WonderBot

Untitled Part 1

To begin, the house where I live is now in shambles.

The police have been at it for hours on end, and I still haven't received a single update. I am using my neighbor Randy's computer, thankful to him, and now is my opportunity to get this horrific tale out of my chest and into the wild. Maybe someone could gather clues about this; the Internet is really good at doing so nowadays. Randy is becoming concerned of my condition- I've really lost myself these past few days. As for why, well, it all started one perfectly ordinary day in September when I was coming home from work.

I was, of course, worn. I let my back and aching limbs uncrumple onto the sofa. Closing my eyes for a nap, my mind drifted hazily and incoherently around as it sank into the sea of dreams. I remember rather clearly the chronic feeling of lonesomeness wash over me when I recounted my day; yet another day of sitting in a cramped space made of impersonal walls; another day of coworkers glancing at me with glassy eyes and stony expressions; another day of service to picky clients; another day of mulling over paperwork and getting ordered around by the boss. All the while we had to keep up a façade of cheeriness to our customers. Oh, if only they knew what it was like here. At least I could escape from it all for just a little while when my dreams took me away.

I dreamt mostly the random and weird things that I still accepted as reality before I woke up, just because my logical mind was sedated. One part of it stood out in particular, though. I was heading to work, as usual, when I sneezed. When I looked back at the corporate building, though, it was no longer there. Or rather, I was no longer there. In its place, and all around me, was a meadow filled with flowers. After walking for a while, I saw my house in the distance. I saw the front door open and out came a golden retriever! It bounded towards me and I, in my surprise, only stood there as it tackled me and licked my face. For the first time in so long, I felt joy. I rolled around with the dog, laughing in sunlit glee as it licked my face and I felt its soft, velvety fur- yet, I had a rude awakening as I rolled off the sofa in real life. I stretched and sighed, disappointed to see the same old layout of the house, devoid of anything living.

Soon, however, my mood returned to indifference. I was in one of those countless situations where something that seemed enticing in a dream loses its attractive charm once I woke up and assessed what it was like in reality. In this case, a dog or any other medium sized pet was a whole lot to look after and sometimes they didn't behave well; I learned as such when I visited Randy's house to help him install a light fixture, and his cat scratched a good bit off of me when I tried to pet it. I wound up spending that afternoon in pain. As for the smaller pets, well... they didn't have a lot to offer. A hamster on a good day could run the wheel, and a parrot got annoying fast. Fish were utterly useless. Now that I think about it, I really am hard to please when it comes to making friends. That was why, in my desperation to end my loneliness I went touring the Internet for something that could help me find that someone. And, after several pages of scrolling, I came across a peculiar thing: a link that said "WonderBot, the Ultimate Companion!"

I had come across chatbots before, and they all had this somewhat nonsensical way of going from one topic to another. Amusing, but not a substitute for a real conversation. Out of curiosity I clicked the link to see what special gimmick this one had, and if it was worthy of companionship.

The page I was taken to looked like it came straight out of the AIM era. It was in solid blue, its text was orange (color wheeling was totally rad back then, I guess), the font was the dreaded Comic Sans, and it consisted only of a description, and a download button. The description read:

Discover the wonders of WonderBot! Talk to it and it'll give you a great time! Mood lifter, problem solver, and wonderworker all in one, WonderBot comes with absolutely NO cost whatsoever! WonderBot has been engineered by experts in the field of artificial intelligence, ensuring topmost quality. Other programs are total wimps compared to it! Get what you're missing today!