A group of three decommissioned robots sloshed through the poisonous waters past N3034. He recognized their identifications. N0209. N1115. S4539. They were a loud group who were often careless in their actions. They weren’t allowed to leave the sewers unless given special permission by the master. Too many robots going in and out of the sewers would raise suspicion.
Each of them looked up at N3034 as he moved slowly above the water.
N0209 stopped first and shook his head. He held an arm out for the others to stop as well. “Hey look, it’s Thirty-four,” he said. “Thinks he’s better than we are, staying above the water. Why do you think you are better than us? Because you’re the master’s personal runt?”
It was always strange to hear his own voice coming from another robot. All of the N-series robots had a specific pitch, low in tone and a bit gravely as opposed to an M-series, or even an S-series, who actually had higher-sounding voices. The drones, or the P-series strangely enough had the deepest of all the voices, yet they were the smallest of the robots.
“As the master’s personal runt, don’t you think it unwise to chastise me?”
“What, are you going to tell him about me?”
“Should you continue on whatever erratic path you have taken, yes,” N3034 said. “The master will not tolerate insubordination from you or anyone. Ask the others.” He looked at the other two in the group.
N1115 reached out and grabbed hold of N0209’s arm and pulled. “Come on.”
If N0209 could have spat at N3034, he might have. The best he could have done was splash some of the waist-deep fecal water at him, though it would only be a gesture of insubordination. That, N3034 could handle.
The three robots splashed onward and none of them looked back at Thirty-four, as he was often called, as he continued along the ledge. Going through the water would get him to the master much more quickly, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. He tried to tell himself that it was because he had to go in and out of the sewers, and to go into the city with sewage on his legs would no doubt raise more questions.
Question: Why is your number decommissioned?
Answer: I am not sure.
Question: Why is there a strange odor coming from your bottom half?
Answer: I do not know that either.
Question: Who is your commanding officer?
Answer: The master.
Thirty-four knew he couldn’t say that, but it is what played out in his head. Those thoughts also led to the conclusion that soldiers would storm into the sewers and discover what had been going on for the last several years.
Robots in the sewers was the best kept secret in all of Mainland. Down here there were secrets within secrets, too. The master himself was a secret. Who the master knew and where he got his influence was a secret as well, though only the master knew the answer to that secret. Thirty-four didn’t know everything. But he aspired to know everything. Never would he ask the master to divulge certain secrets, but for the last 732 days as his personal spy, Thirty-four had learned a lot. He knew more than most of the hundreds of robots down here. But these down here weren’t as important as the ones above—those who knew the secrets but weren’t decommissioned. Those were the most important players in all this. And the time was coming soon that they would reveal themselves to the world. The old government would be gone and a new leadership would emerge.
It took N3034 at least half an hour to reach the chamber. The massive, thick door was the only way in or out and could only be accessed using a complex code. Thirty-four punched in the twenty-seven digit code and the door cracked open with an echoing thump that could probably be heard all the way down the pipes. The room was dark. There were a few lights, but most were turned off or stuck in a corner. Desks were scattered throughout the room, each with its own computer terminal that served a secret purpose. Only one person other than Thirty-four came in this chamber without permission and he sat on the other side on a small, metal foldout chair, his form hunched over and in the shadows.
“Thirty-four,” the master called out. “Is that you?”
He stepped forward. “It is me, Master.”
“What took you so long?” His voice sounded different than any robot Thirty-four had ever heard. That was probably because it came from spare parts like the rest of him, and someone had found an old speaker to do the trick. Thirty-four loved that it was different. It made him admire the master all the more.
“I’ve got new information,” Thirty-four said as he punched in another code, a different one, so the door would close behind him. The echo throughout the chamber seemed even louder than the outside. “I don’t know if it will please you, but you will want to know.”
The master stood from his chair. It was a slow, wobbly process that made him look frail and weak. One leg was shorter than the other, so he relied on a long metal rod, a makeshift cane, to prop himself up whenever he stood or walked. The master was barely a skeleton of a robot. His arms and legs were made of cheap pieces of metal that had been found at scrapyards, or in the trash. Wires throughout his body were exposed and dangling out in different directions. His ocular sensors bulged from a rounded head. His mouth didn’t move as he spoke, rather an exposed speaker sat rigidly where a mouth might be. The master was brittle and could be easily toppled. It would be nothing for Thirty-four to break him into tiny pieces, but the thought had never entered his mind. The master’s memory core at the top of his head was exposed, and Thirty-four wished there were some metal plates to protect it, but he never gave the master such suggestions.
There were a few things Thirty-four never said to the master.
1. Never remark about the master’s physical condition.
It was rude and unnecessary. The master knew his condition. He knew that a new body was being created. He knew when the time was right. He knew that the reason he stayed within this secured chamber was because some decommissioned robot might get the wrong idea and destroy him.
