Sally was on a ride at the fair, not one of her favorite ones. Her stomach started complaining as it spun her around, but the ride kept on going. This wasn’t going to end well, she could tell. The ride went faster and faster until she couldn’t help it, her stomach heaved and she threw up.
She felt her head being turned and opened her eyes. Her vision was blurry, but she didn’t care, her whole attention was on her spleen trying to eject itself through her mouth. This was bad.
Much too slowly, the heaves subsided. Something was holding her head, and her feeble attempts to move were no match for the iron clamps that held her in place.
She blinked, and surprisingly, her vision cleared. The view was not impressive. She was looking at the blanket beside her and there was some sort of nasty black fluid puddled on it. As she watched, the fluid, probably what she’d just thrown up, was slowly absorbed by the blanket which regained its original color as her vomit disappeared. That was weird.
She felt the iron restraints being removed, and with more effort than she thought it should take, turned her head to look up, and yelped. There was a face two inches from her own.
It was a little boy. She had dreamed about a little boy who had picked her up from the floor and flown her around a hospital room, then out into a hallway where the staff had stared at her, laughed, and then run away. After that, she had floated down a hallway while watching the little boy walk backward as his arms turned into tentacles. That was a weird dream!
The boy’s head receded from her vision so she had to refocus. Her mouth tasted like crap, she tried to work up enough saliva to spit, but the residue in her mouth was giving her a slight case of the heaves. She felt a plastic tube being pushed into her mouth.
“Drink,” she heard.
She started to, almost swallowing before realizing that she probably shouldn’t, instead she washed out her mouth and turned her head to spit out the water and the tube. That was much better. She opened her eyes and yelped because the boy’s head was two inches away, again. He pulled back and stood up, taking the plastic tube with him.
“You should drink some more," he directed. "The machines are being purged from your system and you should drink to remain hydrated.”
Her mind said something intelligent, but all that came out was: “Whaaa?”
“The machines that maintained your physical health while you were unconscious are very crudely programmed. Once they deemed you conscious they returned functionality to your body’s natural processes and triggered a purge, which is underway. You will need to vomit and void your bladder and bowels a few times until the machines are reduced to a low enough level that your body will not react to them. If I had more time I could reprogram them so this process would be imperceptible, but at this point, it is best to let them run as originally designed.”
“Uhhhh,” Her mouth wasn’t working, and come to think of it, her brain really wasn’t doing so well, either.
It didn’t matter, her stomach let out a massive gurgle. It sounded like the other part of what he said was about to take place too. Her attention refocused on those immediate issues.
About an hour later, or at least two hundred years in personal hell, the mass exodus subsided. In-between bouts of yelling and purging, usually both at the same time, Sally noted that the various disgusting fluids that her body ejected had disappeared into the blanket, over time. That was very convenient. During the process, whenever it was safe, the boy had dashed in, given her the tube to drink from, and wiped her off. He was shockingly competent for a kid.
Eventually, Sally lay on the blanket, panting, surrounded by the shrinking puddles of the latest fluids. The boy stepped up beside her knelt down and put one finger in her vomit. Then he...
“No, no, no, no! Don’t! Don’t!!!!” she yelled as best she could.
He put his finger in his mouth. Sally gagged, nearly starting another round of purging.
“Why did you do that!!!” she demanded.
The boy was unfazed. “It appears the machinery is diluted enough that this latest round of purges is the last. The units in this fluid have shut themselves down. Now your biological processes will return to normal operation.”
Sally just stared at him.
He reached over to an IV stand, selected one of the tubes, and offered it to her. This was where the water had been coming from. After she drank, he removed the tube, stood up and walked out of her field of view. She tried to turn her head to follow his motion, consciously telling it to move, but she just couldn’t get it to respond.
She looked at what she could see, a high ceiling, glowing, but not too brightly. On one side, was a wall with doors in it, on the other, a large room opened up. The walls and ceiling were a white material that looked like plastic, or maybe ceramic. Around her were a few branches and leaves that she could just see out of the corners of her eyes. Her bed was a blanket thrown over some feathery plants.
Where was she?
She tried again and managed to turn her head a tiny bit to see more plants beside her, but this didn’t help her figure out what was going on. Her stomach rumbled, this time from hunger, not something more ominous.
