Twisted Metal

by Tony Ballantyne

  ‘You flatter yourself, Gearheart. Why should I want a child? It was not woven into my mind.’

  ‘So you say, Spoole, but you are speaking to a woman. No man could understand, but the weave is not so flexible as you might suppose. Some things are immutable. A woman may suppress the reproductive urge in a mind, but she cannot totally remove it.’

  ‘You manage to suppress the urge,’ Spoole would say, but without heat.

  And at that point, the conversation would end. But sometimes Spoole would push it a little further. Just out of reckless curiosity.

  ‘But, Gearheart, if we were to have a child, how would you twist him?’

  ‘Him?’ Gearheart would laugh. ‘Not as good-looking as you, Spoole. Men like you tilt the balance away from women.’

  Spoole gazed reflectively at the city. He had never seen Kavan, but he had been told that the robot wasn’t attractive. No wonder. Kavan didn’t have the same privileged start to life as Spoole. He wouldn’t have had the education, the access to metal; he wouldn’t know how to build a body as well as Spoole could.

  They were different in so many ways, but they still held so much in common. The same need to do what was right.

  Spoole wondered if Kavan realized yet how difficult it would prove to bring about the change he wanted. Had Kavan yet glimpsed the essentially one-way nature of his quest? Did he yet see how, once one goal was achieved, another would immediately appear? Did he not see, that no matter how far he travelled, those people beneath him would be gripped with the same ambition, the same need to do what was right, only to do it better than himself? They would be there already, climbing up the stairs behind him, and if Kavan didn’t want their awls in his back, he would have to climb even faster.

  Spoole stood on the roof of the city, on the roof of the world, on the roof of Artemis. He looked out at the chimneys and the forges and the factories and for a moment he saw a pyramid, a mound of robots, with himself at the top kicking down, and everyone else reaching and grabbing and pulling themselves up towards him.

  He told himself he was being ridiculous, and he allowed his eyes to follow the floodlit railway lines that fanned out from the marshalling yards. He looked into the darkness to the south.

  Kavan was out there somewhere. Kavan and his robots moving into Turing City. The first phase of the attack had been successful. Kavan had requested more troops, and Spoole had sent them. He could hardly do otherwise. But all that metal expended on what had seemed a reckless venture? Reckless? Now Spoole wasn’t so sure. Would Kavan win or lose?

  Either way, Spoole would win; he would either gain more territory, or lose a potential rival.

  But also, Spoole would lose. What would come riding back up the tracks from the south? News of defeat, or worse, Kavan, now a hero, leading a horde of battle-hardened troops?

  Spoole looked down at the marshalling yards, and suddenly he smiled. He had the answer.

  He turned and signalled to a slim robot that stood patiently near the stairs.

  ‘Fetch me the head of the engineers. Get me the railway chief.’

  The thin wind carried Spoole’s laughter into the night.

  There was always someone who wanted to take your place. Let Kavan handle his own would-be successors. Spoole was more than capable of handling his.

  Eleanor

  Eleanor was impressed by Kavan’s progress, but she was frustrated at the role he had selected for her in it. Kavan never quite seemed to trust her.

  She marched through the cold night into the broken remains of the railway station. It was almost peaceful in here under the cold stars, the dark jigsaw pieces of the remaining station walls screening off the sounds coming from the half-defeated city. She could understand why Kavan had made this his headquarters.

  The wreckage of the front of the reaction train had been dragged to one side, the remains of the ripped-open carcase of the railway station had either been made safe or torn down. New rails had been laid, and a steady relay of trains had been set up, bringing in troops and supplies from Artemis, Bethe, even from Wien.

  It took her some time to spot Kavan, just another grey infantry-robot standing near the front of the station, reading from a piece of foil. Wolfgang, Kavan’s aide, stood nearby, along with Ruth, who had formerly been General Fallan’s number two. Their silence was a good sign: it meant things were going according to plan.

  Eleanor marched up to Kavan. She was badly burned down her left-hand side; soot and scorched paint covered the bare metal of her arm, thigh and torso.

