The Android Chronicles Book One: The Android Defense (20 page)

“Like a dummy Vice
President?”

“Exactly,” Damian said.
“You’d have to tweak the title a little, since we already have a
vice president, but you get the idea. Can you line up a list of
candidates and we can start interviewing as soon as
possible?”

“Sure, Damian,” Carlie said.
“Can I finish my bath now?”

“Take your time. But when
you’re done I want you to come to my room and give me your opinion
on this new car I’m having delivered from Japan.”

“Fine.”

The noise and crowds of New
York City were a slight shock to Gustaf after his long sojourn in
the Colorado mountains. He wheeled his suitcase behind him and kept
a close eye on the chauffeur who had waited for him at LaGuardia
Airport and was now moving briskly ahead of him towards a waiting
limousine. Gustaf bumped into many people without bothering to
apologize. He kept his head down and the brim of his hat pulled low
over his face.

When he at last reached the
car the chauffeur took his suitcase and placed it in the
trunk.

Gustaf sat thankfully in the
backseat of the car and rolled up his dark window
immediately.

The car pulled away from the
airport and towards Manhattan. Gustaf did not look out of the
window but instead took his computer tablet out once more and
buried himself in it.

“Only fifteen minutes to the
Frontier Building, sir,” the chauffeur said.

“Good,” Gustaf said. “I hate
traffic almost as much as I hate crowds.”

Chapter 9.

Mandelie leaned against
Luke’s shoulder as they sat on her couch watching a hockey game on
television. Luke was casually dressed in sweatpants and a
sleeveless shirt. His eyes were fixed on the game.

“You really like hockey,
don’t you?” Mandelie said.

“I find it more interesting
than some other human sports,” Luke said. “It requires speed and
skill, as well as physical impact. Basketball is interesting as
well. Jake and I are going to start playing it in a court near his
home.”

“Maybe one of these days we
can go watch a real live hockey game,” Mandelie said. She buried
her face in Luke’s shirt and inhaled his cologne.

“You always smell so good.
How is that possible?”

“I don’t perspire,” Luke
said. “But you know that.”

“Yeah,” Mandelie said. She
leaned closer against him. Luke placed his arm behind her back and
kissed her on the side of her face.

“You’ll stay tonight,
right?” Mandelie said.

“Of course,” Luke
said.

The Frontier Corp. Building
struck Gustaf as horrendously, lavishly ugly. It offended his sense
of design and he did not look closely at it as he was met at the
front doors by Bernard Card.

Bernard extended his
hand.

“How are you, Mr.
Jorg?”

“I am fine,” Gustaf said. He
followed Bernard through the doors and through a huge lobby paved
in dull red marble stones and with stained glass windows on the
walls. Actual gargoyles protruded from the walls and a fake apple
tree sat in the middle of the lobby.

“Who designed this
building?” Gustaf said.

“Oh, Mr. Castleshank drew up
the plan himself,” Bernard said, with some pride in his voice.
“He’s very well traveled, you know. He visits Europe regularly and
draws his inspiration from a lot of things there.”

“Apparently,” Gustaf
said.

They ascended an elevator
that clanked loudly all the way up to the fifty-third floor, the
top of the building. Gustaf said nothing and Bernard checked his
watch every other minute.

“The other recruits have
already arrived,” he finally said. “You will meet them as well. We
have set up a lunch for everyone in the reception area.”

Gustaf was not overly
pleased by piece of information.

The elevator doors opened
and the two of them walked into a large reception area in the
middle of two corridors extending right and left. The reception
area was carpeted with lush carpet the color of a rotten, exploding
orange. The walls were painted a pale, sickly green and hung with
pictures of cowboy hats.

There were four other people
already gathered in the room. Gustaf scanned them all quickly. One
was a tall, attractive red-haired girl dressed in a suit that was
slightly too masculine, and low heels. One was a short,
square-faced man wearing a colorful silk tie, a white shirt, and
pants. One was a plain-faced dark-haired girl wearing a black dress
and a sour expression. The fourth was a tall, angular man who was
passably handsome and stood a little too closely to the red-haired
girl.

