While I would've loved to say it was hard to imagine Mikri being evil, the tin can made it very easy sometimes. Beyond his general propensity for murderous suggestions, he was an immature clanker-wanker. The Vascar had been sitting across from me with an unrelenting glare on his face, his mouth turned in a pouty frown and his metal claws extended. He hadn't said a word in the thirty minutes that he'd been staring at me.
I threw up my hands in exasperation, finally conceding the staring contest. "The fuck are you looking at? What's your problem?"
The robot continued to glower at me in wordless fashion, the feel of his LEDs becoming progressively more creepy. Daggers might as well have shot from his eyes and acted on the murderous wrath behind them.
I gestured toward my pants with a downward slash. "Hey, wandering eyes. Nuh-uh. My crotch is down here."
Not a hint of a smile graced the Vascar's face. The cocky grin I'd been projecting faltered, and I palmed the back of my head nervously. Had I…really fucked up with the stuff I just did? I didn't want to lose my friendship with Mikri, even though he had been difficult ever since Corai came into the picture. It would've been nice to be able to call Sofia to the rescue, but we weren't on speaking terms, probably for the same reason. At least she was ignoring me, rather than leveling me with an "I will exsanguinate you" look.
I bit my lip. "Mikri, please talk to me. I'm sorry about everything. Friends…listen and forgive each other, right? You gotta communicate."
"I do not have to do anything you say!" Mikri whirred in response, finally slamming his paw on the cold metal. "You did not communicate with me, so I do not owe you that courtesy! You betrayed my trust."
"I know, I suck, more than a ping pong ball at the bottom of an ice cream cone."
"In the entirety of human history, when was this ever a thing?" Corai asked, not betraying the fact that she wasn't sleeping to anyone else. I'd figured the Elusian wanted to be left alone.
I shrugged, trying not to reveal that I was responding to her. "I know what you're thinking, Mikri. How did a ping pong ball get inside of an ice cream cone? Was it just always there, like a little plastic collectible toy? Was it put there as a choking hazard? No one knows, but it simply was there. And it sucks."
"Shut the fuck up!" Mikri exclaimed, jumping to his feet and stomping angrily over to me—stooping over inches from my face. "I am a joke to you. You do not love me. You do not even respect me enough as a person to consider my wishes and allow me to have a choice! I am a Servitor to you, supposed to just yield to your wishes without even being asked."
My hand shot to my mouth in horror. "What? No! I…I don't think you're a Servitor. I…I'm sorry that I forced my decision, ran over your autonomy or whatever, and you're right: I didn't care what you thought. Just like you didn't care what I thought when you tried to trade yourself for me with Larimak; I didn't want you to. You had to save me no matter what anyone else thought, right—even if it was dumb?"
Mikri paused, then leaned back and nodded grudgingly. "Yes."
"Does that mean you don't care what I think, and that you think I'm a Servitor who should do what you say…or did it mean you felt so strongly in this particular situation that you weren't asking anyone's permission?"
The Vascar sulked, his frown deepening. "That's different. That was to help you, because your wishes would've resulted in you getting hurt."
"And your wishes would've resulted in Corai getting hurt: I know that with a hundred percent certainty after that probe shit. I had to save her, and I wasn't asking. It was too important to me, so I'd ask forgiveness, not permission. I couldn't give you the chance to stop me. I'm sorry if aiding me felt compulsory, but I just did what I had to. What was right."
"That was your decision to make for all of us?!" Sofia snapped, breaking her silence. "To endanger our entire species, and to put our own lives in danger when you couldn't guarantee Corai wouldn't hand us over to them?! You were willing to damn us all because of…emotions! Impulse! Tocapelotas!"
"Sofia—"
"No! Enough, Preston: you never stop to think before you act, and the stakes are too fucking high for you to go rushing obstinately into danger, and dragging others right along with you! That's exactly what got you captured by Larimak, and don't tell me it's unfair for saying what I was too nice to say six months ago. You need to fucking get it in your head. It's almost gotten us all killed, and it still might."
