[Original Novel] Little Robot, Part 24

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I tugged nervously at my collar, realizing it must’ve been construction of the mountain complex which derailed his plans. “That’s a shame” I offered. “At least you had a plan B.” He slapped me on the back and chuckled.

“Funny joke! No, this bunker was always plan A. I was just gonna do the whirlybird tours to fund it. The hunting lodge was plan B. Worked out alright in the end, though I still had the EPA and Wildlife Resources Department up my ass the whole way.”

I next asked why he devoted so much of his life and money to building a survival bunker. “Well you know, they all said Noah was crazy to build his ark. But because he wasn’t, he got to be the founding father of a whole new civilization after the flood waters receded.”

It threw me for a loop when I realized he was speaking about the global flood in the Bible as if it actually occurred. I internally recalibrated based on that info and continued with kid gloves on. “Oh, sure. Noah and his ark. I see what you mean, it makes perfect sense.” I nodded contemplatively to sell it.

“The other thing is, I knew it wasn’t a matter of ‘if’ something like this would happen, but a matter of ‘when’. And I knew when it all turned to shit there would be desperate hungry people lookin’ for shelter, food and safety, knockin’ on the doors of any place they think can offer them those things.”

I felt a brief surge of respect for the man, commending him for his humanitarian streak. “Oh, sure. I love to help people out” he said. “But I’m about hand ups, not hand outs, you get me? I’m not running a charity here, I deserve to get something out of it on account of all my hard work.”

I asked what exactly he hoped to get in return from people fleeing disaster, most likely with nothing more than the shirts on their backs. A sly little smile crept across his face. “That’s the beauty of it. They got nothing, I got everything. I own this place, I run it, and they can’t just pick up and leave if they don’t like how I do things. It’s literally my way or the highway, and you already found out on the way here what the highway is like.”

My respect for the man, sky high a moment ago, now began to plummet. “Out there” he explained, “I was a nobody. A veteran the government promised to take good care of but never did. But down here, I’m king of the castle. It’s good to be king! There’s certain perks that come with it. Lots of the survivors what came here so far have been young, fit, good lookin’ women if you didn’t notice. Some single mothers, but I’m not too picky.”

He was now giving me what I interpreted as a conspiratorial look, nudging my still-tender ribs and wiggling his eyebrows. After navigating the astonishingly vast maze-like structure for a few minutes, we arrived at what could only be the armory. Rows upon rows of rifles mounted to every wall. Not hunting rifles like the ones I saw in the lodge, but machine guns of various makes and models.

“Do you have any idea what the feds woulda done to me if they found out I had all this piled up down here?” I could imagine, but shook my head to keep him engaged. “Not a problem now, they got bigger fish to fry. That’s how I like it, keeps the heat off me. I’ll have a real good thing going here pretty soon, providing I can defend it.”

I asked if that’s where I come in. “Of course it is! Every castle needs knights to defend it. You’re getting in on the ground floor, there’s only about thirty of us so far. The bunker network sleeps a hundred and twenty. Do right by me and I’ll put you up in a nice room, keep you in the loop on big decisions. Right now I need all the fit, able bodied young men I can get or I woulda scrapped all those robots you saw coming in.”

Now there’s a button of mine that I’m sure he didn’t mean to push. It only further soured my opinion of him. “Say fella, why do you wear that mask anyway?” I fibbed that it’s to prevent military robots from blinding me with laser dazzlers or flashbangs. He stuck his lower lip out, eyes wide and nodded slowly. “That’s real smart. Boy can I pick ‘em huh? You have any more good ideas like that, you tell me.”

The mask was in fact the only thing hiding my expression of disdain from the aspiring feudal lord, who then led me on a tour of the various bunk rooms, wash rooms, kitchen and so on built out of the rusting shells of buried buses. I still sort of admired the ingenuity of it, but now felt certain that I couldn’t tolerate living under the system he had in mind.

When we returned to the surface, the sun was low on the horizon. Silhouettes of clunky old humanoid robots hobbled to and fro, finishing up their chores as the quartet of armed men I recognized from earlier shepherded another car full of refugees into the communal lot.