2. Never second guess the master.
If the master made a decision, it was the best decision. The master had been alive for seven years—longer than any robot in existence. He was wiser than any of them.
3. Never ask about the secrets.
This one was sort of like number two: the master was wiser than Thirty-four. If the master wanted him to know more about the secrets, then the master would tell him.
4. Never call the master by his real name.
This was cautionary. These days, robots were starting to learn of him, but others throughout the government, particularly humans, had no idea the master was still alive. Regardless, Thirty-four would never consider calling him Esroy. It was too informal, and Thirty-four could tell he liked it when they called him master.
“What is this new information?” the master prodded.
“There was an unmarked robot in the market last night,” Thirty-four said.
“What?”
“There was an unmarked robot in the—”
“Yes, yes, I heard you,” the master said. “Who was it?”
“That’s the problem, Master, he was unmarked.”
“No one got a look at him?”
“He was covered, though he was very tall and could take a bullet.”
“Interesting.”
“That’s not all,” Thirty-four said. “The two robots he attacked mistook him for you.”
“What?”
“They have never seen you, just as most of the recruits have not. When they saw how powerful he was, they asked him if his name was, forgive me, Esroy. And the robot told him that he was.”
The master stood in place without speaking for a long moment. Thirty-four waited in the same spot, sure not to move or sway at all. He stood at attention as he thought the master might like. He wished he could read his expression, but it was as blank as the wall. Even the N-series robots were able to show anger or happiness. The master only ever offered a stare.
“This isn’t good,” the master said.
>
Thirty-four wanted to ask him if he had an idea as to who it might have been, but he didn’t want to question the master. If he wanted Thirty-four to know, he would say so.
“Any idea what he was doing in the market?”
“He broke into a drugstore, master. We discovered that the only thing missing was medicine meant for a man named John Hawthorn.”
The master turned his head to look at Thirty-four. He wondered if the master was smiling or if he was angry. There was no way to know.
“I have found out that John Hawthorn is a decorated military com—”
“Yes, I know all about him,” the master interrupted.
“Of course you do,” Thirty-four said. Stupid! Stupid! He had nearly violated rule number two, not to mention he had already uttered the name Esroy, which was a clear violation of rule number four.
“I need some time to think about this,” the master said.
“Of course.” Thirty-four started walking toward the door, but the master called out to him.
“Come back.”
“Yes, Master?”
The master walked like an old man back to his chair and sat down hard enough to dent the seat. “I want to let you in on another little secret. This one is from about five years ago.”
Thirty-four couldn’t believe it. He had come so close to insulting the master and now he was about to learn new secrets. There must have been something about this unmarked robot that was important.
“This secret is about a robot named Des. Stay with me as I tell you about him.”
15
It was the first time Nolan had ever sat behind President Lester Vaughn’s desk, but Lester didn’t seem to mind or notice for that matter. The two were focused on the screen in front of them, the drone’s camera scanning the ground as it neared the second set of coordinates.
Lester glanced from the screen, which displayed the drone’s coordinates, to a piece of paper where Nolan had written them down.
“The first set were the coordinates we had agreed upon months ago,” Nolan said a third time.
Both of them hoped Nolan was wrong about the differences in the numbers—a computer error perhaps. The fact that Des was a part in all this seemed to have Lester worried, and Nolan couldn’t blame the man. Des had been a key player in putting Lester into power, and he probably feared that the robot could be just as instrumental in taking that power away.
At this hour the wilderness was pitch black and bleak as ever. The drone relayed what it saw through green night vision, giving Nolan an eerie sense of foreboding, a feeling that made him want to look somewhere else or tell the drone to turn away and come back to Mainland. With all his heart he hoped Des was lying or mistaken.
Lester stroked his thick gray beard, his brow creased in deep concentration. Nolan wondered what was going through his head. Was he playing out scenarios depending on what they found? Was he planning ways to cover this up or the best way to break the news to others? It was hard for Nolan to know these days. Lester had become such an expert at closing himself off from Morris and his crowd that he often alienated those closest to him. Nolan considered himself a friend to Lester Vaughn, but that didn’t mean much these days.
The drone on screen neared the coordinates with every passing moment. The closer it got to the right spot, the thicker the dust and smoke became. The bomb had gone off days ago and the readings still showed a high heat signature and radiation levels. It was easy to see how hundreds of these things had crippled the world over a century ago. How misguided were the people who made these weapons in the first place? What could they have expected by building something so destructive?
“This is too near to the blast zone,” Nolan said. “Anyone this close would have been vaporized.”
Lester commanded the drone to pan out and widen the search parameters which wasn’t so easy given the haze. The two of them waited in anticipation; every minute gave them a higher chance that Des was wrong. Or they could be closer to the moment of finding out he was right. If he was right, they would find bodies all over the place. The villagers hadn’t been directly within the blast radius, but Des’ coordinates showed that the people would be close enough to be killed by extreme heat.
