Power in the Hands of One (12 page)

I counter with reassuring deftness and catch the arms before they can find their grip. Feet planted a bit behind my center of balance, I guide my robot into a shoving match with limited leverage on the flat cement.

Behind ADS03 at the end of the street, two police cars race into view and skid to a halt, lights flashing. A black SWAT truck joins them and spits out six armed men in riot gear. They assemble in front of the cars.

The system time in the video display is 8:58—late enough in the morning that someone finally took notice of two giant, warring robots.

The God’s Hand pilot seems aware of the police presence. “Now look what you’ve done. You’ve endangered innocent lives.” He maneuvers his robot a step back, creating slack in our tense grappling.

I don’t compensate in time and teeter forward only to be caught with a clanging uppercut from ADS03. The blow connects with the head of my robot and sends a shudder down the frame. I must look inept, waiting for another hit as I hesitate.

My indecisiveness is mixed with questions about the other pilot’s intent. What does he mean about endangering innocent lives? Does he think the officers might be killed as a result of our fighting? Or does he mean that he’ll have to kill them in order to steal the robots?

For the first time I entertain a motive other than the muddled intent to see through Ray’s desire to keep these machines out of the wrong hands. Maybe there’s something noble and honorable at stake here. Grotesque images form in my mind of the boot-like feet of ADS03 stomping the cruisers into the ground. I have the power to stop that from happening. Does that make me responsible for the officers’ well-being?

Another vibration ripples along the controls as the ADS03 lands another punch, riveting the courage from me. I consider retreat again, if only to get us away from the police. Stepping backward, I leave a wide enough berth that the other pilot has to follow if he wants to reach me.

ADS03 stops and turns as if to consider the police two blocks away. With purposed steps, it begins a freakish gallop toward them.

I lean into stride, urging my robot into action. Massive legs pound beneath me as I try to catch the other robot before it reaches the police.

27

Each step resonates through the lower controls as I keep my eyes fixed on the retreating ADS03. The jarring concrete echoes the warnings in my head.

It’s possible the other pilot is testing my resolve—to see if I’ll stand by and watch him do whatever he intends to do. It’s also possible he doesn’t care how I respond and is only concerned with the threat of the authorities.

He hasn’t mastered the controls yet, which enables me to grab him at the next intersection. I maneuver in an attempt to drag him down, draping the weight of my machine over the back of his.

We collapse in a grinding chorus of scraping metal. A brief panic washes over as I struggle to get a grasp on the thrashing monster beneath me. A flailing elbow to my metallic face sends me reeling.

Regaining composure, I catch the driving arm of ADS03 before it connects again. Creaking, whining shrieks come from the strained appendages. I hope my robot is resilient enough to go another round.

In a strained shoving match, we grapple and push each other to a standing position.

I feel cocky. “What was that about me going to Hell?”

Still no reply from the other pilot. Instead, he hooks an arm underneath my grasp, upsetting my balance.

My machine stumbles under the strain before I catch my fall on one knee. The unyielding metal joint grinds into the pavement as ADS03 transfers its leverage onto the upper body surrounding my cockpit.

The shell around me groans in complaint at having to endure such torture. The usual lights flash their maddening warnings; I ignore them.

Will I slip up and land myself into defeat? It seems that if I give an inch, it might mean disaster. Maybe I’m too tired to care.

This loss of concentration leaves me open to attack. I pay the price and absorb a double-armed strike from ADS03. Stumbling backward, I lean my crushing weight into the corner of a nearby structure. The expected destabilization occurs with bending metal and shattered glass.

I ready my guard again but not in time; the God’s Hand pilot is one step ahead of me as he lands another volley of pummeling blows to the cockpit.

My body soaks up the beating without much trouble as most of it is wrapped in padded supports, but there’s nothing to stop my head from whipping back and forth. I feel as though it will snap off as ADS03 smacks me down the street, back toward the center of the business district.

The police and SWAT team follow at a safe distance.

I catch glimpses of them between the swinging, bludgeoning arms of the other robot as I continue to back away.

