WetWeb (19 page)

Franklin pushed these thoughts from his head.  He would deal with Dolly later.  Right now, he felt the urgent need to get Molly out of his house.  He used the vid-phone in his study to order a skim-taxi.  Although hungry, he stayed in his study and watched on a smaller vid-screen the display that showed the two Warmbots standing across the street.  He thought about contacting someone to come and claim them
,
but could not think of a city authority who would deal with wandering Warmbots.  And so the morning simply continued.  The Warmbots stood outside blankly watching the house, and Franklin sat in his study watching the Warmbots over his vid-screen.

Eventually
,
the skim-taxi that Franklin had ordered pulled up in front of the house and broke the stand-off.  Franklin quickly dressed for outside.  He was mindful that he would be meeting with Ashley Van Houghten, the forthright sales woman who he had met when he first saw Molly.  Franklin dressed in a clean white shirt with a high collar. 

The shirt felt a little snug in the collar, but he was able to button it.  He decided he could tolerate the collar until his meeting was done, then he would relax and unbutton it. 

On his way out to the skim-taxi, he gathered his hat and jacket reflexively.  The day was bright and clear, but the sun and the wind
,
or the birds and trees
,
did not bother him today. 

Standing in the open doorway, he commanded Molly saying, “Molly, we are leaving now. Come with me.”

Obediently, the Warmbot stood to full attention.  The grill became active and the nasal air intake openings flared.  It was ready.  It walked through the kitchen and past the stairs until it was standing with Franklin in the open doorway.

Franklin guided Molly down the steps and into the front seat of the
s
kim-
t
axi.  When Molly was seated next to the Warmbot driver, Franklin loaded his heavy frame into the back.

“Savant Organic Robotics Dealership on L Street,” Franklin said.

On this skim-taxi trip
,
he decided to keep the window occlusion controls in the open position.  From his vantage in the back seat of the skim
-
taxi he kept a wary eye on the Warmbots standing by the tree across from his house.  These Warmbots had carefully observed Franklin loading
himself
and Molly into the
s
kim-
t
axi.  The
s
kim-
t
axi noiselessly started to move and Franklin continued to watch the Warmbots until they rounded the corner and he could no longer see them.  He had the impression that they were watching the
s
kim-taxi until he was out of their line of sight.  He felt confident that they would still be there when he got back. Once the Warmbots were out of view
,
he exhaled, relaxed a little, and then settled back into the backseat of the skim-taxi.

Looking up towards the front of the
s
kim-
t
axi, Franklin was disturbed to see the dark grill of the Warmbot driver reflected back at him in the rear-view mirror.  Franklin had the distinct impression that this Warmbot was also watching him.  The Warmbot driver was not a new model.  The old style grill showed signs of rust and wear.  The skin around the grill was irritated and red with some rash that was probably caused by constant contact between the organic with the metal of the faceplate.  The thin hair on the driver Warmbot was long and unkempt.  Its skin was grey.

Franklin slid across the bench-seat to sit on the other side, behind the driver.  From this position, the driver could no longer watch Franklin by using the rear-view mirror.

During the short ride to Savant Organics, Franklin observed the world going by on the outside the window of the
s
kim-
t
axi.  His purpose was to see the city and the people. 

Anand’s words echoed in his head,
“Can you take yourself out of your story and see, really see the world around you?”

Today, Franklin would find out.  But by the time they reached L Street, he had not noticed anything unusual or extraordinary.  The sun was out.  People were walking in the streets.  Skimmers buzzed by him going the opposite direction.  Sacramento seemed like Sacramento.

Franklin observed many Warmbots walking on the streets during his transit.  They were all following along behind their master or they looked like they were performing mundane tasks like walking the dog or carrying groceries home from a corner market.  Their candy-colored grills sparkled in the bright daylight.  These artificial faces did not distract him.  Franklin now saw them as walking corpses. 

