Aboard Wyvern, Blake sighed and shut his eyes.
Safe, at last. For now, anyway.
He waited until his legs stopped shaking and he could breathe again, and then he peeled himself from the corridor wall and began his inspection of his saviour.
The walls were clean, rounded, like white veins, with lights embedded in the walls and doors. The doors were controlled by touchpads and slid into the ceiling when activated; Blake enjoyed opening and closing them, oddly satisfied how quiet and neat it was. Nothing at home (home?) had ever been like that.
There was a bridge, with a pilot’s panel and a small worktable. There was a sick bay, with enough equipment to treat two patients at once.
But there were no people.
Blake had heard of ships that flew themselves but he had never been in one. They were too fancy for people like him. He could not reconcile his suspicion of a self-flying ship with his relief that he found one, though, no matter how pleasant the doors were to open; every time he passed an LCD screen, displaying flight statistics and star-charts, he felt uneasy. The windows showed clear, bright space. He had no idea where they were going, and it was too important not to know.
Each time he rounded a new corner or opened a new door, he checked for other people, first, and still saw no-one. Eventually, he reached a strange new wall, not like the others.
It was covered in plugged-in plugs.
Every single plug was the same size, and not one of them had a wire connecting them to anything – just heads in sockets. Blake had never seen anything like this before. When he got closer to investigate, he noticed dangling metal, articulated arms and legs.
All... robots? A hundred robots?
Curious, frowning, Blake reached out a long finger to touch one with a blue ER on the back.
He did not even make contact before the plug raised its arms, pushed against the wall and shoved itself out of the socket, dropping dramatically and clumsily onto the floor. Surprised, Blake took one step back and stared.
The plug head stood on its thin legs, raised its face. Its 16-bit screen blinked at him as two prongs on the sides of its head flicked up like rabbit ears. The whole contraption came up to the height of Blake’s ankles.
The two strangers stared at each other for a very long time. Blake’s prior experiences with artificial intelligence had not set him up for this; the tiny robot merely seemed confused. At last, though, it grinned, waved, and made a noise that sounded like, “Arrr-be!”
Blake stared. There was no real way of knowing what the robot was saying. He was going to have to figure it out himself. Slowly, he lifted his hand and flicked his fingers in greeting, and opened his mouth. He was not accustomed to speaking much, so his first attempt was a cough. Finally, he managed, “Um... hi.”
Content, the little robot hopped towards a ground-level control panel, prodded at it and watched Blake expectantly. A voice called through the ship.
“Good evening, traveller. Welcome aboard Wyvern. We at Zephyr Scout Ships hope you have a pleasant trip. For your convenience, this ship is manned and maintained by Enfant Robotics’ signature robots, the B-2 model. Please refer to the instruction manual if you have any other concerns.”
A scout ship, run by little robots. If Blake believed in luck, he would have been pleased. As it stood, he was still sceptical.
“They...”
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He pointed to the little robot.
“You... you fly this thing?”
The robot’s pixel-face beamed, and it jumped up and down, chiming, “Arrr-pap-pap!”
Easy enough.
“You aren’t going to... throw me off here, are you?”
The robot did not reply. It cocked its head. Blake took this as acceptance on board and wiped his brow.
“Good. Good.” He had a ship. That meant... “Can you show me to the map room? And...” His stomach, usually compliant no matter how much food it received, gurgled alarmingly. “And then the kitchen. I’m starving.”
“Arrr-pap-pap!”
The robot hopped off the way Blake came, and Blake watched as he went.
He really hoped ‘arrr-pap-pap' meant ‘yes’.
In a derelict warehouse on Silverrim was a trapdoor. Above it, lights hung like gouged-out eyes and ladders lay with broken legs. It was a sign of what lurked beneath.
A thug, Wyvern’s registration papers clutched tightly in his hand, lifted the door up. Warm orange light flooded upwards, blinding him, highlighting the sweat on his upper-lip and the flush in his cheeks.
He descended into another world. Rich, grand statues of angelic beings held up globes of light; paintings and pictures of mythical creatures lined the walls in plush reds and royal blues; thick ferns in golden vases hid security cameras in the walls. The mobster straightened up as he walked the carpet. He checked his tie, pulled down his cuffs, brushed dust from his shoulders. The sweat increased. At last, he reached a door manned by two men who were much bigger than him, armed to the teeth, but they recognised him, nodded, and allowed him entry.
The room, as always, was dark. There was an odd sense of emptiness to it, the same way an echo sounded lonely.
The mobster cleared his throat, and the sound was lost to the darkness.
“Mr. King, sir?”
A chair creaked.
“Did you catch the traitor?” said a soft, calm voice in the room. It was impossible to pinpoint where it came from. It sounded large and everywhere.
“Um...” There was no good answer to the question. “Um... n-no, sir.”
Silence. The mobster wiped his mouth, lifted the ship documents.
“But we know where he is, sir. He’s on this ship.”
From nowhere, a second man appeared, snatched the papers and vanished back into the blackness. The rustle of the registration was the only indication that King had received it.
“The valuables?” he said next.
“I think he ‘ad ‘em with him, sir.”
“You think?”
Sweat rolled down the mobster’s face. He wished he had not been the one to draw the short straw.
“He ‘ad ‘em, sir, we just need to find that ship.”
King addressed someone else, the mobster was sure, but he did not want to assume he was free to go until he was told.
“Circulate the registration, name and details of this ship. The... Wyvern. I want to know every time that ship lands, where it lands, who gets on and off it. But mostly, I want Blake dead. Do you understand me? Dead.”
Blake’s evening was much improved. He had a sandwich.
The bridge of Wyvern was a calming bubble that he never knew he needed. It was a sideways oval, all soft edges and light, surrounding the infinite view of stars in the bridge window – and blissfully, finally, silent.
He munched his sandwich, watching the blackness of space and the tiny robot, hopping about on the flight panels, making silly noises. With the stillness, his mind stirred to his purpose.
His... prize? Perhaps.
Carefully, he slid a hand into his jacket pocket and withdrew the orb. It was not the first time he had touched it, but every time felt new, even though he knew its every line and perfect design like he had crafted it himself. The lines signified an opening mechanism, but he had never been able to pry it apart with force. Blake frowned at it, examined it again, then put it safely back into his pocket.
He took another bite, glanced at the robot again. It saw him looking, beeped, then jumped too far and fell off the panel with a mournful ‘booooop’.
And, for once, Blake cracked a smile.
He reached down, retrieved the robot and set it back on the panel, dusting it off.
“Do you have a name, Enfant Robot?”
The robot tilted its head, confused. Blake absently stroked its prongs.
“I shall call you... Miki.”
The robot’s face smiled, and he jumped up and down in glee. Blake settled on the pilot’s chair, trying to come to terms with the fact that he had a ship, and could go wherever he pleased. But...
He leaned forwards, put his elbows on the panel and stared at the sky, wondering.
“Miki, I don’t know where I want to go. I know I want to go far, far away. I just don’t know... where, exactly. I don’t suppose it matters right now.” He turned, to see if Miki was listening, but the robot was prodding Blake’s half-eaten sandwich, fascinated. “Hey.” Blake poked it; Miki jumped. “Is there a course set?”
Miki tapped at the screen on the desk. Blake tilted his head and inspected the chart. There was a cluster of planets and moons but it meant rather little to him, considering that he had never left Silverrim. Any destination was a good destination, as long as it was far from...
“Anywhere else,” he whispered. “That’s where we’ll go.”
On a screen on a different panel, a message flashed up.
Engine Two Status: Failure
Structural repairs needed
Crash landing probability: 100%