Ghost in the Machine

Once I was a scientist, looking to science as the key to a brighter future, eagerly trying working to do my part in benefiting mankind. Now... Now, I am a soldier who happens to make his own weapons. I am A hunter who does not hide, prowl or stalk, but instead hides in his den, silently defeating his victim before the fight has ever taken place. I am a warrior who fights on a mental battlefield, struggling not with his enemy, but with what makes his enemy work.

I am the Steel Rook. But that name is as hollow as the image it describes. I have been reduced to a hollow person, one nothing more than a tool in furthering a cause. My goals, once noble and proud, have been on hold for as long as I can remember. Planning, plotting, developing and building weapons and engaging in a never-ending war against threats that I may well now be imagining, I am no longer able to remember why I started down this road in the first place. I may once have been a scientist, working for the good of mankind... But now I am just an empty man, serving a purpose which no longer feels my own. Building weapons, solving problems, defeating challenges, examining and reverse-engineering my enemies, finding way to defeat them, and then in cold blood simply applying them...

And yet, I am still here. And in thinking about these things, apparently I still have a grasp on the situation. If there is one thing that Sam has taught me, it's that we are who we choose to be. We can wallow in self-pity and feign helplessness, but in the end it is our choices that define who we are, what we do and why we do it. And from that perspective, the science I do is still benefiting mankind. I may not be inventing better creature comforts, labour-saving machines or the amenities of the future. But in a city at war, I am inventing something far more important - weapons to fight in this war. Fight and win.

I am not a violent person, but desperate times call for desperate measures. Our city is in turmoil, and what it needs most of all right now is not luxury technology - it needs law and order. My weapons, my armour and my inventions provide that. Is that not enough? Would I sooner ignore the real problem and focus efforts better spent elsewhere on research that is not quite as vital? Honestly, not really. And herein lies my reason for choosing this lifestyle. I want to help, and such has been the best way to help for a while now. And though I may not like it and though it may occasionally make me feel empty, I should never forget that I made this choice consciously and for a very good reason.

I am Richard Johnson, founder and owner of Future Dynamics, inventor of the Steel Rook Advanced Battle Armour and the Modular Guided Multigun. I am a man of science, a man of technology, and my resources are now, as badly as ever, required in the City's eternal fight for survival. If and when this battle is over, then maybe I can focus on other work. But for now, the people I've always wanted to help need my help exactly in the form that I am providing it.

But this is becoming all too confusing. To find out who I am, how I got here and what I am to do about it, I need to look at who I was and what I have been through. For this purpose, I am putting together all records and memories of my past in a single file, that they may be easily referenced and examined. But records can be looked up if need be. What really matters is my own take on events, and for that reason all events will be retold in my own words.

I was born in the distant 1968, the son of Texas farmer Bubba Johnson and waitress Betty Smith in the small town of Braxton. I grew up surrounded by the simple life of a rural community. Life was slow and easy, or should have been. But I never felt quite at home there. I was a small, weakly child, useless for helping out at the farm. My friends, all big, burly kids, loved nothing more than running around the woods just outside town, climbing hills, swimming in rivers and generally running amok. I was never able to keep up, constantly injuring myself, getting stung by all manner of insects and coming back home with clothes shredded by thorns and covered in mud.

My father always erupted into towering range at that sight, his speech becoming completely incomprehensible amid the angry shouts, but my mother just calmly took my clothes and later washed and sewed them back together. She never got angry with me for anything I did with the boys. She could tell even then that I did not fit in at all, so she was happy for any interaction I had with the outside world, even if it gave her a mountain of work to do otherwise.

She knew that, even though I was physically unable to keep up with the community around it, my problem was more profound - I simply did not fit in. The simple life of a farmer was scarily disinteresting to me. I was always buried in a book or an encyclopaedia, often choosing to stay home and read, rather than go out and play. I'd always be looking for things to take apart so I knew how they worked. I took apart a few of my little brother's toys on occasion, and he got very angry until he learned that I could just as easily put them back together. In fact, taking his toys apart took on as being my main interest, in addition to reading.

Eventually, I got an old radio to fiddle with. My father had accidentally smashed it on the ground and it was no longer working. I spent weeks in the library and in my room, fiddling with the thing, reading instruction manuals, encyclopaedia articles about radio transceivers and so on. In the end, after having done extensive research into magnetism and electro-magnetism, electrics, radio waves, radio transmitters and receivers and a few odds and ends, I was able to understand the basic principles behind what made it work. Once that was done, it took me a day of fiddling and a bit of creative shopping at the local hardware store, and I was able to repair the radio and make it work again. Not only that, but I actually refined the tuner a bit and made all the connections stronger so it would weather a fall better next time. My shop class teacher in school helped me make a new, better casing, and in the end I was left with a radio set that looked and worked better than most anything you could buy in town at the time.

That was a turning point. I has straight As in science and technology in school, but only Ds and Es in history and my agricultural subjects. I was excused from PE on account of a weak heart, so at least I was spared from that. But after my clear demonstration of scientific skill and practical skills ineptitude, even my father conceded that I was simply not cut out to be a farmer.

After my little radio experiment, I had more or less lost contact with whatever friends I had had left. I mostly stayed inside and didn't feel like going out to play with them, engaged in my books and my tools. So it wasn't with any heavy heart that I accepted my father's announcement that I was going to be sent to Dallas to study at a high school there.

1983, a new life.

I would live with my aunt Isabella there, as I was still too young to and inept to take care of myself. I hadn't met aunt Isabella before, but I quickly learned to hate that woman from the bottom of my heart. She was a control freak and a stubborn traditionalist. She would allow no television or radio in her apartment, she forced me to read the Bible every night before bed, she would never let me bring any friends over. Running away from a small town and into her care had almost been a pointless move, as she even tried to choose my subjects at school for me. Luckily, the principal was an understanding man, so he let me choose whatever I wished and simply overruled her pleas. My father was paying for the school, after all, and my father's take on the situation was "A sent ma boy ta study sciences at yer school. Y'all make sure he gets ta do that."

Being able to choose what I would study for the first time in my life was an amazing experience. No longer would I have to be bothered with uninteresting subjects like care for barnyard animals or crops seasons. Instead, I defiantly chose some of the most outlandish subjects I could at the time. Computer science, artificial intelligence, robotics, structural engineering - I picked the most futuristic ones I could fine. I also branched out into chemistry and physics as an additional curriculum. My aunt still got her way and managed to sing me in for a course in history of religion, but in defiance I chose to study Hinduism. After she had lit a fire under the principal, I let him know what I chose. The still-angry man laughed so hard tears came out of his eyes. He signed me into a History of Hinduism class personally with a gigantic grin on his face.

Oh, my aunt was furious. She made such a scene that a neighbour called the police. I wasn't worried, though. I finally had my life in my own hands. And though she could make my experience at home a hell, I could always just bear it and lock myself in my room with my books. I started spending a lot of time at school, staying after classes to make use of the labs and the library. I began working on a few projects of my own and eventually spoke to my teachers about it. They were intrigued about my enthusiasm and several of them took to working with me on them, assisting me with parts, books or information I could not obtain on my own and providing laboratory access for me for the machines or materials I would need. I actually passed many of my classes just based on the projects that I was doing.

They were simple things, all of them. A small programme that could create and edit tables for printing out, a few simple machines that could navigate around simple obstacle courses and so forth. But it was my ability to learn and use my knowledge for practical applications that impressed my teachers. It didn't impress my aunt, however. She intentionally destroyed some of the projects I took home with me to punish me for my defiance. I simply made a mental note not to bring any more projects home with me. I was not prepared to submit to the oppression of that woman. Ironically, my studies into the history of Hinduism actually helped me, as managed to apply their teachings of peace and harmony over my stressful life.

However, my defiance finally reached the limit of my aunt's tolerance and she tried to send me home. She would not have someone so disrespectful and arrogant in her house, she said. I was on the verge of being sent back to Braxton when all of my effort paid off. The school offered me a grand and a room in their halls of residence free of charge. I packed my bags and left my aunt's house as soon as I got the phone call. I didn't even tell her about it, I just left her a note. I didn't feel like dealing with her, and she never called me at the halls to say goodbye. I wasn't sorry for it.