  ‘One of the foundries,’ she explained, noting Kavan’s glance. ‘The robots in there had jury-rigged some sort of flamethrower.’

  ‘It’s almost a pleasure to hear of someone here bothering to fight,’ said Kavan, rolling the foil into a ball and dropping it on the ground.

  ‘I don’t understand it,’ said Eleanor. ‘Where has the spirit gone from this city? For years we feared it, and yet today we find it as empty as a ghost.’

  ‘It was the same in Wien and Bethe and Segre, and all the other states where the citizens had ceased to take responsibility for all of the state’s functions. The people here are happy to operate a forge, or paint pictures, or make machine parts, but they will no longer scrub the algae from the stones or fight in the army. When you have a state that leaves those jobs to the immigrants and the underclass, you have a state that is already dead.’

  The singing of rails announced another train approaching the station. Kavan and Eleanor watched the blue and yellow nose of a diesel approaching along the Bethe line. The midnight-black bodies of Storm Troopers could just be made out, lined up in racks on the trucks behind the engine.

  ‘Artemis itself has begun to follow that path . . .’ continued Kavan thoughtfully.

  Eleanor looked up at the night. The stars shone so brightly, as if the heavens themselves were watching Turing City’s end.

  ‘You need to get yourself cleaned and repainted,’ said Kavan suddenly, and Eleanor was dragged back down to the world of Penrose.

  ‘Later,’ she said dismissively. ‘We almost have control of the city now.’

  ‘No, we haven’t.’ Kavan sounded tired. ‘We have taken a lot of ground, but that’s the easy part. Holding it will be more difficult. Come the morning, the sun will rise, and the robots of Turing City will see what they have lost. When they understand that all the easy options have gone, then the hard fact of fighting will not seem such an unpleasant alternative. We need to break their spirit now, before that truth occurs to them.’

  Eleanor remained silent. Behind Kavan, a line of Storm Troopers stepped down from the train to the platform in perfect unison, their feet making a perfect double crash.

  ‘Get your troops, Eleanor,’ said Kavan, coming to a decision. ‘Send them out to the residential districts. There will be civilians cowering in their homes, wondering what they should do. Well, let’s keep them cowed. Get your troops to kill about a third of them.’

  Eleanor gazed at him, shocked. ‘If you think so, Kavan.’

  ‘I do think so,’ said Kavan. He stared at her. ‘You want to be leader, Eleanor . . .’

  ‘No, I . . .’

  ‘Don’t deny it, Eleanor. You want to be leader. You know it. Very well, do you think you are really committed to Artemis?’

  ‘Of course I do.’

  ‘Then you will understand why I do as I do.’

  Eleanor turned on her heel.

  ‘Oh, and Eleanor.’ She paused, looking back. Behind Kavan, the Storm Troopers stepped two paces forward in perfect formation. He continued. ‘Give them Nyro’s choice.’

  Eleanor grimaced. ‘Of course, Kavan.’

  Karel

  Karel and Susan sat in silence in the cooling forge room, listening to the hum of Axel’s sleeping body. The child stirred, the yellow glow of his eyes deepened.

  ‘Go back to sleep, Axel,’ said Susan. ‘It’s okay.’

  ‘Why can’t we light the forge then, Mummy?’ said the child, sleepily.
‘I want to work on my legs.’

  ‘In the morning.’

  Axel leaned against the wall and drifted back to sleep.

  ‘Where are you going?’ asked Susan.

  Karel stopped by the door. ‘Back outside. I want to see what’s going on.’

  ‘Be careful.’

  The hallway was dim. Karel turned his vision right up, crept down past the doors of his neighbours to the stair-well, now plunged into darkness. A faint noise of metal on metal echoed up from below. The sound of robots moving about. Karel felt a prickle of tension in his electromuscles. What was happening down there? Karel crept down the stairs, ears turned up full.

  ‘Someone’s coming . . .’

  He heard the voice and froze. A light snapped on, framing him in its beam.

  ‘Who’s that? Karel? What are you doing creeping up on us?’ The voice was unfriendly, suspicious.

  ‘Garfel, is that you?’ Karel strained to see past the bright glare of the light.

  ‘Stay where you are!’

