ROBO SAPIENS: A Science Fiction Classic

by Gary Naiman

  She smiled at the empty chair. Protocol was clear. He must be seated before her. Lucinda was a Near-Elite as evidenced by her new iridescent-blue uniform, but this man in obsidian was a Chosen One allowed to communicate directly with the Consortium. It was believed there were only a handful of his rank on the planet.

  He gestured a second time. “We will not stand on protocol, 0021. I have no time for protocol tonight.”

  She nodded and dropped in the empty chair.

  The man sat across from her and folded his hands. His steel blue eyes locked on her. “I must warn you, 0021. You have been promoted to a lofty rank with no tolerance for failure. Only two of your rank have advanced to Chosen Ones.” He hesitated. “Myself and my Chinese counterpart.” He leaned forward. “Do you comprehend my meaning?”

  Lucinda suppressed a rush of anger. The man reminded her too much of her field commander during the Los Angeles food riots. She took a calming breath and nodded.

  The man unfolded his hands and leaned back in his chair. “Hear me, 0021. I am about to disclose your new assignment. It is the most critical assignment ever presented to a Near-Elite.” His eyes burned into her. “To fail means demotion and banishment to the masses ... clear?”

  She stared at him while managing a tremulous, “Yes.”

  The man eyed her. “I am Olafang Tabulek. You will report directly to me and none other.”

  She nodded.

  Tabulek lunged at her. “I don’t sense your commitment, 0021. I sense you are playing games with me.”

  She knew he was testing her, but something deep was rising in her gut. She suddenly disliked this man for his arrogance.

  “0021?”

  “I don’t understand.”

  His face reddened. “I think you do, 0021. I think you are a sycophant trying to gain my favor.”

  “A what?”

  His bony finger snapped at her. “I warn you, 0021. Your social tricks will not work here. You will be measured strictly on your performance and from what I have seen in the past five minutes, you will certainly fail.”

  She stared at him in disbelief. Her Paradisio-drenched psyche flashed to the dark day her field commander ordered her to disintegrate the starving masses in Los Angeles.

  “Well... say something.”

  Her face twisted in a frown. “I understand your meaning, Chosen One. I am not a sycophant.”

  He gave her the evil eye. “Are you afraid, 0021?”

  “Yes.”

  His eyes glistened. “Of me?”

  She met his glare. “No, Chosen One. I am afraid of losing control and snapping your neck.”

  His face turned purple. “What?”

  “You want me to repeat it?”

  “How dare you!” He rose from his plasma chair. “Do you know who I am?”

  “I do.”

  He trembled. “To challenge a Chosen One is death. Do you know that?”

  She rose to face him. There was no fear. The arrogant pig had pressed her too far. She might die tonight, but the man standing across from her would never see it because she would snap his neck in the blink of his bloodshot eye.”

  “Death, 0021! Are you deaf?”

  “I know the punishment.”

  “And you would attack me? Your superior?”

  “No, Chosen One ... I would kill you.”

  Tabulek’s steel-blue eyes burned into her. “Brave words, 0021, but your record betrays you.” He shrugged. “After all, your last mission was a failure.”

  His words cut deep. Her skin was red hot. She clenched her fists and exploded at the arrogant man standing across from her. “I gave it my best! You sent me out there to do the impossible and I succeeded!”

  Tabulek’s glare softened. “Did you now.”

  “I did! I saved us from revolution!”

  He shrugged. “And that was your mission?”

  She stared at him.

  Tabulek folded his arms. “If you succeeded, answer this question.” His eyes flickered. “What is the truth?”

  His words echoed in her ears. She dropped in her chair, her sullen eyes staring at the table.

  “Your assignment was more than thwarting Harrier’s cyber-virus. It was to learn his secret truth.”

  She lowered her head.

  “0021?”

  Silence.

  “Look at me, 0021!”

  She looked at the gray-haired man standing across from her.

  Tabulek nodded. “That’s better ... humility is a virtue most admired.” He eased down in his chair and eyed her tear-stained face. “Care for some water?”

