Interzone Science Fiction and Fantasy Magazine #223 (18 page)

"Please, do not destroy the books."

256-256-Avocado-Spoon hesitated. “Why? What good is any of it any more, with no people for it or us to serve?"

"Our residents are not the only people."

"What, do you mean the people outside the walls? People who live in ignorance and superstition and filth, scratching in the dirt, people who nearly destroyed their entire species arguing over differences in philosophy? What would they do with any of this, other than burn this place to the ground themselves, and each of your precious books with it?"

"Perhaps so,” Button-4-Circle-Peach said. “But perhaps not, or not always so."

"Or do you mean the people out in the stars who have turned their back on this place, this planet, disinherited themselves of both its past and future? They do not care! You remember how our people were laughed at for wanting to return to spend their days here. Neither would those people have any use for this place, except as they would for dust upon a path they have already walked and will not walk again.” He hefted the book.

"Then, will you spare the books for my sake?"

"Why? What do you need of them for yourself?"

"Because I do not know who I am without this place."

"We are nothing, that is the answer to that,” 256-256-Avocado-Spoon said. His fingers clicked open and the book fell to the floor, just beyond the spitting and hissing of the fire. “When you realize the truth, you will have to finish this work on your own.” As if a switch had been flung, the caretaker's eyes went dim and he toppled backwards into the raging fire.

Button-4-Circle-Peach could not catch him in time. The fire roared up around the newly fallen caretaker, licking at the oak and plaster ceiling, not yet catching. He picked up the book and held it close, the cover hot to the touch and blackened but the pages undamaged. Around him the few remaining caretakers turned themselves off one by one until he was alone. He activated the room's emergency protocols and stood there as water coursed down upon him just as the rain had earlier, until there was only smoke and ruin and ash and a terrible mangle of bodies both flesh and metal upon the marble floor.

He went out into the night, found that Yellow-Square-Q-Forest had finished her task to the extent she was able, and he picked up the digging hands from where she had left them and straightened out the ground above them. A grim accounting followed: of the twenty-six residents, eight had been buried, six of them both by and with their caretakers. One had been thrown into the ocean. Eleven had been burnt upon the pyre in the living room. Six, including Thomas, remained in their beds, and who could say that they were any more or any less at peace than the rest? Other than himself, only three caretakers remained active, and none were communicating anything beyond their intention to self-deactivate in the morning.

Everything had been fine until yesterday. If only he could go back and erase that day entirely, as if none of this had ever happened.

Why can't I?
he thought, and the block slipped easily into place like shutters pulled tight across a window.

Thomas's room, in the east wing, smelled strangely of smoke but otherwise seemed to be in order. He opened the window a fraction to allow fresh air to circulate, combed the man's hair again, and tucked the blankets up further beneath his chin.

"It is much too early yet for breakfast,” he told the man. “I will return and wake you later, and then after you've eaten we can finish our task of feeding the ducks."

Button-4-Circle-Peach closed the door behind him as he left, and, for reasons he could not quite pinpoint, locked it. Leaving the estate house, he walked out into the garden. He would tend to his roses, and then he would read to Thomas—Keats today, he decided—as the man enjoyed his toast and morning coffee.

The sky was just beginning to lighten, smoke particles again detectable in the air out in the distant garden. He considered that he might want to track down the source, but the idea made him uneasy so he set that notion firmly aside. Checking the tea roses first, he found and removed a few stray weeds that had taken opportunistic advantage of the previous day's rain to pop up through the thick cedar mulch. The mulch was thinning here, an intolerable oversight on his own part. He determined to fix it immediately. He had been looking forward to showing Thomas the roses, but then—

No. There must have been some reason he had not already done so. If Thomas could not come to see the roses, he would bring them to him. After thorough study of the blooms on the bush he picked the most perfect of them, a bright yellow double blossom with a faint pink at the edges, much like the sky to the east was becoming. Using his fine cutters he lightly nipped it off with enough stem for a vase. On further consideration, he tapped off the thorns; it would be to his shame if Thomas hurt himself on his simple gift. He would put it in water, and then get the bark mulch and the grass seed out of storage, and see what could be put in order next.

