CHAPTER FORTY-TWO—CONTACT  

First thing Monday morning, James brought Heather up to his personal lab. She sat in the extra desk chair, her head and chest open while he took readings of her power core and ran routine stability tests.

She had scanned as much of the area as she could on her way up from the basement, but her thermal sensor was unhelpful. One useful note, however: she suspected the mysterious room by James’ lab was some kind of generator room or electrical hub.

The more her thoughts turned toward escape, the more she visualized pulling a repeat of Larkspur on that generator, blowing the whole facility sky high.

She watched James putter, his mind elsewhere. His desk was clear. He was on to other projects.

She weighed her chances of making a break for it. She’d have to time it when James took the tether off her ankle to escort her back to her cell. She could incapacitate him with a measured shock, and hopefully smash her way through the window. Sprinting, electrified metal would be hard to apprehend.

However, the fence outside could be electric, which was a problem if the voltage was too high.

She also figured the polymer encasing her vitals wasn’t bulletproof. Inorganic didn’t meant invincible.

James pulled open a drawer across the room and produced what Heather recognized as the pain simulator.

“I need to put this back in,” James said.

Heather buzzed a sigh, but sat still and let him access her neural network. If her escape plan were further along, she might have fought him on it. Better to play along for now.

He plugged in the device, snapped the protective frame back on.

“You can go ahead and close your cranial panels,” he said. “It’s done.”

Heather complied.

“Did it connect?” James moved across the room, where he proceeded to rifle through papers and boot up his laptop.

She searched reluctantly for the connection of the pain simulator. She wondered if she could consciously block it out, and therefore limit its influence. As her attention touched on the accessory, something pushed through in her mind, surprising her. It was text, forming a message:

Heather, it said, You were right, obeying these people is only making things worse. I want to help get you out of here, if you’re willing to work with me. If you don’t want my help, I understand, and I won’t get in your way.
I outfitted the pain simulator with a communicator, so when I test it in the next few minutes, you should be able to access the nearest cellphone tower once the device is activated. I’ve programmed the coordinates to this lab, Empetrum, into the device too. Search for them and you’ll find them. When I test it, reach out to your parents, tell them where we are.
We’re far from civilization, and Empetrum is heavily guarded, with a few fences and security checkpoints between us and the perimeter. It will be very dangerous if Benson catches us, but I’m willing to try if you are.
I’m sorry it took me so long to listen.

Heather stared at him, repressing the millions of questions begging to be given voice. A very real hope after so much despair.

James glanced up to meet her gaze, shy and hopeful and tired. He had nothing to gain by lying to her.

Either way, she’d know for sure as soon as the pain simulator turned on.

He took the remote for the device from a desk drawer, holding it like he feared it would burn him. “I have to test it again.”

Heather watched him. “Okay,” she said quietly.

She squeezed her hands together in her lap, and James activated the device. The signal buzzed oddly in her head, fading in and out like it struggled to translate into a discernible pain response.

She glanced up at him, inquisitive, wondering if he had tried to dampen or eliminate it.

He kept his gaze on the remote, his lips pressed together. His thumb clicked the button again.

The pain signal smoothed out and flared. She winced. Then, somewhere, in the back of her head, she detected something else. Her attention started to fray, splitting between where she sat in

James’ lab, and another piece reaching out all around her.

A weak connection, but it was there.

Hope swelled in her chest.

“Going up two,” he said, and clicked it twice.

Heather stiffened as the pain intensified with sharp, unexpected stabs. She gripped the arms of the chair and tensed her shoulders, closing her eyes. She felt James’ gaze on her as he waited breathlessly for something to happen.

She gave a small shake of her head. With two more clicks, the pain signal ripped from her head down her spine and into her legs. She tried to recall her dad’s cell phone number—she hoped to catch him at Larkspur, where the other engineers might know some way to help. It was difficult to focus.

The signal was still too weak, though she reached out, invisible fingers extending blindly in the dark, trying to find purchase. Trying to find something that could translate her thoughts into a message, and beam it to her parents.

