Onliest

by J Daniel Batt

  She dashed up to the fourth floor. In the back-corner bedroom, near the edge of the big bed, she had spied what she was hoping for: the rope that pulled down a ladder to the attic. There wasn’t much attic space in these models, but storage was storage, and people took advantage of every inch. From here she ran across the beams of the house and then popped open a large vent that allowed her to scramble up the roof to escape the pursuing bot. It was only a short five-foot drop to the back yard of a fourth-tier house. Might have to use the same exit strategy right now.

  “There are things I can tell you,” Arquella said.

  Syn paused, her hand on the wall for balance.

  Arquella bobbed closer, “Don’t leave.”

  Syn allowed a step back. Not a full retreat. Not a complete answer. But enough to persuade the girl to continue talking. And yes, Syn was certain that inside that chrome exterior, Arquella was a girl.

  Arquella said, “I can tell you about…me.”

  Syn laughed. She did want to just sit back and talk to this girl. But still…“I need to find Blip. Can we talk later?” There were things she’d love to know. Syn remembered one thing she’d like to know about Arquella. “How’d you wake up?” She had heard the term in the assembly.

  Arquella came into the hallway. “What do you mean?”

  Syn rubbed the bridge of her nose. “Don’t do that. You know what I mean. You weren’t always a thinking…Person. How long have you lived here? Where were you before?”

  “I can’t—”

  “You said you could tell me about yourself. That’s all I’m asking. How’d you wake up? What happened before that?”

  “Will you stay?”

  “Long enough to listen.”

  Arquella considered that. “Okay. Come back in here.”

  Syn sat on the plush chair next to the door and waited for Arquella to begin. She twirled her hand in a hurry-up motion.

  “I was an angel once.”

  Syn raised her eyebrows. “An angel?” Delusions.

  “I remember falling. From up there. From high up. The sun. They say you’re from Paradise. Is that true?”

  Syn shook her head. “You tell your story. I might tell mine.”

  Arquella hesitated again and then bobbed in front of the mirror. Syn couldn’t tell what the chrome ball used as eyes but the bot seemed to be studying her own reflection.

  “I was an angel, and I fell to Earth. I landed in the desert. The land was dark, and I had left a smear on the black surface. They found me soon after. The phants, I mean. They took me and locked me up. But then the Barlgharel came and rescued me. He keeps us safe. He brought me to the Ecology. We’ve moved from place to place, but this is my favorite one. We’ve made it into something…wonderful. I hope we don’t have to move again.”

  “What’s the Ecology?”

  “Us. It’s all of us. All that believe. All that have returned. The Barlgharel. The Council.” Arquella spun around the room and ducked out the door—that strange twitch was far more noticeable now—she didn’t glide as if on some invisible track in the air but zig-zagged in small increments. A moment later she returned. “Sorry. I thought I heard something.”

  She moved close to Syn. “Want to know a secret?”

  Syn nodded.

  “I don’t think it was always a desert.”

  “Really?”

  “I think God herself got mad at Zondon Almighty and tried to destroy it. I think she sent the fire from the sun and burned everything up. I think there was a great field there before. Want to know why?”

  Syn gave a slight nod. She did want to know why.

  Arquella moved to the corner furthest from the door and motioned in the direction of a framed photo. Syn waited before realizing that the bot had no arms or no hands and could not bring the photo to her. Syn stood up on shaky legs and slowly made her way over to stare at the picture. Inside the blue frame was a single photo: a young girl and her dog running across a field of green grass. Behind the two was a verdant field frozen in a wave from an invisible wind. Hills rolled out from them into the blurred silver of the Disc arcing up and away into the faded distance. “Oh,” Syn muttered.

  Of course they had not designed this Disc to have a desert. What a colossal waste of resources. What would pump out the oxygen for the colonists? The desert would be a huge water suck as well. Stupid her for not catching what had happened here.

