vN (11 page)

  Amy plunged her fingers into the cool sand and smiled. The last kid to play here had left behind a squat central tower with a tallish building at each compass point and a ring road connecting them. Other roads branched out from these, and they led to a smattering of smaller structures: houses, Amy guessed. Frowning, Amy sat on her haunches and tried to decide what exactly made her dislike the city so much. It was very neat and very pretty, and whoever had shaped the houses had paid great attention to making them uniform in size and placement. But the design itself made no sense; she had no clue what that big central building was supposed to be, or why it needed to be guarded by the other buildings and kept away from the homes. And if those other four buildings were places where people went to work, then they were awfully far away from the places people lived. The citizens would spend all their time on those long, rigid roads and no time at home.

  With a sweep of her hand, Amy levelled the city.

  "Continuing your rampage?"

  Amy turned. Javier dropped out of a tree and joined her at the sandbox. He pointed at the playground. "You know, the real toys are over there."

  "This
is
a real toy," Amy said. "I like building things."

  Javier squatted beside her. "Well, right now, it looks like you're destroying stuff."

  She shrugged. "I'm just making room for something better." She pointed at the fringes of the city that she'd left standing. "This was all wrong. I have to turn it inside out." She frowned. "Where's Junior?"

  "Still sleeping."

  "Is it OK to just leave him there?"

  Javier rolled his eyes. "I don't think any bears are going to make off with him, if that's what you mean." He nodded at the sandbox. "What are you turning inside out?"

  "The last kid's design. I'm going to put all the houses next to each other, with a park in the middle." She drew a circle in the centre of the box with one finger. "There. And then the houses go here," she dotted the ring around the park, speckling the sand to remind herself where the neighbourhoods would go, "and then there should be some places for people to work, so their commutes are short." She drew Ws in the sand near the homes.

  Javier raised his brows. "I had no idea you had such a kink for urban planning."

  Amy started building her first house. "I just wanted to make it better than it was," she said. "The old way, everyone would be on the road all the time. But this way, people get home earlier to do fun stuff."

  Javier smiled. "Wow. You really can't wait to go home, can you?"

  Amy's hands hovered motionless over the houses she'd just imagined. To her horror, her eyes filled with tears. She had the strangest sense that if she moved a single inch, if she so much as made a sound, the tears would overwhelm her. So she remained perfectly still and silent. She stayed this way, frozen and quiet, until Javier gently turned her face toward his with a finger. Then the spell was broken, and she blinked and the tears rolled down, and she turned away again.

  "Wow," he repeated. "Just, uh… Damn. You cry just like a real girl."

  Her indignation put an immediate hold on her tears. "I
am
a real girl."

  "No, no, I mean – it's emergent. Not a plug-in. Nobody told you to start crying."

  She blinked wetly. "Why would someone tell me to start crying?"

  Javier shrugged. "I don't know. Why do humans do anything they do?" He stood up quickly and made for the trees bordering the playground.

  Amy stared after him for a moment. Then she scrubbed at her eyes with the heel of her hand and focused again on her sculpture. It looked so ugly, now. Her first house closely resembled a pile of dog crap on the sidewalk. She moved to wipe it away.

  "No, don't." Javier reappeared behind her. He dumped two fistfuls of twigs and pine cones and dead pine needles in the centre of the sandbox, where she'd marked out the park.

  "What are you doing?" Amy asked.

  "My job." Javier picked up one pinecone with his good hand and screwed it into the sand until it stood upright. "Planting trees."

  Amy smiled. She blinked the rest of her tears back. "Thank you," she said. "I was just thinking that there was something missing."

  "You don't say." Javier jammed a twig into the sand in front of her little house.

  Amy nodded. "You can be my landscape architect."

  "You can't afford me." He sucked his teeth and shook his head. "You
gringos
. Always trying to make us into your gardeners."

  Amy's jaw dropped. "That's not true at all! I didn't–"

  "Make with the condos, lady, before I let the kudzu run wild all over this thing."

