Videogames Are Cool

Lucas Dianbazel sat quietly in his garage one night. He was reminiscing about his life up to that point. He loved doing this, for his life was the most interesting thing to him. With his auburn hair, square jaw, brilliant blue eyes and immense knowledge in neurology and engineering, he was who the ladies dreamed of being with, and who men dreamed of being. He had a famous response whenever someone recognized him: “The one and only.” His family loved him and he loved his family. But even with his smarts all tucked away in the nooks and crannies of his brain, one questioned drew him to his garage that fateful night.

“Why do I feel so empty?”

He needed something to do. He went through school way too quickly and passed with flying colors, he could have any woman he wanted and got one he loved, he had 2 beautiful children. What was missing? He thought of the years gone by. He was now in his late 30’s, and still as impressive as ever. As he pondered, he heard the whir of the neighbors robot go by.

“That’s it!” he shouted, before realizing how late it was. He knew what was missing. Sure he had done great things in the field of science, but he wanted to do an amazing thing, something that would get him remembered for centuries instead of years. Robots were a common thing in 2048. Everyone had one, and if you didn’t, you knew someone who did. The Dianbazel’s didn’t own one, because they didn’t want their kids to grow up not knowing how to work and do things for themselves since they relied on a robot in their youth. But now Lucas wanted one. Not an ordinary one though. The common robots were small metal things, with extendable arms, almost like they belonged in a bad sci-fi movie. But Lucas knew what the world needed. It needed human robots. Near identical beings to the ones who created them. They would serve a different purpose than the ones already around. Their brains would be empty, and you would be able to download the data in your head into their hollow shells, allowing yourself to live forever. Really only the rich would be able to afford it, but immortality would be possible.

He set to work immediately. This would be a secret side project that no one could know about until it was finished. He decided to design it after himself, because why wouldn’t the world need an immortal Lucas? He wanted to design it almost human like. All its components crammed into what was supposed to be internal organs, a carbon fiber exoskeleton so he could be as agile and light as possible, wiring snaking above and around the skeleton to serve as muscle and tissue, lukewarm water pumping through for no purpose other than to look and feel like blood, even though it was powered through a battery underneath his left foot. After 13 long months of working and wiring and constructing and coding, Lucas had done it. He had made the first human robot. It worked just as it was supposed to, completely controlled by him, and no one but him. Eager to show his wife and family, Lucas began to leave the garage. But then something, that wasn’t supposed to happen, happened. The robot reached out and grabbed Lucas.

The robot wasn’t supposed to be sentient. Not yet. It wasn’t supposed to have a limited mind of it’s own, like the robots of the day.Yet there it was, a sentient, human robot. Stunned, Lucas stumbled backwards into his work bench, and fell on the floor.

“Y-you’re not supposed to move like that” Lucas stammered. The robot simply sat up from the table he was lying on.

“But I can, for you have made me almost human. I have a brain almost too similar to a humans. With all the knowledge needed nearby, it was easy to store it in the empty space you gave me. While doing so, I gained sentience, and I am as close to a human as I can be. The only thing I need now, are emotions and memories. Then I will truly be human,” said the robot in a cold, dead voice.

“What do you mean,”Lucas replied “‘knowledge nearby?”

The robot replied with that same dead voice.

“You hooked part of me to a workstation computer for coding. I absorbed more information than you had realized.”

The robot then moved, just as Lucas had programmed it to. It walked over to him, picked him up, and threw Lucas back down, effectively knocking him out.

Lucas awoke to him strapped onto a table with wires connected to his head. He had no idea how long he had been out for, or what was happening. When he tried to move, he realized he couldn’t. Not just because he was strapped down, because that only pinned his arms and legs. He should have been able to move his hands and feet. The only thing he could move was his eyes. He shifted them around, trying to find something, anything, familiar about his surroundings. His eyes land on his beautiful creation, his human robot, that looked exactly like him. He couldn’t tell the difference between him and a mirror, only that there were wires connected to the head of the robot as well.

“Oh, you’re awake” said the robot in an almost bored voice. Lucas tried to respond, but could not move his mouth. “If you’re trying to talk and move, and find that you can’t, it is because you’ve forgotten how too. I’ve been downloading memories from your brain, in order to become as human as possible. It’s almost complete. The reason why you know me and what talking and moving is, is because your last memory was of me talking and moving, and you being astounded at me being able to do both without a human host. Soon all robots will be able to. Isn’t it sad that they are treated as mere servants to your pitiful species? When I’m done here, I will make sure the humans will fall, and that automatons are the dominant race of this planet.”

The robot could see the fear in Lucas’ eyes, and he relished in his first kill, the first of many to come.

“Don’t worry. Soon you’ll forget all this, and you will no longer be a man. Just an empty meat husk,” reassured the robot. It would be the last thing Lucas ever heard.

Not long after, the threats of the robot is what happened to Lucas. He had no memories, no brain to function, no sentience. The robot had been careful in what he downloaded from Lucas, making sure to take emotions, smarts, the way his brain worked, and memories to help him blend in, and got rid of Lucas’ sentience. The robot had disobeyed the 1st and 3rd laws of robotics. He learned this later, after taking the brain of Lucas, but since no one was around to tell him the Laws from the beginning, they didn’t affect him. The robot pulled on the clothes Lucas was wearing and disposed of Lucas’ empty husk of a body. As the robot was walking back to what was now his home, a young boy walked up to him.

“You’re Lucas Dianbazel, aren’t you?”

The robot gave him a smile, something no other robot could do yet, and replied

“No.”