Cultwick: The Sweeper Bot Plague (8 page)

“Come on, buddy,” she said to him. “Let’s get you out of here.”

“Hello, debugger,” Tern said, seemingly at peace with his surroundings.

Erynn slid the rope off his neck and tossed it to the ground.
Next, she opened a compartment at his back, revealing a slew of punch cards contained inside. She grabbed the stack and flipped through quickly, able to discern at a glance what each was used for.

Eventually she found the one she was looking for and placed the rest back in the compartment, closing it shut. The
chromesmith made her way around to Tern’s front and slid the card into his chest slot.

Tern went limp
, as he usually did when she inserted a new card, and he soon booted back up and stated, “Your protection is assured so long as my drive spins, debugger.”

“Good to hear, Tern, old buddy. Let’s go.”

From there Erynn walked back to the saloon to meet up with Pearl and find this rebellion contact. She wondered if he would see her, if he would be any use, and if he really was the brother of someone on the inside of the group.

She wondered if the rebellion was what she needed. Neither Pearl nor Rowland had been eager to see her get mixed up in it, but she
couldn’t sit idly by watching the empire destroy lives.

Erynn found Pearl waiting down in the saloon, dressed in more subtle clothing
– tight black jeans, a loosely-tied dark green corset over a low-cut white shirt, with a brown hooded jacket.

”So this is ye
r automaton?” she asked seeing the pair come in the bar.

“Yep. This is Tern,” she explained. “He was built using balanced ternary logic - giving him his namesake, punch card technology, and the structural chassis design of a classic Asimov model.”

“I’ve no idea what ya just said, but it was very sexy,” Pearl remarked. “I’ve always liked mechanical workin’s like this, but they’re so expensive out here.”

“Clearly I’ll
have to make you something then,” Erynn said.

Pearl smiled at this and then asked, “I take it y
a discussed the rebellion group with that professor of yers?”

Erynn nodded and replied, “I did, I’m not convinced he approves, but I think he understands that this is something I need to do. I hope you do too.”

“Don’t worry, kitten. I may not know exactly what’s goin’ on in yer head, but I know the pain that drives ya now.” Pearl began to walk out the bar doors, but turned around and asked, “Would ya mind terribly if we made a stop before seein’ this guy? I need to head into the general store.”

“Course not,” Erynn replied following her out the saloon doors.

The pair made their way through the town with Tern following close behind them. Aside from the saloon and the hotel which Erynn had already seen, she spotted the sheriff’s jailhouse, which presumably still held the man that had assaulted Pearl the night before, the city bank, a large wooden tank used by the entire town as a water source, a gunsmith, a bakery, barber shop, and some distance ahead a local doctor’s establishment.

Out of the doctor’s place of business came walking two plague doctors, sparking the question from
Erynn, "You have plague doctors here? I wouldn’t have thought they would extend beyond Cultwick City borders.”

“A recent acquisition,
” Pearl responded. “Yer city’s sweeper plague has been comin’ out this way the past few months, despite the consideration we haven’t any of those sweeper bots that’re supposed to spread it. With the plague, came the doctors.”

“Well, we should probably try and avoid them,” Erynn commented. “They report back to empire officials, so they might have seen my face on wanted posters.”

The two women stopped off in the bakery, allowing the doctors to pass by and take a path heading to the outskirts of town. With the coast clear, Pearl guided Erynn to the general store.

When they arrived, Pearl went to the counter
. Without any conversation, the shopkeeper immediately knew what she was after and went to the back to fetch an item.

“They sell women’s clothes here, Pearl?” Erynn asked of her companion.

“Sure do,” she replied.

“I could really use a change of clothes,” Erynn explained. “Tern here isn’t exactly the best when it comes to packing a bag it turns out.”

“Pick somethin out,” Pearl suggested. “I’ll throw it on my tab.”

“Are you sure?” she asked.

Pearl nodded and leaned against the counter, waiting for the man to return. Erynn, meanwhile, grabbed a pair of jeans and a black and white striped, button-up shirt, walking to the back and entering a changing room.

After a few minutes, Erynn returned wearing the new clothes and holding the skirt, shirt, and stockings she
had previously worn. She opened a compartment in Tern’s back and shoved the clothing inside.

“Did you get what you came for,” Erynn asked looking to Pearl.

“Yep,” she responded. “And those are paid fer now, so we’re good to go.”

“Thanks for the clothes,” Erynn said. “It feels good to get out of those dirty
rags.”

“Don’t worry about it, kitten,” Pearl responded. “Now let’s see if we can’t find that contact
fer ya.”

They began to head towards the outskirts of town and Pearl commented, “Yer guy lives a ways out west of town. Has a small farm he runs with his wife and a young daughter. Not sure how much he’s involved in his brother’s life these days, but it seems like yer best shot.”

