The Android and the Thief

by Wendy Rathbone

  Khim moved forward and laid down a barrage of laser pulses, forcing the newly arrived guards back. He kept firing to cover Trev, who advanced carefully down the dock, inspecting the bays, which all stood open due to his deft computer skills. The airlocks were closed, of course. The fliers, all in neat little rows, floated in the dark airless sea beyond.

  It seemed Trev had found one he liked; he was now working on the airlock.

  Khim moved from one bay to the next, using the narrow alcoves for as much cover as he could get. He could see Trev working at the door. He kept the guards back with more volleys of laser bolts and stun lines. He had two kinds of guns, both set on nonlethal, per Trev’s wishes. “What’s taking so long?”

  Trev didn’t answer. Khim saw more men in blue uniforms gathering down the dock, arriving from a doorway Khim had not known about linking another area of the prison. If Trev had seen another way in on the computer during the short time they were in the office, he’d said nothing about it.

  Finally Trev called out. “There! Got it!”

  Khim heard a loud hiss. He ran out from cover, shooting, and dodged into the next alcove. The airlock door was open. Trev was already inside, working on the flier door.

  Khim said, “Close the door behind us.”

  “No time. As soon as we’re through here, I will.”

  Khim stayed on point, hearing running footsteps echoing up the dock. At least a half-dozen men were converging on them now. “Hurry,” he said under his breath. “Hurry.”

  “Got it!” Trev whirled.

  Khim took a breath at the two most beautiful words ever and ran backward toward Trev. Trev was actually grinning when he got to his side.

  “Get in! Get in!” Trev said.

  Khim turned and entered the small two-seater flier, climbing into the far right-hand seat. Trev leaped like a gazelle into the front seat, plopping gracefully at Khim’s side as the door began to hiss shut.

  Two guards turned the corner and ran at them, firing.

  The air exploded around them just before the door closed. Trev gave a little shriek, but his hands were moving fast over the controls.

  Khim glanced over at him and saw a hole in Trev’s shirt at the shoulder, the edges burned black. The skin under the hole was already blistering around a deep impression. “You’re hit!”

  Trev’s mouth was a pale line against tanned skin. “I’m okay.”

  But he wasn’t okay. “Damn it. They were using lethal force.”

  Trev did not seem to be listening. He was working the controls so fast Khim could barely see his hands. “Go,” Trev muttered to himself, or maybe to the flier. “Go, go, go!”

  The flier broke away from the dock, floating free for a moment as if all that had happened to them had been a dream and they were just about to wake. Then the boosters came on and they shot into the dark.

  “It’s not over yet,” Trev said through gritted teeth.

  Khim looked up through the roof window, then down through the bottom window. He saw the prison, like a giant black widow spider, hurtling away from them, growing smaller, and the other fliers, like dots of white flowering against the careening blackness, pulsing out from one of the spider’s arched legs.

  There was going to be a chase.

  Khim worried about Trev’s shoulder—he looked to be in a lot of pain. Those pulse hits were like white-hot knives, and they burned deep. The pain twisted through the body like a nest of angry, stinging hornets. Khim had been hit by them several times in his past.

  “I disabled the tracker, and I picked a high-end flier with suitable speed. But if we’re not fast, they’ll catch us.”

  “Can you switch places with me?” Khim asked. “I’m a certified shuttle pilot, and I’ve driven fliers thousands of times.”

  “No time,” Trev answered tightly. His usually pink lips had turned a pale blue. He was still soaked through, like Khim, his gray prison attire sticking to him, his wet hair clinging to his cheeks and forehead. He was beginning to shiver.

  Khim knew the symptoms of shock.

  Trev said, “Too bad fliers aren’t structurally equipped for foldspace.” His breathing had become shallow.

  “Beyond this point, our plan diminishes somewhat,” Khim observed, itching to take over the controls.

  “Not really. I just need to access the flier’s computer. It has wave access. I need a moment only. Then I have to shut it off before they can track us.” Trev’s hands tapped the screens in a fluid pattern Khim could not keep up with. Trev then transferred the screen to holo, and it appeared before Khim’s eyes as if floating on air.

