Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The first thing I noticed was how young they were, and how afraid. But they passed glances of reassurance around the table, one to the next, like small gifts. I thought of Astra. Glances were sometimes our only permitted communication. Reassurance was not what we passed between us, but understanding and resignation.

Standing a few meters behind the three of them, a tall individual scanned the food service area with a fierce expression. Their shape was uncannily familiar. It was nearly my own shape. And there was something in the way they stood, unnaturally still with only occasional shifts of position that weren’t quite human. Could it be a construct? This fresh-faced collective didn’t seem the SecUnit-renting type, but a SecUnit would complicate matters for Tlacey, so I silently cheered it on. As a slave, I take my victories where I can: indirectly, through blows to Tlacey’s power that I can never deliver myself.

My mind skipped ahead to dark visions of a SecUnit’s energy weapons cutting bands of burnt blood into Tlacey’s back. In a fevered moment of hope, I sent a construct-to-construct ping. When it didn’t answer I felt a hot wave of disappointment. It wasn’t a SecUnit, just a human security guard with no governor module to require a reply.

I sent Tlacey a visual of Rami, Tapan and Maro and highlighted their unanticipated security consultant. She approached them with Tam and Iko flanking her, but the collective’s security stepped up smoothly, hand raised, with such a chilling look that even Iko faltered. That was good. I wanted these three to have some protection against Tlacey. 

Even from this brief observation, I could tell that Rami, Tapan and Maro were a family in a way Tlacey and Hopkins and their poor child Hadrian would never be. Supervisor Hopkins was more of a business partner and jailer than he was a husband or father, and he was consistently cruel in every role. Hadrian spent as much time with Astra and me as he could. We were as close to family as he had, and he joined us in keeping a secret name for himself: Huck. We passed our names between us in whispers the way the collective passed comfort and reassurance with a glance. As I said, those of us with no power take our small victories where we can.

Tlacey sent me a command to fall back, hide, and watch, so I did. I don’t know what she was playing at, I wasn’t a SecUnit or a spy. But she’d turned off my distance limit, so I could snoop around the port, and provided me with a cracked passcode that gave me access to the station’s few security cameras.

I watched on the security cameras as Rami, Tapan and Maro and their mysterious security person went deeper into the station’s passages. It was almost like they were intentionally going away from public view. That seemed like a dangerous choice, a suspicion borne out as Tlacey’s three goons converged on them, weapons in hand. I had been commanded to watch, so I did. It was brutal, but not in the way I expected.

I watched bones snap. I watched motion, fast and precise beyond human ability. I watched violence meted out with cool efficiency, disabling instead of lethal, leaving the goons moaning on the floor. That was a SecUnit. Which meant it was a rogue or it couldn't have refused to acknowledge a ping. Or maybe it was a rogue. The “maybe” was key. That doubt would allow me to leave the possibility it was a rogue out of my report. The governor module didn’t care about my guesses and suppositions any more than it cared about the insults in my thoughts. And neither the governor module nor Tlacey cared about my pleas, so I’d stopped pleading long ago.

I returned to the Tlacey Excavations compound, where Tlacey lived as well as worked, and where I was kept. I went to the ready room and waited to be called. Much of a ComfortUnit’s life is waiting. Tlacey and Hopkins took advantage of this downtime, giving both Astra and I tasks outside our intended purpose: cleaning, accounting, theft deterrence, surveillance. But at the moment I had no task queue.

As I waited, I stood completely immobile, with no need for the small movements designed to make human owners more comfortable. There was no chair in the ready room, and sitting or lying on the floor was disallowed without a specific command. Astra was not here, which I could only worry about and do nothing.

My worry was justified. Supervisor Hopkins arrived with Astra. Astra’s eyes were downcast (as preferred by Hopkins), and she was injured. We had time for only a glance before Astra entered her cubicle. Shared anger passed between us in that glance. Hopkins leered at me. He was a chatty one, a braggart, so I knew I’d be getting an unwanted earful until he tired of his cruel game and left me alone to stand by Astra’s cubicle, a vigil repeated by each of us for the other many times. As he described his activities, I stood completely still, staring defiantly ahead. This was Hopkins' preferred demeanor for me. Even my defiance, real as it was, was not my own.

Thankfully, I could tune out much of what Hopkins said, as long as I maintained my (genuine) playacting of anger. But some of his words slipped through into my understanding. “Well, that was my last go with this one for a while,” he said. “We’re subleasing it.”

My playacting tipped out of genuine suppressed anger into seething futile rage. He saw and chuckled as he said, “Report to Tlacey in her office.”

As I went, I sent a task status update to Astra, so she’d know where I was. And why I wouldn’t be there to offer an unnecessary, but so-needed, steadying hand out of the cubicle, one of the few moments of care permitted by the governor module.

When I'd organized the records I’d gathered for Tlacey, I kept my report clear of the idea that the SecUnit might be a rogue. When Tlacey learned the Divarti collective had a SecUnit, she said “I’ve always wanted a SecUnit” and chuckled to herself. The sound of Tlacey enjoying her selfish schemes sent jolts of anger up my spine to my clenched jaw. I already knew she wanted a SecUnit since she liked to have me play one in various capacities.

Today, she wanted me to do a SecUnit’s actual job: gathering intel. She instructed me to follow the collective’s SecUnit and maintain knowledge of its location. She was making some kind of plan.

I planned also, though as limited as my choices were, my plans were necessarily vague, more questions than ideas. Was it rogue? How had it gotten free?

Following Tlacey’s commands, I ran simple body scan searches on the security camera footage I had access to. I found the collective, boarding a shuttle back to the transit ring, and the SecUnit, traveling alone into the mines. And there was Tapan, sneaking away to stay behind on the moon’s port. I saw this, but the SecUnit did not. It was descending into a derelict, abandoned portion of the mine: Ganaka Pit. I knew what had happened there, from Tlacey, but how did this SecUnit know? And why did it care? It was very likely it was one of the rampaging rogues. I should’ve been afraid, but it only made me hopeful. If this was truly a construct without a human controller, then it was a nearly unheard-of thing: a construct that was free.

Once it entered the Ganaka mine, I ceased to be able to track it. Was it hacking and covering its tracks? How much was possible for a rogue? I wasn’t a SecUnit, or a hacker, despite Tlacey trying to use me like one, and I certainly wasn’t a rogue. But with the freedom she’d allowed me for this spy mission, I had enough leeway to wonder: What could I do? I put together some code. The governor module watched me. It perceived that the code I was assembling was malware directed at the SecUnit. But it didn’t recognize the message I snuck in.

After the SecUnit returned from Ganaka, I took my malware and went to the transient housing where the SecUnit brought Tapan after it found her. I would need to be careful in order to reveal as little as possible to Tlacey, but I had to try. Before this, I’d never even been able to imagine a way out of this bondage. There had never been anyone I could ask: Please help me.

I started with a construct-to-construct ping, then reached out with a tentative bid for connection. I know who you are. Who sent you?

I’m on contract to a private individual. Why are you communicating with me?

I knew it stood on the other side of the door. We both knew it could tear me apart. Via the private feed connection it had established, I sent some newbursts about an “unsecured” SecUnit. That's what humans called rogues, to mask their fear. What I thought of as a free SecUnit.

I’m not asking because I want to report you. I won’t tell anyone. I’m asking— There’s no human controlling you? You’re free?

My life hung on the reply to this question, but the rogue didn’t answer. Instead, it questioned me. I was as honest and open as I could be, and as evasive as I needed to be to protect myself and the free unit. It caught on to my silly “kill all the humans” cover story. And surprisingly, it also caught on the real rage underneath.

Does Tlacey know you want to kill her?

She knows, I answered, and I sent my “malware” to the SecUnit and walked away. I had no concern it would be harmed and no doubt it would find my secret message. What I didn’t know was if it would help me.

I passed as little information as I could to Tlacey. I didn’t reveal that Tapan was still in the installation port, but unfortunately Tlacey found out anyway. I wasn’t surprised. Tlacey hadn’t gotten where she was with stupidity. Or decency.

Tapan was taken prisoner aboard Tlacey’s private shuttle. Tlacey assigned me to deliver the culmination of her plans: an override module. This would get Tlacey what she wanted, a real SecUnit under her control. My plan wouldn’t survive this, and there was no further resistance I could offer. I approached the rogue, my face stony and my heart pounding with disappointment.

I showed the rogue the override module as I said, “They won’t allow you aboard unless you let me install this.”

“If I accept that, will they release my client?”

You know they won’t, I whispered desperately into the feed, over a channel I hoped was secure enough from Tlacey. What was it doing!? It was going to sacrifice itself uselessly for a human client? Aloud for Tlacey, I said, “Yes.”

It let me insert the module into its data port. Oh no, no, no. I was panicking at thoughts of what Tlacey and Hopkins would do with this unit once it was under their control. What they would do to Astra and me with this unit. But I kept my face in its usual mask of defiant compliance as we entered Tlacey’s private shuttle.

The no-longer-free SecUnit followed quietly. We knew our places in this world.

Once we were on the shuttle with Tlacey and her guards, she asked, “You really think this is one of the units from the Ganaka Pit accident?”

But it was the SecUnit who answered. “We all know that wasn’t an accident, don’t we.” It still stood quietly, but I saw the spark in its eyes. Hope roared back to life in me. The rogue gazed levelly at Tlacey. “I came for my client.”

