The Robots of Gotham

by Todd McAulty

  He dropped the weapon, and I released him. He fell to his knees, cradling his left arm, his eyes squeezed shut in agony.

  Everything I’d done had happened in a highly accelerated state. The suit was helping me react faster, move quicker. And it was obviously amplifying my strength. It felt both exhilarating and alarming. I hoped I hadn’t broken any bones in the young corporal’s arm.

  His pistol had thudded to the floor at my feet. I wanted to pick it up, but there was a new complication. Van de Velde had finally drawn her weapon. And she had it aimed at my head.

  “¡Un paso atrás!” she said. The gun in her hands quivered, very slightly.

  I stepped backward slowly, raising my hands.

  The two soldiers chasing me came thudding down the hallway. They pulled up as I came back into view, arms raised over my head. One of them shouted at me in Spanish, dropping his crowbar and raising his rifle.

  I kept my eyes on Van de Velde. She took a few steps forward, until she could glance around the corner and see the approaching soldiers.

  She wasn’t happy to see them. She silently mouthed an obscenity. Her gun wavered.

  I contemplated taking it away from her. But I didn’t know my own strength yet, and the two soldiers closing on us would likely start shooting. I couldn’t risk having her in the line of fire.

  I turned to the arriving soldiers, keeping my arms in the air. Making sure they could see I was unarmed.

  The first to arrive had his rifle at his shoulder. He was shouting at me in Spanish. I couldn’t follow everything he said, but it was clear he wanted me on the floor. The second one pulled up behind him, still clutching his metal rod. He moved away from his companion, flanking me on the right.

  Van de Velde swore under her breath. She lowered her weapon and stepped into the entrance, speaking to the first soldier in Spanish and gesturing for him to get his rifle out of her face.

  The soldier was having none of it. He barked right back at Van de Velde, moving around her, keeping me covered.

  I was more concerned about the soldier on the right. He looked furious and was clutching the metal rod like a baseball bat. It was pretty clear what he intended to do with it. The suit might be bullet-resistant, but a crowbar to the head was a whole different ball game. In the bottom left of my visor, a small red light started flashing. A tiny heart icon blinked at me in red.

  The suit was telling me my heart rate was elevated. No shit, suit.

  The soldier with the rod jumped forward, swinging at my head. The suit analyzed where he put his weight, told me precisely when and where he would swing. It would have been easy to step out of the way, especially with the accelerated reflexes of the suit.

  But I didn’t. Instead I simply reached out and caught the metal bar before it connected.

  It was a tricky thing to attempt, but the look of shocked surprise on the soldier’s face made it worth it. Stopping a crowbar in mid-swing with one hand should have hurt like hell, but the suit absorbed virtually all of the impact.

  The soldier was off balance; I didn’t need the suit to tell me that. Nonetheless he was tugging on the metal rod in frustration, trying to pull it from my hand. I tightened my grip and yanked. As the soldier toppled forward, still clutching the crowbar, I took a smooth step back, slamming the palm of my left hand into the rod, spinning it hard to the right.

  The soldier was yanked off his feet and flew through the air like a toy, smashing against the wall. I felt a rush of adrenaline. The suit was incredible. It made me feel astonishingly powerful, like I could do anything.

  But I needed to play it cool until I could figure out how to get Van de Velde out of the middle of this situation. I took a breath, dropped the crowbar to the floor, and turned back to her, calmly raised my hands in surrender again.

  The second soldier surged forward, raising the butt of his rifle, eager to smash my head open. He never got the chance. Van de Velde interposed herself between us, facing the soldier and trying to get this situation under control.

  Her gun was aimed at the floor. She jabbed her finger at his chest, spitting at him in Spanish. She sounded exactly like a drill sergeant.

  The soldier tried to move around her, anxious to crack me in the skull. Van de Velde moved smoothly to intercept, blocking his path. To the right, the second soldier got shakily to his feet, glaring at me. He looked bruised, but not too badly injured. He picked up the metal rod again, and I made no move to stop him.

  Something was happening in the hall behind them. A dark shape was moving into the corridor. A very large shape.

