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Title: Butterfly Fish
Butterfly Fish and its characters, settings, and plot are all mine. Please do not take, alter, distribute, or archive without my permission.
“Mana?” Ark questioned softly from beside me, dragging my thoughts away from the past; our past. I gave him a tired look, leaning back against the fencepost.
“I’m sorry, Ark,” I said at last, now that we had gotten far enough away from the house. “I can’t help. Your tracking device is leading him to you even as we speak. You can’t escape Caveroth. You know that.”
“You got out,” he said sullenly, softening the accusation with a pleading look. “You escaped him.”
“I’m not like you, Ark. I never was.” I shook my head, motioning vaguely in the air. “He’s not tracking me. When I left there was no way for him to find me like he can find you.”
“I don’t want to go back!” he cried, taking a step closer to me. “I can’t.”
My hands fisted and my jaw clenched as I tried to keep a level head. I wanted to yell and scream at him, tell him that he didn’t want anything. He couldn’t want anything! It was hard to keep my cool while I faced him, hearing him sound so much like a human and knowing that it was only his programming speaking. Programming I had made. Finally I was able to sigh, letting the tension seep from my taught muscles.
“You’re a machine,” I said firmly. “You can, and might I add will, do whatever he tells you. The only reason you’ve made it this far is because he has let you. Caveroth isn’t stupid. He knows where you are and that’s putting me in danger right now.”
“You can override his programming,” he said flatly. “That’s how you got away, isn’t it? That’s how you got out.”
He was so… so human when he looked at me like that. The others had never looked at me like that. Their eyes had been glassy and unmoving; fixated in my general direction when I spoke to them. Not Ark. Never Ark. His dark, silvery eyes flickered between my own, nearly forcing me to maintain eye contact. He searched for emotion on my face as though he were really alive.
“I’m sorry,” I breathed, closing my eyes to his pleas. “I don’t know how to disable your tracking device. This body didn’t have one when I left. I don’t know what you want me to do, what you were expecting by coming here, but I can’t save you. I’m going to be in enough trouble just trying to save myself now that you’ve found me.”
“Then kill me,” he replied, begged, fingers brushing up against my cheek to get my attention. “I don’t want to go back.”
Sighing, I pulled away from his touch. “I can’t kill you, Ark. You’re not human. You’re not alive. You’re technology. You’re a machine,” I told him as coldly as I was able. “Machines don’t die, they break and if you’re all the way out here you’re pretty broken. You shouldn’t have been able to make it past the inner gates.”
“I flew them,” he confided seriously, sounding like the vain little kid I had raised so long ago. “But they’ll never let me out again if they catch me now. I don’t want to live in a cage anymore. I want to be here with the rest of the world. I want to feel free like this, always.”
I made a frustrated noise in the back of my throat. “Technology. Doesn’t. Feel,” I said sullenly, staring resolutely at the ground.
He extended one hand and gently touched the edge of my jaw with soft fingertips. Ever-so-slowly he moved forward and lifted my chin, patiently waiting until I looked him in the eyes before he spoke. “Most technology,” he corrected softly, breath ghosting my lips with ever word, “doesn’t feel. But I do. You do. Or have you already forgotten what you’ve become? What else you stole when you left?”
“I’m not the same as you,” I protested once more, though it was a weak attempt at best. I didn’t like to be reminded of the sacrifice I had made when I chose to leave my human body behind for this man-made one. The Hanai units were so much like Ark’s body, although they were made for real human minds, not computer programming. “I made you, Ark. I put your mind together myself. You can’t feel…”
“I do,” he returned. “Maybe I shouldn’t, but I do. I always have. You made me, you raised me. You should know. Please, Mana. Please. You’re the only hope I have left.”
I sighed again, closing my eyes and blocking him out of my world for a few minutes. To his credit he stood by silently, waiting. Calming myself, I began to think out every option I had. I could help him or I could say no; but if I said no I had to understand that he would not leave. I couldn’t make him, either, and if by some miracle he did leave, he could still be caught. If he was caught, after leaving me, his memory of me would be intact and Caveroth would know I still lived.
