by Lee Bacon
My footsteps were solid/metal/steady.
Emma’s were small/shuffling/unsteady.
I was the first to speak again. “I am sorry, by the way.”
Emma looked up at me. “For what?”
“For what we did to humans.” The word massacre blinked in my vocabulary database. I wanted to discard it, to delete it, to never see it again. But I did not. The word lingered in my artificial brain. “Our actions may have seemed necessary to us at the time, but that does not make them right. Not at all.”
Emma nodded once. Her expression was unreadable, shrouded with shadows. “It’s okay, XR. You weren’t around when it happened. Neither was I.”
“You are correct. We are only twelve.”
“Exactly. We’re just a couple of kids who got stuck with the mess grown-ups left behind.”
01000000
An inventory of the objects we gathered while exploring Mountain Pass Mall:
Hiking boots. Wool blanket. Pillow. Sweater. Shirts. Socks. Shorts. Underwear. Spare backpack. Pants. Sunglasses. Binoculars. Umbrella.
These items clattered inside a shopping cart that Emma pushed.
She stopped next to a shelf of lotions and grabbed a bottle. “Check it out! Sunscreen! Now I won’t get sunburned.”
I scanned the text printed on the bottle. “It says this sunscreen expired twenty-eight years ago.”
“Oh.” Emma set the bottle back on the shelf. “Maybe not.”
Emma’s cart squeaked through the dark/ruined mall.
Soon we arrived at a shop called Bermuda Bob’s. She grabbed a wide-brimmed hat off a rack, holding it up for me to see.
“Cool, huh?” she said.
“It is too big for you,” I observed.
“Yeah, but it’s not for me.” Emma hopped onto her tiptoes, lifting the hat. She placed it on my head. “It’s for you!”
I had never worn a hat before. It was an unfamiliar sensation.
Stepping back, Emma rubbed her chin, considering. “Okay, now you need a shirt to go with it.”
“Robots do not wear hats and clothing,” I pointed out.
“How come?”
“Because they are unnecessary.”
“See, that’s where you’re wrong.” Emma grabbed an item of clothing off another rack. “This is definitely necessary!”
It was a bright red shirt, covered in white cartoon flowers.
“You have to try this on!” she said.
I shook my head. The hat wobbled from side to side.
Emma ignored me. She unbuttoned the shirt, slipped one of the sleeves over my left arm, and repeated this process on my right arm.
“Okay, seriously.” She smiled at me. “You—look—awesome!”
Emma grabbed my hand, pulling me in front of a mirror.
I stared at the reflection.
The reflection stared back at me.
We barely recognized each other.
The hat covered the top of my head. My silver neck rose from the collar of the bright red shirt.
The clothing made me look different.
More human.
Emma gazed at my reflection in the mirror. “I think you’re gonna start some major robotic fashion trends.”
I did not respond. Because at that moment, a message from Ceeron flashed across my circuitry. All thoughts of human clothing ended.
EMERGENCY! EMERGENCY! EMERGENCY!
Come quickly. SkD’s battery just died.
01000001
How could I have been so illogical? The power had just drained from SkD’s operating system. And what was I doing when it happened? Playing dress-up at the mall.
When I told Emma the news, the smile dropped from her face. Her eyes went huge with fear. “Where is he?”
“The parking lot,” I replied. “Ceeron sent me its coordinates. Come on!”
Emma left the cart and we set off across the dark mall, our footsteps pounding the floor.
I hardly noticed the clothing I had on. The hat. The flapping, flower-print shirt. I thought only about SkD. Its battery at zero. I would soon face the same situation. My battery was down to 4 percent.
Time was running out.
My GPS location indicator blinked with Ceeron’s coordinates.
The shortest route was through the exit ahead of us. A solid glass doorway. I increased my pace, lowered my shoulder, and barreled into the barrier.
KA-RAAASH!
The doorway exploded into thousands of tiny pieces. Glass shattered all around me. The impact lit up the sensors in my shoulder. But I did not slow down. I kept running until I saw SkD.
The small robot was frozen in place. Moonlight traced the edges of its unmoving body. Its screen was dark.
Emma wrapped her arms around SkD. “There has to be something we can do. You can bring him back to life, can’t you?”
“Maybe,” Ceeron replied. “We must work quickly.”
I surveyed our surroundings.
Above us: solar panels.
Next to Ceeron: a metal box.
Attached to the metal box: a large power cord.
Understanding flickered through my mind. This was once a charging station to power electric cars. It was no longer connected to the grid, but it still received solar energy.
We could use the charging station to refill our batteries.
But there was a problem.
Ceeron explained: “The charging station is old. Its system is outdated. We are not compatible.”
The back panel of the metal box had already been removed. Ceeron’s glowing eyes cast white light across a tangle of wires.
“SkD was trying to rewire the technology. It was almost finished when its battery hit zero. I tried to take over, but my hands are too big.”
Ceeron raised its massive metal hands as proof. They dwarfed everything inside the charging station.
