Robot Awareness: Special Edition

by B. C. Kowalski

  MaBrown couldn't speak for a moment. "Great spot," he finally muttered.

  "Great spot indeed," Malvers echoed. MaBrown sat in silence. He'd win awards for the story that would come out of this. This could be the story of his career, he thought.

  "Do you think that I wanted to play ball with these goons?" Malvers continued when MaBrown stayed silent. "You think I wanted these guys to have anything to do with this great city?"

  MaBrown found it best not to answer rhetorical questions, so he stayed silent, waiting for the administrator to continue. "I have a family, MaBrown. They, along with this city, are my two priorities."

  "What about the payouts?" MaBrown asked, surprisingly pointed after his initial shock. "The documents I obtained yesterday clearly show you took money from some of these Company C affiliates. That's enough to get you voted out of office, if you hadn't resigned."

  "You think there was a choice? There are two options — they pay you, or they silence you. What would you do?"

  MaBrown said nothing.

  "Well, there is another choice. And I just made it. You just saw it. Every news organization just broadcast my choice, and will be talking about it for years to come.

  "But I want you to understand what my choice is. I'm leaving. I probably can't ever come back. My family will likely never see Farven Point again. Everything I've built for myself; everything I've built for this city, is gone. I have to start over. Do you think I ever wanted to harm this city?"

  Malvers sat back in his chair. He looked tired, MaBrown thought. On second thought, he looked like he was weary of thinking about the future, which didn't look bright. If your skills involving working with the public, what do you do when you need to keep a low profile?

  "So why am I here?" MaBrown asked. "Why haven't you disappeared by now? I'm sure every second counts. They must have company goons everywhere by now."

  "Don't worry about that, MaBrown. I've taken all the necessary precautions to ensure my family is perfectly safe from any company entanglements, and I have secured my safety as well.

  "As for what I want from you. I want you to do what you've always done, more or less. I want you to tell the truth. And get it right for once."

  MaBrown couldn't help but grin a little at the dig — of course he would throw one more in before he left. "The truth, or the truth you want to believe?" MaBrown said.

  "It's all there in black and white, MaBrown. There are some correspondence, but there you have to read between the lines. Company communication managers are some of the most careful writers you will see. Most of their memos hardly say anything, they're so obscure. But the holo-files included are far more... illustrative. I think you will see exactly what we're dealing with."

  MaBrown held the envelope in front of him a moment. He looked up at Malvers. "Why me, though?"

  Malvers grinned, straightening his shirt collar. "Despite my misgivings with your 'style' of journalism, I think you're OK, MaBrown. You're a real pain sometimes, but you're all right."

  MaBrown smiled. That was probably the best he was going to get from his nemesis. A mutual respect between adversaries.

  "All right, MaBrown. Enough of this feel-good nonsense." Malvers opened up the hatch in the floor where MaBrown crawled out of earlier. His aid held the door's handle for the administrator as he lowered himself about halfway in.

  "Get it right, MaBrown," he said, pointing at the reporter before lowering himself all the way in. His aide followed, pointing to the main door briefly before exiting, indicating he should go through the front.

  How was he going to explain this to the others? Maybe he'd wait and follow the tunnel — but he just as likely to get lost as find his way out.

  He had something all those others outside wanted — the story of a lifetime.

  ***

  Isellia gripped the steering rod tightly, gritted her teeth in concentration. Sweat dripped off her temple, wetted the bangs that drifted into her face and dampened parts of her flight suit. She always associated XR flying with the horrid smell that comes from being in the cockpit for long periods of time. If she earned enough, maybe she could afford a fancy airflow system. For now, she'd simply have to endure the dank mix of burning electronics and musky perspiration.

  The afterglow of five XRs burned on her screen. She was gaining enough ground on them that she would probably pass the racer in front of her before the turnaround. Chipper Jones turned to look at her, she could just see through his viewfinder. His puzzled look she expected — she was running faster than she should have fuel for. Was she crazy, or stupid? he probably thought.

  Jones didn't know about the modifications. Her little science experiment would require perfect timing — if she didn't flood the engines with a short burst of fuel at just the right time, she would lose all the momentum of the turnaround. She'd be embarrassingly far out of the race — they'd be cleaning out the concession stands by the time she crossed the finish line.

  She overtook Jones, not even bothering to give him a glance back. She sighed, brushed her pink bangs past her right ear, never taking her eye off the four racers remaining in front of her. Veda was in that pack. She could see afterglow from her XR, her fancy XR that mocked her with its cost, its maintenance. Barkley raced just behind Veda — a worthy opponent by all accounts. One of the last of the old school racers — she remembered her father sharing a drink with him once. Wallace wasn't much for social gatherings. He usually skipped the balls, the parties, all the hoopla. At Farven, if he raced it, he usually stuck to a small watering hole a few blocks from the start line. Isellia remembered sitting at their table, watching these two great racers share stories, soaking in every detail. She thought about stopping at the old tavern if there was time, but something told her it would be a disappointment.

  Beating Barkley and beating Veda were two different things. Cruising past Barkley to the finish would be like a child surpassing their parent. But beating Veda — that would be the sweet emotion of defeating a rival of Goliath like proportions. All she had to do was time this right.

