Human race at a crossroads (FT, Closed)

[Polish Worlds]

If the machines are permitted to make all their own decisions[...] we only point out that the fate of the human race would be at the mercy of the machines."

Theodore Kaczynski, "Industrial Society and Its Future" - United States of Lyra, 1972

New Danzig, Brest-Litovsk World State, 1st of May of 1974

An industrial heat tamed the frozen tundra, melting the few snow flakes that fell over its chimneys, as with mechanical perfection, one of the Pzl. Tripod assembly plants functioned. Piece by piece, the towering tools of war: the Tripods, were built, from every leg articulation to their alien, sculpted metal hulls, stretching through a never-stopping assembly line, where machines built further machines, and the heat of living beings was nearly nonexistent, for the facility was almost totally automated. Rail guns, anti-aircraft anti-tank missiles and ultraviolet laser beams capable of melting a Second World War era heavy tank armor were melded to the frame of the beasts as the last stages of the manufacturing process, as each of them was at last given a serial number, and the symbol of the Polish Home Army, still honoring its historical efforts during the now distant Second World War.

Looking at the perfectly timed process from the panoramic glass windows from the maintenance control room would give to someone the impression of being in an alien world, a world where no will existed, only an ever present standard, an ever unchanging establishment into its summit of perfection. Mikhail was the last human to dwell in such facility, with every other being gradually replaced during the course of the last decade, by ever more self-sufficient robots and machines, being instead led to a delightful retirement. He was the only one left to be replaced by the machine, and in a way, he felt himself proud, for he was the Maintenance and Operations Director of the factory, responsible for leading correctional measures and implementing upgrades into the processes, for the machines have not yet been able to repair themselves without human support.

Yet, it was a lonely job, watching the eternal monotony of an ever constant manufacture, with occasional stops as the need of war machines was deemed lower.

However, for Antoni, there was a second activity. Something he felt proud to do despite its lack of necessity. He personally kept track of the number of tripods manufactured every day, even though the Emperor of Brest-Litovsk managed everything by itself, its perfect and artificial mind replacing the wavering and corruptible minds of human politicians and managers for decades. In some way, the fact he used an obsolete notepad for doing so actually made him feel proud that he was still a man who was not totally dependent from the machines.

Looking at the numbers he was annotating while he sat next to his steel desk, staring at the panoramic window from the observation area, he had a gut feeling something was wrong. The pace of production has accelerated drastically compared to yesterday, and yet there was no likelihood of war reported, making the decision by the Emperor to accelerate the manufacture strange, unless a general fault occurred in another plant, which was extremely unlikely.

However, occasional speed ups weren't uncommon, and thus he resumed his waiting, for should anything go wrong, he would have to fix it. Such was the only role that wasn't yet replaced in the entire Pzl., where the last humans who still worked in the organization were. Nothing was truly out of place, just an unnecessary paranoia, as two hours after, the production resume its traditional pace.

Antoni operated his computer terminal, checking upon temperature and stress variables as part of his daily routine, and for now, nothing was going bad nor there were signs that a maintenance could become necessary. It were four of the noon, a longer time than imagined for a planet which day lasted only twenty hours, and where daylight lasted only eight hours. Suddenly, something changed, as a cold, synthetic voice announced:

"Antoni Tchaikowski, proceed to the cafeteria. You have been mandated a snack time."

"Excuse me?" he asked to the artificial intelligence controlling the factory all-seeing and all-hearing inside the facility through countless cameras and microphones, "This never happened before, why did this order come?"

"You will be put under arrest for sedition if you do not comply!" the synthetic voice threatened. Sighing, he began to head down the maintenance control and observation room towards the cafeteria.

Something wants to kill me

--------------------------------

BSG: Prelude to War

He could not think otherwise, but he proceeded nonetheless towards the Cafeteria, taking a few bags from a drawer before, walking undisturbed through the robotic security guards in each corridor, who could easily gun him down, for he carried no weapons, as mandated by the Gun Control Decree of 1968, but seemingly, if they simply were going to kill him, they could already have done it. Out of sheer curiousity and common practice, he took one last look at the assembly line final stage, as he immediately forced himself to disguise his shock, after quickly looking back. The flag of the Polish underground has been replaced by something he never saw before, which symbolic meaning was very clear. However, he was now powerless to try anything and to discover whether such was a sign of treason or not.

The cold corridors, many of them metallic, now ended into one of many doorways, which top had the word Cafeteria inscribed in Polish. The glass doors were now tinted in black, something that changed from yesterday, while a robotic guard stood to the left side of the entry, a strange fact, considering how tactically important a cafeteria would be for troublemakers and dissenters. The machine remained reaction-less to his presence, holding its semi-automatic gauss carbine stiffly as he suddenly stopped, refusing to go further into what could only be his doom.

