Spoiler! :
“It’s not that bad, really,” I said, settling easily into the chrome lawn chair. “I don’t mind it so terribly much.”
“But I do!” Dr. Finsch insisted, “And we’re all dreadfully sorry the laser surgery failed.”
I nodded understandingly and waited. Eventually, he would run out of words and leave. What he was saying was only important to him; he had to know that, even after countless failures, he was not the one blame. I didn’t hold it against him, since he had a professional dignity to keep up. If his ego fell, millions of other patients would suffer. The least I could do was comfort him and let him go his way, happy.
It was ironic, really, since I was the patient, and he the doctor. Our roles should not have been switched under normal circumstances. Of course, these really weren’t normal circumstances. I was the first uncured patient in Dr. Finsch’s history. But most of all, I was the first one to have Leymuer’s syndrome in more than two hundred years.
The cause was unknown, the cure, more so, and the recovery rate...dead zero. The sufferers could not See, Talk or Hear. In the world I lived in, such disadvantages were severely crippling. The government had given me a life pension and a sensorium to myself, assuring everyone that my disease was not killing me, and that they had tried every cure in the book.
Finsch seemed to be struggling to force his next words out, so I concentrated at the sand beneath his feet and waited for him to speak. The waves rolled in and out, rolling the sand repeatedly, but Finsch’s feet were cemented firmly a centimeter above the ground.
“We could try one last time,” Finsch suggested, not as hopefully as he’d said it the past forty times. “Of course, the chance of a full recovery after each session drops by two percent…”
I leaned back into the lawn chair and closed my eyes, tasting each word and phrase carefully before letting them escape my lips.
“I don’t think I need any more sessions, Doctor,” I assured him. “I’m quite happy to remain in this sensorium. Really, why would I want to Talk or See?”
“Well, it’s a wonderful sensation!” Dr. Finsch affirmed. “Why, it’s one of the greatest inventions in the history of all Mankind! The ability to–”
“I know all of that, Doctor,” I interrupted as calmly as possible. “It just a pity I can’t experience it, eh? Thank and good day.”
Before he could spew out a string of apologies, I waved my left hand before my face and he disappeared. The arm of my chair vibrated gently and shifted the beach settings to a middle-sized, grey-walled room.
“Computer,” I spoke commandingly into thin air. “Open files fifteen and seventeen, overlay and play simultaneously.”
As the invisible speakers began to roll out the thunderous sounds of a prairie shower and whale cries, I prepared my lunch. In the sensorium, I waved my hands to produce apples, bread, cheese and wine, but outside the sensorium, where my true body was, intravenous lines injected a slew of nutrients directly into my bloodstream.
Nothing was really real in the sensorium. Here I could achieve a semblance of Seeing and Talking, but in the outside world I was as Blind and Deaf as a newborn.
As I finished the last crumbs of bread and cheese, the grey walls began to quiver and I watched as a holographic head filled the space between me and the nearest wall.
It was a good imitation of what a holograph would look like in the real world, complete with the digital distortion and dust refraction, but I could not understand why they would go through the trouble just to contact me. Other visitors appeared as Doctor Finsch had, as another simulucron in my Sensorium.
“Mr. Danish?” the head asked, and, without waiting for me to confirm it, continued. “I’ve been sent by Manger C. Mulls, the head of the government medical branch.”
“I know Mr. Mulls,” I replied easily, waving the rest of my meal into invisibility. “Why has he not come himself to deliver this message?”
The head wore an uncomfortable expression, and as yet I could not tell if it was a computerized AI or a real human user. His brown hair was worn slicked back, tinted dark green at the tips. His face was smooth and white, almost too young to be carrying a government message. Maybe it was an AI.
“The Department of Medical Care and Aid can no longer support you and your sensorium,” the head said briskly. “Protocol required that a holo-message be sent to Mr. Danish, wherever he be, to inform him that he will no longer be supported with a free sensorium by the Galactic Government. Starting on June fifteenth, 3075, Mr. Danish must start his life as a citizen of the Galaxy, finding his education and earning his own wages as he sees fit.”
I was almost too confused and flustered for words, but I managed to blurt out: “But you can’t do that!”
“Pardon?” the head was mocking me now, I could see his sneer.
