Donato Giancola - “Heinlein Collected Works”

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Start up.

Perform.

End sequence.

Wander.

Rest.

Repeat.

Thirty-four perfect rotations. Each one varied in its content by miniscule alterations, but yet still the same by his programming. He had kept track of each one, every microsecond since he had met the strange new apprentice; fifteen routine maintenances, two emergency repairs, and many other brush-ins and yet he still couldn’t compute. 

The jester stretched, bending almost completely over backward. He swept a hand out to the invisible crowd before spinning on a single pede and springing forward into a round off. The bells decorating his form jingled softly, echoing merrily across his empty stage. The counsel hall was void of life at this time of the night, all organic beings in the Chronos Castle long ago having taken to their beds to sleep. He should be in the cylinder, recharging, sinking into rest mode to prepare for tomorrow. 

Regardless of this fact, he found himself moving through the familiar programming of his basic performances. It was helpful to practice his routines, perfecting his movements and planning out actions for future shows. His artificial shell stretched and bent to the command of his code as his processors worked overtime, his core buzzing with far too many lines of calculated data. 

He didn’t know why, but moving through his acts helped him process better. Helped him understand. 

Thirty-four rotations. Thirty-four cycles of his programming, thirty-four days, and he still was unable to compute the motives of his new keeper. He had been paying attention during each of her training courses, listening for anything that he could file to help him understand this ‘Mission’. 

He finished a sequence of flips, using his momentum to rotate his frame in a tight aerial spiral before landing on the tips of his pedes. He had learned her name was Kari after sifting through her data tablet while she was connected to his core; she hadn’t liked it when he asked to confirm it was hers, quickly disconnecting her tablet without disengaging the scan she had been running. 

He had spent hours unscrambling his processors after that. 

Backflip, spring off his digits, forward roll, stand on digits. He released some of the used air from his cooling system, his chestplate falling and rising as he cycled in fresh oxygen. He had offered to help with her mission, but that only seemed to have the reverse effect of what he had intended. The following day she had managed to lock him out of every digital-based system she used, almost as if she didn’t WANT him to see anything at all. 

He slowly brought his legs forward, balancing himself on one hand to grab the tips of his pedes. The apprentice… Kari had become less hostile in the last few days, even attempting conversation with him. It was strange, mostly her talking about the castle grounds, a place she had been, or asking if he could understand or experience human concepts, things like pain, sensations, smell, wanting things, emotions. He wasn’t sure what she had meant at first, but he had informed her his systems were capable of sensory input, but he lacked the distinct functionality humans did for personal emotion and pain. 

He was an android.

Androids are incapable of feeling. 

He flipped upright with a jungle of bells and the soft impact of his cushioned pedes, his optics half lidded in thought. He wasn’t sure what she had been looking for in his answer, but the way she gave him that long look after… like she had expected something else and was disappointed. He had noticed she had begun to treat him better, almost the way she would treat a human. 

Well, to a degree. She still acted unkindly, just… less so than his other caretakers. More like one would dislike a fellow servant, than the disdain-filled looks of inferiority he received from others. This fact didn’t sit well in his processors, like a misplaced file that didn’t fit. He was the first of his kind, a unique human-like being like nothing ever made in all the realms. He was used to the looks, the disregard, the hostility; all eyes were on him to see whether his kind would bloom, or wither… and many wished to see it rot. 

That line of process made his circuits flicker with cold again. 

He couldn’t figure out why.

He shifted on his pedes, his form simply swaying, having no other command in his performance routine to follow, but still tense with the insatiable urge to move. He cycled in another system-full of cooling air, his biocomponents running hot at the sheer amount of processing power he was using. He needed to charge for the night, keeping himself running in a fruitless attempt to figure out the apprentice would only make things worse. Especially if he ran himself too low, and caused a malfunction during his performance…  

A soft pitter of footsteps echoed in his audio sensors, pulling his attention from his internal dialogue and back to reality. He could sense his mouth beginning to tug into a frown. No one should be up and about in the castle at this time, who…

He cast out a scan of the area, his eyes glowing brighter in the dim starlit halls as he searched for the intruder. He skimmed over the area, the whole hall shaded in hues of blue as he searched for any sign of… 

A flash of orange, just disappearing behind one of the entrances. 

