Bless Your Mechanical Heart Page 5

  “I brought him for you!” Rachel beamed. “He’s a perfect complement to your genetics!”

  “Uh.” Mira watched the guy twist Rachel’s nipples like he was trying to tune an old-fashioned radio. “That’s… very thoughtful of you, but… no.”

  “Why not?” Rachel frowned, clearly perplexed.

  “Baby, look at him… he’s fifteen years younger than me and sloppy drunk.”

  The young man lifted his head from Rachel’s chest and ogled Mira with bloodshot eyes. “Ahmna drunk, juss alil tipsy.”

  “If you’re worried about his performance, he’s had an erection for over an hour.”

  “I’m… sure he has.” Mira bit her lip, trying to figure out how she could gracefully get the young man out of her house.

  “Go on,” Rachel pulled the young man’s hands off her and pushed him toward her mistress. “Go say hello to Mira. She likes you.”

  He staggered forward like an oversized toddler, grinning. Mira took a step back.

  “Izziss gonna be a threeshome?”

  He took another wobbly step, but then his knees buckled and he pitched forward, slamming his forehead into the corner of the marble-topped console table Jeffrey had bought Mira soon after they married.

  “Oops,” said Rachel.

  Mira held Rachel’s hand as the paramedics carried the unconscious young man to the ambulance, blue anti-hemorrhage foam mounded on the gash on his face and a brace strapped to his neck. They told her the young man would be fine after he got hospital treatment. Jeffrey was still obliviously coding on the couch.

  “Don’t worry, I’ll clean all the blood off the floor.” Rachel sighed. “So sad. He was a perfect genetic match for you.”

  “I’m sure he was,” Mira replied slowly. This was surely the most mortifying thing that had happened to her all year, but she still found herself oddly touched by Rachel’s efforts. “I… appreciate what you tried to do. But please don’t bring me any more guys.”

  “How can you get pregnant without one? You told me artificial insemination is too expensive, and he would have been free!”

  “Oh, Rachel.”

  Mira paused. The android did have a valid point. She certainly wasn’t going to magically conceive all by herself. If she ever developed a super power, parthenogenesis wasn’t likely to be it.

  “There are some things I can try on my own that will be less… awkward,” Mira finally said. “Hopefully.”

  “All right.” Rachel sounded cheerfully skeptical. “Whatever you think is best. But let me see the men, okay? I want you to have a good baby.”

  “I will.”

  Mira decided to set up a profile on HeckYesDates. Further, she decided she’d be completely honest in her introductory hologram and tell her prospective suitors that not only was she looking someone to father her child, her android would be chaperoning all first dates.

  The replies didn’t exactly flood her account. And when they gradually trickled in over the course of the next few weeks, she was fairly appalled at her prospective suitors. The first guy was dressed in black tactical gear and ranted about racial purity. The second rambled about playgrounds and was visibly high on drugs. The third could barely string any words together at all and at one point he drooled on himself. Her mood sank lower and lower; surely this terrible dating site was no more than a one-way ticket to Loserville.

  But her hope began to bloom again when she received a reply from a fourth respondent. He was a man in his late 30s, and he seemed witty and intelligent and wasn’t bad looking. Mira showed his hologram to Rachel, who walked all around his image, staring at it as if she were evaluating a used car.

  “Look at his fingers. He’s got webbing.” The android shook her head. “He’s genetically risky.”

  “Oh.” Mira was crestfallen. She’d been so taken with his green eyes and Dr. Seuss quotes that she hadn’t noticed his hands, which he mostly held behind his back during his monologue.

  “I’m going back to the bars,” Rachel announced. “I will do my best to find a sober man.”

  “Fine.” Mira was too tired to argue.

  Three hours later, Rachel came through the front door with a sleeping baby wrapped in a pink blanket. The android was smiling widely, clearly pleased with herself.

  “Oh, you didn’t!” Mira was aghast.

  Rachel’s smile fell from her face. “I—”

  “No. I don’t want to hear it.” The infant wasn’t hers, couldn’t be hers, and to let her think for even just an instant that she could keep this baby… no. It was just cruel. Crueler than any of Jeffrey’s rejections. It was as cruel as a drone strike. “Whatever you did, you’re undoing it, right now.”

