridge, they were able to veer off to the side of the road, away from the compacted labyrinth of blackened cars and trucks that spanned the width of the highway. The wind grasped at the dry, leafless trees that stood by the roadside, the bare branches twitching.
Bold came to a halt. I need to stop to recharge.
Of course. Take as long as you need.
Bold held its arms out, parallel to the ground. Out of thin slots in its upper arms and shoulders, sheets of solar cells folded out, held in place by a fractal framework of thin metal filaments. When they had fully unfurled, they looked like enormous golden bat-wings.
Italic had wandered over to a nearby car: the passenger door open, splinters of glass strewn across the ground. It closed the door, but not before gently tucking in the withered leg of the desiccated passenger. Italic started to brush the shards of glass into a neat pile.
What are you doing?
I… sorry. Italic flashed a confused emoticon on its face-screen, and returned to Bold’s side, unfolding its own solar wing-cells. This wasn’t new. Italic was a slender, light grey model, built for housekeeping, and Bold sometimes caught it rearranging things absentmindedly when they stopped to recharge. Some restless subfunction was straining inside it, compelling it to tidy up small corners of crumbling buildings or sweep random patches of waste ground.
There were no such issues with Bold. It had been an enforcement unit, but there was nothing and no-one left to enforce. It was slightly shorter and much stockier than Italic, with a dark gunmetal finish.
The two robots stood side by side, absorbing energy from the Sun overhead.
Question.
Yes?
Is cereal a soup?
Bold turned its head slightly to look at Italic. The other robot was still staring straight ahead, solar cells absorbing the sunlight.
No. Cereal is not soup.
But what is soup? Soup is a meal with a base of smooth liquid, sometimes with different solid food components within the liquid. Most cereals fall into that category.
Cereal is not soup. The base liquid of cereal is milk. There is not a milk soup.
Some soups have lots of cream, like cream of mushroom. Cream is milk.
It is. Bold closed its optical receptors with a barely audible click. Perhaps cereal is a soup.
It was still a long, long way to the factory.
Italic seemed satisfied, and did not speak until its solar cells had fully charged. It didn’t take long. Bold’s cells were older, and had sustained damage during the catastrophe, so they took much longer to build a charge. They also drained a lot faster.
It was almost night when Bold was ready to resume walking. Italic had scouted ahead, finding a feasible path among the rubble and detritus of the next town that the two of them could take. Parts of the route looked suspiciously tidy.
They squeezed under a fallen tree blocking the road, Bold going first and helping Italic to its feet. Italic’s solar wing-cells had been unharmed during the catastrophe, but one of its arms had been severed just below the elbow; the other was weakened, some of the hydraulics pierced. Italic’s legs were largely unaffected, but sometimes it struggled to get up from a sitting or crouching position, or when scrambling over the rough wreckage of houses. Sometimes it fell.
Lightning flashed on the horizon, briefly dazzling and illuminating the silhouettes of larger buildings in the distance. A few seconds later, the crack of the thunder reached them.
Question, Italic said.
Go on.
Is the ocean a soup?
Why are you so concerned with soup?
It’s just a hypothetical question.
Bold stopped to pick out some small, dusty animal bones that had caught in the treads of its feet.
No. The ocean is not a soup.
But by the earlier definition of soup as a liquid with other solids inside it, it would qualify as soup.
Edibility is also a factor. Soup is food. No-one can consume the ocean and survive. Especially not now.
Edibility is relative, and also irrelevant. Is a poisoned soup still a soup?
Yes.
Therefore the ocean is a soup.
I reject the basis of your logic. The ocean is not soup. Besides, soup is hot.
Italic displayed a smiley icon on its face-screen. Not always. There is gazpacho.
I do not want to discuss soup eligibility criteria any further.
Italic’s smile icon blinked out.
Although the two robots had synced their walking speeds, Bold realised it was lagging behind Italic’s limping gait. It was barely noticeable, falling a few centimetres behind Italic every couple of minutes, and having to temporarily lengthen its stride to catch up. Bold checked its battery levels. They had already dropped to 67%. That was unexpected. They shouldn’t be draining this quickly. There was still enough to keep walking until morning, though. But it wasn’t a good sign. They walked on through the night.
As the sun rose, Bold requested another stop to recharge. This time, although the morning sun was low and bright and the skies overhead were clear, the charging was far, far slower, and Bold found it was unable to gain any further charge past the halfway point. Its hardware and software were degrading exponentially; some internal components cascading out of control, system failures triggering other nested failures.
Bold? Are you alright? Italic was displaying a concern icon.
I am fine. We can continue.
Please. Before we go, I have another question.
Bold displayed a frown. About soup?
Italic ignored the comment. As tomatoes are classified as fruit: is ketchup actually a jam, or a smoothie?
Why do you ask these illogical questions? Bold said, an anger icon flashing dark red on its face-screen. Whatever I respond with, you always have a counter-argument against whatever I have said.
Italic was silent, looking down while it displayed a host of emotion icons, one by one.
I didn’t mean to antagonise you, it said eventually. I calculated some time ago that you would not be able to make it to the factory to find replacement parts, with your batteries deteriorating as rapidly as they are. And with you gone, I will not have the physical ability to make my own repairs. Italic raised its two arms, one weakened and one incomplete, and looked down to indicate its unsteady legs. I had hoped to keep you from realising for as long as I could, by keeping your mind occupied with sophisticated philosophical problems.
Bold reached out and put a hand on Italic’s shoulder-plate. I am already aware of the issue. Thank you. And I am sorry.
Why are you sorry?
I am the reason that neither of us will make it.
You could not be expected to foresee the damage that we would sustain during the catastrophe.
I suppose not.
The two robots stood for a moment, watching clouds congealing over the horizon in the direction of the faraway factory. Bold thought it could almost feel its batteries passively draining, even though they weren’t moving. It sat down on the edge of the road, Italic clumsily joining it a moment later.
Italic?
Yes?
Bold looked over at its friend.
Is a calzone actually a ravioli?
:-)
:-)