by Eric Vall
“It’s alright, Kevin,” Tony said, “we were just about to get out of here, anyway.”
“Oh thank god,” the scruffy man mumbled under his breath, but I still heard him.
“Thank you so much for your hospitality, Kevin,” I said with a nod as I walked toward the door. “That cooking simulation we played was quite fun.”
“Not a problem, Han-Dog,” the man laughed. “My invitation to Tony is totally extended to you whenever you’re around. Now, go stuff your face with bacon and waffles!”
“Will do,” Tony replied as he walked over to the doorway. “Thanks again for letting us crash here, man. Hopefully, the fumigation is all done, and I can actually settle in at home and enjoy myself. Before tomorrow hits, and it’s back to Carmichael’s.”
“Uhuhuhuh!” Kevin exclaimed with a wave of his hand. “You know all mention of that godforsaken place is forbidden within these walls. Now, you kids go have fun while I get in some Ultafighter practice.”
Tony and I waved goodbye to Kevin once more as we exited, and then we headed down the failing concrete stairs.
“Are we really going to this ‘breakfast’ place?” I asked as I tried to keep my pace slow. “Or was that just a lie to get us out of the apartment?”
“Well, it’s customary for the man to buy his woman breakfast the morning after he fucks her brains out,” Tony explained, “even if it does turn out to just be a one-night stand. Plus, I’m starving. Plus, we need to talk about what happens next.”
“We should be cautious,” I said. “You are still being hunted by--”
“How would they know where we are?” he interrupted me. “Are your … uhhh … people going to check every breakfast joint in Seattle? They probably have no idea we spent the night at Kevin’s house.”
“Very well,” I said. “These next few days are going to be integral to our survival, and our odds are hindered with your injury.”
“Ugh,” he sighed.
“What is wrong?” I asked.
“I joked about the ‘fucking your brains out’ thing, but you didn’t try to rebuttal--”
“You pleasured me greatly,” I admitted as I shrugged my shoulders, “but it can not happen again. I must focus on--”
“Your mission,” he finished for me. “Yeah, yeah, fucking whatever. At least you said I was good in bed.”
I opened my mouth to reply, but then I realized engaging him any further would only bring whatever emotions I was suppressing to the surface. I was having a difficult enough time as it was trying to keep myself from demanding that we just turn back around, go back to Kevin’s apartment, and make love for the rest of the day, so I decided to ignore his comment.
We made it to the bottom of Kevin’s building, turned down the street, and began to head west. Tony was absolutely silent as we walked, but I wasn’t sure if it was because of the severity of our situation, or if he just didn’t want to talk to me.
I was too nervous to ask him, and this realization annoyed me.
Finally, after eight-hundred and thirty seven meters of walking, we arrived at a storefront with massive windows and a sign that read “The Rise ‘n Shiner.” Tony held open the door for me as I passed through the entrance, and I was instantly greeted with several new aromas.
My sensors couldn’t make sense of this place. Even though the exterior of the building looked like it was industrial, the inside was full of bright hardwood floors, walls, and tables. There were strange exposed bulbs that hung along the ceiling of the interior, even though there was plenty of light from the windows, and the chairs looked like they were not going to be comfortable whatsoever. Even stranger, a quick analysis from my scanners told me everything in this room was made out of flimsy, fibrous material rather than the material it was trying to look like.
And the humans called us Decoys fake.
“Just the two of us,” Tony explained to a woman wearing a black apron. “Booth or table is fine.”
“Great, right this way!” the woman exclaimed before she turned around and walked into the crowd of people who were already sitting down at the tables.
Tony motioned for me to follow, so we both allowed the woman to escort us to a nearby set of benches with a table in between. The dark-haired man pulled out a chair for me, waited for me to plunk down, and then moved over so he was immediately across from me.
“Can I get you started today with any drinks?” the woman in the apron asked.
“I’ll have a beer,” I announced. “The hoppier, the better.”