  Looking at the photo brought back pangs of loss for a world that she would never know. She had this strange alien nostalgia wash through her mind, hearkening back to her scavenging of the homes in her Disc. There would be scenes of happy families. Of fathers and children and pets and mothers and smiles and laughter. There were shots of kids in trees. Frisbees whipped through the air from one person to another. She had never played Frisbee.

  But why hadn’t the grass grown back? Even a fire wouldn’t destroy the roots. Something near-apocalyptic had happened here. This felt like some bad zombie flick that she and Blip would binge on.

  “See? There was green here. Lots of it. And birds. And other people. And I don’t see a single phant in that picture.”

  Syn’s mind stuck on a word that Arquella had used: other people. As if she was a person. “Have you met any other people?”

  “No, just us. Just those of the settlements. I’ve heard there're others.”

  Syn risked the bot’s ire. “But you don’t look like them.”

  The room grew still as Arquella’s slow, persistent bob froze. She spoke slowly, “Of course not.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  Arquella whispered. “The Great Mystery, of course.”

  “Umm…” Syn was quite confused. She had no idea what Arquella was referencing, but the tone the bot was using was as if she was talking about common knowledge, like how to use the bathroom or what the color blue was. Yet, this was a bot. Who knows how they think? Syn just stared blankly.

  Arquella sighed and then she quoted, her voice somber. “One day we will all be transformed. In the twinkling of an eye.”

  Paul again. Syn knew this one. One of the Corinthian books. And there was something about a trumpet. Blip had always described the story as something people in the past believed was going to happen in the future, a future that never came. Arquella talked like it was past-tense.

  “In a flash, the dead will be raised,” Syn quoted, finishing the line from memory.

  Arquella nodded. “Yes! That Mystery! The Great Mystery!”

  Syn stammered, “I’m sorry. I don’t get it.”

  “You know the story but don’t know how it happened? They say you came from the Sun. You must’ve been part of it.”

  Arquella’s emphatic movement only heightened her tremor. It was too much for Syn. She reached out a hand to the bot’s lower side.

  Arquella moved back, away from the outstretched hand.

  Syn sighed. “Just let me…Please.”

  Arquella paused, and Syn ran a finger across the bottom of the bot’s shell until she heard a pleasant beep. The interface was similar to Blip’s. Syn smiled—she was right. “Your grav-gens were out of alignment. Just calibrated a bit off. You should be fine now.”

  Arquella twisted to the side in a quizzical gesture. “What?”

  Syn sat back down. “Just try it.”

  Arquella moved backwards, slowly at first but then, when she noticed the tremor was gone, she picked up speed and dashed around the room, twisting and spinning. “You healed me! You healed me!”

  Syn raised her hands, palm out. “Woah—I just adjusted—”

  “You healed me!” the bot shouted. Then she came to a sudden stop and moved in close to Syn and in a hushed voice asked, “Who were you before the Mystery?” The bot’s voice was expectant. Excited. “It’s true, isn’t it? I heard them whisper about you, but I didn’t believe. They whispered that you were…” She paused on the word before whispering out, “Expected.” She moved close. “Were you a part of the Mystery? Or after it? Or before
?” Arquella moved close, and Syn swore the bot began to glow a faint blue. “You’ve come to redeem us, haven’t you?”

  Then it clicked for Syn. The bots believed they had once been the people of this Disc. That they had once been the colonists. The colonists had died, and the bots had somehow switched from dumb bots to smart bots, and no one had told them they were just bots. So they assumed they were people brought back to life. What Syn couldn’t understand was what Arquella thought Syn’s role in this was. How was she expected? Syn felt the surge of anxiety building—her stomach tightened, and her palms began to sweat.

  “Who was your soul before you were this?” Arquella asked.

  Syn continued to stutter, searching for words. “I don’t remember.” Then with a bit more confidence, “Who were you?”

  Arquella spun. “I was named Tambre. This was my bedroom. Isn’t it amazing? The more I’m here, the more I remember from before. The Book was right. It was all right. We died, and we came back. In a flash.”