Ah. There it was. 

:SCAN: Complete

The mechanical jester crept toward the source of the sounds, his movements deathly silent in the empty halls; Even his bells were noiseless, months of navigating the silence of the castle at night teaching him soft steps and perfectly timed movements. He sensed his mouth slide back into a cheeky smile. 

You know what they say about cats and bells. 

He popped his cranium around the corner, just catching a flash of gray robes disappearing into the tunnels leading down to the bowels of the castle. He slowly maneuvered into the gold-trimmed halls, his processors kicking up again as his optics homed in on the spot. 

The castle worked on a tiered system. The topmost tier being the main grounds of the castle; towers and open to the outside with the branching lands for the lower-ranking lords and the peasantry. The second layer was the inner workings of the castle; the halls and rooms, the armory, the kitchens, his cylinder and everything in between. That was where he stayed, and where he was now. Most of this layer was decorated with high windows and skylights, providing the openness and grandiose views of a traditional castle. The third and below layers….

Those were the Underways. 

The home of the condemned, forgotten, and hunted. 

He closed the distance to the door, something cold flickering over his external circuits. For the first time, he was unprepared… He had no directives, no code or instructions to tell him how to deal with this situation. He wasn’t authorized to chase intruders through the castle grounds. He had never been to the Underways. Granted, he had made plans to map it out before, he was always updating his mapping programs, but something about GOING there, to chase someone…

It made his circuits splutter. 

Something flickered in his code, his core. His left digit raised to brush the solid wall like surface, his optics locked on the deceptively well-hidden entrance, but not truly seeing it. His form was icy still as his processors ran a marathon within, lines of calculations, decisions, THOUGHTS, swimming in his internal systems. 

He had no directives to enter. 

No code to guide him. 

But…

He pressed his limb flush against the door, something flickering to life in his code. His optics focused on the old-fashioned door handle. 

But maybe….

Maybe. 

He could make his own. 

The jester reached out to grab the handle, his digits curling around the cold metal. Flickers of red glitched in the corners of his vision, there, but not loud enough to pull his attention from his calculations. With a note of finality, he shoved the handle down, his limbs jittery with the uncertainty of his actions. He had no directive, no plan. 

It didn’t sit right in his internal process. 

He crept into the revealed downward slanting passage, his glowing circuits casting soft blue glimmers across the unkempt tunnel. Unlike the ornate inner castle he was used to, this tunnel was dark, dirty, and made only of raw stacked stone and carved smooth concrete. He continued forward, his sensory systems ramped up to their highest as he analyzed his surroundings, keeping an optic out for the stranger. 

The floors were made of partially rusted metal, crisscrossed in grille patterns, leaving empty gaps littering the walkway in neat, purposeful patterns. It was easy to tell why. Escaped used water and fluid from the internal hydraulics of the castle seeped down the walls in infrequent streaks of dampness, leaking across the gaps in the grill walkway. 

It was much darker than he had anticipated. 

The mechanical jester continued his onward excursion, that unidentifiable chill sinking deep into his code. The way was lit by dying energy lamps, his own circuits almost seeming brighter in the condemning gray passages. He scanned the passage, keeping his systems alerted for hazards of any kind.

No identifiable danger in sight. 

He allowed his systems to cool down, tampering his systems to half power as he wandered through the darkened tunnels. He didn’t want to tax his already waning power levels for nothing. The stones of the passages were much older than the rest of the rotating castle, a different color as well, which was interesting. The sound of the whirring clockwork axis of the castle was much louder down here, and he subconsciously dampened his audio sensors.