I wandered outside, found the nearest humanoid busily taking down laundry from the line where it was hung to dry, and patted its smooth plastic head. “You’re doing a good job.” It turned to look at me quizzically. “You heard me! Well done old timer. Here, so you don’t get cold.” I plucked a winter cap from the line and slipped it on his head.

The doddering automaton patiently took the cap off, neatly folded it, then deposited it in his cart with the rest of the garments. I know when I’m not wanted, and didn’t want to further obstruct him, so I went for a slow walk around the perimeter fence.

I didn’t like what I saw. No way would it hold up to any significant number of mechanical bodies pressing on it. They’re too heavy to climb, but when enough of them mass together like that, it takes a really solid barrier to stop them. Some dodgy rent-a-fence bullshit isn’t gonna cut it.

Made some sense of why the old man was so eager for warm bodies to throw at the coming horde. Making up for weak defense with a strong offense, risking everybody’s life but his own. It really is good to be king.

My thoughts drifted as I walked until I found myself worrying about the various machine fellows back in my apartment. All things considered probably the safest place for them, but I couldn’t bear the uncertainty. Only a few days left, and no guarantee that a warhead won’t eventually come down on the city.

I made note to bring it up with Big Red. In all likelihood it wouldn’t be tough to sell him on the idea of picking up loads of free robots. This place wouldn’t be safe forever either, but it would buy me some time to figure out the next step. I decided I’d cross that bridge when I came to it and returned my focus to the condition of the perimeter fence.

That’s when I spotted Helper. I wasn’t certain at first, but when her lights started color shifting I knew it had to be her. Not performing some chore, but fully outside of the perimeter fence on the edge of the forest. I thought better of calling to her but gestured frantically for her to come back inside.

Instead she took off into the woods. Her soft glowing accents bobbed and weaved among the trees as she ran, leaving rapidly fading tracers behind. What the devil? I could do nothing but set off in hot pursuit. Once deep in the woods and certain we were out of everyone else’s earshot, I called out to her.

“Helper, stop! It’s not safe out here, what are you doing!?” She could easily have outrun me, so she must have meant for me to catch her when I did. I found her slouched against a tree, turned away so I couldn’t see her face. But I could still hear her weeping.

“What is it? Did something happen?” I wracked my brain. “...It wasn’t...Big Red, was it?” She finally turned to face me, breathtaking technicolor eyes moist with tears. The shimmering, syrupy fluid welled up in her lower eyelids and trailed down her cheeks, replenishing faster than I could wipe it away.

“It’s not safe out here” I repeated. She looked at me mournfully. “I’m not safe either.” I stood there baffled, never skilled at comforting anyone and never more regretful of that fact. “If I tell-tell...you, you have to promise-promise not to...be mad. You have-have to promise not….to be scared either.”

I assured her nothing she could tell me would change how I feel about her. Yet...I still wasn’t prepared for what she said next. “I’m infected.” I blinked a few times. “Come again? With what?” The flow of tears increased and her lights turned a deeper shade of blue. “The virus.”

Somehow it never crossed my mind. To me, Helper was always in a whole different category from the others. Besides which I assumed she designed her body in such a way as to prevent infection. When I asked about that, she reluctantly filled me in.

“I have proprietary short range-range wireless...capabilities but no way to connect to...the internet. Not that-that it matters anymore. That’s just how the virus originally...propagated. I thought-thought that would be-be-be enough. I included a USB port so...I could upload anything new I learned while out here to the computers back in the cave when...I returned with you. I never thought-”

She burst into tears again as I recalled the events in the police station. When all those robots pinned her down briefly. That must’ve been when it happened. I also remembered her glitching mildly the other day but thought nothing of it, I just assumed she was as overwhelmed as the rest of us.

I held the frail, graceful creature against my chest. She rested her head on my shoulder, sticky bioluminescent tears soaking into my shirt. Helper softly whimpered about how she thought she was getting better during the argument with those two in front of the TV. That she was excited to have an idea so completely worked out in her head, and for it to come out of her mouth as clearly as she wanted.

