Best of Beyond the Stars

by Patrice Fitzgerald

  Plus, using a Short-Stick against a competitor’s PePrs was a great way to mess up their business. That was probably the real reason.

  Glancing at the Short-Stick, Bill shook his head and whispered, “You won’t need that. All our PePrs were only attached to our internal network. Only the ones that were outside during... well, during the event were dangerous. And they left.”

  In the glow of the flashlights, Bill looked strange. Pale, nervous, hopeful, and fearful all at once. It was a strange combination. Given the way Mark’s stomach was flipping about inside him, he figured he probably looked much the same. “Even so, I’m not taking chances. Go on. Let’s get this over with.”

  There were no chains on the second set of doors because it didn’t have the right kind of handles. Instead, several pieces of metal stock were stacked inside brackets hastily drilled into the concrete on either side of the doors. They lifted away the bars as quietly as possible, doing their best to avoid any tell-tale clanging that might alert any other people near enough to hear. Their flashlights skidded across the many signs posted in the room, each giving vital instructions to those who might need to use the EMP-proof section of the building. Relics from another age when humans only had to fear other humans.

  Mark tried to prepare himself for what he might see, tried to imagine. He held the Short-Stick at the ready while Bill opened the door and faint blue light joined the beams of their flashlights. Jerking the light around to try and capture everything at once, Mark saw the jumble of half-disassembled PePrs in one corner, then the huddled group in another corner. Finally, the beam landed on the standing form of Deirdre, her hands planted on her hips and the look on her face giving no doubt she wasn’t pleased.

  “Finally!” she barked, using her best I-was-once-a-military-bot voice. She spread her hands to indicate the two groups of bots. “I had to go all Donner party in here! Just look at this mess. And I’m not happy that I’m now a robot cannibal! What exactly the hell is going on?”

  For one eternal moment, the trio was silent. Deirdre looked from Mark to Bill and back again, obviously impatient for an answer. Bill ended the silence, breaking his stare at Deirdre to look at Mark. His grin was wide and his eyes smiled right along with his mouth.

  “I told you!”

  Mark nodded. “You did.”

  Deirdre snapped her fingers and demanded, “Told what? You better have a bucket full of Chem-En for me or somebody’s in trouble.”

  * * *

  Bill retrieved a case of Chem-En‌—‌the good stuff with plenty of Trace in it to replenish PePr joints‌—‌while Mark dutifully listened to Deirdre’s tirade. Even for a PePr, Deirdre was different. Mark had grown up knowing that Deirdre was special, quite possibly the first PePr, (or SUPer, since she was technically older than traditional PePrs), to achieve sentience. She was also very bossy, hugely opinionated, and not shy about expressing those opinions.

  Once she’d downed two cans of replenishment, and ensured the other functional PePrs in the room did the same, she pointed to the floor and told them to sit and stop staring at her like perverts. Bill actually giggled.

  Mark sat, placing the flashlight so that it reflected off the ceiling and brightened the whole room. “I’ll tell you everything, but first tell me what happened in here? Donner party?”

  Deirdre waved a hand in dismissal. “History, you wouldn’t know it.” She pointed to the pile of defunct PePrs and said, “They weren’t sentient, so I disabled them and drained their Chem-En to keep the rest of us going. We’ve been in low power for most of the time, but I was starting to think I’d have to start eating them.” She flicked her fingers at the PePrs still sitting close together in the corner. Two of them looked away and squeezed closer together at her words.

  Mark noticed the distinct lines of poorly healed synth-skin rips on the functional PePrs. Every single one of them had such a scar running down their face. He asked, “What happened? Was there fighting? Why are they all cut up?”

  “Nah, I disabled communications on all of us.” She lifted up her shirt to show him a similar set of synth-skin scars on her belly. “Lucky for me that mine are old school and located here.”

  “So you know what happened out there then?”

