by J. S. Morin
Eve crept over and laid a hand on the machine. The subtle vibrations were just the way she remembered them. She snatched the hand back as if she’d burned it.
“What now?” Gemini asked. Her gaze strayed to the nearest door. “Think we’re still locked in?”
To Eve’s thinking, the question was meaningless. Any response would be sheer guesswork. There was no way to answer it short of experimentation.
Eve tried the door she’d come in. While it didn’t anticipate her request, it opened as soon as she touched the wall console.
“It appears we aren’t,” she reported.
“What now?” Gemini asked.
Eve cocked her head. “I know you’re a little new at dealing with robots outside a controlled environment, but Charlie13 did everything but give us a config file telling us how to make a Charlie with this rig. I say you start figuring out the machine while I go grab a chassis to upload him to.”
“And how do you plan to get it here?” Gemini asked. “The Version 70.2 chassis is 254 kilos.”
“But you’re—”
“I’ll manage,” Gemini insisted. To illustrate her point, she hobbled for a side door, leaning on the EMP rifle.
“Why that way?” Eve asked.
Gemini huffed. “We haven’t got much time. Best as I can recall from my ever-so-brief looks at the factory schematics, this should be the way to chassis storage.”
“Oh,” Eve replied, wishing she’d had the foresight to memorize the locations of all potential component warehouses they might need. “You, uh, expected we might need to find our own chassis to put the new Charlie into?”
Gemini hobbled through into the hallway beyond. “Yes. As a matter of fact, I did. I suspected we might end up on our own, so I looked it up just in case. Now if you really want to help, lend me a shoulder to lean on and let’s be quick about it.”
The warehouse wasn’t even far. In under five minutes, the two would-be uploaders arrived in a cozy warehouse featuring a motley assortment of robotic bodies.
Eve walked the line of resting chassis and marveled at the faces she knew. While the chassis numbers tickled the back portion of her mind, names came more readily. There was a Jennifer81 right next to a Mary27, same as they appeared at Human Committee meetings. And after that was a Paul208 looking like he was ready to build a statue or a cathedral.
“Here, grab this one,” Gemini grumbled, slapping a Version 68.8. Eve didn’t know anyone who wore that chassis, but she knew it wasn’t a 70.2.
“That’s not what Charlie13 said to use,” Eve argued.
Gemini gritted her teeth and squeezed her eyes shut. “It’s fifty kilos lighter. Charlie42 will thank us for actually dragging it back to the rig before the Human Committee gets here to stop us.”
Eve found the 70.2 at the end of the row. It certainly was different from the others arrayed in the little storeroom. “It’s so… formidable.”
She ran a hand along the polymer steel torso and looked into the dull, lifeless eyes that seemed to scowl with menace. The bulk stood out from its neighbors as well. Those extra fifty kilos it had over the 68.8 came in ruggedized joints, thicker paneling, and a few additional centimeters of height.
Gemini was tugging the Version 68.8 loose from its moorings. “Give me a hand, and quit playing with that overdesigned toy.”
“But this is so Charlie,” Eve countered. “He won’t be able to deny owing us a favor if we get him this chassis. That’s what you need him for. What are the odds he’ll feel generous if he finds out we gave him a lesser chassis than he deserved?”
Gemini stood fuming for a moment, unable to make a case against Eve’s plan. “We still have no way to move it. This one’s pushing our luck as it is.” She hooked a thumb that poked the Version 68.8 in the chest.
On the opposite wall, mixed in with older model chassis, was a selection of automatons.
“Can we power up one of those?”
“It wouldn’t be programmed for anything. It would just be…” Gemini trailed off. The annoyance on her face faded as her eyes grew wide. “No. That could work. It’ll be utterly imbecilic, but it will obey voice commands. As long as we don’t need it to weld or tend crops, we ought to—”
Eve threw an arm toward the drone worker. “Stop talking. Just do it!”
