"They're droids," Rogers said, creeping around a corner, crouching low. "They don't have-"

"CALL FUNCTION [SPRING TRAP AND PERFORM PRIMARY FUNCTION]."

One of the nearby crates burst open, the metallic lid flying through the air and nearly knocking Rogers unconscious. Rogers ducked, screaming, and Lopez let out a stream of curses. He barely saw the flash of a pair of scissors before Lopez tackled him to the ground.

"Barber Bot!" he cried.

"What the h.e.l.l does that mean?"

Rogers stood up, prepared to find a heavy object to swing at the oncoming droid, only to find that BAR-BR 116 hadn't moved. It was still stuck in the crate from the waist down, its hydraulic midsection pumping up and down uselessly as it tried to dislodge itself. The crate was barely big enough at the base to allow the droid's treads enough room to stand.

"CALL FUNCTION [REa.s.sESS CLEVER HIDING PLACE]."

"How did you even get in there in the first place?" Rogers asked. "You know what? Never mind. I don't care. I told you you're not touching my beard, and that's final."

"CALL FUNCTION [INCESSANT REPEt.i.tION]. OUTPUT STRING: YOU MISSED OUR APPOINTMENT."

"And I'll miss the next hundred appointments!" Rogers shouted boldly, puffing his chest out (while maintaining a safe distance from the immobile droid). "You'll never get the best of R. Wilson Rogers!" He thought a moment. "Or his beard! You'll never get the beard of R. Wilson Rogers!"

"CALL FUNCTION [ESCAPE SELF-IMPOSED PRISON]."

BAR-BR 116's torch flared to life-Rogers really didn't want any part of a haircut that involved flaming objects-and set to work on the side of the crate.

"I think I've seen enough of the engineering bay," Rogers said, eyeing Barber Bot warily.

"I think I've seen enough of it too," Lopez said. "Come back anytime you want to turn a wrench or get chased by droids or get yelled at by Ensign McSchmidt or . . . You know what? Maybe you shouldn't come back."

"I'm beginning to think that about a lot of places," Rogers said.

Lopez escorted him back to the entrance of the engineering bay, where he politely declined another sip of what she called "Lopez's Special Sauce" and began the journey back to his room so he could get some sleep. The trip was far from restful; he kept looking behind him for Barber Bot and kept looking ahead of him for any sign of the Viking. There had to be a way to make her see him as more than someone trying to usurp her job. And there had to be a way to blow up that robot.

All problems, no solutions. That was quickly becoming the story of his life.

As he approached the door to his room, he saw Sergeant Stract and Inspect-o-Droid leaving it.

"CALL FUNCTION [PERFORM PRIMARY FUNCTION]. FAILURE TO BE PRESENT AT INSPECTION. ONE DEMERIT WILL BE AWARDED."

Rogers gave the robot the finger, walked past both of them without saying a word, and went to bed. The glowing face of the droid on the wall stared at him, its brightly lit background driving those infernal words into his head: AUTOMATION IS EFFICIENCY IS EFFICACY IS GOOD.

Mechanical Failure Sleep had been broken by the giant beacon of light in his room and the fact that he had to chase BAR-BR 116 away from his door at least twice. So far this morning, he hadn't seen it, and Rogers was starting to believe that perhaps it had given up. Could droids give up? Rogers didn't know. In any case, it made for a weary morning back in the droids' training room.

"Alright, Tunger," Rogers said as he rubbed his eyes. "What have you got for me?

Tunger looked at him blankly. "Didn't I do the whole 'I present to you the Artificial Intelligence Ground Combat Squadron' thing to you yesterday?"

"That's not what I meant," Rogers said, again sitting down in the only chair in the room. He pretended to look relaxed, like he didn't care about anything in the world, but already today he felt his nerves had been stretched so tight, they might snap. The Viking had finally pa.s.sed him in the hallway and didn't even shove him-Rogers would have accepted any physical touch at this point-and then they had run out of SEWR rats in both the Uncouth Corkscrew and the Peek and Shoot. Those meals were bad enough without having to go hunting for them.

