"Targeting Prac"

_____A co-worker found out that I wrote novels, so he kept trying to get me to make vaguely suggestive stories about robots. This one's for you, Lucky.

     What woke him up was the hot licking of the sun and the deep heated breaths of the salty air.  Hard and heavy waves throbbed and pulsed against the wet vulnerable sand of the shore, the delicious sighs of seagulls…  The sailor rose to consciousness from the inner ocean of sleep.  Lifting his sun-burned head…to see the ocean.

     Somewhere within the still-rising depths of his foggy mind, he was trying to figure this one out.  Sailors belong on ships, and ships belong at sea.  Well, this is more or less minus the ships part of the equation. More like, less.  And it took him a bit of effort for him to remember that he was a sailor.  (The uniform was a good hint.)  So let’s try that line again, less the ship part.  Sailors…belong at sea.  One sailor, one sea.  Lucky guy, the sea threw him out�"washing him up on this island. 

     He sputtered a four-letter word which could be translated as a euphemism for an aggressive act of human carnal relationships or being in an extremely compromised position.  Better to light a candle than curse the darkness.  Though this time, it was more like better to get up and figure out what the Hell was to be done next than to curse the circumstances. 

     Looking around, he saw a great deal of sand and shore.  Behind him was a tropical jungle.  Which makes sense because this was a tropical island.  He wasn’t going to thrust himself into that deep soft wilderness yet for survival’s sake just yet.  That was because there were a great many wooden crates nearby, also having been washed up. 

     The storm must have blasted those objects off the ship too.  He remembered being drunk.  (He had a hard time remembering when he wasn’t, actually.)  The sailor remembered some kind of bet about walking out onto the surface of the ship in the middle of a typhoon.  The wind became too windy, the rain was too rainy, and the deck was long and slippery...   

     Into the water, through the storm, and he woke up here, finding himself in one of the most ridiculous situations possible.  Stranded on a tropical island.  The ocean shore, the tropical palm trees, a jungle behind him, seagulls in the air…  Things like this are only supposed to happen in kids’ stories from the 1950s.  People don’t die of hunger or thirst in the kids’ stories.  To the contrary, this was adult subject matter. 

     There was bound to be useful things in those crates, so he set himself to work.  With things thrashed about in the storm, the stroking and thrusting of the sea had knocked some parts of the crates loose.  Grabbing and pulling the long pieces of wood, revealing the new kinds of large plastic cases they used for shipping, protecting the goods inside should something happen.  Something like…say, stormy weather knocking the crates along with an intoxicated sailor into the salty drink.  Salt water dehydrates.  Luckily, he didn’t swallow. 

     Eventually, he had all of the cases open.  He found much in the way of water jugs, more water jugs, waterproof sacks containing food…  MREs, meals ready-to-eat.  Technology is wonderful, making artificial food that tastes like real plastic.  Speaking of technology…

    Four of the containers held robots.  Explosive ordnance disposal robots, to be exact.  Their sturdy metal bodies were folded for shipping purposes, ready to be used and abused as needed.  Each of them could perform acts of moving or disarming bombs, missiles, or other such dangerous packages.

     Once upon a time, EOD robots were brutally simple in design�"tank-treaded bodies with single gripping arms and solitary cameras used to see.  Someone elected to a senate seat figured that it would be gosh-darned cool if the robots looked more like what Hollywood thought they ought to look like.  Then the brainiacs set to work in designing robots that looked more like the robots of common perception.

     Now the EOD robots looked more humanoid.  Two arms and two legs on a metal torso, a head with camera lenses instead of eyes.  These robots could be controlled by multiple means.  An EOD technician could use what looked like wireless video-game controllers, along with some kind of fancy headset to see through the robot’s eyes.  But that wasn’t gosh-darn cool enough.  So the alternate means of controlling the robot was telling it what to do.   

     Before anyone thinks this put an awful lot of explosive ordnance disposal technicians out of work, just keep in mind that the brainiacs didn’t want that to happen.  So they designed the robots with artificial brains that were just about as dumb as rocks.  Additionally, they still needed humans to tell them what to do. 

     So he told them what to do.  Sitting there on a bed of sand with a jug of water and a luxurious midday repast of MRE rations, a half-shelter of palm-tree fronds and sticks for shade, he told the EOD robots to stand up. He was pleased to see that the three robots obeyed.  Unfolding themselves from their tight bondings to stand. 

     Their gleaming bodies of metal stood ready and waiting.  They had well-designed physiques worthy of admiration.  Something was to be said about the long curves and smooth shapes.  Firm, yet smooth.  It was a wondrously sensual coming together of function and form. 

     Yet for all of their beauty, certain accoutrements were lacking.  The sailor crawled out from beneath the shaded canopy.  The hard-bodied robots were designed to deal with environments coldly vacuous as the moon or as hot as Venus, yet he did not want to mistreat them by having them remain standing.  Not mistreat them yet, that is. 

