Gamma World: Tempus Fugitive: Chapter 16

CHAPTER 16

They had left New Portage at around seven in the morning, and by the time they arrived at the ruins of what had once been Regina, it was going on six in the afternoon. Or six in the evening depending on your point of view. Including the detour around Brandon, it had been a journey of some five hundred kilometres. Eleven long hours. Then they found the resurfaced highway and did another hundred and twenty kilometres in an hour or so, including the time it took to slow down for dinosaurs.
    Cera was astonished. It showed her what it must have been like for the Ancients when they travelled: vast distances crossed in small amounts of time. Garadun sat behind the wheel, more content driving than she’d ever seen him. The RV drove so smoothly over the road that she was able to prepare dinner for everyone without a single problem or spilling anything. They stopped for fifteen minutes to eat, and then kept going. It was about seven-thirty in the evening and they had less than two hours of summer daylight left when they reached a junction in the road. According to their map, the road they were on was Highway 11, now completely resurfaced. Yet this junction split off and went west in a straight line; it wasn’t on their map.
    Garadun looked at his friends. “Take the turnoff?”
    “Might as well,” said Cera, and Symphony miaowed in agreement.
    “Into the sunset we go,” he said and took them west. The road had no curves in it at all, running straight as a laser, and at a cautious 80 kph they came to the road’s end in half an hour. What stood before them in the fading light was astonishing.
    It was a city.
    There was an imposing outer fence made of concrete posts and thick steel mesh: each post was six meters high and set three meters apart. At the top of each was a small yellow light, and the fence stretched out of sight in either direction. Where the road met the fence was a colossal gateway, also well-lit. Beyond the protective fence stood a full-fledged city of concrete and steel and glass, just like in all the stories Cera had been raised on. Much of it was already lit, and small vehicles (or whatever they were) could be seen flying through the air at various heights. The architectural style was definitely not pre-Disaster Earth. At least nothing outside of fiction. To Garadun it looked like a cross between cyberpunk, steampunk, and classic science fiction.
    “Now we know who built the road,” he remarked.
    Kittens looked at him and mewed, pointing their paws. Cera said, “She wants to know if the Ancients built this city.”
    “Oh, hell no,” he replied with a chuckle. “Symphony, this is pure Gamma Terra. I haven’t got a clue.”
    “Should we keep going?” Cera asked hesitantly.
    “Well, we’re here,” he said, shrugging. “It’s gonna be dark soon. Might as well see if they’ll let us in. If not, we’ll make camp near the fence.”
    Cera nodded and he drove slowly up to the city entrance. There was a standard industrial warning line across the road from one side to the other in the usual diagonal stripes, and there were surveillance cameras on either side. As they came to a stop, an actual robot emerged from an alcove. A proper science fiction robot and not some stupid novelty. It was a vertically-oriented rectangle that hovered maybe ten centimeters above the pavement. Its outer shell looked like metal, painted off-white. There was a red-orange emergency light bar along the top, and it had no discernable features apart from a horizontal black band with two green lights that gave the impression of eyes. On the bottom was a black metallic bulge, and arms could be seen retracted into its sides. The right arm unfolded and made a stopping gesture.
    “HALT.” The robot’s voice was very mechanical.
    Garadun stuck his head out the window. “We already did.”
    The robot stared at him. “IDENTIFY.”
    “I’m Garadun, and this is Cera and Symphony.”
    “IDENTIFY.”
    “Hey, man, I already told you who we were.”
    “ALL BIOLOGICALS MUST PRESENT IDENTITY PASSES,” the robot told them.
    “We don’t have any identity passes,” the human told it with a frustrated sigh. “Look, we’re from out of town. Isn’t that obvious?”
    “ALL BIOLOGICALS MUST PRESENT IDENTITY PASSES.”
    “We don’t have any, you stupid…” Garadun closed his eyes and took a breath. “We do not have identity passes. How do we get identity passes?”
    “ALL BIOLOGICALS ENTERING ROBOTROPOLIS MUST ACQUIRE IDENTITY PASSES.”
