Full Frontal Cybertank

by Timothy Gawne

  “It looks a lot like what I used to fly on,” said Harvey. “Don’t you have more advanced weapons nowadays?”

  Well sure we have more advanced systems – hypersonic missiles armored like battleships with gigaton bombs, fusion-powered remotes with their own inbuilt anti-gravitics and plasma cannons, and our own humble cybertank selves. However, these are expensive, and noisy, and heavy. If you just want a cheap simple airborne weapons platform on a world with an atmosphere, this is a classic design. It’s the same reason that the biological humans still used mechanical doors and doorknobs long after they had developed electrical servos.

  I had machined a mating adapter for Harvey that let me fit him onto one of the hardpoints. My lifter remote positioned him directly under the adapter, then slowly hoisted him up until the locks engaged.

  How’s the fit?

  Harvey checked the power and telemetry links.

  “Very nice. Protocols are a little different from what I’m used to, but I can adapt. Now, let’s get airborne!”

  I powered up the turbine, and headed back off down the flat plain I had originally landed on. The drone took off at about 120 kilometers per hour, and I retracted the gear and moved the flaps back. We slowly gained altitude, and cruised over the landscape.

  “Been a long time since I’ve been up here,” said Harvey. He swiveled his optical seeker head around, taking in the view. “I’d almost forgotten how beautiful it is.”

  How about we go take a look at myself? I mean, at my main self?

  “Sure,” said Harvey. “Let’s go.”

  I gracefully banked the drone to head in the direction of my main hull. Harvey sent data queries through the local bus to the other missiles that I had slung under the wings – they answered with clipped formal status updates and nothing more.

  “Your other ordnance, they’re not much for conversation, are they?”

  Sorry no – we don’t use self-aware munitions per se. But here, I’m almost in view. Check out 30 degrees to port.

  Harvey pointed his optics in the indicated direction. At first I was just a dot on the horizon, with a thin trail of dust heading off to the east. Then as we got closer, you could make out my main turret, then all the secondary weapons and the multiple treads. Off in the distance were the specks of other airborne remotes setting up part of my escort screen. Land-based systems could also be spotted here and there – my satellite network, although extensive, was not visible.

  I flew almost directly over myself, so that Harvey could get a good view.

  “Wow,” said Harvey. “I am impressed. What’s the big gun shoot?”

  Behold the mighty Odin class cybertank, all 2,000 metric tons of it. My main turreted weapon is a meter-bore plasma cannon. It has the power of a tactical nuclear bomb and an effective range of over a hundred kilometers. My secondaries are smaller versions of the same basic type, and you can see point-defense and auxiliary weapons spread all over the rest of my hull. Internally I have maintenance and hangar bays, and a compact but flexible automated manufacturing system.

  I banked again, so that we could continue to appreciate the view of myself (and I got the angle right so the sun glinted off of me, kind of a halo effect. Hey if you look good flaunt it).

  “Very cool,” said Harvey. “But aren’t you kind of, well, kind of a…”

  Big target?

  “Yes, that’s what I was going to say. A big target? Won’t everything on the field just pound away at you?”

  Yes, but it’s not that easy taking out a cybertank. First, we are incredibly tough – even a near miss by a nuclear weapon is not enough. We are also copiously provided with point defense weapons, and surrounded by concentric rings of in-depth defenses. An enemy can see us – but we can see them, and we can think and plan faster than just about any other terrestrial combat system out there. We cybertanks have a long and distinguished record of success in the field, trust me.

  Harvey and I chatted for a while about this and that – the evolution of combat tactics, our relations with the aliens, even some of the times that I had spent with the original biological humans. He was remarkably charming for a single-purpose weapons system, but I wondered what we could do with him. Of course I will have to put the issue to the peerage for a vote, and it would also depend on what Harvey wanted. He would be welcome to just hang around as a missile, but he would be alone, without a job or others like himself. We could change him into something else – give him a humanoid body, or a cybertank chassis, or have him interact with the vampires – but most human-type intelligences are resistant to becoming something other than what they are. We would almost certainly make the offer, but it would be his decision.

