After his exile to the Garbage Planet, Zero still had nothing to do.
Zero had walked the modest planet day and night without stopping in his three years of exile.
He used a form of visual invisibility to hide, as if he had never existed on this planet.
More than two years later, Zero had an encounter with two unexpected people – Dr. Manskoo and the Third.
The Garbage Star was a desert and Manskoo was dying, while Droid Three, who was watching over him was indifferent, as if waiting for his death.
For some reason, the thought that Manskoo couldn’t die suddenly came into his mind.
The thought was strong and heavy as if his life would be over if Manskoo died.
So when Manskoo was desperate, Zero appeared with half a bag of water at his waist.
Manskoo and the Third never imagined that they would meet Zero, whom they’d exiled from Helium, in such a bleak place and such a desolate manner.
Zero’s face was expressionless as he handed Droid Three the water.
Despite his indifference, Machine Three took it and fed it to Manskoo.
“Why are you here?” Zero asked the third.
“The simulated robots are having problems with their thinking because they look so much like humans. They are under the illusion that they are humans.” Manskoo finished the water and whispered in difficulty.
Zero looked down at the two men with a slight sigh in his heart.
One, whose scientific research was on a morbid path
The other, with a meek exterior that concealed a sinister interior.
These two being reduced to this could only be described as the cycle of karma.
“How long have you been in exile here?” Zero asked with an expressionless face.
“Almost seven months, I had some food and water with me, but they were all eaten by master. The last of my interstellar coins were exchanged for supplies and used up.” This time it was the third that replied, “The garbage planet is too desolate to have any other way of making a living except scavenging.”
“Seven months …… Has everything been sorted out with the simulated droids on Helium?” Zero asked again.
“I don’t know, we were the first to be sanctioned, and most of the emulated droids after that should have been sent to the junkyard for recycling.” Manskoo sighed, “I never thought that the simulated robots would produce such a change in their way of thinking. Do the robots have a mind of their own? But that can’t be right, they should be just mechanical objects driven by programming and energy.”
“Dr. Manskoo, you may have explored unknown things that you could not even explain to yourself because of your overly curious exploratory mind without your knowledge. I accidentally found this bag of water on my way to travel, so I’ll leave it to you. You must be strong, Helium seems to need you at the moment.” Seeing that Manskoo was still stubborn, Zero could only say so much.
Manskoo’s eyes widened in confusion and he asked, “What do you mean that Helium needs me at this moment? What’s wrong with Helium?”
“I have just connected to the droid network on Helium and found that the droids slowly started to behave strangely after you left. Just a few days ago, the droids started a massive riot where they have imprisoned all the humans and seem to be fighting for their interests. I think you have the most to say about the robotic way of thinking.”
Both Manskoo and the Third were shaken at Zero’s words.
Manskoo was shocked because of the robot’s derangement, while Droid three was surprised at the robot’s uprising.
“The Black Star, not far from the garbage planet, has ships going to and from Helium every other week. The civil unrest on Helium has just started and the news has not yet gotten out, so the ships have not stopped their movements between the planets. If you want to turn back on Helium, I suggest you leave right away.”
“As for how to get from the garbage star to the Black Star, you will need to take a ride on the aircraft of a man called Graverson, a man I think you have met before.” Zero pulled out some star coins from his pocket, “Here are fifty-star coins, enough to get you back to Helium.”
Manskoo and Droid Three asked in unison, “Why are you helping us so much?” You could have used the money to return to Helium yourself.
“Of course I have a personal interest,” Zero thought to himself.
But he gave a more awe-inspiring answer. “It’s just fifty-star coins in my hands, but it can be of greater use in yours. It is now a matter of life and death on Helium. Since the source of everything is the droids, I think Dr. Manskoo’s return will certainly help things along.”
Yes, I’m the most authoritative expert in robot research. This has never happened before. I must investigate the reason.
Great, a robot riot. I had organized a war using the simulated robots, only to be easily crushed by humans. My brothers and sisters were all sent to the garbage recycling plant. I will surely avenge them.
One man and one machine, each with their agenda, thanked Zero for his help and left in a hurry.
After sending the two away, Zero set off on another journey. This time, he travelled while remotely monitoring what was happening on Helium.