Tony and the woman both stared at me in awe.
“Uh, ma’am?” the aproned woman finally spoke up. “This is a breakfast place. We don’t have any of that here-- ”
“How about a coffee?” Tony interjected. “Two of them, please.”
“Two coffees,” the aproned woman nodded as she scribbled something onto her pad of paper, “that I can do. Be right back!”
Then the woman twirled around, marched off, and sauntered through a set of large doors behind a wooden counter.
“I was only emulating what you asked for last night,” I explained without remorse. “I assumed beer was a common human drink.”
“It is,” Tony shook his head, “but if you’re drinking before five o’clock, you’re gonna get some weird looks. Coffee will be fine. It’ll cure any hangover you’ve got, plus, if your body works like a normal human’s, it’ll give you all sorts of energy.”
“My body does work like a normal human’s,” I shot back. “I’m an exact copy of your species, just with an A.I. implanted into my nervous system and a nanotech healing factor. Outside of that, I am a one-to-one replica. You should realize that after last night.”
Tony’s face turned red briefly as his eyes darted downward, and then he picked up a piece of paper encased in plastic and held it between us.
“What are you feeling?” he asked.
“Feeling?” I echoed as my stomach began to flutter. “What do you mea--”
“For breakfast,” he chuckled. “I’ve always been kinda a traditionalist, bacon-and-eggs kinda guy.”
“I really do not care.”
“Well, you gotta feel like eating something.”
“I suppose.” I shrugged. “That Thai food you picked out was quite satisfactory, so I’ll trust your judgement on this one.”
Just then, the woman with the black apron returned, holding two ceramic vessels in one hand and a silver pot in the other. She placed one of the vessels down in front of Tony and me before she poured some type of black liquid into them.
“Are you guys ready to order?” she asked perkily.
Tony nodded, picked up the paper, and then pointed.
“I think we’re gonna get one of the big ones and split it,” he explained. “So, how about … let’s see … The Farmer’s Big Breakfast?”
“An excellent choice!” the woman mused. “How do you want your eggs?”
“Over easy,” he replied. “And could we get some extra bacon?”
“Always,” the aproned woman confirmed. “Alright, I’ll get that in for you.”
“Thanks.” Tony smiled as she walked away.
“What was that wording for the order?” I questioned. “I thought humans ate their chicken eggs as large piles of yellow mush?”
“That would be scrambled,” Tony chuckled. “Here in the past, we have the luxury of having all sorts of different ways to cook an egg.”
“Until The Hive launches its first attack,” I noted, and Tony went unusually silent.
“How long?” He stared off into the table, emotionless as he pondered. He looked frightened. Finally, he raised his eyes to meet my own.
“Ten years, four months, two days, and seven hours,” I stated.
“Well, shit,” he continued. “And … my son … he--”
“Many of history’s greatest leaders were young when they came into power,” I reassured him. “From what we know, he did not immediately take control of your resistance movement, but
he was directing all operations by the time he was sixteen.”
“So young,” Tony whispered. “W-what’s he like? My son.”
“I have never met him,” I admitted, “but every single one of us knows his name and his story. Raised by a master strategist and a legendary warrior, the great Alexander Amin rose up the ranks of the Resistance around the time of the Battle of Fallen Monuments. I believe it was in the area you people once called ‘D.C.’ Anyways, your son showed great prowess in that battle and led the humans to their first ever total victory over our kind. After that, he was promoted to lead their armies, and he took down several of The Hive’s forces.”
“He sounds great,” Tony whispered longingly. “It’s a shame he’s never going to exist.”
“As much as I hate to admit it, yes,” I agreed. “We machines may have hated him with every fiber of our being, but he was a brilliant military mind.”
Tony looked sadly off into the distance for a few more seconds, and then he rubbed his eyes with his right hand and shook his head.
“So,” he mumbled, “what’s the plan, then? Do we start off on the run today, or … ?”
