by Tara Tyler
The hair on the back of Cooper’s neck rose as they pulled into the empty lot of an abandoned warehouse. Definitely a setup.
“Cooper, we should go,” Geri whispered and grabbed his hand as he opened the door to get out of the car.
But it was too late. Four android guards appeared and surrounded them.
“Come inside, please.” These were basic models dressed in desert fatigues, tan camo pants and tan t-shirts. Like toy soldiers, all muscle and no personality.
“Sure. After you.” Cooper thought he was special, warranting four droids just for him.
They gave him a shove and escorted him inside. The place was dusty, rusty, and musty. A trifecta of neglect. The goon droids led him to a small metal chair in the middle of the empty building with an old plasma television propped in front of it on a couple of crates. Pushing Cooper into the chair, they bound him to it securely at the wrists and ankles with zip ties.
“Take it easy. Don’t want to cut off the circulation, now.”
They ignored his sarcasm and followed their directives, getting into position. Two of the droids flanked him and one stood behind. The apparent leader used a remote to turn on the TV. The big plastic remote with a million buttons reminded Cooper of when he was a kid at his grandfather’s house. That man never knew where his remote was, and the whole family turned the house upside-down looking for it every Sunday. Cooper doubted this experience would be half as pleasant as the good old days.
When the TV adjusted its display, Cooper saw a fancy restaurant setting. Bright sunlight streamed in through the windows, flowers decorated the tables, and waiters wore aprons and vests, carrying trays high at their shoulders with napkins draped over their arms. But the view was odd. The camera wouldn’t stay still and blanked out every few seconds. The scene swung from a waiter, to a close up of a menu, back to the waiter, to another table. The vantage point rose as the Mayor walked in with the Governor. When they sat down, the view swung over to… to the Colonel.
Cooper blinked. He was viewing the brunch through Wells’ simulation eyes.
The lead droid turned up the volume.
The fake-friendly chitchatting and joking among the Governor, the Mayor, the Colonel, and Wells made Cooper sick. After they gave the waiter their orders, they got down to business.
Leaning back in his chair as he addressed the Mayor, the Governor laid his intertwined fingers on his stout stomach. “Clive, do you think you can get Devon to give us a trial run for a small squad?”
“I believe I can. He has his doubts, but he’s starting to come around.”
“I don’t know, Phil.” Wells shook his head. That wasn’t a pleasant experience. “The Chief still doesn’t sound convinced he needs them.”
Cooper hoped he didn’t have to sit through their whole discussion and watch them eat. The Colonel must’ve been trying to torture him.
“As long as we keep their presence minimal, I believe—” But the Governor was cut off.
The view shot over the Governor’s shoulder and focused on the restaurant’s glass doors.
Sim Geri pushed her way through the patrons waiting for tables and took out two guard droids, slamming their heads together.
The crowd screamed and scattered.
The Governor froze.
Sim Geri focused on the large man and pulled out an electrogun. Anyone who made an attempt to stop her or got in her way was shoved to the side, crashing into tables or other patrons. Her head swiveled left to right, and she shot two more guard droids on course to tackle her.
When she got closer, she glared at the men sitting at the table paralyzed with fear. “You blew your chance, Governor. Humans protect humans.”
Before he could blubber a response, she shot him with a lethal electric blast. Then she stormed on through the tables toward the back.
Learning from her entrance, people either ducked or leapt out of her way as she sped out of the restaurant through the kitchen.
In her wake, chaos erupted with people shouting, screaming, and scrambling to get out in a hysterical tidal wave.
The Governor’s rigid expression of terror would be ingrained in Cooper’s memory for a long time. Maybe he suffered a heart attack before sim Geri shot him.
With all the confusion, no one noticed the Colonel speak directly to Cooper through Wells’ eyes.
“Stay out of my way or Dawson is next.” He glared at him, then the guard droid cut the feed.
Cooper was jarred, but kept his wits about him. He just hoped these droids would let him go, and soon. No time to waste. There was no way Cooper would let that old geezer and his dummy touch Dawson.
He stifled his shock and dismay by taunting his captors. “That was quite a performance, boys. Can’t wait for the shocking conclusion. When’s the next show?”
As Cooper looked around, hoping to find evidence of Geri somewhere, the droid behind him whacked him in the head, knocking him out.
Geri gasped and covered her mouth.
The androids scanned the room.
She hoped the dumb things didn’t use heat sensor vision. The camouflage was working overtime already, and she’d never tested its heat cloaking capabilities.
They must not have read her presence, because they went back to their task. The bulky droids lifted Cooper up and carried him out a side door, still tied to the chair. Stupid droids.
Following them, she watched the clumsy robots toss him into the back of a big old pickup truck. Then they covered him with a tarp. Two of the droids rode in the back with him.
When they pulled away, she hopped into the car and turned off the camo. Staying a safe distance behind, she followed them down the street. She drove past them as they pulled into a run-down barbeque joint with a rusty pig on top of a tin roof. After the droids drove away with the back of the truck empty, Geri doubled back and parked in the empty lot.