    “Robotropolis?” said Cera in surprise.
    “Yeah, that’s right, we need to acquire identity passes,” Garadun told the obtuse robot guard. “How do we do this?”
    “REGISTRATION. FOLLOW.”
    The robot swung out in front of the RV, so Garadun followed it past the city entrance and over to a small parking lot in front of a dull, concrete slab of a building. It had the same feel as any customs area: officious and obnoxious, with a touch of hostility. He parked in the spot the robot indicated, then led his friends across the lot and into the building. It was sparsely furnished. There was another guard robot near the door, and a different robot model behind the counter.
    “REGISTRATION.”
    The guard pointed to a red line on the floor. It went straight for several meters then make a sharp 90 degree turn up to a counter. Garadun was really tempted to ignore the line and just go straight to the counter, but he had learned to never mess with customs officers. Well, the American ones anyway. He followed the red line to the counter and his friends did the same. Behind the counter stood a very thin robot: it wasn’t much more than a pole with arms and a boxy top that was both chest and head.
    “Good evening,” said Garadun, trying to be polite. “The guard said we need to get registered before we can enter the city. I hope you can help us?”
    “AFFIRMATIVE. WHAT IS YOUR DESIGNATION?”
    “My name is Garadun.”
    “ORIGIN?”
    “You mean what city or town I’m from?”
    “AFFIRMATIVE.”
    Now how the hell was he supposed to answer that? Screw it, might as well tell it the truth. Well, as much as he had to. “Montreal.”
    “SPECIES?”
    “Human.”
    “PLEASE HOLD STILL.” A blue light shot out and scanned Garadun’s head and shoulders. “THANK YOU FOR YOUR COOPERATION. PLEASE WAIT OVER THERE. NEXT.”
    Cera went through the same process without a hitch; but when it was Symphony’s turn, the robot had trouble trying to understand what she was. The kittens couldn’t talk, so Cera had to answer for her and wound up explaining about her telepathic abilities and how she was translating what the kittens were thinking. It took a little time, but the robot finally understood. When all the questions had been answered and the scanning done, each of them was issued a plastic identity card with a holograph and an imbedded electronic data chip. Garadun’s image was as horrible as every other passport, driver’s licence or medical card picture he’d ever had in his life. Cera still managed to look lovely, and Symphony’s holograph showed two kittens side-by-side and waving. Probably the cutest I.D. card ever. Now properly supplied with identification, they were allowed to leave the building and enter the city of Robotropolis.

                                                                          *****

Although the streets of Robotropolis weren’t very busy, the vehicles that were there, were eye-catching. Only a quarter of them got around on wheels; the rest zoomed along anywhere from a few centimeters to a meter or two off the ground. They all looked new and in good condition; even the handful of pre-Disaster cars they saw. The latter gave the impression of coming from body shops specialising in restoring classic vehicles.
    Driving many of the ground and hover vehicles were an assortment of biologicals. In other words, regular people and not robots. Mutant animals and humanoids made up the majority, although there were a few unique lifeforms. Of the robotic drivers, androids of varying levels of humanoid appearance were the most common; the rest seemed to be the classic metal-skinned robots. Mixed in with the driven vehicles were large, individual robots who were vehicles; or were simply too big to be travelling on the sidewalks. Some rolled along on wheels, some on tracks; many of them were hoverbots. In the air above the ground level streets, at different heights, flew many more individual robots, most of which were roughly human-sized or smaller. Among the flying bots were what appeared to be not simply hovercars, but actual flying cars.
    Cera and Symphony were completely astonished; neither of them had ever been in a real, functioning city before. It was one thing to wander the ruins of a metropolis, quite another to be in the middle of a living one. Their human friend was equally amazed, but for different reasons. Since arriving in this era, he hadn’t expected to find an active, thriving city again, let alone one founded by robots. Yet for the time being he had to curb his wonder because he had to concentrate on driving the unfamiliar streets. The last thing he wanted was an accident.