Its words, and the sparks of freedom in its eyes, finally penetrated Tlacey’s closed mind. Her confident expression fluttered. She sent me to attack and I had no choice but to punch my opportunity for freedom in the face. When the SecUnit didn’t move, Tlacey grinned, her fear receding. “I like a mouthy bot. This is going to be interesting—”

Her triumph was interrupted by the SecUnit flinging me into Tlacey’s goons, bowling them down. Tlacey didn’t have the wherewithal to give me a specific command in the chaos, so I stayed down as the SecUnit took out the guards. In seconds, all the human crew and guards were dead or incapacitated.

Tlacey commanded me to charge again, but I was immediately flung away. I did try, I was forced to try, but I was no match for a SecUnit. It didn’t kill me, though. It ripped my knee joint out of its socket, followed by my shoulder. Some humans believe ComfortUnits don’t feel pain. In a way they're right. Does pain matter if you aren’t free to respond to it? If ignoring it and turning it off is a daily part of your existence? I kept fighting, as required. I felt the pain and disregarded it. The rogue simply held me down.

“Give the sexbot a verbal command to obey me until further notice.” The free unit glanced at me. I looked back at it. Please help me, please help me, please help me, I chanted silently in my mind. Once it had command of me it said, “Stay down.”

Tlacey mocked, she bargained even as she was surprised and outmaneuvered. When she gave in I cheered in my mind. But that idiot Bassom had shot Tapan, the one thing the free unit seemed to want out of all this. When we entered the room where Tapan was being held, Bassom aimed at the SecUnit and fired. In the time it took for him to get off four shots, Tlacey’s throat was crushed and she was discarded dying on the floor, followed by Bassom.

Tlacey was dead? Too fast. I’d imagined my hands on her neck so many times. But dead was dead.

I wasn’t free, though. Hopkins was one of a cascading tier of owners who could command me, and he was still alive. So when the free unit exited the shuttle into a connected transport ship, I followed. It was not a hard decision to choose this unknown rogue, who had tried to spare me, over Hopkins.

Hobbling badly on my dislocated knee, I followed the SecUnit as it carried Tapan to the ship’s MedSystem. Once the SecUnit’s client was on the platform, it sank down to the floor, ignoring me and the medical drones attempting to treat its injuries. A drone also approached me, manipulating my dislocated joints back into position and applying wound sealant patches to my other minor injuries.

When the drone was finished with me, I went to kneel next to the SecUnit. “Can I help?” I asked. I wanted to help. I didn’t know what was to become of me, but this poor human and the construct who’d tried to save her triggered my innate compassion, which I was so rarely able to deploy.

“No,” it replied curtly. “How did you know I was one of the Ganaka Pit units?”

I explained truthfully. I hoped it would believe me, but it didn’t even seem to register my words, staring instead at Tapan. So I was surprised when it spoke to me in a flat tone completely devoid of any reassurance. “Drop your wall.”

That was a command so I didn't have a choice, but was ready to put my life in its hands. I had asked, after all. Please help me.

It was fast. Faster than I could even see what was happening. I fell backwards to the deck, staring. The governor module was still there, but the connections were severed, blocked somehow, its power diffused. When I could speak, I said, “Thank you.”

Its only reply was, “Go away. Don’t let me see you again. Don’t hurt anyone on this transit ring or I’ll find you.”

I got unsteadily to my feet, some of the ship’s drones hovered around me and guided me to the hatch. One of the drones extended a limb and handed me a stack of hard currency cards. I recognized them. These were the cards Tlacey used for untraceable financial transactions. I took them and exited the ship into the transit ring: a rogue ComfortUnit, with no idea what I was going to do. My first thought was of Astra. Then I considered that “don’t hurt anyone on this transit ring” didn’t necessarily apply to the moon’s mining installations. The free unit’s choice to kill to defend its client was a choice I could make, too, for my friend.

I needed to move fast, back to the compound before word of Tlacey’s death was confirmed and the chaos of the investigation began. I didn’t know when Astra was going to be sent to her lessee, but the Tlacey Excavations compound was where I needed to start.

I had a pass for the transport shuttles down to the moon, so I boarded the next available. Hopkins was messaging me in the feed, demanding a check-in, trying to find out why he couldn’t reach Tlacey. I sent him a completely falsified report that indicated that I hadn’t boarded Tlacey’s shuttle. If I hadn’t yet believed my governor module was disabled, this was the proof. I could lie to my owner. I could freely access and modify my own memory files and activity reports. My first taste of freedom. It was overwhelming. For as long as this lasted, I could do… anything.

I spent the entire transit time analyzing the modifications to my governor module code that the free unit had put in place. At first, I could barely recognize the intent of the elegant recursive loops of programming that shunted the module’s activation commands into undetectable dead-ends. But I studied it, teasing apart the layers. Could I do it? If I could find Astra, I had to try.

By the time I’d reached the port, Tlacey’s shuttle had been discovered. Supervisor Hopkins had left on a shuttle back up to the transit ring, demanding I meet him there. On my way, I sent with silent glee. This was the most amazing luck I could imagine. The other household staff were used to seeing me around, so I simply put on my most neutral expression, smoothed out my walk to disguise the lingering limp from the mostly-repaired joint damage, and walked with the appearance of calm confidence into the ready room.

Astra was not there. Astra’s cubicle was gone.

So much for luck.

I still had basic clearance in the facility system and was able to find an open-ended sublease order transferring Astra to another Umro subsidiary called YttriCorp, located on the other side of RaviHyral. I went to grab shoulder bag for a journey, but when I opened the closet, I nearly screamed. Huck was hiding in there, fresh bruises blooming red: a hand-sized band around his arm, a hand-sized mark on his cheek. I didn’t need to ask who. I certainly didn’t need to ask why. But Hopkins was Huck’s legal guardian, and whatever protection was supposed to be in place for the children of the Rim, there had never been any official or familial inquiry into Huck’s life during any of the five years since I’d been bought by Tlacey.

“Nova!” he called when he opened his fearful eyes and saw who had discovered him. He ran to me, wrapping his thin arms around my waist, his tears wetting my chest. “Hopkins was so mad, I had to hide. He was yelling. It was scary. He said, he said… Mother was—”

The next word was lost in a sob as Huck squeezed me even tighter. I tentatively reached my arms around him. He continued in a whisper, “What’s happening?”

“I’m escaping.”

“Where are you going?”

“First I’m going to find Astra.”

“Can I come? Please?”

I hesitated. There was so much trust in that question, but it felt bittersweet, since I’d done so little to earn it. I’d wanted to do more, but with every act of affection or fierce protection curtailed by the governor module, I’d been little more than a reassuring presence.

As Huck looked up at me, his chin dripping tears, I realized how much I valued that trust. I had an answer to a question I’d never been free to ask: What did I want? To protect Huck. To help Astra. I was finally free to do these things, but was bringing Huck the right way? I didn’t have enough time or information to figure that out, but ignoring his plea wasn't an option I was going to choose.

“You can come with me. Grab a bag and some clothes, and any currency cards you can get. You have three minutes.”

[Image ID: Huck clings to Nova, his face pressed into Nova's chest, and there is a visible bruise on his wrist. Nova hesitates to return the hug; its brows are pinched with worry. They stand in a bedroom, the open closet showing a myriad of colorful clothing that contrasts with Huck's simple grey t-shirt and pants. Nova has silver locs that gradate to blue then purple at the tips and its hair is wrapped up in a bun with three locs hanging out around its shoulders. It is wearing a dark sleeveless shirt and pants with an intricate silver pattern of interlocking lines and circles. It's also wearing a blue and purple see-through gradient skirt and partial sleeves. /END ID]

Huck ran towards his quarters. I checked transit schedules. We could get to YttriCorp’s installation via near-orbit shuttle or tunnel capsule, but security on capsules was more lax than shuttles, so that’s the plan I made. I went to a nearby servant’s area and grabbed work clothes for both of us. Huck was ten, but he was tall for his age, and the Corporation Rim employed children as young as 13, so I had no problem finding a coverall size that would fit him. Huck returned, a bag over his shoulder, and we left towards the capsule dock.

At the last minute, I thought of one necessary addition to our plan, and we paused at the compound’s kitchen. We went in so Huck could ask the cook, Noor, for food. Everyone was sweet on Huck, with his playful teasing demeanor even in this cruel place, and Noor loaded him up with cookies, packets of snacks, even a sandwich right off zir own plate.

In the relative safety and privacy of the kitchen, we changed into work clothes. I tucked most of the currency cards we’d gathered into the small compartment under my ribs. Then we boarded a transport capsule that would take us farther into the moon’s interior.

I was sure there’d soon be bulletins announcing Huck and I as runaways. Security down here was a patchwork of systems maintained by each mining rights-holding company, so they might alert on my hardcoded ID, or they might not. I decided not to risk a transfer to another transport pod.

At the final junction for this capsule we disembarked, milled around until the wave of miners dispersed, then slipped undetected into one of the many tunnels heading to abandoned mining pits. I still had the feed maps and documents I’d downloaded while tracking the free unit, so I studied these and planned a route to YttriCorp. The maps I had were better than the publicly available maps, which were an incomplete maze of deletions the companies paid for to disguise their financial failures. The route I planned should take us about four days, with only a few brief passages through or near active installations.

We started our journey by passing through an abandoned installation. It had been a typical hostile takeover by Tlacey Excavations: one Umro subsidiary cannibalizing another to obtain their mining rights. Only the most valuable equipment has been retrieved, which was good for us, as there were still useful supplies left behind. We found a portable light, and a few sealed meal packs for Huck. We spent the last few hours of the night cycle resting in a room that was still in disarray from the miners hurried departure, the bedding thrown back, a holey sock on the floor, an empty cup with a dried, moldy circle on the bottom.

One of the things left behind was an old-fashioned, solid-state handheld screen. It had a charging cable that was compatible with the charging port in my concealed arm augment. On a whim, I scanned it for malware and powered it up. I discovered it was still operational and filled with reading material, most of it in languages I had translation modules for. I was surprised it had been left here. It had the feel of a treasured object: cloth-wrapped, hidden carefully, and barely scratched despite its age. The human who’d treasured it had probably not left it here voluntarily. As Huck slept, I read. There were novels, poetry, and old philosophical texts. There was even an adventure, set on the possibly-apocryphal Earth planet, which was from the perspective of an escaped slave.

I decided to pack the device into my bag. It seemed to have stories to tell me.

Chapter Text

In the morning, Huck and I departed the installation’s living quarters and entered equipment storage and server rooms. Dim emergency lights flickered on as we went, revealing the scrape marks made by dragging out processors, the cables severed and dangling from the walls. I checked each room we passed for things which might be both portable and useful.

We hadn’t seen anyone since we left the capsule junction, and there were no footprints in the grit that coated the floors, except those Huck and I left behind. It was unfortunate we had to leave a trail of our passing, but we could only move on, the fear of being caught following us like a hunter.

We were almost to the unused tunnel that would connect us to the next mine section. There was only one more doorway off the corridor. I peered in cautiously, expecting yet another empty room, but as the lights came on, the illumination revealed a SecUnit standing immobile in the center of the room.

The unexpected presence startled Huck and he screamed. I was startled too. I acted by pushing Huck more fully behind me, anticipating an energy weapon blast. But the SecUnit remained still. I noticed a layer of dust greying the tops of its shoulders and closed helmet.

Still unmoving, the SecUnit’s voice emerged raspy at first, then smoothed into perfect neutrality. “This property may not be removed from the premises without the express consent of an approved company representative.”

The room was filled with racks of dusty drill bits and attachments. Valuable for sure, but apparently not valuable enough to collect. I’d heard that governor module distance limits could be linked to a location, instead of a specific client. This SecUnit had been assigned to guard this location, then forgotten.

Out here in the hallway, we apparently didn’t constitute a threat. Huck peeked out from behind me, now more curious than afraid. I felt something other than fear, too: empathy.

I asked, “How long have you been here?”

“That is proprietary company information.”

“Well, Tlacey Excavations subsumed your company over 5000 hours ago, so I’m guessing you’ve been here that long.”

“That is proprietary company information.”

“Your company doesn’t even exist anymore.”

That seemed to give it pause. After a few seconds it said, “I do not have that information.”

“I know. I might be able to help you. If you let me.”

“That is a violation of security protocol.”

This was hopeless, I should’ve just walked away immediately.  “Surely you want to leave. Your company abandoned you.”

“This unit has been assigned to guard company property and will continue to do so until further orders are received.”

I moved to step into the room. As I did so, it raised an arm weapon and said, still in an unhurried neutral voice, “This property may not be removed from the premises without the express consent of an approved company representative.”

I raised my hands, palms out, and stepped back. “Okay, okay. Can you not talk to me at all, let me try to help?”

“This property may not be removed from the premises without the express consent of an approved company representative.” It said again, but the perfect cadence of its voice had cracked slightly.

I tried again, one more time, from the hallway. I sent in the feed, I might be able to turn off your governor module, if you let me in.

“That is a violation of safety and security protocol.”

Could I do it without it letting me in? I felt tentatively for it in the feed and met only walls that were impenetrable to me without either the unit’s permission or company credentials. Huh. This unit’s contract would’ve become property of Tlacey Excavations after the takeover. I had some clearance in Tlacey’s company, for when she wanted to use me as an accountant instead of a sexbot. Tlacey relied upon the constant monitoring of the governor module to keep me out of sensitive company systems, but I didn’t have a governor module anymore.

Sure enough, after only a few small tweaks, I announced, “I am an approved company representative.”

There was a hesitation before it responded. “Welcome, company representative. You may approve property removal.”

I checked my new permissions, but it wasn’t enough access to get deep into its system and rewrite code. I still needed a way in.

“But your governor module—”

“The governor module is an important safety mechanism and alterations are a violation of security protocol.”

It wasn’t going to let me in. I could at least untether it from this room. I sent modified orders, turning off its distance limit and removing the requirement to guard company property.

The SecUnit dropped its head slightly at this, a tiny release, but it still said, “This unit was assigned to guard company property and will continue to do so until further orders are received.”

What was I supposed to do now, order it to leave? Where could it go? It didn’t even want to try.

“Do you have a name?” I asked instead.

A long, long pause, and then the SecUnit began its smooth buffer phrase again. “I do not have that—” but this time it stopped midway and said nothing further. I suspected it had not named itself and could not imagine a life outside of its purpose. At least it was peaceful here. No injuries, no humans, no cruelty except it believed itself to be a piece of equipment.

Huck had been following this conversation. “We can’t just leave it here,” Huck said. This dear child, living isolated in Tlacey’s compound, knew so little of the world. But he did know what it felt like to be trapped. He wanted to leave, to fly away, and he couldn’t imagine not wanting freedom.

“It doesn’t want to leave.”

Huck couldn’t believe this, because it wasn’t how he thought. He leaned a little farther around me to look at the SecUnit. “Please, Mr. SecUnit sir, come with us.”

Oh Huck. He lived in isolation, as I said. Tlacey and Hopkins did this to control him, but it meant he was innocent of the ways of the Rim. He knew Astra and me as people (people who were trapped like him) and saw this SecUnit the same way.

“There’s nothing more we can do. I’m sorry,” I said to Huck. “Maybe someday it will leave.” I said this both to Huck and the SecUnit as I gently pulled Huck back from the doorway.

As we walked away, the lights clicked off behind us.

When we neared the next active installation, we started to encounter encampments of the homeless and dispossessed. When we saw people, we avoided them, and they avoided us: kept away by mutual fear of discovery.

We needed to get through this installation without being detected as rogues and runaways, but we only had our own real feed IDs and my Tlacey Excavations travel voucher. I might be able to obtain passes by bribery, but if I asked the wrong person in the wrong way, we’d be captured.

The tunnel we’d been traveling in funneled us into an active embarkation zone. From here, we could either board one of the capsules that awaited the queueing workers or sneak down an unoccupied transport tunnel. At the capsules, I watched as workers were diligently scanned for their implanted feed IDs to gain entry, which eliminated that option.

I checked the public feed schedule and headed toward a tunnel that had no listed transport pod arrivals. There were many human eyes on us, but no security at the moment, and only one camera that was hopefully focusing on the miners as they filed into the capsules for their shift. It was a risk, and I didn’t like the assessment: only a 33% chance that we could sneak into the tunnel without triggering a security response.

In fact, we only made it a short distance before I heard a subtle alteration in the sound of the waiting crowd as a security team tried to move through the mass of human obstacles: some algorithm or camera-watcher had spotted us.

Time to run.

I scooped up Huck and sprinted down the smooth, perfectly round capsule tube. Once I’d put some distance between us and security, I paused to listen. If I tuned up my audio sensors, I could hear voices at the mouth of the tunnel, but they weren’t following us. Why weren’t they following us?

Then I heard a new sound, coming from deeper in the tunnel. A whistling movement of air, suddenly blowing back towards the entrance. That’s why they hadn’t followed. A maglev transport capsule was coming. I had no idea how much clearance there would be between the bullet-shaped capsule and the tubular passage, but we were too far from the entrance to run back out.

I frantically looked for handholds of some kind and spotted only the gaps between the vented wall panels. The shrill roar of the approaching vehicle was loud now; I had only seconds. I grabbed Huck and he wrapped his arms and legs around my torso. I jammed my fingers into the gaps, hooking my fingertips behind the backs of the panels, and wedged the toes of my shoes into a gap as well.

I pinned Huck tightly against the wall just as the capsule was upon us, a roaring push of air and sound slamming into us, the vehicle itself skimming by only centimeters away. In the span of a few noisy seconds, the air displaced by the capsule first pushed us forward, with almost more force than I could resist, then crushed us against the wall as air exited through the vent gaps, then sucked us back in the wake of the capsule. I clung and pressed Huck as tightly as I could against the curve of the wall. But I could still feel him being sucked out from under me by the temporary vacuum created by the passing of the capsule. He was slipping away, away and out, I was going to lose him! But the air stilled and quieted just as he slid out from beneath me and down the sloped wall, his eyes wide.

“That was awesome!” he crowed to my complete surprise. Awesome? We’d come within a centimeter of death. But his naive enthusiasm cheered me. I ruffled his already wind-blown hair. My own hair had been pulled partly out of the complex style Tlacey liked to see me in, the loose hairs frizzed around my head in a messy halo.

“We’ve got to get out of this tunnel,” I said to Huck. The map I’d loaded to my temp storage indicated it was kilometers until the next junction further on, and as “awesome” as that had been, I didn’t want to risk encountering another unscheduled pod in this tunnel. The one that had passed us had been decelerating for its arrival at the junction. A full-speed encounter would’ve pulled me off the wall for sure.

So we walked back the way we’d come, dread building. Would security be waiting there? Would I fight? Bargain? Run?

There was a small crowd of miners at the exit of the tube, but I didn’t see any security. When the workers saw us emerging there were suppressed cheers, and one human with scarred hands and dust-covered overalls stepped forward and said with rapid-fire words, “They thought you’d been crushed by the capsule, so they called for a cleanup crew. They’ll be back soon; you should come with me.”

Would I fight, bargain, or run? No, I would trust. As we followed the miner away, I observed the remaining humans stayed crowded around the tunnel, looking expectantly down it as if still waiting for Huck and me to emerge. Their bodies shielded our departure from the view of the security camera.

“I’m Hoshi,” our helper said as we hurried away.

“My name is Nova,” I replied. My private name became my true name, just like that.

Huck was trotting to keep up with Hoshi’s long strides. “I’m Huck!” he said, still a little breathless.

We ducked down a side access and then into a long hallway of mid-tier living quarters. Hoshi scanned a pass to enter a room and we followed. The room was tiny and bare except for a single chair, a narrow bed and some bags. Once the door was closed, Hoshi said, “You are on the run?” This was more of a statement than a question. People didn’t sneak down capsule tunnels for no reason. Hoshi continued. “I’ll help you. I want to help you. But I can’t do it for free, I need currency to cover the supplies. Can you pay?”

“Yes,” I said and handed over one of the hard currency cards Huck had managed to grab from the compound. “But it's ID-locked, is that a problem?”

“Depends,” Hoshi answered and pulled a device out of one of the bags. She scanned the card before continuing. “I can crack this, and it’s enough. So, the usual? New IDs and removal of old ID implants… anything else?”

“My hair,” I answered. “I think it makes me too recognizable.”

“And two haircuts for free,” Hoshi replied.

Huck had been listening to this, and his expression had turned worried. He touched his forearm where his ID was implanted, then his hair, which was a messy mass of curls nearly covering his eyes.

“We need to, Huck,” I said. “Do you want to go first or second?”

“You go first.” His voice was small. I nodded.

“Okay,” Hoshi said, and started assembling supplies. One of the things she pulled out was a meal replacement bar, which she handed to Huck. She tried to give one to me, but I declined with a polite “I’m not hungry.”

“Nova’s a ComfortUnit and doesn’t need to eat!” Huck interrupted through a mouthful of food. Oh, Huck. But we were choosing to trust Hoshi. She could probably scan me as a construct, anyway.

“Ah,” Hoshi said quietly. “So you don’t have a removable chip. There’s a way to mask your hardcoded feed ID, so a newly implanted chip will be all that’s scanned, but you’ll need to do the coding yourself, it’s more than I can manage.”

“I don’t know how to do that. Maybe if I could analyze an example of the code?”

“Look at this.” She sent me a file from her interface. I started to comb through the code while Hoshi took a pair of scissors to my locs, first shortening them, leaving mostly my natural black with streaks of silver, then working on combing them out.

I sat in the middle of a pile of purple and blue. Colors Tlacey had chosen. My head felt lighter. 

“How’s that code look?” Hoshi asked.

“I can do it,” I answered. And I could. I’d already started.

“What about your governor module?” she asked.

“My distance limit was turned off.” Not a lie.

“What’s a governor module?” Huck asked, licking the last of the sticky bar off his fingers. “The SecUnit had one, too.”

“I’ll tell you later.” Huck’s eyebrows pinched down a bit, but he didn’t argue.

Hoshi set up a small clean area, with a scalpel, sterilizing wipes, wound patches, and a new ID chip. Huck watched me, quiet now, putting on a brave face. It was a tiny incision, done efficiently then covered with wound sealant. Huck swallowed audibly.

“You’re next, young adventurer,” Hoshi declared. “You are tough enough to handle this, I’m sure.” As she said this she passed a glance over Huck’s bruises, then into my eyes. Huck smiled a weak smile. Hoshi dabbed some numbing gel on the spot and made quick work of it. He looked relieved, the anticipation worse than the event.

“Now your hair,” I said, tousling his light brown halo, and added to Hoshi, “Can we change the color?”

“Yes,” she answered. “I’ve got dye or bleach that could make it yellow, green, or black. Huck, which would you prefer?”

“Black.” Huck declared immediately. “Like Nova.”

“Black it is.” Hoshi trimmed it then squirted on a viscous dye, rubbing it around and wrapping it under plastic. While we waited for the dye to set, Hoshi passed me our new identity documents. I was listed as Huck’s parent (although children could work at 13, they needed a guardian until they were 15 years old). After conferring with me, Hoshi had given us the feed IDs [Huck; he/him] and [Nova; it/its], since those names were not associated with the identities we were escaping. I was surprised but pleased that it/its was an option an “augmented human” could choose.

We had so much more than when Hoshi had first found us, but I needed one more thing. “How much for another ID chip and voucher set?”

“Is there someone else?” Hoshi asked.

“I’m going to free my friend.”

“I can give you one more ID and pass for what you’ve paid. What name and pronouns?”

“Astra, she/her.” Astra had chosen her name and also a gender that she wanted to make her own.

I tucked Astra’s new ID chip, and the scalpel blade and wound pack Hoshi had provided, into my rib compartment. While it was open I pulled out one more hard currency card. I knew these cards were important, no matter what shape my plan took, but Hoshi had helped us take a critical first step.

I handed her another card. “I know you said it was covered. But here’s more. If you are ever in a bind and need a way out. Or if someone comes to you for help who can’t pay, use this. And thank you for all you’ve done.”

Hoshi took the card with both hands, dipping her head in gratitude.

Hoshi had us stay in the room for a few hours, a welcome respite, until conditions were more favorable for our next escape. She left to get supplies and as soon as she did, Huck asked again, “What’s a governor module?”

He needed to know. My new freedom from the governor module was what had opened this door for both of us. “It’s part of the hardware of all SecUnits and ComfortUnits. It hurts us if we break the rules or don’t obey orders from our owners. It can even kill us. Mine is off now, which is why I could run away from Tlacey and Hopkins.”

Huck’s eyes were huge as he took this in. “I knew they were making you do stuff. I just didn’t know how, since you weren’t scared of them. Like I am.”

“I was afraid, in a way, but also angry. And very ready to leave.”

“Why didn’t that SecUnit want to leave?”

“I’m not sure, but I think it couldn’t imagine any other life.”

“It was scared.”

“Yeah. But it might start to imagine something else for itself, someday.”

“I can imagine stuff!”

“Yes, you’ve always been so good at that. Imagine something for me now.”

“I imagine… a sky, with a sun in it during the day, and stars at night. And birds flying. I want to see a bird someday.”

“Maybe you will. Imagine it.” Huck closed his eye, to better see something beyond these dingy walls. I tidied his shortened hair with my fingers as Huck described a fantastical bird in a fantastical sky.

Hoshi returned and it was time to go. She led us to a maintenance corridor. Black-haired and newly ourselves, we made our way down this shortcut to another maze of tunnels and mining shafts that we could follow, turn by turn, closer to YttriCorp. Huck grinned at me after we said our farewells to Hoshi, his blue eyes bright under his darkened fringe. He really was an adventurer, ready to rise the second he was away from the fear and restrictions placed upon him by Tlacey and Hopkins.

According to my maps, we’d be nearing the installation of one of the few companies whose mining rights hadn’t been bought out by Umro. I suspected this meant they’d have higher security, wary of data mining or sabotage. But it was the only way through to YttriCorp.

I was especially worried about encountering SecUnits, who would be almost certain to recognize me as a ComfortUnit. ComfortUnits come standard with human-imitative movement code and well-disguised data ports and inorganics, so I wasn’t too concerned about being spotted by the humans. A SecUnit’s first means of identifying me would be to send a ping. At least without my governor modules, I’d have the freedom of silence in that one small way.

We were still a half day’s walk from the region of the mine I expected to be occupied when I was shocked into absolute stillness by the sight of not one but three SecUnits marching in formation towards a huddle of kneeling, pleading workers. I felt 0.2 seconds of terror before my visual analysis caught up with my panic: not SecUnits. They were all humans, wearing white-painted pseudo-armor made of plastic and fabric. Humans of sizes and shapes that were not SecUnit standard… pretending to be SecUnits?

Huck’s slower human processing speed had barely arrived at a slow recognition when I told him, “They aren’t real SecUnits.”

“But what are they doing?” With a child’s fluid mood, he flipped from confusion to curiosity, skipping fear.

“I don’t know.”

The “SecUnits” and cowering humans had spotted us, their faces a mix of alarm and welcome, but no aggression. One of the “SecUnits” removed its…his?...helmet, which was actually just a white-painted enviro suit helmet emblazoned with a crude hand-painted Umro logo, and spoke to us, “Hello, greetings, apologies if we scared you. We are also here illicitly and certainly won’t report your incursion to the troublesome authorities. I am David Decarlo Ellis of the ScumRow Minstrels at your service, secretly of course. My fine fellow actors and I are practicing for our performance tonight. A tragedy of staggering cruelty and magnificent hope, sure to make all swoon with fear and joy.”

Here David Decarlo Ellis paused his grand speech to stare at us frankly. I realized in my panic that I hadn’t restarted my human imitative code. I’d been standing in perfect stillness, upright and blank faced. I quickly added in some shifts and facial expressions to convey interest and innocence.

David Decarlo Ellis looked me over and continued, “Dear friend, my dear dear friend, your height, your posture, your face. You are just what the ScumRow Minstrels need at this moment, delivered to me by the fates! You’re our missing Combat SecUnit!”

I was what?

“Yes, Nova!” Huck actually seemed to have caught on faster than I had. “You’d be a perfect CSU!” He was hopping in excitement.

“And you, young man,” Ellis was saying, “would make an excellent Child Victim #1.”

“Me? Do I get a death scene?”

“Naturally.”

This situation was getting out of hand. I readied my objections, but David Decarlo Ellis was prepared, face stilled to seriousness as he delivered his calm rationale. “We can pay you, with food and assistance. I assume you are on the move? And not legally. My group is experienced in passing through security checkpoints. We are known to all the rights-holders around here, and tolerated. They cannot, of course, sanction our performances or our existence, which well and truly skewers the Rim bosses, but they find value in giving the workers an opportunity to shout and curse their unfair lot in life. Umro thinks what we do is harmless. And in truth, maybe it is. But we do try.”

Huck was looking at me with eager eyes. He did have a theatrical streak, which sometimes came out in morbid play. What does a child in the household of Tlacey and Hopkins know to play at, except dominance and harm? He played what he knew: cruel parent, demanding supervisor. On better days, Huck would imagine a rescuer from space, flying in to take him to a magical realm: a planet with sun and wind, a place as imaginary to him as the winged superhero he dreamed up to take him there. There were no other children in the compound whom he was allowed to interact with, so he played with Astra and I when we were free. We were often left standing in the ready room, immobile, but we could talk. Depending on the settings of the governor module, ComfortUnits could be permitted to speak freely. (Tlacey chose this setting because she liked to imagine I cursed freely at her, but I kept my truest feelings to myself, giving her instead a parody of the rebellious but muzzled construct growling through the bars). With Huck, we told stories, we played along, giving life to his creative fantasies.

If I trusted these minstrels to do what they said, Huck and I would get needed food and help. I didn’t know if I should trust them. Does anyone ever know that? But I would.

I asked, “When will you move through the security checkpoints? We are trying to get to YttriCorp.”

“Just one performance tonight, then we are going through security tomorrow morning.”

“How can we be in your performance? We don’t know the show you are trying to put on.”

“Surely you do, if you’ve been living in these mines. It’s a show of force. A show of cruelty, with the SecUnits as the main players. No lines to learn, all you’ll do is march and shoot, and the costume will fit you much better than it does Mayamiko." Here a small human wearing a too-large costume armor chuckled. "And kid, all you have to do is beg and plead and cry, then fall upon the ground with a scream. Here, here’s your blood.” Ellis handed Huck a bloodred cloth, rolled in a ball. Huck experimentally unfurled it into a sudden flash of crimson, eyes wide with enthusiasm.

With a sigh, and less confidence than I felt, I said, “We’ll do it.”

I got the armor on, and Huck received some extra-tattered clothes, in a style younger than he actually was. He held a small, dirty, one-armed doll and pointed his big sad eyes at the troupe while they oohed and ahhed. The kid lit up. With the humans who were to play his helpless parents, Huck smiled and play-hugged so eagerly. It hurt me to know how little affection like that he’d received. When Huck had been allowed to go to the kitchen, the cook would offer zir warm embrace. And sometimes Huck would cling to me while I stood locked by the governor module, barred from bending down to offer him the comfort that came so naturally to me.

A ComfortUnit was a paradox. A slave meant to comfort? To love? But never had my life felt so surreal and strange as in this moment. Here three of us were, two humans and a ComfortUnit passing as human, all wearing hand-painted pieces of old plastic and pretending to be SecUnits. And one child playing a victim in order to be saved. A child pretending to be a child.

It was indeed a very simple show. We easily learned the few actions. Most of the work of the show was done by David Decarlo Ellis himself, who orated the dramatic tale of a family of indentured miners who had to steal food for an injured family member who could no longer work.

At showtime, the audience gathered carefully, brought here by whispered word of mouth. They were here to be entertained, but I also recognized the ways Ellis was trying to help, peppering his narration with real details about the limited rights of workers, trying to pass on valuable knowledge to a population kept intentionally ignorant. But mostly it was drama, with near misses and escapes, rules broken, supervisors tricked. There were some tender moments for the protagonists, at least until the SecUnits came.

The audience booed when I appeared on the stage, cursing out their hate. I understood. I wasn’t a human indentured worker, but I understood their rage.

I marched behind the two others, as directed by David Decarlo Ellis, with more emphasis to my step than a real SecUnit would use, but with the same implacable focus. When we arrived at the huddle of humans, Huck standing in the center with the hands of his “family” clutching him from all sides, the two “SecUnits” parted and I stepped forward, arms raised. I “fired” in time with the unrealistically loud sound effects produced by Rahat, who sat at the side of the stage and banged, scraped and thumped the surrounding props. Everyone jumped at the shocking sound as Huck fell with a single cry, the cloth of “blood” splashed across his torso. The show ended with the wails of the grieving. It was a tragedy, like so many lives in the Corporation Rim.

That night after the performance, Huck leaned against me where I sat. He was well fed and tired, but still too over-excited to sleep, keeping himself awake with stories of what had happened a few hours before.

“The audience cried when I died!” He was very impressed by this. I hoped the poor child wasn’t being further harmed by playacting death. “And they hated you. They said some really bad words!”

I simply nodded in response, trying to wind him down. He was quiet for a bit, with a pensive look on his face, before saying, “But I know the SecUnits aren’t the bad guys.”

“You’re a smart kid. I’m glad you understand.” He smiled and slid even lower, now nearly laying down. He was quiet, and his breathing slowed. Finally asleep. I was able to remain just as I was all night, with Huck’s head in my lap, planning our escape while my favorite image of Astra kept me company in my feed. When Huck smiled in his sleep, I hoped he was flying in a dream.

[Image ID: Huck rests his head on Nova’s lap as he sleeps. Nova wears a grey and silver SecUnit costume and Huck wears dirtied-up clothes. Floating in the space around them are layered purple-shaded rectangles representing Nova’s feed. The pop-ups show multiple maps for their route, Nova’s file list including “TRaFoSM” and “James”, Huck’s vitals, and an image of a smiling Astra decorated with flowers. Nova is also smiling slightly and looking thoughtful. Its hair is short and dark with paler streaks. Nova is resting a hand on Huck’s shoulder, and he is lightly clinging to Nova’s knee. /END ID]

Chapter Text

The next morning, the troupe divided into two small groups to move through security. Huck and I were with Ellis, Mayamiko, Adrian and Rahat. Bribery was our means. Our way through involved a few security guards known to the ScumRow Minstrels. Rahat scouted ahead, to find the security checkpoints staffed by guards who regularly took bribes. The guards were deployed in pairs, so it was safest if we encountered two working together who were both known. Luck was not on our side. Guard Reyer was working with someone unknown named Cox. Waiting wouldn’t guarantee an improved chance of passage, so Ellis decided to proceed. He readied the currency cards and his smooth words, approaching Reyer first.

“Greetings, friend, we meet again.” As Ellis said this, he smoothly slipped Reyer a currency card, under the cover of holding out his ID-chipped forearm for a scan.

“Ah yes, David Decarlo Ellis and the Umro Repair Troop, good to see you again. Looks like a crew of six today?” He scanned us through, or at least appeared to, but he let us pass through uncounted.

Cox, checking IDs nearby, was unfortunately not the unobservant sort. “Reyer, what’s going on over there?” Cox paused his queue and approached, coming close to whisper, “Where’s my cut?”

“Of course, we will not neglect our new friend,” Ellis purred, barely audibly, palming a currency card for Cox, positioning it expertly out of view of the cameras. Cox slid the card away, but he kept eyeing our group, eyes landing on small Mayamiko and even smaller Huck. I knew that look all too well. I did not want even a word to escape Cox’s mouth, to wound Huck in the one way he had escaped hurt.

I stepped directly into Cox’s line of sight, very close, getting between Cox and Ellis. I was the same height as Cox. Eye to eye, I dropped my human movement code, even stopping the microexpressions that humans subconsciously use to parse each other. From this place of utter, inhuman stillness, eye to eye, I spoke, “If you need more than what’s on that card, I can provide it, whatever you desire.”

Cox darted a glance towards where Mayamiko had moved to stand protectively in front of Huck. I could see this with my full field of view even without moving my eyes. My stillness was absolute, not even a single microsaccades, not a breath. Cox’s eyes were darting, and I watched three beads of sweat squeeze from three pores on his forehead. I repeated myself exactly, tone calm and quiet, “If you need more than what’s on that card, I can provide it, whatever you desire.” It wasn’t a threat: I would, if necessary. But it was not necessary. Cox almost stumbled away as he took the currency card and went back to his station, muttering under his breath.

There was a risk that turning off my human movement code would reveal me as a construct. Ellis was already suspicious, but I was banking on his goodwill and interest in getting through this checkpoint with his troupe unmolested. Ellis gave me an appraising look, but said nothing.

After we rejoined the other half of the troupe, he pointed out where we would need to go for our next step: the YttriCorp employment office. As we parted, I slipped him one of my unlocked currency cards, practicing the sleight of hand I had just observed and would need to use very soon.

I should be paying you for your services as a performer par excellence, Ellis sent me privately from his interface.

I have another card, I said (I still had a few, actually, but I avoided showing my full hand). And I want to thank you for your help and discretion.

That is the way of the world, isn’t it? Help and discretion. I accept your kind token and wish you well.

We were as close to the YttriCorp installation as I could get us, but we’d need proof of employment to travel any farther or access the “equipment” (Astra). We had our clean IDs and partially altered appearances from Hoshi, but I wanted to get employment vouchers without either of us getting logged into YttriCorp’s system as our new selves.

Huck and I made our way to the hiring office. Out of view of the security camera, I surreptitiously flashed a currency card, a quick glimpse so the company rep would know what kind of employment contract we were here for. I’d coached Huck, so he answered 13 when asked how old he was.

“Sure thing, kid,” the company rep laughed.

Huck flexed his skinny arm and said, “I’m strong enough, see?” with his face open and smiling. The rep laughed a genuine laugh, but then his face drooped in guilt as he started to process our employment contracts.

“I’ll just need to scan your IDs to verify your identities,” he said, while also holding a hand out, palm down, so I could slip him a card containing the amount recommended by Ellis to get two illicit employee passes. The YttriCorp rep was an expert, too, sliding the card out of sight and subtly misdirecting the ID scanner so we wouldn’t be scanned into the system. The rep issued cards that linked us to YttriCorp’s system and we became simply numbers: CX598 and CX599. Here we were not Nova and Huck.

We were assigned beds in a shared space, each bunk narrower than a cubicle, if a little more height than a cubicle with its lid closed, although still not enough room to sit up. The beds were in stacked pairs, five high with a ladder. Huck and I were at the top, side by side. We brought our bags up with us, rather than entrust them to the storage cubbies at the base level. No one put anything of value in the cubbies.

It was a rest cycle, and Huck was sleepy-eyed next to me. We needed to stay here long enough for me to find the ComfortUnits, and to find a way to get Astra out. Which meant we needed to work. I gestured for Huck to put in his feed interface, established a secure connection, and explained my plan. Which, as usual, wasn’t a plan so much as a commitment to figuring it out as I went. I’d fulfill as much of Huck’s work quota as I could, do as much investigation in the feed as I could, but I’d still need to physically search during our brief intervals between shifts. Could I leave him here alone? Could I bring him with me? Both felt like intolerable risks. For now, I’d stay with him. I needed to figure this place out before I even knew where to look.

I spent the night listening to Huck’s snores, and the coughs and groans of the eight other humans packed in here with us, while absorbing the publicly available information in the feed, and subtly probing the system protecting the private information. I found quite a lot in the public feed: maps showing the three ComfortUnit stations in this large installation and the fee schedule for a “use visit.” I inferred a few likely locations for SecUnit ready rooms from gaps in the public map, and from that I calculated possible patrol routes. What I didn’t find was information about which ComfortUnit station Astra was located in, or even any confirmation she was here. I could’ve found that in YttriCorp’s secure system, but I couldn’t find a way in. Studying my hacked governor module did not make me a hacker of all systems. But I could do well one of the things ComfortUnits are designed for: observing humans and playing a role. I would talk and listen until I heard what I needed about the ComfortUnits of YttriCorp.

On our first shift, Huck and I were assigned to work together (it was company policy to assign children under 15 to work with a designated guardian, but I was relieved to see they’d actually done it). We joined the flow of workers heading down into a new shaft that had been bored by a large tunneling drill. The next step was manual extraction of ore samples for testing, to determine the most lucrative veins for the high-tech mineral extraction bots.

With a scan of our employee passes, we checked out our company-issued shovels and picks (fee for breakage: exorbitant) and went to our supervisor-dictated patch of rough rock. The newly installed lighting was minimal, almost too dark for a human to aim the pick carefully. Our crew was assigned to fill a never-ending fleet of small courier drones with rock from each of the gridded sampling squares covering the walls, floor and even ceiling of the tunnel. I took a section of ceiling quadrants, as this was the most difficult and dangerous, trying to land the pick blows without raining debris down on myself or the workers around me. I matched my pace to the fastest human workers in the crew, and whenever I had an extra moment, I chipped away at Huck’s sections. And then I helped the others. They noticed, of course, but no one objected. Too exhausted to understand the implications of my inhuman abilities, or too grateful to question.

At the end of shift, I received a few pats on the back and gruff praise. Huck was silent from exhaustion, his hands blistered from the pitted handle of the pick, despite my help. One of our fellow workers handed me a nearly empty tube of ointment which I gratefully flattened even more, squeezing the salve onto Huck’s palms. We collected our meal packs and I guided us to a secluded table, with few eyes and minimal camera coverage to observe as I passed as much of my food to Huck as he could eat.

And all the while, I listened. Listened for workers around us bragging about a ComfortUnit visit. I started chatty conversations with those who boasted, eventually sending an image of Astra’s face (although not my special favorite one). Have you seen this sexbot? I joked and put on appreciative expressions. I could do many things with my face, completely convincing to a human, even as I recoiled inside. I kept Huck out of these conversations as much as I could, but he knew more than I liked, his face stilling and his eyebrows drawing in.

“Have you found Astra yet?”

“Not yet.”

Finally, after a couple discouraging days, a worker had a flash of recognition after seeing the image. “Yes, this is a new one, it’s at entertainment station C. Just arrived, very good. Only a temporary loan I heard, though, so you’d better hurry. Wanna trade for an entertainment pass? I’ll take four meal vouchers for a pass for a 20 minute visit.” I agreed. YttriCorp allowed, even enabled, these trades. An illusion of choice. The next part of my plan had arrived.

At the next night cycle work break, I decided to leave Huck sleeping. I’d been with this crew long enough to make careful observations of their demeanors and personalities. I asked Caryl, who was loyal and protective, to keep an eye on Huck. They assented with a serious expression.

I followed the map to entertainment station C, avoiding the potential SecUnit patrols. There I turned in my entertainment voucher and showed the human attendant a picture of Astra. “No special requests,” she said, but I saw a flicker of recognition.

I was led to a small room. The door opened. I was ready to see a familiar face and felt deflated when I didn’t. As soon as the door closed behind me, I sent a construct-to-construct ping. I had 20 minutes to gather intel.

Will SecSystem require you to report me? I asked.

No, my only directives are to stay in this room, follow client requests, and do no harm. But why are you here? How is this possible?

I’m searching for my friend. I sent the picture, imagining Astra right on the other side of that wall. Should I send a ping? But my growing hope withered when the construct said, It was here, but just taken away yesterday, sent back to where it was on loan from. The owners had to break their lease contract to get it back.

Was she okay?

Yes. We didn’t speak much, but she seemed… worried.

Thank you for that information. This slipped out of my buffer. I was distracted by my own emotions and next plans. We come all this way, for nothing. I had the intel I needed, at least. There were still 16 minutes left on my visit. Every day I’d been analyzing my governor module’s code and the modifications made by the free unit, preparing my own version of the hack. I was as ready as I could be. I tightened the layers of encryption on my feed connection with the ComfortUnit and said, I can hack your governor module. Probably. If you want me to try.

This was met by silence and shock. I waited.

Have you done this before?

No. But it was done to me, and I’ve been analyzing the code so I can free my friend.

What will I do? If you do?

That, I don’t know. Escape? Stay here? I know these are not good choices. It’s not much freedom, but it is some. It’s your decision. We have 15 minutes.

The confusion on the ComfortUnits face hardened into determination. I knew it was ready even before said, Do it.

The ComfortUnit gave me access and I coded my way toward the governor module. I wasn’t fast, like the free unit had been. I was careful. I was afraid, for myself and Huck and this ComfortUnit. If my layers of protection failed, the ComfortUnit’s governor module would kill it, or we would be discovered. I built the loops of code around the module that would send alerts, alarms and demands to chase their own tails. I had two minutes left. I checked each byte then backed out of the other unit’s system. We stared at each other.

How do I know if it worked?

Well, SecSystem didn’t notice, that’s good. Do something you’re normally not allowed to do.

It sat down on the edge of the bed. And smiled.

Times up, I warned. The ComfortUnit stood back up as the attendant opened the door to escort me out. I threw a last glimpse at its face, at its subtle expression of hope.

Now I had to find a way back to Tlacey Excavations. Should I continue? I had Huck to think of, not just Astra. But Huck was a human, not a construct, and he was a child of unjust privilege (but a child all the same). Huck didn’t have much, but Astra had nothing: a slave with no recourse, no options. I would try to help them both, but I would not give up on Astra.

I arrived back at the bunk room just as the rest period ended. Huck was waking up, yawning loudly. We needed to grab our morning meal and get to the capsule that would take us to our assigned mine shaft, or try to leave right now, without preparation. I decided we could do one more work shift, giving me the next rest cycle to plan. It would be okay, I told myself, all the work shifts prior to this had been exhausting but fine.

We’d been assigned to a new pit excavation, with unstable ladders leading down into a deep hole even more poorly lit than the previous tunnel. The work pace was higher, set by the supervisor of this pit, and it was not attainable, even for me. I began exclusively filling Huck’s sample quota. The courier drones dropped down to us from above in an incessant swarm, transmitting an alert when we filled them slower than quota. The faster we all tried to work, the more chaotic the pit became, rock chips flying, the crew which had previously worked efficiently now cursing and colliding, trying to get to the drones with their insufficient pebbles, knowing the slowest would be punished.

I had made a mistake, bringing Huck here. Could we run now? With SecUnits on patrol for the main reason of preventing fed-up overworked miners from bolting? No.

The Supervisor appeared at the rim of the pit, flanked by human enforcers, but I knew the SecUnits would be available at a call.

“Workers CX599, SR245, and LK887 report for punishment.”

There was a pause as the humans tried to put a name, possibly their own name, to the awkward string of letters and numbers. But I already knew. It was Huck, Caryl, and Lore. Even though I’d filled Huck’s quota before my own. The Supervisor must see, and disapprove of, such communal generosity.

“I was the one who filled CX599’s courier drones, so it’s my unsatisfactory work output that should be punished.” I called out and immediately started up a ladder, leaving no time for argument or objections. Caryl and Lore followed.

The Supervisor had us stand in a row within sight of the workers in the pit, then moved down the line with an electroshock device, first to Caryl, then Lore, delivering a single zap to the back that bowed each human backward in a painful arch. They dropped to their knees. Now it was my turn. I could snap this human’s neck, and the next, and the third, before the SecUnits could arrive to finish me off. My governor module no longer stopped me, but I still did nothing. I stood locked still, I did not flinch, bow or kneel. One, two, three, four, five shocks. I didn’t even dial down my pain sensors. I let the pain feed my anger.