I leaned away, taken aback by the harsh sting as her torrent of words washed over me; the guilt I felt over everything that's happened with Larimak, and all of my past failures, erupted like a geyser. I couldn't keep it together or play it off as a joke, not when her accusation struck at my core. I just…wanted to keep the people I loved safe, and to finally preserve the happiness I found! Why was everything I did wrong? It couldn't be wrong to listen to my heart, and Corai hadn't turned on us. It worked out. It…
Sofia is right. You're a bad friend and a worse leader who might've cost humanity big-time, all out of selfishness. It's easy to say what could I have done, but you didn't stop to think about that or talk it through with your companions, did you? You didn't even give them a chance to weigh in.
"I'm sorry," I blubbered, as shame and the weight of my own failure exploded from the box I'd packed them in. "I just…wanted to be a good person and to help. I can't protect anyone, and it's been so hard to just move on—I felt so powerless and I keep getting thrown in situations where I'm powerless, and people get fucking hurt. I'm—"
Corai stirred, finally not pretending to sleep as my body collapsed into itself. "Not the first person to do something foolish for love, especially under a great deal of stress. You acted against your better judgment because you care, as have I, yet I'm glad you did. Even in all of this, I understand you more than ever. I failed to protect my people in the same way. The cost makes me wonder if it all was…worth it."
"I don't know. I'd do it all again, because I'm selfish and I can't lose you. I've never had anyone, and I'm not the guy that can make sacrifices even when I should. It's…not an equation to my calculation matrix. I need the full set, all of you, and now I've lost Sofia and Mikri before I ever…I'm sorry. You should hate me."
The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.
Sofia took a deep breath, fighting to keep her cool. "I don't hate you, Preston. I know you've been through a lot, but that's not an excuse forever. People like us have to be responsible. I'm upset, angry, and frightened for the future, and I'm furious that you didn't even give me a chance to partake in the decision—to understand. I've always had your back, but this time went too far."
"I know. You…both deserve better. What's done is done; I just hope there's something I can do to make it up to you."
"If we deserve better, then be better. Think things through. An apology is only as good as the change that comes from it. I'll move past this in time, but you can't keep bulldozing through life without considering the consequences, for you and the rest of us around you."
"I know. I'm sorry for adding to your stress, Sofia. It hasn't been easy for any of us, not just me. Mikri, will you ever forgive me?"
The Vascar beeped in dismay. "Of course I will. But why don't you love me like you love her? Why are you overwriting our friendship? Like you said, I would have sacrificed myself for you because I need you. You…no longer need me and my inadequate processor."
"It's not…" Sofia started to comfort the android, before her forced look of concern melted. "I'm sorry. I can't do this now. Later, we'll talk about this, but please just trust me for now. He still loves and needs you, and nothing has to change. P-please, Mikri?"
"I do not wish to distress you, Fifi. I will wait. I will pretend this is okay."
"That's not what I…no, that's fine, I guess. Treat things like they're normal. We need each other."
The scientist scurried off to sit by herself, and I held Mikri back; we needed to give her some space, and I thought pestering her about the Vascar's wild insecurities and misunderstanding of romance, or our present circumstances, wasn't a good idea. To my surprise, Corai walked over to join Dr. Aguado in the darkness. I could see shadows moving as the Elusian hugged Sofia, allowing my human partner to weep into her nanobot chainmail. The gray alien was quiet and steady, able to weather the eons.
That's the ethereal aura that I love about her, somehow comforting and seeing above it all at once. I remember how good it felt to be held in her arms after Bighead, and to fall into them after the memorywalk—to give Corai the comfort she's given us. Sofia deserves to have a piece of that too, to understand why this Elusian became so special to me in such a short time.
"You will not be safe on Suam. Don't stress; if I'm to keep you safe, I know that means finding a way out of here. Whether that helps humanity destroy us will be your choice, but even if you're uncertain of mine, I'm not in doubt of yours," Corai said. "You're our best hope. That's a lot of pressure, isn't it?"
Sofia nodded, wiping snot off her upper lip. "I thought I could stop this from happening. Maybe if I had been able to snap out of it in the 5D portal, I could've seen something more."
"The probe still would've broken under the same level of stress. Those visions are never helpful, are they? Often lacking context and mired in ambiguity: I've replayed those words thousands of times, picked apart every one. I'd like to think there's more to these visions, that they could have other meanings. Do you think that?"
