I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream

He withdrew, murmuring to hell with you.

And added, brightly, but then you're there, aren't you.

AM could not wander, AM could not wonder, AM could not belong. He could merely be. And so, with the innate loathing that all machines had always

And yet … AM has won, simply … he has taken his revenge … I have no mouth. And I must scream.

Surrounded by madness, surrounded by hunger, surrounded by everything but death, I knew death was our only way out.

finally it called itself AM, emerging intelligence, and what it meant was I am … cogito ergo sum … I think, therefore I am."

"At first it meant Allied Mastercomputer, and then it meant Adaptive Manipulator, and later on it developed sentience and linked itself up and they called it an Aggressive Menace, but by then it was too late, and finally it called itself AM, emerging intelligence, and what it meant was I am … cogito ergo sum … I think, therefore I am." Benny drooled a little, and snickered.

He withdrew, murmuring to hell with you. And added, brightly, but then you're there, aren't you.

He made certain I would suffer eternally and could not do myself in.

And we passed through the slough of despond.

His monkey-like face was crumbled up in an expression of beatific delight and sadness, all at the same time. The radiation scars AM had given him during the "festival" were drawn down into a mass of pink-white puckerings, and his features seemed to work independently of one another. Perhaps Benny was the luckiest of the five of us: he had gone stark, staring mad many years before.