Robots

by Jack Dann

  She shook her head, although she was not certain he could see it in the dimness of her cabin. "It's men who want to sleep afterward. I want to go out on deck with you, and talk a little more, and—and look at the stars. Is that all right? Do you ever look at the stars?"

  "Sure," he said; and then, "the moon'll be up soon."

  "I suppose. A thin crescent of moon like a clipping from one of God's fingernails, thrown away into our sky. I saw it last night." She picked up both of her tattered little books, opened the cabin door, and went out, suddenly fearful; but he joined her at once, pointing at the sky.

  "Look! There's the shuttle from Singapore!"

  "To Mars."

  "That's where they're going, anyhow, after they get on the big ship." His eyes were still upon the shuttle's tiny scratch of white light.

  "You want to go."

  He nodded, his features solemn in the faint starlight. "I will too, someday."

  "I hope so." She had never been good at verbal structure, the ordering of information. Was it desperately important now that she say what she had to say in logical sequence? Did it matter in the least?

  "I need to warn you," she said. "I tried to this morning but I don't think you paid much attention. This time perhaps you will."

  His strong, somewhat coarse face remained lifted to the sky, and it seemed to her that his eyes were full of wonder.

  "You are in great danger. You have to save yourself if you can—isn't that correct? One of your instincts? That's what I've read and heard."

  "Sure. I want to live as much as you do. More, maybe."

  She doubted that, but would not be diverted. "I told you about the messages that I bribed the radio operator to send last night. You said it would be all right when you brought me home unharmed."

  He nodded.

  "Have you considered what will be done to you if you can't? If I die or disappear before we make port?"

  He looked at her then. "Are you taking back your promise?"

  "No. And I want to live as much as I did when we talked this morning." A gentle wind from the east sang of life and love in beautiful words that she could not quite catch; and she longed to stop her ears as she had after breakfast when he was about to pronounce her husband's name.

  "Then it's okay."

  "Suppose it happens. Just suppose."

  He was silent.

  "I'm superstitious, you see; and when I called myself the Flying Dutchwoman, I was at least half serious. Much more than half, really. Do you know why there's always a Flying Dutchman? A vessel that never reaches port or sinks? I mean the legend."

  He shook his head.

  "It's because if you put an end to it—throw holy water into the sea or whatever—you become the new Dutchman. You, yourself."

  He was silent, watching her.

  "What I'm trying to say—"

  "I know what you're trying to say."

  "It's not so bad, being the Flying Dutchman. Often, I've enjoyed it." She tried to strike a light note. "One doesn't get many opportunities to do laundry, however. One must seize each when it occurs." Were they in the shadows, somewhere near, waiting for him to leave? She listened intently but heard only the song of the wind, the sea slowly slapping the hull like the tickings of a clock, tickings that had always reminded her that death waited at the end of everyone's time.

  He said, "A Hong Kong dollar for your thoughts."

  "I was thinking of a quotation, but I don't want to offend you."

  "About laundry? I'm not going to be on the run like you think, but I wouldn't be mad. I don't think I could ever be mad at you after—" He jerked his head at the door of her cabin.

  "That is well, because I need another favor." She held up her books. "I was going to show you these, remember? But we kissed, and—and forgot. At least I did."

  He took one and opened it; and she asked whether he could see well enough in the darkness to read. He said, "Sure. This quote you're thinking of, it's in here?"

  "Yes. Look under Kipling." She visualized the page. "The fifth, I believe." If he could see in the dark well enough to read, he could surely see her sailors, if her sailors were there at all. Did they know how well he saw? Almost certainly not.

  He laughed softly. "If you think you're too small to be effective, you' ve never been in bed with a mosquito." "That's not Kipling."

  "No, but I happened to see it, and I like it."

  "I like it too; it's helped me through some bad moments. But if you're saying that mosquitoes bite you, I don't believe it. You're a genuine person, I know that now—but you've exchanged certain human weaknesses for others."