    The people on the sidewalks were a mix of mechanicals and biologicals, with robots in the clear majority. They came in a variety of shapes and sizes (with the humanoid design being the least common) and moved about on wheels, treads, hovered in the air, and even walked around on legs the old-fashioned way. When Garadun stopped at a set of lights, Cera and Symphony goggled as pedestrians crossed the intersection in front of them. The kittens mewed at Garadun quizzically.
    “She wants to know if it was like this in your time,” Cera translated.
    The human nodded. “Sort of. We didn’t have robots or mutants or anything flying through the air; but yes, cities were basically like this.”
    “It’s so busy! And so many people!”
    “Compared to a small town, yeah,” said Garadun. “For a full-fledged city, I’d say this was a quiet night. I’m used to there being a lot more people.”
    The weasel girl chuckled. “I thought Big Boat and New Portage had crowds.”
    “All a matter of what you’re used to, I guess,” Garadun observed and continued on when the lights turned green. He didn’t know where he was going, and at this point he really didn’t care. He was enjoying driving through the city and soaking it all in. It wasn’t long before night fell. Lights had already been coming on, and now the fantastic metropolis was lit from the streets to the tops of the tallest buildings. For his companions, this simply made the city all the more magical.
    They drove around sightseeing for at least an hour before they decided it was time to try and find a place where they could safely park for the night. Robotropolis didn’t have many parking lots, due to the fact that the city wasn’t home to hundreds of thousands of vehicles. Garadun didn’t want to pull over on the side of street because, first of all, it wasn’t very secure; secondly, he wasn’t sure if it was legal; and the last thing he wanted was trouble with robotic authorities.
    “Oh, look there!” Cera called out, pointing. Up ahead on their left was what looked to be some sort of eatery; and it had a parking lot that could probably fit at least fifty normal-sized cars. Garadun activated the RV’s turn signal, waited for a break in the traffic, then made a left and drove into the lot, heading for the far corner where it was empty and he had plenty of room to manoeuvre. He got them lined up in the middle of four spaces and turned off the engine. Symphony mewed and pointed paws.
    “What kind of place is this?” the weasel girl translated.
    “It’s a diner, somewhere to eat,” Garadun replied. The parking lot was shaped like an L lying on its side, hooking around a long building that reminded him of the classic roadside diners of decades gone by. The foundation was concrete; the walls and roof made from shiny metal, with large windows forming a band around three sides. There were even huge neon letters on the roof, spelling out the words:
                                                                          ROBOTROPOLIS CAFÉ
    Cera looked at Garadun. “You think we can stay here?”
    “So long as we’re paying customers, I don’t see why not.” He gave the kitties a smile. “What d’you say, Symphony? You up for a late meal?”
    The kittens miaowed happily and scampered over to the RV’s door. Smiling in fond amusement, Garadun and Cera got up and let Symphony out, locking the door behind them before strolling across the lot towards the diner. Garadun counted twelve other vehicles in the lot, one of which was parked right next to the diner. He opened the door and stepped inside, holding it open for his companions.
    There was a moment of silence as everyone in the diner stopped eating and talking to look at the new arrivals. There was no hostility, just curiosity, and after a few seconds they went back to their own business. Garadun was quick to note that he was the only human in the whole place. Although he was technically a mutant now, he still looked like what Cera and others called “pure strain human.” The diner’s customers consisted of a variety of mutants, including a quartet of dabbers occupying one of the booths. There was a humanoid-shaped robot and a cougaroid behind the counter.
    Garadun pointed to an empty booth; Symphony’s many kitten selves swarmed over and took up one bench seat while her friends sat opposite her. At the end of the table, next to the windows, were the traditional items: salt and pepper shakers, sugar dispenser, napkin holder, and plastic bottles of red and yellow condiments. Stacked in a holder behind them were a pair of laminated menus. Kittens peered over and around the seat, looking at the diner with great interest. Garadun took out the menus and passed one to Cera, who was also glancing around the diner curiously.
    “This is really different from the Double Bison,” she remarked.
    “It’s very pre-Disaster,” said Garadun, nodding. “Which is actually kinda weird. Given the name of the city, and the fact that the majority of the people are robots, I’m really surprised. The robots could have done anything; yet they’ve gone and built a place that’s very human in design.”