  Karel had been on edge all night, wondering what was happening outside in the city, fearful for his family, rejected by his fellow citizens. Their command was enough to ignite the anger that was woven deep into his mind.

  ‘Rust, NO!’ he swore. He stamped forward, roughly pushing aside the lamp and the robot who had shone it at him.

  ‘Hey, be careful!’ Karel recognized Gustav’s voice. And now Karel’s eyes adjusted to the dimness of the communal area that lay beyond the stairs. A wide, tall space, the furniture pushed to one side to make more space for the robots that had assembled in the darkness. And Karel felt his anger increase. So many robots, men, women, children: all Turing Citizens and all dressed in underwater bodies. Grey whale metal, elongated faces and big glassy eyes, all illuminated by a dim green glow.

  ‘Traitors!’ said Karel. ‘Traitors, all of you!’

  There was an uncomfortable silence. Robots looked to the floor, to the ceiling, everywhere but at him.

  A voice spoke up. ‘Who are you calling traitors, Karel? Who is it that allowed these Artemisians into our city?’

  ‘What?’ Karel felt a burning inside him like the flame of a forge. ‘What are you talking about? No one let the Artemisians in. Didn’t you notice, Ruther? They attacked! They destroyed the station!’

  ‘Oh yes, we have been attacked. But before that, Karel. Who was it that diluted Turing City by allowing in immigrants? Who was it that diluted the resolve of the people by allowing refugees from Wien and Bethe and Born, even from Artemis itself, into this state?’

  Karel was furious. Even so, he controlled his temper. Just.

  ‘I don’t see any refugees amongst this crowd,’ he said. ‘I only see Turing Citizens. I wonder where the refugees are at the moment. I wonder if they might be out there in the city, fighting for it?’

  There was another uncomfortable silence at this point. Karel pressed home his advantage.

  ‘And think of this, you robots who are about to run away, who are about to become refugees yourselves. What are you going to do when you are walking on the seabed if you meet another state already down there? Will you expect them to welcome you with open arms?’

  No one spoke. The robots focused on the floor, on the ceiling, on anything but each other.

  And then Garfel came forward. Garfel who lived in the apartment above Karel and who ran the residents’ committee. Garfel who was too friendly with Susan, Garfel who had an opinion on everything.

  ‘Why are we even taking the time to listen to you Karel, here at the fall of Turing City?’ he asked. ‘Even twenty years ago there were citizens who would have turned your mother back out onto the Zernike plain when she carried you here as a child. And maybe they would have been right to do so, because even twenty years ago, when all was at peace, there was something about you that some never did trust. Well, that was then, and this is now. Just be happy Karel that your side has won. I say you should think yourself lucky we don’t take things further. As it is, I say leave us alone and go home. Go back up to your apartment and wait for your friends to arrive.’

  There was more uneasy stirring in the crowd. Karel’s fury burned like a jet of white flame now, a flame intense enough to melt metal. But still he held himself in check.

  ‘I am as much a citizen of this place as you are, Garfel. More so, because I am staying here and not running.’

  Garfel laughed. ‘Or are you staying here because you, at least, have nothing to fear?’

  He turned to the assembled robots.

  ‘Come on, it’s time to move out. We need to reach the sea before dawn.’

  Garfel’s words brought a momentary stillness to the robots in the hall. Karel understood why. For all of them, this was it. This was the moment when their flight became real. For these robots, Turing City was no more.

  ‘You could stay,’ suggested Karel.

  ‘No, you can stay,’ said Garfel. ‘But you can also be merciful. Send down Susan, we’ll take care of her.’

  And the white flame was there again, threatening to melt Karel from the inside.

  ‘What about Axel?’ he asked.

  ‘He can stay. He’s half Artemisian after all.’

  Something clicked in Karel’s mind. He lashed out, buckling and badly hurting his hand on the whale metal of Garfel’s chest. He didn’t care, he didn’t feel it. He was a storm of metal, kicking and gouging and scratching and stabbing, but he could find no purchase on Garfel’s new body. Still he didn’t care. Still he fought.

