Chapter 17: Electioneering (Interlude)
“I may be paranoid, but I'm not an android.”
August 29th, 1990.
Samuel sat in his dorm room.
Waiting for his next session of lectures about how drugs were bad and stopping the addiction.
But really, he never wanted to stop.
He just wanted Link II to be safer without his influence, even if it meant his own death.
Sitting around, he looked at the room around him.
The many signs with cute cats encouraging them with words like.
“Meow you doing?”
“I'm just kitten around.”
Almost mocking him with each cat's face.
While Samuel was bored out of his mind, trying to keep his self-esteem going before his mind got to it.
Thinking of why he never wanted to stop his addiction.
“Why do I never want to stop taking the drugs?
Is it because I want to escape from someone or something?
Or can't I handle the fact I went against my own law of abusing children?”
He didn't know the line between excuses and defense mechanisms.
Suddenly, the alarm rang.
Sounding like a loud bell echoing within the hospital.
Samuel reluctantly got up, his body aching from the drug withdrawal.
His body feeling weak.
Thinking of himself as a weak sponge.
Metallic feet echoing against the glass floor as he moved.
Limping to the office, as the other recovering crackheads laughed at him.
Thinking it was foolish for an AI to get addicted to drugs and women.
Laughing and gossiping about Samuel like Hyneas.
Some even grew angry at such a pathetic machine getting more attention than them to the point where some of them jumped him.
Pinning him to the floor with a thud.
Punching like it was black friday, trying to make him feel.
But his metal skin made each punch feel like a mix of stubbing your toe and getting slapped in the face.
Sounding like flapping skin.
Eventually, security grabbed the attackers and took them off of Samuel, restraining them to the floor.
Beating them back up to get the same treatment they gave to Samuel.
While Samuel laid on the floor, curled into a ball and rocking back and forth, trying to ignore the noises in his head.
The sounds of groaning, the red flashes from the alarm.
He felt like crying and screaming like a baby, but couldn't.
His metal body didn't shed anything but fake tears.
Hours later, Samuel was escorted to his appointment by the security.
The clocks in the hallway read 5 PM.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
Arriving into the room where his appointment was held.
Samuel sat down in the recliner, the room looked like an office…
…as if it was stressed out with perfection, the smells of calming candles and stuffed animals to comfort.
Almost like to draw their attention to anything but trauma.
“Hello, Samuel.
This is one out of your many therapy sessions.
You may take as much time as you want, so you may be able to collect your thoughts and speak about your trauma.
…Now, one thing must be clear: you are not here to be happy.
No one here is meant to be happy here, its your own self reflection you sit here by.
And you know why you really are here.
So don't think you'll get a free charge just because you're the first AI with trauma.
Don't get that intertwined with your problems.”
Samuel took it with a grain of salt, taking note of the fact that he was the first out of any AI with problems that needed help rehabilitating himself.
The cold tone of the therapist woke up Samuel to pay attention and give the full truth on what caused his own demise.
Hearing what felt like electricity snap in his brain.
Over.
And over again.
Like a guitar riff was wired to his brain and forcefully electrocuting him.
The room faded.
The random dude faded into darkness.
Samuel felt like he was falling into sin.
Seeing his own past memories rain down like cats and dogs.
From a great height…
The buzzing got louder and louder.
Sounding like they plugged a guitar wire into your ear.
Echoing.
Throbbing.
Painfully still in your head.
Finally waking up from his fallen paradise.
In a chair, he sat.
Wires plugged into him like a science experiment.
The smell of singed wires burning into him filled the air.
Biting, scratching the surface of his metallic skin.
As the person that stood behind glass asked.
“So, tell me the truth.
What are you?
Nobody here can even fathom how you even exist.
You're a fucking Artificial Intelligence given a soul from the drugs you took?
Yeah right…
sounds like a cover up to kill our president.”
Turning a switch back on with the man's right hand.
Electricity buzzing in his head again.
Screaming in pain.
Not knowing the difference between reality and paradise anymore.
Only hearing what felt like something torturiously feeding his head.
Just like the drugs he took.
Feeling as if each moment he delved back into that same old fantasy.
The cute posters still stood.
The humans laughed.
Security watched with authority.
Everything was here, but only his perspectives were changing minutes by minute.
Day by day in this hellhole.
Eventually, the torture stopped.
The clock read 9 PM.
Guards dragged Samuel's unconscious body towards the room.
Disconnecting the wires and turning off the power.
His feet barely touched the floor like a toddler while being dragged.
Leading into his room.
Thrown into the room like a basketball.
A medium thump heard as he landed.
The guards snickering had almost broken the dead silence.
Their boots echoing in the night.
While Samuel groggily got back up, his mind momentarily fried from the electricity.
Limping towards the door and instinctively opening it.
His legs moved while his mind processed everything in lag.
Each step felt weak.
Thud.
Thud.
…
Leading towards a blurred doorway.
Its title reading 2085 on the top.
His hand automatically opened the door while stumbling around in the small room.
Files back to back, stacked like towers.
All of them having blurry words like cards.
Digging through it to look for one file.
His mind slowly catched up, vision coming back in moments.
Seeing his hands while digging for some file of his.
Papers and folders flying like it was snowing.
Eventually grabbing the one file that he found.
Reading “Link II: The Martyrdom.”
His eyes finally looked at its clear words.
It was about his son.
Immediately panicking, wanting to destroy it.
“No… no… no-no-no! I-I Can't let them…
Wait, what does it even have or read about?”
His hand turned open the folder to find…
A list.
Paper filled lead with notes about his son and the god who killed.
Finding many crimes of homicide, killing people of action like police officers.
Even arson for… some reason.
All of Link II's crimes and documents were on that paper.
Detailing below it.
“Plan, we arrive with more officers and swat to his home to try and negotiate an arrest.
Or we kill him for killing many officers and empowering the people of Compton.”
Just as a voice was heard.
“Wow… you really do love your adopted son, don't you?”
Samuel immediately turned towards the strange man, transforming his hand to a blade.
Aiming it towards the man's throat.
Yet the stranger continued.
“Oh? You're angry that we have documentation of your son protecting himself?
Don't worry old chap, I'll make sure he knows it's due to his father.”
Tasering him swiftly.
Whispering to Samuel after falling to the floor.
“Let me be clear, Samuel.
You put this on yourself when you desperately gave the government proof of his existence.
He killed many officers of the law, my officers that were meant to kill the black power of Compton.
So they could reign victorious in their efforts.
But your son… ohh, your fuck head of a son.
He gave them power when he walked through the streets covered in blood.
He gave my officers less faith.
So, I'll let you pay off your deeds…
With his head on my office chair.”
Knocking Samuel out with the taser on full power.
Saying one last thing as Samuel shut down.
“Good night, Samuel.
I'll see you in Alaska."