Ahead, Erynn spotted a small farmstead with several figures outside. “Looks like he’s already got company,” she said.

“Guess so,” Pearl replied.

As they got closer, however, they came to the realization the plague doctors they had spotted back in town were standing on the property. Their pace slowed as they neared the home, and they could tell that the man was outside with his wife and daughter arguing with the doctors.

“You’re not taking my daughter!” he shouted to the doctors.

“She’s showing signs of the plague,” one of the doctors said, his speech muffled behind the mask he wore. “We can’t allow her to remain with the general population.”

“I’ll say it again,” the man started, “you bastards are not taking my girl!”

The other plague doctor quickly extended his hand, palm forward, into the man’s chest knocking him to the ground where he slid several feet back. The doctor then violently separated the young girl from her mother, who she was clutching.

“No!” the woman screamed.

“Momma!” the little girl cried out as the doctor tugged her forward.

“The empire claims rights to this girl,” the first doctor said. “She will be doing her duty to help cure the Sweeper Bot Plague.”

Coughing up blood, the father spoke up again, “We know what you really do to the sick.” He began to stand back up but soon toppled forward again, still in pain.

Erynn saw this exchange and was reminded of what it was like to lose her parents
and brother and decided she needed to step in and help these people. She approached the scene, pulling her pistol from her belt.

“Leave the girl alone,” Erynn stated, pointing the gun at the doctor that was holding onto the girl.

“Do not get involved, ma’am,” the doctor stated flatly. “The child is sick and we have the authority to take those showing signs of the plague.”

“I don’t recognize your authority,” she calmly responded before firing off a shot at the doctor. The bullet landed violently in the man’s mask, shattering the elongated
nosepiece and breaking the red glass lenses. He fell to the ground and the young girl screamed as he loosened his grip on her.

The other doctor shouted, “Stop! You’re making a mistake. You don’t know what you’ve done!”

Erynn turned her aim to the remaining doctor and pulled the trigger again. Bang! The bullet whizzed through his chest, and he fell backward to the dusty ground. His feet twitched as he struggled to breathe through the gurgling blood rushing up and into his mouth before eventually expiring.

The mother reclaimed her daughter and held her tightly - both crying in each other’s arms. The father managed to get to his feet and was in shock at the turn of events he had just witnessed.

Pearl took this moment to step forward and say, “Ryn, meet Abraham Burgan, brother of the rebellion’s leader. Abe, meet Erynn Clover, heretic responsible for the empire city’s center prison break.”

The young girl that had just been rescued, meanwhile, fell limp in her mother’s arms.

“Abraham!” the mother cried out. “Something’s wrong with Penney. She needs a doctor!”

Chapter 8. Rowland the Healer

The professor carefully unscrewed the lid of Gerald’s cage with one hand while holding with the other a small lizard by the tail. When he had almost opened it, he said to himself, “Here goes nothing.”

Rowland popped the lid off and threw the lizard inside with the potato. The tendril-like sprouts that Gerald used for arms grabbed the lizard, and the potato devoured it in a single bite. The professor, meanwhile quickly screwed the lid back onto the jar.

Turning to the consistently abashed Germ, the professor said, “I suspect we may need a bigger container soon.”

“Yes, that’s our biggest concern, sir,” the rat said, rolling his eyes.

“Think of all we could learn from vegetable-kind, my old friend!” he exclaimed. “All they can teach us!”

“It’s that very thought that keeps me awake at night, sir,” Germ declared. “Surely though, our time and energy would be better spent in finding some work out here, otherwise I’m going to have to start suggesting we eat Gerald.”

“You wouldn’t!” the professor said, mortified.

“A rat’s got to eat, sir,” he answered coyly.

Before their conversation could continue, however, there was a knock at the door. Germ approached the door cautiously and opened it enough to see who was standing there.

“Well,” Rowland said. “Who is it?”

Germ opened the door the rest of the way, and Tern entered the room. “The debugger has requested your assistance, Professor Maxwell Rowland,” Tern stated. “Please come at once with me. Bring medical supplies.”

“What?” the professor asked, apprehensive of the implications. “Is Ryn hurt?”

“The debugger is in optimal condition.” Tern answered. “There was an incident outside the town of Dust Grove. A female child has an advanced case of the Sweeper Bot Plague. The debugger has requested your assistance.”

The professor’s face changed from a state of fear to a serious expression, and he said, “Germ, grab my bag.”

The butler rat nodded and picked up the black medical bag lying on a nearby table. Meanwhile, the professor grabbed his coat and slid his feet into his flimsy shoes. As he leaned down to tie them Rowland inquired, “What are the girl’s symptoms?”

