0. Editor’s Note

The Great Stratagem of Lady Ikedanbu — Judith Huang

I can’t love artificially I’m too busy falling for my electric kettle
— Cai Png

Cactus Girl, Lobster Boy
— Alastair Wee

The Girlfriend
— Andrew Cheah

Keep Nothing on Your Person
— Levin Tan

Singapore goes cyborg but what
does this mean for families?
— Darcel Al Anthony

Science City #26
— Joseph Tan

Tensile Strength
— S.L. Johnson

The Winter of Our Science-Fiction Discontent, Part 1
— Vivekanandan Sharan

Cutting the Sapphire: An Interview with Joan Hon, Singapore’s First Sci-Fi Novelist
— Ng Yi-Sheng

A Review: Club Contango by Elaine Boey (Dark Matter INK)
— Wayne Low

Singapore goes cyborg but what does this mean for families?

TAGS | fiction , local

Darcel Al Anthony

Darcel is a journalist with a passion for storytelling and learning. She recently graduated from the National University of Singapore with honours, majoring in English Literature and minoring in French Language Studies as well as Communications and New Media. A bookworm, she enjoys all kinds of tales, with her favourite series being the Harry Potter books. She also spends her time volunteering and listening to classics.

Singapore goes cyborg but what does this mean for families?

Sweltering heat and singlets all around despite the grey clouds looming over Bishan Town.

I had read about Singapore before — efficient, futuristic, a utopia in the tropics. But no book had prepared me for the sheer spectacle of this little red dot.

During my week-long trip, I found myself to be like a child in a candy store. Tall skyscrapers with seemingly gravity-defying architecture, trains actually coming in on time, and now robots? This might be a dream for everyone else around the globe but for Singaporeans, it is just an average day.

Cyborg nannies have been a fixture in Singaporean households since 2045, the latest innovation from Ulokam¹ World. These sleek and greyish caretakers were designed to ease the burden on young families, a heavily funded initiative by the Ministry of Family Care to counteract the nation’s declining birth rate.

While their efficiency was undeniable, their accessibility was another matter. Only the wealthiest families could afford them outright. The rest were tangled in metres of red tape like psychological evaluations, household compatibility checks, and mandatory consultations.

After all, Singapore was not just introducing advanced machines; it was ushering in a sweeping societal shift.

To better understand this new age, I was a guest at Ai Ling Rosman’s condo, a 36-year-old senior associate at a public relations firm. She stays alone with her 10-year-old son, Adil, and their cyborg nanny.

¹ Tamil for ‘metal’.

“Welcome to Singapore, John,” Ai Ling said, grinning as widely as a Cheshire cat.

I remembered how much the humidity clung to my skin like a second layer, the scent of altar incense filling the air. I asked her for a drink.

“Enam, come!”

The floor trembled slightly under her weight. Her loud footsteps echoed, metallic yet eerily smooth.

I immediately turned around, whipping out my notebook.

In front of me stood a gargantuan woman. Her jet-black bangs hung stiffly against her emotionless face and her long braid was slung on her shoulder. The synthetic skin stretched tightly over her high cheekbones, devoid of any human imperfections. The bright pink tube-like veins pulsed, almost real, but not quite; they are dictated by circuits, not a beating heart.

Despite the heat, she wore a long-sleeved white blouse and ankle-length black trousers.

“Hello Puan. How may I serve you?”

“This is John, a journalist for The Daily Papers, a very famous ang moh publication. He’s writing a story about our cyborgs. You will help him with it and make his stay comfortable,

“Hi Enam, a pleasure to meet you,”

Enam turned to me, her neon pink lips twitching. I think it was an attempt at a smile or at least a programmed gesture of one.

“It never needs a break and it never complains. ‘The ideal maid’, that’s their brand slogan. It just works all day, nice, right?” said Ai Ling. “Now go make Tuan some teh, make sure it is not so hot,”

Enam moved to the kitchen, and I followed, curious to see if there was a difference when it came to making a simple cup of tea.

A mug and bowl of tea sachets slid from a cabinet before she even reached for them. How convenient is it to have sensors at one’s fingertips! Without hesitation, she scooped a sachet and placed it inside the mug.

The kettle had already begun to boil. Steam curled in the air, and with a swift motion, she poured the water over the sachet, not a drop splashing onto the counter.

