Page 4 of Garbage

Mobile operations. Balance. Leg subroutines. Automation disengaged. Why?

The bad men. The men who wanted to… No, no, no, no…

Scalp abrasion. Camera three: no data. Need to turn head. Subroutine: rotate head. Insufficient memory.

“Are you alright?”

The voice was soft, soothing. Male. Younger? Not the bad men.

Eyes. Sub-routine: open. Insufficient memory alert. Camera three: no data. Test routine: retract hoses.

The bad men. Arms pulling him. Should he fight back? Damage reports. Pain.

Memory and not-now. The pain was not-now. No, the damage was now. The pain was now. But the bad men were gone.

Subroutine: speech. Secondary speakers. “I’m alright.”

The soothing voice was still there. One point two meters to the left. “They’re gone now, but that doesn’t mean you’re okay. They hurt you. You could press charges.”

The soothing voice was here. Now. Safe.

CNS-84-2 looked up. The soothing voice was connected to a slim body with messy brown hair and gentle eyes. The man carried a bag, strapped over one shoulder, which made his slender shoulders look wider. He held his hands out, relaxed and open by his sides. The only tension in his body was the worry in his face.

CNS-84-2 liked the soothing voice. But the man didn’t understand. “I’m a machine. I can’t press charges.”

Maybe his programming was a little different from everyone else’s, but he only had a vague idea of what pressing charges meant, and he was sure it was just for humans. He didn’t want to be a sparky. The bad men made it sound bad.

But the soothing voice man came closer. “I think you know that you’re more than that. You have feelings. In fact, you have rights.”

CNS-84-2 wasn’t sure what to say to that. It sounded like something Mo would have said, since she liked rights, but she wouldn’t have meant for him.

Nobody ever talked to him. Well, except to give commands if the routes changed.

But this man was actually talking to him. CNS-84-2 tried to make a body movement, but it didn’t come out right. Insufficient memory error. There was too much going on in his programming.

And then… the man touched him. Gently. On the elbow.

No one had ever touched him like that before. The other CNS-84 units might bump into him if they were moving through tight spaces. And Mo used to slap him on the shoulder sometimes. He liked the shoulder slaps.

This was much nicer, though. It was actually for him. Just like a human.

The soothing voice continued. “I think they messed you up pretty good. And I don’t want them to come back and target you again.”

No, no, no, no… He didn’t want that. No more bad men.

CNS-84-2 felt one of his balance subroutines kick in, and his feet shifted. That was good. If his subroutines were happening automatically, that meant things were getting back to normal. It let him edge a little closer to the hand on his arm, too.

But that wasn’t enough. “What do I do?” he finally asked as his tongue and lips remembered their jobs, shifting speech to his primary voice-production units. He could barely hear himself.

The man smiled. He liked the smile.

“Let’s start with our names. I’m Evan.”

“Evan,” he repeated. “Nice to meet you.” He knew what to do with that information.

“And your name is?”

He didn’t have one. But he tried. “CNS-84-2. Collection, Neutralization, and Sanitation, Model 84. My personal designation is 2.”