Scott Medbury - Inga

Inga reached out to grab it.

“No!” said Mateo, and her hand froze inches from the bird.

“Don’t grab him. Just hold out your finger as I am. They’re very delicate.”

She obeyed him and held out her finger. Her eyes widened as the bird hopped from the old man’s finger to her own.

“Pretty boy Max wants a kiss,” said Mateo.

“A kiss?” she asked. “ Kiss. A touch or caress with the lips as a sign of love, sexual desire, or greeting… but the pretty boy has no lips.”

Again, the old man laughed delightedly.

“That’s alright, just do this with your lips.” The old man demonstrated how to purse lips. “You do that and let him peck you.”

Neither of them noticed Ivan in the doorway, his mouth open as he watched the strange interaction. Inga raised her hand slowly until the bird was just an inch or two from her pursed lips. The bird hopped to the end of her finger and began to gently nibble her lower lip.

“Ha-ha!” she cried in delighted surprise.

The startled bird took flight. It had flown barely four inches before Inga’s hand snatched it out of the air, a single peach colored feather floating on eddies of air stirred by her quick movement, the only evidence it had been there a second before.

“What have you done?!” Mateo cried, attempting to grab Inga’s arm. She snatched his wrist with her free hand as quickly as she had snatched the bird. She didn’t release him as she reached into the cage.

“No!” called Babic, assuming she would grab the other bird.

“Inga!” said Ivan from behind them, crossing the room quickly.

The robot ignored him, focusing on the task at hand. The old man struggled futilely against her iron-like grip, only ceasing his struggles when Inga opened her hand, and the unharmed Max flew to his perch, rejoining Maxine and preening himself as if nothing had happened.

Inga released the Croat’s wrist and turned to look at the two men. The restaurant owner’s face was pale. Ivan was frowning.

“I like birds,” she said simply.

Mateo rubbed his wrist and smiled back uncertainly.

“Are you all right?” Ivan asked him.

“Yes, I’m fine – she just took me by surprise… did you see how fast she is? Amazing.”

“Yes – I saw, sorry if she gave you a fright. Dr. Vlad said I could take her to him in an hour. Will you order the passports?”

“Yes, I’ll call now. Did you tell the doctor that she is…” he paused, aware the girl was watching him.

“Yes, apparently he has worked on them before. He sounded excited. Are we able to stay here the night when we’re done?”

“Yes, of course, you can stay upstairs. It’s only me here at the moment. Viktoria is in Croatia visiting family. Chef is already preparing in back and after I make a call to the documents man I will bring you both something to eat.”

Ivan looked at him, a small smile curling the corner of his lips. Mateo looked puzzled for a second and then slapped himself on the forehead again.

“I mean, I’ll bring you something to eat. Sorry, my slow old mind just cannot process that she is an it !”

He led them through the kitchen, Mateo briefly introducing them to the chef as his friends before leading them outside and up external stairs to the small apartment he shared with his wife. It was much as Ivan remembered from his years in Babic’s employ. Clean but dated.

“I’m sorry I don’t have a bed to offer you tonight Ivan, but you’ll find the sofa comfortable.”

“The sofa will be fine.”

“What about…?” the old man nodded to Inga.

“She has sleep mode.”

“Yes, I will stand in the corner. May I go into standby mode and run a diagnostic scan?”

“You won’t restart?”

“No Myfriend, a diagnostic scan is similar to a virus scan on a computer, it is not necessary to shut down.”

“All right, as long as it doesn’t take too long, we have to leave shortly.”

“Yes, Myfriend.”

Both men watched her walk to the far corner of the room. Blood from the wound on her back had seeped through the white jacket Ivan had picked for her. She turned to face them and smiled, her clear blue eyes regarding them for a moment before closing.

“Amazing,” Mateo whispered again, shaking his head. “I must go downstairs; the doors open in twenty minutes. Help yourself to anything you need. Perhaps you should pick a new jacket for your friend. Help yourself to Viktoria’s wardrobe and there is a first aid kit in the bathroom.”

After Mateo had left, Ivan sunk into the sofa and looked at Inga. He didn’t know why she had begun deferring to him; it was as if she had forgotten that Molenski was her primary user. Somehow the damage she had taken had messed with the adaptive technology that Marina mentioned. Whatever it was, he liked the change, not to mention the fact that if it hadn’t happened, he would be nothing but a cooling piece of meat back at Molenski’s mansion.

Far from sleepy, he closed his eyes and began to work through everything that could go wrong in the next 24 hours.

Tom Redfern tried to sleep, but it was difficult to sleep when you couldn’t breathe. He tried to roll over, but the heavy weight on top of him was too much to push away. Rachel?

Slowly – reluctantly – he began to wake.

The memory of what had happened rushed over him. He opened his eyes and looked straight into the staring eyes of the man who had been trying to strangle him, the slack, gray face slightly distorted by the bullet that had so recently traveled through the skull behind it.

For the second time that day he fought his way from under a corpse.

The technician climbed to his feet, his throat raw from the attempted strangulation, and checked himself – no other injuries.

“I’m alive,” he rasped, then cackled like an old crone.

Suddenly the rush of relief turned to one of triumph as he looked down upon the bodies of the killers. They were next to each other, with almost identical head wounds. They looked like the victims of a professional hit.

“Yeah! You like that bitches!?” he yelled down at them and did a little jig before doubling over in a coughing fit.

When he had recovered, he heard the faint sound of sirens. Fuck ! Even though he had technically done nothing wrong and was, in fact, a victim, Redfern panicked. His recent trauma and the moral and legal responsibilities that had been drummed into him as a robotics technician overrode logic.

He had to find that robot and stop it. With the damage it had apparently sustained, there was no use trying to override its programming remotely. He would just waste valuable time. The only way to do that was to shut her down and remove the card.

The sirens grew louder. Redfern bent over and pocketed the gun he had shot both men with and ran to the display, snatching up the GPS unit. The red blip was stationary. The visual feed on the screens was dark, which meant the robot was still functional but in sleep mode. Good.

He quickly grabbed the mini laptop computer they had been using to control the robot and ripped it away from the cables connecting it to the display. He rushed to the kitchen and headed straight to the microwave oven. After placing the laptop inside, he set the timer for twenty minutes on high. It began sparking immediately; he ignored it and headed back for the front door.

Redfern, stressed by the proximity of the sirens, swore and skidded to a stop at the front door. Transport! He needed a vehicle, and the Genitix van would be too conspicuous. He dashed back to the desk and grabbed the keys to the dead men’s SUV and fled the apartment.

Just five minutes later, after nearly causing an accident, Tom Redfern pulled over and forced himself to calm down. Unless he did something stupid on the road, he wasn’t likely to be stopped by the cops. Given the current state of the vehicle’s owners, he didn’t think the vehicle he was driving would be reported stolen anytime soon, if at all, and he had clearly escaped the scene without being detected.