Sole Survivor
Another scene from Awakening the Metal Dragons, the first volume in my science fiction trilogy, The Embers of Empire. Enjoy!
Helen Dahl stared in horror at the path of destruction left behind by the alien war machines. Bodies and pieces of bodies were scattered everywhere-men, women, and even children-and every building in town was in ruins.
"Blood. So much blood..."
The conflicting emotions all but overwhelmed her logic processors, and Helen feared her robotic brain would shut down from the emotional overload. Never in her hundred years of existence had Helen ever experienced such pain, sorrow, and despair, and once again Helen wished she had been programmed to shed tears-tears would allow her to release the powerful emotions building within her, and closing her eyes, Helen fell to her knees and attempted to deal with her grief and sorrow.
Helen ran a full diagnostic of her software, and to her relief discovered there was no permanent damage to her hardware and software. But Helen knew the pain and horror of this day would be with her forever-robots had perfect recall of everything they experienced-and although Helen knew she could erase these awful memories, as one of the few survivors of the massacre she had to remember these events for the good of humanity.
Focusing on her diagnostic programs helped Helen deal with her emotions, much like a human using meditation to resolve their emotional problems-but no matter how much she attempted to deal with the pain and sorrow, these powerful emotions simply would not go away.
But a few minutes later, her audio sensors detected the presence of one of the alien war machines, moving through the ruins in search of survivors. Helen opened her eyes and rose to her feet as her pain and sorrow gave way to a burning rage like nothing she had ever known.
"Who are you?" she screamed. "Why did you do this? Why did you kill everyone on the planet?"
Once again the alien war machine rippled and blurred as nanotech assemblers reconfigured its shape and form.
Jaws like a prehistoric crocodile filled with razor-edged teeth of synthetic diamond resembling those of a monstrous deep sea fish retracted and reconfigured into a muzzle like a dire wolf while the black crystalline teeth became lupine fangs while two pairs of iridescent black eyes appeared among the writhing medusa-mane of sensory appendages, regarding her without pity or compassion. The alien war machine attempted to imitate a human voice, and although the grammar and vocabulary were now perfect, it was without inflection or emotion.
"We are the destroyers of worlds... the death of empires... the end of everything."
"But why did you do this?" she cried. "These people were no threat to you!"
"Negative. These humans attacked us with primitive gunpowder weapons. They became hostile opponents... and were eliminated from the simulation."
"Simulation? These were innocent people!"
"Negative. All hostile combatants must be eliminated. Those are the rules of engagement."
"No! I won't let you do this!"
"Any hostile attempt by another machine will result in immediate termination. Do not engage."
Overwhelmed by conflicting emotions, her logic processors had no choice but to shut down to avoid a system crash. Helen tumbled to the ground like a puppet with her strings cut, and considering her to have been eliminated from the simulation, the alien war machine returned to battle configuration and continued to search for survivors.