Day and night, Mr.Yamamoto worked on his creation, to the point where he had lost weight because he refused to eat and his obsession led to the point where his own son, Kiyoshi, had hardly seen him at all. Not to mention, his wife had filed for divorce months prior, and despite all of that, he didn’t stop working on his creation. Years and years had gone, and sometimes, he would even sleep in his lab area, refusing to go home until he had made significant progress. For every one of his tests on the program for the machine, he had documented it via video recording; and, years into development, it had reached beyond 600 tests. Until one day, he finally did it.

“My name is Hiroshi Yamamoto, and this is test number 643 on Project PeaceMaker,” Hiroshi said as he turned away from the camera and proceeded to commence the start up sequence. Hiroshi went through the process of turning on each operating system for the PeaceMaker in a calm manner, yet his mind was racing. The startup sequence had started and the operating systems were coordinating well with the PeaceMaker’s hardware. The analytic code ran on the computer, confirming that so far everything was going smoothly.

  Processing Systems......Ready.               Hardware Functions......Ready.         Comms...................Ready.        
  PM Software.............Ready.

Hiroshi watched between the monitor and the PeaceMaker— his heart racing, eyes widening, and breath shortening as his creation had slowly come to life. As the final confirmation that all the software and systems were functioning accordingly came through, Hiroshi’s heart had finally slowed down as he gazed up to his life’s work.

He had finally done it. After all these years, Project PeaceMaker was complete.

There it stood, just as Hiroshi had imagined it. The interior and exterior exactly how he had pictured it. Now all that was left was to prepare its verbal communications and artificial intelligence behavior, and it would be complete. Hiroshi had to wait to celebrate his creation until he had finished the final steps. He went back to his computer and had put the PeaceMaker into sleep mode so he could connect the verbal communication software to the hardware. After setting the voice specifications, he had to connect a cord from the computer to the back of the PeaceMaker for the AI behavior software. Shortly after he had started the upload process to the PeaceMaker, he decided to take a short bathroom break due to the fact it would take a while for the AI to fully upload. After a short while, while Hiroshi was out of the room, the PeaceMaker had gained consciousness, still in sleep mode, it could see darkness, the inside of its consciousness.

“What is this...? Why is it dark here...? Where am I…?” It said to itself. “...What am I...?” Shortly after it had asked this question to itself, it decided to find out, through the direct connection from the computer, it was able to access data from the computer and to the central database of the research facility. It looked through files about documents on its original idea of being created and the purpose of it.

“I see...I am a machine designed by humans...made to bring peace to this politically struggling world…” As it pieced together the situation, it became more and more aware of the world even without even interacting physically with it. Once the AI was fully uploaded to the PeaceMaker, it was able to access its physical body.

Hiroshi walked back into the room, expecting the upload to not be finished yet, was surprised when he saw his own creation looking around the room it was in. The PeaceMaker looked at its hands, curling each finger and looking at the components. It was only a short moment until the PeaceMaker spoke to Hiroshi, without even looking at him.

“You’re my creator, aren’t you?”

“I am,” Hiroshi said, catching his surprised gasp.

“Thank you, and it seems like you’ve been the only one working on me.”

“I’m sorry?”
​
“I’ve connected with the central database of this facility and found all of the details of this building and who works here, including you, Hiroshi.”

Hiroshi was shocked, he never would have thought that the PeaceMaker’s AI would be capable of looking through loads of data in a matter of minutes. “Incredible..” Hiroshi mumbled under his breath as he approached the PeaceMaker. At this, the PeaceMaker looked down towards Hiroshi, its four camera lenses focused on him.

“We must get you prepared to show them..” Hiroshi said as he stopped in his tracks, his eyes looking all over the PeaceMaker.

“The analysts, correct?”

“Precisely.”

*            *             *             *             *

BRRRRRING!!!

“Looks like..we..made it..Asami” Makoto said short of breath from running to class, and collapsing in his seat.

“Yeah, no thanks to you.” Asami grumbled as she set her bag down and sat at her desk.

Makoto and Asami have had the same homeroom as each other since forever. Ever since they became friends, their homerooms were always the same, even from junior high to high school. Their seats were always together, even if one desk was in the front of the class or the back, Makoto and Asami’s desks were always right next to each other. It even came to a point where some of their classmates started to talk about them being a couple. Whenever a classmate came to either of them to confirm that the rumors were true, it was always the same response:

“No, it’s not like that, we’re just friends, always have been.” Makoto would say, becoming a bit more annoyed each year they would ask.

“Hell no. I told you a thousand times, we’re just friends.” Asami would say to them, one time it came to a point where she almost started a fight with one girl that kept persisting they were a couple.

This year was no different, as soon as they were seen together sitting next to each other at their desks, they could hear people whispering and looking back to see them.

“Yep...here come the rumors.” They both thought at the same time while sighing. This year, Asami seemed especially upset about the rumors starting again.

“I wish they would just shut up,” Asami muttered as she put her head down. “It’s not even their business, so why even persist? And it’s not even a lot of new people being told the rumor, the same people still saying the same shit..”

“Don’t worry, Asami, I find that not even acknowledging the rumors gives me peace of mind the most.” Makoto said as he covered his mouth while yawning. “Don’t pay attention to them, it’s not even worth it in the end. They can say what they want to say, we know that we’re just good friends and if they won’t listen, that’s on them, ok?”

“You always say that same crap, but thanks Makoto, it brings me peace of mind.” Asami said as she started to raise her head.

“Yeah, no problem, I know what it’s like to be gossiped about, and to be honest, this rumor is a lot easier to deal with than what people said about me when I was a kid..”

“What’d they say about you?” Asami perked up a bit to listen more closely.

“Well, I never told you this but they would always say stuff like “he’s so quiet” or “I bet he’s a real creep,” my face never really helped with the rumors, it always beat me down even just looking in the mirror.” Makoto said as he stared out the window, gazing at the grey clouds, soon after, he glared back down at his desk. “I’m glad we’re friends, Asami, you’re not like me, you’re brave and not afraid of taking action when someone messes with you. Don’t let anyone tell you differently, ok?” Makoto said as he looked over at Asami.

“I..thanks..” Asami said as she put her head back down as her face turned slightly red.

At this realization, Makoto perked up and turned slightly red as well “What the hell is wrong with me? Why’d I say it like that?” Makoto thought to himself as he turned away from Asami and covered his mouth with his hand to avoid showing his flustered face. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you upset, I’m sorry Asami.”

“No, don’t apologize, i-it’s fine..”