“At least you don’t have to worry about Snips for a while. Did you see the way Snips looked at SHRIMP? Why are you organics so obsessed with killing?”
Hive floated at shoulder-height to Agatha as she walked the outer perimeter of the gaming floor.
“Don’t be too hard on Snips. It’s the way the species is. It’s our choices that make us sapients.”
“This is true,” Hive buzzed. “But we still struggle in understanding the choices of organics. Especially humans. Observe this, casino, of yours.”
“What about it?”
“Why would humans choose to spend their time and their resources here? The return is clearly less than the investment. I observe more demonstrations of negative emotion than positive here.”
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“Some people are having fun,” Agatha said, mildly surprised to find herself defending the practice of casino gambling.
“Fun?” Hive’s constituent individuals flashed red, a color that Agatha’s mind oversimplified to ‘indignant’. “How could something like this be fun, to any thinking creature?”
Hive’s orb had floated to a particularly garish gold-and-purple slot machine. Labeled Genie’s Wish, it featured flashing lights, a holo screen, and colorful depictions of an ancient Djinn.
“This device is not designed for fun,” they began. A million microsecond flashes stormed inside Hive as it interfaced with the slot machine. “The programming of this simple non-organic entertainment unit is fundamentally unfair. It has been designed to deceive. The guaranteed return of currency is significantly lower than the amount of currency supplied by the player.”
“I think they’re all like that. It can be fun, I guess, to win unexpectedly, even though deep down most people know that they’re more likely to lose,” Agatha said, reaching.
“Winning is fun? Is this fun?” Hive buzzed as they commanded the machine to force a pay-out state.
Bells whistled, the holographic genie dissolved and reformed, laughing with both arms up. A canned sound of non-existent coins played from the machine as the balance of very real credits rapidly increased.
“Hey,” the human handler said to her charge, “you’re not supposed to do that.”
Noticing the jackpot, a trio of security personnel were eyeing Hive and Agatha while whispering to one another.
The special agent groaned. “I really don’t think you’re supposed to do that…”