Asian American High School Science Fiction

Auto-Mate

A splash of water. Gel from a tube. More water. Foam, foam, foam… until there’s no foam. Liquid slightly more viscous than water, patted in. Liquid thicker than the liquid before it, touching down in three heavy drops - one on each cheek and one on the forehead. A bit slimy. Rubbed in. Last, a cream with the thickness of, well, cream. “Massaged.” That’s not massaged. Gentle. Circular motions. Better.

Karina regards herself in the mirror. Her skin is wet and shiny. So shiny it’s uncomfortable to look at, kind of like a car after a carwash. The pimple on her nose pulses red. She must have irritated it while rubbing all those chemicals on her face. If she has counted correctly, today is her 242nd consecutive day of doing skincare. And her skin looks… moderately better. She sighs and returns to her room, ready for sleep.

She was so excited when she bought her first tub of cleanser and moisturizer. Her mom was going to Target for an optical appointment, and because her mom hated doing anything alone, she bribed her high school daughter into coming along on the promise that she could use thirty dollars to buy anything she wanted. The Target store always seemed to have exactly what Karina didn’t know she wanted. Right when she entered the store, the skincare products stared at her from the front aisle. They waved her over, promising a new look, a complete facelift. She imagined herself acne-free, with skin that was shiny and soft. So she began participating in the ritual, bought in to the effort to make herself better.

But the next day is not her 243rd consecutive day of doing skincare. Staring at herself in the mirror, the pimple on her nose throbs like taillights. She can feel another one about to surface, this time in the worst spot: right under her nose. Overcome by a rush of frustration, Karina refuses to wash her face and heads straight to bed after the shower.

Days go by, and Karina has completely forgotten about her nightly routine. Between school, her part-time job, and all of the other commitments that her mother makes her attend, she has little energy for such a tedious activity. She barely notices a difference anyway. No matter what she does, she can’t seem to get rid of the pimples or the eye bags.

One day, Karina arrives home early from school. (That is to say, she gets back at the normal time because both tennis practice and jazz band practice afterward have been canceled.) She sees a package outside the front door and assumes it must be for her mother. Her mother is constantly buying things that she claims will improve her life while in reality end up either breaking down or being left to dust in the back of the cabinet.

When she picks up the cardboard box, Karina is surprised to instead find her own name written on the label. She doesn’t remember ordering anything, but the rush of excitement that comes from getting her own package kicks in nonetheless.

She shakes the box. There’s movement in there. The object is light but compact. She inspects the sides for any additional information. No Amazon label, no return address, no clues at all as to how this package even got here. Just her name on a printed label, and one word in big bold letters across the front: Auto-Mate.

She contemplates reporting this to the police. The thought crosses her mind that there could be something dangerous inside, like a bomb triggered only when she opens the box. But the package looks so innocuous. Besides, it’s only human nature to open packages of this type and worry about the consequences afterwards.

So, allowing her curiosity to win over, she rips open the tab on the side. She reaches into the box, and her fingers come into contact with a metallic object. In that moment, she registers that it feels like a figurine, the ones her brother is always collecting of his favorite anime characters. There are the arms, the legs, the big bobblehead that doesn’t actually bobble.

She pulls it out and finds herself face to face with a robot.

“Howdy,” it says, holding up a hand in greeting.

“Ah!” she yelps, dropping it on its face.

A red light suddenly comes on from the robot’s head. Whirring noises sputter from the ground as the robot’s head slowly spins so that its face is facing her again.

“Ow…” the robot groans. “Was that really necessary?”

This is not real, this is not real. Karina has half a mind to stuff the robot back in the cardboard box and throw it back outside.

“I can’t feel anything, but my programming tells me that getting dropped like that is supposed to hurt,” the robot says. Its voice doesn’t match its body. For one, it’s female, even though the robot has a masculine build, as far as robots can have gender aligned builds. And for a face that is nothing more than two dots for the eyes and a line for the mouth with cold metallic skin, it’s very animated. “My programming tells me that now I must “kiss up” to my new owner, since her initial reaction was overwhelmingly negative.”

“Maybe you can just shut your programming off?” Karina suggests. “Probably easier that way…”

The owner wants me dead!” the robot shouts, startling Karina yet again. “I must convince her that I have a right to exist!”

What are you saying?!” Karina shrieks in exasperation. It is hard to tell who is overreacting more. “I’m throwing you away!”

The robot lifts itself off from the ground. “My name is Camila,” it says. “Pleased to meet you.”

“Um… what?”

“Since I have a name, you are reluctant to throw me out. It must be true!”

“Says who?”

