An Honest Mistake
Shortly, I found myself sitting atop another hillside, this time a small cliff face close by the crash site.
The hillside was a further removed from Kernelle. Far enough away, in fact, that I could see both it and the city the chief mentioned. What had he called it? Grand Cluster? It was beautiful. The whole thing followed the crescent shape of the bay it was settled against. Lights and colors shimmered against the background of the sea off in the distance.
As I looked out over the horizon, I tried to hold on to the sense of peace from being alone, away from it all, but thoughts began flying through my head again anyway. This hill I sat on was the hill the chief suggested we use to bury the rest of the crew. This was where Israel would be buried in a few days. This is where they'd all be buried in a few days. This is where I'd be buried eventually too if I didn't get away from this nightmare.
Two conflicting hates welled back up inside me. I hated Eli for killing Israel, and at the same time I hated myself for it too. I tried to push my hatred further off onto that robot, but...damn it, it was my fault in the first place. If I'd just fixed that map before we left, we wouldn't have slammed straight into this planet. The crew wouldn't be dead. I wouldn't be stranded here. And Israel wouldn't be dead on a table as a result of some twisted robot's experiment.
But he'd tried to help, right? He hadn't purposefully killed Israel. But did that matter? He literally sucked the life out of him. I was stuck on this planet of robots who could take people apart limb from limb and reassemble them just for the heck of it.
And Blizz...She was stuck too. And there was nothing I could do to get away.
What a rotten fresh start. So much for leaving Earth to find a blank slate. Maybe I just deserved to rot
I've never been an emotional person, but this was all just too much. I sat for a while longer, letting it all stew, half-repeating the ideas feverishly in my head trying to search for even more reasons to hate all of this. Eventually, Ephraim came and stood beside me.
"Sooo, does your kind sleep?" he asked. The question was so odd that it broke me out of my thoughts for a moment.
"Yeah."
"Like...every day right?"
"Yeah."
"So...you should come back to the village and sleep...right?"
I breathed in, then out with a long breath.
He didn't sit down by me. Instead, he stood for a while saying nothing. He just looked out back at the village. What was on his mind? Was he thinking of something comforting, or just socially awkward?
"Ah, I guess you're thinking about stuff. That's fair. I'd be thinking about stuff too if most of my friends died."
Socially awkward it is, then.
He continued. "You know, Eli really wasn't exaggerating when he said he's done this type of thing hundreds of times before. He's not officially part of the engineering clan—he's actually keeper, like me—" he held up his shepherd's crook, "But despite that, repairing creatures is his passion. He's all about keeping them going, you know? Ever since he and I were new. While most of the engineers and breeders are all about figuring out how to make newer, better creatures, he was always finding ways of fixing the broken ones."
Then he folded his arms.
"It's kind of weird, to be honest," he said a little too frankly.
I stopped him. "Why are you telling me this?"
"Just so you know that if he fails, he didn't do it on purpose."
"It seems like he failed even before he began."
I let myself keep feeling it. Just a little. That inkling to hate him for trying so that I didn't have to hate myself instead.
"Where is Blizz?" I asked.
"'Updating her neural weights.' What the heck does that even mean? She kept saying it was important, and then she just turned into this ball of light and started ignoring me."
"She's saving off her experiences for the day, analyzing them, and updating her software to adapt for the next day."
"Uh, 'software?'"
"Her mind. Well, not her mind exactly. Her. Like, everything that defines her aside from her hardware—"
I realized I was trying to explain architecture with a robot who doesn't know the first thing about digital technology.
"She just meant she was going to sleep."
"Oh. Well, she could have just said that!" He said as he put his hands hands in the air. "Come on, you should 'updoot your noodle weights' too."
"Update my neural weights," I corrected.
"Yeah that's what I said."
I sighed internally. I'm too exhausted for this right now. I stood up, and started walking down the hill back toward the village with Ephraim.