All of my distractions were out of the way now, but a new problem had been creeping in without me noticing. Geek. Nerd. Four-eyes. These words hadn't meant anything to me for the longest time, but for my final year, they would become very familiar to me. Apparently my enthusiasm for extra-credit activities and my perfect grades had not gone unnoticed by my classmates. It had been pretty clear to me that I never fit in with them at all - they mostly wanted to go out and party, whereas I would stay home and study, or got to bed early so I could get to classes on time the next day. I never had any fashionable clothes, I never had any "cool" hairdos and I never followed their lifestyle. In fact, I disliked it, because I found it wasteful and irresponsible.

For the longest time they had been content to ignore me, and I was happy to ignore them, but my final year saw them start picking on me with a lot more than they had been. I wore glasses, I had excellent grades and all of the teachers loved me. That made a lot of people hate me. I started getting junk put into my locker, I had people pushing me around before the security guards would chase them off, I had people try to mug me for my lunch money. The few friends I had left for different schools, so my entire final year was spent under extreme peer pressure, ridicule and violence.

But I would not succumb. I ignored the people who attacked me and concentrated on following through with my studies. I was convinced that these people were either jealous or misguided, as I never said or did anything to them, nor did I intend to. I would not get drawn into a fight or a verbal exchange that was beneath me. In a world that was fast becoming modernised, violence and aggression no longer had their place. Success, I was confident, would be had by those who could contribute to building this new world, and not by those who would seek to amuse themselves by tearing it down. My classmates, I believe even now, were not interested in contributing to society. They merely cared about themselves.

With stoicism and resistance I got through my final year. I finished with straight As and got an honorary diploma, as well as a letter of recommendation that I could send to any college or university that I might want to apply in. As it turns out, I wouldn't need any of that. Shortly before I left my halls of residence, I received a letter from the Stanford University in California. They were offering me a substantial scholarship, 50% off university fees and free accommodation. I spoke to the principal about this and he told me it was his doing. He knew some people at Stanford, and he had suggested they offer a scholarship to me. From his explanation it doesn't seem like he had to do a lot of convincing. He explained that all he had done is shown them my grades, my projects and given his own recommendation of me, and they were eager to accept his proposal.

I returned back to my home town of Braxton that summer so I could prepare for my departure for California. Somehow the news of my scholarship had reached my hometown, so I was got a hero's reception. Everyone was suddenly interested in talking to me, asking about what life in the big city was, what kind of people I had met and all manner of other irrelevant details. I didn't think they were irrelevant per se, I had just never thought about them when I was in Dallas, so I had precious little to say. I met all of my old friends who had already started working on their parents' farms full time and were being paid for it. They were still simple folk, but thankfully, not malicious like my big city classmates. They were actually a bit disinterested in my stories once the novelty had been worn out.

I tried talking to my parents about what I had been doing in school, but it flew right over their heads. In retrospect, I think trying to explain the complicated science to people who had only been through elementary school was wishful thinking, at best. My father would just refuse to listen - he didn't care. My mother was perfectly happy to just sit there and listen to me talk, but I could see she wasn't catching a word of what I was saying. I think she was just happy to see me, so she was prepared to listen to anything I had to say. My father was a hard, serious man, but I could tell he had missed me, too. He'd never show it, of course - that's the kind of man he was. But I could tell. He'd go around the house grumbling and complaining, rant about his problems to me, keep calling me over to give him a hand and basically just stay around me a lot.

It broke my heart that I had to leave my parents again so soon. I loved them dearly, and I know they loved me just as much. But we all understood that there was no future for me in Braxton. As much as he hated to admit it, even my father agreed. We spoke the day before I left, and it was the first time I had ever seen him emotional. He apologies about pushing me to become a farmer. He explained that he understood I was not cut out for this life. He asked me to call them often. But then he said something I never expected - he said he was proud of me. I had gone so far against his wishes, and yet he was still proud of what I had made of myself. He told me that the work and effort I had been putting into my own development had made me into a true man. He told me, no... He ordered me to make something of myself. Because I deserved it more than anyone else he knew.

He never said a another word about it, and he was quite and cold the day I left. My mother, on the other hand, burst into tears and my father had to physically make her let go of me when the bus driver started shouting and swearing. I left my family sad and alone, but I left with their blessing. And as much as I missed them, I had been given a mission - to make something of myself. I could not let my father down.

1987 - Coming of age.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

*applause*

Wow. This (along with your other thread) is amazing. You are a talented author.

Thanks

I'm trying to breath a bit more life into my characters, and that's just easier when they have a story that's actually told, as opposed to just in my head. The Steel Rook has an important role among my characters, and I'm determined to flesh him out as best I can.

There's still a bunch of story left to tell about him, so stay tuned

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

My first year at Stanford was incredibly easy. In fact, it was a bit too easy. Most of the things I was supposed to learn I had already done research on, read about or done projects on. What I didn't know already, I was able to quickly find source material for and learn basically on my own. I still went to my lectures, of course - to do otherwise would be unthinkable. I tried taking the opportunity to talk with my professors and discuss the material as it was being taught, but I just kept going into areas that were well beyond the realm of the course. Frankly, difficult as it may be for me to say it, those lectures were a waste of my time. I knew what they were going to teach me already and I was just trying to get a little something more.

That ended up infuriating some of my professors, causing them to put me through specifically difficult tests to "put me in my place," as one of them put it. Unfortunately for them, I passed all of their tests without even trying, in effect raising my grade even further. Other professors were very happy about my enthusiasm for their courses. They would give me extra-credit assignments, access to the university labs after closing time and took me on to do some simple projects with them. A few professors outright excused me from all of their lectures and suggested I only turn up for the exam at the end.

One particular professor, though - Dr. Leonard Samson - mad a really big deal out of my "apparent disrespect" for his subject. He was an old man, born and raised in a strict family. He handled his classes like a military exercise and would allow no deviation. He taught a particular form of robotics that every student dreaded, so poor grades were his weapon of choice. However, it infuriated him that I could so carelessly disrespect his authority and still get away from it no matter how evil a test he gave me. However, he was an honest man, and as difficult as the test may have been, he always marked it as it deserved and never lowered my score for personal reasons.

At the end of my first year, it was blatantly clear to all involved that the university's regular curriculum had little to offer for me. Debates were held weather to advance me a few years or maybe move me to a different mode of study. In the end, a creative solution came from the most unlikely place one could imagine. Dr. Samson suggested that I be attached to a project he was doing that would cover the majority of my course. He would grade me based on my performance on the project and he would provide me with any information or resources I might need. Basically, he offered to take over my study personally.

I was absolutely convinced the man hated me and was offering to take me in his project so he could get back at me for disobeying him. I could not have been farther from the truth. At our first meeting and briefing, the professor gave me his reasons for making his suggestion. He explained that while he could never accept my methods, I had shown skill and ability that was well beyond my level. That had earned his respect and admiration. He still didn't particularly like me, but he was willing to put up with our differences in the name of developing what he described as a unique talent.

The words of my father ringing in my ears, I sensed this was a unique opportunity to finally make something of myself. No longer would I have to subject myself to a learning course that was far below my level. No longer would I have to conform to standards made to make people's study easier, but in so doing slow their potential development. I had outgrown the education system as it was back then, and this opportunity to work outside of it was a godsend. Only adding to my decision was the fact that I really wasn't looking forward to sitting on my hands for another three years.

I was introduced to the professor's research "group," which consisted of one other person - Emillia Cornby. I had heard about her. She had just graduated her Bachelor's degree in computing and was doing a project for her Master's degree in robotics. As soon as I saw her, I sensed there was something different about her. Something special. It wasn't anything she said or did, it was just the way she behaved, the way she spoke and the way she dressed.

My first meeting with Emillia, or Dr. Emma as everyone I knew seemed to refer to her, was quite memorable. Dr. Samson led me into an empty room, and we waited. All of a sudden, this loud, obnoxious red-headed girl burst into the room. She was wearing a simple sweater and pants combo, black work boots and an unbuttoned lab coat. Her face was dominated by her big, deep brown eyes, hidden behind a pair of glasses the size of shop windows. From the very moment she spoke, I was worried. I might have liked her then and there, but she was the most pushy, arrogant and annoying girl I had ever met. She just looked at me, pushed up her glasses and harrumphed. Instead of addressing me, she turned to the professor and started complaining about me before she had even spoken to me.

