Glitch Read online

  I stepped over to Bert. I had to grin, he was holding his twenty-foot tall front tire up like a lame leg. Glitch joined me sparks dribbling from his open access panels. Bert's ocular port following us under him on its articulated stalk. I reached up and thumped his belly, it was much lower than a harvester's just a foot and a half over my head. “Ok, Bert, let's see your foot.”

  His iris dilated and refocused as he bobbed from side to side, was he amused? Then he lifted his second wheel of the two behind his malfunctioning one. He was playing! I narrowed my eyes playfully and pointed. “No you big baby, your other foot.” Then I shook a finger at his ocular port when I thought he was going to lift another wheel.

  He visibly slumped on his suspension and let out a grumph of compressed air. I grinned, it almost sounded like a sigh of defeat. He put the offending wheel down, as it took the tons of weight onto it I could see the hub it dipping too low into the electromagnetic cushion and almost come in contact with the rim of the wheel.

  I whistled and stroked his wheel. “You got here just in time you silly pinger. You could have handed the haul off to Betty and got in here sooner.” He made a low and indignant bawrumph sound with his horn, and I waggled a finger at him. “I don’t care if it was a matter of pride. I'm responsible for your health, and you would have been out of commission for at least a month until I could scavenge the parts for you. Is that what you want?”

  His iris went wide in alarm, and he shook his eye side to side. I patted his ocular port and agreed. “Exactly, so stop being all macho for Betty let me help you.”

  He nodded his eyestalk, and I looked beside me. “Glitch?” I hopped onto his mobility platform, and he grabbed my waist with his grappler, carefully like I was made of glass. Then with a squeal, he lifted me into the air, I joined in with his squeal as he almost missed the open access port that he lifted me up into.

  I grabbed my multitool from my tool belt and absently typed a code and folded itself into a photon projector. I swung the light around the space and winced at all of my jury rigs all around. I swear, they never send me enough replacement parts from topside unless it causes a problem that impacts the food supply chain.

  I crawled over some cables and looked at the control and access panel for his wheel. I heard Glitch squee a question from below. I called back, “I don't know yet silly boy, give me a second to run a diagnostic. Normally a remote uplink would be established, but that just seemed so invasive, like looking under a friend's skirt or something like that. Besides, the uplink subsystems served my pingers better for other purposes and didn't work as they should anymore.

  I accidentally bumped a cable in a jumpered bypass I installed years ago, sending sparks flying, and Bert shook. I heard him utter a warbling brawhumpwump. I grinned like an old Earth loon as I patted the outer wall, the silly pinger was ticklish it seemed.

  I shook my head and keyed in my code at a service port, and it slid away revealing the inner circuitry. I saw the problem right away without needing to run a diagnostic. The main power storage crystal was burned to trollite and the smaller backup crystal was barely pulsing, and most of the inner lattice was burned to trollite too. The poor guy was maybe a day or two from catastrophic failure, and he would have lost a wheel.

  The flanterskelling, crystal licking bootwaffles topside were stingy with power storage crystal shipments, and I had been cut back to one shipment every other month. I spent more time in the boneyard scavenging partially depleted crystals than anything else.

  I scurried over to the access panel and called down to Glitch who was staring up expectantly, like a dog awaiting his master's return. It was too cute. I called down to him, I need the last full crystal we have hidden away for a rainy day buddy, it looks like it is pouring today. Bring the most intact salvaged one too, please.

  He nodded and then squeed as he trundled away. I hung my head down out of the crawlspace and grinned at the retreating pinger. I pointed toward the office and called out, “Other way silly boy.”

  He slowed to a stop, looked back, then lowered his orb and looked embarrassed as she started trundling the other way. I gave him a grin as he passed and then pointed at Bert's visual port when he rumbled like a laugh. “Hey watch it, Glitchy is my best friend.”

  I squinted an accusing eye his way, then he was looking at everything but me. I snorted. “Nice innocent act big guy.” I dare you to tell me my pingers don't have feelings or aren't self-aware.