  “What?”

  He cracked a smile and produced a transparent bottle. “Have some, 0021. You seem a bit parched.” He slid the bottle across the table while eyeing the shaken woman. “Drink your water and we will proceed.”

  “Proceed?”

  Tabulek eased back in his chair. “With your new assignment.”

  She eyed the bottle.

  “Drink it, 0021. We don’t have time for emotions tonight.”

  She snatched the bottle and gulped the cool water through her tears.

  “Better?”

  She stared at him. The test was over.

  “Are you familiar with Neptune?”

  She placed the empty bottle on the table. “Yes ... the provider of Manna. The third most important Consortium member behind Cohesion and Synapse.”

  Tabulek raised his finger in a corrective gesture. “Be precise, 0021. Neptune is the Consortium member responsible for all planetary sustenance, including that purified water you just consumed.”

  She glanced at the empty bottle.

  Tabulek eyed the bottle. “Speaking of water, have you ever seen this?” He waved his hand over the light-wave instrument panel attached to his plasma chair. A hologram materialized above the conference table.

  “Recognize it?”

  She leaned forward, her gray eyes studying the enormous silver platform floating on a large body of water. “It resembles an obsolete oil platform.”

  Tabulek’s smile disappeared. “A simple answer will do, 0021. Do you recognize it?”

  Lucinda frowned. “No.”

  “Good, we can proceed.”

  Olafang pointed his forefinger at the hologram, which zoomed to a tube projecting downward from beneath the platform. The snakelike tube appeared endless as it descended into the ocean’s shadowed depth.

  Tabulek’s voice was crisp and clear. “That platform is located in the Philippine Sea above the Mariana Trench, specifically the Challenger Deep, two hundred miles southwest of Guam.” He hesitated. “The greatest ocean depth on the planet.” He nodded at the hologram. “That tube descends seven miles to the seabed.”

  She watched the hologram darken from the absence of light. Tabulek twisted his hand slightly, converting the image to infrared. The descent accelerated to the tube’s termination point, seven miles beneath the platform.

  Lucinda stared at the tentacles spewing from the tube’s confluence with the seabed. The tentacles fanned out along the murky seabed before disappearing into the ooze. “What are they?”

  Tabulek leaned toward her. “You are about to learn a secret, 0021. A secret known by only a few people. To divulge this secret will mean your immediate termination, and I don’t mean firing.”

  She sighed. “I understand...”

  Tabulek produced a small white memory cube. He placed it on the table and slid it toward her. “Study it well, 0021. It describes the entire Neptune operation from sea level to the depths of the trench. Commit it to memory, for I must now reveal the purpose of your mission.”

  She grasped the cube and stuffed it in her neck pocket, her gray eyes focused on the man she suddenly respected.

  Tabulek passed his forefinger over an indigo beam projecting from the instrument panel. The hologram morphed to its original sea level view of the platform. He leaned back in his chair and nodded at the image. “This facility is the heart and soul of Manna. If it were
compromised, billions would die from starvation.” His eyes locked on her. “This complex is all that protects us from worldwide chaos, revolution, and death.”

  She stared at the floating platform.

  Tabulek pointed at the hologram, exposing the platform’s interior. “Our concern is here.” He jabbed his forefinger at the hologram, illuminating a room below the platform’s deck.

  “That is the platform’s master control room and laboratory.” Olafang glanced at her. “Are you with me?”

  “Yes.”

  He jabbed at the hologram, illuminating a larger room beneath the control room. “That is the solar conversion chamber, the most secured compartment on the planet for it supplies all power to the Neptune complex.”

  He pointed again, zooming the image to the chamber’s massive array of solar energy conversion cells.

  She leaned forward. “I see the conversion cells, but where are the solar collectors? The platform appears barren. There are no solar collection dishes.”

  Tabulek smiled. “The entire platform is a sunlight collector, its titanium alloy impregnated with billions of micro-sized ZZ4 solar cells, the greatest power source on the planet.” He shrugged. “If not for the massive need for sunlight collection and storage, we would only require a small docking station for the incoming Manna transfer ships.”

  She shook her head. “I have much to learn.”

  “Learn it well, 0021, and learn it quickly.” Tabulek nodded at the hologram. “Yesterday, the same day you thwarted Harrier and his accomplice, the Anarchists tried to take out this facility with an implanted nuclear device.”

  Lucinda’s eyes widened. “Nuclear?”

  “Deadly... at least two megatons.”

  She stared at him in disbelief. “God.”

  Tabulek’s eyes flickered. “An unacceptable reference, 0021. There is no god. The approved semantic is deity.”

  “I am sorry.”

  Tabulek pointed at the solar power chamber. “If not for the vigilance of our onboard Guardian robots, the device would have detonated at midnight, the same moment Franz Harrier’s virus compromised Summit Energy’s global network.

  Lucinda stared at the hologram. “Have we interrogated the traitor?”

  Tabulek frowned. “The traitor has not been apprehended.”

  She looked at him in shock. “But how? The platform is isolated in the middle of an ocean?”

  Tabulek rested his hands on the table. “Every week, a maintenance crew is transported to the platform from Neptune’s Luzon installation. We believe the Anarchists implanted one of their own in that crew.”

  “When?”

  “We believe the device was planted yesterday.”

  Lucinda opened her hands. “Then interrogate the traitor.”

  Tabulek’s frown deepened. “Impossible, 0021. The maintenance crew is dead. Their transport sphere went down in the Pacific only a mile off the Luzon coast.”

  She stared at him. “Sabotage?”

  Tabulek nodded. “We were fortunate a Guardian detected the device. It was quite sophisticated with a plasma cloaking agent masking its radiation.” He paused. “The robot’s visual sensor detected a small anomaly in the solar chamber’s configuration. It disarmed the device only twelve seconds before detonation.”

  She stared at the hologram.

  “There are only three scientists on the platform. We believe one or more of them are Anarchist spies.”

  “Have they been interrogated?”

  Tabulek looked at her. “That is your assignment.”

  His words sunk in.

  “You will be conveyed to the platform in the morning. Your identity has been altered. We have scrubbed your true identity from all files and records. There is no link to the woman who exposed Franz Harrier in Chicago.”

  She stared at him. “Who will I be?”

  “Yourself, 0021. Lucinda Montavi, the Consortium’s top robotic engineer.” He shrugged. “Simple enough, since it is true. Our computers have confirmed this is the best procedure. To use another identity would increase your chance of discovery by seventy percent.” He smiled. “Our computers are quite accurate on such things.”

  He waited for her confirming nod. “We have modified your history to display your excellent work at Robotron’s Rome headquarters where you spearheaded the development of the new Meta-One series.”

  “Meta-One?”

  “Yes, 0021. The most intelligent robot ever created, complete with associative memory, awesome processing power, human sensory skills, and weaponry beyond anything imagined. Your purported purpose for visiting the Neptune complex will be to assist its human occupants with an important project while testing the new robot’s security capabilities given the recent near-disaster.”

  “What about my Chicago assignment?”

  “Eliminated from all memory banks along with any reference to Synapse. To any inquisitor, you have spent the past six months at Robotron’s headquarters in Rome.”

  Tabulek eyed the exhausted woman slumped in her chair. “You need rest, 0021. I have arranged for a pleasant sleeping quarter befitting your new rank. I suggest you get some sleep and awaken early to review the memory cube.”

  She sighed. “How do I explain the phantom robot?”

  “Simple enough.” Tabulek gestured to the wall behind him where a concealed portal slid open revealing a black hulk floating in the shadows, its four metallic arms folded inward like a frightened insect. “Come forth, Gog.”

  Lucinda stared at the creature emerging from the portal, its arms spreading from its metallic body, its amber screen flickering. She rose from her chair, unable to believe her eyes. “A Meta? We’ve created a Meta?”

  Tabulek watched the eight-foot creature float beside them. He smiled while nodding at the robot. “This is Gog. He will accompany you to the platform. Gog will be your sole point of contact with me. You must communicate only through him.”

  She stared at the robot. “He knows this?”

  Tabulek nodded. “He knows everything, 0021. He is ready for your commands.”

  Before she could speak, the robot cut her off.

  “I am honored, 0021. I look forward to working with you.”

  She backed away, eager to test the robot’s human-sensory capabilities. “How shall I address you?”

  The creature’s amber eye flickered. “Gog.”

  She gave the creature a surprised look. “Wouldn’t you prefer a human name?”

  “If you like.”

  Lucinda cracked a smile. “You prefer Gog?”

  The robot remained silent.

  Lucinda nodded. “Then Gog it is.”

  Tabulek rose from his chair. “Gog will escort you to your sleeping quarters. We will meet in this conference room at 09:00. I’ll answer any questions you may have. Your transport sphere departs at 10:00.

  She raised her hand.

  “Yes?”

  “The secret you divulged, is it the same truth Harrier spoke of? The truth he took to his grave?”

  Tabulek shook his head. “You have much to learn, 0021. It is best we leave it at that.” He extended his hand. “Good hunting, 0021. You have our support.”

  She clasped his hand. “The Consortium?”

  “No, 0021. The human race.”

  CHAPTER 7

  Hurricane Xanadu

  The transport sphere lifted into the fog at 10:04, its passengers an eight-foot robot and an extremely tired woman.

  Lucinda had spent the night learning everything possible about Neptune’s massive undersea complex. The white memory cube’s holographic presentation had been most enlightening. She leaned back in her seat and rested her head against the soft plasma while recalling this morning’s final briefing with Tabulek...

  “Who will be my contact at the complex?”

  “Sandra Kenney, the project director. She has been briefed on your coming.”

  “Can she be trusted?”

  “No, 0021. Trust no one except the Meta and me
. The three persons on the platform remain under scrutiny.”

  “And I’m not to contact you?”

  “Correct. I will establish the first contact through Gog. Their onboard sensors are extremely powerful. If you try to transmit, you may be detected.”

  “Final question?”

  “Yes?”

  “Why won’t you tell me all you know? I’m one of your warriors being sent into battle. Shouldn’t I know everything?”

  “Not advisable, 0021. Their body chemistry sensors are highly effective and have been activated since the attempted sabotage. It is best you remain uninformed until the news is broken to you by Kenney. Your shock must be authentic.”

  “Then she’s one of them?”

  “We’re not sure. That’s why we need you there.”

  “What if it’s not her? What if it’s none of them?”

  “Then we will know and your job will be done.”

  “But —”

  “Good luck, 0021.”

  Tabulek’s words echoed in her ears. She felt the sphere accelerate as it cleared the mountains overlooking the Pacific. The fog had lifted and the sunlit ocean stretched before her. It would take ninety minutes to reach the Neptune complex.

  She closed her eyes while reliving the memory cube’s holographic tour of the undersea mining complex. She was fascinated by the black collection tubes radiating from the seven-mile-deep umbilical cord. The tubes undulated along the seabed like the tentacles of a giant squid probing for its prey.

  The hologram zoomed on the collection tubes, tracking them along the seabed to their claw-like dredges raking the bottom into a blue-green ooze which was sucked into the tubes by powerful vacuum engines.

  The hologram peeled away the collection tubes’ organic-metal skin, exposing their internal “strainers” busily filtering and ejecting impurities from the precious blue-green soup as it was sucked into the massive accumulation vault at the base of the umbilical tube.

  Within the vault, the blue-green algae received it first chemical treatment as it was blended with “Enhancement X”, a secret catalyst preparing it for its final conversion at the surface. The semi-processed algae had become the most vitamin-enriched, life-sustaining nutrient ever created. It was ready for Neptune’s magic touch.

  At the surface, the enriched algae was pumped into massive vats where intensive ultraviolet radiation multiplied its strength a thousandfold while converting it to the most important foodstuff in history, its name emanating from the honey-flaked sustenance given to the Israelites by Jehovah as they wandered the wilderness in search of the promised land...