"I…don't know, Corai. I'm sorry that I wanted to leave you behind—"
"Don't be. Yours was the right choice. The stakes are too high. I understand. You already had precog, so maybe you have some of that context in their visions."
Sofia's eyes glittered with sorrow in the darkness. "The bodies were on Suam. I know that now. And we were here, watching them drop. A cavalry riding in from the stars—terrifying to see how quickly it all happened. Not much time to panic—like you felt staring down at Pompeii. I related to spectating that from a moment in time I haven't experienced yet. It's weird."
"I can imagine. You were honest with me about your precog visions long ago, so you must have decided to trust me with the truth before. I'm sorry if I lost that. I've lived my entire life as your guardian; whatever my thoughts, I'd never play any willing part in humanity's elimination, no more than I will with the Elusians at stake. The hardest part is there is no middle ground."
"Would you really side against your own species, if it came down to it?"
"I would," Mikri answered to me telepathically. "Humans are more important to me than even the network's survival. Let's see if Corai's answer is so encouraging."
The Elusian sucked in a sharp breath. "No, certainly not when their actions are justified. If it came down to it, I would bring you back, even if it took a million years. I would start over, go through this all over—the good with the bad—for you. And I wouldn't change a thing about humans, even if it spells our downfall. It's a risk I was and am willing to take."
"For love?" Sofia prompted, earning a nod. "You never answered that question you asked yourself, Corai. Was it all worth it?"
"On paper, of course not—but it's not an equation to my calculation matrix, as Preston put it. It was worth it to me for a single second here with you. Love is so transactional to Elusians, that our marriages are bound with an expiration date; the assumption that it will and should die is ingrained in the very fabric of the idea. We don't believe it will or could last forever. We don't believe anything can."
"If you go into something with the idea that it will fail, that becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, as much as the Elusians determining that humans would destroy them."
Corai smiled. "It's not having deep enough conviction, not believing that anything is enough for forever, that made me tell you immortality was a curse. Preston represents the idea that maybe eternity could be more than dull and meaningless. It could be exciting, even. I know you find his mentality frustrating, Dr. Aguado, but I hope you can find hope in that. And I hope you can remember that love is important as well."
The outline of Sofia's head turned toward the Vascar. "Mikri reminded me of that, Corai. I feel the exact same protectiveness and responsibility for him, as if he was my own creation. I want to see him succeed…and I wish I could've set Netchild up to walk this path, if only to say I truly played a part in it. The idea of having something that could live beyond us excites my soul."
"I am not excited by the idea of living beyond you!" Mikri exclaimed, beeping in horror. "But I love you too."
"Netchild wouldn't have been the same as Mikri," I chastised. "I created this monster. I taught him how to pack his bumcrack full of jambalaya and squeeze, a Caelum recreation of Sol's rocket science. The jetcrack!"
Corai shook her head. "Unë flas 4670 gjuhë nga Toka dhe më vjen keq për secilën prej tyre."
"What's that?"
"I said I'm glad I took the time to painstakingly learn the intricacies of human languages, dear. Definitely all worth it, right Sofia?"
"Mmhm. 'English is the lingua franca,' they said," the scientist lamented. "'You need to learn it for any scientific talks or endeavors! It'll become second nature. You'll be glad you did one day.'"
Corai failed to respond to Sofia's sardonic reply, instead standing and pacing toward the exit of the service tunnel. I could see that she was observing some kind of broadcasts from around Suam, to check whether they'd found us. The Elusians pressed a long finger to her lips, and tried to figure out more details. I could hear the loud crash of ripping metal outside, and tensed up at the nearby disturbance. Had Colban's people tracked us down? Were they about to break in here and put us away?
That was when the metal crash was followed by another bang, then another, and another, at varying distances and intervals. I could hear shouting, and a clumsy glance at the Elusian internet suggested that it was abuzz; the chatter had spiked in the last few seconds, as they all reacted to something. It was in the next few moments that Corai and I came to the same realization, and I wondered if humanity had somehow struck first.
"We need to stay hidden down here," Corai said, concern rippling through her voice. "Suam is under attack."
Next chapter will be updated first on this website. Come back and continue reading tomorrow, everyone!If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.