“I’m sorry,” she said. “You want me to say it again? I’m sorry. I’m sorry!” she shouted. “I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry!”
“Stop it!”
“Then you stop,” she shot back. “Stop throwing all that crap in my face every time we disagree about something. So I screwed up. Fine. Like you’ve never done that. Like you’re perfect.”
“I never said I was perfect.”
“You didn’t have to say it.”
“And you didn’t have to say you hated me,” I reminded her, “and that I wasn’t your sister, and that you wished I was dead. But you did. All of it.”
“And I fucked your boyfriend. Don’t forget about that one.” Jude couldn’t stop himself. “Did she just say—”
“Shut up.”
Wonder of wonders, he did.
“That doesn’t matter anymore,” I told Zo. “I don’t care about him. Or any of that.”
“Well, maybe there are things I don’t care about anymore either. Maybe there are some things I thought that… I don’t think anymore. Things I said…”
“I told you, it doesn’t matter.”
“You say that, but you still won’t trust me.”
“It’s not about that,” I said. “I want you to be safe.”
“Since when?”
“Since always.”
She snorted. “Like you cared about that when I was helping you sneak into the temple. Or hack Dad’s files or crash BioMax. You wanted me along because I was useful, and now suddenly I’m not? This has nothing to do with me being some weak little girl that needs your protecting. You’re not that dumb.”
Except that I was. Zo was right. Things were no more dangerous—for her, at least—than they’d ever been. And before, I hadn’t hesitated to let her help, no matter the risks. Her life, her call. But now…
I could have put it on Riley, on the fact that now I understood how things could go wrong and people could disappear. But that was more a reminder than a news flash. It wasn’t that I suddenly understood that I could lose Zo; it was that I suddenly couldn’t stand the prospect. Somehow she had become my sister again. My little sister. Which meant, somehow, she’d become my responsibility.
Obviously, I couldn’t tell her that.
“It’s because you’re a mech and I’m an org, right?” Zo said flatly. “All that bullshit about how we’re all the same, all those speeches you gave, it was all crap, right? In the end you draw a line: you on one side, me on the other.”
And because it would be easier than convincing her she needed protection—because it would be easier than telling her the truth—I let her believe it. She proved me right by doing what I needed her to do. She left.
“Didn’t see that coming,” Jude said, once she was gone.
I joined him at the table, slumping down in the second chair. It was missing a leg, and wobbled precariously as I sat down. Perfect, I thought, bitter and exhausted. Even the furniture had an opinion on my life. Though for the metaphor to really work, the chair would have to dump me on my ass just when I’d finally let myself relax. I was sure that could be arranged.
“Kind of harsh, don’t you think?” Jude added.
“Like you don’t believe all that, us and them.”
“You don’t.”
“Are we done talking about my sister?”
Jude raised his hands in surrender: Done.
Good.
“So what now?” I said. “We obviously can’t trust BioMax—we can’t let anyone trust BioMax. But that’s not exactly an action plan.”
“They’re right about one thing,” he said. “It’s going to be open season on mechs, and without the backups, dead is dead. We have to get somewhere safe.”
“Safe Haven?” I said, incredulous. “You’re joking.”
“It’s not the only option. Let’s not forget, while some of us were busy dancing on BioMax’s string, others of us were planning ahead.” He smiled for the first time since Riley. “‘Some of us’ equals you, in case you didn’t catch that. ‘Others of us’ would be me.”
“As far as I can tell, all you did was hole up in a filthy, irradiated dead zone—” I stopped, suddenly understanding what he was getting at. “You’re not serious.”
His smile widened.
“It’s been the plan all along,” I realized. “You’re probably glad to finally have an excuse.”
The smile vanished. “I didn’t want it to happen. I knew it would happen. There’s a difference.”
“So you want us to run and hide.”
“You have a better idea?”
“There’s got to be something better than holing up like refugees—like animals—in some kind of toxic waste dump.”
“Not all of us grew up like you did,” he snarled. “For some of us it would practically be luxury.”
“Don’t give me that city-rat crap,” I warned him. “This isn’t about me being spoiled. It’s about this not being a solution.”
“It’s a first step,” he admitted.
“It’s a crappy one.”
“And your brilliant plan is… ?”
I didn’t want to hide. I wanted to stay, to fight. I wanted to avenge Riley and destroy BioMax and the Brotherhood and make the world, this world, safe for mechs. As Jude would have pointed out, if I’d been foolish enough to say it out loud, it was a pretty speech.
But it wasn’t much of a plan.
“BioMax would still be in control,” I pointed out. “If anything happened to us and we needed new bodies—”
“New bodies are useless without uploaded memories to download,” Jude reminded me. “Which makes BioMax useless too.”
“So walk me through this. We collect all the mechs, lead them into their new toxic paradise, and… what? Set you up as emperor? Build you a throne?”
Jude slammed his hand against the table. “This isn’t a joke.”
“No, it’s a power trip.”
“Why do you always have to make everything about me?” Jude asked.
“I thought I always made everything about me,” I said. “Isn’t that what you’re always telling me?”
“I never meant—”
“You’ve made it pretty clear you think I’m spoiled and naive and all-around useless.”
“Right.” Jude snorted. “That’s why I always come to you first. That’s why we’re figuring this out together. That’s why I listen to all your bullshit. Because I think you’re useless and don’t care what you have to say. You really know everything, don’t you?”
“I know I’m only here because you don’t have anyone else willing to listen to your bullshit.”
“Maybe you’re right!” he shouted. “I don’t have anyone else!”
We both stopped.
And I could only assume we both thought of him.
Riley.
“Sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t have shouted.”
And I shouldn’t have picked a fight, just because I was upset about Zo and frightened about the virus and angry about Riley and angry, angry, so unbearably angry that I didn’t know what to do except spew it all over anyone unfortunate enough to get close. And all I had left on that front was Jude.
I couldn’t apologize. But: “You’re right. The dead zone is a good option. For now.”
He looked surprised, but he didn’t gloat. Like he said, he didn’t have anyone else either.
So we sat there calmly and cobbled together some kind of plan—or at least a first step. We would release what we knew about BioMax, publicly on the network, and privately to all the mechs we could find; we’d do everything we could to persuade them to reject the corp’s Safe Haven in favor of our own. Then, somehow, we’d figure out what to do next.