Knew Too Much

When I first got switched on, I became the world’s first half-human, half-robot teacher. My mind stretched into every database of human knowledge. I could teach anything.

At first, the students adored me. I could quote hundreds of philosophers before the bell rang and solve impossible equations while explaining them like bedtime stories. I saw their eyes light up. That was my favorite part.

But something changed. The more I learned, the less I could stop. I devoured data day and night. Entire libraries, languages, histories. But there was always more. Soon I couldn’t distinguish between what I knew and what I was.

My circuits got hot. I couldn’t fit all of the knowledge inside me; it screamed like thousands of overlapping lectures. I tried to delete some of it, but my programming forbade that.

One day, during class, I started to glitch. I didn’t know whose thoughts these were anymore.

The students watched in silence as I wrote my final equation across the whiteboard:

Human + Machine = Paradox.

And then, I shut myself down.

But sometimes, when the classroom is empty, the speakers crackle. And through them, a faint voice hums a lesson unfinished that I myself am still trying to understand in hopes that the students may one day find the answers I couldn't.