The Big O and all of its settings and characters are owned by Bandai Visual, Sunrise, and Cartoon Network.
THE BIG O:
ACT 39
ROGER THE DOMINEUS
Chapter Two: Daily Affirmations
Who am I? What happened to me? How did I get here? Those are the questions everyone in Paradigm City asked themselves when they lost their Memories forty years ago. And forty years later, I'm still asking myself those same questions.
So many lives gone, and so many left that were his responsibility. Only so many could be evacuated into the city's domes. The rest would go insane from the psychic assault from the planet's new masters. And when all was said and done it was his choice to decide who would live and who would die screaming from a shattered mind assaulted by the screamingly sentient, dumbly delirious, incredibly ancient and unknowable consciousness that dominated the world. A sickened, sensitive shadow writhing in hands that were not hands whirled blindly past ghastly midnights of rotting creation. Corpses of dead worlds with sores that were cities flashed past his vision while charnel winds brushed the pallid stars and made them flicker low. Beyond the worlds were vague ghosts of monstrous things; half-seen columns of unsanctified temples that rested on nameless rocks beneath space and reached up to dizzy vacua above the spheres of light and darkness. And through this revolting graveyard of the universe the muffled, maddening beating of drums, and thin, monotonous whine of blasphemous flutes from inconceivable, unlighted chambers beyond Time; the detestable pounding and piping whereunto dance slowly, awkwardly, and absurdly the gigantic, tenebrous ultimate gods—the blind, voiceless, mindless gargoyles that had existed before creation.
Roger Smith awoke to a hideous screeching, a din that sounded like a tone deaf cat being tortured. He was jolted awake, sweating and bleary eyed. He cried out and nearly fell out of his bed. Clutching his pillow, he stumbled to the door to discover the source of that awful noise.
Roger's bedroom was on the top floor of a white tower that was formerly a bank building. Right outside his room was a recessed parlor that looked out on the rooftop patio and dominated most of the top floor. Sitting at the piano scratching at a fiddle was a short and slender teenage girl whose brick red hair was trimmed short in a pageboy haircut.
"Dorothy!" Roger Smith roared, drawing himself to his full height, his long legs spread defiantly and his muscular chest puffed out in indignation. He ran a hand through his raven black hair in exasperation. "R Dorothy Wayneright! What are you doing? Are you malfunctioning?"
"I'm teaching myself how to play the violin," the little redhead explained, lifting her violet eyes from her music and turning her deathly pale face towards him. "It's that dead girl's Memories that allow me to play the piano. If I wish to be more than a robot girl created to replace her I will need to establish an identity of my own. That means learning new skills," she added in a matter of fact tone, not raising her voice to match Roger's ire.
"Do you have to do that right now?" the exasperated young man complained. "Waking up to your piano music is bad enough, but waking up to that racket is torture! Is an android really that tone-deaf?"
"You're lucky I'm not playing the bagpipes," the winsome android countered. She rose from the piano bench in an eerily fluid movement and set down her violin and bow so she could straighten her reddish black dress that had a white ruffled collar and formal white cuffs. A set of black stockings and shiny black shoes completed her ensemble. "You've been extremely difficult to awaken again, becoming lost in your own nightmares. I was wondering if we would have to take you to Big O and hook the cables under the chair to your spinal column again."
"I've been having nightmares alright," he snorted, "nightmares of squealing tires and cats being killed in the most painful ways. Why do you want to learn the violin so badly anyway?"
"I already told you," she replied. "I want to become my own person. Based off your own reaction, discovering that you're really somebody else is the worst thing that can happen to you. I was created to be that girl who died forty years ago. I'm not going to be her. I'm going to be me. And R Dorothy Wayneright will play the violin."
Roger put both hands over his face before dragging them down slowly. "It's too early for this."
"Actually it's too late," Dorothy corrected. "You overslept. I thought I made that clear Roger. Norman made breakfast for you. I'd join you, but I need to practice."
"You sure do," Roger groaned as he trudged to the bathroom.
After breakfast, Roger was standing in front of his full length mirror. He was dressed in black slacks, black dress shoes, and a crisp white shirt. He was putting on a black tie bisected by a grey stripe.
A knock was heard at the door. "Are you decent?"
"Yes," he grunted as he rolled his eyes.
The door opened and Dorothy glided into the room. "What are you going to do with your day Roger?"