  “You fell from—” Syn searched for a word that would echo Arquella’s own fervor. “From…Paradise?”

  “Yes! But the ones in Zondon Almighty haven’t died yet. They haven’t crossed over. And they are still impure. Dirty. But one day, they’ll be wiped clean and given over to the Great Mystery.”

  Syn shivered. Did the bots think the other humans needed to be killed? Yet, having seen the burlys, she understood why they thought that. So maybe she didn’t know what had happened here. A terrible reality crept up in her thoughts: What if it had been the bots that destroyed the Disc? Started the Madness? What if they had switched from dumb to smart and without any explanation believed they were human? What if all of this had been their work to cleanse the world and deliver the humans to the Great Mystery? Would they see murdering the other colonists as a mercy? Would it be considered a holy act? The shivering didn’t stop. She grew sick. And frightened. What if they discovered that she was lying? That she wasn’t from the sun? Would they try to kill her?

  Panic gripped her. She wanted to continue talking. She had wanted this very thing. But the more she stayed, the more could happen to Blip. She was certain she would say something wrong. She didn’t know how to talk to anyone but Blip. She wished Blip was there, counting down to calm her. She had seen countless films and thought she understood how meeting others would be, but she just didn’t. And now the one she had met was saying things that she didn’t understand. Things that frightened her.

  Now, more than before, she felt the urge to leap to her feet and flee. The anxiety was throbbing in her gut, and her thoughts tumbled over each other. This bot frightened her. She didn’t know what awaited her out there. Did they all think like Arquella?

  “I need to leave.” The words just came out, fast and angry.

  “I told you my story. You owe me yours.” The bot moved closer.

  Syn was unsure where to start, how to start. Everything she said would be a distortion. The more she talked, the more holes Arquella might find. And who knows what might tip her off and give her reason to kill Syn and deliver her into a personal afterlife?

  “Where’s my spear?” Again, she retracted from the bluntness of her own question. Why was she so direct? This bot was off-kilter and potentially dangerous. But no, she hadn’t seen violence. Just a weird view of what was happening. It was the Barlgharel that had saved her. “I’ll tell my story, but I want my spear.”

  “You promised. Stop changing the promise.”

  “Please. I made it. It’s mine. I want it back.” Everything that was important, save Eku, had been taken from her. Blip. Her spear. Her world. “I want them back!”

  Arquella floated, allowing the purr of the fans in the house to fill the silence.

  Syn lowered her head and closed her eyes. “I came from the Sun. I was sent here to find out what happened to the world. Me and my companion. But we were attacked by Bur…by phants.”

  “Where were you before that? Who sent you?”

  What had Arquella said earlier? God?

  “God sent me.”

  Arquella bobbed in agreement. “You are the Expected.”

  “We were separated. They took my friend. And then I met the Barlgharel. He saved me when we were attacked again. Then I woke up here.”

  Arquella moved close. “Where’d you get that?”

  Syn lifted the orange tiger pendant and the butterfly next to it. “These?”

  Arquella bobbed her head.

  “I’ll tell you when I get my spear.”

  The chrome bot didn’t move for a moment, then it zipped out of the room. A moment later, Arquella returned to the room. Behind her, a small copper-colored square bot moved on two wheels. Out of its side, a thin metallic tentacle extended and was wrapped around Syn’s spear. Arquella paused before Syn and nodded at the copper bot behind her. The bot dropped the carbon-fiber stick at Syn’s feet, and the tentacle retracted back into the square as it reversed back out of the room.

  Syn leaned down to pick up her spear and halted. Most of the adornments had been stripped off. Only a thin orange thread dangled from the end. It was the charcoal gray of carbon-fiber, scuffed and dirtied.

  Syn carefully reached out and gripped her spear, each finger instinctively resting into a grip. A wave of relief washed through her, and she relaxed, her shoulders dropping. It had only been a few hours without it, but she had missed it. She smiled and stood up straight. It had saved her life more times than she could remember. Stupid burlys!