  And Glitch truly was my best friend. He had been mother's favorite before I was born, and he was the oldest maintenance pinger at my grid. I taught him to play, and he taught me to repair things before I even started lessons with my mother. I've watched him and the others slowly open their eyes and become something more than was ever intended over the years.

  Wrongway pulled in under me and waved at the floor. I grinned and waved back at him then he trundled away to continue his tasks for the day. A minute later Glitch was there holding a crystal up to me. I took it and sighed. It was my last full crystal. Maybe I'd requisition five times what I really needed just to get barely enough on the next shipment.

  I reached down expectantly for the other crystal, and he raised his grappler again, and I blinked and chuckled. It was a strawberry, my favorite treat from the fields. I took it and then asked, is this a crystal Glitchy? He looked at it then the crystal in my other hand then drooped visibly. The poor guy. I shook my head and said, “No it isn't, but thank you, I'll take it.”

  I took a bite of the red fruit and closed my eyes to savor it. “Mmmm.” It was decadent, and I grinned as I let the juices fill my mouth. Topside, strawberries were worth their weight in gold or cobalt crystals, but down here dirtside, we ate what we wanted. It was about the only perk to being a dirter as they called us. I finished it with Glitch looking on expectantly. It was a little humorous that I just ate what would have cost anyone else an entire month stipend, and I had a bowl of them in my office for later. I plied Vashon's passion with them last night.

  I licked my fingers then said, “You did good Glitch.” He squeed in glee then I looked at him expectantly. He looked up at me, and I swear he was confused, then he turned his ocular port to the crystal in my other hand, and his iris went wide when he remembered what I needed, then he went trundling off like a pinger on a mission.

  I waited for him, and he came back quickly, if he had been human he would have been panting with exertion, then he offered the partially burned crystal up to me as a prize. I took it and called down, “You're the best,” as I popped back into the crawl space. I heard him warbling something that sounded like “Awww.”

  I looked at the crystals then at my multi-tool. There wasn't any other light in the space. I sighed, I had grown so dependent on the device I had built when I was seven. There isn't another one like it in the galaxy.

  I had used a processor from an old Mark 8 Harvester that had malfunctioned in AgriGrid A3 and plummeted over a cliff. They had brought his remains to the boneyard. Using it and some nano panels, I was able to build a tool that was capable of restructuring itself into any tool I would need. It could do anything, well, anything but make two tools that is.

  I growled at myself then looked through my tool belt for an extractor. I yanked the main crystal and sighed, not even a spark, it was one hundred percent trollite alright. I tossed the useless thing through the access door and heard it tinkle on the shop floor below.

  Blip would find it later and bring it to the pretty path he has been building over the years between the repair bay and the tumbril pad. I think he likes how they glint in the light of the sun and moons. The relays sparked as I shoved the new crystal into the receiver prongs and then with a deep thrumming hum, Bert leveled himself. The movement threw me off balance, and I fell onto some jury-rigged cable bypasses, sending sparks showering down on me and making Bert shimmy and laugh again.

  I grinned and righted myself then repeated the process with the backup crystal, it was a half trollite itself but in much better s
hape than the one in Bert. I almost tossed the old one too, but instead, pocketed it. Ten percent is ten percent.

  I closed up and moved over to the access panel and dangled my legs down. A moment later Glitch had my waist and lowered me to his mobility platform. I reached up and tapped a code, and the access door slid into place.

  I thumped Bert's belly. “Good to go, big guy, remember you have a terminal cleaning in three days.” He honked his deep horn, and it echoed in the place. Then I swear the silly pinger tiptoed past me, watching me the whole time, so he didn't squish me under his wheels. They were always so careful with me.

  I grinned at him as I absently keyed my multi-tool and it reconfigured itself to look like a simple spanner again, and I slid it into my tool belt. Then I wiped the grease off my hands with the shop rag I carry tucked into my belt. Where did the grease come from? Bert's insides were fairly clean. It seemed that grease was an insipid part of my job that I couldn't escape.

  Then I paused when I heard the whining of plasma drive engines. I glanced out to see tumbril with Capitol markings landing beside the Albatross out at the pad.

