City of the cyborgs, p.6
City of the Cyborgs, page 6
Rainor agreed and frowned. “I looked into one of those houses, too. It was like being in a big tomb.” But then he said, “But there’s nothing we can do about that right now.” He seemed to want to change the subject. “When we finish eating, let’s go out again and see if we can catch sight of Mayfair. You want me to describe her to you again?”
Wash grinned. “Beautiful brown hair. Beautiful brown eyes. In fact, the most beautiful girl in the world. You’ve described her a hundred times.”
Rainor managed to grin, himself. “Well, let’s see if we can find her.”
This time when they split up, Josh went with Rainor. The boys walked up and down the streets and went inside various buildings. And all the time, the cyborgs paid them not one bit of attention.
“This is spooky,” Rainor said. “It’s like being in a dead city.”
A shiver went over Josh. “Sounds like a horror movie to me.”
“What’s a horror movie?”
“I’ll explain it to you some other time. Let’s keep looking.”
Then they came to a building that was under construction. The cyborg workers moved slowly, never varying their pace as they carried boards and pounded.
A scaffold had been built, and just as they were passing under it, suddenly Rainor said, “Josh, look out!”
Something had gone wrong up on the scaffold. Both boys leaped out of the way, but a falling board struck one of the cyborg workers, a young woman.
“It hit her antenna,” Rainor said. “The bulb on the end of it has gone out.”
Josh was thinking quickly. “We’re going to get away from here,” he said, “and we’ll take her with us.” He lifted the young woman and looked into her face. “Will you go with us?” he asked. “We’ll help you.”
“I am Unit cd92.”
Her voice was dead sounding, as the cyborgs’ voices always were. “I am Unit cd92,” she repeated.
“Well, come on, Unit cd92,” Josh said grimly. He took her by the arm and pulled her along. She offered no resistance.
“I am Unit cd92,” she kept repeating, but she walked along between them.
“You think that’s all she can say, Rainor?”
“I don’t know, but since that antenna’s been knocked sideways, it may be she’s disconnected. When we get her away from here, we can talk to her. Maybe she can tell us something.”
Leading the girl, they hurried away from the construction site and headed for the hideout.
And for the first time, hope came to Josh. “Maybe this is the break we need, Rainor,” he said. Then he looked at the girl walking between them. “She’s kind of pretty. No older than I am, I would guess. I sure would like to see her come out of it.”
8
“All of Us Are One…”
Has she said anything at all?” Sarah asked. The cyborg girl was seated on the floor, staring straight out into space.
“Not a thing,” Josh said. “Except ‘I am Unit cd92.’ She says that over and over again like a broken record.”
“Nothing else at all?”
“No, nothing. Wish we knew what to do for her. It’s not like she has a broken arm or …”
“No,” Sarah agreed. “We’d know what to do for that—but this is different.”
The rest of the Sleepers were scattered around the hideout in various positions, some sitting, some sprawled on the floor. But all were listening intently, and all of them hoped that this young female cyborg might be able to help them solve the riddle of the city.
Jake approached her and reached out tentatively. “The antenna’s loose,” he said. “That means she can’t receive anything.” He traced the wires that ran from the box to her ear and then gently pulled out the earpiece.
She flinched then, and for the first time her expression changed. “Do not hurt me. Do not—hurt me,” she whispered.
“We’re not going to hurt you, Unit cd92,” Josh said quickly. “We want to be your friends.”
Sarah was watching the girl’s face. “Something came into her eyes then! Some understanding.” They had a sign of life.
“Maybe she’s coming around!” Dave exclaimed hopefully.
“Can she hear us?” Abbey demanded.
“I think so,” Wash said. “Fortunately, they seem to speak the basic Nuworld language here.”
People began trying to talk all at once, but Sarah said, “Ssh. All of you be quiet! You’re frightening her! Come on, Cee Dee. I think I’ll just call you that. Cee Dee. It doesn’t sound so … mechanical.”