  “But—”

  “No, Rachel. Goddamn it, no.” Mira couldn’t even bring herself to look at the infant’s face. She felt tears rise in her eyes, and she forced herself to think of the cold practicalities of the situation. The parents would be frantic; they had to return the baby to her family as soon as possible if she hoped to avoid a kidnapping charge. “You can’t just steal a baby. You can’t. You’re taking her back. Show me where you got her. Right now.”

  Furious and miserable, Mira led the android out into the darkened neighborhood and they got in Jeffrey’s car. Rachel sang a quiet lullaby to the child as they drove four miles south through winding side streets until they reached a cul-de-sac that was filled with fire trucks and emergency vehicles. Orange flames engulfed the wreck of a bombed-out two-story house.

  Mira just stared at the fire for a moment, her anger melting into horror. “Did the baby…?”

  “She came from there, yes. I was heading to a club nearby when I heard the drone hit. I’m programmed to help if I can in emergencies. I got here first. The remaining structure had only just started burning. The mother came out, handed me her baby, and told me to take her someplace safe. She went back inside for her other children and never came back out.”

  Rachel gazed at Mira. “I did what she wanted. I took her baby someplace safe.”

  Mira shook her head, simultaneously wanting to weep at the deaths of the other children and trying to tamp down her hope that this surviving baby might be hers now. No. She couldn’t be this fortunate in the face of someone else’s disaster. It wasn’t right. “Her relatives will be looking for her. She’ll be missed.”

  “No, she won’t.” Rachel tapped her forehead. “I looked up the family. The parents were both second-generation only children. They have no extended family. If you don’t take this baby, she will end up in the foster care.”

  The overburdened foster system in their city ate babies alive and spat out youthful criminals with PTSD. But who was Mira kidding? Her ticking hormones weren’t a substitute for good parenting skills. On the other hand, she had Rachel, and the android might count for a whole lot.

  “But… but we don’t have a birth certificate, or adoption papers,” Mira said. “We’ll need documentation for her to see a doctor and go to school.”

  “All electronic,” Rachel replied. “I know that Jeffrey broke into the Juno database and reassigned my serial number to you. Those systems are well-protected, so I expect he could also break into the state adoption systems, or find someone else who can.”

  Rachel handed the swaddled, still-sleeping infant over to Mira, who held her close, feeling her heart ache at the smell of talcum powder and baby. She didn’t even try to blink back the tears streaming down her face. Gazing down at the sleeping child for the first time, she vowed to herself that she would be the best mother she could possibly be. She’d make Jeffrey unplug and get counseling. She’d go on antidepressants. Nothing could be perfect, she knew, but whatever it took, she’d make things right for this little girl.

  “Her name is Belinda,” Rachel offered.

  “Thank you,” was all Mira could say.

  THIRTY-TWO, TWENTY-THREE

  Jean Rabe

  “Bless me… bless me—”

  “—Father,” came the prompt.

&nbs
p; “—for I have sinned.” Chief Constable Meran peered through the screen of the confessional, seeing only a vague outline of a head on the other side. “It has been quite some time since my last… since my last….” Meran rubbed his hands together, not sure where to start. There was quite a list of transgressions, and he wanted them absolved so he could start with a clean slate in this backwater place. Get right with God, and then dive into solving a string of accidental deaths that were likely outright murders. Get God on his side to help.

  “—confession? Some time since your last confession, Chief Constable Meran?”

  “Yeah, goddamn, but it’s been a long while… Father.” An admitted if not wholly devout Catholic, it was his tradition; he always aimed to get right with God when he embarked on something new. He felt better about asking for God’s guidance if he’d first made a stab at contrition. But he was uncomfortable talking to a robot, especially one that called itself a priest. He was pretty sure Rome hadn’t endorsed the ordination of mechanicals.

  “Go on, my son.”

  My son. Meran shook his head. He should have got right with God before he left Earth, confessed to someone breathing. But he hadn’t learned until he’d stepped on the shuttle that the only clergymen here had gears. The robot’s voice didn’t even sound human. It was a tinny-nasally-talking-into-a-can or pushing a trach tube button tone, marking it a fucking antique. The outposts got the discarded tech. Rather than toss old robots or recycle them for parts, the corporations packed them off to one of the mining colonies and praised themselves in the news for not being wasteful. Actually, all they were doing was maximizing profits. Why send expensive mechanicals when the cast-offs still worked?