On the other hand, the hand where I might find myself taking the terminally insane route, I could help him escape; but that too ran the risk of getting caught. If I took too long helping him and if Caveroth already had his coordinates, Ark might get away while I was left captured. Even if we both managed to disappear again it wouldn’t stop Caveroth from looking for Ark. The ‘Acheopterix’ was special to him not because of his body or his programs but because of what he knew- more than anyone else, and that was dangerous to Caveroth.
It was a lose-lose situation for me, as long as Caveroth still searched.
I rubbed at my temples before sighing deeply. If I would lose no matter what I did, then it didn’t matter if I helped him or not. I would get nothing more out of leaving him to fend for himself than I did if I helped him. The only difference I could see was that if I helped him, he might stand a chance. If I helped, one of us might escape.
“Okay,” I said at last. “I’m not agreeing to help you, not yet.” I eyed him skeptically. “You’re really sure you want to leave them? Once you do, there’s no going back. If I help you, you can never return to them; if they catch you, they’ll shut you down and never turn you on again. You understand that, right?”
“I understand that,” he said solemnly.
“Whatever we do, it won’t be easy,” I told him. “It might… your programming might be lost.” The part of me inside that had always hurt for what I created twinged painfully at my words. If Ark’s programming was deleted, that was it for him; there was no hope that he had a soul; numbers and letters didn’t have souls. With how many transfers I had done between human flesh and machine parts I had surely lost mine as well, if I’d ever had one. “You’ll be gone forever if that happens. Are you willing to make that sort of sacrifice?”
“It is not worse than being caged forever,” he said. “I will take the chance if it means I could be free.”
Shoving myself gently away from the fence post, I pushed past him and began to walk down the dirt road once more, heading back in the direction of my house. “Fine. First thing’s first- we get that tracking chip out.” He began to dog my footsteps, listening intently. “Once it’s out, I’m going to have to fly it an hour out down this road before you break it. After that… I’ll figure out something.”
“How are you going to get it out?” he queried curiously. “Do you even know where it is?”
My chuckle felt hollow. “I’ll have to carve it out. It’s between your shoulder blades, where you can’t reach it. I had them put it there so that it would be accessible without openly tempting you to fiddle with it. You were always very good at breaking things.”
It didn’t take us long to reach the house, despite the way he lagged behind with every question he asked. For the most part I ignored him, trying to think of how I was going to get myself out of this mess. If I could get rid of that tracking chip I would be buying time, but it wouldn’t make much of a difference. Caveroth would re-trace the path, if Ark was not found where it ended, I mused as I climbed the front steps of my home.
He would find us if we lingered.
“Mana?” Ark called from where he’d paused on the rocky front drive.
“Yes?” I asked tiredly, opening my front door.
“I…” He trailed off, dropping his gaze to the ground beneath his feet. “There’s something… Nevermind. You drive, right?”
Rolling my eyes, I stepped into the house. “Yes,” I said as he bounded up the steps behind me and let the door nearly hit him as it closed. “I drive.”
Even as the simple words left my lips I froze, body stiffening as I caught sight of the unfamiliar figures that stood in my front room. Two of them stood solidly beside my beat-up recliner, in which sat Hanai. The boy was sopping wet but otherwise appeared to be undamaged. Beside me, Ark hesitated and I heard his breath strangle in his throat. He knew who the other two were; or rather, he knew to whom they belonged.
Forcing another step from my feet, I moved into the front room. The motion caught the attention of everyone present, including the man sitting across the room. He was not quite the man I remembered; time had taken its toll on him, as it took its toll on most beings. His hair was silver and his skin was wrinkled, but the dark brown eyes that trailed my every movement were the same as they had always been. They held every bit of cold fire they’d held the day I’d met him.
“Caveroth,” I managed steadily. I thanked whatever god had kept my voice from trembling. “What a surprise.”
“Mana,” he greeted suavely, eyes locking onto mine as a smile crept onto his lips. “And I see you’ve found Archeopterix, how… useful.” He motioned warmly to Hanai, who shrunk into the chair as though he thought it might swallow him. “I found your little invention here. It’s been quite the entertainment.”
