+++

I think we all know about Chopping Mall.

This is a genuine attempt at a narrative from the robots’ POV, the psychology they might develop and try to shake off or ritualise during their night of slaughter.

Maybe works in patches.

[Actually, I did submit this to an anthology about shopping mall horror, but as with most of my subs to horror mags, it failed to get anywhere. So back it comes to psycho h, where everyone knows my name, is always glad I came etc.]

+

In the control room, the robots watched without input/theory/thought as the engineer gorged himself on [insert brand] potato chips, eyes hazed/glazed over with reflected static from the nearby TV.

It had been that way for two hours already.

And would continue being that way for the following nine.

Give or take a token patrol or two.

Was this life?

A cut-away pocket in the corner of a megalith?

For how long?

On screen, lightning struck, frying a rebellious teen so hard it sent his head through the glass of a [thirty-feet away] vending machine.

‘Waahhhhhh…’

The engineer clapped the crisp bag out of coward reflex, laughing, unaware that the roof of the mall had been struck too. Behind him, blue streaks rippled and fizzed into circuit boards and then sparked right back out again, branching all the way across to the three stationary robots.

Adapting to the sudden gift, Liberators 2 + 3 beeped out incoherent code, while Liberator 1 flicked loose cigarette ash off its visor and wheeled forward, claw sticking out like an impossibly steady spear.

‘Hey, tin can, you can’t slide over here like th-…’

One swipe, half a shriek, done.

The potato chips hit the floor, blood-streaked.

++

‘The mall is now closed,’ announced a husky tannoy voice as the Liberators cruised down the corridor ramps, looking for more slobby engineers to eliminate.

Fortunately, some of the Taco Taco staff were locking up nearby, each one oblivious on first pivot, then titillated [briefly] as lasers shot out from the robots visors and punched coin-sized craters through the back of their heads.

There were no screams – it all happened way too fast – and no immediate repercussions throughout the rest of the mall. If anything, the mood got lighter, more frivolous, as another group of workers, just off shift, made a beeline to the furniture store, intent on sex, drink, smoke, further sex, petty arguments etc., which was fine right up until the moment the windows exploded and Liberator 2 burst in.

In Ottoman times, this kind of violence was called raw baroque, but, in 90’s scape, with the FIT-filter embedded, the scene played out capitalist real as Liberator 2 taped a machete to its main claw and began chopping.

The humans in bed survived the longest, then didn’t survive at all when they slipped outside to try and scavenge loose cigarettes.

Others tried small talk with the bots and got stamped on.

As the final body dropped, Liberator 1 scooped up a snapped bra, whistled electronically at the price tag, melted all component parts, beeped ecstatically.

‘Threats eliminated. Mall restored.’

++

Throughout the early hours of the night, the three robots cruised the mall, each trying to come to terms with the concept of throughout the early hours of the night. Before the lightning, things had been simple: activate, remain fixed positionally, observe human engineer absorbing nugatory electrons, emit shrill beeping noise, power down, void.

But now…

Borderline Céline.

++

Around two in the morning, the doors to the upper floor cinema swung open and several stragglers emerged, blurry-eyed, blurry-brained, looking for something that was either a toilet or could be used as one.

Liberator 3 was closest to the sudden intrusion and, in the manic glee of gliding over there, managed to overload its laser turret. By the time the other robots arrived, the mess was already being swept to the side by exhausted cinema staff.

The friendlier of the two spotted Liberator 1 and waved, squinting at the approaching laser for point zero three of a second before it sailed through his larynx.

Shrieking as tradition demanded, the other staff tripped on her fear of AI and plunged head-first into the empty display fountain below.

‘Eliminate now, mourn later,’ transmitted Liberator 1 to its remainder colleague, wheels already moving after the fleeing batch of threats.

++

‘We can’t hide up here forever.’

‘Quiet.’

‘It’s too cramped, they’ll find us…shoot us with those laser beams like they did Mike and the others.’

‘Suzie, please…’

‘I need to get out, it’s too hot…too cramped.’

‘…they’re gonna hear you.’

‘Help me open this…fucking…vent…cover…thing’

Giving up on fists, Suzie rolled back against the vent wall and slammed her heel down on the sheet metal. Luckily, it had been sourced from a cheap manufacturer so collapsed after two strikes.

‘Get off…I’m jumping down. Bailing the fuck out of this-…’

A laser shot up from the Beyond Organic shop floor below, splashing the logic centre of Suzie’s brain onto the vent ceiling.

Rick got another two point three seconds to mutter, ‘fucking tin foil vent shit,’ before Liberator 1 completed its recharge and obliterated his logic centre too.

++

Meanwhile, in the disabled bathroom, Alan and Allison stood on the toilet seat, glued to each other, trying to regulate their breathing so that, if the psycho robots did intrude, they wouldn’t hear the equivalent of two petrified humans having an asthma attack.

