War with the Robots

"Double-time to the lock," Pere gasped out, choking over the words as the heat seared his throat. They stumbled and ran towards the large sealed valve at the end of the platform, robot guns tracking them from the turrets that studded the face of the metal wall. Identification was made and before they reached the lock the immense outer door rotated ponderously. Someone screamed as he fell and bare flesh touched the burning metal of the platform. Pere forced himself to wait until they were all inside, entering last. There was some relief when the outer door had closed, but no real drop in the temperature until they had passed through all five seals of the four-barreled lock. Even then the air inside the fortress was far warmer than normal.

"Perhaps this heat has something to do with the reason we were sent out a week early," General Natia said. "This and the tunnel blockage might be caused by an enemy penetration in force."

Pere had reached the same conclusion himself, though he wouldn’t admit it aloud, even to his second-in-command. In addition only he knew that a real emergency at HQ had changed their shipping orders, though Command had not been specific about the nature of the emergency. As fast as he could, without running, Pere led his staff towards HQ control.

Nothing was right. No one answered him when he formally requested permission to enter. There were maintenance robots stolidly going about their work, but no officers in view. For a single heart-stopping instant he thought that all four battle stations were vacant. Then he saw a finger come out and touch a button at Command Prime: the occupant of the chair was slumped so low that he could hardly be seen. Pere stalked quickly towards the post and began a salute, but his hand stopped before it reached his forehead and forgotten, dropped slowly back. He stared with horror.

In the chair the operator gradually became aware that someone was standing over him. It was an effort for the man to draw the attention of his deep-socketed and reddened eyes from the board. When he did it was just for an instant and Pere had only a glimpse of the pain in their depths, of eyes peeping out of their black-rimmed pits like frightened animals. Then their attention wavered back to the board and the thin arm lifted tremulously to touch a control.

"Thank God you’ve come… you’ve come at last thank…" The words, scarcely a whisper to begin with, died away to a wheeze.

The officer’s arms were pocked and scarred with needle holes: streaked with hardened rivulets of blood. The jumbled cartons and vials on the table told a wordless story of a man forcing himself to stay awake and active long past human limits: there were stimulants, sleep-surrogate, glucose, anesthetics, vitamin complexes. He had obviously been days alone in this chair, manning all four battle stations hooked into his own board. Alone — for some unknown and terrible reason alone-he had fought the war, waiting for help. With an uncontrollable feeling of revulsion Pere saw that the man had soiled himself as he sat there.

"General Natia, man that free board," he ordered.

She slipped efficiently into the chair and set up a repeater from the others. Quickly taking in the factors of the conflict she called out, "Ready, sir."

Pere threw the command switch and the red bulb winked out on the board before him, and the one in front of Natia flashed on.

It was as though the light had been the spark of life holding the man at the controls. When the red bulb snuffed out he dropped his face into his hands and collapsed sideways into the cushioning chair. Pere took him by the shoulder and shook him until the hands dropped away and the last traces of consciousness stiffened the lolling head. With painful effort the man opened his eyes.

"What happened?" Pere asked. "Where is everyone else?"

"Dead," the feeble voice whispered, near to death itself. "I was the only one didn’t die — in bed at the time. Just chance I wasn’t touching any metal. Just sheets, mattress. Robots say it was a vibration source — subsonic — supersonic — something new. Curdled everyone, killed them — coagulated the protein. Like eggs… cooked eggs… all dead."

When the man sank into unconsciousness again Pere signalled to the medical officer who was standing by. Pere looked down at the solid steel floor beneath his feet and shuddered; the vibration weapon might be used again at any time. Or could it? The robots must have taken some preventative measures. He turned to the command robot, standing with steady metallic patience by the computor bank. Shaped like a normal motile, this robot’s unique function was apparent only by the large vision screen on its chest and the thick cable, a metallic unbilical cord, that ran back from it to the computors behind. It was simply an extension of the giant computors and logic and memory units that were the heart of HQ.

"Have you found out what generated the killing vibration?" Pere asked the command robot.