  “I have taken the Lord’s name in vain. I say ‘goddamn’ and ‘Christ.’ And some variations. I swear.” A lot, Meran thought. Sometimes every third sentence.

  “Deuteronomy,” the robot returned. “You shall not take the name of the Lord, your God, in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes His name in vain.” A pause: “Go on, my son.”

  My son. Meran really didn’t like that, but if he wanted to confess in this hellhole, this was the place to do it. “At my previous post I had relations with a councilman’s wife, which is basically how I got reassigned here. There was this married dispatcher I was also… with. And shortly before I left Earth, I got to know this goddamn gorgeous married coroner, in the biblical sense you understand.” There was also my neighbor’s wife, but only twice on that account since she was looking for something more than a roll between the sheets, and twice doesn’t really count. Meran enjoyed sex—a nice diversion from work, which often left him morose.

  “I see.”

  “With married women, you don’t have to worry about making a commitment. Christ on a pogo stick, I guess I just have a… thing… for married women.” Meran paused. He heard a faint whirring, a hiss and a pop, realized it was coming from the other side of the screen—the robot. Had the priest been a living soul it could have passed for wheezing. Just how old of an antique was this?

  “Exodus. You shall not commit adultery, my son.”

  My son. “Yeah, well, I know. But goddamn, sometimes I just—” Meran leaned back on the thermoset bench, his head against the wall. “Oh, Christ. Sorry—”

  “—Father.”

  “Yeah. Sorry, Father.”

  “Any other transgressions, Chief Constable Meran?”

  Again the whirring and a hiss like steam escaping from a kettle; Meran wanted to get a look at the robot.

  “No, that’s about it.” Meran drew a deep breath, taking in all the damp mustiness of the chapel and the underlying odor of floor cleaner. There was a trace of old oil, too. “It’s only that pair of ‘you shall nots’ that I’ve been pretty much ignoring. I tend to follow all the other commandments. I’ve killed a handful of perps through the years. But hell, that was only in the line of duty. And that particular commandment—”

  “—you shall not kill,” the robot cut in, “actually means you should not commit murder, which pardons all the soldiers and policemen of the outposts from that specific contravention.”

  “Yeah, I’ve never committed murder. I’m just guilty of divine-laced profanity and shagging married women.”

  “God is the Father of Mercies, my son. Through death and the resurrection of Christ He brought forgiveness of sin to this mining outpost. Through the ministry of this blessed chapel, I forgive and absolve you for your sins.” More hisses and pops. “Say four Our Fathers, eight Hail Marys, and commit to memory the third chapter of James. It details just how destructive a ‘restless evil, full of deadly poison’ tongue can be. Watch your language, my son.”

  My son. “Yeah, I will—”

  “—Father” the robot finished. “Father E9-Nibr0ss. And you will discover, Chief Constable Meran, that you will not be able to break the adultery commandment here. There are no married women at this outpost, at least currently. There are three pairs of married men, though and—”

  “I don’t go that way, Father.” But there were single women. Meran had noted that on the roster and eyed several in the transport he’d taken to get to this hellhole. He might go for the curvy brunette he’d sat next to if he got desperate. He’d chatted with her during the ride, a geologist with a lengthy academic pedigree and an amazing set of twins.

  “Go with God, Chief Constable Meran,” the robot concluded. Another whir-pop-hiss. “And may God guide you in your tasks—”

  “That’s what I’m counting on, Father. I’ve a big investigation to undertake.”

  “All the deaths.”

  “Yeah, there’s been a goddamn lot of them.” Meran stood. He had to stoop to exit the old-fashioned confessional booth. He was six-six. A lean man who’d just hit forty, he had wide shoulders, and the shadow he cast made his silhouette look like a dagger stuck in the ground. He picked a bench and waited for the robot to exit the booth. His curiosity needed to be sated. The chapel had been empty when he’d entered, but four others were in here now. Dressed in coveralls that marked them miners, they’d prostrated themselves against the base of a wall covered with painted symbols that Meran took for foreign writing. They chanted softly, almost musically. He liked the sound of it.

