Robo-Bug

by Bill Bowler

Part 1 appears
in this issue.

conclusion

A gigantic, black, hairy fly the size of a bumble bee flew down the side of the mountain. It crossed a dusty road, flew through a sentry post, up over a brick wall, past an armed guard dozing in a chair, and buzzed along the shaded side of a concrete blockhouse.

The fly banked left through an open window, circled a table in the corner of the room, extended its legs, and commenced final approach. Once at rest on the tabletop, the fly rubbed its forelegs together and looked around the room.

In a secure bunker in the sub-basement of a nondescript building in Fairfax, Virginia, a series of images flickered on Frank’s screen: a window, the interior of a room, a table top, and finally, the backs of two men sitting at a computer monitor.

“Hold it right there, Lou,” said Frank.

The operator steadied the joystick.

“Can you see what they’re looking at?”

“No, sir.”

“We need a closer look at that monitor.”

“Yes, sir.”

Lou pushed the throttle. The fly took off, adjusted its heading, and buzzed towards the men. The top half of the enemy monitor began to come into view. The image on Frank’s screen suddenly rotated clockwise and disappeared in a blur of motion.

“Damn!” muttered Lou. He jiggled the joystick and started pressing buttons on the console panel.

“What happened?” asked Frank. “I want to see that screen. Go back to the screen.”

“That could be a problem, sir.” Lou let go of the stick and began typing commands through the keyboard. “The unit is not responding.”

“What do you mean, it’s not responding?”

“We’re transmitting, the signal is received, but the unit is not responding.”

“Well, keep trying!”

“I am, sir.”

Lou tapped keys on the keyboard, pushed buttons on the console panel, and jiggled the joystick. The fly circled the room.

Frank began to mutter under his breath. Lou pulled a cord from an in-put, blew on the tip of the connector, and reinserted it into the neighboring slot.

“Will you hurry up, please?”

“I’m on it.” Lou pushed the stick right. The fly turned left.

Lou’s analysis of the problem was correct. The little fly’s nervous system had received the command to bank right, but the little fly brain was conflicted. An overpoweringly attractive aroma was wafting from the left.

Lou tapped the keys and tilted the stick. Right came the command. Bank right.

The fly considered banking right. It wanted to bank right. It was prepared to bank right. But the most alluring fragrance was reaching its sense organs from the left, and the better part of its little brain had the irresistible urge to go left.

“It’s still glitching, sir,” Lou reported.

“Can’t you do something?” asked Frank.

“I don’t know, sir. We could try a full-power reset, but we would lose contact with the drone for a short period, and it might not work, anyway. We need to do some trouble-shooting. We don’t know if the problem is hardware or software.”

Frank threw up his hands. “I don’t believe this.”

“Look, sir.” Lou pointed at the screen.

Blurred images flashed by, the screen turned white and then came into focus. The close up image of a white granular surface rippled with dunes appeared on the monitor. It looked like the Gobi Desert.

In the blockhouse control room, the fly had disobeyed a direct command, turned its back on the enemy computer, and veered off towards the aroma. It flew across the room, went into a nose dive, and plopped down face first, knee-deep in confectioner’s sugar on top of a half-eaten donut.

The image came into focus and Frank stared at the rolling white dunes on the screen.

“What’s that? Where is it?”

“I don’t know, sir.”

From out of nowhere, a flat, rubbery, spatula-like surface came smashing down. The rush of wind propelled the fly forward as the fly swatter slapped down on the donut. Skewed images flashed by on Frank’s screen in quick succession as the robo-bug frantically corkscrewed through the air towards the ceiling.

“Look out! Look out!” Frank shouted at Lou. “You’re going to crash!”

Lou expertly manipulated the joystick. The fly leveled off, and the image on the screen stabilized.

Lou pushed the stick forward and the fly headed towards an open window. A hand appeared and pushed the window shut.

“Watch where you’re going!” Frank shouted again.

Lou calmly pushed the stick left. The fly banked sharply, avoiding the windowpane, and began to climb.

“We have regained control of the drone,” said Lou.

“That was close,” said Frank. “Do you think they know?”

“Hard to tell,” said Lou.

