Alexander Joyce had taken most of the tests. He had watched footage of someone getting killed and the wires hooked into his brain said that he felt empathy. He had stopped an android that looked exactly like a child from playing in the street near his house when they had made sure no one else but him would notice. They sent one of their staffed actors to stop by his workplace while he was on duty who had all the physical features his file said he found attractive, flirt with him and said political beliefs he very much disagreed with, but he did not hide anything. So far everything had validated his mental stability and if he passed the next test, he had every right to do whatever he wanted with his mind and body.

Alex walked up to the hospital doors. He ejected the usb connector from his neck port and put the male end inside the slot on the wall. Instantly,the computer recognized him as a registered user. The speakers beeped his customized jingle while the doors slid open.

He walked into the waiting room and sat down in one of the many chairs and looked at the gigantic overhanging monitor,currently displaying a long list of patients with his name at the bottom.

Since he was going to be here awhile, Alex decided to savor his last moment of anticipation. He plugged himself into the wall and shifted though the hospitals interface to find the cafe menu. Ordered a coffee and sesame bagel with cream cheese. He made sure to take his time eating so it would be a proper farewell.

He plugged his neck out of the wall and returned to his own HUD. He scrolled the mouse in his eyes to the Avatar Icon. It was time to say farewell to another soon-to- be-gone hobby of his, perfecting Rick Travender.

He stared at the icon for a few seconds. The cursor following his pupil turned into a circle and started filling with color. After it was full his eyes closed and he was in his head. The background noise of reality slowly faded away until all he heard was a buzz.

A mirror slowly loaded itself into existence in front of him, building itself from the ground up. Alex gazed at his minds render of Rick in the mirror and scrutinized it.

And as much as he loved to fiddle with Rick, there was absolutely nothing wrong with him anymore. Everything about his appearance was a perfect reflection of everything that Alex wanted the world to see. His personality even more so: He had the drive and the ambition and the experience that Alex coveted so badly. He had an understanding of art and music and philosophy and literature and science and struggle and romance and sex. All the building blocks of the human condition you could ever think of, Rick would have something to say about it. And he never backed down, because Rick knew that the world needed him. Rick knew that he had the potential to leave a great mark on culture before he died. Rick knew what discipline really was and how important it was and how he could use it to shape himself to a sharp edge, ready to cut whatever he felt was needed in society. He was everything Alex wished he was.

There was no room for improvement, but Alex could not take it upon himself to shut off the program. This was the last time he would have to see Rick though a screen or a drawing or a story. Soon that mirror will be real. Soon Alex would be the person he always should have been. All he wanted to do now was to pay the program gratitude by staying with it in his final moments.

Mommy look, Its a robot! Screamed a high pitched voice in reality.

Alex instinctively closed the program and looked in the direction of the sound. There was a little boy, about six years old, grabbing the leg of a gofer android. His eyes twinkled with enchantment as he asked Do you wanna be crime fighting partners? The patients all laughed and his mom quickly came over to snatch him away, while the doctor kneeled down and spoke to him in a calm voice, telling him what exactly a neckport was and why he had to have one.

Alex smiled and felt nostalgia. It was odd, he thought, to see that in kids nowadays. Most of them are content enough with media, few develop fascinations with commonplace things like robots or cars or computers. He was like that too, in fact, he used to love robots.

He was born in the age where they started to explode in popularity. Every house had a robot of some kind. You never really needed them and they didnt do anything spectacular that you couldnt really do yourself, but they looked so cool and they felt like a person sometimes. They never were, of course, they always were and always will be just machines, but back then they pretended that they weren't.

Alex leaned back in his chair and rested his head on his hands. He shifted though his organic memory,back to a time when everyone played a game of house.

They were everywhere. Youd see them walking down the street with bags of groceries or trash, in malls spouting out voice-acted-then-ultra-digitized-for-effect family friendly jokes to onlookers and occasionally having what seemed like a normal conversation up until they misheard something you had said and asked you to Please restart the conversation., next to trash-deposits telling everyone proper instructions in an new englander accented version of microsoft sam and made off hand remarks about clam chowda and fishing other things so stereotypical to the point that it would be offensive if not coming from a robot.

Robots were fake. Everyone knew that, but everyone wanted them to be real. They would buy in to the cartoonish delight of seeing them try to talk. Owners would try and get them to learn some things and try to think of themselves more, but to no avail. Public service bots like the stationary garbage man would get nick named and get hugs from little kids and get pictures taken with on a daily basis but he wouldnt remember anyone too well, just their face and name. Sometimes not even that.

