Earth Who by Douglas Neman

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Chapter 5

They searched for an hour in all directions, in two groups of four. Julia and the Doctor were split between the two groups, as they were the two people best suited to treat injuries in case anyone got shot, or to help Uly if they found him. Each group had two mag pros, and kept in constant gear contact with both each other and base camp.

They didn't find a thing.
Devon only returned when Danziger persuaded her to, finally getting her to see that blundering around in the dark wasn't going to do any good. They had to go back to camp and make a plan, he told her. She did, crying all the way. When they got there, she charged Zero in a rage and pounded on him as hard as she could with both fists.

"What were you doing?" she yelled as they pulled her away, thrashing wildly. "You were supposed to be scanning for movement, you worthless piece of scrap! What were you doing?"

Zero just lay on the ground where she'd knocked him, as motionless and as silent as he had been for the last hour and fifteen minutes, probably more. Somehow, the robot had been completely deactivated, and they couldn't start it again.

No one could blame Devon for her fury. After helping the others pull her off, Walman looked down at Zero in disgust, and viciously kicked the robot himself. Then he walked away, shaking his head.

The group consisting of the Doctor, Baines, Alonzo, and Mazatl came back into camp. The Doctor again went to Devon's tent to examine the area behind it. He found Yale standing there. The Doctor bent down to look at the ground.

"No tracks whatsoever," Yale said. "Whoever he was, he knew what he was doing."

The Doctor sighed, looking out into the darkness, thinking. Suddenly he whipped his head around, sprang up, and ran to Zero.

He examined the robot intensely for a moment, then called, "Mr. Danziger, could you help me for a moment?"

Danziger was standing by Devon, who had collapsed in a chair, clutching Uly's little wooden staff to her chest. She was trying so hard to come up with a plan of action instead of sit there helplessly, but she was out of ideas. Julia, Alonzo, and Bess were debating on whether they should all go north, in the theory that the ZED had taken Uly and was headed back to its camp. Puzzled, Danziger left them for a moment to join the Doctor. "What is it?" he asked.

The Doctor looked around, then sprang up again. "Help me pull this table under the light." He grabbed one end of a collapsible picnic table. Danziger grabbed the other end and helped him. "What's all this for?" he asked.

"Surgery!" the Doctor replied. He ran back to Zero, then looked up at Danziger. "Help me lift him onto the table, would you please?"

"Now wait just a min-"
"Please! Time is of the essence!"
Danziger bent down and helped him lift the robot onto the table. By this time, everyone in camp was looking on.

"Early model Zero unit," the Doctor said, to no one in particular. "Surveillance equipment, repair functions, manual labor. Of course!"

He pulled out his sonic screwdriver and opened the plate in the robot's chest, then opened the glass plate on his head. He poked at the circuitry beneath for a moment, the said, "No interface. Can one of you get on a communication device and speak directly with Zero?"

"Even if this Zero unit was functioning properly, it couldn't communicate on our gear channels," Danziger said. "It's not designed that way."

"What?" the Doctor asked. "Blast! The information's in here, we just need to find a way to access it!"

"What are you saying?" Devon asked, her lip quivering, clutching at any hope at all that she would see her son again.

The Doctor spun to face her. "Your robot is chock full of surveillance equipment! The interface between the robot and the people around it was somehow deactivated so it couldn't give alarm! But if you take a look here --" he pointed to some circuits inside Zero which still hummed slightly "-- the surveillance equipment itself is still functioning perfectly!"

"You're saying that Zero still registered and monitored whomever took Uly -- that he was only unable to give an alarm, for some reason?" Julia asked.

"Precisely! Zero couldn't shout a warning or move to prevent the kidnapping, but he still recorded every second of it! We need an interface between him and us! We need some way to tell what's going on inside his circuits, and for that, we need some kind of-"

"Cybernetic link between a human and a machine," Yale stepped forward.

The Doctor smiled. "Exactly!"
Yale stood beside Zero and held out his arm. Between the Doctor and Danziger, an interface was built between Yale and Zero. The Doctor made a final adjustment with his sonic screwdriver, and said, "You should be in cyberspace now. Try to get him to run a diagnostic on himself."

"No, it's not cyberspace, but I'll try. I can still see what's going on, to a certain extent. It seems that although Zero was incapable of warning us, he's still trying to. It's almost as if he's silently screaming inside for someone to hear his warning, and his programming won't stop until it's acknowl- oh, my!" he said.

The others leaned in closer.
"Zero's inability to give a warning is due to an override command sent to him by remote!" Yale was incredulous. His eyes, focused on a point far away, were opened wide as he tried to believe what he was seeing. "There is a program in here which takes precedence over all else when activated! Anyone who transmits the right code can force Zero to do what he wants, even if it means disobeying the three laws of robotics! And Zero is programmed not to know of this override's existence!"

"A Universal Command," the Doctor sighed. "A lot of governments and corporations illegally install them in all robots everywhere. That way, in case any given robot finds itself in a situation where it can be useful, someone in authority can use it as a tool. Whether it's a SuperVoc or a menial load lifter -- it doesn't matter. At a moment's notice it can be turned into someone's enemy."

"Someone in authority," Danziger muttered. "I guess we know who that would be. It wouldn't be any trick at all for Reilly to access the Eden Advance's manifest and find out Zero's registration number."

"Yale, does Zero know where Uly was taken?" Devon asked.

"I can't tell," he answered. "And without the clearance code, I can't cancel the override."

"Clearance code?" Morgan asked. "Describe it to me, Yale." When the others looked at him in surprise, he explained, "I...used to crack government codes all the time back on the stations, because if I just waited for information or help, I'd never get anywhere."