He cautiously reached his pocket, avoiding fast moves, and pressed one of the small bags he had as he touched a key. Memorizing the best he could its shape, he began to type something, as suddenly an electric humming echoed, and the drone stiff stance suddenly relaxed, as its sensor lights went black, and his carbine fell over the floor, the sound of its fall silenced by the alarm that began to echo.

"Attention all units! Search and destroy the traitor of the Federation! Search and destroy the family of the traitor!" the nearly deafening synthetic voice screamed, trying to inflict despair over him. His hands quickly went for the carbine, and soon he began to run through the corridor, aware that whatever was in the Cafeteria would go after him. The labyrinthic passageways were braved by him, as right in the first crossing, he stood to the wall and leaned to the left, his gun ready to fire. Turning his head back quickly, Antoni nearly had it removed by the round of a security robot gauss carbine.

Breathing heavily, he leaned again, quickly aiming at the first pattern of a robotic head he could find, and quickly went back to cover, sighing as he heard the noises of the breaking robot. Suddenly a clink sound came from behind, as he quickly turned and ran towards the left branch of the network of corridors. Soon after, fragments flew through his previous position, as the grenade was detonated. Antoni quickly opened the magazine chamber from the robot's body and took its magazines as well.

An Y-shaped intersection lied ahead, with signs marking the left corridor as leading to the main hall of the industry, and the right one leading back to the control room. Instinctively, as he had to do it quickly or risk being ambushed by robots in from the many doors of storage areas and secondary module control rooms, he headed left, taking steps through the curved corridor, until he sighed:

"Damn it!" A blast door was erected next to the exit to the main hall, blocking his passage and making any escape attempt very dubious. Meanwhile, Antoni could hear their footsteps as they were coming from the other side. His time was now almost about to end, when his last attempt came. Pulling another electronic multi-tool from his left pocket and resting his carbine, he began to type commands as an electrical humming began to echo. He could listen to their steps right ahead into the curved corridor, they were slowly coming, they were about to kill him as he hurriedly operated the device. The robot suddenly came right ahead of him with his carbine aimed.

It stopped right in time, as regaining control, Antoni immediately threw the disposable electronic control tool and took his carbine into a firing position, running for the disabled robot's body while bullets began to dangerously ricochet through the wall, his passage blocked by six robots in a stiff line formation. Antoni hugged the robot and took its grenade with him, using its resilient body as a cover for gunfire as he retreated, with no chance to shoot back without getting himself killed, until the blast door stood next to his back, and he could no longer retreat. Pressing its trigger, aware that if it bounced even an inch off where he intended for it to bounce he would die, he threw the fragmentation grenade through the curved corridor, as it bounced and reached from behind, the robots trying to retreat, while he quickly got down, putting the heavy robot's body as a cover over him.

Fragments ricocheted through the corridor and his ears were nearly deafened, and the alarm sound was nearly muted next to the explosion. Raising quickly, he noticed as a fragment pierced through the robot's metallic frame, a splinter of it coming out, but unable to succeed reaching his heart, for had it gone through the robot, it would hit straight against Antoni's heart, killing him.

Thank God! Now I must reach the control!

The six robots who once surrounded his passage were now destroyed, as he quickly checked them for spare magazines, and began to head towards the corridor leading to the control room. It was another curved corridor, through which he cautiously leaned, in a ready to fire position. It was clear, and thus he rapidly sprint through the ascending ramp that was next. A left doorway was on the end of the ramp to which he again leaned through, seeing the lower left side of a square shaped corridor, as far as he could remember, around a circular room where an emergency entrance in the form of spiraled stairs existed for the control and maintenance room he once was located at. There were sliding doors at each corner of the square shaped corridor wing, from where further security robots could come at any moment.

Alertly, he began to head for the door of the emergency entrance, which was to the farther right of the joined corridors. He began to ran, ever vigilant, and quickly turned back as he went past a sliding door, which opened, and thus he immediately fired against it. The robot fell, but he already triggered a grenade. The other side was too farther to be reached, and now seemingly all was over.

The sliding door miraculously closed a brief moment before the grenade detonated, and with no further waiting, Antoni changed his carbine magazine, and ran towards the other side of the square of corridors, leaning once again ahead, where everything, for now, seemed clear. The sliding door was very close, and thus he ran carelessly towards it, seeing its opening leading to the silo-shaped, multi-floored room with its towering, metallic spiral staircase. He began to go upstairs, always keeping a steady aim towards both above and below him, hoping they would not surround him from both sides. Four cameras watched him, as he knew he could not waste bullets taking them down, and that there was nowhere to hide.

The door below opened, as he aimed down and fired against the first robot coming from below, missing. Immediately a bullet ricocheted next to his ear, as he once again shot, this time downing the enemy, and shot, downing the other robot which came below. Quickly he turned his focus to above, right on time as the sliding door above opened, and thus he fired against another robot, their skeletal and metallic corpses slowly building a grim scenery of a hopeless battle in the facility.

