The Robotessy
Chapter One
by Courtney
"Bye," I cried, waving cheerfully as my friends went off to parts unknown in search of book learning and Aztec gold. Leigh and I watched the proud sails of the pirate ship recede into the sunset until we knew it was gone. I'm not ashamed to say that Leigh cried like a fucking girl.
"Courage, Private Leigh," I declaimed bravely, suppressing that little inner chuckle at the word 'privately'. Haha, private - leigh - privately. It was almost too much.
"We have much time to do, and little things to do it in," I said quickly, so quickly that to Leigh's ears it sounded like pure smartness, straight from the smart mine. I knocked back a shot of cough medicine from my trusty hipflask. Leigh stared at me in what I decided was probably wonder, her cowardly tears drying in a sudden gust of wind.
"First," I ordered, "Give me all the money in your wallet."
Leigh shook out several twenty dollar notes, some stained with what looked like blood, others with crude Vivid moustaches drawn on the Queen's manly visage. "Excellent!"
"What are you planning to do with that?" Leigh asked.
"Never you mind," I replied, giving her a not-unfriendly punch in the neck. She fell to the ground and lay ominously still. The Neck-Punch Jar was all the way back at her place, so I left a nickel on one of her closed eyelids. It looked pleasing there, so pleasing that I left another nickel on the other eye and punched her in the neck again.
At last! With Leigh out of the way, and her hard-earning stripping cash in my pocket, I was my own master. I quickly whipped out my cellphone and dialled her home number.
Victoria answered on the fifth ring. "I told you not to call this number, Mack," she screamed in a threatening falsetto. I relieved her fears by giving her the secret code phrase we used, just between the two of us. "Shut the hell up, Victoria."
"Oh, hi Courtney. How's it going?" she said, in a Scottish accent.
I replied in a pirate accent of my own devising. "Not great, Dave. The semester's about to start and I just realised that all these classes are going to seriously cut into my looting and pillaging."
This was pirate code for 'sleeping and drinking beer'.
She replied in what she thought was a Coronation Street accent. "What do you expect me to do about that?"
I was walking all this time, and it so happened that my feet had led me unerringly to Victoria and Leigh's place. "I expect you to draw me up a homework planner and hook me up with a French tutor," I said in the voice of a Southern belle.
This was code between us, for 'I expect you to build me a robot that will attend my classes, take my notes and sit the exams for me'.
"Do you want the homework planner to be able to think independently, process information and cultivate a flowing eighteenth-century cursive?" she asked, in a Russian accent so thick that from my position outside her bedroom window I was not surprised to see that she was wearing a thick fur hat with ear flaps.
"Yes." I said, in a Scottish brogue. "Will the homework planner be able to love?"
"No," she said, in her own voice. "One thing homework planners can never do is love. Never." She then laughed mockingly and said, "I started in a Scottish accent. Can't tag your master, asshole!"
She hung up.
The robot was ready in a matter of days. I wasn't sure it was a particularly accurate likeness of me, but since neither my lecturer nor many of my fellow students had ever seen me before this wasn't going to be a problem.
"The robot's fat," I said, kicking back in Leigh's favourite chair, idly taping sumo wrestling over the good bits in Leigh's favourite video tapes.
"That part's a washing machine," Victoria replied.
"Why?"
She looked at me for a long moment. My eyes behind my dark glasses were inscrutable. We were locked like that in a battle of wills for what seemed like hours, until finally she said, "You know that's not sumo wrestling, right?"
Damn. I knew wearing sunglasses inside was a stupid idea.
We put the finishing touches to the Courtneybot, or rather, I put the finishing touches to it while Victoria sat back and criticised. "I'm pretty sure you don't usually have the words 'KILLBOT 4000' painted on your back," she said.
"Shut up."
"Do you think its eyes should swirl hypnotically like that?"
"Shut up."
Suddenly, we heard Leigh's step at the door! We immediately knew that it was pointless to try to hide the imposing bulk of the Courtneybot, so in a blinding flash of genius I quickly leapt inside it.
"Hi Toria. Hi Courtney," she said.
This was pretty tense. We both knew that there was no way Leigh was going to approve of the Courtneybot, not when she realised that she was going to have to go to class while I lazed back and let the robot do all the work, smoking fine Cuban cigars by my heart-shaped swimming pool and laughing, laughing fit to burst.
"HELLO LEIGH." said the Courtneybot. "LEIGH, WHO IS A FRIEND OF COURTNEY. WHO IS ME."
"Yeah," Leigh said absently. "I like the racing stripes. Are they new?"
"YES," the robot said proudly. "THEY MAKE ME GO FASTER."