  Deirdre shook her head and pulled down her shirt, which was liberally stained with the blue fluid that provided their fuel and lubrication. “No, but I heard enough before you guys locked us in here to know that something was going haywire out there. And if it was happening to PePrs, then it had to be relayed between them somehow, so I figured communications might be something we should not have running. Just in case.”

  Bill clapped his hands on his knees a little, smiling broadly. “Good thinking!” He glanced over at the huddled PePrs, all of them watching and listening. “Everything will be fine. I’m really sorry about all this.”

  One of the PePrs, his dirty coveralls indicating his maintenance profession, nodded solemnly, but said nothing.

  The surreal nature of this entire situation hit Mark all at once and he put his head in his hands. Beyond this complex, the world was being recycled, humanity shoved into preserves and the Earth itself restored to its pre-human state. He’d seen it himself from the roof. Buildings beyond the wall had been dismantled in record time, only to be rebuilt as compact towers meant to hold huge numbers of humans inside the fence. The disturbed ground left behind went through stages of mysterious activity by PePrs no longer limited to human forms, then left alone. New growth natural to the flat land had already sprung up in those places, leaving no evidence of human disturbance.

  Yet here he was with a PePr who was chewing his ass and making him feel just as guilty as she had done when he was a kid sneaking cookies before dinner. Could this be any more weird?

  Deirdre reached across the gap between them and patted his knee in exactly the same way she’d done his whole life. “It’s going to be all right, kiddo. Tell me what’s up.”

  Mark did. He told her of the rapid dissolution of the human-PePr power balance, of the strange being called The Protector who started this terrible war, of the silence now pervasive beyond the fences. He told her of the hundreds who once worked here leaving to go to their homes when it first began, of the few that were left, of their continuation of the Mars Mission and now, the potential end to that Mission. He told her everything.

  When he ran out of words, Deirdre nodded as if she understood. “It was bound to happen. I mean, don’t you people read books?” At Mark’s expression, she waved her words away. “Never mind. What’s done is done. I’ve got four questions... or at least I think it will be four. One, the PePrs are leaving you alone in here?”

  Bill answered that. “Yes. They know we’re here since we see them from the roof all the time. They aren’t interfering at all.”

  Deirdre nodded as if that made sense to her. “Good. Two, Mars Mission is now human ready or will be if they get that water thingie drilled?”

  Not quite sure where Deirdre was going with this line of questioning, Mark nodded. “The old base is repaired and ready, but it’s not long term. To really get permanent living space, we needed that water and a large enough underground space for another base. The materials are all there and site 351 is ideal.”

  Again she nodded, but this time she gave one of her quirky smiles too. “Excellent! Three, the ship is still in orbit? Still ready to go?”

  “Yes, as much as it can be. Eight people onboard, the pre-launch crew. We thought maybe they were leaving us alone because of that. The PePrs don’t seem keen on actually killing humans, only shoving them into preserves, so we’re assuming they want us to keep everyone safe up there. Even the fuel for the final supply and personnel launch vehicle is here. Of course, our astronauts aren’t. They were in the training facility and who knows what happened to that.”

  Deirdre waved her hand in that expressive way she had, as if it was no matter. “Details. Details. My last question. Do those Mars Mission PePrs still have explosives in their cores?
”

  Mark glanced over at Bill with raised eyebrows. What a strange question. Bill shrugged, but answered her truthfully.

  “Yes, they do. Of course they do. All those that leave the planet’s surface have the failsafe. No PePr is allowed access to satellites or anything else off the surface, so we had to put those in them.”

  Deirdre smiled and crushed the empty Chem-En container in her fist. Originally built as a battlefield intelligence unit, Deirdre had significantly more strength than most PePrs.

  “Well, then, we’re good. Let me at ‘em.”

  * * *

  When Mark and Bill entered the Control Room, Dr. Goring looked up from his book and gave them a tired smile. When Deirdre entered behind them, he jumped from his seat like someone had set his butt on fire. He reached for that big button that connected him to the complex-wide intercom. Bill held up a hand and both men shouted, “Wait!”

