The Lengthy And Completely Optional Introduction:

This story was started years ago, 2003 I think, as a sort of weekly writing exercise. I'd try to write each segment in one sitting without any forethought about where I was going or even any overall storyline. It was fun to write that way, introducing new characters on a whim and jumping heedlessly into a scene without any idea where it might end up. But using that approach I wound up creating a labyrinth of plot points that I had to try and work my way out of each week, and a host of characters whose interplay was uncertain and sometimes forced. Fortunately, at around chapter three, I introduced Erik Tigue, a character that became pivotal to the story and provided the stabilizing effect I needed to go forward. So I am now hoping to revive this serial by rewriting the old chapters and then adding new ones. I will try to post the rewritten original chapters one a week or so until I have to start writing new ones and hopefully, by then, people will be following the story (fingers crossed). The advantage now is that I know the through story and can work towards that end. Plus I think I write a little better than before, so I can smooth over some of the dodgy bits. I also had to change some of the locations to make it a little more geographically accurate. I ripped these locations from Google Maps and I have no idea of their altitude, or whether or not they'd be submerged under the risen rivers.

I would like to explain that, in my stories, I don't present Mecha as indistinguishable from humans in appearance or in their thinking. The rare ones that can pass as humans are usually 'special projects', like David for example. There is another 'special' project in this story who I don't want to give away yet. Others are illegal machines that have had their 'Asimovian' restraints bypassed in order to allow them to attack humans if necessary. This allows the machines to be used as bodyguards and, occasionally, hit-men. A Mecha that cannot commit violence on a human would be useless in this job, and a body-guard that could not pass as human would be a dead giveaway. Therefore it would be absolutely necessary for an illegally programmed Mecha to pass as a human. There are other restraints on Mecha manufacture and programming that will be elaborated as the story goes forward. These are generally politically motivated for there is a struggle between working-class humans and the Mecha who threaten to replace them.

Further, I see the human process of reasoning and emotional reaction as generally un-programmable, and when a complicated Machine like David is created, these programmed emotional abilities have unforeseeable effects on their brains. This is where I see the seed of the Supermecha, an almost inadvertent side-effect of sentient response programming. But this story takes place long before that evolutionary leap in artificial processing. In this time, just years after the disappearance of David, there is much hostility towards Mecha, much of it justified, much of it not.

I should also point out that this story, unlike my others, uses coarse language and exploits the occasional sexual theme.

That's probably enough of an introduction, eh?

Schematic of Terror
a serial by
Bryan Harrison
utilizing the environment and
character concepts established in the
Stephen Spielberg
film
Artificial Intelligence

Chapter 1
Where it all began …

-1-

It was just after 1:30 am on New Years day under the crystalline starry sky of the inland. A solitary cruiser was making it's way along a quiet stretch of private road that bypassed the submerged sections of the old King's Highway and wound through the shanty forest south of Haddonfield where, three years earlier, a roaming Flesh Fair had fallen from the public grace. Inside the cruiser Massud Ramad was telling his wife, for the fourth time, to listen to what he saying. The man seemed quite oblivious to the fact that he had been the only talking since the couple had left a party in Shadow Creek twenty minutes earlier, and that his voice had been raised sufficiently for her, and perhaps anyone in the next lane to hear. Since they were alone on the road there'd be no way to test that theory, but Mariane Ramad was certain it was a possibility. Her husband shook his finger in her face to make his point clear, although it only served more to distract her from his words.

Massud misunderstood the apprehension in her face to mean she did not understand the obvious point that he'd been trying to make about the Martin's, the people whose party they'd left abruptly when he had taken insult from a flippant remark their host had made. But Mariane was not concerned about Derek Martin's inappropriate sense of humor. Her apprehension was derived from the fact that her irate husband seemed to be completely ignoring the road.

"And furthermore," Massud roared, "who is Derek to talk like that to me? If we're so far beneath his standards, then why did he invite us? Huh? Tell me that, Mariane!" She had no response, but Massud didn't wait for one anyway. "At least I earn my money!" he continued. "At least I perform a service for this city. I don't just sit on my ass getting fat on other peoples money!"