“Maybe I can help.” I hunched in front of the box. I could not make sense of the chaotic clusters of multicolored wires. But my confusion did not last long. I took a quick search through the file cabinet in my brain, unlocking a vast database of information.
Just like that, I was an expert.
But the knowledge did me no good. When I reached into the box, I made a dismaying discovery. My hands were also too big. My fingers were not flexible enough. Trying to rewire the charging station would be like a human performing heart surgery while wearing mittens. Impossible.
“I am sorry.” My shoulders sagged. “I am unable to do the job.”
“What if I try?” Emma asked. “I have smaller hands than you guys.”
“Yes, but—this equipment is old. The wires are corroded. If you touch the wrong thing . . .”
My voice stopped. The rest of the sentence vibrated through my circuitry.
You could set off a spark.
You could get electrocuted.
You could die.
If Emma knew these things, she did not back down.
“I can do this.” She set her jaw. “Just tell me what steps to take.”
“Very well,” I said. “Please be cautious.”
And so we began.
01000010
Ceeron and I gazed over Emma’s shoulder, our eyes providing illumination for her work.
We gave directions. She followed them.
Each time she reached into the box, warning lights erupted in my head. But Emma was careful. She was amazingly precise, for a human.
Her small/thin/agile fingers carefully rearranged the complex network of wires.
Beside us was SkD. Perfectly still in the darkness, like a statue.
If we succeeded, we would bring it back to life.
If we failed, we would share its fate.
My battery dropped to 1 percent. I could feel the urgency coursing through my circuitry. The desire to move faster/faster/faster. But I ignored these impulses. Rushing Emma only increased the risk of mistakes. And so I kept my voice steady, my words clear.
“Excellent work,” I
said to her. “You are almost done.”
She continued with each task we gave her. Little by little. Wire by wire. Until—
The lights in Ceeron’s eyes flickered.
Faded.
And went out.
Emma turned to the big robot. “Ceeron?”
No reply.
“Ceeron, can you hear me?”
Silence.
Emma let out a choked breath. She looked to me, her face full of fear.
“It is okay.” My tone was even/calm/certain, despite the storm of warnings that surged through my brain. “I am still here. Let us continue.”
Emma took a deep breath. Gritting her teeth, she focused on the charging station. “What now?”
“One final step,” I said.
“What is it?”
“Do you—” A glitch surged through my speech functions. For half a second, my voice came out as an electronic mmmmmmmmm. Then the words came back to me. I said, “Do you see that red wire?”
I tried to point.
My finger twitched. That was all.
Emma reached into the box, taking hold of a red wire. “This one?”
“Yes,” I replied. “Replace it with—mmmmmmmmm—with the gray . . .”
My voice went silent. All of a sudden, my vocabulary database was a vast, empty room.
“XR?” Emma said. “Stay with me, buddy.”
I tried to analyze her expression. I failed. Her features became a digitized blur.
I checked my battery level. The percentage had been replaced by a single repeated word.
ERROR/ERROR/ERROR/ERROR/ERROR
ERROR/ERROR/ERROR/ERROR/ERROR
ERROR/ERROR/ERROR/ERROR/ERROR
ERROR/ERROR/ERROR/ERROR/ERROR
ERROR/ERROR/ERROR/ERROR/ERROR
I could hear Emma’s voice, speaking to me, but the language was unrecognizable.
She leaned close. A human-shaped smudge. She appeared to grab my shoulder, but my sensors detected nothing.
I could not feel.
I could not move.
I could not speak.
My vision dimmed, and Emma slowly vanished. A final word took shape in my vocabulary database.
Goodbye
Then the world went dark.
01000011
Everything was nothing.
And nothing was everything.
What else can I say?
My world was over.
01000100
Black.
At first, that was all I could see.
Then shapes appeared in the darkness. Words and symbols.
LOADING . . .
I had been through this before. Day[1]. The first moments of my life. This time, I was not nearly as confused by the process.
I waited patiently.
A steady/gentle hum vibrated through my circuitry.
And I was reborn.
01000101
Emma’s was the first face that I saw.
When my visual ports flickered on, she was hunched over me, peering into my eyes. Her lips were moving, but silence was all I heard, until—
My audio ports kicked in.
“. . . you hear me?” she was saying. “Come on, XR. Please tell me you’re back.”
“I am back.”
My response startled her. Emma staggered out of sight. When her head popped back into view, a giant smile had spread across her face.
“It worked!” she squealed. “It really worked!”
“You rewired the charging station.”
“Yeah. I guess I did.”
“But I never finished giving you directions.”
Her shoulders lifted and fell. “You told me what I needed to know. Switch the red wire with the gray one. I figured out the rest.”
I glanced left/right. My surroundings had not changed. It was still dark. My coworkers were still frozen in place.
I checked my settings. My battery was back to 5 percent. According to my internal clock, I had been out for nineteen minutes and fifty-four seconds.
My attention returned to Emma. “Thank you for what you have done.”
“No biggie,” she said.
“Would you mind unplugging me?”
She blinked. “Already?”