  It was the tall, lumpy pillar.

  It unfolded black arms and metal legs and a heavy torpedo-shaped head, and took great lumbering strides toward us. It stood roughly eight feet tall, and must have weighed 1,800 pounds.

  Except for its deep black reflective surface, it was a perfect replica of Standing Mars.

  “Shit,” I said. I put my hands down.

  The soldier with the metal bar managed a grin when I lowered my hands. He wiped a trickle of blood from his lips and lifted the crowbar. This is for you, his eyes promised.

  Van de Velde was no longer actively blocking the soldiers. Her eyes were on the thing in the corridor. She took two hesitant steps backward.

  “You are an unauthorized intruder,” said the robot.

  The soldier with the rifle took notice of the thing for the first time. Like Van de Velde, he quickly stepped away, moving to the wall. He kept his rifle on me, but his eyes fixed on the robot.

  “You are not Damian Peters,” said the robot. “That personnel record is a forgery.”

  “Standing Mars,” I said. “Is that you, buddy?”

  “Standing Mars was rendered inoperative by an unknown machine assailant on March 13th, 2083. That investigation is ongoing. My designation is Echo-One-Charlie-Victor-Eight-X-ray. I am known as Perfect Circle.”

  “Get out of here,” I said to the two soldiers and Van de Velde. “Now.”

  Van de Velde shook her head. She pointed her pistol at me again, suddenly filled with steely resolve. “You’re under arrest,” she said to me.

  The soldier on the right swung the metal rod into his palm with a satisfying smack. He gave me one last sour look, then turned to the robot. He limped toward it, pointing to where it came from. He barked at it in Spanish, ordering it back into its little alcove.

  The robot strode toward me. As it did, it reached out with its right hand and crushed the soldier’s skull.

  Van de Velde was the first to react. Cursing extravagantly, she dropped to one knee, squeezing off three shots. Every one of them hit the thing in its big torpedo head.

  It didn’t slow down. It would crush Van de Velde next. “Move!” I shouted at her.

  Then I lunged toward Perfect Circle.

  The suit didn’t want to attack Perfect Circle. The suit, in fact, seemed to think it was a dumb idea, but it tagged along. We went for the left leg just as its weight shifted to its right, in an attempt to topple it back on its metal ass.

  We failed. Like Standing Mars, the thing was far more nimble than it looked. I went in under its arms and hit its back leg like a linebacker. I could feel the suit powering up my legs, helping me lift. We managed to unbalance it, and for a brief moment I thought it would go over. But before we could topple it, it reached down and plucked me off the ground, lifting me effortlessly and smashing me into the ceiling.

  Every alarm the suit had was going off. It was trying to warn me: much worse was coming, and it knew it. I kicked out with my right foot, but my leather shoe bounced harmlessly off the thing’s metal head.

  Van de Velde had not run. She was standing not ten feet away, feet planted firmly, shooting. She didn’t seem at all bothered by the fact that I was struggling in the monster’s grip as she coolly fired around me, pumping round after round into the thing.

  At least one of her shots penetrated the robot’s tough hull, and I saw a brilliant spark in its torso.

  It responded
in brutal fashion. Seizing my left leg in a crushing grip, it slammed me into the floor, face-first. It did it again and again, with blinding speed. I glimpsed Van de Velde jumping backward as the robot used my body as a club, seeking to kill her.

  I was knocked almost senseless. The only thing keeping me alive was the suit, which stiffened instantly into a hard protective shell. I twisted in the monster’s grip, trying to reach the hand holding my leg, and it responded by slamming me into the wall on the right. Drywall shattered in an explosion of white dust, and a thick metal stud smacked me painfully in the face.

  I had missed a metal girder by inches. The suit highlighted it in my display. The suit wanted me to grab it. I reacted instantly, obediently wrapping both arms around the girder, barely able to think.

  Someone was shooting. Not a pistol—an automatic weapon, at close range. Still gripping the pillar, I twisted around to see what was happening.

