Return to Mech City

by Brian Bakos

  Star: It’s been very nice chatting with you, Brian, but we must get Iri to the workshop. He needs a lot of repair, you know.

  Brian: Ok, whatever. Good luck, Iri.

  Iridium: Thanks, pal.

  Winston: See you in the sequel, Brian.

  Brian: Right.

  Star: Bye-ee!

  Brian: Man, that was strange. You’d think I was the one living inside an ebook, not them ... Hey, it’s all bright and flat in here ... Let me out!

  Questions and Topics for Discussion

  1) Do you agree, or disagree, with the concept that humanity is on a perilous course which threatens it’s very existence?

  2) If so, what is the greatest threat to the future of human civilization?

  3) Is political extremism an inevitable outgrowth of chaotic times, or can people (robots) of good will redeem the situation?

  4) There is general agreement these days that the future isn’t what it used to be. What is your view of the future a century from the present time? Two centuries?

  5) What is the proper role for robotic life forms as they become increasingly sophisticated?

  6) Are you looking forward to owning a robotic life form, or does the idea fill you with dread?

  7) Will machines ever replace people? What about the Super Bowl game in that case?

  8) Is good inherently stronger than evil? Will it always triumph in the long run?

  Next Book in the Series

  Prelude: The Holy Temple

  Devil’s Night, 15 years prior

  The mob flowed toward the REX hotel bristling with fire, like molten lava vomiting down the street. Hatred contorted every man’s face, and barbeque murder surged within every heart. They paused at the entrance to the derelict hotel, under the sign reading:

  Holy Temple of the Transcendent Vision

  “Come on,” someone shouted, “what are we waiting for?”

  “Let’s burn the sons of bitches out!” someone else yelled.

  The hundred-strong crowd began to move again, torches held high, but a commanding voice stopped it in its tracks.

  “Hold it right there!”

  A large, beefy police captain approached, brandishing a nightstick. A phalanx of uniformed patrolmen shoved the mob back from the hotel.

  “Get rid of them torches,” the police captain bellowed, “or I’ll bust your heads wide open!”

  He smacked the nightstick against a palm to emphasize the point. His bellicose, uncompromising stance brooked no opposition. The mob retreated, tossing their incendiary devices into the gutter where they hissed into smoky death.

  A grin of fierce satisfaction spread across the captain’s face. He reveled in the power of his unchallenged authority.

  “That’s better, gentlemen,” he said. “Now – ”

  A boy suddenly exited the REX hotel, moving into the disturbance with steely composure. A wave of cold seemed to precede him, much worse than the chill air of the October evening. Despite themselves, everyone shrank back – mob and police. Even the captain lost his self-confidence for a moment.

  Then a tall, thin woman with frizzy red hair exited the hotel to stand protectively beside the boy. Beneath the dim street lights she appeared ghastly pale. To the onlookers, it felt as if alien beings had arrived, or that the earth had cracked open to reveal some terrible mystery.

  The mob began to shake off its astonishment.

  “There’s the little creep!” someone yelled.

  The 13-year-old “messiah” regarded his adversaries with icy contempt. He stood barefoot on the cold pavement wearing nothing but shorts and a T-shirt, as he’d doffed his ceremonial robe moments before. He was thin, with stringy brown hair, in no way physically imposing. But his wide, dark eyes flickered with an eerie light that compelled and frightened.

  The messiah crossed his arms disdainfully over his chest. Other Visionists were swarming out of the hotel now, gathering around him – men and women, even a few children, about forty persons in all. They were unarmed and outnumbered, but burned with faith in their leader. One word from him, and they would spring into violent action.

  Things held in the balance. Then the police captain stepped into the vacuum.

  “Everybody stay calm!” he ordered.

  The captain seemed to be the very soul of legitimate authority. The messiah knew better, though. Mysticism was his stock in trade, but he recognized a practical threat when it was right before his piercing dark eyes.