The interest of injecting empathy and personality into them faded. Conversation programs were seen as an unnecessary novelty and taken out to leave room for more space, since even then people would just ignore the poor bot and hed be left just trying to initiate something in every passer by. Theyd only have a limited number of greeting quotes to use, too, so theyd would also have to try and keep them interspersed between a certain amount of time because they knew that repeating the same exact sentence over and over would cause people to make faces that registered as angry. They had to talk to people but that made people angry, and they couldnt make people angry. This made processing work overtime and objectives override each other each other, as if they were confused.

The abandonment was painful for some people. Especially seven year old Alex. Even he knew in the back of his head that bots were not people, but he didnt care. Adults played along with him, earnestly too. One time, he went to a bookstore with his mom and dad he saw a robby-the-robot replica standing next to a pile of Asimov omnibuses, preaching out quotes from critical essays by important people, he ran right up to it and tugged on its hand, and asked it if he wanted to be his robotic sidekick.

Why yes! Robby said back. I know I dont look and sound very human but Ill be the Daneel to your Lije!

All the adults in the store smiled bright. The owner was stunned that it could respond that fast to such an uncommon question and walked up to Alex's parents and offered the family store credit if they let Alex stay here just so he could talk with Robby. Alex liked it a lot and there were security guards hounding the place so they felt safe, so they let him stay.

And Alex was happier than anytime in his life. For the first time, his imagination was right. He knew that there was no Santa Claus or Easter Bunny or Tooth Fairy, he could tell just by the way adults talked about them. Too good to be true and always secretive, he just played along because it was fun. But robots? Robots turned out to be people, just like his mom or dad. The adults talked to Robby too, and they enjoyed it just as much. Sure he was rough around the edges when it came to conversation and sometimes hed ask you to Please restate question in clearer voice., and that put doubt in Alex, that he really was real, but then hed say something so clever for a robot and his voice would change pitch, everyone would be reassured.

His parents came and picked him up and he said goodbye to Robby in a cute voice and Robby waved and said Until next time, brave detective. Alex was offered to come back and he did, repeatedly. For a long time the relationship between the two made everyone coo with wonder. It kept the dream alive for some people, to see that relationship. Even though Robby would say the exact same thing again and again when Alexs bountiful imagination proved too much for Robbies conversation program, hed get back on his game and all the adults would be happy again.

But no matter what the adults said and the adults did, Alex knew that Robby wasnt real. In the back of his mind he always knew what Robby was: A machine and a salesmen. Alex was being used to sell more books and get more positive reactions, it was so transparent that he could see right through it. But the adults disagreed, it seemed. Theyd smile and join in with the conversations and tell Alex that hes a smart boy and tell Robby that hes a smart robot, or sometimes theyd just gawk at them both while they stand in line. Alex and Robby even posed for a newspaper article one day,smiling with both arms around each other. So Alex thought that it must be real, despite that nagging doubt in the back of his head. The adults were proof enough.

But it stopped. Slowly and slowly, Robby started to slip more and more during his conversations. They became forced and stilted and hard to hear. Alex didnt enjoy them anymore, he hated being dropped off and having to make special sentences to set up Robby for a punchline that sounded adorable. Gradually everyone came to the realization that it was fake and all the smiles turned into frowns of disgust. Eventually Alex stopped coming since it was scaring away business, and robby was shut down.

And now the only robots left are ones that dont talk.

Alexander Joyce. A robotic voice spoke from the loudspeaker, snapping him out of his daydream.

He got up, threw the wrapper and half bagel he couldn't bring himself to finish away in the garbage can next to him and started walking excitedly into the elevator. The doors slid shut and the white outline of a body projected itself in the middle of the room. He moved his body into position, standing completely still. They began scanning as a voice read off its lines. Heat signature, check. Neuron patterns, Check. Body size, check... After 3 minutes, the white lines disappeared and the voice said Confirmed. The elevator moved down for a very long time before spinning around 360 degrees and moved sideways. Eventually it clicked into the outside of the room, opening. Alex rushed out in a blind euphoria.

The light change hurt Alexs eyes, blurring up what was in front of him. He grunted a little, frustrated that his transition into Rick would have to be even a second longer. It was taking some time for his eyes to readjust, in a worry he cried out Is anyone there!?

