Out of Time by Ryan Matthew Harker (ebooks online reader txt) 📕

Eventually we make it through the mob.

Once gaining the outer perimeter of the Housing District directly opposing the tunnel through which we accessed the cavern Swaddler changes course and veers off to the left, following a zigzag line around rickety homes precariously stacked like a toddler’s alphabet blocks.

We zag and zig to a stop in front of a home that (surprisingly enough) doesn’t look so much like it was designed and built by twelve year olds. Two stories tall I look up at it and decide that if it weren’t for the salvaged building materials it could actually have been constructed by a force of at least semi-skilled tradesmen.

Swaddler reaches up and pulls a cord hanging next to the door which causes a large brass bell to emit a loud and distinct ringing. We wait, Swaddler a bit more patiently and calmly than myself. After a few short moments (that seem longer) the door opens to reveal the vague silhouette of what appears to be a medium sized man standing against a gloomy interior.

“Hello good Curator,” Swaddler greets. “Might we please come in?”

The individual in question, the ‘Curator’, doesn’t immediately reply but stands aside and gestures with a robed arm for us to enter. Swaddler doesn’t hesitate and waltzes right in while I take a moment to survey the madness of the cavern I’d be leaving behind. With a shrug I lift a finger to my brow in salute to the Curator and step over the threshold.

With the door shut behind us the Curator crosses the almost cramped little room I find myself in and turns a knob on what I assume is an oil lamp. Flame leaps up the lamp’s chimney, gutters for a moment, then steadies as a warm source of soft light that easily illuminates the confines of the room in a cozy kind of way. I see the room appears so closed in because, other than the single couch and ottoman accompanied chair, the main furnishings consist of shelves lining each wall stacked and overflowing with books. Partially amazed that so many tomes can be crammed into such a small space I turn in time to see Swaddler unswaddling its head in the reverse of the way in which a mummy may find itself wrapped.

I’m holding my breath, not realizing I was, and release it, quickly drawing another. I guess I’m wondering at Swaddler’s gender more than I want to admit to myself because I can’t tear my eyes away. Why it should matter, I don’t know. Male, female, or really just an it, Swaddler is the least of my concerns. The last of the layers comes off to reveal a hood which Swaddler removes, shaking free brunette locks of tightly curled hair while turning towards me. Verdict? Swaddler is... female, and decidingly so.

“So good to see you again, Sammi,” a metallic, but not altogether devoid of emotion, rumble states from behind me.

I’ve temporarily forgotten about the Curator while satisfying my curiosity about Swaddler, I mean Sammi, but upon hearing that strange voice issue its greeting I turn and observe that who I had first mistaken as a who, is really a what.

The Curator is a robot! As fascinated as I’d just been with Swa-er-Sammi, I now can’t tear my eyes off it.

Sitting in the red, velvet covered chair with its feet propped upon the similarly upholstered ottoman the Curator looks completely relaxed. How can a robot be relaxed? Somehow this one is.

Being the first robot I’ve ever encountered I take my time studying it. Not shiny, like I would first expect, the Curator seems to be constructed of some kind of smoked grey stainless steel of a type I’m unfamiliar with. Casually dressed in a thick, red, fleece lined terrycloth bathrobe the sentient machine turns its unblinking, glowing blue eye holes to counteract my inquisitive stare. I can’t help myself, I look away.

“And who do we have here?” that deep and perfect blend of artificial and organic tones enquires.

Lifting my gaze back to the Curator I answer, trying to keep my voice steadier than it is, “My name is Davey, Davey Jones.”

“He’s a stranger from the surface,” Sammi pipes up and I look over my shoulder to see her sitting comfortable on the couch. “The Zenociders were chasing him. There was an explosion and he was unconscious, so I brought him here.”

“Zenociders, hmm,” the Curators mettalo-human voice is contemplative. “Please, Mr. Jones, won’t you have a seat?” A hard, metallic hand protrudes from a soft, red sleeve as I’m waved towards the small couch.

I look from the robot to the attractive woman on the couch.

Sammi looks to be in her early to mid-twenties, perhaps twenty-four, certainly no more. Her brunette hair, a sandy brown to almost mahogany in color, as I said, is a vibrant mess of tightly curled strands that fall an inch or so below her shoulders. She looks at me as I silently observe her and I notice her eyes are a cool blue, but not with the cold of ice, more like the cool of a mid-autumn’s clear blue sky.

“Mr. Jones,” the Curator intones, drawing me away from Sammi’s appearance.

I can feel my cheek’s flush as I blush slightly when I notice the hand still raised in an invitation to sit.

“A-hem,” I clear my throat. “Yes, thank you,” I say and move to sit on the couch that’s little more than a loveseat.

Sammi’s head is down with her hand over her mouth but I’m pretty sure she’s trying not to laugh as I become acutely aware of the pressure of her leg against mine. It’s been so long since I’ve been this close to a woman, intimate or not, I easily find myself uncomfortable.

“There,” the Curator hums. “Now that we’re all settled, perhaps we can continue our conversation more comfortably.”

