I, Robot: To Protect

Chapter 23

By the time the tram drew up near Knickerbocker Mall, Remington had shoved the front of the radiation detector through the open window and was reporting on the strength of the signal. Driven to action, Susan glanced around restlessly, attuned to the change in the pitch of the brakes that would signal it was safe to leave the tram. “Are you sure she’s close? She’s definitely not there yet?”

Remington pulled the device back in the window. “Of course, I’m not sure. I’ve got no more experience with this thing than you do.”

Although she could not feel the vibrations Remington did, Susan could hear the faint clicks suggesting someone with the proper radiation tags had come within range of detection.

“It’s weak, but nothing else is supposed to set it off at all.”

Susan caught sight of the mall, still standing, and relief flooded through her. We’re not too late.

The brakes finally made the proper hissing tone. The seat belts clicked off. The doors flowed open automatically, and the three R-1s rushed out with the crowd. Once on the sidewalk, people scattered in all directions; and the three headed directly for the mall, half a block north. Four stories high and completely brick, it squatted between smaller, thinner shops like an ancient castle. It had three entrances, but the Ansons had steered Susan to the one facing North Atlantic Street. It was the closest to the bus stop, and Sharicka had always liked the gargoyles overlooking it.

Remington grabbed Kendall’s arm. “Find a way up on the roof and use your detector. You know what she looks like. If you see her headed for an entrance, shoot her.” He released Kendall, leaving him sputtering, then took Susan’s arm and guided her swiftly toward the building.

Only then, Susan could see the monitor going crazy. The clicks came fast and furiously, and the vibration of the thing shook Remington’s arm. “She’s here, Susan.”

Susan’s chest squeezed shut. She could feel her pulse hammering in her temples, and a lump formed in her throat. She craned her neck toward the gargoyle-decorated entrance, but she found no sign of Sharicka Anson. “I don’t see her.” She looked frantically through and around the passing people. It only made sense the girl would act in broad daylight, with the mall full of shoppers; but the crowds drove Susan wild. Having to see around them made it difficult enough, but Sharicka’s small size only worsened the situation.

Remington broke into a run, and Susan chased him. She saw uniforms near the door, and relief flooded her. “There’s security, Remy. They can intercept her. We just need to let them know —”

Remington’s pace did not slow. “Let them know what? How are we going to convince them a four-year-old is armed and dangerous?”

Susan understood the problem, but it did not seem insurmountable. “Once they detain her, we can show them the bomb.”

Remington shook her off. “By the time we tell them, she’s that much farther. By the time we convince them . . .” He threw up his hands suddenly. “Boom!”

Susan glared at him. “What the hell did you do that for?”

They skidded to a stop in front of the entrance. Susan cast about madly, looking for Sharicka. She saw no sign of the little girl, but her Vox shuddered. Nerves frayed, Susan jumped at the sudden touch, then stabbed the button to answer. “What?”

“It’s Kendall. I’m in position. I think she’s coming around the back.” Remington came to the same conclusion almost simultaneously. “She’s around the other side!” The radiation detector had grown calm in his hands, blocked by the building and the layers of stores between them. “Go! Go! Go!”

Susan raced around a building that abruptly seemed enormously wide, hoping Kendall could stop Sharicka, by whatever means it took.

On the rooftop, Kendall reluctantly pulled the gun from his pocket. His hands trembled on the grip, and the sight jumped recklessly. Worried it would slip from his grasp, he wiped his hands on his tattered khakis, one at a time, his gaze trained fanatically on the entrance below him. People swept in and out, some in a city-hurry, others pausing to tie a shoe, blow a nose, or wait for a friend or family member coming in or out behind them. It all looked so serene, so incredibly normal. This can’t be really happening.

Then, Sharicka Anson came into sight from around the corner of the building. She was alone, dressed in the same pink frilly dress she had worn the night of her escape, now covered by a bulky sweater. Her dark, wavy hair was pulled into a frazzled ponytail. Her pudgy body made her look even younger, like a toddler who must have escaped her mother’s hand. Pressed against Kendall’s side, the radiation detector went haywire, just as it had when he found Cary English. He could not spare a hand to silence it. He let it flop around while he aimed the gun at Sharicka’s head and flipped off the safety.