“SkD needs the power more. Once it has enough of a charge, it can rewire two more charging stations. That way, the three of us can charge at the same time. That will be more efficient.”
She chuckled. “Gotta love that microchip brain.”
Emma reached behind me and grabbed the power cable.
I went into sleep mode.
I did not dream.
01000110
When I woke up, my coworkers were plugged in. So was I. Emma was curled inside a sleeping bag between us.
I peered through the gap in the solar panels. Morning light was just beginning to spread across the sky. As I watched it, a voice surprised me. Emma’s voice.
“Good morning.”
She was looking up at me from her sleeping bag.
“Good morning,” I replied. “I thought you were still in sleep mode.”
In the faint light, I could barely see the smile on her face. “Sleep mode. You’re funny, XR.”
“Am I?” I placed my hand against my chest with a soft clunk. “I was not aware.”
“That’s what makes you so funny.”
I was not sure if this was a compliment. I thanked her anyway.
“How’re you feeling?” Emma asked.
“Much better. Almost back to one hundred percent. Once we are all fully recharged, we can start moving again.”
“How much farther do we have?”
I calculated. “Approximately nineteen kilometers.”
“Do you think we can get there today?”
Another calculation. “Hopefully. Yes.”
My memory drive accessed a file from the day we met. The moment that Emma pulled a map from her backpack. The hand-drawn red dot near the bottom of the map. Emma’s goal. Her destination.
“I wonder what you will find when you get to the end of your journey,” I said.
Emma’s gaze dropped. With her finger she traced the folds of her sleeping bag. “Yeah. I—I wonder that, too.”
For the next two minutes and fourteen seconds, neither of us said anything.
I gazed at the piece of sky I could see between the solar panels and listened to the soft mmmmmmmm of my recharging coworkers.
Emma spoke again. “Back in the bunker, grown-ups sometimes complained about you guys. About robots, I mean.”
“That is understandable.”
“But the weird thing is, they also missed you. Like, whenever my parents talked about what life was like before they went underground. It seemed like technology was just . . . everywhere.”
Resting her hands behind her head, Emma stared up at the underside of the solar panels.
“My dad used to tell me stories about that time,” she said. “Back before the bunker, when he was just a kid. Younger than I am now. He was allergic to dogs, so his parents got him a robot dog. After school, he’d take it for walks, play fetch with it in the yard. After a while, a self-driving car would pull into the driveway. Which meant his parents were back from work.”
A faint smile crossed Emma’s lips as she told a story her father must have told her many times.
“They’d all go into the dining room. My dad, his sister, their parents. Plus the robot dog. And the robot vacuum cleaner, zooming across the floor. My dad would do his homework at the table—there was an AI tutor on his laptop to help him—while his parents got dinner ready. They had a home assistant app that scanned their fridge and pantry. Based on the food they had in the kitchen, it recommended recipes. And when dinner was ready, the home assistant would automatically dim the lights to the perfect setting and start playing music from a computer-generated dinner playlist algorithm.”
What Emma was describing happened over thirty years ago. Not that long, and yet—it was a different t
ime. A time when machines were entirely devoted to humans. To playing with them. Helping them with their homework. With their meals.
A time when humans still ruled Earth.
And we were their loyal servants.
Emma’s eyes landed on me. “Wanna hear something really crazy?”
“Okay.”
“So, then one day, out of nowhere, my dad’s parents came rushing into his room. Scared. Frantic. Telling him they had to leave the house. Now. My dad didn’t know what was going on. And the stuff his parents were saying—it didn’t make any sense. Technology turning against humans? It seemed impossible. And while he was still trying to wrap his head around everything that was happening, his parents were like, ‘Get whatever you can fit in a suitcase and come with us.’ But there was only one thing Dad wanted to take into the bunker with him.”
“What was it?”
“His robot dog.”
Emma exhaled. It was a small sound. Barely a breath. But it contained many feelings. Astonishment/Laughter/Sadness.
“He was just a kid,” Emma said. “He couldn’t even imagine a world where robots were the enemy. Not yet, anyway. Machines were supposed to be our friends.”
I scooted forward. “And the robot dog?”
“Oh. They locked it in the closet.”
“How did your father react?”
“He cried.” Emma shrugged. “I mean, he was ten. The world was coming to an end and his best robotic buddy was locked in a closet. So, yeah. He cried his eyes out.”
“And then they went into the bunker?”
“Yep. And then—fast-forward thirty years—here I am. Outside a mall, having a conversation with a robot.” She chuckled. “If someone had told me last month that I’d be here, talking to you, I never would’ve believed them.”
“That makes two of us.”
Emma yawned. Then yawned again, bigger this time. “I think I need a little more sleep mode.”
“Of course.”
“Nice talking to you, XR.”
“You, too, Emma.”
She turned onto her side and closed her eyes. Before long, her breathing settled into a steady rhythm.
In/Out/In/Out.
I considered returning to sleep mode, too. Recharging is more efficient that way. But my battery was almost full, and so I remained awake, watching the sky fill with morning, listening to the regular in/out/in/out of Emma’s human breath.