Tiny ports flap open on the back of ADS03’s arms, shoulders, and legs. They erupt like mini-afterburners as the God’s Hand pilot works the robot into a sprint.

Though short, this propulsion results in a quick burst of speed that sends the giant airborne, skimming over the street. It lands a step away then springs forth from pulverized concrete to tackle me.

I raise armored forearms to take away the brunt of the force, but it’s not enough to keep from tumbling backward. The energy from the collision rips the upper controls from my hands as I’m slammed into the supports of the Kinetic Drive.

ADS03 stands and reaches for a nearby light post. The white behemoth wrenches it free from the curb, raises it, and drives it downward into the midsection of my robot.

New status reports scream that the cannon is offline and the turbine generator is malfunctioning. They flash in a panicked red font.

ADS03 looks down, expressionless and cold, and leans into the light post, which looks like a small cane in its hands.

A mechanical groaning rumbles from below the cockpit, announcing the strain the robot endures. I cringe at the thought of what damage might result. Will my mobility be limited? I’ve already lost my primary form of defense. What if I can’t even maneuver to evade?

Fuel cells at 75% efficiency. Re-routing standby power.
Another warning that I only have a moment to consider… The immediate, offensive threat of ADS03 muddles the fear of losing whatever energy stores are onboard.

The police move closer—about a block away. The SWAT team is lined up as before, firing their weapons at the back of the other robot.

I imagine the sound of bullets plinking off the armor like so many gnats.

ADS03 swings his machine around to engage the police, tree-trunk legs shifting under the hulking body.

“Get out of the way!” I shout, even though I know the officers can’t hear me. My body begs and pleads with the controls as I maneuver my robot to an off-balanced stance.

There’s no time to reach ADS03 as it closes the distance before the police can scatter. He stomps a mechanical foot onto a cruiser, collapsing it as if it were tin.

The officer who was inside leaks out the folded driver’s side door in a mix of blood and pulp.

I sprint down the street, twisting with furious, jerking limbs. Ignoring the burning sweat in my eyes and the stale, dry patch in the back of my throat, I throttle the controls as if they were my own body.

Aiming for the lower half of ADS03, I guide my machine like a linebacker looking for a sack. Closing in, I gasp in anticipation as I picture our giant, brutish robots colliding in my attempt to save the day.

That’s when ADS03, alerted to my approach, reels around to face me with a streaking fist.

28

Leaning forward, I force my robot into an out-of-control dive, not thinking about how the immense weight of the upper body will pull me down that much faster. The outstretched arm of the other machine sails overhead as I deliver my kamikaze attack.

The resulting clang sends a shiver throughout the cockpit as if it’s a tuning fork. I’m nearly ripped out from the supports as the armor absorbs the shock of the collision.

ADS03 bends at the middle as it receives the full brunt of it and falls backward. We both land in a deafening thud into the street and this time my upper body falls out of the supports of the Kinetic Drive.

My left knee twists in pain as momentum carries forward, legs still stuck in the lower controls. A razor strain sears through my side. I try to pull myself back up into the upper supports, but the other robot is already wrestling to get free.

The frantic pressure of ADS03 upsets any chance of balance as the cockpit rocks and trembles. A rigid elbow to an armored chest sends me flailing again, torn free from the lower supports.

ADS03 rolls my robot onto its back and stands over me, towering as a master of my fate. The white monster dominates the fractured video screen as it lifts a dismissive leg and stomps down in full force.

The skeletal foot smashes above the cockpit, pistons driving it into the head of my machine. The monitors and heads-up displays explode in a carnival of lights as if yelping out in pain.

Lying near the hatch, I’m inverted in relation to the controls. I fumble and scrape my way back to the floating supports of the Kinetic Drive as another pile driver of a foot stamps with vehemence into the head.

The cockpit shakes again but I maintain a one-handed grip on a shoulder support. When the wobbling ceases, I swing my way down into the controls as if they were a jungle gym.