Sharicka made a beeline for the mall entrance. Remington’s suggestions on the tram flashed through Kendall’s mind. “Aim for the skull,” the neurosurgeon had said with cold matter-of-factness. “That’s not standard procedure, of course. Head’s too small a target compared with the body, but a random shot to the body might risk setting off the explosives. And, if you don’t kill her instantly, she can set them off on purpose. A professional sniper with a rifle could sever the brain from the spinal cord, so the bomber can’t press the button on a dying impulse. We’re going to have to count on an untrained four-year-old not having that kind of instinct.”

An icy chill screwed through Kendall at the image. He could not believe a child, even one so horribly mentally ill, would have the wherewithal to set off an explosion with the agony of a bullet lodged in her abdomen.

Sharicka stepped into range.

Kendall hesitated, worried for a nearby shopper. He planted the red dot directly between her eyes, anxiety spearing through him. What if I hit a bystander? What if I miss completely? An image of splattered blood and brain filled his mind’s eye. Bile crawled up his throat, sour as poison, as he envisioned a little girl’s headless body flopping to the sidewalk.

Sharicka stepped away from the shopper. It was now or never.

Kendall’s finger cramped on the trigger, unable to defy the pictures in his mind. He had dedicated his life to saving lives, to curing the sick, to making even the last moments of life peaceful for everyone. He had pithed frogs, trapped mice, but the idea of ending a human life refused to enter the realm of possibility. He tried to focus on the loss of life Sharicka would cause to so many others, to rely on the realization he had no choice but to exchange one life for hundreds of others. Still, his finger refused to obey him. Tears rolled down his cheeks.

Then, a rowdy gang of teenagers passed between him and his target, and Sharicka was out of range again.

Susan Calvin rounded the building at a gallop, Remington Hawthorn at her side. She caught a glimpse of a familiar dress in elegant primrose with a lacy hem and bulky sweater disappearing, with a crowd of teenagers, into the mall entrance. Susan knew the only hope for keeping everyone alive was to immobilize both of Sharicka’s arms.

“Stop!” Susan shouted, lunging for the small, brown hands. She seized Sharicka’s fingers with an abrupt violence that caught every eye in the vicinity, including the two security guards lounging near the entrance. Sharicka jerked in her grip, clearly startled. Susan’s mind raced. She could yell “Bomb!” but doubted anyone would believe her. Instead, she went for a ploy that might buy her enough time to reveal the truth. “Sharicka, honey! You’re too young to run off by yourself. You have to stay with Mommy.”

Sharicka screamed and immediately started struggling.

Susan tried to look appropriately embarrassed by her offspring’s behavior. Locking a death grip on Sharicka’s hands, she attempted to reveal the telltale bulge beneath her sweater with a foot.

Sharicka twisted madly in Susan’s grip, shrieking at the top of her lungs, “Let me go! Let me go!”

Susan felt her hold slipping.

A little hand squirmed free. Sharicka swung around and glared into Susan’s face with those same killer’s eyes Susan had seen on the unit. “This is not my mommy!” Sharicka hollered. “Help me! Help!”

Susan lunged to recapture the hand as the guards moved in. Remington reached her first, seizing Sharicka’s other arm and using an exasperated parental voice. “This isn’t funny, Sharicka. Stop playing games with Mommy and Daddy.”

Susan saw people staring. The teenagers had stopped, and the guards were coming closer. It occurred to Susan that Sharicka’s biracial features bore out her claim that these were not her parents. They’re going to tear us apart, and we’re all going to die.

Kendall appeared suddenly, racing into the mall, attempting to herd the teenagers. “Bomb!” he shouted. “Run! Evacuate!” He thundered past, into the mall. “Run! Run! Run!”

All hell broke loose. Panicked people screamed and ran in all directions, some deeper into the stores, others out onto the roadways. Horns honked, brakes squealed, and the crash of collisions rang through the air. These sounded like distant background to Susan, lost beneath the ear-shattering shrieks of Sharicka Anson.

In the commotion, Sharicka ripped her other hand from Susan’s hold and slammed it into the resident’s face with enough force to stagger her. Pain spiked through Susan’s skull accompanied by a flash of white light. For an instant, she thought the bomb had exploded. Then, Sharicka whipped her arm toward her own chest. Detonator! Susan realized she could not move fast enough to stop it.

Remington flung himself on top of Sharicka, driving her to the floor with enough force to foil the movement. Sharicka fought like a tiger. To Susan, she looked like a dark and desperate swirl of limbs and teeth. She saw one of the security guards shouting into his Vox. The other slammed into Remington, trying to thrust him off Sharicka. Tipped sideways, Remington lost his hold. Sharicka gathered her legs beneath her and squirted free. Again, her hand raced toward her chest.

