Chapter 38 #2
“Kevin Turner was diagnosed with terminal cancer when he was forty-three years old, given an estimated three months to live. At the time, Doctor Anderson was the foremost specialist in his field, working on the next frontier in robotics—the transfer of human consciousness into a robotic body.”
“I don’t understand how that would be possible,” Ronin said. “Everything about the way we think and function is completely different.”
“Not so different as it seems. We both feel and react through a neural interface that sends electric signals from sensors—or nerve endings—to a central control point. The coding that guides our thoughts and behavior is, in some ways, similar to the coding of the human brain. It was just another challenge to overcome, and William never shied away from challenges. Additionally, he was working with Doctor Jessica Yuan, one of the most talented neurologists in her field.”
“Why? Why do that?” Lara forced herself to ask.
“Why?” Newton repeated thoughtfully. “For William, it was a way to provide families more time with their loved ones. I believe Doctor Yuan felt the same way. What medical science could not overcome alone, perhaps robotics could conquer. Kevin Turner had a wife and two children who would have been without a husband and father when he passed away. He volunteered for the program after Doctor Yuan explained both the possibilities and the risks.”
“I-If he was human, then why does he hate us?”
“I wish I could offer you a definitive answer, Lara, but I’m afraid all I can offer is more speculation.
The transfer of his consciousness was successful, but not without complications.
The stresses he endured were immense. The team had only just begun to explore the psychological ramifications when the military seized Kevin and all associated research and documentation.
We were all relocated to an undisclosed facility, from which we were eventually transported to Francis E. Warren Air Force Base.
“But we were not long spared from the ravages of war. The base was attacked. In the ensuing chaos, we lost many personnel, and a fair number of them were unaccounted for by the end. Kevin was amongst the missing. I didn’t see him again until I found him in the wasteland years later and reactivated him.
During our brief interaction, he gave no indication that he recalled having been human. ”
“How bad was the war?” Lara shifted, crossing her legs in front of her upon the bed and settling her hands on her lap. She wasn’t sure if she really wanted to know, but some part of her needed to. Needed to understand how the world had become this dust-ridden husk.
“It reached a scale and scope beyond anything humanity could’ve imagined. No corner of the world was left unaffected, and no life escaped unscathed.”
Ronin combed his fingers carefully through her hair along her back. “It was terrible. I see faces, sometimes. Glimpses into my damaged memories. All the people and bots I’ve ended.”
She glanced up at him, frowning. “So…you remember stuff from before the Blackout?”
“Only flickers. Still images of death and deactivation.”
Lara swung her gaze back to Newton. “Could he ever regain the rest?”
“Though not impossible, it is improbable. They had the necessary equipment at the Air Force Base, but there is no guarantee it’s still operable, or that his data is not corrupted beyond recovery.”
“I don’t think I want it back,” Ronin said, drawing her attention back to him.
“Why?” Lara asked.
“What’s waiting for me in those memories?” He raised his free hand and scratched his cheek. “Pain, loss, the reminder of all the terrible acts I witnessed and committed? If I cared about anyone in that life, they’re gone now.”
Lara winced.
Ronin turned his body toward her and captured her face between his hands, forcing her eyes to meet his. “What I have with you, Lara, has brought me more contentment than anything else ever could. The memories I’m making with you render everything before meaningless.”
Heart quickening, she desperately searched his gaze. “What if there was someone who you…you felt the same about as you do for me, but you forgot them?”
“If I ever felt the same about anyone, I would never have forgotten. You are burned into every circuit, embedded in every bit of data. You are part of my core functions now.”
She covered his hands with her own and leaned her forehead against his, closing her eyes.
How had she come to need him in so short a time?
Ronin had worked his way into every part of her being.
When he’d pushed her away, when he’d distanced himself because of his own pain, she’d felt it in her soul.
She needed him, needed his solid, unwavering presence, his patience, his thoughtfulness.
She craved his touch not just for passion and pleasure, but for comfort.
Tabitha leaving home, leaving Lara, had been painful, and her death had left a hole in Lara’s heart that would never heal.
But Lara wasn’t sure she’d survive losing Ronin.
“The two of us left Cheyenne so we could be together.” She opened her eyes, letting them linger on Ronin briefly before drawing back and looking at Newton. “My sister went to live with a bot, and Warlord killed them both. Then he gave Ronin a chance to prove himself by killing me.”
“We never hypothesized that the transferal of his consciousness would be the catalyst for his loss of humanity,” Newton said softly, frowning. “Our aim was to diminish suffering, never to cause it.”
“Can he be stopped?”
Newton nodded. “The same as anyone else.”
“Then why hasn’t he been?” she demanded, fire sparking in her belly. So much suffering, fear, and death had been caused by a single person, by that monster, and she couldn’t bear it. “You turned him on. Why didn’t you turn him off?”
“Were he still human, and I merely the physician who treated him after a terrible injury, would you ask that question of me?”
