The Sky is the Limit (Expanded)
• Original story by: WickedShamrock77 (Additional story added 3-19-2019)
• Some editing by JaneDoe-2010
The sky is the limit isn’t it?
Let me start the story with an introduction, my name is Nathan and I have made a lot of money in the robot industry. I was able to create a new kind of robot with the ability to, pretty much, blend in with any other human being on earth. These robots were created out of organic material. Synthetic flesh and bones that go along with a biological hard drive that resembles and acts like a human brain. Bodily fluids, however, were the only possible way to tell these robots apart from human beings without contacting a surgeon. At this point we still hadn’t been able to create a fluid that resembled the real texture of blood. As the robot bodies were created to be human-like they could either process food like any real human, or a paste was inserted to supply the needed energy to their cells. This required creating another human like behavior to dispose of the waste, either using a regular toilet, or a service pod. On request it was even possible for the bots to reproduce a real human being if the required sperm and eggs were provided. Due to the money I made I was able to afford an estate that made some towns look very small, and of course, the finest professionals, money could buy.
Everything in my life seemed to be quite perfect, if a bit unreal. The property was maintained by robots and was kept spotless at all times. Don’t get me wrong, the company was doing fine, yet life was lacking some aspects. The government, however, was always interrupting our day-to-day business. For example, all robots were expected to have a chip installed as an indication that this was not a real human being. I thought this was my greatest concern on the eventful day I meet Nina. But I should probably start this story from the beginning.
We had regular staff meetings to talk about new ideas for possible new inventions and how to improve existing ones and proceed with the company. Usually these meetings were quite boring. The old team was brilliant, and responsible for my carefree life, but they were running out of new ideas. One of the scientists stepped up and told everyone "The sky is the limit and we have reached it!" After this comment, I spotted Nina for the first time; she was mixed into a group of trainees and the media. The press was sometimes invited to our meetings and they were always hungry for a scoop on the latest invention. When Nina heard the statement, she impressed me immediately by stating, "The sky might be your limit, but as far as I’m concerned it’s not. Let me start by saying that at the beginning humankind thought the earth was flat like a board. Then some brave man said, "No it’s not," and managed to prove everyone wrong. The Sky is the limit? Why were we able to send people to the Moon, and even Mars, if the sky is the limit?" I stood up, clapped my hands, and asked her to come tell me what she thought was the craziest idea she had in mind?
I still remember her stepping up to me, even blushing, when I thanked her for her speech and asked her which team she was on. Nina replied, "I just started with the latest group, we are supposed to check all the departments." This was when it got even better, she wasn’t simply blushing anymore, she was now a deep red. I told her that after that great speech, in front of so many strangers including the press that I would like to give her the opportunity to become the head of development if she could prove she had what it takes. I said as I smiled her, "You get 9 months to nurse your baby!" Afterwards I addressed my team and instructed them to, "Please assist with this young woman's vision as much you can. She might be the one who moves this organization further ahead of anyone else in the market."
The rest of the day was uneventful, I checked the latest news, and they slaughtered my giving such a young inexperienced girl such a great responsibility. Yet others were congratulating me for taking the risk, giving a young woman such a great opportunity. It all just made me smile and I wondered about some of the possible ideas she might have in mind. The next day started normally and during my usual morning walk I had a special interest in seeing the new starts, all of them were very polite, and some had a great future, but my special interest was with Nina.
When I approached her, the first thing I asked was if she had already sorted everything out with HR. I also asked if she would need any help with her new task. Nina's first response was a cheering, "Yes sir! Everything is set and I am ready for my new task. Are you sure you really want to give me this chance?" I confirmed my decision and personally showed her around. I introduced her to the most brilliant scientists, and programmers, in the company, commenting that if she needed any of them for her ideas she was more then welcome to add them to her team.
Nina was interested in Jeff, the scientist who came up with the idea of having the storage system for the bots be implemented into the "Brain" system. She also asked about one of the doctors and she asked immediately if she could bring them along for a chat. I was looking forward to seeing this, and joined the meeting. I wanted to see what she had in mind. Nina recalled Sci-Fi movies from the past, telling us about movies like Surrogates, and Avatar. In these films people had the possibility to connect their mind to a robot, or other creature, and be whatever, and wherever, they wanted to be, without any physical harm to their real body. This as well as the idea of teleportation - she defiantly touched one of my nerves as I was fascinated by these subjects, as well, but never mentioned it to avoid being called crazy.
