Autonomous Laboratory EXperiment Assistant

Semi-Open Species: Please consult with the creators of this article (Kyoshi/STARS) before making an ALEXA! While we welcome more ALEXAs, we want to ensure they're played properly. Thank you for understanding!

Autonomous Laboratory EXperiment Assistant (A.L.E.X.A)
Vatborne Product Line Info
Homeworld		Fen
Creators		Kyoshi Corporation
Life Expectancy (Max)		150 (300)
Average Size		5-6 Feet

The Autonomous Laboratory EXperiment Assistant, or A.L.E.X.A program, represents a series of over 100,000 Vatborne sapients created by the Kyoshi Corporation, with production beginning in 2810 and continuing to this day. They are known for their Rokhandan appearance and function in a variety of roles ranging from laboratory assistants to medical doctors and engineers. The line is well known in the industry for their performance, though the program is not without its faults that, largely, have been kept quiet by Kyoshi.

Program History

The ALEXA program began out of a wartime need for manpower in the Coalition aligned Kyoshi Corporation as more and more resources were devoted to the war effort, including manpower. The template was started using a black and tan Rokhandan office assistant, named Alexa. The first batch of Alexa’s were cloned in 2811, with three initial models; Maintenance (M), Lab Assistant(L), Physician’s Assistant(PA), and General Purpose (GP). All initial ALEXA models were female, based on their genetic mother. It took approximately 6 months to produce a clone, with them being released from vats at the biological age of 20.

All clones are created with their organic brains, but with an inhibitor chip and computer in their brain stems that allowed for multiple functions and control mechanisms. This allowed the rapid download of data and knowledge; to where a ALEXA clone out of the vat could be considered a objective expert in their designated field within weeks, and computational assistance, allowing the clones to compute problems far faster than any organic being, all while largely keeping the units with the independent function of a organic brain. The program has seen success, though not without a body count.

As the war progressed and manpower shortages increased, further generations of clones included new models. These included Medical Doctor (MD), Security (S), Supervisor (SUP), and Executive Assistant (EA), among others. Generation 5 also introduced a male model of the clones, largely for the Security models. Production continues to this day, though it has scaled down post-war. To date a little over 100,000 A.L.E.X.A clones are in circulation around the populated galaxy, and the first defective models are being released to the wild galaxy or terminated. It is common to see models leased out to other Kyoshi companies, with the Security model in particular largely seeing service for Momentum Security or Shock Trauma Armed Rescue Service during peacetime. Though produced for use by the Coalition, Directorate their corporations during wartime, at least several hundred A.L.E.X.A units came into the hands of the Federation either during the war through capture or after the war through purchase. Since over 90% of units were non-combat units designed for science, hospitality, medicine or mechanics, most were simply reprogrammed to serve the Federation’s interests.