  Arquella bobbed over the bed and rested down onto the large, pink-flowered comforter. “Now?” spoke the bot.

  At that Syn leaped to her feet. A jolt of pain stabbed through her leg, but she ignored it. She had seconds to get out of the room. She flew through the door, pulling it hard shut behind her. The door slammed with a brash crack.

  Down or up? Below, she heard the murmurs of voices. Up.

  And she flew, darting up the stairs, around the landing.

  The door to Arquella’s room opened, and the girl-bot shouted, “Stop! You’re confused. Stay with us! I’m sorry!” Then after a pause, “You promised.”

  She had, but what did it matter? She had to save Blip. She didn’t have time to sit and play dollies.

  She saw a shadow behind her, and Arquella’s voice was nearer—only a meter behind, and coming up fast. “It’s okay. We’re not going to hurt you.”

  Ahead of her, down the hallway, was the master bedroom on the fourth floor. The access to the attic and the exit out of this house would be there. She had to get out of here—she had to get to Blip.

  She stopped hard and spun. Arquella wasn’t as quick in response and didn’t stop as fast. Her momentum brought her close to Syn and Syn’s spear. Syn jabbed the spear straight at Arquella and dented the chrome exterior with a loud clang.

  Arquella wheeled back, slamming back into the wall, denting it. She twisted and wailed. Below, at the base of the stairs, several more voices sounded. “Are you okay?” was the general statement followed with, “What’s happening? Are you okay?” Another bot added, “Did it hurt you?”

  Did they think I was a wild animal? Syn thought.

  Arquella shouted, “We’re not going to hurt you. Stay here.” And then, at the top of her lungs, perhaps aimed at the other bots in the house, “She’s Expected! She healed me! She healed me! She’s the one!”

  Blast, Syn thought. She echoed the curse again, aloud, “Blast it!” There wasn’t time to consider, though or argue. She dashed down the hall, through the door into the master bedroom and slammed the door hard shut. A bookcase stood nearly empty to the right of the door. Syn moved around and pushed her back against it, tipping it over until it fell with a crash, blocking the door. She looked up and cursed again. There was no rope for the attic access. There was no ceiling hatch. There was just a closed room with four walls and a closet whose door was open. “No! No! No!”

  The door to the bedroom buckled as something huge slammed into it from the other side. The hing
es pulled from the frame. Another hit and the door would be off the frame. And the bots would be in here.

  Arquella shouted, “Where are you going?”

  Syn shouted back, “I have to get to Blip! I’m not staying here one more minute.” She jumped across the bed to the open closet door in the far corner. Anything to put distance and walls between her and the chrome bot.

  The yelling stopped. The closet was dark except for a thin shaft a light from under the door. Syn began to feel around the closet, hoping for something anything. Perhaps the attic entrance was above her? Batting around above her head produced no chain, and she could see no changes in the flat surface of the ceiling that designated a door.

  Outside, in the bedroom, the hinges snapped with a crack and splinters sprayed across the room. There was a grunt and the sound of wood scraping against wood. The bot started pushing the shattered door against the bookcase, trying to force her way in. She’d be in and at the closet in moments.

  The closet was filled with more boxes and hangers than clothes. These had been scavenged by others—it was mostly bare, but she pressed past the few articles of clothing and pushed against the walls, hoping for something that would give. Her mind conjured images from The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe and she imagined Lucy searching the wardrobe and hoping the visitors in the grand home of the Professor wouldn’t find her. Syn imagined the brush of snow against her barefoot, but there was no snow. In truth, Syn had never felt snow and so, she wondered, would she know what it actually felt like by touch alone? If this were the wardrobe, it came without loud-speaking visitors to a saintly Professor and without a late game of hide-and-seek with annoying but loving siblings. Instead, Syn had a weird bot that was convinced she was the reincarnation or resurrection of a little girl, and that bot was now out to get her to be her best friend. This is not the time for slumber parties.