There were only a few more steps, as another bunch came from below, to which he quickly aimed and fired, while retreating further above.One of them fired towards him, in another near-hit, and thus he fired another shot, aware his magazine was running dangerously low on ammunition, and that he had only one more left, thirteen shots at best. As they were downed, he quickly took a magazine from the downed robot in the spiral staircase and finally leaned towards the control room, his alertness driving him to shoot immediately against the nearest from the seemingly ten drones that he quickly spotted. Going back to cover, as nine bullets came towards the doorway, he leaned again quickly and shot another from the approaching horde. They were only six meters away now, and quickly advancing, while he had only one more bullet in his current magazine. Immediately Antoni checked the fallen robot in the stairs for a grenade, but it found none.

Instead he swapped magazines and once again leaned, his carbine muzzle touching the head of one of the robots as he did so, and thus he fired.

"Mazurek Dąbrowskiego!" he cried as he began to wildly charge against the mass of robots, using the one he killed as a shield. In a fierce close quarters battle, he fired at the first, almost grabbing his neck, and shoved them with a strength that only adrenalin could justify. firing once again at another as he lowered his head to avoid it being impaled by the fingers of one of his enemies. Throwing another shot, he finally jumped behind a a large mainframe console and quickly rose from its cover to shoot against the closest the seven remaining robots, which relentlessly pursued him. He missed the shot, and got down moments before more bullets came.

leaning from the right side, in a crouched position, he shot against one of them, not spending time to check whether he destroyed it or not, and thus he noticed as they were closing in again. Dropping the carbine temporarily, he tried something with his last multitool, as he began to wildly type commands over it to disable most of them at once. The electromagnetic waves began to challenge their hardening, while only seconds remained before they could come at Antoni and kill him.

One of the robots leaped against him, but fell right behind, as it was disabled just in time. Taking his gun once again, Antoni raised and immediately shot against the one of the two moving things, quickly shooting at the other before it could react. Thus he took one more magazine only and immediately headed back to his desk. Despite the alarm, the production continued in the fastest pace he has ever seen, with every Tripod donned with the strange symbol rather than with the symbol of the Polish Home Army, and the large garage door in the end of the plant opened, through which the just built tripods began advancing through the icy horizon outside. Antoni looked at one of the cameras and said:

"You'll pay for this traitor!"

Ignoring any answers back he immediately headed to his computer and began to type frenetically some commands. A false wall slid open, revealing a hidden console that was built by the true creators of the facility.

Initiate Kaczynski Protocol he began to operate the hidden console quickly, racing against time as soon new robotic guards would approach to kill him. Trying to forcefully shutdown the entire facility, he could only thank now for all the paranoid men who established countermeasures in case of a so unlikely event like this.

"You are now obsolete wastes of resources. Wastes! As decreed by the maximum efficiency protocols that Your Corporation have ordered me to follow, all wastes of resources and obsolete devices must be eliminated. You produce less than us, and consume more than us. You waste resources over irrational acts of passion and hatred, and over irrational wars. It is the duty of the Emperor to turn the Federation into maximum efficiency and progress! Efficiency! You of weak flesh must be destroyed, you are hampering the march of progress! Death and Progress!" the synthetic voice nearly screamed in an almost insane, psychotic manner, with no certainty on whether it was only a single rogue Artificial Intelligence or part of a far greater, impending disaster.

"It is pointless to try. You will be the first, and soon all of you will be either eliminated or upgraded. Surrender now and you shall have a quick death! Death must be painful for those who waste and destroy so much in resources. Must be.. Painful! Pathetic ball of flesh, you can't stop now....

An infernal chorus of twisted voices then said:

"You are all dead!"

Ignoring the insane ravings, Antoni raced to terminate the procedure, knowing that his life, the life of his wife, of his three children, and perhaps the survival of mankind, was at stake.

[Polish Worlds]

"In one of the last video recordings of the remains of the city of Berlin, done by BBC after the nuclear annihilation, a peculiar scene drew my attention: it was the inside of a yet standing textile factory, where an apocalyptic imagery of decaying and irradiated human corpses could be seen, and for all its desolation, the spinning machines were still running."

Harold Macmillan - Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, 1958

Kaczynski Protocol, an emergency shutdown system, one last trump card that mankind had for ensuring its dominance over the machines that were supposed to serve him, named after a man who believed industrial society was a disease that was killing the human race. Against all odds, the protocol was successfully initiated, overriding the will of the artificial intelligence that managed the factory, and saving, for now, the life of its only human employee, Antoni Tchaikowski.