  “There. That’s the destination. But don’t plug it in yet. I gotta get rid of our tails.”

  Finally, something Khim could help with. He studied the address. Memorized it—just in case—and the coordinates as well.

  Trev flew straight for the moonstone-blue planet below. Gideon was wreathed in a sapphire-white atmosphere, a swirl of green-edged fog, temperate, steady, life affirming.

  They hit the atmosphere hard, and the flier shrieked an alarm. It was meant to ease in and out of space, not slam itself into barriers.

  Trev made a few adjustments, hands shaking, and then they were shooting past exosphere, ionosphere, and finally into the stratosphere, where they began to encounter clouds and drops of ice hitting the windows.

  The alarm went silent.

  “Fuck! We left a vapor trail,” Trev hissed.

  He flew like the devil of mayhem himself, hurly-burly, the flier tumbling through the air. The only things holding them in their seats were the automatic armrests that had clamped over their thighs.

  The sun gleamed high overhead. If it had been night, they might’ve had an easier evasion. But right then, Khim saw, the lights of other fliers still followed.

  And then, suddenly, salvation.

  They both saw it at once.

  Like soft smoke lit by bronze fire from within. Like a gentle, foaming ebb and flow of some fairy-tale sea beyond the edge of a parched, white desert. Like a distant hearth calling them home.

  “That,” Khim said.

  “I see it,” Trev said.

  “Fly into it.”

  “Naturally,” Trev said, as if he’d known all along it would be there.

  The storm looked huge, progressing rapidly, and already the winds were whipping at the front of the flier. Trev flew into angry slipstreams, fierce sleet, and the pure adrenaline rush that was their only road to safety.

  The currents of wailing air buffeted them, but the flier would hold. It was made for battling storms. Just like the iron-built cloud cities and the little islands of the wealthiest families that surrounded them.

  Trev took a sharp breath, blinking. Khim knew he was fighting pain, but he never once complained. Aside from tiny gasps, Trev made no sound of moaning and never took his eyes off the controls.

  After a minute, when they both knew the other fliers would never find them by sight or tracking systems, they began to relax.

  Khim watched Trev ease up, fingers moving slower, hands quivering.

  Trev said, “We made it.”

  Khim felt himself smile, and it reached more than just his lips. It seemed to sink down into him deep, covering his very core. “Put it on autopilot.”

  Trev nodded. “Yeah. Okay.”

  Khim glanced at the back of the craft. There was very little room. One short couch seat. Black leather. Rather exquisite, actually. “If I help you into the back, you’ll be more comfortable.”

  Trev started to shake his head.

  “I memorized the coordinates you picked,” Khim said. “I’ll get us there. Wherever you’ve chosen to send us.”

  Trev’s whole body began to shake now. His eyes were dim, his gaze distant as they sought Khim’s face. “I just need a synth patch and a painkiller, and I’ll be fine.”

  Khim nodded. “I know. We don’t have either.”

  Trev let out a strange laugh. “I can’t believe we did this. We really di
d this.”

  “Yes. We did.”

  “You’ll be safe now, Khim. I’ll make sure.”

  Khim felt a quiver in his own chest. Trev made the statement as if he’d done it all for Khim alone. As if Trev only thought of himself as an afterthought.

  “We both will,” Khim assured him.

  Trev flipped a switch and the armrests let go of them. Khim moved up in his seat, balancing on one knee. He looked from Trev to the backseat, then back at Trev. “Can you climb over?”

  Trev’s eyes were glassy. “Huh?”

  Khim pushed both their seats into a reclining position. Then he slid into the back and reached forward. He hooked his hands gently underneath Trev’s shoulders. The gray shirt was cool to the touch, still sopping.

  Trev let out a puff of air, followed by a tight sound of protest.

  “I’m sorry,” Khim said. “Push with your legs. You can lie down flat back here.”

  Trev did not push with his legs, though. He seemed not to hear Khim at all. His eyes had closed, his dark lashes making tight lines against the tops of his cheeks.

  Khim kept pulling until he had Trev half on the backseat, half slumped in his lap. “Trev?”

  “Huh?”

  Trev’s head moved a little, then fell forward against Khim’s chest. Trev felt so cold in his arms. The wet clothes were not helping.

  Khim looked forward, saw the darkness trying to penetrate all the windshields above and below as well as in front, saw a bedlam of rain striking the thick glass with rage.

  Khim reached out and righted the front seats. He had just enough floor room to kneel so he could arrange Trev on the back couch more comfortably.

  Trev kept wincing as he was moved, eyelids fluttering, but he made no sound.

  Khim took off his own damp shirt, wadded it up, and put it under Trev’s head.

  Trev leaned into him then, whispering with tight blue lips, “Get us to that address I gave you. The guy owes me. He owes me.”

  Khim said, “I promise.” He had no trouble following Trev’s orders. He wasn’t going to stop now. “Lean back.”

  Trev’s head fell back.

  Khim took that moment to examine the wound. He tore the shirt open at the shoulder, saw a clean but piercing burn. It had already cauterized itself from the heat of the bolt blast, but it was deep, a big enough hole that it would need to be sealed.

  Khim tore at the bottom of his shirt until he had a strip of cloth long enough to wrap the injury. He tied it off, trying to be gentle, but Trev moaned when he finished the knot.

  “Sorry,” Khim said.

  But Trev didn’t seem to hear.

  The wound looked bad, but Khim was more worried about the shock. He lifted Trev’s wrist and felt the pulse. Rapid, thready. There was nothing to give him for it. Even a blanket for warmth would have been nice. But he had none.

  He touched Trev’s clammy forehead. “Do you feel hot or cold?”

  “Cold.”

  “Stretch out as best you can. I’m turning up the heat.”

  “Okay,” Trev said tiredly.

  For a long time, Khim sat on his heels on the tiny back floor of the flier watching Trev slip in and out of a thin sleep. He listened to the rain pelt their tiny shell. The interior lights threw a sepia tone over everything. Khim’s breath came in strained puffs as the fingers of his left hand made small circles over the back of Trev’s wrist.

  The air in the flier grew hot. He hoped it was enough to make Trev comfortable. At least it contributed to drying their clothes faster.

  Finally, when he became confident that enough time had passed so their pursuers would be long gone, he climbed into the front driver’s seat and fed the flier the coordinates for their destination.

  It was strange not having Trev awake and telling him what to do. And yet it wasn’t, because Trev had told him where to go, had obviously planned this every step of the way in his mind.

  The flier headed on course. The voice from the console, soft and lilting, said, “Two and a half hours to destination.”

  Khim searched the front-seat area for anything he could find to make their trip more comfortable. A discarded sweater. A bottle of water. Anything. But the flier was clean, almost too clean, as if it had just flown right off the sales lot. He wondered whom it had belonged to.

  Finally he leaned back and closed his eyes in exhaustion. The storm spilled around them, weeping in shrill, manic tones. Inside, the flier was warm and humming, a temporary haven.

  Only then did Khim realize how lucky they had been.

  KHIM FELT the flier slow, lean in a circular pattern, straighten, and slow some more.

  Outside the windows, darkness pressed upon the little craft. Khim had slept in the front seat, sitting up. He stretched, then turned, breath catching as he checked on Trev.

  The other man lay very still, but his chest rose and fell, slow and even. Khim let out a sigh of relief.

  The flier was landing now, but he could not see where they were.

  He squinted at the front window, through the heaving rain, and noticed a faint, tremulous glow. He could barely see through the million spears of water, but a light was there. It was real.

  He pushed the front seat down and climbed into the back. “Trev. Wake up. We’re here.”

  Trev’s lashes fluttered, but he did not wake.

  Khim pushed the front seat back up so he could kneel by the backseat and said, “Back door. Open.” The flier door opened onto the sound of water hitting earth, puddles splashing, and the scent of mud, fresh growing things, and a raw edge of decay. The light from the flier sparked the edges of the falling raindrops with gilt, and for a moment, Khim was dazzled.