“Hanai, are you all right?” I asked quietly, not taking my eyes from Caveroth’s form. He raised an eyebrow at my words, though he did not immediately speak.
“Yes, Kaily,” Hanai replied softly. “I’m fine.”
Caveroth chuckled. “Hanai?” he echoed, unable to help himself. “Really Mana, I thought you’d have been more inventive. Human adapted non-artificial intelligence.” He shook his head, almost seeming to marvel at the thought. “We have them, but none of them boys,” he said wistfully. “I never did get a stable Y chromosome.”
“I know,” I whispered. “You never will, if your methods don’t change. That’s why I made him; so you would never be able to find me.”
His eyes were cold and dull when he spoke. “Never?” he queried. “Perhaps it would be in your best interest to consider that Archeopterix did not escape on his own but was instead set free to find you.”
“You’re lying” I said stonily. “No one knew I was alive.”
“Not so,” he chided. “You stole something of value to me when you left. Something that at the time, I’d thought you intended to use.” His voice dropped to a murmur. “Something that, at the time, I had hoped you intended to use.”
He rose from where he sat and traversed the distance between us. Ark recoiled from him, hiding behind me as best he could for as large as he was. Drawing up just short of me, Caveroth reached into his jacket pocket and pulled from it the little butterfly fish I’d caught less than an hour ago. With a quick, wordless motion he asked for me to hold out my hands and before I could even register the order he had pressed the machine into my palms.
“I had hoped you would come back to me, my little butterfly. I had hoped so badly that I would see you again, but you never returned.” He sighed as a parent does to a child who just won’t listen. “In the end, you forced me to come to you.”
“I’m not going back,” I breathed, trying to force my hands to remain steady as they held the butterfly fish in an ever-tightening death grip. “This is a first generation manai unit- I still have the self-sterilize command installed.”
He knew as well as I did that the sterilize function had been a back-up defense against having our inventions stolen- in the event that a manai unit was discovered or confiscated, it had the option to activate the sterilize and wipe every last bit of information from the hard drive before its core closed up and overheated, destroying the unit. There was no recovering information or technology after the sterilize function had been utilized.
He raised both hands slightly, bent at the elbows as he gave me a chuckle and a shake of his head. “Woah there,” he said quietly. “No need to go that far. I came to talk.”
“You fooled me, then,” I said, eyes flickering to the two guards he had posted on either side of little Hanai.
The hint of a scowl crossed his features before he smiled pleasantly and gave a short order to both of them to leave the house. Though they looked as if they might protest, they obeyed, shuffling past Ark and I with scathing glares. It wasn’t until the front door had snapped closed that Caveroth spoke.
“Come back with me, Kaily,” he said quietly. “Not as a researcher. Not as an employee. Come back to me… Please.” His gaze moved from me to Ark.
“Don’t go,” Ark interrupted, seeming to finally find an appropriate moment. “Like you said, once you go back they’ll shut you off and never turn you on again.”
“That’s not true!” barked Caveroth, quite harshly. Immediately his tone gentled. “It’s not true. I wish no harm upon either of you. Before you left I was doing everything in my power to assure that the two of you and a few others would be able to live safely.” His attention focused acutely on me and I returned his stare silently. “There was a part of me that died when I thought I’d lost you. I can’t do that again.”
“You’ll have to,” I said flatly. “Because I can’t go back. I’m done, Luckas. Can’t you please just let us go; haven’t we done enough to deserve that? Haven’t we been through enough?”
His shoulders dropped almost imperceptibly at my words and his gaze dropped guiltily to the floor. “Yes,” he replied. “You have, but I had hoped you might return anyway. For me, if not for your research.”
Sighing, I inched forward enough to catch his attention, enough to be within arms reach though I made no move to touch him. “Once upon a time I loved you,” I said. “I worked for and with you because you were the single greatest thing to happen to me. You were the greatest thing to happen to a lot of people, if I recall.” I shook my head, stepping away from him, eyes stinging. “But I hope your betrayal of them hurts you as badly as it hurt them. I hope with all my heart that you still feel their blood on your hands every waking moment and I hope they haunt you each time you close your eyes to sleep. Because god knows that’s what it’s been like for me for leading them to you.”
