Eleven Thirtytwo - Duties

Who: Erik 1132
Where: Somewhere
When: Who knows
Erik looked around. His human eyes picked up everything. The beautiful blue of the clear, cloudless sky. The luscious green of the thick, tall grass. He held out his human hand to touch it, feel its slight form brush against his palms. He walked forward on his two human legs, feeling the luscious long green grass crumple below his feet. He spun around, arms outstretched feeling the breeze blowing over his naked body, relishing the feeling of being human. He closed his eyes and spun faster. Faster and faster until his human brain misread the electronic impulses being sent by his human ears telling him he was dizzy and about to fall over. Still he spun, faster and faster until-
BUMP!
Erik stopped spinning. His processors whirred up to full power. His AI kicking completely into recognition of what was happening. He looked around. His skutter-standard black and white optical processor picked up everything. The dull greyscale ceiling of the cargo bay. The dull greyscale floor of the cargo bay. A few dull greyscale crates in the cargo bay. He cursed the human that developed artificial intelligence and rolled on. The bump from hitting his claw on the wall had woken him from what humans would describe as a dream.
Now, though, he was awake. He was awake and, albeit a little mischievous, still had duties to perform. He rolled on down the corridors, surprised not to have seen any humans on board for some time, and entered the elevator.
On the way up to the living quarters, his orders flashed infront of his imaging unit.
.................
1................
Mickys laundry...
*mechanical overr
ide*.............
*sod that!his pan
ts are disgusting
!................
.................
2................
Feed Mickys fish.
.................
3................
~IMPORTANT!~.....
Add special ingre
dient 795 to home
brew kit........
.................
There was no way Erik was going near Mickys dirty underwear! He would probably skip feeding the fish too, they could wait another, wait another, wait another, wait another, wai...
Erik knocked his claw against the wall to unblock the system malfunction.
...they could wait another few days before they started to die. The most important order was the home brew. Erik knew that if he made a mess of Mickys home brew, he would be scrap metal for sure.
The elevator doors opened and Erik rolled out. He was shocked to see a line of skutters marching down the corridor. They looked to be almost primitive. His curiosity caught the best of him as he rolled off after them, wanting to see what they were up to. There were at least four in the group, all rolling off single file.
.................
ERROR-ERROR-ERROR
.................
PROCEED WITH ORDE
R THREE-PROCEED W
ITH ORDER THREE..
.................
Another swift bump against the wall cleared the pesky override and he trundled on, now almost obsessed with these new primitive skutters. What were they doing? Was there some meaning to their order?
Before he could think any more about it the one at the back spun around to see him. It was holding a flaming torch, flickering in the dull light of the corridor. Looking shocked, it uttered some jumbled language that Erik couldn't understand. This sounded English, but it didn't make sense. As soon as his audio processors heard it, they deleted it from memory as though it was just background noise.
The primitive skutters gathered around him and started nudging him agressively, as if they wanted him to do something. They couldn't see that he was not processing their commands, so didn't understand why he was disobeying them. They got more and more agressive until slight shoves and warning bumps turned into thumping and barging.
Erik was surrounded. He had no vocal processor and these primitives were not responding to his simple digital broadcasts. Erik was sure that if he was human he would be scared by now.
.................
ERROR-ERROR-ERROR
.................
PROCEED WITH ORDE
R THREE-PROCEED W
ITH ORDER THREE..
.................
He couldn't believe that at a time like this, all his processors could come up with was order three. Tending to Mickys home brew. That more-often-than-not explosive drinks setup he had.
.................
EXPLOSIVE-EXPLOSI
VE-EXPLOSIVE.....
.................
PROCEED WITH ORDE
R THREE-PROCEED W
ITH ORDER THREE..
.................
Of course! Erik turned and fled, rolling as fast as his recently serviced skutter wheels could carry him. He hoped the primitives hadn't had a service in a while. Stealing a glance behind him, he saw that silicone God was too busy to answer his prayers. His pursuers were hot on his tail. He wouldn't have much time once he reached Mickys quarters...
.................
<To.Be.Continued>
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