  She didn't have to flick the switch. It would be just as easy to not trust the robot's modification, take the turnaround in the normal fashion, hitting the gas at just the right time in the centrifugal ring to send her shooting with everyone else back toward the start. She only had to stay close to the front to qualify — and that probably would have been the objective of an ordinary racer. It was never in Isellia's DNA to be an ordinary racer, for better or worse.

  "Here we go," Isellia said as they neared the ring, its circumference a green flashing line that revealed individual blinking light fixtures as the racers neared them. She saw the light from Veda's thrusters fade, as she slipped into the entrance, not visible from the outside. Barkley followed her in, only seconds separating them.

  "Bolt bucket, you better have got this right," she said as her trusty XR-13 entered the energy field guarding the turnaround gates.

  Chapter 36

  MaBrown stared at his terminal, the packet Malvers had given him sitting next to it amongst other folders, storage chips, random accessories. It was late morning and the newsroom bustled with the activity of working journalists, talking on comm devices, leaving and coming, running story ideas by each other. MaBrown hardly heard any of it as he sat, staring at his terminal.

  His work was far from done. In fact, it was only beginning. His job was to sift through everything in the folder Malvers handed him, put together a narrative and start filling in the holes. He'd need some reac quotes from council members, maybe a citizen poll? Or should this info stand alone, run the story, then let the reaction flow in. He'd have enough story material that he'd be writing about this for weeks. What happens next, with the administrator gone; how would he be replaced? Special election? Council appointment? How would the council and city hall handle Company C? How would Company C officials react? Would they? Would they sweep it under the rug?

  But all that would follow, he thought, picking up the envelope an
d spilling its contents onto the desk next to his terminal. He sorted through the storage disks. Most looked the same, standard city hall issue. He had plenty already, numbered and matched to a database he kept. One of the few truly organized things he did. None of those contained what these did.

  He inserted one of the disks into the universal serial connector on his terminal, which read every storage format in his desk, probably any he's ever owned. Commercials on the holo claimed they could even read the few remaining storage disks from Old Earth, though MaBrown of course had no way to test that — most were locked in a museum somewhere. As he inserted the first disk, he thought about the man he had seen down a hallway just as he left city hall's main doors. The man caught his attention — MaBrown couldn't have explained it, but it was as if the man had no face.

  "What did you get?" Taylin asked. MaBrown jumped a bit, turning to see his editor standing over his shoulder. She smiled, but Taylin's smiles generally looked all business — he only saw her genuine smile outside of work. MaBrown always thought it seemed as if she were two different people.

  MaBrown panicked a moment. He hadn't really thought about how to explain this entire encounter to her. And he certainly hadn't had time to formulate a story plan, so that he could tell her about it. Lacking a plan usually meant Taylin made one for him, and that usually made his life more difficult.

  But he also knew Taylin could be a confidant, and would help him work through the story. And at this point, he needed it. "We should talk in your office."

  Taylin raised her eyes. "That big, huh?"

  MaBrown looked at her, aware but uncaring of how melodramatic he sounded. "Bigger."

  ***

  Malvers’ fingers hovered over the keypad to his loft, looking around on the seemingly empty street. Silence filled the spot in the alley where the incident had occurred — a cat dove behind some garbage cans, breaking the quiet with a plastic thud, but otherwise there was little movement in the street. He'd be leaving — when, in the morning? Malvers was proud of the fact that he had been born here, raised here, educated here and had eventually become administrator. It had been part of his campaign. “Vote for one of your own. Vote Malvers.” Despite voters not entirely believing the "one of your own" statement, it still worked — Farven Point voters tended to like another Farven Point lifer. Someone living in the city 25 years still wasn't a townie if they weren't born here. They'd always be welcome, and would be treated well enough; but they would still always be an outsider, if only in some small way.

  But now Malvers was about to become an outsider himself. He and his family were destined for a life of hiding from Company C's reach. Not an easy task, considering they owned a monopoly on most of the galaxy. He'd never be able to enter the Inner Circle, but that wasn't huge deal. It leaves half the outside planets free. But Company C had plenty of operations on many of those planets outside the Inner Circle, too. There weren't a lot of worlds with cities such as Farven Point that heavily regulated Company C operations. The planet was unique in that trade was bonus, not a necessity. Enough resources and unique business operated on the planet, especially in Farven Point, that they've never needed Company C's assistance. It's that assistance that tended to cause the problems. Company C became a loaded gun to that planet's head, with contracts growing worse at every re-negotiation. Eventually the planet's leaders acquiesced to some kind of governance agreement, giving Company C a hand in planetary decisions. They started changing laws, setting policies, easing regulations — all of which of course benefited the company. Company C was the silent killer, assassinating with the pen, rather than the sword.

  Malvers always considered himself lucky to be born on one of the rare worlds where that wasn't the case. But he'd been foolish; Company C might have preferred the pen, but it wasn't averse to using the sword either, or at least the threat of it. Malvers thought he could thread the needle between allowing Company C its demands and keeping them in check enough that it would never lead to a larger takeover. That was a mistake, Malvers realized, and one that cost him. Refusing would have cost him too, though. A lack of options, certainly.

