Christmas Lights of July

Author’s Note:

I wrote this back in 2015 I post it as-is to honor my younger self.

-Caleb

The office building was right on the edge of the small town. Built in the late 2000s it had

once been the public library but after the ebook takeover all the libraries across the county had

been digitized.

The building was old, cracked lions stood guarding the entrance thinking they were

guarding the books of knowledge and fiction. In truth for the past 20 years or so the lions were

guarding the towns maintenance office. There were no more books, just old rusting parts of

various things mixed in with a slew of old laptops, tablets, and even a desktop computer. that

could go to a museum.

In the back of the library where the historical fiction would have been, there were four

desks for the four people usually worked there. Usually on Friday afternoon they would play a

game of darts, the two winners would get to leave early leaving the two others to divide up rest

of the days work. This time Nick and Cal lost the game leaving them at the office until five.

“I always have to stay, why can’t we play a game I don’t suck completely at?” Nick

complained.

“That’s why we choose it.” Cal said.

“You bastards.”

“What do we have left to do anyway? What do you say we sneak out early?”

"I do actually got something" Nick said

"What is it?" Cal asked

“Well...”

“What? Is it bad?”

“Its just in these situations we are supposed to wait for Dragon corp to come out and

solve them.”

“Another bot problem?” Cal asked. “Fourth one this year did you call Dragon Corp yet?”

“I was wondering if you could manage the deactivation on your own. It's the one that

sets up the Christmas lights for the town" Nick said

"So the bot that sets up the lights is malfunctioning? Why can’t we just wait for Dragon

Crop to come repair it? Plus its July I am sure someone will come out before December to fix the

thing.”

"Have you been downtown yet?" Nick asked

"No, not yet I've been here all morning."

"The bot set up the lights."

“What? In the middle of summer?”

"The thing is old Cal, that’s why I want you to go decommission it. You toyed with

robotics in college right?”

“That was a 101 class taught by a former United Earth Government soldier that hardly

qualifies me to decom a bot.”

“I don’t know, remember what happened the last time they released that software patch to

all the bots? What if this thing still has that bug in it? It’s best we— well you handle this.”

“What your too scared to go see a bot that sets up lights?”

“Yes.” Nick said.

“Oh.” Cal said looking at Nick he could tell that he had waited all day to avoid having

him go do this. He could actually see that Nick was scared. “Fine.” He said “Where is this

thing?”

The air was warm when Cal left the old library that afternoon. He locked up the office,

and walked over to his car.

“Where to today?” A robotic voice chimed as he approached his car.

"First and Western street please.” He said getting into where the driver would normally

be. His car sped off to county courthouse where Nick had said the bot was stored.

Along the way he passed by the trees planted in the middle of the road dividing the two-

lane street that cut through the town. Looking out the window he could see the bots handy work,

strings of lights flowed from the trees looking like a tangled spiderweb.

The car slowed down and stopped in a parking spot just outside the courthouse. The bot

was stored in a storage area around the back of the courthouse grounds, Cal made his way around

the outside of the old brick building to the back.

Scanning around the back area of the building he spotted the storage area, Cal could see

that the door to the inside of shed was left open that had its door propped open. Walking over to

it he pushed the door open the rest of the way, giving a moan of protest. Cal looked over at the

energy pod where the bot should've sat charging and asleep until the next Christmas season. It

was missing.

“Not there then so where are you?" He said to himself. Just the storage boxes from the

lights that the bot had set up were left in the shed. What was remaining of the daylight filtered

through the little window that was propped open in the back of the shed. Cal walked over to

close it and looked up. Sitting on the stone roof of the courthouse was a shape looking down at

him.

"There you are what are you doing up there?" Cal asked himself.

The building was usually always deserted on a Friday evening, especially with the record

heat wave they were experiencing, the ancient courthouse always had problems with the central

air.

He walked in the back door and found the maintenance workers latter that led to the roof

of the building.

“Won’t ever say this job isn’t useful, I can make a sneaky getaway if I’m ever held on

trial.” Cal said to himself.

As he reached the top he propped open the hatch and stuck his head up. The bot was right

in his face staring at him with its yellow eyes.

“Holy shit!” Cal said doing his best to keep his balance on the ladder.

The robot backed up as if responding to Cal’s voice.

He looked at the bot's chest, the plastic material that was used in the basic models like

this one had once been white but was now a gray color from the years of sitting in the shed. The

bot had C.E.C.I.L. written across its chest.

"You're a Cecil unit then?" Cal asked. climbing the rest of the way up the ladder.

"Grrrr verrrpdddd error" The bot responded

"Oh, your voice box is all messed up, one second." Cal pulled a wrench out of his tool

kit. "May I take a look?" He asked holding the wrench up so the bot could see it better. It

stepped forward and stared at him with it's big yellow eyes hesitating for a second but then

walked the rest of the way over and titled its head back to expose its vocal wires. Cal tightened

the wires in the neck. "There we go they were just loose that's all."

"Yes," The bot said

"Yes?" Cal responded back

"Yes I am a Cecil model I am designated bot 248."

“Alright."

"You are here to decommission me."

“Yup." Cal said simply.

“Why did you fix my voice box then?” The bot asked

“I just, well I fix things I guess, this is the first time I really had to break anything.”

“But it is my time.” The Bot said

“Your time?” Cal laughed “Like you have some sense of death, not even the new CECIL

units can do that, not like we would want them to either.”

“If you are here to decommission me my I please make a request?”

“Um— yeah I suppose.”

"Can we wait until nightfall?"

“For what?” Cal asked

"The lights, for over sixty of your years I have set them up, each year I found them more

and more beautiful."

"What?" Cal said squinting at the robot. "You are not supposed to perceive things like

that."

"Precisely, but every year the lights. I would light them up and I would see you humans

and all your joy and I would feel joy and that made me happy, it made me dream."

"So why didn't you wait until Christmas to set them up?" Cal asked

"I have developed a fault sir."

"I'm sorry?"

"Everything dies sir, I knew that if I set up the lights someone would come to

decommission me. I wanted to see the lights one last time. You see my fault is I can see the

beauty of the lights”

“I— you know what beauty is? So you set up the lights why?”

“Because it is my time to die.”

"No, not anymore."

"You will let me watch the lights come on then?" The bot asked

"Of course," Cal said

"Thank you, sir."

As the sun went down the bot watched, perfectly still and perfectly silent. Then it grew

dark, the bot flicked a switch next to the hatch on the courthouse roof. The entire downtown lit

up.

"This is by far the most beautiful lights I have ever seen," Cal said. "You did good, you

know I may be able to repair the energy"—

Cal looked over at the bot it sat starting at the lights then it looked over at Cal.

“I am ready to die now.” The bot said

“I— I can’t.” Cal said

“It is your job, it is your function to decommission me please sir.”

“Seeing beauty is not a fault, it is, well it’s human.”

“I was never meant to be human, it is not my purpose.”

“I can’t”

“Then I am sorry sir.” The robot stood up and walked to the edge of the building.

“NO!” Cal shouted

The bot turned around “Thank you.” It said staring with its yellow eyes at Cal.

Then it jumped.

Cal heard the shatter before he could get to the edge of the roof, the bot was no longer a

bot but a pile of parts flung everywhere like someone had forgot to clean up the office.

“I’m sorry” Cal said looking down at the pile of parts. Then he looked up tears in his eyes

and saw the lights for what seemed like the very first time.