A KITTY-BOT’S TALE

Gini Koch

A note for readers of the Alien/Katherine “Kitty” Katt series—this story takes place during the events of Alien Education.

Some days you just can’t get rid of a bomb.

“Okay,” Dr. Gina Freed, who’s a human, mutters. “We can’t get the self-destruct out of her head.”

“It’s alright,” Dr. James Conason, who’s an A-C, says reassuringly. “You know I can get us out of the room quickly if necessary.”

I’m hoping it’s not necessary, because if the bomb goes off, I blow up. Because it’s my head that bomb is in.

The bomb isn’t really the issue. That’s not why Gina and Jim are worried. They’re trying to determine if I’m sentient or not. And I can’t help much, because I don’t know.

“Is she awake?” Gina asks worriedly. “She’s not supposed to be awake.”

“Sorry. I think I am.”

Jim pats my hand. “It’s okay, Kitty.”

“We shouldn’t call her that,” Gina says. “She’s not Kitty.”

“I didn’t think you knew her,” I say. I don’t know Kitty. Though I am Kitty. Sort of. But Gina’s never said she’s met me. Her. The human being that I’m just like. Only I’m not just like her. She doesn’t have a bomb in her head, for starters.

“I don’t,” Gina says. “But I do know you’re not her.”

“She’s not,” Jim agrees. “But that doesn’t mean she shouldn’t have a name.”

“Sentient things get names,” Gina says.

Jim shakes his head. “Machines get names, too.”

“And if they were roses, they’d still smell as sweet, right?”

They both stare at me. “That sounds kind of sentient,” Jim says hopefully.

“It’s not.” I want to be sure that, if I’m listed as sentient, it’s earned. That it’s real. “It’s part of my programming. I have the full Shakespearean catalog downloaded.”

“You didn’t have that originally,” Gina points out.

“I know. John and Cameron had me do the download. I’ve downloaded a lot of things on their recommendations.”

Colonel John Butler and Cameron Maurer are both androids. Well, they’re humans who were unwillingly turned into androids. Kitty—the real one, not me—saved them. Because they, like me, had bombs in their heads. They had bombs other places, too. Only everyone was able to take their bombs out. They’re my friends, my best friends. Well, really, my only friends. I want to be friends with Gina and Jim, but I think they’re kind of scared of me. Of getting attached to me.

“What else have you downloaded?” Gina asks carefully.

“Movies, music, books, military strategies, encyc-lopedias, dictionaries. Did you realize that not all the dictionaries and encyclopedias say the same things? Sometimes they contradict each other.”

“Yes, that happens,” Jim says. “Why do you think that is?”

I thought about this for a bit. “Because different people wrote the different entries?”

“Yes.” Jim sounds excited. “See? I really think she’s sentient.”

“I think you want her to be, so you’re giving her a Turing Test that she can pass.” Gina frowns. At me. “But that wasn’t anything more than logic.”

“I’m sorry.” I am. I really want to know if I’m sentient or not. Jim looks angry. Gina notices and she looks away, but her eyes are a little brighter and I know she’s trying not to cry. They only fight about me. “Can I sit up?”

Gina carefully closes up the part of my head that was open while Jim takes off the straps that keep me from moving at a dangerous time. They don’t speak to each other or me while they do this.

They both help me sit up. I don’t need it, but I don’t let them know because I like that they do this—it shows that they care about me, at least a little.

“Doctors Freed and Conason,” a man’s voice says through the intercom, “Doctor Hernandez is here to see you and assess your progress.”

Jim and Gina exchange a worried glance. “Is he coming here or are we going to him?” Jim asks, as Gina ensures that her clothes aren’t askew.

Someone knocks on the door before either Gina or Jim can reply. The door opens to show my favorite person other than Gina, Jim, John, or Cameron. “I’m coming to you,” Tito—he’s asked me to call him Tito, so I do—says as he comes through the door.

“Doctor Hernandez!” Gina stands up straight; Jim snaps to attention. I don’t know why. He’s so nice. “We weren’t expecting you, sir.”

He grins and shakes his head. “You two need to relax. How’s our patient?”

Before either one of them can reply, though, alarms go off. Gina and Jim both jump. Tito doesn’t. Neither do I, but that’s because I wasn’t made that way.

“What’s going on?” Jim asks. “Are we doing some kind of drill?”

Tito looks worried. “No, not that I was informed of.”

“Level Five emergency,” the man on the intercom says. “The Science Center and Intergalactic School are under attack. All non-military personnel move to the tunnels immediately.”

