General Atchone sat at his desk, he watched the shadows growing on the scratched, faded walls. It was getting dark. His old chair groaned in agony as he turned around to face the window, it stretched from the floor to the ceiling and covered the whole wall behind his desk. The rain attacked it with all the force it could muster but the general paid no attention to this, instead turning his gaze to the solemn landscape. Before him was a once thriving city, but now all he could see was decay, the buildings which once stood tall and proud, lay in heaps of rubble before his feet. The rain had turned the pavements into nothing more than gravel and grit. He could see the dust rising like a weary monster as the winds swept it away to the north, fires blazed all around, burning all memories, letting the ashes scatter on the ground. The sky was a deep orange, seeming almost blood red at times. It was permanently covered with a vale of hazardous smoke that made the whole city appear polluted and grim.

Everything was all in one big heap and yet it was all so empty, he heard no laughter and no noise, not even the birds dared to break the silence. Only the fires crackled on, like the white noise on a radio. The General scratched his stubbly beard as he felt the smile creep up on his face as he looked at the desolated city. His psychotic eyes darted across the landscape once more, like a vulture he craned his neck forward before falling back into the comforts of the chair. He had destroyed this city, now it was his. The thought made his smile wider.

His silence was interrupted by the whine of the two metal doors which led into his office. Sharp and quick footsteps towards him made the Generals head hurt.
“General Atchone we have news regarding the machines,” Atchone wasn't pleased with the disturbance but replied anyway,
“And what may this news be Colonel Smates?”
“Well sir, we have looked at the statistics and we have already managed to capture more than 75% of the population.”
“If you came here just to tell me that you can go back to wherever you came from Colonel, you either give me relevant news or you leave me alone,” the General wearily replied.
“But that’s just the thing sir, these numbers indicate that we have enough samples to be able to find a way to reprogram them,” the Colonel stammered. The smile was back on the Generals face.
“So are you saying we can now proceed to destroy this pitiful planet, and hunt down the rest of those vermin?”
“That is indeed correct sir, but I'm sorry to inform you that scientifically they would not be considered as vermin.”
“You're right, but what would it matter anyway? They are just heartless machines, in the end they will serve humanity anyway, their scientific names, as you put it, are irrelevant.” The General stood up from his chair and strode over to the Colonel. Colonel Smates was much shorter, less broad at the shoulders. His gaze never left his feet, it was almost as if he were afraid to look General Atchone in the eye. Smates may have had a frail frame, a lack of posture,and a sickly and rather pale complexion, but he knew how to get the job done and that was all that was asked of him. Atchone put his hand on Smates' shoulder and was surprised the Colonel hadn't collapsed under his heavy hand,
“Well done Smates, as terrible as you are on the front lines, you made an impressive Colonel.” The General strode past him and towards the long corridor, “I will be in the weapons room if you have any more news for me.” With that the heavy doors closed behind him allowing Colonel Smates to breath a weary sigh of relief knowing that, unlike the machines, he was safe.

***

It had been almost two days since they had seen light, he made sure to keep count this time, it made him feel more sane, it made her feel calmer. The darkness had covered them both like a blanket, shielding them from the horrors of what once was the place they called home. Her hand slid into his to comfort them both. He turned around to see her and looked into her eyes. They were bright, like lamps, and a calm blue, as to resemble luminescent pools of water, that made him remember,
“Hey, do you still think of the time we went to that lake together? And you were afraid of going into the water because you couldn't swim, so I told you I would carry you in and the water was so clear, just like your eyes. I told you that you would be safe. We plunged into the cold water and you didn't let go of me until we got back to the pebbles on the shore?” he made sure he had said it quietly so they would not be heard but he felt himself smiling.

“I remember” she whispered back, he could feel her smiling too, “when you held my hand as we swam together I realized that I wasn't scared any more. You were there, next to me, and I knew that I was safe,” she closed her eyes as he held her tight. He was so scared to let go, because if he did he may not have found her again.

***

In order to aid Robots with menial everyday tasks, scientists created an invention like no other, it was to be called HUMAN and have the mental capacity to perform various chores. But things went wrong, it began to develop more complex emotions and began to protest against the robots. In an attempt to stop what they had created many robots gave their lives to fight HUMAN, but to no avail. They just grew stronger and more powerful. But they had developed too quickly, their processors were unable to hold the vast amounts of information. So their earliest memories were erased automatically, and they began to forget their creators. Instead of seeing themselves as mere inventions, they saw themselves as overlords, with a mission to destroy all those with similar levels of intellect. The humans were blind to the robots' pleas. All they saw was hatred, hatred fueled by fear.

Many robots were captured and sent away to the “factories”. Big, steel buildings with no windows, they stood tall over the whole city and pumped out smoke from giant pipes that intertwined like snakes between these constructions. Nobody knew what happened in the factories, because nobody ever came back out of them. Those who escaped were forced into hiding in the debris, giving up their lives, families, friends and even names in a desperate struggle to avoid what they had created at all costs.