She opened her eyes and gave him a determined, meaningful look. He upped it to level eight and she stiffened. She pulled forward, an electronic, mistuning warble slipping from her voice box. She stared at James’ shoes in front of her, holding onto his presence like a lifeline, to keep her from ripping her brain out or screaming at him to stop it, while she stood still in a barrage of discordant, all consuming pain, trying to listen. Her mind reaching, reaching, reaching.

Something caught and held.

Her eyes widened, her vision blurred out.

She threw words into a choppy message, struggling to keep out nonsense information and not certain of her success: Dad, it’s Heather we’re ok James and I are trapped at Empetrum but planning to escape nothing yet but if you could help that would be great please reply right now.

She mentally shoved it away, pushing it toward her connection with a cellphone tower that she thought was southeast of them, hoping that doubled as sending it out. Her dad usually had his phone on him. It would start vibrating on his desk, or in the pocket of his slacks, if he was at Larkspur. It was 9:34:46. 47. 48.

Heather waited. James stood by, his thumb on the remote’s power button.

Please hurry up, Dad, she thought. She clamped her hands behind her head, ducking it between her knees. Just one second longer. She told herself. One second longer.

HEATHER! A reply came from Richard’s cell phone number. The message was full of frenzied typing mistakes. im so incredbkt relieved tonhear from you yes we all want to help you and james ge tout of empetrum what can we do to help???

I don’t know. Heather replied, closing her eyes hard. The emotion was overwhelming, receiving the first words from her family in two weeks. Since dying and being resurrected as a machine. Since everything and everyone had fallen apart. We don’t know how we’re going to do it, but I’ll let you know as soon as we do. I’m sorry I can’t talk any more right now but I’ll contact you again as soon as I can. She felt the urge to cry. She wished she could. I love you.

She waited again. She sent Empetrum’s coordinates.

I love you too.

“Okay,” her voice sounded small and crackling. “Okay too much. James please—” her tone broke. “Please turn it off—”

Abruptly, the pain cut off and Heather remained immobile. She stared at the floor for a few moments, trying to recover from the shock and gather her thoughts. Finally, her death grip loosened around the base of her head. She slowly straightened up and stared at the engineer before her in awe.

James looked his age in that moment, callow and vulnerable. “I—it worked okay?” he managed.

“The bug fixes took?”

“Yes,” she said.

He nodded. “Good…” He exhaled unsteadily. He wiped a hand across his mouth, spent a moment in indecision, then moved to put the remote away across the room. “Good.”

+

I love you too.

Richard stared wide-eyed at his phone, having turned away from the counter where Sesame’s body was quickly taking shape. He felt light-headed.

Very quietly, the small box with the child’s voice attached to his laptop spoke, “Richard?”

He glanced up, and realized his colleagues were all looking at him.

It was all Richard could do not to react. He knew Benson had a surveillance tap in the lab they were in. Very slowly, as calm as he could even while his heart pounded hard in his chest, he got up and passed his phone to Eve.

Eve’s face went ashen as she read the message.

“It’s time,” Richard said.

+

“Director.” Benson’s administrative assistant found him in his personal lab, splitting cell cultures under a fume hood.

“Yes?” Benson continued to work. His right hand managed the automated pipettor, systematically driving a solution of detached cells and fresh media into eight new plates. The motions were second nature to him.

“Security has informed me that all your surveillance feeds of the Larkspur facility have been deactivated,” Walker said.

“What? When?”

“Earlier today. They were removed from their positions and destroyed by Knight and his colleagues,” she said as he discarded the pipette tip and stacked and labeled the plates. “I’ve reviewed the last few minutes of footage, and Knight reacted to something on his phone shortly before it happened.”

“We must have overlooked something.” He transferred the newly split petri dishes to a nearby incubator. He locked the protective glass panel in front of them, followed by the incubator’s heavily insulated door. “You’re sure they found all of them?”

Walker nodded. “Everything’s gone black. I’ll have to review recent footage for more information.”

Benson removed his gloves and snapped off the light in the fume hood. “Okay…”

“And this came for you.” Walker extended a small envelope. “Your mother told Roberts to pass it along to you.”