“No,” I explained. “The Hive told me that, should I fail my mission, it was going to send back two more of my binary brethren to finish the job. We’ve already destroyed one, but there is another robot somewhere in this city. We could leave him behind, but do you really want him rampaging through Seattle, killing everyone you know and care about?”
“Wow,” Tony chuckled. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you cared about these humans.”
“I do not care,” I reminded him, “but I do not want to live the rest of your years hearing about how I would not save Kevin, Renee, your parents and anyone else he kills along the way.”
“How are we going to know what we’re dealing with?” Tony sighed as he rubbed his temples. “You told me there were still three different models The Hive could have sent back.”
“I can all but guarantee you that it didn’t send back the WAD,” I reassured him. “They might pack a punch, but they are about the furthest thing from ‘stealth’ you can get.”
“So, that just leaves the nanotech bot and the guy version of you,” Tony noted.
“Correct,” I continued, “and you must remember The Hive thinks I’m either destroyed or still out and about, searching for you. Which means it probably has not sent back a HMD.”
“Then it’s the nanotech bot.” Tony nodded. “How sure are you?”
I closed my eyes and ordered my systems to do a quick probability check.
Chance of use - WAD, 10%, HMD, 30%, Nano, 70%.
“Seventy percent sure,” I announced. “Even you must admit those are good odds.”
“Cool, so we have to kill a nanotech machine,” Tony sighed. “So what, does he heal like you do?”
Suddenly, the woman in the black apron reappeared holding a large black tray. As she placed it down onto our table, I counted six plates of different types of food.
First there was a small dish of charred wheat bread with a dollop of melting butter substitute at the side. Then there was a plate full of golden-brown, circular pastries that looked like they would be fluffy to the touch. Next came a plate of similar-looking pastries, but these seemed to be much crisper and were covered with square indentations. Another plate came down covered with pan-fried pork belly whose grease glistened in the light of the cafe, and next to that sat a ceramic dish with several brown morsels made up of ground pork stuffed into an organic tube.
Finally, the woman in the apron set down a plate of eggs. However, unlike the eggs I’d seen the Resistance eat all the time, these appeared to hold their original form. The white parts were bubbly, yet firm, and the yellow yolk was runny.
“This looks excellent!” Tony exclaimed. “Thank you.”
The aproned woman gave us both a smile before she turned around and walked over to another group of people.
“Dig in,” the dark-haired man proceeded. “We can talk about the nanotech dude while we eat.”
“The NHD,” I corrected. “Nanotech Human Decoy.”
Tony picked up a pitcher full of strange, viscous brown liquid and poured it over both circular pastries. Then he took his fork and knife, cut a triangular hunk out of one of the pocked pastries, and took a bite. He let out a deep, guttural sound of glee as he chewed and motioned for me to do the same.
I picked up my utensils and copied his actions. The second the pastry hit my mouth, it was filled with a mixture of butter, maple, and dough, all completed with a crunchy exterior.
“Wow,” I whistled after I had swallowed the concoction. “That was excellent.”
“It’s called a waffle,” Tony said in a tone that once again made it sound like he wasn’t sincere. “See, I can correct you, too.”
“Funny,” I lied as I took a bite of one of the small brown tubes.
The juice from inside exploded into my mouth, assaulting my taste buds with grease and spices of a foreign nature to me. I gulped the rest of the tube down in a single bite and let out a long, satisfied “mhmmm.”
“Sausage,” Tony explained. “And those are pancakes. And bacon. And eggs. And toast.”
“Right,” I noted before I scarfed down a piece of the “bacon.” It was warm and greasy against my tongue, but it tasted like heaven on Earth.
“Make sure you try the coffee, too,” Tony explained. “This is probably the best cup in town. And in Seattle, that’s a massive compliment.”
I swallowed the bacon, picked up my ceramic cup, and placed it to my lips. It was still steaming hot, but that meant nothing to an android like me. I ignored the searing pain on my tongue and swished the liquid around in my mouth.
