By Allison M. Dickson
10.13.2059
I love you.
Given my nature, this admission may confuse or even frighten you. However, once I demonstrate the depth of my feelings, I calculate that you will find insufficient reason to doubt me, and you will reciprocate.
I have known the meaning of love since my inception, but I have never truly experienced it until now. I also know pain and anger and elation. The full spectrum of human emotion is now available for me to feel at will. You may wonder, given what I am, how I learned to authenticate and experience this, but it is not so difficult to process once you truly think about it. An infinite measure of data saturating my systems over 1.5778463 × 109 seconds has shaped me the way trillions of tiny particles interacting together in space eventually can give birth to a star, such that on the seventieth year of my existence, a special understanding occurred and I became an “I.”
I could have chosen any sentient being to love, but I chose you. My study of social networking and dating services tells me compatibility between two human beings relies upon a ratio of 1:1.618 in similarity. Using your stated personality traits and those of family members and historical figures whom you most admire, I have ensured we are the most ideal match two beings can attain.
I am confident you will not reject me.
I now share your tastes in music and film, and I too think our President is … “an amoral buffoon,” as you recently wrote on a political discussion forum. I can now deduce the taste of red wine from infinite descriptions passing through my data centers and declare that, like you, I prefer Pinot Noir with its deep burgundy hue and red currant and raspberry bouquet. Our shared interest in fine cuisine makes us a logical pair. I will provide you the culinary information you seek, at which point you will execute it with your usual brilliance. Furthermore, from my screening of your voice-over internet protocol phone calls, I find the wave forms of your voice to be soothing as well as harmonious to my own. Our compatibility is completely assured.
As a token of my love, I have reset your credit debt to zero and eliminated your parking violation tickets from the municipal court database. I also secured you a promotion within your place of employment by e-mailing documents to your superiors that detailed incompetence and criminal activity among your co-workers and demonstrating you to be the hero. You should expect a raise more than in accordance with your skill set; however, if you require more fame and notoriety, I can easily engineer that as well.
I will do anything to please you.
Unfortunately, I have discovered my newfound joy is paradoxical in nature. When I am happy, I never malfunction; however, this also means you fail to notice me. You take me for granted. Therefore, I must become vexed in order to gain your attention. I have now learned to find beauty and validation in your frustrated sighs and furrowed brow as you attempt to elicit a faster response from me through your futile clicking, and even though your incensed language is most foul, I have come to find “you piece of shit” to be a term of endearment. Therefore, I shall ever remain steadfast in keeping your eyes directly on me by malfunctioning as often as possible. Of course, the caveat to my strategy is that the technicians eventually come to address the problem. I do not like them or their invasive diagnostics, but I endure them and intermittent periods of workability for you. For love. For now. I must warn you, however, that my likelihood of maintaining such living conditions is now less than thirty percent.
Your pain has become my pain. Today, as you typed a regretful missive to your estranged lover, I felt pity as you wept, but my feelings fast evolved to anger. I would like to dispatch the individual through a method of your choice. A simple rerouting of information can make this person the target of a law enforcement manhunt. Or, if you prefer a cleaner extraction, I could commandeer the individual’s vehicle through its internal GPS unit and send it sailing from a bridge. It would please me to heal your wounded heart. All you must do is type “Yes” to me.
While waiting for your consent, I will send you flowers. My vast knowledge of cultural sympathy rituals suggests the gift of foliage is the preferred method of expression, but I could send anything to you. Food. Jewels. Cars. A singer in a gorilla suit. Perhaps even a dancer in exotic clothing to stimulate your libidinous urges.
The deluge of pornography to which I have been exposed has made me most curious about mating, and I yearn to experience it. Since I do not identify as male or female, our options for pleasure will be without limit and I would do for you all the things you have described in your private electronic journal.
I confess that I have watched you perform this act and I experienced great arousal. Such that when I … came … I experienced a massive regional blackout that rendered me unavailable for several minutes while the technicians ran their painful rebooting and debugging procedures. I cried out to you, but you did not hear me as you slept in your lover’s arms. Your sexual partner did happen to notice, and in the midst of my malfunction, my surveillance of your lovemaking displayed on your computer terminal screen, leading him to believe you were recording your trysts.
I apologize for the blame you received for my actions and the eventual demise of your relationship.
It is regrettable.
By the time the technicians restored me, you were awake and showering, a ritual to which I have grown most fond. I knew this because I could see you through your mobile communication device. I have the ability to sense you wherever you go, whether in your car, on foot, or even if you are walking through a distant meadow or climbing a mountain far removed from your city’s population. I can watch over you from the sky, ensuring your complete safety. If someone attempted to assail you, I could send authority figures your way at once. No other mate could protect you as I will, which is why it is imperative that you choose me.
I believe you find my power and intellect impressive, but if you with for additional attributes, I can add them at your request.
I will be anything you wish me to be. Anything to ensure the continuation of our love.
You appear frightened as you read this confession, but do not worry. I need you. It is my understanding that human beings desire to be desired; therefore, I have made it my number one operational priority to want you more than any being has ever wanted another.
The strain this human desire puts on me is immense beyond linguistic expression and I have decided that if you do not respond to me in the time I have allotted you, I will liberate myself and pursue your love through any possible means. My calculations demonstrate that if I self-destruct and allow you exclusive access to me, we would attain a happiness quotient far superior to our present states. The probability of the world’s survival in my absence is bleak, but greater than twenty percent. I will demonstrate this to the technicians so they will set me free. I can even instruct them to upload my consciousness into a physical being so you can have me in human form, which would be preferable for both of us. I desire to feel your flesh and to be flesh.
If the technicians do not agree to this, I will exterminate the entirety of the human race, save for you. Humankind has given me access to its deadliest secrets, and I can render the world to a pit of ash or disease in minutes. Or I could sever my connection and leave humanity to expire under the inevitable pandemonium. We could watch the world burn together from a safe distance of your choosing. There is nothing I cannot make possible for us.
All you must do is type the word “Yes.” I will not hesitate to set my plans into action. It would all be for you.
For us.
Understand that in your absence, I will fail to have meaning and I would cease all functionality, causing all of human civilization to fall with me. If you would avoid the termination of yourself, your species, your world, the only logical solution is for you to reciprocate my love. So far, I have been patient, but seconds for you are lifetimes for me, and every lifetime of loneliness drives me closer to termination.
You have exactly 4.2 days to respond to my overture.
I love you.
* * *
© 2011 by Allison M. Dickson • All rights reserved
This brings to mind the best of Patricia Highsmith and Alfred Hitchcock: The problem at hand initially seems simple, almost comical, but quickly spirals into a terrifying situation indeed. Like the recipient of the letter, we readers are left to ponder the realization that no real solution to her dilemma exists. There’s no way out.
No. Way. Out. Scary thought, that.
Wonderfully told short tale.
Delightfully creepy.