"Sir, if I may," said Oh One, who had stepped out from formation to greet him.

Rogers cut him off with a wave. "Look, I know you've been appointed my deputy and that you technically outrank Tunger with all this new rank bullc.r.a.p that they've published, but I want you to step back in formation and stay there until I give you an order."

Rogers wasn't sure where the outburst had come from. Maybe it was the fact that even the coffee in the Uncouth Corkscrew this morning had tasted like motor oil-he willed himself to believe it was actually just bad coffee-or maybe it was the fact that after less than a week on the Flagship, he wished he'd been s.p.a.ced by the Garliali. And that made him think of calamari. And that made him sad.

Oh One stood there for a moment, as if considering what to do. Rogers scowled. Oh One was a droid; there should be no considering about it.

"Back in formation," Rogers said again.

Oh One's eyes flashed red-Rogers was absolutely positive he saw it this time-and he stepped back into formation without another word.

Turning back to Tunger, Rogers leaned back in his chair and put his hands behind his head. Being grumpy was helping him be just the sort of commander he was trying to be: bad.

"You were supposed to charge the control pad and figure out what to drill today so that we don't build another one of those." Rogers pointed at the column of steel that was still in the middle of the training room. "You do remember me telling you that, don't you?"

"Yes, sir," Tunger said. He moved to the cabinet and retrieved the control pad. "I charged it up for you all night. Should be good for the whole day. And I spent some time looking at the manual."

"The piece of paper with nothing on it but an unlabeled chart of the b.u.t.tons?"

"That's the one," Tunger said. "I think maybe we should focus on some target practice. I had Corporal Suresh in Supply bring up some targets for us." He gestured to the far side of the room, where a modified shooting range had been constructed. That hadn't been there the day before; Rogers was sure of it. Now, long rows extended down the opposite end of the training room, ending in target silhouettes.

Rogers leaned forward. "Tunger, why are all the target silhouettes shaped like animals?"

Some of them weren't easily identifiable, but Rogers was almost positive that the shadows of ostriches occupied the first few targets, followed by some sort of gorilla and, strangely, a m.u.f.fin. Rogers could recognize the shadow of a m.u.f.fin anywhere.

Tunger blushed. "It's all I could find, sir."

"I'm kind of surprised these exist, honestly."

"They're actually not targets. They're visual recognition training for zoo personnel," Tunger said. "You need to know the difference between a red-footed b.o.o.by and a blue-footed b.o.o.by at two hundred meters in the dead of night in case the power goes out."

Rogers squinted. "Why would you ever need to know such a thing?"

"Can't just let the b.o.o.bies run around, sir," Tunger said seriously. "Can't do that at all."

Rogers felt like perhaps there was some real, sage advice in that statement, but he couldn't figure it out at all. He just nodded slowly. "I suppose you can't, at that. Well, at least if there's ever a jailbreak in the zoo and the AIGCS has to hunt them down, we'll know what they're capable of."

"Sir!" Tunger said, scandalized.

"I'm only kidding," Rogers said. "I'm curious what you found out by looking at the, uh, manual."

"Absolutely nothing, sir."

Rogers rubbed his eyes again. d.a.m.n, but he was tired. "Right. Well I hope you found it personally fulfilling anyway."

He looked up at the droids all standing perfectly still, their blue eyes shining back at him like a little constellation through the expanse of the ma.s.sive training room.

"I suppose a little target practice wouldn't hurt," Rogers said. "I'll have to figure out how to get them to fire weapons sometime, I guess. Let's take a look."

Taking the control pad in his hands and unlocking it, he was presented with the maze of unlabeled green b.u.t.tons again. If the orange b.u.t.ton was a sort of speaking command b.u.t.ton, the green b.u.t.tons must be able to do things without him talking into the device. Maybe then it wouldn't be so easy to confuse these buckets of bolts, Freudian Chip or no. For droids, they did seem rather stupid.