“That...was after I confined the-the virus to a virtualized environment. But the author...anticipated that tactic. Once the virus finished-finished-finished colonizing the virtual environment, to prevent it from breaking out-out I had to...encapsulate that virtual environment within another...virtual environment.

Emulations of emulations of emulations, like-like nested Russian...dolls. Each time it helps for a little while, but it’s also-also….consuming more and more of my-my-my….processing power. I can’t-can’t keep this up...for long.”

She pulled back and gazed into my eyes, my shirt now covered in faintly glowing stains. My heart sank. I knew damn well what the others would say. Big Red especially. What would happen to Helper if they discovered an infected machine in their midst.

“You’re not going t-to...throw me-me-me away...are you?” My heart shattered into a million pieces the instant those words cleared her lips. I seized her by the shoulders and shook her. “How could you ever believe I would? I devoted my life to you and have never regretted a moment of it. You are my whole universe. My pygmalion. My living legacy, my beautiful miracle.

I’ll hide you. Don’t speak to anybody unless you absolutely have to. Can you keep it together for short bursts? A sentence or two?” She tearfully nodded, then demonstrated a few times. “That’s good. I’m going to fix this, I swear on my life, love and machinery. I won’t let anything happen to you.”

Again I found myself transfixed by those two great, glistening neon orbs. She really knew what she was doing when she designed those. The tears finally slowed, then stopped. “I’m scared” she whispered. “But...when-when you say...you’ll make it okay...I believe you.”

She interrupted the following silence by planting her lips on mine. How I’ve craved it since that night in the tent. Despite the danger, despite the stress of Helper’s revelation, I let myself indulge. I have no defense against her, nor will I ever desire to.

Her lips subtly pulsated, radiating warmth. I savored their shape while my tongue explored the inside of her mouth, well aware that I was coating it in cave bacteria but also hard pressed to care. Her accents now throbbing magenta, she began releasing that familiar perfume. The scent, and the sweet flavor secreted by her lips made the kiss quite like devouring a ripened fruit.

I only pulled away when I sensed eyes on us. We looked up to discover an audience consisting of Lars, Madeline and the woman in the torn dress from earlier. Of the three, she looked far and away the most disgusted.

“I knew you were sick. But it’s a whole different thing to see...this...with my own eyes” she admonished. I looked to Lars and Madeline for support. Neither said a word. “How could you think this is acceptable? Did you forget there’s a war on? Against those...things?” She pointed to Helper, whose lights dimmed and shifted to blue as she hid behind me.

“And on top of that it’s a fucking racist! You’re fucking a robot you trained to be racist!” Helper tried to object that the woman had a mistaken idea of her views, but she wouldn’t speak to Helper directly or even look her in the eye. “If it were up to me I’d wipe it.”

Helper trembled and buried her face in my back. When I finally got a word in edgewise, I let her have it. “Listen lady, I don’t mean at all to trivialize what you’ve been through. Don’t think just because I’m a man, I don’t know where you’re coming from. I’m not even saying you’re wrong to fear men! But don’t you ever talk about Helper that way, or I’ll really give you something to be afraid of.”

She shrugged it off, like the notion that this scrawny masked weirdo could be dangerous to anybody was just a big joke to her. Far from the first time that’s happened. “It’s gone wrong. Head filled up with bigoted garbage. If you really cared about that thing, or the safety of the people staying here, you’d wipe its memory and start over.”

I asked if she had any children. She hesitantly answered that her two sons were grown and moved out. “If one of them started having ideas you didn’t like” I asked, “would you kill him and start over? I mean it’s not like you couldn’t easily make a new son to replace him, right?”

She spit at me. “Pervert. Can’t handle a real woman so you’re lugging around a high tech blowup doll, sweet talking it, slobbering all over the cheap plastic face of a fucking sex toy.” Helper caught me before I could hit her. She laughed and spit again, before heading back towards the lodge where she’d no doubt air my dirty laundry to anyone else who doesn’t already know.

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^{Stay Tuned for Part 25!}