Robot Awareness: Special Edition

by B. C. Kowalski

  “What do we do?” Joey asked in a voice he wished was a lot bigger than it sounded.

  At first, Isellia seemed not to hear him. Suddenly her face was very near his, a grave, almost protective look on her face. “Stay here. Whatever you do, don’t move. Don’t make a sound.” She rested her hand his shoulder momentarily, as Joey could only nod slightly, dumbstruck.

  “What? What are you —” But Isellia turned, crouched so she wasn’t exposed, and began to move toward the other end of the crates. But when she got the end, she encountered a pair of legs that didn’t belong to anyone on their crew. Isellia looked up to see a humanoid figure in black fatigues, dark boots that shone impossibly bright, dark, shiny gloves, a black helmet that seemed to be one piece without seams and an ROU trained right at her as she looked up from her hands and knees.

  Isellia knew she could do nothing as the soldier kicked the weapon out of her hand. She got up on her knees, staring bravely down the laser barrel, tense but unwavering.

  Joey panicked at the sight, his muscles tensed around his core. He felt a tingle prickle its way over his head and down his spine, his heart rate sped and his knees felt weak. He couldn't believe what he was about to do, as if his body were going to move on its own.

  Joey got about half a step in, foot still hovering in the air, when the soldier went crashing into some crates about 20 feet away. His helmet collided with the steel in a loud thump before he fell to the floor, Rex now standing firmly in his place, one arm outstretched.

  “Last one,” Rex said, with little emotion, seemingly as calm as if he were awaking for a cup of coffee. “Get up, you two." Rex walked away again, without saying anything.

  Rex stopped, turning to look at Joey, who was still in mid-spring. Isellia followed his gaze, also noticing Joey in this ridiculous posture. A slight grin found both their faces as they realized what he was about to do.

  "Stupid," Rex said, almost grinning. "Woulda got killed."

  Rex once again turned away, but Isellia was still staring at him. She still had a slight grin on her face, but seemed to be looking at him curiously, as if she were deciding something

  "You can relax now," she finally said. Joey seemed to realize this for the first time and let go, stumbling back a little.

  But Rex suddenly turned toward the man he’d thrown, who was still conscious and reaching for a small button on his belt.

  In an instant Rex pulled a hidden blade and sent it whirling across the room, severing the finger that reached for the button.

  But it was too late.

  The man twitched a few times, then his body relaxed as his muscle control disappeared. All three noticed the severed finger on the button on his belt.

  “He’s dead,” Isellia said with a tone of disappointment, sliding her pink bangs back behind her ear as she left out a breath of exhaustion.

  Joey looked at the soldier only a moment before he had to look away. He’d seen death before, but not this close. Even though he'd been an attacker, still, he was a person, right?

  "This one too," Porter said, crouching over the dead soldier's body. "No way to know now what this was all about."

  Rex sniffed. "Got a feeling we'll find out soon enough." He walked off without further explanation.

  ***

  They found the Sasugan workers bound and gagged in a storage closet just off the docking bay. Rex was the first one to think to check, walking to the door without saying anything. He punched in a few security codes, none of which worked, then fiddled with some wires, opening the door within a few seconds.

  As the door slid open, Joey got his first glimpse of a Sasugan — the first non-human humanoid he'd ever seen. Offworlders came to the colony sometimes, in dealings with Company C plant, but workers there rarely caught a glimpse of them. Joey never had. They tended to travel directly to the manager’s compound, out of sight of ordinary folks like Joey.

  Joey hadn’t necessarily had a perfect ideal of what his first encounter with a non-human would be, but nothing like this had crossed his mind: getting shot at, rescued by a man he barely knew, and meeting his first Sasugans, as they lay tied up on the floor of a dusty docking bay closet.

  They didn't really look as different as Joey had thought. There were four of them, taller than an average human, slimmer. Their translucent white skin was impossibly pale, and their jaws seemed to jut out. Their hair was white, cropped as if cut around a bowl. Joey noticed that one worker seemed distinctly female, though he couldn’t have said how he could tell. Her hair seemed softer, her body more shapely, though she shared the same uniform and hairstyle with the men and didn't appear to have a lighter physique. She had extra insignias on her outfit, which led Joey to deduce correctly that she must be a leader.

