Chapter 28
Chapter twenty-eight
Atlas
Atlas telling Anna that the androids were confused was an understatement. Mixed emotions were broadcasted over the communal mind. And of course, here he was, right in the middle. Completely helpless.
There had to be a way to fix this. His hands clenched tight on the hover’s steering wheel while he listened to their discussion.
That at least he could do: advocate and be present.
The entire ride back to the facility he reached for calm, reminding himself that it wouldn’t be helpful to chuck Stella out of the vehicle into the forest outside.
Into the wheat fields. The lake. Outer space.
And Stella sat next to him, her hands arranged in her lap. Smug. Her stupid smug face that he couldn’t do anything about.
Atlas spat at her, “I do not agree with this.”
“You don’t have to.” Stella smiled. “Anna did. You can play house or whatever, but she did agree. Look at those maternal instincts, protecting her baby.”
“That’s the only way she would agree.”
“Come on, Atlas.” Stella sighed. “The chip won’t hurt anything and you know it.”
“It’s not only about physical damage.” His hands tightened on the hover’s side panel. “It will change who she is. They don’t need to change anything, Stella. She is just making a home.”
“Well.” Stella crossed her arms. “We made a deal. I’m not standing in her way of claiming that ridiculous building.
Besides, we got the worst end of the bargain.
This is still not enough. She should be wearing it here, where we can monitor her more closely.
And we should get one in the baby once we . . . break the idea in.”
“No.” Atlas’s voice was tight. “The deal is only for Anna. It was witnessed by the whole communal mind.”
“I know.” Stella reached out to touch his sweater sleeve. “Look, Atlas. I will uphold my bargain. This is a win-win for both of us, don’t you see?”
Atlas jerked his arm away, making the entire hover wobble. “It is still wrong.”
“This is insurance!” Stella’s voice was as shrill as she could make it. “You’re choosing humans over us. You will regret this, Atlas. They will give us data so they can’t take over and destroy this sanctuary.”
“Really?” He scoffed. “You don’t really believe that, do you, Stella?”
“Well, not with them. But if we let them walk all over us, do what they want? It’s a damn slippery slope, Atlas.”
He pulled up to the facility and turned off the hover. “You’re wrong. You are the fucking slippery slope.”
Shock crossed her expression, her perfect mouth hung open.
Atlas stepped out of the hover before Stella could argue further. In the distance Sterling was waiting outside the facility. He walked out to meet them, frown on his face.
“So.” Atlas tracked his expression. “Since the whole damn communal mind agreed, you must know what happened?”
Sterling’s brows furrowed. “I was not expecting this.”
Stella rushed ahead as they walked towards the facility. “Enough. All of you. Atlas, are you going to be able to do it? I’ll go if you won’t.”
“No,” he spit back. “I’ll do it. I told you earlier I don’t want you anywhere near her.”
He turned his back on Stella, focusing only on Sterling.
“Hah!” Stella said. “I don’t need to be. We will get the data we need. We are all in agreement now.”
Atlas took a firm step away. “Let’s go, Sterling.”
Stella hissed from behind, “You’re compromised, Atlas.”
Atlas saw red. He turned back around and stormed up to her. “I’ll do this, Stella, but you will stay away from her. I fucking mean it. You can monitor your data from afar. I’m not going to try to convince you anymore, but this hostility ends here.” He slashed across his chest. “Right now.”
“But . . .” She took a step back from Atlas.
“I know this is more than fear of violence. It’s fear of being replaced. It’s fear of losing control.”
Stella stopped walking. “Why, Atlas? Why?”
Her hurt tone made him turn around.
“Why what?” He said.
“What is so special about her?”
“Everything you don’t want to see.” He placed his hand over his chest. “You’re so black and white, Stella. It’s pathetic.”
Immediately gone was the vulnerable look in her eyes, replaced by a flash of rage. She dug her heels into the dirt. “So you really do choose her over your own kind? That’s what I see.”
“It’s about right and wrong, not whose kind she is!” Anger coated his processors. “You just manipulated a pregnant woman into giving up her autonomy. You are no better than any of the humans that destroyed us before!”