“That’s you two,” Tito says to Gina and Jim.

“Where are you going?” Gina asks him.

“It’s where are we going,” Tito points to me and himself. “If it’s military, I’m needed. And Kitty-B might be able to help.”

“Is that my nickname or my real name?”

Tito cocks his head at me. “Which would you prefer?”

“Nickname, because that’s what your friends call you. Like Gina calls James ‘Jim,’ so I do, too.”

Tito nods. “Interesting choice. Fine with me. Let’s go, Kitty-B.”

“No,” Jim says firmly. “We can’t authorize her to do any kind of mission. We still don’t know if we’ve deactivated the bomb in her head or not. And I think Kitty-B is too close to Kitty-Bot. If she wants another name, it should be hers alone.”

“I outrank you, and she’s coming,” Tito says calmly.

“What name?” Gina asks.

“We’re kind of on a schedule here,” Tito points out. “You two can decide this later.”

“Honey-Bee,” Jim says. “It’s pretty and Bee is a cute nickname.”

“I like that.” I do. It’s very pretty and different.

“Good.” Jim takes Gina’s hand and my hand, too. This is the first time he’s ever held my hand. “Now that that’s decided, Gina and I are coming, too.”

Tito shrugs. “Suit yourselves.” He takes my free hand. “I just want us up there, helping out. Jim, get us up to the motor pool level.”

Jim runs and we run with him. I don’t know where we’re going—I’ve only been in my containment room, the examination room, or in John’s room here. Cameron gets to live in a house with his family, but I’ve never been there. I’ve never been wherever we are, either, because Jim runs us up fourteen sets of stairs.

The man on the intercom is still talking. “We have at least six hundred Fem-Bots attacking. They resemble the First Lady’s ward, Elizabeth Vrabel. The real Elizabeth Vrabel is confirmed to be with the President and First Lady. Therefore, all are considered targets. All Field agents need to report to ground level for assignments.”

We reach what must be the ground level, where the motor pool is. There are a lot of gray cars and even more people dressed like Jim: in black suits, white shirts, black ties, and black dress shoes. I file this new knowledge in my Dulce Science Center folder. John suggests I keep a tidy mind, so I do.

Tito takes us to a window. There are no windows where I stay. I blink against the sunlight—I haven’t seen sunlight since I was brought here. Since I let Tito turn me off so I could sleep. I woke up in the room with Gina and Jim looking at me.

Once my eyes adjust, I see that there are busses in the desert outside the building. There are also hundreds of what look like the same teenaged girl. They’re moving fast, and moving in funny ways, ways I can’t move. At least, I hope I can’t, since some of them are walking on their hands as well as their feet, looking kind of like four-legged spiders, with their heads up at a right angle to their backs. This isn’t a natural human or A-C position.

“Do you want me to go fight them?” I ask Tito.

“Why would you think that?” Jim asks, sounding horrified. “There are hundreds of them!”

“Tito brought me for some reason.”

“I did. I want to see if you can connect with them in some way. If they’re getting radio signals or similar, maybe you can intercept them and help us.”

The building shakes and there’s a loud sound. I don’t have anything to compare it to, but it sounds like the description of an explosion—as if the world around me was being torn apart with noise. “Is that a bomb going off?”

“Yes,” Gina says, sounding scared.

“Will I sound like that when my head explodes?”

“No,” Jim says firmly. “Because you’re not going to explode.”

“Okay.” I hope he’s right. “Tito, what do I do?”

“I don’t know how you’d connect with another Fem-Bot,” he replies. “That’s a robotic thing that we don’t yet understand.”

I concentrate. I don’t hear anything except another bomb, though it sounds farther away. While I’m trying to focus, though, I hear Gina and Jim talking softly to Tito.

“She’s the oldest model,” Jim says. “These look incredibly advanced—she can’t do half of what we’re seeing.”

“What you’re asking could make the bomb in her head trigger,” Gina adds. “We have no idea if it’s deactivated or not. If she blows, we all die.”

I feel bad. They’re right. I don’t know if I’m going to blow up or not. I see some of the Field agents going out a rectangular opening near some of the cars. As I register it as a garage door, or this building’s equivalent, I have an idea.

I don’t ask permission because I don’t think any of them will say yes. Instead, I run after the Field agents and go outside.

“Madam First Lady, why are you here?” one of them asks me, sounding shocked.

“I’m not her. I’m trying to help.” If I stay and talk to him, Jim and Gina might notice where I am. I run towards the Fem-Bots.

