The young man entered the house with a bag full of things. He didn’t turn on the lights as he walked until he reached his room, placing the bag on the floor and grabbing its contents. He walked to his desk and turned on the small light that was on top, moved the chair and sat on it. Small sparks started flying, illuminating the room with its warm glow. His fingers moved dexterously, grabbing the small metal that would be implemented in the project he has been working for so long. The clock moved its hands slowly, marking the passing of time. He didn´t need to look at it to know what time it was, it was engraved in his memory. His movements were calculated, never making a wrong move nor one extra. Always efficient, just how she liked it.
The sparks slowly died, leaving the room in complete darkness once again. He got up from his chair and, without stumbling with anything, went to the kitchen. After all, he didn’t need the lights when he already saw how the house looked the first time he woke up. When he reached the kitchen, he started preparing food. For dinner, one sunny-side egg with bacon. He placed the dish on the table, in front of an empty chair and he sat across it, looking at that space. His cerulean eyes showed no emotions, as if he was an empty shell. The dinner was always the same, her favourite food. He ate it once it went cold, even though he has never known what hunger felt like.
He returned to his room, the final piece he was welding was finally finished. He took it, and with great care, or as much as his cold hands could, he carried it to a locked room at the deepest part of the house. He sighed before entering, even though he never had the necessity to do so, and entered. The lights were dim, and the floor was filled with tubes and cables. If he remembered correctly, this is the room he awakened for the first time, and the first thing he saw was her smile, and she said words that at the moment he couldn’t understand. And now, in this very same room, he could only see her peaceful face, resting in foreign body that did not belong to her… or at least for now.
He touched her hand, gently, feeling the same coldness that seeped from his own body. In her chest was a whole, the same size as that last piece he worked so many countless nights on. Besides her was a small frame with pictures. It was from weeks after he awakened. They were together, she was smiling and he had his usual expression.
He stared at the piece in his hand, his cerulean eyes adjusting its lenses to see the beauty and the importance of such a small piece. With this, maybe, just maybe, he could find the reason why he has worked so many years to bring her back. He has never understood this. Why did he do this in the first place? It's not as if he has the need to… feel. He wasn’t supposed to do so. He was created with one purpose: to aid her in her investigation. He redacted, he analyzed, he simulated experiments for her, all those things were expected from him. But she never treated him like a… machine. She treated him more like a companion, someone who she could talk to, someone who she could joke and to share some dinner with.
But one day all of that stopped. And then he did everything he was supposed to do. He simulated the experiment, he analyzed the results and he redacted them. He did that every single day without rest, but one day, without even realizing it, his body moved. And he prepared the dinner she used to enjoy. And at that moment he thought that maybe there was something wrong with him. He then started analyzing himself, running program after program, looking for a bug, a glitch or corrupted data that might have produced this behavior in him, but found nothing. Not satisfied with the result, he started turning off the different modules he had. He started with his vision, and then his speech, his short term memory… he turned off everything, losing the control of his own body and falling to the floor. Perhaps this way he could find something, maybe he could “see” something… But he found nothing. He started to feel different. He started doubting. He started doubting everything, about his purpose, about what she expected from him. He revised everything in the house, examined every book and picture, everything that she liked, maybe that way he could understand what was wrong with him. But that interest slowly became into looking for places he was more comfortable at in the house, what books he liked more or started collecting and framing the pictures where the both of them appeared.
“I’m proud of your evolution, ■■■■”
He opened his eyes wide and looked at her, startled. He could swear he heard her but he had imagined her words, or perhaps it was a memory that was hidden in the deepest parts of his mind… or heart. He stared at her, holding her hand. She taught him everything she knew, and he was now prepared to know the answer to that question he has had for a long time. He stared at the small piece, he wanted answers and, at the same time, he didn’t. It was as if he would lose the meaning of what he has done all these years, but at the same time he wanted to know if he had finally fulfilled the expectations she had of him.
He fidgeted with the small piece, trying to come with the correct answer for this, was there even a correct answer? He was afraid to know.
But he still did it. He placed the piece in the hole of her chest and hoped that, even without the necessary data to finish a simulation. He chose to follow the future he could not see and simply hoped that his questions would be answered.