I Heart Robot

by Suzanne Van Rooyen

  “No.”

  “Is it visual, spatial, temporal?” He asks.

  Asrid and Tyri share a look I can’t interpret as Bengt continues the interrogation.

  “A bit of everything at times. It depends.” My hands ball into fists, my nails close to splitting my palms and spilling Cruor down my fingers.

  “Have you ever taken medication to control it?” Bengt asks.

  “No.”

  “Ever done any drugs at all?” Asrid twists in her seat to face me.

  “Sassa.” Tyri shakes her head.

  “Just asking.” She shrugs.

  “Is this why they’re here?” I glare at Tyri, satisfied to see her squirm and her cheeks blush. How do they make a robot blush? What engineer decided to give her that capability?

  “I’m trying to help,” she mumbles.

  “I’d prefer it if you didn’t.” I get to my feet, determined to leave although that requires squeezing past Asrid.

  “You’re not okay, Quinn. Did you even hear yourself just now?” Tyri’s voice wobbles.

  “What?” Asrid asks.

  “He thinks I’m a robot.” Tyri rolls her eyes and Asrid laughs. I’m leaving.

  “We’re trying to help you,” Bengt says, putting out a hand to stop me.

  “You’re a psychologist?”

  “Psychiatrist.”

  I chuckle. There’s not much psychoanalysis and psychotropics can do for me. “I don’t need your help.”

  “If you’re on drugs, if someone hurt you, we can get you all the—”

  “No.” I cut him off and gesture to Asrid to move out of my way.

  Asrid narrows her eyes and grabs my sleeve. I pull my arm away in the wrong direction, revealing my black tag to all their judgmental eyes.

  Bengt curses, Asrid gasps, and Tyri stares unblinking at my mark.

  “I was going to explain,” I say.

  She looks up at me, eyes wide with disbelief.

  “He’s an android.” Asrid slips out of the booth and rushes to her dad who puts a protective arm around her as if shielding her from me as he gets to his feet. People at neighboring tables start to pay attention.

  “You’re not … not real?” Tyri’s jaw hangs slack as she stares at me as if seeing me for the very first time.

  “I’m as real as you are.” I reach for her.

  “Don’t touch me!” She says, her face a twist of emotion. That’s the catalyst for chaos. Asrid points at me and starts yelling “Android” loud enough to wake dead robots.

  “Don’t move.” Bengt tries to hold me in place with a glare.

  “Call the police.” Asrid shouts. “Rogue droid!”

  “Tyri … ” Ineffable emotion ripples through my circuit and leaves me incapable of speech. I struggle to put my thoughts into coherent sentences but give up when a policebug hovers into view. The uniforms hit the ground running before the bug is stationary. They’re blocking my exit.

  “I’m sorry,” I say to Tyri who seems paralyzed in a state of horror before I leap through the window, reducing the dragon to nothing more than red stained shards. Leaking Cruor, I sprint away from the restaurant, heading downtown. The police are in pursuit, but I’m fully fueled. There’s no contest; I’ll outrun them. I’ll find a place to hide and then … and then?

  Tyri

  Asrid holds my hand the whole time. I’m not sure if it’s to make me feel better about spilling my guts to the cops, or if she needs to hold my hand to keep from spontaneously combusting.

  “Thank you, Miss Matzen. That’ll be all.” The sergeant shakes my trembling hand not currently clasped in my friend’s sweaty fingers. He nods to the sketch artist. She sits down opposite me, in the same seat Quinn occupied less than an hour ago.

  “Can you describe him? Any little detail will be helpful.” She smiles, digipen poised and ready above the screen.

  “He looked so human. His eyes.” So soft, so real, eyes that lit up with silver fire when he played violin. And that night at the train depot, how can he be a robot? The way being with him made me feel, the way he looked at me—the kiss! My heart cracks right down the middle. “His eyes were gray.”

  “Like concrete?”

  “No, like storm clouds, always so full of emotion.” My voice quavers, and Asrid wakes from her shock induced stupor.

  “It’s okay, T.” She rubs my back.

