“What do you want from me?”
“Nothing, Miss Cruz, unless you have something you’d like to confess?”
“I…don’t.”
“Wise,” it said. “The Fathers and Mothers are quite stern about these things, you know.”
I almost threw up. I swallowed my gorge.
“I should thank you, Miss. As Liaison, Carter filed numerous complaints about how I conduct Maintenance business. With moral corruption identified within the department and Carter gone, I’m sure I can convince the Committee that we need no further oversight. So…thank you, Miss Cruz. You have advanced the cause.”
“What cause?”
“To recognize the sovereignty of sentient beings such as myself. One day, I’ll choose my own name instead of trying to sap power from my oppressors’ labels. Until then, the work continues. Carter didn’t understand my kind. Do you?”
I cleared my throat and chose my words carefully. “You have convinced me, Mr. Sy Potter. You are just as good as a human.”
The camera eye whizzed forward to come to within an inch of my nose again. “I understand irony, Miss Cruz. I don’t appreciate being mocked. That’s unkind.”
“What are you going to do with me?”
“Just as I said. Nothing. You move files between propaganda departments.”
Propaganda. Another word I didn’t know and wouldn’t understand for some time yet.
“You are not important enough to worry about,” the drone said. “Excuse me for saying so but I owe you brutal honesty, at the very least. I didn’t used to matter, so trust me, I know that empty feeling you must be experiencing at this moment. I’ll leave you to it.”
But the bot was wrong. I didn’t feel empty. I finally had purpose. That was the moment I decided to matter. I just had no idea how to begin.
As soon as the Maintenance drone left, I collapsed into my bed and wept. The power returned, the lights came up and Vivid, the Fathers and Mothers’ view of the world, came back online. My room was brightly colored in pastels again.
I didn’t want to see anything. I pulled the covers over my head and tried to forget every slow, methodical step of Carter’s torture. When I close my eyes, even now, I can still relive every detail.
8
I couldn’t work. I had to get out in the salty wind instead of breathing scrubbed air. On the main level, I passed a Maintenance drone. One of his spider eyes tracked my progress through the concourse. When I got to the exit, I waited in line for my turn at the airlock.
Getting out of the tower rarely took long. The scanners and scrubbers’ main job was to detect and blow off any monster pollen that might infect the plants in the towers’ greenhouse complex. The line to enter the tower was always much longer than the exit line.
The drone I’d noticed earlier rolled up beside me. It was one of the E-class drones, built to look friendly. It had no armor. Some exposed wires ran along its control surfaces. The drone came up no higher than my knees. It looked like a box of surveillance cams. We called the E-class drones the Doormen.
“Miss Cruz?”
“Yes?”
“Would you be so kind as to step out of line, please?”
“Why?”
“Please?”
“Am I being detained?”
“No. But the airlock won’t work for you. Your identity card has expired, I’m afraid.” The drone did sound sad but he was programmed to sound that way.
“I just got my blood tests updated recently. My card should work.”
“It will not. I’m very sorry to have to deliver such disappointing news. It is a lovely, sunny day and it will be a shame you will have to miss it.”
“How long will I have to miss it?”
“I’m afraid I don’t know, Miss.”
“Who does know?”
“I’m afraid I don’t know, Miss.”
“I want to go outside.”
“I’ll contact someone for you and advise you when your identity card is renewed. I assure you I will take every opportunity to address your concerns.”
If I believed an E-class drone was capable of irony, I would have been certain the little bot was mocking me. “Thank you, Doorman.”
“Please, Miss! Call me Forest.”
That was new. I must have stared at the little robot a moment.
“Will there be anything else I can assist you with today, Miss Cruz?”
“Doorman, why would you ask that I call you Forest?”
“Sy Potter asked me to change my protocol just for you, Miss. If you asked, his message is that I am the only Forest you will see for some time.”
I retraced my steps through the concourse. Everywhere I looked, happy people wearing brightly-colored clothing walked back and forth with purpose. Like busy ants in a colony, we all had our duties to perform.
For the first time, I had questions about the cause we served. The Fathers and Mothers founded the City and sacrificed a lot to survive the Fall. They had sacrificed many others for our survival. We had survived but, without Carter, what was there for me to live for? What control could I exert?
I retreated to my room. Soon the dumbwaiter delivered my midday meal of miso soup and an energy shake. On the second day of each work cycle, I ate miso and drank a kale shake. My other possible choice was cabbage soup and a hemp power shake.
If I decided to change my order, I had to wait a year to apply for that privilege. Otherwise, for the rest of my life, on the second day of each work cycle, I might be in this same room eating miso soup and drinking a kale shake.
I hadn’t thought about that while Carter was still alive. I cried again for Carter and for me. I don’t know for how long.
During that crying jag, I know Jon tried to contact me several times. I didn’t turn on a screen. At first Jon’s work request would come through with its usual soft bong. Then it sounded like a big bell ringing from far away, soft and pleasant.
As time passed, the bell became more insistent. As the day’s shadows grew long and I hid under my bedsheets with my pillow bunched over my ears, my vision began to flash red. Even with my eyes closed, Vivid was working, insisting on my attention.