She did not stir. Instead, she simply placed both hands on the sides of the mug, immune to the boiling heat. Her pink veins pulsed in deliberate, measured intervals as if she were breathing into the mug.

Then, she reached for the condensed milk and grabbed the mug once more, cooling it down with her touch. With one final movement, she lifted the mug and extended it toward me.

I took it and had a sip of the tea - or teh, feeling the warmness spreading through my fingers. The teh was wonderfully balanced between the bitterness of tea and the creamy, somewhat sickening sweetness of the condensed milk.

“How’s the teh?” asked Ai Ling.

“It’s good- It’s perfect, actually! Goldilocks would have approved. It’s just right, not too hot or cold,”

“Oh, this cyborg nanny is good at making teal! You wouldn’t believe how much effort went into manufacturing its arm for precision and temperature changes. Luckily, I’m friendly with the boss, I got a discount,” said Ai Ling, winking at me.

Enam tilted her head. “Do you need sugar, Tuan?”

I shook my head, staring at her hands … and then, her blank face.

It was then I first wondered if she could have felt anything at all.

Her skin was smooth and there was not a single blemish nor a hint of pores. Big, black, blank eyes and a sharp nose. She was like a mannequin, eerily perfect when you are not paying attention to the pulsing pink veins and matching lips.

Which is hard to do.

² Like an “amah”, a female domestic servant commonly found in pre-Independent Singapore’.
³ Term used to describe a person of European descent and most things from the western hemisphere

My days flew fast in Singapore. Wanting to learn more about these cyborg nannies, I accompanied Enam to pick Adil up from school each day.

On the first day, something peculiar had happened. At the primary school, kids in white-and-blue uniforms streamed out, laughing and eating Hello Panda biscuits and Chupa Chups lollipops.

Not used to the battering weather, I sat in the corner, observing two different groups. One, a nanny sea of tall, grey-skinned women with bright pink veins and the other, a throng of tanned women in oversized cartoon tees and rugged shorts.

“Enam!”

A small boy walked fast, shoulders hunched.

He did not notice I was there. He went straight to Enam and rested a hand on her wrist. I remembered thinking, that must be Adil.

Something flickered across her face and her eyes widened. It happened so briefly that I almost missed it.

I found it shocking that Enam bent down without any creaking noises. She took Adil’s school bag and ruffled his hair, a very humane gesture. He did not flinch. In fact, he now looked rather relaxed.

“Adil,” Enam said, using no titles and in a voice gentler than when she spoke to me or Ai Ling.

“What happened today?”

Before I could introduce myself, another voice cut through the crowd.

“Oi, Adil! You think that tin chi bai will protect you? Come lah, ask her to do my homework for me,”

A lanky boy loitered near the gate, his too-small school bag slung over his shoulders. It seemed like he bought it years ago. He reached out as if he were going to grab Adil’s collar but he never got the chance.

Enam’s arm shot out, blocking his path. So firm that the boy skidded to a stop. Her pink veins pulsed, brighter this time, like snakes within an artificial polymer.

The boy’s expression faltered for just a second before he forced a scoff, acted as if he was unfazed, and ran straight towards his group of friends.

Adil nervously wiped at his nose with the back of his sleeve. He turned to Enam, his voice small.

“Will they ever stop?”

Enam paused for a long moment. Then, she reached out, brushing a stray curl from his forehead.

“Do not worry for I will be here,” she said simply.

Each day after picking Adil up from school, Enam would resume doing household chores. She would also pick Adil’s shoes up after he kicked them off at the door and unpacked his school bag for him while he took a shower or watched the latest cartoon show on television.

Ever so methodical.

I was curious about the incident. Wanting to know more, I lingered in the kitchen, watching Enam cut bananas into small pieces for Adil as his afternoon snack. Her movements were fast yet so precise. I remembered thinking how efficient it would be to have one of these cyborg nannies.

“Does that kind of thing happen often?”

She looked up at me, her unreadable face betraying nothing. “What thing, Tuan?”

“Call me by my name. I meant those boys at the gate. Does it happen often?”

The pink veins flickered in sync with an unseen command, her response delayed by a fraction of a second, just long enough to remind me that she was perhaps processing.

“Why are you asking me?”

“You’re supposed to speak properly to me, Enam,”

For a long moment, Enam did not speak. I wondered if I had offended her, not that I knew if she could be offended in the first place. Was she programmed to understand disrespect?

