Number One

“Everything in place?” Golga waved the severed hand in front of me. From the darkness underneath her eyes, I could tell she was exhausted. Her lips were chapped from lack of water, and her scalp showed traces of dandruff from the lack of a good shower.

I stood there, cool as a cucumber, hands crossed and my back against the cold, hard metal wall that made up the infrastructure of Slugmine. I slowly nod, my eyes focused on the hand, then back at the body in front of her. 

The Boltcrusher was made up of magnificent circuitry and perfect wiring. Red and blue lines laced through its body like a network of veins, giving it the appearance of a nervous system. Its head was hard as a rock and its eyes were made of advanced ruby glass, the type that doesn’t break when you hit it with your knuckles. It lay there dead in front of her, waiting to be resurrected by her dexterous hands. 

“Good,” she said, resting the hand back next to the body. She looked at it, surmising its greatness and its puniness. “Did anyone see you?”

“No,” I said. “I found the electric panel in no time. No one was in sight, thank God.”

“You cannot be complacent you know,” she grabbed a screw gun and tested its speed. “The survivability rate of a man falls to one percent if you bring an enemy up your trail.”

“One percent is better than zero percent,” I argued, feeling my stomach grumble from hunger. Golga and I have been longing for the taste of water and food ever since we ate the last of our supply thirteen hours ago.

There was sarcasm in her voice when she spoke, “Oh, I forgot to mention that a man’s survivability rate even falls to zero percent as soon as he realizes he can never get out.” 

“The Boltcrusher is our last chance isn’t it?” I asked her, watching the body in front of her with great concern. If it dares to move just one flinch, I swear… “It’s strong enough to break us out of here, right?” I felt a tightness in my voice like never before. Maybe this was the effect of not having water for hours. “You’re… our only chance, right?”

We both had a staring contest for a while before she finally spoke to me with a serious tone. “Reagan, if you don’t trust in my calculations, then leave me alone. The Slugmine has other rooms to spare.”

No. This wasn’t Golga’s usual response. For three days being stuck with her, I already knew what she was like. Whenever I asked her a question that attacked her calculations, she would usually respond with numbers and percentages like a crazy scientist. This time, she didn’t say a number. That was bad news.

The good news was, there was a fifty-fifty chance. Golga can merely fix things, I can fix things and break things. But if I ended up breaking the thing that had given the possibility of fixing our lives, then I guess we’re screwed. I must not break anything unless it attacked Golga. 

Golga worked on screwing the hand back to its rightful body. The Boltcrusher had been lying in that same room we camped in since time can tell. It had been abandoned by its maker, but despite this, there’s that lingering fear that it still was loyal enough. Loyal enough to kill us both.

“Look,” Golga pointed at a spot on the robot’s navel. “This wasn’t here before.”

I got near and saw a strange golden glow in one of the wirings. Either it still had life inside it, or it was going to blow up and turn us to ashes. Either way, Golga was prepared to die, I wasn’t.

“Are we in trouble?” I asked her.

“Not yet,” she said in a happy tone. I wasn’t in the mood to feel happy, not as of the moment. Everything until now felt like a game of life and death. She continued, “If my speculations are correct, this Boltcrusher will be able to get us out of here, and I am ninety-eight percent sure of it.”

I raised a brow at her stupid speculation. “Why is there a remaining two percent?” 

“You pessimist,” she said. “But a good question. This Boltcrusher is not like the others. If you check its feet, it’s got a different build, a different model, and a different manufacturing date. Now when I noticed that glow, I knew it wasn’t anything dangerous. Boltcrusher wirings usually run on electricity. This one doesn’t. This one was built to be like a human.”

“How so?”

“Remember when you broke one of them using a wrench?” Golga’s eyes sparkled with hope. “This one can’t be broken so easily, not with ordinary lasers. Its wirings are thick enough to be pierced through. However, if someone fires a high-powered laser missile, then it’s done for good. That’s one percent. The other percent is whether or not it will side with us.”

“And now, explain the ninety-eight percent certainty,” I grumbled in thought. 

Golga placed a finger on her lip, then she hovered it over the wire with the golden glow. Frantic, I dove for her wrist to hold it away, but I was too late. Golga squeezed the wiring, and the Boltcrusher’s limbs glowed a faint bluish hue. Its red eyes glowed like the last time I saw the sun. It was beauty and terror all at once, a divine and ruthless being.

It quickly sat upright, then snapped its head in our direction. If it was human, it would have screamed at the sight of our faces.

