Even if I had been convinced by this argument, my conviction would have been short-lived. When I took the data down to the repair shop the next evening, I discovered that mechanical robots like the ones Talos were currently making were about to become obsolete, 'gone the way of the internal combustion engine,' as Raoul put it.
The thing clamped into the stand on Raoul's workbench looked pretty creepy. The skeleton of the arm was stainless steel, as were the finger bones – all three of them, plus an opposable thumb, which were all way longer than normal. Instead of the usual cables, rods and servo motors, Raoul had built up sections of his artificial fibre into muscles. These were pale, greenish and gleamed wetly.
"What do you think of it?" Raoul asked, as he unveiled it with a flourish.
I didn't want to say it looked like a giant flayed frog's leg, so I just said "Wow!"
Raoul grinned proudly, and stroked his prototype limb in a way that made me uncomfortable. The sickly-looking muscles were arranged in opposing pairs, like those in a human arm. If you want the elbow joint to bend, the muscle above the joint contracts and the one below relaxes. If you want the limb to straighten, the top muscle relaxes and the one under the joint contracts. Similar pairs control the rotation of the forearm.
There was a control receiver in the arm at the shoulder, and Raoul had the sender plugged into his computer. He flipped a switch, and I saw the arm muscles quiver – literally galvanised.
"Pass the bottle of soda," Raoul said. I held the open drink towards him. "Not to me, to the arm," he said.
I tried to keep my fingers around the back of the bottle as I moved it towards the alien hand: I didn't want that thing to touch me. Or worse, grab my wrist. It was an irrational fear, but I couldn't shake it off. I watched with grim fascination as the disembodied arm rotated and the fingers opened. I pushed the bottle into the open hand, and the fingers closed smoothly round it. I think it was the naturalness of the movements that made it seem so unnatural.
"It only has basic pressure feedback sensors so far," Raoul said. "It can hold an egg without crushing it." He placed a glass on the table under the hand and returned to his keyboard. The arm rotated and poured soda from the bottle down into the glass. "Already it has a better than human typing speed," Raoul said, "with only one hand." He made typing movements and grinned some more. I think he could tell that I wasn't overwhelmed. He released the arm from its clamps and set it down on its fingers, with the arm sticking straight up in the air. Raoul keyed another sequence, and the thing's fingers bent and straightened, as if it was doing press-ups. The skinny little arm, bent almost double, remained perfectly balanced. Then the hand began to move, slowly at first, then scurrying about like a giant phlegm-coloured scorpion. Raoul had saved the best until last, and I couldn't help but laugh. Finally the arm fell, and the fingers pointed upwards, still wiggling, and we laughed even more.
Although the prototype was crude and freaky-looking, you could see the potential of it. Even in this state, its movements were far smoother and more controlled than anything a mechanical system could achieve. Raoul had filed a patent application earlier in the month – I'd helped him put together the documentation and diagrams. He'd described the fibre itself and its use in the movements of artificial limbs. Once the application had been approved, Raoul could begin seeking partners to work on developing and manufacturing the prosthetics. Arms and hands were obviously the first step, as he'd be able to create replacements which were far more sophisticated than anything available today. Not only would their movements be more natural, with almost no delay between thought and movement, but they could – potentially – provide more feedback to their user: everything from the warmth of an object to its texture.
Raoul knew that as soon as his invention was made public, companies would start circling like vultures. Not because they wanted to help Raoul create the next generation of medical prostheses, but because they would want to use his fibre and be the first to create a generation of human-like robots – to end the day of the robot and begin the era of the android. The first company to manufacture the fibre would have a commercial advantage over its competitors, as mechanical robots would become obsolete overnight.
"Licence it to them," I suggested. "All of them. The money they give you will allow you to set up your own foundation to create the prostheses."
"I don't want them to hev it," Raoul said. "I did not develop this to provide ultra-expensive robots for the two percent. Besides, no company is going to want to share the design: they will want exclusive rights."
I knew Raoul was right, but there had to be some sort of compromise that would work to everyone's benefit.
"Raoul is right," Phyllis said, coming in behind me. "We've talked this through, tried every possible angle. Any company that got access to the muscle fibre design would want to suppress its use in low-cost prosthetic limbs – because people would say: if you can make these limbs so cheaply, why do you charge such exorbitant prices for your androids?"
The arguments kept stacking up against Raoul and his dream of helping those people who most deserved to benefit from his creation. I sighed. Phyllis stood beside Raoul and he put his (real) arm around her waist.
"We have already agreed that there is only one thing we can do," Phyllis said. Raoul nodded.
"I will publish my design, every detail, and allow free use of it by anyone who has a use for it," Raoul said.
"Put it in the public domain? But that would mean that any company could use it free of charge too," I said.
"True," Phyllis said, "but so would their competitors: they would have to compete in an equal market, they could not charge inflated prices if they did not have a monopoly."
"And the manufacturers of prosthetic limbs would have free use of it too," I said.
"That is what I em hoping," Raoul said.
"We have to keep this secret until the patent has been granted," Phyllis said. "We have no legal protection until then."