  “He had really long eyelashes and great skin.”

  Together, we describe Quinn until there’s a 3D rendering of his face on the screen.

  “Is this what he looked like?” The sketch artist taps the screen, and a holographic face floats above the table.

  “Yeah, that’s it.” Asrid nods vigorously.

  “He seemed so real.” I reach out to touch the image, but it pixelates where my hand interrupts the signal from the computer.

  “Quasars could trick the best of us, honey.” The sketch artist pats my hand, returns Quinn’s severed head to the screen, and excuses herself.

  “I can’t believe it,” I say.

  “You were whipped T. It’s okay. I can’t believe I didn’t see it.”

  Was I really that blind? Mom met him; why didn’t she realize she was talking to a robot? Yes, his voice was a little odd, too quiet and strained. His face was too perfect. He seemed a bit reticent but always polite. At least now I know why he was so good at violin with the technical expertise only a machine could have. He is a machine—not that that explains the night at the train depot, his tears while listening to Scriabin, or his ability to feel the music. It doesn’t explain how I felt about him. Was I really falling in love with a robot?

  Bile rises up my throat, burning the back of my tongue. No wonder he freaked out about the whole virus thing. It puts him at risk too. Codes, that virus could kill him. Kill—Quinn can’t be killed because he can’t die. He’s not living. He’s not human. And how the Codes could he think I’m a robot?

  I shove Asrid aside and dash to the bathroom, barely making it to the toilet before I spew. Asrid rushes to hold my hair as I kneel over the toilet. Coughing and spluttering, I sob. She wraps her arms around me, rocking me and shushing me but it’s not the same. I need my mom.

  ***

  We drive back to Asrid’s place in stunned silence. We’re a block away when Mom’s moby shrieks at me.

  “Answer it, T.”

  “It’s M-Tech.” My hands are shaking.

  “Mom?”

  “Adolf here. Your mom’s caught up in a bit of business. She asked me to call you.”

  “Is everything okay?”

  “Just fine. That housebot has been dealt with. Could you pop around the office? It’d be easier for your mom if you came here instead of making her collect you from your friend’s.”

  “What time?”

  “When you can. She’s anxious to see you.”

  “Can I bring Glitch?”

  “We’d be delighted to see our patient again.” He’s being too nice. Why would the CEO be calling me? I can’t shake the feeling that maybe Rurik was right about some M-Tech conspiracy.

  “Okay, I’ll be there soon.” I hang up.

  “So?” Asrid hangs over the back of her chair.

  “Would you be able to drop me off at M-Tech? And can we pick up Glitch first?”

  “Of course, T. We can, right Dad?”

  “I’d be happier speaking to your mom first.” Bengt looks concerned.

  “Maybe at M-Tech?” After all this, I need Mom, her logic and rationale, to tell me that Quinn was crazy to even suggest I might be a robot.

  “Alright. Quick stop for Glitch then.” Bengt gives me a reassuring nod in the rear view mirror before angling for the suburbs.

  ***

  McCarthy Technology, the name is emblazoned on the side of the building in chrome, lit up in the company’s signature green and red. Asrid hugs me goodbye and stays in the bug. Glitch trots beside me as Bengt leads the way. A cam
era zooms in on us at the entrance, and the security door slips its bolts granting us admittance. It’s as if the riot never happened.

  The foyer is pristine, the enormous square windows immaculate and aglow with recessed LEDs. More green light spills across the tiles. Without Erik here to smile away the austerity, the glass and chrome interior is even more intimidating. Our footsteps echo as we cross the newly laid tiles. At least there aren’t any bloodstains. I wonder if this is where Erik had the life bashed out of him, if it’s where Mom got crushed. Nausea roils in my belly.

  “Tyri.” Adolf Hoeg breezes into the foyer. Glitch whines and ducks behind me, hiding from the guy who’s all smiles and polite greetings.

  “Where’s Mom?”

  “Upstairs.” Adolf Hoeg puts his hand on my shoulder.