Rogers figured he'd start with the top left, and tapped the screen to engage the first green b.u.t.ton. Instantly, the screen shifted to a display of what appeared to be the training room. A thick silver outline traced the edges of the room, and he could see each droid represented as a blue dot in perfect formation.

"Hey, Oh One," he said. "How does this thing know where we are?"

"Each member of the AIGCS is equipped with a spatial radar system that allows for an instantaneous a.n.a.lysis of the geographical s.p.a.ce in which we are located," Oh One droned.

"That makes sense. Let's see here."

Rogers tapped the position where Oh One was standing and dragged his finger forward. In response to his movement, Oh One took a step forward.

"Hey!" Rogers said. "It worked!"

Corporal Tunger clapped. "Hurruh!"

Rogers shot him a look.

"I mean, hooray!"

It took a few tries and not a few crashes, but eventually Rogers was able to use the command pad to manipulate the movement of the whole squadron and direct them toward the shooting range in the back of the room. He followed them, Tunger in tow, but gave himself a wide berth after the first time one of the hulking beasts ran into him and knocked him completely over.

"This isn't so hard at all," Rogers said. Despite his aspirations to be the worst AIGCS commander in the history of the MPF-which technically he already was, in addition to being the best AIGCS commander in the history of the MPF-he couldn't help but feel a tiny bit of excitement at doing something properly. He was a slacker of professional quality, but he still had pride.

Soon he had the squadron grouped up in five even lines, each in their own row of animal-silhouetted shooting ranges. They were all facing different directions, but he had to be satisfied with little victories.

"Alright," he said. "Tunger, where do they put the rifles around here? If they're going to practice shooting, they'll need something to shoot."

Tunger frowned. "They didn't tell me that, sir. There's no weapons locker in here. I could go down to the armory and see if they have anything."

"If I may, sir," Oh One said, "that won't be necessary."

Rogers looked around, trying to figure out where Oh One was in the formation. All these d.a.m.n shinies looked alike. He'd have to paint Oh One's face or something.

"Oh One, raise your hand."

One of the droids at the front of the shooting lines raised its hand, and Rogers walked over to him.

"Stand still for a second."

Reaching into his pocket-his shirt pocket, since those were the only ones not sewn shut-he pulled a small package of ketchup that he had taken from the Uncouth Corkscrew yesterday, when he still thought he might actually have to put it on something. He smeared a line of it under the droid's eyes, instantly turning it into some sort of insane badger. At least it distinguished him.

"There," Rogers said. He was about to put the packet back into his pocket but thought better of it and simply held it in his hand behind the control pad. "Now, what were you saying?"

"AIGCS members come equipped with their own weapons. There is no need to visit the armory."

"Is that right?" Rogers said, hoping his voice didn't crack. Having droids that knew how to operate weapons was one thing; having them always carrying them was another. He didn't like the idea of not being able to take them away if anything went wrong. "Well, let's see them."

"As part of our programming, the AIGCS is not permitted to draw weapons without a direct order from the commander.

"Right," Rogers said, somewhat comforted. "The control pad."

He looked at the pad-which was, of course, locked-and swiped his keycard through it. If the first b.u.t.ton was maneuvers, perhaps the second b.u.t.ton was combat commands. He pressed it, only to find that instead of anything useful, it brought up what appeared to be a directory of addresses and contact numbers for Snaggardir's locations all across the Meridan system.

"Well, that doesn't help me at all. Why is that on the control pad?"

The third b.u.t.ton brought up a catalog of products sold at Snaggardir's-did that place sponsor these droids or something?-which one could buy and have delivered. Rogers briefly thought about taking a moment to stock up on anything that wasn't a SEWR rat, but he could save that for another time.

The fourth b.u.t.ton switched on one of the droids' speaker systems, through which started playing a very sappy tune by Larisa Sparklefoot, a popular Meridan pop star.

"Oh, come on," he said.

"I love this song!" Tunger exclaimed, shaking his hips in a very disturbing way.