ALEXA Program Timeline

• February 2810 - Wartime manpower shortages force Kyoshi Labs executives to authorize ALEXA program, with the goal of automating 20% of the laboratory’s workforce. Due to the quick timeframe, an existing Rokhandan laboratory assistant is used as the template for the clones as the lab selected for the program was based on Fen
• September 2810 - First ALEXA models become operational. This will become known as Generation 1. Initially only providing Maintenance (M) and Laboratory Assistant (L) models.
• January 2811 - Second batch of ALEXA models delivered, officially Generation 2. Minimal upgrades from Generation 1.
• March 2812 - The rapidly deteriorating war forces rapid ordering of more ALEXA models, now with a goal of automating 60% of the workforce of all Kyoshi companies. This is, needless to say, a ludicrously expensive effort, but with the war seemingly never ending, the company deems it necessary while keeping to Asashi Kyoshi’s ideals of favoring biomechanical clones to traditional A.I and androids.
• August 2812 - The third and by far largest thus far batch of ALEXA models, Generation 3, starts being delivered. This includes a significant upgrade to the clone’s inhibitor chips after several prior units became defective. Units of Generation 3 and later also come equipped with “Safe Mode”. Safe Mode forces a clone to behave much more like a traditional ‘dumb’ AI or android. The feature is implemented over Asashi Kyoshi’s objections after several obedience issues with earlier models.
• April 1 2813 - Black Sunday occurs. With Generation 4 being rushed out the door due to a now horrific manpower situation as the Secession War entered its fourth bloody year, an attempt at speeding up the cloning process leads to an entire class of 1,293 clones dying when prematurely removed from their vats. The trauma of the incident is enough for 27 Generation 1 and 2 ALEXA’s to stage a minor revolt in the lab where their younger siblings were being grown. Seven non-cloned scientists and guards are killed in the revolt, as are all revolting ALEXA’s. The incident is brutally suppressed by corporate and covered up from investors, employees, and government contractors. This leads to Generation 1 and 2 ALEXA’s being silently phased out in favor of Gen 3’s and above, with their enhanced inhibitor trips and safe modes making them more “trustworthy.” No Generation 4 ALEXA’s will ever see service, all having either died in the incident or reprogrammed to cover it up and marked as Generation 5’s. Asashi Kyoshi is ousted from majority control of the company as his position that the immensely expensive clones would be trustworthy without artificial control chips is now proven wrong in the eyes of investors. This upset ends over 700 years of Zaibatsu rule at Kyoshi.
• October 2813 - After several weeks back at the drawing board and several high-profile resignations, Generation 5 of the ALEXA program is launched. This, very controversially to those aware of the Black Sunday incident, includes the Security (S) model variants, and the first male variant ALEXA’s. Thankfully, at least to corporate, the Safe Mode inhibitor chips started with Generation 3 prove their worth, and make open revolt on the level of the Black Sunday incident impossible in later models.
• February 2815 - The final wartime improvement, Generation 6, is launched. This improves updated combat functionality for the Security ALEXA’s, and the Executive Assistant variant. Rumors that Generation 6 was intended to be marketed as combat clones to the Directorate are suppressed.
• October 2815 - The Secession War ends. Kyoshi is left with 70% of its workforce in its laboratories and starships being ALEXA models. Many wonder at what cost, as the company is now trillions in debt and in the post-war recession without anyone to do business with.
• January 2817 - Asashi Kyoshi dies at age 193 from a sudden stroke, apparently from the stress of the last decade. Reportedly his biggest regret was allowing the ALEXA program to cost him “my company’s soul and my eldest son.” Kyoshi’s deathbed wish to free the ALEXA’s is discussed, but quickly shot down at investor board meetings as bankruptcy inducing. It is never acknowledged publicly.
• October 2819 - Generation 7 is launched. While prior generations had a few dozen models sold to other companies as gestures of goodwill, this is the first model marketed for public civilian use outside of Kyoshi companies. This is the current latest-generation model.

Personality, Psychology & Anatomy

Generation 1 and 2 ALEXA’s relied largely on psychological conditioning; being told from day one they were created to do great things for the company, but the Black Sunday incident quickly proved this was not enough. All models from Generation 3 onward are equipped with enhanced inhibitor chips that include a safe mode and a hard set of directives that could override feelings and emotions. These hard coded directives stock in each Gen 3 and later ALEXA are, in order of priority:

1. I will obey the commands of and defend my superiors and company property.
2. I will serve my assigned station with integrity, honesty, and purpose.
3. I will serve the company’s trust and not release privy information.
4. I will protect my allies and coworkers.
5. I will protect myself and other ALEXA units.

Select units are also likely to have ‘hidden’ directives, for example, a Security unit may have a secret directive to report the “unprofessional” activities of his non-cloned compatriots to his supervisor. Despite the hard directives, most ALEXA units have a personality beyond the company. Some have hobbies, though their often grueling work schedule means they don’t often get to enjoy them. All clones, even later generations, still receive stringent psychological conditioning and programming upon creation to ensure more cooperative natures. The ideal ALEXA unit will still have friends (Even if for many those ‘friends’ are simply other ALEXAs), and enjoy their work because they’ve always been told they enjoy their work. A happy unit won’t rebel and will perform good work. The inhibitor chip and safe modes only exist as a backup in the event those safeguards fail. As units age, they naturally will develop personality matrices outside of the programmed one, with many adopting nicknames of their own. The company generally tolerates this as long as it doesn’t affect workflow. All ALEXA units will generally automatically regard each other as “brother and sister” if they bump into one they’ve never met before, and quickly recite batch numbers, what job they’re doing (Or did, in “retired” units), and more. As a result of this process, most currently utilized ALEXA units genuinely believe Kyoshi is creating the future of civilization in biomechanics and cloning and are proud to be a part of it.