The next morning, Ephraim, Blizz, and I were back at the workshop, waiting just downstairs with Reeder and Rider. There was an uncomfortable anticipation in the air. The door to the observatory opened, and Eli invited us up. Blizz and I were the first through the door. On the other side of the room, Israel was sitting upright on the table where we left him the night before. Eli had done it. Blizz flew up to him. “Oh my gosh! You’re okay!” Israel didn’t respond. He just continued to wait. Blizz floated back slightly. “Israel?” A fly landed on his cheek. He remained completely motionless. What...? Ephraim rounded out the pack. When he laid eyes on Israel, he said, "See Jerrod, what'd I tell you? I walked up to him take a closer look at him. His familiar eyes stared right past me. I grabbed his arm. It It was warm. And his chest was rising and falling slightly. It was his him—or at least his body anyway. He was definitely alive. But it’s like he was blank somehow. The night before, my friend was a corpse. I'd wanted so badly to blame Eli for it. And now...what is he? Alive, but empty, like a computer booting up for the first time without an operating system. “Eli, what did you do?” I asked. Eli lifted his goggles. “What do you mean? I said I’d take care of him, and I took care of him. I realized that a lot his internals were either broken beyond repair, or just plain incompatible with our tools. I had to more or less rebuild him from the ground up. Should be good as new, now, though. Just like he was before, I assume.” The fly that had landed on Israel’s face crawled up his nose. “Is that normal?” Ephraim asked. "No, Ephraim. That's not normal." I said, staring at Eli. "Clearly, something isn't right with him." “That’s—that's not true. Watch.” He turned to Israel. “Alright, say hello.” Israel registered the command, and in a very slow motion, he turned his torso and waved to us. Afterward, he returned to the completely neutal position he'd been in before. "He might take some time to re-adjust, but he should be just fine," Eli tried to reassure. "In fact, he'll be even better than he was before." I had a very hard time believing that. “Eli, did you turn him into a hominid? Like, an actual hominid? I don't think this was what the chief gave the thumbs up on,” Ephraim said. Eli tensed. "The chief said I could. fix. him. And I did." Though Eli's mouth was more like a mesh speaker than a real mouth, it sounded like he'd said it through clenched teeth. The room felt warmer, and the feelings of hate from before started to return. This time, the scales began to tip away from self-hate. This wasn't my fault. This was his. He'd promised to save Israel. And Ephraim had promised it, too. I looked over at Ephraim and began to attack. "You said he'd done this before." "He has! Well, not on hominids. Those are taboo, obviously," Ephraim said. "I KNOW they're taboo," Eli shot back. "But as we've established before, the chief gave us permission to fix this one." I threw another dagger. "And how much of him is even left, Eli? Is that even Israel anymore? Or is he just another animal you created?" Eli started to look defensive. "Of course it's still him! I tried to save as much of him as I could, but he was so busted to heck that I couldn't save everything!" "Yeah, clearly. You couldn't save everything, just his empty husk. Forget all his thoughts and experiences. Forget everything that actually made him him." "Eli, come on. Let's just accept this. You know what this really is. You know you crossed a line here," Ephraim said. "I was just doing what I could! Doesn't that count for something?" Eli shifted his eyes back and forth from Ephraim to me. I could tell that I'd gotten to him. More excuses? Why couldn't he just accept his failure and apologize? "And the best you could do was kill him, then turn his body into an empty puppet?" "Jerrod?" Blizz peeped. I watched something change in Eli. "You were on that thing when it crashed right? If you cared about him so much, why didn't stop it from crashing? Why didn't you protect him yourself?" Rage boiled over inside me. I launched myself at him. Ephraim caught me by the arm. "That's enough! For the Creator's sake. What's done is done. Let's quit blaming each other and give it a rest. We can figure out what to do about this heresy after we've all calmed down." Eli's eyes narrowed. The room had felt hot up until now. But in a moment, everything changed to ice. "Heresy?" Ephraim winced. "Is that what you think this is?" "No, Eli, I just meant that—" "I'm just a heretic to you now, brother? Really?" "You just made a mistake, Eli. That's all." "Clearly, the only mistake I've made here was trying to help." "No, that's not it." He didn't let Ephraim continue. Instead, he just began walking past us. He didn't stomp out in a huff. He didn't look at either of us. When he got to the door, he stopped just long enough to get in the last word. "Then, obviously, my mistake was in coming to this cult of a village in the first place." Then he walked out. My heart was pounding. Had he really just accused me of killing Israel? I took a few heavy breaths, then I remembered. I basically had killed Israel. It really was my fault we're here in the first place. My neglect ultimately turned the closest thing I had to a friend and mentor into a husk. A husk that had heard every word of that argument, but now lacked the consciousness to ever process it. It just stared at me, empty eyes neither judging nor caring. At least, not outwardly. But something in me projected the old Israel, the real Israel, onto that thing. What would he have thought about how I just acted? I can only imagine he'd be ashamed of how petty I'd been. Israel blinked, but said nothing. "We're going to go get him and fix this," Ephraim said. That's the last thing I wanted to do. I looked over to Blizz, who had just phased out of her human form back into a ball of light. She had shut most of the conversation out. I wish I could do the same about now. "Come on, let's go." "Wait." I said. "What do we do about Israel?"