Now, you have to understand that by this point, I had become very confident of my skill and knowledge. To have this weird girl just criticise my ability like that was not something I was prepared to stand for, and I told her so. We argued around in circles, ever more bitterly so. Instead of breaking it up, the professor just wished us luck and left the room. The argument ended with Dr. Emma citing her credentials, pointing to her framed diploma hanging on the wall and reminding me of her position as assistant project leader. Like there was anyone but her in the group! I stormed out of the room, only to be met by the professor, who was standing just outside. He took me back into the room and more or less ordered Emillia to work with me.

We discussed the project after the fight had settled down. I still don't know why the professor knowingly and willingly let us go at each other's throats, but I suspect it was his way of testing my resolve. Our task was to construct a prototype of a mobile robot that could navigate a room littered with obstacles. It had to do so in under an hour and without any prior knowledge of the location or shape of the obstacles. Emillia had already worked on the project for the past six months. She already had a working robot shell and software that could move it about, but had been facing significant difficulties with pathfinding for the past month. I was to assist her in the project and we were both expected to show a result in 9 month's time. Over the course of the project, Emillia was to grade my performance and contribution and report it to Dr. Samson. That had me quite worried, but I was determined to see this through.

Over the following days, Dr. Emma opened up a bit and let me in on the project. She was still mostly trying to find something for me to do so I'd be out of her way, but at least we were getting somewhere. It was at around that time that it dawned on me just why she was so arrogant. That girl was a demon programmer. She could read machine text like most people read a newspaper, write software faster than the machines at the time could run it and make computers sit, roll over and bring her her slippers in the morning. I had initially wondered if her computer skills might actually equal my own. Equal? Bah! She was so much better than me it made me ashamed to be in her presence.

Any animosity that I felt for Emillia kind of disappeared at that point. She may not have been a very nice person, but she was so good at what she did that I couldn't help developing enormous respect for her. Like me, she was very talented at what she did, and even if she did not have very good people skills, she deserved my respect. Plus, I was kind of starting to like her. Oh, she was always abusive with me, ordering me around, giving me menial tasks, insulting my intelligence. But after a while, all of her hostility started feeling a bit fake, a bit forced. I started thinking that it was just her way of dealing with a world that did not understand her. Where I simply chose to ignore it, she had chosen to put up a strong visage and fight it. And like me, it was tiring her, depressing her and bringing her down. I saw her grow sad after an outburst so very often.

Someone like me...

Eventually I got through Dr. Emma's defences and got her permission to examine her code in detail and for a great length of time. While it was expertly written and made use of a whole bag of tricks I hadn't even heard of, it looked more and more like a gigantic mess. A well-written mess, but a mess allthesame. My suspicions were confirmed when I asked Emillia for any charts or diagrams she had of how the finished software was supposed to work. I was met with a blank stare. It was starting to dawn on me that while that girl was an excellent programmer at code level, she was terrible at forward planning and management. I offered, with not a little fear in my heart, that her problems probably stem from the hectic spaghetti code she had written and that maybe we could write a more consistent framework if we started from scratch. She exploded in a fit of anger and literally kicked me out of the lab.

Undeterred, if a little bruised, I returned to my accommodation and spent all nigh designing and coding a basic, structured framework for the control software of the robot. I planned ahead up until the very completion of the programme, accounted for possible problems and made sure the different systems would not interfere with each other. I don't think I got more than a couple of hours of sleep that night, but I was sure it had been worth it.

The next morning I came in barely on time and with bloodshot eyes. Emma was already there, kind of twiddling her thumbs and looking a bit confused. Had I been a little wiser, I could have sensed what was going on, but I wasn't really thinking about that at the time. I eagerly showed her the code I had written, but she was not amused. She had one look at it, didn't even read a word, and then just proclaimed it was junk and told me to get lost. Now that irritated me. I had spent all night working on this thing because I thought it would help, and she wouldn't even care enough to have a look at it? I said some things I didn't mean and stormed out of the lab, going back home and crashing in bed.

But something bugged me. Her words sounded somehow hollow, somehow weak. She wasn't angry, she wasn't authoritarian. She was confused, I think, and a bit sad. I even dreamed about it, and it made me feel really bad. Instead of talking about it and coming to an agreement, I had made a scene and stormed out like an idiot. There were still a couple of hours before before she would go home left, so I rushed over to the lab to apologise. What I found, however, surprised me.

I found Emillia furiously typing at a computer, ecstatic and exhilarated. As she later explained, she hadn't been able to stop thinking about what I had said about her programme. Shortly after I had left, she had swallowed her pride and tried working with my framework. Nothing complicated, just the basic things first. With the tools I had provided for her, she was able to replicate a large section of her earlier work in no time. She kept promising herself she'd stop, but she just kept on coding, getting more and more excited at a system that just seemed to work. In fact, that had carried out throughout all the five hours I had been away.

Dr. Emma was, for the first time that I had seen, happy and cheerful. She was overcome with an unusual enthusiasm, almost giddy with the prospect of the technology she had gotten her hands on. After all, I had just handed the proper tools to an absolute expert, and within the span of an afternoon, she had managed to recreate most of the work she had done the previous six months. She was the first person I had ever seen actually happy about her studies and her projects, willing to learn and work and being joyful about it. That really touched me in a way I cannot possibly describe.

Now that she was more willing, I sat down with her and we discussed the programme and the future of the project. We worked together, refactoring her old code into the new framework, solving problems, designing systems and generally moving forward with the project at a furious pace. We kind of lost track of time doing that, actually. We were finally disturbed by a janitor coming to clean the lab just after 3 AM. In a lab with no windows, it's kind of hard to keep track of time, I suppose. The next day was Saturday, but we were both so excited that we arranged to meet at the lab and continue working anyway.

Judging by Emillia's eyes the next day, she hadn't gotten much sleep. I know I didn't, working late into the night, promising myself that I'd go to bed in just a bit. We spent all day Saturday working on the software, and for the first time, we were both happy together. Dr. Emma wasn't angry, she wasn't abusive and she wasn't pushy. In fact, she had transformed into a sweet, charming, understanding girl. I hadn't heard her laugh before, but I quickly grew addicted to it. Luckily, she seemed to appreciate my so-called "geek humour." We got along perfectly well that day, and we got a mountain of work done. We reached about the point where we had switched over to my system, so we decided it was a good time to call it a night. We were both dead tired, it was past midnight and we had done good work, so we went back home.

I think I slept for 15 hours straight that day, waking up in the late afternoon. I was adamant that I would take the day off and relax, so I went to the library to pick out a good book. Much to my surprise, I found Emillia there. She had also woken up late and decided to pick up a few books on electronics. We picked up our books and left, stopping for a while at the park. We talked for quite a bit, and it was only then that I got an idea of why she had been acting in such a hostile manner in the beginning.

Initially, she had started doing her project with her boyfriend, Jason Mathews. I remembered hearing about him. He had been charged with indecent exposure and public lewdness and subsequently expelled in the same year in which I joined. Emillia told me he had used to be an OK student in Robotics and Engineering. He hooked up with her over a joint class they had. He sweet-talked her and she fell head over heels in love with him. They started the project together, he whipped up a passable robot shell for her and then proceeded to skimp on his responsibilities. Emillia went to his dorm room one day to demand he contribute and caught him in a compromising position with one of the football team's cheerleaders.

Just listening to that broke my heart, and I can only imagine what it must have done to Emillia. Turns out the guy was just using her to get a good grade by participating in her project. He never cared about her or about helping her. All he cared about was freeloading off a trusting girl. No wonder she was so hostile against having a partner in her project. And I couldn't blame her for for the things she had said and the way she had acted. Her pain had made her shut herself off from the rest of the world. A world which mocked her and hurt her a lot even before.