Once situated into the supports, I look past the legs and feet of my prone robot to see the police speed away, evacuating the area. One flattened cruiser remains as an explanation for their haste.

ADS03 grips the upper portion of the armor and drags my machine with measured tugs along the unyielding cement. Each scrape of the scuffed back matches a stride of the relentless pilot in the other machine. He’s pulling me back toward the wreckage of ADS01.

I regain control when he drops me in the middle of the street.

The God’s Hand pilot turns to the leftover gray scrap of ADS01, picks it up, and with wobbling joints, heaves it at me.

I almost feel my lungs deplete themselves as the battered torso and mangled legs of ADS01 crash on top of my robot’s chest. Some fluids and what looks like a lubricant splash onto my viewing area.

ADS03 raises a mighty arm as if he’s pointing at us. A slim port opens on the top side of its gauntlet, which reveals a protruding black nozzle. A lick of flame appears; this is followed by a line of streaming fire.

The flames ignite the liquids leaking at various points in the armor of ADS01; they trail their way onto the places the fluids drip and pool onto my machine.

I panic, heaving and twisting in the supports, but I can’t manage the necessary leverage to lift ADS01. Terror sets in as a virtual claustrophobia overtakes my judgment. I’m trapped under a flaming, immovable bulk.

A digital thermostat appears when the cooling system kicks in. Other messages follow, blinking past before they register in my mind. One line of text, calm in the midst of violent flashing screens and menus, draws my scattered attention:
Grant rights to engage Stage Gamma. Y/N?

With the hope of relief, I slap haphazard fingers onto the general area of the “Y” key. The expected title screen appears:
Attack/Defense Sentinel 02. Loading Stage Gamma…

The ambient glow from the blue and red controls changes to a green haze as once-hidden filaments erupt, ablaze with thin, piercing lines. They form a grid around every inch of the cockpit, reflecting a ghostly map on me.

The glowing lines at eye level begin to shift, streaking up and down across my face. The main monitor commentates:
Initiating brain scan.

A dizzy, almost nauseous feeling wells up inside me as the flittering green lines race up and down my face. I almost look away when they cease and one slow, thicker, horizontal ray of light hovers above my eyes. It floats down just below them, and then reverses its track and slides back above them.

Holographic menus appear, speeding through diagnostic information. Strange, it almost seems as though I’m seeing this in my head rather than in front of me. Disorientation and mild confusion follow as I try to hold a single train of thought, but hundreds—thousands—of bits of information infest my brain.

The flames wash over the portion of the video screen not dulled by the mesmerizing grid. I watch them with only half attention, as if they’re part of some weird dream. Conscious thought wanes as it’s harder and harder to maintain focus.

Strange visions of my robot pop into my mind’s eye—detailed, specific visions of subsystems and other components. A pseudo-graphic layout of a file structure begins to form; somehow I know this is part of the operating system.

I find the less I fight it, the more comfortable it becomes in letting in all of this information. Where is it coming from?

The A.I. It’s feeding me…

I breathe deep and let go of the last hold on my thoughts. The fear of having them shredded in the blender that’s now my brain is unfounded. I find that instead, my thoughts align themselves with this new data and circulate in unison with it.

In a few seconds, this sensation radiates from my head into every extremity and I feel as though the machine’s appendages are extensions of my own. Calm, I ease back into the controls and apply the appropriate pressure, always compensating when the prickly sensations floating near my subconscious thoughts dictate.

The burning mass of metal lifts with ease and I maneuver to a standing position with as much grace as I ever have. Using the flaming remains as a shield, I step toward ADS03. Once in range, I drop the destroyed machine between us, reach out, and wrestle with the flamethrower.

The other pilot reacts in sloppy fashion, swinging a miscalculated blow.

I overpower him, twisting the flaming arm toward his head.

The jet of fire rages for another two seconds before the other pilot turns it off. He tries to wrench his machine free, white head now charred.

I maintain my two-handed grip, pulling on the arm with everything I’ve got.

This upsets the balance of ADS03, causing it to stumble forward.