Calm down, said an irritated voice. the model of eyes you have are shit. They react poorly to the light we use in these rooms. He saw a humanoid white blur move towards him and put a hand on his shoulder. Come with me. The blurr tugged at his shirt violently and placed him on what felt like a bed. Just lay down and relax your muscles. Oh, and look to your left. They baked you your favorite snack.

Turning his head, the blur finally dying down, he saw a small dish of oven baked pretzels resting on a plastic adjustable table.

But Ive never had these before.

Just try one. Youll like it a lot.

He did. Damn, these are really good. Didnt know that they could be made with sourdough.

The men watching from the camera scribbled down what they thought that could mean in their respective notebooks. Already he was failing the test.

Oh, I forgot. Im your caseworker. Said the man dressed in white scrubs, going to shake Alexs hand very quickly only to speed walk to the back of the bed. Alright, lift up your neck.

Alex did as he was told.

The caseworker rubbed his hands together and pressed both thumbs at the base of the neck. Ready? One, two, three... With a mild scream the neck port was removed, revealing a chunk of muscle and wires and one large spinal port. The caseworker bent down and removed one of the panels in the floor, bringing up a wire as thick and wide as his palm. He stood up and handed Alex a piece of rubber. Bite down on this. He thrusted the wire into his neck.

With a spark and tears and scream and migraine and reality moving in and out, Alex was connected. He breathed deeply and looked at the caseworker, who was coming in blurry again. Remind the new me to pick up some better eyes.

The caseworker looked away, grabbing a tablet and a stylus and sat down on a stool. I always do He grumbled under his breath.

Well, He said, kicking the ground and propelling the stool halfway across the room, right in front of Alex. you're about to feel something in a moment. I want you to describe it to me. He flicked something on the tablet.

Immediately there was an ongoing train of voices going in and out of Alex's mind that he could not control. Random words and sentences about random ideas that if he understood he would forget a minute later. His own thoughts sounded as if they were being spoken aloud,rather than any organic or mechanical part of his mind, while the other voices buzzed in some constant background. Scared that he was having a moment of insanity and therefore would be deemed unfit to continue the transformation, he perked up a little with a fake smile and said Oh, just a small migraine.

Instantly a shock traveled down his spine and made every single one of his nerves ignite in pain. He shook in the bed for a minute straight, each of his limbs feeling as if they were flying off his body. It stopped and immense gravity made him lie still.

Tell me the truth. The caseworker said sternly.

Voices, said Alex disoriented. Im hearing voices. Lots and lots of voices. Cant keep track of them all.

Alright. Can you understand any of them?

Not really.

The men watching from the cameras debated on whether or not it meant was a score against him or for him, scribbling down thoughts while criticizing each other's theories.

The caseworker listened in and waited for them all to shut up. He pretended to do things on the tablet and held it close to his face so Alex wouldn't notice he was pressing buttons that weren't there.

So, started Alex, his body returning to normal. what does any of this have to do with my personality change?

Sorry. Cant tell you. He raised his face from his tablet and tried to smile. Just think of it like a survey. Will this affect anything on my-

Dont worry about it. Really.

The men stopped bickering and the caseworkers head was clear of voices. Now, could you do me a favor and try to describe Rick from a third person perspective. Like he was your friend or acquaintance.

Well, Id say hes sm- Before he heard himself finish the voices all popped up again, in unison, all talking and spouting out opinions about Rick. Some critical , some very positive, and some indifferent. He lost track of what his own words where and stopped speaking. But the voices continued, and the caseworker seemed to be listening.

I thought so. said the caseworker, his voice shooing out all the others.

Wait,what exactly did I tell you?

Sorry. Cant answer that, doctor patient confidentiality.

But arent you my doctor?

Oh god no! Im your Caseworker.

Ok. Fine. What are all these voices?

Cant tell you.

Alex laid there, confused. He wanted to object, but he dismissed it. Hed be Rick soon enough, and Rick wouldnt remember any of this.

The caseworker heard the men scribble down notes and a few off hand comments. Almost all of them agreed that it was a good sign. Some suggested a few things to ask Alex, but he ignored them. Already had a great one.

So, The caseworker said.what are your likes and dislikes?

Well, I- All the voices started to speak up, softly. He got in few words here and there, but all the voice spoke over and he had a list in his mind of what he liked and what he didnt like that he was about to go through, but before he could say the first word a shock traveled down his spine again. Disoriented, he told what he thought to be closest to the truth,I dont really know.