  For an instant, his pain showed. "They don't have to bite me. They can buzz and crawl around on me, and that's plenty." He licked his forefinger and turned pages. "Here we go. It may be you wait your time, Beast, till I write my last bad rhyme, Beast—quit the sunlight, cut the rhyming, drop the glass—follow after with the others, where some dusky heathen smothers us with marigolds in lieu of English grass. Am I the Beast? Is that what you're thinking?"

  "You—in a way it was like incest." Her instincts warned her to keep her feelings to herself, but if they were not spoken now ... "I felt, almost, as though I were doing all those things with my son. I've never borne a child, except for you." He was silent, and she added, "It's a filthy practice, I know, incest."

  He started to speak, but she cut him off. "You shouldn't be in the world at all. We shouldn't be ruled by things that. we have made, even though they're human, and I know that's going to happen. But it was good—so very, very good—to be loved as I was in there. Will you take my books, please? Not as a gift from your mother, because you men care nothing for gifts your mothers give you. But as a gift from your first lover, something to recall your first love? If you won't, I'm going to throw them in the sea here and now."

  "No," he said. "I want them. The other one too?"

  She nodded and held it out, and he accepted it.

  "Thanks. Thank you. If you think I won't keep these, and take really good care of them, you're crazy."

  "I'm not crazy," she told him, "but I don't want you to take good care of them, I want you to read them and remember what you read. Promise?"

  "Yeah," he said. "Yeah, I will." Quite suddenly she was in his arms again and he was kissing her. She held her breath until she realized that he did not need to breathe, and might hold his breath forever. She fought for air then, half-crushed against his broad metal chest, and he let her go. "Good-bye," she whispered. "Good-bye."

  "I've got a lot more to tell you. In the morning, huh?"

  Nodding was the hardest thing that she had ever done. On the other side of the railing, little waves repeated, "No, no, no, no—" as though they would go on thus forever.

  "In the morning," he said again; and she watched his pale, retreating back until hands seized and lifted her. She screamed and saw him whirl and take the first long, running step; but not even he was as quick as that. By the time his right foot struck the deck, she was over the rail and falling.

  The sea slapped and choked her. She spat and gasped, but drew only water into her mouth and nostrils; and the water, the bitter seawater, closed above her.

  At her elbow the shark said, "How nice of you to drop in for dinner!"

  The Birds of Isla Ntujeres

  Steven Popkes

  Sometimes you can't get what you want, and that's bad. Sometimes, as the unsettling little story that follows demonstrates, you can get what you want—and that's worse.

  Steven Popkes made his first sale in 1985, and in the years that followed has contributed a number of distinguished stories to markets such as Asimov's Science Fiction, Sci Fiction, The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Realms of Fantasy, Science Fiction Age, Full Spectrum, Tomorrow, The Twilight Zone Magazine, Night Cry, and others. His first novel, Caliban Landing, appeared in 1987 and was followed in 1991 by an expansion to novel-length of his popular novella "The Egg," retitled Slow Lightning. He was also part of the
Cambridge Writers' Workshop project to produce science fiction scenarios about the future of Boston, Massachusetts, that cumulated in the 1994 anthology Future Boston, to which he contributed several stories. He lives in Hopkinton, Massachusetts, with his family. He works for a company that builds aviation instrumentation and is learning to be a pilot.

  Aftenvard, it Was never the people she remembered, never faces or bodies or voices—even Alfredo's. It was always the wind, blowing from the west side of the island, and the frigate birds, balanced on their wingtips against the sky. They flew high above her, so black and stark they seemed made of leather or scales, too finely drawn to be feathered.

  It was March, the beginning of the rainy season, and she had come to Isla Mujeres to leave her husband. That she had done this some half a dozen times before did not escape her and she had a kind of despairing fatalism about it. Probably this time, too, she would return. Her name was Jean Summat. Her husband, Marc, lived the professor's life in Boston. She, it was supposed, was to live the role of professor's wife. This was something she had never quite accepted.

