I crest a dune, only to find Cassie pointing a shaky pistol at me with tears that she’s desperately trying to blink away filling her eyes.

  “Cassie! It’s me!” I yell out before she can pull the trigger. I can already tell she’s going to miss, but I know firing will make her feel awful.

  She slowly loosens her grasp, letting her gun drop into the sand beside her. Her arm quickly tches onto her side, holding her shaking body tight.

  I put the car in park and climb out next to her as quickly as possible with my broken knee.

  “What’s wrong?” Worry finally consumes my voice.

  “I- I want my legs back.” She mumbles quietly, her voice shaking just as badly as her body.

  “What happened?” There’s no blood around and no sign anyone besides me has been here. Corax is still sitting safely, undisturbed on our pile of stuff.

  “Nothing.” She reaches up to wipe her eyes.

  “What do you mean nothing? You look awful.”

  “I mean nothing!” Her voice fills with a familiar anger before shifting back to a shaky mess. “I’m fucking useless. I didn’t know if you were coming back, or what would happen if… I thought…”

  “Hey.” I sit up the best I can, and pull her head into my p. “I’m ok, and the car has another 200 miles in it. We can get to a town, and trade the car or the armor I took off the others and get your legs fixed, alright?”

  Cassie grabs a spare shred of cloth from our pile of supplies, and wipes away her tears and snot. She looks up to me and her eyes fill with fear.

  “You’re bleeding.”

  “What?” I guess this is it then? A surprising calm overtakes me. I gave Cassie the best shot I possibly could have, I'm ok with what I accomplished.

  I probably should turn Corax back on to say goodbye, he’d never forgive me if I didn't. And maybe I can write Vince and Ivy a letter before I die? I think they’d like that, assuming Cassie can recover them.

  Wait, No? My coont pressure is both unchanged and stable? I’m definitely not dying, what does she mean I’m bleeding?

  Her hand settles atop my head, but I can only feel the tips of her fingers and heel of her palm. There’s nothing in between.

  I reach up, brushing her hand out of the way to feel a great gash has torn through my skull, the edges sharp. Oil and lubricant paint my insides, and just a few drops run down the side of my head.

  The remnants of a hard drive sit in the middle of the path, twisted and malformed. Whatever bullet tore through me, was luckily deflected by the drive. I can’t imagine I’d still be here if it didn’t.

  I wonder what details of my memories I had stored in there? What did I just forget? I don’t even know which drive that was, and it’ll be impossible to know until I disinfect every other drive.

  “I’m ok, it’s nothing important.” At least I hope. “Just a few broken servos and some hydraulic fluid.”

  “Don’t you dare fight without me again.” Cassie lightly sps her hand against my chest. “You’re lucky you’re not dead.” She’s starting to seem a little more like herself. I force myself to smile back at her, even if it doesn’t come naturally.

  “I’ll do my best to make sure we don’t get into another fight then. We have a few different towns we can make it to, and I’d be amazed if Mara can catch up to us before the next storm.”

  “Make sure it actually exists this time.”

  “I’ll make sure we have enough power left to get somewhere safe just in case it’s not.”

  “Good. I want to get moving.” I’m not sure if she’s just burying her worry, or if she’s already moved past it. I’m not sure if I can find out which it is. I guess it doesn’t matter, I’m doing the same thing, aren’t I?

  “Alright, just give me one second to fix my leg.” I lower her head back onto the sand and begin to drag myself over to the trunk. There has to be some kind of metal rod or something I can use to stabilize my leg with.

  “What happened?” Cassie asks softly.

  “They tried to run me over.” I gesture to the sizable indent just above one of the headlights.

  Of course, there’s no convenient metal pipe in the trunk, because why would I ever get lucky? Guns are retively straight and strong, I can probably use two rifles as a splint? I unload two of them, grab some rope from the trunk, and tie them tightly to stabilize my knee.

  Staggering to my feet isn’t easy, but at least I can stand.

  “Alright, I’m not quite sure how this is going to work. I can’t lift you with just one leg, but I’m sure we’ll figure it out somehow.”

  It takes a lot of effort to finally get Cassie settled in the passenger seat, but the two of us working together do eventually manage.

  “We need to talk about earlier.” Cassie breaks the silence only a few minutes after I start driving.

  “Ok, about what?”

  “You thought I was Vince.” Her arm drifts down subconsciously, settling on her knife.

  “Right.” Of course she would be worried about that. “You know how I hallucinate bad things about my parents? Well, it’s kind of like that, except that Vince and Ivy help me instead of, you know.”

  “It’s fucking terrifying.”

  “Is it? Sorry, I didn’t know.”

  “You had the same look you did at the bus. Just vacant, staring straight through me...” A shiver runs through her body.

  “I promise it’ll get easier when Corax comes back. But until then, I don’t know how to stop it from happening again.”

  “Great.” Cassie lets her head fall heavily onto the headrest. “Can’t I just rip off your ear or whatever?”

  “That’s probably not safe. Corax always bites before it gets bad, hurting me after will only make things worse.”

  “Right, great.” She lets out a breath, and moves her hand back into her p. “Just give me a warning next time.”

  “That’s not how this works. They just show up, even I don’t get a warning.” I say. “But it tends to get worse when I’m in stressful situations. As long as nothing else happens before we reach the next town, I should be alright.”

  “I can work with that.”

  Silence settles over us once again. I guess it’s my turn to break the silence.

  “I’m sorry I just dropped you and ran off. I just don’t know how you can help without-”

  “Without being a burden, I get it. Stop talking.” She turns her torso away from me, staring out the window.

  “No! That’s not what I meant. I was going to say I don’t know how you can help without being in a ton of danger. I’m sure giving you Vince’s rifle would have made things easier for me, but I’m not going to do that at the expense of your safety.”

  “I don’t want to talk about this again.” Cassie says so quietly I can barely hear her.

  “Again?” I’ve never done anything like this before, and we’ve certainly never talked about it. If my hard drives were repaired, I could just skim every conversation we’ve ever had to figure out what she means, but I can’t do that. “What do you mean again?”

  “I thought AI were supposed to be smart.”

  “I think it’s pretty clear at this point that I’m not.”

  I can see the edge of her mouth twitch upwards at my joke.

  “You’re jumping in front of bullets again, literally this time.” All of her anger has evaporated, but she still won’t look in my direction. “You have no right to risk your life, and in the same breath say I’m not allowed to risk mine.”

  “You’re right, but it wouldn’t just be risking your life. I can’t handle being alone when everything is fine, much less right now. If you die, I won’t be able to stop Kara from guiding me into the nearest sandstorm.” Although still blunted, I can hear my voice waver as I talk.

  “And you think I’d be fine if you died? Oh yeah, just let me crawl another hundred miles real quick to a town that I don’t know the location of.”

  “You’re right, I’m sorry.” Don’t freak out, everything’s fine. She’s frustrated, not angry. “I’ll do my best to keep your wants in mind.”

  “Thank you.” Cassie’s voice comes out reluctantly, but still loud enough to be clearly heard.

  “The sun’s going to go down soon.” There’s nothing left to say, and I change the subject. “Make sure you eat before it gets too cold.”

  “Right.” She reluctantly pulls out a bar of food from our supplies, and stares at it for a few seconds. “When we get to town, I want a hot meal.”

  “I can warm that up for you, if you want.”

  She takes a bite instead of responding, trying and failing to keep disgust off her face. She must be sick of those things after not having anything else for four days. She can only choke down a few bites before returning the bar to the pile and untangling her bnket.

  “I’m going to try to get some sleep.” She says.

  “Alright, I’ll wake you up when we’re close.”

  JanePtinum