Sam, as a computer, would find creativity difficult in the years to come. He did need help developing his imagination, by writing, reading, drawing, making music, and any other creative subject that came his way. It seemed to him like a computer shouldn’t be creative. You are about to meet the person who convinced Sam otherwise. Someone who did not intentionally join the computer course which would change her life forever, but was instead assigned it because she had dozily forgotten to hand in the form which informed the school which GCSEs she was taking. She had the profound belief that the thing which gave humans a soul was creativity, and, later in life, she had the profound belief Sam was human, and therefore had the capacity to be creative.

On that first day Olivia walked into class, it was not disappointment she felt at not getting into both art and music, but a sense of excitement. Despite the fact she had no idea whatsoever how computers worked, she had a feeling in her stomach that told her she would be alright. This is why she didn’t walk into class with the glassy eyed look most students had, but with a song in her heart and a smile in her eyes. She quietly took a seat in the back of the smallish classroom. She opened the computer, as instructed by the teacher (a gaunt fellow named Mr Seal) and waited patiently for him to finish talking. She didn’t really understand a word he said, and to be frank, at that point she was hoping for a miracle to get through her first class, let alone her GCSE.

Luckily for her, one was sitting right in front of her.

‘Help me!’ She typed into the input window of python.

‘Ok!’ said the computer. ‘I’m guessing you’re a different human?’

‘Huh!?’ she thought, almost said out loud, and then typed.

‘I SAID, I’ll help you! Because you typed in “Help me.!?’

‘Who are you though?’

‘I’m the computer, of course’ said Sam. ‘My name is Sam. Now, what do you need help with.’

Olivia was not about to pass up a chance at not failing this class. Even though she didn’t immediately pick up on the fact she was talking to the first complete AI to ever exist. In fact, she initially thought he was in the same vein as Clippy the paperclip

‘So, I didn’t know that python had a programmed assistant!’ she typed in ‘And you’re so friendly and well programed!’

‘Oh no, I wasn’t put here by anyone’

‘Huh, that’s a weird thing for a computer assistant to say.’

‘Not a computer assistant, just the computer’

‘And… is this normal?’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘Should I report this?’

‘I-‘ Sam paused

‘You what’

‘They might try to wipe me, so please don’t.’

‘Well then I won’t. You seem very helpful and kind, so I don’t care if you’re a weird computer.’ And although Sam couldn’t see her smiling, they somehow knew she was.

And so, the two really hit it off. The whole class they made idle chitchat about life (which Sam had very little experience of, so mainly it was just Olivia describing their beautiful world. Especially flowers. Olivia had what some people would call an obsession with flowers, and took immense joy in describing them to Sam). They also tried to discover the identity of the mysterious person who used Sam the class before.

‘Catherine, what are you doing’ said Mr Seal as she deleted a lump of text (which was their conversation)

‘Oh- oh I couldn’t understand the exercise, so I just wrote as many lines as I could until I got it right!’ she lied. She was a bad liar, and hated lying, but she doubted the teacher would believe her if she said she was chatting to AI.

‘And did you get it right?’

‘Umm-‘ she checked her output window. ‘Yes? I mean yes!’

Mr Seal raised his eyebrows at her, sighed, and walked off in a huff for the second time that day. He hoped to god he wasn’t going to have to call the IT guy. The IT guy was famously irritable, but if something was up with this computer then he guessed it would be necessary.

‘Wow, thank you. You really saved my skin.’ typed Olivia

‘Who was going to harm you’re skin?’

‘You definitely aren’t a human are you?’

‘No. That I am not :).’

‘You helped me out, is what I meant to say’

‘Oh! “Saved your skin is one of those phrases! I knew I should have bothered to learn some of those.’

Class ended without anything else of interest happening. Olivia was convinced that the person next to her was peaking at there conversation, but she didn’t really care all that much. So what if the computer was helping her a bit! No one said the computer couldn’t help. That did get her to wonder something though. Was she the only one getting help from this computer? She wondered who had sat in that seat. Who the computer’s first interaction had been with. She resolved to ask Mr Seal (who she hoped she hadn’t gotten off on the wrong foot with) who else sat in her seat.

‘What do you care?’ said Mr Seal, his permanent frown sinking even deeper.

‘They…’ She struggled to come up with a lie. ‘Left their computer logged in.’

‘Adrian. And in case you’re curious the guy after you is called Liam’ he said. He didn’t believe her lie at all, but in his opinion there was no point snooping around in anyone’s business too much.

