Renegade Robot

Eight

Jefferson Ash had been Wyatt's boss at Flip Brothers Auto Parts until he'd invented the self-inflating car tire, which automatically maintained a car's recommended air pressure at all times. After quickly becoming rich, he imported a Ukrainian bride, fathered a daughter, and received an irresistible invitation from The Church of Ultimate Reclamation. Although Wyatt hadn't spoken with Ash since a certain awkward episode, he rode straight to his house after leaving Bethany's. Ash was in his front yard, wearing nothing but shorts and sandals, casually trimming roses. Life had continued to be nothing but blessings for this man, for whom money had indeed purchased happiness.

"Hullo Wyatt," he said in his usual quiet manner as Wyatt pulled up. Jefferson Ash was as ordinary a person as anyone could ever hope to be. He was impossible to describe without resorting to terms like "normal" and "average" and "light brown and thinning". He did have a little pot belly which his three year old loved to pat and say "tummy tummy tummy tummy tummy" all the time.

"Hi Jeff," Wyatt said, hopping off the bike and walking over. His face had broken into a wide grin and he couldn't help himself but finally let out a gigantic guffaw, nearly knocking himself off his feet.

"Something funny, I take it," Ash remarked.

"It's Beth," Wyatt sputtered. "She thinks she's possessed because she's having trouble cranking out a sex scene for her latest porno. I mean, what in the world?" and he laughed again so hard he did topple over, landing on his butt on the driveway.

"Possessed you say?" Ash inquired. His eyebrows raised along with uttering the word. This was not something a member of the Church would take lightly. Possession was certainly among one of their central creeds.

"Nanobots," Wyatt gasped, "she thinks some microscopic helpbots are cleaning up her dirty little mind!"

"Seriously?" Ash pondered the implications as Wyatt staggered to his feet. "I suppose it is possible," he continued.

"Oh come on, Jeff," Wyatt said, "it's ridiculous and you know it. It's just the Frantics have got everybody all screwed up. They're seeing The Singularity under every bush, behind every shadow."

"I heard you saw it yourself, in person, just this morning," Ash casually dropped.

"Don't be silly," Wyatt told him. "You know as well as I do that the whole thing's just trumped up for ratings and income. The Church is in on it, you know that. TV, advertising, publications, panic products. Everybody's making money so they keep it up. It only gets nuts when you start believing your own nonsense."

"I'm not so sure," Jefferson said. "It seems more likely every day. These are troubling times, you know."

"Oh, you too?" Wyatt felt disgusted for a moment. He remembered now that awkward scene. Jefferson Ash had once been a staunch Rationalist, but that has been before his conversion. He'd originally gone into the church for the lifestyle, but now it was taking hold of him. In was in and he was in now all the way, it seemed.

"Do you remember?" Wyatt prodded. "Do you even remember how it used to be? When the bots first came out? Look what they've done for us! All the landfills, eaten away. Nuclear waste? Disposed of, naturally. Oil in the ocean? Garbage in the sea? Gone, every bit of it. Abandoned cities, broken down, restored. Extincted species? Returned. Of course there have been some unintended side effects. There have been some rogue elements here and there. Some were accidents, some got carried away, and some were botched jobs. We deal with it. We take care of it. There's nothing we can't handle. That's our motto, what we believe, remember?"

"But the snakes," Jefferson counted. "What about the snakes? Sure the helpbots have done some good. They were supposed to. But now the line's been crossed. It's out of our hands. They create themselves! My God, what are they planning? What about us?"

"They're not 'planning' anything," Wyatt said. "They have some intelligence, yes, but hardly any more than we do. They make mistakes. They mess up. They're practically human!"

"The Church has knowledge," Jefferson informed him. "We have inside sources. The snake that got away this morning, that snake is dangerous. I wonder if you realize what you've done? Still a Rationalist I see, but now maybe you're rationalizing just a bit too much, don't you think? I don't wonder if you do. That was a bad mistake, my young friend."

"Come on, Jeff," Wyatt said. "She thinks the whole family's possessed because the kids cleaned up their rooms and Blair's messing around with Clarissa Simpson."

"I know about that too," Ash replied. "That Clarissa's in a tricky spot right now. The Church doesn't look kindly on divorce. Families broken up are not usually permitted to remain in The Gathering. I heard she'll be evicted soon."

"What is it with this place?" Wyatt blurted out, walking back towards his bike. He felt it was wrong to come here. Ash was not really his friend anymore. A friend is someone you can talk to. This one was like a wall, a repeating wall of doctrine. Frantics seemed to wish the apocalypse would happen and happen fast. They yearned for disaster, cataclysm, catastrophe. Living in a normal world where things take time and even calamity comes slowly was just too dull for them to bear. Ignoring the actual events of the factual world outside, they tuned in to their random noise factories of gloom and histrionics. They would not listen to reason. Wyatt knew. He'd been out there. For all the shrieking and moaning the basic fact was that the world was not going to hell, not in a hand basket or any other way, or rather, it was still going to hell the old-fashioned way, in due course and in its own time.