  The chief acolyte, a tall, thin, balding man with fanatical eyes of his own spoke to his messiah in an urgent voice.

  “What shall we do, Father?”

  The boy scanned the mob contemptuously, hands on hips. Somebody flung a rock at him, but the red-haired woman batted it away.

  “Enough of that!” the police captain roared.

  He approached the rock thrower, nightstick raised. The thrower skittered to the center of the mob.

  “That police captain is demanding more protection money,” the messiah said in a low voice.

  “The unbeliever!” snarled the chief acolyte.

  “If we can’t pay, we’ll be cremated next time,” the messiah said. “I wouldn’t put it past him to whip up a mob himself.”

  “Then let us unleash holy war,” the chief acolyte said.

  The messiah shrewdly calculated the odds against him. A holy war at this time could have but one outcome – the destruction of himself and all his believers. Everything he’d struggled for during the past year would be lost, his sacred mission would be dragged into the dust. He would prove unworthy of his great calling. It was high time for a vision, a little ‘holy deception,’ as it were.

  “I see it all!” the messiah yelled dramatically.

  He smacked a hand against his forehead and extended the other one toward the dark heavens. Off in that coldness, an airliner was passing by, lights flashing. His followers pressed in on him like groupies around a rock star.

  “What is it, Father?” they cried in unison.

  “A divine message!” the messiah intoned.

  “What vision do you comprehend?” the chief acolyte said. “Tell us, and we will obey.”

  The mob looked on derisively.

  “Get a load of that punk,” someone sneered.

  “I tried to ‘comprehend’ his vision once,” another man said, “but I couldn’t get my head that far up my ass.”

  “Silence, infidels!” The chief acolyte roared.

  He took threatening steps toward the loud mouths. He was not a physically powerful man, but the insane rage in his eyes frightened his tormentors. They shrank back as if the very devil was confronting them.

  The police captain interposed his bulk between the adversaries. Uniformed officers flanked him, reinforcing his authority.

  “All right, fellas,” the captain said, “everybody calm down!”

  He patted the nightstick against his palm with an assurance that indicated he wouldn’t mind cracking a skull or two.

  “Be at peace, brother,” the messiah called to his acolyte. “Those lost ones know not what they are saying.”

  The chief acolyte returned to his leader and fell upon his knees, rather enjoying the pain of impact on the concrete.

  “What is your command, Father?” he said.

  The messiah waved his followers in close. They stood around him now like a demonic football team in a huddle.

  “We must depart from these unbelievers,” he said in a harsh whisper. “They are not worthy of our continued presence.”

  “Amen!” his followers cried.

  Somebody in the crowd belched.

  “All right now, show’s over,” the captain said. “Everybody go home, before I start making arrests.”

  The crowd dispersed, grumbling. Already its leaders were planning another assault. Next time they would not fail; they would cleanse Mech City of this unholy menace. There would be more of them next time, better organized ...

  ***

&nb
sp; Later that night, the cult members slipped out of the REX back door carrying an array of luggage, including a spear-like staff from which their standard hung limp – the all-seeing eye leering out of its crimson cloud. They huddled together in the alley, shivering in the cold drizzle.

  Then their messiah emerged from the REX, wearing his ceremonial robe over his warm clothes. He walked purposefully down the alley, looking neither right nor left. The others fell in behind him. They continued on for parts unknown.

  Mech City was rid of them at last.

  Part One: The New Order Wilts

  1. The Winston Horvath Regime

  For seven weeks now, ever since the overthrow of Fascista Ultimo and his Roboto Fascist regime, Winston Horvath had ruled Mech City with an iron hand.

  Actually, it was made of titanium alloy, but the metaphor still applied. His tenure as the supposed “interim mayor” had been one of increasing authoritarianism marked by suppression of anyone who refused to “get with the program.”

