“Leave a note,” Lida Mae said. “If your husband knows anything about surviving in the wilderness, he’ll know to shelter in place, and he won’t come looking for you until after the storm.”
Nobody answered her. Lida Mae turned her head side to side, her eyes narrowed.
“Your husband and stepson—they do know something about surviving in the wilderness, don’t they?” she asked.
Michael and Jackson are robots, Eryn reminded herself. I bet they’re not in danger from a blizzard anyhow. Everybody’s just acting like they are so Lida Mae doesn’t get suspicious.
But even she didn’t feel like this was true. And she really didn’t know—could robots be ruined in a storm?
Blindly, Eryn snatched up one of the backpacks leaning against the shed wall.
“I’m sure Michael and Jackson will be fine,” she said. It felt like a lie. It felt like anyone could have told she was lying. She soldiered on anyhow. “But, Lida Mae, I’m glad you’re watching out for the rest of us.”
“Er . . . right,” Nick said, following her lead and grabbing his backpack just as blindly. “Thanks, Lida Mae.”
Their movement seemed to wake up everyone else, and a few moments later all of them—three kids, three adults—began following Lida Mae downhill toward the cave’s mouth. The wind was ferocious now, and by the time Eryn reached the bottom of the hill, its gusts contained ice pellets that stung her cheeks.
“Into the cave, into the cave—quick!” Lida Mae shouted, holding out a hand to help them over the chains at the cave’s entrance. “Then if you keep going straight you’ll hit the Rotunda, the big open space where you can wait out the storm. . . .”
Eryn, Nick, and Ava stepped over the chains and past the array of KEEP OUT signs. Dad, Mom, and Brenda stopped on the other side of the chains.
“Young lady, you were right!” Dad told Lida Mae as he shook his wild hair back out of his face. Ice pellets glistened in his curls, and his face was red with the cold. “This is awful! I have to insist: Unless you’re going to ride out the storm with us, you should go back to your family immediately! Before this gets any worse!”
“And maybe some of us should go with you?” Brenda suggested tentatively. “Just to make sure you’re safe?”
Lida Mae’s face tightened.
“Oh no, I’ll be fine,” she said. Her expression broke into a mischievous grin. Eryn wondered if it was fake. “Actually, I’m just going to cut through the cave. That way I can come back and forth to check on you.”
Nick jabbed Eryn in the ribs.
“What if her family lives in the cave?” he whispered. “Or right on top of one of the other entrances?”
“It’s possible,” Eryn admitted. This could have been a good clue, but she didn’t have time to think about it right now. Not when Mom, Dad, and Brenda were still standing so awkwardly on the other side of the chains.
Won’t Lida Mae wonder why they won’t step past the KEEP OUT signs? Eryn wondered. What if they absolutely can’t?
Robots were such rule-followers. The adults had said the night before that Ava and Jackson could easily disobey the warnings, because they hadn’t been designed to think of themselves as robots. But the adults could disobey KEEP OUT signs only if it was their parental duty—only if they needed to protect or rescue their kids.
Eryn took a few steps deeper into the cave. Into the darkness.
“Look, Mom, Dad, Brenda—I’m getting into a dangerous situation,” she called back over her shoulder. “What if there’s a rockslide or a sinkhole, and you’re not here to protect me?”
She tried to make her voice light and teasing, so Lida Mae would think she was just joking around. But robots weren’t always great at detecting humor. So maybe her words alone would enable Mom and Dad to defy the signs and cross the chains and come after her.
“You can’t scare us,” Brenda muttered. “Not after we heard Lida Mae say she’d keep you in safe places.”
“And not when all the evidence we can gather would seem to indicate she’s right,” Mom agreed.
Their words should have sounded cheerful—surely they were glad Lida Mae was going to keep their kids safe. But their tones were glum.
Would Lida Mae notice?
“But . . . the three of you can’t just stand there,” Ava said, her voice ringing with dismay. “You’ll freeze!”
