Building the Basics...

Sora heads to his first class, Advanced Robotics Engineering 1A. It was a small class of twenty students. In the back row, he sees an unfamiliar figure.

"Hey there."

"Hi..." Sora answered, unsure of what to say.

"I'm Ayumi Nakamura, nice to meet you!"

She was short, with shoulder-length blonde hair,

Her green eyes were beautiful, and her smile was contagious. Sora had never met her before.

"God, you're so small! How old are you?" Sora asked.

"Uhh... 14... I think..."

"You're so cute!, do you want a cookie?" Sora offered.

"Shut the hell up!" Ayumi's face turned bright red. She shot daggers at Sora.

Ayumi hated this. Her entire life, people could only see her age. They seemed to forget she was a genius. A prodigy, in fact. She was born a prodigy; she didn't have to work for anything. She had the grades, the talent and the skill to be in the top five percent of any country, yet nobody gave her the respect she deserved.

"Oh, sorry. You don't like sweets? My bad." Sora said apologetically.

"No, no, it's not that. I just can't stand being treated like a child."

"Well, you are a kid." Sora said.

"I'm fourteen years old! That's practically middle-aged to me." Ayumi huffed.

"Ok, ok, I'm sorry. " Sora bowed his head.

"It's fine... I guess." Ayumi sighed.

The class was boring. She didn't understand why they were learning these things. She already knew how to program robots. It wasn't like she was learning anything new.

The teacher, Professor Yui Hiroko, entered the classroom.

"Good morning students. We've all heard about the boy in school, Sora. He's going to be in this class. He's a genius in the field of robotics. Please welcome him,"

Ayumi looked up and saw Sora walking towards the front of the class. She could tell he was nervous. She could sense his nervousness.

"Hey, I'm Sora. Nice to meet you."

"Ok, enough introductions. Sora, you'll be teaming up with Ayumi. I see you've already met." Yui said.

Ayumi's face reddened in anger. "I don't need any help! He's just gonna get in my way!" She muttered under her breath.

"What was that, Nakamura-san?" Yui asked.

"I said 'I don't need any help!'"

Yui scowled, "Are you sure? You have been stuck for months now. Could it hurt to have a fresh set of eyes?"

Ayumi glanced at Sora, "Fine... I guess..."

Yui smiled, "Excellent. I hope you're ready for some hard work, Sora-kun."

Sora and Ayumi headed to their workstation. On the table was a metal frame in the shape of a human. The robot was powered down, and only needed to be connected to a computer for it to function.

"So... where should we begin?" Sora asked.

"You don't know?" Ayumi replied incredulously.

"Well, no, I just got here. What problems are you having?"

"It doesn't move right... I think it's broken."

"Well, I can take a look. I might be able to fix it."

Ayumi shrugged, "Fine."

Sora placed his hands on the robot. "Let's see what's wrong with it."

Ayumi sat in a chair and placed a helmet with a bunch of wires and sensors. A holographic visor formed in front of her eyes.

"What the hell is this?!"

"This is a neural net interface. The user controls the robot through this interface. I designed the robot to help those with limited mobility, or for situations that were extremely dangerous. The robot has a very limited AI. The user controls it via this interface."

"So, this is a remote control?" Sora asked.

"Yeah, basically. But it's not like a TV remote. You actually think the commands into the system. I call it the 'Thought Communication System.',"

"I'm not sure I understand."

"Think about what you want the robot to do, and it will do it."

"Cool!"

"Yeah, right now it's in maintenance mode, so we have limited feedback. Once it's fully operational, the user will feel, see, smell, touch and taste everything the robot does. Depending on the situation, the user can dial up or down the sensitivity of any input."

"I don't know what to say. This is amazing. How did you come up with this?"

"My older sister was a firefighter. One night, there was a really dangerous fire. The building was burning, and she was trying to save a child from the flames. She saved the kid but was badly injured. She's paralyzed now. She can't walk, she can't even breathe on her own."

"I'm sorry to hear that."

I wanted to build something to help get her life back. In the final version, I plan to transfer consciousness itself into the machine effectively.

"That's insane! You mean you're going to transfer her brain into a robot?"

"No, not really. It would be more like the robot would become her body, and her body would be the robot."

"Anyway, I'm years away from that. Right now, I would be happy if the damn thing would move like a human."

"I can't wait to test it out," Sora said.

"Ugh, let's get started."

Ayumi put on the helmet and activated the robot. She felt a tingle run across her scalp, then her vision became hazy.

"Ok, I'm connected," Ayumi said.

"Good, try to move the arms."

Ayumi thought about lifting her arm. The robot responded. The arm shot up like a cannon.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa! It's moving too fast!" Sora exclaims.

"You're telling me. Let me try adjusting the speed." Ayumi said.

Ayumi tried to slow the movements of the robot, the movements were sluggish and jerky.

"I think I got it, your using pneumatics to control the movement." Sora explained.

"Right, I needed the strength."

"That's fine, but it lacks precision. Have you thought about artificial tendons?"

"How would that work?" Ayumi asked.

"We could use a kind of smart polymer to give the arms' strength and flexibility. If we strengthen it, it could grab things easier, and it could bend at angles other than ninety degrees. I mean, we're trying to build a human like a robot. We should design it like a human is designed."

"Oh, I didn't think of that." Ayumi said.

"It's going to take a long time to rebuild this. We're going to have to start over..."

Ayumi powered down the robot and removed the helmet.

"You really are new here, aren't you?" Ayumi said.

"Huh? Yeah, what do you mean?" Sora asked.

"We have a rapid prototyping fabrication unit. Think of it as a 3d printer on steroids. Design a CAD model put in the materials and in a matter of hours, you have a fully functional prototype."

"Wow, that's amazing!" Sora said.

"I know. We have a few dozen machines in this school, and they're all free for the taking.

Sora and Ayumi started to work, building a new robot from scratch. They replaced the pneumatics with the smart polymer, they made some other adjustments. After a few hours they were satified with their plans.

"Ok, all we need to do is send the design to the prototyper." Sora said.

"Wait, why don't we give it it's skin" Ayumi said.

"Skin?"

"Yeah, it's supposed to be a body replacement. I've already perfected the sensory system, why not go for broke?"

"So what's our robot going to look like?" Sora asked.

"Well, let's make a girl, about 5'4". She'll have long green hair, a petite build, and a skinny waist."

"That's pretty specific."

"Ok, ok. So it's my sister I wanna make my sister's body... before her accident."

Ayumi pulled up a picture of a young woman, and Sora drew a robot based on the image.

"Looks good."

"I don't know, it's a little... flat."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, you know, a real girl has a round ass."

"You're going to make her have a round ass?"

"Well, she's a girl, isn't she?"

"Ok, I guess I can try."

"Good! Let's give her bigger boobies too!" Ayumi said.

"What do you mean, bigger boobs?" Sora asked.

"Yeah, you know, bigger."

"I get it. Ok, so she's got a big butt and big tits."

"No, no, no, no, no, no, no! Bigger boobs, bigger boobs!"

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah."

"Ok, I get the picture!" Sora said.

All the plans were sent to the printer, and the by next day they could see the result of their hard work