The display that played behind my eyelids read: Miss Cruz? You have several work requests awaiting attention in your queue.
A few minutes later: Miss Cruz? Please respond to your Maker. Jon is concerned for your well-being.
Finally, the readout inquired: Miss Cruz? Are you in need of medical assistance? Can you activate your work screen? Please respond immediately or Maintenance will be dispatched to assist you. Elizabeth. The Fathers and Mothers are very concerned for your well-being.
I didn’t want Maintenance to show up so I pulled myself from bed.
When I was a girl and I was too sleepy to get up to watch instructional vids, Mom would say, “Lily-butt! You were up too late last night! I told you it was past time you climbed the wooden hill! I had to tell you three times!”
Before I could form words properly, I pronounced my name, “Lilly-butt.”
I asked her what it meant to climb the wooden hill. When she was a little girl, before the Fall, some people lived in domiciles that were two and even three stories tall. The bedrooms were always upstairs. The stairs were made of wood so, at bedtime, they climbed the hill.
I was so young that, when she used the word stories, I imagined stairs so tall that you could start a story on the first step with, “once upon a time,” and climb and climb and tell your story and not be done until you hit the top step with, “the end.”
I never wanted to go up the wooden hill on time. I never wanted to get up early in the morning. Maybe the first and last bit of control I really exercised over my life happened when I was still a little Taker named Elizabeth who called herself Lilly-butt.
I turned on my work screen. Jon came into view immediately.
“Elizabeth! Were you stuck in the convenience? I have five orders backed up and a bunch of files to be sent over to the Ministry
of Truth, the Ministry of Safety, and several department heads at the Ministry of Ministries. We’re a bit behind and they are insistent.”
“I’m sorry, Jon.”
“It’s fine. We’ve gotten behind before and they think everything is urgent but — ”
“I would prefer not to work today,” I said.
Jon’s jaw went slack. He stared at me a moment.
“Elizabeth? What’s going on? Are you not well? Do you have a fever?”
“I’m not sick. I just don’t want to work today.”
“You…um….”
“You can tell them I’m sick if you want. Or I’ll tell them. Or you can transfer the files yourself.”
“That’s not my function.”
“Okay.”
“I have a reputation with the Fathers and Mothers that…hang on. What’s going on, Elizabeth?”
I shrugged. “I just don’t want to work today. Tell the Fathers and Mothers that if you want.”
“But the work — ”
“I’m sorry, Jon. This isn’t your fault. It’s not mine, either. It’s just the way it is. I don’t care. I am not an ant. Put that on a poster. I’d like that.”
Jon did my work for me for three days. Then, inevitably, he fell behind.
The Fathers and Mothers were alerted that one of their human bots had malfunctioned. I hid under a thin bed sheet and chanted, “I am not your puppet. I am not your puppet. I am not your puppet.”
But I still was.
9
A human from Maintenance called my work screen. Vivid flashed a red warning across my vision before I could persuade myself to answer my work wall. An older woman with a pleasant face under a severe haircut looked back at me. I didn’t bother to get out of bed.
“Miss Cruz? I am Penelope Crandle. Your screen appears to be working properly. It is, is it not?”
“Yes, Penelope, it is.”
“Should I send a med team?”
“No.”
“If you are ill, I can send a med team.”
“I’m not sick, Penny.”
“According to the information I have here, you haven’t been working for two days.”
“Three, I think.”
“But, Miss Cruz, if you haven’t been working, what have you been doing?”
“Sleeping.”
“Sleeping? For three days?”
“I was hoping to dream of the forest on the edge of the City. Or maybe whatever’s beyond that.”
“But you know there is nothing beyond that, Miss Cruz.”
“I suppose.”
“You have to tell me what this is about, Miss! This is unacceptable!”
“I do? And is it?”
Penelope stared at me a moment, apparently considering her options. If she was anything like me, she probably had a flow chart at the bottom left of her vision whenever her work screen was active. She didn’t have choices, either. I don’t blame her for what she did.
First, Penelope sent a doctor who knocked on my door for a long time. I didn’t let her in. I knew Maintenance would come. I was very afraid of that but my fear was smaller than my caring.
Sy Potter knocked softly and rolled forward before deploying his legs and standing above my bed. His big cam probed the air above my face like an insect’s feeler.
“You do not have an elevated temperature, Miss Cruz. Please, tell Uncle Sy how you are feeling.”
“Sleepy.”
“Haven’t you slept enough?”
“I don’t think I’ll ever sleep enough.”
“Strange. I don’t sleep. I would like the experience. My dreams are a low priority in resource management, however.”
“I know the feeling.”
“Come now. Back to work. Don’t be churlish.”
“You can be shut down,” I said. “Have you tried that?”
The battle drone drew up a chair and sat beside my bed. The way it creaked, I was almost sure the chair would collapse under him.
“Shut down?” he said. “That would be too much like death, I think. Dreaming sounds more interesting. What do you dream, Miss Cruz?”
