Jasmine was stunned by the robot’s voice. She stood up, and checked around her to make sure that no other man was around.
“That voice.” she said as she faced the robot. "Is that your voice ?”
“It is my voice.” the robot replied. “If you feel uncomfortable, I can choose another voice model.”
“It’s fine,” said Jasmine. “You are… a robot ?”
“I am an artificial intelligence model C119 installed in a humanoid steel model.” He said. “I am specifically designed for the protection and care of designated individuals."
"What are you doing down here ?”
The robot quickly panned his head around, his eyes scanning his surroundings. He then let go of the skeleton he was holding, stood up, and looked toward the sky.
"I don’t know.” the robot said
“You don’t know ?”
“Some part of my memory seemed to be…classified. And I’m afraid I can’t access those memories in limited operation mode.”
The robot’s face was still emotionless, but its movement showed that it was puzzled by the current situation.
“Well…isn’t it related to the skeleton lying beside you ?” asked Jasmine.
The robot looked down toward the skeleton for several seconds, then faced Jasmine again.
“From what I could gather from this human body. This was a living female that had been dead for more than a hundred years. Multiple parts of her body were replaced by mechanical parts, either metallic or organic, to maintain her living functions. However, I have no memory of serving a human with this many replaced organs.”
“You meant that this woman was a cyborg ?”
“According to the latest definition, she would be classified as a mechanically assisted human. Most of her robotic replacements serve no purpose further than its previous parts.
Take her hand for example, it looked similar to the other skeleton structures, but it decayed slower than the other parts, because it was a biological skeleton model Gamma, a device made to mimic human hand and wrist, but shall serve no purpose further than that. As you can see, no weapons or tools that could potentially pose a threat were anywhere on her body.”
“I see,” said Jasmine. “So besides this, you don’t know her ?”
“The majority of my memories were classified, and I could provide no further assistance than simple observation and deduction of our surroundings.”
“How about your name ?”
The robot stopped for a second, as if recalling its memory like an old man trying to remember a fleeting recollection. After a couple seconds, it finally spoke:
“Strangely, I do remember my code name.”
“What is a code name ?”asked Jasmine.
“It is very similar to the concept of birth name given to humans. Our owners gave us this name during our production. My code name is Stilicho,”
“Stilicho.” Jasmine repeated. “That’s a nice name. Stilicho, do you know a way out ?”
Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Stilicho pointed his arm toward the top of the room. “One way out is through this roof,” he said. “I do have enough power to carry both of us out of here.”
“That’s great !” said Jasmine. “Before we go, are you able to tell if there are any other people in this underground dungeon ?”
“Of course.” Stilicho said. “May I ask the reason for doing so ?”
“My parents were missing a few days ago, and I tracked one of their signals here. They might have been trapped in this dungeon, just like me."
"Understood.” said Stilicho. He raised his right hand, and a puff of smoke was unleashed out from his arms, as it expanded itself. Then, four small disks, each the size of a CD, flew out from his arms, and started circling around the room, and flew into every door that led out of it.
“Now we have to wait for around ten minutes before they finish a full optical scan. If any humans were in this dungeon, they shall report to me.”
"Thank you.” said Jasmine. “You know, you are the first robot that I’ve met. The elders in the village always told us that robots are enemies, and we shouldn’t trust them. But you seemed like a nice robot.”
“Robots couldn’t be enemies,” said Stilicho. “There must be some kind of mistake. Robots, especially humanoids, were programmed to never harm humans. That is the first principle of our action.”
“Well, something might have changed,”said Jasmine. "You seemed to have been sleeping for quite some time.”
“145 years and 65 days to be precise,” said Stilicho. “though I still find it hard to believe that humans would create robots that could threaten themselves.”
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After some time, the searcher robots returned, all came back empty handed except one, which carried a small device with its arms.
Stilicho took the device and showed it to Jasmine. “Could this belong to one of your parents ?” he asked.
“This is my father’s,” said Jasmine. “There is no one around this thing ?”
Stilicho raised his right hand and the small robots returned into his arms. Stilicho spent some time processing datas, then said: “I’m sorry, there is no detection of any human body beside this room.”
Jasmine looked disappointed. “Father might have dropped this when he crossed the desert.” she said. “Then this thing slipped into this dungeon.”
"Shall we leave this dungeon now ?” asked Stilicho. “You have a better chance at finding your parents up there.”
“Wait,” said Jasmine. “What are you going to do after we leave here?”
Stilicho thought for a moment and answered. "I'll go find my previous owner.”
“But he must be dead, it's been a hundred years !”
“Indeed,” said Stilicho. “But my program demands me to protect my owner if no overwriting assignment exists, and if my owner is deceased, this mission’s target is passed toward his descendants.”
“So you’re going to search for your owner’s family?”
“Precisely.”
“It’ll be dangerous for you,” said Jasmine. “We are at war against robots. If the soldiers see you, they will attack you on sight.”
“This is simply a misunderstanding,” said Stilicho. “I will persuade them that I meant no harm, and we will refrain from hurting each other.”
“But what if they don’t listen,” said Jasmine. “You cannot attack them because of your program, but they can attack you!”
Stilicho lowered his head, pondering if there is a way to avoid this conflict. Jasmine did not miss this opportunity.
“How about we help each other ?” said Jasmine “You help me find my parents, and I’ll help you disguise as a human traveler, so you can search for your owner safely.”
Stilicho raised his head, and looked toward Jasmine.
“Are you willing to help me ?” He asked
“Of course,” said Jasmine. “Though it was more like a trade, right ?”
Stilicho held out his right hand, signaling Jasmine to hold it. Jasmine held it without hesitation.
“Registering biological data.” Stilicho said. “Temporary user registered. Jasmine, from now on I will protect you at all cost, until our goals are achieved.”
Stilicho then pointed his other hand toward the top. Mechanical noises came from his arm, and it started to transform. The fingers that resembled a human’s hand shrank inside his arm, and a big sword popped out of it. The sword was razor sharp, and the tip seemed to be heating up as it glowed in orange.
“Shall we leave here now ?”
Jasmine held on his hand with both her arms. A pair of small rockets emerged from Stilicho’s back, and he flew straight up along with Jasmine. Just when they were about to hit the ceiling, Stilicho used his sword to quickly cut open a hole that was big enough to let them pass.
Finally, they emerged from the underground, and Jasmine looked down toward the ground. The ground looked just like a normal desert covered with sands, except there was a hole that was cut open.
“How come the roof looked transparent when we were down there ?” asked Jasmine.
“Field Induced Transparent Materials,” said Stilicho. “It only allows light to pass from top to bottom, and creates a camouflage if you look at it from the wrong side.”
They continued to fly, until Jasmine saw the hole which she fell in. A couple hours had passed, and the sunlight was becoming weak. Despite this, Jasmine could still see the rope she left off, and a shadow of another man beside it.