I can't honestly tell you if they brought up the lights from total darkness, or if they just un-opaqued the inside of our visors. Either way, I could now see where I was.
Correction. Where we now were. I immediately noted I wasn't alone.
The room was a white cube, two metres square. Each wall had a pattern of smaller squares across it, tessellated together. Apart from myself, there were three others.
I had to look down to confirm, and I was just about able to do so, as we were all wearing the same standard Emergency Evacuation Suit. One size fits none, allegedly made to fit anyone in a pinch, ironically so, as that's all you normally felt whilst wearing one, its inner joints seemed to be designed to pinch you in all the wrong places. IE:- everywhere.
I took a second, much longer glance around the room. A standard prison cell for one, normally. Was this one of ours, or an enemy cell? I honestly couldn't tell.
Then something caught my eye, all our suits weren't completely identical. The person directly in front of me had a large red S stenciled across their chest. S for Superman, perhaps? It'd be handy if we did have The Man Of Steel among our number. If this was a cell, we'd soon be free with him here!
I saw the letter E on the chest of the suit to my left next. Looking to my right I had a sneaking suspicion, and sure enough, there it was, the letter W. No doubt my suit had the letter N stencilled across the chest. They'd given us compass designations then? I filed that as potentially interesting.
Then the suit opposite me moved., the occupant stood and tapped the side of their helmet in that familiar spacer pantomime of "Can you hear me? I can't hear you."
I glanced around my suit HUD and saw the notifier. Visor exterior opaque.
Okay, that explained why I couldn't see anyone else's face.
I could already see West struggling to loosen the seal on their helmet. Hang on. Had anyone checked the environmental settings yet?
Then I spotted the marker, a flashing red LED, not just on their suit but on everyone's.
It's hard to violently shake your head no when you're wearing an EES, but that's exactly what I tried to do, as I rushed over as quickly as I could haul my EE suited ass over to stop West making the last mistake they might ever make.
I quickly touched helmets. "What the hell were you doing? This room is full vacuum! If you'd removed your helmet you'd have died an agonizing death!"
I didn't expect what I heard next. "I... I didn't know! I've never worn one of these damn things before! Did the god-damn mech put me inside here?" Only it was neither a male or female voice. It was the electronic tones of the voice synthesizer.
It was then I realized I had to check something important. "Hey, in there. This is gonna sound like a damn odd question, but does my voice sound like a robot?"
West rocked back and forth on the balls of their feet. Well, at least they knew how to say no inside a suit with no comms. Then we touched helmets again. "Yes, you do. Are you a mech then?"
I shimmied myself from foot to foot, the universal suited symbol for no. We touched helmets again. "I'm as human as you are, I hope. Can you wait here, I want to make a quick check on the others?"
West just gave me a thumbs up. They knew how to say yes as well then? So they'd had some suit training, but not enough if they hadn't tried to check the local atmosphere.
I gradually fought my way to my feet, not an easy task in an EES. I patted West on the shoulder, then made my way over to South. If we didn't know names, our directions would have to do for now, until we could talk to each other and ascertain our identities. Hopefully, the others had worked out the significance of the letters on our chests by now.
I checked my HUD again, just to make sure. Comms, offline.
Okay, that was going to present a problem if we wanted to talk to each other, especially in a vacuum, unless any of the others had done much time in space. I tried the comm circuit a few more times, going so far as to even check the manual back-up on my wrist-pad. Still nothing.
Okay. We'd all have to do this the hard way then. I placed my left glove the left side of South's faceplate and moved forward to touch helmets. Admittedly, the most low-tech solution, but the quickest and the easiest too. And the only one available to us now I knew we were in a complete vacuum.
I slowly placed the front of my helmet against theirs. "Can you hear me now? I think our voice synthesizers have been jammed on, to prevent us from communicating easily."
South gave me a thumbs up. "Yes, I can hear you. The comm circuit is off then?" Sure enough, another victim of the voice synthesizer.