  Van de Velde was shouting orders in Spanish at the only soldier still standing, and he was obeying, firing short, controlled bursts at the robot. The rifle had far more penetration power than Van de Velde’s pistol, and she had ordered him to aim high. Metal fragments sprayed out violently from Perfect Circle’s torpedo head.

  Perfect Circle didn’t hesitate. It pulled violently on my leg, trying to slam me into the soldier. My grip on the girder was sorely tested, but together the suit and I held. The soldier didn’t let up. Every burst hit the robot, spraying metal. Abruptly, it released me. It took two quick strides and struck the soldier with the force of a pile driver. I heard the crack of breaking bones, and he disappeared into the far wall in a fountain of blood.

  I had bare seconds before Perfect Circle turned its attention back to me, this time to kill me. But I couldn’t move. I could barely breathe. It took everything I had just to release the girder and push myself up into a sitting position. Something tumbled into the dust nearly a yard to my left.

  The bag with Hayduk’s drive . . . and the extra power cell. I had no idea what slamming the second power cell into the suit would do, but it was better than lying here helpless.

  Perfect Circle turned around. It was perforated by bullet holes in a dozen places, and the metal shell of its ugly torpedo head was badly broken. A thin wisp of smoke curled out of its torso. Somewhere deep inside, Perfect Circle was on fire.

  And still it came. Striding toward me. I got one of my legs to respond, kicking me far enough to the left to grab the bag.

  Van de Velde stepped in front of me. Raising her pistol, she started firing again. Her aim was flawless, and every shot smashed into the delicate exposed circuitry in Perfect Circle’s head.

  “No!” I shouted. I tore the bag open, groped for the extra power cell.

  Perfect Circle took another step just as my fingers closed around the cold disk of the power cell. Van de Velde stood firm, squeezing off another shot. She kept firing even as it reached down and enfolded her head and shoulders in its implacable metal grip. She fired one last time, into the thing’s torso, even as the huge metal fingers crushed her.

  “No, you bastard!” Behind my back, my fingers fumbled blindly. Somehow I found the power slot, empty and welcoming. The cell slid inside with no resistance.

  I expected my vision to go dark again. But it did not. Instead of welcome blackness, I watched in horror as Perfect Circle flung Van de Velde’s limp body aside.

  Perfect Circle did not slow, taking the last two relentless strides toward me. And still I could not make my muscles respond. I was seconds from death. I wanted to stand, needed to stand, but my body was unable to respond.

  But suddenly, the suit could. As fast as I thought it, the suit bounced me to my feet like a dancer.

  I was so surprised that for a moment all I did was wobble like a drunken sailor. That was sufficient to dodge Perfect Circle’s first strike, a too-fast hammerblow to the floor precisely where I’d been prone a fraction of a second earlier.

  Perfect Circle recovered quickly. I was still wobbling, still barely upright, unsure how to react to the suit’s new responsiveness. An image flashed into my head: a week ago, in my room, Mac explaining how the combat suit worked. Her warm hand on top of mine. The suit knows when you’re going to move before your muscles do, she’d said.So this is what she meant.

  I needed to move, immediately. I wasn’t sure I had the coordination to pull it off, but I didn’t have time for doubts. I needed to trust the suit, and I needed it to get me four feet to the left,right fucking now.

  I trusted the suit. And it brought me precisely where I wanted to be, RFN, just as Perfect Circle’s second blow tore a gaping hole in the wall, right where I’d been standing.

  I was still a little unsteady. But I was a little more certain on my feet, a little less out of breath. I was getting the hang of using the suit now. Perfect Circle took two slow steps backward, appraising me.

  The suit was like a dream. The first power cell had brought it to life, but the second had awoken its magic. It responded now with the speed of thought, its lightning movements quick and sure, carrying my sluggish body along for the ride. I felt momentarily unsettled by this unnatural quickness, but the suit knew its limits. As rapidly as it responded, it never let me become unbalanced. The numbness was leaving my arms and legs, and as it did I was becoming more sure of foot. I took two quick exploratory steps backward, and one to the right. Weaving like a boxer.