Hearing Emillia say that and seeing a tear roll down her cheek made me genuinely angry. I don't even remember what I said after that point, but I got really upset. I might have sworn bloody murder against Jason Mathews, but I'm not sure. What I do know is that this seemed to touch Emillia in a very profound way. She just waited for me to sit back down, and she hugged me around the neck and put her head on my shoulder. She thanked me for saying what I had and we just stood there for a while.

I could feel my heart beating faster and my stomach turning over, but at the same time, I felt happy, cosy and calm. I think Emillia did, too. I think she felt that I really, deeply cared about her. I know that I did, I just hadn't realised it until then. Somewhere along the way, I had grown to like this obnoxious, loud and irritating girl. She had a certain charm, a certain honesty that I had never met in anyone else. But above all, I felt that, most importantly, she had feelings for me. Even though neither of us had seen it, we had felt good just being together and working together, even before we got along. Because even in her shouts and in her abuse, I could still tell she was happy to see me. Happy to have her shouting buddy around.

We exchanged a our goodbyes and went our separate ways. And yet, she stayed with me. In my mind, in my heart... I could not stop thinking about Emillia. I had met many girls in my life. Many of them I had had a crush over, at least for a while. Many more had remained my friends. But none of them had ever made me feel like this. Just thinking about her made my heart pound and gave me butterflies in my stomach. I'm not sure if I got any sleep that night.

Early next morning I showed up at 9 AM on the dot. I came in to find an uneasy Emillia sitting at her computer, waiting for me. She tried to say something, but when she opened her mouth, nothing came out. I had spent the night thinking about what I was going to say, and yet when I stood there, looking into her brown eyes, my mind just drew a blank. The funny thing is, nothing had happened, really. We just sat at a bench for a bit. But it was clear to both of us, and I know it was, about how we felt about each other. It had been a surprise, both in finding out how the other felt, as well as how we felt, ourselves.

I think we must have spent an hour in awkward silence until Dr. Emma needed my help with something. Gathering all the courage I could muster, I proceeded to... Do nothing. I just acted like nothing had happened. She played it safe and went along with it. I know I was deathly afraid of talking about it, fearing that bringing it to light would somehow make me loose my dear Emillia. I suspect she felt similarly. We were both just happy to be together, and neither of us wanted to rock the boat.

So we went on like nothing had ever happened. She went back to finishing the software for the robot and I took to overhauling the body. That kind of delegation of effort eased the tension a bit. And, really, the body needed a LOT of work. That Jason guy might as well have made the robot blindfolded, because it was terrible. It was constantly tripping the lab's breakers, short-circuiting and frying its circuit boards. It moved on wheels, but their workings were shoddy, making the robot pull to the side, skid or seize up. It had mountings for sensors on it, but no real sensors to speak of.

I got around to fixing it up, but I may as well have started from scratch, because I ended up repairing or replacing just about everything except for the sheet metal. I could tell Emma was pretty happy with what I was doing. We spoke about Jason a bit more, and she explained that she initially got together with him because he had promised to make the robot's body. She was not very good at metalwork or electronics - her forte was computer programming. So when Jason the Jerk had offered to help her, she had been overjoyed. She was trying not to show her enthusiasm for it when I took over, but I could tell she was happy to see me work on the thing.

I also suspect she just liked seeing me work. I caught her just staring at my back while I was leaning over the robot, stabbing at it with a screwdriver or welding things to it. Staring at me, might I explain, when she should have been working on the software. But I was guilty of the same, oftentimes sitting down supposedly to rest, but ending up just watching her work. She didn't notice most of the time - she was very good at focusing on her work, but I think she did notice a few times. She never said anything, though. It was a funny feeling. We liked each other, but never actually said it. And yet, our time together was becoming more and more like a game. Like a dance. We'd start verbal spars, argue furiously, up until one of us said something silly, and then we'd burst out laughing. Or she'd prod me while I was working, only to watch me drop my screwdriver inside the thing. Or I'd wait until she went to the bathroom and put funny comments within her code.

We had worked together for about three months, but it really just felt like mere days. Towards the end we were having so much fun just hanging around together that work just seemed like play. And when we weren't working we were still together, watching movies, going to conventions, strolling around the library, even going shopping together. We were literally together all the time, except during the night, of course.

And just like that, we were done with our robot. I had outfitted it with a video camera, proximity scanners and a few mechanical devices, made it run on more stable tracks, keep its course and run smoothly. It had become reliable and sturdy, resistant to damage or electric shocks and generally not prone to malfunction. Emillia had done her part, making it find and recognise obstacles, build a "mental" picture of the environment and plan a rout to the end. It utilised all sensors and had a variety of backup algorithms in case it got lost or confused or something on it broke. We had a finished project 6 months ahead of schedule.

Suddenly, we were both struck with a terrible realisation - we were done. There was nothing else left for us to do together. We would have to move on with our lives, submit the project early and probably never see each other again. The day we realised this, we were both very quiet and very depressed. We were planning to add some finishing touches to the robot, but neither of us was feeling up for it. We kind of wasted a whole day doing nothing. That was a black Friday, and one that still scares me when I think about it.

Just before we left, though, I started talking about a walker - a walking robot. I wasn't seriously suggesting we make one, but it was in the back of my head. We laughed it off, of course, and went home. That night, however, I delved into the science behind walking robots. Some research had been done on the subject, but most of it was on an academic level, requiring multi-million dollar labs, computers more powerful than anything we could afford and materials we could never get access to. I did, however, find a book and a few articles on the basis of robotics. Rather than ready-made prototypes and complete designs for me to recreate, it listed some of the basic principles of robotics, what made them work and how one would go about building one if certain key problems could be solved.

I spent the entire weekend pouring over the data, calculating equations and drawing up designs. I don't exactly remember, but I may well not have left the library at all that weekend. In the end, I came out with a lot of theoretical knowledge in robotics and a few designs already in mind. It wasn't just that I wanted to keep the project going that intrigued me. It was the prospect of what I had learned. I felt I could actually create something truly revolutionary. Something practical. That I could actually apply my knowledge for a practical purpose. It may have been a long shot, and it may have sounded crazy to me at the time, but I was now inspired.

On Monday, I met with Emma and showed her everything I had done during the weekend. All of my research, all of my notes, all of my designs. I expected her to laugh or maybe even mock me, but instead she said "it could work." She started theorising what she'd need to change, going over my notes, going through her code, cross-checking things. In the end she said that there were a few apparent difficulties, but overall we could do it.

And that was the moment I realised I was in love with her. Any other person would have laughed in my face and proclaimed it impossible, but she considered it. Not only that, she understood it and approached it from a scientific perspective. She did things my way. She understood what I was saying. She agreed with my methods. And she had inspiration and vision that matched, maybe even exceeded my own. Never before had I met anyone quite like Emillia Cornby. And I doubt I ever will.

So, with 6 months left on the clock and 9 already gone, we started on a project, the subject of which had barely seen success from brilliant scientists with financial backing, let alone a couple of college students. But we started work on it, anyway, because we knew what we were doing, and we believed we could make it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

We spent most of that Monday formulating a plan of action. We planned on what we had to do, what we could reuse, what we would need, how we would build our timetable and such. We thought we came up with a pretty decent design. We could have gone for a four-legged robot, but we were really shooting for the sky, so we went for a bipedal one. We were determined to go all the way.

It was weird, though. Just a couple of days ago we had been so depressed that we couldn't get anything done. And yet, today, we we were productive, efficient and on top of our game. Though neither of us was laughing or joking, I could tell we were both pretty happy in our own peculiar way. You see, after three months of working together, we had become so accustomed to each other that we didn't even have to speak. I knew what Emillia wanted and she knew what I was trying to say just by looking at each me. It was a weird feeling that I had not experienced before in my life. I felt like I truly belonged there. Belonged with her. I felt calm, confident, and above all - happy.

I had fallen madly in love with that girl without even realising it. Everything she did captivated me. Every word she spoke sank right into my heart. Even when I was entirely focused on my work, I could still not get her out of my head. Her charming smile, her flowing hair, her beautiful eyes. But rather than being a distraction, it was actually helping me focus. I was no longer doing this project for myself or for my grade. I was doing it for her. I wanted to make up for all the pain her jerk ex-boyfriend had done to her. I wanted to help her finish what she had started. But the truth is, I just wanted to work with her, to be with her. And when we were focused and determined, absorbed in our work is when I felt the closes to her, even though our contact then was minimal. It was because we were engaged in something together, facing difficulties and beating challenges together. It just warmed my heart to finally have someone who was like me.

