The robot moved at full speed towards the little boy. Behind him, Denn was trying to keep up. A few moments later, they were in front of the boy. The robot, without waiting even a second, took hold of him and lifted him up, giving him a hug.
"Are you all right?" he asked.
Denn looked all around, trying to find out whether the boy had come accompanied. That was not the case. Qein had come totally alone.
"I'm fine, C0. You can put me down," said the boy, smiling.
"What's happened, boy? Why are you here?" asked Denn, curious.
The boy looked at him with mistrust. He had still not forgotten what had happened.
"I was looking for C0," he said, very seriously.
"How did you find us?" asked Denn.
"When we arrived on the planet, C0 programmed a locator in my eyes," he said, referring to the device he wore in his eyes, "so I would always know where he was."
"Well done, C0." Denn looked at him, smiling, a pleasing sight for the robot who had not seen him brighten up in several days. "Are you okay, boy?"
"I'm okay," he replied, with an expression of anger. "You don't have to worry about me." The boy looked at him angrily.
“Denn is innocent, Qein," intervened the robot, who had noticed the boy’s attitude. "It's true that we hijacked the station, but we didn't want to hurt anybody."
"It's okay, C0," said Denn. "I'm the one who ought to be doing the explaining." Denn crouched down and, gently holding the boy by the shoulders, looked at him with affection, and said to him: “Listen, boy, I did some bad things, it's true, but I never had the intention of anybody getting hurt. I'm not trying to justify my actions; I know that I'm the one to blame for us being here. I will never forgive myself for what happened to your sister. I just wanted you to know that it was never my wish for all of this to happen."
A tear ran down the boy's face; he was very sad about the death of his sister. He wiped away his tears and looked fixedly into Denn's eyes.
"Those beasts? Did you let them in?"
"I didn't, Qein, I swear. If you want to be angry with me, I understand, but you have to believe me. Neill planned all of this in order to get rid of Senlar and me. He lied; I would never do anything like that. It's true that I hijacked station, for reasons that perhaps you might not understand, and I'm not trying to use it to justify myself, but that is everything, boy. From the moment I dragged you all with me, I've done everything I can to try to get you out of this mess. Unfortunately, I was very naive."
The boy decided to believe Denn. He was not completely satisfied, but at least he knew that it hadn’t been he who had been the one directly responsible for the death of his sister. He already suspected that Neil was lying. His recent actions, to which Qein had born witness, practically left no room for doubts. The man was a maniac.
"I believe you. Neil lied. Even so, I'm not sure if I want to forgive you. If it weren't for you, we wouldn't be in this place and Dani would still be alive... But there's no time for that now, the people are in danger."
"What are you referring to, boy? Did something happen?"
"Neil... is out of control. The injured... He killed the worst ones, but he made sure he did terrible things to them beforehand."
The horror behind that allegation was reflected in Denn’s face, which deformed into a barely distinguishable grimace as he brought his hands to his head. His worst fears had become reality. That man had massacred the ones who were not able to defend themselves.
"Why?" asked Denn, devastated. He immediately realised that this had been a stupid question. There was no logical reason for somebody to do such a thing. Neil was deranged.
"He's insane. I watched as it happened. He was torturing them, laughing as he did so and then he killed them. According to him, as the medical capsule was destroyed by the beasts, there was no way of curing the injured, but he didn’t even let anybody try to help them. He treats everyone like rubbish. That’s why I decided to escape.”
Denn appeared immersed in an illusion, without managing to react.
“What about the rest?” asked the robot.
“The people are really scared; nobody dares face up to Neil. There are still many injured, I don’t know what could happen to them. They might die from their injuries, that is if Neil doesn’t finish them off first.”
“I’m going to kill him! I swear! I’m going to cut off his head.”
“Calm yourself, Denn,” implored the robot.
“I’m not going to calm down. Not until I finish him off. I’m going there right now,” he said, and began to walk.
The robot took him by the arm to stop him. With all his strength, Denn fought to carry on.
"Let me go!" he yelled.
"Stop, Denn!” The robot held on to him, to his surprise, with more force than he imagined necessary. "You're going to hurt yourself, stop!"
"Yesterday you were bothering me about how I was putting it off, and now you're the one stopping me. What the hell is up with you?"
"If we're going to do this, we are going to do it well, Denn. If we don't plan it, it will be suicide."
"But, what about those people? More deaths happened because of me. I have to make sure it doesn't happen again. I have to do something."
"We will do, but if you want to stop Neil, we have to plan it out properly.”
Denn barely managed to overrule his desire to go and confront Neil, but his friend was right; if he went now, without a plan, he would die. They had to find a way of drawing Neil outside of the fort. If he approached the fort, he would be an easy target.
"Before running away, I took this knife," said the boy, and brought up his hand to give the weapon to Denn. "Something will come to us at some point, Denn. Together, we will avenge Dani."
Denn, at seeing the certainty and determination in Qein, felt a twinge of regret.