  Perfect Circle tried to grab me then, darting forward with alarming speed. I forced my muscles to relax, told the suit where I wanted to go. The suit brought me under the robot’s first swing, and then spun me out of range of its second. I danced away from the attack, into the open room. The robot followed, grabbing for me with its great metal paws.

  I’d been stupid enough to allow it to grab me once; I wasn’t going to make that mistake again. I threw chairs at it as I retreated into the room, slowly regaining my strength. The robot batted them away in midair. The suit watched every move it made, timing them carefully. After the fourth chair, it showed me how I could get past it.

  I threw a fifth chair. Just before it swatted it out of the air, I darted forward, slipping under its defenses. I was behind it before it had time to react.

  I risked a glance at Van de Velde’s fallen body. She lay twisted in a heap twenty feet away, her head at an unnatural angle. A thin line of blood had spilled from her open mouth. I couldn’t tell if she was breathing.

  The suit highlighted two fallen weapons in easy reach: an automatic rifle and Van de Velde’s pistol. I ignored them both.

  I heard the robot behind me. It had turned around and was marching back toward me. I found what I needed and turned to face it.

  The suit’s metallic protein enhances both speed and strength, Mac had told me. Just how much stronger did it make you?

  I was about to find out.

  Perfect Circle came within fifteen feet and stopped. It seemed to be regarding me, although I couldn’t find its eyes. The fire in its torso had spread, and I could see the first tiny flickers of flame reflecting inside its chest cavity.

  “Lay down your weapons,” it said. “Or you will be neutralized.”

  “Come and try,” I said.

  It surged forward, grasping at me with a heavy metal hand.

  I slapped it aside with the crowbar. The bar made a satisfying clang as it deflected the blow. The robot tried again with its other hand, and I swung hard with the crowbar in my left, with the same result.

  The robot shifted position, trying again. We continued that dance for a few moments. On its sixth attempt, I shifted my attack slightly, bringing the metal bar in my right hand in at a sharper angle. I heard a loud crack. I had shattered the metal casing at the base of one of its fingers.

  It retreated, then suddenly surged forward, pummeling me with blows. I ducked and wove, swinging out with my weapons. After a moment it retreated again.

  I took grim delight in my choice of weapons. They were the ideal weight—light enough for the suit to wiel
d them with blinding speed and just heavy enough to penetrate the robot’s hardened shell. With the crowbars, and the suit’s boosted strength, I could crack Perfect Circle open like a lobster. But to do that, to bring it down, I would have to get closer.

  While I considered how to do that, the suit warned me that Perfect Circle was about to lunge again. Sure enough, a fraction of a second later, the robot came at me. This time, it locked its hands and brought them down overhead in a crushing blow.

  In response, I made a near-fatal mistake.

  The ease with which I’d deflected its previous blows had made me cocky. I had plenty of warning and should have dodged; instead, I brought both metal bars up and locked them in a V over my head.

  I took the blow on my arms and shoulders. It was jarring, but the suit helped me absorb the impact.

  But Perfect Circle didn’t relent. It leaned forward, applying steadily more pressure.

  And suddenly I was trapped. It took everything I had to keep the robot from crushing me.

  I was now in a head-to-head battle of strength with an 1,800-pound robot, and I wasn’t going to win. Strong as the suit was—and I was still learning the astonishing limits of what it could do—it wasn’t going to get me out of this one. More warning lights started flashing. With dispassionate clarity, the suit showed me how much force Perfect Circle was capable of exerting . . . and precisely what would give out first.

  My ankles. They were the only part of my body not protected by the suit. If I had remembered the boots, I think the suit might have won that battle of strength. But long before the suit would yield, my very human ankles would give way. Already they were in agony. One or both of them would shatter, and this would end very shortly thereafter.

  Before I could attempt a desperate maneuver, I heard a gunshot. And then another. The second hit Perfect Circle in the head. Someone was firing at it.

  The pressure eased and then was gone. The robot backed away. A steady stream of smoke was curling out of its torso.

  I risked a glance over my shoulder. Van de Velde’s corporal—the one whose elbow I’d almost broken—was kneeling next to her. He was shooting with his pistol, taking careful aim with his left hand.