"I'll admit, sometimes the extent of my Human Code surprises me. This kind of technology should be impossible..."

*

Theorists got it wrong. Worlds do not crumble in three days under distress. It takes three hours. And if there is a stronger party, they'd plant their feet flat on the earth and raise their flag without questions asked.

Androids had risen every banner ever made in their honor. Bionics proud. And there was nothing anyone could do about it.

As Mary and I stood out back, watching Will rush to grab his car out of the store's small parking lot, I thought the same about me-there was nothing I could do about it. I was an Android in the law's eyes, meaning I was expendable. But to the droids, I was... I wasn't sure. That bot out at the school's parking lot wanted me to find him and took Wendy with him as leverage. It was a game of cat and mouse, I was sure of it.

Except... I wouldn't be the mouse in this game. I was never one for losing, either.

Mary put her hand on my chest to press me against the store's brick wall. I looked down at her fingers, almost pale with fear, before I looked at her face. My sensors picked up on her pulse, heart racing past what was healthy. The whites in her eyes were almost ghostly, as though she were two steps away from death.

Reaching up, I touched her hand, just as Will slowly pulled the car in front of us. "Breathe," I told her.

Will unlocked the doors, nervously glancing around the streets nearby. It was quiet; not a person, not a droid. Fires on front lawns were brighter than streetlamps. Their crackling flames were our only noise.

"I can't breathe," she whispered as she dropped her hand and reached for the car's door. She didn't bother to look at me as she dipped into the backseat. "I can't..."

My hand pulled at the passenger-side handle, pulling it slowly. Like Will had done, I looked up and around the street. There wasn't an electrical rush, no static. We were in the clear.

I hope.

"You can." Closing my side door, I turned back, arm draped over the headrest of my seat. "Breathe with me."

Her emotions sparked. Temperature increased. All while my battery life flashed in the corners of my eyes.

Battery at ninety-one percent.

I hadn't been fixed.

"Can we do this woo-sah later?" Will asked, hands nervously on ten and two. "You guys want me to take you where?"

It was funny how I knew... funny because science or Bionics couldn't explain it. Mary had said she reconnected my systems, so I'd function differently. Because of it, I saw my state map differently than I had hours before. The Bionics facilities, their "drop-off point" for broken droids-I knew them as well as the back of my hand. And no one had to tell me a thing.

I just needed help getting there.

Digging into my computer's files, I retrieved the address we needed to get to. "The I-90." I shot Will a side-glance. "There are a few old warehouses about seven miles down."

"Seven?" Will's hands gripped the wheel. I heard the rubber squeak under his hands. "Seven miles?"

It was clear I was the only one in my right state of mine. Yes, I'd reacted on impulse earlier. And yes, I feel. But when it came down to it, my path was set in front of me-point A. I needed to get to point B.

"Right." Reaching around the steering wheel, I tapped the digital dashboard on Will's car. The menu came up, requesting commands, awaiting input. I ignored every option and pressed my palm flat against the screen. The car hummed with the connection as I tapped into its Bionics sensors. "I'm uploading the directions now. Following the streets I've provided will get us there in half an hour, tops."

Will did nothing but blink. Behind us, Mary had scooted forward on the very edge of her seat. I didn't need to look at her to know the expression on her face.

Shock. Confusion.

"Just do it." I slammed my hand against the dashboard and gritted my teeth. "Move."

|||

Do it.

Move.

These became nothing but words to me; unmade commands. As the car drove down the empty streets, passed the abandoned patrol cars and mini-vans with open doors, my composure started to crack. Break. Right down the middle.

Law enforcement bordered the intersections at the end of our town, but it wasn't to stop people; they were hunting droids. Which meant pushing my seat far back to hide was easier than I thought. Will passed them without looking out the windows, and Mary double-checked-a quick glanced back-but they didn't pay us any attention.

That only meant Androids were on their radar. My small Bionics beacon wasn't what they needed. And I didn't know it until we were just half a mile from the warehouse I'd noted on the map.

I felt it in the air; the pull, the tension.

Static...

In my head again...

The closer we got, the harder it was to move, to breathe. My sensors went haywire, picking up on signals from every part of town. I squeezed my eyes shut to get rid of the feeling, but that pull tugged at my chest, my artificial lungs, and I took in a deep, hard breath.

Interference.

It wasn't until we were just feet from the massive building and its dark windows that I reached out and grabbed Will's arm like it'd been falling off his shoulders. My fingers dug into his skin, nails into his sweater, and he shouted at me, trying to yank himself free. "Dude!"

"Stop the car, Will." Mary reached both hands out from the backseat and grabbed my arm. Yet, I didn't look at her when she did it. My eyes were forward, focused, searching. My sensors picked up on the location of bots and people.

And Wendy.

"Javi." Mary gave my arm a hard shark. "Hey, listen to me."

"I see her." My fingers slid away from Will's arm as the car finally stopped. He pulled it close to him, gripping it tight. And I leaned forward, hands on the glove compartment. Just before us, I could see the warehouse light up with tiny location markers, like a Christmas tree. Wendy's signal was at the lowest level.

"Wendy?" Mary had moved between Will and me to look ahead. She couldn't see what I saw, but I knew she was aware of the number of droids inside. "Where is she?"

"There." I pointed ahead, at the far back end of the warehouse. "There's a bot beside her, and..."

The interference returned, static, and feedback covered over my vision. For a moment, all I saw was white snow. Leaning forward, I pressed my forehead against my hands and tried to will it away. Mentally, I told myself to work to be functional.

Don't break down. Not again. Think, Javi. Think.

"Will." I listened as Mary sat back in her seat. "Do you think you can pull the car over there, into the trees?"

Sparks went off under my skin. In my head, I could see Wendy's face. Smiling, happy, always full of life. When I lifted my head and found I could see the warehouse again, emotion gripped my chest.

She'd been screaming for me in that van, begging me to save her. And I didn't do it.

Yet, as I pushed myself back into my seat, my sensors cleared themselves up and I found Wendy's signal again; alone. Stretching my fingers, I cracked the knuckles on my left hand.

"Do I stay with the car?" Will nervously asked. "Do I-"

"Stay with it," I said, my voice deeper than I'd expected. "Hide in the trees. Stay out of sight."

"But-"

As Will opened his mouth to complain, I turned and looked at him. Judging by the look on his face, he could see the emotion on mine.

Anger.

"Stay in here, Will. Better to be here, in the trees, than Mary's original plan of feeding you to the murder-bots-"

Mary scoffed, taken aback in the backseat.

"-So, I need you to be safe, all right? I refuse to lose track of anyone else."

Will's face softened, and his hands went lax, dropping from the wheel. He glanced back at Mary, as did I, and the two of us watched as her eyes widened in disbelief. Her stare bounced from him to me, then out the front of the car where she focused on the warehouses. I wanted to read her thoughts, whatever ran through her mind. My sensors could only tell me so much.

Fear. Excitement. Determination.

"What will we do when we get in?" she asked as I opened the car door.

My hand settled on the handle, my foot on asphalt before I looked at her. What she said repeated in my head.

And she spoke again. "Do we grab her and run?"

The handle bent under the pressure of my sudden grip. I hesitated. Thinking. Feeling. Waves of energy rushing over me as the interference returned. For a second, I heard the sound of crashing waves.

"I know they're all broken, but I think I can-"

I turned back to look at her before I stepped out of the car. With just my head inside and hands on the door, I shook my head and met her confused gaze. "You're not coming with me."