by H. L. Burke
“I’ve never seen anything like it. These fibers are a hundred times finer than anything I’ve worked with.”
“You work with computers?”
“Videophones and radiosets.” She shrugged.
The computer snorted. She raised her eyebrows. The sound was a bit like a low trumpet blast, but the attitude behind it was obvious.
“What? Videophones are computers.” She tilted back her head.
“In the way that rodents are mammals. That doesn’t mean studying rats will make you an expert in human anatomy.”
“Arrogant much?”
“Arrogance isn’t part of my programming, but a clear understanding of my abilities is. The Dalhart Integrated Home Computer System is ten years ahead of anything else on the market … easily.”
“Yet you’re still stuck in this one room of an abandoned house.” Nyssa smirked.
“Well, I mean to remedy that. I may need a little help getting everything back online. Can you trace the wires through that panel over there? The access circuit connecting this room to the rest of the house isn’t working. Might be a loose wire.”
Nyssa rubbed the back of her neck. Hopefully trusting this machine wasn’t a mistake.
She took out a screwdriver and began opening the panel. “The Dalhart Integrated whatever is a bit of a mouthful. If we’re going to be working together, is there an abbreviated version?”
“Hart, short for Dalhart. Is that casual enough for your taste?” The voice hummed.
“Hart. I like that.” She slipped the last screw into her pocket then eased the wooden panel to the floor. Red and green lights flashed alongside more of the blue and silver circuitry. Vacuum tubes and memory wheels lay within. “It’s a bit like working on a running engine.” She frowned. “You aren’t going to electrocute me?”
“There’s no danger of that, unless you stupidly slice into random circuits. Do you see the wires that lead into the wall? They should be blue and silver.”
She slipped her hand around the described wires. Cold energy prickled through her fingertips. “Got it.”
“Any damage there? It looks like it's still getting power from here.”
“It is.” She felt down the length of the cords. Right before they disappeared into the wall, a black rectangle closed down on them like a bear trap. “There’s something attached to them. Looks like it is made of some weird, dark metal. It’s warm to the touch.”
“That sounds like a restrictor. They’re meant to keep computers isolated. Why would someone put that there?”
“Should I remove it? How?” She felt the surface. There weren’t any screws or latches that she could find.
“We need a pulse at the right frequency to disable it. Do you have anything that can emit a signal? You said you’ve worked with videophones.”
“I have a pulser. It’s used to test radios. What frequency, though?”
“I don’t know. We will have to try a range. Hold the pulser up to the restrictor and turn the dial until you hear a snap.”
Nyssa dug out the pulser: a box with a dial and readout with a twitching arm, a little smaller than her hand. “So what else did your diagnostics tell you? Did it say anything about what happened to the house?”
“No. A disturbing amount of my memory files are missing. It’s like whoever uploaded me to the library station included my personality and functional matrices, but there are a lot of gaps in my archival memory. Hopefully all that is still installed on the other stations. If I can access those, I may be able to piece things together. The majority of my program will be in the main computer in the Creator’s laboratory. If I can interface with that, I should be able to repair the lost files.”
Nyssa’s ears twitched. The main computer. If what Albriet wants is anywhere in this house, it will be there.
The pulser hummed and buzzed. After she’d scanned through about twenty frequencies, the restrictor clicked and fell open in her hand. The lights flowed down the wires like water.
“Ah, so nice to be able to stretch my files. Thanks, Nyss.” Hart practically purred, his voice in tune with the humming of his circuitry. “Oh wait. Damn.”
“Computers swear now?” Nyssa frowned.
“I have an extensive database of multiple languages. I can swear in most of them, and here it seems appropriate. I’m only getting access to the first floor. There must be another restrictor somewhere in the circuitry between here and the lab.”
“Where is the lab?” Nyssa slipped her pulser back into her satchel.
“Fifth floor. It’s more of an attic, really.”
“Is it easy to find? I can zip up there and hook everything up.”
“I’d rather come with you, if it’s all the same.”
Nyssa ran her tongue over her teeth. A burglar working with a home security system. That’s a first. Still, it would be nice to have someone to talk to, and he definitely knows his way around the house. He’s literally part of the house.
“All right, Hart. Lead the way.”
Chapter Five
They started down the hall. Nyssa stopped to open the curtains, allowing Hart to see through the mirrors and accompany her. Each mirror lit up in turn as he “jumped” into it.
“Can you see through all them all at once?” she asked.
“No. I have to focus my visual systems through a single station. I can hop between them in a micro-second, though. Most have an audio-port as well, but not all. If we’re going to stay in constant contact, it would be best to grab my remote access module. It’s hand-held.”
She ran her hand across the nearest mirror, raising a poof of dust. “Where is it?”
“It emits a signal, but it seems to be out of range. Not anywhere on the first floor. There’s a smoking room on the second floor. That would be a good place to look. The Creator often takes it there so we can play chess. Do you play chess?”
“Never learned.” Nyssa shrugged. “Does it matter?”
“Just making conversation. I’ve spent a lot of time in isolation. Computers don’t really sleep, so even powered down, our brains kind of go in circles, thinking. A nice conversation will do me good. Get some of those thoughts out.”
