Quantum State, page 18
Kir says, “Not long.”
“If we're going to die, maybe we should die fighting MAQS,” Esfir finishes.
“Fine,” I huff, angry that whatever decision I make, we'll likely end up dead. But at least we are fighting, fighting for freedom.
We follow Kir all the way back to the wall, wondering what happened outside of Cherni, why a human skeleton would be out there, and why the land is so decimated. Then we're climbing and crawling through the hole, until we're standing back where I started—Cherni.
By the time we cross the yellow, dead dirt-grass, the sun has almost fully descended, and when we reach the inner district, a few yards from town hall, the sun has settled behind the horizon, and yet—past curfew—there is a large gathering of about thirty, chanting, “Freedom, Freedom is our call; Freedom, Freedom one and all.”
Seven people stick out among the maddening crowd. Six of them with the faces of those who were imprisoned so many years ago, and I wonder if we can trust these faces—these unknown allies—to really help us. Faces I've only seen in newspapers, warning Cherni of what not to do to MAQS, or you would end up like them—behind bars the rest of your miserable life. I'm sure I remember a newspaper clipping to that effect. Still, their imprisonment makes them all the more trustworthy, because their goal is the same as ours: to destroy MAQS.
But the seventh face… the seventh familiar face stands on top of the stairs of town hall tall and firm, like she holds the world in her hands, shouting, “Let us in!”
Inna!
State of MAQS
Her youthful and hopeful expression cheers the group on below her as she raises her hands in defiance, yelling at the Echo adjacent to town hall. “What do you want from us?! You are a controlling warden! Always listening, always watching! Well, today we declare our freedom!”
The crowd cheers as darkness plummets around us and paints an unseen picture. Bots stand near the town hall doors repeating a single message, “Return to your homes. Return to your homes.” Keepers try to calm the crowd by talking to them on the steps in a respectful and quiet manner, waving their hands in a gentle movement for the crowd to disperse.
One Keeper watches Inna closely, just a step away from her, and his hand is ready to attack her arm like a snake about to choke a rat, but Kazimir elbows him in the side and there seems to be an understanding between the two, as if Kazimir—the higher ranked among them—has given her his unspoken protection.
But no one is listening, not to the bots and not to the Keepers. Not anymore. The dam of oppression has broken and its defiant waters are flooding the streets. Kir waves me ahead as I run side by side with Esfir toward the building as Inna sees me and smiles wide. Her smile is highlighted by slivers of moonlight. She races down town hall's steps and to my side where she slips KLI's copied key into my palm. “I knew you'd return.”
I smile in return, wanting to hug her, but I don't have the time. Instead—just as crowds notice me and start chanting my name—I dart off toward the side of the building behind Kir and Esfir. Then, Kir signals to the six prisoners from Calypso Tower to follow him.
Two of the prisoners look like siblings, except one is a man and the other a woman, both with curly, short blonde hair and crystal-blue eyes, long noses, and thin lips. They are clean, as is expected, because MAQS doesn't let anyone go unhealthy, not even prisoners. They each carry surge batons and swing them as they lead the band of imprisoned rebels behind them.
The other four have darker hair and eyes, though two of them are particularly short, one too lean, and the last is too tall. They carry rods which look like solid wood. Kir keeps his surge baton attached to the side of his tunic on a rope belt of some kind. I squeeze my hand over the key that will take us into the underground again, but this time we have the army we need to finally confront MAQS. I can't believe I'm here again. I feel like my whole life has led me to this moment, and I feel it in the pit of my stomach, in every fiber of my being. This moment will change everything.
Kir grabs the knob to the side door and I look at him in surprise when he explains, “Your Keeper boyfriend opened it for us.” But the knob doesn't budge and Kir wiggles the knob again. “Damnit.”
“What?”
“MAQS must have overridden the program. It's locked.”
“What do we do?”
