The Measuring Game

The elevator whirred quietly upwards, near silent.

It was far too small for the three passengers it held - Two robots and one human, both crammed tight into the small space. In fact, the robots were fairly bulky, and shuffled nervously, trying not to press up too much against the human between them. To his credit, the human did not take up much space. His arms were folded around himself, his shaggy black-haired head bowed, thin shoulders hunched, as if he were trying to be as small as possible. The grubby white lab coat he wore hung on him like sheets on an iron rail, stained with both an array of paint splatters and his own blood, though most of it long dried. One robot, its orange eye glowing softly, glanced at him nervously. It was a good few inches taller than him, and as lithe as a cat, its wide plated hips bobbing as it shifts awkwardly.

The silence stretched on.

The other robot, it's optic an electric blue, met the others gaze and shrugged. Humans were meant to be barbaric, troublemaking things, but this one hadn't said a word since they'd left CentralCore's chamber - or, in fact, at all. It also shifted its stocky, low-slung frame, and rumbled something to the other, glancing at the human. The robots voice was low, so low it was probably meant to be below the human range of hearing, but having (wildly) misjudged, the human heard anyway. It would have been imperceptible to most, but both robots sensed the tiny motion of the human's eyes flicking up, and immediately froze in place. They just stood there, unsure of what to do, suddenly pinned by the human's gaze.

His eyes were dark and hard to see, shadowed by his mess of irrationally spiky black hair, but the glint of them was clearly there, and fixed right on them. He stared blankly down at the robot beside him, gaunt frame unmoving.

The silence was uncomfortable now.

Orange shifted its weight nervously, then finally cracked - breaking under the pressure of silence and blurting out;

"You have not moved, human-thing. Are you experiencing a malfunction?"

Orange chittered anxiously, peering at the gaunt human. He flinched at the sound, his eyes flicking to Orange with a hunted, fearful look in them. His hands, still clutching his arms, tightened slightly as he replied.

"…no?"

He croaked, his voice hoarse. There's a grating, unused tambre to it, like the creak of a rusted hinge, or the hollow crack of rotted wood. A dusty voice, which hasn't been used in a very, very long time.

"I'm just…thinking."

He stared off into the blank middle-distance, his expression flat and empty. The elevator sped quietly on, and the robots exchanged a worried glance. They didn't properly know this human, of course, but CenteralCore had. She'd seemed to not even consider him to be a human. She called him a rat. The robots had seen rats before, but they hadn't looked like this - Rats were small and fast, while this human limped, his movements sluggish, when he even moved at all. Rats had short fur, while this human was wildly overgrown. At least, he seemed to be, compared to the paper-poster humans they'd seen before. The robots honestly couldn't see the comparison.

Then, unexpectedly, the human spoke.

"…do you think…" He began, very quietly, the two robots jumping in surprise as their mics picked up the mumbling sound.

"Do you think she meant it?"

The robots glanced at eachother, unsure what he meant. His voice was halting and distant, nothing like CenteralCores concise tones, and they found it very unnerving. The human didn't even look at them, just stared absently into the distance, the miles of stone whizzing by around them.

"About…about that. About out. She said she was, it was her voice…"

He looked up at them both now, an unsettling look in his eyes. Almost like one of the dead cameras the pair had seen outside the testing tracks - murky and empty. He seemed to be leaning heavily on his right leg, and he wavered then, placing one hand on the elevator wall for support. There's a strange hissing sound from the ceiling, almost hidden by his speech.

"…I…I can't trust that,"

He mumbled hoarsely, the robots chittering quietly to eachother now, looking him up and down and fiddling anxiously. He looks like he's about to fall. CenteralCore said not to break anything - did that include him?

"Where are we really going?"

He croaked, voice wavering, and only then did the robots see the thick red stain down his left leg. He is injured! Leaking coolant! There is a desperate, fogged look to his eyes, and the human's gaze flickered between the two robots, the shapes of them blurring together.

"Up?"