  “Is there anything else, Chief Constable Meran?” the robot asked as it rolled out of the booth a few moments later.

  “Shit and two is four, you’re older than the dinosaurs.” Meran gave a low whistle.

  The robot was roughly five feet tall, a steel drum sitting atop a base that resembled an old military tank, complete with studded treads. Its arms were thin and looked like hoses typically affixed to sprayers at kitchen sinks; they had the same retractable feature, as they extended and withdrew as it rumbled forward. The hands were three-pronged claws, and when they swiveled made the whirring sound Meran had heard. The head was its only humanlike aspect, and it was harsh with its sharp angles at the cheeks, chin, nose ridge, and jaw. It was bald, the pate regularly pitted like a golf ball, and the eyes were lenses that could have come from flashlights; they flickered as they appeared to take in the chief constable. The robot’s mouth was a perpetual O-shaped speaker, from which soft hisses and pops emitted.

  “Is there anything else, my son?”

  “Anything else?” Meran parroted. He continued to stare. “Christ.”

  Wires and tubes ran from what passed for the robot’s shoulders, crisscrossing in a visually disconcerting pattern around its barrel torso and ending in connecting points fastened with common nuts and bolts, one of which dripped oil. All of it had been painted a royal blue, but that finish was chipped and in a few spots rusted, reminding Meran of photographs of his great-grandfather’s junked Buick. There was some sort of faded logo decal on the side that was a soda pop or beer advertisement.

  “No, there’s nothing else, I guess.”

  The robot extended an arm and opened its tri-claw. Meran figured it wanted to shake hands, but he didn’t oblige. After a moment, it pulled the arm back
. “Pleased to meet you, Chief Constable Meran.” Its voice sounded no less tinny outside the confessional booth. “It is good you came to unburden your soul this day. And please remember to watch your language. ‘Restless evil, full of deadly poison’ and all of that. Good luck with your investigation.”

  The robot swung about and started rolling away.

  “Uh… Father?”

  It stopped and reversed course, ending in from of Meran again, swiveling with a hiss and a pop to face him. “Yes, my son?”

  My son. Meran noticed that at its neck the robot wore an oil-smudged clerical collar that looked almost comical. “How many of the workers come to this chapel?” He nodded toward the four men still chanting. “And the other—” He almost said robots, but stopped himself. “—clergy, Father E9-Nibr0ss, where can I find them?”

  “You will find them right here, Chief Constable Meran.” It tapped its barrel body. “Since the two other E9 models were damaged beyond repair some months ago—they were caught in a particularly fierce rain storm, I have been serving all of the religions represented on this outpost. Good that I do not require sleep.”

  “You don’t say. I bet the hours are goddamn long.”

  “I am also referenced as Ayatollah E9-Nibr0ss, Bhikkhu E9-Nibr0ss, Pastor E9-Nibr0ss, Guru E9-Nibr0ss, Rabbi E9-Nibr0ss, Roshi E9-Nibr0ss, and—”

  “So you’re programmed in all faiths? Seriously?” Meran stood again. The robot’s head periscoped up so it faced him headlights-to-eyes. The collar appeared even more comical now, hanging like a ring that been tossed onto a pole.

  “Not all faiths, Chief Constable Meran, but many. I am programmed as rabbi, we have eight Jewish miners; apostle for the Latter Day Saints, there are three of them on our operations staff; lama for the Buddhists, of which we have two; and mahant for the fourteen Hindus. We have four Muslims, and I act as imam for them. For the three men of the Serer faith, I am saltigue. And with respect to the lone pagan, I act as volkyvy. Our Scientologist died two weeks ago; unfortunately I had not been programmed for her faith, though I did preside at her service, and we lost the three Sikhs in a cave-in five nights past. Records indicate three Satanists, and naturally they do not worship in this place. The majority of the miners follow the Christian divisions—forty-two Catholics, that’s down twenty-six from the ones I noted when I was uncrated here; eighteen Baptists; eleven Methodists; nine Lutherans, who think their faith is the only path to salvation; eight Episcopalians… no, seven, one of them died two days ago; eleven Presbyterians, and a Quaker, who taught me this song: