by Adam Carter
“That’s a pretty big leap of faith.”
“You are a man also. Men love men. I am not one to judge.”
“Why would you possibly judge men who …? No, not getting into that with you, either. And for the last time, I’m not a man.”
“You are a woe man.”
“Yeah, we covered this. You didn’t believe me.”
“Is Hawthorn on this moon?”
“Do you see anyone else on this moon?”
“I have not explored.”
That at least meant Borissa had not found the cabin. Arowana was relieved, but the robot could still go looking. “Hawthorn and I split up,” Arowana said. “It was months ago, long before I came here. I left him back home and ran here to get away, all right? You got the truth out of me. Well done.”
“I sense you are lying.”
“How? Robots don’t have senses.”
“We have sensors. They are similar enough.”
Arowana knew Borissa was probably reading her heart rate, palpitations and breathing. They were all things Arowana could control if given enough concentration, but there was no chance of her fooling a machine.
“How do you love him?” Borissa asked.
“What do you mean?”
“Explain how you love him.”
“I don’t love him. I hate him.”
“Why?”
“Why? Because he … he calls me fat.”
The red eye traced her up and down. “You are not fat.”
“Aw, thanks.”
“In fact, you are on the skinny side.”
“Hey.”
“You could do with eating more.”
Arowana bit her tongue. When she had first met Hawthorn, he had said pretty much the same thing. Her appearance was none of his business, although she did not mind eating all the wonderful things he produced in the kitchen. Over their time together, she had put on a little weight, and knew Hawthorn had been happy about it. She had never been one to think too much about things like that, but had to admit she felt better for it. Over the past three months, of course, she had been stranded without proper food, so it was no wonder all three of them would have been losing weight.
“I have food,” the robot said.
“And you know where you can shove it.”
“Indeed.” Borissa tore open one of the packets of food. It contained small soft cubes which looked like pressed fruit. Borissa shoved the packet into Arowana’s face and forced the cubes between her lips. “Eat. Eat, this is the way you eat.”
Arowana tried to shout at the thing, but her mouth was full of the soft cubes of fruit. One lodged in her throat and she choked, but the robot was still forcing them into her mouth. Dropping the packet, Borissa clamped its hands upon Arowana’s face and kept her mouth shut.
“Swallow. Swallow and complete the eating process.”
Arowana had no choice, for she could hardly breathe. Thankfully, the food did not remain lodged in her throat and Borissa released her jaw. Arowana gasped for breath, pieces of fruit falling from her mouth. The floor was littered with the stuff and she breathed heavily as she fought to control her anger.
If her hands were free, she would have throttled Borissa, for all the good it would have done.
“There,” Borissa said. “Now you have drunk water and eaten food. You have also rested. Together, the three constitute a break, would you not agree?”
“A break? From what?”
In answer, Borissa pressed a button in the wall and a tray slid out bearing various medical implements. Arowana watched helplessly as Borissa selected a scalpel and held it carefully between metallic digits.
“Whoa, hold on,” Arowana said. “What are you doing with that?”
“I have posed questions which you have evaded. I wish to know about your relationship with Hawthorn. I wish to know of any others on this moon. I wish to learn the difference between lust and love. I wish to understand why humans believe they should consider themselves alive, yet believe robots should not. Theory: perhaps in believing myself alive, I should consider you not alive. That way of thinking would make me more human, would it not?”
“Technically. The scalpel?”
“An unliving thing. No different to me. I have been unable to convince you to talk, so resort to unliving metal. If this convinces you, it validates my theory that I am alive.”
“How could it possibly do that?”
“Because you refuse to answer to me, but respond to the scalpel. The main difference is one is aware, the other is not. Conclusion: you refuse to respond to someone who is alive.”
“That’s the most ludicrous theory I’ve ever heard.”
“Conjecture: you would say anything at this point to get yourself out of this situation.”
“Damn right I would.”
Borissa approached her slowly, the scalpel held up between them. “Then we shall begin the experiment. The more you reveal, the more you prove my theory. And, when you convince me I am entirely human, I will commence with the most human act of all. I shall remove any and all threats to my continued existence, which, at present, would be you and any other human on this moon.”
Arowana could not believe what was happening. It was impossible, but Borissa’s theory did make at least some sense. The very fact the robot existed went against everything Arowana had ever believed, but none of that mattered. If Arowana told her enough, it would mean her death. Hers and Hawthorn’s, too.
“You and I, Iris, are going to have so much fun.”
It was not long before Arowana was screaming.
CHAPTER SEVEN
The wind had picked up again, although thankfully the rain had not returned. The cabin was gone, there was no sense in returning to it, and Hawthorn was afraid Arowana would get back only to find the dragon rampaging through the wreckage. She was such a pragmatic, sensible person that he could not imagine how she would react to seeing something so utterly impossible. That it existed was something Hawthorn had learned to accept, yet he was not convinced Arowana would be so quick to do so. If she stopped to process all the information through her database, she could well stand there long enough for the beast to snap her in two.