     They followed him, of course.  Moving upright, this bold figure of manhood penetrated the soft foliage.  He parted leaves in search of the wild materials needed to bring his vision to a climax.  Some such items were within easy reach and on the ground.  He simply had to reach down and pull.  Others, he had to climb for, wrapping his legs around tree trunks, pushing and pulling, applying himself to climb some of those palm trees.  This driving desire for his end goal pushed him to grunting and sweat in the heat was this vision of what he wanted.  The robots stood obediently as he fitted their bodies with the materials. 

…

     If anyone thinks that the government is going to let any sort of property get lost for even a second, then they must have taken a few blows to the head.  Congress likes to cut budgets like a butcher on prime sirloin.  Word got out that government property�"that property including a sailor�"went up the chain of command, it was immediately decided to locate the sailor and bring him back to what passes for civilization. 

     Having cut out from the aircraft carrier, this high-speed patrol boat went blazing and cutting cleanly through the water.  It was a fine day for a rescue mission, and these sailors were having a fine time of things.  Fine day, fine day indeed…

     Everything computerized nowadays can be tracked by satellite, be it robots, wrenches, or red sausages.  They were tracking on all three of those items and more having ended up on the shore of a tropical island.  Getting off a ship to get on a boat to get to an island to verify the presence of some things lost, they had high speed computers tracking satellite feeds while old-fashioned eyeballs looking through high-styled binoculars went to work.

     A simple pair of binoculars, no computers or image modification involved, this rescuer should not have been seeing what he was seeing.  This petty officer first thought the comms guys pulled (another) prank on him.  Looking over the binoculars, making sure there was nothing too obviously wrong with them, he nevertheless blinked his eyes a few times in the off chance he was seeing the result of saltwater beading on his eyeballs, thereby producing the mind-searing vision which he beheld.  It must be a product of distorted light or mental hallucination, because this was something he did not want to see. 

     Steeling himself against what he had to see, he again raised the binoculars to his worried eyes�"looking off the port bow.  “Sweet Betsy O’Grady…” muttered the petty officer.  The other seamen looked at each other, some of them also with means of long-range sight also taking a gander at the vision.

     Now, this is being said in the most upright and proper manner possible, given the circumstances.  The sailor had a certain look on his face which was related to a grimace but indicative of another sensation. 

     On the shore, the sailor was in a rather compromising position with the three robots.  Suffice to say that the humanoid machines were outfitted in such a way that they were no longer simply functional in appearance.  Fastened to their metal torsos were pairs of coconuts shells�"lovingly crafted by someone with too much free time on his hands, also by someone who would prefer to not use his hands for what was taking place.  Shredded tropical grasses served for long hair.  Somewhere among the supplies must have been some kind of cosmetics, because glimpses of the robots’ heads revealed ovals of lipstick where mouths would be.  And that wasn’t all they were outfitted with.  Leather restraining straps, chains, lengths of material serving for whips, they were quite versatile equipment after all.   

    Also versatile were their end effectors�"also known as robot hands.  They could use them very well.  Highly advanced and articulated parts designed for operations that could perform operations ranging from ripping metal shells to gripping delicate components more fragile than egg shells.  It seems that the sailor liked it rough as well as delicate.  As the patrol boat went into silent-running mode, they could hear the sounds of the improvised whips.

     The search and rescue party had seen many things in their days.  People who have seen warzones see all kinds of things.  And in that they were sailors, they really did find out the recruiting posters were right about seeing the world.  But for all of their travels, all of their adventures, this was the first time they had seen EOD robots outfitted and utilized in quite a manner.   

…

     They took him back to Florida, of course.  Having extracted the stranded sailor from those circumstances, they bundled him up in a nice comfy jacket with wrap-around sleeves before using a chopper to get him back to the mainland.  Truth be told, he could have probably swum back to the naval base.  But he didn’t.  He was too busy enjoying the company of some rather willing and submissive machinery.  He was submissive too.

     With all of the bureaucratic processing, filling out reports, talking to naval officers, talking to more naval officers (the report gets better with every telling), they brought the sailor to a psychiatrist’s office�"the head-shrinker being another Navy officer.

     In the quiet, air-conditioned indoor comfort of Lieutenant Commander Lucky’s office, they had the once-lost sailor lie down on the long couch.  They patted him on the shoulder before leaving as the psychiatrist-officer prepared a notepad at his desk. 

     “Son, when I ask this, I mean this with the utmost of medical courtesy and preliminary analysis of your mental condition,” began Lieutenant Commander Lucky.  “That is to say, what the Hell were you thinking?”

…

     “It’s an issue of erotic targeting, sir,” said Lieutenant Commander Lucky, in turn reporting to another officer.  “A developing mind begins to take on those mature urges.  Of course, what we consider normal in Western society is that of targeting the opposite sex.  Things sometimes go awry in this process.”

     “Like a lonely boy farm-hand and plenty of friendly sheep,” went the commander.

     “That’s exactly the comparison I was going to give,” responded the psychiatrist.  “But instead of wool-bearing mammals, the patient became…attached to the equipment.”

     The commander reviewed one of the concluding paragraphs in the report.  The name of the sailor would be kept confidential, but the incident itself would soon be known to just about anyone who wore the Navy uniform.  “Just wait until NAVSCOLEOD gets wind of this.”