Sentry-chan

The sentry gun of course! There’s no way that you could resist having the iconic machine decorate your bedroom like it adorned the Valve offices. Oh the things you could do with a sentry gun! Go on walks, play fetch, rain bullets down on your enemies, go on car rides, take bubble baths, all the things! You scrolled to the sentry gun option, rotating the hologram so that it faced away from you, just in case. With all the faith in your body, you pressed the center button again and hoped with all your heart that something would happen. The counter on the PDA’s screen decreased from 200 to 70, and before your mind could even process how it got there, a red metal toolbox sat where the sentry gun hologram used to be.

The toolbox started to emit a cacophony of mechanical noises, as its top opened on its own and the sentry gun of your dreams began to assemble itself. But wait, that didn’t look… quite right. Metal plates slid into place as it became increasingly clear that this was not the little red turret that you were expecting. No, this was closer to a transformer or android of some sort. The frame had two legs, two arms, and a head, clearly humanoid in shape. You could only watch on in worried fascination as something unknown was built in your bedroom.

As the process continued, your permanently internet-bound brain had another realization. Oh my god, this wasn’t a sentry gun. Well, actually, maybe it was and wasn’t in a way. You had seen this robot before, this was sentry-chan! As if she was confirming your eureka moment, sentry-chan’s assembly completed with a final beep noise that indicated that she was now online. She began to scan to her right, beeping again before she started to sweep to the left. Her gaze fell upon you and a quick series of beeps indicated that she saw you. She just stared at you, as you tried to figure out what to do or say.

“Um, Hi there.”

She beeped again, then extended one of her small arms for a handshake. She was quite small and petite overall, certainly level one in proportions, but quite cute in her own way. You reach your sweaty, fleshy hand out and shake her hard metal mechanical appendage. The feeling woke you up in a way. Everything so far felt so surreal, like you were suddenly thrown into a high fidelity version of The Polar Express 4D Experience, but with fewer uncanny faces. But now that you could touch it, feel it, somehow it was more real.

Sentry-chan seemed to notice you getting distracted, and resumed scanning the room left to right and back again. That gave you a moment to ponder your next actions. Did you want to try communicating? What about revealing the mystery of the PDA you were still holding on to? What about some experiments, like trying to upgrade sentry-chan to level two? First take some selfies and post them to your socials?