Prototype D (Prototype D Series Book 1)

by Jason D. Morrow

  “How many soldiers are ready to fight now?” Des asked.

  “Not enough,” Nolan answered.

  “How long could you sustain a fight at the border?”

  Nolan looked at Lester who shrugged and shook his head. “Less than an hour before we would need to retreat back. But that depends on what they bring at us.”

  “And the number of people you’re expecting to join you after the video,” Des pressed, “how long then?”

  “There’s no way to know,” Lester said. “There are too many variables.”

  Des nodded. “I don’t know any of you. I don’t have much of a reason to trust you, but I have less of a reason to trust people like Bracken. So, if you’re ready then I’m yours.”

  Nolan watched Des for a moment. He wondered what the robot was thinking or even if normal thoughts actually passed through his mind like a human’s. His words were in reaction to what he had witnessed on the screen. Emotions were running through him just as they were through Nolan, according to Hazel, but he almost couldn’t believe it.

  “What do you want to do?” Nolan asked.

  “It takes a lot more than a bullet to take me down,” Des said. “And I’m just one person. I can get to the tower quickly and quietly. I will need Gus to show me how to play the broadcast, perhaps upload schematics into my memory beforehand if possible. I think your plan for Gus to start the video feed should be the second option.”

  Nolan didn’t know what to think about the robot’s proposal, and from the look on Lester’s face, he didn’t either.

  “I know it’s a matter of trust,” Des said. He looked at Hazel who watched him with wide eyes, the skin on her cheeks wet and pale. He smiled at her and looked back at Nolan. “But I can get there more quickly and efficiently. And if I’m shot I won’t go down.”

  “What about Esroy?” Hazel asked. “He will be looking for you.”

  Des looked at each of them who stared at the robot in disbelief. “If Esroy wants to kill me then let him try.”

  37

  The evening came and Hazel found herself perched on the same cliff overlooking the Outlander city again. She wrapped her arms around her as the chilly breeze blew over her. She suddenly wished she had the hardened metal exterior that Des had so she could disregard the cold. Each breath came out as white vapor that could be seen only because of the moonlight above her.

  The people below had all been gathered together in the streets. Apparently broadcasts weren’t too uncommon; they were used whenever the Council wanted to make announcements through Lester or some other representative meant to pass on information to the public.

  She thought about her dad. He was probably in some prison cell somewhere being beaten and tortured for any information about Hazel and her whereabouts. She hated that she had brought this upon him. He didn’t deserve any of it. Whatever sins John Hawthorn may have committed, he had paid for them ten-fold in this life. He’d lost almost everything: his wife, his youngest daughter, his sight. He probably even thought he had lost Hazel.

  Des sat next to her on the cliff, watching. Waiting. It was good to be next to him. He seemed highly aware of her feelings, knowing when to speak and when not to. He carried an insightfulness that hadn’t been programmed into him. Perhaps he’d learned it from his brief interactions with human behavior.

  She thought about both Esroy and Des and all the other robots Bracken would make because of Hazel. More water came to her eyes the more she thought.

  “Still thinking about your father?” Des asked.

  “Thinking about a lot of things,” she answered. A tear escaped her left eye and she wiped it away quickly.

  “You don’t have to keep yourself from crying,” Des said. “It’s something I wish I could do. With emotion, comes the need to release those emotions and my body doesn’t allow for too many releases. Crying seems to be one that helps a lot.”

  “I’m so sorry, Des.”

  “For what?”

  “For bringing you and Esroy into this world.” She rested her head in her palms and her elbows on her knees as quiet sobs escaped from her lips. “It was never supposed to be this way.”

  “Hey,” he said. “Look at me.”

  Hazel’s wet face looked up to meet Des’ eyes. His blue stare was captivating and intense. Part of her wanted to look away because the innocence in his gaze felt overwhelming.

  “I don’t want you to ever be sorry for creating me,” he said. “I would rather be alive than not.”

  “Would you? Your entire existence has been hard.”

  “My entire existence has only been a few days. I expect there to be many more days ahead of me.”

  “I don’t expect that for any of us,” Hazel said. She hated sounding so downtrodden, but if she couldn’t be honest with Des, who could she be honest with?

  “That’s because you’re a pessimist,” Des said with a smile. “I might be too with the life you’ve had. You ask me if I would have rather never been created, but would you have rather not been born? Your life has been harder than mine so far.”

  “It wasn’t always that way,” she said. “There were happy times.”

  “And those are times I have to look forward to. And so do you. It is impossible to see the future, but I can guess that it won’t be all bad.”

  She appreciated his optimism. Even Esroy had never tried this hard to cheer her up, though to be fair, he’d been stuck inside a computer terminal his entire life and didn’t see her outside of the office very often. This topic was another reason for her guilt. Had she just taken the risk and given him a body like he wanted, none of them might be facing this problem. Whatever the fight to come, Esroy would be a significant enemy, and Hazel wouldn’t be able to hide behind their relationship forever. He would one day find cause and justification to kill her, especially since he no longer felt fear.