He opened his notebook and wrote
,
“Warmbots are reanimated dead people.  The
living have
made servants from the dead.”

He re-read the words on the page.  It was a simple truth.  How did this never occur to him before?  Blanco had seemed tired and grey because her body had died when she was old.  The new model represented by Molly with bouncy brown curls and warm pink skin looked young and perky because the girl whose body they re-animated had died at a young age.  Without the face, it was hard to tell, but just looking at the smooth pink skin and rich thick hair, Franklin guessed she was in her early twenties when she died.  Maybe younger, maybe she was just a teen-ager.

Franklin remembered the other new models that were on display at Savant Organics.  He thought about the sales pitch when she said, “We do not often get organics of this quality.”  Did she know what she was saying? He wondered.  Did Ashley the
sales woman recognize that the
new more expensive feature
s
that they were selling in the
ir new model Warmbots
was
simply youth?  The bodies they had converted were simply younger than the previous models.

The skim-taxi was idling in front of Sav
ant Organic Robotics dealership
s main entrance.  Franklin eventually noticed they were not moving and looked up from his notebook where he had been busily updating his thoughts about Warmbots around him.  He waited till Molly was out of the skim-taxi, and then paid the fare and then he watched as the skim-taxi quietly slipped away and into traffic.

Franklin and Molly stood on the steps leading into the Savant Organic Robotic Dealership.  The building had no windows, and the outside wall was decorated with tall full color advertisements.  It reminded Franklin of an old style movie house where the features and coming attraction were displayed in large frame colorful posters on the outside.

The first poster showed a male Warmbot playing catch with a young boy.  The boy’s Mother stood off to the side watching.  The Mother was clearly looking at the strong musculature of the Warmbot.  The caption at the bottom read
,
“Frisky and Playful.”

The next poster showed a young female Warmbot.  It was serving a steaming hot meal to a family sitting at the dinner table.  The family seemed obscured except for the father.  He was looking hungrily at the buxom Warmbot as it leaned across the table with the serving platter heaped with food.  The caption read
,
“Festive and Satisfying.”

Looking at these posters Franklin realized that Savant was clearly selling sex as a reason to own a Warmbot.  He recalled his own reaction to Molly when he first saw her and was repulsed by his natural attraction to her.

As Franklin stood considering the posters, he felt a cool breeze blow across his hot face.  He realized he was standing in the direct sun and had been for some time.  He was standing outside and without a hat.

Strangely, he realized, the Sun and Wind did not bother him today.  He lingered on the steps admiring the day.  The world outside the building was clean and natural.  He heard the songs of birds in the trees and they made him feel at ease and part of the healthy living world around him.  He was glad for the first time in his life to be standing outside in the sunshine.

Finally,
he said
quietly
,“
Come along Molly.”

He navigated his large frame up the steps and up to the tall front door of the Savant Organic Robotics Dealership.   He pulled heavily and the door swung open and outwards.  Franklin followed Molly into the dark interior.

* * * * *

“You never told me you were married,” Claudia said.

Franklin was still holding open the door of the Chimneysweep bar.  His reading was over and when he finished his reading the elderly crowd had applauded politely.  Claudia moderated as they asked a few questions which Franklin answered and then slowly they had dispersed into the night.

  Franklin wondered if they understood what he was saying.  He wondered if any one of them would now begin to recognize the strange dystopia in which they were living their lives.

“Yes,” Franklin said answering Claudia statement as if it was a question. “I am married to a very nice woman named Dolly.”

“Yes, I got that from your reading
,
” Claudia said.

They walked together in silence now.  It was late.  The warm night air smelled vaguely of sour smoke as if somewhere rubber tires were burning.  Franklin felt uncomfortable.  He thought about the long walk to Claudia’s house and then the even longer walk home.  He would be alone again, walking past the dark houses that now reminded him of a graveyard.