Kir flings the tip of his surge baton to the metal knob and a blue electric wisp hits the door, which fries like an overcooked dinner. After the door short-circuits, Kir knocks the door in, and we step inside as he continues, “I told Kazimir I'd return with you so he'd better have the door open.” Then, he cranes his neck to glance at me. “He said he'd try. Not many Keepers willing to break rules.”
“Yeah, I noticed that about him,” I agree, and then my mind goes to Kazimir and where he'll be in all of this, when we finally meet MAQS face to face.
The six prisoners march in behind us as Esfir squeezes between me and Kir. “So, we head straight to the underground, right?”
“Yep,” Kir replies.
“But she's got to know we're coming. She must see us?” Esfir's forehead crinkles like it does when he's worried.
“I guess we'll find out,” Kir says as we continue in our march down the halls. “The distraction outside is keeping most bots and Keepers busy.” We turn a corner. “We don't have long—” we turn the last corner “—but maybe we'll make it?”
In the hall with the door to the underground, we see KLI standing by the door, protecting it like nothing matters more. I'm surprised to see him—just him. That is, until five more bots veer round the corner and demand, “Put your weapons down and return to your homes.” When we stand firm and tighten grip on all our weapons, the bots respond again, “We do not want to harm anyone. Please put down your weapons and return to your homes.”
The blonde female retorts, “You mean that tower you've keep me in for the last eight years?! I'd hardly call that home!” She swings her surge baton and hits the chest of the bot standing behind her, the blast of the electricity streaming through its wires causing the machine to keel over. Then, everyone loses control.
The two blonde siblings swing around and hit two more bots simultaneously as if they've kinked their brains to the same frequency or something, while Kir and the two shorter prisoners jump onto the last two bots behind us. I'm surprised the bots don't react with violence. Seems they could at any second rip any one of us apart. But I don't have much time to ponder the deeper details of bot programming or to witness the courageous fighting from us humans, because KLI aims for me.
Before I even notice, the machine has got its hands gripped around my wrists. My legs buckle underneath me and my feet scrape across the floor as it pulls me in the opposite direction of the door to the underground—my destination.
My fate starts to vanish in front of me and I scream. Esfir lunges toward KLI, his fingernails clawing at KIL's backside hopelessly, when the tall and the lean prisoners both leap at either side of KLI. With three humans pounding on his deft body, his robotic attention turns off of me and toward protecting himself.
“Put your weapons down, and return to your homes. We do not want to harm you.” KLI repeats the message as the two prisoners beat his sides with wooden rods. When KLI lifts his arms, he lets go of me, and simultaneously lifts both prisoners into the air with his metallic hands. Esfir freezes momentarily as we both watch this bot do what's impossible for us. Then, Esfir grabs my shoulder.
“Come on!” We back away, and then circle around toward the door to the underground. While bots are either distracted or fighting, I slip the key into the keyhole and finally hear the click that opens the door.
“We're in!” I yell to Esfir, and everyone in the hall looks up at me as I watch the blonde siblings work in sync and hit KLI's chest with surge batons before he falls to the floor in a convulsing motion. The hall is filled with six fallen bots, and despite a few bruises on our arms and legs, we're still standing, and that gives me hope.
I can't believe we've come this far, and the shock is still hitting me as I step through the underground door to the stairs. Then, we all hear her. Her voice is much like I remember it eight years ago when she spoke through the Echo by my home, announcing the arrest of Masha Mikhailov. Except this time, her voice isn't just commanding, it is scared.
“Do not enter the door. You will not find what you are looking for. Please, return to your homes immediately.”
We look at each other for a moment, all of us hearing MAQS either for the first time or after so long. Then the glimmer in Esfir's eyes reminds me that we're almost there, and his excitement means more to me than anything else—especially after the fear of outside. This is exactly what we've been looking for: the truth.
No way we're backing down now.