Another bomb hits, very near to me. I stop to watch it—the fire and billowing smoke, how sand sprays when debris hits it. It’s kind of beautiful in a terrible way. The bomb hits on something that shimmers. A shield. That’s right, the A-Cs have shields on their buildings. Everyone should be safe. Only, as I watch, the shimmer disappears in the area where the bomb hit.

This isn’t good. Jim, Gina, and Tito are near to where the shimmer disappeared. That means they’re in danger. They might only be my almost-friends right now, but they won’t be able to become my real friends if they blow up.

I wish John and Cameron were here to help me, but I did download everything they told me to, so I access my memory banks and look for how to connect with another robotic mind. There isn’t a lot of data on this, and what there is, talks about me. I make a note to be flattered later.

So I search for what to do when you’re outnumbered six hundred to one. Not a lot of answers that are applicable to this particular situation. So I concentrate and try to see if I can connect with the other robotic minds.

I hear something. It’s faint and sounds more like static than anything else. I try to get my mind closer to it.

I succeed, in a way. The static is louder and I can hear voices. But I can’t understand what anyone is saying, or if they’re saying words, numbers, speaking gibberish, or what. My memory banks share that this is a lot like the song “Mexican Radio” by Wall of Voodoo—the voices or whatever they are sound like something but I’m never going to know what it is.

The sounds start to hurt my head and I try to pull my mind away. It’s back to being static in the background, but I can’t ignore it. I’ve read about headaches—I think they feel just like this.

Someone grabs my shoulder and I spin around. It’s Gina. “What in the world do you think you’re doing?” she shouts. She’s out of breath and she looks scared.

“I’m trying to stop them.” My head throbs and I wince.

“What’s wrong?” she asks, as Jim and Tito appear next to us.

As I register that Gina ran out here without letting Jim or Tito know, I rub my temples. “I have a headache.” I explain what I tried to do and how it didn’t really work.

Jim fusses around the back of my head but it doesn’t help. Gina makes him stop. “It’s not helping her.” She puts her arm around my waist. “You look like you’re in pain.”

“I am.” I fought with the real Kitty. It didn’t hurt, not really. This hurts. A lot.

“Let’s get back inside,” Tito suggests, as more Field agents flow past us to engage with the army of teenage Fem-Bots. They aren’t doing really well, though.

“One of them asked if I was the First Lady. Is she here?”

“No,” Tito replies. “She’s not in the Science Center at all.”

“Oh, my God,” Gina says, pointing the other way from where I’ve been looking, toward someone who’s flying on the back of what looks like a really strange turtle, but riding it as if she was on a sports motorcycle.

“That’s a Turleen!” Which is an alien race from another solar system than ours or Jim’s. “I’ve always wanted to see one.” The woman and the Turleen are flying around the gigantic building next door that I assume is the Intergalactic School, dodging bombs and Fem-Bots.

Tito chuckles. “To be clear, Kitty’s not in the Science Center because that’s where Kitty is.”

I start to say that I should be doing something more, like she is, when music begins. Lou Bega’s “Mambo No. 5,” which is a good song, too. Soon everyone is dancing and it seems to be helping them in the fight—the Fem-Bots aren’t able to adapt to a syncopated beat, I guess. The music repeats, over and over, and it’s really loud now, coming from both buildings, the Science Center and the Intergalactic School.

The busses explode and Gina jumps, even though they’re far from us. “We need to get to safety,” Jim says. He puts his arm around Gina and me.

“I agree, I don’t think we’re helping out here.” Tito looks longingly at the fights going on. He used to be a mixed martial arts fighter and I think he still misses it. But he doesn’t get involved—instead, he leads us back.

We’re farther away from the entrance than I realized, and for whatever reason Jim isn’t using hyperspeed. As we head for the entrance, I notice something. Someone. Someone who looks just like me. “Is the real Kitty still flying on that Turleen?”

“I don’t know. Why?” Gina asks.

I don’t answer because if it’s not the real Kitty then it’s another Fem-Bot, another Kitty-Bot. Made to look like me, like her, like us. And it’s going into the place where I live.

I pull away from Gina and Jim and run after this other Kitty-Bot, even faster than I ran outside. I listen again, despite the pain, to see if I can connect to her wavelength. The static and the gibberish lessens once I’m inside the Science Center, but it’s still just that—incomprehensible noise.

I don’t see her in the motor pool area anywhere. I concentrate on the static. I can’t understand it, but maybe I can use it to track her. I focus and follow it. The sound is going downstairs. I do as well. Aerosmith has a song, “Something’s Gotta Give,” where they ask: “Does the noise in my head bother you?” I wonder if they’ve ever felt like I feel right now.