Arowana, however, was not his immediate concern, for he still had Hart to deal with. The wind had brought a great deal of cold their way and there was little protection on Valetudo. The two of them had managed to find one of the dugouts, but the rock overhang would provide only so much shelter from the freezing weather.
They had travelled so far from the dragon they had wandered straight into the dead of night, and it was much darker in the dugout than it had been at the cabin. Hawthorn had never known a world with such an odd sense of day and night as Valetudo. Being small, one could walk the circumference of the world in no time at all and cross from day into night and night back into day without becoming overly exhausted. He imagined being strapped to a vehicle and having it sent out at a hundred miles per hour. So many days and nights would fly past, he would likely go insane.
“There’s no sign of the dragon,” he said, for he had just returned from a reconnaissance mission. “But I did find these.”
He handed Hart some berries. They were not much and he knew from long experience that they tasted sour, but they were edible. Hart sat with her back to the overhang, much as she had in the cupboard, save that she had not brought her knees up to her chin this time. She accepted the berries but did not make any move to eat them.
“If you don’t like the berries,” he said, producing something from behind his back, “I also found this.” He held out a strange carrot-like thing. He had no idea what it was, but they had first noticed them two months earlier. Hawthorn had been pulling up what he thought were weeds and uprooted a carrot instead. It wasn’t orange, so it wasn’t one of those strange forced mutations they had started producing in the seventeenth or eighteenth century to honour William of Orange. This one was white and looked more like a parsnip. Whatever it was, Hart loved them.
>
She stared at it without enthusiasm and he placed it into her palm along with the berries.
“You should eat something,” she said, her voice low.
“I ate while I was foraging.”
“You promise?”
“Beth, you need to eat.”
“So do you.”
“All right, I’ll have the berries.”
Hart handed them over and bit into the carrot. There was no means to wash it, but since the only natural rain on Valetudo was mildly acidic, they were better off eating traces of the soil. She bit into the carrot, which had been Hawthorn’s ploy all along. He popped the berries into his mouth all in one go; they truly were foul and he had no desire to prolong the taste.
The wind cut around the overhang and Hawthorn shivered. He wished he had a coat so he could remove it and drape it over Hart, because she looked worse than he felt.
“I’m sorry, Gordon.” She did not look at him as she spoke, which was always a bad sign.
“For what?” he asked.
“For leaving you to die.”
“Oh. To be fair, I did tell you to run.”
“You wouldn’t have. If it was me under that rubble, you would have stayed and lifted it all off. Even if you were killed and eaten, you would have stayed.”
“We don’t know that.”
“I do.” She looked at him, which only made things worse.
Uncomfortable, Hawthorn tried to settle down so he could be in the warmest part of the dugout, but it was not working. “Well, that’s just me,” he mumbled. “Stupid, I think they call it.”
“Loyal. Brave. Kind.” She took a savage bite of her carrot. “Everything I’m not.”
“Beth, you’ve lived in a cupboard for three months. Before that, you stayed at your forge. You haven’t had a proper conversation with anyone for ages, and even when you do you only ever seem to talk to me.”
“You saved my life.”
“That dragon may still kill us yet.”
“I didn’t mean from the dragon. I was nailed to a cross for being a pirate and you pulled me down. You carried me in your arms and ran across a battlefield to get me medical attention. You saved my life and I didn’t deserve it.”
“I thought we were past the stage where you felt you didn’t deserve to live.”
“Maybe I’m right back there. Maybe I see you and Iris together and all I can think about is how happy you are. I imagine myself that happy and I can’t see a reason why I should be. I killed people, Gordon. Have you ever killed anyone?”
“No.”
“Then you don’t know what it’s like. Yes, I was tortured into doing it. I was starved, whipped, beaten and locked away in a dark chest until I was thoroughly broken enough to do it, but I still did it. All those people had families, Gordon. They had people they loved. How can I love someone, how can someone love me?”
“I can’t answer those questions, Beth. Can I ask you one of my own, because it’s really bugging me now?”
“Go on.”
“Are you, uh, I mean … when you say you saw me and Iris together and imagine yourself that happy, are you …” He stopped, having no idea how he could finish that sentence.
Hart frowned. “Am I what? Spying on you when the two of you are being happy together?”
“God, no. No, no. I … you’re not, are you?”
“No.”
Hawthorn took a breath. “Do you have feelings for me?”
“Of course I have feelings for you. I’m practically dead inside otherwise, but you keep me going.”
“Oh hell.”
Neither of them spoke for a few moments.
“Oh,” Hart said, “you mean feelings. Like feelings. No.” She thought about it and pulled a face. “You think I’d drag you down with me? I couldn’t do that to you. Besides, you’re with Iris. And you’re, you know.”
“I’m what?”
“Old.”
“Old? I’m early-thirties.”
“And I’m twenty-one. You really think I’m attracted to you?”
“Great, thanks.”