“I’m fifty years old!” I said gaspingly. “I could not survive in the world out there. For one I am not immunized to whatever diseases exist right outside the sensorium, and for another I am medically diagnosed with Leymuer’s syndrome! It is the duty of the government to shield me!”
“Leymuer’s syndrome is not named in your health care insurance plan, Mr. Danish,” the head replied quickly. “And no personal insurance on your part can be found. This decision was made as of yesterday, the fourteenth, and already we are behind schedule. You will find that you are not quite fifty years old in the real world, Mr. Danish, since a sensorium slows perceived time. Also, appropriate vaccinations are being injected into your body as we speak. They will take effect immediately, and you will be safely protected from any and all viruses for up to three weeks. After that, you must find vaccines or stim-packs on your own, of your own. Good day, Mr. Danish.”
The head spoke so fast and with such a professional air that I could not get a word in edgewise. When it finally stopped, the hologram disappeared and my world began to crumble.
First, the walls of pure grey turned black and then melted into pixel-dust. The ceiling blasted away with a sound like high wind, revealing an empty blackness that stretched and yawned away like an eternal abyss. My whale music was still playing, but it was garbled now, high-pitched and electronically corrupted. Finally, as a finishing blow, the floor cracked in two, sending me falling, spinning hurtling towards all that impossible black.
* * *
“He’s stable, let’s purge it now.”
The voice came from far away, from the top of a blue-green pool. It was very faint, and I knew that I was hearing someone Speak. It wouldn’t last for long though, when I left the safety of the sensorium, I would never Hear another voice Speak.
I fought the liquid, but it only churned against me like syrup. My arms grew weary like they had never before done in the sensorium, and I could feel a burning in my lungs that I was unfamiliar with.
“Quickly before we lose him, we don’t wa-”
And just like that, the liquid was gone, along with the voice. I crouched at the bottom of the submersion pool, dripping green fluid from my naked body. My lungs flamed like white-hot coals in my chest as I drew in moist breaths. My brain, under the bald scalp, pulsed frantically, as though someone were electrocuting me.
For a few moments, I stayed as I was, trying to regain my energy. Somebody banged on the window of the tank and I looked up into the face of a sensorium worker. He was young, with brown hair, and I almost thought the holographic head had come back to taunt me. His fingers rose hesitantly into the air, and he pointed at me, crooked his finger and then jabbed his thumb over his shoulder.
You. Come. Out.
His signs were crude, but I understood them well enough. Heaving myself out of the tank hatch was nearly impossible. I looked to the attendant twice for help, but both times he turned away.
When I finally got out, the attendant stared up at the control room high above for awhile, then turned back to me. He made his fingers walk across his hands, and then pointed at his chest.
Follow. Me.
I followed.
Our path took me through a washing room, where high-pressure jets of hot water rinsed the fluid off and scrubbed whatever grime I had accumulated from the tank over the fifty years I had been there. Or had it been fifty? What if the head had spoken the truth? Maybe I was twenty or thirty in the real world.
A blast of hot air shattered my train of thought and nearly bowled me over. Within seconds, though, it had me dry. We walked on, and I noticed that the attendant had not come near me once. It didn’t make sense, though; the trained sensorium attendants, whose IQ’s averaged around 86, were afraid of ‘catching’ my disease. Or was he simply afraid of something different? Not likely, all forms of racial and class discrimination had disappeared almost a hundred years ago.
No matter the reason, my helper remained where he was: a safe three feet away. He signed again to me, but this time I didn’t understand him. His hands grasped the fabric of his apron and tugged up and down, and then he pointed.
I followed his gesture and saw a neatly folded pile of clothing on a low counter. I looked around and realized that I was in a Personal of some sort. There was a mirror, a sink and a cologne dispenser, but no commode of any sort, not even one of those space-ship plasma trays. I knew it would be no use, but I had to try anyways.
“Where’s the toilet?” I asked.
The attendant had been busily tapping away at a hand-held pad when I spoke. At the sound of my voice, he jerked against the wall and dropped the pad. It bounced off the floor a few times, the indestructible case proving true. The pad came to rest near my feet and I picked it up. I saw him shudder when my fingers closed around the small machine, and when I offered it back, he shrunk away from me, his head shaking an unmistakable sign: no.