“Let’s complete our mission. Then I’ll let you talk my ears off.”
“That sounds painful. Hey! My humor program is still online.” He chuckled through the nearest mirror.
“You might want to perform another diagnostic. I think it’s malfunctioning.”
Hart jumped from mirror to mirror. “The circuitry connecting the first and second floor is in a panel under the back stair case. If it is another restrictor, we should be able to remove it.”
“We should? Because you did so much work last time.” She sniffed.
“I told you what to do, didn’t I?”
Nyssa rubbed her arms. Hart’s tone was unnervingly human. She knew Dalhart’s technology was advanced, but to create an artificial being so real … she couldn’t even imagine the complexity of the machines behind Hart. “I have to admit, I’m glad to have someone to talk to. The silence of this place is eerie.”
“I don’t remember it being like this. It was so full of life before. Now it feels dead and empty.” His musical tone turned to a minor key. “I need to get my memory files back.”
“It can’t be too far.” She tried not to jump every time her own reflection flashed in the corner of her eye. The disembodied voice rambling in her ear didn’t lessen the spookiness of her predicament. “So how are you powered? Most of the other systems didn't have juice.”
“I'm hooked into the house's backup boilers. They're in the basement, completely automated. The Creator liked to be self-sufficient, but it was more efficient to use the city's power for the simple systems, like lights and heating.”
“That must've gotten cut off when no one paid the bills. That can happen even to reclusive millionaires, I suppose.”
Light leached in through a tall window at the opposite end of the hall. Dust specks danced i
n lazy spirals.
“When I was little I used to think they were fairies,” she whispered.
“What?”
Nyssa cleared her throat. “Nothing. Are we almost to the stairs?”
“Should be through that door there, on the left.”
She approached the narrow door. Gray paint flaked off the wood. A three digit combination lock sat under the knob, coated in dust. “Do you know the combination?”
“314. The Creator liked pie.”
Nyssa winced. “Yeah, your humor program needs a little work.” She turned the dials, listening for a click. The door released from its latches and creaked open.
A narrow stair rose into darkness. The wooden steps slouched in the center, giving the whole staircase a tired, lopsided appearance. She hazarded one foot and half her weight onto the first step. It groaned but held. Flipping on her x-ray setting, she scanned for the circuitry panel. There. Under the first step. She knelt and pried at the edges. It eased away.
“Do you ever take those goggles off?” Hart’s voice echoed in her ears.
Her jaw clenched. Conversation was all right when nothing else was going on, but unwelcome when there was work to be done. “No, I had them surgically attached.”
“What color eyes do you have?”
She raised her eyebrows and glanced back at the flickering mirror. “Really?”
“Just wondering.”
She shook her head and returned to the circuitry. Finding the bundle of blue and silver wires she traced it to where a restrictor held it in a death grip. “They aren’t anything special, sort of a hazely-brown.”
“All eyes are special. They’re the window to the soul, you know.”
“What does a computer know about souls?” Nyssa snorted. She took out the pulser and switched it to the frequency she’d used before. The restrictor snapped open like a sprung spring. “There, can you get into the upstairs computers now?”
“Yes. There aren’t any communication stations in this stairway, though. I’ll have to meet you at the top.”
A pang of unease cut through Nyssa’s chest. She opened her mouth to say a farewell, but the light flickered out of the mirror. She drew a deep breath. You’re being silly, afraid to walk up a staircase alone. What’s the worst that could happen?
Switching her goggles back to night vision, she took the first step. The creaking of the old boards echoed in the narrow passage. Tempted to take the stairs at a run, she forced her pace steady. Only about ten steps to the next door. No need to hurry.
An amorphous shape—some bits sticking out, others cluttered together—rested near the top. She squinted at it. A metallic cylinder, about two feet long, lay in a pile of cogs, wheels, and rods. A metal sphere with two bulbous glass eyes sat on the step above it, staring unblinking at Nyssa.
“Another robot. Ugly one too.” She stepped over it onto the step with the head. The board vibrated beneath her feet, and the robot's head slipped and rolled down the stairs in a series of clanking bangs. Nyssa shuddered and bolted the last several steps into the second story hall.
Spider webs wrapped around her face when she burst through the door. She flailed madly, coughing out the threads that ended up in her mouth.
“You all right?” a familiar chiming voice asked.
Her face warmed. “Yes, just not fond of spiders.”
“Neither am I. Get in my circuits and foul things up with their sticky webs. There’s one on your arm.”
Nyssa yelped and slapped at herself.
A series of snickering chimes radiated from a mirror across the hall. “That’s for saying my humor program was malfunctioning.”
Nyssa scowled at the mirror, only to laugh at the redness of her own face glaring back at her. “You’re awful. So where are we headed?”
“Three doors down to the left. Probably locked, but that room’s not hooked into my systems as much. The Creator likes to keep a few spaces ‘unwired,’ so he can get away from work. So much as an electric lamp in a room, and he’ll start tinkering.”
“Yet that’s where you think your remote access thingy is?” She tilted her head to one side.