There was nothing for him to say to that and so he said nothing, merely staring at me with the same soft eyes as always.
It hurt to say those things to him because despite all of it there was still that small, aching part of me that remembered the good times we’d had; he times before I’d known what he planned, before he had begun to clean out his staff to save himself. He’d been so gentle when I first met him, so loving and sweet. Everyone he adopted into his facility became family to him; not once did I seem him falter or hesitate to supply the name of the person he was greeting. He knew their names and their preferences, their family, their pasts… he knew and I’d thought he’d loved all of them.
Looking at him now, I knew that he had loved all of them.
I closed my eyes and shook my head. “I can’t go back. I won’t.”
At first I thought he might protest but he merely nodded sadly. “I didn’t come here to make you do anything you didn’t want to do,” he said quietly. “However, I cannot leave you here, or let Ark leave the premises again out of my care. I left the staff under the impression that I was going to retrieve him and possibly you. If I return with neither, they will lose their faith in me and you well know that faith in me is all some of them have anymore. If you will not come with me, tell me what other option you see.”
The butterfly fish weighed heavily in my hands as I thought over in my head. It was chance that I happened to catch sight of it as I turned the question over, wondering if it would be possible to move Ark’s consciousness somewhere else. Eyes widening, I looked up sharply. “I might know a way. They know I left in a manai unit, correct?” I asked, not waiting for an answer; of course they knew. “And they all should recognize Ark on sight but not many of them have worked with him in person, unless you’ve changed that too?”
“Since you left, not much has changed,” he said as if there was quite a lot more to that story. “We’ve begun to stagnate without another like you.”
“You still use the fish for messengers?” I asked as I moved out of the front room and down the hall. Caveroth, Ark, and Hanai all followed without question.
“Until we find something better,” he assured.
“How big is their main drive?” I unlocked and pulled open a short, beat-up looking door at the end of the hallway. Darkened stairs led downward to my basement; the hum of machinery was evident now.
He lifted his eyes skyward for a second, calculating in his head. “Maybe… a couple k gig?” he said finally, following me down the steps.
My eyebrows rose at the number. “Tripled since the last time I heard it,” I said, surprised. Lights flickered on all around us at the touch of a switch.
“We took out some extraneous functions. They have basic behavior and motor functions, motion recognition, and memory storage. No voice activation or remote control access. What’s this?”
“No boundary restrictions, I see,” I said as I ignored his question. “Tracking? Radio transmission?”
He shook his head. “Nope.”
Placing the fish on a table, I began to dig through the closest drawer, looking for tools enough to fix the machine. “Return command?” I pulled out a set of screw-drivers and a case containing basic small computer parts.
“Regrettably removed,” he said, eyeing my progression. “If you’re looking to fix it, you can skip that step. I was rather bored waiting for you to return and so I took the liberty of repairing my property.”
I hesitated, glancing between Caveroth and the idle butterfly fish. Reaching over, I picked it up and pressed my finger lightly against the black dot on the right side of its tail. There was a mechanical whir and then it was airborne again, flittering about as if it had not been dunked in a pot of water and imprisoned there only an hour ago.
“Oh,” I said, not quite knowing what else to do. “Well… that saves time.” I settled back on my heel and looked over to the assembled. “You should all know that this isn’t the greatest plan I’ve ever had, but on short notice it will have to do. Ark,” I said, turning to him. “I’m going to transfer your data to this fish. Right now it’s the only working AI unit I have, aside from Hanai there and… well, I’m going to need an escape and a body that works properly if I’m to try and get you into a different unit.”
“What about Hanai,” Caveroth asked softly. “It seemed… awfully sentient.”
