Part 14 (1/2)
Such distinctions were lost on Annie. Kay liked science fiction, whereas she herself had never cared much for it. What to call James didn't seem terribly relevant, anyway. All she could seem to wrap her brain around was the fact that James wasn't human.
”My G.o.d,” she moaned, horrified. ”I had s.e.x with a robot.”
Dekka snorted with contempt. ”Believe me, you aren't the first.”
Kay stood up. ”Annie,” she said, more gently than usual, ”we're going to have to call the police.”
”Are you nuts'” Annie demanded. ”Do you know what they'll do to him'”
”It isn't a he, Annie. It's a machine.”
”But when they figure that out, don't you realize what'll happen'”
”Yeah, of course I do. They'll take it apart to see how it works. But why should you care' It's just a machine.”
Annie felt a tear escape her control and slide down her cheek. ”I can't accept that. Maybe you're right,
maybe he is a machine, but he means something to me. I--” She broke off as James began to stir.
He sat up and blinked. ”What happened'” His bewildered gaze took in Dekka and the unconscious man. ”I don't remember--”
”Annie and I knocked them out,” Kay said. Her tone was brittle.
He lifted his eyebrows. ”Impressive.” He rose smoothly to his feet, shaking his disheveled mane of hair out of his face, so that every strand instantly fell back into place, and glanced at the man and woman on
the floor. ”I think we need to leave.”
”No,” Kay answered. ”We need to call the cops.”
James shook his head. ”I would prefer that the police not be summoned until we have left.”
Kay met his gaze forthrightly. ”Why' Are you afraid they'll find out you're a machine'”
His gaze flickered to Annie. She said nothing.
”Yeah, she knows,” Kay said, her voice shaking with fury. ”And if you ask me, that was a h.e.l.l of a mean
trick you pulled on her, d.a.m.n it. She thought you were for real.”
James lowered his eyes and spoke softly. ”Annie, I am sorry.”
Annie said nothing. She couldn't have spoken if she wanted to.
Kay looked at the two bound bodies. Dekka stared back with savage green eyes. ”We can't just make
an anonymous phone call,” Kay said. ”They're in my condo, and we obviously tied them up. What are we supposed to do with them'”
”Why don't you kill us'” Dekka challenged.
James looked down at her. His features froze into icy lines. ”A practical suggestion, to be sure.”
”Murderer,” Dekka snarled with icy contempt.
Annie glanced at James, seeing the hard set of his jaw. ”We can't just kill them,” she protested in a quavering voice.
”Of course not,” Kay said. ”It'd make a huge mess on my carpet.”
James lifted his head and stared at her with a baffled expression, as if trying to decide whether she was joking or not. At that moment there was a flash of light.
The bodies and devices on the carpet flickered out of existence.
Annie saw Kay's mouth drop open, and knew she had a similarly shocked expression on her face. ”What the h.e.l.l'” Kay said incredulously.
James alone seemed unsurprised. ”They have pa.s.sed through a spatial distortion.”
”You mean they've gone back in time'” Annie said.
James shook his head. ”As I said before, it takes a great deal of energy to operate the temporal displacement module. They will not leave this time until they have completed their mission. They have simply distorted s.p.a.ce to return to whatever location they are using as their base.”
”Why didn't they use that to come to Kay's living room in the first place' Or to my house' That would have been a lot more sensible than chasing us around in a car, wouldn't it'”
”The machinery that creates spatial distortions has to be set up in a particular location. They can't simply appear out of thin air.”
”Why the h.e.l.l not'” Kay made an ostentatious show of looking around her living room. ”They seem to have disappeared into thin air.”