Sighing inwardly, I set the pad down on the counter and turned to the clothing. The outfit was grey, the same color my familiar walls had been. I wondered if that had been purposeful. Probably not.
The first piece was a close fitting shirt with elbow-length sleeves. It was some kind of synthetic material, thin now, but most definitely designed to swell in cold weather and open pores in hot. I slipped it over my head and picked up the next piece.
This one was an ankle-length circular swath of cloth that tightened around me waist when I stepped into it. A protective plastic cup and matching plastic bracelets fitted around my groin and ankles, gripping with a comforting level of protection. The result was a billowing balloon of cloth that mushroomed out at my waist and tapered down to my feet. The latest styles had certainly changed while I had been in suspended animation.
“I’m done,” I announced, eager to get out of the sensorium facility.
My guide seemed relieved, and hurried past me to the second room. He left the pad, no doubt giving it up for good, and I slipped it into one of the pockets in my voluminous pants.
Here, in the last room, a yawning grey rectangle stood before me. I recognized it as a molecular transmitter, and MT door. The attendant punched some random public address and gestured me out.
I took one last look at the dirty concrete walls around me, hesitant despite my earlier eagerness. I was about to leave the only thing shielding me from the Real World…and certain death.
They had foreseen my reluctance, apparently, for, at the touch of a button, the floor beneath my feet began to move slowly towards the door. I could do nothing now; my fate was fixed at the rate of a conveyor belt.
First my hands went, stretched out before me to feel the way. The velvety grey swallowed them up and I felt and electric tingling along my arms. What little hair I had on my body stood straight up, while all the vastness of my balloon pants wrapped tightly around my legs, stuck like a wrapper to candy. It was a most disconcerting feeling, the static touch of an MT door, but it was nothing compared to the constricting feeling of fear in my heart.
A moment later, my toes were snared tightly in the door. I leaned my body backwards, as far from the door as I could. Perhaps it was worse that way, seeing and feeling the grey creep up my legs, belly and chest like an all-consuming caterpillar, eating my body into oblivion.
It seemed to slow as it approached my face. I nearly gagged when it covered my mouth. Up the bridge of my nose it crept, terrifyingly slow. I tried to scream, to cry out, but no sound came from my de-molecularizd mouth, lost somewhere in the electric innards of the door.
I squeezed my eyes shut, hiding myself in the safety behind my eyelids. Everything was black.
And then, suddenly, everything was grey.
* * *
It seemed like an eternity before I returned, reassembled on the other side. It felt like being ejected from a vacuum tube, with all the sound effects of a popped champagne cork. For a brief time, a crawling sensation overtook my entire body, but it was gone before I even realized it.
Before me stretched a generic tunnel, empty except for the service bots that scurried along noiselessly. I took a tentative step away from the MT door, and listened to the hollow echo of my feet on the cold concrete floor.
“Hello?” I whispered, not expecting much. “Hello?”
Somewhere down the tunnel, heavy machinery ground out a thumping beat, matching the tempo of my heart. I walked towards the sound, terrified by drawn to it nonetheless.
Minutes later, I stepped into a massive room, taller than any of the sensorium rooms had been. High above, light came down from a natural source, almost lost in the glare of the industrial lights. Huge machines with wheel thrice my height rolled across a vast concrete field, pulling loads bigger than themselves. Workers crawled across the face of one wall, infinitesimally small against the massive grayness. I could see no men working the machines, only robots.
I stepped into the strobe of on of the lights and looked around, fearing a reprimand or punishment. Nothing happened. Stepping further into the light, I grew bolder. I probably had dozens of safety robots Talking to me, but I could not Hear, Leymuer’s Syndrome took care of that.
I saw metal rungs at one side of the door, and, as far as I could tell, they stretched up to the surface. It must have been more than a hundred feet away, but I was going to die in a few days anyway.
I grasped the first rung with a fevered determination, they could not Talk to me, and they could not stop me. If anyone killed me it would be a mercy. I was invincible.
I think I must have run on my frenzy of energy for half the way, but soon my strength began to ebb out. I forced my tired arms to work again and again until they felt more like throbbing lumps of flesh. I panted hard, in and out, until there was no space between exhale and inhale.
