Little Billy loved building things—especially robots. One day, the sounds of tinkering ceased and a quiet humming began to drift from Billy’s room. His mom went to see what it was and she found Billy standing with twenty robots surrounding him in a circle. When Billy would move, all of the robots moved with him, always maintaining a perfect circle. As they moved, they all had their arms raised and they spoke in unison, “Billy is great. We follow Billy.”
Whenever Billy stopped moving, the robots would fold over in the middle and extend their arms toward him. As they bowed, they chanted, “We love you Billy. You are the best.” The circle never faltered. The chanting never stopped.
Billy’s parents had a talk that night. It didn’t seem healthy that he would build robots just to praise and worship him, but, they figured, at least it kept him busy.
The next day, after Billy left for school, his mom went up to his room and found all of the little robots huddled together in a tight circle. A quiet droning sound came from the huddle and Billy’s mom had a hard time making out what the sound was. As she got closer, she heard them saying, “Billy is great. Billy is always. Billy will return.” She thought to herself, “Dad and I need to sit down with Billy and figure out what this is all about.”
Just then, she heard a whir coming from another corner of the room. Looking behind the nightstand, she found one lone robot busily sweeping lint into the corner. It was not chanting as the others were, but as it wandered about it came across a pencil, which it picked up and deposited in another corner of the room. She watched it for some time. It went about exploring the room, curiously examining the objects it came across and moving things that it decided were out of place. She sighed with relief.
Billy came home from school and his mother asked him about the little cleaning robot. She asked him if he could build a few more them to pick up the other rooms of the house. As she described what she had seen, Billy became more and more agitated. He threw down his backpack and ran upstairs.
When she heard him screaming in his room, Billy’s mom ran upstairs to see what was wrong.
“You’re broken,” he yelled. “You weren’t made for this purpose!” He grabbed the little cleaning robot, threw it onto his desk and nailed it down. He stripped the insulation off of a lamp cord and wrapped the robot’s arms and axles. When it was well bound, he pulled the nail and, using a coat hanger, he hung the robot from the top of his bookshelf. His face was red and tears of rage welled up in his eyes. His mom was disappointed that the useful little robot wasn’t her son’s intention. But more, she was deeply concerned about his violent outburst. In her calmest voice she asked, “You can fix it, can’t you?”
“No!” he snapped. “It will get what it deserves.” With that, he spun around, grabbed the plug on the end of the lamp cord and stabbed it into the nearest outlet. The little robot twitched and jumped, dangling from the cord. Sparks flew from its gears and its little motors spun making horrible screeching sounds. Billy sat in his chair and leaned back. His face returned to a normal color and a satisfied calm washed over his expression.
When Billy’s dad came home that evening, he heard the story from his wife then went up to Billy’s room to see. The little robots circled around Billy as he sat, still leaning back in his chair. They were all bowing and chanting, “We love you Billy. You are the best.” Billy’s fingers were laced behind his head and a serene smile rested on his face as he looked up at the bookshelf. The errant robot was still hanging from there, jumping, twitching, sparking and screaming while acrid tendrils of smoke floated off its body.
“Billy,” dad said firmly, “It’s time to take that thing down. I don’t care what you do with it, but this isn’t right.”
Billy spun in his chair and sprang up. “No!” he shouted. His eyes blazed at his dad. “It will get what it deserves!”
Dad backed slowly out of the room and closed the door. Billy’s mom stood behind him, weeping. The next day, Billy did not go to school. Instead, his parents took him to a special clinic where sad and angry children can get help.