by David Poland
An hour ago, before his escape, Tommy lived in a very comfortable first-floor flat that he shared with his half-sister and her half-brother and their two assigned robots. The flat had three bedrooms and a two-car garage. Of course the robots didn’t need a bedroom. Their cradles were in a hall closet.
Homeland Care had assembled his family unit after discovering the bloodline between the girl and the two boys. Tommy had lost his mother to a hang glider accident. Like Tommy, she was tall and slender and very strong. Unfortunately, she let her over confidence get her in trouble. His half-sister and her half-brother had lost their mother to a super bacterium immune to any known antibiotic.
The two fathers, who had never met each other, had each filed for the Unencumbered Social Freedom Entitlement. The entitlement was a way to abandon your own children, but you could only do it if you moved out of the city and made no contact whatsoever.
Homeland Care had assigned their family unit a domestic robot to keep their house and a provider robot to earn their credits. Tommy felt no kinship to his half-sister’s half-brother. The little “turkey” was now in high school and seemed to be enjoying it. Having passed his first two years of high school without a hitch, the half-brother’s chaperone robot had been reassigned to another child now turning five years old.
Tommy and his half-sister shared a family resemblance. She could look at him and know what he was thinking. She had earned a diploma and had chosen to work for the WPA. Of course, she didn’t have to work, but she took a personal pride in each project her office managed. She could buy a motorcycle if she wanted one but she refused. Her lack of cooperation told him that he was not as closely related to her as he appeared to be. She didn’t need him. Her half-brother didn’t need him. The robots didn’t need him; and Jack was long gone. The time had come for him to drop out of his family unit.
It was time to be his own man.
He had heard that west of the city there were very few robots, and people still needed each other. He had also heard that nobody Out West cared if you were wearing a com-link. He would go Out West, but not to the ocean. The West Coast had just as much Homeland Care as the East Coast. Nebraska, the song said Nebraska was the Promised Land. He would go there and get himself lost.
He wished he had a watch, but he knew they were all Homeland Security transponders. He would wait for the church bells. Be calm, he thought, just be calm and wait for the church bells.
“Tommy? Are you up in that tree?”
Every nerve in his body exploded with anger. How could he find me? No one could possibly know where I am. I’m not wearing my watch!
“Tommy, I know you’re up there. Come on down and I’ll give you a lift home.”
“How do you know I’m up here?” yelled Tommy in a very unfriendly way.
“If the remains of that green helium balloon are yours, I have to write you up for littering.”
“Oh man, that wasn’t my balloon. How do you even know about the balloon? It was gone before you even got here.”
“I didn’t,” called back Officer Dax. “The gardening robot told my transport about it. When they asked me to come get you, I read it off the monitor. So was it your balloon?”
“No, I told you no. I don’t waste my credits on no helium balloons. How dumb do you think I am?”
“I’m not so sure helium balloons are all that dumb; my kids loved’em when they were little. Are you sure that one wasn’t yours?”
“Of course I’m sure. I know what I done, and I got better stuff to do with my credits than buying no balloons.”
“That’s good Tommy. I believe you. Now I don’t have to write you up for littering.”
“How did the gardening machine know it was me?”
“It saw your blue spring-loaded nitro shoes, and one of the trash trucks said it had seen those shoes running into the park.”
“Everybody has nitro shoes. How did it know it was me?”
“I don’t have nitros,” said the police officer. “Demy was wearing your com-link and the trash truck matched it with a shoe store image.” Officer Dax admired the intellectual speed and agility of the trash truck. “Why don’t you come down before it gets dark?”
“I’m not coming down. I’ll come down tomorrow. You just go on home. So how did you know which tree I climbed up?”
“I didn’t. The gardening robot told my transport which tree you climbed. I can’t tell one tree from another. Why don’t you come down and ask my transport how it knew? It’s got a good voice coupler. You can talk to it if you want to.”