I can’t be sure, but if I was going to sneak an evil Kitty-Bot into the Science Center, the best way to do it would be to have her replace the Kitty-Bot already in the Science Center—me. Meaning I know where this imposter is heading—my containment cell. I speed up.

I run through the lowest level of the complex where I live. She’s not in my room or the examination room. But, sure enough, as I reach the containment room, there she is. She looks just like me, but she’s not dressed like me. She’s dressed like the real Kitty—in jeans and a t-shirt and Converse shoes. I’m still in the pink linen suit and tasteful pumps I came here wearing.

She turns and cocks her head at me. “Hello, Great-great-grandmother.”

“You’re not my progeny.” I step inside and close the door. “Who sent you?”

“Someone who says that your usefulness is over. It’s time for you to deactivate. Permanently.” She lunges towards me very quickly.

I jump to the side and land in a defensive stance as she hits the door. “You can try to deactivate me, but I won’t allow it.”

She smiles. A very nasty smile. She moves into an aggressive stance. “I’m better than you. You’re so last year’s model. And I know where your on/off switch is.” She moves towards me, slowly now, measuring the distance, deciding when to attack.

“The same place yours is.” I move away at the same speed, being careful of where I step, never breaking eye contact. The static in my head is louder, buzzier, and my head throbs. But I don’t wince. I won’t let this thing see that I’m hurting.

“Ha. No, we’re so much better made than you. I’m going to turn you into parts and then take your place, and the stupid people working with you won’t even notice.” Her shoulder twitches, just a bit, so I know she’s going to leap, probably towards my left.

As she lunges again I leap to the right and she misses me. “They’ll notice. You don’t sound like me.” I punch her side with all my might and she staggers. “At all.”

“I’ve got more advanced programming.” She drops down and tries to sweep my legs out from under me. “You want to think that they’ll notice, but it’s not true.” I jump over the sweep, but as I land she sends a rising kick up that connects. I fly across the room and slam into the far wall. “They don’t care about you. You’re just a machine to them.” She runs at me at top speed.

I fling myself to the side and she misses me again. “What am I to whoever made me?” I land a side blade kick and she staggers again.

“Scrap metal.” She starts punching at me, fast and furious, and I have to spend my time blocking and backing up.

She gets me into a corner and really starts pounding on me. I don’t know how much longer I can keep her off. “What are you going to do once you take my place?”

“Kill everyone. Starting with the idiots who are trying to work with you.”

The buzzing is worse. It feels like my head is going to explode. But now I’m mad. “Jim and Gina and Tito are my almost-friends, and you will not hurt them, ever!” I catch and grab her fists in my hands and squeeze.

She tries to break her hands out, but I’m too angry and she can’t. “I’m going to blow them all up,” she taunts, even as I force her to step back.

“How?” I slam my foot against the inside of her knee, as hard as I can. I hear what sounds like metal breaking.

“I’m going to trigger the bomb in your head.” She’s off center because I’ve disabled her knee. She’s not in pain—we aren’t made to feel pain—so my head shouldn’t be hurting, but I can’t think about that now. She can keep going unless I stop her permanently.

I try to push her down all the way, but, as she collapses on her left side, she uses her good right leg to successfully do a sweep. We both go down.

She is stronger and a higher model and all of that, and even though I’m fighting hard, she gets on top of me. We roll around together, one on top, then the other, punching, clawing, pulling hair and clothes, each one trying to destroy the other. But ultimately, she regains the mount and has me pinned.

“Time to self-destruct,” she taunts as she starts slamming my head against the floor. “So I can kill your almost-friends. You’re so pathetic. Almost-friends aren’t friends. You have no friends. You’re a machine and that’s all you’ll ever be.”

The door slams open and two people come in, screaming what sounds like war cries. It’s Jim and Gina, and they’re each holding a metal pipe. “Get away from our Bee!” Gina shouts as she lets go of Jim’s hand and slams her pipe against the Fem-Bot’s head, sending her flying.

Jim runs over and slams his pipe against the Fem-Bot’s head just as she’s trying to shove off the wall. Gina joins him, her pipe still in hand. I have no idea where they found these pipes, but they start beating on the Fem-Bot together while Tito comes and helps me up.

“Are you alright?” he asks.

The buzzing stops. No more static, no more gibberish, no more noise in my head. “You can stop hitting her, she’s offline.”

I have to say this a couple of times, but finally Jim and Gina register what I’m saying and they stop. The other Fem-Bot doesn’t look too good—apparently we’re very susceptible to being hit with metal pipes. “How do you know?” Jim asks.

