Asher

  "Quote here"

A friend.

That was the man's main goal. He wanted someone to talk to. He was a child prodigy, revered for his brains and his endless wall of accomplishments. But no one could keep up. Not in class, not in a conversation, not even in a friendship. The man wanted someone to just... be a friend. That's where Asher came in.

The child prodigy spent years working on Asher... Working on an artificial intelligence.

After he accomplished his base goal of having a program that could converse with him, he placed the program into a human-like body. The only way one might be able to tell the difference between Asher's body and that of a real human might be the metal and electronic inside.

But something went wrong during the transfer. The program that the man was placing in the body suddenly crashed. And then it vanished as if it had never been there in the first place. But the robotic body awoke. His dull eyes opened and looked at the machinery... at the room... at the man. And he yanked himself loose from the machines that were connected to him. It was as if.. As if he was afraid. Asher, a machine... was afraid.

Within the next few moments, Asher had disappeared. He ran from the lab where the now-old child prodigy created him. He escaped.

Eventually, the man found Asher and brought him back before he ran out of charge, but the man was only human, unlike Asher. The man died and Asher was still alive with not artificial intelligence... But real intelligence. He learned how to operate the lab, how to charge himself, how to live... It was almost as if he had absorbed the man's knowledge... Well, whether he did or not doesn't truly matter. But Asher, a machine, has lived years and years... and he's lived those years just like a human.