Why the grass seed? He recalled a bare spot in the lawn, though at the moment he could not remember quite where, or what had caused it. He determined to do these tasks immediately, so that he would not be late rousing Thomas for breakfast, and set off back towards the estate house. Just the other day he had walked this same path to retrieve and assist his friend, and he had stopped, just about here, to—

He fell to his knees with an awful crash, and regarded the battered remains of the creeping vine he had rescued only the previous morning which now lay flattened and torn at the edge of the path. All that effort to save it, and it had been destroyed regardless, for nothing.

For nothing. For nothing.
For nothing.
And the shutters in his mind fell back and away, the truth of the previous day glaring in again in its awful fullness. If he could have wept he would have, but no one had ever considered that a robot might have a need to weep. “It does not matter what I do, nothing I have done has come to any good,” he said out loud to the world close around him. “Some caretaker I have been! Only a fool, a deluded, mechanical fool until the very last!” And he resolved, in that instant, that there was nothing for him to do except to join his remaining fellows, who had proven wiser than he, and deactivate himself, for he could be of no use and serve no purpose ever again.

"Robot?"

He turned his head in surprise. The nameless girl had been entirely forgotten in the day's tragedies. She had her arms crossed in front of her and stood slightly hunched over, as if cold or in discomfort. “You brought a lot of trouble with you when you climbed over our wall,” he said.

"I didn't mean to."

She looked so miserable that he felt guilty for having forgotten her. “Are you hungry?” he asked.

"N-no,” she said. “I don't feel right."

"I should find you a room,” he said. “And I can make you breakfast, whatever you may wish to eat. I can show you the library, teach you how to read, and we can—"

"I'm not staying, robot. I only came here because they would've killed me otherwise."

"Who?"

She shrugged. “People. My people."

"Why?"

"For not being married, stupid."

He did not understand. “If they'll kill you, how can you leave?"

She touched her stomach. “When I'm done with this, I can get on the run. Soon, I think. I shouldn't have to go too far. If I head away from the coast and over the hills, I can find somewhere I can stay safe. The world's pretty broken and nobody talks to anybody, everybody's afraid of everybody else now. That one of your roses you were talking about?"

He looked down at the flower in his hand. “It is."

"It's very pretty,” she said. “What's that book you've got? It looks burned. I could see smoke from the fire, earlier."

He looked down, realized he was still carrying around the volume he'd rescued from 256-256-Avocado-Spoon. “It's only sustained superficial damage,” he said. He turned it so he could read the spine, and smiled sadly. “It's just poetry."

The girl sat down in the wet grass, the sky turning pink behind her, and wrapped her arms around herself as best she could. “Read some to me?"

Button-4-Circle-Peach shook his head. “I'd rather not."

"You like poems. You said so."

"I did,” he admitted. “I don't think I still do, though."

"I'm a little scared,” she said. She closed her eyes for a moment and rocked back and forth, seeming to be counting under her breath.

When she opened her eyes again, Button-4-Circle-Peach said, “I am too."

"I watched Mama do this, but there were always other people around to help her and hold her hand and take care of what needed doing. I'm cold. Can you get me a blanket? Two, maybe?"

"Certainly."

He left her and walked quickly back towards the estate house, taking the long way around the pond so as to avoid the newly bare earth with its sad, silent sleepers beneath, and going in through the kitchens to avoid the fire-damaged living room. He made his way to the laundry and picked up two neatly folded bundles, selecting the warmer and more water-resistant of the available supply; the break in the rain would not last out the day.

When he reached the girl again, she was on her hands and knees, making noise that only increased his fear on her behalf. But her eyes were clear when she looked at him, and he helped her settle onto one blanket as he wrapped the other tightly around her. “Is that better?” he asked.

"Yeah,” she said. “I'm going to need a ladder so I can get over the wall again."