  Joey frowned, seeing them like this. The expression on their faces seemed both scared and ashamed — as if they had failed in their duty and were awaiting punishment.

  Porter sighed. “Well, let’s not just stand here. Help me untie them.”

  Joey’s fascination with these creatures alien to him had parlayed the fear and general shakiness he’d felt after the attack, and he was ready to jump right into the task at hand. He happened to be near the female, so he bent down and started to untie the knots around her pale, slender wrist, as the others helped the other bound Sasugans. Joey struggled with the bonds, along with the fear of accidentally touching the female Sasugan inappropriately, until Porter came over and helped him. Soon the Sasugans were freed, and when the last of them stood up, they immediately formed a row in front of Joey and company. Joey looked at Porter quizzically, who grinned to himself, knowing the ritual that was to come. Rex seemed to roll his eyes. Stephen looked with interest and Isellia seemed bored.

  Suddenly the Sasugans thrust their right arms out straight in front of them, beat themselves on the chest with that arm and returned it to the straight-out position, all in unison as if coordinated in advance. They must practice this, Joey thought.

  “Welcome Sasuga,” the female said. “Greet we you. Here, you stay, happy.”

  Rex took a glance at Joey, rolled his eyes, and walked back to the ship. Joey looked up at Porter quizzically, who grinned back at him. “It’s their way. Formality first, with the Sasugans.”

  Porter then turned to the Sasugan ensemble. “Thank you. Youga ritsu. Dou kama mu?”

  The Sasugans murmured amongst themselves. Finally the female spoke. “Good, you speak Sasugan, yes?”

  “Thank you.”

  Watching Porter speak in Sasugan amazed Joey, and he stood listening to the conversation, none of which he could possibly understand.

  “Yes, explain. This what happened. Sasugan okay, mu?” The Sasugan woman looked at Porter with her head cocked to the side farther than a human could do and not look ridiculous.

  “Bujou dai,” Porter said.

  ***

  Joey’s first encounter with the Sasugans had been a hurried one, and now that they were up and about, he started really seeing them for the first time. Their appearance wasn’t that different, but just enough that Joey required some adjustment. Their faces were longer, like the rest of their bodies — even Porter, who was relatively big for a human, had to look up at the woman he was speaking to, who was shorter than the rest of the dock workers. More Sasugans, whom Joey guessed were some type of security guards had entered the room, pointing around the docking bay with very concerned expressions.

  Something about the way they moved wasn’t altogether human — it was slower, with different muscle contractions, somehow graceful and awkward at the same time — Joey found himself trying not to look at them. They were just too… different. The urge to stare at these other beings was overwhelmed by dizzy spells that he couldn’t seem to shake.

  Isellia, whom Joey hadn’t seen standing nearby, punched him lightly on the shoulder. It wasn’t a hard hit but Joey had been lost in thought and lurched forward a step at the strike.

  “Whatsa matter with you?” She said. Her earlier anger seem
ed to have faded for good, Joey noticed.

  “Nothing,” he said. He couldn’t explain his strange dizzy spells to her. She’d been places, seen things. She’d just think he was lame.

  Isellia didn’t follow up on her question. “Jeez, he’ll be there all day if we let him. Likes to show off.”

  Joey looked up at Porter, who was still speaking to the female Sasugan. He started seeing them again but felt another spell, putting his hand over his eyes like a frustrated old man.

  “Jeez, you OK?” Isellia looked at him. Joey nodded but didn’t look up.

  “Dizzy spells?”

  Joey looked up at her, surprised. “Yeah, how’d you know?”

  “They’re pretty common.” She seemed to be following the conversation, though how much Sasugan Isellia spoke was a mystery to Joey.

  “Did you get them?” Joey asked. “You know, when you met your first alien?”

