This is the weirdest fill I have ever written but sod it.
Robots cannot feel emotions.
That was the idea, anyway. They would build Charles a companion who could not be slaughtered by Roundheads, or flirted with. Something that would be able to cope with his insomniac sleeping routines and choose the most logical pathways of thinking. Something that would be able to protect him, if Cromwell were to come for him.
And little Charlie never even questioned it. He never noticed that Sotherby, just plain ‘Sotherby’, was fully-grown when he was just a teenager. He never noticed that Sotherby did not age. He never noticed that Sotherby did not necessarily act like the rest of his courtiers. But one day, when the Prince became a King, he realised.
It took a few guesses. Sotherby’s programming kicked in – flush of the cheeks, head in hand, signalling embarrassment. Charles could never really figure out if the lump of metal and wiring could feel, but he assumed that Sotherby, dear Sothers, could. Why else would he laugh at his jokes, appear drunk after drinking alcohol, get flustered around the ladies of the court?
They were best friends.
But everything comes to an end. Charles got old. Sotherby remained loyal. He stayed by Charles’ bedside every single night and though Charles knew that Sothers was just clever engineering, he had always been more than that; he had been a friend. A friend who had seen him through everything. The civil war. The death of his father. The marriage, the mistresses, the countless parties, every time looking after him and making sarcastic quips that only his dear Sothers could ever really come out with. And when Charles closed his eyes for the very last time, he didn’t see an android in front of him, staring out with cold eyes. He saw Sotherby, and he saw a heart breaking.
There was no use for Sotherby when Charles died. With nobody to care for him, or to care for, he began to rust and squeak. He had only ever been programmed to do one thing: look after Charles. But Sotherby could not understand that Charles would not be returning. He was not programmed to accept death. So he waited. He waited, and waited, and waited.
FILL: Sotherby/Charles II, android!Sotherby
Robots cannot feel emotions.
That was the idea, anyway. They would build Charles a companion who could not be slaughtered by Roundheads, or flirted with. Something that would be able to cope with his insomniac sleeping routines and choose the most logical pathways of thinking. Something that would be able to protect him, if Cromwell were to come for him.
And little Charlie never even questioned it. He never noticed that Sotherby, just plain ‘Sotherby’, was fully-grown when he was just a teenager. He never noticed that Sotherby did not age. He never noticed that Sotherby did not necessarily act like the rest of his courtiers.
But one day, when the Prince became a King, he realised.
It took a few guesses. Sotherby’s programming kicked in – flush of the cheeks, head in hand, signalling embarrassment. Charles could never really figure out if the lump of metal and wiring could feel, but he assumed that Sotherby, dear Sothers, could. Why else would he laugh at his jokes, appear drunk after drinking alcohol, get flustered around the ladies of the court?
They were best friends.
But everything comes to an end. Charles got old. Sotherby remained loyal. He stayed by Charles’ bedside every single night and though Charles knew that Sothers was just clever engineering, he had always been more than that; he had been a friend.
A friend who had seen him through everything. The civil war. The death of his father. The marriage, the mistresses, the countless parties, every time looking after him and making sarcastic quips that only his dear Sothers could ever really come out with. And when Charles closed his eyes for the very last time, he didn’t see an android in front of him, staring out with cold eyes. He saw Sotherby, and he saw a heart breaking.
There was no use for Sotherby when Charles died. With nobody to care for him, or to care for, he began to rust and squeak. He had only ever been programmed to do one thing: look after Charles.
But Sotherby could not understand that Charles would not be returning. He was not programmed to accept death. So he waited. He waited, and waited, and waited.
But Charles never came back.