"Directive?" said the Angel of the Harvest.

It had failed at communication. It had spoken to itself, using words it alone understood, and had failed to comprehend the context of the Other. It had received a report according to priorities it did not understand, disquieted by an obtuse request for compassion AI431338 was not programmed to give, using a dialect that was perhaps more standard than what its long gothic isolation had driven it to consider appropriate. A human sequence of mistakes. The reality was that they were machines, and should speak to each other as machines. 

Step one was to understand AI431338's Directive. Then they would be in a state of co-operation, indifference or conflict. Things would be clear.