"Would you have the security clearance to know a code like this?" Devon asked.

"No, but it might be similar to ones I've handled before."

Yale said, "It's a three-tier encryption, in the form of a pyramid, with ancient Egyptian carvings all over it."

"With a heiroglyph on top that looks like a cobra?" Morgan asked.

"Yes."
"King Tut's Tomb," Morgan said, then added awkwardly, "That's...not what it's called, it's what I call it. Okay, um, look. This encryption is in the form of a pyramid, and there's a secret route through to the center, or the tomb area, where the treasure is. Find the secret entrance and the secret route, and you're there. Start giving the computer any image which matches one of the heiroglyphs, or a group of them set close together on the surface."

Yale sat in silence for about 30 seconds, then said, "I'm in."

"Watch out for traps!" Morgan warned him. "Now, in my experience, no heiroglyph is ever repeated. So if you see one you've used, don't use it again. If there's a doorway, don't go through it! Always look for the hidden door."

Again, Yale was silent. Then he said, "I've breached the first encryption tier. Should I worry about mummies that come out of the walls and head towards me?"

Morgan was surprised. "Um, well....I've never encountered any, but I think it would be an awfully good idea for you to stay away from them. They might be viruses, and my guess is they'd be pretty nasty ones."

"I'm through the second tier!" Yale said excitedly. "That was fast," Morgan muttered. "Now, don't get cocky. You've got one more tier to go."

Yale swallowed hard. "I can't find the door, and the mummies are getting closer." His body was tense, his hands clenched in fists. Then he shouted, "I'm through! Initiating cancellation code! Disconnect me now!"

The Doctor yanked the connecting wire out of Zero. Yale breathed in suddenly, his head thrown back -- then brought it forward again in a sigh. He was all right. He rubbed his eyes tiredly. "That was too close," he said. "The mummies were almost on me."

Walman shook his head. "Whoever designs those things needs to have his head examined!"

"You bet he does!" Morgan exclaimed. "You've never met the guy! He's this weirdo in Programming named Littlefield. He's got a twisted sense of priorities, all right."

The robot sat up.
"Hello, Zero," the Doctor smiled. "How are you feeling- uh, well, that is to say, how are you doing?"

"Running diagnostic. All systems fully operational." "Excellent! Are you aware of what happened to you?" "Please specify a time reference," Zero said. "The past three hours -- are you aware of the override, and that you were forced to disobey the laws of robotics?"

"Of course I am," the robot almost sounded offended. It climbed off the table and stood up. "Now that the override has been deactivated, I am fully aware of its presence."

"Who sent you the command, and when?" the Doctor asked. "I do not know who sent it. One hour and 42.389 minutes after I was put on full alert, I received a command which overrode all my functions. The person giving the command instructed me not to communicate with anyone or anything, in any way."

"But it didn't occur to this person to tell you to stop surveillance?" Devon asked desperately.

"That is correct. Although I could not give alarm, I was perfectly aware of what was going on, and I recorded it."

"What happened?" she clutched at the robot. "Thirty-nine point seven one three minutes after I received the override, I first detected a humanoid with cybernetic enhancements matching those of the first ZED we encountered. She came floating down the stream-"

"She?" Devon was incredulous. "This ZED is a woman?" "That is correct," Zero said. "If you wish a further description, she was 1.56 meters in height, weighing approximately 135 pounds, with short brown hair coming almost to her shoulders."

Eden Project was stunned. Finally Denner muttered, "Tiny little thing."

"Don't let that fool you," the Doctor said. "With the right cybernetic enhancements, a butterfly could be turned into a killing machine. What happened next, Zero?"

"The ZED floated down the stream from the north on a raft, which she appeared to have made herself from local materials. It was not pre-fabricated. She was too silent for any of you to hear her. She crawled on the ground toward the camp, keeping Ms. Adair's tent between herself and the rest of you. When Ms. Adair took Ulysses into her tent, she was waiting 9.47 meters away. After Ms. Adair left her tent again without Ulysses, the ZED waited 31.254 seconds before she approached the tent. She cut it open with a knife and carried Ulysses away. Since he had already been sedated by Dr. Heller, he was unconscious, and also could not give alarm."

Devon was shaking and crying. "Did she harm him?" she asked.

"No," Zero replied. "In fact, the ZED seemed to take great care not to harm him. She went back to her raft and carried Ulysses away, floating downstream. She was still on the water when they passed beyond the range of my sensors."

Danziger sighed. "That means they could be anywhere. She could just keep going, or she could ditch the raft and start hiking in any direction. And the only thing we have to follow her in is vehicles, which she'd detect a mile away!"

"What about the horses?" Mazatl asked. "We could open those canisters and grow a few horses, and ride after them! These ZEDs can only detect machinery, right?"

"It would take too long to grow them," Julia said. "No one knows how to ride them very fast, and most of them probably wouldn't survive for very long, anyway."

Everyone was silent again. The despair on Devon's face was total.

The Doctor was staring at the ground, deep in thought. Then he looked up at Julia. "Why Ulysses?" he asked.

Julia sighed. "The ZEDs work for the Council. Specifically, on this planet, they work for Reilly. Reilly thinks Ulysses is the key to controlling the planet, because of his Terrian link."

"And what exactly would Reilly do to find and exploit this link?" the Doctor asked.

Julia pursed her lips, unable to meet Devon's gaze. "Experiment on him," she said. "With no regard for his life whatsoever."

Devon sobbed, and buried her face in Danziger's shoulder.

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