  I hopped off of Glitch and furrowed my brows, what was a tumbril doing here today? The next shipment wasn't until the morning. We didn't have it prepared yet.

  We wandered out, Blip joined us, and Wrongway stopped working on the tender he was changing lubrication oil in on the other side of the maintenance bay to see what was up.

  The doors opened, and Sanders stepped out with a smile. “Hey Fixit, how goes things dirtside?”

  He was one of the three regular pilots who shipped the foodstuffs topside for my grid. I actually liked him because unlike the other two who didn't consort with dirters, Harvey Sanders seemed like a friendly guy.

  I shrugged. “Can't complain. The shipment isn't ready yet, you weren't supposed to be here until tomorrow.”

  He grinned. “Oh, I'm not picking anything up. I'm dropping something off.”

  Two Sky Guards stepped off the tumbril behind him in their violet plasti-ceramic armor, one male one female.

  Dropping something off? And why the Rangers? I perked up and blurted hopefully, “Power storage crystals?”

  He smiled and said, “Better.” He tapped something on his iso-pad, and I heard the familiar sound of rubberized tank treads and a shiny white Mark 5 pinger trundled down the ramp to stop beside him. But the mark 5s weren't supposed to be out for another six months, and we got him or her?

  I smiled widely and waved at it. “Hello.”

  It looked at me and considered, then it looked almost confused as it waved back. The tin voice of its speech synthesizer replying coldly, “Hello.” We'd have to work on that, I knew what it needed to feel like itself.

  Sanders offered his iso-pad. I gratefully placed my hand on it, and it scanned my identity as I asked, “Wow, not to sound ungrateful, but why am I getting it? I've never put in a requisition.”

  He seemed happy like he was giving me great news when he said, as he tapped something on his iso-pad and handed it back to me, “New Terra is giving it to you to replace the recalled unit. You'll finally be rid of that old Mark 2.”

  I almost dropped the pad and stepped back, moving my arm wide to shoo Glitch behind me. He squealed in distress and hid in my shadow.

  I sputtered, “Recall? No! You can't have him. Glitch is my friend.”

  The two Sky Guards stepped forward, hands resting on their weapons at their hips and I realized that is why they were there, in case I refused. Sanders furrowed his brows and started to step forward. “Wait, what's going on...” One of them turned on him and pushed him against the tumbril, her arm across his chest. He held his hands up to show he was offering no aggression.

  They were here to kidnap Glitch!

  Chapter 3 – Crystal Lickers

  I grabbed the private uplink transmitter from my tool belt. Vashon had given it to me on our last date, it was no bigger than a biscuit and had planetary coverage using the satellite relay network. I pressed the button frantically.

  The second bootwaffle was using an iso-pad to try to put Glitch into sleep-mode. Good luck with that you pieces of trollite, he doesn't have an uplink. The man got frustrated with their efforts to deactivate my friend, as I waited for Vashon to respond. They stepped forward, and two other Sky Guard stepped out of the tumbril as the man advanced.

  Glitch let out a frightened squee, and I could hear him shaking, and Blip was blipping. I kept my arms wide, blocking the man from Glitchy. Wrongway sped up to us, and I saw one of my Mark 9 harvesters, Turk, stop in the wheat fields a couple hundred yards away and turn his ocular port our way. He was the biggest and smartest of my pingers.

  I exhaled in relief as a honey coated voice came from the transmitter, “Well Fixit, as I live and breathe. To what do I owe the honor?”

  I blurted, “Vashon, they're trying to take Glitch! They're...” Then the man grabbed my arm, and all hell broke loose.

  Glitch squealed in anger and shocked the man by charging his grappler and grabbing the arm that was on mine. I got a bit of the shock transmitted to me from the brief contact before the man released me and convulsed and slumped to the ground.

  The ground shook as the air was filled with the bellowing warning horn from Turk as he started tearing through the wheat field toward us, leaving the two tenders he was loading behind, crushing everything in his path under his two-story tall tires. Fluffers around him took to the air, startled by his outburst.

  Blip was blipping and squealing, moving in front of me, as Wrongway flailed his grappler around behind him then started spinning around to back up toward the other Rangers.

