Love in the Robot Dawn

by C. W. Crowe

  I was standing right beside Lucy, so that her noises were louder than the others who were passing us on their own Segways. She sounded royally pissed. “The name is Mrs. Lucy Smith.”

  Lawson blanched, “Oh dear. I can see that your . . . secluded . . . lifestyle has led you to subjugate yourself to your husband. I think we will have to discuss this at an appropriate time. You see, my dear, we are writing the constitution for our new society right now, and it will be a matriarchal society. It is women who will finally take our place at the head of the table and the glass ceiling will become our floor. Such anachronistic customs as discarding your own name will be, well, not allowed.”

  I could tell that Lucy was on the edge of losing her temper. I'd seen it happen more than once and she was showing all the signs - her face had red spots on her forehead and chin, her lips were compressed into lines so thin as to be almost invisible, and her eyes were squinting as if she wanted to see only the person in front of her - probably so that she could unleash her wrath all the better on her target.

  Usually that target was me, but not this time. However, I couldn’t let Lucy explode because there was so much we needed to learn from these people. I reached around behind her and pinched her just above her waist. At first, she didn’t seem to even notice, but I pinched harder until she turned to me and smiled, letting me know she was in control and the crisis was over.

  I breathed a sigh of relief and then asked a question, “Has anyone ever tried to escape from here?”

  Now it was Dr. Lawson’s turn to frown. “You mean people in our group? Or the permanent residents of Los Alamos?”

  I wasn’t sure what I meant exactly, but her answer cleared it up. “Many of the residents tried to escape when the robots . . . when they took over. There were a lot of people and not many robots to hunt them all down. Even today, there are only a handful of robots here at any one time. No one got away though because they brought in three Raptors - very fast dinosaur robots - to hunt and kill those who tried.”

  I think she could see that we were both shocked because she continued to explain. “I believe the robots saw dinosaurs in the data they mined while the Internet still worked. No one knows why they liked that creature so much since they didn’t seem to really care for animals in general. But they built Raptors that acted like the real thing. We believe they programmed their brains to act on the primitive level of these creatures.

  “So that took care of the residents - leaving only us. One of our group - a foolish and weak woman - went insane. We tried to treat her, but we didn’t have access to appropriate drugs, so one morning she ran. The Raptors had been out of sight for weeks, but when we discovered her missing, we followed protocol. That meant that we all gathered in the storage room which is built with sufficient strength to deny entry to the Raptors and then we reported who had run. The creatures were activated and learned her location from the DRP that had been implanted in her. They brought us back her remains - which were not much.”

  “You reported her?” I almost couldn’t believe my ears.

  “Of course, Leonard. It was part of our agreement with the robots. Don’t you see? They allowed us to plan the building of a new world, and we agreed to make sure that any humans who were part of our group followed their rules.

  “And besides, it was her fault for failing to fit in and running. We just can’t have that since the world we are building here will be a special place for special people. You’ll see - your child will grow up in a new society, one that transcends the old. It will be a society of equals, a group of humans who are homogeneous in their diversity while being without conflict, living with robots as we learn from each other. For those minor disagreements among humans, the Council of Mothers will render a ruling but otherwise people will be free to contribute as they can.”

  Lucy was calmer now. “And take as they need?”

  Lawson smiled from ear to ear, “Oh course! I believe you are getting it.”

  She prepared to ride away when Lucy asked one more questions, “You said the women were in charge here. How did that happen?”

  The Segway started to move. “The way it always should have happened, my dear. There are more of us than there are men.”

  *.*.*

  The walk to the warehouse started off on a rocky note. “I hope you’re proud of yourself. I’m sure you left a bruise.” Lucy wasn’t looking directly at me but I could tell she wasn’t really mad - at least she wasn’t mad at me. “Thanks Leo for helping me keep my cool. I almost blew it there. She really thinks she’s going to raise my baby to believe the tripe she just handed us. Well, I’ve got news for her - it’s not going to happen.”

  We walked in silence for a few minutes while I heard her noises as a kind of buzzing sound which told me she was thinking hard about something.

  Finally, she spoke up, "Winter is coming. It's going to be hard to sneak out into the mountains when they are covered in snow."

  "No way to do it, really," I agreed.

  "So, it's either leave very soon or wait until spring and I'll be six months along by then. Today we need to keep our eyes open for the horses."

  She was actually thinking about leaving soon! "But Lucy, even if we do manage to sneak off and then somehow avoid the robots, where would we go?"

  "Where we've always planned to go. The place with no robots you told me about. Near Las Vegas."

  "It's 600 more miles to get there!"

  "I know that Leonard, but what would you rather do - stay here and be part of The Faculty, or run for freedom? Even if we fail and get captured again or even killed, I'm for making a run for it. Besides, I'll soon be big as a barrel and unable to run and shortly after that we'll have an infant. If we're going, it's got to be sooner rather than later."

  I took her hand and held it gently as we walked. "Do you have any idea how we might accomplish this miracle of escape? We'd have to be magicians."