From my precarious position in the washing machine section of the Courtneybot, I shared a glance of pure relief with Victoria. The robot had passed its first test.
The next few weeks were a breeze, and passed in a manner not unlike an 80s movie montage. I could perceive Billy Idol's famous song White Wedding just below the threshold of hearing as the days went by in flashes: the robot in class, taking notes - me on a stage in front of millions of screaming fans, effortlessly winning the rap battle to which presidential hopeful John Kerry had so foolishly challenged me - the robot constructing a French essay as I look on with benign confusion- me in my Harry Potter costume, drunkenly yelling at the supermarket checkout operator ("You got served! You got served!") - the robot handing in a flawless Latin assignment -
- Yes, it was pretty damn near perfect. It was an idyll; indeed I might not be going too far to say that those were true Halcyon days. But as a philosopher once said, 'Be careful what you dream for . . . because you just - might � get it.'
"Talia," I said one day to my sister, the person dearest to my heart, "What would you do if you won the lottery?"
"What are you talking about?" she asked suspiciously. "And how come I'm suddenly so dear to your heart?"
"Kidney transplants," I said airily, waving that topic of conversation away. "You know what I would do? I would buy lots of really expensive jewellery."
She made a derisive noise. "Moron. I would get my eyes fixed, ever think of that?"
I was momentarily thrown, my thoughts still on her sweet, compatible organs. She edged away from me on the couch.
Suddenly, with a blinding flash of genius, it came to me. The perfect crime, the best way to have my jewels and eat them, too.
"Well I," I said loftily, "I would get my eyes REPLACED. With DIAMONDS."
Natalia stared at me in horror. I nodded smugly. "Hell yeah, that's goddamn right. Then all you losers with your lame old meat-eyes would be totally jealous. I'd go around all the time, just staring into the sun. And you know what?" I added, becoming more and more excited by the notion, "I'd go around with my cane and sunglasses, and people would be like 'hey, are you blind?' and I'd be like, 'AM I???' and I'd whip off my shades, and BAM! My beautiful diamonds sparkling out of my face, oh man, it would fucking rule. People would be like 'holy crap, what have you DONE??'"
She left the room. It was okay; she didn't need to say it - I knew that she'd been overcome by my genius and probably wanted to go write down my brilliant plan in her dream journal or something.
I lolled back, confident that the good times were just beginning.
Of course, we had all reckoned without the vengeful ghost of Bruce Lee.
�You know, Bruce Lee used to teach the cha-cha,� I remarked to Leigh that fateful day.
�No he didn�t,� she replied shortly. �And what in God�s name are you doing in my room?�
�Yes he did,� I insisted smugly. �Anyway, shouldn�t the real question be: what am I doing in your clothes?�
�Jesus Christ,� she said, turning away in disgust. �You just never stop, do you?�
�You know, Bruce Lee once did a duet with Kurt Cobain, but it totally gave away secrets about the Freemasons, Hitler and the New World Order. And within a year, both of them were dead.�
Leigh gave me an odd look, a look that was so odd I suspected mainly because she seemed to be trying desperately not to bleed from the eyeballs.
�Firstly, that�s a goddamn fucking lie, secondly your dates are all wrong, and thirdly why for the love of God did you have to bring Kurt Cobain and Hitler into it? I fucking knew you were going to mention them; you never give it a goddamn rest. I bet your room�s some kind of freakish shrine to them, all Nirvana posters with swastikas and weird little moustaches painted on them.�
She was growing more and more agitated as she spoke, gesturing wildly in the air as though her hands were itching like crazy to get around my throat and just squeeze.
I shook my head pityingly, wondering as I did how she had managed to sneak a peek into my bedroom.
�I can�t believe those Nazi bastards got to you, too,� I said sadly. �I�m going to go see Victoria.�
She spluttered, and as I closed the door I heard a scream of incoherent rage.
�Hey,� I said, casually taking a seat in Victoria�s spacious Fortress of Solitude.
�Hay d00der,� she said, like a total dork. I laughed. She laughed too. I laughed some more.
�Could you not sit on the dog?� she asked. I laughed.
�No, I mean it.�
�Oh, sure.� I moved. �What�re you up to?�
�Nothing much, just listening to this new mp3 I downloaded. It�s called Heart-Shaped Reich, there�s all this cool ninja screaming on it.�
She turned up the volume so I could hear the words.
Hitler�s not dead, he lives in your TV
Hitler lives in your head, his son is Bruce Lee -
- Shut up, asshole �
Make me, Mr. Miyagi � AAARGH dude that was right in the fucking neck, you know that?!
