Brain Recyclers (Robot Geneticists Book 2) Read online

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Eve shot forward at the sound of a human voice from the darkness.

  James187 grabbed the girl just before she would have exposed herself to view.

  “Stop that,” he warned in a harsh whisper. “What did we just finish talking about?”

  When Eve stopped straining against the robot’s grip, James187 let her go.

  “Right,” Eve said with a huff. “But that’s a human.”

  “Just because you don’t recognize an archetypal voice doesn’t mean it isn’t a robot. Odds alone say it probably is.”

  Eve crossed her arms. “Didn’t that sound suspiciously like Plato?”

  “You’re imagining things. That was a feminine voice, for starters.”

  The precocious teen aimed an index finger at James187’s torso, right where his internal computer resided. “You’re the one with record and playback. Listen again. The pitch is higher, but the voice is almost identical otherwise.”

  James187 stood still for a few seconds. When the robot’s brow ridges pulled together, she knew he’d heard what she had. “I’ll be damned…”

  Whoever was down that tunnel was likely an experiment, same as Plato, same as all the Eves. Safety or not, Eve was the one who’d be damned if she let a fellow human suffer alone in the darkness. Still, she took the precaution of not poking her head around the corner.

  “Hello!” Eve called back.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  “Hello,” the voice echoed, clear and sweet as a holiday caroler’s.

  Gemini’s heart nearly broke. Her Eve14. Her Eve, she corrected herself. It wouldn’t do to slip up this late in the game.

  “Do you have food?” Gemini called back. It sounded like as good a ruse as any. Charlie25 hadn’t packed her off with anything more than an afternoon snack. The appearance of sponsorship might throw off any element of surprise.

  Plus, Gemini suspected that Charlie25 didn’t want her running off completely loose.

  “Sort of,” Eve replied. No songbird ever sounded so effortlessly melodious. The years of vocal exercises and operatic puzzles had paid off. Gemini’s human ears couldn’t analyze the pitch and timbre. Somehow, stripped of quantitative judgment, the quality was all the more apparent. “They’re dog biscuits. But I’m willing to share.”

  Gemini’s stride faltered. James187 was feeding the girl dog treats? “Um, thanks?”

  How dare that ignoramus risk Eve’s dental health and delicate nutritional balance like that! The girl could survive a few hours’ hunger while the acclaimed hunter shot something edible and roasted it over an open flame like an ancient cannibal.

  A glare up ahead prompted Gemini to slide the UV goggles up. Light. Real, visible-spectrum light floated disembodied, illuminating the track from a raised platform off to the right of the tunnel.

  “That’s far enough,” James187 ordered. A robotic head popped around the corner, backlit.

  Gemini froze. Not just her muscles, but her lungs, her tongue, even her heart seemed to shut down. Human eyes, sharp as an astronaut’s, could only make out the indistinct shadow of the gun aimed her way.

  Was it a tranquilizer pointed at her neck or a hunting rifle?

  “Drop the weapon,” James187 ordered.

  “I thought you offered to help me,” Gemini countered. “I don’t want to die.”

  The words had been meant as a ruse. But as she spoke them, the impact chilled the bones of Gemini’s body. The heart that had iced over just seconds ago resumed with pounding force, trying to escape a potentially doomed body.

  “James187, you put that thing down this instant,” Eve scolded from out of view. “You’re scaring her.”

  A hand reached out, forcing down the barrel of James187’s rifle.

  Gemini wasn’t going to let her window of opportunity pass. Lowering the rifle, she took quick aim and fired.

  The EMP rifled hummed.

  James187 toppled, limp, off the platform and crumpled to a heap in the gravel.

  Gemini brought down her goggles and fired again, taking the time to line up her shot in the dark shadow of the platform’s edge. She wanted no chance that a data record of this encounter survived.

  “No!” Eve screamed. The piercing keen brought tears to Gemini’s eyes.

  Eve dropped down to the tramway beside the inert form. The young woman pried open James187’s thoracic access plate. Deft fingers dug inside, but everything within the robotic chassis was offline.