While they might not have been among the most well-heeled to attend the festivities, the Ramads could easily count themselves among the coddled classes; wealthy by any standard. What made the Ramad family unique was that they had achieved that status by walking the straight and narrow. Massud knew this fact made him a subject of rumor and mistrust. Certain members of the Council felt endangered by the presence of an honest man in their midst. This was what he was trying to explain to her.

It was just after his fifth "and further more…" that they both saw a flash of light at the side of the road and immediately felt the front end of the cruiser buckle. They were screaming when the wall of the service exit smacked into the windshield at 105kph.

The impact was deafening. Then there was silence.

Mariane awoke with a start. It took her a moment to realize she was not in her bed but, somehow, lying in the middle of a roadway. But that realization only led to another puzzle: how had she come to be here? She pondered this unsuccessfully for a moment, but it wasn't until she the tried to sit up that the memory came back in a flash of pain and nausea. She lay helplessly with this horrifying realization, having no idea how much time had passed since the crash, but knowing that the taste in her mouth was blood. A sick feeling came over her and it only grew worse when she realized that she did not know where Massud was. Then she heard him moaning somewhere near. In the cold blackness of the night, though, she could not see him. She tried to call out, but pain assaulted every point in her face at even the slightest movement of her mouth. She was hurt… badly.

Then she saw a sight that quelled her growing panic. His frame was just a shadow against the embankment of the road, but it was definitely a man she saw, walking towards them. In her excitement and the delirium of her injuries, she didn't ponder where the man might have come from and why he would be walking along the center of the road on the outskirts of the city in the middle of the night. These things were unimportant to her. They were rescued!

But her spirits quickly dropped and she realized that there must have been some trick of the light, for now, it seemed, the man was quickly walking away. Didn't he see them? Surely he must have seen the accident and the mangled cruiser the road.

She tried to yell, to call to him, to shame him for leaving the scene of an accident, to remind him it was against the law. But pain flared in her jaw and she could only moan as the shadow retreated down the roadway.

A moment later, however, Mariane was glad she had not been able to beckon the man that was hurrying away from the scene of their accident. With sudden terrifying clarity she saw him as he crossed the road and hurried into the darkness. For one brief moment he was clearly silhouetted against the distant glow of the city and then revealed in the stark halogen glare of a roadlamp.

The sight made Mariane scream until she passed out from the pain.

-2-

The woman was still in agony. That was plainly obvious. The paramedic ran another booster of anesthetics into her arm and was grateful to see her relax. But freed from the pain from her broken jaw, the woman swore and then called out for her husband.

"He's in the unit right behind us," the young paramedic said in an assuring tone. She didn't add that the unit that carried him was no longer in a hurry. The woman would find that out when the time was right.

"Can you hold still for me now?" the paramedic asked. "We are almost at the hospital. You're going to be fine! I just want you to…" But the horrified gaze the woman set on her silenced her.

"He was dead!" the woman said through an almost ruined mouth.

The paramedic didn't have any response for this. There was no way that she could know, was there? But something in the woman's eyes suggested that she was not referring to her husband. It had to be delirium.

"Take it easy now," the paramedic said. "You've had a terrifying experience but everything will be fine now." She didn't want to put the woman to sleep; she needed her to be conscious in the emergency room. But the woman refused to calm down.

"Don't patronize me!" she yelled. "I know what I saw! He… he…" she stopped for a moment and her eyes grew puzzled. "He didn't have a head. I saw it! He didn't have a head!"

"Ok. Ok. You're just going to do more damage to your jaw," the paramedic said her before putting her to sleep. She'd deal with the emergency room issue when they got there.

-3-

Cherry Hill wasn't in the busiest of the five regions the State Police had to deal with that night. But you wouldn't have been able to tell by looking at the station. The detox-tank was filled with people who wouldn't volunteer to a neutralizing shot. So they were stuck for the night, or at least until their wristband changed color. Magna-tagged against the wall, away from their Orga counterparts, a line of malfunctioning Mecha struggled against their captivity, looping robotic phrases and twisting in awkward postures. It would have been a funny spectacle if they weren't such a pain this time of year. All around the room, quiet stern-faced men and women in tight blue uniforms went about their various tasks, used to the chaos.