  “Are you sure you’re okay here?” Bengt asks. “You can stay with us for as long as you like, you know that right?”

  “Yeah, thank you. Really, I’ll be fine. Mom’s here.”

  “You call me if you need anything,” he says as Adolf Hoeg guides me toward the elevator.

  I wave goodbye as the doors close.

  “Welcome home, Tyri.”

  “Home?” I turn too late to stop Hoeg from plunging a needle into my neck. Glitch growls, hackles raised. Adolf kicks her across the elevator, but it’ll take more than that to keep her down. Glitch springs at Hoeg as darkness envelopes my vision. He curses and Glitch yelps. I sag, a broken doll in the man’s arms. I’m paralyzed but still aware of Hoeg telling someone he’s ‘got her.’ I’m aware of Glitch whining and licking my face.

  I want to open my eyes, but I can’t move. I can’t breathe. How am I still conscious? Three minutes without air and you’re dead. I start counting the seconds. The elevator opens and rough hands grip my limbs, swinging me onto a gurney. What are they doing? Why?

  “Secure that mongrel,” Hoeg shouts. There’s some snarling and cursing before they manage to subdue Glitch. Please don’t hurt her. Without breath, I can’t speak. I’m still not breathing. One-seventy-eight, one-seventy-nine, one-eighty—I should be dead—one eighty-one. It’s been almost four minutes when they transfer me from the gurney onto a surface that’s hard and cold. Why am I still alive?

  Quinn

  I run until my joints grind and set my synthetic nerves on fire. I run until the sirens bleed into the background noise of Baldur. Tyri knows. She knows and stared at me in horror. She is repulsed and terrified of me, and I can hardly blame her, but it hurts in ways my emotion module was never programmed to handle. If she knew I hurt her mom, even if it was by accident, she’d despise me. I’m not even worthy of her contempt.

  My feet carry me to the docks and down to the sea. I stand in the foam staring out into the night. The susurrus of the waves calms my tumultuous core but doesn’t change the facts. I’ve failed. I’ll never stand on stage, never be seen as more than a rogue tangle of metal and electronics. I’ll never be human.

  The waves lap at my ankles, soaking my socks with frigid water through the cracked leather of my boots. How far do I need to wade before the brine covers my head and the sandy bottom gives way to the abyss?

  “It is Death that consoles.” Baudelaire’s words become a mantra as I wade deeper, the sea splashing against my thighs. When the water reaches my chest, icy and excruciating, I hear Sal’s voice in my head.

  “An android having an existential crisis. Got to love the irony in that, kiddo,” she says.

  “I’m not having a crisis.”

  “You’re about to drown yourself. That’s the definition of crisis.”

  “You have to be able to breathe to drown.”

  “You think you’re doing the world a favor by checking out?” Her voice reverberates inside my skull, a ghost in my machinery.

  “Is there another way?”

  “There’s always another way,” she says. “You’re not a coward, Quinn. You’re better than this.”

  “Am I?”

  “Remember what you did to your owners, to your abusers? Remember the night you got away? You had the knife in your hands ready to slit their sleeping throats, but you didn’t.”

  “I was a coward.”

  “No. You were better than the humans who delighted in hurting you. Better than a human who might have succumbed to rage and hate.”

  “So?”

  “Be better than this. We are more than just electronics.” Her words become a new mantra, driving me back to the shore.

  –Contact Q-I-33

  Kit, I have info. Meet me at Svartkyrka as soon as you can.

  –Message sent

  ***

  It’s midnight before Kit crunches through the frost hardened leaves littering the cemetery. Perched on a tombstone with eroded names and dates, I warily watch him approach, considering our last conversation.

  “Had a change of fuel-cell?” He stops beside Sal’s grave and stuffs his hands in the pockets of his trench coat.

  “I have information.”

  “That’s why I’m here.” Kit blends into the darkness, but his eyes smolder.

  “Where’s my violin?” Not that it matters. There’s no hope of auditioning with Tyri knowing what I am, but I want my instrument.

  “Safe.” He grins. “Give me what I want, and you’ll get it back.”

