Part Three – Sad Days, Robot Nights

It can be difficult to find the right words when someone is crying in front of you. It’s still harder to console someone you suspect is going to kill you. “Oh,” was the best Alex could find for the weeping mechanical hulk in his kitchen. The Boytronic Wonder was trying to say something but the words were obscured by his incredibly undignified snorting, bubbling and fizzing noises. Alex awkwardly looked down at the mugs drippping scalding tea over his hands.

“Um,” Alex tried again, and proffered the Star Wars mug, “get this in you.”

The Wonder honked out a thank you and took the mug in one shaking hand. With the other he tugged a charmingly embroidered handkerchief out of the string of pockets at his waist and noisily blew into it. Tea spilled onto the floor.

“Why don’t you sit down,”Alex suggested. He pulled out the kitchen steps from the corner and deftly kicked them open. They stood a slightly better chance of survival than the battered dining room chairs.

“I’m sorry about this,” sobbed the cyborg, gratefully accepting the seat. Alex grimaced as the metal steps creaked and bent under his weight, settling into a more rigid and permanent structure. Alex took up a poistion at a safe distance and sipped at his tea. It was much too hot but was more polite than staring. He felt embarrassed for the man’s tears and figured he’d have to be the one to talk them out of this.

“So… Boytronic Wonder,” even saying the name sounded ridiculous and Alex cringed inwardly, “how have you been?” The sight of a the naked man exploding shot past Alex’ inner eye again.

“Please don’t call me that. I hate that name – it sounds so stupid.”

“It’s a bit of a mouthful alright,” Alex sipped some more scalding tea.

“Dad gave us such stupid names. I mean, I’m not bloody Robin, the Boy Wonder. Can you imagine being taken seriously? Batman’s bad enough,” he affected a high pitched female voice, “‘Hello Batman, how nice to see you again – black, two sugars isn’t it? And would the Boy Wonder like a croissant?’ You’d feel like such a dick. Just call me Si.”

“Cy? As in cyborg?”

“No, as in Simon. That’s what Mum called me.”

“Right.” Between them they were defeating Alex’ previous record of awkwardness, set when he tried to explain to his parents why he’d drilled three holes in his head.

“It’s nice of you to drop by Simon; I mean, it’s very – new, this dropping in for a chat. Is there anything I can do..?”

“Well who else is there to talk to? Everyone else we’ve ever gotten involved with is either dead, or,” Simon thought for a moment,”- no, they’re all dead.”

Alex really didn’t like the sound of this and was regretting asking at all.

“You know, I didn’t really see anything,” Alex began.

“Oh, don’t worry about that. I don’t think Dad knows. We got Clive back, and that’s all he cared about.”

“Oh good. But there must be someone else you can talk to. Not that this isn’t lovely.” Alex felt he’d covered that well.

“Yeah – you. You’re not family. Dad would never understand.”

“Have you tried talking to him about how you feel?”

“God no! Jilly Lazareth tried that. We’re still finding pieces of her. She just wanted to go university.”

Alex pretended he still had tea in his mug and took a big fake sip.

“I liked Jilly,” Simon mused, “she had really nice hair.”

“At least you get out now and then,” Alex said, trying to get away from the topic of people dying. Simon’s blank look gave him a horrid trembling sensation in his stomach. “I mean, you’re here now…”

“Oh no, Dad would go mental if he knew I was here. I’m supposed to be silencing this policewoman in Leicester. Normally Man-Ho Tjusk would do it, but he’s got a cold, so it’s me. I was nearby so I thought I’d pop over, say hello, you know. I-” Simon broke off, tears threatening his circuits again, “I don’t want to kill people anymore. I just want to be normal.”

“Well, what’s normal anyway?” asked Alex lightheartedly.

“For me, this-” said Simon, tapping at objects on Alex’ kitchen table. A postcard vanished in a flash of flame, keys and coins magnetised and flew together in a clumsy orbit of Simon’s hand, and the radio turned itself inside out. Alex wasn’t entirely sure what was going on, but was grateful that he’d never hear John Humphreys on Radio 4 in the morning again.

“That’s, um, a bit different.”

“Different?” Simon stabbed his finger back down at the table. Blue tendrils crawled from under his t-shirt sleeve and down his arm, the ends sparking as they pulled free of his skin and vanished into the crap covering Alex’ table. Alex was alarmed by the rage emanating from the cyborg, despite his pacifistic claims. Then Alex’ ancient sandwich toaster glowed blue, coughed out a cloud of cheese-scented black smoke and started talking.

“First thing we have to do is establish an escape route – no matter what happens we gotta get you clean away,” Alex stared at the machine as it babbled, “we need an extra door in here.” Hastily Alex reached out and turned off the plug socket – the thing was prone to overheating at the best of times. He switched his stare to Simon.

“This is my life, look,” Alex averted his eyes as Simon yanked down the top of t-shirt, revealing a hissing mass of shapes revolving under the clear skin of his chest, “I’m just an experiment to them, like all the others,” Simon’s eyes lit up from the inside as he warmed to the topic, the tears welling up puffed out into steam; the coins spun round is a wider, sharper circuit of his outstretched hand; his voice took on a metallic ring as he began to shout, “thanks Dad – this is what I am. A monster, a killer.”