Was Ava trying to trigger some self-preservation response in the adults? Was that another rule robots might have to follow, one that could overrule the need to obey KEEP OUT signs?
Eryn whipped her head back to check the adults’ reaction.
They looked grimmer than ever. Then, suddenly, all three of their expressions brightened.
“Of course we’re not just going to stand here,” Dad announced, squaring his shoulders. “We’re going back to . . .”
“Rescue Michael and Jackson,” Mom finished.
NINETEEN
Ava
“That’s not safe!” Lida Mae cried. The words were ripped from her mouth by the wailing wind. “It doesn’t make any sense! What are you talking about? You’re the adults—you’re supposed to be the sensible ones!”
Ava saw all three adults grit their teeth simultaneously. Maybe the makeshift robot network Mom had built made them a little too similar.
They need to be careful, Ava thought. What can I do to distract Lida Mae?
“Actually,” Ava said, trying for her sweetest, most innocent, most persuasive voice, “they’re just being responsible, Lida Mae. I know you’re trying to take good care of all of us, but the adults really are better in the wilderness than you think. Come on. Let’s get to the safe place in the cave, and the adults can join us later.”
She grabbed Lida Mae’s arm and tugged. Maybe Ava’s parents should have designed Ava with a little more strength—or maybe Ava herself should have added that—because Lida Mae shrugged off Ava’s hand and ignored her.
“This is pure dad-blame craziness!” Lida Mae exclaimed. “You’re proving you don’t understand wilderness conditions, just by saying you plan to go traipsing out into a blizzard. People get lost in these conditions if they don’t take shelter! People die!”
“Mom, Dad—you will be safe, won’t you?” Eryn practically whimpered.
She doesn’t actually know, Ava realized. Nick and Eryn aren’t sure how much cold and ice robots can withstand.
“Tell Eryn they can survive better in a blizzard than the two of you,” Ava whispered in Nick’s ear. He was standing closer, and Ava didn’t think she could say something directly to Eryn without Lida Mae hearing her too.
“Don’t worry,” Ava’s stepmother, Denise, said calmly. “We’ll take every precaution.”
The other two adults nodded beside her, just as calmly.
“If you were taking every precaution, you’d come on into the cave with your kids!” Lida Mae protested. “That’s ‘taking every precaution’!”
“Here,” Donald said, handing flashlights across the chains to Ava and Nick. “This way you kids have two of the lights and we’ll have two. For later. When we come back to the cave with Jackson and Michael.”
He might as well have added a wink-wink-nod-nod gesture. Ava knew he was trying to tell her and his own kids, You know none of us adults can go past these signs unless we think you’re in danger. Which you’re not. But we have to pretend we can, so Lida Mae doesn’t get suspicious. That’s why we can’t give you all the flashlights.
“No!” Lida Mae shouted. “I insist! Come into the cave now!”
She grabbed for Donald’s arm, but he jerked it away. The motion pulled Lida Mae toward the chains, and she fell over them.
“Sorry,” Donald mumbled, backing away even more. “But we’ve got to go. Now. Before the snow gets worse. Kids, be careful. And stay in the cave.”
All three adults spun around and began scrambling up the hill again.
Ava and Nick tried to help Lida Mae up, but she seemed fighting mad. She kept shaking their hand
s off, shoving them away.
“Let go!” she screamed at Ava and Nick.
“Come back!” she screamed at the adults.
The adults didn’t stop. They started running instead, getting farther and farther away. Lida Mae hurdled the chains and took off after them.
“Mom? Dad? Brenda? Lida Mae? Wait!” Eryn screamed from behind Ava. “Let us come too! Don’t leave us behind!”
Ava grabbed Eryn’s arm before Eryn could leap over the chains. Maybe Ava had gotten stronger in the past two minutes; maybe Eryn just wasn’t as determined or forceful as Lida Mae. Even though Eryn tried to pull away, Ava held firm.
For good measure, Ava reached out and grabbed Nick’s arm too.
“Think,” she whispered to the other two kids. “You two really would be in danger of dying out there. The adults will be fine. They’ll just find somewhere to hide from Lida Mae. And Lida Mae can take care of herself.”