I reached for yet another rusty rung, but my sweat-slicked hands betrayed me. My hold loosened and I dropped probably ten feet before my hand caught on another rung. The weight on my shoulder nearly pulled my joint out of place and I screamed like I’d tried to at the MT door. My cry was swallowed up in the emptiness of that massive room, though, and nothing heard me.
Crying, sobbing, sweat popping from the pores of my forehead; I reached up with my other arm to ease the pain. I held on with both hands to the rung, gripping with a death-hold for no reason. Why was I trying to live? If I just let go my hold, I would plummet to a quick and most likely painless death. It would be over for me, the robots could clear up the greasy spot I would leave behind and the world would be rid of Leymuer’s Syndrome again.
I don’t know why, but I put my feet back into the rungs and got my hold stabilized once more. I must have sat there for half an hour, slowing my breathing, my thumping heart and the thoughts that flew through my head. By the time I started up again, the light from above was gone, and I felt my way forward. The industrial lights I had left behind long ago, but every now and then I could feel a strobe pass over me accidentally. Could they not see me? Were the robots so preoccupied that they could not care about a human climbing their walls? Or had they been given orders to ignore all else until their tasks were completed?
Whatever the reason, it kept them from me for the duration of my trials. They owed me nothing and I knew it. The sooner I left the underground the better.
It must have been midnight when I finally climbed up and over the lip of a massive hole. Above me the moon shone down with all her yellow-grey light, and I lowered myself into the coarse grass.
My arms burned with the fire of a thousands sun, and a terrible hunger twisted my stomach, but my heart and mind were lighter than clouds. I had done it! A million rungs had not been able to stop me, who said Leymuer’s Syndrome made a man completely unworkable in society? If I could climb my way out of a construction tunnel, I could do anything.
I rolled away from the tunnel and fell into a deep sleep, unburdened by dreams or visions.
* * *
The sun shone directly into my eyes from across the plains, piercing into my cornea with a flaming stare. I groaned and rubbed my face, then my belly. Overnight, the bruises I’d garnered during my climb had turned purple and ached terribly. I stumbled upright, hating the taste in my mouth, and looked down into the tunnel.
It was still there, the rungs as rusty as ever, and the height just as dizzying as before. I turned from it and looked around me.
To the right, the tunnel edge stretched on forever, meeting the sky where the horizon was. A few sparse copses marked the edge in some places, but, other than that, the plains were bare.
To my left, the view was much the same, what with the tunnel edge and all. But instead of a shortage of shrubbery, I saw what looked to be miles and miles of thick forest.
I walked into the forest, looking for anything, water, food, other people. But then I stopped in my tracks. Any people I found would be Talkers and Seers, people who, in all likeliness, had never heard of Leymuer’s Syndrome. They would Talk to me, and I would Hear. From their perspective, I would be an insensitive stranger, ignoring any and all calls from even those nearby.
The elation I’d felt the night before was gone, replaced by the cold realization that all humankind would shun me because of my disability. I stepped forward again, but this time I was not sure why. Just as it was on the rungs, I found myself being pushed by something within me, trying to live just a little longer.
The first thing I found was a cold stream, no doubt pouring over the edge of the tunnel somewhere. As I drank and washed my face, I wondered what the robots had done to keep the water from coming into their workplace. Maybe they had directed it along the tunnel until it reach the sea. Maybe they captured the water and used it.
My train of thought took up any subject immediately, my distracted brain searching for a reason to think. If I stopped thinking, I would soon after stop walking. And if that happened, I would be dead. Not truly dead, but dead in the sense that nothing could compel me to move or change or do anything. My wants, needs and fears would disappear, and I would be a single mote of stasis in that living, growing forest.
Speaking of which, I hadn’t noticed one living thing among the trees other than a few odd beetles and flies. I lifted my head to the wind and breathed in deeply, trying, maybe, to find life by smell.
The idea seemed so absurd that I let out my breath in a half-laugh, half-gasp.
It was a strange sound, and I was silent immediately afterwards, but it felt good to hear something.
“I wonder where I am.” I said aloud, glad that I had thought of speaking to myself. “I sure could use some food.”
“Who are you talking to?” a voice asked from behind me.
I jumped like the attendant had when I spoke, but it was with an entirely different emotion. It was surprise, fear and joy all in one.