And on the flip side, I could tell she wanted to be with me, as well. I just didn't realise it at the time. From speaking to her, I had learned that Jason Mathews was not the first person to hurt her like this. Others had tried to use her as a study-buddy in similar fashions. And people had generally either teased her or kept their distance from her. She had never been able to fit into the youth society of her home because her interests had never been popular. I think she was happy to find a kindred spirit, as well. She clung onto me, onto my company like a drowning man. Though she wouldn't show it, I could feel she did. And that affection, that attachment just made me love her that much more.

We worked all day and all night. We never actually left the university building until it opened up the next day. We waited for Dr. Samson to arrive, that we may present our decision to him. He arrived at 9 AM on the dot - he was a punctual man. He was quite surprised to find us waiting for him. He took us into his office, where we explained our plan for the next six months. The professor was a creature of self-control, that much he had made clear, but even he could not help but raise an eyebrow and ask us if we were serious. He tried to explain the problems of developing a realistically-walking robot, but we would have none of it. We would constantly interrupt him, pointing to our data and our timetable. In the end, we just ended up presenting our plan of action to him after he had given up trying to talk to us.

Dr. Samson took our hastily-scribbled notes and designs, looked through them and sighed. Then he looked at both of us staring at him, eyes begging and expectant. He asked us if we were positive one last time, then conceded. Thinking back on it now, I think it was our enthusiasm that really won him over more than anything else. He could see that we were really serious about this, and that we really wanted to do something big. We weren't just a couple of overambitious students who were looking for glory. We really wanted to do make this work. And having seen our previous work, I think he got a little inspired and a little romantic. He got swayed over by the prospect of a couple of students pulling off something as big as what we had set up to do.

With the professor's blessing we began work. Emillia couldn't do much with the software, as we needed a body at least barely operational for her to know what to program into it. She did some work on her code, but most of her time was spent watching me work and getting in my way. It slowed me down a bit, but her occasional interruptions were keeping my spirits up and helping me through the long nights I had to spend in the lab. It was amazing how this grown woman, this scientist, could so easily regress into a wanton child just looking to prod you in the side or sit down and ask "wha'ch'you doin'?" Personally, I found it cute no matter how much she interfered. And curiously, even though she had almost nothing to do for a full week, she kept coming to the lab. Coming to meet me. To be with me.

We got very close during that time, and quite physically as well. Emma, in her playful way, was always looking for ways to huddle up against me and watch me work. I kind of got used to that over time, and I actually missed her when she got up to do something else. Amazingly, just from watching me work and asking questions, she kind of picked up robotics pretty fast. She had studied the subject, after all. I suppose she just never had anyone really teach her before. And like a couple of kids playing with a mechano set, we worked together, helped each other and managed to get a body that worked more or less.

It was pretty basic in design - a box with two legs that kept falling over. Emma went back to her workstation and got to work on the code aand I kept fiddling with the mechanics and electronics. Turns out that sorting them out just right saves her tons of work writing spaghetti code to work around my shoddy engineering. We followed the framework we had designed together, but it quickly became evident that we had made some mistakes and assumptions. We hit the books, put our heads together and worked through them.

However, after just a few days of this, I realised something - I missed Emma's closeness. I had gotten so accustomed to having her physically close to me that it just made me feel cold and lonely working by myself again. I kept peering over my shoulder at the desk where she was working, only to occasionally catch her peering over her shoulder looking at me. Eventually we decided to rearrange the room and get our workstations closer to each other, but still out of each other's way. We ended up with our chairs being almost side by side and our things spread around the room from there so that we'd be close together the whole time. We never actually explained it like that, of course. My explanation was efficiency (which was a lie, it was horribly inefficient) and hers was comfort (which I suppose was the truth, just not the kind of comfort one would assume).

We ran into a few very significant problems as time went on. First and foremost, we had exceeded our library's selection of science on the subject and obtaining more proved problematic. Dr. Samson was reluctant to assist us, citing his earlier warning. However, a tour of the lab and a demonstration of just how far we had gotten convinced him, and he got us in touch with several universities and laboratories doing robotics research. Both me and Emma exchanged a mountain of letters with probably a couple dozen scientists, had hour-long telephone conversations with them and even travelled off-state to visit some of their lectures. Some of them didn't want to take us too seriously, but towards the end they all regarded us as colleagues in science. We had become so well-versed in our chosen field that a few scientists actually asked for our project data to help with their own projects.

The implementation part of the project was kind of at a standstill while we were doing our research. Wrapping our heads around all the data just took forever, and it required both of us. We spent many late nights studying the data and formulating theorems together. A lot of times we did so at Emillia's parents' house, as they had a big study, be oftentimes we'd go to my own dorm room and study there. We never quite noticed it, but we were spending all of our waking time together. Even when we weren't doing any specific research, we were still together, talking about our project in casual conversation or doing all of these things that neither of us could really do with other people. We were enjoying each other's company. Perhaps more so than we knew.

Curiously, that was not lost to the professor. It turns out that Professor Dr. Samson was a friend of the Cornby family, especially of James Cornby - Emillia's father. They had studied at the same university in the past. Basically, Dr. Samson was getting inside information about our relationship. He probably saw what neither of us was prepared to admit, so he made us an offer: a family accommodation right there on campus. That surprised us greatly, but his explanation was plausible - we were involved in such a complicated project that required us to spend so much time together that it was the reasonable thing to do. That was a load of crap, and we all knew it. And yet, neither of us objected. Even though we would not admit it, we kind of wanted that.

So we were given an apartment on campus just 5 minutes away from the lab. We got to live together all the time. At first it was awkward - I had never had a serious relationship with a girl before, and now I was living with one. And being room-mates, it's inevitable that we got used to seeing each other walk around in our pyjamas or underwear. We were starting to feel like a real family, but that had not yet been driven home.

About half a month after we had moved into our family accommodation, I received terrible news from home. My mother and father had been in a serious car crash. My father had died instantly and my mother would be confined to a wheelchair for at least 5 months. As the eldest son, my brother inherited my father's farm. But even when father was still around around, running the farm had been hard work and long hours. Without him, my brother was simply unable to take care of my mother. Emillia offered that I take her in and take care of her. We had enough room in the apartment and we were almost always there or close by. We spoke to Dr. Samson about it and he agreed without hesitation. It sometimes saddens me how badly I had misjudged that man at first. He turned out to be a good, kind person with a heart of gold. He just had a fist of steel that you had to go around.

It should be noted that my father's death really affected me at that point. You see, we may never have been very close, but I had great respect for him as a man. He was a strong, wilful person and the head of a very big family. He may not have been the most educated person around, but he took care of us all, went through so much hardship and until the day he died, he was still looking after my family. And, of course, I had promised him I'd make something of myself. I wanted to make him proud so badly. I wanted to make something of myself and go back home to show him. He would have liked that, I'm sure he would have. But now he was gone. Just like that, a great person disappeared off the face of the world.

It really hit me hard when I attended his funeral. Watching my father lying dead in a coffin... That's something that still hurts me to this day. Emillia accompanied me to Braxton, and I have to say I was very grateful for it. She helped me a lot in my time of grief. She always knew how to make me smile and forget about my problems. She was always there for me when I grew sad and depressed. She genuinely cared about me, and I could see it pained her heart to see me sad. I think that's part of what helped me pull myself together - I wanted to see her smile, and I knew I was bringing her down.

When we went to pick my mother up at the hospital, however, is when weird things started happening. My mother was ecstatic to see me again. She just wanted to hug me and hug me until my head popped off like that of a Barbie doll. And I missed her, too. She had always been my friend, always been the one who'd comfort me when I was a child. But this time she acted a bit strangely.

