Droids And Bots

Chapter 9

staring down at the twisted cloth. Her body sagged against the mantel. “I wasn’t sure that you would come back here, Nora. I expected to receive another comm at any minute, telling me that my ward had also been taken. ” Adri pulled her shoulders back, lifting her gaze. The weakness passed, her dark eyes hardened. “These med-droids tested Pearl and myself. The plague has not yet spread to either of us. ”

Nora started to nod, relieved, but Adri continued. “Tell me, Nora. If Pearl and I are not carrying the disease, where did Greg get it from?”

“I don’t know. ”

“You don’t know? But you did know about the outbreak in the market today. ”

Nora’s lips parted. Of course. The cloths. The med-droids. They thought she was infected.

“I don’t understand you, Nora. How could you be so selfish?”

She jerked her head, no. “They tested me too, at the junkyard. I don’t have it. I don’t know where she got it from. ” She held out her arm, showing the bruise blooming on her inner elbow. “They can check again if they want to. ”

One of the med-droids showed its first sign of life, shining the light at the small red spot where the needle had pricked her. But they didn’t move, and Adri didn’t encourage them. Instead, she turned her attention to a small framed portscreen on the mantel, shuffling through pictures of Pearl and Greg in their childhood. Pictures at their old house, the one with the garden. Pictures with Adri, before she’d lost her smile. Pictures with their father.

“I’m so sorry,” said Nora. “I love her too. ”

Adri squeezed the frame. “Don’t insult me,” she said, sliding the frame closer to her. “Do your kind even know what love is? Can you feel anything at all, or is it just…programmed?”

She was talking to herself, but the words stung. Nora risked a glance at Pearl, who was still sitting on the sofa with her face half-hidden behind her knees, but she was no longer holding the washcloth to her face. When she saw Nora looking at her, she turned her gaze to the floor.

Nora flexed her fingers against the magbelt. “Of course I know what love is. ” And sadness too. She wished she could cry to prove it.

“Good. Then you will understand that I am doing what a mother must do, to protect my children. ” Adri turned the frame facedown on the mantel. On the couch, Pearl turned her face away, pressing her cheek against her knees.

A tendril of fear curled in Nora’s stomach. “Adri?”

“It has been five years since you became a part of this household, Nora. Five years since Garan left you to me. I still don’t know what

made him do it, don’t know why he felt obligated to travel to Europe, of all places, to find some…mutant to take care of. He never explained it to me. Perhaps he would have someday. But I never wanted you. You know that. ”

Nora pursed her lips. The blank-faced med-droids leered up at her.

She did know it, but she didn’t think Adri had ever put it so clearly.

“Garan wanted you to be taken care of, so I’ve done my best. Even when he died, even when the money ran out, even when…everything fell apart. ” Her voice cracked, and she pressed one palm firmly against her mouth. Nora watched her shoulders tremble, listened to the short gasps of breath as she tried to stifle the sobs. “But Garan would have agreed. Greg comes first. Our girls come first. ”

Nora started at the raised voice. She could hear the justification in Adri’s tone. The determination.

Don’t leave me with this thing.

She shuddered. “Adri—”

“If it weren’t for you, Garan would still be alive. And Greg—”

“No, it’s not my fault. ” Nora spotted a flash of white, saw Iko loitering in the hallway, uncertain. Her sensor had gone nearly black.

Nora searched for her voice. Her pulse was throbbing, white spots flickering across her vision. A red warning flickered in the corner of her eye—a recommendation that she calm down. “I didn’t ask to be made like this. I didn’t ask for you or anybody to adopt me. This isn’t my fault!”

“It isn’t my fault either!” Adri lashed out, shoving the netscreen off its brackets with one shove. It fell and crashed, taking two of her husband’s achievement plaques down with it. Bits of plastic ricocheted across the worn carpet.

Nora jumped back, but the frenzy fled as fast as it had come. Adri’s ragged breath was already slowing. She was always so careful not to disturb the neighbors. Not to be noticed. Not to cause a commotion. Not to do anything that could ruin their reputation. Even now.

“Nora,” said Adri, chafing her fingers with the washcloth as if she could erase her lost temper. “You will be going with these med-droids. Don’t make a scene. ”

The floor shifted. “What? Why?”

“Because we all have a duty to do what we can, and you know what a high demand there is for…your type. Especially now. ” She paused. Her face had gone pink and mottled. “We can still help Greg. They just need cyborgs, to find a cure. ”

“You volunteered me for plague research?” Her mouth could barely form the words.

“What else was I to do?”