Nina was conveying her idea with such enthusiasm, when I stopped I found myself looking at the two scientists who were already falling into the Surrogate/Avatar topic. Some sketches were already on her laptop and when I asked them what they thought I felt like a fool when they replied that this was no great issue, technology had made it this far. No connection would be required for a complete session, one would only need the booth to take care of the body and send signals to the "Avatar," for the main body functions to work without an operating mind. The also felt that for the robot some safety mechanism would be required so that no one could override the current directive. The next question was from Nina and me, just how long would this take? As the guys looked my way they were also talking to each other, discussing the subject, and their answer was a fortnight, maybe sooner.
What can I say? I was full of joy, when I saw Nina at my desk a week later asking me if I would like to see their first official test. When I arrived at the highly secure lab I saw all three of them looking my way and a collection of robots. I was immediately asked the question, "Would like to try it?" I didn’t even think about it for a split second. I asked, "How is this going to work?" They pointed at a box which, more or less, resembled the one you saw in the movie "Avatar." Jeff explained how everything was supposed to work and that he also had added a failsafe system which stored a current copy of the user's memories, and which prevented copies the experience, in that the backup file was deleted as soon as the person had left the box, without incident.
I was in a Sci-Fi movie, so it seemed, when the System asked me which robot I would like to choose. I offered to make a selection from all the robots I saw earlier. I didn’t want to read too much and just selected number 7, as this was my lucky number. The transfer went, much to my surprise, without any further action. As I started moving unnaturally in the new body however I realized that this robot was a female version. I was in for quite a surprise, as the movement was a bit off from what I was used to, and the heels were, really, not helping. When I looked at the other three, the first thing I could say was, "if any of you are laughing, you're next, and up for a greater humiliation." When I heard my voice, you can imagine my surprise, I didn’t make a choice on looks, I made it from the Number, and when I approached the mirror you can imagine the shock when I saw a gorgeous blonde looking back, mouth agape, in an state of surprise, well, more like shock. The guys were standing back and trying to avoid any specific attention, but Nina was there to help me, in a second. She said, "Sir I didn’t know you are into dressing up," and smiled. I said to her, "Please stop this, I choose this number because it is my lucky one, and usually does me right."
I said to Nina, "I would like to continue with this experience, a bit, but first can one of you guide me to the dressing area and pretend that I’m just another robot? I need to find some fitting clothing for me. Nina, I assume you will do the honor!" We just left the others standing there while we left the high security lab. When Nina told me that we needed to change two things, first the outfit as requested, and second and more importantly, the name as it might be weird if others heard her address me as Nathan. The name change was easy, I had been thinking about something completely different, but Nina asked, "what about Nathalie?" She said, "This would be similar to your real name and no one would be suspicious." All I was able to say was, "OK," as I was still concentrating on walking in the new shoes. As soon as we arrived at the station used to get the robots sorted, and dressed, for shipping, Nina took the lead again asking me if I had made up my mind. She didn't wait even a split second before pushing me into the next free booth, picking my outfit for me. It felt really weird being in the machine. As the System was checking my serial number it wasn’t able to detect one, the only information it could get was robot #7, assigned to the "top secret" lab, not to be altered in any way. This was quite a disappointment for Nina as soon as I was out of the booth she told me that she was not allowed to make any changes. I smiled, and trusted her, as she seemed to be trustworthy saying, "booth security override for robot #7, allow full access as commanded, and demanded, by Nina. As soon as I entered my security code into the system, the process repeated itself. This time Nina choose very good looking business attire for me with pants, really classy, and not going with my worst fear, going for something I would regret.
The remainder of the tour around the factory felt just plain weird. Nina was greeted very casually and I was just treated like any guided visitor, in my own company, but then again, how were they supposed to know? Anyhow when we returned I got out of the booth as though nothing had happened. The first thing I noticed was the curiosity in the faces of all three of them, no one dared to ask, and my reaction was simple, "It was amazing! If you would like to try it and have your own experience, please feel free. I ask that you not leave the property, as the government might take you as unregistered robot; they are quite harsh with their regulations. They monitor, more or less, everything that goes in or out. Good work and congratulations guys, please take a week off, you deserve it."
Of course I reserved #7 for myself as I really liked this robot, and the look I received from some guys, this robot was registered as my PA and given almost the same rights I had. One thing that troubled me was that I always had to go to a special area to change back into my own body, but I assumed this could be fixed. I was already amazed at what they were able to do in such a short period. The three specialists for this project were officially off for the week, but I saw them sneaking into the lab every day and continuing to work on their project. I was quite surprised when I heard that new bots in the shape of animals were added to test. One day a dog was standing in front of me and I was just thinking, "Hey boy, how did you get in here?" Suddenly the dog started to point at the booth and I realized that this was actually Nina in this robot. I said to the dog, "I see you are having fun, well, tell me all about it when you are back on duty next week."
