The Fire Inside

by Skye Ryan

“I’m glad you feel that way. I’m not so sure about our outcome.”

  Lia grabbed Corvan’s hand, “The only good thing I have ever learned from the Empire was that only those who fight are the ones that have a chance to succeed. If you do nothing, you are doomed to the whims of those more powerful than you.”

  Corvan nodded. “Wise words.” He studied her a moment and ran a hand through his thick sandy hair. “Stay with me tonight.”

  Lia felt caught off guard. Part of her felt obligated to what she was beginning to develop with Rhyssa. And yet, another part, the part that enjoyed Corvan’s touch and the sensation of being held in his arms and his easygoing manner, wanted nothing more than to sleep in his bed to awaken with him during first sun rise.

  “Yes,” she told him, her gaze firm and true, “I will stay with you tonight.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  L ia “awakened,” beneath Corvan’s sweat soaked body. They had made love several times that evening and each time was more incredible than the last. She sighed and stretched. She completed the action but felt no release of pressure from tired muscles, or the pain of a joint held in position for far too long. It was amazing how she felt inclined to do the simplest human things and yet not feel very human at all. She looked towards the window that overlooked the gardens. It was a beautiful night, and the stars twinkled like precious stones in the inky darkness. Lia wondered suddenly what had happened in the after math of her disappearance. She wondered what had been done since she left. She tried not to think of the waves of punishments that were surely pursued in the wake of her escape. She was almost sure that there were innocent Constants who were injured or killed due to her run for freedom. She felt incredibly guilty, and for a moment thought that perhaps the cost of her leaving was too high.

  Then she gazed fondly at Corvan, whose face looked boyishly handsome as he slept, and thought of all they’d accomplished together. She thought of the virus that had ravaged worlds and left destruction in its wake, and the inept response of the Empire.

  She gently moved from beneath Corvan’s heavily muscled body and he groaned lightly in protest. She smiled and swung her legs over the edge of the bed and stood. She needed to clear her mind, to think of what would come next. Soon, she’d no longer be an artificial entity, she’d be a human again. She slipped on a warm sleeping coat over her nakedness and sauntered out into the hallway. She quietly closed Corvan’s door and stepped further out, relieved when she didn’t hear any footsteps or the sounds of an imminent presence.

  Just as she thought she was in the clear, she looked up and saw Rhyssa watching her. She was watched as Lia closed Corvan’s door, observing her tousled hair and rumpled state. Lia could tell what her conclusion would be, and it would be the right one. Rhyssa’s face turned hard and cold and Lia ran after her, softly calling her name.

  She caught up with Rhyssa at the end of a hallway. She grabbed the girl’s arm but Rhyssa yanked it angrily away.

  “So, you’re going in between me and my brother? How pathetic is that?” Rhyssa spat and moved to walk away.

  “Rhyssa, please wait. It’s not like that,” Lia tried to explain.

  “Why should you even care what I feel? You’re just a stupid machine.”

  Lia said nothing for a long moment and then she sighed. “I don’t have to be a human to see that you’re hurt. And I am sorry for that Rhyssa.” Rhyssa paused, and then she turned. “What did you say?”

  “I said I’m sorry that you’re hurt.”

  Rhyssa said nothing and came to stand close to Lia’s face. “No one has ever apologized for hurting my feelings before.”

  “Never?” Lia asked incredulously.

  “No, not ever. This—this is a first.”

  The two said nothing and simply regarded each other for a time. Rhyssa was the one to break the silence.

  “Why did you choose to be around me? You didn’t just waltz into that library by accident.”

  Lia resisted the urge to bite her lip. Instead she averted her gaze and shrugged. “I—I cannot say.”

  Rhyssa narrowed her eyes. “It was Corvan wasn’t it? He wanted you to get me away from him. So, he told you to be around me, didn’t he?”

  Lia’s silence was enough confirmation and Rhyssa cursed, low and hard. Rhyssa swallowed convulsively. “Even an android doesn’t want to be near me.”

  Lia reached out to Rhyssa, her touch soft and gentle. “That’s not true. I enjoy being with you Rhyssa.”