"You're very brave, boy." Denn placed his hand affectionately on Qein’s head. “Your sister would be proud... You're right, C0," he said, addressing the robot, "first we must think up a good plan."
"First things first," said the robot. “Qein is hungry, and you ought to eat something too, Denn. We’re going to search for lunch.”
Denn decided to listen to the robot. Taking some time to calm the spirits was just what they needed. The three of them, now determined to reclaim the fort, walked along the hill towards some trees they knew for their delicious fruits.
“You can eat from there,” said the robot. They sat down under the shade of the tree and ate.
"What are people saying about us?" the robot asked the boy.
"Some are very confused. A lot of them believed what Neil said at first, but they're beginning to doubt after seeing how he treats them."
"Do you think we will be able to convince them of the truth?"
"Perhaps, but Denn confirmed the hijacking of S4-07. That's why they’re doubting."
"You know, Qein, I also had something to do with the hijacking of S4-07. It's not just Denn’s fault."
The boy fell silent. He had not considered it, but the robot had also participated in Denn’s plan.
"What about Neil?" Denn hurriedly asked, at seeing the boy's crestfallen look. “Did you hear anything about what he was planning to do with us?”
“He said that he was going to kill you... He wants C0, I heard him asking Wallace whether he would be able to use his reactor to provide energy to the fort.”
“Energy?”
“Didn’t you know? The fort’s reactor was damaged in the commotion. There’s no energy.”
“Would it leave the turrets unusable?” the robot asked Denn, with the hope of using that to their advantage.
“The automatic systems will not work. But the turrets use energy cells which can last for months without being recharged, and can still be controlled by people.”
"At least they won't be able to detect us, isn’t that so? The sensors won’t work.”
“Are the drones still working?” Denn asked young Qein.
<
br /> “Yes. They’re still working. They fly all day around the fort’s walls.”
“Then we won’t be able to get close...”
“We’ll think of something, Denn... Didn’t you want us to see the robots’ shelter first?”
He had completely forgotten about it. After the terrible news the boy had brought them, his mind had been focused on Neil.
“That’s right!”
“What shelter?” asked the boy.
“Come on, C0,” said Denn, and got up immediately. Now that he was calmer, he had resumed his interest in seeing that mysterious place. After doing so, they would leave for the fort. “Lead the way.”
They began the walk; investigating the shelter would give them a certain amount of time to think up a plan, or, at least, Denn would be able to have the last thing he wished for before confronting his enemy. They walked to a clearing, without any nearby trees, with many branches and leaves on the ground, as if someone had tried to cover something. Now, from so close up, it was clear to them; there was an entrance on the ground barely covered by the branches that possibly Senlar had placed back after he was there.
As quickly as they could, they removed the obstacles, and lifted the door, which was made from a hard and heavy metal. Perhaps the robots had taken a lot in their ship when they fled from the Solar System. It was the only thing that came to Denn’s mind to be able to explain the shelter being covered up by a door of this material.
Beneath the metal door was a ladder that led to the interior. The contents of the place were hidden in the darkness.
“Can you light it up?” said Denn to the robot.
C0-UN1 approached the edge and brought his head closer to look. A white light emitted from his eyes, illuminating a small portion of the place.
“I’m going to go down first,” said the robot. In one jump, he launched himself through the hole, to land at the bottom, some ten metres below.
Denn and the boy looked down, trying to follow the robot who was beginning to get lost from view. After a moment, the only thing they could see was the shine of the light moving around inside.
“C0!” exclaimed Denn, anxious. “Can we come down yet?”
“Oh...! I’m sorry,” said the robot, he had been overcome by curiosity, forgetting that they were waiting for him. He returned to the ladder to illuminate his friends’ way. “You can come down... Do you think it’s advisable for Qein to come down?”
“I’m don’t plan on leaving him out here, C0, if anything were to happen to him...” Denn turned to address the boy: “Go ahead, Qein,” he encouraged him, and helped him down through the narrow space. “Make sure he doesn’t see anything he shouldn’t!” he said to the robot.
“What is this place, Denn?” asked the boy, frightened.
“Don’t worry, Qein,” said the robot, who was waiting for him down below, “I will protect you.”
The boy began his long descent until he was close enough for the robot to take him, to then place him on the floor. Denn, above, was already beginning to go down. The boy grabbed hold of the robot, fearful, trying to make out anything in the darkness. When Denn reached the floor, the robot directed his light at the rest of the room. It was clear from the appearance of the place that nobody had been there in a long time, excepting, or course, Senlar, who days earlier must have set foot in the same place.
“This is the place!” said Denn, somewhat fanatic.
“Seriously, Denn, tell me where we are.” The boy looked fairly scared. He was not managing to understand how a place like that was there.
“Don’t worry, boy, C0 and I will protect you. There’s nothing here that could hurt you.”
Before Denn could finish speaking, an enormous creature, similar to a snake, crossed the room, before becoming lost from their sight: it had come in through a corridor at the far end, and left through another. The place was larger than they had imagined. The walls and floors were made of concrete; it was obvious that those intelligent machines had managed to establish themselves on this planet.