"In the meantime, we have to be careful," I said. "If any of the companies get a sniff of this, they may try and put the pressure on you to stop you releasing your design to the world."
"That's why we had to tell you this, Stevie," Phyllis said. "By being here, you put yourself at risk too."
She and Raoul were prepared to risk their lives to protect his life's work. Was I?
Chapter Eight
It was Nathan's idea to ambush a police patrol. "You ever flown a sky suit?" He asked. I hadn't. If I'd given it some thought, I might have been suspicious of his motives, but sometimes you just get carried away by an idea. Deep down you know what you're doing is stupid, but when someone says 'have you ever wondered what it would be like to fly?' logic doesn't really come into it. There are some things you just do, because doing them is more important than any possible consequences. It just seemed like a great idea. At the time.
When you're a kid, there's always a gang you secretly wish you could be part of. Punks, Goths, Hells Angels, Zeroids or whatever. You want to wear the clothes. Speak the secret language. Proudly display the colours or the logo. You know you'll never be able to join them, but if you could... I always wanted to be a StormRider. There is something incredibly seductive about the blend of man-made technology and nature's elemental forces. The suit itself is like magic armour that gives you the strength of a superhero. A negative-feedback counter-gravity field generated inside the suit cushions the wearer almost completely from any kind of external force: you can walk through an inferno or ride the shockwave of an explosion – you're almost invulnerable. And with a CG unit on your back, you can fly right into the heart of a tornado or a thunderhead and ride the storm.
The suits are hugely expensive, of course, and were developed for the military. Then the homeland security forces came up with uses for them. Their use is restricted by law, but like all military hardware, sky suits occasionally find their way onto the black market. StormRiders give them custom paint jobs before christening them in the eye of the stor
m.
Nathan's plan was to lure an armoured police patrol out to an old warehouse in one of the blitzed zones, hijack the control system of his suit to disable him, and them make him hand over the suit to us. Then we'd figure how to fly the thing for ourselves. Like I said, it seemed like a fun idea at the time.
It felt like Nathan and me were growing apart as time went on. We hadn't fallen out as such, we just seemed to have less in common than we'd thought. We were sort of avoiding each other, spending as much time out of our shared apartment as we could. I was spending most of my time at the repair shop or out scavenging spares. While Nathan had been hanging out with The Insurgents ever since the warehouse incident. He wasn't wearing their colours yet, but it was only a matter of time. He was trying to persuade me to join the group too: I got the feeling that he was trying to prove his worth to them by recruiting me – my knowledge of robot control software was a marketable skill, and I suppose Nathan felt that if he couldn't impress them with his own abilities, he could at least get the credit for securing mine. Only I didn't want to be secured, which only added to the tension between us. Maybe Nathan's original motive for trying to hijack a sky suit was to gain himself some credibility points with his new gang.
Another reason for him wanting to take a can-opener to an armoured policeman was the motorbike. Nathan had spent a lot of time, and more of our money than he should have, getting himself back on two wheels. He put the bike together from salvaged parts. And it was a monster. The engine was a big old ethanol burner that had come out of something much bigger than a bike, and all the metal work had the greyish gleam of an old revolver. It looked good and it sounded great.
The trouble began with a parking ticket. Nathan had left his bike in a side street while he went into some junk shop to check out an 'antique' leather jacket someone had told him about. He came out wearing the cracked and scuffed black animal hide twenty minutes later, and discovered that his bike had been towed away by traffic cops. They left his helmet in the gutter with a ticket stuck to the visor telling him where to go to reclaim the vehicle, and how much he'd have to pay to get it back. He was left to walk home in his new biker jacket, carrying his helmet under his arm. He was not a happy chap.
I gave Nathan the money to pay the fine and get his bike back, partly because he was a mate and I might occasionally need a lift on the bike, but mostly because he was threatening to break into the yard where the police kept the impounded vehicles. He didn't just want his bike back, he wanted revenge: he'd burn down their building and blow up their cars and, when they came running out into the road to escape the flames, he'd perform unspeakable acts on their person. So I handed over the money and went with him to the impound yard to reclaim the bike: I figured it was worth it for my own peace of mind – I didn't want him to end up hurt, imprisoned, or worse.
Nathan presented the ticket to the desk sergeant. The sergeant's badge said Ramirez. His jet black hair was starting to thin at the front and he seemed to be compensating by growing a thick moustache which almost hid his mouth. His uniform shirt was stretched tight and there was an unhealthy sheen to his skin.
"Wait here," Ramirez said. He disappeared into a tiny office behind him and returned moments later with a sheaf of brittle yellow and green print-outs. I didn't like the expression on his face as he scanned the papers. "Your vehicle is unregistered and unlicensed," he said.
"I just bought it, day before yesterday," Nathan said, knowing he had fourteen days to register ownership. He'd had the bike for almost three months, but the authorities didn't know that.
"Vehicles brought to this depot are also subject to safety and emissions tests," Ramirez said, flipping to another page.
"I know there's a couple of things need fixing," Nathan said. "I was going to get them sorted before I registered the bike."