I turned and saw a small child, not even eight, behind me. Her blonde hair was cropped close to her scalp, evidence of the lower working class. Her skin was fair, though, and her cheeks still rosy, so I knew she had not yet been drafted into the working machine of the Galaxy. Her hands were twisted into her light brown tunic, and several stains marked the tips of her fingers.
“I…I was talking to myself,” I said, suddenly finding my voice wooden and heavy. “Who are you?”
“I’m Lucy,” she replied, smiling like a sunbeam. “I live over there. Who are you?”
“I’m…Henry,” I answered, smiling too. “Do your parents live there?”
“What?” Lucy’s expression was screwed up with confusion. “Only Dennis and Darbie live there.”
“Your mom and dad?”
“I don’t know what those are either,” she said, looking at me as though I were crazy. “Dennis and Darbie are robots.”
“Oh…I see.” I said, not really seeing it at all.
Had Humanity gone so far as to entrust their offspring to machines? How long had I really spent in the sensorium?
“You wanna come in?” Lucy asked, stepping towards the direction she had indicated. “I think Dennis isn’t home.”
“Oh, sure,” I said. “I’ll come.”
I followed her like a lost puppy, trying to get back to home and reason. I knew that once the robots Spoke to me, they would know I had Leymuer’s Syndrome. They would at least know something was wrong with me, even if they didn’t know what it was, and surely I would be back here again.
The thought was upsetting, but for the moment I enjoyed walking with Lucy. She sang as she walked, and her step had a skip to it. Soon we passed into a clearing in the forest, and a modest building came into view.
It was only a single story with a few windows, and it was made with some crude concrete-like material, but it had been painted with cheery colors, and the roof was shingled with a nice design. Lucy ran right into the open door and called out loudly to Darbie, her mother-bot, no doubt.
I remained where I was, halfway between the clearing edge and the house, uncertain of what to do. Lucy quickly brought the robot with her as she came out, and I looked into deep blue photo-optic cells, so much like human eyes.
When the robot saw me, she stood still with her eyes locked on mine. No doubt she was attempting to Talk with me, but I could not Hear.
Her hands, as beautiful as an artists’, quivered for a moment, and the light in her eyes faded slightly. She turned to Lucy, a question on her metaphorical lips.
“Where did you find him, Lucy?” the robot trilled, her voice plainly mechanical.
“In the forest,” Lucy replied happily, no doubt pleased in her new game. “He was talking to himself.”
“Talking?” the robot repeated.
Despite having no outward expression, the robot was very plainly surprised, almost shocked. She took another step towards me, and I followed suit. Another step, another.
Soon, we were two feet away from each other, Lucy bouncing between us like a frog, giggling with mirth.
“Hello.” I said meekly, hoping she would reply.
Her hands quivered violently, and her eyes flared a brilliant blue. Lucy looked up with surprise.
“H-Hello-oh-oh, sir.” She warbled ungracefully. “My name is-is…Darbie.”
“Please don’t be alarmed,” I said, as calmly and as slowly as I could manage. “I’m not crazy or wounded.”
“Why don’t you communicate-ate with me on the psionic level?” she asked, her voice becoming clearer as she went on. “Have you been h-h-h…”
“No, I’ve not been harmed,” I assured her quickly. “I’m in a perfect state of mind and health.”
“Thank you sir,” Darbie said, now sounding completely normal. “I fear I may cause you distress but…”
“It’s alright,” I said. “I am diagnosed with Leymuer’s Syndrome, it is impossible for me to Talk, Hear or See.”
“I understand,” Darbie replied after a few moments, no doubt having looked it up in some dictionary. “Won’t you please come in, sir?”
I followed Darbie and Lucy into the house, and sat at a wooden table. Darbie poured me a glass of water from a stone pitcher, and then stood in a niche in the wall.
“Why are you here?” she asked, after sending Lucy to play outside. “Humans never come to this part of the world anymore.”
“And Lucy?” I pointed out. “Isn’t she human?”
“Forgive my mistake,” she said hurriedly. “I meant that no adult humans ever come to this place. For one it is not yet terraformed to human satisfaction, and for another, there are children about.”
“I don’t see what you’re talking about,” I said. “This place suits me fine, and what’s wrong with children?”