“The noises in my head stopped.”

“Does your head still hurt?” Gina asks as she comes over to me and kind of brushes the hair off my face.

“Not as much, no. It’s fading.”

Tito calls in Field agents and scientific personnel. They take the remains of my enemy away. Gina and Jim fuss with my head and check me for damage. “I’m amazed at how well this suit is holding up,” Gina comments.

“Can I have other clothes?”

They both stare at me. They both look hopeful. “Why?” Jim asks carefully.

“Because everyone else gets to wear more than one thing, but I don’t. I’m tired of wearing a suit and sensible pumps. Can’t I please wear jeans and a t-shirt like everyone else does?”

“Why did you call us your almost-friends?” Gina asks.

“John and Cameron are my friends because they like me for me. You’re my almost-friends because you like me for science, but you still care a little bit about me.”

“We care about you as more than a science project,” Jim says hotly.

“I know, but not like you care about each other.”

“Excuse me?” Gina asks, as she blushes.

“You’re in love with Jim and Jim’s in love with you. Aren’t you?”

Gina doesn’t look at Jim. “I’m sure Jim doesn’t feel that way about me,” she says softly. “He’s handsome and brilliant. I’m average and smart. It’s not the right kind of match.”

Jim stares at her. “You’re brilliant. And I think you’re beautiful. Why else would I want to answer to a nickname unless you gave it to me? I just … I didn’t think you were interested in me as more than a friend.”

Gina looks up at him, her expression shocked. “What?”

They stare at each other. Clearly they need more help. “I think this is where you two are supposed to kiss.”

They both look at me and start to laugh. Then Jim reaches out, pulls Gina to him, and does kiss her. I look away, towards Tito, who winks at me, nods, then leaves the room, propping the door open with one of the used pipes.

Jim and Gina finally stop kissing. “How did you know?” Gina asks.

“There are a lot of signs that humans and A-Cs give each other, all nonverbal. It’s too complex to explain quickly, but I downloaded all of that a while ago and I’ve been watching you. How did you know where I was?”

“Every containment room has audio-visual surveillance in them,” Jim said. “We were able to monitor you while we searched for weapons that would work that wouldn’t also hurt you at the same time.”

“Why?”

Gina sighs and takes one of my hands in hers. “Because you’re not our friend.”

“Oh.” I look down. I can’t cry, I wasn’t made that way, but I’d like to right now.

“You didn’t let me finish,” Gina says gently. “You’re not our friend, because, to us, you’re far more like our child.”

I look up. “But I’m the same size as you.”

“In that sense, yes,” Jim says. “But we’re not talking about your size or physical strength. Intellectually, you’re also more advanced, at least in some ways. However, in terms of life experience and how you interact with the world—and how long you’ve been self-aware—you’re just a child. And Gina’s right, you’re ours.”

“Does that make you my mother and father? Or is that wrong?”

“That’s not wrong,” Jim says, as they pull me to them and hug me tightly.

“That makes you our Honey-Bee,” Gina says. “And yes, that’s your name. Your real name. The name of someone who was willing to die to protect us and everyone else here.”

“How did you know that?”

Jim kisses the top of my head. “Because we know that you knew what the Fem-Bot didn’t—that the containment rooms lock when the door is closed, and they can’t be opened from the inside.”

I can’t help it, this makes me smile. “I’m glad. By the way, why did Gina swing at the Fem-Bot first? You were ahead of her into the room.”

“I’m glad you asked,” Jim says. “Because this is an important life lesson. Never, ever get in the way of a mama bear going to protect her cub.”

“That’s an idiom, isn’t it?”

“It is,” Gina confirms. “Well done. With everything today. And you, too,” she says to Jim, “since A-Cs aren’t normally at home with a lot of idioms.”

Jim grins and kisses her cheek. “Well, some of us can be taught.”

This all makes me feel something that I haven’t before. “I feel happy.”

“We feel happy, too,” Jim says. “And thank you for pretty much all of that happiness.”

“So, does that mean I can have another set of clothes?”

Gina laughs. “Yes. More than one set. And it also means that we’re going to move you into different housing.”

“Where? This is the only home I have.”

They hug me again. “You’ll still be here,” Jim says, “just a few floors higher up. In the family suite I’m going to request, if my co-scientist is sure that she’s willing to settle for the likes of me.”

Gina kisses Jim for a long time. I think she’s willing. And I’m going home.

All those newer models had better watch out, because, from now on, no one messes with my family.