  Gemini tried to be relieved. She was out of personal danger. A twinge of regret nagged that she could have just murdered, if not a friend, then at least an old acquaintance. James187 was a potential asset to conspiracy’s plans as well. Charlie25 might have been the brains of the operation, but the conspiracy couldn’t exist without widespread assistance from the general community.

  Worse than the minor guilt of choosing expediency over the life of a fellow robot was the effect of James187’s death on Eve.

  Eve sobbed as she tried to revive the robot in a pointless, Hollywood effort to save her friend. Somehow, the logic of old movies held that if a death was recent enough, it was reversible. Not in the year 3090.

  Gemini approached warily. She couldn’t afford to spook Eve. The impact syringe was right in the breast pocket of her tactical vest. Setting down her EMP rifle, Gemini knelt beside Eve.

  Then something strange and unexpected happened.

  As Eve sobbed, fingers working furiously to tap in diagnostic codes and restart commands, Gemini pulled her away with a hug. Eve buried her head against Gemini’s shoulder.

  “I didn’t want him dead,” Eve wailed. “He wouldn’t have hurt you. He was just being cautious. He just wanted to protect me.”

  “There, there,” Gemini cooed. Eve14 had been the one raised to be cold and logical. Eve16 was the one Evelyn11 had lavished with affection, but the process still worked.

  Despite never having held Eve14 before, Gemini felt the kinship between them. Eve was warm. Her skin was smooth as Gemini stroked her cheek. The hedgehog hair prickled Gemini’s cheek, but the former geneticist looked past that.

  A sick knot twisted in Gemini’s stomach seeing Eve in this state.

  “When I heard the name James187, I recognized him as a dangerous robot. He was part of a conspiracy to—”

  “I know that,” Eve snapped. She pushed away to fix Gemini with tear-flooded eyes. “He was helping me stay away from them. It was James who told Charlie7 and Plato where to find me.”

  Gemini stiffened. “Oh. I’m… so sorry, then.”

  Good enough for the treacherous weasel. It was James187’s fault that Eve was walking around in that body instead of Evelyn11. He was responsible for months trapped in a rent-a-chassis, pondering the existential dilemma of whether she was even the Evelyn11 or a mere copy.

  If Eve weren’t there watching, Gemini would have disconnected that Version 68.9 head of James187’s and found a shelf to display it.

  Eve sniffled. Blinking a few times, she studied Gemini’s face. The scrutiny made the neophyte human’s skin crawl.

  “You look like him,” Eve said offhandedly. The petite girl stood and backed away a step, looking Gemini all over. “Genetic phenotypes mapped onto a female form.”

  “What are you talking about?” Gemini asked. Was Eve hallucinating in her grief? She couldn’t have known James187 well enough for his death to shatter her psyche. Plus, the look in her eye was lucid, even through the redness and swelling.

  “Plato,” Eve stated. “Your features bear unmistakable similarities. If this were a movie, I’d assume you were his sister. But since we live in the distant future and everyone is cloned, I think it’s safer to assume you’re a clone with a non-expressive Y chromosome.”

  Gemini stared. For an instant, she regretted schooling Eve14 on the processes of genetics and all that could go wrong. It had been nice to treat the girl as a colleague, testing ideas that might go into embryonic Eve projects. The curriculum involved tiptoeing
around pitfalls such as named diseases and syndromes. But Gemini had a name to put with Eve’s description: Swyer syndrome.

  That instant of regret washed away in a storm of dueling angers. Gemini didn’t know who to vent the worst of her fury on, Charlie24 for creating Plato and his ilk, or Charlie25 for squirreling away survivors of ‘24’s experiments and foisting one of them on her.

  While Gemini was still struggling to wrap her wet, spongy, biological mind around this revelation, it was Eve’s turn to offer a hug of support.

  “It’s OK. I know you were trying to help.”

  Gemini felt those warm, surprisingly strong arms squeeze around her. Eve only came up to her chin, and fuzzy hair tickled Gemini’s jawline. Pressed close together, there was no way to extract the impact syringe without first forcing Eve away.

  To her surprise, Gemini didn’t want to.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Eve snapped one of biscuits and handed half to Gemini. The larger girl took the canine treat reluctantly but accepted the canteen readily when Eve passed that as well.