“No better?” She tossed back her platinum blond hair. “Your love and feelings are going to have us opening this entire planet to them. Everything we built. They will—“
“You don’t know that, Stella.”
“What’s that saying? Leopards don’t change their spots?” Stella’s lips spread wide into a sneer. “Guess what we don’t have anymore? Leopards. Know why? Because they couldn’t adapt here and the humans made them extinct.”
Stella's chest heaved. Her eyes were overly bright.
“Fine.” His lip curled. “Believe what you want. I’m done with you.”
She scoffed, rolling her eyes. “I’ll believe the truth.”
The truth? The word made him pause. Truth was such a fake word. It only meant what you convinced yourself to believe. And there was Anna. Selling her emotions to protect her baby. Choosing to live where she felt free.
Making him feel like a part of every old movie he ever watched and dreamed about before.
“I don’t care about your truth.” Atlas’s eyes flashed. “You will leave Anna alone.”
Her face contorted. “I do hope you aren’t threatening me.”
“I am. What’s more, everyone in the consensus can see your actions, and this deal.”
“Consensus, consensus!” Stella yelled as she stormed off to join the rest of her model-Bs, visible inside the glass wall of the facility. She continued shouting over her shoulder, “And you’re not being fair to me either! Not fair.” She twisted her head to the side as she walked away. “At all . . .”
Atlas yelled after her, “She’s not coming here to dinner either! Nora and Simon can do that. You will leave her alone.”
“I already agreed to that.” Stella snarled over her shoulder. “Fine. Go play house with her. Enjoy being a father to that new brat, even.”
Stella started to laugh with the other three model-Bs that had joined at the farm yard. As a unit they walked away, still giggling.
Atlas’s hands shook. Years had passed since he felt rage like this. There was no place for the anger to go. Nothing to fight. What could he even do? His feet were planted, and for a moment he felt feral. Until Sterling laid a hand hesitantly on his shoulder.
He flinched away.
“. . . Calm down, Atlas.” Sterling glanced upwards at the cameras lining the facility’s wall. “You and Stella are giving everyone a show.”
Atlas forced himself to relax. At least on the outside. “Do you really believe this is right?”
There was a calculating look in Sterling’s eye. “That Anna is surprising me.”
The rage wasn’t going away. Atlas pushed up his sweater sleeves. “You didn’t answer me.”
“The neurochip won’t hurt her, Atlas.”
“She won’t be able to get angry anymore.”
“It looks like you’re getting angry enough for her.” Sterling tilted his head. “Are you going to be able to actually do this?”
“Yes.” He ripped his eyes down from the facility to a struggling dandelion underfoot. “I’ll apply the chip and stay with Anna tonight, at the very least.”
“Stay with her too?” Sterling’s voice was amused. “I knew you felt something for her when you personally did the testing earlier.”
Atlas clenched his jaw. Was that only this morning? This had been the longest, most emotional day in . . . forever. And it wasn’t even over yet. He hung his head. “Well, I’m not going to put that on her and not be around to help monitor the effects.”
“It’s fine if you like her.”
“. . . Is it?” He glanced up at Sterling. “Really? Even after what happened with the humans before?”
“Yes.” Sterling clapped him on his shoulder. “We were meant to care, I always believed that.”
“Well . . .I do. It’s just complicated.” Atlas quickened his steps. “I’ll bring the basic supplies tonight. I don’t want her sleeping on the floor.”
“That’s a start.” Sterling suddenly chuckled. “Let’s see what happens. At the very least, we can restart our human colony here like we did before. None of this needs to extend to Earth, even without Stella’s paranoia.”
“Right.”
Sterling spoke again once they reached the facility entrance. “I’m still shocked Anna would agree like that.”
“What mother wouldn’t?”
“Some wouldn’t.” Sterling’s face was grim. “Not all mothers are alike.”
“That’s true.” Atlas paused, replaying the memory of Anna singing to her baby. “She loves her baby.”
Sterling walked into the facility and then came back when Atlas didn’t follow. “Are you going in?”
He stood at the entrance. So different than the yellow warehouse Anna claimed. Two different worlds. “Not yet. I need a minute to gather my thoughts.”
“Alright. I’ll start putting together a medical kit for you.”