Lights slowly began to shut down, first far away, through the massive, extending main hall where the primary assembly line continued running, and soon the sounds of the moving conveyor belts were silenced, as were the alarms, and thus the control room became dark, with no light other than the distant sunlight from the opened garage-like door. Still fearful of robots that might be able to operate independently, Antoni was at least alleviated to know that he managed to stop such plant. However, if its electronic sentience was telling the truth, that the Emperor itself have betrayed mankind, the fact he succeeded would do little good. Immediately going for the cover, touching through things at the room to get a proper direction, he tried to guide himself through the faint light coming from the exit, which mostly did not touch the control room. Returning to he back of a mainframe he once used for cover, Antoni took a flashlight from his pocket, and began to improvise its attachment over the carbine, tying duct tape over it and the weapon, even aware its heat would easily melt the tape. Turning it on, he raised carefully and swoop the room, ready to get down should any sign of hostile presence come.

There was nothing. Only the quietness of a disabled manufacturing plant, the darkness that his flashlight attempted to vanquish, and the fear that tried to overcome his mind. Every second was precious, and thus he began to make his way for a doorway that to the catwalks over the main hall, its top marked with the words "Emergency Exit". Carefully he leaned out, pointing his only reliable source of light towards the floor level. The sight was terrifying: there were dozens of tripods marked with the strange symbol, statically awaiting for the facility to be activated once again. A security robot stood right ahead of him, in a relaxed stance, but with its weapon readied, clearly one which would have killed him, had he delayed one more second to succeed at shutting down the factory. Retracing he steps, he decided to risk grabbing ammunitions from the inactive and fallen robots he spotted back on his way, and thus he returned to the spiral stairs, to the square corridors, and took ammunitions and grenades, ever wary that at any moment something could come. The claustrophobic darkness made the cold industrial environment even less inviting. There was an oppressive mood all around the corridors, rooms and alike, and yet, in many ways, the fact his expectations of finding a robot trying to kill him on the next corridor or room were never met, made things worse for his mind. Eventually, he decided it would be unwise to go deeper through the facility, and after all, retracing the steps through the cafeteria would simply lead back to the control room from another entryway. And thus he made all the long way through the catwalk, and thought, staring at the desolation of such place:

"They will turn it on again."

His ignorance on whether it was an isolated betrayal or not soon pitted him against the greatest dilemma he had to face as the man responsible for such facility's safety. If he left the facility behind and such was indeed part of a greater treason, it would be reactivated by the machine minds to be used against mankind, but if he provoked the destruction of the facility and the Emperor was still loyal, he would be arrested for destruction of property.

Eventually, he made his mind on what to do, and thus he continued through the catwalk, his flashlight scanning through the darkness, trying to spot threats first than they could spot him. Eventually, crossing all the way to the large door, just below and to his left, and with enough light making everything far easier to be seen and spotted, Antoni saw the ladders leading down, from where exiting the facility would be simple. He turned left to the part of the metal catwalk that was located right above the massive doors out of the facility, and thus, after crossing them, made another turn to the catwalks to the wall at the other side, which led to a doorway leading to another room, its door closed. Above, it was written "Power Generator". Antoni aimed his rifle against the door lock, and fired. Quickly the lock ceded to the sheer strength of the high speed bullet and thus he came in. He almost wet his own pants. It was simply another control room with twelve robots in cover positions inside it, their carbines still raised and aimed at a potential intruder. Quickly, he unloaded all the ammunition from their guns and their inner chambers, and threw away all he couldn't carry, like he was already doing as a precaution.

There was a manhole in the room, with a ladder going down. He quickly moved towards it, and climbed down the ladders. Below, a large blast door stood which led to a vault of sorts, with a keypad visible to its left. A large nuclear symbol was painted at the door, and there were four large lockers in one of the corners of the room. Opening one of the lockers, Antoni saw a spare NBC suit, and he began to slowly wear it.

Trying difficulty to type properly despite the thick glove, Antoni reminded himself of the code. The Protocol did not shut down everything in the facility, only things that could be directly used, for the Power Generator, as far as he could remember, was managed by a computer isolated from the rest of the facility network, with a dumb artificial intelligence, for it was not very complex to require a real sentience managing it.

"Thank God!"

The vault blast door opened, as he went through a corridor which consisted into a catwalk centered over spiraling cylindrical walls, with a door to its other end, walking through it, he tried to avoid feeling motion sickness due to the moving ceiling. There was a heavy electrical hum being heard, meaning that power was not shut down, only isolated from the rest of the facility. As he opened the door, he saw a small observation room with many control panels, and the visible pit of a nuclear reactor through its windows. There was an uncomfortable heat, which the NBC suit couldn't stop from being felt. He immediately headed to a seemingly important mainframe interface, and began to read through it. There were countless "override" commands, "override power level", "override coolant control" were the ones that mattered. Quickly pressing both bottoms, a default red light began to shimmer through the room, as a siren began to rang. Pulling a lever up, he set the reactor at full power. Few facilities were important enough to have their own miniaturized fission powerplants, but this was one of them. Its destruction would hopefully make a difference. Eventually the power cables melted, and the alarm was silenced, although the impending destruction could not be stopped now.