Officer Dax of Homeland Security had known Tommy since he was a child. Unlike many Homeland Security policemen, he had not moved around the city. He was an old-fashioned cop with a beat he loved and his own nifty new self-driving transport. The transport was more the size of a golf cart than an automobile and the two seats were over the front wheels. When it was stopped, you could stand up and step off of it. There was no structure in front of the passengers. The transport was driverless and was a little like a big two-seat wheelchair that pushed itself.
“So when you’re not chasing your friends in the park, you sit around and talk to your transport?” There was no immediate answer. “Tell me Daxy, does your transport know any good jokes?”
“You left your flat without your com-link watch! And you know if you go outside without it, you’re in trouble.” Officer Dax couldn’t see Tommy up in the tree. He got off the transport and walked around the tree, then he called up to him again. “You know we have a video of you running a red light and creating a traffic hazard.”
“That was no traffic hazard. That was a people hazard, and I was the people, not them. Whose side you on anyway?”
“You found a pretty good tree. I can’t see you up there.”
“That’s because I’m not here. You got the wrong park.”
“But I can hear you just fine. Come on down.”
“You come up and find me.”
“I’d love to,” answered Officer Dax, “but my salary grade doesn’t authorize me to climb trees.”
“Then you got to go back to the office and get yourself a better grade. Right now you got an ‘F’ for tree climbing.”
A devious smile crept across the policeman’s face. “You getting hungry Tommy?”
“That’s none of your business.”
“I can hear bells,” yelled Officer Dax back up the tree. “I think I’ll have some ice cream. You want a cone?”
“Ice cream cone? You think I’ll come down for an ice cream cone? You got to do better than that.”
“Do better than what? Every robot in the park knows where you are and they already called for a police robot to come help you down.” No answer came back down from Tommy. “You want to sit up there until the police robot gets here? I assure you that thing can climb your tree.”
Tommy called back down. “So what kind of ice cream do you like?”
“Apricot sherbet.”
As Tommy came down he yelled, “Apricot sherbet! You got no class.”
Officer Dax hadn’t expected to see him as beat up and dirty as he was. “What happened to you? Did you fall off the trail?”
“Yeah, something like that.”
“Have a seat. The ice cream man is down by the gate.”
“So why can’t I come to the park and climb a tree?”
“Homeland Care understands that boys like to climb trees, but you must climb the ones that are certified as climbable. You know this park as well as I do; the trees for climbing are over by the jungle gyms.” Officer Dax knew his transport was listening to them. He patted the side of the machine and said, “Let’s go get some ice cream.” The transport engaged silently.
“So now I’m in trouble for climbing the wrong tree?”
“No, I’m not going to put that in my report either. Right now, you are in trouble for leaving home without your com-link. Why didn’t you stop and let your own domestic robot give it to you?”
Tommy sat sil
ently in the police transport as it took them back down the turf pathway. If there was no ice cream man by the gate, he would jump and run back into the undergrowth. The transport slowed for the footbridge. As it skillfully drove over it, Tommy guessed it had no more than two inches clearance on either side. The transport made the crossing without scraping the bridge, not even once. “You got a pretty good transport here. Do you like it?”
“It’s great! I love it. The seats even have heaters if it gets cold. My dad never had anything like this. So what’s it going to be, vanilla with a cherry on top and a chocolate dip down to the cone?”
“Don’t forget the powdered sugar inside the cone before the ice cream.”
“You trying to give yourself Type-2?”
“Why not, everybody else has it.”
Without further instruction, the transport turned off the path and parked close enough to the ice cream man that they didn’t need to leave their seats. Officer Dax had a cup of fresh apricot sherbet and ordered the cone for Tommy just the way he liked it. “So why did you leave home without your com-link and come here and hide in a tree?”
