Toy Wars (16 page)

“Priority interrupt,” I called to the Nans.

“
Acknowledge
d
.”

“Replace tertiary CCT with the one from this body.”

“Negative,” the
Nan
said immediately. “Proscribed procedure.”

“Override.”

“Negative! Proscribed procedure.”
If I couldn’t get them to do it as a whole, I would need to break it down.

“Remove the tertiary CCT from this body.”

“Acknowledged.” T
he pair of
Nan
s worked quickly to enlarge a small hole in the chest using special knives built into their hands.
One reached in blindly and plucked out a single blue cube
with clear hair on one side. The whole assembly
couldn’t have been bigger than my tin
iest claw
.
“Task complete. Returning to primary priority queue.”

I took the small device. “Negative. Hold.”
I turned around, obscuring the device from the
Nan
s
before turning back around.
“Replace my tertiary CCT with this spare.”

“Negative. Proscribed procedure.”
The
Nans
’
intelligence is known to be exceptional. I needed to be trickier. I needed an
act of legerdemain.

I dropped the CCT on the floor and stepped forcefully on a pebble directly beside it.
“Return to your priority queue.”

Both
Nan
s returned to putting back together the poor teddy unit
I caused to be crippled for this desperate gamble.

“All combat units activate and focus on tunnel entrance.”
With everyone’s attention elsewhere I casually knelt down and retrieved the undamaged CCT next to the badly scuffed pebble.

“Priority tasking,” I ordered again.
“Require tertiary CCT
replacement.”

“Affirmative.”

“New parts.
Use
this CCT to replace my tertiary CCT.”

“Affirmative.
Please l
ie
down on your belly and deactivate tertiary CCT and command pathways three, six
,
and fourteen through twenty-four.”

I
sprawled out
flat
with my rotund belly between the train rails.
This e
mergency repair
I didn’t need
mechanically or electrically, but
it
just might save my life.
Before I let the
Nan
s do a single thing, I
used my
SAN
to force
commands into their command pathways: One, replace my third backup CCT with
spare part; two, complete this transplant before taking any additional instruction; three, no other priority may supersede these orders until the procedure is completed.

As
these
Nurse Nan
s
had no direct connection to Six
my orders would take precedence over any other order or situation they could encounter, even their own imminent
demise.
This whole episode
reminded me
of Six’s experimentation on me.
I
dreaded getting my CCT replaced
almost as much as when Six stuck that needle down in my skull.
Would I be whole when I awoke, would I just be dead
, or would I go mad and kill all my own troopers?

As
I saw
Nurse Nan
reach up to
turn off my cognitive functions,
I began to doubt.
Would it work or wouldn’t it?
All this and I couldn’t go through with it.
No, I couldn’t do it.
I tried to scream for her to stop
,
but it was too late.
I immediately began to dream.

U
nlike the shadowy world of being asleep
these dreams brought
a vivid and disturbing vision of a world unlike my own.
Green and brown trees abounded, as did a carpet of verdant plant life.
Furry animals ran away from my approach
. I’d never seen any of them myself but
from
the encyclopedic knowledge Six programmed me with
I
recognize
d
raccoons, deer, and several red squirrels.
I looked up to see a sky in all the wrong shades of blue and gray with puffy white
flyer
s, not fighting the wind, but being driven before it like a unit which has fallen into a river.

W
ind rustle
d
the grotesquely wrong emerald
-
colored leaves.
Not only that, but
the heat
.
I felt like my hydraulic fluid would
boil into steam
, but somehow I kept moving.
There, in a flimsy canvas construction,
lay
four
Human
s, two adults and two not yet grown.
I realized with horror that I
was
only
30
centimeters high
.
T
he not-yet-grown female
Human
ran
toward me, reaching to pick me up.
At only a
meter tall
she looked huge!

“How cute, Mommy.
Can we keep him?”
She wrapped me in her arms in a vise-like grip, crushing my external armor and severing several of my hydraulic lines.

“Teddy Bear cubs shouldn’t be handled, Candice.
Put it down,” said the full grown male.

“But Daaaaaady!” she whined and flung me to the ground.
My left leg broke on impact.

“You heard your father, Candy.
Now come away.
You never know where the mother Teddy Bear is.”
A four-legged brute, which I recognized from my preprogrammed memories as a sheepdog, lumbered toward me.

“Spot!” called the younger male.
“No, leave it alone.”
I crawled at my top speed away, but the animal bore down at me even faster, jaws open.
I felt the teeth sever my hydraulic pump and rupture my brain case.
I was dying...