  She stopped walking and looked at me with an expression of surprise on her face which soon turned into a smile. "That's not a bad idea, Leo. Maybe we will."

  Her buzzing got even louder, so I stayed quiet to let her think. I was thinking too - thinking about Nick Presser and Area 51.

  *.*.*

  The warehouse turned out to be a cavernous space, divided up into many rooms. Just inside the main entrance, the Faculty milled around. Several of them had coffee cups, though a couple still had their wine glasses.

  Lucy and I had just entered when Kristen Blalock rushed over to greet us. She was one of the few women with only one last name; she'd told me yesterday she'd never been married. "Never saw the need," she'd said. Like all the others, she was a PhD, though she'd asked me to just call her Kris.

  She was one of the youngest humans in the Faculty, though she had to be forty or more. She was slim and a blonde and I thought she was wearing makeup. I'd never had an eye for guessing ages, but I made a note to ask Lucy about her later.

  Her greeting caused all other conversations to cease. "Ah, our happy couple. Welcome! Did you sleep well?"

  Her noises, combined with all the others, were like a wall of sound that I was struggling to deal with. I knew I'd be able to function, that I could adjust, but it had been a long time since I'd had to.

  Without waiting for an answer, Kris moved between Lucy and I, took our arms, and guided us to the group. She had her hand on my bicep. It occurred to me that, other than my mother and Lucy, I could not remember any other woman touching me there.

  Lucy answered for both of us, "Yes, quite well, thank you. Our bed was very comfortable." There was something in Lucy's voice, some tone.

  We joined the group as Dr. Peter Readner asked, "Coffee, Mr. and Mrs. Smith?" He grinned while he said it.

  I hadn't had coffee in a long time. "Sure, I'd like some," I said. I glanced at Lucy to see if I could get her a cup and found her already staring at me. Something deep inside, some alarm, sounded. I tried to separate her noises from the others, but I couldn't do it yet. I neede
d more practice.

  She smile at me sweetly, "None for me, Leonard."

  Kris Blalock pulled at my arm. "Let me show you to our little kitchen. The coffee is in there." She started walking away, still holding onto my arm. I followed her lead.

  *.*.*

  My cup was almost empty when Peter Readner called the group to order. I wondered if he knew that it was the women who were in charge.

  "My friends, this is a happy day for humanity as we celebrate the arrival of the first new members of our new society. Leo and Lucy, we welcome you and hope you will be the first of many."

  There were a smattering of approving noises and someone said, "Here here."

  "Now as our newest members, you two also have much to learn about us and the kind of world we are planning to create. It will be a wonderful world, my new friends, one in which men live in peace and harmony, always choosing to cooperate rather than compete."

  I was standing next to Lucy and she was holding my arm. It helped me hear her personal noises. Her sounds were somewhat musical, but with some instruments out of tune.

  "We discussed it before your arrival and decided that you should learn about our supply system today. I think you will find it both simple and elegant. Basically, we provide our robot friends a list of things we need and they provide them."

  Lucy interrupted him. "Can you get anything you want?"

  His smile wavered, just for a second. "No Lucile. We have negotiated a list with our robot friends of things they agree to supply. It is mostly staples - various types of food, clothing, that sort of thing. You will see, my dear, as Dr. Lawson will provide you with a list and your job will be to organize and count our stock so that we can request replenishment. It's actually quite simple. I'm sure you will be able to accomplish this task."

  Elaine Lawson must have touched up her hair color, because it was a brighter shade of green that I remembered from just yesterday. She smiled as she led Lucy and me out of the room and into a corridor. As soon as the door was closed behind us, Lucy asked her, "While we're 'organizing' what will the rest of them be doing?" I could hear her noises better now and they sounded like they did when she wanted to have a fight with me.

  "Oh, we will be busy. There is so much to do. Today, we plan on a session dedicated to writing our new constitution. This is difficult work since there is so much to consider."

  "Can we read it?" It was Lucy again. I'd hardly said a thing all morning.

  "I'm afraid it’s still rather rough, my dear. You see, we've only completed the preamble - actually we haven't even had the final vote on that. Creating a new and better world for humanity is exacting work - it will likely take years."

  I was feeling much better since we'd left the crowd behind along with their noises. Dr. Lawson led us to the last door on the corridor and we entered into a medium sized room. Scattered here and there were boxes, crates, cans, bottles and a complete jumble of items. They were stacked haphazardly, some piles looking like they were in danger of falling if they were even bumped. Against two of the walls there were industrial shelving units that had to be twenty five feet in height. None of them were used.

  She handed me a list and a pen. "Basically, Leonard, you just neatly stack all the like things together and note their number on this list. Any questions?"

  I was still looking at the chaos of the place, trying to think of how to get started. "Good," she said. "We'll be back to bring you some lunch." She started to leave, but seemed to remember something. "See this device mounted by the door? It is a communicator to our robot friends. Don't push this button, in fact, don't touch it at all. If you call them for no good reason, the least you'll get is the pain stick."

  She turned and left, her heels clicking as she walked.