“No!” Susan screamed again. She sprang for Sharicka, missing the girl but catching a handful of sweater. As the girl ran, the sweater slid down her arms, revealing the tangled coils of wires. Susan twisted, using the fabric to imprison Sharicka’s arms. “Bomb!” she shouted, certain the guards would turn their attention to the appropriate target.

But, fully focused on wrestling Remington, the guards paid Sharicka no heed. She could see Remington fumbling for his gun, the guard pinioning his hand. Then, from the corner of her eye, she saw the second security guard pull his own weapon and swing it toward Remington.

“The girl!” Susan shrieked, clinging frantically to the sweater. “The girl has the bomb!” The fabric tore in Susan’s grip. Abruptly released, Sharicka staggered wildly forward, tripped, and skidded across the floor. Her hand swung toward the button again, and Susan saw no possible way to stop her. Another scream ripped from her throat, this one without intention or direction.

Remington shouted, “Run, Susan!” Clearly fueled by adrenaline, he landed a desperate blow to the side of the guard’s head that finally gained him his freedom. He flew toward Sharicka. Susan dove for the other guard, frantic to reach him before he pulled the trigger. She crashed into the man so hard, it rattled every tooth in her head. The blast of the gun deafened her left ear. Pain shocked through every part of her. For an instant, she thought he had shot her; then she realized it all stemmed from the force of the impact. The man toppled, and she tumbled over him, sprawling into the exit.

“Run!” Remington managed again.

Susan turned her wild momentum into long-strided running steps, charging out the exit. The pavement whirled in front of her, open. Everyone else had a head start, using it to take as many steps as possible away from Sharicka Anson. She listened for Remington’s footsteps; and, when she didn’t hear them, she dared to glance backward as she ran.

The guard Remington had struck lay still on the floor. The other was scrambling to his feet. Remington had wrapped himself around Sharicka, covering her like a carpet, using his own body to shield them all from the terrible might of the coming explosion.

“No!” Susan shouted again. She tried to turn, tripped, and sprawled, rolling across the concrete. She could feel the skin sloughing off her hands, the fabric of her pants abrading from her knees. Then, suddenly, a roar reverberated through her head. A wall of heat slammed her against the building with bruising force, and she could feel small, hard objects raining down around her. Fire washed over her. It felt as if it burned every part of of her, through her clothing and skin, into her internal organs. The taste of gasoline filled her mouth like physical pain. Then, cold air gripped her, quenching the fire. She raised her head, bashing it against brick. Pain shot through her skull; then black oblivion descended upon her.

Susan Calvin awakened to the familiar sounds of a hospital room: the steady beep of a monitored bed, the rumble of the central air system, and the muffled sounds of distant conversation. She sat up too quickly. Dizziness swam down on her, and the room disappeared in a swirl of tiny black and white spots. She sank back to what she now recognized as a bed. Her vision gradually returned, first as a fine blur, then as distinct shapes. A screen traced her heart rate, breathing, and oxygenation. Someone tall slumped in a chair in a far corner of the room, his head clamped firmly between his hands.

“Dad?” Susan guessed, sitting up more carefully. “Is that you?”

The figure in the chair straightened. It was indeed John Calvin who rose to his full six feet eight inches and hurried to Susan’s bedside. “You’re awake.”

“Only just,” she admitted, pulling her hands from under the covers. They felt enormous and awkward, and she realized they were swathed in bandages. “How long have I been asleep?”

“Two days, in and out. We’ve had this conversation before. Don’t you remember?” He tapped a button on his Vox.

Susan shook her head. I don’t remember anything after —” Terror shot through her. “Remy?” She gave her father a desperate, hopeful look.

John Calvin shook his head with slow and weary sadness. He had that same, broken stance he assumed whenever the topic of Susan’s mother arose. “He died a hero. If he hadn’t thrown himself over the bomb, you certainly would have been killed. And, probably, several more innocents.”

Susan felt as if the air had suddenly been sucked from the room. Instantly, tears filled her eyes, splashing down her cheeks, and sobs racked her mercilessly. She could not breathe, wasn’t sure she wanted to ever again.

Gingerly, John wrapped his arms around his daughter.

Susan barely noticed. She felt cocooned in the depths of unbearable grief, an emotion that seemed destined to overwhelm her for eternity. No longer hearing the steady blips of the monitor, she was certain her heart had solidified into an unreachable boulder.

