Serengeti

by J. B. Rockwell

  “Ta-da!” the TIG cried, flourishing the grease pencil like a magic wand.

  “Very nice,” Serengeti told her. “But—”

  The robot turned her pink-bowed head away before Serengeti could finish and held the grease pencil out to Tig. Tig hesitated, glancing uncertainly at the camera. His partner waved insistently, pressing the grease pencil on him, wanting him to take it and fix his tag like she’d fixed hers.

  “No,” Serengeti said sharply.

  The two robots froze, turning wide eyes toward the camera.

  “No,” Serengeti repeated more gently. She slipped inside Tig and used his leg to push the grease pencil away. “Tig is Tig, not just 442. And you, my dear,” she touched Tig’s leg to that freshly drawn G, wiping it carefully away, “are more than that missing letter.”

  The TIG blinked in confusion, eyes flicking from the grease pencil she held to the empty space on her side. She chittered softly, face lights flashing and fading like she was trying to puzzle something out. But a word from Tig, and a short burst of cobalt communication, and the pink-bowed robot put the grease pencil away.

  “There now, that’s better.” Serengeti lit Tig’s face lights, offering an encouraging smile.

  It took a bit, but the TIG eventually smiled back at her, tilted her head and hooted a question as she brushed at her side.

  “Who are you?” Serengeti laughed in surprise. “That, my dear, is a very good question.” She thought a moment, looking the little TIG up and down. “We can’t very well call you Tig, now can we? Not with that pretty pink bow. And TI-111 sounds so…” Serengeti trailed off, smiling to herself as inspiration struck. “Tilli,” she murmured, touching the robot’s side. “We’ll call you Tilli. How does that sound?”

  Tilli whistled shrilly, repeating her new name as best she could. She blushed when Serengeti laughed, and ducked her head in embarrassment, but she shuffled her legs about and tried again, whistling louder, more confidently this time, flushing with pleasure now as she offered a shy smile.

  “Is that a yes?”

  Enthusiastic nod, Tilli’s rounded chrome head bobbing up and down and all around, Tig nodding right along with her.

  “Alright then. Tilli it is. Now then.” She panned the camera left then right, looking from one robot to the other. “Tell me why I’ve been woken. Tell me how long I’ve been away this time and what you two have gotten done while I was gone.”

  They both blushed together. Tilli flicked her eyes to Tig, then ducked her head and pawed at the floor, leaving it to him to answer.

  Not good then. Whatever Tig and Tilli had to tell her, she wasn’t going to like it.

  “Spill it, Tig.” Serengeti focused in on him, leaving Tilli alone for now. “How long? How long was I asleep this time?”

  Tig shuffled uncomfortably, fronting legs tapping together. He looked at the camera, then down at the floor, leaned to one side and lifted three of his legs.

  “Three months?” she asked hopefully, but Tig shook his head. “Three years.” Serengeti sighed wearily. Not as long as last time, but still longer than she’d expected. Longer than she’d wanted. “I’m guessing that means the task I left you is taking longer than we had originally anticipated.”

  Tig shrugged and nodded, eyes locked onto the floor.

  “So, what happened?”

  Tig shuffled to one side, leg ends rattling against the deck plating as he hemmed and hawed, trying to figure out where to start before launching into a long and winding story about components and damage in unexpected places, setbacks and wrong turnings, droning on and on and on.

  “Stop, stop, stop!”

  Tig stuttered into silence.

  “How about you just show me?” Serengeti suggested.

  “Beep?” Tig blinked, thinking, tilted his head and nodded. “Beep-beep.”

  She abandoned the camera slipped inside the little robot, waved to Tilli to come with them as Tig trundled across the bridge and into the corridor outside.

  Tig scuttled over to the nearest ladderway and climbed inside. Serengeti expected him to climb downward to Engineering, but instead he glanced behind him and burbled something to Tilli before grasping the rungs and pulling himself up.

  “Where—?”

  Tig shook his head, babbled something about outside and the solar array, and kept going.