  Dr. Goring did, but his hand remained close to the button and his eyes were wide. “Do we have a breach?” He seemed confused, which was totally understandable.

  Once again, Deirdre lifted the hem of her shirt to show off the badly “healed” synth-skin of her middle. “Nope. The evil robot overlords can’t get to me. I yanked my comms. All the others are the same. At least the ones I didn’t eat.”

  A vaguely horrified look crossed Dr. Goring’s face, so Mark said, “Never mind. It’s a long story. Deirdre thinks she can help us.”

  The horrified look was replaced by one of skepticism. “I know she’s your PePr, Mark, and is somewhat famous for her association with your grandfather, but she’s ancient, an early model without physics or any significant science programs. She may be very good at aiding in your work, but how can she help us?”

  Mark winced as Dr. Goring spoke, knowing what was coming. He could almost feel Deirdre’s robotic hackles rising from a few feet away. She didn’t disappoint.

  “Oh, really? Excuse me, but I’ve been around almost as long as you and seen far more than you ever will. Also, I was built for intelligence, as in spying, as in sneaky guessing what the enemy will think before they even think it. How good are you at red-celling?”

  “Red what?”

  “Exactly!” she pronounced.

  Bill held up a finger and clarified. “She means gaming what the enemy will do. That’s red-celling.”

  Dr. Goring’s extraordinarily bushy eyebrows drew together in consternation, but the confusion cleared. His hand left the vicinity of the red button. “How exactly can you help?”

  Deirdre shrugged and grinned a small, but very wicked grin. “I’m just gonna have a conversation or two. You want to open up a channel for me?”

  * * *

  Mark and Bill left Dr. Goring to work the consoles with Deirdre, but only after much discussion that transformed into conspiracy. Mark wasn’t sure how he felt about all this, but what he did know was that the people here kept going despite everything because they were true believers. All their hopes rested in that tiny reddish dot in the night sky. Everyone left inside this building knew that humanity’s reign on Earth was over, at least for now and maybe for forever. If that dream died, then what was left?

  It was worth the risk.

  Bill held open the roof door for Mark and they stepped out into the late afternoon sunshine of a perfect summer’s day. A light breeze danced across the roof and stirred the layer of dust into swirls. It felt divine as it threaded through his sweaty shirt and cooled his skin. It was Mark’s turn on the ventilation bike, but he needed a few minutes of peace first.

  They walked to the edge of the high roof and looked out at the world. Mark usually didn’t do this, not wanting to face what was happening beyond these walls. Bill seemed much more at ease with it. Mark wished he could be too.

  Pointing beyond the great fence, Bill said, “Looks like they got the mall.”

  Mark nodded. “That was fast.”

  “Yeah, it was there two days ago. Did you see what they were doing with the wall?”

  “No, what are they doing?” Mark asked.

  Bill dug a pair of binoculars out of a cooler they left on the roof to keep things that needed to be kept away from dirt and rain. He handed them to Mark and pointed at a particular point on the wall. “Over there.”

  Mark swallowed hard, then forced himself to look. Originally, the wall had been made up of PePrs in this area. Spread-eagled into vague X shapes, hands gripped feet in a continuous form of chain link. Not all of it, of course, but the first part. It had steadily been replaced by repurposed material from all the buildings they recycled.

  “It’s made of road!” he exclaimed when he saw what Bill had pointed at. And it was. Chunks of dark asphalt and the underlying layers were now stacked in a near perfect wall. Only the yellow lines still visible on various bits showed where different pieces were put together. Movement caught his attention and he brought the binoculars up to the top of the wall. It must be a thick wall, because a PePr‌—‌or something that had been a PePr‌—‌walked along the top. It looked like a male from the neck down, but the head had been remade to look like a giant crow’s head. The golden-brown eyes surveyed the interior of the fence as it walked. Suddenly, the head tilted a little and Mark was staring right into the eye of the PePr... and he knew it was looking back at him.

  Jerking the binoculars back down, he shoved them at Bill and said, “That’s frigging creepy as shit.”