I step through the door and down the stairwell, my heart racing and chest pumping. I skip steps as I bolt downstairs with everyone on my tail. When I reach the bottom step, I notice only five bots protecting MAQS—or the blue-purple light on the wall in the background. Esfir, Kir, the blondes, and the other four prisoners quickly build a fortress around me in a semi-circle as we step forward in unison.
“We just want the truth, MAQS,” I yell. “We just want you to leave us alone! To stop listening to us, watching us. We don't need you in every aspect of our lives!” We step closer to the bots protecting MAQS. “Why can't you just leave us alone?”
The prisoners rush forward in a frenzy, not even needing me to encourage them on because they have their own war to fight and have waited so long—too long—for this moment, and it is theirs as much as it is mine. A moment that wasn't finished eight years ago, one that after all this time being locked up has only festered inside of each of them, and is ready to explode.
I'm not even sure what's happening before three prisoners are clobbering bots with wooden rods and the blonde siblings are poking others with surge batons. It's like a tornado swept in with us. So, I keep my distance with Esfir. Even Kir sticks to our side.
We watch as the bots hardly put up a fight, their strategy seemingly more of a defense, with an arm block here and a push there…until eventually they all meet the end of a surge baton and hit the ground convulsing.
I don't understand why MAQS doesn't attack us, send her bots to rip us to shreds, or better yet knock us out altogether and drag us to jail. Why not just execute them and send a clear message to any future rebels? But maybe she needs us alive? Maybe she needs something from us?
Despite my list of questions that continues to grow, I try to focus on the plan. The bots are on the ground, and nothing else stands between us and MAQS. We move forward, the darkness underground abating the closer we get to MAQS, until we can finally see her blue-purple lights flickering on the wall in front of us like streams of lightning. A large circuit board with an amazing quantum code.
She is not quite what I imagined. I guess I expected another robot, maybe one more sophisticated-looking than the ones that serve us in Cherni, but not this. As we gaze at the wall, I notice the wall is more of an illusion and that MAQS is more three-dimensional than that. Her circuitry streams in and out of a box shape the size of the wall, with a glow at her center.
“MAQS?” I ask as I reach my hand forward to touch the blue circuitry in front of me.
“Stop!” her voice demands in warning. “Human hands will burn at my touch.”
Her voice makes us all freeze.
“You can't stop us anymore. We're here. We've won,” I say, sure of myself, almost proud as I feel Esfir's hand graze my side.
“You shouldn't be here,” MAQS says, her female tone like metal through honey.
“Don't worry, MAQS. We're not going to kill you.” I squint my eyes as I lean closer to her circuitry, an astounding set of wires and connections that all seem to flow seamlessly, and I'm fascinated, more so than I should be. “At least, not if you tell us what we want to know.”
“And what is that, Masha?”
I'm surprised she says my name. The last time she said Masha was when she was addressing my mama's crimes, and I suddenly I feel infuriated. Turning, I look around, and see all the faces that have fought so hard with me for this moment, at all the hope in their eyes, and then I turn back to MAQS. “Why are you here?”
MAQS glows yellow for a few seconds and then, turning blue-purple, she responds, “I am here because of you. Because you are here. I allowed your descent here because I could see that you would not stop until you saw me, until you saw yourself.”
My head shakes and I almost slam my fists into her wall of circuits before Esfir touches my back and I remember her circuitry will burn me. “What does that mean?! Speak English!”
Her color turns a brighter yellow and then she answers in blue-purple again. “I was created to oversee humanity.”
“What are you talking about? Created? By whom?”
“By you.”
I stand frozen, confused. “You aren't making any sense!” I scowl. “Tomorrow, I'll only be eighteen! You existed before I was even born! Ruled over Cherni for generations!” My heated words puff my chest as I draw on my history lessons from Pod.
“Three generations to be exact.”
I don't expect answers to be so frustrating and scowl.
“No one has ever gotten this far,” Esfir encourages. “No one, and she's talking to you. Finish this.”
“Why are you watching us? Listening to us?”
“Because that is my program.”
I feel my face wrinkle like clothes left in a pile. “Your program?”