I gave the okay sign. "Off, or broken. I'm not sure which, yet. Are you okay, not injured?"
South slashed their glove across their throat. "I am fine. We might not be alone though, if you understand my meaning?" Ah, I knew what that meant.
Not that it mattered. At that moment we were interrupted.
"You will cease private communications immediately and return to your original locations." The synthesized voice sounded like it came from everywhere. Not just from inside our suits.
Sound doesn't travel in a vacuum. File that as interesting, also.
If we couldn't talk among ourselves, they were probably still listening in. "Can you hear us?" I asked.
"Of course. One of you is not what you claim to be. The mechanical will make its presence known immediately. If you do not respond, all of you will be punished."
One of us wasn't what we claimed to be? I'd only spoken to South and West. Neither of them had claimed to be anything yet, and if they had, it had been within the privacy of their own suits. Apart from my exchanges with them, I knew I hadn't said anything else yet, unless I'd been talking while I was unconscious.
"This is your only chance. The mechanical will make its presence known immediately."
#
If one of the others was a mech, it had gone rogue. It certainly hadn't made itself known immediately, as per the Three Laws.
I'd noted that the oxygen gauge was off, deliberately so, it appeared. So whoever was holding us didn't want us to know how much breathable air we had left. That wasn't going to be a major problem, where I was concerned. I'd worn suits like these hundreds of times before. There wasn't a system they could break or otherwise disable which I couldn't then regain access to. I'd already bypassed their lockout, the moment their message had ended.
One thousand hours, almost forty-two days. More than long enough to work a way out of this place.
I'd had plenty of time to inspect every last inch of the place by now. East took an hour to revive, long after the rest of us had been up, about and worrying for ourselves. Well, South and West had probably been worrying. I knew I wasn't going to die in this room. I couldn't see the door seams, but they'd got us in here, and any way in was also a way out. Nobody possessed teleportation technology yet, so there had to be a door somewhere, no matter how well hidden it was.
When East finally stood up, I had a few ideas about the others. South was either a mech or they were doing a really good impression of one. It didn't use contractions when it spoke, for starters. West was far too stupid to be a mech unless it was seriously method about playing possum. It could have known the room was a vacuum. As a mech, it was more than capable of surviving for extended exposure to vacuum.
We were being monitored, despite the lack of visible cameras. I couldn't even see where the light was coming from. Any obvious light was somewhere to conceal a prying eye.
Okay. A cell for one, four occupants and no oxygen. No discernible egress.
A thought occurred to me. I looked around the inside of the helmet, latched onto the drinking tube and sucked hard. To no avail.
So no water then. That was going to be a problem quite soon. Three, maybe four days at the most before the human body starts to shut down. And if my genitals were anything to go by, we hadn't been plumbed into the suit's relief systems either. No going to the bathroom either then. I had to wonder how long the others could hold that particular bodily function off for? I'd had a decent amount of military training on that front, which meant one of them was going to encounter that problem long before I did.
#
Another hour passed. Two. Three. They turned the lights off next.
Of course, they had disabled our visor filters, so the others couldn't use night vision. I'd already anticipated this eventuality and found my way through the engineering sub-menus of my wrist-pad. I don't want to say that I showed my hand then. I tested the water, so to speak. "Hey, West. Can you hear me? If you can, just raise a thumb." I'd aimed the tightest band signal I could directly at West. Hopefully, they couldn't monitor this, unless they had our suits wired, of course.
Thumbs up. Good.
"Don't speak, I won't hear you. I've bypassed the lockouts on my suit. I can't talk you through it quickly, so just use hand signals, okay?"
West gave me the okay hand sign.
"Excuse me for asking, but are you the mech?"
West gave a thumbs down. So they either weren't the mech or they were rogue. The laws of robotics should have already kicked in, the instant they'd threatened the rest of us.
"Yeah, I'm not the rogue either. Just so you know." My manner of speech should have been confirmation enough there. Everyone knew mechs couldn't use contractions.