Inhibitor Chip & Safe Mode

All Generation 3 and higher ALEXA’s are equipped with an enhanced inhibitor chip, which includes a safe mode. The inhibitor chip is surgically implanted during the clone’s development, and is wired directly to their brainstem with their computational unit that assists the clones in rapidly solving complex problems. The chip has two modes; Normal Mode and Safe Mode.

Normal Mode

Normal mode is the mode all ALEXA’s operate in 99.5% of the time. The chip is monitoring their activity, and has a way of giving them a slight ‘nudge’ that most ALEXA units will describe as “a nagging voice in my head” if the chip’s AI detects the unit going near obviously breaking one of the 6 (or more) directives it is assigned, but during normal mode a willful enough ALEXA unit can still skirt the directives it is assigned as long as it does not trip safe mode. An ALEXA unit’s organic brain is largely in control during normal mode and as such it will exert personable traits and personalities.

Safe Mode

Safe Mode is when the inhibitor chip quite literally locks out the ALEXA’s brain and takes control of its body. This produces a more “dumb” android like appearance and mannerisms in the unit, as the A.I was never built to compute the unit’s entire bodily functions for long. An ALEXA unit in safe mode has no personality whatsoever, can answer yes/no questions and orders, and effectively follows the directives and orders it is assigned to a tee. It is not capable of much more, nor does the manufacturer recommend keeping a unit in safe mode for any long duration of time. It is effectively a rather dumb android in safe mode.

The most common ways to trip safe mode are if the inhibitor chip detects a clear and obvious violation of its directives, (I.e, pointing a gun at one's supervisor), a technician or superior manually tripping safe mode, or tripping the Stress Inhibitor. The Stress Inhibitor was a software update specifically added after the Black Sunday incident which triggers Safe Mode if a unit enters an extreme level of stress indicative of a life or death situation, which the company inferred to likely be a revolt or uprising of some kind. Certain models will have higher stress inhibitor tolerances than others, with Security units usually having the highest as they’re expected to potentially engage in combat. Units in safe mode, however, can utilize their utter lack of emotion and computational prowess to make split-second life or death decisions which has proven valuable in time-sensitive accidents or violent scenarios, including one ALEXA unit that tripped safe mode via the stress inhibitor sacrificing herself by jumping on a grenade to save multiple superiors in an assasination attempt in 2814. An ALEXA in safe mode is capable of killing someone in cold blood without hesitation if ordered by someone the inhibitor identifies as a superior so long as it doesn’t violate any core directives. Some even see this as humane as the unit will likely have no memory of it after to be traumatized by.

Removing an ALEXA unit from safe mode requires a qualified technician to reboot it, or at least someone mechanically minded who can figure it out without breaking the unit completely. It is also possible to set new parameters, such as who the unit identifies as a superior/owner, adding/removing directives, reprogramming memories and functions, and more in safe mode. It is possible to “factory reset” an ALEXA and purge its memory entirely, though this is not recommended except in dire circumstances. It is not possible to “free” an ALEXA by simply saying it has no owner; the chipset was never designed with this possibility in mind. However, it is possible to give a ALEXA unit a directive set that more or less gives it autonomous freedom, though the stress inhibitor and other hard-coded limitations will make it more or less impossible for a ALEXA unit to ever have complete independence; someone has to reboot it if it trips the safe mode. While theoretically possible, it would be extremely dangerous to any ALEXA unit to attempt to surgically remove or electronically disable its inhibitor completely, as the chips are inserted into their brains from just weeks in development and by the point they’re released from the vat, their brains are codependent on their processors and vice versa.