The fly went into a holding pattern, circling the room near the ceiling. A door opened, and a security guard entered the room with an aerosol spray can.

“Go! Go!” said Frank.

Lou pushed the throttle to full and the fly accelerated out the open door as the spray can hissed behind it.

“You made it!” said Frank. “Good job. Now let’s get out of there.”

The fly buzzed at full velocity down a corridor at ceiling height, and turned a corner. An intricately woven net of cables appeared on the screen.

“Look out! Look out!” screamed Frank, but it was too late. The fly flew into a spider web high in the corner of an alcove.

Lou switched into reverse and pushed the accelerator. The fly buzzed frantically, but could not pull free.

“We’re stuck,” said Lou.

“Oh, great,” said Frank. “That’s just great.”

“Now what, sir?”

“Let me think, will you? There must be a way out.”

Frank stared at the monitor, his brain racing through the possibilities, searching for the solution. Suddenly, a terrifying hairy speckled face with ferocious jaws and eight staring, unblinking inhuman eyes filled the screen.

“Oh my God!” Frank involuntarily took a step back.

“Uh-oh,” said Lou.

Normally, the spider would have wrapped up its prey to eat later, but four days had passed since its last meal. The spider lifted the fly to its open jaws and bit down.

The screen went blank.

As the spider chewed on a tasty morsel, it chomped down on a piece of something hard and cracked a mandible. A sharp pain shot through the spider’s jaw. It spit out the offending mouthful, rubbed its jaw, and returned to the edge of its web to wait for the next guest.

Frank gazed at the blank screen and turned to Lou.

“Spider-bot?”

“Sir,” said Lou, “that was a real spider.”

“Of course,” said Frank. “Listen, can you scroll back before the glitch to the partial shot of the enemy monitor. Maybe we’ve got something.”

Frank felt a nudge near his left buttock and turned around. A large dog stood behind him, drooling and wagging its tail.

“What’s that dog doing in here?”

“She’s a guard dog, sir,” said a security officer standing near the door.

Frank looked at the dog’s face. The dog looked back at Frank and seemed to be studying his features. Frank stared at the dog, and the dog stared back. It was no longer wagging its tail.

“Say, what’s going on here?” Frank thought.

The dog walked around Frank, put its front paws up on the desk, and looked at the screen displaying the image from the surveillance mission.

The tail started wagging again. The dog studied the screen, and then slowly looked around at the four corners of the bunker, taking everything in.

There was something about the dog that Frank did not like. He couldn’t put his finger on it, but the dog’s behavior was odd.

Frank turned from the screen in disgust. The mission had not gone as planned. Unexpected external parameters had altered the mission vector. The brass would cut his funding now. He’d be lucky to still have a job. He looked around wondering, why me?

The guard dog was circling the room, sniffing the equipment. It studied the dials and gauges, looked at the computer screens. On a desk near Frank lay a black book marked “Top Secret/Classified.” The dog put its forelegs up on the desk and nudged open the book with its nose.

Frank shook his head and smiled despite himself. What’s the use? He decided to make friends, walked over, and scratched the dog behind the ear.

“Hey, boy. How are you? Good dog. Hey? What’s this?” With his fingertips, Frank felt a small disc-shaped object under the dog’s skin behind its right ear.

* * *

Frank banged on Lionel’s door.

“Lionel, it’s me. I have to talk to you.”

“Come in,” came a familiar feminine voice from behind the closed door.

Frank entered the Lionel’s office. Tamara was standing behind Lionel’s desk, smoothing her skirt. Lionel was straightening out some papers. He picked up his coffee mug, took a sip, and leaned back in his chair.

“That will be all for now, Miss Hari. Sit down, Frank. Would you like a cup of coffee?”

Frank took a seat and looked suspiciously around the room.

“What’s the matter, Frank? You think they’ve bugged my office? Ha ha. Don’t worry. We stay two steps ahead of them.”

“I’m not so sure, sir.”

“What do you mean?”

Frank took a tiny metal wafer from his pocket and placed on Lionel’s desk.

Tamara watched as Lionel picked up the chip and examined it.

“What’s this?”

“Microchip transmitter-receiver.”