I shook my head in dismissal. “Basic level mimicry,” I assured him. “He knows how to follow orders and ask questions. He’s picked up a little bit of personality, but he’s only been aware a month or two now. I… remember what it was like, waking up from a body that had never experienced sensations before. I thought I would save myself the trouble this time.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” said Caveroth as he followed me across the room. Ark stuck close to my side, still eyeing his previous captor uncertainly.
I took a deep breath and turned to Caveroth. “If I’m going to do this, what are you going to tell the others?”
“That you activated your sterilize function. That you forced a system delete on Ark before I could stop you.” He rolled a shrug. “I will tell them what I have to so that your safety is ensured. I never wanted to see you hurt. Never you.”
For a moment I could think of nothing that would match that, nothing that would sooth that for either of us. I found I didn’t want to, either. Refusing to meet his gaze, I turned back to Ark and held out my hand for his. “I’m not sorry,” I said to Luckas, heart twisting in my chest. Ark’s hand was cold to my touch, a further reminder of what he was. Of what Caveroth and I had done and made together. “I don’t regret leaving. I won’t regret this.”
“I will,” he said sadly. “I have always regretted the way things went, and I always will.” Silence fell amongst us as I pressed a cord end to the tip of Ark’s finger until the flesh parted to reveal a data port. The other end trailed off to the snout of the butterfly fish, which hung unnaturally motionless in the air. “I do see them,” Caveroth murmured. “I see them and I hear them all. Every day I regret their deaths.
I flipped the switch at the center of the cord and Ark’s body stiffened, his eyes widening as they fell all the way open. There was a crackle as the transfer was made and almost immediately afterwards the fish began to tug away from the plug at its mouth. I separated the two and wiggled my fingers, presenting one of my data ports. The little fish darted over, nibbling gently at my hand. The tiny tip of the beak brushed feather-soft against the processor in my fingertip. Data flashed through my system at the contact and I quirked a smile as it resolved into something understandable.
I’m here.
He’d made it.
“Everything intact?” I breathed, not daring to hope I’d done it completely right. My equipment was old and homemade, but it should still have worked.
No. Not enough space. I left behind useless information during the transfer.
“Useless?” I echoed, worried. “Useless how?” I ignored the look Caveroth was giving me; he had only seen manai-messenger conversation a handful of times while I had been at the facility.
Stuff I didn’t need; information about his facility. I don’t really know, Mana, because I don’t remember it. That’s how deleting information works.
I couldn’t help the laugh that bubbled up at his sarcasm. “I see you left behind not a bit of your personality. Hanai?”
“Yes?” he asked from where he still stood across the room.
“Come on, you’re next for transferring.”
“Next, Kaily? I thought…”
Again I laughed, though I couldn’t have explained what was so funny. “You didn’t think. Now come on, or did you actually want me to delete you?”
“No, thank you,” he replied, slipping across the room. “You’re going to move me… in there?” he asked, motioning to Ark’s now vacant body. The little fish swirled dizzyingly around it as if testing its new capabilities.
I nodded. “It’ll be okay. Caveroth will take care of you, won’t he?”
“Absolutely,” Caveroth replied as swiftly as he could. “Although I would advise that if you can do this quickly…” He jabbed one finger upward in a meaningful manner. “Unless you want me to try and explain to them what took me so long in retrieving the two of you.”
The move from human to machine was normally a very difficult transition to make; it required the logging and backup of every single brainwave from a certain living being, encryption into a code that the AI unit could understand, and the transfer was definitely not always a success; often times data, memories were damaged in the process. However, in making the hanai unit for myself, I had taken that problem into consideration before hand. Hanai, while being human for the most part, had had a few very unique additions.
I extended my hand for his and he placed it gently against mine. I pressed the free tip of the transfer plug against his left index finger. Though he winced, he did not protest or jerk away from me as I thought he might. We’d only done this a couple of times since he’d awakened, and the freshly data port was still raw under his skin. The small processor unit inside the base of his skull had been there since his creation, so it would cause him no harm and the transfer would be much easier since he was already only computer programming.