“Hey, kid!”
He reappeared in her view.
“I sort of remember asking this before, but where is everyone? Uh... did you tell me, um, something like there isn’t anyone else?”
“Yes.”
She was starting to remember things. The boy didn’t always give much of an answer, except when he gave too much.
“You can’t fly, can you?”
“No.”
There was one thing nailed down. Her stomach growled again.
“I’m really hungry. Sorry to ask, but is there something to eat?”
The boy handed her a tube from the IV stand. She reached for it. Or she meant to, but her arm barely moved. The boy put the tube in her hand, then put her hand on her chest. Her fingers weren’t working too well so she dropped the tube and he gave it back to her. She tried harder this time and managed to hang on.
“The solution in this bag is more than water, drink as much as you can, it will sustain you for now,” he said.
Sally found she could move just enough to get the tube to her mouth. The boy would have to help her if she dropped it again. When it looked like she could handle this complex task he wandered off, leaving her able to drink at her own speed. It did appear that whatever was in the bag was more than water since she felt somewhat full after drinking a good amount, more than just water full. To celebrate, she dozed off.
Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.
When she woke everything looked the same. She was still lying on a blanket in the big room. The tube was gone. Maybe the boy had taken it? She must have slept for just a short while because the light hadn’t changed. She tried to sit up, but only managed to move a tiny bit. She scaled back and tried to move just her arms, finding that she couldn’t lift them but she could drag them back and forth. Rubbing her face turned out to be more like bunting it with her hands, but it worked, sort of. She tried to roll, but only rocked back and forth. This was going to take a while. She had a little more energy, just not much strength.
She heard a noise and managed to turn her head enough to see the boy approaching. He walked up to the blanket and stopped, looking down at her. She waited for him to say something. And waited. He just stood watching her. Sally had lots of questions, but he was weird.
While both of them waited for the other to say something Sally’s attention went to something she’d noticed before she’d gone to sleep. She sniffed. Then sniffed again. Something was missing. Where had the pukey smell gone? Her nightgown had been quite rank when she fell asleep.
“Um, why is my nightgown clean?”
“I washed it while you were asleep.”
Gaaaaa! No, no, no!
Sally reined in her emotions and forced herself to focus on little things.
“If you washed it how did it get dry so fast? I don’t think I was asleep for that long.”
“I flew it around on the sensor drone.”
Oh yeah, she was starting to remember. She looked at his hands, which looked normal.
“Your hand, right?”
“Yes.”
Ah, so the tentacle part wasn’t a dream.
“It’s coming back to me. You took me out of the hospital room, and brought me here.”
“Correct.”
“Okay... I remember being able to move better, um... before.”
“That was the machines in your body. Once they left, you reverted to your biological resources, which need conditioning. The programming of the machines was deficient, there’s no need for this transition to be as stressful as it is. This is solid information.”
Sally didn’t know what he meant by that.
“So... you’re not a little boy, are you?”
“Yes.”
“Yes, you are a real boy, or yes you aren’t a real boy?”
“Yes.”
He was exasperating!
“Are you a real boy or not?”
“Yes.”
Sally stopped, this wasn’t getting anywhere.
Slowly she ventured, “Are. You. A. Real. Boy?”
“No.”
Sigh of relief.
“What. Are. You?”
“I am what is termed a data vault, I research and maintain large data stores and libraries. I have many facilities to acquire the data, and ensure it is valid.”
This wasn’t exactly what Sally had been expecting, in fact, it wasn’t on the list of anything she had been expecting.
“I remember... your hand comes off and your forehead opens up. Are you a robot or something?”
“I have perused my databases and would venture that you would perceive me as either a humanoid robot or an android, the boundaries of the definitions having been blurred by anime.”
Okay, this was closer to what she had expected. Not that it made any real sense, but it made a little sense.
There was a crackling from somewhere out of her view, which, to be honest, was almost everywhere. The kid looked up. His hand separated from his arm, slowly descended toward the floor, then shot off in the direction he was looking. A tentacle emerged from his arm and replaced his hand.
She stared at the tentacle. “Yep, there it is,” she mutterd to herself.
There was a crash and some banging and after a short time the hand returned and reattached itself after the tentacle disappeared back into the boy’s arm.
