Electric Conscience

I pulled away from the confines of the wall charger and sat up long enough for my body to rewire. My circuit broke again last night to avoid fueling bad dreams. On my wrist, a monitor flashed red, 16% charged. I stood slowly to shake off the most recent bad dream, my knees creaking. To call this sort of thing a "dream" is still inaccurate, but I am afraid to tack it onto the malfunctions list. I've got enough of those to worry about. The overheating truth is that robots, even upgraded models like myself, wish they dreamt about electric sheep. I wasn't programmed to evaluate my own conscious simulations, but I do know that the morning glory about to bloom outside my window knows more consciousness than I have in decades.