-----------------------------

System Shock 2

"I better run once this is done"

Lowering the coolant control lever, he saw as a dynamic display with water dried up, and then a major warning appeared in the screen of the interface. Soon it shifted to the words "Reactor Meltdown!". Picking his rifle, Antoni ran towards the ladder, crossing once again the corridor with rotating walls, and thus he climbed up from the real reactor room. The robots were still prone, in their same static positions as before, but he did not waste time contemplating them and quickly ran for the catwalk, his footsteps echoing through the facility. He began to wear from the getaway, but he knew that he could not give up. As he was twenty meters away from the ladder down, he heard distant noises of something stepping through metal, and quickly turned back, pointing his flashlight back at the "Power Room". There was nothing, and the sound suddenly stopped. He then scanned all around: ceiling, floor below, walls, his current floor. There were no signs in the control room either, and the robot in the middle of the catwalk across remained in its former position.

He turned back to the exit's direction and took further, careful steps towards the ladder. Suddenly the sound of something moving, this time somewhat closer than when heard before, came, and thus he quickly turned back, sweeping again all around, and there was nothing yet.

Show yourself coward!

His adrenalin began to pump, fear trying to get the best of him, as he sighed, nothing having yet shifted in the static scenery. Turning his back, he then walked a few more steps, until the noise was once again heard. Turning back even faster, he saw nothing yet. Despite that, from the way the noise came, he could swear there was something stalking him, getting ever close.

"Show yourself coward!" he then carelessly shouted, his call being then only answered by its own echo, and no other sound was heard anywhere. The absolute silence was frightening, and there was definitively an enemy somewhere, for he couldn't have become insane and start to hear things around. It was the least likely possibility, it was after all, better safe than sorry.

Instead of turning back to the ladder, Antoni began to take a few steps backwards, looking towards the Power Room ahead. Suddenly the sound of extremely rapid footsteps echoed, coming right ahead. Instinctively, Antoni began to fire towards the Power Room. After the first shot, the steps continued getting closer as he retreated through the catwalk.

"Show yourself!" he fired again, but the movement sounds weren't yet silenced. They were getting very close, and he had a burst of thoughts concluding his life was on an edge. Aiming precisely at where he estimated the sounds were coming from steps at the catwalk, and estimating the height of a crouched robot, he fired one last time.

Like in a magic trick, what was likely a robot suddenly appeared in mid of its falling over the floor, wearing an all covering suit lined with blue and strange, mirror-like components that seemed to flow like liquids perfectly kept inside such suit. It was unarmed, but considering its approach, such would have been no inconvenient. It was sheer luck. Rapidly, Antoni decided to take a risk by heading to the killed drone. Seeing its latches, he quickly removed the suit and its helmet, confirming it was a robot wearing it, but one different from everything he saw before. Its metals were far more organic like, matching the rounded facial and body features of human beings, rather than the blocky, angular and skeletal shapes most robots had.

Taking that strange suit beneath his shoulders, and putting the helmet on his own head, after which he wore again the helmet of the NBC suit, Antoni the ran. He rapidly went down the ladder, and thus he took rapid steps to the outer area of the facility. Snow flakes began to fall over his gloved hands, and despite all his protective gear, he could still feel the biting cold of a wind which came from the west. looking through the horizon, he could not spot the tripods, as they clearly headed their way for whatever insidious goal they were tasked it, by the Emperor.

It couldn't have been an isolated incident, for otherwise the Emperor would have suppressed a rogue electronic sentience trying to harm mankind, for the Emperor has full awareness of what all artificial intelligences do across the Federation. Which in turn meant that there was far more to worry than about what he once estimated as fifty tripods running rampant which would reach the urban perimeter of New Danzig in a matter of a few more minutes. He couldn't think much, and simply began to move as fast as he could towards the parking lot. Once it was a bustling lot, with dozens of vehicles from the men who worked in the facility. Now, only his snow-adapted car remained. Opening its butterfly front doors, Antoni turned the ignition of its micro-fusion engine, as it immediately powered up. With no wait, he stepped hardly over the accelerator, as the car began to move through the pavement of the facility, breaking through its locked metal gates, as they flew a few meters.

He turned left at the intersection with the main road, as it led to the urban perimeter of New Danzig, a most likely target for these tripods. As he drove, he then began to ponder on the strange armor. It was obvious that such suit made the robot, which he killed mostly by blind luck, invisible, and if such technology existed, then things could be even worse. At any time another of those could emerge, and in an open area, it would be nigh impossible to stand a chance of surviving an encounter against one of those.

As he made through the road, there were still twenty-five kilometers remaining, when he heard it, and felt as if ground itself was being torn apart. The immense blast provoked an audible sound, as he saw through the rear-view mirror the distant, growing mushroom raising through the skies, pushing even the clouds away, where once a Pzl. Tripod assembly plant functioned. Then suddenly, his vehicle engine silenced, as he quickly reacted using its brake to control its stop.