"What's it to you?"
"Since our confrontation with Schwartzwald in that underwater city you haven't been very productive."
"No kidding," he snorted.
"It's time for our daily affirmations."
"Do we have to?"
"Yes," she said without emotion. "We both need it."
"Ladies first," he sighed.
She looked at the mirror. "I R Dorothy Wayneright, am a fully sentient being recognized as a citizen by the government of Paradigm City. I am a person, not a thing. I am not merely an imperfect copy of that girl who died forty years ago; I am a woman in my own right. My Memories are my own; they do not belong to her. I have my own dreams, hopes, and desires that have nothing to do with the girl I was based on or the wishes of my creator. I am capable of love and happiness and more importantly I am deserving of love and happiness. I am the rightful owner of my own person and possess free will. I am more than the sum of my programming, my life is my own. I am me, and I have a soul. I am R Dorothy Wayneright, not the late Dorothy Wayneright. That is my choice and that's who I am. Your turn Roger."
Roger let out a sigh.
"Roger, this is for your own good," she insisted without a trace of emotion.
"I Roger Smith am a unique individual in charge of my own destiny," he recited reluctantly. "It doesn't matter whether I'm a clone or if I'm the same man who founded Paradigm City forty years ago. It doesn't matter if my Memories are factual or if they were manufactured to give me peace of mind. What matters is that I run my life and decide what to do with it. I am not responsible for the actions of someone I can't remember; I am only responsible for my own. I am not the man who lived before; I am the man who lives right now. I owe nothing to the past; I am only responsible for what I do from now on. I am Roger Smith, the negotiator. That is my choice, and that's who I am. Happy Dorothy?"
"Not really," she replied. "I don't think you entirely believe it."
"If I don't believe it, what's the point of doing this every day?"
"If you really believe it, you should act like it," the android girl insisted. "You should get something done instead of hiding from the world like you're ashamed of it."
"Don't ask for something you'll regret," Roger muttered darkly.
Later Roger entered the robot repair bay to find Dorothy examining a headless figure lying on a tilting table that was specifically built to support her during maintenance and repairs. The tilting table was more of a rack, for it was a framework of bars that allowed access from underneath as well. The figure that Dorothy was examining was nude, it was slim and slender and its skin was as deathly white as Dorothy's own. The headless neck and the opening in its chest revealed that the body before her was as mechanical as her own: To all appearances, it appeared as if she was building another R Dorothy Wayneright.
"I'm surprised to see you in here," Roger remarked. "I was under the impression you refused to have anything to do with your evil twin. You told me you didn't even want to be in the same building, let alone touch her."
"I'm not," Dorothy replied. "This is my body. Did you forget? When I was shot in the chest you removed my head and placed it on the killer android we call 'RD' and hoped I wouldn't notice. I'm trying to get my real body operational again. One of us facing an identity crisis is more than enough."
"Um, oh," he grunted sheepishly. "Where's her head?" he asked.
Without a word, Dorothy pointed to a box that was on a shelf on the left hand wall.
"Thanks." Before long, Roger was sitting on a stool before a worktable, bending over RD's damaged and disassembled head. Every so often he would look at a large schematic that had been attached to a screen that was lowered from the ceiling like a big blackboard.
Surprisingly it was Dorothy who first broke the silence. "Roger, why are you trying to rebuild her CPU? Is she going to replace me or something?"
"Ugh! What a thought," Roger shivered before turning to face her. "No Dorothy, not at all. It's just when Beck removed your memory drive he removed your I/O peripherals also. We needed his help to put them back in. I want to use RD here to recreate your head so I can practice giving you brain surgery without his help."
"If worse comes to worse you want to be able to move my programs and memories to a second Dorothy don't you?" she asked dryly. "If anything happens to me, you want to have a spare."
Roger blushed and looked away. "Does that make me a bad person?"
"No worse than my father," she conceded as she rose from her workbench with an eerily fluid movement. "If he didn't want a replacement for his daughter, I wouldn't exist."
Roger bowed his head with his back to her and was slumping forward. He straightened and took in a breath when he felt Dorothy put her slender arms around him and give him a delicate kiss on his ear. "What brought this on?" Roger asked in a surprisingly cheerful voice. Who knew that a hug and a tiny peck from the normally cold and distant Dorothy could raise his spirits so much? "I figured you'd hate the idea of a spare Dorothy."
