Gabi pulled up to the front of the resort and hit the brakes hard, barely avoiding the car of a couple that had just arrived. On their way inside, they froze mid-stride at the appearance of the transporter and were almost knocked over by the luggage cart immediately behind them. The husband managed to grab his wife by the arm and by some miracle, they both didn't end up face down on the sidewalk.
One of the valets stared at the military machine, eyes wide open, mouth agape, while one of his colleagues already had a radio to his mouth, speaking rapidly while he waved frantically at Gabi to move the eyesore. His message was clear. Get the transporter out of there. Now. She ignored him.
"Lowering the ramp," she said as she glanced over her shoulder at the still unconscious Jarell. "Denton, Carter, you'll have to carry him inside. Leah and I will find something to load Tanner onto."
Denton nodded without a word. He grabbed Jarell's feet and legs while Carter picked up his torso. They gently exited the cabin and then continued past Tanner in the cargo area and down the ramp.
Audible gasps were heard from the crowd of guests that had gathered around the front door of the resort. Some pointed and whispered, hands over their mouths, others were quick to grab a photo of the drama for posterity.
"Wait, wait, wait," the concierge hissed as he came running, his hands stretched out in front of him, two fingers pointing at the lifeless Jarell. "Stop right there. You can't bring that...thing in here."
Denton pushed past him. "That thing? We need to get him to medical," he shouted over his shoulder. "Help me out, will ya?"
"Certainly not," the concierge said as he followed them inside the lobby. "This is not a hospital. Call for an ambulance if you need medical assistance."
" I don't have time for that," Denton said and looked at the man's name tag. Stan. "Listen, Stan, this is a matter of national security. I don't have time to argue. Help me out or get out of the way."
"You're not going anywhere," a booming voice from somewhere on the other side of the lobby shouted. Denton looked in the direction of the voice and saw a small, stubby man with a balding head stride towards them faster than he should. His face was already red from exertion, and he was wagging a finger in the air as he approached Denton. "You are not welcome here," the man said.
Denton sighed and shook his head. "And you are?"
"I'm Pranton, Oswald Pranton, resort director. I'm in charge here."
"Oh, are you now? Excellent, maybe you can help us out here? This man needs medical attention. Can you..." Denton was interrupted by Pranton's finger in his face.
"I don't take orders from you," the short man hissed. "This is my resort, you will do as I say,
"Not quite right, director," a voice behind Denton said, followed by a cough. Pranton's face turned a darker hue of red, his fists squeezed together tightly.
"How dare you," Pranton began as he stepped sideways to get a better view of the defiant guest. He froze mid-sentence as his eyes met those of Carter and his face lost all color. "Mr. Forsythe, I, I didn't recognize you there," he said softly and bowed stiffly.
"I gathered as much. Now, if you please, clear a path to medical. This gentleman needs urgent attention."
"Oh, yes, of course, of course," the director said and snapped his fingers, which sent the staff scurrying around him like a pack of squirrels.
"We also need your best engineer's help," Carter continued.
"An engineer? For your transportation?"
"No," Carter said and pointed towards Tanner being carted through the door by Gabi and Leah on a luggage cart. "For that."
The director's face seemed to pale even further, if that was possible, as murmurs from the crowd in the lobby made it evident that few of them had ever seen a contraption like Tanner.
"Ok, yes, yes, I'll send for our best, err, engineer," the director said and directed one of the lobby personnel to show Gabi and Leah where to bring Tanner. He then personally led them through the resort to the medical wing before he quickly disappeared out of sight.
The resort doctor was waiting for them, and after debriefing Denton about the condition of the patient, he set to work to stabilize Jarell with the help of his staff. Denton figured it would take a while before Jarell would be in any condition to speak, so he asked Carter to take him to the room Tanner had been left in. Carter then left him alone and disappeared to deal with the administrative fallout of their unexpected arrival. Denton suspected this would include a lot of resort credit for emotional discomfort and stroking the ego of a certain resort director. Or, maybe someone would be without a job at the end of the day. It didn't matter. Tanner was the only thing that mattered at that very moment.