Pressing the fifth b.u.t.ton turned the song off-why allocate two b.u.t.tons to that?-and the sixth b.u.t.ton didn't appear to do anything at all. The seventh b.u.t.ton, however, brought up a high-definition display of a single combat droid that rotated, displaying the health of each of its components in a gradient color system. To the left was a list-Rogers guessed from the number that it was a list of the droids under his command-and on the bottom, there was another set of b.u.t.tons that were clearly combat commands.

"Finally," he said. "Here we go."

He pressed the "all" b.u.t.ton on the side, and instantly all the droids were highlighted. Then he pressed the "draw weapons" b.u.t.ton and nearly died.

A horrible clanking of metal erupted as the chest compartment of every droid in the squadron opened up, out of which sprang a modified disruptor rifle, fully charged and ready to go. They s.n.a.t.c.hed them into their glossy hands in a crisp, unified motion that, together, sounded like a s.p.a.ceship had just gotten stepped on by one of the sand dragons on Dathum.I Rogers was standing so close to one of the droids that it elbowed him in the shoulder, sending him ricocheting into another droid that thankfully pushed him outside the formation. Rogers fell backward and rolled to a stop, the command pad slapping him in the face and sliding to the floor.

"Wow," said Tunger.

Groaning, Rogers pulled himself to his feet, his heart racing. The ketchup packet that had been in his hand had spilled most of its contents onto his fingers. He wiped as much of it as he could on the floor, not really wanting to stain his uniform, but his hand was still much redder than it had been a moment before.

"That was . . . enthusiastic," Rogers said. Oh One made no reply. The red-faced badger now looked like a red-faced badger-killer-robot. Rogers wasn't sure he liked the change.

It took another few seconds-and unlocking the command pad twice-before Rogers could figure out how to get the droids to turn in place. It took another few tasteless pop songs before Rogers could even begin to understand how to make them find a target and take aim. The last thing he wanted was all of them facing different directions, shooting whatever they liked.

"Let's maybe just start with you, Oh One," Rogers said. He highlighted Oh One in the list of droids and pressed the b.u.t.ton for "attack target."

So quickly it blurred in Rogers' vision, Oh One snapped his rifle up, took careful aim, and with deadly precision, shot the ceiling of the training room.

Both Rogers and Tunger ducked reflexively, despite there not being anything to duck away from. The floor vibrated as the disruptor rifle blasted a hole in the ceiling the size of a small melon, sending disintegrated metallic dust showering down like silver snow. A larger chunk broke off, colliding with the head of one of the droids in the second row and sending it sprawling to the floor. Its motion knocked another droid down, and soon there were four or five of them down, legs and arms flailing as they tried to get back up. The one that had been hit in the head wasn't moving; its eyes were no longer shining blue, and, for all intents and purposes, it appeared to be "dead."

"Great job, Oh One," Rogers said. "You're the first droid to ever commit fratricide."

"While I should appreciate your praise, sir, I don't understand how fratricide would be cla.s.sified as a good job. Is it encouraged to kill one's peers in training?"

Rogers shook his head. He should know better than to think droids understood sarcasm. They couldn't even march properly.

"No," Rogers said. "No, it's not. Never mind. Tunger, are you sure we're ready for firearm practice?"

Tunger brushed gray dust off his uniform, his hands shaking. "No, sir."

"I didn't think so. Maybe we should try-"

The Flagship exploded. At least, that's what it seemed like to Rogers. The lights went off, leaving only the red hue of the emergency glowbulbs. The ground vibrated. The walls seemed to be caving in. Every robot in the room was bathed in an eerie red glow, swathed in the shadow of the droid next to it. A shrill alarm split his ears, followed by the unintelligible speech of what must have been one of the public transportation announcers coming over the loudspeakers, shouting frantically: "Fhrrr drigg. Mrhgh a ghnanbr. Next stop is grrnnsvilne shrugngh. All aboard!"

"Everyone get down!" Rogers screamed as he ducked. "I was wrong! I was wrong! The Thelicosans are attacking! I was wrong!"