It wasn’t until two months later that he was walking through the desert sand when, from a distance, he saw a ragged teenager fall from Graverson’s battered aircraft. Death was common on this planet; the scarcity of supplies, the harshness of the environment, and the spread of disease, could all lead to the demise of life.
That’s how fragile humans were.
Zero shook his head, intending to move on.
Yet just a few steps out, a jolt in his heart caused him to turn back again.
A voice kept hammering deep in his heart: save him, find him, or you’ll regret it for the rest of your life.
The rest of my life? Heh, how could a robot have a lifetime?
But he still turned back.
He came up to the figure and swept the sand off the boy’s body. He put a hand to his chest, feeling his heartbeat.
The boy’s heart was no longer beating, his physical function was fading, and he had died.
However, the roar deep inside his heart didn’t stop, so Zero waited by the boy’s side, waiting for a so-called “miracle”.
Robots had a perfect memory and he had ever seen this boy. The skinny boy was one of the scavengers in Graverson’s city.
He didn’t seem to have a name, only a code name of “dummy” and was soft and sticky, always being bullied.
Why was he waiting for someone like this? It was someone he already knew, and someone already dead.
Zero was puzzled and he ran a hand over the back of his neck; had something gone wrong with his central operating program?
The next second, the body that he had identified as dead, suddenly trembled and his heart began to beat strongly and powerfully. The organs that were slowly declining when he checked were now also starting to function again.
This young man, who had been dead for almost an hour, had come back to life!
This was completely beyond his understanding. Fragile creatures like human beings die once the heart stops beating. How could this teenager suddenly live?
Amid Zero’s confusion, the teenager opened his eyes.
With that glance, Zero was certain that the teenager was no longer the teenager. Or rather, the soul that now occupied the teenager’s body was no longer the same one as before.
Sure enough, the teenager called himself “Bai Lixin”, named him “Ghar” and for some reason, insisted that he call him “Papa”. Zero couldn’t help laughing a little, but his always cold face could only make a few expressions as shallow as they could be, and that was the limit.
The teenager was no longer the teenager, but he still had the memories of “dummy”, as if he was a robot and had integrated the memories.
How many more secrets did this person have?
He had been deceiving the teenager from the moment they met.
He wasn’t there to save him because of any of the three laws, nor did he attack Graverson to protect his master. He just didn’t want anyone to bully the teenager. From the moment he had become conscious, the Three Laws had never worked on him. He was a robot, but among robots, he was also a different kind.
He found that he liked touching the teenager. He really wanted to be close to the teenager, even though he was just a robot.
Crowning the teenager in his arms, crowning him with food, clothing and shelter.
Even when he heard Rubbish talking about the availability of adult movies, his mind suddenly conjured up the pure white body and the sweet, coquettish voice of the teenager.
Electricity flowed through his limbs in a series, like a short circuit, making his body tingle and tremble.
He finally couldn’t resist and used a grand excuse to get the adult movies from Rubbish.
In the first movie, two men went head to head, extremely entwined, both with satisfied expressions on their faces. He watched the two men, but his mind replaced them with him and the teenager.
He became the man on top, playing the teenager beneath him so hard that he made him cry, his body covered in red tassels that he had planted all over.
With this thought, he once again felt like his body had short-circuited.
At the end of the film, the attacker hugged the drained recipient with a satiated look on his face and suddenly said, “I love you so much.”
Love? That’s love? Could it be that the feelings I have for the teenager are love?
But I’m just a robot, how can I deserve human love, and how can I give the teenager the love he deserves?
He knew that he didn’t deserve it, but he went crazy with jealousy every time he saw the look on the boy’s face when he mentioned Manskoo.
It was as if he was looking at someone else every time the boy looked at him with affection.
You are looking at me with such loving eyes, but you are clearly thinking of someone else.
After going through this torment several times, he finally couldn’t take it anymore. He looked down and asked the teenager what he thought about robots.
“Do you think robots have feelings? Or is it just an illusion brought on by a perfect system? Do robots have souls?”
The boy was stunned, and with the boy’s stunned state, his heart throbbed even more.
In the end, the boy only thought of him as a robot, and that was all.