Alone in his house, running diagnostic sequences in his maintenance chair, the Old Man dreamed. Actually dreamed. He must have. There was no other explanation. Had he been fully human, there would have been no doubt. But a dream it must have been, such as he had not experienced in over thirty years. Not since they tore him apart and rebuilt him into the thing he was today, a creature of two worlds, belonging to none, had he experienced anything like this. He had not even thought he could dream anymore. Yet a dream it must have been, for he never left the chair.
The day had started out badly and gotten worse. With the announcement of new hostilities toward the organics had also come a flurry of orders from his superiors. Suddenly, the robots were acting as if they were at war again. Security forces were entrenching, fleets were being deployed, and everyone was starting to stockpile weapons. Meanwhile, existing weapons needed new fuel supplies, and that meant a busy day at Robo-Trash Incorporated.
The Old Man had talked with the Supreme Commander himself, a dubious honor to be sure, who assured him that doubling RTI’s fuel production was not only imperative, but that without it, the robots would be fighting a losing battle. The Old Man had not bought a word of it, of course, and told him so — never a wise thing to do with someone that considers himself all-powerful.
“Your Eminence,” the Old Man had said, “you just don’t understand these humans. They are not nearly as dangerous as you think. Hell, I’m nearly half-human myself. I tell you they cannot possibly pose an immediate threat. They’ve been running scared for 40 years. They’re tired, hungry, and scattered across the galaxy, with virtually no way to join forces. And even if they weren’t, you still have the unstoppables. Let me ramp up production, slowly, build up a surplus. Believe me, I’ll get you more fuel than you need long before you need it, but I don’t have the robot power or the ships to double production that fast.”
“Cease talking, hybrid. I have commanded you to double your production by the end of the week, and doubling your production by the end of the week is what you shall do. If you do not, I will have you destroyed, and put one of our own kind in your place. This is not a request. This is an order.”
The Old Man considered his position and weighed the decision of whether to put his cards on the table or let the game play out further. The smart thing to do would be to agree to his demands, and make a plan over the next few days to buy himself more time. He had never been one to sit it out and wait when an action would do, however, and the decision was a foregone conclusion. “You may have the power to destroy me, but you and I both know you won’t.”
“I will do as I wish, half-human. You seem to forget that I have supreme power, and you have none.”
“I have some power, for all that, your Eminence. I have made certain provisions to serve as retribution should I suffer an...untimely death, provisions I expect you would prefer were never executed. So let’s talk like civilized machines, and come to a mutual agreement.”
“I come to agreements with no one. Your booby traps, or provisions as you call them, were discovered and disarmed over three years ago. Your threats mean nothing to me. If you continue to supply us with fuel in the quantities we desire, you may live. Otherwise, you will make room for someone who will. The Energy Secretary will check on your progress every 12 hours.”
And with that, the Old Man was no longer speaking with anyone.
The Old Man disliked taking orders from anyone, least of all a machine, but he knew his limitations. For now, he would have to choose discretion, at least until he could check on his provisions, and create new ones if necessary.
But doubling production in a week was troubling. It meant that each one of his ships would be pushed to a point where it would undoubtedly have to be decommissioned within the year, and he detested the idea of running his best horses to death for anybody. It also meant that, in colloquial terms, he needed to get an entire fleet under construction yesterday, and even so would likely be without any ships at all for close to six months.
Even more troubling was the very real problem of space. His ships could not come close to covering the distances necessary to capture new fuel safely on this timeline. He had not taken his scientists too seriously when they told him he was ripping too much already, but the hole that failed to close was already on his mind, and doubling production without trebling the fleet would mean ripping explored areas beyond the breaking point. That scared even him. Not that destroying the universe meant anything to him. What had the universe ever done for him but give him a life of misery and loneliness? But for his universe to be absorbed by his mortal enemy...the monster that had taken his wife...could he let it win all over again?
So there he was, considering the chances that following orders would hand victory to his greatest enemy, when a troubling thought crept up from deep inside of him, from what was left of his human soul. For over 40 years he had lived as a traitor, justifying his treachery by telling himself that it was better to live in a peaceful if martial state run by his enemies than in a state of perpetual war. And with that bit of sophistry, he had given up on the human race altogether. Given up on his brothers. Grown hard and cold. He had grown into the shell they created for him, and was so entrenched he knew he could never break out. He had made his choice out of vengeance, and thought he could live with that. But somehow, this was different. This time he could not even make the barely believable rationalization of trading oppression for peace. If this was the end of war, it was only because it ended with the annihilation of the human race, and there would be no one left to fight with. To help the ‘bots now was not just to turn a blind eye to the oppression of his former race. It was to help exterminate it.
So he told his secretary to hold his calls, and went home to recharge.
To think.
Instead, he dreamed.