�Wicked,� I said, nodding approvingly.
Victoria shrugged. �It�s okay,� she said dismissively.
�I like how they worked in the sound of a nickel dropping into a jar.�
�Yeah.�
We sat for a while in companionable silence.
�Are you still here?�
�Yeah,� I replied.
�Good, cause I forgot to tell you something: the vengeful ghost of Bruce Lee kidnapped your Killbot.�
With those simple words, my life turned upside down. Almost immediately, Victoria and I found ourselves most impertinently surrounded � by pirates!
�What the hell is going on here?� Leigh asked, coming in with a tray of delicious gingerbread. Lightning-fast, I deduced that either the gingerbread was a peace offering, or she thought I�d left. It didn�t matter now.
�Pirates!� I gasped, throwing her an axe and a false beard. �You�re Gimli, I�m Aragorn and Victoria is Legolas. You know what to do!�
She caught the axe expertly, but threw the beard away. �I�m not Gimli, I refuse to be Gimli, and I�m never wearing that beard. I don�t know where it�s been.�
�How come I have to be Legolas? I�m Aragorn in the movie,� Victoria whined, a pain in the ass even when threatened by the scurviest sea-dogs ever to sail the ocean blue.
�You have to be Legolas because that bow is gay, it�s a gay bow and I�m not touching it.�
I brandished the two-handed sword I always carried with me for just such an emergency. Victoria hurriedly changed the music to the Lord of the Rings theme, just in time for me to valiantly face the leader of the pirates.
�Who sent you?� I cried, �And don�t lie to me; if you lie to me I�ll punch you so hard in the neck you�ll die!�
�Arrrgh,� said the pirate, the sound billowing out from behind his huge black beard. �Captain Bruce Lee sent us, arrrgh, and ye�ll never see your Killbot again!�
�Courtney, what Killbot?� Leigh asked dangerously.
I punched her hard in the neck, but not so hard that she wouldn�t be of use in the battle to come. �Now is not the time, Gimli!�
The pirates drew back in consternation. �That�s right,� I said, brandishing my sword in one hand and making a ready fist of the other, �If that�s what I do to my allies, what will I do to my enemies?? Now, where is my Killbot?�
�Arrrgh, Captain Bruce Lee has it, in his Fortress of Pain,� the pirate�s leader said, sneering as menacingly as a P.E. teacher. �But ye will never live to find it!�
And with that, battle was joined. I saw Leigh throw the gingerbread at the comic relief pirate (there�s always one), but after that everything was a whirl of pirates and scything blades. It was just like the Return of the King Playstation game, so much so that when I yelled to Victoria to check out how much ass I was kicking, I was disconcerted to learn that she was kicking ass, I was the retard fighting the wall.
�Hi-ho Fellowship, away!� I suddenly cried, swashbucklingly leaping out of the window to freedom. Leigh and Victoria quickly followed.
It felt as though we ran for days. It felt as though we ran for years, decades, centuries. We�d reached the end of the street, gasping asthmatically, when Leigh said, �Look!� and there before us, shining out of the darkness, was the Fortress of Pain.
�At last!� I said, �I�m coming, sweet Killbot!�
�What Killbot?� Leigh asked again; her eyes narrow like the minds of fundamentalists.
�Still not the time,� I said. �The time will probably never come. It�s past! Past is past, and the future may never come. But the now, the now is such a gift.�
Leigh and Victoria looked at me with apprehension. I smiled benignly on them.
�That�s why I like to call it . . . the present.�
�Courtney, what Killbot.�
�Shut up.�
The door was locked, locked tight as a Scotsman�s wallet. The skull mounted so threateningly above the door stared down at us with a mocking grin.
�What now?� Victoria asked.
�The thing we must remember about Bruce Lee,� I said slowly, �is that above all things he is a sporting man. He wouldn�t leave us out here with no chance of getting inside, it would be contrary to his sadistic nature.�
I stared at the skull. The skull stared at me.
�OPEN SKULL!� I cried suddenly, and to the astonished gasps of Leigh and Victoria, the skull slowly slid up from its perch, revealing the small black key left inside. I took the key calmly, sliding it into the lock.
�How did you know to do that?� Leigh asked. I merely tapped my neck knowingly, and by collective agreement we left it at that.
The hall beyond was dimly lit by flickering torches, and was silent as the grave. I had proven myself a fearless leader; and now Leigh and Victoria were both looking to me to make the next move. Something whispered in a dark corner.
�SEX AHOY!� I yelled suddenly, my voice echoing and reverberating in the high-ceilinged hall, echoes building on themselves until the whole hall rang with sound, which just as suddenly � stopped.
