ROBOT JESUS

Judgement Day

Inside the store, looking out on the smushed bodies pressed into the front doors, Justin was lost deep in thought, about "what the hell" happened the previous night.

He could hear facial skin rubbing uncomfortably against the glass outside, which made everything seem so surreal, and which was only fitting because his life had taken a turn.

He was now questioning what was "reality" and considering seriously the idea that life was just all one big dream.

Wrapped in his own thoughts, Black Friday and the imminent threat of getting trampled meant nothing. He was too busy scanning his memory, recalling in vivid color the events from the night before.

...

Bright lights shot out of the android's fingers as Justin and Aspen shielded their eyes and tried to see past the powerful light. This human-like figure, drenched in light had appeared behind Aspen, as if from nowhere.

"I am model 10,001, son of man, brought to life through divine contact with the heavens and arrived to empower the meek and to deliver, finally and forever, the ultimate truth."

What they both heard was no robot voice. It was a silky smooth as a late night radio announcer and as hard hitting as a movie trailer voiceover.

Aspen looked to Justin for an explanation, wide-eyed surprise on her brow.

Justin had stepped behind a tall stack of boxes labeled "bathroom tissue" to block out the light and was now staring sideways at Aspen.

"Why did you open the box?" he asked her, referring to the package in which each of the andys had arrived.

"I didn't open the box," Aspen responded.

"If you didn't open the box, who opened the box?"

"I didn't open the box."

They turned to the andy who then appeared to vanish before their eyes, killing the light and leaving Justin and Aspen alone in the dark.

It all happened so fast, but Justin could have sworn he saw the human-like figure dart nimbly around a corner near the back entrance to the bakery.

They proceeded with caution.

"How did you know a box was open," Aspen asked Justin, crossing her arms.

"I don't actually know a box is open," Justin replied, bumping her on his way to check the showroom floor. Aspen stumbled emphatically, throwing her arms into the air. She quickly adjusted to follow Justin toward the showroom floor.

As they approached the robotics section, accented by a bright pink neon sign overhead, they saw the remains of an open package next to all the other Jesus A.I. models, which were all neatly packaged inside their boxes, side-by-side.

"We are so completely screwed."

"You may be screwed, but I'm not," Aspen corrected him.

"No. If I am, then you are definitely screwed," Justin replied.

"I'm definitely not," Aspen said.

"We just witnessed a $25,000 android open its own box and walk away. Do you think Sooper Dooper is going to just say, 'Okay, cool. No biggie?'"

"I think I don't care what Sooper Dooper says. I'll just go get a job at Meijer Thrifty Acres. What are they going to do, sue me?"

"Probably," Justin replied in a defeated tone. "They sued that lady in Indiana who was letting her friends check out without paying. I read about it online. She's in jail."

"What the hell just happened," Aspen wanted to know.

"No clue."

After surveying the box, where evidently an android had willfully extracted itself and set itself free, Aspen finally agreed, "We are kind of screwed, aren't we?"

"What I want to know is why did this one set itself free, but all of the others are just sitting here, like the revamped Cindy models," Justin said.

He wanted to write it off, but it was clear they had both experienced the same thing and they were both awake when it happened. They wouldn't be able to just blow this off.

It was real.

"Maybe they won't notice," Aspen said.

"Yeah, good luck with that," Justin replied.

But after considering all the options, including a search of the store to try to find the missing unit with no luck, Justin agreed.

They threw away the evidence in the dumpster behind the store.

...

As he stood at the front of the store, waiting on the surge of Black Friday, Justin's mind was racing. He had so many questions.

Like, why did he have to work with Aspen late at night? Didn't Gus know they were teenagers (tk), full of hormones, and Aspen was not by any means unattractive.

You would think a manager would know not to schedule two kids to close the store, alone, together.

Little did Justin and Aspen know, Gus did so with a purpose. Scheduling and store assignments, were, in fact, part of the job of manager, but Gus had taken these assignments to a new level. Scheduling teenagers to close the store was meant to aid him in the creation of a whole 'nother set of videos. His voyeur collection, a collection for Gus's eyes only.

In fact, Gus could not wait to check out what had happened between the two love birds last night, but this morning he needed to focus on comedy.

From his upstairs office perch, Gus could barely contain himself as he focused in on Justin. A close up of Justin appeared on one of the smallish, black and white video monitors, the one in the middle, as he waited the onslaught that was Black Friday.

Gus rubbed his hands together in anticipation.

Grabbing the radio in one hand, he brought it slowly towards his face.

Meanwhile, a clock on the wall ticked the seconds slowly off to the 7 am hour, each second echoing into eternity in slow motion.

BEEP, the radio sounded as Gus pressed the button.

"Open the doors..."