    Cera was about to reply when the robot rolled out from behind the counter and came over to their booth. Her upper torso was basically human in contour, with a head, two arms, and a female-shaped chest and waist. From the hips down she was a single, jointed limb with a large ball-wheel at the bottom. She appeared to be made of metal and plastic; her head had shoulder-length, moulded “hair” and human-like features. Garadun was reminded of the bots in the animated film Robots.
    “Hi there.” The robot greeted them in a cheerful, non-mechanical voice. “Welcome to the Robotropolis Café. You new in town?”
    “How did you know?” said Cera in surprise.
    “Experience, honey. You got out-of-towner written all over you.”
    Garadun couldn’t stop his smile. He found the robot to be inherently likeable and her attitude was classic. “We just got in tonight,” he supplied. “I’m Garadun by the way, and this is Cera and Symphony.”
    “Nice to meet you,” said Cera, and the kittens miaowed in chorus.
    “Likewise,” said the robot with a smile. “I’m Jessica. What can I get you?”
    Cera looked at her menu. “I need a little more time, please.”
    “Uh, before we order,” said Garadun, “what do you take as payment?”
    Jessica smiled knowingly. “Robotropolis uses credits. Now a credit is–”
    “Credits?” he interrupted, intrigued. “Is that issued as physical currency, or are they on credit chips? Or do we need to get an account for online payment? I assume the city has some form of currency exchange to deal with outsiders.”
    Jessica gaped at him, speechless. Cera laughed. She loved having an Ancient friend! The look on the robot’s face was priceless. Kittens grinned.
    The human answered the unspoken question. “I’ve been around.”
    “I’ll say,” said Jessica, eying him with interest. “Pure strain human, eh? Well, honey, if you’ve got actual coins on you, you know, gold and silver and such, then you can go to a city currency exchange and trade them in for credit cards. There’s also one place that deals in barter, if that’s all you have.”
    “Most of what we have is coin,” he supplied. “We traded away most of our goods at New Portage for cash. Easier to carry.”
    “Do you accept coins here?” Cera asked.
    “The boss prefers credit, but we’ll take coins if we have to,” Jessica told them.
    “Look, no problem,” said Garadun. “Is there an exchange place nearby? We’re gonna need credits while we’re here anyway, so I might as well get some now.”
    “There’s one about six blocks away,” the robot told him.
    Garadun slid out of the booth. “Okay, easy. Just gimme some directions and I’ll walk over right now.”
    “Are you sure about that, Gar?” Cera asked in concern.
    “Sure, no problem. Might as well get it done. You two order and I’ll be back before you know it. Jessica, where’s this exchange?”
    The robot gave him easy-to-follow directions, after which he told his friends not to worry and strolled out of the diner. The weasel girl and kittens watched their friend go back into the motorhome for a minute, then come out and cross the parking lot and disappear down the street. Both were worried despite being told not to. Robotropolis was unlike anything either of them were used to, and their friend walking around alone on the streets seemed dangerous.

                                                                          *****

Despite the presence of robots and mutants and hovercars and everything else that the Ancients had considered to be science fiction, Garadun felt more at home walking the streets of Robotropolis than anywhere else he’d been in Gamma Terra. Although he was no stranger to open country, at heart he was a man of the city. Concrete and asphalt underfoot, towering buildings around him, sidewalks filled with people, and streets filled with traffic and all the noise that went with them: this was his natural habitat.
    Truth be told, the fantastic elements of this particular urban jungle didn’t faze him, not one bit. He had lived and breathed science fiction all his life; he had read it, watched it, imagined it, written it. So to actually be in the middle of it was nothing at all; especially when one considered everything he’d seen and had happened to him since his arrival via the temporal distortion. He had long since acclimated.