The director took it and opened it up, revealing an index card. Reading the diminutive capital letters, he suddenly brought the note closer to his face with a startled frown.

Dr. Director,
Your kingdom’s coming down.
Sincerely,
A Liar

+

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE—CONFRONTATIONS 

Benson pounded on the door of his mother’s dingy single apartment. After what felt like an eternity fuming in the corridor alone, the door unlocked and Alice appeared, braced for impact.

“What do you mean by this?” Benson demanded, shoving the envelope into her hands as he barged unbidden into the apartment.

“You look well, Michael,” Alice said. She shut the door and turned the envelope in her hands, smiling bitterly. “A little pale, though. Spending too much time in the lab?”

“You said I was wasting my time continuing to consider you a threat!” Benson cried. “I can’t believe you’re helping them. As if I wouldn’t have found out on my own, but why would you wave it in my face?”

Alice’s gaze fell to the card. “I told them,” she said softly, as if she hardly believed her own words.

“About us, your grandfather. About you and Empetrum. Everything.”

Benson stared, eyebrows raised. “Do you have a death wish?”

“What on earth did you do to Knight’s daughter?” Alice asked. “Empetrum’s in the business of kidnapping children now?”

“I don’t have to explain anything to you.”

Alice moved toward the kitchen. “I have something else for you.” She pulled a short stack of papers off the counter and extended it.

Benson snatched it from her hands, exasperated.

“This is a printed copy of the information I gave them,” she explained as Benson glanced through the pages. “If anything happens to me, I told them to take this information to the press.”

“Ah, there it is, the self-preservation,” Benson muttered, tossing the stack back onto the counter in disdain. “You think I’m afraid of some bad publicity?”

“You should be. Maybe the Conxence will take up their case. You should let your prisoners go before this gets any worse.”

Benson cracked a wan, spiteful smile. A panicky tightness pulled in his chest at the mention of the rebel militia. “Go ahead and try it. We can deal with unwanted visitors.”
 “That sounds like a bluff to me.”

“I really should just drag you back to Empetrum and give you that mindwipe,” Benson snapped. “If you’re determined to be a problem.”

So soon after the death of his mentor, Benson hadn’t had the heart to lose his only remaining family member. Even if it was his gloomy, deadbeat mother. Enough of his sentimentality should have worn off by now.

“Do it then,” Alice said. She stepped toward him, eyes burning. “By all means, don’t be shy! Give me the Q-13 if it’ll make you feel in control!”

“What the hell do you want from me?” Benson shifted back. He paused, and his face softened into a surprised smile. “Oh, you want out.” He laughed. “You had me there for a second. I almost thought you were trying to make amends or stand up to me, in your own pathetic way.”

“I am trying to make amends,” Alice said. “You have to stop this, Michael. Victimizing your peers and destroying lives won’t give you what you’re looking for.”

“And what am I looking for?” Benson managed to keep his voice steady, despite the immense weight inside his chest, the terrible memories clawing through his mind. He did not fear them anymore. “I’m very curious what you think that is.”

Alice didn’t answer.

“So you want me to adopt toothless, ineffectual ideas about the world,” Benson said. “By taking up my grandfather’s work, I’ve failed you, is that it? You blame me?” Heat spilled into his tone, inundating his waning efforts to curb it. “You were the one who brought me to Empetrum in the first place. It was you who drove my father away and left me alone. Grandfather was the only one in our family with purpose after Delva dragged our name through the mud. He knew exactly what he wanted, and he worked hard for it until the day he died. And then he left it in my charge. He was the only one who saw anything in me, so how on earth could I have turned out any differently?” He spread his arms. “Why would I want to be anything else!”

“I know you loved him, but you don’t have to follow his path,” Alice pleaded. “You can be free of this.”

“I don’t regret anything.”

“Then show me.” Alice squared her shoulders. “Show me you can follow through—that you became the perfect person to lead that hellhole you call a research facility. Prove you aren’t that elusive and ever-changing definition of coward your grandfather hung over absolutely everyone. See, being away from that poisoned air, I finally figured it out. Real cowardice is playing along. And even though he’s dead and gone, you’re still playing his game.”