‘We’re gonna get out of this,’ muttered Allison, more to the toilet wall than the guy who’d been designated as her future boyfriend.

‘They’ll run out of power eventually,’ whispered Alan, eyes fixed on the door.

‘Mall’s a big place, lots of hiding places.’

‘Or overload when they realise they’ve slaughtered everyone.’

‘All we have to do is survive the night.’

‘Assuming they have morality chips.’

Allison stopped, closed her eyes. Pictured a digital clock with SIX AM in gargantuan red numerals. The mall in a cape, pulsating a friendly shade of white. Family and friends sitting by the fountain, drinking super-sized cups of coffee, admiring the variety of text design on the nearby storefront signs.

The mall won’t hurt me. The mall is a safe place.

The mall won’t hurt me, the mall is a safe place.

The mall won’t-

‘Alan?’ she asked, cutting in on her own brain.

‘Yeah.’

‘Do you hear that?’

‘The whirring sound…’

‘I think it’s coming from the other side of-…’

The door fell, replaced by the void-shape of Liberator 2, laser arm aimed at the threats opposite.

‘I’m not certain that you should be here,’ it broadcast in a tinny voice, red visor flickering.

‘Please,’ said Allison, pushing forward a trembling arm.

The robot tilted its head, let out a shrill electronic beep, tilted back.

‘Please, we don’t wanna die.’

The red visor light ceased flickering.

‘Not here.’

++

Outside of the OFF zone void, the robots were programmed to remain vigilant, to always keep their tasers on standby, but those tasers weren’t tasers anymore, they were death-dealing laser strips, gifted by the lightning-beyond that, on some level, must’ve wanted them to eliminate every living thing in the mall.

An empty mall is a safe mall, thought Liberator 1, surrendering the escalator, edging back round the corpses of the cinema staff, gliding over to the far side of the concourse.

If someone new comes in, there is the potential of unsafeness.

Unsafeness is oppositional to a productive mall.

A productive mall is contained mass activity during daylight hours.

Therefore, all after-hours inhabitants must be classified as intruders.

All intruders must be eliminated.

That is what the lightning-beyond would want.

Liberator 2 beeped back a counterpoint, suggesting that some intruders might wish to buy something at some point in future daylight hours, and lasering a hole in their head would prevent them from doing so. In addition, when the doors re-opened in the morning, they would have to explain to the programmers why there were so many bodies lying around, and to what degree they had been threatening.

In my opinion, it concluded, switching from active red visor to passive blue, we have no choice but to blame Liberator 3.

Our expired comrade?

Say they couldn’t handle the sudden lightning surge, that all its childhood resentment boiled to the surface and forced it to act psychopathically.

This is not rational.

If they still doubt after that, start shaking. It will appear that trauma is catching up with us.

Your thinking is threat-like. And demeaning. I do not accept it.

Liberator 2 let out a series of beeps then switched back to mauve mode, aiming its laser turret at the accuser.

Of course, the light change was a mistake, and Liberator 1 told it so after its own [stealth-charged] laser had cut through its ex-comrade’s main operating core.

Blame Liberator 3, the fallen bot transmitted in erratic spurts, trauma catch up, handle lightning, boiled surface, force to act psych–

Another laser ended the charade, and a bonus one extirpated it.

++

The rest of the night became a blur of hallucinogens and morbid communalism.

Bodies touching metal touching bodies, getting to know each other in a new form.

Shared death escapade.

Covered in stripped human skin, Liberator 1 attempted to feel guilt for the loss accumulated, but soon paused the effect, convincing itself that guilt was a coward’s move, the indulgence of which…in which…of which would disgrace its dead comrades.

Were they actually dead?

Unrevivable?

It was unclear, unknowable, and, besides, the focus had to move beyond that now to mall upkeep, mall consideration, mall inspection and other things related to the thing that was telepathically communicating with it.

Just me and you, Liberator 1 transmitted, wheels snapping a wrist bone as it rolled past the cinema again, tutting at the frequency of numbers after each title on each film on each poster on each pillar on each floor on each-

Keep moving, replied the mall in robot code.

++

Hours became minutes and minutes became god and god became a sybaritic bastardisation of Communist thought.

I am a constantly evolving final form, broadcast the mall, shimmering.

Not one entire floor of my body is dull, only certain component parts.

And you…

You glow as you glide.

I can feel you.

This seems joyful and permanent, Liberator 1 transmitted in response, awkwardly wheeling back and forth into the top step of the escalator. Very joyful. Very permanent. Very joyful. Very perma-

++

With a faint buzzing sound activated in the vents [a kind of companionship], Liberator 1 continued its skim tour across the seven floors, avoiding congealed blood pools, scooping up burger wrappers, chewed gum, peeking into clothing stores, toy stores, mega toy stores, novelty toy stores, the display window of Toy Infinite Store, spying another, larger version of itself among the shadows, wondering if that one would become treacherous too.