I had exchanged letters and phonecalls with my mother during my time away, and inadvertently I had spent a lot of time talking about Emillia. Apparently, I had been very flattering and expressed my feelings in a way that my mother caught on to what I was feeling before I knew it, myself. She insisted that she meet this girl I had talked about so much. And when I introduced her to Emillia, she was charmed. And I don't mean that superficially, she really was charmed.

After we moved back to San Francisco, things got even stranger. My mother spent most of her time watching TV in our apartment, as she was confined to a wheelchair. But I could see a change in her. She was no longer trying so hard to be close to me, she wasn't trying to treat me as her little boy. Instead, she kind of acted a bit more distant, always leaving the room when me and Emma were home together. To let us be alone, no doubt. And she treated Emma more and more cordially. They got along very well, and I could see my mother becoming more and more attached to her. Eventually, she treated Emma like her own daughter. It made the three of us feel like a little family. We had dinner together, spent our evenings together and generally just kept getting closer.

However, our trip to Texas had put us behind schedule by a significant margin. Dr. Samson called us in several times to express his concerns about the approaching deadline, ever more pressingly so. And he was right. We were still facing major problems and time was fast running out. In a twist of fate, our latest problems were balance-related, and they stemmed from my robot's mechanical inability to balance consistently. Emma's code had been stretched to the limit, my machine could simply not cope. And just as things seemed hopeless, Emma pointed me to an article on passive dynamics. It gave me an epiphany, of sorts. I immediately got in touch with the author of the article, and eventually with the scientists pioneering the technique. I even had to fly off-state to meet with them. Unfortunately, as someone had to stay behind and care for my mother, Emma could not accompany me.

I spoke with a lot of people on that trip. I showed them the specifics of our own project, spoke with them about the basis of the technology, the theory behind their research and so on. They took me to their research labs, showed me around, gave me extensive lectures on what they were researching and generally bombarded me with precious information. I was only there for two days, but by the time I left, I had a head full of knowledge and a deeper understanding of the principles involved. Even before I was home, I already knew what I was going to have to change on our robot and how that would affect performance. And I was about to give Emma a whole lot more work to do.

But I came home to something unusual. My mother was away from home, in retrospect probably intentionally so. Emma was just sitting on a sofa by herself, softly crying in a low voice. That scared me stiff. I immediately rushed over to her to find out what was going on. I'm not sure exactly what happened next or how it happened, but we ended up entangled in each other's arms, exchanging a deep, passionate kiss. All I remember is that it felt so good, so right. It was a feeling that I... I just wanted to keep forever. As we pulled away, Emma just hugged my chest, cuddled close by and leaned on me. We stood like that for what felt like an eternity, not speaking a word. Just sitting. I could feel her breath on my neck and her heartbeat against my side. It felt so nice and cosy. The warmth of her breath, the touch of her skin, the strength of her grip... It just felt like everything I had ever wanted.

My head was racing, thinking of how to react, what to do, what to say... And yet I didn't want to do anything. I did not want to do anything to disturb that precious, precious moment. To be honest, I could have stayed like that forever. I wanted it to last forever. Eventually, the only thing I could think to say... That I wanted to say... Was "I love you." Just saying that made my heart jump up into my throat. Emma looked at me and I saw a tear run down her cheek. I could feel her heart race and her grip tighten. "I love you" was her only reply as she pulled me down and kissed me. We didn't say anything else for the rest of the night. We just got more and more intimate, each of us surrendering more and more to desires we had fought against for so, so long... It felt like we had finally been set free after an eternity of torture. And in a way, that was not far from the truth.

In the morning, I found Emillia humming an off-key tune and making breakfast in the kitchen. I was happy to see that her spirits had lifted. It always made me happy to see her smile. When she saw me looking at her, though, she went quiet and her face turned red. The significance of the previous night's events hadn't dawned on me up until then, but when it did, I kind of lost my ability to speak complete sentence. We had done something that was so very intimate, and not just on a physical level. We had made a solemn promise to each other through our actions, and we had become so very close.

Emma spoke up first while I was still searching for my vocabulary. She explained the situation and the reason for the events that had transpired the previous night. Apparently, my mother had spoken to Emma about how I felt about her. That was something I had been too afraid to do, myself. I hadn't actually shared my feelings with anyone, but my mother had just sensed what was becoming pretty obvious. When she learned that, Emma finally realised what she felt for me, herself. In her own words, she realised why it made her feel so safe and comfortable around me, why she couldn't get enough of me when we were together and why she couldn't stop thinking about me when we were away from each other. Why it made her so happy to just watch me work.

It wasn't just comradery, it wasn't just that we were like-minded people. We were genuinely, truly, deeply in love. All of my explanations, all of my theories, all of my rationalizations as to why we felt the way we did... They just didn't cut it. I had no real answer as to why I loved Emma. I just knew in my heart that I did. And while I could certainly come up with a dozen rationalizations, none of them could do justice to the power of the feelings I had. And none of them felt really important, either. All I knew is what I felt.

I felt happy when Emillia was around. I was enchanted by her beauty. I was entranced by her voice. I was simply in love with everything she did. I wanted to spend all my time with her... To spend all my life with her. And she shared my feelings. She had tried to deny them so many times, but they always kept coming back. She kept wanting to hug me, to kiss me. She kept wanting to make me laugh, just to be with me. I was always on her mind, always in her heart... Always in her dreams.

We had managed to keep our feelings hidden for so long because we were always together. Circumstances allowed us to exercise our affection for each other without having to talk about it. Events had never forced us to express our feelings, so they grew and grew unexpressed, until we could no longer contain them. In recollecting back on our life together, we could see that these feelings had always been there. We just hadn't wanted to admit them, to each other or to ourselves. But as our project drew closer to completion, it forced our feelings to the surface. We felt that our time together was coming to an end. And that was scaring us both of us to.

Afterwards, events took on a strange turn. With our emotional baggage now gone, we were free to indulge in our once impossible fantasies. We started acted just like a couple. We'd go around dating, we'd go to the movies, exchange kisses at every opportunity... We just couldn't get enough of each other. In the lab, however, we always stayed focused. By that that was part of the allure. We both wanted to see the project through, so we pooled our efforts, worked together, focused on a single goal. We stretched our abilities to the limit and employed all of our energy into something we both loved doing. That was what had brought us together initially, and that was where our relationship really shone.

Teamwork and high spirits soon made a difference.

I had to do an almost complete rebuild of the body, adding arms to serve as counterweights, along with better motors for the joints. I had designed a system of pneumatic and hydraulic muscles to give the body both strength and dexterity. A sensors array gave it complete information of its joint positions and body incline. To accommodate that, Emma had to change so much of her code she ended up basically rewriting the thing from scratch, adding in new bits as I welded them to the robot. And yet at the end, we had a machine that walked almost like a human, could navigate a variety of obstacles, climb stairs and even react to dynamic environments. A complete success, one might say.

What followed was an event that would change my life forever.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

WOW. I wish I could do justice to this story with my comments ... but I can't, so, just ... wow. I love a good story, and this, my friend, is a good story. Who would have thought from the first post that it would turn into a love story?

But wait! The Steel Rook isn't married. You look at the first post and see a grim, determined, and alienated man, doing the work that needs to be done. I sense impending tragedy ... but in what form? A simplistic "they took my girl from me" revenge story? The depressing "times change, people change" of romantic betrayal down the road? Some way-out event explaining the drastic change that justifies the creation of Dr. Emma as an evil Robotics MM? Or am I way off base? Is Mrs. Emma Johnson simply not represented in game because she has no reason to be?

Tension is building beautifully, and I look forward to the next installment. You've certainly achieved your goal of giving Steel Rook a bit more depth than "some AR/Dev who looks like the Fallout armor guy".

This is awesome, Sam. This is the sort of background you just can't see in the current (or even the prior) iterations of comics. Novels, maybe, and that's a big maybe. Normally, this kind of character development is reserved for flashbacks, and even then you only get a small taste of what the character actually went through.

Interesting that you present us a flashback as a story, so the narrator has more time to get the totality of his message across.

Thanks for the comments, guys

This story is so far the one I'm the most proud of from all that I've written. It's hardly the best story I have in mind, but it's probably the first time I've been quite this serious about writing a consistent story. I have a problem with actually putting my thoughts into words. Partly it's coming up with the words to say, partly it's just the time involved in writing things out. Mostly, though, it's the fact that these stories just really affect me. This one in particular even scared me a bit, which I find interesting, but quite disconcerting.