“Reactivate, Teddy 1499.
Reactivate, Teddy 1499.”
I opened my eyes to look out at the subtle shades of red in the darkened cavern, a cavern with no more garish blues or greens.
“The transfer was a success.”
I mentally felt all over my body.
Yes, I was still whole.
No giant
Humans nor their shaggy pets
abused me.
Belatedly
,
I mentally felt for the
tertiary
CCT bank.
It was there in standby.
It was as much as I could have hoped for.
I intended to test my theory exactly once before throwing caution to the wind.

I stood up and ran a basic physical, mechanical
,
and electronic test.
All systems showed nominal, including CCT number
three
.
I moved back as far into the tunnel as I dared.
Even with light
-
enhancing vision,
the
dark
ness overwhelmed everything.
I couldn’t see anything beyond a dull red circle back the way I came.
Through my CCT I easily “experience
d
” where my
troops
defended the entrance by simply pinging their CCTs. Despite all this I could not see them in any way.
It was now or never.

I transferred all command pathways through CCT number
three
.
The
tunnel
instantly
filled with enemies.
It was all I could do to keep from drawing my side-arm and firing in
an
autonomic response,
an
almost instinctual
urge. My weapon remained holster
ed
.
My troops didn’t exercise the same restraint.

A pair of machine
guns cut loose above my head before I could
reactivate
my own primary CCT.
The fire immediately ceased and my crew went back to
guarding the entrance of the tunnel.

My theory proved to be true, thus far.
If I was correct, I could now switch CCTs and walk right out the door and never be shot at by the enemy.
That would save me, but the other
106
units would be left without control.
I would be leaving them to die.

Was it right?
Was it cowardly?
I couldn’t make up my mind at the time.
Nothing I could think of would save them.
I would think for a time, but I knew that in the long run it came down to only two choices
—
die with my own, or try and survive
to avenge their deaths
.

I picked up an abandoned railroad spike from the floor and began carving unit designations on the wall by slamming it repeatedly into barely yielding stone.
Over a seven-hour period I avoided the decision I must face by creating a memorial to us all.
The first three
unit designations
were in letters five times as high as the rest: Elly 5998, Jeffrey 177, and Jeffrey 178.
The remaining
107
names listed the units
that
still lived in this deathtrap.
At the end, I considered adding my name to the list of honored dead, but as
I’d already decided
, I couldn’t insult the others’ memories by putting my own name there.
At least there would be something to remember the sacrifice that these units made to their Factory
.
I knew they would feel no pain.
With those two thoughts, I gained a tiny measure of peace.

It was time.
I walked back to the guard perimeter at the mouth of
this soon to be mausoleum
.
My voltage ramped up the closer I got to actually committing myself. If
what I suspected was true, then I was doing something far more dangerous than hanging on the back of a monster
. Soon
I’d be bearding the lion in his own den.

“All units prepare to shut down cognitive processes for a period of five
minutes.” I heard the echo of my order down the chain of command. Several units lay down on the ground. “Execute.”

The units wore no telltales of compliance. Barring a direct order from Six, my command overrode all other priorities. Now that I stood at the moment of truth my voltage crept up in fear again. Nothing would change the outcome. Six’s armies wouldn’t ride over the mountains and save us.

I forced my voltage back down
to no
minal
.
At the same time I noticed the overpressure in my hydraulic fluid. How dare Six put me in this position! My righteous indignation poured off me like lava out of a volcano.
I saved its dome so many times I couldn’t count them all
,
and now I had to do this.

I took a few moments of no processing and forced down the fluid pressure.
The nominal state of my being
made me feel better.
I hoped it wasn’t
a false sense of security
.
I turned off my vision circuits, changed my
command pathways through
CCT number
three
and walked out the tunnel mouth.

I strode blindly about forty meters before stopping.
Nothing blasted me and nothing shot me.
I opened my eyes to find several dozen units milling around
, all battle oriented toward the train tunnel
.
My new CCT showed them
all
to be allies.

The train bore, through the interpretation of my new CCT, glowed red with danger.
Even though I appeared from nowhere, my new allies
neither attacked nor acknowledged
my presence
in any way.

It had worked!
My voltages dropped in
elat
ion
that I had pulled it off.
Just as fast as I rejoiced, my fluid pressure dropped
because
looking at
the red glow around the train tracks saddened me.
Intellectually
,
I knew that my hundred plus comrades
’
fate
had been
sealed the moment they entered that artificial cave.
Was I a monster for abandoning them anyway?