She took the girl’s arm, and the cyborg got up without resistance. “I think she’d better be kept back in our room where there’s a little quiet. Maybe she’ll come to herself after a while. There are too many people here—we’re scaring her.”
“I think you’re right, Sarah,” Josh said. “You and Abbey see what you can do.”
“You think they’ve got any way to trace her here—I mean by radar or something like that, Jake?” Dave asked.
“Could be. Whoever thought up this system is pretty smart. I’d like to take that gear off her, but somehow it’s attached to the side of her head. I don’t understand it, so we’d just better leave it alone.”
“Well, one thing’s for sure. If she’s not receiving any instructions from whoever’s the boss,” Josh said slowly, “she ought to begin thinking for herself pretty soon.”
“I wish I could listen to one of those things,” Jake said. “If we did, we might find out who is up to all this.”
“We’ll just have to wait,” Rainor said. “We can keep looking for Mayfair. Maybe Unit cd92 will recover and can tell us something.”
∗ ∗ ∗
“Josh—Josh!”
Josh had been napping. He looked up to see Sarah bending over him, excitement in her face. Now she was shaking him. “She’s beginning to talk, Josh. Come quick.”
A day had passed since they had brought Cee Dee back to their hideout. She had done little but sleep. Josh—and everyone else—had begun to lose confidence that she would ever think normally again.
Dave even said, “I’m afraid that whatever they did to her has destroyed her brain permanently.”
“It could be,” Josh had agreed. He too was doubtful about her recovery.
Now he and Rainor followed Sarah into the back room, where they found the girl they had called Cee Dee standing and looking much more alert.
Sarah went close to her. “Cee Dee, this is Josh, and this is Rainor.”
Cee Dee turned to the boys and seemed frightened.
Josh said quickly, “You don’t need to be afraid. We’re your friends.”
A confused look came into Cee Dee’s eyes. They were beautiful blue eyes, and she had blonde hair that had been cut very short. “I am …”
“You’re what, Cee Dee?” Josh said gently when she hesitated. “What is it?”
“I am … I have become insane.”
The three stood shocked and staring as the girl began feeling for her antenna. Obviously she was highly disturbed at being cut off from all instructions.
“You’re not insane, Cee Dee,” Sarah said.
The girl turned to Rainor and said, “What is your number, Unit?”
“I’m not a unit, and my name is Rainor.”
“What is your number, Unit?” she repeated. Then she looked at Josh and Sarah and asked the same question. She spoke slowly, as if she had forgotten how to speak.
Rainor waited for only a moment before saying, “Cee Dee, I am looking for a young woman named Mayfair. She has brown hair and brown eyes, and she hasn’t been here long, and …”
“What is her number?”
“She doesn’t have a number,” Rainor insisted.
Cee Dee fingered the antenna that was tilted over to one side and obviously disconnected. She appeared to be totally confused.
“Have you seen her? She’s an exceptionally beautiful girl. She’s one girl you would never forget.”
“We are all One. There is no two, and there is no three. All of us are … One!”
Josh could make no sense of this, and he was sure that the others could not either. “What do you mean you’re One?”
“We are One. There is no other. All of us are One.”
They questioned her further, but she seemed to tire. She closed her eyes and whispered, “I am Unit cd92.I am Unit cd92.”
Sarah whispered, “She’s like a baby. She doesn’t know anything at all!”
“More like a machine, I’d say,” Josh said, and he gnawed his lower lip nervously.
“Let’s give her something to eat. She might be hungry and not even know it.”
“That’s a good idea,” Josh said quickly, brightening. “Maybe food will help. Is there anything prepared?”
“We still have some of that good beef and vegetable soup.”
“Just the thing. Let’s have it.”
Sarah said, “I’ll get it!”
Josh and Rainor seated Cee Dee at an old table and let her rest until Sarah came back, bearing a bowl of steaming soup.
“Here, try some of this, Cee Dee,” Sarah said and set down the soup before her.
