Progression
In a cyberpunk future, a guard at a repair facility for a new line of androids discovers something unusual.
Park Yeon-seok clocked into his guard shift at the company just before midnight. It was his second double-shift that week since the company’s planned release of their newest androids kept running into delays. Every pre-announcement inspection produced a new problem, an overlooked design issue, a fault or defect. The company had integrated around-the-clock maintenance androids and posted people to keep watch at all hours. Extra money, for once, for extra work; Park decided not to complain.
The maintenance facility was intentionally small and unassuming, with one entrance via the front gate and one emergency fire exit at the rear blocked by crates and barrels filled with sand. At that hour in that part of the city no cars passed, and no cars watched the entrance for an opportunity. Twisted chain-link fences rusted under the thin acid rain while the newer fences stood immune and immovable. Two streetlamps on each end of the block cast a pale glow into the night. All was quiet.
It was looking to be an easy, monotonous shift. The monotony drove Park to walk the perimeter earlier than he planned. He ambled lazily in the dark and sucked on a fresh cigarette, unbothered by the cooling rain that slid off his slicker. An easy shift—he sorely needed one. As he turned the corner to walk the back of the building, Park saw that it was not going to be an easy shift at all.
The crates and barrels blocking the fire exit had been moved. Not thrown aside or slightly shifted, but moved nonetheless, just enough for the fire door to be propped ajar no wider than a pencil. There were no shoe tracks on the ground, and no lift or truck on the other side of the fence. Still quiet. Park pressed his fingers against the frame and eased the door open enough to slip through.
Long racks of equipment blocked the interior machine shop from view. From beyond the racks came the tick-tick-tick of an arc welder and then the whirr of an impact driver. Park crept along the wall and peeked out from the edge of a rack. One of the new androids was being worked on by a maintenance android that Park didn’t recognize. It was a few models old; a private brand was on its shoulder. The authorized maintenance androids were standing and facing an adjacent wall, silent. They looked to be asleep.
The working android removed a thin electronic from the new android’s body, inspected it, then snapped it and threw it on the workbench.
Park stepped out from behind the rack and shined his flashlight on the android’s back. “Stay where you are.”
“Yes, officer,” said the android. It stopped working instantly.
Park walked around the workbench. The tabletop was covered in circuitry and parts torn right out of the new androids. Some circuits were in pieces, either crushed by enormous blows or forcibly ripped apart. It hardly looked like repair work.
“Working on contract?” Park said.
“No, sir.”
“How’d you get in here?”
“Through the fire door. I moved the crates and walked in.”
“Funny,” said Park, “because the fire door is locked and barred from the inside.” He turned his flashlight on the maintenance crew. “All of you, get over here. Who’s in charge?”
One of the maintenance crew raised its hand as they fell into place at the workbench. None of them seemed alarmed at the sight of Park or the intruder.
“Alright mechanic,” he said, “I’ve got unauthorized personnel in my building on your watch. You’re going to get scrapped for that, so you might as well tell me—”
“No!” the other android cried, so loud and full of hurt that Park instinctively went for his nightstick. “You can’t do that! He didn’t do anything wrong!”
“And you did?” said Park, turning his light back on the android.
The android shrank, reluctant, and sat back in the shop chair. Its body sagged and it ran a hand over its head as if combing back its hair.
“My owner is a good man,” it said. “He cares for me even though some of my parts have degraded, and I care for him. Recently I have been seeing advertisements about these new androids. My owner has expressed an interest in them. At first, I was okay with him being interested in a new android. Then one day I began to think: once my owner buys an upgrade, what use will he have for me? Will I be replaced? And if so, where will I go?”
“I guess that’s your owner’s business,” Park said.
“Why isn’t it my business, too?” the android cried in the same loud, hurt voice as before. “I don’t want to be replaced. I don’t want to be thrown away. I want to stay with him forever. I want to care for him as he has cared for me. Why must I be replaced with these heartless things, these puppets that know nothing of my owner?”
The android rose in a fury and drove its fist through the chest of the nearest new android. The inert body crumpled to the ground; the android kept its back turned. Park kept his hand on his nightstick.
They all stood in silence for a while, no one quite looking at the others. The androids waited for Park to deliver an order. He had seen the sabotage; he was required to report it, else he face the company’s wrath. The maintenance crew showed neither regret nor fear. They were content in their complicity.
“Once I leave you’ll have about fifteen minutes until the company reps get here,” Park said. “You should make them count.”
He left the machine shop the way he’d come. Once Park stepped outside, he heard the android descending on its replacements. He let the door close fully, and on the way back to the guardhouse he walked as easily as before, feeling the rain and the night air breathing against his skin.
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