Embarkment 2577 (30 page)

“What happened?”

I wondered the same thing. Adam said, “If you take
over here I’ll start work on the mainframe. I’ll have to go through all the
code.”

All
the code for a
starship? Jia’Lyn seemed to share my sentiment; she stared at him. Then, she
held out a sweet smelling box to me. “That’ll take a while. You’ll need your
lunch.”

“Thank you.”

I plodded after him to the mainframe enclosure. Could
I bring food in there? “Do you think Anya is okay? She would be in there,
wouldn’t she?”

“At this time a day she’d probably be in her mobile
emitter. I’ll keep an eye out for her.”

He turned towards me and I drowned in his eyes. I had
missed him more than I had words to say. He trailed his fingers over my cheek
and murmured, “You can go home if you want to. I promise to come by there
before I go anywhere else.”

It took an effort to pull free from the tug of his
gaze, but I gave my head a slight shake. “No… If it’s okay with you I’d rather
stay here.”

“Of course.” He brushed his lips against mine, but the
kiss was much too brief.

“Adam…”

He already stood by a terminal, and glanced over his
shoulder when I spoke.

“What is it, sweetheart?”

“Nothing… I’m just so glad you’re back.”

Understatement. I was so relieved I wanted to weep. He
smiled and sent me another hypnotic stare. “I’m glad to be back.”

I took a seat on the floor and opened the lunch box.

“Did she get you something good?”

“Yes she did. Miniature spring rolls. Want some?”

“No, thank you.”

The old routine of me asking and him declining reassured
me. Maybe life was back to normal.

I was still eating when Blake and Jia’Lyn came in. “It
appears the ship is safe. Would you care to explain what’s going on here?”

Adam paused the lines of code that flew over a screen
faster than my eyes could register. “Eve planted code in me as a failsafe in
case her plan was unsuccessful. I suspect I was supposed to realize something
was wrong and connect to the mainframe to run tests.”

He never did, of course. The code couldn’t spread to
the ship, and gave him bigger and bigger problems instead.

“I knew something was wrong, but I failed in removing
the danger. My apologies.”

My fault. I deactivated him so we could reconnect him.
“You told me the ship was about to explode. How did you know?”

“When the last piece of code transferred out of me I
was only aware of my base programming. She left a few lines of code there. I
guess she counted on me leaving so she could pick me up somewhere. I’d be rid
of everything tying me to the world of humans, and we could take over the world
in peace and quiet. It would have succeeded if you hadn’t been there.”

I blushed. “I didn’t do much.”

“You connected me to reality. For you, I could
override the command to leave the ship.”

Wow. He really loved me.

Blake looked between us. “Alright. Adam, report to my
office as soon as you’re done here. Jia’Lyn, you have the ship. Eve is out
there somewhere, keep an eye for her. I’m going home for a few.”

The frown on our captain’s face made my heart sink.
None of the things that happened were really Adam’s fault, he kept the
malicious code contained for weeks and almost destroyed himself in the process,
but there would be repercussions for hurting people and nearly blowing the ship
up. This time it would probably be worse than a house arrest. Deactivation
seemed a bit steep, but maybe he’d end up in the brig. The thought of being
separated again made me want to weep.

I had too much time to think and tears brimming in my
eyes. I needed to distract myself, so I decided to count up to a hundred thousand
and backwards down again. It was extremely boring and probably a bit insane,
but it worked: I didn’t cry.

I was at thirty four thousand three hundred and sixty
seven when John came by. He peeked in through the door in an almost comical
way. “No hostile officers in here?”

I waved to come in. “The coast is clear.”

He fixed me with eyes identical to my husband’s.
“Anya’s seeing a patient. She wanted me to tell you she’s fine.”

The news raised a boulder from my chest.

John lifted an eyebrow and bobbed his head towards
Adam, clearly asking if he was alright. I nodded, and he stepped up to pat
Adam’s back. “It’s good to have you with us.”

Adam turned the chair around and faced his father. As
always, the likeness amazed me. “I know what you’ve done for Alex when I
couldn’t. Thank you.”

Interesting. I hadn’t mentioned that.

John looked embarrassed. “Any time, son. What’s going
on here, anyway?”

My husband explained and John grimaced, turning his
attention to me. “I don’t want to scare you, but if Eve is anything like her
mother, she’ll be back. It wouldn’t surprise me if they have Cheryl’s
vindictive brain transferred to a computer somewhere it can plan mischief and
disaster for decades to come.”

That was an unwanted and unnerving thought. Maybe this
truly was a time when you wouldn’t get rid of people even when they died.

How had John and Cheryl ended up together anyway? I
didn’t want to ask, not in the computer hall. Maybe she wasn’t always crazy.
Maybe she’d been a sweet girl when they met. Deeming from Eve’s looks, she must
have been drop dead gorgeous.

When John left, I rested my hand on Adam’s shoulder.
“You’ve been keeping tabs on me.”

“Of course.”

I probably shouldn’t probe, but it was impossible not
to. “So… How did that work out for you?”

“Not good.”

He returned his attention to the computer, and it was
clearly the end of the discussion. All these past weeks I thought he just
ignored me, but he must have watched from a distance. That was both sweet and
heart-breaking.

If he wanted to crush Anya’s processor for talking to
me, I couldn’t even imagine what he must have wanted to do to
John
for
being there every day and every night. He had slept on our sofa for weeks,
chased away my imaginary monsters, and comforted me after more nightmares than
I could count.

“He loves you, you know.”

“Not like that. He loves Anya.”

