Dr. Powell entered his crooked iron door at the Pentagon, keeping his head low and his eyes to the floor. It had been thirty years since the dictator had taken over and shut down all government buildings like this one, but Dr. Powell had a mission, and he wasn’t stopping for anything. Stepping over some debris from the neglected building, he made his way to a secret hatch located under a frayed, rotting carpet, and lifted it up, descending a hidden staircase underneath it.
Reaching his lab and closing the hatch behind him, he let out a breath of relief. Even though the Pentagon had been abandoned for more than twenty years, the thought still scared him that someone might be watching. Dictator Laser had eyes everywhere, and you just never knew who you could trust. He leaned back against a wall, clutching his chest and thanking the heavens for another safe trek to his secret lab.
Dr. Powell was not a young man anymore, and these bi-weekly trips to perfect his experiment were really taking a toll on his heart, but he had to do this. He had to do it for the future of the world, and the future of the Arts. Slowly, he reached into his coat and pulled out a dog eared and well worn copy of Edgar Allen Poe’s The Raven.
Today was the day.
This was his last chance. All other copies of this text had been sacrificed to the government ages ago, and if this didn’t work, then this story would be lost forever. He sighed deeply, an annoying habit that he had picked up shorty after the hostile takeover of Dictator Laser, and shuffled his way to the complicated machine in the center of the room.
It had been easy to scrounge the abandoned labs and pick up different machine parts here and there and build what he called TAM. TAM, or Tammy as he affectionately called the machine, stood for (not creatively) The Arts Machine. Tammy, an artificial intelligence machine, had originally been a low level robot used for light cleaning maintenance.
Dr. Powell had since perfected her mechanics in a way that had not even been heard of in modern sciences. Gingerly, he put the book down on a platform, and stepped away to do some checking up on the machine. He plugged the power cord in, checking all the buttons and levers and making sure there were no shorts in the wiring.
“Good Morning Dr. Powell a soft feminine voice flitted through the chamber. ”Hello Tammy, did you have a nice rest?” The doctor asked the machine, carrying on a conversation as if she was a real person. ”Yes sir, and yourself?” The machine carried on, whirring and moving it’s arms around as it warmed up. ”As bad as usual, nightmares all night…” The poor doctor stated, taking out a clip board and writing down figures.
It took a while for Dr. Powell to be satisfied enough to actually set down his clipboard and walk over to a small panel of buttons. ”Okay Tammy, no pressure, but today is the big day. You’re ready, and I’m ready, and we can do this. Countdown commencing now, switching on beam in
5…
4…
3…
2…
1…”
If anyone had been within five miles of the building, they would have thought an earthquake happened. Dr. Powell was blown backwards into a far wall, and plaster shook down from the ceiling as the machine let forth a beam that completely encompassed The Raven. Dr. Powell stood up slowly, cursing his old age and the unforeseeable power of the life beam.
As the dust cleared, Dr. Powell heard the machine power down. He was disappointed. This wasn’t supposed to happen! There wasn’t supposed to be smoke, and dust, and wreckage… there was supposed to be—-
Then he heard it.
“Where am I?” A small boy asked, shaking his head back and forth and brushing dust off of his black clothing.
Dr. Powell let out a woop of excitement, and picked the boy up, spinning him around. He had done it. He had made the book into a living, breathing, person! No dictator could touch them now, the arts would be saved!