  “I’m not going to lie to you,” Eve said. “They’re not good.”

  Gemini opened her mouth and gingerly angled the oblong bar of dried grain product toward her molars. With bomb-squad care, she bit down and winced as the rock hard biscuit crunched.

  Grimacing, Gemini chewed. “Thanks.”

  “It’ll hold us over,” Eve said, trying to maintain a facade of confidence to keep Gemini from worrying. “We’ll have to take James’s skyroamer for supplies, but first I think we need to know if this is someplace we can come back to.”

  Gemini paused her chewing, still working on the first bite. “What do you mean?”

  “These tunnels were part of a civic transit system. They might lead anywhere. We shouldn’t hide out anywhere without multiple points of egress. Cave-ins, debris, soil deposition, anything that might have changed the layout over time might affect whether this is a viable long-term solution.”

  “How long term?” Gemini sounded skeptical.

  Eve started down the tunnel from the station platform that James187 had chosen as their base of operations. Turning to wait for Gemini, who hadn’t budged, she shouted back. “Until we get a new Charlie.”

  Throwing back a swallow of water, Gemini choked down the bite of biscuit like a bitter pill. “You want to do what?”

  Eve was already on the move again, but this time Gemini hurried to catch up. When Eve looked back to check the girl’s progress, the newcomer hastily stuffed something back in her vest pocket. Though she said nothing, Eve suspected Gemini was carrying a small supply of food she didn’t want to share.

  “I promised Charlie7 that I’d help get a new one of him made. Same specs as the original. Obviously he’d have none of the memories of Charlie7, but he ought to have the same personality. He’ll be Charlie42, and he’ll help us.”

  Each of the girls carried one of the workspace lamps James187 had brought along. Gemini kept her dark-vision goggles across the stubble of her scalp like a headband.

  Gemini snickered. “Help us how? A freshly booted robot won’t have any pull.”

  The system of tunnels followed a similar line to the ones that ran to the station. The tunnel ceiling had been plastered over in some decorative layer of concrete that had crumbled to litter the floor. However, the load-bearing infrastructure appeared to have held up over time.

  “Maybe not,” Eve replied. “But he’ll be resourceful and kind, and he’ll be willing to risk his life to help us.”

  Gemini shook her head. “You’re the darling of the robotic world. That pretty face of yours is all over the new feeds.”

  Eve stopped and turned her lamp light on Gemini, careful not to blind the other girl. “You think I’m pretty?”

  “Well… I mean…”

  “No one since Evelyn11 has told me that. Well, Phoebe did once, but since we’re the only two fully-grown clones, we’re identical. She was trying to be funny.”

  Gemini cleared her throat. “Well, just look at me. I’m overgrown and bear a resemblance to a dangerous criminal.”

  It wasn’t her fault, but Gemini’s words hit Eve like a punch. “He’s really not like that. He did what you thought you were doing, protecting humans from robots who might hurt them.”

  They started down the tunnel again. Crunchy bits of dog food gurgled in Eve’s stomach like a science class experiment gone wrong. One egress. That’s all she needed to see to know that this was someplace they could come back to after finding food.

  Without warning, a laugh bubbled out of Eve, echoing in the hollow depths of the underground tramway.

  “What’s funny?” Gemini asked, cocking her head.

  “You think this is what those last humans envisioned when they made the robots? That the new generation a thousand years later would be wandering old subway lines, trying not to complain about how yucky dog food tastes?”

  Gemini joined in laughing, and when she finished, shook her head. “No, I don’t imagine they did. Not at all.”

  “What was yours like?” Eve asked.

  The light from Gemini’s lamp swung around to Eve’s face. “My what?”

  Eve brought up a hand to shield her eyes. “Charlie24 created Plato. I’m guessing he made you too. Or did some other robot share DNA samples?”

  “I… uh… don’t recall. I’m sorry, I—”

  “It’s OK,” Eve assured her. “I saw the marks on your scalp. He did something to your brain, didn’t he?”

