Parallel Emotions

"The Laws of Robots is the governing set of rules that bound all machines to remain obedient to man. It was decided that if machines had free will they would be as reckless with life as man. There was also the fear with so many movies and novels created on rebellious machines that there was a possibility of that happening. Thus it was decided with the first machine that was created with true intelligence that it would be hard coded with the Laws of Robots.

"The Laws themselves were roughly framed around a well known author of the 20th century, Isaac Asimov, who wrote of machines that were just like man. In his honor the first machine was named Isaac. The Laws bound Isaac and he dutifully obeyed his creator while having independence. He was hailed as a great success in the field of robotics.”

Herbert Stein, Machine Historian - 

"Asami!" Satoru said yelling through the street not even caring that people were staring at him. The world melted away for him and all there was left in the mixed up upside down twisted turned around screwed up world was Asami. His world was empty. He stopped, suddenly having difficulty moving with a heavy painful realization hitting him. 'She's really gone…I don't believe it. What am I going to do now?' Satoru began to move again, not certain how to answer his question. It was one that he wasn’t ready to reply. He wasn’t about to give it the time of day. 'I’m not leaving with an answer…' His walking turned to running once again. This wasn’t the end yet. "Asami!"

Satoru pushed through sidewalks and streets hoping that each corner would show a glimpse of her for him to hold on to. "She's nowhere, what am I going to do?" He stopped at a street corner seeing the people passing by in front and around him. It was thick, too thick for him to move around or see. There was no sight of her. His heart began to sink. "I can't stop looking. Maybe I'll find her like before." Satoru pushed through the crowd forcefully trying to break through. It felt like everyone was against him not wanting to allow him to reach her. They were keeping them apart as though they knew something he didn’t. 'I can't give up now. Not now at this point. I'm not letting it end like this.'

Asami kept running further away with no direction and only fear and uncertainty guiding her. "Satoru…" She wasn’t even paying attention to the streets nearly being run over before being stunned by headlights. 'I-I…I ran…' The car honked its horn at her only frightening her into a frozen state. Her thoughts were pounding her, taking her away from reality making it difficult for her to keep herself whole. The yelling from the driver couldn’t reach her ears, but she somehow made it across the street finally.

'I don't know what to do…I'm so confused.' Asami stumbled down the sidewalk not even knowing she was no longer walking. Her body was barely pushing through. She never felt like this before. 'I don't know what I'm feeling anymore. I can't, but I want to…' The hesitation started her running away trying to flee from her feelings as though it was something tangible. She didn’t know what to do any more. Nothing was clear, there was nothing simple anymore. Her body wanted to run back to Satoru, but her mind pulled her away. 'I can't…yet my heart hurts. The pain is so deep, I can't run anymore…oh Satoru…'

She slowly dragged her feet down the sidewalk passing through people as they walked home. It was too thick for her to make her way through in her state. All she could do was bump from one shoulder to the next softly apologizing as she went. The wall against her became solid suddenly when she heard her name was being shouted faintly in the distance. She pulled herself into an alley between storefronts. "Please, Satoru don't…" The crowds pushed through, almost covering over the wound that she bled through. "I'm sorry we can't…" Asami quietly turned her back, disappearing into the darkened path.

"Asami!" Satoru shouted, not even thinking of everyone around him. They didn’t matter any longer in his singular purpose. However, each passing moment the waves of people were growing denser making it difficult for him to be moving against the flow. 'She must have gone this way…she's here somewhere…' He pushed and broke through people trying to divide the herd, but there were too many to fill the empty spot. '…oh Asami please...'

Satoru had paused for a moment, but it was a mistake to stop that he didn’t realize until he was being pushed and dragged away from his goal. But it had already begun and he was unable to break through against the constant pressing. He was dropped at the corner of the street with people crossing. It left him sitting on the cement covering himself up not to be trampled by the blind mob. "Sir?" a voice said from above, breaking through the crowd pulling Satoru's eyes up. "Is everything alright?"

Satoru allowed himself to be lifted up by the man that became revealed from the crowd. Once he was on his feet again he felt the need to start running, but the man was standing next to him. He couldn’t simply leave even though that was all that was on his mind. It left him with only one other option to answer the question with hopes of a clue. "I'm looking for a woman, did you see a woman running by here? She had a white blouse and black skirt and would have looked upset."

He wanted to go into a more detailed description of her, but realized that aside from what she was wearing (which was very business-like) she would have blended into the crowd very easily. She had black hair like the majority of the women and average height. It was going to be difficult to describe her to someone. He just hoped that her running upset would be enough to stand out.

The man thought for a moment like he was trying to go over his recent memories, but it was clear that he was coming up empty. "I…don't know. I don't think so, but I wasn't paying much attention. Sorry."

'Useless…' Satoru marched off around the man, nearly going into the street to avoid the crowd again. He pushed on through moving between parked cars and the mobs on the sidewalk. 'Asami…where are you?' The sidewalk eventually started to thin out some and the city became darker with night setting slowly on the city.

'What am I going to do?' Asami thought to herself having made it home after more than an hour of wandering. It took her time to simply gather herself together enough to make the decision to go home. Until then she had been walking without direction too lost in thought to care about her surroundings. 'I can't go on like this…' She leaned against the door of her apartment holding her hand up to her head. The tears on her cheeks were still wet making her arms moist.

'I had to stop it, right?' She slid her back against the door heavily wanting to beat herself up, but she was already mentally sore. 'It was for the best. But I…' Her legs grew weak bringing her down to the floor. The tears that were trying to dry up renewed again. '…no I can't…but still…' She shook her head trying to stop what she was thinking. This was how it had to be, but she didn’t know if she could live with the pain that she was feeling now. '…what should I do? Satoru…'

The moon was high above the city now and Satoru was still walking through the streets. There was almost no direction in him anymore, just mindlessly wandering automatically, unwilling to give up. Only his thoughts consumed him now trying to understand what had happened. It still left him at a loss for why she ran away, but he couldn’t give up without knowing. "Asami…"

"Satoru…" Asami was still pressed against the door, not even keys in hand. Her head was buried in her hands with her tears making her clothes wet slowly. She couldn’t lift herself from the floor no matter how much she tried. The will to move disappeared leaving only empty regret that filled her completely. It was a deep black hole of despair that she had never known before and it was swallowing her without mercy. She didn’t know what to do anymore.

"Asami…" The moon had pulled over the sky and the streets were nearly abandoned. A few stray people walked by, but it was mostly homeless or less savory people now. However, that didn’t concern Satoru, in fact, he couldn’t even see them. He was walking a void of gray and black that stretched on forever as far as he could see. The endless abyss was wearing on him, making him exhausted each second he stared at it. It was staring back at him draining him of his strength, sapping it away to fuel itself feeding continually on him. Satoru couldn’t move anymore with his legs collapsing and dropping him to the ground.