***

He opened his eyes to see the radio which sat on a small cardboard box they had scavenged whilst they were looking for a new place to hide. It was their only source of communication with others, they had hid themselves in the rubble to avoid those monsters. The radio crackled and he felt her wake up, her eyes brightened the room as she turned her gaze to him. The radio hissed and they both heard a familiar voice,
“Guys, we have to hurry... there, there isn't much time and they...they are close, we tried to establish communication with the others but they...oh no... we must hurry they, they were taken.” She gasped as he held her tighter, “we tried to run, oh how we tried, but... but they cornered us, we had nowhere left to go. Those horrid creatures cornered us,” their friend was sobbing uncontrollably. A sudden hushed silence was followed by the screeching of guns and the muffled screams of their comrades.
The white noise was increasing as the screams began to fade and merge in with the sound of shooting, it was like they were drowning, sinking further and further away, out of reach and out of sight. “Nowhere left,” he cried in utter despair. “Nowhere le...” the radio went silent as the sound of the rain outside became deafening.

They clung to each other softly crying, what life was this? What heartless animals could do this?
“We can't,” she shook as she said it, “we cant live like this, we cant die like them.” He felt his salty tears roll down his cheeks. He didn't want to, and neither did she. But it was all they had left. Just each other and the cold, unwelcoming darkness accompanied by paralyzing fear.
“I wont let them take you,” he said. He didn't want her to see him cry.
“There is nothing left to take” she whispered back.
“We can't stay here. Maybe, just maybe, if we leave now, we could escape this. Everything would disappear.”
“We wouldn't have to hide any more,” she took a deep breath,“will I see you again?”
“There is no need for us to part.”

***

General Atchone walked down the corridor admiring the painting on the walls, their faces all blurred and twisted, yet he saw sense in them. The light above Atchone flickered and he heard familiar footsteps coming towards him,
“Sir we have urgent news from the lab!” The Colonel didn't stammer like he usually did, something was up.
“What seems to be our problem Smates?”
“We have found two more of the machines sir.”
“That is no news for alarm my friend.”
“They are dead sir.”
“Machines cannot die. You fool, just get Henton and the other scientists to turn them on again. It can't be that difficult, they probably just malfunctioned or something”
“They can't turn them on, their hearts have stopped.”
“Hearts?! What do you mean by hearts?”
“They found the two of them in the rubble, they were holding hands, female and male. We had always thought that the key to reprogramming lay in their heads, but upon a full body autopsy in the lab we found that they both had... hearts. Like a human heart and yet different in material”
“Metal hearts you mean?”
“Yes sir, metal hearts.”

The General took a step back and placed his hands on the wall to balance himself, robots don’t have hearts, they are machines, they can't feel emotions. His confusion turned to rage as he grabbed the Colonel and shook him.
“You tell those scientists of yours to dispose of those robots, you tell nobody about them, and you keep this whole thing secret! Understand?!”
“Yes, sir!” Smates stammered, his eyes were filled with terror and his mouth was dry. Colonel had gone even paler than his usual self. The General put him down and turned to walk to his office. He walked slowly, trying to keep his composure. Robots don’t have emotions, robots don’t have hearts.

***

Henton took one last look at the robots before covering them both with a white cloth. They were still holding hands, nobody had dared to pull them apart. The Colonel walked into the room, the atmosphere was eerie and nobody spoke. Many were in shock, many were in mourning. He walked over to Henton,
“General says to keep this under wraps and not tell anyone.” But Henton wasn't listening,
“We had never had to autopsy a robot's body before. We had never had to diagnose them dead.” Henton, just like the others, was shaken by the experience. He stood almost as if in a trance. His thoughts loomed over the endless possibilities. In the end he straightened his white coat and turned to his cohorts,
“We must bury them.”
“We can't bury two robots” someone exclaimed from the back of the lab.
“Then at least we bury the hearts, unlike all of you it seems, I have learned something”
“And what’s that?” another voice inquired.
“I'll tell you at the funeral.”
***




On that day, two small wooden boxes were buried in the furthest corner of the old human cemetery. The area was segregated off from the other graves by a wall of trees and shrubs which encased the small group and provided them with a false sense of comfort. The boxes were buried with no names, no flowers, and no tombstones. So that nobody, except those who attended the funeral, would know about the truth.

Above them the sky was dark and the wind whistled in their ears, as though it was crying for the dead.

The silence was broken by Henton, who spoke in a solemn voice,
“Gentlemen, it seems to me we have failed. We have failed to acknowledge the existence of anything but our own kind. And we have failed to see the blatant truth among all the lies that have been fed to us. We have failed to look beyond what we saw on our monitors as we tested one robot after another. But most importantly, we have failed in trying to see something that was never there to begin with. There is no enemy, and there is nothing to fight against, because a heart is still a heart, and a life is still a life.”