“Alright.”
“You’ll need a bed too.” He scanned the area critically. “You need more rest than you’ve been getting.”
“Bah.” She waved her hand. “I can sleep on the floor. I did that a lot when I was younger. We had some blankets we hung that we slept in too—Nory and I did that when we were kids.”
“A hammock. Is that what you mean?”
“That’s what it was, yes.” She adjusted her shirt. “I don’t know if I could get myself up on one right now though. Do you think your androids will get mad at me if I bring some pillows out here?”
“No. A bed. You need a bed, at the very least.” He scanned the corners of the room. “And running water with a septic system. This warehouse can be wired easily for electricity.” His mind superimposed the changes that would need to be made. “I suppose it could all work. We have the materials available.”
That was the crazy part. And hard to admit. Once he got over what should happen and how illogical this was, he could see that this warehouse was enough shelter. In fact, the walls were better built than most homes on Earth in terms of stability.
Anna brightened. “Really?”
The hope in her voice pierced him with a brief, hollow ache that made him take a step back.
Before he could react, she rushed toward him and threw her arms around his neck. She hung on him while her belly pressed into him from the front.
His sensors threw an error code. “What?”
“. . .Thank you.” Anna buried her head on Atlas’s shoulder, her tears wetting his favorite blue sweater.
Before he could respond and put his arms around her, she had let go. Then she once again avoided his eyes, back to spinning her hands together.
Atlas stood frozen, yet his entire body felt heated. Branded almost, from where she’d hugged him. He swallowed, wanting to close the distance again.
“. . . You’re welcome, Anna,” he cleared his throat. “You’re right. You’re completely different from the humans before. I keep forgetting.”
Her cheeks flashed red, accentuating her sunburn. “I don’t want to live in a perfect glass box.”
Glass box.Atlas winced at the description. “They did want to provide for you, you know.”
“I know.” She walked away, fast, to the window. “But I want to live where life is. I want to do what feels right to me for a change. I had enough of things being decided for me.”
Atlas followed at a calculated distance until he was close, but not touching.
“See?” She tugged his sleeve, pointing with her other hand out the glass.
Atlas scanned the outside.Just cows in a pasture.He turned to Anna and saw her eyes fixed on the view outside. As if . . . as if. The whole world was in front of her.He inhaled sharply.
Suddenly, everything clicked for him. She was made for this. Humans were made for this. Society and progress had stripped that away—that is why everything became so rotten in the first place. He froze. Maybe that was what Stella has wrong. Maybe this was the nurture part they had been missing.
Maybe the old movies were right after all. Maybe the one he loved, with the smiling family and presents under a pine tree was actually real. Everything in him tightened. MaybeFriday Morningcould be real.
The sky had turned to dusk, the sun low on the pasture outside. The cows took no notice, grazing as before. They were calling to one another across the distance. But, next to him, Anna’s face no longer had tears. Heglanced at her instead of the scenery.I want her to be happy. Peaceful.Fear coated his processors, making him stiffen.Another complication.Another way to manipulate him? His brow furrowed.Enough. Anna is different.There was no manipulation here.
“Beautiful, right?” Anna tentatively touched his sleeve again. “I know you think so. You showed me this on the ship, on that feed.”
Atlas scanned again. It wasn’t really beautiful. The view was of cows on a pasture that was probably due for maintenance with how they were trampling down the grass, as it was worn down to dirt in some places.
But.He turned to Anna and his breath caught. Her face was lit up by the fading sun, soft in the lowered lighting.
She is.
She is absolutely beautiful.
“Yes, Anna,” he breathed out.
