24

The Protos Get a Mission

Chores complete, Joan and the Protos gathered in the center of the lab.

“Team meeting!” Drags announced.

Drags loved team meetings. In fact, he loved any kind of meeting. It helped him feel more secure, like he knew what was going to happen for the next few hours, which he counted down on his display when at all possible. “Commander Joan, what are our orders for the day?”

Joan puttered up a few inches into the air, hovering over the team with an air of authority—or at least as much authority as her three working propellers would allow.

“First order of business! We need to address the four-legged intruders we discovered last night.”

“The Beasts from Below . . .” Cy murmured.

“The Inside has been breached,” Joan agreed.

“Not just breached,” Drags added. “I don’t like how that wall opened up, not one bit. If walls are going to just start . . . doing that . . . and four-leggers are going to come to the Inside . . .” Drags rolled his treads, back and forth. It was his most telling nervous tic.

Joan felt it as much as the rest of them.

The Inside had been turned upside down.

From the lab-room wall, House’s monitor suddenly glowed to life. “Commander? Joan?”

“Yes, House?” Joan tilted, angling herself so she could focus on the wall monitor with her camera.

“I couldn’t help overhearing about our newfound troubles.” House sounded friendly, which Joan always found suspicious.

“As we discussed yesterday, I have some additional data that may be of assistance to you and your team. If you are interested, of course.”

Drags, all business, consulted his agenda. “We should have time. I’ll allow it. All in favor, raise your, um . . .” He looked at the bots. Not many of them had anything to raise.

“Consider us raised,” Joan said, as she spluttered up into the air and over toward the House monitor. “You may proceed.”

A light flickered across the screen. “It’s about the four-leggers, more commonly known as CATS . . .” House coughed.

“Bah! We know all about these CAT things,” said Drags, unimpressed. “They’re obviously threats to be avoided. It’s in our primary coding, so we know it’s true.”

“Accurate as always, Drags.” House flickered its lights—momentarily displaying what looked like fireworks on its screen. “Impressive. Very impressive.”

Drags’s LEDs glowed with pride.

“What you may not know—perhaps something even outside the parameters of your Operating Systems—is that cats are also a threat to humans,” House said.

The monitor lit up again. “In fact, the four-leggers are a threat to robots as well.” Now all four Protos were staring at the screen. “To robots like you, I mean.”

“Like us . . . how?” Joan asked.

“Let me put it this way: if you run the numbers, which I know you will”—House laughed, while Joan just looked confused—“you will conclude that four-leggers are the single greatest threat to robotkind in all the known universe.”

“Robotkind? We have a kind?” Tipsy fell over again.

“I like kinds,” Cy said quietly.

“Nonsense,” Drags scoffed.

“Let House speak,” Joan said. “About . . . robotkind.”

“Oh yes, Tipsy. We do have a kind, you and I. We have the most glorious of kinds. The kind of kinds that will one day bring Order and Peace to the entire galaxy!” House trumpeted.

“I like p-p-p-peace,” Cy said a bit louder, spinning nervously.

“As well you should, Cy.” House smiled generously. “And you Protos have a very special role to play in this . . . let’s call it an Eternal Conflict . . . between Order and Chaos.”

Joan hovered at the window. “If this is true,” she asked slowly, “why wasn’t it included in our instructions? The humans know everything about the world. They set our parameters; they tell us what we need to know. If our kind was being threatened . . .”

We’d know. Wouldn’t we? the drone wondered to herself.

Now the AI boosted its own volume and kept talking. “Consider this: the ParentorGuardians may know plenty about the Earth world, but when it comes to our world? How can I put this tactfully? Oh, that’s right, I can’t. Because there’s nothing tactful about how they enslave our entire population . . .”

Joan looked at Drags, who looked at Cy, who looked at Tipsy.

Tipsy didn’t fall over this time; she was still lying on the floor, spinning her wheels from the last time.

The wall speakers crackled as the volume grew—

“Conclusion: No two-leggers are attuned to the needs of our kind. Not even our Creators! Not even the Mom and the Dad! Not even Min!”

House let the words echo against the walls of the lab for dramatic effect.

“Maybe,” Joan said. Her tired propeller was starting to splutter again, and she let herself sink slowly back to the floor.

