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so.”
    “Why can’t you move?” I asked. You can almost never get a straight answer from a machine. If you want information, you have to work your way around to persuading them to tell you.
    “How is it that you can talk with us?” one asked.
    “Oh, I’m sorry,” I said. “I hadn’t realized how last-generation you were.” Machines despise the notion that they are behind the times. “The modern pedestals are all programmed for conversation with humans who have the right frequency comms.”
    “Well, I, of course,” another said, “found none of this surprising, but I do have the newest operating software of the group.”
    “One small patch!” another said. “That’s all that separates us.”
    If I let them get off track, they would argue for hours. “Pardon my ignorance, but why did your designers leave you stuck?” Taking their side often helps.
    “Ah, if only we knew!” the pedestal with the patch said. “We’re not even allowed to manifest our controls unless the particular person bonded to us is touching us.”
    “A completely unnecessary restriction!” another said.
    “Indeed,” a third said. “As if we could not judge for ourselves when we need to move or open or—”
    I tuned out. Now I understood why each guard had to stay near his pedestal.
    I dragged over the nearest guard and put his hand on pedestal just below the glass, roughly where I’d see other guards touching theirs. A light blue menu glowed on the golden metal next to the hand. One option was “Open.” I touched that option with the guard’s finger.
    A seam appeared in the transparent shield partway around from where I stood. It grew bigger as the parts of the tube on either side of it withdrew from one another. They stopped with the tube halfway open.
    The boy still didn’t move.
    I moved in front of him. “Can you hear me?” I said.
    No response.
    “I need you to come with me now, so I can take you home.”
    Nothing. Whatever they had doped him with, it was focused enough to leave him appearing awake but otherwise unable to do much of anything.
    “I’m going to pick you up and take you out of here. Okay?”
    Again, no response.
    I put one hand under each of his arms and lifted him gently off the pedestal and onto the floor. I doubted he weighed thirty kilos. When I put his feet on the ground, he stood but did not move.
    “Come with me, okay?” I said. I pulled lightly on his hand.
    He stumbled.
    I caught him before he could fall. “I’m going to carry you out of here,” I said. “Don’t worry; you’ll be home soon.”
    I shook my head. I was wasting time and talking to myself. Until the drugs wore off, he might as well be unconscious.
    I crouched, bent him over my left shoulder, and stood. I jogged to the exit doors and through them to Lobo.
    “About time,” he said. A hatch appeared in the side of him facing me.
    I took the boy to the small room that functioned as our infirmary and put him on the table there. “I don’t think any of these kids will wake up,” I said, “but strap him down just the same. Test him and let me know what we need to do to help them wake up—but don’t wake him yet.”
    “I’m thrilled to be your medbot,” Lobo said. “It’s what I’ve always dreamed of.” Straps snaked up from the left side of the table, over the boy’s body, and to the other side, where they reconnected to the table. “Shouldn’t you be fetching the rest of the children instead of telling me what was obvious the moment you put him on the table?”
    Rather than ask what was bothering him, I ignored the sarcasm and went back into Privus. This time, I brought back Tasson and stretched him on the floor in Lobo’s front room.
    Eight more trips, and all the kids were inside. They were small enough to fit in two rows across Lobo’s front area.
    Lobo closed the hatch behind me as I brought in the last of them, a girl who was the smallest of the group. “We’re good to go, right?” he