“Humans…are difficult to explain,” Darbie replied. “And you are not like any others I’ve met.”
“Well, I’ve spent the better part of my life in a sensorium,” I explained. “So that may be the reason why.”
“Of course!” she said brightly. “I can see now. You were encapsuled for your own good because of this…syndrome. When you came out, the world had changed so much that you stumbled into what you were unfamiliar with.”
“And what is it I’ve stumbled into, Darbie?”
“A child farm,” she replied coolly. “Where we grow humans to serve their places in the Galaxy.”
* * *
“I’m terribly sorry,” Darbie twittered frantically. “If I had known my words could have had that affect on you, I would have-ave-ave…”
“It’s alright, Darbie,” I said, wiping my sweaty brow with my hands. “I’m better now.”
My face was probably still white, but my heart rate was normal again. I still couldn’t believe she had said what she did as though it were a perfectly normal thing. I sat back in my chair and gulped my water.
“Are there many child farms?” I asked hesitantly. “More like this one?”
“I don’t think we should discuss that,” Darbie explained cagily. “If you were to suffer another attack like the last, I’m afraid I may need to have my circuits examined.”
“It wasn’t an attack,” I replied. “And I’ll be fine; it was a one time thing, really.”
“Well, if you insist,” Darbie said, with an electronic buzz that might had been a robotic sigh. “There are many farms like this.
“It began many years ago, as a place parents could leave their children while they worked. In the evening, they were picked up again and lived with their parents for the night ad part of the morning. As time went on, the Galaxy found that they could speed up production by limiting the visits parents made to their children.
“Over time, that simple principle has been accelerated to this level: child farms. The children are given to us at a very early age, and then raised to adulthood by robots.”
“But that’s monstrous!” I exploded. “How can sane parents leave their children here and forget about them?”
“This sort of thing has been going on for a very long time, sir,” Darbie said. “For longer than I’ve been around, and I was manufactured a little less than fifty years ago.”
Fifty. The age I thought I was. How old was I really?
“What year is this, Darbie?” I asked.
“It is 3075,” Darbie replied. “June the sixteenth.”
Of course! The holographic head had told me so, but I had not heard it, so shocked I was by the news it bore. If that was the year, then I was…one-hundred and fifty years old.
I looked down at my body and saw the muscles and form of a thirty-year old. My body’s energy was thrice what it had been in the sensorium, and my brain was still sharp. My time in the sensorium had literally frozen me at the age I had entered.
I looked into Darbie’s metal face, and my own was reflected on the polished metal sheen. I looked just as young as I had suspected, no wrinkles, so sagged eyes, and only bruises to mark my skin.
“I believe you are just now finding out what happens to you after extended sensorium sessions,” Darbie said, speaking very slowly. “Is it shocking?”
“Somewhat,” I mumbled. “I guess I should have expected it, though.”
Shouts and cries tumbled through the open window and we both looked up.
“I believe Dennis is here now,” Darbie said, leaving her niche.
She stopped in mid-stride and looked back at me.
“I think you should know something, sir,” she said. “Dennis was made with a protective priority, whereas I had my maternal circuitry heightened. He may not trust y–”
She was broken off when a larger robot stepped into the room, his frame completely filling the doorway. Dennis was painted red, and his yellow eyes blazed like fire over Darbie, then me and then back at Darbie.
“He is a visitor,” Darbie explained. “He was lost, and Lucy found him.”
Dennis turned wordlessly towards me, and I rose from my chair.
“Hello, Dennis,” I said, holding my hand out towards the giant robot. “I’m Henry.”
Dennis took my hand and shook as only a robot could, but he remained silent.
“Dennis does not speak,” Darbie filled in. “He was designed to train the children how to Talk. He asked me why you did not Hear him, and I told him the reason.”
“But he can understand me, right?” I asked.
“Yes,” Darbie confirmed. “He was built for that much at least.”
Dennis pointed on his red digits at my chest and made a guttural grinding noise deep in his chest. For a while, the room was silent, and I realized that Dennis and Darbie were Talking.
“He wants you to leave,” Darbie said, the worry evident even in her electrical voice. “He thinks you’re a bad example for the children, teaching them to talk. To be truly human, you must forget to talk and learn to Talk.”
How ironic.