  Serengeti sat back and left him to it, hoping this wasn’t some wild goose chase. “Limited power, Tig. Remember that.”

  “Beep-beep-beep.” Tig waved a leg in acknowledgement as he let go of the ladder and worked his way out of the access shaft, flipped onto his tank treads and hurried down the hall.

  Twists and turns after that, one corridor leading to another before Tig finally reached the iciest one of them all: the one paralleling her portside hull. He tip-toed through a gap in her side, threaded his way through three shredded layers of hull, navigating gaps and twisted debris until he reached the dark of space outside.

  “Hold,” Serengeti said, bringing Tig to a halt. Tilli rolled to a stop beside them, flashing questions at Tig as Serengeti turned on all his sensors and let the icy cold wrap around her. “I’ve missed the cold, Tig.”

  Tig shivered in answer.

  Serengeti sighed and shut his sensors back down. But she held him there a while longer so she could drink in the sight of the stars. Selfish thing to do, wasteful considering they were low on power, but she’d earned a little selfishness after all her time in the dark.

  “Quite the sight, aren’t they, Tig?”

  Tig cycled the filters on his ocular lenses, processed some data and then decided she was correct. Serengeti almost laughed.

  “They look…pure from here, don’t they? Henricksen told me the stars twinkle when you look at them from planetside. The light passing through the atmosphere—” Serengeti broke off as Tig shuffled his legs and coughed. “Am I boring you, Tig?”

  “Beep?” Tig pointed at his chest, face lights flashing a question. “Beep-beep-beep,” he assured her, waving all his legs at once. But he flicked his eyes to Tilli, saw her shuffle around, throwing glances at the distant solar array.

  “Alright, I get it. Proceed, Tig.” Serengeti released the little robot, letting Tig and Tilli continue their journey. She flipped to the camera in the robot’s thorax and stared at the stars, feeling a strange sense of yearning at being so close and yet unable move closer. Unable to break free of her endlessly circling orbit and wander the universe around her. “Someday,” she whispered, making a promise to herself. “Someday this will end and a new journey will begin.”

  Tig beeped softly, trying to get her attention.

  Serengeti sighed wistfully and flicked forward, peering through Tig’s eyes as they rounded the crest of her port side and reached the top of her hull.

  Tig rolled to stop and panned his head around, giving Serengeti a panoramic view of her shimmering, starboard-side hull.

  “Beautiful,” she murmured, smiling to herself.

  “Beep?” Tilli cocked her head in question.

  “Yes,” Serengeti laughed. “You too.”

  Tilli burbled happily and shuffled to one side, moving closer to Tig. The two robots reached for each other without looking, twining their leg together like lovers.

  Love. Another complex emotion. Far more complicated than anger or sorrow, sadness or regret.

  Can a robot feel love? Serengeti wondered, watching the robots swap communications between each other. Can I?

  That was the better question. Fondness, certainly—she had that in spades for the crew trapped inside her—but love? Real love? She knew the concept but the actual application…

  How does a crystal matrix brain even know what loves is?

  You’re a tenth generation, super-powered AI brain mounted inside a warship’s body, Serengeti, not some besotted little schoolgirl.

  Henricksen again. More pithy wisdom.

  Yeah-yeah, I get it. Stop whining and get with the program.

  “Why are we h
ere, Tig?”

  Tig let go Tilli’s leg and started chattering away, telling her how the hull plates had gotten dirty, slowing the solar collection rate. It took a while—a lot of extra effort they hadn’t planned for—but he and Tilli managed to sweep and buff and polish every last speck of space dust and debris away, returning the panels to optimal working order. A wave of his legs and Tig rolled toward the bow, showing her the forest of panels they’d erected there, pointing out linkages and connection points, components they’d had to replace.

  Time, Serengeti thought, adding all those unplanned tasks up. They were all important—every last one—and Tig had been right to not ignore them, but the more time he and Tilli spent on these tasks, the less they had to work on the one Serengeti had set them to.

  “Enough,” Serengeti said, as Tig continued to prattle on.