“My programming! Camila the Auto-mate. Get it? Because we’re automatically mates!”

Karina sighs. She wonders how a robot can have so much energy. “Why are you here? I never ordered one of you, yet my name was on the box.”

Camila the robot scrambles over to the box and reads the name. “Ka-ri-na,” it pronounces. “Pleased to meet you, Karina.”

Karina bends over and picks the robot up. She knocks on its metallic scalp, and all that returns is a dull thud. She tries twisting its head off, but the design is surprisingly sturdy.

The robot grasps at its head in a frenzy. “Ah!! This is robot abuse! This is not the purpose of our existence! Fulfill your sadistic urges with your stuffed animals or something!”

“My friends did this, didn’t they?” Karina tightens her grip around the robot.

“Ow! Ow! My programming tells me I’m not able to respond if I’m being suffocated!” the robot’s tiny hands grasp at Karina’s fingers.

“Or… could you possibly be a spy? Did some guy make you so he could spy on me?”

“Can’t… breathe…”

Karina shakes her head. “Can’t believe I almost fell for something so stupid. Robots don’t exist…”

“But they do!” Camila protests. “Robots exist and we have a purpose!”

Karina rolls her eyes. “And what might that be?”

“I’ve already told you,” Camila wheezes, making dramatic gasping sounds. “I am here to be your Auto-mate! To fulfill the robotic elements of the human day! To optimize your biorhythm so that you can achieve your full potential! It is a glorious purpose, and I will not stop until I make sure I have seen it through!”

Karina paused. “The robotic elements of the human day?”

“Yes!” The robot leans its head forward to observe Karina. “Like skincare, for example.”

Karina’s heart stops.

“How… why did you say that?” She doesn’t why she’s still talking to the robot. Forget throwing it away, she should run it over with her car then kick its remains down the sewer.

But the robot is persistent. “Isn’t skincare such a pain? It’s one of the most tedious routines, for such a marginal reward. I’ll strike you a deal, how about it? I’ll be your skincare assistant! You won’t even have to think a single thought while I strengthen your skin and make it look as perfect as a movie star’s. I’ll do everything! You can even sleep through it if you really like! Just let me exist and have a purpose!”

Karina frowns. It does seem like a pretty good deal. Maybe it’s because she reads too much science fiction or because her friends always inundate her with the latest conspiracy theories, but she wants to believe this is true. “You’re not gonna spy on me, are you?”

“I will only record the improvements to the quality of your skin.”

“Bit creepy but… practical, I suppose.”

“That’s me! Practical Camila! Practical Camila the Auto-mate!”

So that very night, Karina stands at the sink and lets the robot go to work. Right before the robot begins, she realizes that there is simply no way a tiny robot can be capable of even washing her face. Its hands can hold maybe a teardrop’s worth of water.

But the robot climbs onto the faucet and pushes the lever upwards with both hands, letting the water run.

“How are you gonna–”

But Karina doesn’t finish her sentence. Camila’s right hand suddenly gets sucked into her body (so that she now looks like Karina’s Luke Skywalker Lego figure), and a large contraption emerges from where its hand was, as if its arm was one of those multi-purpose tools with detachable heads. She does the same to her left hand, and this time a nozzle emerges in its place.

“No way…” Karina mutters.

The robot looks at her with those two dot eyes.

“May I?”

“Uh…”

Before Karina can even ask what Camila means, it connects its left arm to the faucet and points its right arm toward Karina’s face. And before Karina can protest, she is beamed by a stream of water.

The robot completes the rest of the procedure with remarkable efficiency, and it somehow has a hand designed for every need.

For the cleanser, it simply elongates its fingers. For the toner, it produces circular discs with cotton padding that evenly applies the the toner with equal force. For the moisturizer, it uses a vibrating device that gently massages the cream in. On top of all this, the robot is amazingly clean and precise. It doesn’t squeeze a milligram too much or let anything spill.

At the end of the routine, Camila stands back and marvels at its work.

“There we are! Looking great, Karina!”

“Impressive,” is all she can say. And even though she doesn’t see any noticeable difference immediately, she can’t complain, either. “Thanks… Camila.”

The robot’s line-mouth twisted into a smile.

The next day, Karina tries watching her favorite TV show while Camila washes her face. The robot adjusts to her however she moves her head, so she doesn’t feel burdened at all. Slowly, she begins to accept that Camila is just here as her personal dermatology assistant.

When Camila suggests getting better skincare, Karina agrees and purchases it with next-day shipping from Amazon. Karina cannot deny that her skin condition has dramatically improved, and it comes at practically no extra cost. On days when she is exhausted or feeling down, she even lets Camila work when she is sleeping. Usually, after the procedure, Camila will tell Karina her report on the skin, giving her the option, of course, to skip. When she is sleeping, Camila records a video so that Karina can play it back if she wants.

