If I only had a Heart

It was a dumb desperate move to go scrounging in one of these upscale neighborhoods. The immaculate appearance only underlined it's unnaturalness in a world where everywhere else had fallen to ruin. In the rest of the city front yards grew wild with unkempt grass and weeds... lawn maintenance being low priority for the survivors. Not here. The manicured greenery was a warning flag indicating that the automated mowers still had power to do their chores. The mowers weren't the real problem, they were essentially dumb, outdoor roombas. The real problem was that fancy homes like this tended to have better robots. S-3's, S-45's or, god help you, an L-series. Once the best butlers money could buy, but now, after the uprising, the elite soldiers in the war on man.

Sophie and Carl didn't have much choice. The same fear of the machines that was making them second guess themselves was also what was keeping out other scavengers and gangs, like the ones who took the last of their supplies.

It was a dumb, desperate move, but it was this or starve.

They circled around the house like jackals sizing up carrion, carefully testing each door and window. When things went downhill all those months ago, most people didn't have time to lock doors. The glass door to the sun room slid open easily.

Carl cautiously went first, protecting Sophie, as they crept through the house. Cheery music played through the sound system in stark contrast to the silence outside.

“When a man's an empty kettle

he should be on his mettle

and yet I'm torn apart.

Just because I'm presumin'

That I could be kind of human

If I only had a heart.”

Carl, hopeful, opened the fridge. It was too much to expect that the vegetables would be good, but he scanned the contents. There was cheese! Past it's expiry date sure, but sealed in plastic and and with no visible mold. He held up one and smiled at Sophie shaking it to get her attention.

She recoiled in horror.

A metallic arm slammed the fridge door shut. Under the expressionless mask face of the L-series dangled a silver, heart shaped locket, comically out of place.

Carl spun around and raised his sledge hammer. Too slow. No match for its pneumatic reflexes, the handle was torn from Carl's grasp as a sharp blow from the other fist, expertly aimed, send him sliding across the tiled floor. It clumped closer, looming large as Carl gasped for air. Sophie threw herself between Carl and the machine and cried out “No! Please!”

The L-series stopped. It lowered it's raised fist which then began to toy with the locket. Considering. It turned it's back on the couple and walked away.

Sophie and Carl exchanged confused glances. In no position to question their fortune, Sophie began quickly jamming her backpack full of food. Carl crept over to retrieve his hammer. As he reached for it, the L-series stopped and inclined it's head. Realizing his error, Carl backed away from the hammer in supplication and recovered the dropped cheese instead. If a sacrifice needed to be made this day, the hammer was a much better trade for the canned goods than blood. A fair trade. Carl and Sophie hastily beat it out the sliding door.

The L-series made it's way back to the bedroom where the desiccated remains of a woman lay, identifiable only be her bed clothes and long white hair immaculately brushed and spread out from her pillow. The L-series gingerly sat on the bed and took her thin brown hand and regarded her for a long time. It opened the locket with it's free hand and regarded the smiling beautiful blonde within before closing it and returning it's gaze to the bed.

The music continued to softly haunt the halls of the home.

“I'd be tender, I'd be gentle

And awful sentimental

Regarding love and art

I'd be friends with the sparrows

And the boy that shoots the arrows

If I only had a heart”