“Shut up.” Benson’s inherently soft features lowered into a glare behind the narrow lenses of his glasses. “I did this because I wanted it.”

“Did you? You were just a child. I watched as he traumatized you, desensitized you—”

“You’re right, you just watched!” Benson snarled.

“And I’m sorry!” Alice said. Her voice shook, and Benson was disgusted by it. “I failed you, and I will never forgive myself for that. But Empetrum is yours now, Michael, not his. You don’t have to be bound by your grandfather’s cruelty. You don’t have to make that your legacy.”

“Don’t you dare make me out to be the victim in all this,” Benson said. The side of his mouth twitched up to form what he hoped was a confident smile. “You are so obsessed with bringing out this person that doesn’t exist. Don’t you understand? There isn’t anything there.”

Alice wanted so badly for her greatest mistake to fix itself. This wasn’t about Benson. His mother had only ever looked out for herself, and Benson had never needed her concern, or her remorse. Benson would never give her the reconciliation she wanted. It was too late, anyway, but Benson wasn’t broken.

Maybe he wanted to be a monster.

Benson turned. “I’m done here.”

“I crossed you in the most blatant way possible, yet you’re just going to overlook it.”

“I haven’t overlooked it.” Benson paused. “In fact, I hate you all the more for it.”

“But not enough to do anything to me?” It was more a statement than a question.
 “It doesn’t matter what you told Knight or Delva, or what they do with the information,” Benson said. “No one is going to help them, and I’m not going to do you the service of taking those memories that haunt you so much, or relieve you of your failed life. Rot in your guilt for all I care.” He opened the door, glancing coldly over his shoulder as he left. “Nobody can touch Empetrum.”

+

James paid greater attention to his surroundings. Cameras lurked in every corner of the facility like an invasive species. He assumed his apartment was also under surveillance, though he hadn’t found evidence of it.

He felt watched as he leaned against his kitchen counter with a composition book, outlining equations and symbols for small stun devices that Benson would find troubling if he were to decipher James’ notes. When he was ready to make the devices, he would have to be really quick about it.

He felt sick with anxiety every time he thought about escape plans. There was no easy way out of Empetrum. He wasn’t even allowed off the grounds outside of Benson’s direction.

Late the next evening, he would activate the pain simulator remotely for two fifteen-minute intervals so Heather could collaborate with her family. Despite his hopes, he hadn’t been able to completely disentangle the pain signal from the communication one while updating it. They didn’t have much room for trial and error, if any.

His pager beeped from the other end of the room, halting his thoughts. He stole over to the table, and found a message from the director.

Please come to my office.

Benson had postponed their followup at the end of the work day. He’d had some errand to run.

James took a slow breath as he headed across campus. The days of late summer brought long, warm dusk, in which the air smelled like heated earth and green leaves. It was sort of calming, even here, and he tried to remind himself all over again of the world outside.

On the off chance he and Heather succeeded, escaping the grounds wouldn’t rid him of Empetrum. Whether he had a rigged legal fight and a prison sentence ahead of him, an impending re-kidnapping or assassination, or life spent hiding from the government itself, he wasn’t sure. He only hoped that Heather could be free.

Maybe the Conxence would take him.

There was the question of Hodgson too. They couldn’t leave her behind, but James’ ID card didn’t have access to her cell. He would need someone else’s. Yeun’s, or one of the security guards that appeared to have universal clearance.

The director’s office was open. James ventured into view, knocking furtively on the door.

Benson stood in front of the window at the back of his office, considering the lab below with his hands clasped behind his back. He turned.

“Good evening, Siles,” he said, and it sounded extra chilled. “Please take a seat.”

James complied.

Benson didn’t move from the window. “How did it go today?”

James tried to ignore a growing sense of foreboding as he summarized the day’s progress.

“Productive. I ran diagnostics with Heather, reinstalled the pain simulator after making some bug fixes that would have interfered with the integrity of the pain response. Then I shadowed Yeun and studied Compatible modulators.”

