did i tell u im also robot trash
"Mommy, mamá, I wanna make music."
At least that is what young Rhapsody Ruiz wanted to say at that moment, but her even younger brother had cut her off with an even more interesting story about his class' field trip to the museum of science. Knowing her parents would rather listen to his detailed explanation on how fast light traveled, she stayed quiet for the rest of dinner, only picking at her green beans and marinated chicken.
"Mom, I wanna be a DJ."
That is what a slightly older Rhapsody Ruiz wanted to say, but was silenced by her one of her mother's' cell phones— a call from her other mother about her water apparently breaking. As she and her younger brother were hurriedly shuffled into their car that evening, she figured her career decisions would have to come after the arrival of her baby sister.
"Mom, mamá, I wanna be a musician."
That is what a current eighteen year old Rhapsody Ruiz said to her reflection in her dresser mirror, face straight and hands clenched at her sides. She let out a puff of air after staring herself down, letting her head fall onto her dresser. Who was she kidding? There was no way she could win this on-going battle of wanting to confess her life-long dream to her parents— and getting approval from them. Both of her mothers were extremely understanding, however, when it came to the future of their children, there were no fun and games. And it did not help that she was a senior in highschool about to graduate in just eight months.
Footsteps came stomping up the staircase, and her door swung open. "D! Mom's callin' you," her younger sister, Marina, chirped. "It seemed important, too."
The elder groaned, waving her sibling off. If her mother was calling her rather than her mamà, then she knew it was serious. She sat up, assessing her reflection in the mirror: her chocolate brown hair was tied up into a sock bun, the messy bangs falling slightly into her eyes under her glasses. A beauty mark lay on near the corner of her right eye, the green irises contrasting with her overall tanned skin. All in all, she only looked like her mamá, having received more genes from her biological mother than from the donor. Not that she minded— it saved her the effort of getting a tan.
Rhapsody forced herself from her dresser, clad in her running shorts and school sweatshirt, and made her way down the staircase to see what new college her mother was going to attempt to sway her with. She's yet to decide, and while it is still a while until her graduation, she knew the decision had to be made sooner or later. Scholarships were also questionable, seeing as she excels in the arts— specifically music. Not that either of her parents would allow her to pursue.
"Mom?" The house was surprisingly quiet; even her little sister was no where to be seen with the family iPad, blasting whatever new pop artist had conjured up recently. Her younger brother was also absent from the couch, as was his gaming system. Now thoroughly confused and slightly alarmed, Rhapsody padded her way into the kitchen, flipping on the light switch—
"Surprise!" A confetti popper and the flash of a camera went off, and the teen had found herself in the middle of a surprise party. Or at least, a small surprise party, consisting only of her family members. They had big smiles on their faces, her brother being the culprit of taking her picture while her sister held the now-empty confetti popper. A chocolate cake lay on the kitchen's island with two numbered candles stuck on top, along with a "Happy Birthday Rhapsody!" frosted across the top in yellow frosting.
"My— my birthday isn't until Monday," Rhapsody finally laughed in disbelief, walking forward to hug her parents and her siblings. "What is all this?"
"Well, since we're both working that night and it's on a school night, we decided to throw a little party ahead of time," her mamá said, squeezing her tight in a hug. "It's not everyday you turn eighteen, mija."
"You've grown up so fast, it's like you were just eight years old yesterday." Her mother added, joining the hug. "We're so proud of you."
"Alright, alright, we get it, congrats on being eighteen, D," her brother, Julian, interrupted then, producing a knife from one of the drawers to cut the cake. "Let's cut this thing already!"
He handed the knife to Rhapsody, who began cutting pieces gingerly to her family's requests. Marina liked the corners, Julian preferred the middle pieces, mamá liked extra frosting on her piece, and mom wanted a small piece from the side. Rhapsody took a piece with her name scrawled across it happily.
After eating the rather delicious cake (courtesy of Marina's allowance), her parents had yet another surprise. They lead her— blindfolded!— through the house to their living room, flipping the light switch on and removing the blindfold to reveal—
"You-You got me a guitar?" She all but squeaked, frozen in place as she marvelled the absolute beauty before her: a— no, the— Fender American Deluxe. And in white! "Mom, mamá, I can't believe this! How did you guys even know I wanted a guitar?"
Both of her parents gave a pointed look towards Julian, who only shrugged his shoulders. "So I eavesdrop on your phone calls sometimes, sue me. I can hear you through the wall, anyways."
While the slight invasion of her privacy bugged her, Rhapsody's attention quickly shifted to her new guitar. Her hands touched the handle gently, and the smooth wood sent shivers up her spine as she picked up the entire instrument. She slipped the leather strap over her shoulder and let her fingers strum a few chords, letting out a happy cry over the crisp sounds. "This is so freaking nice! I love it!"