He considered different excuses, he was tired and he wanted to see Dolly.  He wanted to be home.  But there was no way out.  He needed to walk with Claudia until she was home again.  He resigned himself to it and walked on.

Presently Claudia broke the uncomfortable silence saying,
“I like your book.  I think you do have something original and important to say.”

“Thank you,” Franklin managed. 

“Did you read the letters I gave you?” Claudia asked.

“Yes
,
” Franklin said, “They are very helpful
.
I did not read from them tonight, but I am incorporating them into the history.”

Franklin had read through the letters that Claudia had passed to him with growing interest.  They were letters from Claudia’s son who had enlisted as soldier in the Warmbot wars, back before there were Warmbots.  He was a soldier, who, Franklin surmised, never came home. 

Franklin remembered the pained expression on Claudia’s face when he first mentioned the theme of his work, when he first mentioned the WetWeb. 

He was not sure if Claudia was ready to discuss the letters openly, but the letters contained within themselves a central mystery because they ended abruptly.  Franklin in reading the letters understood that Claudia’s son had participated in a military experiment that was utilizing the new Synaptic interface device that was developed by Anand and Sadhna Singh.  But the letters ended abruptly.  There was no description of how the device performed in on a real battlefield.  Franklin did not know
if
the mili
tary experiment was a success or
a failure.

“There is something else about that I want you to know
,
”  Claudia
continued.

“After the letters stopped coming,” Claudia remained composed, as if she had rehearsed these lines. 

She continued saying,
“I did not know what happened to my son for a long time.  I receiv
ed the missing in action notice, b
ut it was cryptic.  I called the military command and wrote them many letters, but they would not tell me what had happened.  It was the not knowing that wore at me.”

She paused and walked a few steps forward.  Quietly, Franklin stayed by her side, step by step past the dark houses.

Then she continued, “Some
time later, a young man came to visit me.  He was in a wheel chair.  His name was Jonathan Grey.”

Exo-Suit: An armored suit that combines a strength enhancing exo-skeleton together with a protective shell.  The Exo-
S
uit also provides a regulated artificial atmosphere insulating the soldier from extreme weather conditions and offering a high degree of protection from biological weapons. 

- WetWiki

Eckwood focused his mind on the strange and random noises created by the Exo-Suit.  The suit maintained a positive internal air pressure to ensure the soldier was not exposed to any toxic gas or airborne disease or contagions.  The seals that surrounded each of the multitudes of joints always leaked.  When t
he air pressure inside the suit
dropped below the operational tolerance, Eckwood would hear an audible HSSSSSSS as the pressurized air valve automatically opened allowing compressed air to vent into the suit.  The hissing sound continued for a few seconds until the air pressure inside the suit returned to within normal operating range and then would abruptly stop.

Additionally, the Exo-Suit
was
outfitted with an array of servos that
would
auto-activate in response to the motion of the Eckwood’s arms and legs.  The purpose of the servos
was
to augment and assist with the management of the weight of the suit
,
and any additional gear or weapons that he happen
ed
to be tasked with carrying. 

The use of automated servos throughout the Exo-
S
uit mean
t
that a soldier wearing an Exo-Suit
was
stronger.  But at the same time, the heavy full body armor and controlled motions required to activate the servos make the soldier slower and lumbering.  Active motion by the soldier inside the suit result
ed
in a wide range of whining sounds from the automated servos inside the suit.  Each servo operate
d
at
a
different pitch and sometimes the sounds of the servos
were
singular and sometimes they
would
ring out in harmony with each other
,
depending on the complexity of the soldier’s activity. 

Finally, the Exo-
S
uit
was
equipped with a temperature control system that
was
utilized for both heating and cooling the soldier who remain
ed
insulated inside. 

Private First Class Holden Eckwood
was
sitting inside the confined space of the multi-purpose vehicle
. 
It
was
driving across the heat of the mid-day desert
and
the cooling system inside his Exo-
S
uit
was
running on high
.  T
he cooling system therefore
was
continually making random gurgling noises as
the
coolant
was
re-circulated.