Gemini had the front panel of the drone opened in seconds. Eve couldn’t see what she was doing in the cramped confines of the automaton’s torso, but it wasn’t long before it lurched forward under its own power.
Eve punched a fist in the air. “Yes! Way to go.” Then to the automaton, “You, pick up that chassis and follow me at a distance of two meters.”
The drone didn’t hesitate, shuffling with a lockstep gait to the Version 70.2 and holding it at arm’s length, as if the chassis would give it a rash.
Eve led the way back to the upload rig, which became a procession of human, robot chassis, automaton, and a second human bringing up the rear. Gemini lagged behind, but Eve knew her friend was tough enough to make it the rest of the way on her own.
As the drone brought the chassis into the lab, Eve directed the clumsy thing to deposit the new Charlie into the robot side of the upload rig. She cringed as the drone let the body drop half a meter to crash onto the table with force that shook the floor and rattled Eve’s teeth.
“Go. Stay out of the way.”
The tangle of cables coming out of the rig was daunting.
How long had their search and recovery of the chassis taken? How soon would perturbed robots from the Human Committee be arriving?
Too many connections. No documentation.
This was the trouble with entrusting this process to two secretive, aloof robots in a factory somewhere. A few hundred years’ experience, and no one thinks to write down how things work.
Gemini limped through the door. “Stand aside. We haven’t long.”
With deft fingers, Gemini plucked cables from the tangle and found matching ports exposed when she removed the skull plate of the Version 70.2.
“How do you know—?”
“Quiet!” Gemini snapped. “I’m trying to concentrate.”
Faster than Eve had believed possible, all the cables were accounted for. Every one that had dangled loose from this side of the upload rig had found its home in Charlie42’s head.
Eve knew she should get used to calling him that before Charlie42 woke up.
Gemini moved to the control console. Fingers flew through menus and options. She wasn’t just tapping through all the defaults, either, Eve noted.
“You fully certain that it’s the same mix you want? The same bothersome seventy, twenty, ten mix? If you have any reservations—”
“I don’t,” Eve cut in. “Just do it.”
Seventy percent Charles Truman. Twenty of Jason Sanborn. The remaining ten from the personality of Johnathan Medina.
“I can’t be certain of any customizations in the mix,” Gemini warned. “It could well be that the defaults of each are what produced—”
Eve reached past Gemini and hit the glowing button on the touch screen that read UPLOAD MIX.
Chapter Fifty-Four
At first, nothing happened. Eve and Gemini huddled together, staring at the status screen.
Then everything went haywire.
Lights in the laboratory flickered and overloaded, sending showers of sparks. Eve ducked for cover as Gemini shielded her eyes with a forearm.
On the display panel, angry red warnings flashed.
UNAUTHORIZED ACCESS
SYSTEM OVERRIDE
And when Gemini attempted to shut down the upload, the display added another.
REQUEST DENIED
While the system wouldn’t allow user input, it continued to show a progress indicator. An empty bar the width of the screen slowly filled left to right with glowing blue.
“What did we do wrong?” Eve shouted as the upload rig howled like a skyroamer’s engines powering up.
Gemini hobbled acros
s the tiny lab. “Someone’s hacked in. Just about anyone might come off that table if we don’t stop it.” She grunted in agony as she squatted one-legged to scoop up the EMP rifle.
“What are you doing?” Eve demanded. But the answer came clear as an instructional video when Gemini hauled the weapon onto a workbench and unburied a portable power supply from the clutter. “No!”
“It’s us or that thing,” Gemini snapped, jerking her head toward the Version 70.2 chassis that was having a seizure on the table. “I’m willing to gamble on the Human Committee at this point.”
Eve wrenched the rifle away from Gemini and flung it across the room. One of the power terminals from inside the weapon snapped free and dangled from the portable supply.
Gemini held up the damaged terminal, aghast. “What’ve you done? You stupid fool, you’ve doomed us.”
Eve’s gut clenched at the insult.
“I’m sorry,” Gemini blurted. “Just… I don’t… I mean, we can’t wait here. Our saving grace is that the upload should be complete by now if it had worked. Maybe we can still get to the skyroamer.”