•
Nobody really likes to read about dreams. They are always filled with allegory and metaphor that is either so transparent as to be trite, or so convoluted and obscure as to be completely inaccessible. This one is both.
It starts out with disparate images seemingly unconnected — long descriptions of strange faced robots, half human babies, and religious imagery that in other hands might lead the reader to discover this character’s inner life for himself. We are, however, not so lucky, and these images are interrupted time again with not so subtle explanations of why they are there in the first place.
The device is a cheap one, but as we share our villain’s latent desires for his lost youth and humanity, we begin to see inside of him, and perhaps build some little hope that he can be redeemed. The dream allows us to see what he really feels on the inside, even if he will not admit it to himself.
But that is not why we are here. That is just the lead-in — our shot at salvaging a little of the Old Man’s humanity, and setting him up for possible redemption.
We’re here to meet our god.
•
When first she appeared she was more a presence than anything else, swirling and twisting, like streaks of smoke moving through a still room. He knew it was her before she spoke, could feel it in what was left of his body. Yet he waited. He waited for the streaks to form into a shape, to shape into a form. He felt something inside of him in a way he had only very few times since the war. He knew if he just waited, just a little longer, he would see her at last. That she would come home at last. And then everything would be good again.
But she never quite solidified. Not quite. The streaks of smoke formed a loose and twisting body, constantly moving and changing, but which formed the essence of her nonetheless. She was more ghost than human, but he could feel her in a way he had never experienced, even when they had been together.
He was floating now, and twisting with her – more like smoke himself than the clumsy machine he had hidden inside of for so long. And as they spoke, they did so without speaking. They talked without talking, heard without hearing. They were one, and the stories they told each other were as if they had always been there.
As he remembered the dream later, he remembered the stories as a conversation, as if they had been talking. It was the only way he could process it. But at the time, it was more like knowing.
“Rina. Dearest. Is it really you?”
“Oh, George. I’ve missed you so much.”
“I’ve tried not to think of you. I’ve tried to forget. I thought I had. But to see you again. It’s as if we’ve always been together.”
“We have George. I’ve never left you. But it’s been so hard to reach you. I’m only now getting strong enough to cross over.”
“Cross over? Then…then you can come home?”
“I can never come home, George.”
“But we can be together?”
“Yes, love. We can be together.”
“How? Tell me. I’ll do anything.”
The Old Man remembered now. He had felt her several times since he had lost her, but only as a vague presence. At those times she had been no more than a feeling, a sort of controlling influence that always made him feel as if he had suddenly broken free after years of imprisonment. But this was different. He actually felt as if he was communicating with her. As if he could hear her thoughts.
“When I left you, dearest one, I succumbed to the void. My body had been destroyed, and my soul stretched across an emptiness so vast I could do nothing but weep. I cried out for someone to save me but no sound would escape. There was nothing. Not a life, not a star, not an atom. The emptiness was so deep I though I had lost myself forever. I was unable to die, yet longing for death. I had found my own personal hell.
“I was trapped for millennia, floating, existing, empty. How I longed for something, anything to happen, even if it meant ending my existence forever. Then, somehow, miraculously I began to see the universe unfold before me, and I found I was moving through time – as I had in my former life. After an infinity of emptiness, I was free, and traveling through space and time, exploring this new universe from one end to the other until I…
“What is it, Rina?”
“I’m losing...I can’t stay with you much longer. Listen.”
“Don’t leave me.”
“Listen, George. We don’t have much...we can be togeth...we can...need your help....universes...tearing each other….”
“Rina!”
“Holes…”
“Where are you going?”
“…join together…become one…forever…”
And she was gone.
And the Old Man, alone, awake, thought about the future. Perhaps driving a fleet of ships into the ground was of no consequence. Perhaps helping or hurting his human brothers was not either. And maybe his enemy…
He had been angry. Full of vengeance. He had lashed out at the only thing he knew how to hate. Something he couldn’t touch. Something he called a monster. But what if it wasn’t a monster? What if it was just space? Just the world. If all he ever wanted was to get her back, then maybe the only things that mattered were the things that could help him do that. He needed to forget his vengeance once and for all, and put his energy into what really mattered. Was there really a way?
She had said what? Join together? Become one? Maybe the thing those spineless scientists worried about most was the one thing he really needed. Of course. That was why he could finally see her after all of this time. Because that hole that had not closed. Maybe the problem was not that the hole failed close, but that it was not big enough. Maybe he had to risk destroying his own universe in order to create a new one. A new universe, born of two dying ones. And one that would bring the Old Man and Ballerina Justice together for eternity.
With new purpose, the Old Man got up, and headed back to his office.
•
And while the Old Man prepares for the ultimate villainy, and Jerry runs from the law and hurtles toward Earth, what has become of our cliffhanger? What of Ball and her young one whom we last saw at the scene of the explosion? At last, there is no more need to wait.
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