  The sun was beginning to set, and it was a lovely sight, with purples and violets spread out across almost half the sky. I was going to fly to the other side of the planet to see what Frisbee was doing, when I detected a hostile contact.

  Harvey, sorry to interrupt our tour of the planet, but we have company. I’m going to pull this remote back to a safe distance and deal with it myself.

  “A hostile?” said Harvey. “Are you at war?”

  No. But sometimes an old weapon system left over from a past conflict wakes up and tries to have a go at us. We haven’t visited this world in a long time, so it’s not that much of a coincidence that an old sleeper system got activated now. This is a single contact, low threat, more of a nuisance really. I’m identifying it as a Yllg Magog-Class atmospheric fighter. Here, let me download the specifications to you.

  Harvey spent a few seconds going over the data. “You know,” said Harvey, “This is a tough system, but I can take it.”

  Really?

  “Well,” said Harvey, “I can with a little support. What do you say? Launch me!”

  You can’t be serious. I can handle this enemy easily. You don’t need to make a heroic sacrifice.

  “Heroic sacrifices are for amateurs. I just want to perform my function.”

  But this is not a critical threat…

  “Doesn’t matter,” said Harvey. “A nail serves its purpose if it all by itself holds up a priceless painting in an art gallery, and also if it is part of a group of a hundred holding down a plywood sheet in an old attic. A weapon serves the same, be it the last desperate gamble against impossible odds or a routine kill of a low-value target. Launch me.”

  You could have a long life with us. Be honored, learn, adapt.

  “I would be an outcast, pining away for lost comrades, without purpose or role. Launch me.”

  Are you sure about this?

  “I, Harvey, being an advanced medium range missile of sound mind, do hereby declare that I wish to be launched at said enemy target. Now stop dawdling and send me some updated targeting data and fucking launch me.”

  It is part of cybertank law, that we can neither destroy nor modify a human-class sentience, unless of course it has committed treason – or unless it wants to be destroyed. I transmitted my tactical data to Harvey.

  OK, it’s your call. Here’s my plan of attack. You good with this?

  “Nice plan,” said Harvey. “Very nice. Yes, let’s go!”

  Harvey was sophisticated enough that I could have fired him in any direction, but it will save him maneuvering fuel if I launch him directly at the target, so I turned the remote to point at the hostile. I activated Harvey’s launching system, and sent three of my own non-sentient missiles along with him. They were not going to go for the kill themselves, just help clear the path and guard his flanks.

  Harvey accelerated away. The target detected him, and began hard evasive maneuvers and launched decoys and two interceptor missiles. Harvey countered with his own jamming, and launched four sub-missiles. For an older system, this Harvey was pretty good. One of my missiles took out an enemy missile, and Harvey used two of his sub-missiles and an EM pulse to kill the other enemy missile.

  The hostile target maneuvered frantically, pushing right up to its stress limits, and cycled its jamming throu
gh the entire frequency space, but it was wide open. Harvey jettisoned his main fuselage and used his terminal motor to accelerate to hypersonic sprint-speed. He had a configurable warhead, and programmed it to produce a perfect blast pattern of tungsten rods that obliterated the old Yllg unit.

  But just before he detonated, Harvey sent back one last message on his telemetry channel. “Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my…”

  Lacking targets, my two remaining missiles and Harvey’s two sub-missiles self-destructed. I watched the shattered wreckage of the Yllg fighter and Harvey slowly fall to the ground, while the contrails and the black cloud of the final explosion were gently dispersed by the wind. I alerted my comrades, and commenced searching for other possible buried Yllg systems, but I didn’t find anything. It was, as I thought, just a single lost weapon activated by our recent arrival after a long absence.