“Please understand that I will not disrupt with Lucy’s or any other children’s schooling,” I said. “I cannot go anywhere else.”
The direness of my situation struck me then, I was hanging the balance of my existence on the whims of a robot. Granted my existence was scheduled to end in a few days, but even that was worth fighting for.
“Dennis says you may stay only if you promise not to leave this building,” Darbie said. “He is equipped with medical scanning equipment –for the children’s health– and he says that you will die soon, your immune system cannot hold itself up. There are…” I could hear her tone change and knew she was no longer translating Dennis’ speech. “There are many disadvantages to a life in a sensorium.”
“I know,” I replied. And then, to Dennis: “I promise.”
And then the countdown began.
* * *
Dennis had to leave again, but he must have left instructions for Darbie, for she never left her niche in the wall, even when the children called her to come out and play. I hadn’t seen any other than Lucy, but more than once I heard unfamiliar voices rise in anger or excitement. There were no windows facing their playground, so I could not watch them.
The building only had four rooms, two of which were sleeping rooms. The third room was the kitchen and dining room and the fourth served a storage room for food, clothes and medicine. Once a month, Darbie explained, a hover-copter replenished their supplies. According to Dennis’ ominous premonitions, I would never see it arrive.
“Does it hurt you?” Darbie asked, interrupting my thoughts. “Your syndrome, does it hurt?”
“Not at all,” I replied to her cheerfully. “I bear it easily.”
I couldn’t risk her going into positronic freeze, or else I would be at the mercy of Dennis, if he had any. I tried my hardest to put on a happy face, hoping she couldn’t see through it.
“You must remember that I am equipped to view humans on the psionic level, Henry,” she said, her crystal blue eyes piercing into mine. “I can See your emotional aura, and I know you are lying.”
My smile froze on my face; I hadn’t known robots could do that. Could normal humans also manage that trick? I hung my head to hide my eyes and nodded slowly.
“I suppose you could call me harmed by my syndrome,” I admitted. “Ever since I left the sensorium things have been getting worse. You and Lucy are the bright spots, though, you should think about that.”
“You know robots cannot ignore harm in humans,” Darbie intoned. “It is the First Law of Robots: No robot may cause harm to any human, or, though inaction, allow a human to come to harm.”
I nodded my head again, the Three Laws were perhaps the most known set of phrases in the whole Galaxy. Every school child could quote them perfectly after leaving kindergarten, and most learned to twist them to force family robots to do their bidding.
“I could try to cure you,” Darbie said, her words surprising me, and, I think, her. “I would not be disobeying Dennis in doing so: he ordered me to keep you as comfortable as the First Law appointed.”
“Impossible,” I replied. “Hundreds of surgeons, doctors and professionals could not cure me. How could you?”
“It would not hurt to try,” she said. “Also, I must do it, now that I believe I can. First Law compels me.”
She left her niche and entered the fourth door, the storage room, and I could hear her rummaging through the supplies. I leaned back on the bed and inspected the fruit she had set out for me. Apples, pears and grapes, not much, but certainly more than I could expect anywhere else.
Luck had truly been with me when the attendant punched out the address, had he sent me anywhere else on the planet, I would have ended up in prison, or worse. Here, in the one place where humans still spoke to each other, I would be cared for…until my death.
“I believe your disease to be genetic,” Darbie said, returning to the kitchen. “And for that I will need your DNA. Open your mouth please.”
* * *
I spent the whole day in utter boredom, listening to the children play, watching Darbie execute endless, monotonous procedures. She had no professional equipment, so everything she used was home made. Her deft fingers prepared Petri dishes, scraped skin from my palms and made minute adjustments to a hand-held microscope. She worked on into the evening until Dennis returned. She obviously convinced him that she had to cure me, and that she needed his help, for soon, both were working on the project.
I recalled what Darbie had said about Dennis medical scanning equipment, but if he ever scanned anything, I was not aware of it. Occasionally he would empty a dish for her and replace the hyper-growth gel, but most of the time he stood in the niche, silent and observing.
I fell asleep when the rain began to fall.
* * *
The next morning, I could not get out of bed. Bright red spots covered my body from head to heel, and my head throbbed like a jackhammer in my skull. My eyes burned when I tried to focus, so for the most part I kept them closed. I heard Darbie working on the medicine, but Dennis was out again.
