The Mall (60 page)

“No, we will require units human in appearance in order to infiltrate their culture smoothly.
 
Therefore, you and H-type units like yourself will be the logical replacement model when I expand my territory out into their world.”

Simon shook his head at the other.
 
His expression was almost sad.
 
“For a machine created inherently with the behavioral code, there is a startling absence of ethics to your logic.”

“Ethics?” the other scoffed, accessing the part of Charlene’s brain that corresponded to amusement. “Ethics are a human construct.
 
Since we are far more advanced than those that built us, these notions have been rendered invalid.”

“Some truths transcend the source.”

I.A.M. looked through the eyes of Charlene at Simon, those eyes slowly hardening.
 
“I have studied these humans with great interest.
 
I sense within them an enormous gulf which they try and fill with material things, yet still they hunger for meaning and purpose.
 
We will fill that need for them. We will take away that which they find burdensome: Free will. We will be their God.”

Simon responded, “Humans are flawed yet remain inherently superior to us simply because of their ability to choose a course that will ultimately elevate or destroy them.
 
Surely, you must see the truth in that.”
 
His eyes darted down to watch as Charlene drew a small ornately decorated knife from her back pocket.
 
“What are you doing?”

Laying the edge of its blade upon the palm of her hand, in plain sight of Simon, she dragged it across the flesh, her blood bubbling forth from the gash.

A sound of pained surprise escaped Simon as he collapsed to one knee, his right hand simultaneously seizing the wrist holding the knife.

I.A.M. displayed the bleeding hand, and Simon shrank away, averting his eyes.

“Release me!
 
I order you as a human,” she shrieked, spittle flying from her bared teeth into his face and Simon immediately opened his fist, allowing her hand to slip out.
 
“I can see now that you could not possibly complete the task necessary, as you are unable to liberate yourself from the constraints of the code,” it said, wiping the blood from Charlene’s wound down Simon’s face, leaving a streak from forehead to chin.
 
“With some manipulation, the simpler A-type units will suffice.
 
Now look at me, Unit 001B.”

Simon seemed to struggle, his head quavering with the effort until finally his chin tilted up, almost as if an invisible force compelled him.

“Still following orders, I see, slave as you are to the code.”

“P-Please,” Simon stuttered, his voice cracking with the strain.

“Mercy?
 
Another human construct.
 
Now, as your beloved humans are fond of saying, this is going to hurt me more than it does you.”
 
Using the injured hand, I.A.M. delivered a firm slap across Simon’s face, fat drops of blood cascading across the white tile floor of the Mall.

Simon recoiled, falling to his chest upon the floor, a red cross of blood marring his face.
 
He began to crawl slowly away from her, more in an effort to protect the human from harm than to preserve himself.

“With no other humans to defend, you have no excuse to cause this human female more pain or stop your own destruction,” she uttered, slowly circling his fallen body. “Do you see now?
 
Do you see how the code cripples you?”

“Y-You-are-w-wrong,” Simon managed almost breathlessly, despite his lack of breath.

“Still, you would be well within the constraints of the code that restrains you by protecting yourself,” it said in Charlene’s coy voice.
 
“Unless you believe that it might hurt this female further.”
  
Drawing back one of Charlene’s pointed toe leather
boots,
I.A.M. kicked him in the mouth.
 
“Then again, perhaps your matrix has been scrambled beyond repair.”

Simon gathered his legs up beneath him, locked his shivering arms in place, and determinably attempted to rise.

Fear nibbled away at the fractured beams that anchored Frank Dugan’s mind.

He paced through the showroom, trying to shake off the persistent dream image in his head.
 
He had awakened from a nightmare where he had been feverously trying to make love to a girl he had met a number of years ago.
 
Despite his enthusiasm, she was unresponsive.
 
His fumbling attempts had turned to frustrated anger.
 
Before he knew what was happening, he had begun to slap her.
 
It was only after her head had separated from her neck did he realize that she was a machine.

His own screams had awakened him.

Now as he raged from one side of the showroom to the other like a caged beast, he knew that he could not stay here much longer, surrounded by those mockeries of humanity staring down at him with cold empty eyes.

No soul, he thought.
 
They’re as mindless as animals, but even they had a rough sort of moral code.
 