“Everyone, this is Gustaf
Jorg,” Bernard said.

The red-haired girl gasped.
She came forward towards Gustaf.

“You’re Gustaf Jorg? I can’t
believe it. I’m Carel Beflern. You’re like my hero!”

She seized Gustaf’s hand
before waiting for him to give it, and pumped it
energetically.

Gustaf jerked his hand back
when he had the chance to do it.

“Nice to meet you,” he
said.

He exchanged quick
handshakes with the other three people as well. The dark-haired
girl’s name was Mary Alsin, the square-faced man’s name was Harris
Tamber, and the tall angular man’s name was Jozef
Gimble.

“The lunch and Mr.
Castleshank will be here shortly,” Bernard said, looking at his
watch again. “In the meantime, why don’t we go around and just give
a brief introduction to ourselves?”

He looked at
Carel.

“I’m Carel,” Carel said.
“I’m thirty two years old and a robotic engineer for the U.S.
Navy.” She smiled, aiming her smile at Gustaf.

“Mary Alsin,” Mary said.
“Spent four years as a robot designer for Ford Motor
Company.”

“Harris Tamber,” Harris
said. “I’m a transplant from Ireland. I was working on plane design
there. Don’t have much experience making robots, but I was told
there are strong similarities.” He laughed nervously.

“Jozef Gimble,” Jozef said.
“I’m from Denmark originally but I’ve been living in Maine for
years. I’m a prosthetics builder for one of the biggest hospitals
in Maine.”

“Gustaf Jorg,” Gustaf said.
“I’m from Sweden but I have dual citizenship in Sweden and the
United States. I’ve been designing androids all my
life.”

Harris laughed again
nervously.

“Right, we’re supposed to
call them androids right? Not robots.”

“A true android is worlds
apart from a robot,” Gustaf said.

Carel looked at him
admiringly.

Luke stirred slightly and
opened his eyes, his sleep state interrupted. Mandelie lay beside
him, her hair fallen over her face. Luke ran his hand over her bare
back and pulled her blanket over her more closely. He watched her
breathing for a few moments.

“I know you’re looking at
me,” Mandelie said, without opening her eyes.

“I can’t help it,” Luke
said. He pushed her hair from her face.

Mandelie felt the heat from
the electric current running through his body. She moved closer to
him, pressing her bare skin against his, and felt him
respond.

The lunch Madrick
Castleshank had ordered for the recruits was good, at least, Gustaf
had to admit that much. He sat on an orange chair eating a plate of
caviar and lettuce cups, while watching Madrick introduce himself
to Mary Alsin.

Madrick looked even more
like a cartoon character than usual in a denim jacket, wide-legged
denim pants, boots and a gem-encrusted cowboy hat. His cold,
calculating eyes clashed with the gaudy hat in an unsettling way.
Gustaf had taken the eyes in when he had shaken Madrick’s hand, and
been unwillingly impressed.

He hardly noticed Carel
drifting over to him and sitting down beside him.

“What do you think of
Madrick?” she said, in a low voice. She bit into a fried
shrimp.

“I don’t think anything of
him,” Gustaf said. “He gives the orders. We follow.”

Carel smiled. She seemed not
at all affected by Gustaf’s curt tone.

“I’ve been following your
work ever since you started, you know,” she said. “You don’t know
what a thrill this is for me.”

“Do you wish me to autograph
your arm?” Gustaf said.

Carel simply
laughed.

“You do kind of live up to
the rumors, don’t you? But I don’t mind. You can be completely rude
to me. I’ll still be one of your biggest supporters.”

Gustaf looked at her in
irritation.

“We’ve got one more
candidate,” Carlie said. She and Damian had been interviewing
prospects for the position of Vice President of for nearly two
hours. Damian looked tired and annoyed.