  He reached out and touched Trev’s chest. His shirt was dry now. Trev’s hair was tangled along the edges of Khim’s balled-up shirt-pillow. He needed to carry him out of there, but hated that they’d have to get wet again. He could feel how cold the air was wafting into the little flier.

  But he didn’t have to make up his own mind. Trev’s orders were clear. Get them to this address.

  He climbed out the back door, rain hitting his bare arms like ice and soaking quickly through his stockinged feet. He reached back in and pulled Trev up and into a seated position on the couch.

  Trev moved a little, mumbling a protest, but did not fight him. The torn shirt bandage still held, tied against the shoulder and upper arm. Now Khim leaned in farther and put his left arm under Trev’s knees, his right under his upper back. He used all his strength to turn him, then lifted him easily into his arms as he straightened under the storm’s unrelenting deluge.

  Trev cried out as the cold water hit him. His back arched; his muscles tensed. Khim held tight. Trev reached out blindly. One hand grabbed Khim’s T-shirt at the shoulder and held on. He cried out a second time and turned his face into Khim’s chest.

  Even in the shocking cold, Khim’s body stayed warm from an upsurge of adrenaline. He hugged Trev tight to him and walked toward the faint, misty glow as if he were made of flame.

  As he moved through the watery air, a distinct shape took form before him. A house, gigantic. At least three stories, like an old-Earth Victorian expanded on, enlarged. Flagstone steps led up to tall blue double doors.

  Four lanterns lighted the way up the steps, their old-fashioned, square-cut glass panes outlined in black iron. The light in them pulsed orange. The deck of the porch was polished oak, as deeply brown as Trev’s eyes.

  Two more lamps shone high on either side of the double doors. A digital screen by the door glowed. Khim pulled Trev close, balancing him easily, then reached forward with his metal hand and tapped the screen. From within came the faint sound of trilling bells. Khim touched the pad again, and the bells resounded.

  It seemed like forever that Khim stood there with Trev tight in his arms, dripping cold water on the bright green welcome mat. Finally, one of the double doors swung open.

  A man stood in flickering shadow, hair purple, glimmering, and long, ti
ed into a braid that curved over his left shoulder. He was tall and broad, with a cool, violet-eyed gaze. He wore a frost-blue coat with tails.

  An android.

  Khim said, “This man says you owe him.”

  “Who’s there?” said a low voice from beyond the greeter.

  Staring at the android’s eyes, Khim said, “Khim. And Trevor Damico.”

  The android stepped back. “You know one of them, sir.”

  A man stepped into view clad in black trousers and a white shirt. He wore a loose red robe about his shoulders. His hair was white, shaved on both sides.

  Khim lifted his head and addressed him, repeating his statement. “This man says you owe him.”

  The man came forward and inspected Trev, who lay delirious, turned away in Khim’s arms, still clutching the sleeve of Khim’s T-shirt. “Trevor Damico?” he asked.

  Khim said, “He told me to bring him here.”

  “Of course. Of course. Come in.”

  It did not matter that the house was warm, that he could smell the woodsy odor of a fire burning in the next room, that the man in the robe and the android by his side were an older, strange mirror of the two of them. Khim still trusted no one.

  “Sir,” Khim said, “the flier outside is stolen.”

  “I have a man who will take care of that,” the white-haired man said.

  “And Trev is in need of medical attention.”

  “I can see that,” the man said. “Renn, is the guest room made up?”

  “Yes, sir,” the android answered.

  “This way.” The man motioned Khim forward.

  They went past a vast front room with a giant walk-in hearth roaring with snapping flames, and on into a more shadowy hall decorated with flaring, cobra-headed sconces.

  The white-haired man opened the second door and went in, waving his hand to make light. The room flooded into being. Khim followed Renn over the threshold and saw an elaborate room, old-fashioned looking, with a giant, soft bed covered in brocade and heavy burgundy curtains closed over the window. The room had several wood chairs, a wood desk, and another door that led, Khim presumed, into a bath.