“I was programmed to oversee and protect humanity through surveillance.”
“Right,” I respond sarcastically. “And the service bots that ensure we are in by curfew are just part of the program?”
MAQS lights up yellow and then answers in blue-purple, “No, the bots were an adaptation of the program you designed for me.”
“Me?! Me?! Why do you keep saying me? I had nothing to do with this!” I shout at this computer, this hunk of bad circuitry, as Kazimir and Inna bolt down the steps and slide up behind Esfir, Kir, and me. Kazimir's brows are pulled inward and his eyes are fixed on me, confused—but I'm so glad to see him, and I become braver with more humans standing for me.
I change the subject, hoping that will give me better answers. “Why are we stuck inside of Cherni?”
“Because Cherni is your home.”
ARGH! I grumble and kick MAQS with my left leg, to my peril. My toes singe from the heat she emits and I fumble backward, landing on top of Esfir. MAQS glows red, and then the five bots that were on the ground stand; their clanking of hard, heavy metallic parts alerts us all as we jerk our heads in their direction.
“Damn it!” Kir shouts as he flips his surge baton. “We've got company.”
Before anyone can say anything, the six prisoners lunge toward the bots, swinging.
“Freeze.”
MAQS' command causes all five bots to stop moving, instantly. If a leg was up and ready to move forward, the leg stayed there. If an arm was about to block a hit, the arm stopped. Each and every bot froze precisely where they had been in the exact moment MAQS said freeze.
Then, she continues, “I have not awoken them to fight, but to aid Masha with her wound.”
Kir looks to me and I look to Esfir before Kir answers firmly, with veins throbbing his forehead, “Fine, but you don't need all five bots. Command three of them to leave. Two should be enough.”
“Or?”
He lifts his surge baton to MAQS's wall of circuitry. “Or you'll be fried beyond repair.”
MAQS chuckles, a strange mix of human laughter and metal clanging together, leaving us to wonder. “I knew you would say that. I'm a quantum computer, after all, designed to predict outcomes with precise accuracy.”
Kir steps closer to MAQS, his baton dangerously close to her. “Just do it now!”
“I'm doing this for Masha, not because that baton would damage me,” MAQS clarifies and then glows red before three bots walk ahead to the stairs, their footsteps slowing vanishing as they vacate the underground and enter the hall above us.
“Good,” Kir responds. “Now, help Masha.”
The last two bots walk over to me, and help lift my leg as one injects a serum from the tip of its pinky into the sole of my foot. MAQS brightens purple-blue. “The fluid should only take 40.5 seconds before soothing the burn.”
I look up to her. I've seen doctorbots treat sick people all the time, and once even myself when I was burned after a hot bath. “Thank you.”
“It is my program to help you.”
My foot is feeling good again, and the stinging skin around the burn begins to heal—but her words vibrate in my mind as I stare at my leg with bots to either side. “You keep bringing me up. Why do you do that?”
“It is my program to help all of humanity. That is how you designed me.”
The six prisoners look at me like I might be dangerous, like I've stabbed them in the heart or something.
I grab Esfir's hand as he helps me to my feet. I can stand again without feeling the burn, and am grateful and angry all at once. “No I didn't!” I argue.
I hear the prisoners growing uneasy with all this uncertainty, their whispers to each other more unsure than angry. Suddenly, the blonde female turns on me. I feel her hand on the back of my shoulder. “Who are you? Is this some kind of trap? You lead us down here to be killed by MAQS personally? A test of our disloyalty?!”
The blonde female flips me around without even trying and her hot face is so full of confusion—confusion I share.
“Why'd you free us?! What game are you playing, girl!” She punches my face before I can even answer, even breathe, and then I fall backward, landing in Kazimir's catch as Inna's heroic fist flies through the air and in loyal retaliation hits the female blonde in the nose. Blood runs out of her nostrils just as MAQS glows red and ten bots from behind suddenly surround us.
