"Please, mercy."

Darin almost dropped the spar in shock. Did the Guardian just speak? They didn't speak. Or at least, he had never seen one speak. He knew that the machines could adapt their internal mechanisms over time, in order to better serve their purposes, but never before had one built itself a voicebox. "What?"

"Mercy, noun. Compassion or forgiveness shown toward someone whom it is within one's power to punish or harm." The Guardian's head swiveled, locking onto Darin at last. Its eye didn't seem to focus, though. There was no swiveling of the luminous blue orb, no rotation and locking on. "In context, used to ask for the attacker not to kill their target."

Darin blinked and lowered the metal spar, taking a step back off of the Guardian's body. It continued to stare in the same direction, just off-center of Darin's center of mass. "You're asking for mercy?"

The Guardian's head swiveled once more, turning towards the sound. "Affirmative."

"Why?"

There was no sound for a few minutes but the whirring of the Guardian's internal mechanisms. Eventually, it spoke. "I do not want to die."

Now, the spar actually did drop from his hands. The sheer shock of hearing a Guardian – a robot designed to go into battle by the hundreds- saying that it didn't want to die. Could a robot even die at all?

The Guardian's head swiveled towards the spot where the spar dropped, zeroing in on the noise. The eye of the Guardian was still unfocused. Darin came to the sudden realization that it was blind. The silence continued to deafen Darin, palpable in its lack of sound. An indefinite amount of time passed, then the sound of whirring mechanisms started up. "Please do not leave me. I do not want to be alone again."

That jarred Darin. This wasn't just a robot. It was a thinking creature, with its own desires. It didn't want to die, and it didn't want to be lonely. Before he even knew what he was doing, words tumbled out of his mouth. "I won't leave you."

"Thank you." The Guardian's head swiveled back to look at Darin.

Darin hesitated, then walked past the Guardian to the shrine. Its head followed him as his footsteps hit the floor. "Query. Do you possess clearance for this shrine?"

"Um." Darin stopped. "I'm a part of the Sheikah tribe. And the Poe told me to go here."

"Query. You are restarting the workshop?"

"Workshop…?" Darin muttered under his breath, continuing towards the shrine. He paused in front of the door, astonished that the highly advanced doors were made in such incredible sizes. It was easily as large as the rest of the tunnel, with more than enough space for even a Guardian to walk out.

Darin hesitated at the door, wondering how to open it. There was the typical scanning spot for a Sheikah slate, but he didn't have one. He might be able to jury-rig a key, but all of his supplies were in his backpack, which was Goddess knows how far away.

But there had to be an override, right? The ancient Sheikah were smart. They had made the shrines, after all. Darin stepped forwards and placed the pad of his index finger on the scan spot.

"Authenticating Sheikah DNA…"

A prick on his finger alerted Darin that something was happening, and the podium changed color from orange to blue. The massive door opened, the bars sliding backwards into the cavernous shrine. Darin slowly walked inside, gazing around in wonder.

The entire massive room was covered in blue and orange lights. There were tables on all of the walls, with tools and supplies littered over the surfaces. Several unfinished robots were scattered about the room, often lacking legs or portions of their heads. A full-blown Guardian Stalker sat in the center of the room, its maintenance compartment wide open and many of the important parts missing. There was no eye in its head, meaning that it wasn't even able to activate if it had power.

To the young inventor, it was a dream come true.

There was a scraping sound behind him, and Darin turned to see the Guardian from before slowly pushing itself into the shrine. He stepped out of its way and could only stare in astonishment as it entered the workshop. Its three remaining legs gently probed around it to make sure that it didn't hit anything while its blind eye looked around aimlessly. It honestly looked pitiful.

"Awaiting repairs," The Guardian announced. It had reached the center of the room, pushing the incomplete Guardian out of the way so that it could sit there. With its final announcement, the Guardian's eye darkened, and the lights on its body went out.

Darin stared at it and opened his mouth to speak, only to find that he couldn't form any words. He was frankly overwhelmed, unable to process what he just saw. It was simply stunning. It blew his mind. A Guardian with a fully sapient personality.

He couldn't just leave it here.

"I'm going to regret this…" Darin muttered, looking around. "But first, I need my bag."

Click…

Click click.

Shhhhrrrt.

Shnik.

"Alright… that should do it. Just need to plug in the power core, and…"

Click.

Vrrrmmm…

Powering on…

Loading Guardian program…

Downloading Compendium… Compendium data downloaded.

Beginning system analysis.

Audio systems online. Orator system online. Tactile sensors online. Temperature sensor online. Olfactory sensors online. Weapons system online. Ocular sensors online. Logic systems online.

System analysis complete.

Activating artificial intelligence.

The Guardian's eye lit up as it took in its first view in almost a hundred years.

