Virginia’s nose wrinkles in confusion. “That can’t be the most secure place.”
“Mansfield can control virtually every mech in existence,” Abel replies. “He can secure any location he wishes. His health wouldn’t permit him to move around very much.”
He remembers the last time they were together, how fragile Mansfield was, how Abel had felt so protective of his elderly creator. All that time, Mansfield had planned to kill him that very night.
Virginia leans close. “Cray to Abel. Cray calling Abel. Come in.”
As though he hadn’t stopped speaking, he continues, “The house is the most logical base of operations. What we must determine is the exact nature of the threat to Noemi, so that I can arrive prepared to counteract it.”
Forty-five hours, two minutes, twenty-eight seconds.
“If you screw up my ride,” Virginia says, one finger in Abel’s face, “and fail to bring it back to Cray in one piece, there won’t be anywhere in this entire galaxy far enough away for you to hide from my vengeance.”
He nods, glancing across the docking bay to see Zayan securing Virginia’s flashy red corsair in the Persephone’s bay; his movements on Earth can only remain undetected if he’s traveling in a ship that wasn’t previously owned by Burton Mansfield, one Mansfield would know how to track. Virginia’s generosity means he can dock the Persephone elsewhere but remain mobile. “Understood. If I damage the corsair, I’ll need to find a wormhole to another galaxy.”
“That’s not what I meant!”
Twenty-three hours, thirty-seven seconds.
A landing dock in Namibia provides as good a hiding place for the Persephone as any. Long-term storage fees are reasonable, and security is tight. Abel pays Harriet and Zayan their advances and tells them farewell.
“It may be some time before I can return,” Abel says. “If the two of you find other work that interests you, I’ll understand if you choose to take it. But I hope you’ll decide to stay.”
They look at each other in mutual, almost comic disbelief before Zayan says, “Abel, do you really not get it? We’d never make this much doing anything but radium mining.” The radium mines on Stronghold’s largest moon are notorious for paying well but providing inadequate radiation shielding. Miners regularly die within five years of taking the job. Some people take it anyway. “Besides, we like you.”
More subdued, Harriet says, “Noemi’s a survivor. If anyone can make it through, she can. And you’d better come back to us safe and sound, too. Got it?”
“Got it.” Abel finds her words illogical. No one can know the future. But he is unexpectedly pleased to realize how concerned Harriet and Zayan are about his welfare. These people he met only months ago care for him more truly than his “father” ever did.
They depart on a noontime shuttle to Rangpur to visit Zayan’s family. For no reason he can name, Abel watches their shuttle take off and fly away until the distant dot in the sky disappears from even the farthest range of his vision.
Twenty-two hours, thirty-six seconds.
One hour provides sufficient time between Harriet and Zayan’s departure and his own that no random security check should find any link between the two. The instant he can, Abel slides the corsair’s cockpit closed and prepares to fly.
Virginia’s corsair is a top-of-the-line personal cruiser. It can seat three at most, and sleeps perhaps two, assuming those individuals are sexually involved or extremely good friends. The lone mag engine may not compare to the massive ones on the Persephone, but it’s powerful enough to take this ship from one side of a system to another in good time. While the interior is luxurious, the exterior is even more flamboyant to Abel’s eyes. Shiny red paint, exaggerated curves, chrome trim and fins that serve no aerodynamic purpose: The aesthetic reminds him of ancient automobiles of the mid-twentieth century.
It’s also a ship that tends to attract attention, but Abel isn’t worried about that. Mansfield believes he has the situation under control. He’ll expect nothing from Abel but compliance.
The vision clarifies in Abel’s mind so swiftly, so vividly, that it feels almost real: Walking into Burton Mansfield’s home again, hearing the soft chimes of the grandfather clock, seeing Mansfield sitting in an easy chair with his hands outstretched. Mansfield saying, “You came back. You came to save me after all.”
“Yes, Father. I could never abandon you.”
If this were actually to happen, Abel would swiftly be shown into the basement laboratory, invited to lie down on a metal table, and, he suspects, be strapped down. Mansfield wouldn’t trust him not to change his mind.
But when Abel imagines the scene, he envisions a different ending:
Mansfield saying, “I could never hurt you, my boy.” Holding out his arms. “Your girl is safe. I’m so sorry. Everything’s all right again.”
Abel being folded in his creator’s embrace. “I love you, Father.”
“I love you, too.”
Directive One should be such a simple piece of programming to obey, but it turns against him sometimes, providing dreams like that one. Delusions. Falsehoods. Directive One lies. He must remember that.
The ready lights glow green on the corsair’s console. Abel hits ignition, and the corsair streaks upward, aiming beyond the sky.
Twenty-one hours, twenty-six minutes, two seconds.
London looks even more worn-down to Abel than it did when he was last here not quite six months prior. Upon reviewing his memory files, he cannot justify this impression; the state of disrepair is actually very similar. But apparently something deep within him insists upon comparing this to the London he remembers from thirty years ago, the one that still possessed more of its vitality and hope. For him, that past vision is more real than reality.
A curious paradox. He’ll have to discuss that with—someone, someday.
After stowing Virginia’s corsair in a public dock, using a false name, he hurries to a public-access info station. This takes him through Trafalgar Square, past the remnant of Nelson’s Column that still stands after a lightning strike a century before. The bustle of a large Earth city is like nothing