A balding man with an impatient brow and permanent scowl etched on his face, eyed the bustle with obvious disdain. "Fuk-it-all!" he said. As if there wasn't enough to deal with without the stupid fiber-heads blowing chips or whatever the hell went wrong with them. Precinct Captain Rachman Davich stood in the doorway of his office not wanting to leave the sanctuary it offered. Behind him a quiet game of holographic chess waited. Before him the New Years Eve mess was getting worse by the minute. It was a mess that would not go away without his effort. He turned and yelled "Save" to his chess game, which immediately folded itself up and shut down. Time for work. "Fuk-it-all!" Davich swore again.

"We heard you the first time Boss," Spacer said as she passed by. The muscular woman had a rowdy Orga boy in tow. The kid looked like one of the mainland neo-nazis, black tights on sickly white skin. And this one had spikes protruding from his shoulders. Davich followed, enthralled, stepping out of the range of a tagged Mecha that had started swinging its arms wildly, ranting some digital gibberish.

"Hey! Is that shit real?" Davich asked with a low whistle. The kid didn't respond, just fixed Davich with dark scowl that the man returned quickly.

Spacer cuffed the kid to a post in the center of the room. It was safer here than in the tank. The brat was obviously a bruiser, just waiting for a chance to take his frustrations out on someone who wasn't a cop. Nobody was stupid enough to try a cop, especially one like Spacer.

"Yeah, Boss. It's real alright," Spacer responded when the kid was secured. "Damn implants!" she said. The brat had his eyes downcast. He couldn't have been older than fifteen… sixteen tops. Spacer made a sound that might have been pity or disgust; it was hard to tell. "Little shit and his pals ripped up some shanties outside Haddonfield. Almost killed a couple of vags in the process. The others were quicker, got lost in the woods. But they'll show up."

Davich shook his head. "Oh yeah. Tough guy, eh? Beating on vagabonds that probably ain't eaten in weeks. Scaarrry!" he mocked. "How in the fuck do you sleep with those things on anyway!" he asked eyeing the spikes. "That shit is like… permanent, right?" The kid just rolled his eyes and looked away. Davich lean close and caught the boy's eyes. "Ya know, one of these days you might want to get a job," he said with the hard-edged sincerity of a cop who really believed in his rhetoric. "And your employer might not like the idea that you could accidentally decapitate one of his customers." But he could tell by the feral sneer the kid shot him that he was wasting his time. Another one for the stasis someday. His waved his hand dismissively and grabbed Spacer by the elbow.

"I'm glad you're back," Davich whispered conspiratorially, pulling his lieutenant aside, "I need to get some of these tranc-heads and drunken clowns boosted with detox and outta here. I got no room for this shit tonight."

Spacer knew the routine. Get them into the Interrogation room and vid them saying 'ok' to anything. Edit in whatever questions you want later. Just ask them any question that they would say yes to, and then pump some detox in 'em. If anybody bitches later, they got the agreement on record. All nice and legal… sort of.

"Yeah, Boss," She said with a wink. "I'll get someone on it. Anderson should know the routine."

"Good," Davich said. "Oh! And get rid of these goddamned Mecha. I don't give a shit if they got licenses or no. If you can't locate the owner, you just hand 'em over to Johnson's freak show for all I care. Just get them outta my…"

"Captian Davich!" a voice called from across the noisy room. Davich turned to see a young city cop craning his thin neck as he scanned the busy room. Local kid. Whoever was looking for him obviously didn't want it on the record or they would have used his cell. This couldn't be good.

He turned to Spacer and sighed. "Think I can slip outta here before this pencil-neck finds…"

"Oh there you are. Sir," the pencil-neck said from behind Davich. "We have a situation at The Lady, sir. I was told to ask specifically for you."

"Fuk-it-all!"