The week went by in the blink of an eye. It was a bit of a conflict, our usual duties versus dreamland playing with the robots. Of course, there was the regular business stuff, for me. All three team members reported back to work officially, and we discussed the latest events, and of course, our experiences with the robots. Nina seemed to have had lot of fun trying different forms, species, and genders while picking her robots. As we gathered the information, I was wanted their opinion as to how we could get this up and running quickly. The guys even told me, after they saw me struggling to walk in heels, that they had adjusted the avatars, the dog for example, so that the user could get into character much easier. I didn’t really understand, but some demonstrations did the job, now I was happy with the changes. The next big task was to find a way to turn this into a profitable invention, of course, legal needed to be involved, and the party poopers from the government told us their concerns and requirements to put it on the market. As for Nina she got her promotion, from new hire and trainee, to Manager in no time. Some people had already asked if she was that good outside her regular duties and gossip started. I had been robot jumping as my PA a lot, and people noticed that Nina was rarely seen either without me, or my PA. As for the other two, I needed them to remain quiet and not tell anyone. Normally I do like a little gossip as it keeps the mind sharp. I didn't ask them to do this for me for free; they were fine with me supplying a new house system, including a test version of the new invention and some complimentary robots. As for Nina, she sent a standard system to her parents, as she only lived in a shared apartment and hadn't purchased a house yet.
Our next staff meeting was quite boring, with the usual information, when the topic came up about the new resource team I let everyone know that were working on something really big, and if legal and the government approved it, that it might be the next big thing. At any rate, they were able to prove that the sky was not the limit! I encouraged everyone to come up with new ideas. The last time this idea was stated, at exactly this location, we were able to prove that our only limitation is our own mind. Who told you that it doesn’t work? Did this person try it themselves? Did they have the resources we have? If the any of these answers were no then please feel free to try it, but always start from the ground, and not by jumping from a skyscraper.
The company was having great success in its day-to-day business, yet I still wanted to have our latest invention up and running as soon as possible. The new Avatar system was still facing government approval. The government quickly had more and more tests up and running to prove there was no risk to the human controlling the Avatar. It looked like everything was too good to be true! I even created a promotional event for everyone, to try to hack into the system. I hoped the hacker would help us to find any security flaws in our system as well as consider working for us. As no one had succeeded getting into our system so far, I placed a nice reward on success.
Later that day I gathered with the four of us involved in the project. Imagine my surprise when Jeff and Nina volunteered for the experiments directly, but the Doc bailed out, as he would be on holiday at the time of the test. Jeff's wife Jane heard the news and was more than happy to assist, but not as one of the people controlling an Avatar. No, instead she wanted to live out a fantasy, to use, as well as choose the robot for Jeff. By now, I on the other hand, had a lot of faith in Nina so we teamed up as well. We did all this to ensure that nothing would go wrong and our partner in crime could take care of the project and run interference if needed.
The rules for the event were quite easy, the time and duration was one week, starting Monday, 1200UTC. The reward was one million US dollars, along with two robots of the winner's liking, a house system and, of course, a job offer with no further questions asked. Every one of the participants chose their own Avatars, as the Government was monitoring this event they demanded that the Avatars were allowed to run wild, outside the plant, and were even tested in average day-to-day life. One requirement from the government was that the avatars had to be identified as robots using the usual chip. I didn’t like this idea but without it the Government would stop the project before it had even begun.
The day of the event started with the four of us monitoring the security reports and system to see if anyone was able to get into, or close, to our system and our beloved robots. There were all kinds of amateurs trying to hack their way into the system, but no really good, or even better, successful attempts had been made so far! At this point we began to set up our own Avatars for the field test. I choose my beloved #7, aka Nathalie. Nina made plans for the day so that we could spend some time together. Jeff was not allowed to choose his Avatar as his wife wanted to do it for him, and I had a great laugh when I saw the one she picked for the first time. Jeff's new avatar was a standard female robot dressed, programmed, and outfitted, like every other MaidBot we make, nothing fancy, just your average MaidBot.
