Chapter 11
Mia
Nolan left three days ago, but I haven’t heard from him in over forty-eight hours.
He messaged me when he landed and kept in contact with me all through getting settled in with Apollo and the other guys. The last message I have from him on Sunday reads:
I’ll send you a text as soon as I can, but they’re deploying us now, and I may not be able to talk for a day or so.
I accepted it. I can handle a single day without my man.
Come on, I’m not that clingy. But now it’s Tuesday morning, and my emotions have snowballed into full-blown anxiety.
Normally I wouldn’t be so worried, except Jessica hasn’t heard from Apollo either, and my own messages to my brother are unread.
Lying on my bed, clutching my silly sparkly unicorn plushie I’m far too old to be snuggling, I helplessly ruminate, knowing deep down something’s wrong.
Something has happened. He told me once that my texts feed right into his optic screen, allowing him to see them immediately, and he can answer them just as quickly without becoming distracted from anything he’s doing, so long as he’s not headfirst in a fire somewhere.
Then his messages are silenced until he’s out of danger.
But the little check-in messages I tentatively sent him Sunday night, just to let him know that even in his absence I’m thinking about him, aren’t showing as delivered. Sent, but not received. And I know, right down to the pit of my stomach, that something isn’t right.
And just as I’m trying to pick myself up, telling myself it’s only Tuesday, and it’s probably because he’s busy saving lives, and there’s nothing to worry about, Apollo’s phone call comes in.
I don’t even say hello when I answer the call. “Apollo! Oh my god, are you okay? Jessica has been worried sick, and so have I!”
“I know. I’m sorry,” Apollo rasps. “It’s been tough out here. I just got off the phone with her.”
“Where’s Nolan? Is everything okay?” I’m on the edge of a precipice. Whether I slip and fall will be entirely up to my brother. I can’t breathe, can’t think, can’t rest, until I know.
For one prolonged moment, Apollo says nothing. Then I hear the weariness in his voice. “I’m sorry, Mia.”
My insides are instantly gripped by an invisible vise. “Sorry? Sorry for what? What’s happening?”
His voice cracks. “Nolan’s gone.”
“What do you mean?” I clutch my phone as my stomach drops.
I’ve never heard my brother cry. Not once. Not even a quivering voice. He’s always been the strong one, always smiling, laughing, never letting his guard down. But sorrow thickens his words.
“It got pretty bad out here. The boys and I were resting after our first shift out there, but Nolan went out with the rescue team, and . . . the pilot didn’t wait for him to load up. He was left behind.”
I shake. “Where is he now?”
“They tracked him down and picked him up, but he’s a husk. They’re sending him back BioNex. Dr. Taylor’s going to work on him, see if they can’t save him. But even if they do, he couldn’t back himself up in time.”
“So he’s not dead?” I ask, stricken. “He’ll—he’ll come back, he’ll be okay?”
Apollo is hesitant. “Yes and no. We had someone at the fire department comb through his last uploads from his memory banks to the department servers. I made an inquiry, asked if there’s anything . . . sensitive about you. But you weren’t in there. At all.”
“I don’t know what that means.”
“It means even though they’ll be able to replace his body, they’ll only be able to restore what’s on company servers,” Apollo says somberly.
“You have to understand he’s the first of his kind, and there’s no protocol or guarantee.
There’s a chance Nolan might be the same old Nolan we know, but, Mia . . . he won’t remember meeting you.”
Tears spill down my cheeks as my brother confirms Nolan’s ultimate destruction.
He won’t remember me? My heart is in agony.
“Give me a second.” I put myself on mute and bow my head, rocking on my bed, unsure of what to say or do.
All our messages, all our talks, our dates, our lovemaking, have literally gone up in flames.
A fire stole the man I love from me, and me from him.
My door creaks, and Jessica peers at me sorrowfully from the hallway. She’s been crying too. “Mia?”
I reach for her, and she crosses my room and hugs me tightly as I sob into her chest. She rocks me and caresses my head, squeezing me as tightly as she can. She speaks comforting words to me, but I can’t register them, too caught up in my grief.
I have to be strong. I try to stop weeping first. The point is, he’s going to come back. He’s going to be okay. That matters more than any memories of me. His life, his existence. My life isn’t over, and neither is his.
Putting Apollo on speaker phone, I implore him. “What can I do? Tell me what to do. I’ll get on a plane, I-I’ll come out.”
