“Just do it, and take that fucking thing away from your face.”
Dad pinched the midsection of the lizard between the index finger and thumb of his left hand.
“What the fuck?!” He whipped the lizard to his ground and jumped back. The creature’s neck was whipped back with the force of his throw and it moved no longer.
“What? What is it? Did it bite you?” If he was bitten we were shit out of luck out here for medicine and it was several days’ walk back to the colony.
“No, no. I’m just fine. It wasn’t that. It’s just that...” He stared off for a couple of seconds as if trying to figure out what to say. “When I pinched its midsection, I felt something like a motor moving. But that’s impossible...” I tapped the lizard’s body with my boot. When it didn’t move, I picked it up and splayed its lifeless form across my palm.
“It’s a machine.” My father’s voice had grown small and distant. “How the hell is that possible?”
“I don’t know.” I turned the simulacra over in my hand. It was stunningly complex; the motor inside the thing was impossibly tiny. Its spine was made up of joined metallic plates, rounded and connected by a mass of tiny cords in the center like a spinal cord. The clicking noise I heard was the clicking of its metallic limbs moving against its flexible outer covering. “It looks like a robotic imitation of a lizard.” Dad didn’t say anything. I used the tip of my utility knife to pry open the machine’s eyes, shuttered by minuscule plates. The color was gone from them now, the artificial light extinguished by the severing of its power source to the rest of the body.
“Fuck.” He breathed. “How could something like this even exist?”
“We’re going to have to figure that out later. I’ll stash it in my bag. If it somehow comes back to life, it won’t be able to go very far. At least, I hope.”
“All right.” He got back on the ground and held the scope to his eye. The appearance of a new form of robotic life scared the hell out of me. I could only imagine what it was doing to him. Asking him about it wasn’t going to help. For the next couple of hours, we had to stay on task.
“Give me the scope, Dad. You should fill your belly with something. It’s getting really cold out here.” I took it from him and proffered an MRE. He took it gratefully and sat on the ground next to me. The smell from his packet made my stomach growl. Whatever it was smelled far more appetizing than whatever it was I ate. I leaned on the ground so hard that my fingers were starting to go numb from the circulation being cut off. The last thing I wanted was to go back to Eliza with only the robotic lizard to show for myself. I was just as hopeful as anyone that we were going to find signs of civilization out here. I was ready to give up when I saw movement on the ground.
A slim profile emerged from one of the buildings and started across the wide street. It didn’t appear to look around. Maybe there was some kind of fencing around the city to offer that level of protection? I adjusted the scope lens but couldn’t see with much more detail. The figure appeared to be clad in some kind of dark clothing; its arms and legs were covered in black. Black hair sprouted from the head. Whoever it was must have sensed me watching them because they turned their head from side to side. When their gaze swung toward me, it felt like my entire body was encased in ice.
Their eyes glowed an unnatural bright green, like the lizard’s eyes had. I dropped the scope, hearing the fragile instrument crash onto stone.
The ‘person’ I was looking at wasn’t a person at all.
I was looking at an android.
Chapter Eleven
“What is it?” I heard my father’s concerned voice call in the distance. Blood rushed through my ears as I struggled to figure out a coherent explanation. Perhaps the person had been wearing night vision goggles. That might make their eyes glint the wrong color in the scope.
“I saw someone.”
“That’s great! Where?” He bent to pick up the scope but I slapped his hand away. “Fiona, what...?”
“Don’t. Whoever it is saw me with the scope. For all we know they’ve run off to alert the others. Stay low for now. We’ll wait a little longer until the dawn. As soon as light starts coming over the horizon, we’ll get back to Eliza and the others.”
Dad settled himself into the long grass next to the rocky outcropping and I joined him, taking care to leave space between us. I didn’t want him to feel me shaking. Our meager pile of equipment lay in the open but there was nothing I could do. If the android had seen the lens of my scope from that far away, a few bags stuck out like a sore thumb. We had already been sighted. There was no use in worrying about it now.
“Did they do something to make you think they’re returning with hostile intent?” Dad’s eyes stayed fixed to mine. I cursed my position. No amount of calming my breathing would fool him. I had been a bad liar as a kid, and I was an even worse one now. Better to come out with the truth before he figured it out.
“I don’t know that what I saw was a person.”
His brow furrowed. “What do you mean you don’t know whether or not what you saw was a person? I doubt you mistook an animal for a human, honey! If it walks on two legs, it’s generally one of us. Though I wouldn’t put