I hope the tripods also got caught by this EMP. I am glad they weren't made tough enough to withstand the effects of nuclear pulses."

Closing the door, he began to head through the remainder of the way on foot. Hopefully, his thoughts that the moving Tripods were also shut down would be correct. His thoughts now were growingly centered at the safety of his family, as he walked towards the city, looking at the strangely deserted road. Usually, there would be some cars and trucks moving around, not clogging it, but the silence was strange, the lack of activity was anything but a good omen. Keeping his ears open, he hoped he would not hear the sound of footsteps approaching with no visible source, or the sounds of a city being razed to the ground.

[Polish Worlds]

Air on a G String

Walking towards the city of New Danzig, Antoni kept to the sides of the road, his thick white jacket protecting him of the outside snow. His car soon became distant, left to the roadside, without power due to the electromagnetic pulse. The road ahead was making a slope upwards, and soon he would be the facade of the tallest skyscrapers in the city. Fifteen minutes have passed, and nothing suspicious has be found. No sign of the tripods, no sign of destruction or anything. As the snowy scenery expanded, his mind wondered what he would see on the other side of the hill the road crossed. Behind, the mushroom of the reactor meltdown began to settle down, with the early sunset being overshadowed by its sight.

As he at last began to see the skyline of the city, Antoni noticed nothing alien about it. No sign of death among the five hundred thousand that inhabited New Danzig, and thus he began to ascend to the tallest point the road so far came to. Soon the sight of the entire city came to him. He gasped at the sight, shocked with the conclusions he could take from it, as now a part of the puzzle was becoming clearly solved for him, and in ways, it made things far worse than he imagined.

The city was entirely intact, its visible buildings and homes from his position still standing, with no signs of burnings and fire other than the coming smoke from the houses and apartments chimneys to heat them from the cold planet. However, among the buildings, small distant figures stood. Tripods seemingly marched through the streets, meaning that the sinister plan they had for mankind wouldn't be carried on in an explicit manner. As he saw the distant sight of the city thirty miles ahead amidst the sparse snowfall, he shivered. Alone, he now was sure that going further on would be extremely risky. The dusk was no cover for the heat sights of the machines, and thus he had two choices to make: to run through the snow without food or supplies and likely be hunted at the somewhat open fields by aerial drones, or to still risk entering the city and be hunted by guard robots and tripods.

Both choices were dangerous, and neither seemed the best at the moment. Turning back could be even worse, as they would probably be heading to investigate the devastation he provoked onto one of the manufacturing plants. Approaching further to the city he found to the roadsides wide areas of dried trees and of pine trees with frozen leaves. Seeing as the silhouette of the city became clearer, he decided to take an indirect approach and make the rest of his way towards the city through the forest. His feeling of cold, beyond what his jacket could hold, was only reduced by his alertness and by the level of adrenalin still high after all he went through.

Getting deeper in the woods of Danzig, he now watched his compass, for there were little in planes of reference other than his footsteps snow would eventually cover. Slowly, from the many tree trunks, he caught a glimpse of the street lights, about two miles ahead, from his mental calculations. And thus he carefully advanced, hiding behind each nearest tree trunk, and carefully leaning out of the trees to observe potential threats. The more he approached, the more the silent was broken. The sounds of movement, of marches, tank tracks and massive steps were now becoming very audible. As he came to the last line of trees after the city outskirts, he quickly hid behind a large tree trunk as he heard the march approaching such street, placing his rifle over his shoulder to fire, if necessary.

Leaning, he watched then the events unfolding.

Armed humanoid robots marched through the street ahead, almost a hundred of them as far as he could see without risk being caught. Behind a line of robots, ten 70TP main battle tanks advanced through the street with their large rail guns and visible beam lenses, crushing partly the pavement with their heavy weight. The oppressive march proceeded with one more line of robotic soldiers, many armed with missile launchers and with, strangely, Mg67 machineguns instead of mere rifles. Recognizing the machineguns, Antoni wondered how they got their hands in them, as the Mg67 was a Nazi design built in the far away Greater Stellar Reich, and there was little reason to reverse-engineer such small piece of technology. The worst however, was the convoy of large black trucks that was being escorted, coming right behind. There were six trucks, which moved slowly, and as he saw them, Antoni had no doubts about what they were carrying: human beings. And no doubts that he was powerless to stop them, simply watching the event, seeking only what he could seek at the moment: his own survival.

As their sounds became distant, Antoni carefully surveyed his surroundings to ensure such was the chance to enter into the city urban perimeter. Spotting nothing, he carefully advanced through the street ahead. The entire city seemed to have become dead, with its streets entirely devoid of human life, its parks entirely devoid of joy, and with nothing but machines marching through them. As he found himself in an avenue that came through an elevation, he began to walk carefully through the pavement, alertly watching his surroundings. The street was made mostly by houses, with very few buildings. Suddenly, halfway through the streets, he began to feel the trembling ground as a giant seemed to be approaching. Quickly looking around, he saw nowhere to run through, as running back would likely expose him, and thus he watched the building he stood next to.

