Nora reached across him for the cup of water on the nightstand. He watched her drink, feeling heated where her body had lain on his for a moment. She finished the rest of the water and returned the cup, leaning over him again.
Simon gave a tentative touch to her knee when she sat back up. “You’re not stupid, Nora. Not at all.”
“I do okay, I guess. I’m no android though, that’s for sure.” She tapped his hand on her knee with her own and said in a joking tone, “Wish I could be programmed sometimes to learn some of the things you already know.” She breathed deep and chuckled. “Wouldn’t that be something.”
Simon didn’t smile at her joke.
Nora spoke in a low voice a moment after, still coloring on the page. “Thank you for helping me. Helping us. I didn’t know what to expect. Actually half expected you to take off once I got you started back up, but . . . thank you. It’s been really wonderful not only getting the help, but also getting to know you. It’s been nice.”
Simon nodded, ashamed that he had a thought similar to what Nora said when he initially awoke, sitting alone his first night in the rain, contemplating what to do with his newfound freedom.I don’t really feel much like leaving now though.“I could thank you for just as much, Nora.” He added a second later, “I wish I could do more. I wish you didn’t have to struggle so much here. Earth was so beautiful . . . before.”
Nora went back to coloring in the lines. She spoke down to the drawing as Tilly handed her some faded crayons. “We got each other. Things are looking up.”
Chapter twenty-eight
Simon
AbeaconbeckonedSimonin the dark, a yellow light flashing outside of the kitchen window where Simon sat, working on parts from the smaller spare hover while Tilly and Nora slept. They were in a deep sleep tonight, worn out from that sickness yesterday that seemed to leave as fast as it came. Tilly’s tiny body was next to Nora’s, who was scrunched to the side. The solar AC kept the room cool and they both shared a large blanket.
That light.He knew the beacon was from the drone that had not left the house the entire day yesterday while Nora and Tilly recovered. It had hovered high above as Simon took care of the outside chores, happy the pair of them were content to remain inside and just rest, still weak from their illness.
He wanted to observe the drone further before he worried Nora by telling her about it, knowing they needed to sleep. The whole day, he’d worn his shirt that he washed, despite Nora’s protests that she would get to it, to cover up his arm. He’d kept an eye on the sky and tried to connect the whole day.
He decided to ignore the beacon, watching it blink outside, while he felt for a signal. Now, sitting at the table, the encryption from the Mars billboard he’d been puzzling over in the background connected—without his doing—as he worked in the silent night on the hover parts. The link wasn’t fully open, however. The encryption still retained some barriers.
“Come outside, Simon,” a voice said from outside the window, right where the beacon shone.
That doesn’t sound hostile, at least.Simon frowned and stood to walk outside in the night. There, he was unsurprised to see the drone hovering in front of him, eye level.
“Are you going to reveal yourself now?” Simon asked. “Are you friendly to us? Or a danger?” He tilted his head as he questioned the drone, his eyes tracking the minute movements as it hovered.It knows my name and can clearly communicate.He crossed his arms, a very human gesture of impatience, as he waited for the hovering green metal to make the next move.
Simon stood there, scanning the surface of the sleek craft and noting the identifying dent on the side, until he felt a pressure on his intensity combinations. There, he found the signal and truly connected, the encryption and guard gone.
His eyes widened in shock as the data from the drone effortlessly downloaded, the air swirling from a desert wind that picked up. The sheer amount of information made him take a step back, stumbling in place.It’s all clear now.
There was a Mars settlement. Yes, there was. But Nora was right to question things, to doubt what she’d been told. Everything was a lie to keep the population from going completely feral and hopeless. There was a colony on Mars, but it was not a human colony.
No, it was run by androids . . . for androids.
His eyes darted back and forth as the connection unfolded in front of him like a web, taking over his sensory processors to the point he no longer saw the desolate desert outside, preoccupied as he was with the inner connected world.
“Hello Simon.” Came a robotic voice, multilayered with different voices and frequencies. “We have seen you before.”
A video from the drone superimposed on his vision. The one with a dent that scanned Nora, Tilly, and him overhead as they went to the mall and did chores outside the little house. Simon’s processors hiccupped as he watched the feed, Nora at his side in the hover.
They were watching, always.
The images flashed of different times since he had been awake, different scenes of him and Nora learning each other. And scenes of before he awoke, of Nora alone, as the androids had been taking an interest in her and Tilly for quite a while. He watched, seeing snapshots of them over many, many days. Years. All the way back to when Tilly was just a baby in a carrier around Nora’s chest.
He winced at the memories, seeing how the drone just watched from afar as Nora scavenged slowly, moving and working the entire day in the rubble some times. Never intervening.
The voices split off into a singular female entity.“I am Stella. I have been chosen to be the one to communicate with you directly.”
The smooth voice of Stella continued in his mind.“Yes. We watch. We were unsure of your origins when we initially scanned you, but we had suspicions you were an android like us. Now we know. Would you like to join us? Earth is not the place for you. It is peaceful with us.”
Simon didn’t answer, internally, over the uplink. Nora’s words returned to him.She said living out here in the desert was peaceful.His thoughts changed a second later as Stella pressed more data on him. The information downloaded, and then he was busy processing the images, the history from one hundred and fifty years until today, now freely available. It made him involuntarily take a step back in shock, his foot bumping into the cracked stucco siding of Nora’s house.
He saw the Earth being destroyed from bombs the humans dropped, first on each other, and then on the androids once the androids stopped accepting orders. The humans decimated the Earth in their fear and hatred until the androids gained the upper hand and took away their weaponry and stripped them of their technology.