As I continued to follow Jeff and Jane's story, he was in for a surprise when he saw his robot for the first time. His wife had his avatar delivered to their home in order to blend in with the rest of the robots in their system. She even asked Jeff to only respond if he was addressed as Jasmine, the name she intended to give the robot. She even tried to give the house system some control over Jeff's robot; she wanted it to assign the same rights and duties to him as any other robot. But Jane's plans failed in this respect, as our robots where set on high security to prevent being overridden by any other system, much to Jane’s disappointment.
Jeff was so exited that when some of Jane's friends came over he pretended to be just another MaidBot, serving food and drinks, as well as, following orders. When the day and the party was at an end Jeff returned to his wife in his regular human form and Jasmine the robot was standing by in a neutral, inactive, state. The failsafe caused Jane to be a bit disappointed so Jeff, unwisely, messed with the settings of the robot allowing his wife to give it commands and she was added to those able to control the robot. However this action created a conflict Jeff wasn’t expecting, this new directive interfered with the existing orders to only follow commands from the control booth the human Jeff was in while controlling Jasmine, this was designed to ensure Jeff had full control at all times.
Jeff reported to his wife that he had altered the settings to her liking. Imagine Jane's joy, when she addressed the house system, commanded it to include the new robot, and assigned the new robot the name Jasmine. The next day, when Jeff entered the booth and the system activated, he found himself in his Avatar as expected. In the beginning Jeff had a lot of fun, letting go, and following the orders his wife gave him. Unfortunately for Jeff, the fun ended immediately when Jane received a phone call and told him, "sorry hun I totally forgot that I promised my friend Stef I would help her this afternoon, it will probably be late, when I get back." Jeff was disappointed and decided since the fun was over for the day he should regain control and tell her to enjoy her day and that he would be fine. That was until he realized that he had no control of his Avatar at all.
The only thing Jane heard from Jasmine was, "yes Mistress, is there anything else I can do for you?" Jeff tried as hard as he could but nothing happened, he found that he had no way to communicate with his wife. Jane smiled and thought to herself, "Wow he is really getting into this role, I never expected that." The next couple of hours felt weird Jeff was fully aware of everything that was happening but could do nothing about it. The house system ordered him to clean, hover, and keep the house tidy, Jeff found that he had no other choice but to obey.
Jeff really began looking forward to when his experience would be over and he would again be able to regain control. What he hadn't planned on was when Jane came back with Stef and both of them were pretty wasted. Jeff heard Jane say, "look around, you remember how our old dorm looked? I'm still the same old Jane but now the robots are keeping everything spotless." Jeff didn't know what to think about her statement but that all changed when Jasmine, and her two companion MaidBots, were commanded to report to the mistress of the house immediately. All three robots, including Jeff complied, standing at attention while awaiting orders.
Jeff was not happy when he heard Jane say, "Computer, please allow Stef access and follow her commands as long as I don't interrupt. Ok, probably three MaidBots are too many, and what are their names? I'm too drunk. Computer, please assign the name silly bitch to all three of them." Then Stef said, "Jane, do you remember that slut from our old school? Doesn't this robot look just like her, while pointing at Jasmine? Can I play with it, insult, and humiliate it a bit?"
Jane just smiled and was fine with the Idea, not even thinking that this was her beloved Jeff. He was completely humiliated but couldn't protest, as both of them stood there laughing. The next day Stef thanked Jane for the fun day and left. At this point Jane realized that Jasmine had not been saying anything to her, and she asked the house system to send Jasmine in for a report. The computer's response gave Jane a shock when she was informed that no robot with this name was assigned to the house system.
Jane said, "Robots, please state your designation," and all three robots replied in unison, "Unit designation: Silly Bitch, assigned to the household of Jane and Jeff!" As all three robots looked the same Jane was in a panic. Jeff wanted to scream to her but, as before, the system wouldn't allow Jeff to instigate any form of interaction without first being spoken to.
Let’s take a break from Jeff and Jane's story at this point and continue with Nina and my story. Nina had talked me into a girl's day out filled with shopping and having fun. I dressed my avatar, Nathalie, up in something casual and joined Nina for a shopping spree. Nina asked, "Nathalie would you please take a look at this beautiful, whatever?" Hell, I didn't even know so many names for female clothing existed. I did enjoy Nina showing me some new outfits and I enjoyed seeing my avatar in something sexy.
The bad part was that some shop security systems were set to scan for robots and due to the required chip in Nathalie; I was detected as a robot as soon as I walked past the scanner. Nina always introduced me as her personal robot, and assistant, what I didn't know was that some shops are fitted with display runways for robots, more-or-less like a catwalk to model clothing. It felt like my control was overridden by these systems and I found myself modeling everything Nina commanded me to try. I had no option but to walk back and forth on that runway modeling everything from lingerie to business casual. Unknown to Nina, I kind of enjoyed the experience, but when we left the stores Nina apologized to me. My only reply was, "no worries it will be my turn tomorrow," then I smiled at her. We had a fun day and though my credit card suffered a bit, it was worth it.
