By David C. Daoust
Ratchet was not surprised to learn of the reaction to the tiny toy bunny that Harper used to try and communicate with the new data-sphere. He grew up with a bot, Vincent. Quality ports were important to high caliber Data-spheres. Vincent spent most of his time plugged into a small hover bot. The hover-bot was little better than the bunny, but he knew his Uncle Chuck had replaced the port with a better one. And the small toy’s inherent ability to fly, took care of locomotion. Ratchet never considered that Vincent may want limbs.
Harper insisted that the bot would need some sort of limbs to move. She insisted that it would be like torturing the thing, if they didn’t provide something. She made him imagine, waking up, without arms or legs! Unlike most of the Onion, Ratchet understood that bots were a lot more than just programs. Vincent himself, was like an Uncle to him, or Great Uncle really, since he was Grandpa’s chum from way, way back. Despite all that, he never really put much thought into whether or not a bot would ‘like’ any given form.
Ratchet pulled the trigger of the high powered drill, bolting the huge mechanical arm to the big old metal ‘bucket’ they’d decided to use to house the port. Harper was diligently at work cleaning away as much grime as she could from the old metal surface. The square bucket was more about supporting the over-sized arms though. The original chassis, which they’d acquired from Mr. Lions, that actually held the ‘quality’ port within, was bolted to the back of the metal tub, there was no way that chassis could support the only available arms they’d found.
All they could find were these old arms, from some old industrial machine. Arms which were dragged out of the junk piles that made up most First Waver’s holds. The hands were fairly dexterous, but over-sized. Ratchet had no idea, exactly, what they were used for before this. He knew they had better stuff at his house, but their crawler was all the way at the Starport, and he knew his dad was busy with more important stuff.
Eye, mouth, and ear, were relatively easy; he just popped open an old computer and built something that could serve as a head, all the bits were readily available, therein. The wiring was bit tricky, and making sure it could connect with the much older port model, took a few adapters, but tech tended to snap together pretty easy in the Onion. Harper insisted on two eyes, so he had to dig up another camera.
He deconstructed his boots and ran the anti-gravity gizmos through the bottom of the massive bucket. So, the new bot-form wouldn’t have legs, but it could hover around. Ratchet always felt hovering around was preferable. In fact, he crossed his fingers that he had enough parts at home to replace what he took from his boots (which were his favorite thing).
Building the bot was challenging, but most of all it was distracting. Ratchet could use all the distractions he could get, seemed like he was taking hit after hit these days. Who knew where Dad’s decision to help overthrow Red Faction, with the people from Grady, would lead. Well, if it wasn’t for the bot, he’d be worried; Unlike Charles, who Dad, for some reason, allowed to accompany him during- whatever the heck they were doing at the starport!
“So…” Harper, clearly deep in thought as she examined their progress, suddenly spoke up as Ratchet bolted the next arm on. Ratchet had a sinking feeling she was about to insist on something else, “I mean, we did this so that we could talk to it without it… possibly… destroying everything…”
“Yeah?” Ratchet didn’t understand the issue.
“Well,” Harper said gesturing to the metal contraption, it was smaller than the mining-bot, but it was still fairly imposing, “We built a hulk!”
“Oh, right,” Ratchet put together where she was going, he’d already given it some thought, “I figure I’ll sit inside the bucket, and if it starts going wild, or acting funny- I’ll pull the data-sphere. She’ll never know I’m in there.”
“Oh, Okay,” Harper agreed readily, “That sounds good.”
“From what I gathered from her, before Grandpa shut her down,” Ratchet continued as he tightened a few extra bolts, “I don’t think she’s dangerous, like, at all.”
Ratchet thought for a minute, “I suppose I could disconnect the…”
“No, no,” Harper stopped him right there, “I don’t want to torture the poor thing any more…”
“Okay,” Ratchet was agreeable, whatever she wanted. “I think it’s about ready.”
“Oh!” Harper said surprised as she hurriedly finished scrubbing down that last bit of grime on the old blue contraption which was now ready to become a bot.
Harper backed away as Ratchet climbed inside the spacious innards of the bot’s torso, Ratchet signaled her to back up a little bit further, and she did so with a nod. He ducked down inside and pulled the head, which was really more of a lid, down on top of him. There was a light within, which he’d pulled from an old freezer, so he could see despite being sealed inside. Unfortunately, he couldn’t see outside.
“Ready?” he called out, as he held the data-sphere over the port.
The expected reply never came. Instead he heard the muffled conversation between Harper and her mother, who must have arrived just as he’d closed himself within. Farrah was worried, Sadie was hurt, and her mother was trying to find all the sisters.
The distraught mother asked where Dicey was, the youngest of them; where Gracie was, the second youngest- but Harper just kept asking what was wrong with Sadie. The woman finally explained that Sadie was in a med-bay, after being ‘beaten-up’. Harper cried ‘by who?’ and insisted that she go to her sister at once. Her mother, tight-lipped about ‘who’, said she couldn’t, they needed to find her sisters.
Ratchet already knew by whom. The anger welled up within him, his fist slammed into the solid metal wall. The searing pain shot up his arm, a pit formed in his stomach, and his eyes immediately began to water. He knew it was broken. He stood up, opening the bot back up with his remaining good hand. Harper and Ratchet’s gaze locked as the pair stood, both speechless.
Farrah immediately rushed forward, shocked, she tenderly examined what the boy had done to himself.
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