But it was a Boltcrusher, a robot, an object, a tool, and a machine. It didn’t have a soul. It only had energy and an unexplainable intelligence that even Golga couldn’t decipher.

“Hello,” it said in a male voice.

“Uh, hello?” I echoed back in a small voice, readying the rage in my limbs in case it went mad. 

“I am number one.”

Sure enough, it had the number one painted right on its shoulder blade, thin scratches of what seemed to be made by a flat tip screwdriver appearing under the fluorescent light. 

“How may I be of service?” it asked. 

Golga started to laugh. I laughed too. We both laughed. The Boltcrusher was our only hope, and it was offering to be of service.

“This is number one,” Golga whispered. “Probably a reject. The first Boltcrusher to fail his master, the first one that will ever be of assistance to humankind.”

“Can you get us out of here?” I asked without a second thought. The Boltcrusher tilted its head, surmising my intentions, but then he could be surmising Golga’s intentions too. From its eyes, one couldn’t really tell which way it looked. 

“With pleasure.” The Boltcrusher got off the flat slab he was once laying on and proceeded to walk out the doorway. 

“Take your stuff,” I ordered Golga and she hurried to her things, grabbing her knapsack.

Number One eyed the largest door outside the hallway, perhaps thinking.

“I did this,” I told Number One. “I managed to find a way to open the doors earlier with a bit of wire tweaking and I also got it to close, but unfortunately, this tripped a security mechanism and is thus shut for twenty-four hours.”

“And Reagan is the reason why you’re alive, Number One,” Golga chirped behind. “Without him, my skeletal remains would have made a decoration back in the lab. He got the power source from the floors running, which gave you the energy to power up.”

“Ugh, don’t glorify me,” I mumbled. 

Number One didn’t pay any attention to what we had said. He clearly knew what he was doing. With the flat surface of his foot, he kicked the double doors open, sending each metallic slab colliding with the next one and the next one in a Domino Effect. 

As soon as every door had magnetically reached the very end, numerous Boltcrushers appeared from the sides. What differed between them and Number One was the fact that they were gold in colour. Number One was just plain scrap metal and wires. Unlike the others, Number One looked ordinary. Nothing special about it at first glance.

Despite their differences, Number One proved to be worthy of helping us survive.

Laser bullets shot off from a distance, almost hitting my head if I had been taller. I brought Golga down into a crouch with me and we scurried behind a large bulk of junk next to us.

We stared deep into each other's eyes as we listened to the orchestra of lasers and metal against metal. Golga had tears in her eyes. I wasn't sure if it was from the war between Number One and the others or from the fact that we were getting out of there. I had a strong feeling it was the latter.

I never realized it until now, how awesome Golga had been in getting us out of here. I never once brought up the idea that a mere lowly mechanic like me and a mad inventor like her, working in the same company, would be the only ones alive to this day. 

Slugmine’s cause had always been for the people. It wasn’t just, I wouldn’t say so. It required military men to leave the battlefield and have machines take over. Jarrod Smithson, the owner and founder of such a vile corporation, thought of Boltcrushers as the only solution for America’s greatest victory against the world.

Why I began working under his wing was because I wanted to create, not fix, and yet, he placed me in a mechanic occupation for six months. Golga, on the other hand, had already been there when I first got in. She was an eccentric figure, always banging a fist on things whenever she got frustrated. She went with the Boltcrusher idea and thought that it would help humanity stay relaxed in times of stress. But unfortunately, Jarrod preferred someone else who was not Golga. Maybe because he also found Golga weird and eccentric to work with.

Golga never made it to operating Boltcrushers despite her thorough studies of creating life forms in machines. She was tasked instead to create house bots, necessary for serving humans in little ways, which include unclogging a toilet. Now, Jarrod and Angela’s bodies, and among many others, lay dead all over Slugmine, betrayed by the very thing they created. 

Now, here she was, in my arms, staring at me as if I was her damn saviour. “Where are you going?” she asked as soon as she felt my grip around her loosen. I grabbed my trusty stun gun. I could stun Boltcrushers with this, it was their weakness. “Let’s hope I don’t hit Number One,” I told her.

“No…” she tried to stop me, but I bolted away from her in a quick fashion, fixating my gun on one of the Boltcrushers against the metal doors. Hitting one was easy, and it did little to help Number One. Our darling Boltcrusher was stampeding across the hall, right into the gang of traitors. He went and showcased his martial arts, slicing with his arms, kicking with his legs. It was all magnificent. He even managed to kick a Boltcrusher’s head off with his own head. 