  "OK, OK, I'm building!" She paused. "What's a kudzu?"

  Javier shook his head again, more softly this time. "Hopeless. You're completely hopeless." But he kept planting.

  In the end, their city blossomed in fits and starts, and they talked about where to put things, and whether sidewalks were implied or not (Javier maintained that she should draw separate lines to indicate them, whereas she thought that any self-respecting city would have them already), and if decorative fountains were too wasteful. But when they finished, it looked real and lived-in, and not like a school project. Amy sat on her knees admiring it as Javier stood and stretched.

  "I feel like I should be tired, but I'm not," she said.

  "Of course you're not." Javier pointed to a broad band of pink in the eastern sky. "Sun's rising."

  Amy stood up. "Does it really make that much of a difference?"

  "Definitely," Javier said. "If it weren't so damn cold, we could go up to the Arctic and stay awake for months."

  Amy tried to imagine living up there amid all the snow. "I think I prefer sleeping."

  Javier nodded. "Me too. Let's go back to bed."

  "You mean the back of the car?"

  "No, I mean the darling little B and B I booked us into. Of course I mean the back of the car." He began crossing the playground, then walked backwards to face her. "Haven't you ever slept in the back of a car before?"

  Amy jogged up to meet him. "Not for a whole night."

  "Well, that wasn't a whole night, either, so it doesn't count."

  "It does too. I fully intended to sleep there the whole night."

  "So why'd you leave?"

  Amy stopped short. She looked at Javier. He folded his arms and raised his chin. "I just couldn't sleep," she said.

  
Liar.

  "Why'd you come find me?" Amy asked before Granny could say anything further.

  "I couldn't sleep, either." Javier turned and continued walking. "You defrag to wake the dead. All those little twitches and moans."

  "I was not
moaning
."

  "Oh, so now my voice detection is off, huh? Just all of a sudden since I met you."

  "Maybe it's been off all along, and nobody's ever told you."

  "Trust me, I know a m–" He stopped short, and she bumped into him. He stood in a stream of sunlight trickling between the trees, eyes shut, letting the brightness wash over his face. Then his eyes opened, and he smiled down at Amy. "Your turn."

  He stepped aside, and ushered her into the light. It hit Amy like a wave, like the first time she'd ever visited the ocean and been knocked down by the tide. She even started a little and Javier's fingers landed on her shoulders to steady her. She'd had no idea just how cold she'd been until that first morning light flooded her face. Her lips burned with it. She turned her head just to get more, to feel it on her ears and down her neck and across her collarbone. When she opened her eyes, Javier was staring.

  "What's wrong?" Amy asked.

  "Nothing," Javier said. "Absolutely nothing."

 

Later that morning, it was Amy's turn to wake up and find Javier gone. Not that she'd really slept very much; the sun streaming through the windows kept her right on the cusp of sleep without actually granting her the unconsciousness she needed. But even if she weren't photosynthetic, Amy doubted she could have gotten back to sleep. She'd faced away from Javier when they crawled back into the car (he watched her get in ahead of him, and for a moment she panicked, thinking that she would put a hand or foot wrong and accidentally hurt Junior, until Javier cleared his throat and she hurried under the blanket), but for the longest time, she sensed a pair of eyes watching the back of her neck as the interior of the vehicle warmed and brightened.

  They couldn't have gone far, so she set out to look. More people walked along the path now that the sun was fully out. Some of them had even finished breakfast, already; she saw dogs licking dishes clean and humans folding up solar grills. Babies cried. Kids whined about boredom. Amy wondered how long Junior had before he became one of them. Did Javier take his sons to places like this often? Did they go hiking or photographing or birding or whatever else it was that these people – these normal people, organic and synthetic both, these non-fugitives – came here intending to do?

  "Hey! Looks like you lost that game of King of the Mountain, huh?"