She got out and searched the premises. The front of the building was made of aluminum siding and boarded up windows all covered in elaborate graffiti. As she peeked over the rickety wooden fence that had once been painted red white and blue, she noticed the back portion of the old restaurant was a sturdy brick building. But no sign of Cooper.
Behind it lay another empty leveled lot. Georgia State University had cleared away much of the abandoned, condemned buildings in the area to keep crime at a healthy perimeter. This place might be operational. The best barbeque places were small joints just like it. Geri felt an urgency to hurry up and find Cooper before someone came to open up for lunch.
As she looked closer, she noticed the front door of the place had a shiny new padlock, and the lights over the parking lot were intact. On the other side of the rustic building, she saw a big blue dumpster. She rushed over and climbed up on a crate to peer inside. It reeked something terrible. She hoped Cooper wasn’t in there.
He was. He groaned as he came to, still tied to the chair.
“Cooper! Wake up!” Geri yelled down to him, “Don’t make me come in there.”
He grunted. “Sure. Be with you in a minute. As soon as I untie myself.”
Geri sniffed at him. The foul odor was sure to make her pass out. “Oh, fine.”
Dumpsters were the worst part of the job. Stanky, slimy, and disgusting. Climbing down into the muck, she dreaded what might be living in the heap of garbage that might crawl up her legs, and shivered. The creepy sensation motivated her to move quickly. She used her laser ring to zap off the ties and scrambled back out, not waiting to see if Cooper was okay.
“Thanks.” He climbed out after her, smelling like stale beer, rotten vegetables, and a mixture of worse things she couldn’t identify.
She twirled around, searching herself for creepy critters, then stomped her feet and shivered a few more times. “I can handle heights, mud, cold, even being submerged underwater. I’m not afraid of big ugly men, small spaces, or having a gun in my face. But this, this is my weak spot. Never again!”
“Well, I appreciate you facing your darkes
t fear for me.” Cooper brushed himself off and rubbed his wrists.
Geri grimaced. “Sorry. Are you okay?”
As they headed over to the car, Cooper gently touched the back of his head. She noticed his hand had blood on it.
“Cooper, we should get that checked out.” Geri rushed over to inspect the injury.
“Do I need stitches?”
“I don’t think so. It doesn’t appear to be very deep. But I’d feel better if we had a professional look at it.” He was going to have a nice lump.
He felt it again and winced. “I’m fine. I just wish they would’ve used a stun gun to knock me out.”
“True. Their instructions must not have been specific enough. They used what was handy.”
“What?”
“A hand.” Geri smirked.
“Funny. Why don’t you drive?”
“Sure. Where to?”
“Oh, I’m taking this to where he lives.”
“Where’s that?”
“I don’t know, but we’re going to find out.” Cooper opened his QV.
“Aimee, what’s the Colonel’s home address?”
She gave them the private address of the Colonel’s Lake Lanier estate. “His property is a couple of acres.”
“Let’s go.” Cooper buckled up.
“Now? Like this?” Geri wanted to at least drive thru a car wash with the windows open or something.
“Yeah. We may alert every dog in a three-mile radius, never mind guard dogs, if he has any, but we know he isn’t home. I can handle dogs. It’s time to see what he’s up to.”
Warner Robbins, GA
Tuesday, June 23, 2082
The Colonel smiled at his secretary on the way into his office, causing her to raise her eyebrows at him. His plans were baking up nicely. He smelled the sweet aroma of a peach pie just out of the oven, cooling on a windowsill, and felt ten years younger.
Sitting at his desk, he opened his imager and scanned the subjects of his and Wells’ qmail messages. Everyone wanted to talk about his droids. Where did he get them? Who designed them? Many wanted to order personal squads. Crews grinned at his shrewdness for investing in BioTech, not that he needed the money. He’d invested in their innovations and willingness to take risks.
And Wells was the Superman of the hour. Now that the Governor was out of the way, Wells could easily hop into that position. The whispers had already started. The best part was Crews had a scapegoat to pin everything on.
The Colonel realized he wasn’t alone. He looked toward the door and saw Wells standing there, waiting for a command.
“Shut the door and have a seat, McFarland.” The Colonel waved at a chair. The simulation was supposed to go to his office and charge up. Crews must have forgotten to tell him.
He continued to glance through his overflowing inbox. When he reached the report from his android guards who had detained detective Cooper, Crews frowned, remembering the proverbial peach pit he still had to spit out. He hoped he didn’t have to resort to a discreet murder. Killing the real Wells had been unavoidable. Crews didn’t want to undergo that unpleasantness again, especially with the ineptitude of Rajul, who hadn’t properly disposed of the body. That still irked him. What he needed to do was push the Cooper boys in the right direction. He could sway them both away from sniffing out his ultimate goal, despite their best efforts to do otherwise. The battle would be fierce, but the Colonel had never been out-maneuvered before and wasn’t about to be now.
“I don’t think that detective is going to give up so easily. I’m going to tackle both of those pains in the arse at once.”
Wells just stared at him.
“It’s a figure of speech. A metaphor. What did I tell you to do when you don’t know how to respond?”
“Mimic a similar expression and nod if it’s positive.”