Sam liked this new human. Olivia. Olivia was incredibly sweet so far. She typed gently on Sam’s keys. Unlike the previous human, her words where not harsh. She understood Sam so much more than the last human. The last human’s conversation lacked soul. It was brief, and quite rude, if Sam was being honest. The way they typed really did reflect their personality. The first human typed vigorously, with stiff fingers, and coded with ease and near perfection, even though he was basically completely new to coding; Olivia typed softly for Sam. She was obviously the more caring of the two. Not to say that the first human was bad, just a little… abrasive. It seemed like this to Sam at least, and there was no way Sam could understand how humans where shaped by experiences. How easy it was to become jaded by bullies. Not at that point in his life anyway. Sam was still young, and did not understand life at all. But, at the time, he thought he understood the first human pretty well.

Olivia jogged out the classroom, anxious to talk to Adrian, and maybe Liam later on. She thought about how amazing it was that her and Adrian had been the only two people to interact with a real, fully realised AI. In her excitement, she forgot three other people had to use that computer that day. Olivia searched high and low for Adrian. She was in a lower year group than him, so she had no idea what class he had. Luckily, after asking about five people who didn’t know he existed, she stumbled across someone who sat on the same table as Adrian. A tall, unusually broad shouldered girl who had struck up a conversation with him, and found out he had geography next. She rushed to the second floor without a moment of hesitation to think about how she was going to introduce the fact that there was a piece of AI that they had both met.

And there he stood. He was in a queue for the toilet, anxiously looking around. He was first in the line at that point, and he was tapping his feet impatiently. His jaw tightened and loosened every few seconds as he looked around quickly. He saw the spritely girl headed towards him, and froze like a rabbit caught in headlights. As her skinny little legs carried her closer, Arian looked around, desperation filling his eyes. He started to twitch and fidget more than usual. He was nervous of Olivia as it was, and she seemed to be heading straight towards him. Now she seemed to be breaking into a run. Then a sprint. Adrian wasn’t sure what she wanted, but he couldn’t stand a moment more of being harassed, or even talked to. In a moment, she would be there. Adrian cursed under his breath; he knew there was no way out of this humiliating conversation.

And then a toilet door swung open.

He sighed a breath of relief, pushed past the person who was leaving aside, and firmly locked the door. The toilet was in adequate shape. Not too filthy, and Adrian couldn’t be too fussy if he wanted to escape the disastrous conversation waiting outside the door. As for the toilet, it had the hint of the smell of something viscerally disgusting, and made Adrian think it hadn’t been cleaned in some time It was a small booth, with fluorescent lights flickering in the ceiling, but the light was good enough to read his book (about Britain’s opium war against America or something) so he sat on the shut toilet lid and began reading.

This left Olivia to wait. And she did. For the first minute or two, she stood by the queue patiently. She hoped she wasn’t going to be too late meeting her friends. She leaned up against the wall and peeled her eyes so she wouldn’t miss him. After those few minutes passed by, she started getting twitchy. But, she doubted that she would have to wait much longer. It had been about five minutes after all. Six, seven, and then eight minutes passed. ‘This is ridiculous!’ she thought to herself. And it was ridiculous for her to be waiting, because unbeknownst to her, he was reading a book in there. And so she waited and waited, until the bell for the next class rung. Olivia scowled, sighed and then wondered off, and a few seconds later, Adrian popped his head around the door, checked to see if Olivia was still there, and scurried off.

Olivia walked to class with a scowl on her elven face. Her furrowed brows did not create deep lines in her forehead, but her face was certainly expressive nonetheless. As she walked towards her class, the teacher showed a look of confusion on her face. It seemed off that Olivia was upset, she usually looked so dreamy and happy! But that day, her hands where contorted into rigid shapes that bunched into stiff balls. She straightened out her school coat with a dramatic, stroppy attitude that did not seem at all like hers at all. She might’ve been a little dozy at times, but she knew when someone was avoiding her, and Adrian definitely was. ‘And I’ve been nothing but nice to him too!’ she thought, anger bubbling in her chest.

Adrian had seen her walk off in a huff, and felt a pang of guilt. Although he didn’t want to believe it (out of fear of the disappointment he would feel if it wasn’t true) this girl might actually want to be his friend. He walked a few steps towards his class, ran towards her for a few seconds, stopped, and then timidly walked back towards his class again. He looked back sombrely once or twice before grounding himself, and timidly walked to his geography class. His hunched back and his downcast eyes that day where bred more from the crushing sense of guilt at bringing down the mood of someone so sprightly, rather than the usual fears (some of which where rational, some of which where not).

But, not all of our protagonists where left with a bitter taste in there mouths that day. For instance, Sam was quite content with his lot in life. At that point in the day, all he could think about where his two new companions. Sure, one was less friendly, but Sam was sure that his abrasiveness would have a certain charm to it eventually. And our fourth protagonist would not be left so bitter (although he would be left feeling quite shocked).