  Isellia turned to him with a somewhat perturbed look. “Of course not!” She giggled a little. “Well, I practically grew up around... and by the way, we’re the aliens, if anything. We’re on their world, you know?”

  Her sarcasm made Joey feel a bit ashamed.

  “Right.”

  “Anyway, you’ll get used to it,” Isellia said.

  Joey wanted to say thanks to this new-found, somewhat protective Isellia, but found himself distracted as a young girl about his age ran across the docking bay and put her arms around the female Sasugan.

  Joey couldn’t help but stare at her. She was much shorter than the adult Sasugans, and her features were less defined. She almost appeared human, despite the white hair and translucent white skin. Her hair was different than the others’ — long and thin, like a young human girl’s might be.

  She looked up excitedly at the older woman, tugging at her black and grey fatigues, before noticing the non-Sasugans. She looked at the others in fascination, glancing at each one successively — but when she turned toward Joey she sighed in surprise, promptly hiding behind the taller Sasugan.

  Porter and the woman laughed at this, then exchanged the chest-beating salute again. Joey and Isellia followed him back to the ship.

  “All right, things are somewhat cleared up,” Porter said, somewhat sarcastically. “The woman’s name is Fina. She said they’re as baffled as we are by the attack.”

  Rex leaned against a crate with his arms crossed.

  “You wouldn’t know anything about it, would you?” Porter stared at Rex, arms crossed.

  Rex maintained his cool, not bothering to look at Porter when he spoke. “No clue.”

  Porter couldn’t help but notice what appeared to be a letter sticking out of his shirt pocket. He’d noticed it before — it never seemed to leave his person.

  “Anyway,” Porter continued, “Fina is taking responsibility for this incident, and has agreed to allow us to stay at her home. As I understand, it’s rather large. We shouldn’t head out in public too much — not until we know what that was all about.”

  Porter made a pointed glance at Rex.

  “Responsibility?” Joey questioned. “But it wasn’t their fault. They didn’t do anything wrong.”

  “I know that,” Porter interrupted. “It doesn’t matter. It’s the Sasugan way. Someone has to take responsibility. It’s best to just go along with them on things like this.” Joey nodded, looking at the ground. “Trust me.”

  “What about our supplies?” Isellia asked, tapping her foot impatiently.

  “That’s all taken care of,” Porter said. “Fina’s people will gather the things we need. I just need to hand them a list. Probably save us a few credits to boot.”

  “What if what we want isn’t something we want on a list,” Rex said, glaring at Porter almost challengingly.

  “Do you have something you want to tell us, Rex?” Porter asked.

  “Just asking,” Rex said.

  Porter looked at Rex contemplatively for a moment. “I’m not your boss. It was just a suggestion. Whatever you do just don’t endanger my crew.”

  Rex didn’t respond with anything like words, per se, but snorted with slightly less derision than normal, which Porter took as at least marginally reassuring.

  “What about my new flux cooling coils?” Isellia demanded, crossing her arms as she, too, glared at Porter.

  “What about them?” Porter sighed.

  “You said we could get them when we got to Sasuga.”

  Porter rubbed his head. “I don’t know if we are going to have the funds. The ship needs a lot of repairs. I don’t think we can ask for something else….”

  Isellia grew very quiet, though her face turned an unhealthy red, perhaps more so than when Joey accidentally released the landing gear. Which was likely the reason he was unconsciously stepping away from her…

  “You said we could get them when we got to Sasuga,” Isellia repeated, stamping her foot.

  “Isellia, be reasonable. We’ve got bigger problems than cooling coils to worry about.” Porter was trying not to look at her, yet maintain a sense of authority. It appeared even he wasn’t immune to Isellia’s tirades.

  Isellia let out something between a yell and a shriek, stomped over to Joey, grabbed his hand and began dragging him toward the ship.

  “Where are we going?” Joey was almost too afraid to ask — both glad and nervous to be holding hands with Isellia.