He wouldn’t be able to detect the apprentice’s footsteps over the noise anyway. 

Absently, he pulled his mapping system to the corner of his HUD, the blue-coded map flickering to life reassuringly in the corner of his vision. A purpose he could cling to. He began drafting a map of his trek, pinging information about the tunnels, its directions and state to his system to be converted into his map. Something in his system seemed to relax at that. At least he would be able to find his way back. 

Whispers flickered across his audio sensors, making his steps stutter. They were faint, almost drowned out under the rumble of the Castle’s gears, but there. He dialed his sensors up again, quickly pinpointing the location of the voice… voices? There were two, he could hear two differing pitches. They seemed to be coming from just ahead, down a short pocket to the side of the main walkway. He dropped into a crouch, keeping his movements slow and calculated as he approached. It felt familiar, natural…. Like he had done this many times before. 

Why didn’t he have memory logs of it?

The voices were just barely loud enough for his sensitive receptors to hear, echoing across the smooth concrete with perfect clarity. 

“That’s good to know, at least it won’t get any worse.”

His face shifted into frown without his command. The voice was male, soft, but stern, accented like one of the lower-positioned peasantry. 

Not the apprentice. 

“There’s more, but I haven’t got far enough in yet to know the details. I wasn’t aware the meeting was so soon.” 

Female, young, higher-bred sounding accent, unfamiliar. The corners of his frown deepened as he shifted in his place. That wasn’t her either, he replayed snips of both voices, just to be sure he wasn’t mistaken, but he was right. 

Both voices were not Kari’s.

But…

What did they mean worse? Meetings? Details?

Did this connect to the apprentice’s mission?

He dared to creep a bit closer, the need for information spurring him on as the voices continued. 

“I’m sorry, it was short notice. The syndicate was getting restless, and with Kari’s urgent report requesting audience…. Well, my hands were tied.”  The male voice. 

He caught a soft sigh. 

“No matter, at least I had something for the syndicate to look over. The guard is not careless with who they trust, so gaining access to more sensitive information will take time.” The female.

Something in his code stuttered, his processes grinding to a harsh halt. His digits and servos tightened on the rusted railing, his optics rooted on the tunnel containing the two…

The two spies. 

They were spies. 

His core shuttered with strain as his processors whirled into a frenzy of calculations as he tried to find a directive of what to do in this scenario. He should tell someone… right? Spies were for discovering secrets of the kingdoms they were sent to, they told others where you were weak, what your kingdom lacked, and how to destroy it… They were dangerous…

Wait…

His metallic face twisted into an expression he couldn’t understand, his processor sifting through his memory logs for reference only to find nothing. The cold sank deeper. 

Then how… 

How did he know what a spy was?

:WARNING: System error detec– 

“Why you lil nosy PRYING pie-pan.”

He blinked away the error, barely registering the voice as familiar before something collided with the back of his cranial plating. Enough to knock him sideways, leaving a harsh dent in the metal of his interface. 

Deep inside his core, something cracked. 

His vision filled with error messages, drawing away his optical feed as he collapsed to the side. Red dominated his vision, screaming in his core, making everything blurred and unfocused. He couldn’t grab onto a single line of code or calculations, everything seemed to slip through his digits before he could see what it was, or what was wrong. Something was broken... what was broken?

Through the haze of crimson words and glitches, he caught a glimpse of someone standing over him. A familiar angry face, dressed in the robes of a technosage, wielding a solid metal pipe. Kari.

Why did that make his code seem heavy?

:WARNING: System error detected. Extensive system damage detected. Engaging emergency system shutdown to preserve core. 

For the first time, he found himself out of control. His systems shutting down without his consent, without warning. Darkness swallowed the red around him, and everything went silent.

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Also, he's a bloodbender.

"Topic was demon door or warp gate.. decided to make it a demonic warp gate door.. seems right! " by RogierB