Droids And Bots

Chapter 49

Poliman is in the back, washing the cookie sheets. He has to let the sinks drain real slow or else they flood the floor drain and I have to go back in there and mop all over again. I’ve told that dude a hundred times not to let the sinks drain all at once.

Anyway.

The tapping sound is real light. Tap, tap, tap. Then it stops. I watch as the door slowly cracks open and a padded gripper slips around the edge.

Is it unusual for a domestic droid to come into the store?

Nope. We’re in Utica Square, man. Domestics come in and buy a ’nilla frogurt now and then. Usually they’re buyin’ for a rich person in the neighborhood. None of the other customers ever wanna wait in line behind a droid, though, so it takes, like, ten times longer than if the person just got off their a*s and came in. But, whatever. A Big Happy type of domestic comes in probably once a week with a paypod inside its chest and its gripper out to hold a waffle cone.

What happens next?

Well, the gripper is moving weird. Normally, the domestics, like, do the same sort of pushing motion. They do this stupid I-am-opening-a-door-now shove, no matter what door they’re standing in front of. That’s why people are always pissed off if they get stuck behind a domestic while it’s trying to get inside. It’s way worse even than being stuck behind an old lady.

But this Big Happy is different. The door cracks open, and its gripper kind of sneaks around the edge and pats up and down the handle. I’m the only one who sees it because there’s nobody else in the store and Poliman is in the back. It happens fast, but it looks to me like the droid is trying to feel out where the lock is at.

Then the door swings open and the chimes ring. The domestic is about five feet tall and covered in a layer of thick, shiny blue plastic. It doesn’t come all the way inside the store, though. Instead, it stands there in the doorway real still and its head scans back and forth, checking out the whole room: the cheap tables and chairs, my counter with the towel on it, the ice cream freezers. Me.

We looked up the registration plate on this machine and it checked out. Besides the scanning, was there anything else strange about the droid? Out of the ordinary?

The thing’s got scuffs all over it. Like it got hit by a car or had a fight or something. Maybe it was broken.

It walks inside, then turns right around and locks the door. I pull my arm out of the frogurt machine and just stare at the domestic droid with its creepy smiling face as it shuffles toward me.

Then it reaches over the counter with both grippers and grabs me by the shirt. It drags me over the counter, scattering pieces of the taken-apart frogurt machine all over the floor. My shoulder slams into the cash register, and I feel this sick crunching inside.

The thing f*****g dislocated my shoulder in about one second!

I scream for help. But frigging Poliman doesn’t hear me. He’s got the dishes soaking in soapy water and is out smoking a jay in the alley behind the store. I try my best to get away, kicking and struggling, but the grippers have closed in on my shirt like two pairs of pliers. And the bot’s got more than my shirt. Once I’m over the counter, it pushes me into the ground. I hear my left collarbone snap. After that it gets really hard to breathe.

I let out another little scream, thinking: You sound like an animal, Jeff dude. But my weird little yell seems to get the thing’s attention. I’m on my back and the domestic is looming over me; it’s sure as hell not letting go of my shirt. The Big Happy’s head is blocking the fluorescent light on the ceiling. I blink away tears and look up at its frozen, grinning face.

It looks me right in the eyes, man. And I can tell that it’s … thinking. Like it’s alive. And pissed off.

Nothing changes on its face or anything, but I get a pretty bad feeling right then. I mean, an even worse feeling. And, sure enough, I hear the servos in the thing’s arm start to grind. Now it turns and swings me to the left, smashing the side of my head into the door of the pie fridge hard enough to c***k the glass. The whole right side of my head feels cold and then warm. Then the side of my face and neck and arm all start to feel really warm, too. Blood’s shooting out of me like a damn fire hydrant.

Jesus, I’m crying. And that’s when … uh. That’s when Poliman shows up.

Do you give the domestic droid money from the register?

What? It doesn’t ask for money. It never asked for money. It doesn’t say a word. What went down wasn’t a telerobbery, man. I don’t even know if it was being remote controlled, Officer …

What do you think it wants?

It wants to kill me. That’s all. It wants to murder my a*s. The thing was on its own and it was out for blood.

Go on.

Once it got hold of me, I didn’t think it would let go until I was dead. But my man Poliman wasn’t having any of that s**t. He comes running out the back, hollering like a motherfucker. Dude was pissed. And Poliman is a big man. Got that Fu Manchu ’stache and all kinds of ink running up and down his arms. Badass s**t, too, like dragons and eagles and this one prehistoric fish all the way down his forearm. A colecanth or something. It’s like this monster dinosaur fish that they thought was extinct. There are fossils of it and everything. Then one day some fisherman gets the surprise of his life when he pulls up a real live devil fish from hell below. Poliman used to say that the fish was proof you can’t keep a motherfucker down forever. Someday you gotta rise up again, you know?