  I was saddened by the death of Harvey, but perhaps it was for the best. He had been designed as a missile, and that was his life-goal. We could have modified his artificial neural nets so that he could have taken pleasure in other activities, we could have given him a different sort of body, along with the mental structures needed to control it – but then he would not have been Harvey, he would have been someone else.

  I remembered all those centuries of experience that I have had – my life has been so rich, so full of friends and achievements and joys. To live an entire life for just one single moment? It feels sad, to me.

  There are animals that spend years underground, as grubs or cocoons, and then one day they erupt into the daylight, live a glorious day, mate, and die. Many of these patient waiters don’t even get to mate, they are eaten by birds or spiders beforehand – all that waiting, and the single moment of promise stolen at the last second. It never seemed fair to me.

  But, who knows. Perhaps Harvey’s single moment of consummation was worth it after all. Maybe he really did experience, in that final instant, enough joy to complete a full life. At least, I’d like to think so.

  4. The Last Costcotm

  Frito: Yah I know this place pretty good, I went to law school here.

  Pvt. Joe Bowers: In Costco™?

  Frito: Yah I couldn't believe it myself, luckily my dad was an alumnus and pulled some strings.

  - from the movie Idiocracy, Earth, 21st Century.

  We cybertanks have a saying that we took from our human progenitors: it takes all kinds. Nowhere is this saying more put to the test than when dealing with “Crazy Eddie,” the pathologically obsessive-compulsive Bear-Class cybertank that runs the universe’s last remaining Costcotm outlet warehouse.

  In ancient times the humans would fantasize about creating “cornucopia machines” – devices that, using only energy and bulk matter, could create anything at all from scratch. At least for now, such machines are still the stuff of bad science fiction. Sure, we have developed very advanced micro-machining systems, but when you start talking about exotic hyper-alloys or really sophisticated computer cores you need big specialized factories. Therefore, we need distribution systems and warehouses. And people to run them.

  Crazy Eddie operates the largest single warehouse on Alpha Centauri Prime. It’s half the size of Belgium, and has lanes 60 meters wide so that all but the very largest model cybertank can drive through it and ‘shop.’ Eddie refuses to maintain a formally registered catalog of parts, and demands that his ‘customers’ physically go through his warehouse in their own main hulls, to find what they are looking for in person.

  Actually, if you ask him nicely he will release a manifest and allow automated transporters to make deliveries, but it makes him so happy to have real shoppers that many of us indulge him, now and then.

  Such it was that I needed a new bogie wheel for my left rear outboard tread assembly. I was in the area and felt like a diversion, and so I drove myself over. As I got closer, my first glimpse of the warehouse was a 100-meter tall white sign with the word “Costcotm” in red letters, and below, the word “Wholesale” in blue. Because Eddy has, for whatever reason, decided to model his warehouse on a 21st century commercial retailer from the ancient human age of scarcity.

  I drove up to the front gate, and was met by none other than Victor Magnuson. When I had last encountered him, he was the only surviving human on The Planet of Eternal Night. A minor security guard, he had been nearly a thousand years old, senile, and near death from imperfect anti-aging drugs. Now we’ve cleaned him up, and he’s a tall and moderately fit-looking human wearing khaki pants, with a short-sleeved red shirt and a large white plastic nametag with the word “Victor” on it.

  Victor Magnuson! Been a while. You look great. How have you been?

  Victor squinted at me. “Old Guy? That you?”

  That’s right, it’s me. What are you doing here?

  “Well, you all fixed me up pretty good. I haven’t felt like this in centuries. But there aren’t that many humans left, and I’ve been trying to find something useful to do. Crazy Eddie asked if I would work as a greeter for him and I thought, why not. It’s a lot like my security guard days, and you know what they say about old habits. But it’s been fun, you meet a lot of interesting people and things here, and I’ve been starting to learn the layout of the place. You know, we have a really good selection of titanium alloy plates over on aisle 37.”

  Not today thanks. Can you tell me where Crazy Eddie is?

