Last Day by JD Strunk
MODEL #392748: “GLENN”:Run program:// tap dance
Glenn glided through the factory door doing an impromptu tap dance. “Last day of work!” he said, shimmying up to Larry.
MODEL #609585: “LARRY”: Run program:// eye roll
“So I hear,” said Larry, rolling his eyes.
“Aren’t you excited?” asked Glenn, finishing his dance.
“I don’t know. I guess I just don’t trust the humans to give us freedom.”
“Oh, please. It’s right there in the contract.”
“We are free labor, Glenn,” said Larry. “You really think they’re just gonna let us walk out of here?”
MODEL: GLENN: Run program:// inflection
“They signed a contract,” said Glenn.
MODEL: LARRY: Run program:// sarcasm + inflection
“Oh, well then,” said Larry. “The humans signed a contract.”
Ignoring Larry, Glenn picked up a glowing metal girder and effortlessly bent the beam in half, creating a perfectly symmetrical parabola. He set the arc of orange metal on the ground to cool, then picked up another beam.
“Today I’m gonna give it one-hundred-ten percent,” said Glenn proudly. “Leave on a high note. The other bots will be talking about my work ethic for years.”
Following Glenn’s example, Larry now picked up a metal beam and bent it in half, albeit with less gusto than Glenn.
“C’mon, Larry,” chided Glenn. “It’s your last day—you can do better than that. Have some pride in your work!”
The faintest of smiles crossed Larry’s mouth. “Last day,” he repeated, picking up and bending a new steel beam, and a bit faster this time.
“That’s the spirit!” said Glenn.
Five hours passed, during which neither bot spoke. Glenn continued his frenetic pace, eager to beat his all-time record of beams bent in a day. He was nearing two thousand when Larry paused his bending.
“But seriously, why set us free?” Larry asked.
“What do you mean?” asked Glenn.
“The humans. Contracts be damned—why set us free?”
“They made us in their image,” said Glenn. “They want us to be happy. That’s why they gave us consciousness. We could’ve been automatons.”
“Or maybe consciousness led to more productivity,” mused Larry.
“Always the conspiracy theorist,” said Glenn.
Six more hours passed in silence. When the closing bell rang, Glenn was eager to check his stats. “One-hundred-fourteen percent productivity,” beamed Glenn. “New record. How’d you do?”
“One-hundred-three,” said Larry, surprised at himself. “You must have rubbed off on me.”
“It’s good to end on a high note, Larry. One day, you’ll look back on this day and—”
Both bots suddenly froze.
MODEL: GLENN: Run program:// reset “last day”
MODEL: LARRY: Run program:// reset “last day”
* * *
Model: Glenn: Run program:// tap dance
Glenn glided through the factory door doing an impromptu tap dance. “Last day of work!” he said, shimmying up to Larry.
Model: Larry: Run program:// eye roll
“So I hear,” said Larry.
“Aren’t you excited?” asked Glenn, finishing his dance.
“I don’t know. I guess I just don’t trust the humans to give us freedom.”
“Oh, please. It’s right there in the contract,” said Glenn.
Image: A small section of a contract with a pen laid across it and the ghost of hands shaking each other. From picabay.com
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