PROJECT TITLE : Geostatic Ordained Design (G.O.D.)

THE SPONSORS : N.A.S.A.

THE SETTING : A Cleanroom two miles beneath the Great Canadian Shield

624 pounds of gleaming metal, wires, batteries, pulleys, positronic cpu, gears, acoustic components, optic sensors, gyroscope, auditory sensors, - they don't add up to a hill of beans.

Unless they're sitting in a pile on the floor of this one room, waiting for a proverbial spark of creation from an unknown force. That force being Dr. Mark Hill, team leader of the Robotic branch of NASA.

The idle positronic brain sitting in the room has no on/off switch. It can be deemed dead or more accurately, inactive. Dr. Hill glances around the viewing room to his 4 colleagues and they all give a nod to proceed. Dr Hill starts the electro static charge build up routine. The room housing the inert material, hermetically sealed off from the outside environment, begins to glow as the ion charges build within the molecules of the air.

3 minutes pass; well within predefined time parameters. NOTHING.

5 minutes pass; still within predefined time parameters. NOTHING.

6 minutes pass; outside predefined time parameters. NOTHING.

Dr. Hill glances once more, with less zeal, around the viewing room to his 4 colleagues and they each give a solemn nod to disengage the static buildup procedure. The project has failed. Dr. Hill silently agrees and slowly reaches for the switch.

6 minutes 38 seconds pass; well outside predefined time parameters. A SPARK!

Dr. Hill continues to reach for the off switch with a new purpose. The static charge in the room must dissipate before the experiment can proceed.

The positronic CPU has been activated by the static charge and now has enough latent energy to proceed with its subroutines. It sends a remote process call with enough energy transfer to the electronic arms to drag themselves into position. Along the way the arms seek out the other components place them accordingly. The Posi-CPU is the first piece of 24 components to be assembled. All of these pieces have a predefined place in this construction ballet. The process will take 48 minutes to complete.

47 minutes elapsed. Anxious grins abound in the viewing room. An electric charge of a different kind swarms thru the air. The tension is palpable. One piece left....!

I AM BORN

Cheers and screams of joy enveloped the viewing room. The experiment was a complete success with the robotic acoustic production signaling the coda of the process. The team had succeeded in a mini BIG BANG in the robotic world. The robot had formed from essentially nothing. A spark of energy had prompted its production. Self assembly into a fully functioning robot.

The team put the robot thru a series of tests that lasted for 27 days. Each one passed with excellence. It was time for the last part of the experiment to commence.

'Initiate End-Routine Sequence'

The robot hesitated. It was not adhering to the subroutines encoded within it. Had something gone wrong? It was totally non-responsive - just standing there, motionless.

Then...a sign of a major malfunction. A leak in the ocular socket. The experiment looked like it was washed out - over. But then the robot seemed to snap out of its hesitance and produced another acoustic response, not part of it's programming.

I AM NO MORE

As planned, the robot then proceeded to dismantle itself. Ending the experiment.

Dr. Hill and his colleagues considered the experiment a total success!

One thing remains unexplained though - Dr. Hill never installed an ocular duct in the robot, which was present at the autopsy. It seemed to have self-formed. It could almost be considered ...a tear duct.