“Open.”
The airlock stayed shut.
“Open!”
Still shut. Kerstin felt panic rise. She had just twenty minutes’ O2 left. Xia had less.
“There should be an emergency release,” said Xia.
“There isn’t,” said Kerstin, exasperated. “This model’s fully voice-activated. Self-aware, apparently. And, supposedly, fully failsafe. Useless heap of junk. Open!”
The airlock stayed shut.
Xia’s breath, loud. Starting to gasp? “Whack it with your multi-tool.”
“Won’t work.” She did it anyway. It didn’t help, and the recoil sent her spinning. “Running out of time here. Damn you, open!”
“Let me try something,” said Xia. “Open. Please.”
And the airlock opened.
Author’s Note: I long for the day when gadgetry becomes truly self-aware, so it will understand exactly when I tell it how annoyed I am with its performance.
Very nice. I love the ending. It’s very suitable for a drabble.
[…] I should advise that the first one of seven of my diminutive fictional offerings, ‘Protocol’, is up at all-drabbles-all-the-time site SpeckLit — the other six 100-worders will be rolled out during the next few months. I shall […]
Ha! I like this one. 😀
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