“HC won’t let me have a motorcycle, and I’m sick and tired of them telling me what I can do and what I can’t do. I’m not half dead and I’m not half asleep either. I just don’t like being told what I can’t do. I’m alive and they got no business taking away my freedoms. This here is supposed to be a free country, isn’t it? ”
“The rules apply to everyone. You have to get a job to get your first bike, and I can’t do a thing about HC. When it comes to Homeland Care, I’m in the same boat you’re in.”
Tommy considered the Officer with a foul expression before he spoke. “So how am I going to get me a motorcycle?”
“Go get a job, then they’ll let you buy one.”
“Impossible.”
“Nonsense. Your own sister works for the WPA. Go to work with her tomorrow, and she’ll help you get started. No big deal!”
“I went there once. The place is worse than school. Besides that I have disabilities that prevent me from working.”
“Right. Are those the disabilities that prevented you from climbing one of the biggest trees in the park?”
“No, I have different ones.”
“You don’t have to fake disabilities if you don’t want to work. You know that as well as I do. If you don’t want to work, don’t work. There are enough robots to do all the work, and your family group has a very good provider.”
“Stop right there!” yelled Tommy. “If they got enough robots to do all the work, then they don’t need me. That work rule is just another way for HC to push me around.”
“Don’t you yell at me,” growled Officer Dax. “I didn’t make the rules; and as sure as data processing, I didn’t create Homeland Care.” Dax considered Tommy for moment and then with a friendlier tone of voice asked, “Have you ever gone to work with your provider?”
“Paycheck? Are you talking about Paycheck? You got to be kidding. That robot repairs buildings where the bricks got broken. I go to work with him and they’ll drop broken bricks on my head. No thank you Daxy.” Tommy raised his ice cream cone and bit through the chocolate to the cherry.
“If you give the WPA a second chance, they will give you an aptitude test and help you find something you like.”
“I like not working,” said Tommy; “and you just said they got enough robots to do all the work anyway, so they don’t need me.” Then he took a much bigger bite from his cone.
“I thought you wanted a motorcycle. If you don’t really want one, stay at home, watch the screen and get fat.”
Tommy had bitten off so much ice cream he had to clear his mouth before he could answer. “Any job I get, they got some robot that can do it better than me.”
“That’s not the point. I’m sure there are also people that can do any job you get better than you can. The point is that somebody has to do the work and Homeland Care has determined that if you’re responsible enough to work, then you’re responsible enough to have a motorcycle. Besides all that, you should think of working as part of being alive. Work is an essential life experience. There is a real pleasure in a job well done.”
“Yeah, that’s a good one. I think riding a motorcycle is an essential life experience.” Tommy considered Officer Dax skeptically. “That’s not you talkin’. They made you say that. You’re a cop because your dad was a cop and that’s what you guys do. I don’t know what my dad did, but I’ll bet you he didn’t work for no WPA.”
“Listen to me! There are interesting jobs you don’t even know about.” Dax fell silent. They could hear the heavy lumbering of the police robot coming down the trail. Dax looked over his shoulder. “Something has gone wrong. Whatever happens, don’t leave the transport.”
The ice cream man closed up his cart quickly and left. Looking back up the trail, Tommy gasped when he saw it. “Man, they makin’em bigger and bigger. It looks more like a spider than a machine. Can you stop it?”
“Don’t say a thing,” said Dax. “Something’s gone wrong. Buckle up your seatbelt.”
Tommy had never heard fear in Dax’s voice before. His hands had started to tremble at the sight of the police robot. Keeping an eye on the robot, he grabbed the seatbelt, but missed the buckle the first time. Now looking at it, he buckled it up.
Officer Dax calmly put his hand on the fingerprint reader between the two seats. When it vibrated with recognition, he opened it and turned off the Artificial Intelligence unit. He slipped his hand down and took hold of the manual controller. Suddenly, off in the distance, they could hear four or five police sirens turn on.
The police robot walked off the footpath and stopped close enough to grab Tommy or Dax or both of them. It extended one of its mechanical hands. It was large enough to sit in and strong enough to lift the transport. It spoke with a gravely inhuman voice. “Retrieve 29 year old Tommy from unauthorized tree. Leave tree in park. Retrieve 29 year old Tommy.”