  That his political career was done was a certainty. He was the public face of the city — basking in its triumphs and sulking in its blunders. There'd be plenty of both, as every city has.

  The city was his ship, and he went with it — its captain, wherever it sailed. He'd lie, connive, cheat, anything he had to do to keep the ship afloat. And if he had to leave to protect the city, he certainly would.

  Malvers punched the numbers on the keypad. His family was already safely tucked away, but the pit in his stomach gnawed at him. It wouldn't subside until he saw them face to face. To know for sure they were OK, to look into the eyes of his wife. She'd stuck by him through all this, and certainly didn't deserve any harm. The man with no face wouldn't care.

  It was his face Malvers saw, or rather, didn't see, as the door clicked shut behind him, marking one of the last times he would see Farven Point.

  ***

  --- “Folks, if you're just joining us, well, you missed the most exciting part of this Farven Point 400!”

  -- “Jeft, I feel bad for those folks at home! Let's recap for viewers what just happened. We saw Antoinette cruising into the turnaround, and boy did she have a trick up her sleeve.”

  --- “You see her enter, a touch behind Chipper Jones, then — is that a glow, I think it's a glow around her ship — she slingshots through the turnaround, barely keeping herself on the field's edge, and she really shoots out with some speed.”

  --- “Jeft, she's caught the front pack with Allister Barkley and Veda, and the three of them have been battling ever since.”

  --- “Let's not overlook Chipper Jones, either — with some quick thinking on his part, he's managed to catch Isellia Antoinette's wake, and now he's in fourth. There's a good chance Jones is going to pull off a podium finish today, something we haven't seen from him this season.”

  --- “Definitely. But let's not take away from Antoinette — if we paused it right here and called it a race, this would be the comeback story of — well, probably of our careers, wouldn't you say?”

  --- “Haven't seen anything like it. Well, we just saw Isellia try to leave Veda in one of those cosmic eddies, as the lead pack is heading to the penultimate ring. Veda's obviously an old pro, brushes her off without a blink.

  --- “Remarkable — and these two, as I understand it, have had quite a rivalry before Antoinette left the scene.”

  -- “Yes, and — Whoa, look at that! Never count out Allister Barkley. He's just made a move on the outside, ducking an eddy and now he's in front of both of them! This is unexpected, as Veda and Isellia scramble to take position early!”

  --- “He's made an early move, Brill. I don't know if it will pay off or not, it's earlier than I expected him to attack.”

  --- “He looks comfortable up there. He's going to be tough for those two to shake. But either way it doesn't look like the rest of the field is going to catch up. I think we're looking at the top four here, unless some major catastrophe happens.”

  --- “Back behind them is Twixter Tooly, followed by NAR-2. They’re jockeying for that fifth-place spot. It’s going to be a tight race between those two for the last qualifying spot, if all positions stay the same.”

  --- “And now we’re cutting away to a crash that happened in the last ring, we’ve got confirmation that Billy Darvey is out of this race, his XR is out of commission. We’ve got a reporter on the ground, ready to give us the full details, when we return to the Farven 400!”

  ***

  "So tell me what's going on," Taylin said, easing back in her chair. She sat back from her desk, storage chips scattered across its surface, her terminal on the corner. MaBrown looked down at the synthetic carpet. Its fibers were made to repel stains, so that a simple rub would turn the spilled liquid into solid rubbings, easily cleaned. He stared at the fibers absently as he thought about how to frame the story.

&nb
sp; "Malvers didn't do this intentionally," MaBrown said. "He was forced." MaBrown looked at Taylin to see her expression. Her brow furrowed, which left her looking like she was angry, but MaBrown knew that was just her concentrating.

  "How do you know?" Taylin asked. Her brow remained furrowed but her eyes lit up with interest. And something else. Fear?

  "Well, that's what he says—"

  "But?"

  "But the packet on my desk is supposed to contain audio recordings of him being strong-armed by Company C officials."

  "Supposed to?"

  "I haven't had a chance to listen to them yet."

  Taylin was silent a moment. MaBrown held onto his lightbook, twirling the stylus between his fingers. Both of them knew what this meant.

  "He's leaving town," MaBrown said. "I went to his office through a trap door in the floor. A trap door! Taylin, there was a trap door in his office the entire time!"

  Taylin could only shake her head. She ran her hand through her shoulder length, greying sandy hair, tucking it behind her ear.

  "I think he's in serious danger," MaBrown continued.

  "So will you, if you write the story I think you plan to."

  MaBrown looked at her in surprise.

  "Well, what do you think is going to happen if you write that Company C is strong-arming Farven Point politicians? This story is going to buzz out to the galaxy. And Company C execs read the Buzz, too."

  "But we can't not write this," MaBrown said, but his stomach clenched and his face flushed.

  "I didn't say that," Taylin said. "But we have to talk about the consequences. This is serious, MaBrown. If they threatened the administrator, and forced him out of the city, off this world, they certainly can do that to you."