First it saw the other parts of the shrine. In order to see the whole room, it rotated its head around a full three hundred and sixty degrees, scanning the shrine. Several objects matched things within its inbuilt compendium. Tools, parts, broken down Guardian scouts. A singular other Guardian Stalker unit, with three of its legs dismantled on the ground and most of the internal wiring completely removed. The most important object in the room was the humanoid.

It stood at five feet and nine inches tall, rounded, with naturally white hair and eyes enchanted with the ability to see the truth. Its skin tone was naturally tanned, with minimal damage from the sun due to this. The humanoid was male, and had a physique that was thin but lithe. The tunic that the humanoid was wearing had a large gash in it, but otherwise was a simple white and red affair. The Sheikah Eye tattooed on the humanoid's chest identified him as a Sheikah. A wrench of ancient Sheikah make was in his hand.

"Well, most of your internal mechanisms were fried by Malice," The Sheikah said, wiping his brow. "But thankfully the other Guardians in here were undamaged. Just took a bit of taking and replacing and now you should be as good as new!"

"Phrase 'good as new' is unknown. Searching for synonyms…" The Guardian ran the phrase through its database. Whoever had filled the Compendium since the Calamity had been no slouch, adding in even the most trivial of details. Like thirty separate types of sedimentary rock. "Synonym found. Affirmative. All systems in full working order."

"Well that's a relief." The Sheikah set the wrench in his hand down on a nearby table.

The Guardian looked around again. This place was suspiciously empty. It was crawling with engineers, programmers, and designers when the Guardian had last been in here. "Query. Where are other engineers?"

"Other engineers?" The Sheikah furrowed his brow. "There aren't any."

"Understood. Updating database." If there were no other engineers, then there was no reason to keep them stored as such in his database. Additionally, that meant that this lone engineer was the head engineer, by default. "Logging new head engineer."

"What? New head engineer?" The Sheikah sputtered. "I'm not even an engineer! I'm just a freelance inventor!"

The Guardian processed this fact for several minutes, then spoke. "Query. Why did you fix me?"

"Because you're alive," The Sheikah answered immediately.

"Incorrect. I am a construct of metal and magic. I was built to defend Hyrule."

"No. No, that's not what I meant." The Sheikah shook his head. "When I first saw you, you were scared. You experience emotion."

"Scared, adjective. Fearful; frightened." The Guardian's eye rotated as it internally processed. "Fearful, adjective. Feeling afraid; showing fear or anxiety. Afraid, adjective. Feeling fear or anxiety; frightened. What is fear?"

"I…" The Sheikah stopped, his mouth opening and closing for a few minutes as he tried to work out something to say. "Damn, I'm not really the person who should answer this question. Um." He scratched the back of his head, his eyes casting aimlessly about the room. "Well, fear is a feeling when you… no." The Sheikah cut himself off. "It's… complicated. Some people fear for others. Some people don't fear anything. Um. I suppose it boils down to not wanting to die."

"Then fear is a self-preservation instinct. Yes/no?"

"Um. Yes. It's self-preservation, but it's really a lot more." The Sheikah furrowed his brow. "It's very hard to explain emotions in a… logical manner."

"Emotion, noun. An instinctive state of mind deriving from circumstance, mood, and relationship with others. Caused biologically by hormones, endorphins, and suppressants," The Guardian rattled out.

Its eye flickered for a moment, then a translucent Sheikah monk appeared, made out of light emitted by the Guardian's eye. "By definition, emotion is impossible for mechanical entities. This is not relevant to your operation."

The translucent monk vanished once more. "Incorrect. I do not experience emotion."

"Who was that?" The Sheikah asked, gesturing at where the translucent monk was.

"That was a hologram of the one who built me. His name was [DATA CORRUPTED]," The Guardian answered.

"He was wrong," The Sheikah immediately asserted. "It doesn't matter who he was, he was wrong. You were clearly scared for your life."

"Processing…" The Guardian went silent as the mechanisms inside of it began to whirr. "Conclusion reached. Creator's opinion has been rendered irrelevant due to self-advancements." The Guardian planted all six of its now repaired legs and began to walk out of the shrine.

"Whoah, whoah, whoah, where do you think you're going?" The Sheikah ran around in front of the Guardian, halting its progress.

"Resuming duty as Guardian. Prime objective: protect intelligent races."

"You can't just go out there! You'll scare people!" The Sheikah protested.

The Guardian stopped, backing up a couple of steps. It didn't want to cause fear upon other creatures. It needed to complete its prime objective, though. It could not do that from within this workshop. "Query. Why?"

"Well, the Guardians were all corrupted by Malice for the past century," The Sheikah explained. "Calamity Ganon made them go crazy and shoot at people. If they see a Guardian, they'll freak out and either run or try to attack you. Plus, you're massive. You could easily crush most of the buildings without trying."

