The dark broken down city loomed closer as they made their way past the abandoned buildings. The group was plunged into darkness and had to guide their way through the streets by fumbling over rubble and helping each other up if they fell, focusing on the distant city center. Once visible light was readily available by the lights of neon signs and floating lamps dangling above the sidewalks, the entire city seemed to transform.
Terra had been to this city before and knew where the Discount Center was, but never had the chance to fully explore the entirety of the bustling city-life. Although the sky was dark grey, the artificial lights never dimmed so the city never slept. There was no set unit of time-keeping since there were no night and day, simply dark red sky and artificial lights at all times. In order to have everyone using the same unit of time, people wore horizontal bands around their wrists that determined the time left until the next ‘day’. 50 hours in a day, 50 days in a month, 8 months in a year. At least, that’s what Terra could determine.
Indo stopped at a booth and exchanged some tools for three tickets. Wenindal Inn read the neon lights that hung on the side of the building. Ushering everyone to follow behind him, he stepped into a building and pushed open the doors. Terra followed, surprised when she felt cool air pass over her and had to travel through another set of doors to get to the interior of the building. There was already a multitude of people in the lobby, but a good majority of them turned to watch the newcomers trudge in. The air was cleaner inside, but a purple haze rested over the room, giving it an ominous feeling.
“Can I help you?” A man dressed in a bright pink jumper asked them as they all passed through the second door.
Indo handed him the three tickets.
“Thank you for staying with us, if you’ll follow me I’ll bring you to your rooms.” They walked past the gawking people in the lobby and reached an elevator where they all crammed in their things. It was a little difficult considering they still had to carry around the stasis tube on a cart.
“If you don’t mind me asking, how did you get such an old Efficiency model? Those are very difficult to come by since they’ve been long since discontinued.” The man in pink asked.
“Found it in a junkyard and fixed it up. Got lots of bugs, but it’ll cause no problems.” Indo explained, giving Terra a look.
Terra took the hint and tried her best not to roll her eyes and make a snide comment.
They arrived at their floor and the concierge showed them to their rooms, giving them each (excluding Terra) a keycard that would allow them access. With a quick wave goodbye, the pink man was gone and the group piled into the room and released all their things into a giant pile on the floor.
“Damn. That was way worse than any training I’ve had to go through!” 895G commented as he tried to massage his sore shoulders. He had been tasked with carrying the canned foods.
“Oh shut up. I had to carry the water, cans, and push the cart.” Terra complained.
“Yeah, but you’re a robot.”
“So you keep reminding me.”
“Alright guys,” Indo interrupted. “Get some rest since we’ve got a long trip ahead of us. If you thought today was tough, you’re going to be in a world of pain tomorrow. We can’t afford to stay in places like this often, so enjoy it while you can.”
Indo unloaded some computer equipment and began typing away, immersed in his own world. Petri had already changed into sweatpants and gotten under the sheets of one of the beds, so 895G stripped down and did the same. Terra grabbed the clothing bag and dug around in until she found pants, a shirt, and an overcoat, putting them on to hide her mechanical exterior.
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“What are you doing?” 895G called out from his bed.
“I’m not going to sit around watching you guys sleep for the next ten hours. I’m going to do some exploring of my own.” Terra grabbed one of the key cards and slipped it into her pants pocket.
“Be back by eighth after day-start,” Indo called out as she opened the door to leave.
Terra gave him a short wave to indicate she had heard and shut the door quietly behind her.
“Is it alright for the robot to leave like that?” 895G asked Indo.
“I don’t know,” Indo stated, delving back into his computer project.
“What does that mean? Didn’t you create it?” 895G was in disbelief.
“Up until yesterday that robot was my creation. Its name was Fishy. Something changed on its CPU and I want to know what, but it protected us from you so it can’t be all bad.”
895G pondered this for a bit and then realized that with the robot gone, there was nothing threatening his life to say with the other two men. He jumped out of bed and grabbed his clothes.
“I wouldn’t try and get away if I were you. We made copies of the switches, we’re not idiots.” Indo calmly added, lifting up a small box with a little red switch on it. “Petri has one too, so don’t get any funny ideas.”
“The robot is heartless, but I don’t think you have the guts to flip the switch.” 895G stalled as he tried to think of an escape route.
“You’ve read my file, you tell me if I have what it takes.” Indo hardened eyes glared at 895G, and he knew any pleas he made would fall on deaf ears.
The Scout felt a chill cascade down his spine. No, this old man most definitely had what it took to hurt someone. Indo had become somewhat of a legendary story back at the training academy and the newer recruits would often joke about taking things to the extreme like Indo had.
Indo had been raised as a Scout, but quickly moved up ranks and became interested in the robotics field. He worked as an assistant to the head roboticist at the time when the first Helper model was created. The Helper’s main objective was to help its user with any small monotonous task like washing dishes or doing laundry. Two models later, the name was switched to Efficiency.
By the time the third Efficiency model was released, Indo had risen to lead roboticist after the previous one retired, making him the youngest leader of the robotics division. The government eventually bought out the company and ordered him to make Combatants. Indo gladly complied since he held no quarrels with creating machines made to destroy; as long as he got to play with robots. In order to create even more sentient robots that could predict attacks and react accordingly, Indo began experimenting with transferring human-like behaviors into the robots themselves. He managed to get government funding by hiding it under the prosthetics field, where he used voluntary subjects who wanted a new limb. It was a painful experience and it yielded few results, so Indo was forced to stop. Entranced by his idea, he started kidnapping live subjects from the pharmaceutical division to test mind-transfer. When the higher officials found out about this, they send a squad after Indo to arrest him, but he had already fled, taking one of the human lab rats with him.
Nothing was heard from him for a few years, but he came back with a vengeance and a different agenda. He would hack into Efficiency models inside government facilities remotely and make them self-destruct near the main power sources, causing massive blackouts to those facilities. He mostly aimed for the pharmaceutical buildings and alternative energy research buildings, never the robotics labs. Indo went on to destroy billions of dollars of equipment and research, killing thousands of lab rats in the process, before he went into hiding. Nothing was heard from him for nearly twenty years, but here Indo was, working on some secret project in a shady inn. 895G wondered what had changed, what had caused Indo’s life to dramatically turn around. Maybe it had something to do with Petri? Or the robot?
A wave of sleepiness washed over the Scout and he laid back down in bed. He would find out what Indo was up to, escape, and then get a promotion and go back to his old life. There had to be a reason they were keeping him around so he wasn’t going to push his luck any further that night. As soon as he found an opening, though, he would bolt.
His eyes sluggishly closed. Yep, any day now he was going to escape and be hailed a hero when he caught Indo and his robot and turned them in. Any day now.