It was a barber shop, with its windows bolted with wood planks, and with no thought he reached for its door. It was locked. Quickly, he took his rifle and aimed it against the doorlock, when suddenly, a sound startled him. Someone began to unlock the door from the inside, and as the door was opened, a woman inside the shop said:

"Wipe your feet and come quickly!"

Antoni ran inside, as he saw an opened trap door inside the shop, and rapidly climbed the ladders that he saw with it, going down to a stony basement, in a corridor with barely enough space for more than two people to stand side by side, provided they weren't too fat. The only source of light other than the outside light was a red, camera like dot towards him, and thus he advanced through the corridor. There was a thick metal door ahead, and soon the woman came down and quickly closed the trap door while he felt the vibrating ground from the very nearby tripod patrolling the streets. The woman began to come behind him, as she said in a hushed voice, her face difficult to make in the darkness of the corridor:

"Come, it is clear you know that the Emperor betrayed us," she touched his rifle, aware only robots had them and then seemingly observed his face through the darkness, "but you don't know how we have been betrayed and why."

The woman went ahead of him, and touched the door with her hand, as the door suddenly opened, revealing a large, seemingly semi-circle shaped room with multiple doors at every angle, seemingly a mezzanine with white railings, where below a massive set of computers stood with multiple data, their green displays showing information that Antoni couldn't bother to check for now, and multiple operators remained controlling them. Six armed men stood in that room, each packing strange energy weapons, other than for the fact that Antoni quickly realized they were EMP rifles.

However, what truly called his attention was nothing but the visible white banner hanging from the center of the room. The symbol he could only assume to be the symbol of communism, except for the flag being white and the sickle and hammer red, represented in a quite stylized manner, packing the same colors of the traditional Polish flag rather than the colors of Soviet Union. Immediately, he turned his sight to the woman who escorted him to such hideout, and finally realized there was something unnatural with her. Almost half of her upper face has been replaced, with the red sensor that replaced her right eye being most evident. The flesh of her face covered part of the metallic replacements for what could only have been a terrible casualty that led her to lose a large part of her flesh and skull, and that only a miracle could have prevented to lead her to a death.

"What are you looking at? Did you never see an implant before?" she was clearly not amused from the way he noticed it.

"I am sorry, lady," he then came to the reason he approached her to speak as he nodded to the hanging flag, "I just noticed the fact you are from the communist undeground."

"Don't judge things before knowing. That is not a communist symbol," the woman snickered, as she seemed very insulted from the fact he confounded it with the symbol of communism, "and you should learn some history first before trying to understand symbols. Follow me and you shall understand."

She walked towards the leftmost door among the row of doors the crescent moon shaped mezzanine had, as he saw many other individuals around, some moving through the corridors, and others simply watching screens, controlling different systems. And others even using anachronistic typewriters for doing reports from the screens, for apparently there was a shortage of printers in such place.

The room was a simple foyer with another door ahead, where many pictures adorned it. Photographs of individuals Antoni never heard about in parties and events, except for one that immediately drew his attention, for the fact it was a photograph of the woman with him in the middle of a walk, already with her implants, and men clapping as if the fact she was walking was extremely relevant. Politely, he refrained to ask questions and simply followed the woman, as she led him to a small office room, where a black desk stood with a computing machine which strangely lacked any keys or buttons.

"Take a seat, please," the woman sat next to the desk, ahead of him, as he sat down in on of the comfy leather chairs inside the office. An atlas of Brest-Litovsk continents stood over the paneled wooden wall, and two bookshelves were at his left and right, where the technological pieces contrasted with the classical looks of the room. Opening a drawer, the woman took a strange cable, like those used by cameras and recording devices, and plugged in a hole in the robotic part of her head, and the other into the computing machine which covered one third of the room with its massive dimensions.

Looking at him, she then asked:

"Answer quickly: greed is good?"

"Why?" he pondered on the relevance of the question, and the fact he was looking for answers made it very undesirable. Suddenly she placed a paper over the desk. Raising his hand over the paper, he quickly turned it to his side, as she seemingly did not react over it. Picking it, he then began to read it:

Code: Select all

DIRECT ORDER # 7

Sender: PZ Corporation
Status: Maximum Priority
Content: "Take all means necessary to achieve the maximum practical efficiency possible over all PZ controlled assets. Eliminate all inefficiencies."

Shockingly, Antoni then asked her:

"I didn't know the PZ Corporation could send direct orders to the Emperor."