“She spent four years as the
president of her own tech company in Arizona and another four as
the assistant to the president of Global Communications. She’s
thirty one and originally from Pennsylvania. Her name is Elena
Marchet.”

“Alright,” Damian said, in
an apathetic tone. “Bring her in.”

Carlie opened the door and a
tall, slender woman with short blond hair and piercing blue eyes
wafted into the room, wearing a dark business suit and heels. She
smiled at Damian, who looked immediately more energetic.

“How are you doing?” he
said, as she sat in the chair in front of him and
Carlie.

“I’m good, Mr. Foster,”
Elena said. “It’s an honor to meet you. You’re kind of a legend in
the tech world.”

Damian laughed.

“What makes you think you’re
qualified for this job?” Carlie said, cutting in
abruptly.

The interview lasted a half
hour and even Carlie could not find anything unsatisfactory in
Elena’s responses.

When she was gone Damian
turned to Carlie.

“Hire her.”

“You just like her because
she looks like a swimsuit model,” Carlie said. “She’s not much more
qualified than any of the other candidates.”

“I don’t care,” Damian said.
“I want her.”

Chapter 10.

While the other recruits
were enjoying desserts, Gustaf had been slightly surprised when
Bernard had tapped him on his shoulder.

“Mr. Castleshank would like
to see you privately,” he said. “Come with me.”

Gustaf followed Bernard down
the left corridor and all the way to the very end, where Bernard
knocked on a door and opened it.

Gustaf found himself in a
vast office with high windows and ceilings. In contrast to the
decorations outside the office was sleek and more in accordance
with Gustaf’s sense of design. It was filled with heavy standard
black furniture – a black desk with two black chairs in front of
it, a black couch pushed against the wall. The only out of place
decoration was a pair of deer antlers that hung over the
desk.

Madrick was sitting behind
his desk, talking on his phone. He hung up as Bernard and Gustaf
came in.

“Leave us, Bernard,” he
said. Bernard left.

“Have a seat, Gustaf,”
Madrick said, in a congenial enough voice.

Gustaf sat down in one of
the black chairs.

“First of all, I’m very glad
you came all the way out here,” Madrick said. “I intend to make
this experience worth your time. Those other people out there are
all accomplished, qualified people. But they’re peanuts compared to
you. So I want to talk at you, one to one. Get your take on things.
How immersed in androids are you?”

“I’ve made a lot of good
androids in my life,” Gustaf said. “But even my best-made android
can’t compare to one android in existence. He’s the gold standard
of android engineering. His name is Luke and he was constructed by
a little-known lab called Argonaut Laboratories. He is, in short, a
miraculous creation.”

“Argonaut Laboratories?”
Madrick said. “Hmm.”

Gustaf took out his computer
tablet and began pressing buttons on it.

“I’ve been studying Luke for
years ever since I learned of his existence, gathering all the
information I could about him and deriving my own conclusions from
that information. My dream is to examine him up close, but that may
never come to be. However, I’ve learned enough about Luke’s design
to apply it to my own works. Sometimes I am successful, sometimes
less so.”

“Tell me what you’ve
learned,” Madrick said, his eyes narrowing intently.

“Luke is unique among
androids in that his android technology is infused into human
material,” Gustaf said. “He is made completely of organic material,
just as you and I are, though he has a metal skeleton in place of a
bone one. He has human sensations relating to the five senses. He
can eat and enjoy food, drink water, appreciate sounds and smells.
He can even have intercourse. In some ways his senses are even more
amplified than ours are, by his android technology. Certainly his
physical strength is much more than a human being’s. His android
technology is buried in every molecule and atom of his body,
through electric currents that move constantly through him and meet
at consoles placed in certain areas of his body. Those consoles
control his movements, his data and memory storage – which is vast
and limitless – his organic body functions, and his energy supply.
But they work in tandem with the electric currents that are
constantly filling the atoms and molecules of his body with
information and sensory knowledge, as well as supplying him with
incredible physical strength and endurance.”