They took a few steps, following the light of the robot, who was leading the way to the place through which the snake had slithered. They were long passageways; longer than they were able to see.
“It doesn’t seem to have an end,” said the boy. Curiosity had made him forget the fear.
“It does,” said the robot. He was the only one capable of making out a wall at the end of the corridor. He turned around to see the other and continued: “They both do. Where are we going?”
“I’d like to not go behind the snake,” responded Denn.
“I agree,” said Qein. Upon remembering that creature, he grabbed hold of Denn’s hand.
The robot began to walk down the corridor, followed by his friends, all on high alert to any danger. They met with several doors along the length of the corridor. They were all open, surely because of Senlar, who must have been examining the place. All of the rooms were empty, with the exception of a few old and broken pieces of furniture.
“They look like personal rooms.”
C0 was trying to hide his fascination for the place. That building had been constructed by beings of his very species. He was feeling much curiosity; he wished to understand those robots, his own descendants.
At the end of the corridor, they took a turn to the left. Just in front of some steps that would take them even deeper into the ground.
"Who built this, Denn?" asked the boy.
"The Colonisers... We’ll explain later.”
“The Colonisers...?" The boy was surprised. What was a building like that doing on this planet? He found even less sense in the fact that those mythical robots were the ones responsible. He did not have time to think about it much longer, his intrigue for the place diverted his attention once more. After going down the steps, they arrived at a large hall with several rooms. In the back began another passageway.
One of the rooms was special. It was the very one that had taken Senlar aback days earlier. A room, with a large sheet of glass which divided the space in two. On the other side of the glass, there was a large table, and on top of it, the skeleton of what had clearly been a human being. In the walls, chains with shackles held other bodies. They had found it.
"Are we going to be alright, C0?" asked the boy, frightened, gripping on to the robot.
"Don’t worry, Qein, I'm here," said the robot.
The room was sinister at the very least. Denn was thinking that it looked like a place of torture. Perhaps it was something more than that.
"Surely they must have sat here, to look through that glass while they did unimaginable things to them on the other side," said Denn with repudiation.
“But why?" asked Qein, horrified.
“I don't know. There are no instruments or anything... they will have taken them with them... There must be some device through here," he said. He immediately began searching the whole room.
It did not take him long to find what he was looking for. On a shelf, just to the side of the box from which very likely Senlar had taken it out of, was the device he had told him about.
"How do you turn that thing on?" asked Qein, at seeing the primitive device.
It was a cube the size of a fist. It was old technology, but it still worked.
"You need to wait for it to charge a little. It works with the same technology as the devices we have in our bodies. It charges at the touch of flesh, and with the background noise...” he said, and waited a few seconds. "... There we go.” The device turned on, and a holographic image coming from the cube showed a menu. "... Perhaps we shouldn’t let Qein see this, C0.”
“Turn around, Qein,” said the robot. After grumbling a little, the boy obeyed the order.
Denn searched on the device, and found the images he was looking for. It was horrifying. In them could be seen the mutilated bodies of a few people, whilst some machines were working over them. It was worse when they played the videos; they had to silence them so that the child would
not hear the screams that could be heard in them. The humans that the Colonisers had brought from the Solar System had suffered unimaginable things.
Mutilations and destructive procedures. The robots did all kinds of things with their prisoners. When Denn finished watching the images, he was traumatised.
"Why would they keep those images?" asked the robot.
"That's what you're wondering?" exclaimed Denn, still deeply affected by what he had just seen.
"It's just that I don't understand it. A robot can keep an image in its brain. Why would they do it?"
"Who knows? They're sick beings. How could I understand what they think or what they do?"
C0-UN1 had had his doubts about the evil of the Colonisers, before seeing those images. He tried to understand what possible reason they would have for committing such atrocities, but there was nothing that could justify it. Indeed, they were monsters.
"What did the images show?" asked Qein.
"Forget it, we're not going to show it to you. Believe me, it's better that way."
Denn remain silent, trying to take in what he had seen. Now he was convinced that his convergence had given him a view into the future. The Colonisers would surely be somewhere planning their attack, and there he was, still stuck on that planet, still with pending issues to attend to.
"This is the proof we needed, C0. If we could just get out of here and show those images to the people, there would be no way they would ignore it."
"But what can we do?" asked the robot.
"I don't know. I'm sorry to say that perhaps the only option we have is to wait for someone to find us. They must be searching for the station, any day now someone will come here."
"Then, all we can do is wait?”
"It makes me feel terrible, but we can't leave here. We have to hold on; someone has to see this. We have to keep ourselves safe... And whilst Neil is alive, we never will be. Now I know what we have to do... There could be something in this place that could help us defeat Neil. Let's search the whole place." Denn went up to the robot so that the boy would not hear him. In a low voice, he said to him: "It doesn't matter what happens to us, Qein must live so that he can hand this information over to someone, and Neil has to die.”
Convergence: Genesis Page 27
