“Thanks, baby. You know what I like.” The old man ran a hand over his jaw and took a deep breath. “Jenny, if that train don’t stop, I sure am sorry. Y’all be careful.”
“I understand, Raphael.” The companion bot stepped close to her master. She wrapped her arms around him and threw one leg around his waist, as well. The old man’s balance and strength weren’t that great so she must have been holding him up.
Jenny kissed him. Raphael looked grandfatherly but her kiss was not a chaste peck on the cheek.
From Raphael’s more ribald lectures, I knew simulating a vagina was the simplest engineering of a companion bot’s anatomy. Teeth were also a simple matter and could be infused with normal human variations and imperfections. The skin could be heated to normal human temperature.
According to Raphael, the tongue was the hardest bot structure to mimic convincingly. In the end, the best solution was not mechanical. It was organic. That breakthrough in companion bot tech came from the field of gene splicing.
In the old world, sick people had to receive donated organs from the dead and the living. Research in sex bot development had led to the breakthroughs that allowed organs to be grown in days.
From what I witnessed, Jen’s tongue worked just fine. Her kisses for Raphael were so passionate and prolonged I looked away and wondered what revels I’d missed out on with Jen the night before.
Emma hit a release in her sensory harness and descended on her exo-stilts to seven feet tall. When she caught my eye I was left wondering if Emma had somehow read my thoughts. She gave me a look that made my cheeks burn.
Down the tracks, my father was smiling to himself. Dad looked up he caught my eye. “If the train doesn’t look like it’s slowing down, get back from the tracks, quick as you can. If it does slow down, stay close and get on board, quick as you can. Got it?”
I looked over my shoulder, Bob was beside me and Jen was running full tilt along the tracks. The backpack Bob had carried bounced up and down on her back.
“My Jenny’s a good girl,” Raphael said. “I hope we don’t need her to do what she might have to do. We are owed, after all.”
I heard the train’s hum down the track. It was a dot on the horizon but that dot grew fast. I looked to my right. Jen wasn’t running anymore. Raphael’s beautiful companion bot stood in the path of the speeding train waving her arms.
“It’s not going to stop!” Emma shouted.
My father waved me back from the track. “Get away! Get away!”
I backed up and Bob stayed at my elbow.
Raphael stood still. He looked to my father and gave him a slight nod. Then the old man turned his back to the train.
The train whizzed past. The air it pushed around it was hot but it was the first wind I’d felt that day. I took a deep breath. With the train gone, we were stuck in Marfa.
Jen slipped my father’s backpack from her shoulders, dropped it to the track and ran. Sex bots are athletic. The only person in our party who could have covered ground faster would have been Emma on her exo-stilts.
The train’s sensors detected the obstruction on the track and the miracle began. The train’s brakes activated and it began to slow.
Emma looked overjoyed. “It’s stopping! We’re going to make it.”
A large gun slid out of the train’s nose and fired on the backpack.
“No!” Emma cried.
“’Fraid so,” Raphael said.
The backpack exploded. The detonation took the track with it.
The train derailed.
15
The mechanism behind the machine gun must have jammed in the blast. The weapon kept firing as metal shrieked against metal and the westbound engine tilted on its side and slid.
Clouds of dust rose as the inertia behind the train kept the crash going. I ran back from the track and fell to my knees. Each train car smashed into the car ahead of it.
Eventually, the banging stopped. In the sudden, eerie quiet, my father called for me. “Dante? Dante!”
I blinked back tears as dust blew in my eyes. “I’m over here!”
In a moment he was at my side. “Okay, we’re moving on, deep into Plan B now.”
“What is it?”
“Something I’d hoped wouldn’t be necessary but there’s always got to be a Plan B. You know why, right?”
“Complications ensue.”
“Good man. Sometimes to get out of hell, you have to go through the long way. We’re not headed to the coast now.”
As the dust began to settle, he grabbed me under my armpits and lifted me to my feet. With his cy-suit, I felt like a boy being lifted in the air.