“Good.” Benson said evenly, like he was absorbing the information slowly, running it through a filter in his head. He observed James for several moments after that. “I wanted to talk to you about Larkspur.”

James’ face went cold. “Okay.”

“Are you aware of anything that’s been happening over there in your absence?”

“No,” James said. That was truthful, he didn’t.

Benson studied him again, his frame silhouetted in front of the window, still as a python calculating its strike.

“I know about what you actually did with your first test subject,” Benson said finally. “You call it ‘Sesame,’ right?”

James’ heart squeezed. Fear flushed up the back of his neck. “Yes.”

“You pulled its neural network and left it for Knight to find,” the director went on. “Which he did. He plugged it into his laptop, and it found the internet, upgraded its intelligence, and now they are building it a humanoid body in exchange for information.”

James straightened up a little, shocked. “What?”

“You really didn’t know about any of this?”

“No.”

“I can’t help but wonder what else you’ve blatantly lied to me about?” Benson said.

“That was shortly before Heather’s transfer,” James struggled to keep his voice steady. “It was a frightening transition for me, and I was reacting defensively.”

Benson pushed up on his glasses. “But not anymore?”

“I understand the situation better, and have chosen to embrace it.”

“…More or less.”

James swallowed. Benson’s gaze felt like a vice around his throat. “I don’t want to cause any more trouble.”

The director nodded, thinking. “That’s all I needed. Thank you.”

James hesitated, then stood up. He felt the director’s icy attention on his back as he left his office and escaped down the hallway. It was all he could do not to break into a run.

+

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR—MEDIATION

By Tuesday evening, the Larkspur engineers had finished Sesame’s body.

“It’s beautiful,” Sesame said, using the laptop’s automated voice as Richard transported his setup to the counter beside the android’s open cranium. The black facial panel lay dormant in the light gray head.

“All right, Sesame,” Richard said. “Ready?”

“Yes.”

“I’m going to unplug everything in order to put you where you need to be,” Richard explained. “But don’t worry. If there are any major hitches, I’ll just hook you back up so we can figure it out.”


“Okay.”

“Here goes…” Richard gently pulled the chord connecting Sesame’s neural network to his laptop.

Eve and Chelo propped the android up and kept the head from drooping as Richard carefully fitted Sesame’s neural network into the cushioned frame inside. He craned his hands into the tight space, plugging in wires, taking care to unite the wire leading to its power core last.

As soon as the last connection clicked in, the robotic body jolted. The facial screen switched on, blinding white.

Richard snatched the last piece of the frame off the counter and snapped it in over Sesame’s neural network. His colleagues returned the android to a supine position on the counter, and they all stepped back.

The robot lay still for several long moments. Slowly, the cranial panels closed, sealing the neural network inside. A fan in its chest began to hum softly.

The light of the face panel flickered, the visual screen glitching in multicolored bars of pixels as it tested its connection. Then it faded from white to dark gray. Large cartoonish eyes opened from the dark background, and a simple black line for a mouth materialized on the screen.

“Woah…” Sesame’s voice tuned until it found the tone he had chosen a week before. He stared up at the ceiling, stunned. Very carefully, he planted his robotic hands on the table and pushed himself up to a sitting position.

“How do you feel?” Richard asked.

The robot looked at its hands, turning them one way, then the other, curling and opening the fingers. It turned its head to look at him. The face glitched and materialized a few times. Finally, it figured out how to smile, and the virtual mouth matched the words as it spoke. “I feel good.”

Addie stepped forward to help him steady the robot as it twisted, dangling its legs over the edge of the counter. Together, they helped it down to the floor.

Sesame stood still, his head just above Richard’s elbow, staring at his own feet. “I’m so tall.”

“Welcome to the bipedal body plan.” Chelo smiled, crossing her arms.

He shot her a virtual grin over his shoulder. Experimentally, he put a foot forward, faltering. Addie and Richard reached out to support him as he tried to walk on two legs for the first time.
Sesame watched the floor. He smiled. “I like this.”

