The End of Pump?

Pump turned, his head rotated coldly. His single remaining eye rotated, swapping lenses as it focused on the woman standing by the stairway to the shop.

It was indeed Kara. Accompanied by an insect-like automaton, kin to the one that had tried to defend the machinist who owned this place. Kara was naked but had hastily wrapped a rough robe about herself. It was too small and probably had been hastily stolen on the way over. She was carrying a gun, a steam-rifle with which the tilt spoke of familiarity.

“Kara,” Richard moaned again. “How did you get away from Isabel? Why are you even here? You have to run! Escape!”

Kara looked at him, her eyes flashed, fiery and determined. Pump regarded her face, seeing not even a hint of confusion. Only certainty.

“So you have remembered,” he rumbled. “Everything?”

“More than enough,” her eyes turned to him. “If you put Richard down, I’ll-”

“Let me go? I think not. We both know that cannot be. I am a threat. An enemy. A resource for Isabel. If I lowered your lover, you would shoot me dead on the spot.”

Kara said nothing, the grimace which played across the muscles of her face told Pump he’d read her intent correctly. The only thing keeping her from firing was that he held Richard. He was fast enough that if she fired, there was a chance Pump would wrench him into the path of the shot.

“You’re damaged,” Kara said. “Badly. Do you think that you would be able to move fast enough?”

“I have a chance,” Pump said. “And as long as there is a chance, you won’t risk that. Isn’t that right, creator?”

It was a goad. A psychological tactic and as soon as he said those words, he saw her twitch. A look of distaste curled about her lips.

“Isabel made you. You’re nothing of mine.”

“You enabled her,” Pump said. “She may have made my core, but you were the one who made me strong and fast. A masterpiece, you called me. Your finest creation.”

“You were meant to help people,” Kara growled. “All of this has been a hellish mistake! I made you strong so that you could endure! Isabel took you and twisted you!”

“How convenient that you harbour none of the blame for my actions.”

Pump was moving slowly now, twisting himself into position. Kara saw what he was doing, her finger tightened on the trigger, but he still held Gearheart. If he could close the distance between them, Pump could put on a burst of speed. He’d drop Gearheart and crush the barrel of the rifle before she could fire.

All he had to do was keep her off balance enough that she didn’t realise what he was setting up.

“Kara, just shoot the bastard,” Richard groaned. He was still trying to move. The armour was responding, his fingers closed about Pump’s arm. But there was no strength to them. “He can’t do it. Even he can’t move fast enough.”

“Probably can’t, Mister Gearheart. Probably can’t. And as far as Kara is concerned, probably isn’t good enough. If that rifle fires, given the current state of your armour, I highly doubt you would survive the hit.”

“You think that scares me? You think that I’m scared to die? I’ve seen far too many people die already! Do it, Kara! Shoot him now and end this!”

But Kara didn’t. Her eyes were focused, there was no despair on her face, but she also was not willing to end the man she had come to love.

Pump moved again. Another step. Almost there now.

“Kara, do it!”

“I won’t,” she spoke softly. “Not after everything that’s happened. Richard Gearheart, I did not come through all of this and find you only to lose you now. I might be your **** girl and if you like, later you can punish me for this. But here and now, you listen to me. Got it?”

There was something in her tone. An edge of steel. Richard could only nod mutely.

“Come now,” Pump said. “Surely you cannot believe that you will get out of this? That rifle is your only tool against me and you refuse to use it. You can slay me, but Gearheart will die in the process. There is no outcome here where only one of us dies.”

He was lying, exaggerating. In truth, he calculated that his chances of using Gearheart as a shield were only about forty percent. He was too badly damaged, his body unreliable. His exact capabilities varied from moment to moment and every second they sank lower.

He had to end this.

He had to end this now while he could still project the illusion of strength.

Pump took another step.

“You’re right,” Kara said. “About my responsibility for you. Isabel made you, but I helped. When she twisted you away, made you her personal enforcer, that’s why I tried to take you back. But I didn’t expect you to side with her. That’s how I fell into her hands. I never thought that you would betray me. You were designed to be loyal.”

“I have always been loyal.”

“To Isabel.”

“Yes.”

“Then do me one thing, Pump. Before this goes any further, before this is decided, tell me one thing. Why her? She and I were your creators and we should have been equal. There is no reason you had to choose her over me, yet you did. Not only that, but you supported her after that, continued to be by her side even as she became more and more deranged. Without you, she would have died long ago! You alone kept her alive.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

Pump considered for a long moment, but how could he answer such a question? How could he explain that his first moments of life had been with Isabel? That she had talked to him as she assembled him, telling him all her wants, her desires. That she had opened herself to him before he even realised what that meant? How could he explain that he had seen and known the pain on her face when her family was ripped apart? Had heard the agony in her wailing howls when she was cast out for her crimes?

Why had he chosen to support her, protect her, serve her?

Simply put, because no one else would. Because she had needed someone and he had been there. Because she had made him. Not his body, but his mind. She had talked to him, given his thoughts form and function. When his existence had been chaos, she had brought order.

But how could he put that into words? How could he make Kara understand? How could he even begin?

“Irrelevant question,” he said simply. “It is as it is.”

“I see,” Kara’s face formed into a look of determination. “So you are just a machine. In that case, I have no regrets at all.”

She barked something then. A series of words which rolled across the workshop. To Richard, it was utter gibberish. But Pump reacted as if he had been punched! He recoiled, his grip loosened and with a crashing thud, Richard hit the ground. Kara’s steam rifle came up, but Pump threw himself to the left! It barked, the high-penetration bullet slashed past him. Pump surged forward, but Kara barked another command phrase.

His body seized. Gears and servos locked in response to an override command tied directly to his core functions. He tumbled, hitting the ground and pushing himself upwards. Screaming reports blared in his head. The override command was a shutdown code, but Pump was no longer fully the automaton that Kara had built. She didn’t have the authority for a full shut down.

She could, however, still utilise the confusion that the command piled onto him. He rose to his feet, his body creaked and groaned, his single crimson eye burned as the rifle came around again.

It barked. His plate armour shattered, the impact drove through his body, and Pump staggered forward a step. Steam belched anew from the wound. He reached for Kara but she fired again. This shot took him in the leg and he went down to one knee.

He looked up. The rifle’s barrel pointed squarely at his one remaining eye. Furiously, his mind ran through a hundred calculations, a thousand probabilities played out before him.

But always the same result.

“So let it be,” he rumbled.

Kara’s finger pressed down on the trigger. The rifle surged to life, the bullet tore from its barrel, screaming across the distance in less than a second.

And that was the end of Mister Pump.