“But your leg…”
It wasn’t as if the skyroamer was parked the next corridor over. It could take an hour to get back, even if they didn’t get lost.
“Might lose a leg, but if you can help me walk, I can make it.”
Gemini was nearly twice Eve’s weight, but she bore as much of that burden as she could. The arm draped over Eve’s shoulders was warm, solid, and trembling with fatigue. More importantly, it was human—a reminder of what Eve stood to lose if they were captured.
Eve helped her hobbling friend flee the lab where some unknown robot was hijacking her Charlie.
Chapter Fifty-Five
Plato paced in front of the video screen.
There was no way a man could sit still for what he was seeing. Yet at the same time, there was nothing, nothing at all, that he could do about it.
On the knee-high table in front of the couch, a scattering of clay-forming tools surrounded an amateur attempt to create an image of Eve. How could Plato continue his fruitless attempts to bring Eve into his cell?
Eve was out there, in trouble, and Plato could do nothing.
The guards had left the audio on. Whether that was meant as a favor or a torment, Plato wasn’t sure. The news narrator seemed to provide equal measures of both.
“…latest reports indicate that Eve Fourteen has been visually confirmed within the great robotics factory at Kanto. An anonymous source claims that she has an accomplice, and that her accomplice might possibly be human. The identity of this alleged human remains a mystery, but…”
“Just give up, Eve,” Plato shouted at the screen. “I’m fine.”
Plato squeezed his eyes shut and attempted to ignore the news. But it was as if his own conscience had crawled into the screen to explain how this was all his fault.
Eve wouldn’t have gone to Kanto except for one thing: to enact Charlie7’s last request. That Teflon-voiced bridge salesman had convinced her that a blank, factory-fresh Charlie would have the cunning, charisma, and influence to protect her—and set Plato free.
The latter was Plato’s own inference. But he knew Eve. That was just how she thought. This was all a puzzle, and Charlie7’s heir was the solution. This Charlie-what’s-his-number would make everything right.
“I. Don’t. Need. Saving!” Plato screamed, punctuating each word by pounding on the screen.
It was a lie, and he knew it. But Plato didn’t want saving, not at the cost Eve seemed to be willing to pay. The news broadcast made her out to be an unpredictable rogue. The language sounded eerily similar to the brief hearing Plato had attended, the one where he’d been branded a dangerous human.
The news feed droned on. Each update was so minute that they blurred into one repetitive monotone. It felt like a loop. Same news story, same cell, same food, same worries.
Eve was out there. She needed him. Plato was in here. He needed her. The world wanted them separate, and the more they tried to reunite, the harder the robots drove a wedge between them.
The news feed shown panoramic views of the areas where Eve’s journey had taken her. All Plato could see was the distance. Earth was vast without a skyroamer to cut the distances.
Finding Eve, getting to her, bailing her out of whatever trouble she was in—the thoughts were never far from the forefront of Plato’s mind. He was ready at the snap of Eve’s fingers or the faintest cry for help to rush to her side.
But there was the matter of a locked door, wary robots, a hovership he couldn’t command. On top of that, Plato still had the damned sedative collar around his neck. The movie action hero inside him told Plato that he could tear it off with his bare hands. The reality was that if he so much as tugged at it too vigorously, it went off.
“…Human Committee chair Jennifer81 wants to assure everyone that no human is above sanction. When Eve Fourteen is recovered, she will be brought forth to answer for the death of James187, Marvin108, and John117…”
It was happening all over again. Eve was going to end up in a cell just like this one, and there was nothing he could do about it.
Plato wept.
Chapter Fifty-Six
As they staggered through the Kanto factory’s corridors, Eve and Gemini developed a gait that worked. Eve shuffled along, supporting Gemini’s weight as the taller girl hobbled, placing her broken leg down as gingerly as possible. On alternating steps, Eve either bore all of Gemini’s weight or none of it.