“Well?”
McFarland raised an eyebrow, made a smirk, and nodded at Crews.
“That’s fine.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Crews shook his head and spoke to his number one assistant, his shadow in the corner.
“Echo, I need you to set up the live television debate for tomorrow morning. Contact Senator Dawson Cooper and have him clear his schedule. The need for android police squads in every city is imminent with the rogue FBI agent situation. If he needs more convincing, tell him I am getting flooded with requests for private droid squads, which will require immediate regulation and legislation so they don’t get out of control.”
“Yes, sir.” Echo got to work. He didn’t trust the secretary in the front office with such delicate information. She was a figurehead purely for appearances, and valuable as a personal touch for sending people away politely.
Echo was the real aide. He did exactly what he was told and made things happen for the Colonel. And he didn’t ask questions or gossip about it. A vault that obeyed and never asked why, Crews’ most indispensable tool.
“Sir, if I may interject?”
Crews widened his eyes, then narrowed them at the surprising words from Wells. The clone android never spoke unless it was spoken to, as it should be. “Yes?”
“Sir, the police droids aren’t at optimum capacity. They need more training and more data. I have not had much time to work with them. I am not completely in sync to command them yet.”
The Colonel blinked at Wells, shocked. Then he turned a shade of crimson that would make a rose blanche. Slowly rising from his seat, with his palms on the desk firmly supporting him, he leaned over and glared lasers at Wells, the big pile of spare parts he had created to do his bidding.
“Did you just question me?”
Wells’ face was blank. “No, sir. I am just relaying the statistical information from my probability equations to determine the optimum outcome. If we wait just a few more days, possibly a week, the police droids—”
“Silence! How dare you assume to know better than me! I do not need numbers to make my decisions. I know much more about the world than numbers or probability formulas can tell me. Don’t you eva voice your unasked-for opinion to me again. Do you un-der-stand, sim-u-la-tion?” His drawl thickened as he emphasized each syllable.
“Yes, sir.” Wells stared blankly at him with no remorse, infuriating the Colonel even more.
“You are dis-missed.” The Colonel pointed to the door. “To your office, boy!”
Wells stood tall and left, again the Colonel’s fuming intensity falling impotent on the simulation.
“Is everything all right, sir?” Echo could read the Colonel’s distress.
“Yes, Echo. Did you hear that gibberish?” Sitting back down, the Colonel rubbed his thumb under his chin.
“Yes, sir.”
“Insolence from a robot. I don’t care how real he appears. He’s still a robot to be commanded.” Crews shook his head. He might have to curb the adaptive learning bits of program in the thing. The whole wicked scene gave him horrible flashbacks to the vile human pups he’d put into office.
He covered his eyes with a hand and rubbed his temples. “Echo, please continue with the arrangements and let me know when everything is in place.”
“Yes, sir.”
My own inanimate progeny contradicting me. It’s downright unnerving how real that simulation is.
Lake Lanier, GA
Tuesday, June 23, 2082
ooper gawked at the monstrous, yet sleek hauler rig as it flew past them like an electric turbo bullet train, rattling their tiny e-car. The force was so great, he thought his little rental might spinout in a three-sixty like a cartoon. Pop logistics took care of most large-scale product and package delivery except for hazardous or oversized items, which had to go the old-fashioned way.
He shook his head, wondering what it could be transporting. The combination of the mighty truck being all the way out here, far from any manufacturing plant, yet suspiciously close to the Colonel’s estate, told Cooper to check it out.
“Wow. I haven’t seen one of those dinosa
urs in ages.” Geri’s deep voice startled him. He was still having trouble adjusting to her disguise as the sultry Gina.
“Me either. Hard to imagine those big rigs taking up so much space on the highways. What do you think he’s carrying?”
“I don’t know. Weapons? A hover tank? Medicine for the poor?” Geri smiled.
“Let’s find out.”
Geri turned the car around and caught up with the truck. “Here, hold the wheel a minute.”
Cooper didn’t like the sound of that, but he kept the car steady.
Poking her head and arm out the window, she aimed her electrogun at the truck.
He had no chance to question her actions as he kept one eye on the road and the other on the huge truck ahead. Then he heard a loud pop.
The truck swerved and hit the brakes.
Geri slid back in and took the wheel. She had blown one of the rig’s tires.
“Nice shootin’. How’d you do that with an electrogun?”
The truck bumped and skidded to a stop, pulling over to the side of the road. Geri answered as she followed at a safe distance and parked behind it, “Aimee’s gun has a molded bullet chamber.”
“Of course.” Those feds think of everything.
When the driver got out, he inspected the rig methodically. The truck’s CC probably told him what happened and showed which tire blew out, but the guy went over every inch of the truck anyway. He nodded as he checked things off in his head, looking underneath the chassis, feeling each wheel. Very thorough, almost mechanical. Then it dawned on Cooper the driver must’ve been a droid.
Before the driver got too close to their car, Cooper got an idea.
“Geri. Let me wear the camo cover. If that’s a droid, his camera eyes might link to the Colonel and he’ll be onto us. But he won’t recognize you.”