The coins exploded like domestic shrapnel, burying themselves in the brickwork. Alex’ house keys thudded into the cupboard door by his head. Alex swallowed nervously and tugged them out of the wood.

”Thanks, I’ve been looking for those. Would you like a biscuit?”

Do cyborgs like biscuits? Is Alex’ sandwich toaster alive? How many parts will this story have?

Find out next week in Part Four of: A Cyborg Calls

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Part Four – Do Androids Have Wet Dreams?

“You know, we’re all different on the inside,” Alex feared he was sliding into cliche but its horrible inevitability drew him on, “that’s what makes us special.” Alex hated that he was spewing the same bullshit his own parents had used as they drove him to the psychiatric hospital, but he really didn’t need an emotional cyborg on his hands. His house was too small for someone that special.
“Special doesn’t tell you what silk feels like, special doesn’t get you friends, doesn’t get you girls….” Simon spat with teenage moodiness.
“In fairness, you don’t really feel silk anyway. Your fingers slide off it. Like a er, soft fridge. Normal’s just trying to fit in,” hearing voices and self-trepanation puts people off, “plus really normal people tend to be boring arseholes.”
“I want to be boring. I want to be liked.”
“I’m sure people like you.” Alex was skating on thin ice; it seemed plausible that no one liked murderous half robots.
Simon just stared at him with those weird mismatched eyes, the blue one went right though him and the red one, well, it just felt like a laser target. It probably was.
“Well, what about girls?” Alex rallied.
“All the girls I know are either family or slaves.”
“Right. Slaves?”
“Not slave slaves. They’re just mindbent. It’s fine. They do whatever you want.”
“Oh.”
Another awkward silence separated them. Alex shook the biscuit packet like he was tempting a wild animal. Simon took three bourbon creams.
“Well, there is this one girl,” he began shyly.
“Great!” (please don’t be anyone I know, or at least someone I won’t miss) “What’s she like?”
“She’s beautiful,” the cyborg crooned dreamily, “and strong and clever-”
“Sounds lovely-”
“-and evil.”
“Less lovely. So what’s her name, how did you meet?”
“She’s Volupine Dementia and she held me captive for a week.”
Fuck. “The Volupine Dementia?” Because it’s such a common name… Volupine Dementia, legendary survivor of the nuclear blast that destroyed most of Sheffield when Alpha Strangemind discovered his powers and went underground. Legendarily insane and as dangerous as anyone in Galaxy Team. The instigator of the Nottingham Massacre, creator of the Cathedral of Sexual Death and reputedly the only person Galaxy Team can’t kill. Of course it’s the same Volupine Dementia, who else would this crazy kid fancy?
“Yeah… when me and Sally (you’d know her as Talon) infiltrated her lair because she was turning everyone in Nottingham into killer lust-zombies. Well, she caught us,” he gave a big goofy grin, “next thing I knew I was chained up and blindfolded and there was this gorgeous girl giving me electric shocks and asking me all these questions. It was wonderful, you know, just really talking to a girl. She wanted to know all about me.”
Alex was struggling to keep the phrases ‘Stockholm Syndrome’ and ‘what the fuck’ out of his voice and off his face.
“We talked for hours. I mean, she’d go off to do stuff with Sally too, but that was just cutting her head off, it wasn’t like our time.”
“She killed your sister?” incredulity was creeping in.
“No, nothing like that. She just took Sally’s head off and stuck it on a sex-eagle.”
“Well, that’s okay then.”
“Eventually Dad spoiled it all by having us rescued.”
“You must have been disappointed.”
“Yeah,” he blushed to a remarkable shade of red and lights twinkled furiously in his cheeks, “we’d been, um, you know, before the Beastlie Boys smashed the door in.”
“Oh. Oh!”
“I’d really like to see her again. I mean, she escaped – obviously.”
“Obviously.” And went on to breed armoured tortoises which she unleashed on motorways.
“But, I don’t know how to get in touch with her,” he looked at Alex with an expression of hope and pleading that even spaniels couldn’t match.
“You want me to… find her?” No, this was awful. Alex could not be a matchmaker for the criminally insane. Simon looked suddenly defensive. Perhaps it was Alex’ tone of incredulity and horror.
“You have to find her!” the lights flared up and the toaster plug ejected itself from the wall.
“Okay,” Alex chirped as the frightfully important kettle began to smoulder, “okay, I’ll have a proper think about how to do that.”
“That’s great. You know, guys like us have to stick together. I’ll be really grateful,” Simon said, earnestness and desperation competing in his throat.
“I’ll see what I can-” Alex was cut off by a roar that passed overhead, shaking the windows and setting off car alarms all down the street.
“I think I’d better go,” said Simon, handing his mug back to Alex, “but we should do this again sometime. Thanks for the tea.”
With a cheery wave and an anxious glance at the light blazing through the living room window, he let himself out the backdoor and hurried away. His garage-crushing craft took off, and raced low down the back road. It disappeared from sight just as Alex’ front door shook under a pair of heavy blows. Sighing, Alex put down the mug and went to answer the door. He was totally unsurprised to find Man Ho-Tujsk glowering at him under the orange streetlight. He sneezed mightily and brandished his tusks.
“Oh hello, I suppose you’d like a cup of tea too?”
 

Will Alex snag Simon’s date? Do cyborgs dream of electric eels? Was that the end? (Yes it was) What happens next?

Find out in a future story!

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