  Esroy wasn’t afraid to lose Hazel.

  From this high up, Hazel could still see Lester standing on a wooden platform in the middle of one of the squares. The darkness fell heavy on the crowd but a bright orange light shined on Lester. He stood in front of a microphone which was connected to an ancient PA system, no doubt left over from the old world. It was simply a more primitive version of what Mainland had throughout the most populated areas. However, the striking difference was the fact that nearly every Mainland citizen had a television in his or her home—one that could be switched on when it came time to make announcements.

  Hazel remembered how she always hated the television. All it meant was news talking about the bad things happening throughout the city, or announcements from the government that never felt like they pertained to her, especially when she was a child.

  When it seemed everything was ready and all the citizens stood in the streets outside their homes, Lester cleared his throat.

  “My friends. My fellow Outlanders. Day by day we suffer together. Every moment we think of a better life and what it would take to get there.”

  A loud hiss followed by a noisy crackle echoed through the streets as he spoke into the microphone, but the message came across clearly enough.

  “There are many ideas,” Lester continued. “Some of you wish to seek out new lands. In the future that may be a possibility. But it is not one afforded to us now. Some of you think we should wait out the storm and try a diplomatic approach. In a world where such diplomacy is valued, it might work. But the Mainlanders have created an image of us that does not allow for peaceful talks. They would rather see us die and no longer be a bother.”

  Hazel watched his face on the screen, studying the lines and wrinkles, the expressions with each word spoken. She wish she knew the man. For her the truth about the Mainland leadership wasn’t enough. What was behind Lester’s speech? What were his intentions? His end goal?

  “I know some of you don’t believe this, for it is too difficult to swallow. For those of you who do not believe it, for those of you who think I am hell-bent on warring against the Mainlanders, I
tell you that you are right. And I believe that when you see what I have seen, each and every one of you will feel the same way.”

  Hazel looked at Des who scanned the crowd with his zoomed vision. She wondered what was going through his mind. What was his thought process? Emotions were there, but what were they?

  “Over the last few days, we have conducted an operation to infiltrate Mainland and steal evidence that proves our motivations are true. I want to go ahead and say that this video is edited only for time. We’ve chosen clips that need no explanation. These videos were obtained by Nolan Ragsdale during his years in the Mainland government.”

  Lester looked down and nodded at someone below the stage. The orange light shut off and the video began playing. The image was grainy and not as clear as it had been on the tiny screens in the caverns or on her computer screen at the military compound, but it was clear enough to recognize a younger-looking Nolan sitting in front of the camera.

  “These clips are from meetings that I have personally had with President Godfrey and Vice President Morris. Before you see it, know that I took these videos at my own risk. If any government official were to find out about these recordings, I would be put to death without question. I do this for the truth. I do this because all of us deserve to know the truth. These are the kind of people that made the world the way it is. These kind of people are why there are so few of us left.”

  The video cut to the same meeting Hazel had seen in her office. From there to another and another. Most of the clips she had seen. Some of them she hadn’t. She could hear the low murmur of voices below her even from this distance as the people learned the truth about why they lived on scraps and what the Mainlanders planned to do to them.

  “They’re crying,” Des said. “Some of them.”

  “Really?” Hazel asked, turning to Des.

  He nodded. “They are angry.

  “So, it’s working.”

  When the video ended, everything went dark, though not silent. The crowd’s volume grew louder as voices of discontent rose into the night sky. Finally, the orange light came back on and Lester stood on the wooden platform with a look of anger on his face.

  “For those who still say we don’t have a war to fight, to you I say leave! Because your chances of staying alive through peaceful resolution are worse than if you traverse the nuclear wilderness alone!”

  A loud cry of support rumbled through the crowd.

  “Ready yourselves! Soon we will fight. We will fight!”

  The crowd caught his last sentence in stride as he raised his fists in the air and their chants echoed his words with power.

  We will fight! We will fight!

  Over and over the words were chanted by each person in unison. They were enraged by what they had seen and heard. Those who had wanted to find a different way to solve their problems were forgotten, replaced by a hunger for battle.

  Hazel stared below as the noise grew louder and louder.

  We will fight! We will fight!

  Des turned his head to her, a solemn expression on his face. “We are doing the right thing, aren’t we?”

  A puff of white vapor blew out of her mouth in a cloud. “I hope so. I really do.”

  The Outlanders’ cries carried on into the night. Images of Mainlanders plotting to kill them was more than enough to rally them together. They only had to wait for the time and place. Even if it was their last fight, and it probably was, they were ready.

  38

  A day went by and there had been no word of when the Outlander fight would begin, though there was something in the air that suggested it would be soon. Des made sure to keep close to Hazel, the two of them doing little more than watching the Mainland news for any updates about her father or sitting at the cliffs and watching the people as they formed lines—this time for weapons rather than just food. The news offered no updates, and Hazel became more and more frustrated the longer they had to wait. They tried to ask the few people they saw within the caverns, but most of them, Nolan and Lester included, had gone into the city to be a face for the revolution. Apparently they were there to inspire the people further before the harsh fight ahead of them.

