Robofootball: Doublespin

It would be a little ways after game 2 that Antwan would find out about Jess. Hell, all of the personnel knew that Jess’s #18 was a little different, but Antwan had huddled up with him enough as the plays were called to notice the human factor. Everyone else on the sideline or control room just put it off to Dr. Hobson’s unique research or pet experimental project, but Antwan was not dumb. The giveaway came when Jess’s visor accidentally popped open once during practice revealing what sure looked like blue or hazel-like human eyes to Antwan. The visor popped back into place however before Antwan could get a closer look. It would be game 3 when Antwan would learn the whole truth.

The Robocats had taken the train to Chicago as they would all of their away games given the bulkiness of the players and support equipment, combined with the less expensive price. Boxcars were always cheaper than airplane cargo holds. Aside from mandatory player control rooms for home and visitors, the respective locker rooms were basically turned into small machine shops. The bare minimum league requirement for a visitor locker room included a drill press, CNC mill, a metal cutter, metal bender, metal lathe, a welder, and an air compressor. These were standard. A visiting team could bring their own more portable equipment along with spare parts, whatever they could reasonably carry.

The home team on the other hand could squeeze as much as they desired or would fit in their home base of operations, which in turn, was responsible for a significant home field advantage. With additional equipment and spare parts, the home team, at least in theory, could get key players back on the field quicker. On the road, there were only so many box cars that could be rented, packed, unloaded, and later reloaded in the given amount of time. As a compromise, the RFL scheduling never allowed for more than 2 games in a row away from a team’s home, and when they did, they tried to organize it with the bye week in between as they did for the Robocats this year.

Unlike his robotic teammates, Antwan did not require much in the way of mechanical attention, except for his two prosthetic legs and 1 prosthetic arm. If he needed any adjustments or repairs, Reynolds would see to it that Yuri did them later back at the MIR headquarters. Yuri, Doc Holliday, and their team of assistants were busy enough on game day reattaching limbs, heads, and even complete control or mother boards in some instances. It seemed that more players required attention than those that did not, and it was ordinarily only a handful of starting players that made it through a complete game unscathed.

Reynolds, Hobson, and Holliday were the primary 3 who bopped back and forth between the control room and the locker room, though the rooms were usually adjacent in most parks like the Silverdome. As the head coach, Reynolds had a large office with private bathroom at the dome. In fact, there was a series of offices especially where some of the former NFL stadiums had been utilized for the RFL. It was much easier at home to set up special but separate office rooms for Antwan and Jess. Jess’s special room would be equipped with much of Dr. Hobson’s free standing medical diagnostic equipment. Hobson had thousands of Reynolds’ dwindling budget, over 6 figures alone tied up in equipment at the dome to monitor such things as Jess’s heart rate, blood flow, lung capacity, fluid levels, air intake, waste bag that was like a thin colostomy bag, EEG and EKG monitors, and so forth. The equipment back at his lab had run into 7 figures.

The problem with Jess unlike Antwan, is that the younger man could not speak out and tell if or where it hurt. It was up to Hobson to monitor Jess’s health and keep him functional physiologically, and he needed a lot of machinery to do just that. Of course, it was convenient to have a sensor module brain implant that could be monitored wirelessly through Jess’s hair-like antenna. On the road, Hobson had to make do with more portable devices along with such things as emergency blood packs, oxygen tanks, adrenaline, and so forth.

Reynolds had the offices renovated at the dome so that one had to go through his to get to the two special setups for his two human players. In Antwan’s case, he needed little more than a table or sofa, a bathroom, and a refrigerator. Antwan could install his own armored coverings and remove them too with nothing more than a battery powered rechargeable screw gun. For Jess, Hobson basically set up a mini-medical diagnostic lab with a gurney. Reynolds, being the coach, general manager, and boss of the team all rolled up into one, left little of anyone to question if and what player was brought through his office. He usually kept the clones there under lock and key, and then would release them when needed, but only when Antwan and/or Jess were safely tucked inside.

Yuri and Holliday had their hands full in the main locker room or machine shop dealing with their respective players. Yuri was in charge of armor and mechanicals as well as all of the older Gen 1’s and Gen 2’s that now served mostly as backups. Teams were allowed to carry 50 full functional models for the team plus 10 full substitute non-starting backups; nevertheless, there was really no set limit on parts. Holliday had his team of students to deal with the newer Kettering models, which, for all practical purposes, did indeed rival the Japanese Gen 3’s in ability and programming. Yuri and Hobson were well aware of Dr. Hobson and the prototype quarterback, but Hobson was bit stand-offish, not much of a team player, and did not willingly associate with the others.

Hobson simply did not play well with others, and it served to Reynolds’ advantage in terms of secrecy as Hobson stayed out of everyone else’s way, only dealing directly with Reynolds, even as a go-between with Rudy. Hobson had only one player to deal with, and in the office part of the locker room, he readily switched to a tablet style PC to maneuver Jess around. The other robotic players had alternate smaller pad controls too that overrode those in the master control or war room when they needed to be serviced. That way, the actual game play thumb jockeys did not have to follow their player around closely with a bulky control board.

Game 2 was the first home game for the Robocats and they came out swinging against the god-awful Arkansas Aluminites. Despite rumors of folding or selling out, Arkansas was able to barely stay afloat without paddles and a hole in the boat. In 2019, the two teams had not played each other and both were considered the bottom dwellers, the only winless teams in the league. They had both lost their opening game in 2020 which meant that they both carried 13-game losing streaks, one would finally have to end on September 27, 2020.