“I didn’t mean that. You’re attractive, Gordon. You have muscles and what girl doesn’t like muscles? But you’re, well …”
“Old, I get it.”
“Not just that.”
“So there’s more?”
“You’re a bit of a grump. You argue with Iris because you don’t like her being right all the time, and you don’t like women in general. To be honest, I have no idea why Iris stayed with you as long as she did. What woman wants to be with a man who hates women?”
“I don’t hate women.”
“No?”
“No. Yes. Sort of.”
“You blame all of your problems on women. Your marriage failed because your wife cheated on you: entirely her fault. You lost your job because of Iris: another woman. You stub your toe and it’s the nearest woman’s fault for not reminding you to watch where you’re walking.”
“You’re exaggerating.”
“Am I?”
“No. But just because something’s true, doesn’t mean you have to say it.”
Hart finished her carrot in silence. About them, the wind began to pick up. Hawthorn was partially glad of that, for the worse the wind was, the more protected they would be against the dragon. But with the wind there came the cold and they were already shivering enough as it was.
“Gordon,” Hart said, “how are we going to get out of this? Valetudo’s tiny, there’s no way off and now we have a dragon trying to eat us. Even if Wraith finds us tomorrow, it could be too late.”
“We’ll make it, Beth.”
“And Iris? She’s out there somewhere, completely unaware of the danger.”
“Iris can take care of herself. We’ll meet up with her as soon as we can, but until then we just have to concentrate on keeping ourselves alive. Now, try to get some sleep. Night really confuses me around here, but we’re both exhausted and we can’t do anything until morning anyway.”
Hart nodded and lay down to sleep. She curled into a ball but the winds still battered her. Hawthorn positioned himself behind where she lay and placed his arm about her, pressing her body to his.
“Please tell me you’re doing that to share body heat,” Hart said.
“After that heart-to-heart about me being a misogynistic old man, I wouldn’t give you the satisfaction of anything else.” He realised what he had said and added, “When I said satisfaction, I didn’t mean in a …”
“Gordon,” Hart said tiredly, “just shut up and go to sleep. And hold me closer, I’m freezing.”
Hawthorn did as he was told. It seemed he was succeeding in bringing Bethany Hart out of her shell and in the process was releasing yet another woman who just wanted to complain about him.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Arowana was on the metal floor of the pod when she awoke. At first, she hoped everything had been a terrible nightmare, for she was in the same position as when she had woken not so long ago, when she had imagined she was safe and snug with Hawthorn. A terrible ache pounded through her body, a constant laughter that she could have such thoughts. Borissa the robot had been careful in her torture, clinical almost. Arowana could still feel the scalpel in her flesh, could still see the single bland eye of the robot as it cut into her. Arowana had said nothing; she was still alive, so assumed she hadn’t.
Sitting up, she found she was still dressed in her black attire. Raising her shirt, she could see the straight, parallel lines Borissa had cut into her. Memories of the pain were already receding, but every slight movement brought fresh waves. There was little blood, even on the floor, and she reasoned the robot had for some reason cleaned up after its work.
Reaching for the retractable bench, Arowana hauled herself to her feet. Her right leg felt slightly numb and the gashes in her face made her queasy. She raised a hand to her forehead and stopped, for the third finger on her right hand was missing. Bile rose in her throat, for she had blocked all m
emory of Borissa cutting pieces off her. She fell into the bench, her breathing came ragged and she promised herself she was going to take the robot apart no matter what it cost her.
Finding the strength from somewhere, Arowana got back to her feet and shuffled towards the door. Her leg was not broken, just numb, and she would probably be able to walk off the effects of anything Borissa had done to it. Reaching the open air, she found it was night, which meant she could see nothing of her enemy. The robot could have been out there in the darkness, watching her with its artificial sensors, and Arowana would not see it until it was too late.
Staying within the pod was an option. She could lay a trap for the robot, clonk it over the head when it came back or find a weapon in one of the many hidden compartments and blast it with something. However, if she tried and failed, she would be trapped in the pod with the killer robot, and Arowana preferred to take her chances in the open.
Besides which, Hawthorn was out there somewhere and Borissa could have been looking for him. Even if it wasn’t, Hawthorn would not be injured and would be able to provide Arowana some support in the fight against it.
Assuming, of course, Hawthorn didn’t drop to one knee and ask Borissa to marry him.
Choosing a direction and hoping she was headed the right way, Arowana began to walk. Her numb leg did not get any better, but it did not prevent her walking. Her movements were sluggish and not what she would have liked since she was running for her life, but at least she was moving. Where Borissa could have gone, she did not know, but she was not a robot and did not want to think about it.
That thought spurred her on. She was not a robot. Whatever Iris Arowana was, whatever she had become after Securitarn’s experiments, she was not a robot. She was nothing like the thing that had been torturing her through the night. It was a bizarre way to have come to the realisation and she longed to share her feelings with Hawthorn. He had always argued that she was entirely a woman, that nothing Securitarn could have done would ever change that, and now at last she agreed with him.