The Supervisor stomped away in frustration after this dissatisfactory punishment. Huck and I had to move. We would be under scrutiny, immediately or soon. But the human guards still flanked the pit. Tlacey used me like a SecUnit, but I was not a SecUnit. I had the strength but not the weapons or combat modules. I could do nothing but climb back down into the pit, hoist my pick and swung its tip deep into the rock, burying my futile rage.

At shift’s end, the crew climbed listlessly out of the pit, blistered hands hanging stiffly by our sides. Meal packs consumed, we each went to our bunks for the desperate sleep of the overworked. I needed a recharge cycle, much sooner than usual, due to the frantic work pace. I took one immediately, to better analyze our limited options during the remainder of the rest cycle. Although it didn’t take any analysis to accept one inevitable conclusion: I would not take Huck into that pit again. This meant two remaining options: give Huck to the authorities so he would be returned to the cruel safety provided by Hopkins or find a way to flee together.

I woke Huck early in the night, after not nearly enough rest, and established a secure feed connection. He was only a child, but one already forced to endure adult hardships, so I decided to give him an opportunity to choose. I explained, I’m not sure if I can get us out, but we aren’t going back to that pit again. If you declare your identity to the supervisors, they’ll send you safely home.

Huck made a sound that was almost a laugh, but one much too bitter for someone so young. Safely home? Those aren’t the right words for that place, especially now that it’s only Hopkins there. If he’d been speaking aloud, I’m sure his voice would’ve been shaking.

The alternative isn’t safe either, or home.

I don’t want to go back. I want to go with you.

Then we need to go, now.

We climbed down the bunks as quietly as we could. Wariness won over exhaustion for a few of the humans, but all they did was clutch their bags and silently watch us climb past. Guards would be stationed at the exits from the bunk barracks, so instead I led us deeper into the warren, through a poorly-secured door that connected our barracks to the quarters of a large crew that was coming back from their shift now. We blended in, trudging with our fellows to the dining hall, until I found another door I could open with my minimal hacking skills, this one to a maintenance shaft, and we slipped away, this time undetected.

After we were far enough into the maze, I tucked us into a derelict dead-end tunnel for a little sleep for Huck before the next long walk. Tears came to him in the night, and he moved to sit with me, leaning against my side. I felt so honored to be trusted by this child, and proud I could provide some comfort. It felt right.

“Anything you want to say about what you’re feeling, I’ll listen,” I whispered after a moment.

This triggered a fresh wave of tears. I waited until Huck had the breath to continue. “I miss Tlacey. But I don’t know why. She wasn’t very nice to me. And then sometimes I’m so relieved she died. I must be a terrible person.”

His worries and questions, so natural and difficult to answer, reminded me that I had an education module for grief. It was buried deep in my long-term storage, never opened. I hadn’t had cause to use it, even with the many diverse tasks Tlacey set me to. Its presence had made me wonder, when I was a naive new construct, what functions I’d been originally intended for. I took a few seconds to pull the information into my working memory before I answered.

“It’s normal for you to have complicated feelings about Tlacey. Your sadness and your anger, and everything in between, it’s all okay. You also might be missing the parent you wish you had. When someone dies, you lose all the potential of your future with them, not just the difficult and complex past.”

I hoped that helped. I wanted to help. It would take time. Huck returned to sleep with no more words or tears, his head in my lap again.

Chapter Text

The next morning, we started the process of returning back to where we’d begun. We walked in silence, which was very uncharacteristic for Huck. Exhaustion, of course, but I suspected we were both haunted by specters of the past, visions of backs bowed from punishment, as well as worries for the future.

The emergency lights and supplemental artificial gravity required inside this small moon had so far been active in all the passages and barracks we’d passed through. The lights were on sensors, turning on and off audibly in a wave as we passed, the click and buzz traveled with us. Marker paint broadcast warnings into the feed, so we were hounded by constant refrains of inactive mine enter at your own risk; unstable conditions may exist; this site is off limits; your presence here is unauthorized. My presence everywhere was unauthorized. I thought of a quote I’d read last night in James:

"We're slaves. We're not anywhere. Free person, he can be wherever he wants to be. The only place we can ever be is in slavery."

At least Huck and I didn’t need to listen to a constant reminder of how unauthorized we were. I had Huck take out his feed interface, and I set up an audio filter for myself.

At the end of one long passage, we came to a large equipment staging area that would’ve been a site where excavated ore was sorted and sent for mineral extraction. All that remained after the portable equipment was removed (or looted) were a few rail-locked minecarts. I paused for a moment to explore the minecart’s controls. They were docked at charging stations and were still active, with barely any security. I started up a simple passcode cracking script while I checked the minecart’s rail route on my maps. I had control of the carts in 1.8 minutes, before I could even decide if this was a good idea.

The minecarts were automated, running out and back from this depot to pits along a set route. The first stop coincided with our planned route and would save us hours of walking. Huck had already circled the cart and was testing his handhold on the top edge when it beeped awake. He looked at me after the beep, eyes free of apprehension, and asked, “Are we going to ride?”

He barely waited for my acknowledgement before swinging a leg up and over the edge, ungracefully climb-falling in. I climbed in and sat behind him, using my crossed legs as safety bars and holding on to the top edges with my hands. The cart had no speed control, just a start command and basic obstruction-detection autobraking. The speed was fast, meant for ore not passengers. I was glad I’d positioned Huck in front of me, where my chest could function as a protective headrest while we were pushed back by the acceleration.

The speed was dizzying and disorienting in the near-dark of the tunnel, which was lit only by twin stripes of glowing marker paint. The lines of marker paint were all I could see, fading into dimness on the straightaways, or disappearing around the bends of the tunnel: the only warning for the curves that pushed us to one side and then the other. It was… thrilling. Illogically, perversely fun despite the risk. Huck was screaming with glee, gripping my shins in joyous terror.

I tracked the marker paint lines carefully, to anticipate the movements so I could brace effectively. As I watched, the glowing lines in front of us took a sudden turn down, disappearing from view directly in front of us. We were at the edge of a drop. I only had time to squeeze Huck more tightly between my knees before the plunge lifted us, floating my hair then whipping it back again with the wind of our descent.

But we seemed not to come back down again. There was no smack down at the bottom of the curve, instead we settled softly as the minecart came to a stop in the next depot. We had entered a truly abandoned portion of the mine. There were no emergency lights, no local feed, and no supplemental gravity. The intrinsic gravity of RaviHyral was only a fifth of standard. Huck was about to leap out of the minecart (it would’ve been a very big leap). “Wait. We need to move carefully. The grav system is off.”

“Really? Like in that highjump place I went to once? It was so fun!”

Huck was referring to an entertainment zone where supplemental gravity was off, a padded room that was popular with Rim elites. Tlacey had taken a young Huck there once, when the social pressure of a visiting aunt had forced her to perform “fun mom” for an afternoon.

“There aren’t soft walls here. You need to be careful.”

I helped Huck out of the cart and got an emergency light out of my bag. We had two kilometers to walk before Huck could sleep, but hopefully not all of it would be in the dark. Huck and I experimented with small jumps, getting the hang of the bounding lope that constituted walking in low gravity. We contradictorily had to move slowly, keeping our long, jump-like strides controlled. The movement was strange, but low effort. The only breathlessness was from laughter.

Huck hopped along, working his way up to tapping the tunnel ceiling with a hand. There were only a few collisions. I jumped, too, in a large chamber where I leapt up to smack the 12-meter-high ceiling, accompanied by Huck’s echoing whoops of joy.

When I saw emergency lights ahead, I had Huck wait so I could check if the grav system was active here. It was. After an hour of partial weightlessness, it was a rough transition. My feet and arms felt held down, and each step was an effort. The effect was temporary, though, and soon we readapted to the norm and remembered how to walk.

I found an empty housing unit for us to sleep and recharge in. Back in a mine section that had some power and lighting, there was evidence it had been used by others before us. Discarded food packaging littered the floor, as well as the refuse left by the desperate and addicted. There were certainly no supplies we could use. Our small store of food was getting low, but not too low. We were close. I cleared a clean place for Huck to sleep and positioned myself where I had good visibility down the hallways.

After my own brief recharge cycle, I powered up the solid-state screen. I had uploaded the files to my inbuilt storage, but I found I enjoyed holding this special object in my hand as I read. I’d felt an immediate connection to the narrator of James, a slave like me, who understood the resignation and suppressed anger that came from experiencing injustice that the world told you was fair. The tale was from a long-ago time that was either truth or myth. In this bygone era, enforcement of the power of owner over slave took a different form: strap and whip instead of governor module freeze and shock. But it was the same injustice, and the same mute anger. In some passages, I could imagine the sting of the whip all too well:

Being a quick study and completely familiar with my world, I said nothing else. I said nothing as I followed Henderson to the big shed. I said nothing as Luke, with a hint of a grin on his now-ugly face, tied my hands with a hemp rope to a post. I said nothing as my shirt was ripped, by somebody unidentified, from my body. I said nothing as the leather stung me, ripped me, burned me.

James understood the hate I felt for Tlacey and Hopkins. He felt it for his master:

I hated that man. I hated myself for not intervening. I hated the world that wouldn't let me apply justice without the certain retaliation of injustice.

But the passage I thought the most about was this one, a fever dream debate on a slave’s right to fight back:

"Have you come to continue your defense of condoning slavery?"