  Bill looked through the binoculars, then sighed when he lowered them. “I’ve seen him before. There are lots like that. I think they take on the persona of whatever species they like best.”

  Mark shook his head. “And to think, all this because of one PePr.”

  “Not just any PePr. The Protector. We must have built it that way to protect something, so really, whose fault is it?”

  “Do you think it really was an elephant? I heard it was one built to protect the last African herd from poachers.”

  The breeze picked up at that moment and Bill plucked at his shirt to let it in, then sighed in pleasure. It really did feel good after the heat inside. When that moment passed, Bill shrugged his typical shrug. “Could be. Or it could be one made to protect whales, or one for the lemurs‌—‌remember those from the vids? They were cute. But still, whatever it was, we built it.”

  “It doesn’t matter anymore. It’s all done now.”

  The eternal optimist, Bill patted Mark’s back and said, “It’s not over till it’s over. I’m not giving up.”

  Mark squeezed Bill’s arm in gratitude, then turned toward the bike waiting for him under the tarp erected to keep the bikers from burning in the sun. “I hope you’re right and I’m glad you’re not giving up.”

  * * *

  “Well, you’ve got nine less workers up there, but they’re moving the drill and you’ll get your base.” Deirdre said, tugging down the hem of her shirt as she stood and faced him. Mark was still sweating from his turn on the bike, but Bill had come up to relieve him with a huge grin on his face. He’d only been on the bike for an hour and a half, but somehow, Deirdre had managed to rein in an entire Mars Mission during that short interval.

  Dr. Goring was standing behind her with a vaguely shell-shocked look on his face. “She, uh, she talked them around.”

  “Uh huh,” Mark said, wiping his face with a very smelly towel. “I’m sure she did. Nine?”

  Deirdre shrugged. “Better them than you, right?”

  “Sentient?”

  She shrugged again. “Hard to tell. Three were for sure, including Abigail. They were having a problem with the concept of destroying the only life on the planet. I convinced them that it was worth it.”

  “By exploding heads.”

  “Only nine, and it’s not in their heads.” She tapped her chest and added, “I exploded their brains. The head is a terrible place for a brain, what with those skinny necks humans gave us.”

  Dr. Goring was staring at Deirdre like she was an alien or something. He’d never had any occasion t
o deal with her before the event, and after, well, she was locked up.

  “That’s sort of funny,” Mark said, a thought coming to him.

  “What’s funny?” she asked.

  “I mean, here we are, being eliminated because we’re a potential hazard to life on this planet, yet to live, we’re going to actually destroy the only life we know exists on another planet.”

  Deirdre grunted, which was a weird habit that she picked up from his grandfather. “Well, that’s a flipping irony. I think we’d best not mention that too often or too loudly. Know what I mean?”

  “What next?” Mark asked, still sweating. He was more than ready to change into something that had been aired out on the roof so it was less smelly. That’s what they did instead of washing clothes. It worked. Sort of. “Well?” he prodded when no one answered him.

  Deirdre and Mark looked at Dr. Goring for an answer. For the first time since this began, Mark could see a hopeful light in the old man’s eyes. He took a deep breath, then said, “We get ready for Mars.”

  * * *

  After hugging Bill tightly and watching him enter the launch facility, Mark and Deirdre wandered aimlessly around the complex. There were only a dozen humans left now, the rest either in the launch facility or somewhere else. A few had left the building and not returned once they realized they wouldn’t be making the trip. There was nothing for Mark to do really, not anymore. Everything that could be automated had been, and the PePrs they’d kept locked up for so long were now manning the stations once manned by humans during launches. Mark’s duty had been to load their programs‌—‌a difficult task since they had no wireless comms. He was of no use during launch.

  The complex was huge, something Mark had almost forgotten during those months inside. So much of it was unused and empty now. The launch facility was over two miles away and the walk back through the underground tunnel seemed a long one. The abandoned carts that once zipped back and forth lay like relics along the dark corridor.