  “Then why are you with my stepbrother?”

  Lia blinked rapidly and opened her mouth several times before closing it. “I—I can’t explain it.”

  Rhyssa rolled her eyes. “Sure.” She began walking away, and soon outdistanced Lia and disappeared through a door to the outside.

  Lia searched around a bit for Rhyssa in the near darkness. Several lamps detected her movement and flickered to life. Lia began walking down a neat, colorful stone path, with gorgeously trimmed foliage and flowers flanking each side. She finally arrived at a gazebo that faced a small pond. Rhyssa was sitting on the long swing, her feet dangling in the air and her body sagging with sadness.

  She turned. “Oh, it’s you.”

  Lia sighed and sat beside Rhyssa. “Rhyssa, I don’t want you to be angry.”

  Rhyssa said nothing and stared out at the water. “I’m not angry,” she said finally. “I understand I can be difficult to be around.”

  “If you know this, why don’t you try to change?”

  Rhyssa considered Lia’s word and then shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess I push people away and try keeping them at a distance.”

  “Why?”

  Rhyssa leveled tear filled eyes onto her own. “Because the ones I love always leave. And then I’m alone.”

  Lia touched Rhyssa’s hand and held onto it tightly. “But you are not alone. You have Corvan. You have Mrs. Danvers. You have Ms. Tran. And you have me.”

  At that last declaration Rhyssa smiled and leaned over to kiss Lia gently. The kiss turned deep and passionate and then Rhyssa broke the kiss. She laid her head on Lia’s shoulder and they watched the water in the darkness and sat beneath the shining silver moons.

  The next few days proved hectic for Lia. She spent much of her time occupied with helping Corvan most mornings, with Rhyssa at lunch and the night in Corvan’s bed. It was exhausting, mentally, for Lia, though her body was running more efficiently than ever. Corvan waded through reports on the status of the situation involving the virus and finally he decided it was time to see things for himself. He and Lia started off in the star ship, canvassing the second planet in the closest star system. He had friends in that galaxy, and since they had ceased communications, he had begun to worry. They landed on Helios, a class III planet of the Empire that boasted enormous swaths of trees and forests.

  They landed softly in a clearing that was ringed with trees. When they stepped out, Lia noticed that the air around them was unusually quiet. No birds sang and there was no scurry of small furred animals in the distance. Corvan walked determinedly forward, towards the direction of one of the small village centers in the area; Lia tried to stop him with a firm grip on the arm. Something was wrong. Lia could feel it within her. Even her programming seemed oddly off, as if it too, could sense trouble.

  Corvan shook off Lia’s hold and stopped. He stood in the middle of the clearing and looked about anxiously.

  “Hello?!” he yelled out through cupped hands. Nothing happened for a few moments, then the scuttle of hundreds of feet moving at once made Lia pull at Corvan and try to move him back towards the ship. There was only the noise at first, and the uneasy feeling of something not quite right. Soon, Lia realized why. Hundreds of the infected were bursting through the trees, their wounds streaming and their mouths twisted with rage and pain.

  “Corvan!” Lia yelled, “Get back into the ship!”

  Corvan stood dumbfounded for a moment, as Lia continued to prod him until he began moving, his feet picking up speed as the in
fected moved closer. He stumbled onto the steps and Lia pulled him inside. She hurriedly banged the door closed. The sound of hundreds of hands pressed against the side of the ship could be heard as the infected angrily banged and kicked.

  “Corvan! We need to get out of here!” she yelled.

  Corvan was tapping the controls. “The thrusters aren’t responding!”

  Corvan cursed as he continued to try to work. “Damn it. It’s not doing anything. I have to crawl out onto the top of the ship and fix it.”

  “No,” Lia told him firmly. “I have a repository of knowledge stored in my data banks. I will try to fix it remotely. If I can’t, I will be the one to go out there. You’ll get infected.”