  *.*.*

  In an hour we’d made a decent start. Lucy would take an item and call out its name - like “Case of peaches. Twelve cans.” She’d move the first one to an open spot and then I’d search for any more and move them there too. I could see that we’d eventually get it all done and that the place would be infinitely neater and more organized. Once we had all the items sorted, it would be a simple job to count them and update the inventory. The only non-inventory items in the room was a rusted old loader with extendable arms to lift items high up on the shelves and a ladder. The loader was totally dead so we were limited to using the bottom shelves. That was fine since there was plenty of room.

  “Do you see the Starbucks coffee?” I asked. “Kris said she couldn’t drink any other kind and she thought we might be running low. She asked if I’d check for her.”

  When Lucy didn’t answer, I stopped and glanced over. “What?” I asked. Her noises had changed a lot.

  “Nothing. Listen, Leo, I want you to go over to the door and look out into the hallway. There are two doors in this room, the one we came in and that other one on the far wall. I’m going to explore what’s beyond that other door and see what I can find. If anyone decides to come check on us, whistle for me and I’ll come back. It’ll look like we’re hard at work.”

  It made sense to check out the place since we needed to escape. Maybe we’d find something that would help us - a bomb, or a laser gun or something.

  But I didn’t move because I didn’t know what to say. “Is there a problem?” Lucy asked.

  “Ah, yeah. You see . . . I don’t think I know how to whistle.”

  “You’re pulling my leg. What’s really going on, Leo?”

  I was telling the truth. For some reason, I’d never even tried to whistle, but I did now. I put my lips together and blew. Only breath came out.

  Lucy was frowning and her sounds were ominous. “Forget the whistling then. Just call out ‘Lucy get the peaches’ real loud if you see someone.”

  That I could do, but she wasn’t finished. “We’re going to have a talk Mr. Smith. You can bank on it.”

  With that, she turned her back on me and I went to watch the corridor.

  *.*.*

  The room was about thirty feet wide, so even after she left, I could still hear her noises quite clearly. Lucy blocked the door with a case of wine so that it stayed wide open. I struggled to make out something beyond it, but all I saw was a dimly lit hallway.

  Second by second, her sounds became fainter as my worry ramped up by an equal amount. Soon, they were so faint I could barely hear her at all. I took a couple of steps back into the storage room which made her signal marginally stronger, but didn’t allow me to see very far down the hallway.

  Then I lost contact altogether.

  *.*.*

  I had never worn a watch in my whole life. In the days with cell phones, I could always check it for the time. And since the robots took over, there had been few opportunities to care about exactly what time it was.

  So as I stood there, half way in the storage room, watching for any member of the Faculty to come down to check on us while listening intently for Lucy, I had no idea how much time was passing. It felt like hours, but was probably only minutes.

  Finally, almost convinced that something bad had happened and ready to yell about peaches, I heard her again and in a few moments she entered through the far door.

  She motioned for me to come to her, "If the coast is clear, close the door and follow me, Leo. You've got to see this. It'll just take a minute."

  There was no one coming our way, so I did as I was told. "Hurry up," Lucy said, waving to me from across the storage room.

  I started to jog and as I approached her Lucy held out her hand. I took it and we ran together through the door and into a dim hallway. "It's over here," she said, turning left.

  We stopped in front of another door that looked just like the others. Without waiting, Lucy opened it and pulled me inside.

  Chapter Thirty: Step One

  I had no idea what to expect, but I knew that Lucy would not have brought us here if there had been danger.

  Even so, when I saw three Raptors standing across the room, I jumped in fright. "Don't worr
y, Leo. They're turned off or something."

  I wanted to ask her why it was too much trouble to give me a word of warning, but I didn't. Instead, I said, "I about had a heart attack."

  She pulled me further inside the room. "Sorry,” she said. That sorry apology would have to do, I guessed.

  As we approached the Raptors, it became clear she was right. They were incredibly lifelike, exactly like I'd seen in movies as a kid, but there was no flicker of life in them. Each of them was about six feet tall with a long tail and a lizard like face. In all three of the ones before us, their tails were held high in the air, they were balanced and standing on their powerful looking rear legs, and their mouths were open, revealing twin rows of what looked to be razor sharp teeth. One of them had a piece of pink cloth caught on a six inch long claw.

  We were both staring at that little piece of ripped cloth. I asked, "Do you think that's from . . ."

  She cut me off again! "That woman who tried to escape? Probably. And they did it, Leo - these people that think they are going to raise our baby. They called the robots and reported that the woman had run away."

  Doctor Elaine Lawson had told us the story of the woman's attempted escape in an almost off hand manner and with no emotion. But here, looking at these creatures, these killing machines, the horror of what they'd done became real to me.

  And to Lucy too. "They'll do the same thing to us, Leo, if they know we've run."

  She was right. Now we were a novelty - new people who would soon present them with a child for them to raise in their sick utopia. But another and larger supply of children was going to be available sooner or later; so if we ran, they would report us - or at least some of them would. I had no doubt of it.