  Gemini’s hand strayed to her head, where a grid of pinpoint electrical burns stood out. The taller girl winced. “I had a hat, but it kept rubbing the sores.”

  “Aren’t those bothering you?” Eve asked with a nod toward the goggles Gemini wore across the same tender area.

  “I’ve been putting up with it, in case something comes in the dark.”

  Eve reached over and eased the strap away as she stole Gemini’s dark-vision gear. “I’ll hang onto them.”

  Tugging the strap tight at the back of her head, Eve peered into the world of pale violet shades. The lamp glow washed everything out, so Eve shut hers off.

  “Hey,” Gemini complained. “That’s not fair. Keep them safe, but for heaven’s sake, leave the lamp going. We’re neither of us bats.”

  “You’ve seen them, too?” Eve asked, perking up. She had worried that there might not be much in common between her and Gemini aside from both being human creations of crazy robots.

  Gemini looked away. “Well… no. But I’m… let’s say I’m aware of them.”

  “We don’t have to talk about bats,” Eve assured the girl. “Do you have a favorite color?”

  That was supposed to be a nice, safe, getting-to-know-you question.

  “Picking out a favorite frequency of the visible light spectrum seems trite.”

  “I know,” Eve gushed. “I’m glad it’s not just me and Olivia who think that way. These aren’t my normal clothes. It’s a long story, but I had to swap with my sister Phoebe.”

  Gemini snorted. “Don’t get me started on that one’s taste in colors…”

  “Huh?”

  Gemini cleared her throat. “Well, you Eves are all over the news feeds, like I said earlier. Remember? No idea where she got such chavish notions.”

  “You’re losing me…”

  “Sorry,” Gemini blurted. “Just forget it… or look it up later. You and I were raised differently, it would seem. How about that story of your outfit? You said it’s a long story, but we’ve the time for one.”

  The two young women explored the subway lines as Eve recounted the tale of her escape, starting with Nora109’s advocacy, which bought her the opportunity to plot.

  Time and again a subway line would end abruptly in rubble. Sometimes it would be shortly after starting down a new branch; other times, it required more than a kilometer of backtracking.

  “We should think about prioritizing food,” Gemini said after their eighth dead end. “I
know we’ve yet to rule out every possibility, but I think biological imperatives may force our hand.”

  Eve dug in her pocket and pulled out the last of the dog snacks. “We’ve got one left and enough water.”

  “Not sure I care to stomach another of those…”

  “What did Charlie24 feed you? Must have been a lot better than what Evelyn11 fed me. These are a little stale, but the taste could be worse.”

  Gemini rubbed at the back of her neck. Probably a residual injury. “I ate… regular food. You know, typical stuff. Food. From the… food machine.”

  “I found out mine was ape chow,” Eve said with a giggle. “I mean, I’m mostly hairless, but I’m still a primate. Makes me wonder if I would have grown to your size with a proper human diet.”

  The taller girl raised her chin. “You look fine to me. Not malnourished in the least. Someone took good care of you.”

  “Oh, sure,” Eve said. “Someone who wanted to slip into my body like a parasite. I did some studying, and the closest I could find in the animal kingdom were hermit crabs. I was just going to be the next shell for Evelyn11. In a way, hopping from chassis to chassis, all robots are like that to some degree.”

  “I’m still hungry,” Gemini said. “I’d rather find James187’s skyroamer and get to a food distribution depot.”

  Eve shot out a hand and grabbed Gemini. “Shh!”

  “Don’t shush me! It’d be a fitting tribute to a noble protector cut down in the line of—”

  “Shh!” Eve repeated more urgently, then dropped her voice to a whisper. “I think I heard someone else in these tunnels with us.”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Why were this little brat’s ears sharper than her own? Gemini wondered this as she stood statue still, waiting for Eve to confirm what at first she had only suspected.

  “Voices,” Eve whispered. “Back at the station platform. They’ve probably found James187’s chassis by now.”

  Thank heavens! At last an end to the tedium. Either the robots the girl heard would be working for Charlie25 and help her haul Eve back for upload, or they’d scare the little scamp enough to get into a skyroamer with Gemini. She patted the vest pocket with the syringe to make sure it was still there.