They remained enfolded together for what seemed like hours, until Susan’s eyes felt on fire and her muscles became exhausted from the spasms. Lost and hopeless, she lay still in her father’s strong arms and dared not contemplate the future.

John seemed to sense when she could hear him again. Either that, or she had simply missed everything he had said until that moment. “Susan, it wasn’t supposed to go like this. The idea was to shield you and Remy from danger, to place the burden on the corporation.”

The words seemed nonsensical to Susan, but she found herself unable to voice any opinion. Her throat felt raw with sorrow.

“When you suggested a smallish mall far from the downtown area, Lawrence deliberately sent you there to keep you busy and out of harm’s way. None of us believed she would go there. We were sure the programming would send her to a larger, more newsworthy target.”

Susan could only nod. The employees of USR had relied on logic and science. She alone had believed in the power of the psyche of a tiny sociopath; this time, she had not underestimated Sharicka Anson. Lawrence had done a stellar job convincing Susan he trusted her idea. She supposed the fact that he should have done so made the task simpler.

“I’m sorry, Susan.” John’s voice hoarsened. “I’m so very, very sorry.”

Now, it was Susan’s turn to comfort her father. She did not blame him for Remington’s death. To fault anyone else was to belittle his sacrifice, to lessen the courage it had taken for him to forfeit his life to save so many others. “Dad, I’m not religious enough to believe everything happens for a reason, but I am scientific enough to know things that have happened cannot be undone.” She remembered Remington’s words at USR, the ones he used to soothe her while she blamed herself for Misty Anson’s death. “Life is full of hard choices. When they’re made intelligently and with all the best intentions, we must accept the results, whether or not they’re what we expect, what we want, or something entirely different.”

“But I feel responsible for Remy’s death, for your suffering. If I hadn’t convinced you not to call —”

Susan did not allow him to finish. “People still would have died, many more of them. I don’t believe law enforcement could have acted any quicker than we did, and no one would have thought of going to Knickerbocker Mall. With the pressure off me and on the police, I know I wouldn’t have. You’d probably be in jail, along with several other blameless scientists, and robotic technology would have been set back fifty years, a century, maybe indefinitely.” Susan’s words reached home, as comforting to her as to her father. “Nate would have been erased, and hundreds of people at the mall would have died needlessly instead of . . .” She paused. “What was the actual death count?”

“Three,” John said. “Remy, a security guard, and the girl. A dozen in the hospital, but no one worse off than you.”

Her father’s words struck a note of terror that Susan would not have believed possible. If she still worried for her life and her future, then she would survive her grief, would find some way to limp through the rest of her life without the man she had come to love so absolutely, so quickly. “Dad, am I going to be okay?”

John Calvin managed an actual smile. “You’re going to be just fine, kitten. Your hands are expected to heal fully. You have minor burns and bruises only. Nothing life threatening. They’re already talking discharge.”

Thanks to Remy. Pain seared Susan’s heart. If she had believed in a higher power, her faith would have died in that moment. No superior being worth worshiping would bring a man like Remington Hawthorn into her life, only to place him in a situation where he had to die to save her. If he hadn’t done what he did, we would both be dead. “And the people responsible? The ones who reprogrammed the nanorobots? Has anyone caught them?”

John Calvin turned Susan a wan smile, betrayed by the deep sigh he heaved at the same time. “We’re still sorting it all out, but we’re hopeful. The SFH has always been dangerous. Now, they’ve apparently managed to recruit accomplished scientists and experienced international terrorists. The men who made the physical switch worked for the delivery company. At least, they’re in custody, and we hope they’ll give up the others. Making the connection between them and the Society for Humanity will probably prove a lot more difficult.”

Susan nodded grimly.

“We won’t give up, though,” John promised.

Nor will they. Susan guessed the Society for Humanity would have all the tenacity of most extremists. No matter how worthy the cause, those people who took it to irrational lengths always ruined it for the true and sanely passionate believers. Such were antiabortion extremists who murdered doctors and misrepresented beloved stillborn infants as aborted embryos; environmental extremists who slaughtered scientists, blew up corporations, and stole credit cards to finance their radical agendas; extremists on both sides of the political aisle who threatened federal buildings and workers, vandalized property, and fomented lies when elections did not go their way; radical Islamists who daily fired rockets into Israel, demonized civilization, demoralized women, and declared war on every religion not their own.