Hollow blue eyes glow piercingly into my own and I’m pretty sure that I blush again, which I confirm when I feel the shiver a suppressed giggle pass from Sammi’s leg to mine. I shift my weight in an attempt to lessen the contact between our two appendages but the couch is too tiny for much relief to be found and I sigh quietly as I resettle.

Seemingly unconcerned with the dynamics of social human peer bonding the Curator sits unmoving as I fidget then, satisfied I’m ‘comfortable’, he asks, “So, tell us Mr. Jones, how is it you became a target of the Zenociders fingers?”

Again I sigh, and start out by saying, “Let me start out by saying, please, call me Davey. Mr. Jones was my father... and my grandfather.” I flash my most endearing smile at my guide and my host. Sammi’s eyes twinkle delightfully, like far off stars, while the Curator’s don’t even pulsate in the slightest. So much for a robotic sense of humor.

“Very well, Davey, continue.” The Curator seems a deep well of patience.

I continue, “Let me continue by saying, although I know it’s against the rules of polite etiquette to answer a question with a question, before I can answer yours I have to ask, who are you people? And, other than Sammi graciously saving my life,” for the moment I’ve overcome my embarrassment of being near her and flash her another winning smile, once again rewarded with that mystic twinkle. “Thank you, most truly, by the way. But why should I trust you?”

I hadn’t noticed during my first inspection but where the mouth portion of the Curator’s face should be is a fine mesh of little eighth inch by eighth inch squares. This mesh is hard to notice due to the fact that it’s the same smoked stainless color as the rest of its chassis. It becomes readily apparent what the purpose of this mesh is as soon as a number of the squares lit up, bright white in the pattern of a smile. The effect is similar to that of a child’s Lite-Brite. So this machine is capable of displaying emotion through means other than the modulation of its... well, I suppose... his voice. I can’t help but think of the Curator as male, in both appearance and personality.

The Curator flashes his bright smile (literally) and actually chuckles, a low humming vibration I can feel in my teeth.

“Trust us the way we trust you,” he drones. “You were running from the Zenociders, we saved you from Zenociders, it stands logically- as the ancient saying states- that the enemy of my enemy, is my friend.”

As reasonable as this sounds, I stall. “So you’re enemies of these Zenociders?” I ask.

Indeed, we are,” the Curator states and then poses a question of his own, “Did you notice the people who inhabit this place?”

“I couldn’t help but notice them,” I smirk.

“And what was your impression of them?” the Curator probes.

“That they have the appearance of many cultures worldwide... from across Time,” I don’t hesitate to answer.

“Exactly,” again that grin flashes upon the robot’s face and I’m sure this time his eyes do pulsate briefly. “You are exactly correct in your assessment of their origins.”

“I see,” I don’t see. “So, what’s the deal?”

“The deal?” Robot ignorance.

“He means, what are they doing here?” Sammi chimes in. “Or, possibly, how did they get here? ‘What’s the deal’ is twentieth century slang.”

“Both, actually,” I reveal and smile at Sammi. “How did you know that?”

Now it’s Sammi’s turn to blush and she turns away slightly as she does so.

The robot frowns, it’s no less bright than his smile. “I am sorry, Davey, but perhaps you would take a moment to answer my initial question?”

I sigh. I was just wondering how much longer I could keep the Curator answering my questions before he got back to asking his. I as much as tell him this and his chuckle vibrates in my teeth.

“I like you, Davey,” the robot discloses. “I have had little amusement from a human in some time. You amuse me.”

I laugh at the very idea of being the source of a robot’s amusement.

“I like you too, Curator,” I tell him am and only partially surprised to find that the sentiment is genuine. I wonder if all robots are like him, so affable. “And this is why I’m going to tell you everything.”

Reaching into my inner coat pocket to remove Khronos I begin my tale, starting with being thrown through an eighth story apartment window.

At length I explain my situation to my two listeners. Occasionally Sammi or the Curator (mostly the Curator) interrupt my oration with questions, prodding me to further enlighten some detail or another. I’m completely honest in every aspect. I tell them about One Day When, my poor betting instincts, the bookie sending the Hench after me, and the two weeks I’d spent in terrified anxiety. I talk about ‘finding’ TRU, going out the window, and ending up in the jungles of Earth’s primeval forest. I tell them everything: the Mysterious Gunman, the Wolfman, getting stranded and building Khronos. Finally, after what feels like many hours of talking, I end my tale by describing coming to their Time, my running into Ras and his Zenociders, and waking up in the musty tunnel.

“Sammi here can attest to the rest,” I pat her knee with my left hand. “After I woke, she returned and led me here.”

At my stories end I find myself the center of an awkward silence. Not knowing what to do next, I keep my mouth shut. It’s a lot to digest, I know, I’d have a hard time swallowing it if I hadn’t lived through it. As it is, I did, so I get it and being as it’s impossible to read the robot’s steely features I turn to see what I can gather from Sammi’s.

She’s looking at me intensely with a nearly indecipherable expression, eyes all narrow, brows scrunched up, and mouth pursed so hard as to create cute