These random background noises
were
the focus of Eckwood’s auditory meditation.  By focusing on the white noise of the Exo-Suit and assisted
by the drug induced state of 10
CC’s of liquefied Somnambutol, Private Eckwood
was
able to enter into a deep meditation. 
A trance that allow
ed
Eckwood to remove himself from his body sufficiently so that even loud combat noise
did
not distract him.
 

Eckwood
found he was
floating above himself.  He drift
ed
out of his body and out of the multi-purpose vehicle.  He
was
rising higher
,
until he
was
far removed from the scene below
.  R
ising up
,
and up
,
on a bubble of noise from his Exo-suit
, he rose
up into the white light of the desert sky.  Eckwood
was
floating on an updraft of hiss
,
and whine
,
and gurgle.

* * * * *

The perspective of Lt. Jonathan Grey who
found
himself synapping into a live fire combat situation was diametrically the opposite from the calm trance of Holden Eckwood.  Grey
was
not meditative, he
was
highly focused.  Grey
heard
the sounds of the Exo-Suit
,
but instead of an aria of noise used to focus a
meditation
,
these sounds
were
relegated into a background of white noise.  His ears
were
trained and attuned to the sounds of equipment working and equipment failing.  If the Exo-
S
uit
made
an awkward grind
,
or an unusual buzz, then this sound might be indicating a system failure.  If Grey hear
d
a sound like this, then suit noises of the Exo-
S
uit and its operational status
would
move to the forefront of Grey’s attention.  But right now
,
the noises are telling him that everything
was
working normally. Therefore, Lt. Jonathan Grey
was
fully focused on the battlefield situation that
was
erupting all around him.  Grey
was
back in the desert, and back in action.

Bounding out of the personnel carrier, Grey landed flat on both feet.  H
e
enjoyed a moment of gratification
with
the feel
ing
of strong working legs supporting his weight.  He actively pushed this thought from his mind.  It was time to fight; there could be no hesitation. 

Lt. Grey triggered the combat communication system that connected him to the squad and took command with a flat emotionless voice saying,
“This is Lt Jonathan Grey: I am now in command of this squad.”

Around him Grey could see the tail end of the convoy slowing to a stop.  On the open communication line Grey heard only static.  The
squad had been trained for a seasoned combat veteran to Synap in and take
command in a combat situation
,
but this was the first time that this had happened in a live fire combat situation.  Further, the squad did not know him personally
.  T
hey had trained to work with random veterans.  Whoever was on duty that day at the Comm-RAM command center was the commander during their training.  The squad waited for further instructions.

Grey knew that the tone of his voice, his tactical movements
,
and the specific orders he issued over the next few minutes
,
would decide how the squad accepted his command decisions and ultimately the success of this skirmish.  Failure, hesitation, panic could be the end for these young soldiers and his mission.

Grey remained calm.  He would be in control and reassuringly comfortable in combat.  He had been here before, he knew what to do.  His example would lead his squad more than his commands.  He ordered his commands by priority giving each squad team a specific task to perform.

Grey spoke in a calm voice, “Alpha, form a perimeter around this vehicle. Bravo, launch the LASO. Charlie, warm up the .55 caliber canon and let them know we are armed and dangerous.”

The priorities were straight-forward.  Defense first, this would be established by the men forming a defensive perimeter around their current position.  The second priority was information.  The final priority was a show of force.  The sound of the large .55 caliber canon would give the attackers something to fear, and at the same time encourage his men and the squad in the front of the convoy who are under continued attack.

Grey watched as the squad deployed, carrying out his orders.  These soldiers were untested in combat, but they had started to move and this was a good start.

From his vantage point behind the vehicle, Grey could see the last of the convoy stacked up in front his vehicle.  The vehicles that comprised the military convoy were used to transport supplies and were driven by remote control.  Comm-RAM was shutting these vehicles down and raising their individual vehicle defenses.  They looked like a line of desert tortoises all simultaneously pulling in their heads and legs.