“Everything feels functional?” Eve asked.

“So far so good.” Sesame kept his hand on Richard’s forearm to steady himself. “Is there a mirror?” he asked eagerly. Even though he’d used his voice a little prior to this, Richard was still unaccustomed to it. Expressive, humanoid, speaking more naturally every day. He had even chosen pronouns. “I want to look at myself.”

Richard accompanied him to the restroom on the first floor, and Sesame was walking on his own well before they reached it. The android gripped the sink and stood up on his toes, peering into the mirror. Another smile spread across the dark screen of his face.

He changed his eye color from the default black to a range of different hues, and finally settled on a teal color. He threw a smile at Richard and the other engineers, who had congregated by the open door.

Watching Sesame operate his new body brought Richard a challenging mix of emotions: relief that they’d held up their end of the bargain, dread and uncertainty of how to move forward. This creature that had loosely adopted the visage of a human child currently played the part of friend or ally, as long as they kept its trust. Now that it had intellect and independent physicality, Richard had no idea what its next actions would be.

Sesame explored other features of his body, opening and closing his chest panel and touching his fingertips to the blue light beaming modestly from his right shoulder.

“What do you think?” Richard said.

Sesame turned and threw his arms around him, squeezing him a little too tightly. “It’s perfect! Thank you!”

Then he ducked under his arm to go hug everyone else in turn. “Thank you so much! I love it.” He ran a few steps into the lobby, losing and regaining his balance as he took a wide look around. He raised his hands high and gazed through his fingers at the ceiling. He twirled again, laughing. “I can’t believe this is mine!”

Richard felt like he was only dreaming this. So much had changed in such a short time and in such unexpected, impossible ways that it felt like his daughter had been missing for two years instead of two weeks.

After Sesame had flitted around and experimented some more, he consented to staying still long enough for the engineers to double-check his body’s functionality. Then, he helped them clean up, immensely enjoying himself. He smiled constantly, listened well, and talked whenever he had the opportunity, and Richard found his tension toward the android beginning to ease. Foolishly, perhaps.

Before long, Sesame was walking with Richard to the car, holding his hand, but not for support.

Richard opened the door to the passenger seat for him and Sesame got in.

“I was here when I was with the laptop, right?” Sesame said, looking around. “Your car is different than James’.” He opened the glove compartment as Richard slipped into the driver’s seat and shut the door. Sesame mimicked his movement and pulled his own door closed. He curiously pulled a car manual from the glove compartment.

“Leave everything in there, please,” Richard said, fastening his seatbelt.

Sesame replaced his find and, watching Richard closely, he located his own seatbelt and pulled it over his chest.

“Like this?” he asked, fumbling with the latch.

“Yes.”

Sesame pushed up the door to the glove compartment and gazed up at the sky through the car window.

“When Heather and James come home, I wonder what they’ll think of my new body,” he said as

Richard started the engine.

Richard backed the car out of his parking spot and navigated toward the main road.

“I think they’ll be happy,” Sesame decided finally.

“Yeah,” Richard agreed tightly, a lump in his throat. “I think they will.”

+

Heather watched her internal clock in acute apprehension. She paced, listening to the rhythmic hum of her movement and the click of her bare feet on the floor.

In two minutes, James would activate the pain simulator. He was across campus in his living quarters, but the remote had a wide area of influence. It had to. It was for controlling her, after all.

After so much time spent waiting, deciding that no risk was too high to keep her from attempting escape, she found herself afraid. Of contacting her family, of getting caught, of having decided to trust James again.

She didn’t know what she felt toward him anymore. Less hostile, perhaps. A willingness to work with him. She was embarrassed to realize she wished he was with her at that moment for moral support while she waited to grapple with the pain simulator again. To finally tell the people she loved what had happened to her.

She paused to regard herself in the small mirror in the far corner above the sink. She still somewhat expected to see herself as she used to be, and the empty gray face was forever a bitter surprise. Even if she and James really did manage to escape, she couldn’t imagine confronting the long, dysfunctional life that awaited her because of him.