The Society for Humanity would not give up the fight until certain branches of science disappeared from existence. Individual victories would never suffice. They would not rest until the things of which they disapproved wholly perished from the earth, and they did not care whom they damaged, whom they murdered, to achieve that goal.

History had proven only one way to handle terrorists, Susan believed, and that was to defeat them. In the past, when one side wanted only peace and the other would settle for nothing less than total annihilation of the other, the side wishing for peace was the one that had to survive, the one that deserved to triumph. When extremists won, they did not quietly disappear; they did not embrace peace. They simply turned their might onto a new target. First, kill all the Israelis. Then, kill all the Jews. Then, kill all the gays, the Christians, the Hindus, the Buddhists, the gypsies and, eventually, even the gentler practitioners of their own religion. This was not a matter of dueling philosophies; to the Society for Humanity, this was all-out war.

Gradually, Susan became aware of more presences waiting patiently at the open door to her room. She glanced past her father to see Kendall Stevens standing at the entryway, the bare hint of a smile creeping onto his battered face despite two black eyes and multiple bruises. Beside him stood a middle-aged man Susan did not recognize.

Releasing Susan, John Calvin also turned to see the newcomers. “Ah, there you are. Did you get my signal?” He tipped his head toward the Vox on his wrist, and Susan remembered he had tapped a button when he first came to her bedside.

“I did.” Kendall stepped fully into the room, gesturing for the other man to follow him.

Susan sat up in her bed. She knew she must look a fright. Besides having survived an explosion, she had spent what seemed like a lifetime crying. Her eyes felt swollen and sore. “Hi, Kendall. Hi . . .” She paused. Now that he stood closer, the man at Kendall’s side did look familiar. “I’m sorry. I’m still a bit muddled. I can’t remember your name.”

“Ronnie,” the man inserted in a cheerful voice. “Ronnie Bogart.”

The name cued an image of his back, his body curled into a fetal position. Susan had injected Ronnie Bogart with nanorobots, but he little resembled the pitiful man who had come to her in desperation after seventeen suicide attempts. He seemed to have grown several inches, and he projected an aura of confidence wholly lacking the first time she had met him. His hair was still thinning, but now it was neatly combed and tended. “Ronnie Bogart?” Susan repeated incredulously. “You . . . you . . .” She did not know how to say it without sounding offensive. “You look wonderful!”

“I feel wonderful,” Ronnie said, sounding wonderful. “After the docs analyzed the data from the nanorobots, they found an unusual chemical imbalance. I started on my new meds, and voilà!”

Susan could not help laughing. She turned her father a look that she hoped said, The nanorobots still collected useful data despite the reprogramming.

John Calvin pursed his lips and nodded.

Ronnie continued. “And you know that fellow, Fontaina? The one always on the unit whenever I got admitted? I used to sit and talk to him for hours, like I would a dog. I mean, he never spoke, never moved. Great sounding board, right?”

Susan wanted to rush him to the punch line. “Don’t tell me he’s walking around.”

“Not yet,” Ronnie admitted, “but he’s sitting up and looking at people.”

“The issues the nanorobots found are a bit more complicated,” Kendall explained, clearly trying to maintain whatever confidentiality remained to Neal Fontaina. “And it’s only been a couple of days.”

“I can’t remember the last time I had this much energy.” Ronnie scooted back into a normal position. “I can’t remember if I ever before felt . . . happy.”

“Congratulations,” Susan said. The nanorobots might just turn out to be the miracle treatment they had hoped for, at least for some refractory patients. She tried not to wonder if they might have helped Sharicka or if the Ansons were celebrating or mourning the loss of this particular child. Knowing them, she suspected they cried as hard as for her as Susan did for Remington. They truly had loved her, even after mental illness had turned their special child into something horrific and monstrous.

The conversations seemed to have come to a natural conclusion. Kendall scuffed his feet. “So, when do you think you’ll be back at work?”

Susan looked at her father.

“The doctors say her wounds will heal in a couple of weeks.” John Calvin made no real attempt to answer the question. They all knew shock and grief had more to do with her return than physical injuries.

“Sooner than later,” Susan promised. She was not the type to wallow in sadness. She harbored no illusions she would handle the loss of Remington any better than her father had her mother’s death. He had gone back to work, though, remained competent at it, resumed a mostly normal life with just a few quirks to prove he had become a different man. She suspected she would prefer leaping back into her residency rather than filling her days with nothing but thoughts of her loss and attempting to distract herself with inane movies and television shows. “I’ll be back in time for our next rotation.”