  Exactly how this state of affairs came about was something of a mystery to him. One day he was the darling of the revolution, the leader by unanimous acclamation, loved by everyone. Then, by small degrees, he’d morphed into a despot – someone immune to error who could tolerate no disagreement.

  Well, what of it? he thought.

  He’d had to take stern measures to whip things into shape after the chaos of the Roboto Fascist regime and the subsequent liberation struggle. The whole social order had been ripped apart, dozens of robots had become casualties, many beyond repair. Security and order were the top priorities.

  Besides, this was only a temporary state of affairs, as he kept telling everybody. As he kept telling himself. And the glorious results of his rule were everywhere to behold!

  He stood at the window of his office looking dramatically over the city, his city, undergoing a Renaissance as the capital of an independent robotic society – the only one in the world, as far as anybody could tell. The streets were clear, water flowed in the public fountains, and construction boomed.

  One hand rested on a hip while his intelligent face tried to look hard and dramatic. He was a blue Humanite model robot, the size of an average human male, with large golden Mayor’s Medallion hanging around his neck.

  He wore no clothing over a body that, while not anatomically correct, had many human-like characteristics. The battle scars he’d received in his various altercations were all filled in and concealed beneath a fresh paint job. Stylish red highlights ran along the outsides of his legs, like the trouser stripes of a 20th century Nazi field marshal.

  Winston would have never considered himself to be a Nazi, though. Hadn’t he, personally, engineered the overthrow of the Roboto Fascist regime in Mech City? What other credential did he need to rule?

  “The humans had their Winston ... Churchill,” he said, placing his hands on the window sill. “Why shouldn’t we have ours?”

  In the world outside the window, a new social order was being developed. Winston had brought order and discipline out of the chaos. Everyone had work, work made them free. Under his guidance, the dreaded Che Syndrome was being held at bay. Nobody committed suicide anymore, and the scrapper gangs gave the town a wide berth. Any outlaw who dared enter the city limits was quickly dispatched by the mech wolf Guards Battalion.

  The city was also receiving a badly needed face lift, starting with the new Palace of His Excellency the Mayor – an imposing marble edifice being erected next to Heroes’ Square. This structure would cast in stone forever the unbreakable bond between the citizens of Mech City and their great leader – hero of the battle against the Fascist tyranny, Winston Horvath!

  Later today, Winston would visit the construction site, after he’d studied the latest materials acquisition report submitted by Jimmy, the construction foreman. Jimmy was a “damn good fellow” in Winston’s estimation, but he had a bothersome habit of neglecting the political aspects of his job. All he ever talked about was prosaic technical stuff, he lacked the proper ideological flair.

  Winston turned toward his massive desk with its Excellency the Mayor placard standing sentry on its leading edge. His movements were smooth and decisive as he crossed the distance between the window and his seat of power.

  He settled into the great leather-clad chair and flipped open the folder containing Jimmy’s report. His face registered deep concentration.

  “Ah, yes,” he sighed, “another day of toil on behalf of my people.”

  ***

  Across town, at the Robotics Development Institute, another day of repair work was underway. Every table in the main workshop held a casualty from the battle that had wrenched control of Mech City from the Fascista Ultimo dictatorship. Tools and spare components covered every available surface. Precision machines stood by to mill new parts, fed by data from one of the world’s most powerful surviving computers.

  The repair technician robots, Jack and Quincy, worked on the prime casualty – Iridium. Every day for weeks they’d studied and probed, removing this part or other and replacing it with one from a mech wolf wreck. Some components had to be built from scratch. Just about everything in Iridium’s body had been ruined. His advanced brain unit was one of the few components that had escaped serious damage.

  Laboring without proper schematics, Jack and Quincy had followed a meticulous process of trial and error, but their efforts were finally paying off. They were both “metal man” designs, but of highly advanced intelligence. They’d been persecuted by the Roboto Fascist regime because they were not considered part of the Humanite “master race” of robots.

  Winston Horvath had changed all that, however, when he’d accomplished the dictatorship’s overthrow. Things were better now ...