“No, don’t do that,” Apollo says. “What’s left of Nolan is being sent priority via plane to BioNex as we speak.
They’re going to see if they can salvage anything, and study the rest to improve his next version, and other bionics too, I imagine.
” He speaks so bitterly in this way, and I can’t blame him.
We’ve lost someone we love, and it’s so—technical. So cold.
“I have to go,” Apollo says. In the background on his end, I hear a flurry of activity. “Bye, Mia.”
“Be safe,” I say desperately, more fearful for him now than ever without Nolan there to look out for him. “We can’t lose you too.”
“I will. Talk soon.”
My eyes sting with tears I haven’t shed and I fall quiet. Laolao enters the room and sits on my bed near Jessica. She says something to me in Chinese that I don’t understand and reaches for me. I rest my head on her lap.
Nolan, my Nolan, may be gone forever. And even if he isn’t, he’ll see me as a stranger.
There’s nothing anyone can say or do to comfort me.
Laolao and Jessica do their best, and Jessica’s mother treats me like her own child.
She stays with me the entire night, letting me rest my head on her lap, as she runs her fingers through my hair, whispering kind and loving words until I pass out.
* * *
“Please, Chief. I want to be there. I want to see him.”
When Apollo tells me several days later that what’s left of Nolan is on the way to BioNex, I couldn’t sit around and twiddle my thumbs. I went to the fire station.
I stand before Chief Bennigan in his office, wearing my best clothes and earrings. My hair is curled, my makeup is on. I stare at this large, intimidating man with a faintly reddened face and a slightly overgrown gut.
He squints at me from behind his desk, tapping the surface with his fingers. “The boys mentioned there might be a girl,” he says in quiet consternation. “But I didn’t think it’d be you, Miss Bennett.”
“When the plane lands and Nolan’s body is taken to BioNex,” I repeat, “I want to be there with him.”
Bennigan regards me pensively and sighs. “Miss Bennett, it’s more of a husk than a body at this point. I’m sorry. I’m trying to be delicate, but the truth serves everyone better.”
“I know,” I reply. On the outside, I do what I can to appear serene. On the inside, I’m trembling. I don’t want to hear this, but I have to. “All the same, I’d like to be there.”
Bennigan grunts, considering my words. I struggled with even making this request. But I made my decision.
My Nolan is gone. And I am going to conduct myself the way any firefighter’s partner would if she lost her man.
It doesn’t matter that he’s bionic. I can only hope the chief thinks the same way.
“If you weren’t Apollo’s sister,” he mutters, “I’d likely say no. As it stands, I have a lot of respect for your family.”
“I appreciate that, sir.”
“Okay.” Bennigan shakes his head. “Okay. I assume you already know he’s arriving at the airport today. Three p.m. You can accompany his transport.”
“And my sister-in-law? She can come with me too?”
“I don’t see why not. But I can’t guarantee BioNex will let you in. They’re rather strict about facility access.”
One battle at a time. “Thank you, sir.”
* * *
Jessica and I arrive a half hour early to the airport, and the wait is pure torment.
I told Jessica she didn’t have to come, that I could handle it.
I was worried about stressing her out too much, in her condition.
But she insisted, and I’m so grateful to have a sister-in-law like her.
People are constantly spilling out of the glass doors, heading to the parking garage or to be picked up by family members.
Together, we exit the car, and I do what I can to keep still, when all I want is to pace back and forth.
Then they come out into view. Volunteers, not my brother’s team. Jess identifies them as a few Belmont fighters who had gone to California a couple weeks before and were only just returning.
They’re pushing along a box on wheels with a lid displaying the BioNex logo, which looks like it’s near buckling from the weight. I know without having to be told that it’s Nolan.
My Nolan.
I hurry over the crosswalk, rushing them. “Nolan—”
The fighters look confused when they see me, and then somewhat offended at my behavior. “Excuse me. Back up, please.”
“She’s his girlfriend,” Jessica interjects, and some of their eyes flicker with recognition when they see her.
“Oh, sorry, Mrs. Bennett, we didn’t know,” says the fireman who initially put himself between me and what I can only describe as Nolan’s corporate coffin. He regards me with apologetic sympathy. “You might not want to look, ma’am.” But I’m already opening the box. I push it to the side and blanch.
Nolan is unrecognizable. His skin, his hair, everything is gone. He looks like an alien, something not of this world. It’s just his blackened steel exoskeleton, and his circuitry is completely burnt out.