Boy or Bot?

Author : Sam Davis

I think I’m a robot. Hi. I’m Arthur. My parents, well I guess I should say the people that own me, they like to call me Artie. All my friends here at school call me Arthur though. They say I seem more grown up that way, and that makes sense to them since I was in my wreck. To be clear, it wasn’t really my wreck. I didn’t cause it or anything. Really it was just a wreck that happened to me.

That’s when it happened. At least that’s when I think it happened. I remember being a kid and all that other stuff. I even remember the car slamming into my bike. There are some bits and pieces of a few other things-ambulance, nurses, a lot of yelling and some sobbing in the background. After that though, it’s all blank.

My mother says that’s because I was in a coma. It is what the doctor said too. But I can tell I’m different. I think I died and they bought a robot body to put what they could harvest of my consciousness in. Marco says they do it all the time on the streets like some sort of reverse back alley abortion. Marco likes to seem like he knows things, because he is the only Latino we know. His dad owns the dealership on Park. We all take what Marco says with a grain of salt. Laura says it’s total bullshit.

My parents don’t love me anymore though. At least, not how they used too. Instead of taking care of me, it feels like they are taking care of a car. I don’t even mind that much except when my dad stares at me for a long time at dinner. I think he is worried I’ll snap and kill them like in the movies. But that’s not the plan.

Marco said his dad has the stuff at the Dealership to make an EMP. He was right. It took us about three weeks of after school “study groups” to build it the right way. Laura says we shouldn’t do it. What if it does kill me? I told her I thought she said it was total bullshit. Apparently so would me being dead. But I’m pretty sure I already am.

We are going to try it tonight. I guess this is my note, though I don’t think this counts as suicide. Maybe vandalism? Don’t punish Marco or anything though if it works. I know it will work. I wonder if I’ll feel myself fuse together. I wonder if I have a soul any more. Or if I got a new one when I got remade. If there is an afterlife, I wonder if I’ll get to meet myself.