Eryn jerked back, and this time Ava let go.
“I . . . I wasn’t really scared,” Eryn said stiffly. “I was trying to trigger that—what’s it called? The parental imperative?—in Mom and Dad. So maybe they would be able to come into the cave with us, if they thought it was the only alternative to us wandering around in some blizzard with them.”
Ava thought maybe Eryn was lying. Or exaggerating, anyway. She really did look scared, with her lips pressed tightly together and her eyebrows furrowed with worry.
Up the hill, the adults and Lida Mae disappeared into the swirling whiteness.
“Are you sure our parents are all right out there?” Nick asked plaintively. “And Michael and Jackson, too, I guess . . . Can robots withstand extreme cold and snow and ice? Can they survive a blizzard?”
“Of course they can,” Ava said, her voice coming out strong and confident. “No problem. Remember how all the embryos that were used to restart the human race were frozen for centuries? Didn’t you think about how there were robots taking care of them? So robots are great with cold temperatures. And ice and snow.”
And . . . now I’m lying, Ava thought, amazed at herself. Or at least passing off false logic as truth.
There was a difference between robots temporarily dealing with frozen embryos and robots running through a blizzard for a long period of time. Yes, robots could withstand bad weather better than humans could, but they could break down in extreme cold. Their circuitry and memory cards could be destroyed by long exposure to ice and snow.
But if I tell Eryn and Nick that, they really will go running out into the snow after their parents, Ava thought. They’re humans. Ruled by emotion, not logic. I have to lie to save them.
Was that why the lie flowed off her tongue so easily? Almost as if it had been . . . programmed?
Do I have programming I never discovered before? Ava wondered. Just because I’ve never been in a situation before where I could influence anyone making a life-or-death decision? Did Dad—and Mom—design Jackson and me to have the same obligation to save humans that they themselves have? To value human needs and lives above our own?
If that was the case, why wasn’t Ava worried about Lida Mae?
While Ava was standing there trying to figure her own self out, Eryn and Nick were both leaning out over the chains, as if still trying to catch a glimpse of the adults and Lida Mae out in the snow beyond.
Ava pulled them both back.
“Come on,” she said. “You’re going to get frostbite standing there. Let’s go to that Rotunda that Lida Mae was talking about.”
Eryn frowned. Nick stomped his feet.
But they both still followed Ava deeper into the cave.
TWENTY
Jackson
Dragging his father’s body, Jackson reached the edge of the woods with one ear cocked to listen for the sound of a police car behind him.
Not yet, not yet . . .
His progress across the highway and the grassy dividing strip and ditch had been slower than he’d wanted, because he’d paused a few times to make sure he wasn’t leaving footprints or drag marks on the ground. He was just lucky the ground was so frozen and the wind was so brisk, erasing his tracks.
So as long as I didn’t miscalculate . . .
Miles down the road, he heard a vehicle slow down, maneuver its tires from blacktop onto gravel, and then speed back toward him and Dad.
Okay, so they’ve turned around, and now they’ll see my van off the other side of the road in . . . oh, just under 10.235 seconds, Jackson told himself. But they won’t be able to see me once I step past this next tree.
Jackson forced himself to take six more steps, dodging six more trees. Then he risked a slight pause, leaning his father’s body against a stump for a moment. He surveyed the path he’d just taken, and brushed aside a few broken twigs that might have given them away. He settled the dead leaves he’d disturbed back into place.
“There,” Jackson muttered, as if his dad could hear him. “All better.”
He estimated that the cops would spend at least an hour searching the other side of the highway before they realized he could have scrambled over to a more distant hiding place—an action that would defy all robot logic.
Did that mean he had time to reboot his father? And then let Dad rewire Jackson’s innards too?
Jackson went back to listening intently, even as he lifted Dad again and started tugging him toward a small clearing in the woods ahead. Once he determined it was safe, he and Dad would need space to work. Jackson tuned out the wind whipping around him and shrieking through the branches overhead. Behind all that, he could hear car doors slamming. Someone let out a whistle.