Tanner had been left on a large work desk. Several server clusters hummed on one side of the room while a variety of spare computer parts and terminals littered shelving units on the opposite wall. A bank of bright lights was centered above the desk in the center of the ceiling. Drops of water that fell from the thawing body of Tanner broke up the otherwise monotonous hum of the servers and supplied a growing puddle of water on the floor directly beneath the desk.
Denton took a tentative step up to his partner and touched Tanner's hand, still pointing towards the ceiling, his arms locked in a ninety-degree angle as if still carrying Jarell's body. The metal fingers of his fist were still cool from exposure and wet from the melting snow and ice. Denton wiped his wet fingers on his pants as he tried to figure out what to do next.
Tanner's one eye was still glowing, although very faintly. That was good news. At least there was some life in there. Or, so he hoped. Although he knew that the totality of Tanner's being was only partially present in the metal body in front of him, he was unsure what would happen if the machine Tanner now inhabited failed. Would the Tanner he had gotten to know be gone? Was there a backup? Would a backup even be the same? These were all questions he desperately needed the answers to but didn't want to have to think about.
He stepped away from the table and looked around the room. Although he was comfortable around computers and electronics in general, he had no idea where to start when it came to something as sophisticated as a robot. Should he try to find a power source? Was one even available in the room that would be sufficient for an advanced AI?
While his mind jumped around between good and bad outcomes, he scrounged through the parts on the side of the room, looking for anything that might help. Stacked on the shelves were memory units, storage devices and a variety of other hardware devices. Nothing seemed to be of any use for his purposes. He slammed his palm against the wall in frustration and glanced back over at the table.
His eyes fell on the server bank on the other side of the room. He stepped over to the server side of the room and was just about to power up an access terminal when the door opened behind him.
"Whoa, man, what are you doing?"
Denton turned to find a young technician, several years younger than him standing in the doorway. His eyes were large, his knees slightly bent in a crouch and both his hands were stretched out in front of him.
"Man, don't touch that thing," he repeated and slowly walked over towards Denton, one of his hands still outstretched. "You can ruin the whole network from here."
Denton took a step back, his hands up, palms facing outwards. "Eh, sorry, man. Just trying to figure out how to help my partner."
The tech furrowed his eyebrows. "Your partner?"
Denton nodded towards the table. "Yeah, right there. His name is Tanner."
Wide-eyed, the tech turned and looked at Tanner. "Wait...this is your partner?"
"That's what I said."
"Man, are you kidding me? You've got a robotic partner?" The tech's eyes grew larger, and Denton could sense the excitement of a geek on the verge of laying his hands on a new piece of tech.
"Well, not really. He's more of an..." Denton said sharply.
"Wait, this is the one they just brought in, right? You guys came from the Shadowlands."
"Yeah, that's right. He's been shut down since we found him. I'm not sure what to do."
"Ok, ok, ok," the tech said and stepped closer. "Lemme see. Ok, I see his eye glowing," he said and pointed towards Tanner's eye. "He's still online."
"I figured as much," Denton said and crossed his arms. "What's your name, by the way?"
The young tech looked at Denton. "Porter. You?"
"Denton, and you've already been introduced to Tanner."
"Tanner, eh?"
"It's short for Totally Autonomous Neural Network with Enhanced Responsibilities."
Porter's mouth fell open, his eyes wider than before. "Seriously? He's one of...them?"
"I don't know what that means, Porter. The only thing I care about is getting him up and running again. Can you fix him?"
"Oh, right, right. Well, err..." Porter said and leaned in closer and took a close look at Tanner's head. "I need to find a way to hook up."
Denton's eyebrows went up. "Hook up?"
"Oh, you know, interface with the robot's operating system. So I can see what state he's in." Porter looked at Denton and squinted. "What did you think I meant?"
"Oh, uh, exactly what you said," Denton said and walked around to Porter's side of the table. "What exactly are you looking for?"
"A port of some sort. Usually, there's one at the base of the neck of these things, or somewhere around the cranium. It's just a matter of...oh, here you go," Porter said and pointed towards a small circular gap just above the area where the left ear would have been on a normal human head.