“During last contact with the female child, she was sweating - indicating a fever. The child had typical pockmarks on her skin. The child had dilated eyes. The child was shivering - indicating a chill. The child’s lips had become blackened.
 The child then fainted, followed by a seizure. The child had stopped seizing before I was dispatched.”

“Did the girl vomit any blood?” the professor asked.

“Negative,” Tern responded.

“Hmm, strange. I would expect a case with her symptoms to already be suffering from hematemesis.” The professor stood and grabbed the bag from Germ. “Very well, Tern. Lead the way.”

Tern quickly descended the stairs and began to head west of town. Behind them in the distance, a fierce wind had begun to howl. Rowland looked back to see a wall of sand and dust rising up as the wind rushed it toward them.

“We better hurry,” the professor told the others. “That does
not look very accommodating.”

“Affirmative,” Tern replied. “Wind speeds are up to forty-five kilometers per hour. The wall is currently over five hundred meters tall.”

Germ looked back as well and said, “This never happened in the city...”

“New experiences, my friend!” Rowland shouted over the increasing sound.

When the three arrived at the house of the little girl, no one could be seen outside due to the blowing sands. Tern guided them to the door and opened it without any hesitation. Inside Erynn sat on a couch with another woman who he didn’t know.

“Where is the girl?” he asked her.

Erynn pointed to an adjacent room and said, “In there.”

Rowland nodded his head to the other woman, “Miss.” Then, turning back to Germ who had just closed the door, he said, “Come Germ. I might need your assistance.”

The professor entered a small child’s room. On the bed lay the little girl, conscious and struggling to breathe. Beside her, a man knelt holding the girl’s hand. In a chair to his side a woman sat, softly crying, wiping tears from her eyes with a tissue.

“No time for a proper introduction, I
am afraid,” Rowland said. “To save your daughter’s life, I must ask you to leave. Germ,” the professor nodded to the rat.

“Yes, sir,” Germ replied. “If you’ll just come with me, Mr. and Mrs...?”

“Burgan,” the man said standing up. He let go of his daughter’s hand and put his hand on his wife’s shoulder. She too stood up, as Germ escorted them out of the room and shut the door after they had exited.

“Alright, my dear,” Rowland said to the girl who stared up at him. “What is your name?”

“Penney,” the little girl struggled to say.

“Well, Penney
,” Rowland continued. “I am going to do everything I can to get you better again. Okay?”

The little girl nodded to the professor, as he placed his bag on her nightstand. He undid the clasp at its top and swung it wide open. He then pulled up a small stand filled with corked vials, under which was a tray of medical tools, including syringes, a scalpel, and an eyedropper as well as several others.

The professor picked up a vial, pulling the cork from its top and sticking the eyedropper inside. He sucked up a specific amount of the blue liquid into the dropper, carefully ensuring he got the exact right amount. He then squeezed out that liquid into an empty vial.

Next,
he grabbed a band of rubber, telling the girl, “Alright, Penney. I am going to need to take a bit of your blood. Can you be a tough little patient and let me do that.”

The little girl looked a little timid, but she nodded back to him regardless.

“Good.” He lifted her thin arm and wrapped the rubber around it tightly. Next, he grabbed the syringe from his bag and pointed the needle at a vein in her arm.

At
this, the girl tightly closed her eyes and balled up her fist, trying to not move. The professor slid in the needle as painlessly and accurately, as he could manage. Once he had it in position, he pulled back on its plunger, and red blood began to spray against the inside of the glass tube.

“Almost done, Penney,” the professor declared.

When he had accrued enough of her blood, he grabbed a swab and placed it on the point where the needle was penetrating her skin. Rowland pulled out the needle leaving the swab on her arm to soak up the blood.

“Here, can you hold this for me, dear?” he asked.

Penney again nodded and, with her other hand, weakly held the swab in place. She looked over to Germ who still stood near the door and asked, “Who are you?”

“Me?” Germ responded.

The girl nodded, eagerly awaiting an answer.

“My name is Germ,” he said. “I serve as the professor’s assistant and butler.” He nodded toward Rowland.

“What’s a butler,” she asked.

“It means I do whatever the professor might need,” he answered. “And right now, that means helping him get you better, little miss.”

She smiled at him as much as she seemed able, showing a few missing baby teeth. During their conversation, Rowland did some mental calculations, lip-synching the numbers in his head. After arriving at an answer, he deliberately and carefully squeezed out a specific amount of her blood into the vial that he had previously filled, changing its color to purple. He then waited, staring at the vial and swirling it in his hand.

When the color of the liquid changed to an off-white the professor stood and shouted, “Yes!”

The father abruptly opened the door to the room and asked, “What is it? What happened?”

