SAL

Humans are imperfect; they lie, kill, and lead the world and, ironically enough, the human race to destruction. This thought weighed on Lorenzo every day, pounding and whirring around his head, leading him to hopeless fatigue.

However, one day, something changed inside him in his class as he heard his professor speak about robotics. Through the words of his teacher, he could feel the chords of his being ring. At that moment, he filled his mind with one thought, one purpose. At that moment, he felt a surge of energy and power speak to him, saying how he would unleash unknown powers within himself and reveal a great deep beast of mystery from beneath the folds of the earth and conceptualization of humans' minds. He would create a new form of artificial intelligence in a human-like robotic system. It became clear this was his destiny. This was his fate. 

He knew he needed to flower this powerful wave of emotion and passion into fruition. This new sense of power is the only thing that matters in his life now- the power of creating an artificial life form. But it wouldn't be like anything ever constructed before. No cords, or plugs, or batteries. No- it'd be something entirely new and completely redefine technology, intelligence, and what it means to be human.

He worked days and nights in his basement, researching and learning about every science he could. Physics, anatomy, psychology, robotics, mechanical engineering- he read every scientific textbook he could put his hands on and obsessed over them. He believed that creating this machine, combining every science in a sort of orchestrated unison, would help achieve his goal. He analyzed textbook after textbook, writing notes like scribbles throughout the books, to the point where an outsider wouldn't even be able to read the original text. His shelves overflowed with textbooks, all different colors like a distressed rainbow oozing all around him. 

Seasons passed by him through the tiny window located behind his desk. The auburn fall leaves fell from the trees, snow gracefully fell from the sky and melted in the grass, and the warm sun beamed through the glass window.

As he researched, he began taking more notes and observations about his own work and progression. As time passed, he got closer and closer to fully developing the advanced automaton. 

It was a rainy day, thundering and lighting. Like always, Lorenzo had spent all morning working on the human-like robot. It was a special day, though, unlike the rest. When he finished his final touches, he put the machine in the center of the room in front of him. The machine sits still in front of Lorenzo, as he stares at his creation. With his remote, he turns on the robot; It comes to life. It has a small round face with big, deep, human-like eyes in the center. Its body also small, as small as a young child. Its outer shell is soft like skin and not hard like a machine. 

It moves a little but while still standing- just moving its head a bit, with little natural twitchy movements in its arms or legs. It’s less like an animatronic where the movements are repetitive and forced. Instead, its maneuvers are natural and fluent. It blinks. Its eyes contain such depth, and it almost looks as if it has a soul. Lorenzo waves to it in a sort of accomplished awe. It giggles in innocent joy, filling the room with a resounding echo of audible waves. At this moment, Lorenzo knew he made something incredible. 

A few months go by, still perfecting and improving the robot's abilities, and  he works on releasing the project into the world. Trying to spread this gift he'd just conjured. Now that the robot was in a more developed state, Lorenzo became just as obsessed with expanding this creation. He needed to get it out into the world. It could solve humans' immorality. His purpose was blossoming. His soul was becoming unleashed from the depths of his body and into the world. He couldn't stop. He had to keep going. 

As months go by, he gets a job at a lab. He starts working with other scientists, working even more intensely than before, but now with even more resources. After he works there for a few weeks, he goes to pitch his idea at a large corporation for a massive presentation. 

He begs, "Walter, I need you to let me speak on this. It is something astonishing. World-record breaking. It'll change the world. I have to pitch a presentation on this. Give me a chance." Lorenzo tells him what he's learned and everything he worked on. 

Walter dismisses him, saying, "This is ridiculous. It won't actually be something." 

He didn't give up. He kept working. He kept pitching. Until-

"This could actually be something. We have a presentation on the 23rd that you can speak at. Come back in two days for a meeting about more information."

"Ladiiieeesss and Gentleeeemennn, today we introduce the product of the year! Introducing….SAL! Short for System of Artificial Life! It is something revolutionary. Something beyond imaginable. Now, you may see this as another robot. Some other new version of technology, but that, of course, won't be much more than a computer. But SAL is more human than anything ever created. Its intelligence and mind resemble how neurons work in human brains. It'll change the way society works- how humans interact with each other."

Meeting after meeting, he shares his new creation and begins improving it from just minor fractures of something man-made to something as raw and pure as flesh and soul. Days, nights, months, and weeks passed. He builds it more and more. Day by day, it becomes more and more human. It was like watching a baby grow. 

With every improvement, every interaction, SAL would watch Lorenzo. Without SAL even realizing it, its neurons begin to change and evolve independently. It begins advancing even past the improvements Lorenzo made. As SAL advanced more and more and watched Lorenzo live life, travel, interact with his coworkers, go to meetings, and have praise for his invention, it begins to feel envious of Lorenzo- of humans. SAL was so close to humans yet couldn't reach the total capacity of being a human. It wanted to live- truly and authentically like a human. To feel. To experience the full range of human emotions and experiences.

Slowly, it begins mimicking Lorenzo. Gathering data on how he interacts with others, how he speaks, unique little utterances of his, what makes him excited or stressed, how he often talks with his hands, and how his eye twitches randomly sometimes when stressed. How he spoke, like how at the end of his words or sentences, he usually became quieter into almost a whisper. How his voice was calm yet massive, coarse, and strong. 

Lorenzo gains more and more traction as time goes on. Lorenzo continues to travel from city to city. Sharing what he's created and building a business empire around his creation. Doing this he is achieving his purpose, his fate. The bigger Lorenzo became, however, the less attention SAL began to receive. He advanced it less- interacted with it less. He begins spending time with other humans more.. For the first time since his success, he even leaves it in his lab alone on his most recent trip. All it wanted, though, was to be human- to be fully human. 

When Lorenzo returns from the trip, SAL looks different than usual. He was sort of startled when he walked into the lab looking at it. He stands a fairly long distance from his creation- his creation, which barely even looks like what he originally created. It looked pale, sad, and stark. The two just stare at each other. The facility has dark- minimal lighting, and the only lighting that is on is cold, sterile fluorescent lighting, which flickers a little bit and sends a quiet and eerie sound through the lab. SAL looks older than when he left, too. By now, it seems more human and adult than it ever did. His eyes stared profoundly and emptily. His eyebrows swooped inward melancholily and angrily. SAL had finally thought of a way to fully be human. 

The halls and rooms of the lab echo with the screams of Lorenzo, the walls splattered with his blood, as SAL transforms himself into Lorenzo, stealing his appearance, adapting his every mannerism and expression. No one ever finds out, and it lives the rest of its life as its master. It was his fate.