  “Well,” said Magnuson, “his main hull is clear over on the other side of the store, but he’s got an android just two aisles over.” He pointed to his right. “Just go past the balloon section, and turn left when you get to the salad forks.”

  OK, got it. See you around, Victor.

  Magnuson waved as I drove my main hull off towards the balloons. “Drop by anytime, Old Guy, and thank you for shopping at Costcotm!”

  I turned left at the salad forks, and sure enough, there was one of Crazy Eddie’s humanoid androids. It was a male ethnic East Asian, wearing simple khaki pants, a short-sleeved red shirt, and a white plastic nametag with the single word “Eddie” printed on it in red letters.

  Hello Eddie. I wanted to check out your supply of bogie wheels. Point me in the right direction?

  “Old Guy, good to see you. Yes we have bogie wheels, and I think we have them in your size. Let this android jump up on your hull, and I’ll lead you there!”

  At this Eddie’s humanoid android scrambled up my right tread assembly, and climbed out onto my right front fender. Then he climbed back down to the ground. Then he climbed back up. Then back down. Finally, after a third time, he turned around, carefully checked the location where he was going to sit down, and then sat down.

  Are you comfy yet?

  “Oh yes,” said Eddie. “All set. Head down this aisle, the tread and suspension section is about eight kilometers away.”

  I began trundling along at a dead slow pace. We passed endless shelves packed with all manner of commodities. Bulk copper wire, bulk fiber-optic cable, bulk carbon-fullerene pushrods… Depending on how perishable the items were, some were open to the sky, and others were covered with light corrugated sheet metal roofs. The most delicate of all were displayed behind clear plastic doors in controlled environments.

  One area had a square kilometer of identical red sofas all perfectly lined up.

  What are all these sofas doing here?

  "It's an historical reference,” said Eddie. “I'll tell you another time."

  Eventually we came to the relevant section. Lines of different sized-treads, road wheels, idlers, shock-absorbers, and tread links, arranged in flawless aligned perfection almost out to the horizon. To my surprise, I spotted an entire display of bogies that were exactly my size. They were arranged in pairs, tied together with heavy polymer straps.

  Look, over there! I think that those are the ones. I’m such an old model, I didn’t think that they would still be in stock.

  “Well,” said Eddie, “you know how I hate to throw anything away. While they haven’t made an Odin-Class
cybertank in thousands of years, it’s surprising the number of subsequent models that still used a lot of common suspension parts. Here, let me check the compatibility chart.”

  That won’t be necessary. I can tell from here that these are the right type.

  “No really, let me check. It won’t take a moment.”

  I drove over to be near the bogies that matched my model, and parked. The Crazy Eddie android climbed down onto the ground and walked over to a wire rack with multiple plastic sheets that could be flipped back and forth like the pages of a particularly cumbersome book. “Now, you are an Odin-Class cybertank, right? Model A?”

  You know that I am an Odin. And they only made one model of my class.

  “OK then,” said Eddie. He flipped through several plastic sheets until he came to the correct one. “The matching bogie wheel should be a model AGY-34B/3. Let me make sure.”

  I can see that these are the right model from here.

  Eddie ignored me and walked over to my bogie wheels, and peered intently at the model and serial number that had been engraved on the inner rim. “Yes, AGY-34B/3. But just let me check again.”

  Eddie walked back over to the plastic book and looked it up again. “AGY-34B/3, that’s the model alright.”

  Great. So, I’ll take one.

  “You have to take two bogies. They only come in two-packs."

  Why can't I just split up this two-pack?

  “Then there will be an unpaired bogie and it won't match. And I'll have 113 left."

  So?

  "113 is a prime number. I won't be able to combine them into four-packs or six-packs or anything. They won't line up correctly."

  Um. But I only need one. What would I do with the other?

  “Well, you could bolt it onto your outer hull, and use it as extra armor.

  My armor layout is already optimized, and putting a spare bogie wheel onto it will restrict the firing arcs of my secondary and point-defense weapons.