It had started out so promising. Before long, though, Eve’s back ached, and her thigh muscles burned. All the sympathy in Eve wished that Gemini could wrap around her and ride on her back. The realist in Eve wondered if they’d be better off if Eve went on alone and found help.
“Don’t… slow down,” Gemini grunted. “I’ll… not… give up.”
Between heaves to haul the heavier girl along, Eve gasped out her reply. “Right. Not going… to leave you.”
They passed through a short section of hallway lined with windows that overlooked a production area for building-sized mining drones. Normally, Eve would have stopped to watch the titans taking their first steps. Now, the sound of the thunderous footsteps below was just a distraction.
At the end of the hallway, the door slid open.
Eve had grown so accustomed to Plato’s guidance through the factory that at first she thought nothing of it. Gemini didn’t believe it was Plato, but she didn’t know him the way Eve did. But her confidence in her savior took an abrupt nosedive at the sight on the other side of that door.
Barring the corridor beyond was an unfamiliar robot in a chassis Eve had only seen during her research on robotic history.
It was an old and unpopular design with a surface that gleamed more brass than steel. But this chassis looked new, without a scratch of blemish on it. By its attire, this robot was a scientist, decked out in a white lab coat and black trousers.
“Hello, Eve,” a voice from the grave greeted her.
Gemini stumbled forward with a gasp. “No… noooo…” she whispered.
Eve hopped around to pivot Gemini for a retreat; she couldn’t very well swing the larger girl around her. But Gemini was a dead weight. She balanced, but Eve couldn’t get her to move.
“Come on,” Eve prodded, wondering what horrific hold Evelyn11 had over Gemini.
“No…” Gemini mumbled, though Eve had the impression that her denial was unrelated to what Eve had said.
With an arm around Gemini’s waist, Eve hauled with all her might and finally got Gemini moving.
“What’s the matter? Not happy to see me?” Evelyn11 asked.
“You’re not her,” Eve protested without looking back. “Evelyn11 is dead. You’re just copying her voice to scare me. It’s not going to work.”
“It’s not her… it’s not her… it can’t be her…” Gemini babbled.
Slow though their progress was, Evelyn11 seemed in no hurry to collect Ev
e and Gemini. Her saunter clopped as practical lab shoes clopped along in languorous pursuit.
Ahead of Eve, the door snapped shut with a hollow clang.
“You won’t be getting away that easily,” Evelyn11 taunted. “I have control of the computers.”
The clop of artificial leather soles on steel plate flooring continued to close in.
Chapter Fifty-Seven
It can’t be.
It couldn’t be.
It wasn’t true.
It wasn’t her.
It wasn’t me.
Gemini struggled to sort out the horror of Evelyn11 existing within the chassis that Charlie25 promised had been destroyed. Realizing the truth socked her in the gut with the force of a boxer’s punch.
Charlie25 had lied. He hadn’t wiped Evelyn11’s mind at all. He had duplicated it!
What was Gemini, then? Xerox girl? Plan B? A sick joke?
No, the truth was worse than that.
Gemini was bait.
Nowhere else would Charlie25 have found a more motivated hunter to track Eve down or a more sympathetic friend for Eve to glom onto.
She had to get away. If Evelyn11—and it was so bizarre thinking that name in the third person—discovered her identity, Gemini was as good as dead.
That’s what Gemini would have done, had their places been reversed.
Even for someone who bought into the credo of, “Immortality Through Redundancy,” the idea of a mental copy of her existing was anathema.
Eve bantered with the robotic usurper, but all Gemini could think was to move just a little bit faster.
Then the door slammed shut in their faces.
Chapter Fifty-Eight
Eve shouldered Gemini against the wall and tried to access the door console. Her mind raced in search of options as the controls failed to even acknowledge her attempts.
Fight? Hopeless. For an unarmed human, any robot chassis was an impossible opponent.
Run? Even if Eve could slip past this Evelyn11 impostor, it would have meant abandoning Gemini. That would have been a death sentence.