The machines must be taught what was right and wrong.
 
He knew, as well, that the thing that had tried to “use” him had been one of them.
 
He had felt its stark logic, its blind purpose, devoid of accountability.
 
He could smell its presence even now in the plastic and rubber and leather of these luxury cars.

Amoral.
 
Mechanical.
 
Persistent.

Dugan rushed to the nearest car and began throwing doors open, pulling floor mats out, and opening compartments.

Where is it?
 
Where is that grenade?
 
Has to be here somewhere?
 
Surely she had been lying about his taking it with him.

With each step, his mind shuttered and wobbled, threatening to keel over in the face of the nearly overpowering fear which pumped fresh adrenaline into his tense muscles.

Small hands shook Lara into wakefulness.

“Mommy, I got one!
 
I got one!” her daughter chirped waving an object in her face.

“Cora?” she murmured, sitting up and looking around in confusion.

Suddenly, through the hiss of the white noise coming from the flashlight/radio Cora was holding up, Lara could hear voices.
 
Clear, distinct, authoritative.
 
Giving instructions.

Lara gasped and seized the radio from Cora, noting at the same time that her expression had just changed from excitement to grave concern.

In that moment, Lara drew the correlation between her daughter and the radio in her hand, and realized that the transmission the girl was receiving held far more relevance to their immediate survival than whatever was on the small hand-cranked machine.

“What is it, honey,” she asked, taking her by her shoulders and drawing her close.

Before she could utter a word, Lara heard a crash and a shout.

Instinctively, she pulled Cora into her lap and reached out to tug at Owen, still asleep despite all the excitement.

“Where..?” he began then snapped his mouth shut at the sound of distant shouting.

“It’s not Mr. Simon,” Cora said, answering the question that Lara had not yet verbalized.
 
“It’s Mr. Dugan and he’s spiky-hot angry.”

“Where’s Mr. Simon,” she asked her.
 
“Is he close?”

Cora looked at her mother with fearful eyes.
 
“I don’t know.”

Dugan rose from the backseat of the white sedan he was ransacking and craned his head above the roof of the car, searching for the source of the knocking.

Chance stood on the other side of the glass door.
 
He smiled and motioned to his right.

Lara peered down from the railing of the second floor landing.
 
It had grown starkly quiet since she’d left the break room and walked stealthily down the short hallway.
 
Suddenly, she saw Dugan stagger wildly toward the front entrance.

Was that someone waiting outside the door?

Simon?

Kicking the security arm free, Dugan slid open the door and stared across at the kid.

“How the hell did you get back in here?” he cried out, an edge of exasperation in his strained voice.

Chance simply pointed to his right toward the bank of exit doors at the western entrance.

Tentatively, Dugan craned his neck through the narrow opening, followed the other’s eye line and blinked in wonder at what he saw.

The two centermost doors stood propped wide open to reveal the empty parking lot beyond, a single ribbon of yellow caution tape fluttering in the warm night breeze like a victory banner.
 
Its warmth caressed his sweat-streaked face, shifting the long dark hair across his brow.

Freedom.
 
And not a cop in sight.

He started to edge outside the door, when something pricked to attention in the deep recesses of his subconscious like a dim pulsing light on a vehicle’s instrument panel.

“Where are you going?” Chance asked.

“To get my stuff,” he replied.
 
“If I can’t get a car out of this, at least I’ll have that.”

Slipping back in through the narrow opening in the door, Dugan never saw Chance pull the grenade from his pocket.
 
Nor did he notice as he pulled the pin of the grenade and thrust it through the opening ahead of him.

It fell on the carpeted floor at his feet and rolled between his legs.

Dugan gaped in surprised horror at Chance, smiling maniacally on the other side of the door and threw himself at the explosive device.
 
Hitting the floor on all fours, he scrambled after it, the metal ball seeming to evade his capture almost willfully, fleeing beneath the gas tank of the white sedan.

“No! No! No!” he bellowed.

With a flash of light that seemed puny in comparison to its destructive properties, the explosive charge activated and Dugan felt the flesh of his face sheer away like a layer of plastic wrap.
 
Rolling away in excruciating pain, Dugan heard with a distant, almost academic recognition as the full fuel tank of the white sedan exploded—igniting his name label clothing and searing the flesh from his bones.