  Isla Mujeres. Island of Women..

  She sat in a small pier cafe that jutted out into the water, waiting for her first meal on the island. In a few minutes it came. A whole fish stared glassily up at her from the plate. Delicately, she began to carve small pieces from it, and ate. She glanced up and a Mexican man in a Panama hat smiled at her. She looked back to her food, embarrassed.

  Boston was cold right now and covered with a wet snow as raw as butcher's blood. But here in Mexico, it was warm. More importantly, it was cheap and people's lives here were still enmeshed in basics, not intricately curved in academic diplomacy.

  She left the restaurant and stood on the pier watching the birds, feeling the warm heavy wind, sour with the hot smell of the sea. The late afternoon sun was masked with low clouds and in the distance was a dark blue rain. She had a room, money, and time.

  The Avenida Ruda was clotted with vendors selling Mayan trinkets, blankets, pots, T-shirts, and ice cream. Several vendors tried to attract her attention with an "Amiga!" but she ignored them. A Mexican dressed in a crisp suit and Panama hat sat in an outdoor cafe and sipped his drink as he watched her. Just watched her.

  Lots of Mexicans wear such hats, she told herself. Still, he made her nervous and she left the street to return to her room. On the balcony she watched the frigate birds and the people on the beach.

  Jean swam in the warm water of Playa de Cocoa. When she came from the water she saw the man watching her from one of the cabanas as he sipped a Coke. She walked up to him.

  "Why are you following me?"

  The man sipped his Coke and looked back at her. "No entiende."

  She looked at him carefully. "That's a lie."

  There was a long moment of tension. He threw back his head and laughed. "Es verdad."

  "Why—what the hell are you doing?"

  "You are very beautiful, Senora."

  "Jesus!"

  "You need a man."

  "I have a man" Or half a man. Or maybe more than a man. Do I still have him Do I want him? Did I ever?

  "With specifications?"

  She stared at him

  Hector led her through the rubble at the end of the Avenida Hidalgo to a small concrete house nearly identical to all the other concrete houses on the island. It was surrounded by a wall. Set into the top of the wall were the jagged spikes of broken soda bottles. She looked down the street. The other houses were built the same. There was a burnt-out car leaning against one wall, and a thin dog stared at her, his eyes both hungry and protective.

  Inside, it smelled damp. It was dark for a moment, then he turned on a blue fluorescent light that lit the room like a chained lightning bolt. Leaning against the wall was a tall, long-haired and heavily built man with Mayan features. He did not move.

  What am I doing here?

  "This is Alfredo." Hector was looking at her with a considering expression.

  She shook her head. The air in the room seemed thick, lifeless, cut off from the world. "Alfredo?"

  "Alfredo. I show you." Hector opened a suitcase and took out a box with a complex control panel. He flipped two switches and turned a dial and the box hummed. Alfredo pushed himself away from the wall and looked around.

  "Good God." She stared at.him. Alfredo was beautiful, with a high forehead and strong lips. His body was wide and taut, the muscles rippling as he moved. Hector touched a button and he became absolutely still.

  "You like him?"

  She turned to Hector startled. She'd forgotten he was there. "What is this?"

  "Ah! An explanation." He spoke in a deep conspiratorial whisper. "Deep in the mountains north of Mexico City is a great research laboratory. They have built many of these—andros? Syntheticos?"

  "Androids."

  "Of course. They are stronger and more beautiful than mortal men. But the church discovered it and forced them to close it down. The church is important here—"

  "That's a lie."

  Hector shrugged. "The Senora is correct. Alfredo was a prisoner in the Yucatan. Condemned to die for despicable crimes. They did not kill him, however. Instead, they removed his mind and inlaid his body with electrical circuits. He is now more than a man—"

  "That's another lie."

  "The Senora sees most clearly." He paused a moment. "You have heard of the Haitian zombie? The Mayans had a similar process. My country has only recently perfected it, coupling it with the most advanced of scientific—"

  Jean only stared at him.