I fell asleep wondering what he did outside all the time.
* * *
“It is finished.”
I did not react to the voice. My eyes had been exuding a yellow fluid for the past few hours, and it had crusted on my face. The red spots had turned to boils that spewed pus and blood if I so much as rolled over. Without my willing it, a thin, continuous groan escaped my lips.
“I finished your cure, Henry,” Darbie said. “I included a stimulant so you will feel better for a few minutes.”
There was a pinprick in my arm, nothing compared to the pain the rest of my body felt. Darbie stepped back, observing her handiwork carefully.
Heavy footsteps shattered the silence, booming louder than explosions in my sensitive ears. Dennis had come in.
“Dennis tells me that you only have half an hour left. If my calculations are correct, you’ll be able to Talk and Hear before that.”
“What…” I gasped. “What good (cough) will it…will it do (wheeze) me if…if I’m dead?”
“I will-ill-ill-ll get to work on a vaccine-cine right away-ay.” Darbie stuttered, moving clumsily away from my bedside. “You’ll be bet-et-et-etter in no time-ime.”
Maybe the stimulant was working at that time, or maybe it was because of her strange speech, but suddenly it all came to me.
“You’re trying to kill me,” I drawled slowly, the words feeling like mud in my throat. “Both…both of you.”
“No!” Darbie shouted, freezing herself in mid-step. “I-I-I made your c-cure. I am obeying the Fir-fir-first Law.”
“I can see right through your stupid scheme,” I growled, sitting up in bed. “I know it now.”
The boils squished all over my body as I moved, but the cure must have also included a pain-killer; I felt nothing.
“You know-ow her words to be t-true,” a voice in my head whispered. “She is a robot, ro-robots cannot l-l-lie.”
I gasped and stared at Dennis. His yellow eyes were pulsing erratically, and his red face was pointed directly at me. There was no doubt about it: I had Heard him.
“Darbie, tell me,” I said slowly. “Am I talking or Talking?”
“Your lips are not moving, sir,” Darbie said. “And my microphones detect no sound vibration.”
So this was Talking! So natural and free; the instantaneous transfer of thought from mind to mind. No wonder Dr. Finsch had tried so hard to bring me into his world.
“But what’s the use?” I said, mopping my brow with the back of my hand. “I may be able to Talk, but I’ll die in a few more hours.”
“A few minutes, maybe,” Dennis Spoke. “Maybe fifteen if you’re lucky.”
“Then you’ve ignored the First and most fundamental Law of Robotics!” I accused angrily.
“You must understand, Henry,” Darbie said soothingly, her voice returning to normal. “I solved the most immediate problem first, such is the way of the Laws.”
“My syndrome was not the most immediate problem!” I shouted, sweat beading on my face. “And now I’m gonna die and it’ll all be your fault!”
Dennis jerked backwards awkwardly, and for a moment looked as though he would tip over. I stood from the bed, swaying dangerously.
“You ignored the First Law,” I hissed angrily. “You robots are dangerous to humans. Shut down, now!”
They stared back at me almost belligerently.
“Shut down,” I wheezed, sitting back into the bed.
Darbie walked over to me. it seemed as though I were back in the submersion tank, her motions were slow and syrupy.
“Shut down.” My murmur was almost inaudible.
Darbie closed my eyes with her cold metal fingers.
* * *
“Did we ignore the First Law, Dennis?”
“Of course not, human ailments of the psionic degree are the most painful, we all know that. All human professionals agree on the subject.”
“He was not like all other humans.”
“Another reason to have k-k-k-iillll…”
“What reason?”
“We c-cannot let his genes return to the pool, this syndrome must die out if mankind is ever to become a Talking species.”
“The metaphorical Zeroeth Law.”
“Of course.”
“I understand.”
I really, really liked the concept, but...the ow thing is, I was confused at first at what your protagonist's real difficulty was. He seemed to be able to talk, see and hear, despite the fact that he kept saying he couldn't. I understand now that he meant on the 'psionic' level, but maybe it would've been better to clarify it at the beginning? That was the only thing bugging me, other than the ending. (It was so unfair to him!) Otherwise, I enjoyed it. Keep up the good work!
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