I'll be damned if I let some half-wit bot take up space in my workshop.
Tim's latest project was perhaps the most complex job he'd ever taken on. To hell with the giant stack of orders on his desk, he was going to build himself an assistant and it wasn't going to be a mindless drone like Brian's shop bot. Admittedly this newfound ambition had a lot to do with being incredibly competitive, but it also had a lot to do with an actual need for a second pair of hands. He kind of wished he had an extra pair of hands right now actually.
A sentient steam-powered robot. He had chosen a blue toned marbelite coating that was supposedly thinner than the standard red marbelite to accommodate the extensive system of nerves surrounding the frame. A sentient robot that could feel sensations just like a human. Tim was pretty sure that had never been done before. He had even installed a camera in the bot's eyes to simulate something close to human memory. Photographic memory in the most literal sense.
"There we go." Little blue pinpricks of light announced his success as he connected the last wire.
"What...Oh?" The bot stared down at his hands, flexing each finger individually. He looked up at Tim and cocked his head to the side. "Hello."
"Welcome to the world." He leaned back in his chair with a satisfied grin.
"Who are you?"
"My name is Tim. I made you."
"Who am I, then?"
"I've been calling you 'Jay'. You can pick a different one if you want, though."
"No, that's fine. That's a nice name, I like it."
"Good. Any questions before I put you to work here?"
"Er...put me to work?"
"I needed an extra pair of hands." He shrugged. "So I built one."
"Is that all I am?" Jay looked up at him and Tim immediately regretted his words.
Technically yes, that's what Jay was. A shop bot, built to work. But he had given him the ability to think and feel, so he was more than that, wasn't he? Tim hadn't really thought about the consequences of that until now. He sighed.
"Well, no, you're not just an assistant. You're like...I don't know, like a room-mate, I guess? I kind of made you into a person rather than just a robot so...No, you're more than that."
"But you're just going to make me help you, that's it?"
"No, no." Shit I'm not good at this. "Here, why don't we actually sit down and talk first. I'll try to explain what you are and what you can do. You'll have to bear with me, okay? Living in a garage attached to a crappy apartment doesn't really promote good social skills."