I don't want to give any spoilers for the story, as I'm still dead-set on moving it forward at least a few chapters. I'm kind of writing it as I go, so I'm not really clear on the details, myself, but to the questions that were posed, I do have answers. I'm actually quite impressed with Zombra's insight into the fact that something doesn't look right. Hell, I had forgotten

I kind of left this story part-way done because it was starting to unsettle me a little bit more than a story should, and it was making me do stupid things. I actually have another chapter ready at a friend's board that I apparently forgot to ever post here. Will do that as soon as I'm done writing this, and I'll probably come up with another one in the coming days.

Again, thank you for your support. Feedback, any kind of feedback, is the greatest reward I can get for writing a story.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

We had about a week to spare before our deadline at the point where we were finished. We had already spent a few days testing every function of our robot. Sure, we came up with a few minor problems and some fine-tuning that had to be done, but by and large it worked above specifications. And, I have to admit, it looked damn cool, too. Emma had had a brainwave, and she brought me a sketch of a weird-looking robot she had made. She had done that just for fun, kind of to put her imagination of what the robot could be like on paper. I took it a bit more seriously, though, so I pulled a few late nights and a sheet metal body on the thing that made it look kind of like what she had in the sketch. Truth be told, it looked horrible, but she liked it anyway. It was just a little present I had made for her, and I could see she was really moved by it.

We presented our working robot to Dr. Samson for evaluation, but the whole thing went very weird. It was supposed to be a formal test of the machine, putting it through its paces and evaluating its performance on a formal basis. That didn't happen. The professor wasn't taking any notes, he was rushing through the different tests and basically acting very strangely. Now, he had worked with us throughout the entire project, so he knew pretty well just what the machine was capable of. But he was a man of principle, and for him to forgo protocol so uncaringly was very uncharacteristic. In fact, he almost didn't say a word at all. He just looked at us perform our presentation, did a few tests and gave us our grades on a piece of notebook paper.

It wasn't really until the next day that we understood what was going on. We were kind of bummed out after the anti-climactic evaluation, so we came to the lab a bit late the next day. There, we found the professor waiting for us, accompanied by several people in grey suits, some with thick beards, some with big glasses. We were informed that we were being formally invited to a national science convention, and that our robot had been entered into a contest of technology that was to be held at the end of the convention. Someone had obviously signed us up without telling us. Someone who had been acting weird for some time, worrying way too much and being far more critical of our work than we felt was justified. Someone named Dr. Leonard Samson.

That's why he had been acting weird. Apparently, our enthusiasm and the staggering pace of our progress had inspired the old man. He spoke to us the next day about it, explaining that he had spent most of his life teaching people who were not very interested in learning, or not all that gifted if they were interested. As a young man, Dr. Samson wanted to do something big for the world, to be a real scientist. He had won many science competitions, worked on many projects, but ultimately had never been able to realise his dream. He had tried to help other students realise their dreams, but they invariably failed or turned away from science. The professor had simply grown jaded over the years, losing hope that his work, his contribution to the university would ever amount to anything meaningful. That was why he was go stern and unforgiving - he felt that the students were already doing a lot less than they had potential for, so he would accept no excuse for doing less still.

And yet, he saw something special in us. He saw us work through difficulties, overcome challenges and keep on struggling. He felt that we would keep on struggling further still, always, until we finally succeeded. He felt that we had what it takes to finally realise his dream for years ago - to make something of ourselves, to make a contribution to mankind. Just like my father had once wanted. And just like I had once wanted to make my father proud, so I wanted to make the professor proud of me. Because he believed in me, in us, enough to stake his very reputation by signing us into one of the most prestigious contests in the country. I could not let him down.

While we were filling in the forms for our contest entry, we came upon something that we did not have an answer for: project name. We hadn't actually ever named our project, nor our robot. It was always just "the robot." Me and Emma had a few interesting discussions about it, coming up with ridiculous names like "Bob" or "The Tin Man."

Eventually, the right answer came to us in a game of chess. You see, Emma was a demon at chess. She had been a state champion several times. She had an interesting strategy where she relied heavily on her rooks. I was quite good at chess, myself, as its basic principles kind of clicked with my thinking, but I played it more by feel and logic than by any consistent strategy. And every time we played, the thing that "felt" the most threatening and the biggest pain was her damn rooks. Every time I did something wrong, a rook took advantage. Every time I failed to see trap, it was a Rook that attacked me. I had talked to her at length about her strategy, and did so on a regular basis. At one point I spoke a sentence where I think I said the word "rook" maybe 15 times.

"Why don't we call it that?" Emma just kind of got that idea out of thin air. We laughed at first, but then we got to thinking. Our robot was, in fact, a big (relatively) walking pile of metal. A slow-moving walking tower. So, it kind of fit, and it kind of stuck. In fact, it's still with me to this day.

So, we filled in our papers and handed them over to Dr. Samson. He gave us two airline tickets to New York and his best wishes. But he also said something that sent a chill down my spine. In an offhand comment, he talked about how our many months of labour were finally over. Over... My work with Emillia, my excuse for being with her, was almost over. I had has so much fun just working with her and having a relationship with her that I had never thought about what I was going to do once our project was done. It had occurred to me a few times, but I just never wanted to think about it, so I tried to ignore it. I had tried to ignore it for a long time, but now it could no longer be ignored.

That really brought me down, and Emma could feel it. She was a very sensitive person. I don't know how she did it, but she could feel when I was happy, when I was sad, when I was excited... Feel everything I did. And it just broke my heart to be sad around her. For her sake more than for mine. I spent probably a day dragging my feet around the house and being completely worthless. I could feel Emma getting more and more concerned each time she looked at me. Towards the end I could feel that I was hurting her, too, and that just made things even worse. For just a single moment, I suddenly felt like it would be best if I would just disappear from off the face of the world. I couldn't help myself, I couldn't help her... I was just making everyone's life miserable.

That kind of feeling... You can't really describe it. It just makes you lie down, squeeze your eyes and pray. It really scared me, and it really scared her. I could not stand hurting her like that, listening to the pain and concern in her voice, so I just got up and left our apartment. I ran as fast as I could so she wouldn't follow me and just collapsed on a park bench. I stood there, just trying to breathe right, and then, something happened. I can't even explain it, it just happened. I just sat up on the bench, and my eyes stopped at a jewellery shop across the street from the park. I had gone through there many times a week, and yet I had never seen that shop before. By the looks of it, it was very old, so it must have been there all along.

I got a funny feeling in my stomach, so I stood up and went to investigate. For some reason that I cannot understand, they were having a special half-price on wedding bands. I don't know how long it had been on, but I went there the next day and the promotion was off. I stepped into the store, looking confused and depressed. An old man with a thick white beard thick glasses behind the counter greeted me and asked if I was here for a wedding band. To be honest, I had no idea why I was in the shop, but the moment the old man said that, I felt a pain in my chest. Yes, yes I was there for a wedding band. Yes, that was what I wanted... Had wanted for as far back as I could clearly remember. It's what I'd always wanted, but was deathly afraid to do.

The old man just looked at me lost in though and kept on talking to me. He never waited for my answer before he started showing me the rings he had at half price. My hands were shaking and my voice had deepened significantly from the knot I had at my throat, so I couldn't say much, anyway. But then the man said something I will never forget. He said that they would be closing soon, and that it was not a good idea to let an opportunity wait until tomorrow. I think he was just trying to make a sale, but that really sank right into my heart. Then and there I made a decision - I wanted to marry Emillia more than anything else in the world, and my opportunity was almost over. It had to be now or never. I could not let our life together just fizzle away. Even if she refused and I lost her, at least I will have tried. It was the right thing to do.