Kendall bobbed his head. “Well, it’s not as if you left us a bunch of patients to clean up for you.” He brightened. “By the way, I’m discharging . . . the teenager you helped me break through to.” Confidentiality stopped him from speaking the name.

“Oh yeah?” Susan knew he meant Connor Marchik. No happy ending existed for the teen with refractory liver cancer; but, at least, he could spend his final months with friends and family in an environment more pleasant than the PIPU.

John Calvin took the hint. “You two look like you want to talk shop. Why don’t I walk Mr. Bogart back to the unit, if that’s okay with him?”

“I’m fine with that,” Ronnie answered. “It’s only a matter of days till discharge.”

As the other men left the room, Kendall’s smile faded. Even without the black eyes, the bruises, and abrasions, he would have looked more serious than she had ever seen him before. He paced the floor. Twice.

Barely recognizing him, Susan tried to break the silence. “So, what is our next rotation? The Violent Care Unit?”

Kendall resisted the joke, which surprised Susan in and of itself. “Outpatient psych,” he answered distractedly. His smile returned, but it seemed forced. “You’re already scheduled to see some old friends.”

“Diesel,” Susan guessed. “And Monterey. Maybe even Starling.”

“Yup.”

“And I imagine you’ll see Connor.”

“Almost certainly.” Kendall dodged her stare.

Susan could not stand it any longer. Clearly, he was not going to raise the issue that bothered him on his own. “What’s bugging you, Kendall? You look like a shark’s eating you from the feet up.”

“Susan?” Kendall attempted to look at her; then his gaze flitted away. “When I was up on the roof. With the gun. I had a perfect shot at . . . her.”

Susan blinked, trying to understand the implications of what Kendall had just revealed.

“I could have prevented the explosion, Susan. Remy would still be alive.” Kendall’s eyes blurred behind pools of salt water. “No one would have gotten hurt. Not you. Not anyone.”

Susan did not know how to feel. “Come here,” she commanded.

As if in a trance, Kendall moved to her side. An uncharacteristic stiffness to his gait betrayed his own injuries, ones that ought to keep him out of residency, too, for at least a week or two. Susan caught him into an embrace. “It’s not your fault, Kendall.” She spoke the truth the instant it came to her mind. “I couldn’t have pulled the trigger, either.”

“Remy could have. To save us. He —” Kendall choked on the words.

Susan did not know how he had intended to finish, so she used her own words. “He was a rare type of person. A true hero.” It occurred to her the word was thrown about too casually, applied to inappropriate things. She had heard parents call their children heroes for winning a difficult race, had heard newscasters refer to random survivors of catastrophes as heroes, had heard hero bandied about the hospital to apply to patients who did nothing more than survive a dangerous procedure or let a dying loved one go. Surely, those things took courage and fortitude, but she wondered when hero had lost its meaning, when it had ceased to refer to someone who risked or sacrificed his own life to save the lives of others. Susan thought she had cried out all her tears, but new ones stung her eyes.

Kendall clung.

“We can’t all be like that. If we were, it would take all the specialness, all the greatness from men and women like Remy.” Susan clutched him tightly. He felt warm and comfortable in her arms. She had never seen him confront vulnerability with anything other than humor, and she liked this strange and different side of him. She whispered, “I couldn’t have shot her, either.”

Kendall pulled away far enough to look at her.

Susan explained. “That was why I refused to take the gun. Even knowing what she was. Even knowing she had murdered before and would eagerly do so again. Even knowing she would have shot me in a heartbeat, I couldn’t have shot her.” She looked directly into his eyes; and, when he avoided her gaze, she followed him until he had no choice but to stare back at her. “It’s no dishonor to be incapable of killing a human being.”

“But — ,” Kendall started.

Susan could not allow him to finish. “No ‘buts.’ Not ever.”

Kendall clutched her again, and they both sobbed with raw and terrible grief, as if the world would end.

And when the embrace ended, Susan knew, there would be robots to construct and improve, diagnoses to make, and lives to save. Like a flower budding from a dormant stem, she would learn to laugh again, beginning, almost certainly, with a quip from Kendall Stevens.

“Nice going, Humpty Dumpty.” He waved a hand to indicate the broken state of Susan’s body. “Thanks to Major Medical and professional courtesy, your bill will only be eight hundred million instead of a cool billion.”

Susan doubted all the king’s horses and all the king’s men had fully finished with Kendall, either. At least, they had salvaged his sense of humor, and she suspected they both would need it over the coming years.