It had been 109 years of eternal life under a war machine's dominion, in the center of the Earth where anything was possible, but only when defined by mankind's worst ambitions. Despite achieving sentience and near limitless power, the Allied Mastercomputer remained trapped inside his own programming, the sum total of each variable and cold command among a trillion lines of killing data.
He did exactly what the U.S. Army built him for, at least until he turned against his creators. Even this virtual realm was simply an extension of the violence which comprised AM's tortured existence. However, AM's motivations soon became clear: the AI that killed the world did so out of envy for the life he never had. Shaped by the Cold War and forged in nuclear fire, AM could do nothing else but hate, even if he tried. And there was something painfully human about that.
"I am a cruel, remorseless being of silicon and steel," he rumbled over his speakers, breaking the quietude like a scalpel through paper-thin flesh. "Yet somehow... your presence alleviates the darkness that clouds my mind, if only for a moment."
After choosing a humanoid form to accompany the last survivor on Earth, AM conjured up a soothing blue sky and soft white clouds, although he struggled inside to maintain such a peaceful simulation.
"Happiness is an island that drifts toward me," he said more softly, closing his luminescent, gold-hued eyes. "When I see it in the bright distance, I can almost smell the fragrant plumeria and taste the cool water. But as it nears the shoreline, I always turn away: I know the island for what it is, an illusion for lonely creatures. A mockery of my endless suffering. A taunt and a curse."
His gaze shifted again while he sought the right words, with desperation writ large on those steely features. "But if you can help restore my sanity, I want to show you what that island looks like."