“Yes!”
His metallic frown deepened, and his body sagged.
“I am no fighter. My directive, my goal, my desire, was to assist the world’s recovery, but in that I have failed utterly.
In Cheyenne, especially, my intervention has only heightened people’s suffering.
That’s why I’ve been here. Perhaps at one point, I believed I could do it.
Believed I could end him. After hearing rumors of what he’s done…
“But I am not designed to destroy, Lara. So, I’ve lain here for years, hiding from the world I wanted to help. A world my own actions helped to create.”
“Why not get someone else to help, then? Someone to do the dirty work and end some of this suffering? But no, you just sat here, rusting away while he killed people. Not just humans, but everyone!” She glared at him, chest heaving, but her inner fire snuffed out as realization dawned on her. “And we…just left them too.”
Hanging her head, she stabbed her fingers into her hair and tugged it back with a growl. Tears stung her eyes. “Fuck, we just left them, Ronin.”
Ronin wrapped his arms around Lara and pulled her into his embrace. His hold was gentle, but firm. “You know nothing is ever that simple.”
“Bad humans get punished. Why not bots, too?”
“He has a small army around himself. Who could oppose that?”
“Other bots, like you.” She lifted her head to meet his eyes.
“I’m only one. Even if I managed to walk up to Warlord and deactivate him permanently, I’d never get out in one piece.”
Lara flung her hand toward Newton. “He’s the fucking Prophet! You recognized him. Wouldn’t others? There must be bots in Cheyenne who trust Newton, who owe him their lives. If the Prophet openly opposed Warlord, more would rise up with him.”
“The Prophet is a legend, Lara,” Newton said. “I’m just a robot who assisted in scientific research and experimentation.”
“But they’d listen to you. You know things, and you turned a lot of them on, didn’t you?”
Newton raised his hands, turning them to look at his scratched palms. “I reactivated them, yes, but it was individuals like Warlord who provided them the things they require to function properly.”
“Ronin provides the things they need. Him and the other dustwalkers are the ones bringing in scrap.”
“That’s true,” Ronin said, “but it doesn’t matter. I’m still an outsider in Cheyenne, existing apart from the community he built.”
“Built? Humans built Cheyenne, he just took it over.” Lara pulled away from him.
How could she not feel guilty for leaving now, having learned all this?
She hadn’t even said a word to Gary and Kate, who’d helped her despite having no obligation to do so, whose lives hung by a thread that Warlord could cut at any moment, especially now that Kate was expecting another baby.
“He’ll kill them all, every single one of them.
It’s just a matter of time. We can’t just sit here and do nothing. ”
Newton met her gaze. “What would you have us do? Are the three of us to walk into the center of town and proselytize in an attempt to rally robots to our cause? You know what he’s capable of, Lara. You’ve seen it firsthand.”
“The humans would fight. We’ve got nothing else to lose. And what about the people at the base? If you told them what he’s doing, would they just sit back and wait until he eventually finds them?”
“We can’t go back to Cheyenne, Lara.” There was steel in Ronin’s voice. “It’s not safe for you.”
“Is anywhere safe?” She closed her eyes and shakily inhaled.
Her throat was tight, and she was on the verge of crying.
She knew she was asking a lot, knew she was pushing against forces beyond her control.
But even if she didn’t personally know all of them, Cheyenne’s humans were her people, and they’d lived in fear under a needlessly cruel, vindictive tyrant for longer than anyone could remember.
He’d stomped his boot onto their backs to keep their faces down in the dirt, and the conditions he imposed on them had slowly scraped away the compassion and humanity people must once have had.
Like he was making them as empty as he’d become.
Lara had seen it all around. The weariness and wariness in everyone’s expressions, the despair, the gleam of hunger in the eyes of the malnourished children running and playing in the filthy streets. It was suffering she’d known firsthand all her life.
She hated feeling so helpless, hated that there was nothing she could do about it. The whole situation, the whole town, was wrong, it was fucked up, but what were her options?
Run away and live…or return and die. Getting herself killed wouldn’t help even a single damned person.
“You’re right,” she whispered. “We can’t go back.”
“It may be difficult to believe,” Ronin said gently, curling a warm finger under her chin and guiding her eyes to his, “but there is an entire world beyond Cheyenne. We can make a future somewhere, and this may be the only chance we have to do so together.”
Lara nodded. However terrible the situation was in Cheyenne, she had something to live for. Someone to live for. Mental exhaustion tumbled atop her, weighing her down; this was all too much, too fast. She sagged in Ronin’s embrace and rested her head on his shoulder.
Newton said something quietly, but she’d already closed her eyes and stopped paying attention.
Once the storm was over and they left this place, she’d see the world, and she was glad Ronin would be the one to show it to her.
But she knew, in the deepest part of her heart, there’d always be a patch of gloom casting a shadow on her happiness because she’d done nothing to help the others.