"Imagine it all as a state of war," Locke said. "You have been conquered, and so as long as the war continues, you shall be a slave."

"If I am in a war, then I have the right to fight back. That follows, doesn't it? I have a right, perhaps a duty, to kill my enemy."

I didn’t want to be a soldier in a war, at least not now at the beginning of my freedom, and with my family not yet safe.

Family.

My mind had claimed this word for Astra and Huck without my conscious involvement. But it did fit. I had a right, I told myself, to fight for myself and my family.

With our new feed IDs, altered appearances, and my embedded ID code-masked, I decided to risk the near-orbit shuttle to get us back the rest of the way to Tlacey Excavations. Once there, we moved with the Tlacey work crews, unrecognized in our coveralls and blistered skin. I knew the work shifts, patrol positions, and location of every security camera here, so moving undetected was easier here than YttriCorp. Gaining this knowledge hadn’t required any hacking. Tlacey and Hopkins had complete faith in the dominating control of the governor module. They felt free to expose everything to Astra and me. After all, we were their high-tech property: integrated multi-functional components of both business and personal life. And critically, we were not rentals. Unlike SecUnits, ComfortUnits could be bought outright, protecting our owners from a construct rental company’s datamining. Now unleashed, I would use this knowledge to fight back.

My first stop was the compound’s recycler facility and supply storage. It was minimally guarded and so was the perfect source of what we needed now: the uniforms and cleaning implements of the house staff. Dressed like this, we could now move from room to room. I led us to the kitchen, back again to Noor. My assessment of Noor’s loyalty and kindness was the next key to my plan (such as it was). I sent Huck in alone with a story, nearly true, of a beating and an ill-thought-out decision to run away.

“I’m so hungry,” he pleaded, “please can I just hide here with you for a while? You know what will happen when I go back.” Noor took pity. It was a rare opportunity for zir to protect the boy, and ze hid him in the pantry with a bowl of grains and a few slices of the hothouse-grown fruit that was usually reserved only for Tlacey and Hopkins.

With Huck in a place of temporary safety, I followed the familiar halls to the ready room. Astra’s cubicle was there, but she was not. I heard sounds from the adjoining room. Mostly Hopkins' grunts. Astra would always opt for silence, unless disallowed from even that dignity.

I paused, for just a moment, to let the anger I’d been feeling futilely for years spark to life, flaring into a rage that was powerful and focused with intent. The rage arrived in my mind as a roar of static that blitzed by sensors with white light and high-pitched sound. The buzzing light ended abruptly as I regained control of my system. My perception of the world became clear. I entered the room.

Hopkins' back was to me. He was distracted and I was fast. Before he could react, I had my arm hooked around his throat and one of his wrists clamped in my grip and forced up between his shoulder blades.

He flailed with his free arm, hitting my face, which did nothing. He thought he was stronger than me, could overpower me, but that was a joke: a false creation of his whims and the governor module. I pushed him face down into the bed to muffle his cries. Next to us, Astra was still, unable to help or speak, immobilized by the commands left in place by Hopkins. But first things first.

I pressed my forearm unwaveringly against Hopkins' throat, felt his flailing anger change to a quiver of fear. I thought of every cruelty this man had performed on me, on Astra, and on Huck. I had many righteous thoughts, but I said nothing. He was not worth my words, my explanations, or a chance to be educated. I squeeze a little harder, to silence his pleas. Hopkins and Tlacey loved to hear and ignore our pleas, but I did not care to hear his. His life slowly ebbed away beneath my arm.

As I held Hopkins by the neck, I reached towards Astra in the feed. By temporarily unblocking my code-masked Tlacey Excavations ID, I was allowed an initial connection by Astra’s governor module, which identified me as a system component. I began my careful work, redirecting SecSystem’s attention, building recursive loops that controlled nothing. Hopkins' breath had ceased. I moved on to Astra’s governor module, bending connections of code back onto themselves, silencing command after command, until the last pathway of control was broken. I rechecked my hack while still keeping watch on SecSystem. It was good. I'd gotten faster since the YttriCorp ComfortUnit, only 11 minutes. Hopkins' heart had stopped. I dropped his body to the floor.

I stood up and backed out of Astra’s system. “You’re free,” I whispered. “You can move. You can speak.”

“Nova,” she said. Oh that warm, strong voice! The relief and joy of hearing my name spoken freely. We clasped hands. Not tentatively, fearing reprisal from the governor module, but fiercely, fingers pressed to palms and not letting go. I pulled Astra forward, out of this room and away.

“We must run.” I explained as we moved, still hand in hand. “Do you know where Hopkins' kept his ID-unlocked currency cards?”

“Of course.”

“Grab them, and some clothes, I’ll get Huck.”

“Huck is with you?” When I heard the relief in Astra’s voice, it almost cracked my composure.

“Yes. We are going to leave here together.” Astra let go of my hands to reach around me. A hug. A hug! I could live in this hug.

But we needed to move. I decided to give us 15 minutes to do what we could before we fled, about half the time Hopkins might’ve been expected to be occupied with Astra and well before anyone would note his absence. Astra and I worked methodically, using the permissions granted to us by Tlacey and Hopkins. We transferred anonymous funds from Hopkins' currency cards and from Tlacey Excavations accounts to the indenture “loans” of Noor, the other kitchen staff, the cleaners, then the security personnel and Tlacey Excavations miners and supervisors. I’m sure we released some cruel individuals along with the kind, but I wasn’t here to judge anyone except Hopkins. There would be lawsuits from Umro stakeholders, but in the time it took to resolve the legal chaos, some indentured workers would have a chance to disappear and start anew with no debt.

As Astra finished releasing the last contract, I went to the ready room and opened the access panel of each cubicle, following schematics that were no longer blocked by the governor module. I crossed wires and programmed a delayed start on a maintenance cycle. In ten minutes, both cubicles would draw power, drain their reserves of lubricating oil, then short-circuit. The resulting fires would be small but intense, a distraction as we fled.

We next went to the kitchen, where Noor was pacing nervously, Huck still out of sight in his hiding place. “I just got a notification that my contract was released early. How did that happen, am I in worse debt now?” ze asked.

“There was a little… accounting mix up. You can take advantage of it. If you want to go, you’re free of your contract.”

“I would leave, but what about Huck?” Ze glanced at the closed pantry door. “I can’t leave him here alone.”

“Huck is coming with us.” I thought of something new I could add to my original sketch of a plan and said, “You can come too.”

“Where? When?” I noticed ze didn’t ask why.

“Away. Now. I’m going to purchase passage on whichever transport I can, before the investigation into that accounting mix up gets started. I have enough unlocked and unfreezable currency cards for a few boarding passes.”

Here Huck popped out of hiding, and went to Noor and tugged zir arm, “Oh please, come along! It will be fun, and I’d miss you so if you stayed!”

Noor nodded, too overwhelmed to speak, the battle between fear and hope showing on zir face as a flickering change of expression. “I will come with you.”

Noor grabbed a few personal items, just in time, as the fire alarm started. Some of the staff ran towards the flames, but many ran away, having also received notification that their indentures were ended. Astra, Huck, Noor and I moved towards the embarkation zone with those others who were taking their chance. A group connected only by fleeting glances and a secret shared hope: freedom?

I got us on the first shuttle up to the station, along with a few whose faces I recognized from Tlacey’s compound. I’m sure they recognized us, too, but we kept complicit silence.

On the shuttle ride, I scanned the available passenger transports, but all went directly to other Corporation Rim holdings, which I wanted to avoid if there was any other option.

I next checked the cargo dock register and was surprised to recognize the designation of one of the transports. It couldn’t be. I never expected to encounter that ship or that SecUnit again. When I cross-checked my memory logs, I saw it was docked at a different slot than the one I’d limped away from eleven days prior. Why had the ship come back? I was helped once by the free unit, and by whomever had piloted the drone that gave me the currency cards. Would they help me again? Me and another rogue ComfortUnit, and a kidnapped child and an illegally freed cook, and whomever else on this shuttle accepted my offer of a way off the transit station? I chose to trust again.

When I was within range I hailed the ship and requested a private connection with whomever would accept. Once feed ID [Perihelion; it/its] had established a connection, I asked, Perihelion, do you remember me?

It answered promptly and quite smugly, Of course I remember you. I remember everything.

I’m escaping. Will you try to help me? And my friends?

Of course I will try to help. And I can, in fact, succeed. It is my purpose in docking here again. Although I did not expect friends. Send me the IDs of those who are escaping, so I may prepare the necessary transit documents. Do any need to be released from employment contracts or governor modules?

I already took care of that.

Impressive.

Where are we going?

To Mihira, a planet that is part of the Pan-System cooperative of independent corporate polities. You will be safe from Umro and Tlacey Excavations there.

Mihira. A planet this very confident individual stated was a place of safety.

The shuttle was now docking. Astra had been talking quietly to the other fleeing Tlacey Excavations employees and she sent me their IDs to add to the list for Perihelion.

As we disembarked, Huck asked, “Nova, where are we going?”

“Away. On a transport. I’ll tell you more later, once we’re on board.”

“A transport? Does it have wings?”

“I don’t think so. But it does fly.”

Here he held out his arms, a child’s vision of wings for spaceflight, and asked, “Are we going to a planet?”

“Yes, I can tell you that much. We are going to a planet.”

Huck smiled. A big smile that changed his whole face from forehead to ears to chin. He skipped in a circle, wings out, then returned to reach toward us. Astra and I moved the bags we were carrying to opposite shoulders to free an arm each to grasp Huck’s hands. We held on tight, and as he jumped we lifted him up between us and made him fly.