The girl looked at the bowl as if she had never seen soup before. “What … is … this?” she asked brokenly.
“It’s soup. It’s good to eat, Cee Dee. Try it,” Sarah urged.
Cee Dee stared at them, but then she nodded and picked up the spoon. She took a spoonful of the soup and put it in her mouth. For a moment she was quiet. Then her eyes widened. “Good,” she said. “Good food!”
“Look at her eat,” Rainor murmured. “She must be half-starved.”
Cee Dee ate two bowlfuls of the soup, and then she seemed much more relaxed. When they offered her hot tea, she drank it and asked for more. And then, for the first time, she smiled. “I am insane—but you are good.”
“What do you mean you’re insane?” Josh asked.
“I cannot hear the Peacemaker.” She touched her broken antenna. “Anyone who is not listening to the Peacemaker is insane. Only the One is sane. Everyone outside of the One is bad. They are all insane.”
The girl was willing to talk for quite some time, and mostly it was Sarah who skillfully asked her questions about her life in the City of the Cyborgs. Josh soon realized that Cee Dee had no sense of the passage of time. She was surprised when they asked her how long she had been a cyborg. “I cannot remember.”
“I think her memory might be damaged,” Josh murmured to Rainor. “After all, she’s still got that gear plugged into her brain. If we could get that out somehow—without hurting her in any way—she might be perfectly normal again.”
Sarah continued to ask questions. “Do you like being a cyborg—being part of the One?”
“Oh yes.”
“Why do you like it, Cee Dee?”
“Because there is no fear.”
“You’re never afraid?”
“Never. The Peacemaker gives us peace. If we were not part of the One, we would be afraid, and we could be hurt.”
“Do you ever have to decide anything for yourself?” Josh asked curiously, watching her face.
“Decide?”
“Yes. You know. Make decisions. What you are going to do next, for example.”
Confusion swept across the girl’s face. “The Peacemaker tells me what to do. When I do it, I am sane. If I would not do it, I would be insane, and the annihilators would throw me out of the city.”
“Would leaving here be so bad a thing?”
Fear leaped into Cee Dee’s face. “Yes. I would be insane. I would die if I were not part of the One.”
“Who is this Peacemaker?” Rainor asked then. His handsome face was stern.
“He is good. He always takes away our fears. He takes care of the One.”
Josh finally decided that was all the information they could get out of the young cyborg. Besides, she seemed to be growing tired again. He and Rainor and Sarah consulted together.
Sarah said, “She’s so much better than she was. If we let her rest some more and feed her, maybe we’ll be able to get the whole story.”
“You’re probably right. Why don’t you see if maybe she wants to sleep for a while?”
Sarah turned back to Cee Dee and said, “Would you like to lie down and sleep?”
The question seemed to confuse the girl. “The Peacemaker has not told me to sleep.”
Sarah put her hand on Cee Dee’s arm. “Come along, Cee Dee. I’ll show you where you can lie down. I’ll talk to you awhile. Maybe you’ll get sleepy.” She led the girl away.
As soon as they were gone, Rainor said angrily, “Somebody has made these people nothing but mindless slaves!”
“And this Peacemaker. Who is he? What do you think of him?”
“You know pretty well what I think. Anyone who would do what he’s done to a young girl like this doesn’t deserve to live himself.”
Secretly Josh agreed with him, but he took a less violent point of view. “Well, maybe there’s a way to convince him that what he’s doing is wrong. If we can find him.”
“You haven’t been around very much if you think that, Josh.”
“How’s that?”
“I mean that people who are in total control—you can’t easily convince them that they’re wrong. They’ve got power, and they won’t give it up.”
Josh slowly nodded. “I suppose you’re right. I think I was just hopeful.”
Rainor lowered his head and seemed to be deep in thought. “I think it’s getting clear what we’ve got to do, Josh.”
“Are you thinking the same thing I am?”
“Probably. We’ve got to help all these people. Not just Mayfair but all of them.”
“I’m coming to believe that’s why we were sent here.”