Leigh put her head in her hands, listening with a pained expression to the hoarse breathing and shuffling sounds that began to draw ever closer, insinuating themselves out of the darkened recesses of the great room.
�What the hell did you do that for?� she asked wearily.
I shrugged. �In the game of life, I fail.�
�You sure do,� said Victoria.
We heard their lungs before the first one stepped into the flickering light, the sound of their dust-choked lungs labouring for breath. The first was joined by several of its fellows, their shambling footsteps rasping on the stone floors, and once the firelight showed them for what they truly were I laughed despite myself.
�You are slipping, Bruce Lee,� I declaimed to the roof, sure that he was listening. �I expect zombies, and all you send are the Golden Girls!�
A great booming laugh was all I got in reply, but my confidence was not shaken.
�Courtney,� Victoria said, sounding worried, �I know you think you can handle the Golden Girls. And if there were only four of them, I�d agree. But there are hundreds.�
There sure were. Bruce Lee�s sorcery had enslaved the lame eighties hags and cloned them and cloned them, cloned them until there was no original DNA left from any of the women.
And they had us surrounded.
�Leigh,� I said softly, �I want you to listen to me very carefully, and I don�t want you to interrupt with whiny bullshit like �this plan is insane�. Are you listening?�
�Fine,� she replied.
�Here�s what I want you to do,� I began.
Leigh nodded slowly when I was done. We looked at each other.
�Ready?�
�Ready when you are.�
�NOW!� I yelled, and as Leigh threw herself bodily at Victoria, I snatched up the nearest Golden Girl, whipping my trusty elven rope around it in a series of lightning-fast movements. Knees tied to its sunken chest, it was the perfect bowling ball.
�Nooooo!� Victoria screamed, trapped under Leigh. Leigh punched her in the neck, and I bowled!
Old women flew left and right, the sound of snapping hips like the music of the spheres to my suddenly jubilant mind. The path to the stair was as clear as it was going to get, and the three of us bolted for it at the same time, Leigh dragging Victoria beside her in a surprisingly efficient headlock.
�They can�t climb stairs,� Leigh gasped, �they�re too old!�
�Yes,� I replied, staring coldly at Victoria, �but we�re not too old, are we Victoria?�
�I don�t know what you�re talking about,� she claimed.
�Not too old for stairs,� I continued relentlessly, �or . . . for treachery!�
She sagged against the wall, and I knew that she knew the jig was up. She was a pitiful sight, but there could be no mercy for her now.
�Hahahaha!� came a great flourish of a laugh from the head of the stairs. �Yes, for who else knew where the Killbot would be? Who else could provide me with a key to its study dungeon?�
We looked up, up to the resplendent figure of the vengeful ghost of Bruce Lee.
�What was it, Lee?� I asked, �Money? Power? Whose Line tickets?�
Bruce Lee smirked, tapping his neck knowingly. �Let�s just say that Victoria and I reached a gentleman�s agreement.�
�Where�s my Killbot?� I screamed.
�Sorry Courtney,� Bruce Lee chortled. �The Killbot is in another castle.�
I heard a rushing sound, and for a moment the world dimmed. I had fought so hard and come so far, and the Killbot was in another castle?? What kind of sadistic madman would do such a thing? Bruce Lee, my mind replied, and I sat down heavily on the stair.
�Alas, it has all been in vain,� I murmured, my heart broken in two.
�I�m sorry, Courtney,� Victoria said remorsefully, breaking the awkward silence. �Look, Bruce Lee gave me a hundred dollars for the Killbot. His friend Jim Bagleaducia has already sold it, but I�m sure we can get it back . . .�
She blithered on, but abruptly my mind was swirling with a new kind of faintness, one that made me giddy instead of merely sick. One hundred dollars! Kate Shepherd�s face drifted in my vision, ten of them, ten sweet Kates all dancing to my tune. One hundred dollars!
� . . . or I could build you another one, it�s not like it was that hard, or I -�
�Fuck the Killbot,� I said suddenly. �And fuck Bruce Lee. Let�s go get some pizza.�
I smiled at Victoria, and she smiled back. And that�s when we knew that everything was going to be okay.
Well, that�s my half-semester newsletter, and I think it pretty much explains everything. There were a few loose ends, there always are, but although I wish I could to tell you about the final defeat of the Golden Girls, or how we got rid of the pirates, or the mysterious erasure of the Heart-Shaped Reich mp3 from Victoria�s computer, I just don�t have time right now.
I have half a semester�s worth of French to catch up on.
Chapter Two