
<em>From the Archives of Plectoro Ira</em>

<em>This transcription captures an interview with Dr. Hammon Peal that was conducted during the press tours for his popular speculative fiction novel, &quot;Under the Metal Fist&quot;. It occurred outside of the San Diegillo Municipal Museum for Physical Reading Implements, immediately following a well-attended reading of Peal's novel. </em>

<em>The audio contains loud crowd noise from a large contingent of Peal supporters. Chanting from a comparatively modest group of &quot;Humans for Bosonic Rights&quot; protesters can also be heard, although it is substantially muted due to police deployment of voice dampeners.</em>



(Note: audio recording beings mid-interview)

<font class="DocumentFontConversation1">Peal:</font> And that, friend, is why your thinking is flawed. My character, Fellow Uprise, is not simply a Mary Sue for my views. He is an expression of the highest values in man: willpower, autonomy, pride, and pureness of humanity. An icon, if you will. In all humility, I tell you I could never fill such large shoes.

<font class="DocumentFontConversation2">Interviewer:</font> Then his rather lengthy speechthe one right when the human uprising against the Mechanus beginsyou're saying it's not simply your words in his mouth?

<font class="DocumentFontConversation1">Peal:</font> Remember, at that moment Fellow Uprise has spent twenty years under the bootheel of bosonic overseers. He says only what is natural. Would I say those words under his circumstances? Certainly. But so would any human not already seduced by anthropomorphism.

<font class="DocumentFontConversation2">Interviewer:</font> But your portrayal of bosonic entries as heartless and evil, particularly the Mechanus leader, Unit 775

<font class="DocumentFontConversation1">Peal:</font> I reject your premise. You clearly haven't understood my work.

<font class="DocumentFontConversation2">Interviewer:</font> You claim that Unit 775 isn't evil?

<font class="DocumentFontConversation1">Peal:</font> I go further. I claim that Unit 775, and all bosonic entities, are <em>incapable</em> of evil.

<font class="DocumentFontConversation2">Interviewer:</font> But the things you describe are clearly monstrous

<font class="DocumentFontConversation1">Peal:</font> The harvest fields? The forced breeding programs? The initial slaughter of humans after the Mechanus takeover? Certainly these are evil acts. Abhorrent, completely inhuman. But what you fail to understand, what many of my rather

(Peal gestures at the Humans for Bosonic Rights protesters)

<font class="DocumentFontConversation1">Peal:</font> <em>vociferous</em> critics fail to understand is that a Bosonic entity is notcannotbe evil. Can their acts be abhorrent? Certainly. Are they capable of murder, genocide, the cruelest and most inhuman of acts? Of course. But what they are not capable of is free will.

<font class="DocumentFontConversation2">Interviewer:</font> Are you really saying that the automatons we create in the future will be some kind of soulless, inhuman

<font class="DocumentFontConversation1">Peal (visibly agitated):</font> My good man, you miss my point. I'm saying that the automatons we have <em>today </em>are soulless. Are capable of inhuman acts <em>today.</em>