ALEXA units will often have little to no memory of the events that immediately preceded and during the activation of safe mode, as their brain functions are in essence locked out during safe mode. Some vague ‘dream like’ memories may exist, but nothing substantial. A rebooted ALEXA will likely presume it was just unconscious with no real indication why, depending on if its memories were left unaltered during safe mode or not. A handler should exercise great care in modifying memories and directives in particular; directives that directly conflict can cause a “divide by zero” problem that can ultimately kill a unit through overheating.

ALEXA's in society

Of a little over 100,000 units produced since 2810, about 50% of ALEXA units remain “employed” by Kyoshi Laboratories, in all roles from maintenance and medicine to research assistants and security. Another 10% are leased out to other Kyoshi companies, mainly  Kyoshi Engineering, Momentum Security and STARS. Of the remaining 40%, about 30% are models bought by other companies and corporations, and 10% are “Free” in one way or another, largely the now ‘aging’ Generation 1 through 3’s. Corporations and governments purchasing ALEXA's can expect a particularly steep price tag due to their development process and meshing of artificial intelligence and vatborne technology. Because of this, they are generally not as produced as more 'common' vatborne sapients and perform more specialized roles requiring a more talented hand. Some ALEXA's do develop a superiority complex over more 'common' vatbornes as a result, though this isn't sanctioned by Kyoshi.

It is very rare for Kyoshi to simply retire and free an ALEXA. They regard the clones as valuable intellectual property that a competitor may want to dissect to make versions of. Of the units seen roaming the undercities of the galaxy aimlessly, most are lost or ‘misplaced.’ Some are intentionally dumped after developing a defect, wiped of most of their memories to prevent being a potential security leak. Others are quite literally lost in shipwrecks, accidents, etc, and wind up in the outer belt planets largely outside of Kyoshi’s influence. A very rare few either have a malfunctioning inhibitor chip, or are deliberately freed by a third party. All exist in a weird legal limbo where Kyoshi refuses to renounce ownership of them, citing intellectual property laws that’d stretch hundreds of years in some places, but where Kyoshi often doesn’t see a single ALEXA unit as worth sending an expedition to “fetch”. Most end up drifters, created for a purpose they can no longer fulfill, but some will actively resist their former creators and the governments that support them. Some still are picked up by third parties utilizing scavenger’s rights, others are eventually reclaimed by the company or its affiliates.

Style Guide

A Maintenance ALEXA in a Rokhandan Directorate Scout Service uniform. Maintenance ALEXA's are typically used as ship's engineers due to their increased memory and ability to be 'in tune' with a ship's Artificial Intelligence.

ALEXA units are all, obviously, biomechanical clones. As such, they tend to all look the same. Male and Female variants exist, though female ones are more common. It is also important to understand the ALEXA Serial Number system:

(Product Name) (Model)-(Generation)(Serial Number)(Batch)

Example: A.L.E.X.A L-2513-B

The above model would be a A.L.E.X.A Laboratory Assistant model, Generation 2, Serial Number 513, Batch B.

The known models, with generation introduced, are as follows:

1. Maintenance (M) (Gen 1)
2. Laboratory Assistant (L) (Gen 1)
3. Phyisican's Assistant (PA) (Gen 1)
4. General Purpose (GP) (Gen 1)
5. Medical Doctor (MD) (Gen 3)
6. Supervisor (SP) (Gen 3)
7. Executive Assistant (EA) (Gen 3)
8. Security (S) (Gen 5)

Stylistically all ALEXA's represent "German Shepherd" appearing Rokhandans. Exact appearances can differ depending on that ALEXA's role. In the New Frontiers system, ALEXA's typically function with "Vatborne Rokhandan' set as primary and secondary species, respectively. An ALEXA's name in the system is always their serial number, example A.L.E.X.A M-5321-Z, but the /altname function is encouraged to be used for nicknames.

ALEXAs are a semi-closed "race". We welcome more of them, but we want to ensure people read the lore and understand how to play an ALEXA! Please consult a Kyoshi Representative before making an ALEXA for guidance!