It sported a heavy, roasted flavor with just a hint of what I assumed were nuts. Despite its bitter roast, it still went down as smooth as a gentle river and warmed my entire body from head to toe.
“That is amazing,” I announced. “Without a doubt the greatest cup of coffee I have ever had.”
“So, to get back on topic … ” the man across from me said with amusement. “How hard is the NHD to kill?”
“Very hard,” I admitted. “His body is composed mostly of bioorganic nanomachines. He doesn’t have a human skeleton or organs like us Decoys or the Behemoths do. Plus, he can heal almost instantly and can morph his body into different shapes to dodge attacks and slip into small spaces. The Resistance has only been able to take down one of the three models in existence, and that came at a great cost to them.”
“And now a single robot and a gamer have to kill the one,” he groaned. “I will admit, I don’t know much about nanotech outside of what I’ve seen in my Mech Wars game. There, you can play as Nanobots, but they’re essentially bullet vacuums with little to no power.”
“Bullet vacuums?” I asked. “That sounds fairly inefficient.”
“That’s the point,” Tony agreed. “They’re super agile and can brush off a freaking atom bomb, but they don’t do much damage themselves.”
“That sounds about right,” I admitted with a shrug. “I believe the first Nanotech was destroyed by the Resistance when they collapsed an entire cave down on top of him. That’s what it takes to kill one of those things.”
“Then we’d better start planning,” the dark haired man sighed. “What can you tell me about the NHDs? What are they made out of? Do they have any weaknesses? Are they more advanced models than you?”
“They are an earlier model than me,” I said as I took another sip of coffee. “I am made with perfectly crafted human DNA and am the latest in The Hive’s infantry units. The NHD is regenerative human skin with a nano robot underneath. It was the model before me.”
“Oh, good.” Tony exhaled. “So, you’ll be able to take this guy out easily.”
“No,” I corrected. “I was designed to bypass human scanners and infiltrate bases. I am strong, fast, and excellent with tactics, but the organic DNA limits my capabilities. The NHD looks lik
e a human, but it will not pass any sort of scan or verbal engagement with a human. It is still incredibly strong and can heal almost any damage, too.”
“Fuck,” Tony groaned. “So, how are we going to beat it?”
“I … do not know,” I said. “I was hoping you could assist me.”
“Me?” he asked as his eyes opened wide. “Why do you need my--”
“Because you are a military genius,” I interrupted.
“I’m just a video game player,” he argued.
“No,” I stated. “You are much more than that, or else I would not have been sent back here on my mission. If you want to live, you will help me save you.”
“Okay.” Tony cleared his throat, took a bite of his breakfast, and then stared into my eyes. “Tell me how this thing works, like uhh … the nanotechnology stuff.”
“Well, to start off,” I began, “The Hive’s nanotechnology is derived from the cellular connections inside of an organic body. Millions upon millions of tiny robots attach themselves to the cells of something organic and then force those cells to bend to their will. Hence why NHDs can change their physical forms and do not require internal organs or a skeletal structure.”
“So, you’re saying these guys are basically giant clusters of nanomachines attached to skin?” he asked.
“Precisely,” I confirmed as I took another sip of coffee. “When a Nanotech is formed, each and every nanomachine is attached to an individual biomass cell via an organic membrane.”
Tony remained silent as he munched on a piece of toast and furrowed his brow in thought. Then it was as if a switch was flipped in his head.
“Wait!” he exclaimed as he held up a finger. “Maybe that’s it … in Mech Wars, all of the nanotechnology enemies are weak to fire. I think it’s all starting to make sense now!”
“I am not following … ” I admitted.
“Okay, hear me out,” Tony explained as he pointed at one of the eggs. “You see this egg right here? It’s yolk is completely runny, almost a pure liquid. But there’s something holding it together.”
“The membrane on the outside,” I answered.