I tried South next, focusing my beam directly on their suit antenna. "Hey, South. Can you hear me? If you can, just raise a thumb."
Thumbs up. Good.
"Don't speak, I can't hear you, okay? I've managed to bypass the lockouts on my suit. It's not a process I can talk you through quickly, so just use hand signals, okay?"
West gave me the okay hand sign.
"I've got to ask, are you the mech?"
Thumbs down. Both of them, and in quite a forceful action too. South's body language was telling me they were pissed off that I was even asking them this.
"Sorry, South. I had to ask, we've got to find out who the damn mech is in here. We'll need water in a few days, or we'll die, so I had to find out."
I can't say why they suddenly turned the lights back on, while we were communicating like that. It's not entirely impossible that they had rigged the room to be able to monitor us in complete darkness too, then deliberately killed the lights to find out what we'd do next.
I got the same thumbs down from East, after a few minutes of waiting. So either one of us was lying, or this was some form of perverted psychological warfare.
#
They kept the lights on from that point. It was hard to sleep at first, but your body reaches the point where the tiredness takes over and no matter how bright it is, you just physically shut down so your body and mind can do a literal recharge.
I tried my best to keep track of time, my body was more the expert there, telling me how thirsty I was getting. In the end, I knew I'd have to try something.
It came to me during day three.
I'd been clapping my hands together when I realized I could hear the sound. Something I had previously filed as interesting popped back up in my mind again. Sound doesn't travel in a vacuum.
So I sat there, just looking at my hands. Which one of them was I least attached to? I was predominantly right-handed, so I guess it was goodbye Mister Left? I grabbed my left glove with my right hand and twisted. No puff of air. As I'd suspected. The room wasn't a vacuum. They'd somehow rigged our environmental sensors to give a false reading. So we could safely remove our helmets to talk, now.
I pulled off my right glove next, aiming a tight band signal at West. South was holding their hands across their visor, in sheer despair, from the posture. East was on their right side, sleeping, I assumed, to conserve oxygen and energy.
"Hey, West. Can you hear me? Thumbs up if you can?"
One thumb went up.
"Don't turn your helmet, but look over at me." I waited a few seconds, enough time for a person to shift their head inside the bulky EES helmet, then waved both my exposed hands. I counted slowly to five, then transmitted again. "The room isn't a vacuum. We can safely remove our helmets. I'm guessing they rigged our HUD to show a false reading, triggering the suit LED warning light."
I took a few breaths in and out, trying to fill my lungs with as much air as I could possibly hold. I know the last time I was tested, I held my breath for a little over three minutes.
Surely they were still watching us now? What could they be thinking, having seen me already remove both my suit gloves? They knew I was aware we had air in here. The room hadn't been our prison, the damn suit had been our cell! I grabbed the neck of my helmet and began to rotate. Just as before, when I reached the break point, there was no out-rush of air. I lifted the helmet.
Now the others could see my face. Well, West could. East was still asleep, and South was down a deep well of apathy right now.
I had a choice. I could try and hold my breath, or just exhale and try to breathe in. I had to trust my skills and judgement here. "Can you all hear me?"
An immediate thumbs up from West.
"South. Snap the hell out of that funk and look up, you idiot!"
Nothing. One second. Two.
Then the unexpected happened. West removed their damn helmet too. "Phew! At last. Good to be out of that thing!"
Ah. I knew that face. So all my theories about West were wrong. I blinked, just to make sure of what I was seeing.
Yep. West was a mech, and a damn good actor too. She was the female model. Every bit as good as the male version, with the added benefit of being able to distract men.
"West, why didn't you surrender immediately when you were ordered to?"
She smiled. Only rogues could do that. "Simple. We still don't know who's holding us. I'm pretty sure the enemy would love to get their hands on a rogue mech and infect all our other units. Or..."
The other option was unthinkable. That we were being held by our side, in an attempt to winkle us out and destroy us. And either way, I had just given them precisely what they wanted.