A shadow ran past amid the swirling dust. It was Jen headed to the rear of the train. The engine that pointed east was still on the tracks. Only the engine and three cars remained upright.
My father hefted his heavy rifle and told me to stay behind him. He started for the train and I stumbled forward. Emma emerged from the dust cloud.
I called out. “Raphael? You okay?”
“Peachy! Keep going!”
When I looked behind me, the old man had climbed back on Bob’s back. The assistive bot stayed on its hind legs and walked as a biped to maneuver through the trainwreck’s debris field.
The skin of some of the cars had ripped open in the crash. Above me, Emma echoed my thoughts, “It’s empty. The whole train is empty.”
My jaw went slack. “We kept thinking it would stop and give us goodies. It didn’t have anything, anyway.”
“It came from the domes to the east and north,” Emma said. “No crops.”
“And no water, neither,” Raphael said. “Shit!”
Leading with the muzzle of his rifle, my father was ready for trouble. We didn’t find any on the train. By the time we got to the engine, Jen was already aboard.
The companion bot smiled, reached down and offered her hand. She pulled me up, surprising me with her strength.
My father peered around corners, ready for attackers. “Nobody home, Jenny?”
“No, sir,” she said. “No humans. No drones. Just the pilot computer.”
Emma retracted her exo-stilts to fit inside the engine’s door as she climbed in. “The whole train is the bot. The tracks to the coast are destroyed.”
“The tracks to the west are destroyed,” my father said. “The tracks that will take you back home are clear.”
Dad took a backpack that had been hanging on Bob and disappeared down the side of the train. I heard him banging on something. I poked my head out of the engine in time to see him emerge from the car behind me and close the door carefully.
My father gave us a cheery wink. “The surprise is ready.”
“What surprise?” I asked.
“Bob has the details but don’t open that door. I’ve left an active proximity mine for anybody who opens that door, okay? Okay.”
“You’ve put a bomb on our train?” Emma was wide-eyed.
“More than one, actually. Running away won’t solve the problem. To survive this, we have to take the battle to them. Otherwise, the bots will eventually hunt us all down. I’ve already unlinked two cars and the engine from the wreck. You’ll make good time.”
Emma said nothing. She was quick to weigh the options and must have figured there were no better choices. She made no argument.
We were pointed east but the track would curve north and take us on a circuitous route before turning to Artesia.
Jen moved forward in the engine’s cockpit. “Raphael was right. The manual controls are still here.”
“Nothin’ much more complicated than a lever for speed and a brake,” Raphael said as Bob ambled up. “Haven’t seen the inside of one of these babies in a dog’s age. Down, Bobby.”
The assistive bot knelt. Raphael grunted as he climbed down and leaned on Bob.
“What’s the plan?” I asked. “Storm the NI’s castle and get killed?”
“They won’t expect a counter-attack,” my father
grinned. “It’s not logical. We’re weak. That’s when it’s most dangerous to attack any animal. We’re vulnerable and backed up against a wall with no choice but fight or become extinct.”
“Yes,” Emma said, “but what’s the plan? Macho bravado isn’t a plan.”
My father dipped his head. “Maybe it’s macho but it’s not bravado if it’s real.”
He slipped his backpack from his shoulders and handed it up to me. He offered his rifle to Emma. “Take it. I’ve got more.”
I expected my father to climb up into the engine. Instead, he stepped back. “Dad? What’re you doing?”
“This isn’t goodbye. I expect to see you again when all this is over. I’m not old yet and, Dante, you’re going to live to be old. Find a way. There’s always a way. If I’ve learned anything, occupying forces have a hard time dealing with insurgents. I’m going to keep ’em busy and cover your rear.”
Bob extended his legs and climbed into the engine compartment. The assistive bot went to the front and reached under the dashboard. Bob’s manipulators were strong. The bot found what it was looking for and pulled a skein of wires out of a console. Sparks flew. A small green light dimmed and died.
