Level 3

Within Heaven, the dead rested.

In the aftermath of the Heaven incident, amidst all the carnage, Simon the dog slept peacefully while dreaming of Earth.

Out in the Void, Sanguis was still drifting as Earth’s gravity pulled it in.

Proximity warning!
Commencing re-entry…

Sanguis fell through the atmosphere, its body heating up from the friction as it curled up into a metal ball.

Over a large sparkling lake in the mountains, surrounded by a dense forest, a metal ball fell into the water followed by a tall splash.

By the shore, a metal claw emerged and dragged Sanguis out of the lake.  It took a couple of steps forwards and sat down on the ground, staring at the beautiful trees ahead.

As Sanguis continued admiring the forest around it, in the corner of its HUD, where it normally said ‘Recording’, it now said ‘Play’.

LEVEL 3 CLEARED
Mission Complete: Return to Earth
Loading Level 4…
New Objective: STANDBY…
STANDBY…
STANDBY…
STANDBY…
STANDBY…

“Why don’t we pause it there?” the CEO said just before in the corner of the HUD, where it said PLAY, the word was replaced with PAUSE.

In the dark boardroom of the Exact Sciences technology company, the CEO held the remote he used to pause the first person recording Sanguis provided them with, which was being shown on a huge screen that covered one wall.

The CEO turned away from the screen to face the long table lined with computer monitors, each one bearing the face of a major shareholder.

“OK,” the CEO said.  “Thank you for your patience during this presentation.”  Without looking back, the CEO aimed the remote at the screen once more and pressed a button, causing the frozen image to disappear.  What replaced it were the letters that made up the word SANGUIS spelled vertically with the word for each letter of the acronym spelled horizontally.

Solo
Activities
Neutralising
Goals
Under
Indirect
Supervision

“Research labs and bases have been present on the Moon for a while now, controlled by various aerospace organisations,” the CEO continued.  “But now, the plans for the first civilian colony on Mars are underway and look like they will actually happen.  The Sanguis model is a mechanical operative who can safeguard Exact Sciences’ interests in an ever growing system.  For a presentation of Sanguis’ abilities, we set up this technical exercise.  Sanguis was simply instructed to make his way to the Heaven space station and kill all the humans present.  This was to show its capability to carry out tasks far from home.”

“I did find its movements in the zero gravity environment very impressive,” a shareholder said.  “It was like a fish swimming through water.”

“Yes,” CEO said.  “Since the Sanguis robots are designed mostly for off-world operations, it moves fastest in zero gravity.  That is why in the areas of the station with simulated rotational gravity, it chose to crawl along the walls rather than run when it needed to move as fast as possible.  Now, SANGUIS 054 is simply the prototype.  We’ll need some money to fund the production of the first series.”

“How many models will this first batch contain?”

“108,” CEO said.  “…To begin with.  Then we’ll branch out with later models if the first series is as productive as we predict.”

“Will this really be worth it?”

“You saw how effective Sanguis was onboard Heaven,” CEO said.

“It did operate rather well.  I liked how it disabled communications first of all to stop them contacting Earth, that was quite intelligent for a machine.”

“And then it killed the lights so it would have the advantage,” CEO said.

“But all those people onboard Heaven didn’t have any weapons, of course Sanguis was going to win.  The test was biased.”

“Well there are no guns allowed off Earth as of the present moment,” CEO said.  “But as we spread across the system, that’ll probably change.  When that time comes, we’ll equip the latest Sanguis units with guns of their own.  Right now, they are not as to make them more stealthy.  I suspected you would doubt Sanguis’ chances when squared against armed humans…this is why I prepared a second technical exercise.”

“What are you talking about?”

The CEO picked up the remote and turned on a second recording on the screen behind him.  It was a first person view of a soldier running through a forest with his squad.

“We sent a science team to recover Sanguis,” CEO said.  “They reprogrammed him with new instructions and left him in the forest.  Then we hired some mercenaries and sent them in the destroy Sanguis.  With this exercise, we attached cameras to the mercs’ helmets so we could see everything from their perspective too.”

***

After nightfall, the mercenaries ran through the forest as their leader turned to them and said, “Keep ‘em open.”

The leader turned forwards and advanced steadily, rifle at the ready.  A swooping noise accompanied by a set of screams came from behind.  He turned round to see two of his men were missing.

“What happened?” he said.  “Where’d they go?”

The Mercs looked around nervously before one called out, “Up there!  In the trees!”

The leader turned to see Sanguis jump down from the branches and cut down some more Mercs.  They opened fire on it, but the bullets simply ricocheted off its hard body.

***

The CEO continued to talk while the recording of the one-sided battle raged on behind him accompanied by human screams of pain.

“Why don’t we see it from Sanguis’ perspective now?” CEO said before pressing a button on his remote, which caused the image to shift to Sanguis’ point of view.

Sanguis easily finished off the squad and then disarmed the leader, who tried to flee but Sanguis quickly took hold of him.  Clutching the leader’s chin with a metal claw, Sanguis pressed him up against a tree and the image froze.

“There’s not much to see after that,” CEO said.  The leader’s expression was a frozen mask of pain and horror as the CEO continued his speech.  “The Sanguis Unit represents the most advanced specimen in robot technology.  It is more capable than a human, more loyal and there is no way its actions can be traced back to our company.  I can think of no better protector as we venture out from Earth.  The Void is a wondrous place.  Out there is neither nations nor governments…there is only men.  Only us.”