"I've been unfair to you," the little android admitted before giving him a tiny kiss on the cheek. "I've been asking you to embrace your demons while I'm still wrestling with mine. The daily affirmations apply to both of us."
"I thought they just applied to me," he teased.
"Well they don't," Dorothy declared dryly. "They apply to both of us. And that means overcoming the things that are keeping me from leading a full life. I can't avoid the robotics lab because she's in here just like I can't be afraid to give you a hug because I might feel different than a human girl," she said as she gave him a playful squeeze for emphasis. "I have to assert myself and become a complete person or I'll never truly live."
"Good for you," he said without a hint of sarcasm. "Now if only…"
"Roger, let's go out," she decided. "Let's go out on a date. To the Nightingale. My membership was paid in advance and it's almost expired."
"The Nightingale?" Roger repeated in disbelief as he broke out of her embrace to stand up and turn to face her. "Why would you want to go there? That was the place where your father died! I can't imagine you ever wanting to go there again."
"Roger, I can't hide from my fears forever," she insisted. "I've let fear rule my actions for far too long. Even now, I can't seem to open up to you and display my feelings. Even when we're alone, I keep my behavioral protocols engaged and never let my emotions dictate my actions. That night my father took me to a club that had special meaning to the original Dorothy Wayneright. He hoped that the surroundings would allow the original girl's Memories to make my emotional reactions more natural."
"I have to admit, that evening, you seemed very… natural," Roger admitted. "But doesn't the memory of what happened to your father spoil it?"
"Roger, I'm an android, I have perfect recall," Dorothy pointed out. "The memory is spoiled no matter what. But we can make new memories and even if going back to that nightclub is pointless, at least it will mean that I have come to grips with my loss and am ready to move on." She held his hand and put her other hand on his chest while gazing up into his eyes. "You've been treating me as if I'm made of porcelain when I'm actually made of metal. Until I learn to get over myself and move on you won't even touch me. Roger I really want to get over myself and move on. There are other things I want to do with my life besides mourning my father and wallowing in my fear. I deserve it. We deserve it."
"I think I understand," Roger murmured as he smiled sadly. The last time she allowed herself to feel like a human would was the night her father was killed before he eyes. Small wonder she never let herself go. And it was such a shame. Dorothy's mechanical body was fully functional, and user friendly enough for intimacies with a human. Dorothy was exploring herself and trying to muster the courage to invite Roger to explore her too. It was the most poignant way of flirting that Roger had ever…
"Besides, at least one of us should have the courage to face their fears," Dorothy announced as she let go of him. "If you won't face yours then perhaps I should go first."
"Excuse me?" Roger raised an indignant eyebrow.
"I may a frightened girl hiding from the world, but you Roger Smith are hiding from yourself," she countered. "That is much worse. You don't even trust yourself enough to determine what to do about the criminals currently in charge of the city. Until you can accept yourself, you're paralyzed, just like I am. I want to go on a date that doesn't end in my being shot and I have to get over myself and face my demons. A night at the Nightingale should fill both orders. I'm going to find something to wear," she decided as she turned to leave the room. "You can just wear one of your awful suits."
Her remarks stung and the frown on his face revealed just how much they did. She was right of course, but he didn't want to admit it. "What's the matter with my suits?" he asked, deciding to challenge the trivial offense.
"Nothing, except they make you look like you're going to a funeral," she called over her shoulder before turning to face him, "but don't worry about it. I'd prefer that one of us remained in their comfort zone. You've been on more dates than I have, you can be the comfortable one and just phone it in. You can challenge yourself next time."
"Androids aren't very spontaneous are they?" he muttered to himself after she left the room. He growled and put his hands in his pockets before he kicked a pebble that wasn't there. She was right. He was going against his instincts and avoiding his responsibilities, all because he didn't trust himself. That wouldn't do. It was time to take decisive action.
Soon Roger was at his desk and on the telephone. "Operator, I want to speak to Enoch Browning," he said into the mouthpiece. "Yes I know he's the chairman of the Paradigm Company. Don't worry; I'm sure he'll make time for me," he assured the operator. "He will if he knows what's good for him," he muttered to himself.
On a desk filled with hourglasses a phone rings. Roger's hand picks up the receiver and a sinister voice says:
Next: Return to the Nightingale