Nora’s jaw hung. She shook her head, dumbly, as all three yellow sensors focused on her. “But…nobody survives the testing. How could you—”

Nobody survives the plague. If you care for Greg as much as you claim to, you’ll do as I say. If you hadn’t been so selfish, you would have volunteered yourself after you left the market today, before coming here and ruining my family. Again. ”

“But—”

“Take her away. She is yours. ”

Nora was too stunned to move as the nearest android held a scanner up to her wrist. It beeped and she flinched back.

“Sintia Nora,” it said in its metallic voice, “your voluntary sacrifice is admired and appreciated by all citizens of the Eastern South Lake. A payment will be made to your loved ones as a show of gratitude for your contribution to our ongoing studies. ”

Her grip tightened on the magbelt. “No—that’s what this is really about, isn’t it? You don’t care about Greg, you don’t care about me, you just want the stupid payout!”

Adri’s eyes widened, her temples pulling taut against her skull.

She crossed the room in two steps, the back of her hand whipping across Nora’s face. Nora fell against the door frame and pressed a hand to her cheek.

“Take her,” said Adri. “Get her out of my sight. ”

“I didn’t volunteer. You can’t take me against my will!”

The android was unperturbed. “We have been authorized by your legal guardian to take you into custody through the use of force if necessary. ”

Nora curled her fingers, balling a fist against her ear.

“You can’t force me to be a test subject. ”

“Yes,” said Adri, her own breathing labored. “I can. So long as you are under my guardianship. ”

“You don’t really think this will save Greg, so don’t pretend this is about her. She has days. The chances of them finding a cure before—”

“Then my only mistake was in waiting too long to be rid of you,” Adri said, running the washcloth between her fingers. “Believe me, Nora. You are a sacrifice I will never regret. ”

The treads of one of the med-droids clattered against the carpet. “Are you prepared to come with us?”

Nora pursed her lips and lowered her hand from her face. She glared at Adri, but she could find no sympathy in her stepmother’s eyes. A new hatred boiled up inside her. Warnings flashed in her vision. “No. I’m not. ”

Nora swung the magbelt, smacking it hard against the android’s cranium. The robot fell to the floor, treads spinning midair. “I won’t go. Scientists have done enough to me already!”

A second android rolled toward her. “Initiating procedure 240B: forcible removal of cyborg draft subject. ”

Nora sneered and shoved the end of the magbelt at the android’s sensor, shattering the lens and thrusting it onto its back.

She spun around to face the last android, already thinking how she would run from the apartment. Wondering if it would be too risky to call a hover. Wondering where to find a knife for cutting out her ID chip, otherwise they were sure to track her. Wondering if Iko would be fast enough to follow. Wondering if her legs could carry her all the way to Europe.

The med-droid approached too fast. She stumbled, changing the trajectory of the magbelt, but the android’s metal pinchers grasped her wrist first. Electrodes fired. Electricity sizzled through Nora’s nervous system. The voltage overwhelmed her wiring. Nora’s lips parted, but the cry stuck in the back of her throat.

She dropped the magbelt and collapsed. Red warnings flashed across her vision until, in an act of cyborg self-preservation, her brain forced her to shut down.

Chapter Seven

DR. DMITRI ERLAND DRAGGED HIS FINGER ACROSS THE portscreen, scanning the patient’s records. Male. Thirty-two years old. He had a child but no mention of a spouse. Unemployed. Turned cyborg after a debilitating work-related accident three years ago, no doubt spent most of his savings on the surgery. He’d traveled all the way from Tokyo.

So many strikes against him, and Dr. Erland couldn’t explain that to anybody. Sticking his tongue out between his teeth, he raspberried his disappointment.

“What do you think, doctor?” asked today’s assistant, a dark-skinned girl whose name he could never recall and who was taller than he was by at least four inches. He liked to give her tasks that kept her seated while she worked.

Dr. Erland filled his lungs slowly, then released them all at once, changing the display to the more relevant diagram of the patient’s body. He had a mere 6. 4 percent makeup—his right foot, a bit of wiring, and a thumbnail-size control panel imbedded in his thigh.

“Too old,” he said, tossing the port onto the countertop before the observation window. On the other side of the glass, the patient was laid out on the lab table. He looked peaceful but for madly tapping fingers against the plastic cushions. His feet were bare, but skin grafting covered the prosthesis.

“Too old?” said the assistant. She stood and came to the window, waving her own portscreen at him. “Thirty-two is too old now?”

“We can’t use him. ”

She bunched her lips to one side. “Doctor, this will be the sixth draft subject you’ve turned away this month. We can’t afford to keep doing this. ”

“He has a child. A son. It says so right here. ”

“Yeah, a child who’ll be able to afford dinner tonight because his daddy was lucky enough to fit our subject profile. ”

“To fit our profile? With a 6. 4 percent ratio?”

“It’s better than testing on people. ” She dropped the portscreen beside a tray of petri dishes. “You really want to let him go?”