    Garadun was mindful of the directions he’d been given, and was paying attention to where he was going and was alert; but otherwise there was nothing in his manner to say that he was anything more than another pedestrian. He wasn’t wearing a hat or a hoodie, so his human features were easy to see and he got a few looks because of this. Yet beyond that, no-one even noticed his presence. He blended in. Six blocks down from the diner he found the currency exchange. He held the door for a customer walking out (because he was Canadian and had manners) and stepped inside. There was a robot behind the counter, another roughly human-shaped construct along the same basic lines as Jessica the waitress.
    “Evening,” said Garadun.
    “Good evening, sir,” said the robot. “How may I help you?”
    “I need some credits, please.” Garadun took out a large pouch and carefully shook out the contents over the glass counter. “What’s the rate of exchange?”
    “New in town?”
    “That’s right,” he replied casually. “That a problem?”
    “Not at all, sir,” the robot told him and started separating the coins. “As you can see on the chart behind me, city exchange rates are determined by law. Value is based on weight, metal type and purity.”
    “I see. What does the city do with ‘em?”
    “Melts them down, for the most part,” the robot explained.
    Garadun studied the chart for a couple moments (it honestly didn’t make much sense to him) and then looked at his coins. This was a robot city. And robots would have to have a very different view on what made any particular metal valuable. He pushed all the nickel domars to one side, which were the majority.
    “So let me get this straight: the city melts these down.”
    “Yes, sir.”
    “For industrial use, right?”
    “Correct, sir.”
    “Which means, as robots, these are going to be the most valuable,” he surmised, laying his hand over the nickel coins. “Nickel gets used in everything, especially batteries. Gold is good because it doesn’t corrode, same for silver, and they both get used in electrical components, but not as much as nickel. Am I right?”
    “Somewhat,” the robot conceded. “In Robotropolis, silver has a slightly higher value than nickel because it’s used more in electronics. But not to worry: you have a lot of coins here. How much would you like to exchange?”
    “Everything but the gold,” Garadun replied and swept them back into his pouch. The rest of Gamma Terra still gave gold its traditional value, despite the fact that other metals were much more useful when put to practical purposes. The robot took the coins and examined them for weight and content. The final tally was quite high.
    “How would you like your credits?” the robot asked.
    “Uh, do you have cards with a hundred credits on each?”
    “Of course, sir. They’re our most popular.”
    “Okay, cool. I’ll take it in hundreds.”
    “Do you wish to open an account with the Robotropolis Bank?”
    “Uh, no thanks, that’s okay. Just the cash cards.”
    “As you wish. I’ll need to see your identity card.”
    A few minutes later he was back on the streets with a couple thousand credits on him. Silver and nickel were a lot more precious here than in the prairie towns because they were what went into making robots, not simply valuable because people said they were.

                                                                          *****

When Garadun returned to the diner less than an hour later, Cera and Symphony were extremely happy to see him. The kittens miaowed and purred like crazy.
    “So no problems, then?” Cera asked in relief.
    “None at all,” he assured her. He took out a credit chip, which was half the size of a pre-Disaster credit card. It was made from blue plastic with an electronic chip in one corner, much like the ones in their I.D. cards.
    “This is a credit card, or credit chip,” he explained. “Stored on this card, electronically, are 100 credits. Think of them as domars. When you pay for something, they’ll pass this bit here in front of a reader, and it’ll deduct the credits. If it runs out, don’t throw it away. You can put credits back on it.”
    Cera looked doubtful. “You’re sure about this?”
    “Trust me: this is money,” he promised. “Robotropolis doesn’t use barter, and most places are not going to accept coins. But we got a very good deal. Gold isn’t very valuable here. Silver and nickel are worth a lot more.”
    “You’re kidding,” said the weasel girl, taking the card.
    Garadun shook his head. “Think about it: this is a robot city. The value of any metal is going to be based on how it can be used to make things. Silver and nickel are vital to making electronics, which go inside robots. Gold, not so much.”
    “All right, I see how that makes sense,” Cera acknowledged.
    “So of course I didn’t sell the gold,” he said happily. “To everybody else it’s still gold, and that means serious cash.”
    “Can we switch these cards back into coins when we leave?”
    “Yeah, of course, don’t worry.”