  Weren’t they?

  Iridium was an astonishing canine robot – the size of a timber wolf – with a lustrous, flowing coat that constantly shifted color under the workshop lights. The effect was so distracting that the repair bots often donned sunglasses while working on him.

  “I think we’re about finished with you, Iridium,” Jack said.

  He switched off the analyzer device he’d been studying and raised his sunglasses.

  “That’s right, old boy,” Quincy said.“We’ll do your final mobility tests this afternoon.”

  “Thanks,” Iridium said. “You guys are the greatest!”

  Jack and Quincy exchanged nervous glances, then looked toward the two mech wolves observing them balefully from a corner. The ferocious creatures, knock offs of the original Iridium design, had been posted here by Mayor Winston to “keep an eye on things” and “provide assistance as required.”

  What kind of assistance could anyone expect from these primitive machines – so much like Iridium but lacking his intelligence and nobility?

  Every casualty sprawled on a workbench had been put there by these mech wolves and their comrades during the battle of Heroes’ Square. Many other metal men had been wrecked beyond redemption. They existed only as scrap material or as random components in the spare parts bins.

  “Don’t let Winston hear you talk like that, Iridium,” Jack said in a hushed voice.

  “Yeah, he’s got the corner on being ‘the greatest,’” Quincy said.

  Star Power, originally named Estrella, looked over from a table across the room where she was working on another damaged robot. A warm beam followed her gaze, it accompanied her as she walked toward Iridium and the repair bots. The head of every casualty on the various tables turned to follow her progression, drawn by her incredible loveliness – so apparent even to the asexual metal men.

  Star’s light brown skin, almond eyes, and long, dark hair referenced universal concepts of beauty. Her voluptuous figure moved seductively as she walked. She was the most human-like of all the robots, though still – observable just barely – a machine creation.

  She arrived at Iridium’s table and stroked the great canine’s head.

  “How do you feel, Iri?” she a
sked.

  “In the pink, Star,” Iridium said. “Considering that I’m made up mostly of recycled parts from mech wolf wrecks.”

  Star laughed gently, a tinkling, melodious sound that complemented her low and seductive speaking voice.

  “It would have been better to transfer Iri’s brain unit into a healthy mech wolf body,” Quincy said, “but that type of surgery is beyond our skill set, I’m afraid.”

  “Yeah,” Jack said, “he’s constructed much different than the usual robot. If we disconnected the brain, there’d be no telling if we could hook it up again.”

  “I think you boys did just fine,” Star said.

  She kissed Iridium’s head. The great canine melted at the contact and began purring like a gigantic kitten.

  “You hang in there, Iri, okay?” she said.

  “Right-o,” Iridium said.

  “Maybe you should take things easy for a while,” Jack said.

  “Why?” Iridium said.

  “You know, enjoy life after everything you’ve been through,” Quincy said. “Just hang out, smell the flowers, if you can find any.”

  Iridium shook his head emphatically.

  “I’m going out of my brain unit with boredom,” he said. “Right after my tests, I’m seeing the mayor about my security chief job.”

  Again, Jack and Quincy exchanged glances, including Star in their unease this time.

  “Are you sure you want to do that?” Quincy said. “I mean, things have changed a lot since you were injured.”

  “Why not?” Iridium said. “I was promised the position as soon as I was well enough to take over. Didn’t you just say that I’m fully recovered?”

  “Well ... yeah,” Jack said. “Of course, something might turn up in the final tests.”

  “Not likely,” Iridium said. “I feel great. My internal diagnostics would tell me if I wasn’t fit.”

  An awkward silence followed; Jack and Quincy diverted their optical sensors toward the floor.

  “Why don’t you let me speak to Winston first?” Star said.

  Iridium studied the worried faces of the two-legged robots hovering over him. He didn’t like what he saw very much.

  “Okay, Star,” he said, “sure thing.”