Ramirez looked over the top of the papers at Nathan. "Follow me, sir," he said.
We followed him out into the yard behind the station. The yard was surrounded by electrified chain-link, which was topped with razor wire. There were several surveillance cameras dotted about. It looked a lot like a parking lot: eight rows of vehicles, some of them dusty and neglected, the closer ones shiny and modern. There was even an industrial sky hopper in one corner.
"This way, gentlemen."
We followed Ramirez through the lines of impounded cars and motorbikes, towards a large auto workshop. We turned right and walked along the side of the workshop towards the back. Behind it was a sort of mini scrap yard with the rusting, burnt-out and/or crashed wrecks of vehicles stacked up all around it. In the centre of this little auto graveyard was a small crane painted in police department colours. I spotted Nathan's bike a second before he did.
"Hey!" Nathan said.
Nathan's bike hung ten feet above the ground, a chain threaded through the chassis was suspended from the hook of the crane. The bike was hanging directly above a compactor – the kind that squashes cars into cubes the size of sugar lumps. I laid a restraining hand on Nathan's good arm and stepped forward.
"Officer," I said. "This probably isn't necessary. If it's just a matter of paying a fine and having the bike repaired and reconditioned to make it roadworthy – "
Sergeant Ramirez shook his head sadly. "I'm sorry, but it would take a miracle and a small fortune to get this machine street legal. We have to destroy it."
"You can't do this," Nathan said quietly.
"We're legally obliged to," the sergeant said. "I don't have any choice in the matter. I wish I did."
"Sure you do," I said.
Ramirez glared at me, and for a moment I thought he might lose his temper. He didn't. "Before they stuck me behind a desk here, I used to be a street cop. I patrolled the streets on a motorcycle for more than twenty years. Until they brought in the big cruisers and the guys in robot-suits to replace us. So it's not that I hate bikes or the people who ride them. But I am a cop, and the law says this bike can't go back out on the road. I'm sorry."
He nodded to the crane operator, and Nathan's bike was lowered into the jaws of death. Me, Nathan and the ex-motorcycle cop watched the hydraulics fold the metal like origami paper. When it was done, none of us said anything for a while.
Nathan was normally pale, but now his face was a sickly grey-white. I knew how long he'd spent working on the bike, how much it meant to him. He stood, still and silent, and that worried me.
"I'm supposed to run your licence through the machine, endorse it and levy the fines for illegal parking and driving an unroadworthy vehicle," Ramirez said. "But I can't be bothered with the paperwork." He balled up the yellow and green pages and tossed them through the gaping windscreen of a rusting camper van. He left us to our thoughts.
Nathan's emotionless silence lasted eleven days. He didn't leave the flat, he didn't shave, and he didn't wash. He sometimes drank tea when I put the mug into his hand, but he wouldn't touch the food I prepared. He had every right to be depressed. It worried me that I hadn't known him long enough to know if he'd snap out of it eventually. I was afraid to leave him on his own unless I had to. I tried to think of things to re-engage his attention; suggested a few acts of creative vandalism I thought might have appealed to him, but he just stared at the wall, and in the end I had to leave him enough space to work through his bereavement.
I went out for fresh milk and pizzas and I was gone less than twenty minutes. When I got back, Nathan wasn't in his room. The nest of grey-white sheets on his bed was empty. I did what any normal person would do: panicked.
"Nathan!" I yelled, running from kitchen to living room to bathroom. The bathroom door was locked. Without a moment's hesitation, I put my shoulder to the door and broke in.
Nathan was sitting on the toilet holding a Batman comic. He looked startled to see me. "You desperate to pee or something?" He asked.
Over lunch Nathan told me about the idea he'd had. I was so relieved to have him back, I agreed to help him. Like I said, sometimes you do stupid things.
We stopped a couple of rich kids who were out cruising in a shiny new Volvo and forced them to drive us out to this old dump of a place in a derelict area west of the city. Before we let them and their car go, we made them activate the auto-distress call. Then we trashed the distress unit, ripped out their 'phone, and sent them on their way: who knows, they may even have enjoyed the adrenaline buzz the adventure gave them. But they were just pawns in our opening move. We knew the cops would come. Any rich kid who calls for help gets it; their rich parents are company employees and tax-payers, they pay for the cops.
It didn't take long for the police to respond: a cop in a bulky black-and-white armoured suit came drifting silently between the buildings, floating a few feet above the rubble like a Snoopy balloon in a street parade. He stopped over the exact spot that the Volvo had stood. Amazing how they can pin-point those signals, huh?
We knew the patrol man's infrared would pick us up as soon as we came out of hiding, so we had to distract him somehow. I thought a smallish explosion might do the trick, if it had a little added something to confuse his suit's electronic systems. I had laid a charge under the spot where the Volvo had stood, and triggered it by remote control. There was a bassy whump, clouds of brick dust and smoke, and the policeman was lifted a little, then dropped heavily in the newly formed crater. We felt the vibration through the soles of our feet, and it set off a little avalanche of bricks further up the street.
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