Deliver Us Huis

The charts were spread across the large table we had set up in the erstwhile ballroom. It’s former decor had perhaps been more fancy, but I liked its current renovations as our command center, and we needed a command center without distracting frills.

At least, it made me feel better to have an official looking command center.

The tenth floor’s renovations were possibly my favorite changes of the last few weeks.

A huge glass table sat in the middle of the command center, bright lights cascading onto the papers that lay strewn about it. Above it sat screens showing on a large scale whatever research or documents we had pulled up on our computing systems.

On one wall was a giant tackboard, currently covered in various political and general plans. The other side held televisions, all tuned to different news stations. We kept an eye on what was happening, always checking to make sure our missions had been covert and inconspicuous.

And in front of it all lay the window, showing us the busy world below, the world we were going to save.

I had started my campaign as city delegate, which had caused a bit of a stir. As a never before seen candidate there was quite a lot of interest about my political views, my history. The interviews stacked up quite nicely, portraying me as a dull political figure. Things could not be more perfect on that front.

It had made enough of a stir that I saw almost nothing about the small robberies of metals that had been happening recently. Of course the two events were never linked. And even if I was ever suspected, I would always have an alibi. My political events usually conveniently coincided with the robberies.

Everything was working splendidly. We had the first batch of metal for droid and droid parts stored on the third floor, and we had converted the second floor into a lab for Nickolai. The first floor had been opened up and looked quite respectable for any political business I needed done. The fourth floor had been prepared, as best we could, to start the manufacture of the droids.

The fifth through seventh floors had been opened for eventual droid storage. The eighth had been opened up for apartments for Nickolai and temporary housing for Petrus, if he ever left the control center to sleep, which wasn’t often.

The ninth floor had been made into apartments for O’Malley and I.

There had been so many changes, and for once I felt like I was doing something that mattered.

But it also meant I was very busy. But that didn’t matter so much today, because today was another important day, the day we finally were going to start working on the androids.

Going into the lab with Nickolai I laid out my android concept plans on the table. After a moment he came over and started looking at the rough sketches of android soldiers.

“My guess, from what I have heard, is that you are going to want these droids to be as strong and powerful as possible. How many are you needing?”

“It depends on how powerful they are.” I said, “We’re starting from scratch with this design, and we want them to be as powerful and cost efficient as possible. However, we want no corners cut. We’ll get you the technology you need, as long as you can use it. ”

“I’ll see what I can do, however I have a few questions. First of all, I’m assuming you want me to equip them with artificial intelligence, correct?”

“Correct.”

“Then I wonder if you would be interested in the new form of AI I’ve been working on.”

“Which is?” I asked, curious

“The new AI program I have takes from the genetic makeup and knowledge of an individual, translates it into computer code, and gives the droid the thinking capacity of the individual. All our prototypes have worked very well so far, and the intelligence we are seeing rivals the most sophisticated we’ve seen yet.

“Of course,” Nickoli paused, “In taking the knowledge of an individual and translating it into code certain things are lost, and the android is not capable of the capacity of a real being, but still, it’s quite amazing what they can do. Not to mention you can program in so many abilities the original did not have, such as fighting skills.”

“Sounds amazing,” Petrus said, “What do we need to get this kind of artificial intelligence?”

“The beta chip I retrieved was the one that carried all of the information, silly.”

Petrus rolled his eyes.

“One more thing, how will these droids be controlled?” I asked.

“Simply enough, they will be linked to a computer which will tell them where to go, and when and whom to attack. From there on their programing will do the rest.”

“When do you think you can have the plans drawn up?”

“With what I have in mind, I should be able to draw up the plans and have them ready by tomorrow for approval. From there all I need is the beta chip so I can work the kinks out, and you should have your first android made within the next five days.”

“If all is to your approval from there I can work on mass producing them using the lovely tools you have given me, and then sending their control links to the computing system of your choice.”

“Excellent,” Petrus said, “We’ll let you work for the rest of the day on drawing up those plans.”

With that we exited the lab, leaving Nickolai pouring over my maps and instructions. As the door closed behind us Petrus enabled the encoding lock.

“You’re locking him in there? Don’t you trust him?” I asked.

“He’s my own brother, of course I don’t trust him. I don’t think he’ll be a problem right now...” Petrus said confidently, “My only concern is that he’ll grow power hungry and somehow retain control on the droids.”

“We’ll watch him,”I said, “And we can always keep him in an isolated place until it’s all over.”

“True,” Petrus said, “Either way I’m excited to see what he comes up with.”

“Me too,”I said, “I just hope we can manufacture enough of them in enough time. This election business won’t keep the news busy for long, and we’re going to need to raid a lot more places for the metal it’s going to take to build all the androids we’re going to need.”

“We’ll think of something,” Petrus assured me, “It shouldn’t be too hard to find something exciting enough to distract the press from some missing metal.”

“But for now I need to get ready for the delegate debate tomorrow.” I said with a sigh, “They’re putting me against one of the top candidates, that Old General Caliban.”

“Caliban?” Petrus asked incredulously, “The Caliban from the shuttle wreck?”

“Yup,” I said, “Though he has some serious fame, I doubt he’ll be a serious contender. His story? Cool. His politics? Shaky. Just because he was part of the government agency that created our hyperspace technology, doesn’t mean he’ll survive in the world of politics. In any case he shouldn’t be smart enough to be any threat to us.”

“Still,” Petrus said, “He was in part of the government for a reason. Keep on your toes, and don’t cream him too badly.”

“I won’t.” I promised with a smile.

And with that we split paths, Petrus watching the cameras trained on Nickolai, and I getting ready for the delegate debate.