[Original Novel] Little Robot, Part 60

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As it got dark, discussion turned to who was going to stand watch. “What do you mean, stand watch?” said Lars. “Can either of you really sleep in the car again after what happened last night?” He had a point.

We still wound up sitting in the car just because, so long as the engine was running, it kept the interior nice and warm. Lars continually scanned our surroundings, clutching the shotgun close to his chest. No danger for the moment, but it made for a comforting sight.

We were all less cranky now that there was enough gas to keep the heater running continuously, so we joked, reflected, and argued through the night. Madeline told Lars all about her background as a war reporter and what she did before that.

I shared with both of them what little I recall of my childhood as both nodded slowly, probably thinking some shit like “that explains everything.” Then Lars reminisced about how his job at Evolutionary Robotics was the first to really pay what he considered big bucks, but he still had to pinch pennies for over a year before he could buy the muscle car he always wanted.

“You bought it that recently?” Madeline seemed shocked, but Lars confirmed it. I confessed that I was equally surprised. “Somehow I always pictured it coming out of the birth canal beside him on its own umbilical.”

Even Lars laughed. To have some breathing room like this, a moment of unencumbered levity, was an increasingly rare treat. I got so absorbed in it that I lost track of the sim. When I finally thought to check on it, at first I didn’t understand what I was looking at.

The sim window depicted Helper simply standing in place. I looked at the clock. Had it really been that long? Perhaps because I’d fallen silent all of a sudden, Lars and Madeline soon picked up on my thought process by that mysterious capacity: The one seemingly possessed by everybody in the world but myself.

“Is it…?” I hushed Lars and fiddled with the software. No error messages. Nor did it seem to be frozen. I turned my attention to Helper, waving my hand in front of her eyes in the hope of eliciting some sort of reaction.

Everything pointed to the same conclusion. That the virus finally finished executing its archived instructions. So any minute now, Helper will wake up. Any minute. I sat there anxiously studying her face for subtle movement.

Then went back to the program, tabbing through the options, looking for some other detail I may have missed. When Lars next spoke, his voice was slow, steady and gentle. “Look...there was never any guarantee it would work.” I shushed him again and returned to hurriedly searching through the software for some indication of why Helper remained inert.

When I looked over at Lars and Madeline, both watched silently from the front seat, expressions difficult to interpret but vaguely depressed or something similar. Oh ye of little faith. They’ll see, I told myself. Any minute now.

“We can bury her if you want.” I slowly turned to face Lars, corner of my mouth twitching involuntarily as I processed his intended meaning. “...We’ll do no such thing, Lars. You’re jumping the gun just a bit, aren’t you? Something’s amiss, but it’s just...it’s a speed bump. I’ll fix it. She’s going to wake up soon.”

He neither agreed nor contradicted me. Just looked on with what I took for a mournful expression as I continued ticking and unticking every option, restarting and terminating the sim over and over, unable to give up until I knew for sure I’d tried absolutely everything. Unable to accept the truth already known to Lars, Madeline...and my heart.

“You’re wrong, okay? You’re out of your depth. Robotics is my field, and I say she’ll be fine.” Lars softly replied that he hadn’t said anything. “She will wake up though” I insisted, voice now trembling. “She’ll wake up soon. She will.”

Nothing I tried had any effect. Lars and Madeline just looked on as I toiled fruitlessly to revive what we all knew, by that point, was a corpse. Even when I finally broke down and allowed myself to believe it, my hands wouldn’t stop.

I just kept wiggling the plugs, ticking boxes, restarting the sim and carrying on a one sided argument with Lars. As if his disbelief was the reason it wouldn’t work. Unreasonable of me to take it out on him, maybe, but I was in the middle of a breakdown.

In the end he had to forcibly pry me away from the computer as I screamed and cried. He and Madeline held onto me until I stopped fighting, went limp and began to bawl. All of the bravery I summoned to carry me through this was a farce.

I could only do it because Helper was in danger. Never more than I was, but when you love somebody, details like that are immaterial. Every ounce of strength, bravery and resolve I’ve been able to summon, I owe to Helper. In the same way that moonlight is really just reflected from the sun.

I begged them to release me, but they held fast until I admitted the truth. “She’s dead, alright!? I know it. She’s dead. I just…” I sniffed and collected myself as best I could. “I just want to hold her one more time. I want to touch her face.”

They looked at each other, visibly troubled, but allowed it. I felt so weak, it was the most I could do to wrap my arms around her shoulders and whisper into her ear even as I wept. “I did everything. Tried everything. I’m so sorry. I love you so much. I love you. I wish I didn’t wait so long to say it. I’m such a fool. Such a weak, frightened fool. How am I going to live without you?”

I tried to get more out, but it swiftly degenerated into incoherent blubbering. Lars and Madeline gave me all the space I could’ve asked for until I came to terms with what this meant for us, and decided what to do with the body.

We had nothing like a shovel, but the soil was loose and gravelly. It wasn’t difficult to scoop out a grave with our hands, just tedious and time consuming. Helper’s body was back breakingly heavy, but I refused any help carrying her to the shallow ditch we managed to excavate.

Some small part of me remained violently unbelieving, even as I laid her to rest. I had to fight the urge, second by second, to dive in there with her. To curl up into a ball and wrap her arms around me, indifferent to the earth being thrown on top of us.

When we finished covering her up and assembled a crude marker out of a few large stones, I stood there for a while soaking in the painful silence. Lars asked me if I was alright. What a dumb question.

“It’s just…” I choked up, words sticking in my throat. “It’s just...I promised I’d never throw her away.” Madeline hugged me. I allowed it. Lars asked whether I wanted to say something. I didn’t feel up to it, but neither could I let her passing go un-memorialized.

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^{Stay Tuned for Part 61!}