It was bizarre. I thought all cyborg nannies were supposed to follow orders to the tee.

Just as I was about to ask her again, she said,

“I exist to take care of him,”

Could a machine truly care?

⁴ A vulgar Hokkien term for a woman’s genitals

Day after day, I observed Enam and Adil. They have developed a close bond over the three years that Enam has been with them. Such is one conversation we had after school.

“You think if I had a metal arm, I could punch through walls? Create a big lobang? You could do that, right, Enam?” Adil asked, eyes shining.

“Yes,”

He grinned. “Cool,”

She smiled back at him, a proper one with pearly white teeth showing. The first I had seen.

I watched the exchange with fascination. There was no wariness or hesitation.

Adil spoke to her as if she were a person. I wondered if he knew the difference. To be honest, at that point, I was already starting to feel that there was not any.

After dinner on Tuesday, Ai Ling scrolled through her tablet, quickly tapping at her screen while I continued my writing. We were seated at the dining table.

“Enam, make sure he brushes his teeth before he tidur,” she said without looking up.

“Yes Puan,” Enam replied. She turned to Adil, her voice softer. “Come, Adil,”

When she spoke to Ai Ling, her tone was clipped. With Adil, it was like the way a mother might coax a child. If this was programming, it was incredibly sensitive.

The boy obediently followed. Ai Ling remained seated, still engrossed in her digital world. She eventually paused to take a sip of wine, a night-time habit for her.

I took this opportunity to ask her more about Enam and her species.

I learnt that Enam means “six” in Malay and that Enam had been the sixth cyborg helper belonging to Ai Ling.

“So, who were your previous helpers?”

“Cyborg nannies or also the jungle ones?”

“Er, just the cyborgs,”

“Lima,” Ai Ling replied without skipping a beat. “‘Five’ in Malay. It was … defective. I sent it back to the warehouse, free delivery if you do so on the day they glitched,”

Defective.

The word sat uncomfortably in my mind. What did that mean for a cyborg?

“At the end of the day, they are just robots. They break and they need repair here and there. Just like aircon. Ulokam sends a replacement. I’ve had what - four? Five? Oh ya, five. Doesn’t matter. Enam’s been here the longest.”

Ai Ling continued to list the names of her previous cyborg nannies, with matching Malay numbers, and how they too malfunctioned.

“There are so few of them in Singapore, not everyone has it yet. Not even sure if they can even buy in the first place,” said Ai Ling. “I wonder how long Enam will last.”

She chuckled and took another sip, unaware that Adil was listening from his bedroom, his fingers tightly curled around Enam’s long sleeve as she tucked him in.

⁵ Malay for “hole”

⁶ Malay for “sleep”

Unfortunately, the school bullying persisted.

The lanky boy taunted Adil regularly, shoving him during recess breaks and throwing eraser dust into his hair. Day after day, his confidence seemed diminished. He was even teary on some days.

On Thursday, I asked Adil why he did not defend himself against his bullies. His reply came easily.

“Enam says to ignore them as they’re jealous.”

A shy boy, he did not look at me when he said it. Instead, he was focused on the snack Enam had just prepared for him, a plate of cut apples, neatly arranged in a spiral. He picked up a piece with a metal fork and chewed slowly.

“Jealous of what?” I pressed.

Adil shrugged. “That I have Enam. That she manja me. They say that mummy has no time for me so she bought Enam for me,”

There was no arrogance or hurt in his voice, just a quiet certainty.

Enam, who had been wiping down the counter, paused mid-motion. She gripped the cloth in her hands. She turned her head just slightly, not enough to meet my gaze, but enough to show she was listening.

I leaned forward. “Is that what you think too?”

Adil hesitated this time. “I don’t know,” he admitted, picking at the edge of his plate. “They’re not as rich as us. They don’t have her, so maybe,”

He finally glanced up at Enam, his brown eyes softening. “They just don’t have someone who actually looks after them. Some of them only have maids who can’t wait to get out of the house on Sundays,”

“Does your mother know about the bullying?”

“I don’t know. She’s never here. The only time I told her about it, she just said that ‘boys will just be boys’,”

Adil’s words stayed with me long after our conversation ended.