    Cera handed the credit chip to the kittens, who examined it. Symphony still couldn’t understand how there could be money on a bit of plastic; but if Garadun said there was, then she believed him. He never ever lied to her. Besides, he was an Ancient. They knew about this sort of thing.
    Garadun noticed the lack of plates. “You didn’t order?”
    “We wanted to wait for you,” Cera told him, giving his hand a squeeze.
    “You didn’t have to. But thanks.”
    Taking a good look at the menu, Garadun decided on a classic burger and fries. Cera went for a dinosaur steak with fries, and Symphony (after being told her choices) asked for bison meatloaf. They had to explain to Jessica that they needed three orders of meatloaf, and to skip the mashed potato on the side. When their meals came, Cera helpfully broke the meatloaf up into easier-to-manage chunks, and the kittens took turns on the table eating their fill. The food was very tasty.
    “Would you like anything else?” Jessica asked when she collected the plates.
    Cera was going to say no, but Garadun spoke up. “Actually, yes, please. We’ll have three milkshakes. Chocolate for me, strawberry for Cera, and vanilla for Symphony. And for hers, could you put it in a bowl, please?”
    “Coming up.” Jessica smiled and wheeled away.
    “What’s a milkshake?” Cera asked.
    Garadun beamed at her. “Oh, you’re gonna love this. Just you wait.”
    Jessica soon returned with the milkshakes, setting them down on the table. Both Cera and Symphony could smell the milk content, and both were equally intrigued by the thick, frothy beverages. Garadun took a big sip of his, and the sound of pleasure he made was enough. His friends tried theirs and were delighted. Kittens crowded around the bowl, lapping up the vanilla milkshake eagerly. It didn’t last very long.
    Cera sighed happily. “That was the most amazing dessert I’ve ever had.”
    “Good, huh?” said Garadun, grinning, and the kittens miaowed happily. He picked up a menu. “I saw ‘em listed and knew you had to try ‘em. Y’know, I’m really amazed with this. Everything on this is very pre-Disaster, not counting the dino.”
    “Maybe the robots did research or something?” Cera suggested.
    “Possibly. Someone’s gone to a lot of trouble for us ‘biologicals’ to have authentic food from my time. At least here in this diner.”
    Jessica rolled over and collected the bowl and glasses. “Anything else?”
    “Just the bill, thanks,” Garadun told her. When she returned, she was holding a small electronic reader and she handed it to him. On the small screen was the total in credits. It was a lot less than he expected. He added a very good tip to the total, put his credit chip against the device, and pressed the green OK button.
    “Thank you very much,” said Jessica, beaming when she saw the tip.
    “Great food and better service,” he told her with smile.
    “Wish I had more customers like you.”
    “Not a lot of good tippers, huh?”
    “Honey, nobody seems to get the idea but you,” Jessica replied, rolling her eyes.
    “Well, we know where to come and eat while we’re here,” he said, and Symphony miaowed enthusiastically.
    Cera nodded happily. “The food is excellent. I love the milkshakes.”
    “Thank you, I’ll tell the cook.”
    “By the way, Jessica,” said Garadun, “would it be all right for us to park our RV here for the night? We don’t know where else to go.”
    “I don’t see why not.” Jessica looked out through the windows at the RV. “So long as you’re paying customers, you have a right to park here as much as anyone.”
    “Thank you, you’re very kind,” Cera told her.
    “Don’t worry about it, honey. You’re nice folks.”
    “We appreciate it, Jessica,” Garadun told her gratefully, and they filed out of the booth. “Have a good night.”
    The robot smiled. “You too.”
    Symphony’s many kitten selves rubbed against her wheeled limb before following Cera and Garadun through the door and across the lot to the RV. Jessica watched them fondly; the kittens were unbelievably cute.
    “Interesting group,” said the cougaroid when Jessica rolled up to the counter.
    Jessica nodded. “Nice folks. The human’s a good tipper.”
    “Oh yeah?”
    “Thirty percent of the bill, Sam.”
    Sam the cougaroid whistled. “There’s a first. Especially for outsiders.”
    “Wish we had more like him,” said Jessica. “Everybody else is cheap.”