The caseworker sighed and leaned back into the chair, his hand rubbing his temple. The men unanimously agreed that is was a point of failure, but still bickered at how they could have created this outcome. Both the men and the caseworker felt shame.

Excuse me? Alex said, offended and impatient.

Alexs voice snapped the caseworker back into reality. Sorry, the men's voices continued to bicker over him, louder than his own words. Its just this tablet. Im having a lot of problems with it today.

The caseworker managed to shush them after a while.

Alright. Are you SURE that theres NOTHING you like?

Well, I enjoy customizing Rick Travender. I can sit there and fiddle with him and never get bored. But besides The voices interrupted him again. This time speaking of dear old Robby. He fought the voices and tried to articulate around it, or at least he thought he was doing it, he couldnt hear himself anymore and he couldnt exactly make out the flaps of his lips, it was just the voices talking. Soon all of his senses seemed more and more detached as the voices got louder and clearer.

Robby?

Hearing the caseworker say that name made everything worse. Reality in it of itself flickered in and out. He felt as if he was one of the voices, his senses gone and all that was left was a drift through a sea of non-stop electrical currents. He was slowly losing thought as the voices merged into his own, whatever was left of him in that gigantic tube was weakening, fast. His memories and feelings and values, all stripped away piece by piece. He needed out.

He thought of Rick. He thought of being Rick. He thought he was Rick. He began to travel further away from the voices, they couldnt touch him anymore. He was finally what they all wanted to be and he wanted to be, and really, he was pretty sure he was what everyone wanted to be deep down.

He felt control over his eyes and his legs and his hands and his mouth, and soon his old body. He was Alex again.

Anyway, the caseworker said casually, his attention buried in the tablet. How do you feel about Robby?

He felt the voices try and climb up from the tube once again, but with rick he fought them off. He heard Ricks voice, for the first time, speak. It spoke louder than his thoughts and louder than all the voices. Childhood memory. Alex said, in tandem with Rick. Makes me feel a bit nostalgic, but nothing more. His body began to feel a shock again but he found the willpower to shrug it off. His body felt the shock, but he sat there, upright and unmoving, his eyes locked on to the caseworker, Smiling condescendingly as the voices tried to get to him.

The men debated on what this meant. Could be that he was a liar or that he was simply disciplined. Some argued that it meant that he passed while others said it meant he failed. They scribbled down notes on interpretations and planned out psych reports.

Youre lying to me. Said the caseworker, yelling so he could hear himself above the bickering. It doesn't matter that you can withstand the shock, the tablet tells me you're lying. Now Ill ask you again: How do you feel about robby.

I just told you, The voices grew louder and louder, the shock traveled down his spine, he fought so much the voices had to compensate, all he could hear was the voices and all he could feel was the electricity. He felt himself being sucked back into the void again, back to where hed be picked apart and stolen, Its a trivial childhood memory. He said, with Rick infinite wisdom being his guide. Makes me a bit nostalgic. Nothing less. Nothing more.

Well, the caseworker said, sighing. the rest of you doesn't think so.

The men in the camera freaked out, yelling at the caseworker for ruining the test. Calm down, Said the case worker, yelling at where he thought the camera was. you have enough data to make your decision.

Alex sat shocked, staring at the caseworker who was yelling at a blank wall. What do you mean, the rest of me?

Those voices, the caseworker said.Are all you. The 40 different versions of yourself that youve cycled through.

Alex stared at the caseworker.

And nothings really different this time. You remember robby and you remember what a sourdough pretzel tastes like, and you hate yourself. All of you hate themselves, but some think the others an almost objective improvement, and some hate others more than themselves. The caseworker looked down and sighed.The original idea, he continued, depressed, was that, maybe theyd all agree on SOMETHING. But the only thing they ever felt connected for was Robby. And I guess you really dont want that.

Not for something Like robby.

Well then, for what?

I dont know. And frankly I dont care. When Im Rick, Ill feel better.

The caseworker sighed. He got up from the chair and walked towards Alex. Hold still for a second. He pressed a button overhanging the port. The tube crawled back into the ground on its own, with minimal pain.

As alex was fixing his normal neck port back in, he looked back up at the caseworker. I still get to be Rick, right?

Weve been over this. The caseworker said. Doctor patient confidentiality. The caseworker smiled as the elevator doors shut.

After both had left, the men continued to bicker on whether or not alex had passed the test. The caseworkers head was filled with their voices.