Humanity's Enslavement

A short story

Angie brought her finger to her mouth and held it between her lips. The cut didn't hurt much, but even if she had sliced off her finger, she had to keep working. 

Yesterday, Mark, who assembled biocircuits at the space adjacent to hers, stopped for sixty-one seconds when a migraine invaded his brain. A minute and a second. An android hauled him away. His terror-filled eyes burned her memory.

Maybe he would have been my procreation partner, Angie thought. Androids allowed humans an hour of intimacy twice a lifetime. But now...dead. 

Angie refocused on her work. Falling short of her daily quota would be as fatal as taking a break that was a second too long. 

The assembly plant was so gigantic that its construction had to allow for the curvature of the earth. Ten million human slaves worked here, and one hundred thousand androids guarded them. 

An android stood behind Angie, spot-checking her work. She didn’t turn to look because that wasn’t allowed, but she also didn’t need to. Androids were identical, two meters tall, with large, wide-set eyes, indentations in their heads where human ears would be, bald, with thick, triple-jointed arms, legs made of two parallel, flexible metal bars, eight fingers, and pasty-white skin. They were genderless. 

Hot air singed her neck as the android vented steam. The android moved closer to inspect her progress, heating her like the desert sun at noon. 

A peculiar buzzing, like amplified mosquitos, caught Angie’s attention. Despite the risk, Angie turned toward the sound as an insect-sized robotic drone collided with the android two tables away. 

A shriek echoed off the ceiling, followed by another, and then a cacophony of screeching. Androids screamed, an agonizing discordance that sounded like grinding metal, coming from all directions. 

Angie pivoted in time to watch an android bite the one standing behind her on its neck. The scream, so close to Angie’s ear, deafened her. 

The bitten android collapsed to the floor, its limbs folded underneath its torso. After a few seconds, it growled, stood, and staggered away, its legs jerky, its arms no longer under its control. The android’s blue eyes turned red, and its skin morphed from white to gray. The android found another and dug its teeth into the neck. This android shrieked and tried to push the attacker away, but the teeth anchored deep in its artificial flesh. When the android withdrew its mouth, it pulled out circuits, wires, tubes, skin, and green fluid. The bitten android dropped to the floor and, a few seconds later, reanimated, snarled, and began to hunt.

Some of the humans jumped onto their tables. Others froze, gaping in surprise and shock. But the androids ignored the humans, biting only each other. 

The factory doors flew open, spilling thousands of androids into the sunlight. 

Angie waited to leave until only a handful of androids were left inside. Androids without arms, disemboweled androids, androids convulsing in their death throes, and android corpses littered the ground. Angie sat and watched with other humans until they all stood and took their first steps toward their future. 

---

If you enjoyed Humanity’s Enslavement, I think you’ll also like my story, The Gift of Time.

If you didn’t like this story, try The First Felon. It’s a completely different genre.