Moving away from him, I shoved things about on one of the slate-topped laboratory benches until I found a small, round box. From a hole in the side spouted two long, thick cords. Each ended in the same sort of data-port as the one Hanai was hooked up to already. I shoved the first of the two into my own data port and solemnly walked both the box and the other cord end to Caveroth, placing both in his hands.
“I can’t do this all by myself. If I was just erasing Hanai’s information like I’d planned, I could, but that’s probably not a good idea,” I told him seriously.
He accepted the box with the utmost care, looking to me with a bit of confusion. “What… do you want me to do?”
“Hanai’s body only has one data port,” I said, staring him in the eyes. He knew what that meant more than anyone else I could have told.
“He shouldn’t have any,” he said quietly.
“I installed one. It’s a useful function, even in an otherwise human body. But it’s limited because there’s only one. I can’t do two transfers simultaneously where that body is involved.”
His brows furrowed. “Can’t you switch it once you’re done moving Hanai?”
“Even if I could move once this generator is turned on, I wouldn’t be fast enough. If there is too much of a delay between when Hanai leaves and I enter, the heart in that body will stop. You may not be able to start it again if that happens.”
Eyes widening, Caveroth began to hand the box back to me. “Oh, no, Kaily. You want me to do the switching, but-“
“You have to,” I snapped, forcing the box firmly into his hands. “I’ll be down, Ark doesn’t have hands anymore and Hanai’s not going to be able to work Ark’s body fast enough. It has to be you.”
He swallowed thickly as his hands tightened on the generator. “Okay. What has to be done?”
Steeling myself, I leaned forward and rested my hand over his where it clutched the cord to the side of the machine. “That end goes into Hanai’s left index finger, right where the cord is right now. After you’ve flicked the switch to transfer him, take out the one he has now and replace it with this as fast as you can. Then press this button.”
“That’s it?” he asked, looking confused. I wondered if he had expected it to be harder, but he should have known. The machines at the facility had been calibrated to be that easy, though we’d always had a million other things about to monitor the health and signals of the consciousness being transferred… Unfortunately I couldn’t afford that luxury, even if it would have made a difference.
“That’s it,” I agreed. “You’re going to be alone. Once you turn it on, my body will be functioning only from that generator. I won’t be able to move or instruct you. If something goes wrong, press the red button and it will safely shut itself off. Got it?”
Though he gave me a look that said he didn’t, he pulled the transfer cord away from the side of the little machine and sighed. “Yeah. I hope you know what you’re doing…”
Nodding, I turned to Hanai. “Ready?” He murmured assent and I took a seat beside him. Caveroth trailed close to us, setting the machine on the table beside us. I smiled weakly to him, pushing down on the fear that I had not done something right. This was something I had planned to do by myself and I’d been months in taking care of the setup, though I’d been putting off the actual transfer. I was afraid of being lost.
“See you in a minute,” he said quietly, reaching for the switch to turn on the generator.
“Hopefully less,” I replied before my world went dark.
I opened my eyes to find Caveroth smiling softly in front of me. His eyebrows rose and he took a step back. “Everything there?”
My hand came up to the back of my head, where a dull ache had begun. “Yes,” I said, startling off the stool at the way my voice sounded. “Woah… I’d forgotten about the voice change.”
Settling back on his heels, he chuckled. “It’s strange on this end, too. I never thought I’d see my beautiful Kaily inside a little boy. Is it all right?”
“I think so,” I said shakily, feeling a small smile cross my lips at the way I spoke. My tongue was too young for my mind still. Stretching one arm out, I flexed my fingers, felt the world in a human way for the first time in many years. It felt good, but there wasn’t time to dawdle or relish in the sensations. “Take her hand and lead her upstairs. There should be a basic program still. Hanai, go with him.”
Ark’s new little yellow, white, and black form swirled madly around his old body, gears chirruping sweetly at it. Extending a hand to my old body, Caveroth gave me an uncertain look. “Aren’t you coming?”
Tiredly, I scrubbed at one eye and offered him my best attempt at a patient smile. “Yes, I just have to check a few things first. Your friends will begin to wonder if you stay much longer.”
