Friday Challenge Entry #4

For the Friday Challenge.

"The message"


To: CarlHansen@Neximrobotics.com

From: JMHall@WMA.org

Re: Latest dig. You have to see this!

Carl,

I'm sending this to you because you're the only man I'd trust not to immediately think that I'm crazy.

During a recent archeological dig in Mexico an extremely curious object was found. An object that had no earthly reason to be buried among the remnants of a 1918 campsite, purportedly one where Pancho Villa had stayed for an extended period.

I'm sending you copies of both the original documents, and photos, as well as the translated and digitally enhanced versions.

Sincerely,

James Mathieu Hall; Phd

Archeological Director, Westermann Museum Albuquerque, NM

ATTACHED DOCUMENT: DIGINFO.PDF

Carl opened the document and saw what appeared to be a diary entry. The handwriting was shaky and barely legible, so he scrolled down to the next page and saw a cleaned up and thankfully translated version of the same page.

Day 38: Experiment a complete failure. Minor cascade reactions in my central neural net have slowed my ability to move, and are impairing some motor functions. I've spent the better part of a month acclimating myself to this odd era, and the humans who've welcomed me into their society.

They have been most helpful in repairing most of the external damage to my outer housing. But any queries I have of replacement parts seem to be beyond them. When I asked repeatedly for an oscillating wave-form projector they looked at me strangely and walked away.

Carl laughed and thought about sending a reply to John, he'd nearly forgotten how wicked a sense of humor the man had. But something in the text he'd just read had caught his eye.

Oscilating wave-form projector.

The phrase was something well out of John's wheelhouse, and it'd be easy for him to look up the term on any online tech site, but for the fact the term hadn't even existed up until two days ago. Other than himself and a few technicians, Carl knew no one else even knew of its existence.

But then how did John manage to work it into this weird prank, he thought to himself as he scrolled down to the next page.

Day 51: Have met an odd human. He is under the impression I am not of this Earth, and despite my many protestations (in his native tongue) has managed to conscript me into his personal army.

I fear this may be the last entry in this journal, and have managed to find a hiding spot where it and the other material enclosed will remain undisturbed for well over a century. My hope is that this will be found before my creator performs his “grand experiment”, and I am somehow not flung back in time.

Carl wondered what the brief entry meant by “grand experiment, but decided to scroll to the last page in the PDF.

What he saw at first made no sense. A formation of several men dressed in clothes of Mexican peasants, but standing alongside of them, a robot.



A robot that seemed eerily familiar, he thought as he quickly moved to his drafting table and pulled up the schematics of prototype #318, his latest breakthrough.

As he stared, moving his eyes between the two images, a thought occurred to him. “Look for it”, knowing the entire time it'd be there.

Opening up a copy of the picture in the company's high-end image editor, Carl zoomed in on the odd photo, and hidden on the lower quadrant of the robot's head was exactly what he expected to see, something only he knew to look for.

Etched in micro-printing were the words “CarlHansen@Neximrobotics.com”