"Install it," Rogers said, "because that's what I'm going to call you new models." He leaned forward. "You don't like . . . feel or anything, do you?"

"If you are asking whether or not F Chip droids-" The droid made an unintelligible computation noise that sounded a little bit like an old skipping record. "If you are asking whether or not Froids have human emotions, you are correct in your a.s.sumption that we do not feel."

"That's great," Rogers said. He thought back to the way the inspection droid had reacted when he had used the word "shinies." Rogers could have sworn that it had gotten angry, which just seemed ridiculous. "I don't think I could handle it if any of you started crying or trying to tell jokes or anything like that."

"I have no reserves of saline solution to excrete from my ocular implants," the droid said. "If this is a modification that is desired, please see Ensign McSchmidt in the engineering bay, who will put in a request for a new design."

"I think we'll skip it," Rogers said, "but thanks for the suggestion."

Rogers sat in silence for a moment, Oh One staring at him with that blank blue-eyed gaze and Tunger looking a little depressed at not being able to talk like an idiot. A droid as his deputy. Wonderful. Judging from the rest of the people he'd met on the Flagship so far, he wasn't sure that many of the human choices were any better.

Briefly, he thought about simply leaving, blowing off the training altogether and going to find a good card game to join, but that didn't seem practical. He didn't think he could find a card game in the entire ATBG, for one, and that wasn't being quite subtle enough about doing a poor job. If he was going to be bad at something, he couldn't make it look like he was trying to be bad at it.

So, he did something just short of being overtly stupid: he put a corporal in charge.

"Tunger," he said, "you've got control. Why don't you give me a little demonstration of what these battle bots can do?"

The corporal stiffened. "That's not really my job, sir. I'm here to help you with the administration and organization-"

"Come on," Rogers said. "Show me the good stuff. Make 'em spin around in circles and shoot each other with paint guns and do karate."

"The word karate does not appear in my vocabulary," Oh One said. "Are you referring to droid fu?"

"Shut up for right now. I'm trying to get the corporal to do orderly stuff like order you around with orders. Tunger?"

Tunger's face was getting red, and he was avoiding meeting Rogers' gaze.

"It's just that . . ."

"You have no idea how they work, do you?"

Tunger looked at the floor. "Nur."

Rogers sighed and stood up. "How long have you worked with droids?"

"Since I was transferred from the zoo deck."

Well, that explains the boot stain, Rogers thought.

"And that was?"

The corporal hesitated. "Three days ago."

Rogers grit his teeth. Another bizarre personnel transfer. What would possess Klein to put a zookeeper-if Tunger had even been in that ill.u.s.trious of a position on the zoo deck-with droids? Rogers supposed dealing with strange creatures might give Tunger a leg up, but Rogers didn't think these shinies would respond to fish or whistles. Maybe electrical prods, though . . .

"Fine. Fine. Did they tell you anything at all about these droids before you came here?"

Tunger brightened and turned to where a small cabinet was attached to the wall. He opened it with his personal keycard and removed a strange-looking datapad, roughly twice as large as the standard-issue personal datapad that everyone was required to use. He handed it to Rogers with ceremonial seriousness.

"They told me about this, sir," Tunger said. "It's the control pad. I tried to play with it a little but it's not keyed to me; you'll have to unlock it with your keycard first."

Rogers held the device as though it was a live grenade with the pin pulled out. In his hands he held the controls for a bunch of shinies, none of whom had any personalities but all of whom had weapons, and he was supposed to somehow train them to fight. Or were they supposed to train him instead? Removing his keycard from the back of his datapad, he swiped it in the slot on the side of the control pad.

The formerly blank screen lit up, and it was a few moments before a complicated control panel came onto the screen. Nothing on it was marked at all, and there was precious little to distinguish one b.u.t.ton from the other; small green and red squares dotted the display, looking almost like a new sort of game or an old box of chewing gum, and there was one large orange square b.u.t.ton at the bottom.

"Well, this is helpful," Rogers said. "Is there an instruction manual of any sort?"

"Yes!" Tunger said excitedly, happy to be of use. "Yes, there is!" He reached around to the same cabinet and pulled out a sheet of laminated plastic paper and handed it over.

"Ah," Rogers said. "Well, let's see, then."

It was a picture of the datapad with all of the b.u.t.tons on it. Nothing was labeled.

"What the h.e.l.l am I supposed to do with this?" Rogers asked.

Tunger's smile faded. "Well, I think they might have thought you would label them as, you know, you figured them out?"

Rogers shook his head. "Alright, Oh One, what about you? If I get blasted by these phantom Thelicosans that everyone keeps talking about, what happens?"

"I a.s.sume command of the AIGCS and utilize the best available strategy to neutralize the threat at hand."

"About as descriptive as the command pad, thanks. Anything more than that? How exactly do you exert said command?"

"I utilize the best available strategy to neutralize the threat at hand."

Rogers ran his hands down his face, grabbing onto his beard and pulling hard. "I think I'd rather have another inspection."

"For inspections, you should contact the Standardization and Evaluation Squadron. I am not programmed for that function."

"Thankfully not." Rogers turned the command pad over in his hands, wondering what would happen if he just started pushing b.u.t.tons. The big one on the bottom, the orange square, looked promising. But maybe it was an execution command that only made any sense to use after other commands had been issued? It all seemed like a very primitive system for such advanced technology.

"Well," Rogers said. "Here goes nothing. Why don't you step back into formation, Oh One?"

The droid's eyes flashed for a moment. "I am unable to find a suitable answer for that question. Most likely it is because I have not been ordered to do so by my superior officer."

Rogers blinked. "Get back in formation."

"Yes, sir." The droid moved smoothly back to the position it had occupied previously.

