“1.
A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a
human being to come to harm. 2. A robot must obey the orders
given to it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict
with the First Law. 3. A robot must protect its own existence as
long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second
Laws.”
HAL 9000* #quote
Happy Mother's Day y'all! Anyway onto
the flash fiction!
Once Upon A Death Orb
The Death Orb floated in the center of
the galaxy, it held the record for being the largest space station
ever built along with being the most weaponized and legally distinct
from other giant spherical space stations by being painted green,
having several thousand satellite death lasers on the outside and not
one big one and no openings that missiles can be shot down.
The general that oversaw all matters
in the Death Orb went by no normal name. People only knew him by a
title, “Helmetman”. Helmetman struck fear into his subordinates
by commanding the amazing powers of The Stuff, the previously thought
to be completely bogus magical practices of the secret mystics
called the Guys. Also he used a really awesome yet also horrifying
axe made of lighting that went “wee-woo-crack-broowww” while he
swung it.
And poor Steve, a janitor among all
the Striketroopers on the Death Orb, was called up to meet Helmetman.
When he signed up to serve in the military he figured that he would
fear for his life while he fought for the Dominion on the front
lines. But no, fear overtook him when he faced Helmetman for a simple
error.
He hadn't been on the job long in the
Death Orb and got lost, stumbling onto a top secret meeting.
Helmetman reached to the conclusion that he worked as a spy for The
Resistors. Steve didn't know how long he'd live as his boss held his
axe of lighting high above his head while it illuminated his red
helmet, armor and cape.
“Tell us everything you know spy,
and we may spare you. The torture will stop when you tell us.”
Helmetman held Steve in place with a strange liquid that covered and
drowned him like water, but didn't kill him. It allowed him to hear
and speak, and when it first grabbed him it peeled off his Dominion
regulation armor and weapons like peeling off an egg, leaving him
defenseless in his undershirt and pants with his black hair ragged.
“I don't know anything!” Steve
yelled for at least the ten thousandth time. Helmetman kept torturing
and Steve kept telling him the truth. It went on and on while the
commanders under Helmetman watched. They became more convinced of
Steve's innocence with each passing moment, but they didn't want to
speak against their boss's judgment to continue or else they might
become tortured themselves.
Helmetman continued to wreck Steve's
body, and he'd rather have Steve die of shock from the torture than
admit that he was wrong about him being a spy. Steve gained relief
from the torture when Helmetman lost focus due to a explosion heard
beyond the walls of the room. Controlling The Stuff required control
of one's mind and Helmetman's lost the focus needed for complete
needed when the explosion echoed through the Death Orb.
More and more explosions. Not in a
chaotic fashion like a reactor exploded. A steady beat. Bam, bam,
bam, bam, bam.
Helmetman then yelled, “The
Resistors are here!” The commanders were shocked to hear both the
statement and the fear in his voice. Helmetman figured out from the
rate of explosions that they managed to somehow to breach the Death
Orb and each explosion was a demolition of a lockdown door between
areas. He didn't know how but the enemy had disabled ship
communications in such a way that alarms could not but rung but
everything appeared as business as usual.
In the next few minutes the commanders
tried to deliberate what happened and what to do while Helmetman
worked even harder to torture Steve because he figured that he must
have been involved somehow. Those short few minutes were enough for
The Resistors to get to the room and enter it with another explosive
blast. The commanders were quickly shot but Helmetman managed to
block all the ray gun shots with his lighting axe. However a good
mystic from the order of the Guys used the powers of the The Stuff to
break the lighting axe and Helmetman was defeated.
The Guys mystic opened his hood and
revealed his thick white beard and heavy wrinkles. “So, who are you
young man?” Steve saw the pity in the eyes of the man who saved
him.
“My name is Steve. I'm on an off the
books spy mission. Well was since they captured me. But you rescued
me, so it's over I guess.” Steve's still felt the mental toll of
the torture even though it ended.
The mystic replied, “Well it's good
that you survived Steve. Let's get you out of here. I can hardly
imagine what they did to you.”
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