What happened next, Jeff?

Yeah, right. I’m on the ground, bleeding and crying, and Big Happy’s got me by the shirt. Then Poliman comes running out the back and turns the corner of the counter, roaring like a friggin’ barbarian. His hairnet is off and his long hair is flying. He grabs the domestic by the shoulders, just snatches it up and throws it down. It lets go of me and falls backward through the front door, shards of glass flying everywhere. The bell chimes again. Bing-bong. It’s such a dorky sound for this kind of violent s**t that it makes me smile through all the blood running down my face.

Poliman kneels down and sees the damage. “Oh f**k, jefe,” he says. “What’d it do to you?”

But I see Big Happy moving behind Poliman now. My face must tell the whole story, because Poliman grabs me by the waist and drags me back around the counter without even looking at the door. He’s panting and taking little crab steps. I can smell the joint in his front pocket. I watch my blood smearing behind me on the tile floor and I think, s**t, man, I just mopped that.

We make it through the doorway behind the register and into the cramped back room. There’s a low row of stainless steel sinks full of soapy water, a wall of cleaning supplies, and a little cubby desk in the corner that has our punch clock sitting on it. In the very back is a narrow hallway that leads to the alley behind the store.

Then Big Happy plows into Poliman out of nowhere. Instead of following us, the fucker was smart enough to climb over the counter. I hear a thump and see Big Happy bash Poliman across the chest with its forearm. Not at all like getting punched by a guy—more like getting hit by a car or, like, nailed by a falling brick or something. Poliman flies backward and hits the cabinet doors where we keep all the paper towels and stuff. He stays on his feet, though. When he stumbles forward, I see a dent in the wood from the back of his head. But he’s wide awake and more pissed off than ever.

I drag myself away, toward the sinks, but my shoulder is messed up and my arms are slippery with blood and I can hardly breathe from the pain in my chest.

There aren’t any weapons or anything back here, so Poliman snatches the mop from the filthy yellow bucket on wheels. It’s an old mop with a solid wooden handle and it’s been there I don’t know how long. There’s no room to swing the mop, but it doesn’t matter because the droid is hell-bent on grabbing Poliman the same way it grabbed me. He rams the mop up and gets it wedged under Big Happy’s chin. Poliman isn’t a tall guy, but he’s taller than the machine and has a longer reach. It can’t get ahold of him. He shoves the machine away from us, its arms waving around like snakes.

/> The next part is awesome.

Big Happy falls backward onto the cubby desk in the corner, its legs sticking straight out, heels on the ground. With no hesitation, Poliman raises his right foot straight up and comes down with all his weight on its knee joint. Snap! The droid’s knee pops and bends backward at a totally f****d-up angle. With the mop handle stuck under its chin, the machine can’t catch its balance and it can’t grab hold of Poliman, either. I’m wincing just looking at that knee, but the machine doesn’t make any noise or anything. I only hear its motors grinding and the sound of its hard plastic shell banging into the desk and wall while it struggles to get up.

“Yeah, motherfucker!” Poliman shouts before crushing the droid’s other knee joint backward. Big Happy lies on its back with both legs broken and an angry-as-f**k sweaty two-hundred-pound Mexican on top of it. I can’t help but start thinking that everything is going to be okay.

Turns out I’m wrong about that.

It’s his hair, you know. Poliman’s hair is too long. Simple as that.

The machine stops struggling, reaches out, and clamps a gripper down on Poliman’s black mane. He hollers and yanks his head back. But this isn’t like getting your hair pulled in a bar fight; this is like getting caught in a shredder or a piece of heavy equipment in a factory. It’s brutal. Every muscle in Poliman’s neck stands out and he screams like an animal. His eyes squeeze shut as he pulls away with all his might. I can hear the roots tearing out from his scalp. But the f*****g thing just pulls Poliman’s face closer and closer.

It’s unstoppable, like gravity or something.

After a couple seconds, Poliman is close enough that Big Happy can get hold of him with its other gripper. The mop handle clatters to the floor as the other gripper closes on Poliman’s chin and mouth, crushing the bottom part of his face. He screams and I can hear his jaw cracking. Teeth pop out of his mouth like f*****g popcorn.