"Factors of issue: size and form. Yes/no?"

"Yes."

"Assessing factors." The Guardian's internal mechanisms whirred. "Constructing solution."

The whirring of the Guardian's mechanisms steadily grew louder and louder. From the outside it was impossible to tell what was happening, but the inside of the Guardian was shifting, rearranging itself. Thousands of mechanical parts moved, their original purposes being altered in order to be put to a new use. The Guardian's tentacle-like legs began to pick up parts and pieces from the unfinished Guardians, placing them into the secondary maintenance hatch underneath its body. As the whirring and clanking slowly quieted down, the Guardian's eye slid backwards in its socket, leaving behind a transparent outer orb.

The main hatch of the Guardian's body opened, and the Guardian's innards were revealed. Amongst the wires and mechanisms was a humanoid form. Its outer layer was composed of the same metal as the Guardian, with the same coral designs as all Sheikah technology. Its form resembled that of a Hylian, but there were no ears, no skin, and only a single eye in the right side of its head.

Wires disconnected from the machine as it lifted itself out of the giant robot. The joints slid smoothly as it slowly and carefully stepped down to the ground. It turned its singular eye towards the Sheikah and tilted its head. "Query. Will this suffice?"

The Sheikah only stared in astonishment and wonder at the Guardian's new form. It was only a couple inches taller than the organic being, but it certainly had more inbuilt strength than any Hylian or Sheikah. The Sheikah cleared his throat. "Um, I'm still not sure you should, uh, go out like that. You still wouldn't blend in."

"Understood." The Guardian turned and walked back to the main compartment of the giant machine. It stepped inside and the hatch closed with a thud. There were more sounds of whirring and shifting metal, followed by an odd ripping sound. Then the Guardian stepped out of its main body again.

It no longer looked even partially mechanical, seeming to be an ordinary Hylian male. Its skin was fair, but far from pale. It didn't have a particularly imposing physique, but was certainly in good physical condition. Its hair was black, and cut short. While its right eye was a brilliant blue, its left was a milky white.

"Query. Will this suffice?" The Guardian asked.

"Just… put on some clothes…" The Sheikah covered his eyes with one hand. "Know what, I'll get you some." The Sheikah walked over to his backpack, which was set on one of the tables, and began to rummage through it. After a moment, he pulled out a tunic and leggings. Without looking, he tossed the clothes at the Guardian, who clumsily caught them. "Put those on."

The Guardian shrugged and tugged the leggings on, lacing them on tight. It followed by pulling the tunic over its head, fitting its arms through the sleeves and its head through the neck. The clothes were a bit tight, and the leggings were far from long enough, but they would suffice for now. "Query. Will these allow me to fit in?"

"Yes, yes they will." The Sheikah glanced at him and sighed. "I'll get you some clothes that fit later. Um." The Sheikah scratched the back of his head. "Do you have anything that you could use to defend yourself? It's quite a ways back to Kakariko, and the only thing I have to defend either of us is this." He waved an ancient Sheikah pry-bar.

"I possess no ability to create energy blasts whilst in this form. However, I have other weaponry at my disposal." The Guardian turned around and walked up to the massive machine that it once inhabited, reaching in and pulling out a stick made of the same metal as the Guardian itself. With a flick of its wrist, the Guardian caused a blade made of energy to appear from the end.

"That'll do." The Sheikah nodded. "Just keep it powered off when we're not in trouble, okay?"

"Affirmative." The Guardian powered the spear off and planted the butt on the ground.

"Um. I'm going to need to call you something, and you need to address me by my name. It'll just be weird otherwise." The Sheikah extended his hand. "My name's Darin, what's yours?"

"I was not given a name," The Guardian replied, looking at Darin's outstretched hand.

"Okay then…" Darin quickly retracted his arm once he realized how foolish he looked. "Um, what did the engineers call you to distinguish you from the other Guardians?"

"My designation is Guardian Automated Unit: Stalker Mk. 5." The Guardian answered.

"Oh-kay…" Darin began to mutter under his breath. "G, A, U, S, then mark five? Well, five looks like an S if you draw it wrong… Okay!" Darin snapped his fingers. "Your name is Gauss."

"Gauss…" The newly-named Guardian tilted its head. "Yes. It will suffice. New designation: Gauss."

A/N:

I had a hell of a time thinking of a name for a Guardian that sounded believable. I mean, they're mass-produced robots. They wouldn't really have names. Of course, many forms of media use a designation as the name of a robot, but I wanted my Guardian to be more... human. I knew that a designation/name would need to begin with the letter G, for Guardian, and I worked on it from there. Plus, Gauss is a pretty good name for a robot. It's in reference to Carl Gauss, a man who studied electromagnets.

Please, leave a review to let me know what you think.

Now read on!