  For the first time since she had trapped herself inside the AI’s body, Lia was grateful that she was not human. She couldn’t get infected and spread the virus to Corvan or anyone else. Her skin was made of a durable polymer that resisted bacteria and viruses and was self-cleaning. Purging micro-organisms was an important part of her sub-programming and though Lia often found it distasteful, she often looked in on that part of herself, and saw the nasty things that tried to take root on her skin. She often wondered how she had survived as a human being with all the things that were in the air and on surfaces she touched each day.

  She stalked over to the controls and typed in a series of codes, hoping that would release the thrusters. They refused to budge, and after a moment Lia decided she’d have to do something she really didn’t want to do, go outside the ship and repair it manually. She heaved a sigh and turned to Corvan.

  “I tried to repair the engines, but it’s no use, they’re locked. I’ll have to manually slide them out and onto the sides.”

  Corvan shook his head. “I can’t let you do that. You’ll be safe inside.”

  “You’re safe inside as well Corvan! In fact, I’ll wager that I have a better chance of survival surrounded by the infected than you do.”

  “I can’t let you go out there Lia! Don’t you see! There are hundreds of infected just vying to get their hands on a healthy person! What kind of man would I be if I let you do that?”

  “A man who doesn’t have a death wish, that’s who!” Lia argued back, “Please don’t regal me with the talk of what’s right and manly. What’s right is that I am an AI unit for now. I do not get sick. I don’t have any of the things a virus needs in order to survive. You are the healthy person that can easily get infected.”

  She could tell that Corvan wanted to argue more, but they were running out of time. The ship lurched and Lia walked decisively to an upper vent and pulled herself in. She was careful to seal the locks behind her and crawled along the side to the top, where the engine sat.

  She slowly pushed out a panel and climbed out. She looked out over the top and could see they were surrounded by hundreds of bleeding, angry infected. Some yelled, some clawed at themselves, at each other, or simply stood as if they were waiting for something. Lia shivered and began to fix the engines. She carefully manipulated the locks and slid the engine thrusters from their base. They slid out from their housing and down to the sides of the ship. With a happy sigh, Lia set off to go back inside.

  One of the infected men had managed his way to the platform and was standing not 20 feet from her. He had been a middle-aged man before the virus struck him, she could see, but he was now staring at her with a strange hungry look in his white hued eyes.

  He looked at her for a moment, as if sensing that there was something quite different about her. She braced herself for a fight, her programming quickly flicking through hundreds of fighting styles and combat moves. She didn’t want to hurt the man, after all, it wasn’t his fault he was infected. But he was a threat to Corvan, and he was her top priority. The man growled like a beast and turned his head in a bird-like way towards Lia. She was sure that if she were human, she’d be terrified. But as it stood, she was coolly assessing her odds, her brain quickly formulating plans and discarding the ones with low outcomes.

  He suddenly attacked and grabbed Lia by the arms. Lia easily disentangled herself and pushed at the man. She suddenly found her hands buried in the skin of his face. The virus had invaded his epidermis, Lia’s programming had surmised, disrupting key parts of the skin that had to do with strength and connectivity, making his skin like tissue paper. Lia’s face contorted in a grimace as she pushed the man up and over the side. His delicate body couldn’t handle the fall and he splattered upon contact onto the hard ground below.

  Lia was covered in what she thought was millions of the viruses. They were clinging to her skin, trying hard to take a hold, but she wasn’t human and the endeavor wasn’t successful. Lia closed her eyes and moved her mind’s eye into her processes. She manually ordered an auto- clean of her skin and hair. Her body began heating up, first pleasantly like a soft sun on a back on a mild summer’s day and then more quickly. Her skin turned red and pulsed with heat. Her hair, though it mimicked human hair follicles, was much more durable. As she burned, the viruses began to die in droves. She finished the process a few seconds later. The ship below her wasn’t marked by the heat and seemed just fine. Her clothes however, were not so lucky. They had burned with the heat of the cleaning.

  Lia climbed naked back into the vent and into the ship. Corvan turned and a flash of concern flitted over his face.

  What happened out there?” he asked as he ran to her.

  “I got attacked by an infected. I pushed him off the ship but he spewed fluids on me. I had to self-clean. My clothes burned.”