Still, she wanted the chance to see what continuing to live could be like. Despite James, despite everything.

With her time running out, she lay down on the bed against the wall. She knew she was being monitored, so she would have to give as few visual cues as possible to the watchful cameras.

She folded her hands across her middle and stared at the ceiling, trying to focus. She had already considered what she would say. Fear welled up through her circuits at the thought of having to go through with it. Her parents deserved to know what would be coming home to them—as much as she wished she could hide it from them forever, to continue being the Heather they knew, and not this unnerving hybrid of metal form and organic memory. She kept thinking there had to be a way to take all this back, but the door to her old life, the only thing she truly wanted now, had closed forever.

Gradually, a headache reared into existence, a warning from James.

Heather closed her eyes. Bring it.

Soon, the pain increased and Heather focused on the communication signal. The pain wasn’t real, she reminded herself. She couldn’t feel real pain. Without this device, she could cut off her hand and only feel a breach of her electromagnetic field before it moved in over the gap.

Level eight wasn’t as hard to bear the third time she had experienced it. The communication signal was tenuous in the concrete confines of her cell, but it was functional enough. She had fifteen minutes.

Dad, are you there?

__

Richard’s phone vibrated from where he had left it on the kitchen table while he and Su made a late dinner, with Sesame as happily underfoot as a toddler.

Richard read the message, then brought the virtual keyboard onto the screen.

__

Yes we’re here. What’s the status? Are you all right?
Heather felt a smile wash through her, despite the pain that strove to consume her attention.
I’m ok, she replied. I have 15 minutes, but I’ll be back in about 10 after that for another 15—if that makes sense. Sorry. Contacting you is hard.

__

Richard scrolled through the message, Su at his side. Sesame craned his neck to read it too.

Richard lowered it a bit so the android could see it more easily.

“How is she texting so fast?” Richard muttered.

Why? he texted.

Long story, came the reply. Later.

Sesame hopped up and down. “Plug me in! We could do this so much faster.”

“What?”

“Where’s your phone charger? And that cord you used to plug me into the laptop? You could splice them together and I could mediate!” Sesame was already on his way down the hall to grab Richard’s briefcase from the home office. “It wouldn’t take long at all.”

Are you at Empetrum because of James’ neural transfer project? Richard typed as Sesame reappeared.

“Do you have tools here?” The robot planted the briefcase on the table. “Please tell me you have stuff.”

Richard dug out the wrapped neural cable and extra charger cord. “They should be in that drawer.”

He pointed to a narrow compartment at the far end of the counter.

Richard’s cell phone vibrated again.

Indirectly, yes, but they want him for something else now. How much do you know?

Sesame helped us find info about Empetrum’s origins and the people who run it, Richard replied.

Su brought the whole drawer to the table. But nothing about why you and James disappeared.

“Why is your phone a heat-sensitive touch screen?” Sesame whined, reading the text as Richard set the phone aside to work with the wires. He found the tools he needed, clipped the heads off each cord, and took to stripping the insulation.

His hands were shaking.

__

That night when I went down to the lab, I walked in on James arguing with a security guard who worked for Benson too. It hurt to remember. She found herself omitting details automatically. She couldn’t bear to tell them what had really happened. They took me to the facility because, according to them, I had seen too much.

This is Mom, came the reply. We’re gonna plug Sesame in so he can talk to you, make this go more smoothly.
Ok, Heather sent. Then what her mom had said registered, and she opened her eyes, confused.

__

“Alright,” Richard said. He severed a strip of electrical tape and wrapped it around the newly united wires. “I’ve got it.”

Sesame was already opening the top of his head and inclining it forward.

Su handed over the phone, and Richard attached it to one end of the spliced cord. Unlatching the top of the protective frame inside Sesame’s head, he pushed the other end into the port he had used to connect him to the laptop.

Sesame propped himself up onto the nearest chair. His face panel went blank and the words of their text conversation showed up white against the dark gray.

“How do I connect with her?” Sesame asked.