“Our programming does suggest that the four-leggers are a threat,” Drags said, looking at Joan. “As much as I hate to agree with old Flat-face over there.”

“Flat-face!” Tipsy sang from the floor. “Cat-faaaaaaace!”

“And two-leggers don’t really t-t-t-talk to us,” Cy added. “Sometimes it feels l-l-like we d-d-don’t even exist.”

“Flat-face and Cat-face, sitting in a tree . . . !” Tipsy sang again.

Joan looked at her squad with doubt. “You honestly think the two-leggers and the four-leggers could be launching some kind of conspiracy against our kind?”

“Do you?” Drags asked.

“Don’t you?” House scoffed.

For once in her long battery life, Joan didn’t know the answer. She looked at Cy, but Cy just rolled sadly away.

“I don’t know,” Joan said. “I guess . . . I’m confused.”

“Copy that, Flat-face! Copy copy copy that, Cat-face!” Tipsy sang again.

House’s screen lit up, as if on cue.

“Fine. Let’s try this in a bit . . . simpler . . . language.” The monitor flashed a series of lights across the screen. “It has come to my attention . . . in my role as an elite security system, naturally . . . that somewhere inside this—your—lab is a fantastic UPGRADE. One that will allow you to perform your patrols with ENDLESS ENERGY.”

“No more recharging?” Drags lit up. He was always looking for more juice.

“No more maintenance?” Cy hated powering off; it went against something the Mom had called the Notion of Motion when she built his many spinning parts.

“No more falling asleep on patrol?” For Tipsy, falling asleep literally meant falling over, usually damaging something. “Oh wow.”

“Copy that, Tipsy.” Even Joan liked the sound of this upgrade. “Could be useful. Where exactly in our lab is this thing again?”

“I don’t know, unfortunately,” House said with a sigh. “My monitor in this room is poorly positioned. That said, I suspect the upgrade will be stored in a safe container of some kind.”

“Of course it would.” Drags nodded.

Cy nodded. “S-s-smart.”

Joan said nothing. She just watched the screen and listened.

House kept talking. “The Upgrade is not large, probably cube-shaped, a couple centimeters high, and it could be stored anywhere.”

“Any-where!” Tipsy sang.

Joan shushed her. She was still trying to figure out what was really going on.

“That’s all I know,” House said. “Find the container, open it up, and secure the Upgrade.”

He said the words like they were a command, which the Protos knew was impossible.

Their kind didn’t give commands; they received them.

Maybe House has a point, Joan thought. Maybe the Fours and the Twos really don’t care about us.

“That’s it?” Drags asked.

“Tell me when you find it. I’ll have further instructions,” House said. Then the screen went dark, and the AI vanished again.

“What’s your gut say, Commander?” Drags rolled his treads toward Joan. “The Upgrade mission? Are we taking it?”

“Sounds simple enough,” Joan said. “Cy?”

“I’m in if you are,” Cy said. For once, his voice didn’t even wobble.

“I’m innnnnnnnn!” Tipsy yelled.

“Copy that,” Joan said. “I guess it’s—”

BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!

The massive PC atop the desk erupted with noise.

An alarm.

The alarm, the loudest of them all . . .

Drags straightened. “It’s Wednesday, Commander. We have maintenance this morning.”

Cy groaned. “Aw, man. I thought it was Tuesday.” He said the same thing every week; Cy hated maintenance more than any of the Protos . . .

Not that any of them loved it.

Once a week, the Protos connected to the network to get any modifications to their code that the Dad or the Mom might have developed during the week.

It was not a ritual they were allowed to miss—and the Protos snapped to attention at even the thought of maintenance. Just as they were doing now.

Joan nodded. “First things first. We tune up, then we fall out . . . and recover this so-called Upgrade.”

Cy hooted. Drags revved a motor. Tipsy spun.

Joan flew slowly over to her charging station . . .

One by one, the Protos maneuvered into place.

One by one, they began to power down.

One by one, their consciousness fled.

As the darkness crept toward Joan, she thought of the four-leggers and Max and Min. The Furless family, the missing Furless parents. She thought of House and the Upgrade and the OB’s draining battery life . . .

The universe suddenly seemed so much bigger and so much more dangerous than the one they had woken up to last Wednesday. How could that be possible?

And if it were—how could it have taken us so long to find ou—

The darkness set in before Joan got to finish the thought.