I always fancied Nina, but at this stage I can say, I was truly falling in love with her. I asked her if she would like to join me at my place and the reply from her was, "Yes I'd love to." What can I say, we had a fun night but it seemed a bit wrong, in my opinion, as she spent the whole night with Nathalie and not the real me.
The next day our role-play was supposed to be reversed; I thought when Nina asked if I would mind spending another day as Nathalie and she would make it up to me, that this would be a great idea. I was not sure what she had in mind but I simply agreed to it. I was a bit nervous, as this would mean we were both in our Avatars with no one to back us up in case of an emergency. But when I saw Nina in her robot I was exited and lets just say, a bit confused. Nina choose a really good looking male Avatar, due to our experience in the stores, she asked me to spend the day at my place with some special settings in the security so we could play a bit. My imagination went crazy and I would have probably agreed to anything she asked for.
Back at my place she asked, very politely again, if this was ok that she wanted to take the lead, if I was up for some role-play. The game was quite simple, she played the Butler, and my role was the maid. Nina even put our records into the system and had prepared a failsafe. The system needed my approval before continuing, and as I was totally distracted, I simply agreed. I thought male-female role-play at my place, what could happen?
Man I found out how wrong I was when I heard the door open, and my sister Mel stepped in; she had a key to the house and dropped in from time to time. She was in the area, visiting friends, which was usually no big deal, as the house is big. The system usually told me everything in advance but for some reason I was distracted this time. Mel exclaimed, "OMG, what is Nathan up to? Why are robots toying around in his living room? Computer, please place the robots in their default positions then have them report to me."
As we had lowered our robot's security settings the computer took over and we found ourselves standing at attention in front of my Sister. We weren't able to fight it. Then Mel said, "Bots, please state your designations. Our responses were simple and as commanded I stated, "My designation is Nathalie, I am assigned to the house system and owned by Nathan," soon afterwards I could hear Nina say, "I'm James assigned to the house system and owned by Nathan."
Mel had been around my creations for years and was used to this, since nothing seemed to be wrong at this point she gave us our orders. "James, please clean up the mess here, and Nathalie please prepare my room for the night with new linens, and can you inform my brother that I am here?" The computer system had quite a conflict how it could send me a message to inform me that my sister was in the house. Thankfully, due to this conflict, the system crashed and rebooted giving me full control of my Avatar this allowed me reset it in case anything else happened.
My second reaction was to ask, "Mel are you alright?" After I had deactivated the control system, I had a lot of explaining to do. I started to explain everything to Mel and she just smiled at the two of us and said, "So I finally got to meet the woman that managed to get my brother interested!" I planned on spending the night, tomorrow I want to see the real you. No robots, and no disguises, and I will want the full story. Have fun kids, and I'll see you tomorrow. While looking at Nina I couldn't stop myself from saying sorry to end it this way, but I hope you don't mind. This was the point when Nina started giggling; boys never knew that we women already know. I kissed her and we spent a fun night together.
The next morning started with me telling my sister everything, and why we are using the robots. She was smiling yesterday, but today, she was just plain laughing out loud when she said, "so little bro you like a dominant girl taking the lead and doing some role-play?" Who would have thought that the big business man has a feminine side? Nina started to smile at me and I could only reply with, "jealous?"
As my sister was already on the topic I invited her to visit the lab. The system was running fine and I was informed that Jeff had been online for the past 72 hours. I tried to call Jeff, but there was no response. I called Jane to find her in tears, telling me what happened, and that she had three bots at home answering to the name "silly bitch" that all looked exactly the same. I drove to Jane's place with Nina and Mel in tow. When we arrived, Jane was already at the door motioning for us to come in.
I had no Idea how to get Jeff back, if I reset the wrong one I might fry his brain. When I mentioned this she cried again. I told Jane what had happened to us, and that she needed to call all the MaidBots and have them report to her. Then we could switch off the system. Hopefully, this way we could regain full control. You could see Jane's relief when she did so, and one of the MaidBots suddenly said to her, "Hi hun, glad to see you, it was sure fun but next time we need to make arrangements so that you can tell me apart from the other two bitches." With that said we all breathed a sigh of relief and started to laugh then said we would meet up in the lab for before making further arrangements.