"I don't think—” he started.

"No, you're a stupid robot,” she snapped. “Just go get a ladder, okay? I don't want you here right now."

"All right,” he said. He went back again to the estate house and around, to the gardener supply shed. None of the caretakers had need of ladders—they were tall enough to reach most things, and their legs were fairly extendable—but once in a while a resident wanted one for picking apples, or for some other pursuit. Not in years, though. It took him a while to rearrange the items in the shed enough to get at where the ladder stood, leaning against the back wall, and extricating it took even longer. Then he headed back to the girl again.

This time she was lying down, blankets wrapped around her so that only her head stuck out. She looked exhausted, her face flushed, and her eyes were closed. When he drew near, she cracked one eye open. “You got something that'll cut?"

"I have a cutting attachment,” he said, turning his hand and extending the proper tool.

"Does it come off?"

"It can."

"Give it to me."

He ejected the blade, turned it around and handed it to her. She took it from him, then scowled. “Go set the ladder up for me, so I can reach the tree branches,” she said.

"Is there something—?"

"No.” She pointed the blade at him. “Just go. Come back when you're done."

Button-4-Circle-Peach picked up the ladder from where he had set it down beside the roses, and carried it through the garden to where the girl had first come over. The sun was up now, not quite high enough to do more than peek over the far wall of the garden, but enough to make the rain and dew in the grass and on the leaves seem to dance in its light. He set the ladder up against the wall, tested it to make sure it'd hold steady, then hurried back yet again to the rose garden.

The girl was sitting now, unsteadily, holding something in her arms wrapped in the second blanket. She handed it to him, and he took it with no small amount of surprise. “I left something nasty in your shrubs,” she said. “Sorry about that, but you're gonna want to clean that up. I'm leaving here before it gets too light out, while everybody's still at morning prayers, so I can get far away without being seen. I'm not coming back here again."

"You don't have to go. You clearly aren't well. I could take care of you. Please, may I?"

"This isn't my home, this crazy devil place. I don't know anything about books or poetry or stars or any of that. I wish I wanted to but I don't, not really. But if I didn't come here, then we'd both be dead. Sin-babies get left outside, let God save ‘em or not as He will, not in the hands or on the heads of good people if cold or hunger or packs of dogs get ‘em."

"You could at least stay until you are stronger."

"I already said I don't want to,” she said. “You can make food here, right? Any kind, with your machines?"

"We can replicate anything, though we grow our own fruits and vegetables when they are in season."

"And you're gonna think to look in your books when you need to know something, right? Like how to take care of it, and what to feed it?"

"I will try."

"Good.” She wrapped the remaining blanket more tightly around herself, then pushed herself forward and up onto her feet. She swayed unsteadily for a moment, then lifted her shoulders and gave him a defiant look. “I'm going to the ladder, and I don't want you following or watching me. Be nice if you told it about the stars and maybe read it some poetry,” she said. “It's a girl, so pick pretty poems, not all that war and Wrath of God stuff."

"All right,” he said. Then, “Wait!"

He opened up his compartment with his free hand, took out the half loaf of bread from the day before, and handed it to her. “I could get you some more food, if you are willing to wait a few minutes longer."

"I already said, I got to get out of here before people come out of prayer. Thanks for the bread, and sorry for causing you trouble. I didn't think all the robots would go mad like that when you figured out everyone was dead. Why didn't you?"

"Because I still had things to take care of,” he answered.

"Well, now you got someone new,” she said.

"Yes,” he said, that realization just now dawning. “So it seems I do."

"Try not to be stupid about it this time. And, robot?"

"Yes?"

"Give her a
short
name, okay?"

"I will try."

"Good. Don't follow me."

The girl knelt and picked up the rose stem where he'd dropped it earlier, and tucked it very carefully in the knot of hair upon her head. Then she turned and walked away. He watched her go, then looked down at the small, ruddy face peeking up from the blanket in his arm. It seemed very much the color of his favorite blooms.