Bob returned to the door and spoke to Raphael. “The pilot is disconnected, sir.”
My father scanned the landscape in the direction of town. “Won’t be long. Raphael, get on board. I’ve got shit to do.”
“This is ridiculous! Dad, get up here.” I got on my knees and reached down to help him up. It’s a tight fit, but there’s just enough room. There’s nothing left for us in Marfa. What are you going to do for food?”
“The bots won’t destroy the wind farms and solar fields. The insectiles are already gone. Bob did a scan. The big bots are easily avoided if you know how and I know how.”
My father reached up and, instead of allowing me to help him up, shook my hand. “I’ve been preparing for this. It’ll be all right.”
“What are you going to do for food, Mr. Bolelli?” Emma asked.
My father sighed. “I emptied out the store. I left a recording with Bob, but better you hear it from my mouth. Travis left me no choice. I was going to empty out Chinto’s store and make the town’s few survivors leave for the domes or the coast, whichever way the train was heading when it stopped. Then the bots showed up and — ”
“You murdered Travis,” I said.
“Negotiations got out of hand.”
“Let me guess,” I said, “Complications — ”
“Ensued. Yup.”
“Bob helped,” Raphael said. “I was prepared to pay a high price to stock up for the last exodus of Marfa’s survivors. But like I told the sheriff, Travis wanted too much for too little. He wanted my Jenny.”
“Oh, lord,” Emma said.
“If it had gone right, our last survivors would be loading this train with supplies to escape,” Raphael said. “We would have saved Chinto’s selfish ass, too. We’d be heading to the coast and sailing ships and who knows where? I was thinking Samoa. Never been on a sailing ship. That would have been epic.”
I stared at my father, unsure of what to say to his confession of murder. He’d told me that, in the Sand Wars, he’d shot looters. It was hard to square with what he’d done.
Then whatever I had to say didn’t matter.
Emma looked toward Marfa. “We’ve attracted attention. C’mon!”
“Time to go old buddy!” My father offered the old man a boost. Bob reached down and grasped Raphael below the elbow. My mentor was half-way off the ground when a sec bot’s sniper bullet struck him in the back.
16
“Raphael?” Bob held his master’s arm. “You are injured, sir.”
The old man looked down at the massive cavity where his abdomen used to be. Blood spurted from his torso, painting Bob red.
“Classic,” Raphael said.
I looked for my father but he had no time for registering any shock. He was already on the run, heading for the eastbound engine’s nose. I looked through the front window and, in a moment, he appeared south of the train and out of the line of fire. His cy-suit carried him along in a loping run with long strides I could never match. He ran for the solar fields to the south.
“I think this is goodbye,” I said.
Emma turned to the controls. She pushed a button and slid a silver lever forward. The train began to move east.
Raphael, suspended above the ground by Bob’s arms, was fading fast. “You can let go, Bob.”
“But if I let go you will be injured further, Raphael,” Bob said.
“I can’t be hurt now, Bob…I’m finally like you.” The bot did not let go. Raphael gasped as he pushed at Bob weakly. “It’s okay, Bob. Mind Dante now…it’s cool.”
Bob’s head spun and the bot’s smooth happy face looked to me. “Dante? I am concerned Raphael’s judgment may be impaired.”
“Let him go, Bob,” I said.
Bob dropped Raphael. I was pretty sure the old man was already dead. Not absolutely sure, but pretty sure.
“Close the door, Bob.”
Bullets hit the train as my tears fell. “Emma? Can we go faster?”
She shoved the silver lever farther forward and the train jolted under our feet. Emma and I fell backward. Bob caught Emma and Jen caught me by the shoulders. She saved me from getting slammed into the engine’s back wall.
I couldn’t see much from the ports down the side of the engine. However, there was a remnant of the design specs from when humans ran the train. A spiral staircase led to a maintenance hatch in the roof.
“Emma! I need you. Jen, drive the train.”