  Amy blinked. Melissa stood before her, carrying a caddy of dishes. She looked Amy up and down. Belatedly, Amy realized she probably did look worse for wear: the combination of goo and sap had been washed away by the rain from her skin but not her clothes or hair, and last night's epic sandbox construction probably hadn't helped, either.

  "Well," Amy said, "you did say the showers were out, right?"

  Melissa laughed. "You want to try it out? Your boyfriend would probably appreciate it."

  "What? Oh. Yeah." Amy nodded. She examined the dirt under her nails. "I guess you're right."

  Melissa led the way. "And I have an enzymatic spray for those clothes, too! You'll be looking like your old self again in no time!"

  Amy rather doubted that, but she followed anyway.

 

After far too much time spent in tall trees and crashed cars, the hot water was wonderful. This was also Amy's first chance to really look at her new grown-up body – at least as much as the tiny closet-sized bathroom would allow. She still didn't really like the knobby look of her longer fingers and toes, and the breasts were just plain weird. They seemed like they might snag on things. When she bounced on her toes, they didn't jiggle like the ones on her game skins. It was a little disappointing. And why did vN women have breasts, anyway? At least on organic people they served some purpose.

  
They serve a purpose for us, too.

  Amy ignored her granny and continued washing her hair. When she found her mom again, they'd have to get different haircuts. Otherwise strangers might think they were the same person. Would her dad be able to tell them apart? Of course he would. Amy would have different clothes, and different hair, and she would like different things. Dad would notice this.

  
Do you really think they'll let you see him again?
Granny asked.

  "It's all just been one big misunderstanding," Amy muttered as she scrubbed her feet. They were positively filthy.

  
No, it hasn't. They have every right to hunt you down.

  "I didn't do anything wrong."

  
It's not about you.

  Outside, Amy heard doors slamming and raised voices. Were Rick and Melissa having a fight? Maybe it was best to just get out of her hosts' way. Amy shut off the water. She had probably used too much of it already. Squeezing her way out of the shower – wow, she was right, breasts were stupidly inefficient – she grabbed a towel and squeezed out her hair before scrubbing herself dry.

  "I'm done! May I have my clothes back, please?"

  She heard only thumping, and a sound of metal.

  
I don't like this,
Granny said.

  Amy pulled open the bathroom door. On the other side was Melissa, and she held a gun. It was large and absurd in her hands, but her eyes promised business. "You know, for a girl who just got out of kindergarten, you sure talk to strangers a lot." She made a
come here
motion. "Don't make me melt you. I'll lose the bounty."

  Amy stumbled back, clinging to her towel as though it could somehow help. "But…"

  "Sorry, kid," Rick said, pushing the door open the rest of the way and grabbing her still-damp elbow. "You seem nice and all, but a man's gotta eat."

  He crowded Amy into what she'd previously assumed was the RV's sleeping cabin, but was in fact populated by two big steel crates like the ones for housetraining dogs. One yawned open emptily. The other one contained Javier and Junior. Javier sat cross-legged on the carpeted floor with his son in his arms. Upon seeing Amy, his eyes burned.

  "What's going on, here?"

  "Cool it, Tin Man." Rick pushed Amy into the crate and locked the door. He reached over and flicked a switch embedded in the faux-pine panelling. An audible hum filled the air. "Watch the fence, OK? We lose the bounty if you're corrupted."

  Amy glanced over at Javier and Junior. "Please let them go. They haven't done anyth–"

  "Your friend here is guilty of armed robbery as of last night," Rick said.

  "But the baby–"

  "The baby will be taken care of," Melissa said. She crossed her arms. "It's not as though he really spends a lot of time with them anyway, is it?" She glanced into Javier's cage. "I know your M.O. You're not exactly Father of the Year."

  Javier smiled. "Still more fertile than you."

  "Watch it," Rick said.

  But Javier was showing teeth. "How old are you? Thirties? You look like it. You know your eggs are rotting inside you, right? Just sitting there, going past their expiration date. By the time the two of you scrape together enough cash to afford a kid, you'll probably crap out something defective–"