“I know.” Adam flashed a wry smile. “But he’s enough
like me to love you too.”

I never thought of that.

Minutes ticked by and became hours, but time didn’t
seem too long. In spite of everything going wrong, we were together.

Finally, Adam lifted his warm eyes to meet mine. “I’m
done.”

“Really? All of it?”

“All of it. The computer is getting back online. Come,
I’ll walk you home.”

He would walk me home because he couldn’t come in,
because he had to see the Captain. I was queasy and wanted to cry again. There
was no hiding emotions from him; he saw every twitch of a muscle and every
change in a person’s pupils.

“Don’t look so sad. It will probably be alright. I’ll
come home as soon as I can.”

“You’d better.”

The overhead lights came on and seemed unnaturally
bright compared to the earlier dusk.

“See, it’s all fixed.”

We walked hand in hand to the lift. It was empty, and
once the doors closed he pulled me tight. “There aren’t enough words to say
it, but I’m so sorry. For everything.”

I didn’t know what to say. I held on to him, kept my
face buried against his chest, and nodded.

He walked with me all the way to the door. “I wish you
could stay.”

“I do too. But I must face the consequences of my
actions just like everyone else. Trust me, the Captain has told me this many
times the past few weeks. I’ll be back, and I’ll let you know what’s
happening.”

I hurried inside so he wouldn’t have to see me cry.

*****

I roamed around the large rooms feeling like a stranger.
Maybe the soul of our home died from lack of usage, or at least slumbered?
“Stop projecting yourself on the room.”

It was good advice, even when presented with my own
voice, but it didn’t do me any good. I just got him back, and if I lost him again
I’d break. Full scale mental breakdown, here I come. Waiting powerless was
already getting to me, and he’d only been gone a few minutes.

I rummaged around in the bedroom closet, lacking
anything better to do, and my heart froze when I heard the front door open. The
computer would ask whether to let visitors in, and Adam couldn’t be back so
soon. Who else could it be? I peeked out with a mix of dread and curiosity.

After John’s words of Eve coming back I expected a
vindictive, platinum blonde android to stand there. I could almost hear her
voice demanding to know how I dared cross her plans.

A moment later, I threw myself into Adam’s arms. He
caught me easily and held me tight, my toes dangling a good foot or so over the
floor. “I didn’t expect you back so soon.”

He looked content. “I have three days’ house arrest
for almost killing a crewman.”

Three days and nights of pure bliss. “We have the best
Captain.”

“Yes we do.”

“Should I call him and thank him?”

Adam smiled. “No.”

“So… Three days of just you and me. What should we
do?”

His eyes glittered. “I’m sure we can think of
something.”

I woke in the middle of the night, certain I felt
Eve’s unrelenting fingers strangle me.

“Alex… Alex, it’s me. I’m here, it’s okay.”

Eve’s face from my dream morphed into Adam’s. He held
my hands so I couldn’t hurt myself while tearing at the invisible enemy’s grip
around my throat.

“You’re home. You’re safe.”

I stared into his eyes for a long moment, just to make
sure it really was him and not John or a dream. When certain my senses weren’t
playing a prank on me, I threw my arms around him. He held me and stroked my
hair.

“Can I get you anything?”

“No. Just… be here.”

“I’m here.”

I eventually fell asleep again in his arms. Having him
there was a relief. I could cling to him as much as I wanted, and he had the
patience of an angel.

Three days passed much too quickly, and as much as I
tried to be normal and ready for him to go back to work, I didn’t succeed very
well. Daytime wasn’t too bad, but evenings found me jittery if I had to be
alone in a room. Adam normally worked all night and a shorter shift during the
day. The mere thought of him leaving every evening made me cry.

The day I feared arrived much too soon and Adam’s
symbolic house arrest was over. Early in the morning, I slept with my head on
his shoulder, and woke from him moving me to a pillow. I tried to hold on, but
he slipped out of my arms.

“Where are you going?”

“I’m going to work. We have this big starship just
waiting to find trouble.”

I had to laugh in spite of all. “Now? What time is
it?”

He kissed the tip of my nose. “Ssch, it’s early, go
back to sleep.”

“But…”

My husband tucked me in. “I’ve pulled in some favours.
I’ll work daytime until you’re feeling better. I figured you’d rather have me
gone in the mornings than at night.”

“Yes, I can handle mornings. Thank you.”

He brushed his fingers over my cheek. “I love you.”

The upcoming weeks and months were so
blissfully calm they were almost boring, probably because he put extra effort
into protecting me from the world. I was grateful; I needed downtime.

I still expected
something
to
happen. Surely the ship would be overrun by space monkeys, or maybe the entire
crew would revert into iguanas. Adam laughed. “You’ve watched too much TV.”

After four months of peace and quiet I
wasn’t exactly myself again, but probably as close to it as I would get. Adam
went back to his regular schedule, and I worked on my history projects, trying
to convey as much as I could remember of the early 21
^st
century. I
still suffered dark moments, however, and one day John chuckled, “I’d tell you
to start drinking, I mean, that’s what
I
did, but there’s nothing to
drink on this boat.”

I never figured out if he was serious or
not. Either way, he made me feel better. If Cheryl could have such an impact on
someone like
him,
I didn’t have to be ashamed for being so affected by
Eve, Cain, or anything else that happened.

One day, Adam came home with a hologram
of a bug. It hovered prettily in the air, looking like a golden dragonfly.
“When’s the last time you saw one of these?”

“Never. Insects on Earth don’t come in
metal.”

“Use your imagination. It’s almost the
same, isn’t it?”