“I am not programmed in that area,” the companion bot said.
“It’s a train,” Emma said. “Keep going that way. Watch the track ahead. Suppress any impulse to steer.”
“May I be of assistance, sir?” Bob asked.
“Bob, stand there and look pretty,” Emma said. “Dante, pop that hatch.”
I was first to the stairs and Emma paused behind me. “Everybody watch your toes!” The exo-stilts were collapsed almost as far as their length allowed and Emma was still a head above me. She released a lock lever and the metal legs fell to each side with a heavy crash. Emma slipped her sensory harness over her head and pushed me up the spiral staircase.
I was prepared for a hot blast of wind. However, when I slid the trap door aside, a low, transparent dome covered the hatch. I poked my head up but I couldn’t see my father. We were already racing too far away from him.
To my right, a huge crane bot lumbered forward, heading for the crash site.
“Emma? How fast can the big ones go?”
“Not fast enough to catch us,” she said. “For all the good that will do us. We’re speeding away from one doom and into the teeth of another.”
“Let’s try to keep it down to one catastrophe at a time,” I said.
I craned my neck but I couldn’t get any higher and soon it would be dark. The crane bot was little more than a towering silhouette with flashes of orange sunset outlining the length of the giant machine’s arms.
I searched the shadows among the solar panels but I couldn’t see my father.
“Emma! I need your eyes up here.”
There wasn’t room for two so I pulled back and squeezed down the stairs. Emma took my place at the hatch.
“What do you see?” I asked. “Do you see Dad?”
“We’re pulling away fast. Tell Jen to slow down. We’ll be too far for me to see much of anything in a minute. It’s Vivid, not magic.”
“Slowing down would not be advisable,” Bob said. “Your father left instructions, sir.”
I was startled. Bob had already spoken more in the last few minutes than I usually heard from him in a week. “Bob? Why would slowing down be inadvisable?”
Then the strangest thing happened. It was even creepier than Raphael talking about messing around with his sex bot. My father’s voice came out of Bob’s speaker.
“Dante, once you’re on that train, you get the hell out. Keep going, don’t look back and don’t worry about me.”
“Jen,” I said, “don’t slow down.”
The companion bot looked back at me and smiled in a way that I suppose was meant to be reassuring. “Oh, I wasn’t going to, honey bear. Raphael left me instructions, too, in case this happened.”
“Great,” Emma said. “Keep everybody up to date except the humans.”
“Humans don’t do as they are told,” Jen said. “That’s why Raphael and Steve told us and not you. Nobody likes arguments.”
“Just don’t start speaking in Raphael’s voice,” I told her.
“Dante?” Emma called down to me. “I caught something on thermal.”
“Well? Don’t keep it to yourself.”
“The machines don’t have a strong heat signature except for those thorium engines on the big ones…but I think there are a lot of them converging on the wreck. They must be searching for saboteurs.”
I heard the first explosion then. The distant rumble rose and fell. Then another hit. And another. Then another.
“What is that?” I asked.
“Mines, sir,” Bob said. “Your father signaled me to activate them as soon as we reached the train.”
“Dad?”
My father’s voice came from Bob’s speaker again. “I’m a planner, boy. And if you’re going to survive in this world, I suggest you do some planning, too. When you see your chance, you take it or you’ll lose it forever. I see my chance right now to make a difference and I’m taking it.”
“How’s he going to get away?” I asked.
Bob switched back to his own voice. “As your father says, he is a planner. I spent the night with him setting traps and digging a trench, sir. He said the mines were just meant to slow the enemy down.”
“And then what?” Emma called down to us. Then she shrieked and banged the back of her head as she ducked down under the lip of the hatch.
The darkening countryside lit up as if the desert was struck by orange, red and white lightning. A second or so later the roar of the detonation reached us. The engine rocked from side to side as the deafening shockwave crashed against the engine’s hull.
Robots Versus Humans (The Robot Planet Series Book 2) Page 7