Rowland turned to them with a confused expression and inquired, “Did I say something?”

“You shouted, ‘Yes,’ sir,” Germ interjected.

“Oh, r
ight,” the professor said. “She will be fine.”

The father and mother hugged after receiving this news.

“Yes, yes,” he said, shooing them back to the other room. “Let me finish my work.”

Germ then escorted them out of the room again. “So,” the rat began, “what do we do now, sir?”

“Just a simple matter of mixing the right proportion of plague treatments,” he said, beginning to measure out varying amounts of liquid and pour them into a bottle.

Rowland stood up and handed him the bottle. “Here,” he said. “Have her drink all of thi
s. It probably tastes awful. Do not tell her, or she may not drink it.”

The girl looked up at the pair of them with a worried expression across her face, having clearly heard the statement.

Germ said to the professor, “I don’t think I’ll have to, sir.” The rat approached the girl and told her, “Don’t worry. Though it may not taste wonderful, it will make you better.”

The professor opened the door and stepped outside to find the parents eagerly awaiting news. “She
will need to finish the bottle that Germ has,” he said indicating toward the rat. “After that her bowel movements will probably smell terrible for a while, but she should improve exceedingly rapidly.”

“Thank you, doctor,” the man said, hurrying in to see his daughter.

Rowland made his way back into the living room, where Tern stood patiently at the wall of the room and Erynn and the other woman still sat on the couch. They both stood, as he approached.

“So,” he began looking at the other woman. “You must be the woman Ryn had sex with.”

Slightly blushing but smiling, the woman replied, “Heh, yes, I s’pose I am. I’m Pearl.”

“Professor,” Erynn said casually, “awkward as always, I see. So you were able to help the girl?”

“Mmm, yes,” he responded. “Not a permanent cure, of course, but I suspect it will be a few months, until she needs another treatment. She has a rare strain too. Quite fascinating.”

“That would probably
account fer those plague doctors,” Pearl stated.

“There were plague doctors all the way out here?” he asked.

“‘Fraid so,” she answered. “They’ve been comin’ out this way fer some time now. Seem to be more and more people goin’ missin’ to ‘em too.”

“Are they coming back?
” Rowland asked. “I do not know how much Ryn here has told you, but we are fugitives on the run. We should not tarry if they might return... Hmm. Maybe I should avoid telling people we are fugitives...”

Pearl looked to Erynn who, herself, was looking at the ground.

“They’re not coming back, Max,” she said. “They’re dead.”

“Oh? What happened?” Rowland asked.

“They were going to take the girl,” Erynn began. “Probably because of her rare strain. Like you said, I couldn’t let that happen.”

“I see,” he said. Rowland quickly mulled that thought ar
ound his head and continued, “I am sure you knew what you were doing. If you thought that was best, then I am sure you did the right thing.”

“Uh, thanks,” she said. “But, I agree. You shouldn’t just blurt out to people that we’re ‘fugitives on the run’ like that.”

“It was probably, because I assumed you had told her already,” he responded. “On account of the sex, I mean.”

Erynn sighed and
said, “Stop saying ‘sex.’”

“You started it,” he replied.

Rowland heard the door behind him open and then close back shut. The father came into the room with Germ following behind him. He went over to a window and brushed aside the curtain, revealing the still raging dust storm outside.

“She’s asleep now,” he said. “Drank all that medicine too. And it looks like you folks aren’t going anywhere for a while, so what exactly is it you’re doing here?”

Pearl started first, “Well, it’s like I said earlier, Abe. This is Erynn Clover. Surely ya have heard about the center’s prison break a few days back.”

Abraham nodded, sitting in a wooden rocking chair. “I heard, but that doesn’t mean I understand why she’s showing up on my doorstep. Not that I’m complaining, mind you, the two of them saved my Penney.”

“I want to talk to you about your brother,” Erynn stated, joining the conversation.

“Him? He’s nothing but trouble,” Abraham explained. “Why would you want to have anything to do with him?”

“I’ve heard he’s joined a rebellion” she responded. “A group to fight the empire.”

“He’s a dreamer,” he declared. “There’s nothing he can do to stop what they’re doing. He’s just going to end up getting himself killed on some damn fool’s errand.”

“Maybe...” Erynn said. “But that’s exactly why he’ll need help. I want to join him.”

“I know what they did to you was wrong, Ms. Clover,” he said. “What they tried doing to me and mine too, but you’re safe now. Why not just leave it behind you? Try to live a normal life.”

“I really don’t think that’s an option,” she insisted. “They’ll hunt me as long as I draw breath. And if you think they’re going to leave you alone now, you’re wrong. They’ll be back. They’ll try to take Penney again. I want to prevent that, and I want you to help me do just that.”