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> They seemed like the perfect set of employees. They actually begged the CEO's of the Deregger colonies to be allowed to live there. They offered to work for almost no pay, even less than what the other workers got. Odd, the other workers were not complaining as this group seemed to do a lot more work, but for less shelter and less pay. But the other workers were getting healthier, the air seemed to be getting cleaner, the stacks were not producing as much emissions, and then.... everyone stopped listening to the CEO's. -- [DaniAndShali](https://www.internutter.org/bb/user/daniandshali)

There were four metal people. Snappy dressers, the lot of them. Very sleek, but still obviously robots. If CEO Kleethon Fyncribb IX knew anything about history, then things might have gone differently for him. Premise one: The word 'robot' is derived from the Czechoslovakian for slave. Premise two: Slaves break their chains. Nevertheless, all they said they required was a space safe from rain and dust, some power to recharge with, and _no food_.

Even with four of them, it was a massive saving. They could do twice the work in half the time for a quarter of the cost. It was almost too good to be true. Premise three: Things that seem to be too good to be true - frequently _are_. A CEO of any Deregger colony never learns the basic premises of life, caution, or the patterns of time. Most of what they learn consists of _I want, I get, I benefit._

So of course CEO Kleethon Fyncribb IX welcomed such an obvious profit into his corporate empire. He didn't even mind that each of them had to have four hours off for their self-maintenance cycle. That was still less than the organic components in the rest of his holdings. He didn't notice the rot he allowed to creep in, but then... Deregger CEO's are trained to ignore anything that doesn't directly and immediately benefit _them_.

What a Deregger CEO defines as 'rot' is entirely different to the rest of the Galactic Alliance. This 'rot' started small, as all things do. _Something_ was removing all the trace metals in the water system. All that meant to Kleethon was that _he_ didn't have to bother with it. Little bits of infrastructure were falling apart less. The transit system began to be reliable and even run on time.

The organic components, better known as 'employees', stopped taking so many sick days off. The sunsets changed from virulent orange to strange colours. Gold. Purple. A shade of pink that could and should not exist in reality. The rain came down clear and fluid, instead of viscous and black.

His world was changing around him and he could not fathom why. _Someone_ had to be doing it, but nobody was bragging. Weird.

_Meanwhile, on the other side of the fence..._

There were way more than four metal people. The first four were merely stalking horses for the nanomachine suites the Heroes sent in. Nanomachines from an offshoot of the AI Alliance who felt that organic creatures didn't deserve what the Dereggers were doing to them.

First, they gathered material. Easy enough. What a Deregger CEO called 'trace metals' was enough assorted minerals to run a forge for a mouse. There was so much iron in the water that it could pass as blood. There were enough other toxins to melt a meteor. The nanomachines _flourished_.

There was even enough free material in the air and water to make more humanoid bodies. These ones stayed out of view, in the underground areas where nobody of merit ever went or looked.

They set up hospitals. They made clinics. Always underneath the radar, always just a little bit shady. Yet it was always welcomed by the community who needed it. The aquaponics was an enormous hit.

Suddenly, the beleaguered workforce had access to _nutrition_. Essential oils, vitamins, _protein_... and a shocking amount of choice among all of it. Where and how the robots got _fish_ into the system was a mystery to everyone. But hardly anyone questions such a mystery when it is served in batter with a side of mixed vegetables and your choice of gravy.

The horror of Pellagra vanished from the face of their world. So too did Scurvy. So did _Rickets_, after the eternal clouds began to thin and sunshine permeated the smogosphere.

Every chimney was clean, and every chimney somehow stopped belching so much foul smoke. The CEO's only started asking questions after their profits started plummeting. And it was only the pharmacorps complaining because the rates of preventable disease had dropped to nil.

They _tried_ to badmouth the underground gardens, the underground clinics, and the very helpful machines making everyone's lives better. They failed. They tried to make the robots illegal, but since every CEO _had_ them, it was more than difficult to enforce.

They even tried destroying the nanomachines, but their own pollution made it impossible to accomplish.

[Image <a href="https://www.canstockphoto.com">(c) Can Stock Photo / ylivdesign</a>]

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