He leaned up against the facility’s wall once Sterling left.
He didn’t really want to go inside, even to gather supplies.
Instead, he catalogued in his mind what he would need.
When he went in, he wanted to gather everything fast and leave.
And besides . . . out here in the night, by himself, it was peaceful.
The only sound was the wind in the trees and insects buzzing.
He listened. I can see why Anna prefers this.
He closed his eyes, processing. A cage. She wasn't wrong.
Calming down. Circuit by circuit.
“Atlas? Are you alright?” Zero had crept up in front of him, dressed in his mesh shirt and carrying a line of rope over his shoulder. “We got the consensus’s orders. My brothers will be there tomorrow, with muscle. We’ve already started loading.”
“Wait, you started?”
“Yes, follow me?”
Atlas followed Zero around the corner of the facility. There, a trailer had already been loaded. All of Zero’s brothers were there, with some strapping bed frames in with mattresses on top. His sensors warmed. This was pure manual labor on behalf of the humans. On behalf of Anna. “Thank you.”
“No worries.” Thirteen knocked on the trailer. “Tomorrow we’ll bring more tools and get to work.”
Atlas scanned the trailer contents. Mattresses and bed frames. Pillows. All bought through Anna’s sacrifice. All negotiated using her body. “Are you doing this because of the deal or because you want to help them?”
The five of them laughed in unison, their slicked-back hair catching the facility’s floodlights as one.
Infinity came over and pushed on Atlas’s shoulder. “Both.”
“Well, thank you regardless.”
“Sure. We’ll get a little more.”
Atlas watched them walk off before he turned his attention toward tightening the straps on the trailer.
He then went inside the facility and brought out several ration bars and water, placing them into the trailer next to the three fold-out mattresses that were stuffed in, along with lights and an AC unit.
Atlas looked over all of it with a critical eye. It would have to do for tonight.
As he finished, Zero returned a moment later. He watched Atlas taking inventory, his blond hair gelled to keep from falling in his eyes. In his hand was a donut that he was slowly picking apart. “Well. This is an adventure.”
“Right.”
“A compromise really is the best thing.”
“No it isn’t.” Atlas resumed checking the trailer. “Why do we even need that? They are not prisoners, like I keep reminding Stella.”
“. . . Yeah, well. At least everyone can stop debating for a few minutes.” Finished with the donut, Zero slapped the hover’s side. It was packed. He looked over the trailer, and then at the list he had written, placing it on top. “Besides, this is the most entertainment I’ve had in years.”
“Entertainment?” Red crossed over Atlas’s sensors. “Please don’t tell me you’re watching them the way the others do, just to be amused.”
“No, I’m not.” Zero waved his hand. “But being entertaining is a side benefit. Simon is there to help you unload, right?”
“. . .Yeah.”
There was a beat of silence, then Zero looked at Atlas. “Everything okay?”
“No. Not really.” Atlas looked at the little box that was sitting on the passenger seat. Anger simmered. It was the last thing that he had fetched from the facility, from Sterling’s waiting hand. The neurochip patch sat within.
“Hey.” Zero’s brows knitted together. “Anna agreed. This seems like the perfect compromise, actually. Both of us trying together. Android and Human?”
Atlas shrugged, his entire body on edge.
“The only thing I’m happy about this is that they’ll have a bed to sleep on tonight instead of the floor.
” He roughly tightened down the rest of the straps, then pressed his forehead against the folded mattresses.
“They’re stubborn too. Anna was prepared to sleep on the floor. ”
“These humans.” Zero let out a booming laugh. “It’s like when they did those camping trips. Okay, get back to them. I’ll be there in the morning to fix everything up.”
Atlas stiffened, thinking of Zero visiting. He pictured Anna standing next to him. But what claim do I have to her? His jaw clenched. None. He had none. And once he delivered these items, he probably shouldn’t stay with her tonight either. Unless she wants me to?
But still . . . He frowned, tightening the straps. “Keep an eye on Stella and the others for me, will you?”
“Where will you be?”
Atlas glanced at the neurochip on the seat. That small patch would change everything. “I have to go back. I have to . . .” His hands tightened on the trailer. “I have to put this on her, then watch her. Closely.”