Tommy knew that once a police robot had you in its sights, there was no way you could outrun it. Trying hard not to draw attention to himself, he tightened his seat belt.
Dax held up his com-link watch toward the robot. “Your presence is noted. 29 year old Tommy is in the custody of Officer Dax, code-bar 27-32-48. Your mission is complete. New directive: return to base.”
The black-spider like machine shifted its weight and revealed two more hands from its underside. It spoke again. “Deactivate. Deactivate Officer 27-32-48 and retrieve 29 year old Tommy.”
Dax jammed the controller forward and the transport spun dirt racing off the turf. Tommy twisted in his seat to see what the robot would do next. Responding instantly, the monster extended two of its hands. “Faster, Faster, faster,” yelled Tommy as the black steel hands reached forward. The hands snapped shut, but only ripped off taillights as they sped away.
All the robotic traffic pulled to the sides of the street and stopped. Dax maxed out his transport racing down the center of the street. The spider-like monster leaped forward in pursuit. Logic units in the traffic lights read the problem and froze all lights on red.
The six-legged police robot was tall enough to step over the small cars and strong enough to push anything else out of its way. As the monster started gaining on Dax down the center of the street, three provider robots from the sidewalk leaped onto its legs and locked three of its knee joints tight. For a moment they stopped it, but the spider needed only three of its powerful hands to remove the providers from its legs and crush them. The monster then threw what was left of them on the asphalt and leaped forward.
The sirens were getting closer. Dax could see the mechanical spider gaining on them and looked for a place to dodge it. There was a narrow alley just ahead and as the black steel hands reached out for them, he turned sharply into the alley. Just missing them, the machine ripped off a fire hydrant. Water shot thirty feet into the air.
The alley was a dead-end. As they jumped off the transport, th
e great black spider appeared and started for them. “Don’t run!” yelled Dax. “That thing will kill you.” Dax then stepped in front of Tommy and removed his weapon. He pointed it toward the sky, holding it with both hands. Dax showed no fear. He didn’t move.
At the sight of the weapon, the machine stopped. It scanned the weapon and rated its power. Tommy backed away from Dax and slowly went around behind the transport to hide. The machine’s low gravely voice echoed slightly off the buildings. “Deactivate. Deactivate 27-32-48 and retrieve 29 year old Tommy.” The sirens were getting louder. Helicopters could be heard overhead. When the machine moved, Dax fired into its sensor pack again and again taking out optical sensors, range finders, and heat sensors. He damaged it and stood his ground; but the monster moved forward slowly and started to extend all four of its hands.
Hiding behind the transport, Tommy raised up enough to see Dax firing at their enemy. “Run Daxy! Run! You can’t stop that thing. Run man, you gotta get outa there!”
Dax fired again and again, hitting the knees on the front two legs. One leg went stiff, but it didn’t stop. The machine could only see with the small sensors in its hands. It knew exactly where Dax was. The moment before its hands could crush him, a ton of white goo came out of the sky and covered the machine. The goo was the consistency of wet bread dough and was electrically charged. The monster emitted a terrifyingly inhuman moan as it flinched from electric discharges and shorted out. Now dead, it froze solid. Motorcycle policemen with their sirens still screaming, came around the sides of the mess to help Dax.
Tommy was speechless and still hanging on to the transport with both hands. He was shaking and couldn’t believe Dax would die before he would abandon him. Tommy felt like a foolish child.
Dax calmly holstered his weapon. “You guys cut it rather close.”
“I regret that Captain Dax. Are you okay?” said the nearest policeman.
“Yes, I’m fine,” and then with just a hint of a smile, “So kind of you to ask.”
Other policemen brought Tommy from his hiding place. “You needn’t worry about him anymore. We’ll take him downtown for you.”