  But Garfel was too strong. He’d always had so much lifeforce and now he was clad in heavy whale metal. Slowly, he pushed Karel to the floor, stepping onto Karel’s left arm, bending it out of true, wrenching the electromuscle with his hand so that it fed back, making Karel let out an electronic scream.

  Garfel released him, and Karel struggled to get up again, to attack Garfel, but another robot kicked his arm away, and he rolled across the floor, anger and pain flooding through his mind. He tried to rise again and was tripped once more. And then they were all over him, stamping on his chest, denting the panelling. They wrenched at his arm so that the metal bent and the electromuscle twisted painfully over the tear in his own panelling. A heavy whalemetal foot stamped down on his hand, crushing three of his fingers.

  Anger gave way to pain, pain was swamped by despair. Through the legs of his attackers he could see the sea-grey bodies of his former fellow citizens gradually draining from the hall. None of them looked back in his direction.

  Eventually the beating ended. Finally they let him alone.

  ‘Traitor . . .’ said Karel from the ground, his voice an electronic whine. Garfel stood over him, gazing down with his pale grey eyes.

  ‘How long,’ whined Karel, ‘how long were you planning this?’

  Garfel said nothing; he just continued to stare down at Karel, who lay listening to the heavy tread of robots filing from the room.

  Olam

  Olam made his way along the street, eagerly scanning the windows and doorways for further prey.

  ‘You’ve never been to Turing City before, boy?’

  Doe Capaldi was there at his side. It seemed as if Doe Capaldi was always there at his side, checking up on him.

  ‘Never,’ said Olam. ‘I’ve read about it, of course. It’s a lot smaller than I expected.’

  ‘You’re not seeing the real city here. We’re heading into the residential area, not the centre. We’re coming in from the east, stopping anyone escaping out this way.’

  ‘I know what we’re doing,’ snapped Olam. ‘You’ve been to Turing City before, I suppose?’

  ‘Naturally,’ replied Doe Capaldi, swinging around for a moment to check a sign of movement down a side street. An Artemisian infantryrobot emerged from a doorway down there and gave them an okay sign.

  ‘Yes,’ continued Doe Capaldi, ‘I came here several times as part of the ambassador’s retinue. On one occasion I was presented with a breastplate of electrum. It was a fine pie
ce of work.’ He was silent for a moment, lost in memory. ‘The paint shops in the galleries are particularly fine, too. A pity we were not sent to ransack those instead, boy!’

  ‘Don’t call me boy,’ said Olam. ‘We’re equal now, both soldiers of Artemis.’

  ‘I’m still your sergeant,’ Doe Capaldi reminded him.

  ‘You hate me, don’t you?’ said Olam. ‘I tried to have you killed.’

  ‘I understand why you did it,’ replied Doe Capaldi smoothly. ‘It’s all down to the way you were made. I would expect nothing else from one of your class.’

  Just one day ago the insult would have goaded Olam. But not now. Olam had killed and he felt different now. He wasn’t a commoner any more.

  He lowered his voice. ‘Don’t speak to me like that, Doe Capaldi. I’m watching you, you know. You should watch me. One dark night in the middle of battle . . .’

  ‘You’re making too much of the past, boy. We’re all Artemisians now.’

  Olam laughed nastily. ‘Yes, and I bet that hurts you a lot more than it hurts me. You’ve lost far more than I have, Doe Capaldi.’

  But Doe Capaldi wasn’t even listening. He gave a signal, and his patrol moved to either side of the street, lost themselves in its doorways and shadows.

  Something was coming.

  Olam waited in the shadow cast by an ornamental metal pillar that climbed the side of one building.

  There was movement further up the street, and for a moment Olam was plunged back into the stories of his childhood, of ghosts that rose up and stalked the world at night. Ghosts, the empty metal shells of bodies from which the mind had been taken, or which had merely died. Ghosts! Bodies that did not need minds to make them move, they hunted the world at night, searching for wire that they could draw from a sleeping child’s head, winding it out inch by inch. As the child slumbered, their dreams were turned to darkness as their life was spooled away, to be bottled up and reawoken in the perverted nightmare of a ghost’s shell.