  Corvan nodded and hugged her quickly before moving towards the concern. “Let’s get out of here. I’m sure I have a set of extra clothes around here. You’re going to catch a cold like that.”

  Lia laughed at his deference to her as a human. That was one of the things she enjoyed about him. He felt she was human, therefore she was.

  “You forget I don’t get sick or cold. Anyway, I’ll find the clothes while you start the engines and get us home.”

  Corvan tapped into the controls and soon the thrusters were firing up and they were airborne. They flew over one large burned out building and several other burned out village centers. Lia looked on curiously.

  “That’s the Embassy and some of the villages,” Corvan said. “It looks like they just bombed the whole place and left. They probably didn’t even try to help any of them. Just left them there to die.”

  Lia looked sadly at the rapidly disappearing planet as they rose higher and higher into the atmosphere. Soon, they were gliding into space and into the stars.

  Corvan sighed. “This is worse than I thought. I will try contacting people tonight to see if there are any safe places we can go until I can synthesize an amount that’s viable. A few networks, including the resistance were open to helping. There are reports from several of my sources that Empire soldiers were rounding up entire cities and exterminating citizens. This is getting to be—unbelievable.”

  Lia was not surprised. She had lived beneath the shadow of the Empire’s tyranny for far too long to be surprised or shocked at the things they did. The Empire was filled with greedy people who had no concern for the people they ruled; the wanted only the resources that those same people could provide.

  “I think we should leave at the end of the week. That will give me time to lay the framework for everything.”

  Corvan’s face crumbled into sadness and Lia said nothing. She instead touched his shoulder lightly, and with a squeeze of his hand on hers, he told her in his own way that he was grateful for her presence. She wondered briefly about the friends he had on that doomed planet they just left, and if they were alive or dead. Her programming analyzed the thought without Lia even trying and it spewed out a number: his friends’ chance of survival was less than 4%.

  Lia wanted to be angry at her programming, which at this time was an extension of herself. But she couldn’t hide from the truth. The numbers were accurate. People who came in contact with the virus often died. There simply seem
ed to be no survivors of the disease.

  They sped quickly home and landed to a quiet abode and cold dinner. They searched out Rhyssa and found her quietly reading. Ms. Tran was in her office going over finances and the books. Davis was repairing a technical glitch in one of the communication modules.

  Corvan made his way over to Davis who turned and smiled. “Where’s Mrs. Danvers?” Corvan asked and Davis grew silent.

  Rhyssa came up, her usual stroll was stiff and sad. “You don’t know?”

  Corvan shook his head. “Know what? I’ve been away, no one has said anything to me.”

  Rhyssa sighed. “We put Mrs. Danvers in the infirmary.”

  “Why?” Corvan asked.

  “Corvan—she’s infected.”

  Corvan stumbled backwards. His breath was coming out in hard spurts and he was shaking his head. “No, no that’s impossible. She was just making dinner a few days ago and she seemed fine.”

  Rhyssa looked down at the floor and looked back up at them. Her youthful face had seemed to age in a short time and she heaved a sigh. “I’ve been tending to her. We didn’t want you to be distracted from your research since you seem to have found a viable cure.”

  Corvan pushed Rhyssa out the way. “I have to save her. She needs the cure.”

  Corvan raced to his laboratory and came back quickly with a vial and an injector.

  “Take me to her,” Corvan commanded, and both Davis and Rhyssa obliged. They moved in tandem towards the infirmary, their eyes sad and at the same time expectant.

  Once they reached the infirmary, Corvan slipped inside and walked over the bed Mrs. Danvers lay in, surrounded by hygienic plastic coverings.

  Corvan unzipped the plastic and stood inside the space. He filled the injector with the liquid and pressed it onto Mrs. Danvers skin. The liquid quickly disappeared inside her. At first, nothing happened. Then Mrs. Danvers ashen complexion became softer and healthier. Everyone in the room became instantly cheered. They moved closer, their eyes expectant and hopeful. Corvan sighed with relief and placed the injector on the side of the bed. Lia smiled. Mrs. Danvers was going to be fine.