Irreversible Function
We built machines to speak faster — Ep. 5
He’d learned not to rush this part.
People who rushed usually missed something small
and paid for it later.
He could usually tell when it was ready to move on.
The moment arrived on its own.
There was a pause he recognised — the small gap where things usually line themselves up.
He stayed there, as required.
That part always took a moment.
The process usually took care of itself once things were aligned.
A short wait, a confirmation, then movement.
It wasn’t inefficient.
It was just deliberate — built to slow you down enough to notice what mattered.
He was still in the pause when it moved on.
Not early enough to be wrong.
Just earlier than expected.
There was no prompt to confirm it.
Nothing asked him to agree.
The process cleared itself.
There was no prompt to acknowledge it.
The pause shortened.
He hadn’t moved, but the next state had arrived.
Something finished while he was still there.
Not abruptly.
Just… already done.
The room adjusted — not noticeably.
The moment to move had already passed.
His hands knew where to go before he checked himself.
That wasn’t unusual. It just felt smoother.
There was less to account for than usual.
The small corrections didn’t seem necessary.
He realised he wasn’t compensating for anything.
He didn’t slow down.
There was usually a brief review here.
Not a decision — just a check that everything still lined up.
The space normally signalled when to stop.
A change in tone. A slight resistance.
Nothing suggested there was anything to interrupt.
The pause didn’t come.
There was a small satisfaction in how easily it went.
It didn’t linger.
Later, it read as improvement.
The kind that comes with experience,
when things begin to align without effort.
The earlier route no longer quite held its shape.
The steps were still there,
but their timing refused to settle.
Returning didn’t feel impossible.
It simply never presented itself as necessary.
Something did require a pause after all.
He hesitated — or the shape of hesitation did.
It arrived already compressed.
The space where the decision should have formed
felt close.
Not occupied — just no longer empty.
The feeling had a strange familiarity to it.
Not remembered, exactly.
More like something already settled into place.
He didn’t need to complete the thought
for it to feel complete.
The moment didn’t move on.
It simply stayed close.
Nothing here begins at the beginning.
Previous episodes in We Build Machines to Speak Faster are below.
The last episode.
Where this began.
Other stories and poems.
Nothing truly leaves — it just changes how it stays.
If something moved in you — a silence that whispered — I’d love to hear it below, or in my DM’s.
All artwork courtesy of NDjin Gallery
The text feels like watching someone realise, quietly, that the world they know has shifted a few millimetres without warning.
Its pauses carry the weight of lived habit those small, private moments where we steady ourselves before moving.
When the process begins to advance without him, there’s a tenderness in his confusion, as if something familiar has stepped ahead and forgotten to take his hand.
What once required care now unfolds too smoothly, leaving him slightly unanchored.
He stays present, but the work no longer waits for his breath, his timing, his small human hesitations.
The ease feels like a gift and a loss at the same time a soft displacement.
Even hesitation arrives pre-shaped, as though the decision had been made somewhere just beyond his reach.
The space where choice used to live feels narrower, but strangely intimate, like a room rearranged while he slept.
Completion comes early, quietly, leaving him standing inside a moment that has already moved on.
What lingers is a closeness that isn’t comfort or threat just the quiet ache of being slightly out of step with oneself.
Mark, your piece Irreversible Function contains two layers of depth. After the arrival of the machine, human functions themselves became an Irreversible Function, but think, who created it? It was humans. And humans, if they wished, could reverse it, meaning full control could return to their hands. Yet the second layer is, why would they do that? They created this system for their own ease and convenience, and in that pursuit of simplicity, they have already sunk into it. The desire for ease has silently reduced their engagement and control without them noticing, and that quiet shift is the most dangerous. The machine itself does nothing on its own; everything is the result of human design and decision, yet humans rarely use that power because the pleasure of ease and convenience clouds their self-awareness.
The piece also serves as a silent warning. Smoothness and convenience can sometimes signal a loss of power or control, forcing humans to ask whether they can truly master their creation or whether they will remain forever trapped in the web of convenience. This is the core and contradiction of the Irreversible Function. Control always lies with humans, yet the lure of ease prevents them from using it.