What Am I?
Have you ever felt like you just didn't fit in the body you were born or created with? I do.
I know that I am a robot… but I don't feel like one. When I'm out in the world, I see the humans playing and working alongside each other… and I see myself in them. I've told the Professor about this, and his response is always the same: I must remember that I am, in the end, a robot.
But that answer has never been good enough for me. While my body is that of a robot, I can feel it: I have the soul of a human.
…So what does that make me?
Robots are machines that follow orders from humans. We work to do tasks that humans could not possibly do on their own. We may have gained the ability to express emotions, but in the end, we are still bound to our creators… except me. I don't feel bound to Professor White, but I stay with him because I feel that he is a father to me. It wasn't part of my programming: I made that choice on my own. Doesn't that make me a human?
The more I think about it, the more I realize how odd I am in the way the world works. I'm an anomaly, an outlier, or as humans would call it, a freak. A human soul isn't supposed to lie within my metal body: Only wires and circuit boards. Why? Why would the Professor give me traits that don't match what I'm supposed to be?
And what will my future be then?
When a robot outlives its service time, it is meant to be deactivated and turned to scrap metal. I dread the day this happens when I should expect it. I want to run away when I should take my eventual end with dignity. I want to live even after laws state I should die. …I feel like a prisoner: A human prisoner locked in a human-shaped metal cage. And there's no way out.
And even now, despite what I'm thinking, I'm aware that my complaints are pointless. I am bound by the ways of robots, and that means doing what I am needed for. But I also feel that it's something I need to do willingly. I am both will and duty… human and robot. I am the only one of my kind… but I don't even know what my "kind" is.
It's easy to know WHO you are. I am Beck, creation of Professor White. But knowing what you are or what you're supposed to be can be much harder.
Someone… tell me. What am I…?