“I don’t know.” Richard pulled up a chair and took a seat in front of him. Su stood very close beside him, silent and nervous. “I’m not even sure what she’s messaging with.”

Wait—Sesame’s going to talk to me? Heather texted. He talks now?

“There she is,” Sesame said, a watermark smile flashing behind the words on his face panel. The brief visual lit up on the phone beside him.

__

HEATHER!! Text burst into her mind almost immediately. It’s Sesame! Hello! I’m a humanoid now!

Heather’s eyes widened. What?

More excited words inundated her.

James left me behind so Richard and everybody could tap into my memories, but when Richard plugged me into his laptop, I found the Internet and updated myself! I have an android body now and I can talk to people and everything! I’m not a mouse anymore. It’s great!

Wow. Heather didn’t know how to reply. It was hard to imagine Sesame in a body like hers. That’s amazing. I hope we’ll get to meet again soon.

Me too! Sesame said. How are you making contact? This isn’t James’ number.

Yeah, I think they took his phone. Heather hesitated. He made a different sort of communicator, but it’s disguised so we don’t get in trouble—so it’s hard to use.

She stared up at the ceiling, warring with herself, distracted by the pain signal. She knew lying to them would waste time and resources they didn’t have. But the longer she put it off, the longer they could pretend that maybe things could be okay.

There’s something I need to tell you, she said. That night…at Larkspur…the security guard killed me. Shot me with some kind of poison dart. Empetrum would have preferred to leave it at that, but James transferred me to bring me back. The body he was making for his project at Empetrum wasn’t finished yet, so he put me in Larkspur’s android instead.

__

Richard read the text scrolling across Sesame’s facial panel, and his heart sank so quickly it felt like it had imploded in his chest.

“Oh no…” Su said.

I’m dead, but I’m alive. She said. I’m Heather, and I’m not. I’m sorry.

“No,” Richard gasped, removing his glasses to rub a hand across his eyes. His throat tightened. “No no no…”

“So he did do it,” Su murmured. “That bastard…”

Your mom says James is a bastard, Sesame said.

“Don’t tell her that—” Richard straightened up, horrified.

__

Heather decided not to tell them that she agreed. It was thanks to James she wasn’t all the way dead, but getting her killed in the first place put it in the realm of “too little too late.” What’s important right now is that James knows more about the inside of Empetrum than any of us, and he’s promised to help.

If they were lucky, they could tackle the existential devastation later.

There was a pause, and she hated to think what her loved ones were going through in that moment, dealing with an impact she had been processing for two weeks. At the very least, she had been able to tell them herself.

__

Su crossed her arms, her face stony. “If he’s helping her, I guess he’s on our side for now. I’ll respect that.”

Your parents will work with him, Sesame translated, generously.

Thank you. Heather said. My time’s up for now. Please stand by, I’ll be back in 10 minutes. I just need a break from using this device. It creates a pain signal—Benson made James make it.

“What?” Richard leaned forward indignantly. “She’s in pain?”

You’re in pain? Sesame asked, but he didn’t receive a reply. “Ohp, connection’s lost,” he said, his face re-materializing to replace the text.

Heavy silence suffocated the kitchen. Richard stared at the phone on the table, eyes wide, feeling like his soul was leaving his body.

“Is this real life?” Su said, her voice barely above a whisper. “Is this actually happening?”

Richard glanced up to see she was in tears. He stood up and wrapped his arms around her, on the verge of sobbing himself. Sesame looked like he might want to join the hug, but he remained where he was, troubled.

“I can’t believe that he—” Su’s voice cracked as she buried her face in Richard’s shoulder. He held her as she broke down. “Our daughter…”

A part of Richard tried to focus on the practical positives: Heather was alive in some form, and communicating with them, and James had agreed to help from the inside. But all their private, catastrophizing fears about the situation had just been confirmed, and the agony of it dragged him under like a riptide.

Sesame quietly watched them hug each other and cry, observing their pain, giving them this moment and waiting for the next one. Richard wondered if the robot even understood how devastating this all was. For Sesame, his transfer had been a rebirth.

Only time would tell what it would mean for Heather.

+