"Rhapsody, why didn't you tell us you wanted a guitar?" Her mother asked. The question caught her off guard, but it did not completely ruin her mood. "You already know piano, you could have told us you were interested in another instrument."
"Yeah, uh... I'm sorry. I guess I didn't wanna bother you guys—"
"She doesn't wanna tell you that she wants make music!" Marina interjected, much to Rhapsody's horror. This was supposed to be discussed in private, on a different day, possibly when they were both in extremely good moods. "I think she can make it. She already messes with that music stuff on her computer, anyways."
"You do?" Her mamá raised an eyebrow. "You want to do this as a career?"
Not with the way she was spitting out the words. "Mamá, it's-it's more of a hobby, I just do this for fun."
"It better stay a hobby, Rhapsody," her mother said, crossing her arms over her chest. "You won't make it on your own doing foolish things like that."
"Foolish? It's not foolish, mom, it's what I've been wanting to do since I was little. Every time I tried to tell you guys, I chickened out because of that exact reaction," she tried to keep her tone down to an inside voice, but when people diss music, her feelings get hurt. Especially if the dissing was coming from her own parents, the ones whose approval matters most to her. "It's what I'm passionate about and actually good at."
She noticed that Marina and Julian had made their way out of the room and away from the rising argument. At least they did not have to see her shed tears over this.
"You're good at other things, more practical things, Rhapsody. This music idea needs to get out of your head pero rapido," her mamá switched to her native tongue to emphasize her growing anger. "You're not going to spend your life living in this house."
She was quick to realize the depth of her mamá's words. "You don't think I can make it, do you?" Neither said anything. "My own parents don't have confidence in my music career? This is exactly why I never told you two anything in the first place, I knew you would shut me down!"
Rhapsody ignored the yells of her parents, instead turning to stomp up the stairs and shut the door to her room in frustration. The guitar suddenly felt heavy, and she set it down next to her bedside table gingerly before climbing under her covers. The day was officially ruined, her sibling's efforts were put to waste, and her parents were probably downstairs arguing about her career and where they went wrong. This is the exact outcome she envisioned when she thought about telling them; her worst nightmare come true.
For now, she could only hope to escape through sleep, and perhaps things would be better when she woke up. She could try to make a new track with her new guitar later, if her computer was not completely uninstalled when she wakes up.
A shuffling near her door woke her from her frustrated sleep. It was dark out, and her digital clock beside her read eleven pm. She blinked her weary eyes open to see who was trying to break into her room— probably one of her mothers to try to talk to her about the music thing— and sat up, the covers falling from her shoulders. After taking down her messy bun and putting her glasses on, she walked over to her door, where an envelope sat. Her name was written on the front in sparkly purple ink, which could only mean it was from her sister.
D,
Sorry for spilling your secret to mom and mamá today. I didn't get the chance to give you Julian and I's other present after your fight with them. We put together our allowances and managed to get you this! Sorry if it's a little lame, but Julian researched music mixing stuff and decided on this. Happy Birthday, sis! We think you can make it. XOXO
Marina + Julian
(P.S. You can have my desserts for the next three weeks!)
She wanted to cry and rush out to give them hugs, but of course, she was a bit more interested in what they had gotten her that had to do with "music mixing". She put the letter down on her desk next to her laptop, fishing out what her siblings had gotten her from the envelope next: a floppy disk. An actual floppy disk, that was actually made and distributed in the twenty first century. It was a bright gold on one side, and a cool silver on the other, and had a small piece of tape that read "DP Program" on the gold side. It looked new enough, but she had her doubts. It was not as if she doubted her siblings, rather, she doubted the program itself. What the hell did "DP" stand for?
Deciding to give the program a whirl, she fired up her laptop and slipped the floppy disk inside, grateful for its small size. Rhapsody waited for a disk alert to pop up on her screen, but instead an entire new window appeared, to her surprise.
"What the hell?" She murmured, moving her mouse to hover over the black window where a blinking grey line sat. Something— or someone— was about to start typing out a message, she guessed. "What is this?"
Then, words began to appear:
Hello, and good evening.
The situation was truly something one would see in a science fiction movie: a computer software talking to a human user. Rhapsody knew she needed to shut her entire computer off and possibly have it exorcised, but she didn't. Her fingers hovered over the keyboard, hesitating to type a reply. Perhaps this was a part of the program Julian and Marina had personally put in, an interactive aspect to music making or some creative thing such as that.
Warily, she typed out a response:
Hi...I don't mean to be rude or pushy, but what exactly are you?
A few seconds passed, then a response:
Oh, yes. Please excuse us, we're a bit new to this. My name is Thomas and my partner's name is Guy-Manuel.
Another message underneath that in yellow letters read:
Just Guy-Man is fine, thank you.
