A Toaster on Mars Read Online Free PDF

hole.’
    ‘Doesn’t sound like you can buy it at a supermarket.’
    Two guys walked past, looking Nicki up and down.
    ‘You get a lot of that?’ Blake asked.
    ‘It’s not easy being a sex goddess, but I live with it.’
    Some people used robots for companionship, but Blake had always considered it weird. A person dating a toaster, even one with a high-spec AI, might as well date a photocopier.
    ‘Anyway,’ Nicki said, ‘I’d rather look like this than…’
    ‘What?’
    She nodded at him. ‘You’re hardly a movie star.’
    ‘What’re you saying?’
    ‘How old are you? Sixty?’
    ‘Forty!’
    He looked for a cab, but then caught sight of Sally. The assistant director must have organised for her to be brought to the hospital.
    Nicki stared at the car. ‘It does fly, doesn’t it?’ she asked.
    ‘Of course! What do you think I am? A Neanderthal?’
    ‘Is that a rhetorical question?’
    ‘Blake!’ Sally exclaimed as they climbed in. ‘Where have you been?’
    ‘Around,’ Blake said, evasively. He introduced Nickiand started the engine. ‘We’re going to PBI headquarters.’
    Nicki stared at him, aghast, as he gripped the steering wheel. ‘Uh, what are you doing?’
    ‘What do you mean?’
    ‘You’re not driving this car, are you?’
    ‘I’m a good driver.’
    ‘He wrecked his last twelve cars,’ Sally said. ‘I live in constant fear for our safety.’
    ‘Shut up!’ Blake said.
    ‘You don’t need to be rude!’
    Blake resisted the urge to thump the dashboard. ‘You’re a motor vehicle,’ he said. ‘I don’t need to be polite.’
    ‘Why are you so stressed? Have you had a hard day on the streets?’
    ‘Blake was in hospital,’ Nicki said.
    ‘Hospital! My little Blakey Wakey was in hospital!’
    ‘Don’t call me that!’
    ‘Sally,’ Nicki said, smirking as she shot Blake a look. ‘Have you got a little crush on Blake? Is that what it is?’
    ‘I’ve got a subroutine that makes me fall for bad men! They can slam my doors as hard as they want and I just keep coming back for more.’ Sally paused. ‘Is it that obvious?’
    ‘Only to me. Blake’s not the brightest star in the sky.’
    Blake groaned.
    Zeeb says:
    I should mention that humans and AIs have come a long way, but Earth is still one of the many planets where they’re forbidden to marry. The reasons against automotive-human marriages are varied, but authorities often worry where it will lead. For example, a man on Trigor Nine trying to marry his neighbour’s ride-on lawnmower was disallowed by the courts. The whole incident ended in tragedy when, faced with separation, the man drove himself and the lawnmower off a cliff.
    If that isn’t love, I don’t know what is.
    Blake slammed his foot on the accelerator and they took off. Sally and Nicki chatted away as he gloomily navigated his way through the traffic. Badde was somewhere out there. The PBI might be trying to track him down, but they didn’t know Badde like he did.
    ‘Thinking about the investigation?’ Nicki asked.
    Blake frowned. ‘How’d you know?’
    ‘I would be if someone stole a case I’d worked on for years.’
    Blake sighed. ‘Badde is the galaxy’s most infamous criminal. He’s committed robberies from one side of the Milky Way to the other: the Sirus Four bank job, the Mars gold depository, the First Interstellar platinum heist. The robberies were always carried out after-hours, and no one was ever arrested.’
    ‘So he’s always stayed in the shadows.’
    ‘Until now. We’re lucky he’s finally surfaced.’
    Zeeb says:
    Evolutionary scientists on Earth have long debated the importance of luck in the development of life there. They believed that atoms bumped into atoms. Amino acids were created. Lightning struck. Things climbed out of the sea. Legs were grown. Things did things with other things.
    The theory was bounced on its head and kicked out the door by a five-billion-year-old race called the Xengonia, who turned up one day