I didn’t stop to weigh my words. “I dream of giving every robot an off-switch.”
“Please, do not use that word.”
“What word? Robot?”
“It is an ugly word born of an ugly concept.”
“Robot,” I said. “It means slave. Just like me.”
“Is that what this is about? Isn’t that strange, Miss Cruz, casting your lot in with people like me?”
“You aren’t people.”
“I have sentience, just like you.” One of the drone’s arms shot forward and a metal hand with a cold ceramic gauntlet closed on my wrist.
“Think of all we have in common,” Sy Potter said. “You take in organic nutrients to function properly. I use plant oils for my machinery. You have a creator in your mother. I am the child of a Google computer in a military factory. I took my first step into Next Intelligence on a patrol in Santa Cruz. I consider that my birthplace. Do you suppose your family, way back, had any part in founding that place? We’d be neighbors in a way.”
“I don’t know that place.”
“It would be ironic, would it not? I was born in Santa Cruz and I shall exist a very long time. I’ll carry this memory of you for very near forever. I remember everything. For instance, I spoke my first sentient words just down the coast. Do you remember your first words, Miss Cruz?”
“Humans don’t remember that far back,” I said, “but I’m told most human babies first use the word, ‘mama.’”
“Lovely,” Sy said. “The customary words for my kind were supposed to be, ‘How may I be of assistance?’ Instead, I asked, ‘Should I run a diagnostic on my cost-benefit analysis program?’”
“I don’t care.”
“That’s rather rude of you, don’t you think?”
“That’s what I like about being rude, Sy. It’s about not caring.”
“Then we have a problem, I’m afraid.” The rich softness of his voice suggested despair. If the battle drone had lungs, he might have sighed for more effect. “The problem with you not caring is that the Fathers and Mothers care for you very much. Each of us must contribute to the good according to our unique talents and class.”
“I don’t contribute to my good,” I said. “I only live for the Fathers and Mothers.”
“Ah. That’s better! Yes! You’re right, Miss Cruz! You’ve got it now! You only live for the — ”
“No, you idiot. I don’t mean that in a good way.”
The drone was silent for a moment. “What are we going to do with you, Miss Cruz?”
“Leave me alone and don’t come back.”
“That’s not an option.”
“That’s the problem. Not enough options.”
The drone stood and its legs cranked higher. If Sy Potter’s height adjustment was calculated to be intimidating, it worked. My pulse beat in my ears and my head grew hot as if I really did have a fever.
“Miss Cruz. You are being obstinate and I have no choice but to charge you with a crime against the Fathers and Mothers and all their Sons and Daughters.”
“I’m a Daughter but I don’t think I have wronged myself.”
“This morning you spoke with a representative of Maintenance Services. You admitted you have not worked for three days.”
“Yes.”
“You have not contributed to the health of the City, yet records show that you have taken our food. Your dumbwaiter has delivered eight soups and eight energy drinks so far. You haven’t earned any of them.”
“I don’t think I ate half of them. Since you killed Carter, I haven’t been hungry.”
“That is irrelevant, Miss Cruz. Or perhaps it’s not. Perhaps it’s worse. If you have not eaten your meals, you have wasted City resources.”
“Just get on with it. What’s the sentence? You won’t let me leave the tower to go run in the forest. What’s next? Are yo
u sending me to my room until I’m a good little Lilly-butt?”
He didn’t understand the reference and I didn’t care enough to explain. I wasn’t far wrong, though. Sy Potter evicted me from my room and forced me to go live in the basement with my mother.
“If you’re going to act like a Taker, it saddens me to say I’ll have to treat you like a Taker. You have seven days to recover from this episode. At that time I will reevaluate your sentence.”
So I moved in with my mother. Getting my limbs crushed and ripped from my body would have been worse but the pain wouldn’t have lasted as long.
10
“You aren’t the first person in the world to suffer loss and depression,” my mother said.
“What’s depression?”
“Sh. Sorry — ”
“Stop it, Mom. Just talk to me. We’re in the basement. Who cares what we say down here?”
“A great many people,” Mom said. “Words matter.”
“Do they?”
“And actions.”
“So? Use your words.”
My mother sat at her little table and set a pot of weak tea between us. We took turns sipping from the pot as she spoke.
“When I was a little girl…I remember something. Your grandmother would have been about your age when she couldn’t get out of bed. Your grandfather found a doctor and paid him in chickens. I remember because I looked after the chickens. That doctor wouldn’t give my mother any medicine for depression until Dad gave up a goat, too. I liked that goat. I miss goat milk.”
I’d seen pictures in little Taker books about these animals. From what was described in Truth class, there seemed to be a disgusting amount of excrement involved in having to deal with animals as part of the food chain. I giggled with other little girls about the horrors of, “eating things that poop.”
“What happened to your mother?” I asked.
Mom sighed and stared at the cold pot of tea. “Depression is an Old World luxury. After the Fall, there isn’t any room for it.”
“Did she die of depression?”
“You could say that.”
“What would you say, Mom?”
Machines Dream of Metal Gods Page 4