What can I say about a society that envies machines? A nanny made of wires and metal, yet somehow more of a guardian than flesh-and-blood parents who barely glanced at their children. A robot in the absence of love.

⁷ Referring to Southeast Asians

⁸ Malay for “spoiling” or “taking care”

On Friday, I stood with Enam at the school. I wanted a seat and so, Enam stood next to me behind the metallic assembly line, each cyborg waiting for their designated child.

Adil walked fast, as usual, head low, hands gripping the straps of his school bag.

But today, the lanky boy was stalking directly behind him.

“Eh, tin chi bai bodyguard not here yet, is it?” Mocking, like a cat toying with a mouse.

His friends chuckled with him. “All you rich suckers.”

Adil kept walking. Then, a shove.

He stumbled. I expected Adil to turn around, maybe yell or fight back. Instead, he took a deep breath and started walking again.

Another shove, harder this time, and Adil fell to the ground. His palms scraped against the concrete, a thin red line forming where the skin broke.

Adil cried in pain, cradling his hand while the lanky boy laughed, feeling proud of his triumph.

I turned to Enam, wondering if she could heal Adil. Her pink veins pulsed rapidly now, glowing almost too brightly beneath her synthetic skin. Her fingers twitched at her sides.

Then, she stepped forward.

Everything shifted at that moment. The way her footsteps landed was ever so calculated. The boy’s laughter faltered.

Enam bent down, picking up Adil’s school bag from where it had fallen. She dusted it off with slow, methodical movements. Then, she knelt beside Adil, carefully inspecting his scraped palms.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

Adil sniffled but shook his head. "Aidoh! My hands so pain,"

She nodded. Then, finally, she turned her attention to the boy and walked menacingly towards him.

Despite his tall height for a boy his age, he strained his neck to look up at her and did not take a step back.

“Oi,” he spat, voice cracking slightly. "You can't touch me. You know that, right? You- you’ve got rules. You are programmed,”

Enam tilted her head, and now, I was certain that something did flicker behind those black eyes.

“You hurt Adil,” she said in a voice so hauntingly smooth.

The boy blinked, not expecting a defiant answer.

An unnerving silence settled over the gates. The boy’s friends had suddenly gone quiet, watching the scene unfold.

That was when Enam moved.

It happened in an instant.

Enam’s hand shot out like an iron viper. A hard grip wrapped around his throat and lifted him off the ground.

His legs kicked around in the air, the dirty soles of his tight velcro sneakers up for all to see. His hands made an attempt to claw at Enam’s wrist, fingers slipping against the cold synthetic skin. Her pink veins pulsed violently bright, illuminating her arm like a shiny sword.

“You will never harm Adil again,”

Her voice echoed clearly through the precinct.

The boy’s face was turning blue and his eyes were beginning to bulge. His friends had scattered, but the other students watched, wide-eyed and frozen. Some had their phones out while the others were yanked back by their cyborg nannies, quickly fleeing the scene.

I should have understood why they did that instead of intervening with their superb strengths. Something was happening. Something bad.

I exhaled, realising I had been holding my breath. I am afraid to say that I just stood rooted to the ground.

“Enam!”

Adil shouted. He looked scared.

“Enam, put him down!”

For the first time since I had met her, she hesitated.

Then, with a sharp exhale of air from her vents, she let go.

The lanky boy crumpled to the ground, gasping, his hands flying to his throat while his schoolmates quickly surrounded him.

“You machines will kill us. We will all mati,” one of them called out to Enam who did not look at him.

She casually turned to Adil, her expression unreadable.

“It is safe now. Let us go home.”

I was stunned. I dared not speak and thus, we walked in silence. I was grateful for how short the walking distance was.

By the time we reached Ai Ling’s condo, the videos had gone viral. Enam’s face, her vibrant veins, the horrifying ease with which she had lifted the boy, all of it was spreading like wildfire across social media.

I finally mustered my courage to address what had happened.

“Enam,” I asked quietly as she prepared Adil’s late afternoon fruit snack, grapes without the stems, her movements as fluid as ever.

“Why did you do that?”

The knife in her hand stopped mid-air, hovering above the cutting board. The pink veins across her wrist flickered, almost as if they were breathing.

“I exist to take care of him.”

⁹ Singlish term for “Oh no!”

That fateful evening, Ai Ling, oblivious to the events of the day, received a group call from the Ministry of Family Care.

