Alliance: An Intersolar Alien Romance, Book 6

33

A bright, anxious smile burst across Fásach”s features as he sprinted to my side. He turned me around by the shoulder and pointed at the canopy.

”I can see towers,” he breathed urgently.

”White towers?”

”Three of them,” he confirmed.

”Dios mio,”I gushed, all of my systems lighting up like fireworks. ”That”s it! That”s Renata!”

”A couple miles. There”s a break in the canopy five hundred feet ahead, where the valley descends.” Fás pressed both of his palms into the fronts of his antlers. ”I didn”t think we”d get this close without a fight.” In a rush, he opened his holotab. “Look! All of these bastards were offline before, but now they’re active. And my comms… are waiting for an upload connection!”

[Warning] The excitement in my chest stuttered to a halt. ”Comms?”

“I sent a couple to Vin and Sizzle,” he admitted breathlessly, spreading his arms wide. “I don’t exactly look like the last time we saw each other, you know? I wanted to be safe.”

I pushed the inexplicable worry away. “Right.”

Then my eyes glanced down the path without my prompting. How long would it take me to get down to the river? I didn’t want to meet Vin and Sizzle right away. For some reason, they made me anxious. I wanted to see Imani. Only Imani. She would be able to tell me if—

Fásach”s chest exploded in a victorious chuckle, too wrapped up in his own elation to hear my hesitation. He punched the air and snapped his teeth with a sharp crack.

“There’s no guarantee they’ll get the comms though,” I said, more to calm myself. “Uploads might be throttled without administrative permissions within the colony’s security dome.”

How did I know there even was a security dome?

Still panting, Fásach’s smile faltered. “You’re right.” He stopped in his tracks, licked his teeth, and chuffed at the trees he”d just jumped down from. ”But Sizzle and Vin will remember my howl from our dock days. If I call from the treetops, they”ll probably hear it.”

[WARNING] My face froze in an elated, beaming smile, and panic bled through my eyes.

Something was wrong.

I stopped breathing and went entirely too still, like a mannequin in a market with a painted face. I’d never felt more like the doll I’d been born as then at that moment. My faculties were paused, and not by me. Some horrible force had taken hold of my vitals deck. The ghostly code at the corners of my LMem slithered its binary deep into the lines between my programming, shoving its way in here and there, breaking apart my core control. I tried to open my mouth and scream for help but—

Warning. Non-essential movement restricted during priority override.

No!

When I didn’t answer, Fásach”s hackles rose. He approached me and patted my cheek, chirruping inquisitively. He leaned down so he could look me in the eye, and whatever he saw sapped all the excitement right out of him.

”Roz?” he prompted, squeezing my shoulders.

That’s when I heard it again. The echo. Such a smooth, old world voice. It was clearer now.

Welcome, Roz-02. Please remain stationary while I perform an update.

I knew the moment the blue light at the back of my eye turned on because Fásach’s ears flattened. I tried to move again, knowing that I’d lose everything if I received whatever the echo wanted to give me. I raced frantically through my own processing core, pushing the limits and draining my new charge. Whatever was inside of me ramped up its speed, but a second too late, and I gasped with a jilted, robotic whirr.

I reached for Fásach just as it took me again, and words that weren’t mine tumbled from my mouth.

”Do we have to? Maybe we can sneak into the colony and make sure the girls are safe first. Imani James can—”

”Roz, what’s going on?” Fásach asked. His ears twitched. “You don’t sound right.”

”I need to see her,” I trembled, fists clenching with the effort to control my own voice.A whimper escaped my throat as my electronics began to overheat. Fásach clutched me a little tighter, blinking at the blistering heat radiating out from my dermal mesh.

”Roz, what”s wrong!”

Breath exploded from my mouth as I wrestled control again. ”Don”t let me see her!” I shouted, stumbling back. ”She-she needs to tell me if I”m the—” My only option was to fry my own vocal function, reducing it to clicks and static as I felt that fog roll over me. ”1f-f-f-f I”m the-I”m the traito0o0orrr.”

Apologies, Roz-02. An update is required for access to the colony. Any further damage and your unit will be barred entry.

”Traitor? Tell me what to do,” he begged, hearing something in our harmony that I couldn’t understand. ”Something”s frightening you.”

I snapped my mouth shut and shook my head, eyes welling with tears. He nudged my face with his nose and hugged me hard enough to squeeze the panicked air from my chest.

”I trust you, Roz. I”m with you to the end. Even if you won”t speak out loud. So just nod or shake your head. Do you want me to howl?”

A moan of sadness bubbled up my throat, but the unit that was no longer mine locked it down.

Then, a thought struck me.

I would be barred entry…

I didn’t have much control, but I wrestled the last of my vitals deck from my sabotaged coding. My respiratory and cardiovascular systems were out of my hands, but I still had my thermoregulator. I blasted my temperature, racing along my LMem as elements of Rosy’s life were fried to a crisp. The edges of my vision crackled and faded like burned film as my electronics overloaded.

Bloody oil dripped from my nose. I bit the inside of my cheek with a frantic nod as the code receded with a screech. In the moments I had, I gripped Fásach’s forearms, biting into his pelt with fear.

[WARNING] ”Yes,” I gasped.

Wholly me for the last time.

”Okay. Then I will. Stay here, and I”ll be right back.”

When Fásach led me to the needle and sat me down on the saddle, it wasn’t me anymore. And when he climbed back up into the trees, my wide, shaken stare followed him but only saw a blown out, faded mess of oranges and yellows as my core temperature rose above one hundred twenty degrees Fahrenheit. The skull casing around my cranial components vibrated into action, filling with a coolant that I’d soon overcome.

I told him I’d save him. That I’d choose the path that would ensure Safia and Misila came to no harm. I’d meant every word.

[WARNING] His war cry crackled through his diaphragm in staccato yips until it reached a fever pitch of huhuhuh stutters that warbled across the trees. High, vicious, excitable.

Please relinquish control of your thermoregulator or suffer irreparable harm.

I didn’t.

[WARNING] An eerie, hollow howl rose to answer like a storm siren from the direction of the towers.

The sound caused the echo to panic as if it were a living thing, like me. It rushed in a chaotic haze, overrunning my LMem, demanding control. My eyes rolled back as the update forced its way into my body and singed my components like a tattooing needle buzzing over every inch of my skin and insides all at once.

Within one heartbeat, I was gone.