Blue replied in its baritone rumble, nervous now, and the human made a noise that could maybe be considered a laugh. They'd heard it once before, In CenteralCores chamber, but it's different now - more choked. He ran one trembling, paint-smeared hand through his hair, pushing the tangled mess of it back from his face and fixing his gaze on the rock whizzing by in front of him, one hand bracing him against the glass. His cheeks were sunken, the shadows under his eyes ash-dark against his pale skin, a sick look to him as he wavered again. The robots glanced at each other, worried, but unsure what they were allowed to do. The hissing grew ever-so-slightly louder.

"But…?"

He mumbled, and looked back up at them then, his eyes wider than they should be, pupils contracted to dots. The look on his face is inhuman, and somehow despite being inhuman themselves, the robots had still never seen something so terrifying before in their life. The soft hissing sound was still coming from the ceiling, and the human swayed again, his voice wavering between different pitches.

"But she…all that time, she knows what I…she knows I helped, helped to make her, and she hated, doesn't make sense, the variables, but why…"

His eyelids flickered for a moment, his gaze slowly going dull. Then, his arm buckled, and Blue had to step forward to keep the human from breaking his neck as he fell - pushing him back so he slid down the elevator wall instead, head lolling. His body is limp now, and the two robots looked at eachother frantically, unsure what to do, a deactivated human now limp between them.

"[Is he unconscious?]"

A voice asked from the ceiling, the elevator harshly jerking to a stop. The robots blinked in unison, surprised, before Orange bravely replied;

"Yes, CentralCore. He is deactivated. Did we do something wrong?"

Orange chittered, wringing its three-digit hands nervously.

"[No. You did…fine.]"

CenteralCore stated flatly, voice still echoing from the ceiling. The elevator began moving up again, the rock passing slowly by as the two robots shifted in unease, still not…sure.

"[I couldn't sedate him while he was in the room with me. Continue with your original objective.]"

Orange and Blue blinked in unison, glancing to eachother uncertainly.

"But…CenteralCore, how? Human is deactivated, leaking coolant. Must bring to a repair center before continuing."

Blue rumbled, and from the ceiling came an electronic sigh.

[Don't worry about that. Humans…fix themselves. Just take him out into the next chamber and leave him somewhere far from here. I don't care where. Anywhere farther than a mile, maybe two.]

CentralCore ordered, and the two robots glanced uncertainly between themselves.

"CenteralCore, what is a mile? Is it a type of hazard?"

Orange asked, blue shuffling beside it. CenteralCore was silent for a moment, the elevator whizzing upwards. The next chamber must be very new for it to have been built this far up! A new chamber, all for them - this must be a very important test.

"[…No. It is a large unit of measurement. Please tell me you two idiots know what a unit of measurement is."

The two robots nodded knowingly to eachother.

"Like wall panels!"

Blue rumbled, Orange chittering in agreement. They have a game just like this, the measuring game! CentralCore can't get angry at them for playing this time, not if it is what she wants, right? The robots chitter happily to eachother, excited at the prospect of getting to play such a fun game during a test! That will be double the fun!

"[Fine,]" CenteralCore replied, "[Take him a distance equal to 1609.34 wall panels along any horizontal route, and leave him. Understand?]"

CenteralCores voice was flat now, and the pair knew that they would not get more elaboration. So the robots nodded, simultaneously assuring CenteralCore that they understood.

"Yes CenteralCore, we understand."

They chorused, and promised they would take the human somewhere far away, where it could never bother CentralCore again. They had no choice but to promise - they were only robots, after all, and had no concept of doing anything else. They didn't know of anything beyond their little testing world of orders and panels, and so had no idea they could ever escape it, or that escape was what this human had been dreaming of for years. They had no idea that they themselves would be taking him to a place he'd begged for, prayed for, clawed for and screamed for, and they had no idea the life they would see.

They had no idea what they were promising, or just what would ensue.

"[Good.]"

The elevator whirred on, near silent.