Though he clearly wanted to protest, he surrendered and began to lead the trio of rearranged AI units away to the upstairs. They moved awkwardly in their new bodies, except for Ark. My smile deepened to a real one as I watched him flitting about as if he were finally happy where he was. At the facility, I had not seen him act like that since the first time he realized how much of a prisoner he truly was.
As soon as they were out of sight, I made a dash across the room to my computer station. My hands flew over and through the papers piled there, some higher than I could reach. The drawers thunked horribly as I threw them open, digging through the contents as fast as I could. I didn’t want them to return to find me because I wasn’t quite sure why I was even considering doing Caveroth this favor.
At last my fingers brushed the sought-after item- a small, round disk. I pocketed it and joined them upstairs. Caveroth raised one eyebrow at my sudden appearance and my eyes fell upon my old body; it lay limp and slightly contorted on the ground. Smoke roiled around its midsection, where the generator had begun to burn itself into oblivion.
“They’ll smell it in just a second. You’d better be prepared to act.”
My heart twisted as it had not done in years and years. “You too.”
The front doors slammed open even as the words left my mouth. I snatched Ark out of the air and he went limp in my grasp, as though he’d been deactivated. Apparently he was ready to act as well. Hanai, for his part, stood still and calm, staring curiously as the two men from earlier entered. They took one look at Caveroth, kneeling on the ground before my old body, and both seemed to come to the same conclusion.
In short order I found myself staring down the barrels of two guns.
“Leave him be,” Caveroth said acidly from the floor. “The girl sanitized herself.”
“Sir, I thought you’d had that function removed years ago,” one of the men blurted before he could help himself.
“Well I did, didn’t I?” Caveroth bit a little nastily. “But she’s been gone twice as long as that.” He gave a long suffering sigh and clambered to his feet. “Just… get it to the car. Archeopterix too.”
“Sir, will he…”
“No. She erased his memory with that damn transceiver. Get them out of my sight. I’ll meet you in just a minute.”
Nervously, the closest guard took Ark’s old body by the hand and Hanai put up no resistance what-so-ever. It was not in his programming to disobey anymore; I was certain that Ark had left him that. Good boy, I thought silently as I clutched Ark to my chest, watching the second man drag my old body from the house.
Caveroth watched them leave as well, a little sadly. When he turned to me, I could see the exhaustion in his eyes. “I don’t want to leave you, Kaily, so I will ask once more before I leave; come with me. Please.”
“Caveroth,” I said gently. “I can’t forgive you.” His shoulders dropped and he nodded solemnly, like a man broken. I took a deep breath and stepped over to him, slipping my arms around his waist. It felt strange to be so much smaller than him now. I drew back enough to dip one small hand into my pocket and pull forth the disk I had salvaged from my basement. I pressed it into his much larger hand and smiled against my tears. “But I won’t forget you,” I murmured. “It’s all there,” I told him as I stepped away again. “The working Y chromosome you’ve always needed.”
“Kaily…”
I shook my head, arresting whatever protest he might have given. “Don’t. Don’t make it harder. When you are ready to disappear from the world, leave you empire to someone else and come find me. I can’t forgive what you did or who you were, but people change. Above all others, I know that people change. Come find me when you have.”
He smiled softly then, eyes glistening as he nodded. “I will, Kaily.” He was the only other person who knew me by my real first name. “Don’t get too lost.” As he turned away, Ark fluttered up from my hand, settling in the air beside my shoulder. “Goodbye, Ark,” he tossed over his shoulder. “Good luck in this world. I hope it treats you better than we ever have.”
Chirruping sweetly, Ark swirled up a little and stopped, freezing where he hovered. We both trailed slowly after Caveroth, watching as he walked away from us for the last time. Ark found my finger with his tiny beak and the familiar flush of data invaded my partial system.
We did it! He exclaimed before racing away and out of sight to explore his newfound home. Watching him, my heart filled with all the words he had not said. We’d escaped. We were free. We were safe at last, to lead the lives neither of us had dared to believe we would ever have a chance at living.
With a hesitant smile, I took my first step after him and into our new world.