By the time the Boltcrushers’ numbers were reduced, I grabbed Golga’s hand and urged her to follow me. While Number One went on rampage mode and slain all the other Boltcrushers in its way, Golga and I crept slowly from a distance, making sure that there were no enemies in our way.

So far, so good. Number One was a bomb. We didn’t even have to do anything that much. The main exit of Slugmine had been lasered shut, by one of the Boltcrushers. It was as if they had dreamed of the day when they would take over the corporation.

Jarrod never liked adding windows in the facility. Everything had to be secured and inconspicuous. No one had to know the workers inside were building tools for mass destruction. 

Number One studied the wall very carefully, taking a good look at how it had been sealed shut. “I can remove this door for you,” he said in a monotone fashion. “But it will take me five minutes to get it done.”

We hear footsteps from a distance. Another stock of Boltcrushers was on their way to killing us. If I let Number One fight them off, there might be a chance Number One would end up getting broken, and worse, our chances of escaping would be reduced to zero percent. The only way to get us out of here was to work as a team. 

I grabbed two guns from a distance, guns once held by the Boltcrushers of today. 

“I got you covered,” I told Number One. “Get it done, Number One.”

Number One got two other limbs coming out of his back. It reached far up to the edges of the bolted door. Soft bluish laser beams emanated from micro hands, melting away the component that shut the door forever. 

I pressed a button on my suit that instantly enveloped me in copper and chrome. It covered all my limbs, including my head, until I looked like a Boltcrusher except without round eyes. This was Golga’s invention in the past which she presented to Jarrod, who for some reason, rejected it. He didn’t like mechanics like me wearing armor. What was the point? For Golga, it would protect mechanics from the unknown forces of the world. For Jarrod, it was a liability rather than an asset. 

I glanced at her only to find her eyes staring up at me in awe. She always thought the suit had been scrapped away, but I had kept one before Jarrod halted the operation. I found the armor suitable when I fixed things with high volatility. Jarrod never paid attention to its importance. He didn’t even care if someone died because of electrocution.

I stood there, guns in my hands. The Boltcrushers began to shoot lasers at me and I retaliated. I admit that the suit wasn’t easy to use because it was slightly heavier to move around with, but despite this, it allowed me to predict the movement of the lasers coming my way. I ran towards them, dodging lasers one by one, and kept a short prayer in the back of my mind. 

Before long, my armor was already getting scrapes and marks, but so far, I was kept safe inside it. Five minutes had passed and I was already dead tired, but my will to escape kept me shooting at the damned Boltcrushers. If I had enough sleep, I would have had all this energy for five minutes.

I glanced behind me, only to find Number One about to finish the whole door. Its hinges melted away and the door collapsed forward, rays of sunlight beaming in like holy light, revealing the empty desert of the world. 

Golga stood from where she hid, mesmerized by the light. One of the Boltcrushers next to me was still alive and I saw it turn its attention to her and Number One. It was a defect, this lying Boltcrusher. It had a special gun come out of its hands. A cannon gun. 

It made a sharp, whirring sound as if gathering all this energy before its very last breath, like a self-detonating force. It shot out before I could even stop it. 

And I watched Golga’s face turn to me, a heavenly smile as if she had already been expecting it. I wasn’t ready to cry at that moment, but Number One saved my partner and absorbed the blast before he released high-powered energy from his hand, the golden glow that once rested in his navel, hitting the last Boltcrusher into nothingness.

Quickly, I ran to Golga, asking her all sorts of safety questions. She laughed in relief before collapsing to the ground from hunger. I knew it was the hunger for I, too, felt it. I carried her in my arms and stared at the large hole in Number One’s torso. His eyes were still glowing.

“Thank you, Number One,” I said. “You’re a friend of mankind. The only one, I’m afraid.”

“That’s why I’m Number One,” he said jokingly. This robot had emotions. No wonder he was a defect. Electricity leaked out of the broken wires like blood. Number One didn’t speak anymore, and the glow in his red eyes stopped. 

Jarrod didn’t want a machine that could feel the emotions humans could. Emotions rendered it useless and weak, and I couldn’t help but cry for my dear friend. He saved our lives, as many times in an hour. 

If a machine can save us, what was man’s excuse?

I held the answers closely in my consciousness as I carried Golga away from Slugmine and into the safety of the desert before us. Never again will I work in a place like that. We stepped out into the sunshine, and the sun meant to tell us that there’s still a lot of hope out there and a lot to do to survive like finding water, food, and shelter in a lifeless environment. But that would then have to be a different story.