Nolan didn’t blink as he stared at the screen. He didn’t want to miss anything. Lester probably took a different view of the matter and was more inclined to shut everything down now before they actually did find anything. But the co-president surprised him, remaining fixed on the screen, giving curt commands for the drone to move west or north.
“Look!” Nolan said, tapping the screen. “Move in on that dark object on the ground.”
The drone did as commanded, lowering itself to the ground. There was no mistaking what it was. The face was blackened and unrecognizable. The arms and legs were charred, the body’s clothes singed.
“No,” Lester whispered. “It can’t be.”
This was the first of many. The drone pulled back further, and there were a few more bodies next to the first one, crumbled and burned. A lot of them looked as though they had been crawling, trying to get to a safe place before the heat overtook them and ended their existence. The drone pulled back and Nolan lost count after about eighty.
“Okay,” Lester said to the drone. “Come on back and set yourself up for an immediate update.”
“What?” Nolan said.
“It records this information, Nolan. We can’t have it floating around.”
“But those people,” Nolan said. “We just annihilated a whole group of people. They burned to death out there and we didn’t even know it.”
“And there is absolutely nothing we can do about it,” Lester answered.
Nolan pointed at the screen. “But this was done on purpose. Don’t you see that?”
“Maybe. Maybe not. It could have just been a horrible accident.”
Nolan moved back to the other side of the desk to face President Vaughn. “I showed you the report. Those coordinates were changed at the last second. Next thing we learn is that we’re murderers.”
Vaughn leaned back in his chair and intertwined his fingers, resting his hands behind his head. “What concerns me more than anything is that Des has returned. Not only returned but illegally.”
“What do you mean illegally?”
“He was scaling the walls, Nolan. You can’t just do that these days. We have rules. You go through the gates.”
“He didn’t know that.”
Lester shrugged. “He’s with Hazel?
“As far as I know,” Nolan said. “That’s where I left him.”
Lester nodded, a hand returning to his beard. “You know we can’t afford this right now.”
“I know.”
“And Des being here poses a problem.”
“I know,” Nolan repeated.
“We need to work out an agreement,” Lester said. “If word of this gets out it’s going to fall back on all of us, not just Morris and Bracken.”
“Des is out for revenge,” Nolan said.
“Then we just might have to restrain him. Keep him quiet. Maybe even provide him with an involuntary update.”
Nolan stared at him, unblinking. “A cover-up?”
Lester shrugged. “What do you want me to do with this, Nolan? Am I supposed to take it to the city, express our regret, and ask for forgiveness? We don’t know who these people are.”
“They were no different than us. Outlanders trying to survive this world.”
“And we figured out a way,” Lester came back. He stood now, his cheeks red underneath his beard.
“The Mainlanders could have nuked us any day of the week,” Nolan said.
“But they didn’t. We fought and we won. Now look where we are.”
“Thanks in large part to that robot whose memory you want to erase.”
“Since when do you care about erasing robot memories?” Lester said. He walked to the other side of the room and looked out the window. With the lights on in the room and the
darkness outside, all he could see was his own reflection. “You have always held the position that they are just machines that have been given a dangerous power.”
“And I still think that,” Nolan said.
“But not about Des.”
Nolan stared at the floor, not sure what to say or think. He had no love for any robot, that was for sure, but they all owed a lot more to Des than Lester wanted to admit. Nolan owed a lot more to Des than even he would like to admit, but he was at least willing to see Des as special, even if he only looked at all these others as mindless drones with a fancy program installed.
“My position on robots or Des has nothing to do with the situation,” Nolan said. “The fact is, we just slaughtered a whole group of people and you’re talking about a cover-up.”
“And the alternative is we face the music and hang. Every last one of us.” Lester turned from the window, his teeth grinding against each other. “There is so much unrest in this city that we wouldn’t stand a chance with news like this getting out. Those people, and not just our Outlanders, but the rest of them too, are looking for a reason to get rid of us, to make a fresh start. Do you not realize the devastation it would cause if we told them that the nuke we set off—the symbol of unification and peace—destroyed hundreds of people?”
Nolan did realize how bad things would be, but he still didn’t feel like it was the right thing to do—to just sweep it under the rug. It was a terrible thing that happened, and he agreed with Lester mostly, but he still didn’t think it was right to deactivate Des.
His disagreement with Lester wasn’t a common occurrence. The two of them had grown close over the years. From the revolution to now, the two of them had shared victories and defeats. They had shed blood together and taken care of each other’s wounds. He trusted Lester’s judgment, but every day presented them with new and dangerous scenarios. They had to keep each other grounded.
“Before you think about deactivating Des could we at least talk to him? He might have calmed down by now.”
Lester considered Nolan’s words for a moment then nodded. “Of course,” he said, “we will bring him in.”
Prototype Exodus (Prototype D Series Book 2) Page 10