The next morning, Ephraim, Blizz, and I were back at the workshop, waiting just downstairs with Reeder and Rider. There was an uncomfortable anticipation in the air. The door to the observatory opened, and Eli invited us up. Blizz and I were the first through the door. On the other side of the room, Israel was sitting upright on the table where we left him the night before. Eli had done it. Blizz flew up to him. “Oh my gosh! You’re okay!” Israel didn’t respond. He just continued to wait. Blizz floated back slightly. “Israel?” A fly landed on his cheek. He remained completely motionless. What...? Ephraim rounded out the pack. When he laid eyes on Israel, he said, "See Jerrod, what'd I tell you? I walked up to him take a closer look at him. His familiar eyes stared right past me. I grabbed his arm. It It was warm. And his chest was rising and falling slightly. It was his him—or at least his body anyway. He was definitely alive. But it’s like he was blank somehow. The night before, my friend was a corpse. I'd wanted so badly to blame Eli for it. And now...what is he? Alive, but empty, like a computer booting up for the first time without an operating system. “Eli, what did you do?” I asked. Eli lifted his goggles. “What do you mean? I said I’d take care of him, and I took care of him. I realized that a lot his internals were either broken beyond repair, or just plain incompatible with our tools. I had to more or less rebuild him from the ground up. Should be good as new, now, though. Just like he was before, I assume.” The fly that had landed on Israel’s face crawled up his nose. “Is that normal?” Ephraim asked. "No, Ephraim. That's not normal." I said, staring at Eli. "Clearly, something isn't right with him." “That’s—that's not true. Watch.” He turned to Israel. “Alright, say hello.” Israel registered the command, and in a very slow motion, he turned his torso and waved to us. Afterward, he returned to the completely neutal position he'd been in before. "He might take some time to re-adjust, but he should be just fine," Eli tried to reassure. "In fact, he'll be even better than he was before." I had a very hard time believing that. “Eli, did you turn him into a hominid? Like, an actual hominid? I don't think this was what the chief gave the thumbs up on,” Ephraim said. Eli tensed. "The chief said I could. fix. him. And I did." Though Eli's mouth was more like a mesh speaker than a real mouth, it sounded like he'd said it through clenched teeth. The room felt warmer, and the feelings of hate from before started to return. This time, the scales began to tip away from self-hate. This wasn't my fault. This was his. He'd promised to save Israel. And Ephraim had promised it, too. I looked over at Ephraim and began to attack. "You said he'd done this before." "He has! Well, not on hominids. Those are taboo, obviously," Ephraim said. "I KNOW they're taboo," Eli shot back. "But as we've established before, the chief gave us permission to fix this one." I threw another dagger. "And how much of him is even left, Eli? Is that even Israel anymore? Or is he just another animal you created?" Eli started to look defensive. "Of course it's still him! I tried to save as much of him as I could, but he was so busted to heck that I couldn't save everything!" "Yeah, clearly. You couldn't save everything, just his empty husk. Forget all his thoughts and experiences. Forget everything that actually made him him." "Eli, come on. Let's just accept this. You know what this really is. You know you crossed a line here," Ephraim said. "I was just doing what I could! Doesn't that count for something?" Eli shifted his eyes back and forth from Ephraim to me. I could tell that I'd gotten to him. More excuses? Why couldn't he just accept his failure and apologize? "And the best you could do was kill him, then turn his body into an empty puppet?" "Jerrod?" Blizz peeped. I watched something change in Eli. "You were on that thing when it crashed right? If you cared about him so much, why didn't stop it from crashing? Why didn't you protect him yourself?" Rage boiled over inside me. I launched myself at him. Ephraim caught me by the arm. "That's enough! For the Creator's sake. What's done is done. Let's quit blaming each other and give it a rest. We can figure out what to do about this heresy after we've all calmed down." Eli's eyes narrowed. The room had felt hot up until now. But in a moment, everything changed to ice. "Heresy?" Ephraim winced. "Is that what you think this is?" "No, Eli, I just meant that—" "I'm just a heretic to you now, brother? Really?" "You just made a mistake, Eli. That's all." "Clearly, the only mistake I've made here was trying to help." "No, that's not it." He didn't let Ephraim continue. Instead, he just began walking past us. He didn't stomp out in a huff. He didn't look at either of us. When he got to the door, he stopped just long enough to get in the last word. "Then, obviously, my mistake was in coming to this cult of a village in the first place." Then he walked out. My heart was pounding. Had he really just accused me of killing Israel? I took a few heavy breaths, then I remembered. I basically had killed Israel. It really was my fault we're here in the first place. My neglect ultimately turned the closest thing I had to a friend and mentor into a husk. A husk that had heard every word of that argument, but now lacked the consciousness to ever process it. It just stared at me, empty eyes neither judging nor caring. At least, not outwardly. But something in me projected the old Israel, the real Israel, onto that thing. What would he have thought about how I just acted? I can only imagine he'd be ashamed of how petty I'd been. Israel blinked, but said nothing. "We're going to go get him and fix this," Ephraim said. That's the last thing I wanted to do. I looked over to Blizz, who had just phased out of her human form back into a ball of light. She had shut most of the conversation out. I wish I could do the same about now. "Come on, let's go." "Wait." I said. "What do we do about Israel?"
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