  He stopped, then shrugged. "What does it matter, Senora? He is empty. His mind does not exist. He will—imprint? Is that the correct word?—on anyone I choose."

  "This is a trick."

  "You are so difficult to convince. Let me show you his abilities." Hector manipulated the controls and Alfredo leaped forward and caught himself on one hand, holding himself high in the air with the strength of one ann. He flipped forward onto his feet. Alfredo picked up a branch from a pile of kindling and twisted it in both hands. There was no expression on his face but the muscles in his forearms twisted like snakes, the tendons like dark wires. The branch broke with a sudden gunshot report.

  Hector stopped Alfredo at attention before them. "You see? He is more than man."

  She shook her head. "What kind of act is this?"

  "No act. I control him from this panel. The—master? maestro?—would not need this."

  Control. Such control.

  Hector seemed uncertain for a moment. "You wish to see still more? You are unsure of how he is controlled?" He thought for a moment. "Let me show you a feature."

  In the stark light and shadows, she had not noticed Alfredo was nude. The Mayan turned into the light.

  "There are several choices one could make when using Alfredo." Hector manipulated the box. "Pequeno." Alfredo had a normal-sized erection.

  She wanted to look away and could not. The Mayan face was before her, dark, strong, and blank.

  "Medio," said Hector softly.

  She looked again and the erection was twice as large, pulsing to Alfredo's breathing.

  "Y monstruoso!" cried Hector.

  Alfredo looked fit to be a bull, a goat, or some other animal. There was never any expression in Alfredo's eyes.

  "Y nada," said Hector. And Alfredo's erection wilted and disappeared.

  She couldn't breathe. She wanted to run, to hide from Alfredo, but she didn't want to be anywhere else.

  "You are pleased, Senora?" Hector stood beside her.

  Jean tried to clear her head. She looked away from both of them. No man could fake this. It was real, a marvelous control, a total subjugation. Was this what she had wanted all this time?

  "A very nice show." She took a deep breath. "How much do I owe you?"

  "You owe me nothing, Senora." Hector bowed to her. "But Alfredo is for sale." When she did not answer immediately, he continued. "He imprints on the owner, Senora. Then voice commands ar
e sufficient. He will show initiative if you desire it, or not. He is intelligent, but only in your service."

  "But you have the controls."

  "They do not operate once imprinting occurs."

  Crazy. Ridiculous.

  "How much?" she heard herself asking.

  Alfredo followed her home, mute, below the birds and the sky. She could smell him on the evening wind, a clean, strong smell.

  "Do you speak?" she asked as he followed her up the steps to her room.

  Alfredo did not answer for a moment. "Yes."

  She asked him no more questions that night.

  His mind was like a thunderstorm: thick, murky, dark, shot through intermittently by lightning. These were not blasts of intelligence or insight but the brightness of activity, the heat of flesh, the electricity of impulse. He was no more conscious of what happened or what caused his actions than lightning was conscious of the friction between clouds. Occasionally, very occasionally, a light came through him, like the sun through the distant rain, and things stilled within him.

  He was a chained thunderbolt, unaware of his chains.

  She copulated with Alfredo almost continuously the first three days. It was as if a beast had been loosed within her. If she wanted him to stroke her thus, he did so. If she wanted him to bite her there, it was done. Something broke within her and she tried to devour him.

  It was only when she fully realized she owned him, that he would be there as long as she wanted him, that this abated. Then it was like coming up from underwater, and she looked around her.

  Alfredo had cost her almost everything she had, nearly all the money she would have used to start a new life. She could not go back to Marc now. Perhaps buying Alfredo had been an act ensuring that. She didn't know. There were jobs on the island for Americans, but they were tricky and illegal to get.

  At the end of the first day of a waitress job, she came to their room tired and angry. Alfredo was sitting on the edge of the bed staring out the window. It was suddenly too much for her.

  "You! I do this to feed you." She stared at him. He stared back with his dark eyes.