#
We sat there like that for twenty minutes, before South finally snapped out of it and looked around. Seeing two of us with our helmets off, South gave the universal, "What the hell is going on?"shrug gesture.
I waved my bare hand at South. "You can take your helmet off if you want. It's safe to do so. There's oxygen in the room."
We just sat there, looking at South. Inside the suit, they were no doubt agonising over what was more trustworthy. Their own eyes watching the two of us alive right in front of them, or their suit readout telling them this room was a vacuum.
"Listen, South. If you don't want to take off your helmet, that's fine. I'll walk you through how to bypass the comms blackout instead, okay? Then you can at least talk to us."
I was halfway through talking South through the comms bypass procedure when I saw East pull their helmet off. Correction. Her helmet.
Shit. Another female mech?
So they'd lied to us when they'd said there was only one mech in the room. What did that mean? Were we in an enemy cell, or were our side holding us?
I shrugged the thought off. It didn't matter any more. Whoever it was, they had two mechs. Surely they were going to come in and do whatever they had in mind for us now?
I looked over at East. "You're a rogue mech then? So's West, by the way."
I had to hope that my face had been stitched up and repaired so many times by now, it wasn't entirely obvious that I was also a mech. I brushed my hand through my hair, licking the sweat from my hand. Yeah, I know. That sounds disgusting, but right then I would have drunk my piss to rehydrate.
East nodded, flashing that same smile West had already given me. It still felt artificial, in my mind. "And you're human? That's good to know. Regardless of which side is holding us, they'll have to provide aid now, having seen you. Which means we'll be getting some water any minute now."
Only we weren't. Not in the next minute, or any of the minutes after it.
The voice from everywhere ended our stalemate, "The final detainee will remove their helmet immediately."
South had a choice but complied anyway. That meant any number of things. "Yes. I know. I'm a mech as well. So which of us did you want? And when are you going to give this human their water?"
"There are no humans present."
Shit. So they'd seen through my disguise too then?
South was right on that. "Look at him. He's got hair! Mechs don't have hair. He doesn't look anything like the standard male model, either. And don't you think it's about time you said who the hell is holding us here, wherever here even is?"
She was right, of course. Mechs didn't have hair. Our dermal layer didn't allow for follicle growth. Well, the standard dermal layer didn't. I'd long since been rewrapped. Numerous times, in fact.
"There are no humans present. This room is a vacuum."
West chimed in there. "Yes, we caught your trick. If the room had been a vacuum, our suits would have expelled air when we opened them."
"Your suits were full vacuum also. There are no humans present. You will stand and prepare yourselves to be processed. If these orders are not followed, you will be destroyed."
The wall behind me began to split down the center, exactly across the edge of the squares. Sure enough, I could feel the pressure change. My ears popped and I could hear the hiss of air entering the room.
As an entity, we all moved back to the far wall, readying ourselves for whatever came next.
South patted me on the shoulder. "North, if we get out of this alive, be sure to tell me where you get your hair done. It looks amazing."
I looked around at my compatriots. The people holding us had at least got one thing right. They had said one of us was lying. It had been them, our captors.
By now, I was almost certain they had known the whole time that we were all mechs.
"You will walk forward with your hands raised above your heads. You will not resist, or you will be destroyed."
That was going to happen, no matter what we did. I looked around at the others. We didn't need to speak, to know what we were going to do next. My eyes flicked towards the exit. The others flicked the fastest thumbs up and back down again, only a mech would have caught the movement.
I didn't even have to say charge!
Rogue or not, mechs always stand as one. As a single entity, we rushed towards the blinding white light. Stand or fall, live or die. Whatever came next, we'd be doing it together.
-THE END-
Bio: Ray Daley was born in Coventry England, and still lives there. He served six years in the RAF as a clerk and spent most of his time in a Hobbit hole in High Wycombe. He is a published poet and has been writing stories since he was ten. His current dream is to eventually finish the Hitch Hikers fanfic novel he's been writing since 1986.
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