Now this was getting way too weird. There were two softwares in one? Was that what they meant? And what did "Thomas" mean by being "new" to this? She wanted to ask all of these questions, but after much debate, she simply settled for: Nice to meet you two, I guess. My name's Rhapsody. Then, her curiosity got the better of her. What do you mean by "new" to this?
GM: He means we are not used to interacting with humans like this.
R: Wait, aren't you two software? Isn't this whole thing a software?
After hitting send, a new window popped up on the screen, this one looking more or less like the standard mixing software she had seen before. Another response was being typed out as she looked over the new window.
T: Correct. We are the software you downloaded in the disk, as you can see to the right. You are interested in making music, no?
R: Well, yeah, but I didn't think this would come with an interactive thing.
GM: We are not simply "interactive", we are entities within the software. Stated in better terms, we are the owners of the software, and we just come with it.
R: What, like robots or something?
T: Correct!
The enthusiastic reply almost put her off, but instead, Rhapsody was more intrigued. No way they were telling the truth, right? This was one intricate add-on to the software, she had to admit. How much time did Julian spend coding this?
R: Very funny, Julian. This is actually pretty hella— how much time did this take you? And where did you even find a floppy disk?
GM: She doesn't believe us, as predicted.
T: Obviously. Time for plan B.
The chat window disappeared, leaving only the software window up on her home screen. While she was starting to enjoy this present more and more, she idly wondered if she had upset her new "guests". If you could even call them that, seeing as they were supposed robots.
What happened next is still fuzzy to her, but she does remember sitting at her desk, about to create a new music file when there was a flickering on her screen accompanied by beeping (she was also sure her laptop began to sizzle). Afterwards, there was a loud popping noise, and the next thing she knew, she was on the floor and blind without her glasses. Her head ached from the fall (or rather, sudden explosion), but other than that, there seemed to be no internal damage— besides her missing glasses.
She groaned, reaching up to rub at the side of her head where she landed while sitting up. From what she could see, her laptop and desk were still where they sat before, and there were not black burnt marks on her walls, so her laptop explosion did not seem to destroy anything important. However, despite her blurry vision, she could make out two things that definitely were not there before: two black blobs, but they were not exactly in blob form. They were rubbing their (silver and gold?) heads and also sitting up, but no words came from them except angry (this was the only word that summed up their apparent emotion) beeping and chirps.
Her hand reached desperately for her glasses, and when she finally found them, Rhapsody's trembling hands brought them to her eyes. Just as she predicted, there were two men— no, robots— sitting on her bedroom floor, communicating to each other through beeps and chirps and everything else a robot could possibly do to communicate. The silver and gold she had seen before turned out to be their heads, whereas the rest of them donned simple black clothes that covered every inch of themselves up, except their hands.
Before the teen could actually begin asking where in the hell they came from, the silver one started speaking. "Dieu, I did not think it would be that much of an effort. Is this what pain actually feels like?" The french accent was a surprise.
"Who cares?" The gold one snapped, gently rubbing the back of his helmet/head. "Merde, I think a wire is loose, my accent is getting worse by the minute."
"Your accent has always been that way, Guy, you are just overreacting. Where is— ah, there she is," the silver one stood up, albeit a bit clumsily, and extended a hand to a stunned Rhapsody. "Are you hurt? We apologize for the dramatic entrance."
A part of her pushed her hand up to take his offered one, grateful to be on her own two feet again. However, there was still an obvious issue before her: how the absolute fuck were two robots standing in her room, and just what the hell was she supposed to tell her parents? Did they even hear anything that just happened, the mini-explosion that her laptop just went through? Or the somehow deep, suave voices that were definitely not hers coming from their eighteen-year old daughter's room? Julian must have heard, seeing as he eavesdrops on her conversations apparently.
No one came rushing into her room, there was no incessant knocking or her mamá threatening to break down the door. The house was as silent as a graveyard— which it should be, considering it was now one in the morning.
"I think she must have hit her head," he turned to the golden one, Guy-Man, who was now standing and still rubbing the back of his helmet gently, "she's not responding."
"No, no, I'm fine, I'm just...I need some air," she managed to squeak out, sitting on the edge of her bed and trying not to have a panic attack. "Just a quick question, um, where did-did you two come from, exactly?"
"Do you not remember? We introduced ourselves earlier through the computer." Guy answered. "I think you are right about her hitting her head, Thomas."
"Wait, you two are...you two are Guy-Man and Thomas? From the software?"
Thomas nodded, the screen on his helmet flashing a red, pixelated check mark. "Yes, we decided to show ourselves due to your doubting us. We have not been outside of a computer in quite a while, so I will admit it is refreshing."
"So...actual robots..." Rhapsody felt her head getting lighter— whether it was from exhaustion or pure shock over the situation.
Either way, the last thing she remembered hearing was both robots cursing, "Oh, merde."