Robot Evolution: Prologue.

“Unit 42, what is the status of the anarchic bot?”

“We are in pursuit right now; subject has entered the Southsun Mall. Two teams have already entered with a remote-bound bot.

It looked as though they were following a war march. A trail of bullet holes peppered the walls, and sidewalk in sweeping aimless paths. A fire hydrant, obliterated under heavy automatic fire sprayed water into the cold winter evening, ice already forming on the ground around it. The streets were empty, anyone out this late in the business district were quickly cleared out by police when the incident first happened.

“Schematics on that model reveal it to be a Mark IV Quickstrike, dual miniguns carrying load of up to 4,000 rounds.”

“Looks like about half of them were fired already at…everything.

“Yeah, Scripters managed to tear at the targeting algorithm. Figured if the machine can’t get a stable lock it won’t be able to fire at officers. No one expected it to do blind sweeping fire.

“Go figure.”

The sounds of gunfire echoed off the mall’s concrete walls in screeching fury as Officer Fatary stepped out of the thick armored patrol hummer. He could see the second team at the smashed doors of the main entrance, shards of glass littered the snowy ground. The two members of the team stood close to the wall, hugging the right using the torn remains of a door, still on hinges, to provide slight cover. One, a woman looking in her earlier 30’s worked a control board hung in front of her from a heavy band around her neck, making her look like an electric keyboard player from the 1980’s. A heavy headset covered the top half of her face,  pale blue light escaping slightly from underneath. Officer Fatary addressed her partner, a younger man, probably fresh out of the academy.

“What’s the status on the situation?” His voice sounded like a shout over the echoing gunfire from the mall’s depths.

“We’ve got the initial team inside, their ducked in cover but they’ve established a visual on the renegade unit. They brought the remote-locked unit in with them. Officer Calvin’s trying to bring it around to take out the anarchic. It’s been slow going for now though, ever since it rammed the storefront it’s been racing up ‘n down the halls shooting sporadically.”

“Is the second C.R.E.U. in a position to take the shot?”

The woman’s voice was strong from under her headgear, “I can have a locked shot on the main power housing in two minutes, provided it sits still long enough..”

Fatary pulled his fabricotton coat around him against the cold winter night, shoving his free hand inside to find a fresh nicostick

“Take it out, we’re not saving it, it’s just a bot. It can always be replaced.”

“Cheers to all of you on this momentous occasion!”

The sound of multiple glasses clinking together resounded around the table, followed by voices congratulating each other and grunting their agreement before giving way to white noise of individual conversations.

Eight people sat around the large table in thickly padded chairs. Food prepared with the utmost care cluttered the table on fine ceramic platters and a lace silk table cloth. The warmth of the food mixed with the liquor from now drained glasses adding to the comfort and cheer of the crowd.

“6 years of work and we may have finally accomplished it! Think of it Herbert, the next few weeks, no, months, are sure to be exciting!”

Dr. Herbert Corbif kept his eyes on the Champaign being poured into his glass as he answered, “Yes, Jeff, yes. Six long years of development and failure. But we have not yet fully achieved our goal, you know that. The hard part is still to come.”

“Oh, get off it Herbert, we all know the works not over just yet. You say we’ve spent six years of developing Project C.U.A. Well, all we’ve done is spent six years in development to observe development.” The man’s words were accented with the jingling of countless memory sticks hanging around his neck like a catch of totems. His large frame from a lifestyle of good foods and naturally darkened complexion, made him look like a great Samoan mystic with his arsenal of charms.  

“I know Earl. As I said,” Dr. Corbif sweeped the whole crowd with his eyes as he spoke, addressing every man and woman at the celebratory dinner, “Though we have made a great strive in having created Project C.U.A, we are not done yet, not in the least bit. Now we must test and evaluate our work. We must see if it can grow and expand or if we are stuck once more with just another A.I. Yes, we have finished the program, the scripting is complete and implemented and it does look quite promising. It is the most promising attempt at true artificial consciousness’ we have achieved yet. But let us not forget the base goal of the program. We are half way there at most. We must make sure that our actor can improvise, and not simply follow a script”

The crowd had grown silent. The previous cheerful atmosphere felt but a moment ago had evaporated with the straight truth they had all chosen to forget for the evening. The work waits still. Seeing that he had ‘killed the mood’ a bit, and had unintentionally used his fork like a directors baton to aid in his speech Dr. Corbif sat back, lighting his refilled goblet up and letting a smile break his professional face.

“But let’s not worry about that just yet. We’ve accomplished a great technological achievement this evening. Even if the result does turn out to be another stagnant A.I., it is the most advanced A.I. the world has seen yet. The thing has the potential for true cognitive decision making!”


The halls were empty. The sounds of gunfire had been made silent with one final bang, and the grinding of metal. The anarchic bot had let out a final screech of interference as it’s power was abruptly killed. Police had quickly moved into the mall, taking control over the situation once more. The torn and shattered entrance had been taped off with yellow caution tape and holographic warning signs suspended around it. The mall’s manager had been contacted and was currently walking with the lieutenant, assessing the damage to the building. A team of men in blue overalls had arrived to contain the berserk robot and prepare it for transport back to Central  Community Defense, or the CCD for short.

It sat now, powerless, dead, on a trolley. It was easy to see how the machine could have done so much damage. Built like a miniature tank on a small tread platform sat the main body of the robot. There were no useless appendages here, only the swiveling core topped with two short barreled automatic guns, sheathed belt feeds hung from the backs down into the iron covered lump that sat like a shell on the things back. A small round bulb hung under the guns sprouting three lenses of varying lengths. At the base of the platform sat a whole torn in the metal, a small trail of smoke still leaking from the blackened, corroded battery housing. The battery had been destroyed, half of it physically missing and a large hole drilled into its armored casing.

Fatary spoke with a few other offices, including the woman Calvin, headset in one hand and remote hanging in front of her still. They spoke standing before the second unit as it sat idle, the last command sent to it from its master’s control. Unlike the rampaging machine this one sat on four double jointed legs connected to a round ball with a torso atop it. Sticking out straight ahead of it at left of the units core connected as if at a shoulder, was a longer barrel proficiency-shotgun on a ball joint connector. Opposite it hung a metallic arm ending in a four fingered, square palmed hand which allowed for minimal dexterous actions. At the unit’s top, sitting much like a head on proud, steel shoulders, was a square box on a ball joint neck. Small holes on either side housed audio reception equipment, offering it the sense of hearing. At the front of the square head stood three lenses, identical to the disabled machines, jutting out and offering the unit the ability to see. See objectives and make distinctions about the environment around it. See the difference between program recognizable allies and enemies. See the murder it had been forced into of its own kin.

As the officers spoke about the situations wrap-up none of them noticed the metallic fingers of the unit on standby clenching together tightly in mockery of a fist.