I was not privy to the conversation but I managed to make out some parts.

Immediate retrieval.

Malfunction detected.

Spoilt unit.

Defective. Defective. Defective.

Ai Ling’s voice remained calm throughout the call but I could see the tension in her shoulders, the way her fingers continuously clenched and unclenched around her wine glass.

When she hung up, she exhaled sharply and finally said it.

“They’re taking Enam back,”

Adil froze, a fork halfway to his mouth. “What?”

“They're coming to fix Enam now,”

“No!”

Ai Ling sighed, rubbing her temples. “Adil, you should know this. This is protocol. Now, I have to pay the delivery fee because I didn’t inform them. This is how I have to find out. it-”

“She protected me!” His voice cracked. “She just wanted to- she-”

“Enam attacked a human boy,”

“He deserved it!”

“He could have died!” Ai Ling snapped, finally losing her patience. “Look, Enam broke the rules and will come back after they fix it,”

“Liar!”

“You could have told me about the bullying, I would have spoken to your form teacher,”

“You’re never here. You are not my mother!” Adil shouted as he shoved his chair back, running to the living room to Enam, who all this while, had stood by the window, watching the dusky sunset.

“Enam,” he said, grabbing her hand. “You don’t have to go. We can run away,”

Enam looked down at his small fingers wrapped around hers. Her pink veins pulsed faintly, her black eyes unreadable.

“That is unnecessary, Adil,”

“No! They’re going to shut you down! They’re going to tear you apart! That’s what they did to the others and they never came back,”

Enam crouched in front of him, pressing a cool metal hand against his cheek. He sniffled, gripping her other wrist.

“Do not be sad, Adil. I have known,”

“Then stay,” he begged.

Her lips twitched into that almost smile. The special one she always reserved just for him.

Enam did not struggle when they arrived within a few minutes. Two men in dark suits, representatives from Ulokam World.

She simply stepped forward when they called her name.

“Zero-six, you are required for immediate diagnostics and decommissioning,”

Adil clung to her arm. “No, no, no!”

Enam bent down, brushing his hair back one last time. “Adil, be strong,”

He sobbed. “Please don’t go,”

And for the first and last time, I saw it.

The way Adil looked at her. Not as a machine, not as a tool, but as something more. The question was never about how real these cyborg nannies were.

It was about what made them any less real than us.

Enam pressed her forehead to his, just for a second. Then she pulled away and walked out the door with the representatives.

Adil did not speak for the rest of the evening. Ai Ling tried to cheer with him but soon gave up, having to prepare for an online meeting.

That night, I found him sitting by the window, knees pulled to his chest, staring out at the city.

“She takes everything away from me. Enam was perfect, she was the best we had. She wasn’t defective,” he said quietly.

I swallowed. “No,”

He turned to me, his eyes shining.

“She just cared about me,”

Adil was right. Enam’s only fault was her affection for him.

He did not cry but I heard him whisper, “Goodbye, Enam,” into the dense air.

In the morning, Ulokam World delivered a replacement.

A new cyborg nanny.

She looked nearly identical to Enam. The same smooth, grey skin. The same long braid and outfit. The same pink veins.

“Tujuh,” Ai Ling said, introducing her to Adil.

I don’t speak Malay but I had an inkling that it meant “seven”.

Adil stared at her for a long moment. Perhaps he was searching her face for traces of the one he had lost.

Then, slowly, he reached out and placed a hand on her wrist. Tujuh’s pink veins pulsed softly, akin to a heartbeat.

“Hello, Adil,” she said.

Her voice was familiar but not as soft. He hugged her.

“Please take care of me,”

And just like that, the world moved on.

Ai Ling barely glanced at them as she swiped through her phone, already preoccupied with something else.

As I watched, I had the sinking feeling that Enam had been just like this once.

That she, too, had arrived one morning, pink veins pulsing, created to serve a household. And one day, Tujuh would be replaced just the same.

I left Singapore that day. My trip had come to an end. I came with the intention of writing about advanced technology, the next great innovation in childcare. But as I waited for my plane, I realised I had been poking around in the wrong areas.

Good riddance to the stifling heat.

Singapore goes cyborg but what does this mean for families? TAGS | fiction, local

Darcel Al Anthony

Singapore goes cyborg but what does this mean for families?

TAGS | fiction , local