“See how that thing’s parked?” a woman’s voice asked.
“Did you see how he whipped around that corner?” a man replied.
It slowed him down, but Jackson risked glancing back toward the road again. He could see nothing behind him now but dense woods; even leafless, the trees blocked out any glimpse of the highway or the cops’ car. That meant the cops’ words came through so clearly because of Jackson’s extraordinary hearing—not because they were close enough to see him. Jackson estimated they were 0.6382 miles away. Give or take.
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” the female cop asked.
“Juvenile,” the male replied. “And I mean, a young juvenile. Twelve or under.”
“So . . . human,” the woman agreed. “No robot—not even a teenaged robot—would drive like that.”
Shows how much you two know, Jackson thought. I am capable of driving every bit as recklessly as a human!
But it worried him that they had concluded he was an illegal driver—and a kid—so quickly. He tried to lift Dad higher and take bigger steps. The wind blew dead leaves around behind them.
“This means all bets are off, figuring out where to look for this juvenile delinquent,” the male cop said. “This fugitive from the law.”
“Exactly,” the female cop said. “Anyone who drives like that—well, you can’t expect him to make any logical decisions.”
Oh, crap, Jackson thought, picking up his pace even more. They figured that out way too fast.
He didn’t have time to stop and reboot Dad. He didn’t have time to fix his own circuitry, no matter how frayed his wires were. And he really didn’t have time to break down.
No, no, not going to do that, Jackson assured himself. You’re fine. Dad’s counting on you. . . .
Maybe it would help to forget about the cops and just concentrate on walking? Dragging Dad meant Jackson had to go backward, his head turned awkwardly to watch where he was going. One foot back. Then the other. Then the first foot again . . .
Dad’s head thudded against Jackson’s chest. Jackson struggled to pull his father’s body over a downed log. But his muscles already ached, and by his estimation the campsite was still more than ten miles away. That was if he dared to go straight to the campsite, rather than taking a roundabout way to throw the cops off his trail.
I should have given myself s
uperhuman strength and running skills when I had the chance, Jackson thought. He and Ava had never upgraded their athletic skills. It had always seemed like physical changes would be too hard to hide. But Jackson regretted that now.
“Don’t worry, Dad,” Jackson whispered. “I’m strong enough. I’m fast enough too. I’m going to make it back to the campsite before those cops find me. No problem. Don’t worry. I’ve got this covered. . . . I do. . . .”
Jackson’s head swam. He heard a rustling off in the distance that had to be a twig snapping under the weight of somebody’s foot.
Just an animal, he told himself. Just a squirrel or a chipmunk or . . .
He couldn’t help himself. He turned and looked back toward the highway.
See? No one’s there, he told himself. You might be hearing a mouse in someone’s house back in that town you left fifteen minutes ago. . . . You might be hearing a snowflake falling a mile away. . . .
That was the disadvantage of enhanced hearing. Sometimes it was hard to figure out what was important and what wasn’t, when he heard everything.
Out of the cacophony of little sounds he heard the crackle of a police radio, and then the female cop’s voice: “Requesting backup . . .”
Jackson shifted his father’s weight and started trying to run. But his gait was awkward with his arms around his father’s chest, his father’s legs dragging. What was more important: going fast, or not leaving a noticeable trail? Dad’s torso slipped to the side, and Jackson tilted the other way to keep Dad from falling to the ground. Now he was running backward and sideways, his neck bent, his hands clutching Dad’s armpits. The bag of electronic supplies thudded against his leg, an echo to Dad’s feet jolting against the ground.
And then Jackson tripped.
No, no, his brain screamed as he fell. There’s no time for this! Not when there are going to be swarms of cops looking for me . . .
Desperately, he tried to ease his fall, simultaneously going down on one knee, jerking Dad’s body higher, and twisting even more to the side so that Dad at least wouldn’t hit the ground with full force. But that meant that the weight of Dad’s body landed on Jackson.