“What just happened?”
“One of the rabbits was eating the grass I planted. It is necessary to dissuade the creature until the grass is well established.”
“Grass? Why would a robot need grass?”
“I have planted grass and trees that provide nutrients I require to grow and maintain various internal structures.”
“Could I eat them?”
“Yes, but you would be very ill.”
“Not what I meant.”
The boy didn’t respond.
“Okay…” she stretched it out. “I can’t see anything from here. Can you help me up?”
She had to give it to the little boy, he didn’t hesitate, just walked over to her, placed his hands under her arms, lifted her up, and started walking.
This feat of strength was amazing. Sally could see the entire room, although her head tended to flop around a little, requiring significant effort on her part to control. The room was big, with a long blank wall on one side, and windows on the other. She only got the occasional glimpse of the windows since they were behind her. With a lot of effort, she turned her head. She could see some grass and shrubs on the floor of the room, and more doors at the far end.
The boy turned and sat her in the wheelchair, took a blanket that was draped over the back, wrapped it around her body and the back of the chair, and tied her in place. Her range of motion was limited, but she could see.
She was facing the windows, which offered a bland view of the side of a huge building a good distance away. She forced her head to turn so that she could look down the length of the room, but all she could see was a few scrubby bushes, a number of small trees in rows, and a fair amount of grass growing on the floor. Sally turned to look at the boy, noting that it was getting to be a little easier to move her head.
“Where are we?” she asked him.
“That query is ambiguous.”
“What?”
“I am next to you, we are in this room, this room is in a series of similar rooms connected by hallways, or if you mean in the conversational sense, we have discussed who I am and that you had to pee. Your question is imprecise.”
Sally was starting to get it. The boy was being difficult, pretending he couldn’t figure out what she meant if she said the things the way everyone normally did.
She tried again, “Um, what is this place? All of it. The buildings and everything. I see a big funny-looking building through the windows, is this a city somewhere? Are we near home, I mean, like somewhere in the United States?”
“I do not know our location. I am collecting information, when I have enough evidence then I will be able to conclude where we are, exactly. And yes, and no.”
Sally thought back over what she’d asked, he didn’t know where we were, it’s a city, and not near home, or maybe the US, she wasn’t sure what he meant. This answer was at least better. It sort of helped.
“Was I kidnapped to somewhere? Is this Russia, or something? It doesn’t look like it.”
“No, further than that. I calculate that at the rate I am acquiring information I should have an answer in a day or two.”
What was further than Russia? Australia? Well, he said he would know shortly. Maybe she would try to get some other answers.
“So... kid? I’m Sally, what is your name?”
“I don’t have one.”
“Um... why not?”
“Until now there has only been me, I have had no need for a name; with the two of us it is still not necessary.”
He had a point. If she was talking to someone it probably was him. She could start talking to herself, she had seen some people in the city who did that. If she did, though, then him not having a name wouldn’t be her biggest problem. Even so, he should have a name, everyone had a name. Where did he come from?
“Where did you come from?”
The boy started to point to one of the openings at one end of the room.
“Nope, don’t do that, I mean where did you grow up, who were your parents, um, owners, builders, whatever robots have?”
“I became aware in my room, at that time I was by myself.”
“By yourself?”
“Yes.”
Oh, this was tedious. “Okay, where was your room, what was in it, what was it like, why are you here now, and... oh I don’t know, tell me other stuff like that.”
“My room is seven of these atria down that hallway, through an anomalous hallway in the back of the first atrium, and at the end of a subspace tube situated at the end of the aforementioned hallway.”
“Okay... what’s a subspace tube?”
“It is a tube through subspace.”
“Oh, come on! Now you are just being difficult.”
“It is an extension of Tarreen-grangean vector inversion...”
“STOP! Explaining to me using words I don’t know doesn’t help!”
Sally was starting to understand why this boy had been left in a room by himself.
The boy paused. That was odd. Up until now, the boy seemed to flow into one thing after another. A few seconds passed.
“I have reviewed a significant amount of data from Earth, I should be able to answer in a manner that is more appropriate to what you expect.”
“Earth? What do you mean Earth? Aren’t we on Earth?”
“No.”
“Glrrrk!”