Taking up the pad in his hand and swiping his keycard again-it had locked itself in the interim minutes-he hovered his finger over the orange b.u.t.ton, wondering. What if it was the "seek and destroy" b.u.t.ton? Or the "fire indiscriminately" b.u.t.ton? Or, worse, the "talk to your commander" b.u.t.ton? He had to believe that whoever had designed these things wouldn't let something so dangerous be so easy to do.

He pressed the b.u.t.ton, muscles tense.

A resounding ding came from the control pad, followed by the feminine voice that seemed to come standard with all pieces of military technology.

"Congratulations on activating the Mark III Artificial Intelligence Ground Combat control pad. As thanks for activating this service, you are ent.i.tled to one free It's a Droid Life coloring book, to be redeemed at any of the many Snaggadir's Sundries locations available across the galaxy. Remember: whatever you need, you can Snag It at Snaggadir's!"

"Great," Rogers muttered. "My life's treasure at long last."

Oh One beeped, though to Rogers' eyes, it hadn't done anything. Looking back down at the datapad, he found that it had locked again.

"d.a.m.n it." He swiped his keycard again, and the screen came back on. Nothing had changed. He pressed the orange b.u.t.ton one more time.

"Command?" the control pad prompted.

"Ah, here we go," Rogers said. "Now we're getting somewhere."

"Invalid command," the control pad answered.

"I haven't commanded anything yet."

"Invalid command."

"Hold your horses; I'm thinking!"

"I have received your command," Oh One said, loud enough to make Rogers jump, "but I cannot execute it due to a lack of equine life forms in the immediate area."

Rogers goggled at Oh One, wondering what kind of witless moron had programmed these things. When he turned back to the command pad, the screen was blank. It had locked itself in the short interim.

"What is wrong with this thing?" Rogers said as he aggressively swiped his keycard through the reader, unlocking the pad once again. He tapped the orange b.u.t.ton.

"Command?"

"Disable the auto-lock feature on the command pad."

"Security protocol prevents users from tampering with access features on this command pad. Command?"

"Ugh," Rogers said. What was he supposed to do with these droids, anyway? He didn't know how to fight, himself, so it seemed kind of ridiculous to try and teach them how to do it. Maybe some of that standard, Steuben-esque drill maneuver c.r.a.p would suffice for now. It was about the only military training that Rogers remembered other than engineering work.

"Stand at attention," he barked.

"Command received."

None of the droids moved, but Tunger's boots clicked together so hard that Rogers thought he might sprain his ankle.

"Not you," Rogers said.

"Oh," Tunger said, his face turning sour. "I don't get to do anything, either?"

"You're supposed to keep things orderly," Rogers said. "So, do that."

Surprisingly, this seemed to please Tunger. "Yes, sir!" he said, and, for some reason, left the room.

Turning back to the droids, he noticed that none of them seemed to have changed position. But now that he thought of it, it was the same position they'd been in the entire time. Was this standing at attention?

"Oh One," Rogers said. "Why did none of you do anything, even though this thingy here said that the command was received?"

"We are unable to find location: ATTENTION at which to stand."

"What? It's a military drill term!" Well, maybe they just couldn't stand at attention because it just didn't work with their metallic bodies. Maybe he could get them to move around a little.

He ripped his keycard so hard through the reader that it didn't have time to recognize his credentials, forcing him to do it again. Unlock. Screen up. Orange b.u.t.ton. Command?

"Right face!" Rogers barked, astonished at his own drill sergeant-ness.

That did something! The entire group of droids, in one frighteningly smooth and coordinated motion, pivoted and snapped their bodies ninety degrees to the right, bringing their legs down with much less noise than a group of shinies should have made with all their stomping around.

"Now we're talking" he said.

"What are we talking about?" Tunger said as he came into the room with a small dustpan and broom and began sweeping up.

"What are you doing?"

"Keeping things orderly, sir."

"Right," Rogers said, turning back to the command pad and pressing the orange . . . unlocking the worthless piece of s.h.i.t with his G.o.d-d.a.m.n keycard and pressing the orange b.u.t.ton.

"March!"

"For commands to be executed at a later date, please specify the day and year as well."

"No," Rogers cried, "not March the month; march forward!"

Vibrations coursed through the floor of the training room as the entire formation of droids ran into the wall that was six feet in front of them. As they collided with the wall, they kept moving forward, their legs pumping up and down, though they seemed to be doing little enough damage to each other in the process. Perhaps it was a benefit of their made-for-combat metal alloy or whatever.

"Stop!" Rogers shouted. "Why are you doing that?"

"We are responding to the command given," Oh One said, though the voice was m.u.f.fled by his speech transmitter being smashed up against the wall.

"Oh for the love of . . . march backward, will you?"

"Affirmative."

The formation marched backward until they were in the middle of the room again, at which point Rogers shouted for them to stop. They didn't stop. Looking down at the control pad, he noticed that it was probably because it was locked. Rogers took it in his hand, about to throw it at Tunger's broom, but was distracted by the clattering of a formation of droids. .h.i.tting the opposite wall.

"Stop!" Rogers shouted at the command pad once he'd unlocked it again.

The formation of droids stopped abruptly, the sudden silence almost as startling as the symphony of metal had been moments earlier.

"Dear G.o.d," Rogers said. "What use is this?"

"We are used to neutralize the current threat by utilizing the best-"

"Shut up!" Rogers said.

He took a deep breath. Okay, so moving them wasn't as easy as he thought. He definitely wasn't ready to try anything with weapons yet, that was for sure, not that he really wanted to. Maybe he could march them down the hallway and "accidentally" vent the room to open s.p.a.ce, or something. No, too obvious. G.o.d, he wanted a drink.

"Everyone stand still and do nothing," he said.