Grey’s squad was positioned in the rear of the convoy and another squad was tasked with defending the front.  Grey could hear that the forward squad was actively taking fire. It was this nearby firefight that had triggered the syringe of liquefied Somnambutol inside the Exo-Suit of the soldier who had volunteered to for this experiment.  Lt. Grey was on duty and standing by at the Comm-RAM command center
.  When the volunteer was injected with liquefied Somnambutol, Lt. Grey
e was immediately Synapped into the soldier who had volunteered to let his body be used by an experienced veteran in a combat situation.  Grey was there for the same reason they had the LASO and Comm-RAM technologies.  Grey was an experienced combat officer, he would give this squad a tactical advantage.

From his position, he could hear the gunfire, but he could not see any fighting.  It was all happening out of his line of sight. The line of mechanized convoy vehicles in front of him curved to the left
,
following around a gradual ridge that rose along the left side of the rough road.  Eventually his view of the convoy was obscured by the rise of the ridge.

A loud “THWOOM” sound from the vehicle notified Grey that the LASO sensor cluster had been launched.

LASO is another military acronym.  LASO stands for “Local Area Sensory and Optical” system.  The LASO system
,
when activated launches a projectile into the air which automatically detonates at apogee spreading hundreds of small sensors into the sky over the battlefield.  The sensors once deployed into the sky begin a slow drift back to earth.  Each sensor sends information to the LASO command center.  The LASO command center
,
located on the back of the multi-purpose vehicle
,
is fully integrated with Comm-RAM
.  LASO uses
real time battlefield intelligence
, and is
combined with updated tactical recommendations from the central military tactical computer.  In theory, this combination of real time battlefield intelligence and access to a powerful tactical computer gives Lt. Grey and his squad a strong tactical advantage of the enemy combatants. 

The LASO sensors detect terrain, topography
,
and the presence of any enemy combatants or civilians during their drift to earth.  This information is transmitted by the sensors to the LASO command center which combines all of the data together providing the LASO tactical analysis system with a real time overhead snapshot of the battlefield and all participants.  Eventually the LASO sensors complete their slow drift to earth.  Once the sensors contact the ground, they form a networked sensor array which detects and transmits any nearby movement.  These individual sensors can be used for
g
uidance of the .55 Caliber artillery canon mounted to the vehicle
,
or as an objective for Grey’s combat resources, his men, deployed on the ground.

“Excellent,” Grey thought. 

The squad mov
ed
and they
were
taking action.  Soon
,
he would have a battlefield overview on the LASO command console
and
he could expect the telemetry from the sensors in less than a minute
. 
So
far so good.

Right now, Lt. Grey wanted to hear their voices and make sure the men were steady.  It was ok to be tense and scared, this was expected; Grey was alert for any indications of panic among the squad members. 

Into the Squad Communication system Grey said,
“Roll call
-
by the numbers.”

Grey did not know their names, nor would he be with them long enough to get to know them individually.  His command would last until this combat situation was resolved
.  Once resolved,
he would Synap-off and find himself back at the Comm-RAM command center and back in control of his own body.  Therefore, the men were trained to respond to him using their assigned designations following a phonetic alphabet which also denoted their rank and status in the squad.  Over the squad communication system, Grey heard their responses:

“Alpha, on the perimeter,” It was Fetch.  He was excited.

“No enemy in view, Sir,” Fetch said to conclude his report.

“Bravo, on the LASO, Sir,” It was Fontaine
,
“Initial telemetry coming in now.”

“Charlie on the artillery, Sir; we are locked and loaded.”

Grey could see that the artillery stabilizers that were built into the vehicle had automatically descended from their normally retracted positions.  The multi-purpose vehicle had transformed into a large caliber artillery weapon that was now fully stabilized and ready to fire.