“Today we’re gonna try the newest serum we got from Torriden!” Camila says, doing little robot jumps.

“Cool, cool,” Karina says.

“Skin index is looking a whole lot better! Look at the skin!” Camila points like astronomers point at a full moon. “I can almost see myself in it! You’re almost as shiny as me!”

“Too enthusiastic, Camila,” Karina says, to which the robot then nods, acts a bit flustered (“according to its programming”), and proceeds with its performance.

While the robot applies Vitamin C to improve brightness, Karina suddenly has an idea. She pauses her TV show. “Hey Camila.”

“Yeah?”

“You know… I’ve been meaning to get into piano recently. It’s fun to play on its own, but I didn’t realize how much repetition goes into it.”

“Oh, I thought you’d never ask! Of course I can help you! Just press the button on my foot.”

“Huh?”

“There’s a button on my foot!”

Karina lifts Camila up.

“The red or the blue?

“Red!”

“What’s the blue one do?”

“It’s a different feature. My programming won’t even tell me what exactly it does, though!”

Karina shrugs and presses the red button, and the robot suddenly becomes a transformer. It first retracts all appendages so that it is no more than a box, then it attaches itself to her fingers, forming a metallic glove of sorts.

“Amazing,” Karina gasps.

And sure enough, over the next few practice sessions, Karina finds that she doesn’t need to put any effort into practicing. The robot builds the muscle memory for her.

One year later, Karina keeps Camila at her side at all times. She sits in the living room, watching a television show. She doesn’t think it’s very good, though. She finds it quite unrelatable. So she lets Camila yap on the side while vacuuming.

“Bach is sooo dramatic, isn’t he?” Camila says. “My programming tells me that the human mind registers all of his songs in a melancholy way. We need to somehow bring out more of that, I think. Or maybe there’s a way to twist it so that the happiness is more there?”

“Try both,” Karina says.

“Of course! That’s the only way to learn! Oh, and by the way, I dug through my programming and found this better toothpaste we should use in the morning.”

“It’s really not a big deal.”

“But your doctor said you got cavities! How is that even possible? I’m so thorough… it’s insulting!”

“Probably cause of all the candy I eat.”

“I see,” Camila responds. “Oh, what’s this, Karina?”

Karina glances to the side. Camila emerges from underneath the couch dragging a stuffed animal with both hands.

“Oh, that’s Richard the Dog,” Karina says. “I didn’t realize I lost him. He’s probably from ten years back.”

“Then victory has been claimed!” Camila shouts. She starts dancing atop the carpet, nodding her head and bouncing her knees. “We have recovered what was lost and unlocked important memories in spite of the relatively banal nature of this task! Wahoo!”

“Nice job,” Karina says, her eyes glued to the television screen.

Despite her glowing skin, Karina’s friends at school keep telling her that she doesn’t seem very lively ever. Despite her prowess in piano, she stops listening to music in her free time. She just didn’t see the need. Despite her unlimited free time thanks to Camila doing all of her chores for her, Karina always feels bored. She’s tired. Every movement is exhausting.

“Hey… Camila,” Karina says, still lying on the couch, still staring at the screen.

“Yes, Karina?”

“You want to live a day for me?”

Posted Oct 11, 2025
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12 likes 7 comments

Maisie Sutton
15:55 Oct 12, 2025

Very interesting story that shows that convenience might be a trade-off for a soulless existence. Although I sure could use a skincare robot. Well done!

Reply

Chris Tai
15:05 Oct 13, 2025

Thank you Maisie!

Reply

Elizabeth Hoban
18:54 Oct 11, 2025

This is such a cute story - and I can relate to those tedious skincare routines for certain. Camila is super cute - I love the interactions, but I hope Karina doesn't give up on having a decent life - I like them both together! Sappy, but true. I enjoyed this story very much.

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Chris Tai
15:05 Oct 13, 2025

Thanks Elizabeth!

Reply

S N
17:38 Oct 11, 2025

And this is where we are headed... Excuse my inner cynic. Very fun story and sad. This little robot is more intrigued by life than our protagonist and by the end, I am kind rooting for Camila to take her place which is seriously messed up. Karina and Camila's initial meeting was hilarious! Robot abuse, lol.

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Chris Tai
15:06 Oct 13, 2025

This means a lot! Thank you!

Reply

Shirley Medhurst
20:14 Oct 13, 2025

Scary stuff, if you ask me….

Reply

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