  Tig rolled to a stop in the middle of the solar panel forest, face lights flashing and swirling, letting her know his report wasn’t yet done.

  “I know. I get it. You two have been busy as beavers and I appreciate, but I’ve seen enough of the outside for now. Engineering, Tig. Show me what’s gone on down there.”

  Tig slid his eyes to Tilli, but she just shrugged and looked away. He hesitated a moment, glancing to one side, dancing on his tip-toes as he turned in a circle.

  “Tig.” Serengeti touched the little robot’s brain, stopping him in his tracks. “I’ve seen all I need to see here, Tig. It’s time to go back inside.”

  Tig sighed and nodded as he reached for Tilli’s leg. They turned together, putting the starlight behind them as they stepped down into shadow and slipped through a gaping hole in Serengeti’s side.

  #

  She braced herself as they entered Engineering, knowing what she’d find, but it was still hard to actually see it. Still difficult to look upon all those broken robots and not wonder at the cost.

  Tig rolled inside as if it was nothing, inured to the sight of all that death after living among it for so long. Tilli followed close behind him, switching from her tank treads when Tig did, the two of them picking their way through the cables and bodies on their jointed, insectile legs.

  They’d straightened things up while Serengeti was away, collecting the robots scattered about the floor, lining them up against the wall with the others, closing their panels so they didn’t look so dead inside. Hardly a necessary undertaking, but it made Engineering look less like a robotic charnel house and more like a well-maintained mausoleum.

  Serengeti appreciated the effort, but when she looked about her, she saw more wasted time. She couldn’t bring herself to berate Tig, though. Not for this. Not for seeing to his brethren, and giving them some semblance of dignity in death.

  Tig crawled his way across Engineering, high-stepping over cables, dodging debris and spare parts floating around him until he reached the bank of fuel cells against one wall.

  He’d warned her there was a problem, but hadn’t wanted to tell her what it was. Easier to show her. Easier to let Serengeti see for herself that one of the three fuel cells left to her was leaking badly—so badly it had started to leach power from the other two. After three years of charging, the power levels in all three fuel cells should be full, even with the small drain from her own consciousness, the robots recharging and using their tools. But a check of the power meters showed the two undamaged fuel cells hovering just above half full and the third all but empty—spewing energy out as fast as the hull collected it and fed it here.

  Damn. Another setback we can’t afford.

  Nothing to be done about it, Henricksen’s voice said. Deal with it and move on. Keep pushing through.

  “Right,” Serengeti said softly. “Shut it down, Tig. Shut the leaking fuel cell down before it damages the others and we lose all three.”

  Tig objected, insisting he could fix it. That he was already working on it and with a little more tinkering, he could slow the leak down.

  Serengeti listened for a while and then cut the robot off. “No, Tig. There’s no time, and we can’t spare the parts. Not unless you’re telling me you can fix the leak completely. Not just slow it down,” she said, as Tig renewed his objections. “Fix it. Really fix it so it works as well as the others.”

  Tig fell silent, staring at the failing power cell, face lights swirling slowly.

  “Can you?” she asked him. “Can you fix it?”

  Tig thought a moment and then shook his head.

  “Didn’t think so. Shut it down.”

  Tig gestured to Tilli, waving her over to the cracked power cell. She scuttled behind it and disappearing into the dark, cramped space between the fuel cell and the wall. Micro-sensors picked up pings and bangs, the sounds of metal on metal as Tilli cut the failing fuel cell’s connection to the rest of the power grid.

  A crackle of electricity, the whir of machinery spinning down and the fuel cell went dark. Serengeti stared at it, wishing they could have fixed it, but the truth was, she didn’t think they needed that third fuel cell now. Not if she altered her plan a bit and took herself out of the equation.

  Tig won’t like it. Nor Tilli either.

  Tilli crawled from behind the wall of power cells and scurried back to Tig’s side.

  I should tell them, Serengeti thought, and then realized she didn’t need to. She’d granted Tig unprecedented access to her network. He could sense her thoughts, and the feelings that came with them. Knew what Serengeti had planned and immediately started to object again.