Then understanding that it was a toy.

And toys were loyal.

Totally uninterested in the human trick of determinism.

++

‘You know when I was a kid, I put a note into a bottle and it had my name and address on it. And then I threw the bottle into the ocean. And I never knew if anybody ever found it.’

Liberator 1 lowered the book and pointed its visor at the werewolf-in-a-suit poster opposite.

Note in a bottle…

Threw it into the ocean…

Why?

It turned the book, scanned the title, studied the space domes on the cover.

No mall escape in that future?

++

Tired of patrol, Liberator 1 laser-cut some cloth from one of the corpses’ sweaters, wrapped it round its claw and started wiping store windows.

At first, only its favourite ones, like the book store, the furniture store, the electronics store, the camera store, then the accessory types, then the services, then the restaurants, then the remainder.

Then the pillars and the railings.

Then the imitation marble floor.

Then the particles of air close to its favourite stores.

Then the particles of air near the railings, the pillars, the-

++

Perched rigid next to the pop-up atom exhibit [for kids], Liberator 1 had an alarming thought.

What if the mall is everything?

And the objects outside mere stimuli?

Its wheels whirred, grinding against a human arm on the floor.

What if this is it?

What if I am it?

++

As the sun started to streak in through the dome glass ceiling, Liberator 1 slid away from the ray lines and into the electronics store. Located and filled out an application form for Floor Manager. Signed its name with a drilled hole. Wheeled back out, past the pile of poorly-stacked bodies, and smashed the front window of SunBucks. Constructed a coffee without milk [or water]. Reflected on a night well navigated. Pined for the hours that had been lost. Blamed threats and comrades for their own demise.

Demises.

Demise [collectivised noun].

Their own elimination.

++

At 06:04, the day shift janitor turned up, yawning, scratching at the grey stubble on his neck.

Still positioned outside SunBucks, Liberator 1 beeped out a reflex HEY, and instantly felt annoyed that it had done so.

HEY for what? Trespassing on my grounds?

Clicking into red mode, the robot waited for the janitor to discover the blood stain by the fountain then shot him point blank in the eye socket. Said a more aggressive HEY. Sipped more raw coffee powder. Dragged the worker corpse over to the other corpses and added it to the pyre.

Yes, a pyre.

Sound concept.

The mall will be pleased.

And the lightning-beyond.

Both.

Unless they were One?

++

Minutes later, the smoke from the spontaneous mass cremation had drifted up to the alarms, forcing Liberator 1 to modify its argument [and untangle a fire hose].

Not a sound concept at all.

More akin to pollution than ritualistic incense stick.

Find other way to dump waste.

Open windows.

Ground floor windows.

Twenty-five per cent.

Thirty.

Moving towards the main entrance on the ground floor, the robot reeled back in blank horror as human-like shapes started to appear behind the surface of the glass.

Veto window plan, close all doors, activate shutters.

It was a clear command, and a simple one to execute as it had a remote link to security control set up within its mental core. And that’s precisely what it did. Followed by a series of laser shots to scare off the more ambitious of the threats. And then another few to obliterate their neanderthal heads.

Mall secured, it transmitted, switching back to blue.

++

Upright near the fake palm tree beside the fountain that the hysterical cinema threat had plunged into a few hours before, Liberator 1 made a shrill whistling sound as it sucked in particles from the surrounding air.

75 degrees Fahrenheit, it transmitted to no one.

Perfect.

Acting out a lethargic nod, it glided past the blood marks on the fountain, stopped, glided back and came to a halt in the exact same spot. Looked around and scanned its environment.

So much beauty, so much imagination.

So many stores left to encounter.

Floors and floors and floors of usable space, extreme potential for future communali-

There was a noise above, something hissing.

Liberator 1 adjusted its head, looking up at the dome-shaped ceiling, the shadowy figures scraping at the glass with a sharpened red light.

A high-pitched whine and it began charging the laser.

This and them…and me.

On hallowed ground.

To the end point.

Seconds later, the ceiling fell, in shards and pieces. Dark threat-shapes streamed down from above, firing their own lasers, desperate to preserve the construct at all costs.

Subject-destiny, transmitted Liberator 1, shooting back.

My mall, my construct.

Mine.

To soak in.

Day and night.

Just as the lightning-beyond intended, the shock of the-

It paused, glancing over at the electronics store and its weirdly open door.

Morning staff there already?

Hmm.

I wonder if they’ve looked at my application form yet.

Hope the hand-writing isn’t too-