Unlike Michigan, Arkansas had completed little if any upgrades to their team other than basic repairs. Despite Senator Leahy’s influence in landing a team in her home state, she and her family had no financial stake in it to avoid any conflict of interest. Those who did like Michigan, suffered financially, but unlike Michigan, ownership did not change with Arkansas. The Arkansas team owners struggled to stay afloat and were able to keep the franchise, but not invest or upgrade the players. As a result the shiny Aluminites were filled with mostly Gen 1 players peppered with a few Gen 2’s.

On the opening kickoff, Ichiro snagged it at the Robocat 10 and ran it back for a touchdown with ease. After playing against a lot of Gen 3’s and fewer Gen 2’s at powerhouse Chicago, the Arkansas team was like the junior varsity. Hell, Reynolds thought, Chicago had more Gen 2’s as backups than Arkansas had as starters. Many of the glitches that plagued the league as a whole in the first few games in 2019 were still present with the Arkansas team this year. One Gen 1 offensive guard had to be removed because it couldn’t stand still. Its right leg kept jerking forward by accident resulting in an off side penalty. Seeing the movement, the Robocat controller for the defensive guard would then push his player forward to knock the offensive guard down. The offense got flagged 3 times for a penalty before they were forced to take a time out and take the player off the field.

Like the old NFL, the RFL allowed 3 timeouts per half and then would enforce delay of game penalties after that when a player had to be removed. Another common occurrence for Arkansas was the player freeze akin to the blue screen of death on a monitor. Sometimes the big emergency deactivation button had to be pressed on the master player control board by the offensive or defensive coordinator for sweeper removal. In the war rooms, there was a master board for emergency player shutdowns for each and every player as mandated by the RFL. A 300 pound mechanical monster that went berserk could pose a danger to the sideline refs though the officials directly on the field including the ball spotter, and the sideline sweepers too were all robotic. It was not wise to mix humans with the machines given the mayhem involved directly on the field. Human refs or umpires only entered the field if play had been halted.

The Arkansas player with the twitchy leg that would not stop had to be deactivated and removed from the field. It usually required the player’s button number on the master control board that corresponded to the player’s painted number on its torso to be pressed, simultaneously with a red button fully 3 inches or close to 8 centimeters in diameter, along with a transmitted voice command to boot.

Early in the 2nd quarter, Hobson would successfully maneuver Jess to throw his first touchdown pass to Antwan. The 20-yard pass was actually a little off, but Antwan had beaten his Gen 1 defender so badly, that he could adjust a couple of yards to his left and make the catch with no resistance. From then on it was a route, but the funniest play of all came when Arkansas got the ball back on the following possession. On a run play, one of the Kettering student controllers neatly maneuvered his linebacker sideways through the line to fill a gap and smashed the ball-carrying arm of the Gen 1 running back. The blow caused the running back’s arm to come off in a weird sort of fumble. The ball, since it was slightly magnetic, still clung to the hand of the detached limb and would not separate. The Kettering student simply grabbed the limb with the ball and raced it into the end zone. After some human referee conferring on the sideline, they ruled it a touchdown for the Robocats and gave the Aluminites a welding penalty that Reynolds signaled in to his sideline rep to decline.

At half time it was 35-0. To preserve their health, both Antwan and Jess were benched despite Antwan’s protests to Reynolds in the locker room to return, “Come on man, I’ve got a chance for my first 100 yard game!” Antwan went on excitedly.

“You’ve got some damage to your armor for one,” Reynolds said.

“Just a couple of dents man, its nuthin’.”

“We’re bringing Mark in with his quarterback and your backup receiver too, they go together better and those controllers need some more game experience too.”

“So? Doesn’t matter to me who’s throwing the ball, but now that I think of it, what’s up with the main dude?”

“You mean our #1 quarterback?”

“Yeah.”

“Don’t know what you mean.”

“He uh…, well…., his eyes look funny,” Antwan said.

“Oh? In what way?”

“They look almost real, like those statue ones that follow you around.”

“Well, he’s a special project, you know, from that Hobson guy.”

“The spooky doctor? Hobs? Yeah, I know.”

“I’ll worry about that. I just want you to rest up, stay healthy, it’s a long season, and you’re too valuable to get injured on me.”

“Is that an order sir?” Antwan mocked a little in his old marine-like tone.

“Yes,” Reynolds thought aloud, “Yes it is, I want you and Je….,” he caught himself with a light made-up cough, “Uh, Hobson’s quarterback to sit out the 2nd half, we’re up 35-0 for Chris sake.”

“Yes sir,” Antwan said at attention and mock saluted somewhat disappointedly. He was having fun today, running around the sluggish defenders, catching passes, and coordinating his one good human left hand with the robotic right.

“There’s 10 more games after this one,” Reynolds added. “I’ve got a lot of kids on the back-up controllers that are itching to play like a bare ass in a muggy swamp with a swarm of those damn mosquitoes crawling up their cracks, know what I mean?”

“All right then boss, ya know Yuri made me some extra armor pieces.”

“Yeah I know, but he’s got a lot going on game day and during the week. No need to get banged up and give him more work this time of year. Hang in there you’ll get plenty of playing time soon.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

Even with the backups in, the Robocats would claim a 56-7 victory, their first ever in rather convincing fashion. It would at least make Mr. Verlucci happy and keep him off of Reynolds’ back for a week. Everyone always had someone else to answer to, even the president of a company or the United States for that matter. There was always a board of directors, stock holders, Congress, league officials, and even the American people, but none of them in Reynolds’ opinion were quite like Dano Verlucci. After 2 weeks nevertheless, the Robocats were tied with Wichita for second place in the Central.

“Football kicks you in the teeth.”

Dave Jones