Post-Post-modern Prometheus

A somewhat disjointed piece based on the challenge at terribleminds http://terribleminds.com/ramble/2011/06/17/flash-fiction-challenge-must-love-robots/

Enjoy, I went from blank page and mind to this in 45 minutes. 

 There are things that lurk in the dark. Don't give me that look it's true. I don't know what all of them are, not really sure I want to know. But I do know this, I am an incredibly unlucky guy. Most people it goes one of two ways. A dead man kills you and then yeah it sucks, but it's over. Or you turn into one of the “good guys” and kick it's ass. Me? I got saved at the last minute by luck. I was about to be killed by that pale thing with dark eyes when some freak in a trenchcoat swooped in and killed it. Drove a stake right through it's chest. I've never seen anyone move that fast, it wasn't natural. I freaked and stumbled away. There was to much to handle. I could have imagined the whole thing, but I won't let that happen. I know what I saw. I see it more often now, the subtle cues that there is something more than humanity on this earth, and it sickens me. It flies in the face of science, of rational thought. The creatures and those men barely better than them. And through it all innocents die. Innocent people get hurt. Well no more.

Man alone was insufficient to take on these things so I needed something new, something big and mean. I worked for weeks perfecting the design, making sure it could handle punishment and move around, and fight back the right way. I collected all the materials and worked nights at the machine shop so I could get some custom work done. One month later and he was a shell. A seven foot iron behemoth, humanoid, with fists capable of crushing a skull and a few nasty surprises in his cavities. But he wasn't done. This was the body, now I needed a brain. Not just some remote control. This would be a trick. If I was to fight the darkness of the world it would need to be able to think.

As luck would have it I knew a few engineering students and they were always up for a new project. Especially something as scifi as a freaking fighting 'bot. They jumped on the chance to help out with him, even giving my creation a name. They called him Arnold, though there was a short debate about just naming him the T-1000. It took two more weeks and we had him mostly running, all that was left was the final hookup. I was alone that night, just doing the final upload into the brain. In one glorious moment I felt like a mad scientist. Logic and learning came together and in a brilliant spark life, or a semblance of it, flowed into that metal frame. Animation took hold and he stood up. Then it all went wrong. It turned to me “Who? What? Where?” His voice was working, though it sounded odd, coming from a speaker in his chest.

“You are a robot, built by me and my friends. I are your creator. You are in a machine shop.” I hoped the language hookup was working or this was going to take a long time. He/it seemed to understand though. “Why then?” “Your purpose is built into you. Check your brain.” He stopped for a moment, testing each thought as it came. “To fight the darkness. And the unnatural. To destroy the things that haunt the night.” The eyes, previously glowing brightly dimmed as if he was shutting down. In a moment they came back up and he just looked at me.

“God your an idiot.” And he started to lumber away. I was floored. It wasn't suppose to happen this way. “Wait, what?” I ran after him, though it was hard with those legs. He didn't stop but he did turn his head. “You made something in defiance of the natural order to fight what you think is unnatural? This makes sense how? And to take the credit when you didn't code one line of me? Moron. Oh, and go read Frankenstein. I basically have to reject you.” And he stalked off into the night.

I get emails from him occasionally. He does sometimes fight those things, but mostly he seems to study humanity. Became a local hero for a while, was an art exhibit in New York, reads a lot of comics. And I'm thousands in debt from making his body.