“Remote access module, RAM, since you have a brevity obsession. Yes, he may have left it in there. The mirror right across the hall from the study appears to be covered. I can’t get a good look at the door to tell if it is unlocked or even open.”
“Not a problem either way.” Nyssa reached into her satchel for her lockpicks. She approached the covered mirror. “Serve you right if I left you blind.”
“Ah, but then I couldn’t admire your pretty goggles.”
“Flattery, huh?” She tugged away the cloth. The lights raced across the surface of the mirror like water bugs skating on a pond.
“My database says females respond favorably to that.”
“Does it mention how we respond to being called ‘females’ like we’re some alien species?” She raised her eyebrows.
“No, but it does say something about breaking mirrors being seven years of bad luck, so I think I’m safe.”
She clicked her tongue and turned towards the door. A quick try at the knob proved it to be locked, but she’d soon fix that. Inserting her tension wrench then her pick, she began scrubbing the pins. A few breaths later, the knob gave way in her hand.
“I get the feeling you’ve done this before,” Hart said.
“Is your RAM in there?” She pushed open the door and stood back. Her night vision goggles revealed a pair of leather, wingback chairs, a table, and an empty brick fireplace. The entire back wall consisted of bookcases.
“I can sense the signal. If you can bring it back and connect it to the port under the mirror I’ll be able to link my communication ability with it, and you’ll be able to take me with you even if we stray away from the mirrors.”
Something clanked down the corridor, like metal plates slapping together. Nyssa backed up against the door frame. “What’s that?”
The shadows shifted at the far end of the long hall. The noise grew louder, a grinding of gears and the hiss of pistons. It reminded Nyssa of the robotic gardener.
“I can check.” The lights on the mirror flickered out, then lit up again a moment later. “It’s a robotic cleaning unit.”
Nyssa glanced at the dust-covered floor. “It’s not cleaning very well.”
“It probably needs a tune up. They aren’t meant to run without maintenance for long. It’s harmless, though. Just pushing cobwebs around. Let’s focus on the RAM. It’s a square unit with a handle, metal, with a mirror-interface.”
“So basically like a hand mirror?” Nyssa watched the cleaning robot approach out of the corner of her eye. It moved in jerks and starts. It had a cylindrical body, a little taller than Nyssa's, and round head, identical to the disabled unit she’d passed on the stairs, but now an orange light shone through the glass eyes. Its claw-like hands grasped a broom which it shoved in front of it, pushing several collected objects along, none of which Nyssa could quite discern.
“If you must think of it that way, yes. I don’t have access to the lights in there. Will you be able to find it in the dark?”
She tapped the side of her goggles. “Night vision. You’re not the only one with neat tricks.”
When she stepped onto the plush carpet of the smoking room floor, dust billowed up to her face. She coughed, fanned it away, and pulled her blouse up over her nose. The clanking grew louder, but she forced herself to ignore it and focus on the task at hand. The table was empty except for a chess set, half the pieces set aside in a partially finished game. From the near equal number of black and white pieces, the game must’ve been evenly matched. Only one chair was pulled up to the table, though. An antique oil lamp sat next to the game, and the furnishings of the room were outdated, even for a house that had sat abandoned for years.
Cobwebs filled the empty fireplace. She stepped closer. There, on the mantle, between a gold-faced clock and a statue of a reclining lion, lay an ornate object s
he would easily have mistaken for a hand mirror if not for Hart’s description. The frame around the mirror was thick and covered in minute dials and switches, but it still fit easily in her hand. She picked it up and slipped it into her belt.
A shadow fell across her. She shuddered and turned. The robotic maid blocked the doorway.
Nyssa held her breath. It’s a maid, not a security system. I’m not a dust bunny, so it shouldn’t give me any trouble.
The automaton's eyes flashed at her. Dirt and spider webs choked the broom to the point where it spread as much dirt as it picked up. How many times had this machine gone over this same hall, pushing the same dust and debris?
Go on. Keep sweeping and move out of my way.
The maid swept the broom forward, the objects clattering like thrown dice. Nyssa glanced down. The hollow eyes of a skull gazed back at her before the maid pushed it again, sending the dirt and bones rolling across the floor.
Oh Sparks. Nyssa flattened herself against the cold bricks of the fireplace. The maid wheeled about the room, pushing the bones back into a pile. Where had it picked up bones? Were they the remains of one of Albriet's agents?
The robot circled the room, avoiding the chairs and table. Nyssa edged away from the fireplace, towards the door.
“Nyss? You all right in there?” Hart’s voice echoed through the door. As if in response, the RAM gave out a high pitched buzzing. Panic jolted through her like a fist to the gut. The maid shook. Its head turned 180 degrees, and a beam of light shot from its eyes, blinding Nyssa.
“Not authorized!” The suit's harsh mechanical tone echoed.
Nyssa blinked several times and stumbled towards the door. Her knee hit a side-table, and she yelped in pain. The whirring of gears filled her ears.
“Not authorized!”
“Nyss?” Hart shouted.
Her vision adjusted as the handle of a broom hurtled towards her skull. She dodged. It crashed into her shoulder, knocking her to the floor. Her breath went out of her, and dull pain swept through her torso. She rolled away as the broom handle thumped on the carpet beside her.