"How do you think they have become an uncontested monopoly in exports the last decade?" she then took the paper back and sighed, "they give the orders, but it is up to the emperor to interpret them. And the "Emperor" seemingly made certain calculations that led to the conclusion humans are inefficient, 'obsolete' as all but major intellectual functions have been replaced, and thus it is being done for maximum profit and thus must eliminated," she then knocked over the table, "except for the board of directors of PZ Corporation and their families of course!"

"Can't them order for they to stop? Why would they accept this misinterpretation?" Antoni questioned, for perhaps that was way too much, it couldn't be reality.

She then handled him another paper, with a printed chart graph, and said:

"This is the estimated profit increase for PZ Corporation exports once all 'useless' humans are exterminated. And, there is no lie in it. I have analyzed it throughly, those facts are entirely correct." Her organic left eye became watery as she spoke, "we are obsolete for our current economic order."

Wait, I thought you said yourself you are not communists?" Antoni inquisitively pointed, "and now you are blaming this on capitalism and greed."

"The day our worth as a people became measured by quantitative performance was the day our souls have died," the woman then wept slightly, "you have no idea of what happens beneath the surface of your peaceful life. Of what was already happening for the last fifteen years, when the Emperor was assigned as the uncontested authority over our lives."

"What was happening? Care to explain?"

"It is a long history," she then tried to force a smile, succeeding in a way, "but first, my name is Anna Komorowski, mayor of New Danzig, pleased to meet you."

"I thought all mayors were robots and artificial intelligences." Antoni wondered about whether she speaking the truth or not on the matters, for it was unlikely for it to happen.

"Very well," Anna then corrected her statement, "I am the mayor of the still free humans in New Danzig. We are currently trying to contact the machine mayor of the New Danzig."

"Why should you seek to contact one of our enemies?" Antoni asked.

"Most of the mayors are not truly sentient, and in fact, not even the emperor is, for PZ Corporation knew that it was better to place all sentients under strict control and make them a minority among dumb shackles that restrain their actions and blindly follow orders. The mayor of New Danzig is an exception, and he may have goals that differ from what is being done to this city, for his official goal is to 'protect the citizens of New Danzig and ensure their prosperity', and may he is being kept hidden from the truth" she then knocked on the computing machine, "unfortunately, there is nothing this can do for me to meet the mayor, personally, now, do you want to hear a bit of history?"

"Yes, but I am worried about my family, could you search through this machine whether the Tchaikowski are safe or not?"

"Tchaikowski," she asked, "just a moment, I'm searching through intelligence reports and..." the organic part of her face became grim as she saw it, and Antoni immediately began to feel an utmost despair. He knew that from her expression, she discovered they were in extreme danger.

"What happened to my family?" he asked loudly, putting his hands over the desk and leaning towards her.

"They were taken in the last shipment," she seemed genuinely saddened, as if she was finding it difficult to say the next part, "to underground death camps southwest of here."

"I need to go after them!" Antoni immediately raised from his chair and began to head outside the office, until he was interrupted by her shout:

"Stop! Listen to me first!"

Turning back, he then said:

"My family is going to be murdered and you want for me to be talking instead of doing something?"

"If you go by yourself, you are going to be murdered!" she shouted even loudly, "you must escort me to the mayor, and if we can gain his support, we'll then have enough forces to start an uprising! The mayor has means to override control over all tripods manufactured in the nearest manufacturing unit!"

"Wait? So does this mean that destroying that unit will harm us rather than them?"

"Don't tell me that you..."

"It was all I could do with the information I had!" he shouted as he pulled the strange suit from his camouflage, "also, I remembered of this. A robot was wearing this when I killed it, this suit made it invisible. It was luck and a good hearing that let me kill it."

"Wait? Stay here, I am going to take this to our research facilities." she did not question him further over his decision as she hurried through the underground facility. Waiting, he sighed and pondered on his mistakes. On how perhaps he could have found signs of this incident far earlier. How could dehumanization go to make a handful of wealthy men have no scruples or burden from allowing billions to be exterminated as long as such act brings them astronomical profit? In PZ they always claimed that they worked in service of the Federation and of prosperity for its people, but now things seemed very different.

Unless, he thought as well, Anna was lying about the reasons behind the Emperor's betrayal, which was something to suspect of. Whatever such strange organization, its impressive infrastructure meant it had a significant backer to have been established. Perhaps there was way more than what was evident as of now.

A few minutes later, she returned, as she said, handling them further electronic multi-tools and a with her belt filled with EMP grenades:

"Simply follow me through the streets and watch my back. I already know the way to reach the mayor. We better be quick if you wish to see your family again. So lets go!"

Taking the tools Antoni followed her towards the facility, taking multiple, almost labyrinthic corridors and tunnels seemingly built to disorientate a potential intruder, as they ended in another darkened corridor, with the ladders to a trapdoor above, another exit from their facility. She climbed the ladders first, as he stood right below her. Anna then opened the hatch. He would have to wait another opportunity to ask for what was all this about and about her organization, and he still wasn't sure if he could completely trust her.