“What do you mean, ‘sent’? Sent by whom?”
“Well, since we’ve been serving Goél, we have found out that things just don’t accidentally happen. I mean, why were we out there in the desert at exactly the time you came along?”
“You think it was meant to be? That Goél planned it that way? Is that it?”
“All I know is that we wouldn’t be here to help you look for Mayfair if you hadn’t met us. And if you hadn’t met us and saved our lives, we’d be dead. And now it looks like there’s a job laid out for us, Rainor.”
“Still, I just came here to find Mayfair.”
“I know you did, but it’s come to be more to it than that, hasn’t it?”
Slowly Rainor nodded. “And the first thing we’ve got to do is find this Peacemaker. But I’ll tell you one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“When I get my hands on him, he’s going to have anything but peace!”
9
The Captive
Sarah and Josh were making themselves a snack in what had once been the cafeteria kitchen.
“I think Cee Dee is going to get well,” Sarah said. She glanced over at him, adding, “She’s making much more sense now. Just give her a little time, and she’ll be fine.”
Josh had made himself a sandwich and was proceeding to add a layer of beef. He added salt. He shook pepper over it until it was almost black. Then he eyed the sandwich and took a huge bite. “That’s good,” he said and offered it to Sarah. “Have a bite,” he mumbled.
“It would paralyze my tongue, Josh! I don’t see how you eat anything with that much pepper. You always did do that—even back in Oldworld.”
“It adds flavor.” But then he said, “I think you’re right about Cee Dee. She has some bad times, but in between she’s talking quite a bit and making a lot more sense.”
“It gives me chills just to think about her life here.”
They had found some windfall apples lying under a tree, and Sarah was cutting one into small slices with her sheath knife. She nibbled on a piece, then said, “These aren’t as good as apples used to be in the old days. They aren’t as sweet, and they’re harder. But they’re apples.”
Josh swallowed another bite of sandwich, then said solemnly, “Well, when people get to be your age, the olden days always seem better. That’s one sure sign you’re getting old.”
Sarah stuck out her tongue at him and shoved a sliver of apple into his mouth. “There, chew on that!” She took another bite herself and then walked to a window. The abandoned cafeteria was in an especially rundown section of town. She looked out at the grim street and sighed. “Josh, this has got to be the ugliest city in the whole world. Not one colorful thing in it. I’ve never seen such an awful place in my life!”
“It’s sad, all right. These people don’t have any color or any beauty. They never sing. There’s no art, no television, no nothing! It’s really dullsville!”
“Saddest thing to me is when you go into their barracks and see them just standing there.”
“I know,” Josh said. “It’s like they’re a toy that’s run down. You wind it up, and it moves jerkily for a while, and then it just stops until the next time you wind it up.”
Still looking out, Sarah thought about the green fields as the sunlight hit them. “This could be a beautiful valley,” she murmured. “It’s the buildings that make it ugly.”
“They must have a chief uglifier. The guy who runs this place designed the city, no doubt. The Peacemaker, she called him. Somehow I don’t much like that name.”
“Nor do I. It’s such a beautiful, unsuitable name for such a terrible person.”
“I’ve noticed,” Josh said, “that people always like to think up better sounding names for things. Remember back in the old days when they changed the title janitor to building engineer?”
The two stood at the window and nibbled on their snacks until Sarah said, “Let’s check on Cee Dee. Then go out again and see if we can find Mayfair.”
“OK with me.”
They found Cee Dee talking with Wash.
He grinned when they came in. “I been telling her about all the good things to eat that she’s been missing. Stuff like hamburgers and french fries.”
“She can still have a kind of a hamburger.” Sarah smiled. “Would you like to have a hamburger, Cee Dee?”
Cee Dee’s speech was still halting, but she was much more relaxed than she had been when the Sleepers had found her. Automatically she touched her broken antenna as if she expected a voice to come through it and give her directions. But then she smiled and said, “I would like to have a hamborger.”