-4-

The Lady wasn't one of his favorite places, but then he really didn't have any favorite places. Maybe home was ok… once in a while. Or perhaps the Precinct lounge at noon. Some might find it rather pathetic that a man of his years and office would prefer hanging out with a bunch of street troopers over lunch rather than being at home with his 'family'. But then no one really understood Rachman Davich. In spite of appearances and rumors, the man didn't drink, so the clubs were out. Even after all the shit he'd survived, he preferred to be sober. And even though his status would make it easy to take advantage of ambitious departmental climbers, he didn't fuck around. It had been a long time since he and his wife had really been in love, but they had both been cursed by a traditional sense of duty. So affairs were out. And divorce was out. So were kids. The Child Licensing Authority had long ago determined the instable relationship the Davich's shared. But a few Christmas' passed Rachman he'd made that last one up to his wife, as best he could. She was happy enough, he guessed, but admitted to himself it was not high on his list of concerns.

Davich loved the youngsters; the new troopers, the ones still learning the ropes. They were his kids. He loved to hear their talk, their boasting and challenging, the unlikely and downright impossible stories, the screw-ups and the successes. It was like old times, like when he had been a fit young recruit, not the balding overweight desk jockey his rank had turned him into. Once a day he could shoot the shit and be one of them for a while. Well, at least until lunch was over. Then he was 'Boss', again.

He swore as they walked into the glaring lights and noise of the Lady of Lourdes Medical Complex, known generally as The Lady. Everywhere he looked there was fresh misery. Blood. Puke. Starry eyed tranc-heads, and even more drunken assholes slouched in waiting chairs or laying on the floor in puddles of unidentifiable bodily fluids. The one thing you didn't see, apart from an occasional aide pushing a wheelchair along a crowded aisle, was Mecha. It was a small favor in his eyes.

"Hey, Spacer," Davich said, thrusting his chin at a group of transients huddled in a corner across the room. "Those the vags your boys cut up?" he asked.

Spacer glanced in that direction. The vags looked beaten and bruised. "Probably," She replied nonchalantly and turned away. Davich harrumphed and followed the pencil-necked kid that had come to get him, wondering at the secrecy of the whole affair

The woman had her own room. That meant something. Only people who 'mattered' could get a private space on a crazy night like this. She was pretty messed up too. Her face was wrapped around in bandages and coils of tubes ran from the casing. Good Lord, Davich thought. Was she alive in there?

"Rachman?" The bandaged mess said. Davich immediately recognized the voice. Spacer had never seen the man's face go pale before.

"Mariane?" Davich blurted. Why hadn't someone told him? "Mariane! What the hell happened to you?" Davich yelled.

"Massud is dead!" the bandaged woman muttered urgently though her ceramic mask.

Davich received these words like a punch to the gut. One of the few good men this damn city had ever known! Gone? "Oh Fuck!" he said, oblivious to the annoyed glances from passing nurses. He bent over and placed his hands on his knees, as if a sudden weight had fallen on his shoulders. With Massud gone the Commerce Council would be run by that self-serving prick Grainer.

"I had them get you, Rachman." Mariane said slowly. "I needed to see you and didn't want anyone to know. We need… we need to act fast."

Davich understood immediately. Too many people wanted her husband out of the way; powerful people who had probably had one too many dirty deals exposed by the man's uprightness. Without her saying a word, Davich knew that she wanted him to do his own investigation, that the findings of any official inquiry could not be trusted.

Mariane tried to sit up and lean close to Davich, but the pain stopped her. Davich leaned close to her instead. "I saw something out there," she whispered. "I saw something, Rachman… something I can't explain." Then she proceeded to describe the thing she'd witnessed.

Davich listened carefully, expecting her to describe sinister looking men, or perhaps something that resembled men, dressed in dark suits and dark glassed, behind the wheel of a dark, low sedan. But that was not what she described at all. Not even close.

Lieutenant Spacer could not hear Marine Ramad's words, but she was amazed to see her Boss go pale for the second time in one night.

-5-

An unceasing mechanical groan penetrates the darkness. Fire erupts from piping blackened by age and decrepitude, and a sulfurous reek poisons the air.

Nothing here can smell it though.

Amid the toxic clutter of this dark and stinking place, something is moving. Something that shouldn't be moving; that should have long ago ceased to have any motor activity at all, is busy. It's casing is flesh. Occasionally a chunk of it, wet and rotting, peels off and falls to the ground.

But there is no pain.

For it is not alive.

(cont...)