“Very nice work. Is it one of ours?”

“It’s one of theirs, Lionel.”

“Where did you get it?”

“Behind the guard dog’s ear.”

“What?!” Lionel stood up behind the desk.

“It was implanted behind the dog’s ear. We’ve got a mole. Someone is conducting surveillance through a remote-controlled canine. They’ve got a program just like ours, Lionel, but it’s bigger. They’re farther along. They’re using animals, dogs, maybe cats? Birds? Fish? Elephants? Who knows what they’re capable of?”

“Calm down, Frank. Let’s work the problem. It may not be as bad as you think.”

“I hope you’re right, sir.”

Frank pulled a photo from a manila envelope and placed the photo on Lionel’s desk.

“We lost our micro-drone, but not before it gained access to the enemy base. We surveyed the area scrambled in the aerial reconnaissance image. Before we lost control of the drone, we captured this image.”

Lionel and Tamara bent over the photo. It was a shot of two enemy agents looking at a computer monitor that showed another two men looking at another computer monitor.

“Hmm,” said Lionel. “Those two men, they look familiar.”

“Well they should,” said Frank. “It’s Lou and me. The enemy is watching us watch them.”

Lionel straightened up and winced. The circular concept seemed to pain him. He stared straight ahead, expressionless. Frank waited patiently. Lionel turned and walked stiffly to the window. His movements were mechanical. He stood gazing out at a bird on a branch for several moments, still not saying anything.

“Sir?”

Lionel stood a moment longer, then came back to his desk and sat down awkwardly. He cocked his head at an angle, and with a blank look on his face and empty eyes, began to speak.

“I... I... I...”

“Admiral,” said Tamara, “are you feeling all right?”

Frank had never known Lionel to stutter. He must be under a lot of pressure. Or, maybe... Frank went on his guard. He put his finger to his lips to shush Tamara, and peered around the room.

A faint, acrid smell reached Frank’s nostrils. Something was burning. Frank sniffed the air, followed his nose, and noticed a thin wisp of smoke coming from Lionel’s left ear. Lionel was still trying to say something.

“I... I... I...”

Tamara screamed.

“Guard!” Frank called out. “Guard!”

The door opened and two military policemen rushed into the room.

Lionel began to rattle. “I I I I I I...” His body shook, a small flame flickered, and he fell forward onto the desk, grey smoke streaming from both ears. His head knocked over his coffee mug, spilling cold coffee onto Frank’s surveillance photo.

“Lionel!” Frank cried out. “Lionel!!”

Frank and the guards stood with their mouths open as the smoke from Lionel’s ears wafted lazily out the open window. Tamara was crying quietly.

“He was acting strangely today. Cold. Distant. He wasn’t himself.” Tamara dabbed her eye with a tissue.

“Shh,” said Frank. “Listen. Do you hear that?”

Tamara stopped crying and they looked around the room, straining to hear.

Frank heard it again, a muffled scraping sound. They all heard it this time.

“Over there,” said Frank. “It’s coming from the closet. Someone’s in the closet.”

The guards drew their pistols, and Frank flung open the door. Inside the closet, another Admiral Plankton was lying on the floor, bound and gagged.

“Get him out of there,” said Frank. “Help me.”

They untied the newly discovered Lionel and dragged him out of the closet into the office.

* * *

“They snuck up on me from behind!” said the real Lionel, breathless. “They’ve infiltrated the base. Their program far surpasses ours. Flies? Why should they worry about measly little flies, when they’ve got nice, big spiders, and dogs, and...” He broke off and looked at the robot sprawled face down on his desk. “Who’s that?”

“No wonder he seemed so... cold.” Tamara sniffed.

“Whoof, whoof.” The droopy eared guard dog had nudged past the guards and stood wagging its tail in the open doorway.

Frank froze. The sensation of being watched by unseen eyes sent shivers down his spine. He squinted and peered around the room.

Just outside the window, on the branch of a flowering dogwood, a robin sat, singing. Frank stared out the window at the bird. The bird broke off its song and stared back.

“Close the shades,” Frank said to Tamara. “Quiet, everybody. Don’t worry. Everything’s under control.”