  I heard Vashon yelling, “Fixit? Vega! What's going on?”

  The Rangers were drawing their weapons, and the third conscious one dropped her arm from Sanders and drew a sidearm, aiming it at me, then my various pingers. She paled when she saw Turk had already closed half the distance, his horn still bellowing in rage. Mother of all crystal, this was not going to end well.

  The woman was scared, and the stupid crystal licker actually took a couple potshots at Turk. He was as armored as any hover tank, just by virtue of his heavy duty construction for handling fifty metric tons of crops and the harsh environment of Prime. Hell, he massed over thirty metric tons himself.

  Vashon was yelling at me, “Was that weapons fire? Vega speak to me!”

  One of the men shot an electro pulse at Blip who was in front of me now, he squeed in pain and fell over with a barely audible blip. No! I stepped up between the Sky Guards and my pingers, holding my hands wide. This had to stop before someone did irreparable damage to one of my friends or the piece of trollite Rangers.

  I yelled, “Stop it now!” Turk stopped blasting his horn and slowed to a stop just before he would have crushed the tumbril. All electronic eyes were on me. I said, “He didn't hurt me. I'm fine. He's just a bootwaffle. I love you all, but you don’t need to put yourselves in danger for me. We'll get this all sorted.”

  I remembered what was in my hand and I held it up as one of the Rangers shoved me against the tumbril, causing my pingers to all let out low oscillations of their speakers, sounding like growls as I said, “I have Captain Peregradopolis on uplink.”

  The other two started moving to flank Glitch as they pulled stun sticks that were nothing short of electric cattle prods, which would likely fry his circuitry of they prodded him too much with them. He was spinning in place, looking at the two, and his oscillating growl got louder.

  I repeated to the one who was roughly holding me face first against the tumbril, “I have Captain Vashon Peregradopolis of the Sky Guard on uplink.” I shook the transmitter in my hand.

  This time they heard me and it... caused them all to hesitate. They all knew who Vashon was. She was elite among the Rangers. She was the troubleshooter they sent in whenever things got dicey, a one-woman wrecking crew. And her exploits were in all the waves transmitted in the news. A tiny voice in my head was grinning and hopping around
in joy as it added, 'And she chose me.'

  In the new silence, my personal Sky Guard spoke, “What's going on there Rangers?”

  All of their eyes went to the unconscious man beside Glitch's mobility platform. He must have been in command of this so called recall. The woman responded, “Corporal Benson, ma'am. This dirter is resisting sanctioned orders from the Capitol. She refuses to turn over government property, and they have attacked a Sky Guard, the flanterskelling pingers attacked! They aren't supposed to be able to do that.”

  I heard what could only have been a growl coming from the transmitter, then Vashon said in a cold tone that chilled me, “That 'dirter' is my girlfriend. And you should refrain from using slurs about one of the few people on Tau Ceti Prime who stand between our entire planet's population and starvation. Stand down until I am on site, I'm already inbound, ETA two mikes.”

  She hesitated then looked at their man on the ground again then said, “Yes ma'am.” She made a sweeping motion with her hand, and the man released me, but not before giving me one more shove into the tumbril. Damn crystal licker.

  I stepped over grabbed glitch's grappler and tugged, he moved behind me, and I motioned for Wrongway to as well, he did, and I helped Blip up as the Rangers helped the stunned man to his feet. “Blippy? You ok buddy?”

  He made a silly groggy “graaaawwll” sound then blipped cheerily. The silly drama queen was as bad as Glitch.

  I moved him behind me with the others. I looked around and saw Bonnie arriving and four or five tenders. I looked around and said loudly, “Everything is ok everyone. Vashon is on the way. She'll take care of everything.” I hoped. “Thank you for coming. Now shoo, scoot back to work, the silos won't fill themselves.” I smiled at all my friends.

  They seemed to look between each other with their ocular ports, then all looked at the Sky Rangers, and all started sounding their warning horns. I had to cover my ears as the ground around us shook under the sheer volume of sound we were assaulted with, more fluffers took to the sky from the fields as far as my eyes could see, startled by the warning my pingers were issuing to the Rangers.