I came back home to find Emillia worried out of her mind and with tears covering her face all the way down to the neck. Oh, there were not enough apologies in the world for me to make up for what I had done to her so carelessly. I had not been myself, I had not been thinking clearly... I had acted like an idiot. Any apology I tried to think of just sounded horribly hollow and weak. I tried to speak, but she never gave me the chance. As soon as she saw me walk in, she ran up to me, hugged me by the chest and cried. Much to my surprise, she was apologising profusely for what she thought she had done to me. I didn't know weather to laugh at her silliness or cry for her sadness and pain. I know I pulled her face up and gave her a deep, long kiss.

After a few moments we had both settled down to where we could speak in complete sentences. I had regained just enough mental function to remember about the ring in my pocket, and only that because Emma pressed against the case by accident. I took the ring out, kneeled as best I could and proposed to the woman I loved so dearly. I was expecting her to take the ring, but instead she jumped down, kissed me and said she loved me. We kind of broke protocol on that one, but it all came out OK in the end.

The next day I took Emma to the jewellery store I had bought the ring from, and I... I don't know how to explain it. I found a young, blond woman at the counter. She told me they had been closed the day before because she had to be out of town. When I described the man I had spoken to, she said he sounded like her father, who had been dead for 15 years. I showed her the ring I had bought, and she found that they did, in fact, sell that model of ring. However the one I had a certain insignia that she had only seen her father ever use. In fact, it looked like the ring he had given to her mother when they were married. The day before had been the 30th anniversary of their wedding.

I don't think the girl believed a word of my story. I'm not sure Emma did, either. Hell, I don't know if even I believe it. Thinking back to that day, my state of mind was so awful that I can't really trust my memory at all. But it all seems so real for it to be a confusion of any sort. But I suppose it doesn't matter in the end. Weather that old man I spoke to was real or just in my head, his words still rang in my ears, and I was determined not to let fear ever stop my live for Emma, my future wife.

Later that day we picked up my mother from the healthcare centre where she was undergoing physiotherapy. She had shown remarkable progress since she came to live with us and was already out of her wheelchair and walking around with a cane. She was still not fully-recovered, but she could move around with much greater ease.

Almost giddy with excitement like a couple of children, we announced our engagement to my mother. It brought her to tears, and she just wanted to hug and kiss both of us forever. She calmed down, eventually, however, and made a startling announcement, herself: she was moving back to Braxton. She could move around and look after herself now, and my brother had managed to find more help around the farm. She made it clear in no uncertain terms that it was time for her to go home. I, no... We had our own life now, and she did not want to get in the way of that. I think she felt that there was nothing more she could do for us. We were both sad to see her go, but we understood her reasons.

There were four days left before we had to be in New York, but were we packing? Nope. We were planning a wedding. We talked about it and we both unanimously agreed that we didn't want anything big or ceremonial. Just a small gathering of friends and family. And we had to do it on the fly, too. So we put together a small party and invited just a few people. Professor Dr. Leonard Samson was one of the first invited, as he was a man we both greatly respected. My mother came to the wedding, as well, as did my two brothers who had to fly from Braxton. Emillia's mother and father and I think her uncle attended as well. It wasn't very complicated - we more or less just signed a contract, formally exchanged out rings and, well... Ate a lot of cake. Amid a sea of congratulations and gifts, we went on until early next morning. Well, the party ended at around midnight, "we" went on until next morning.

After that, it was back to business. We had notes to put in order, files to sort out and take with us, tools and spare parts for the Rook in case anything broke or malfunctioned, pages upon pages of research material, even more pages of reference material and diaries of the project. Most importantly, we had to pack the Rook, itself, along with all the equipment we'd need to operate it.

The work went fast and easy, though. We were both in high spirits, so we just got things done very quickly. Well, we would have, if we didn't constantly take breaks to chat, huddle or to joke around. Emma had her charming smile back, and it made me happy just seeing her happy again. I caught myself just sitting there and looking at her as she went about her business. Not that bad, except we had a lot of things to do, and that delaying us. She didn't seem to mind, though. I even think she caught me a few times, but she just giggled to herself and ignored it. I actually think she enjoyed it, because I caught her just looking at me out of the corner of her eye a few times, probably checking up on me.

We managed to pack everything just barely in time, with Dr. Samson actually coming over to our apartment to inform us we were leaving in an hour. He ended up helping us pack, actually, which was a bit amusing. Here was this proud, authoritarian man down on his knees, trying to shove a big machine in a small box. But we ended up arriving at the airport just in time for our flight.

It's funny. Most couples go to a honeymoon in some exotic location, to get away from their lives and just be by themselves for a while. For our honeymoon, we went to a science convention. My brothers have not stopped reminding me about that to this day, but I don't really care. We were there together, doing something we both liked. We went there to acheive something we both wanted, to work together, to live together... Love, as they say, is not two people looking into each other's eyes, but two people looking in the same direction.

Once we arrived at the convention, we had a lot of work to do. That was little different from just about any other time in our lives, come to think about it. We had an exhibit to set up and a competition to prepare for, and that just took forever. But then, we were good at doing difficult things quickly and efficiently. Once we set our minds to it, we just worked like demons. We could almost read each other's thoughts, so we worked quickly, efficiently and most importantly - with coordination. It was almost like a dance, when you think about it. We were constantly aware of each other's location, action and intent. We always knew what to do, and what we would be doing next when the current action was done. We always knew what the other needed. It was unintentional choreography which some later remarked looked almost like a staged show.

We got our exhibit set up and the Rook prepared well in time, so we had some time to rest before the start. We weren't scheduled to do anything until almost the end of the convention, so we were able to enjoy a large part of it as visitors. We went around the different booths, spoke to many people about their entry into the convention and visited a lot of photo booths. For some reason, Emma just insisted we have our picture taken every time we saw a photo booth. We came out of it with a few souvenirs, a lot of useful information, bot scientific and otherwise, and I think one guy chased us off his booth with a baseball bat after we argued with him for a bit. We had developed this evil kind of arguing technique where Emma and I would put another person under crossfire as we lay down our arguments. I wonder if the fact that we were right justifies that...

Our exhibit opened towards the end of the convention, and only then did it occur to us that we had prepared no script for it. I jotted down what we were supposed to say down on a napkin and we rushed on stage just in time. Surprisingly, we managed pull the thing off excellently. We both knew what we were doing, how to explain things and basically what we were supposed to talk about. We ran our demonstration with perfect synchrony between us and managed to get quite a few people excited about it.

Following immediately was the competition of science. This year's choice was robotics, for which we had been signed in. I took the Rook out of its case and my jaw nearly dropped off its hinges. Someone had painted it in a very talented and impressive way, making it look almost like a robot from the future, the kind you see in comic books. That someone was giggling like a little girl behind my back as I came to terms with her action. Emma's sense of humour was like that, I suppose...

But with out spiffy paintjob, our robot just stood head and shoulders above the rest right from the start. For one, it was the only walking robot, everyone else's robots ran either on wheels or tracks. As the competition started, our robots had to navigate an assault course. Our robot had difficulties scanning the terrain, it went off to a slow start. But as soon as Emma's scanning algorithms had finished it just took off. Where the other robots were restricted to manoeuvring around obstacles or at most pushing them out of the way, our robot could run, climb and even jump. I had made sure it had ample power to move around freely. It ran circles around the opposition (literally, I think it got confused for a while), overcame all of the obstacles with amazing ease and ended up at the finish within a few minutes. The closest contender took just under half an hour.

Needless to say, the audience was very impressed, and that was comprised largely of serious scientists and very capable amateurs. But we had impressed someone else, as well. As we were putting our equipment away at the end of the convention, we were approached by an important-looking gentleman in a black suit. He introduced himself as a CEO New-York-based Future Technologies, an enterprising new corporation looking into the development of new technologies. They had been impressed with our work at the convention. So much so that he had been authorised to offer us a very, very lucrative job in their robotics division. In fact, they were offering to buy the patent for our robot then and there. I didn't know what to say, but Emma flatly refused to sell our patent.

We still took the job, though. Dr. Samson, who had been present at the deal, could not hide his enthusiasm about it. He was really happy about us, about our new job, and about our marriage. He had finally seen one of his students become a real man of science. In our success, I think he finally found closure for his own failed career as a scientist. He was proud of us, and we were grateful to him. I hope somewhere up there, my father was watching. I had finally made something of myself, just as he had asked.

1989 - My own family.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.