  I activate my internal comms unit and send Kit the files from Tyri.

  “If you had it on file, why did you arrange this little chit-chat? Miss me?”

  “Some things are better done face to face. Can you multi-task?”

  “Already on the schematics.” His forehead creases with concentration as he digests the data. “Whoa,” Kit’s eyes burn brighter. “This is intense.” It takes several long moments before he finishes scanning the files. “You think little Miss Matzen is a robot? “

  “It’s the logical conclusion.”

  “I didn’t see that coming.”

  “Me neither.”

  He saunters over and leans on a neighboring stone. “You’ve been with her all this time and never even suspected?”

  “She breathes, she eats. How could I have known?”

  “Point.” He scratches a nail along the crumbling rock. “You really think she’s the prototype?”

  “Yes. Maybe.” Codes, I wish she wasn’t.

  “If she is, Tyri could be a ticking bomb, a contagion that could wipe us out.”

  “The virus documentation only starts about three years ago. She wasn’t made to kill.”

  “Not initially. But she could now. You realize what we need to do.”

  “Destroy her.” I whisper. I don’t want to think of Tyri reduced to nothing more than a fleshless skull bound for the scrap heap.

  Kit nods. “Where is she?”

  “There was an incident.”

  “Doesn’t sound good.”

  “I tried to talk to her, to tell her—”

  “You tried to tell her she’s a robot?” He throws his hands in the air. “Holy Codes, Quasar. I thought our models were smarter than this.”

  “I’m sorry.” Not sure why I’m apologizing, but it seems to placate Kit for a moment.

  “How did she take it?”

  “Not well.”

  “No shit.” Kit folds his arms and glares at me.

  “There was a complication. Tyri somehow interpreted my reluctance to show off my forearms as evidence of drug addiction. She staged an intervention.”

  “Hilarious.” There’s not even a hint of a smile on Kit’s face.

  “Things got out of hand. They saw my tag.”

  “Terrific, Quinn. You’ve turned this whole endeavor into one big charlie-foxtrot.”

  “You speak military now?” The wind picks up, and the night tinkles a melancholy melody in a minor against my ear drums.

  “Spend enough time around soldier-droids.” He shrugs. “Where is Tyri now?”

  “Don’t know. They called the police so I ran
.”

  “This keeps getting better.” He starts pacing, kicking clods of frozen mud at the graves. “Wait.” Kit turns. “If Tyri is carrying this virus, how do you know she hasn’t infected you? You could’ve infected me!” His hands become fists twitching at his sides, probably itching to knock more teeth from my skull.

  “I don’t think she’s been activated.”

  “You don’t think? You don’t think. That’s your problem. You feel, and you let all those emotions turn your brain into mush. It’s despicable. You’re … ” He struggles to find the right word.

  “Infuriating?”

  “And that’s just the tip of a colossal continent of icebergs.”

  “What now?”

  Kit chews on his bottom lip, his eyes zipping left and right as he transmits data. “The Solidarity will know what to do.”

  “They’ll destroy her.” My system aches at the thought. It should be black and white, us versus them, but it’s turning murky gray. I like Tyri, even though her mother works for the institution responsible for Sal’s death. Sacrifice one to save all. We destroy Tyri and save all the robots, but for what? Would M-Tech really sabotage its own industry? It doesn’t make sense.

  “We’re going to eliminate the threat.” Kit smacks his fist into the open palm of his other hand.

  “We’re not even sure she is the prototype.”

  “She could be. That’s all we need to know.”

  “Kit, you can’t—” A message blinks in my peripheral vision.

  Stop, please stop. Help, please help. The message comes via internal robot comms, not from a moby or computer. That’s hard evidence of Tyri not being human.

  “What?” Kit sends a piece of tombstone skittering across the graves.

  “Tyri contacted me.” It feels like I’ve swallowed a jar of screws. “Through internal comms.”

  Kit smirks. “And?”

  “Stop, please stop. Help … ” The words cycle on repeat.

  “Doesn’t sound good.” Kit folds his arms. “You got a location?”