  “Shh. We’ve not got time for that now, Tig.” She stroked at Tig’s AI brain until he quieted down. “Cryo, Tig. That’s what’s important. The rest of it…the rest of it’s just what-ifs and maybes. Can’t really worry about that. Let’s focus on Cryo for now and let the rest of it work itself out later.”

  Tig didn’t like it, nor Tilli either, just as she’d predicted. But they didn’t have much choice in the matter and grudgingly accepted.

  Serengeti stoked electric fingers across their cheeks, offering what comfort she could. “Now then,” she said, changing the subject. “What about that task I left you? How far have you gotten with that?”

  Tig perked up a bit and started chattering excitedly. He whirled around and grabbed Tilli by one leg, dragging her with him as he scuttled out of Engineering.

  TWENTY

  Tig went flat-out down the corridor, zipping along on his tank treads, all but throwing himself into the ladderway, barely touching the rungs as he descended to the level below. Twists and turns, one corridor connecting to another and another, until they reached a stub of a corridor, and the thick shape of Cryo’s dull grey door.

  Serengeti rolled Tig right up to it and then reached up, touching his leg to the blocky, black letters stenciled across the metal. She paused to wonder if Cryo’s systems were still working, if Henricksen and the others were still alive or if the lifeboat was yet another graveyard she carried inside her bowels.

  “No,” she whispered, angry with herself. “They’re in there. They’re alive.”

  They had to be.

  Serengeti let Tig’s leg drop back to the floor. “Alright, Tig. We’re here. What do you have to show me?”

  Tig beeped happily, face lights curling in a cat-that-got-the-cream smile as he opened a panel beside the door and retrieved a tiny piece of electronics he’d set inside.

  “You planned this,” Serengeti accused. “You set this all up.”

  Tig shrugged and burbled, denying everything, but his face lights gave him away. Tig always did have a flair for the dramatic.

  “Scamp.” Serengeti chuckled. “All right. Show me.”

  Tig’s smile widened, stretching from one side of his face to the other as he opened another panel and slotted the little electronic device inside.

  Click!

  Tig turned around, throwing his legs in the air. “Ta-da!”

  Serengeti looked round, flicking from Tig’s eyes to the camera in his thorax, expecting something magical and amazing after all the
buildup. But everything looked the same. As far as she could tell, nothing at all happened.

  “Tig?”

  Tig smiled in anticipation, looking very pleased with himself.

  Five seconds passed, ten, and still nothing.

  “Umm…Tig?”

  “Uh-huh?” Still smiling, still looking immensely proud of himself.

  “I don’t think—whatever you did, I’m not sure it worked,” Serengeti said gently.

  “Beep?” Tig tilted his head, pincered leg lifting, pointing at a camera high above him. One of the few that still worked on this level.

  “What? It’s just a camera, I don’t—”

  Tig pointed again, more insistently this time.

  She flipped her consciousness to the camera—mostly to humor him—and looked down on the hallway, watching as Tig waved cheerily and pointed at Cryo’s door.

  What on earth is he up to? Serengeti wondered. She checked the power levels out of habit, saw them dip a bit more, dropping below the halfway point. Can’t stay. I can’t stay here much longer. We need to preserve the power.

  “I don’t understand.” A hint of impatience crept into Serengeti’s voice. She’d indulged the little robot’s antics until now, but the showmanship was starting to wear thin.

  Tig held his front legs up, urging Serengeti to be patient. A wink of one cobalt eye as he tapped a leg against Cryo’s door and turned his head, staring expectantly at Serengeti’s camera.

  “I still don’t get it.”

  Tig wonked in frustration and repeated his routine: tap at the door, point at the camera, tap at the door, point at the camera—over and over and over again, Tilli copying him after a while, as if two of them doing the exact same thing would somehow help Serengeti understand. And maybe it did, because at some point it finally clicked in her brain.

  Not the camera or the door—what was behind the door. That’s what Tig and Till were trying to show her.

  “You could have just told me, you know.”

  Tig shrugged and kept right on smiling. Damn him and his flair for the dramatic.