Denton leaned in for a closer look. It didn't look like much. A circular cut-out in the otherwise smooth surface of Tanner's head.
"And you know this how?"
"I studied robotics. It's a pretty standard interface."
"If you say so," Denton said and straightened up, his hands on his hips. He suddenly felt that his knowledge of technology that he just moments ago had been so confident in was, in fact, shallow. Did he really know so little? "So, what are you waiting for? Interface away."
"Ok, ok, give me a sec." Porter dug through the spare parts bins on the other side of the table, found a few cords of various lengths and then disappeared behind the server rack, all the while mumbling quietly to himself. Denton sighed and sat down on a stool by the table, crossed his arms and waited. There wasn't much he could do anyway.
A few minutes later, Porter emerged and returned to the table. He pulled a cord with him over to the table and plugged it into the port on the side of Tanner's head. Without saying a word, he returned to the server bank, powered up the mounted terminal and punched in a few commands.
The screen came alive with rows and rows of data quickly scrolling by. Denton had no way of reading it, and he felt reasonably sure that there was no way Porter could read any of it either. A few seconds later, the screen turned black and then faded into white. A red dot flashed in the middle of the screen.
"What's that?" Denton said and approached the terminal.
Porter looked at Denton and shrugged. "No idea. I've never seen anything like it."
"You haven't...." Denton was interrupted by a scratching sound from somewhere within the server bank. "What the..."
"You made it," a garbled voice from somewhere within the servers said. Porter's face drained of all color, and he looked at Denton, wide-eyed. Denton himself was speechless, not expecting the servers to suddenly begin a conversation with either of them.
"Denton, is everything alright?" the voice said, this time crystal clear. It was then Denton realized what was going on.
"Tanner?"
"Yes, of course. That's why you hooked up me up to this cluster, correct?"
"Oh, well, yes, sure. How..."
"As you know, my personality within any physical form is limited, but as soon as the connection to the mainframe was established through this server cluster, I was able to sync up with my neural network identity. I have discarded the physical form on the table, and I am now fully operational again."
"In there?" Denton said and squinted at the screen while he gestured at the servers.
"Well, partially, yes. The connection to the outside networks allows me to operate at optimal levels. Fortunately, the backbone to this facility is military grade."
"Glad to hear it," Denton said and sighed with a smile on his face. "It's good to have you back, buddy."
There was a silence for a moment longer than usual before Tanner responded. "Oh, so you missed me?"
"Well, of course," Denton said without hesitation. "I'm not sure what I would have done if you hadn't made it."
"I'm pleased to hear that. Although, you do realize that even if the robotic body had failed, my identity would still be available on the network."
"It would?"
"Of course. It would lack the specific memories of this most recent mission, of course, but it's programmed to automatically awake from hibernation if I don't resync within a certain amount of time."
"How come I didn't know this?"
"Does it matter?"
"Yes it does," Denton said, irritation in his voice. "That my partner has a backup somewhere out...there, yes, that would be good to know."
"My apologies. I thought for sure our superiors would have briefed you."
"Well, they didn't, " Denton said and crossed his arms across his chest again and furrowed his eyebrows.
"If I may," Porter said, his hand raised as if calling for his turn. "It's an honor to meet you, Tanner. I've read so much about your...kind."
"I am grateful for my revival," Tanner said. "I'd be happy to share anything about my kind that you may have questions about as a token of my gratitude for your expertise."
Porter clasped his hands together and cracked a smile as he glanced over at Denton. "Oh, wow..." he started before Denton cut him off.
"Since you're alright, I'm going to go check on Jarell. I'll let the two of you chat about, well whatever it is."
"No need," Tanner said. "He's not waking up anytime soon."
"And you'd know that how?" Denton said, his hand on the door handle.
"I'm connected to the resort network, I have immediate access to the medical bay's computer systems. Jarell will likely never wake up."
~~~
Tanner is back but Jarell is down. Will this affect the end at all? Will Jarell escape punishment by virtue of being comatose, or something worse? How do you think it'll end?
Leave a comment & vote!