  Des zoomed in on the crowd and spotted Nolan every now and again. Each time he tried to listen to the people, but his hardware was not nearly so advanced to wade through the sea of low voices and commotion. He was too far and the people too many. Occasionally, Hazel would ask what he saw and he would explain it even though it was almost exactly the same as the time before.

  There was one such time when they sat together that Des wasn’t watching people. Instead, he watched as the sun set over the western horizon. He realized that this was one of the first times he had actually had a moment to sit and think about things. His entire life up to this point had been a whirlwind of commotion. He hadn’t had time to consider his own motivations and gather his own thoughts. He thought about how he had so offhandedly volunteered to take the video to the broadcast tower in Mainland. Sure, he was the most capable out of anyone, but that didn’t mean he had to do it. For some reason he had felt it was necessary, but now as he watched the sunset, he wondered what would happen if he instead took Hazel away from this place in search of a more peaceful land. He shook the thought from his head, knowing that finding such a place could take months. Years. There was no way to guarantee her survival on such a trip. He would have to leave her and travel by himself. Once he found a place that was suitable and peaceful enough for her, he could come back and find her, then take her to it. It was a nice thought, and one he liked to entertain, but it was unlikely.

  He’d calculated the odds more than a thousand times. There was almost no chance of them succeeding in battle. Of course, Des was a variable in all this. But the enemy also had Esroy to even the playing field. Des just couldn’t ascertain what role Esroy would play in this fight considering he didn’t know how the robot thought, especially without the emotion of fear. Just knowing that Esroy had no fear gave Des a sense of nervousness within himself. Without fear, every thought, every decision was weighed based on logic alone and what would make his own outcome more desirable without taking into account the consequences of his actions.

  The sun had gone down and the moon shined bright in the evening sky by the time Nolan came back to the caverns. Hazel and Des had gone in to find her some food because she hadn’t eaten since morning. Nolan helped her find some bread and cheese—a luxury among the Outlanders, he was sure to tell them. While Hazel sat at one of the tables, taking small bites of her sandwich, Nolan led Des to one of the screens on the other side of the room. Gus and Phil were waiting there and stood a little straighter when Des walked up. He wasn’t sure if they were still nervous at his presence or not, but Des wouldn’t have been surprised. Truthfully, Des did everything out of his own free will and there was nothing the others could do to stop him. Not here, at least.

  “We need to plug this in,” Gus said, holding up a cord that was connected to a computer tower. “It’s the best way to show you how to display the broadcast over Mainland tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow?” The inquiry came from Hazel who stood from the table, her mouth full of bread and cheese. “That’s been confirmed?”

  Nolan nodded. “Tomorrow morning. By the time we make it to the tower, everyone will be awake and probably near a screen.”

  “So, what’s the plan then?” she asked, shrugging. “You’re just going to attack head on?”

  “What other option do we have?” Nolan asked. “The attack is merely a distraction to get Des into the city. Bracken is going to have all of his forces concentrated on the largest number of enemies they’ve ever faced. If we’re lucky, they won’t even see Des get through the lines.”

  “It’s unlikely that I won’t be seen,” Des said. “I just need to get far enough in that I can get a head start.”

  “You understand that the moment the broadcast starts, Bracken is going to send Esroy after you,” Hazel said.

  “I’m
not afraid of Esroy,” Des said. He wasn’t sure if he spoke the truth, but he felt he needed to display a certain sense of confidence to the others.

  “It doesn’t matter if you’re afraid,” Hazel said. “He’s bigger than you. Stronger.”

  “I can take a bullet,” Des said proudly.

  “Yeah, but you can’t take a lot of bullets. You can’t take a rocket to the head.”

  “That thing took your leg off, Des,” Nolan said, “Once the broadcast starts your primary objective is to guard it and make sure it plays all the way through.”

  “There will be heavy resistance,” Gus chimed in.

  “Wait,” Hazel said, “You’re not planning to send Des alone are you?”

  “No,” Nolan said. “He’s got a team. Gus and Phil will lead a group to the broadcast tower.”

  “I will go with Des,” Hazel said.

  Des shook his head. “No. There’s no way you’re going with me.”

  “I have to, Des,” she said, taking a step forward. “If Esroy comes after you, which I am almost certain he will, he might listen to me. He will be far less likely to fight you if I’m there.”

  “Not anymore,” Des said. “He let us go on the way out of Mainland but only because he had a good reason. He saw some advantage to letting us go.”

  “I don’t believe that,” Hazel said. “It may not have had anything to do with fear, but there was something inside him that didn’t want to let me die.”

  “And other than the fear of losing you what could it have been?”

  “Respect,” Hazel said. “Principle. I made him. I gave him life. Just because he can’t feel fear doesn’t mean he can’t feel remorse or that he is completely emotionless. He can still care.”