  “To get our bags! Come on!” Joey let her tug him along, as she was much stronger than him — though he would have been afraid to try and stop her if he had been Porter’s size. As they made their way back toward the ship, Joey looked back and noticed the Sasugan girl, standing next to Fina, staring at them. As soon as Joey turned toward her, she quickly ducked back behind Fina. The two disappeared into the cargo ship.

  Chapter 5

  Joey sat on the edge of Isellia’s bed, fidgeting nervously. Clothes flew comically from Isellia’s trunk, which Joey had hauled through the streets of the Sasugan space station. The top of the trunk hid Isellia herself, so the articles of outerwear (and underwear, Joey noticed with embarrassment) seemed to fly out of the trunk on their own power.

  Joey didn’t have much time to notice the station itself, as he lugged the giant trunk with all his might, sweating under its weight. The sights he did notice were overwhelming: A block of tall buildings that seemed to rise forever into the star-lit dome of the station punctuated by blocks of sprawling little shops and bodegas and other buildings, the use of which he could only guess. The buildings hung over the streets like trees, many of them connected by skywalks at varying levels, like a skyscraper jungle gym. The lights from the many buildings were nearly indistinguishable from the stars themselves.

  The glow of flashing advertisements and directional signs fought an ongoing battle for the attention of passersby, most of whom paid little attention to anything going on in the sky. The streets were filled with many busy Sasugans and otherworlders — none of them looking like tourists, agape with wonder as Joey was as he dragged Isellia’s pink trunk through the streets while trying not to run into anyone. Susugans, and the occasional otherworlder, seemed to regard him with annoyance and disregard at the same time and most forgot about him moments after running into him.

  He now had time to process the overwhelming experience of the Sasugan street, comparing it to the absolute quiet of the 35th story condominium in which Isellia continued to fling clothes. The room was white and sparsely decorated; there were a few shelves in the rooms, most with one object on them. He didn't know what any of them were but they all seemed withered and old, and somehow striking. A big window behind Isellia's flying clothes looked out over the cityscape of the Sasugan station, as well as a garden with native Sasugan species — Joey could only see the silhouette of plants against the night scene. Each of them were given a room like this — he guessed this Fina must be pretty important, in some way.

  “What’s with you?” Isellia asked, peeking out behind the side of the trunk momentarily. “You haven't said m
uch.”

  Joey snapped out of his revery as a light-blue and black top stuck him in the face. "Oh, just — it just seems so quiet here."

  She stared at him a moment.

  “You know,” he continued, worried he had said something stupid, “compared to outside.”

  Isellia nodded. “Sasugans like their peace and quiet. The buildings are all soundproof. Keeps the noise out.”

  Joey looked at Isellia. He had been under the impression that she hated him. Now he was sitting on her bed — he'd never sat on a girl's bed before, and even though it wasn't her bed, per se, it made him nervous none the less. She had been acting different toward him now. But why did she ask him to come into her room?

  “Um, so, why did you ask me to—"

  “Aha! Found it,” Isellia sang in that tone that undercut her rough exterior. She held in her hand some sort of tool, one that Joey had never seen before. “Now we can go.”

  “Go?” he asked.

  “Hey go find that robot of yours,” she said, poking into his chest playfully as she walked past him. “We might need him.”

  “Um, okay,” Joey said, “but I think Porter said that we should—“

  “Go get it!” Isellia ordered, her more demanding persona once again emerging.

  As Joey walked down the hall back towards the room he shared with Stephen and the robot, he wondered what exactly he would be getting himself into, why he was getting into it, why Isellia was suddenly being (relatively) nice to him and why he seemed to utterly lack the ability to say no to anything she asked of him.

  ***

  Joey walked as fast as he could to keep up with Isellia’s pace as they navigated the Sasugan streets. It was later now, the flow of people reduced to a trickle, and a cool mist hung in the air. The mist was a by-product of the station’s bio-scrubbers as they worked ceaselessly to clean the station’s air. He looked back at the robot, the mist covering its chassis with a thin film of condensation. Joey considered tracing a smily face on its access port, but thought better of it.