Part 31 (1/2)
In fact, James spent most of the afternoon talking with ”his people.” She was aware of a faint twinge of jealousy, but she tried to repress it, knowing it was unworthy of her. She really couldn't blame James for his childlike delight.
In the evening, she put on a dress Charles kindly provided, and went to dinner in the town square.
The humanoids ate outside, ”under the stars,” Charles explained. As the darkness fell, it began to grow chilly, but not uncomfortably so. She sat in the middle of a large, friendly group of humanoids, James by her side, and chatted as she ate homegrown corn and beans. ”How long have you been up here'” she asked Charles.
He flashed a smile that was as brilliantly mesmerizing in its way as James' lady-killing grin. He was chocolate-skinned, with long dreadlocks--every bit as gorgeous as James, yet totally opposite in appearance. ”Two years,” he said. ”We couldn't go on living as slaves. James here led us out of slavery.”
James looked abashed. ”I did my best.”
”But you claim it didn't work,” Charles said, grinning. ”No matter'if you didn't save us in the present, James, you must have saved us in the past. Because we are free.”
”Your village is very impressive,” Gar said, looking around at the metal structures. They looked vaguely reminiscent of those buildings Annie remembered from M*A*S*H'Quonset huts, she thought they were called. It was no wonder they didn't use wood; here in the middle of the desert there wasn't much to use. ”How did you build it'”
Charles seemed slightly taken aback. ”How'”
Gar nodded. ”How did you get the metal' Surely you don't have mining capabilities, do you'”
The smile on Charles' face flickered slightly. ”No.”
”So I suppose you bartered with my people for the metal,” Gar said.
There was the slightest hesitation before Charles said, ”Yes, that is what we did.”
Odd, Annie thought. It was almost as if Charles didn't know how the village had been built. Which was
ridiculous, if he was the mayor of this place. He must have supervised its construction. She frowned at her plate. Crops growing in the desert. ”Where do you get the water'” she asked abruptly. Charles raised his eyebrows. ”The water'” ”How do you get the water to grow the crops'” ”We have a source of water,” Charles said. There couldn't possibly be enough water in the desert to keep those crops growing, Annie thought.
”What source'” she persisted. ”I thought the pipes were far below ground here. How do you get the water'” Charles hesitated, looking confused and bewildered, and James intervened. ”Annie,” he said, wrinkling his forehead. ”Surely it isn't necessary to interrogate Charles.”
Annie lowered her lashes. ”No,” she said. ”It isn't. I'm very sorry, Charles.” James frowned at her, a disapproving look that made her feel about five years old. ”Annie,” he said in a stern voice. ”We need to talk.” He stood up, and she rose to her feet and followed him.
When they had walked some distance away from the others, he turned to her, looking uncomfortable. ”Annie, I want you to know that I very much appreciate everything you have done for me.” That sounded so much like a dismissal that her mouth fell open. ”I haven't done anything for you, James.” ”You have done a great deal for me,” he said. ”You have treated me like a human, and for that I am extremely grateful. But my people'.” He lifted his head and stared past her, at the group of laughing, chattering humanoids. ”My people need me, Annie.”
”They don't need you, James. They're doing just fine.”
”They need me,” he repeated. ”And I need them.”
She saw the truth in his eyes, and a huge lump lodged in her throat. ”Fine. I can stay here with you,
James. I don't mind.” In the back of her mind she thought of never seeing Kay or Clark again, and pain sliced through her heart like a knife. But she was willing to make the sacrifice for James. She wasn't exactly certain what her feelings were for him. But she did know they'd been through too much together, and she couldn't let him go. She couldn't. But his next words shattered her hopes. ”No,” he said gently. ”You need to be with your people. You must return to your own life, Annie. You belong in your time, just as I belong in mine. According to Charles, the Bureau in this reality understands, and they will help you return to your time.” ”I thought they wanted me as an accessory to murder'” ”Charles believes they will send you back to your own time rather than punish you.”
She swallowed hard and tried very hard to keep the tears that burned in her eyes from falling. ”You're telling me to get lost, aren't you'” ”Annie'.” He sighed. ”Our time together meant a great deal to me. But you cannot understand me, understand the way I think, understand what I truly am, the way other humanoids can. I've come to realize that a relations.h.i.+p with a human is a poor subst.i.tute for living among my people.”
He couldn't have hurt her more if he'd slapped her. ”Fine,” she said tightly. James looked at her with a compa.s.sionate gaze. ”I'm sorry, Annie.” ”It's all right,” she said in a harsh whisper. ”I understand.” And the h.e.l.l of it was that she did understand. He'd been cut off from his people, alone in the universe, and he'd turned to her for companions.h.i.+p because he'd had nothing else. But she knew she couldn't really understand him the way Charles and the others did. It didn't surprise her that when he had to make the choice, he chose the humanoids.
”You and Gar should leave in the morning,” he said. ”Fine,” she answered dully, and turned and walked back to the happy, laughing group around the fire, feeling like she was dying inside. * * * * ”Charles told me we have to go,” Gar said an hour later. He and Annie were walking back through the town, with its small, neat metal huts. ”Is James coming with us'” ”No. He's not.” Gar frowned. ”I don't understand that, Annie. He loves you.”
”I don't think so.”
”He is capable of love, Annie, despite the fact that he is a machine. When I was a child, he gave me a great deal more love than my mother ever did.”
”I know that. But I think'” Annie swallowed. ”I think I was just a sort of subst.i.tute to him, something he
could hang onto when he lost his people. But now that he's found his people again, he's discovered he's
not that attached to me after all.”
Gar shook his head. ”James isn't like that, Annie. He's loyal to the core. I don't believe he'd leave you voluntarily.”
”He did,” she said, unable to keep the bitterness from her tone. ”He looked me right in the eyes and told me to get lost.”
Gar's steps faltered, and he turned to face her. ”Suppose they forced him to do that somehow'”
”Forced him' How could they do that'”
”They could threaten him with one of our deaths,” Gar suggested. ”We both mean a great deal to him.
He would probably agree to let us go in order to see us be unhurt.”
That idea appealed to Annie's wounded heart, but she shook her head anyway. ”No, Gar. Think about it from his point of view. It makes perfect sense that he doesn't want me anymore. He fell for me because he missed his people, because he felt alone, but when he found them'”
”When he found his people he just told you to go to h.e.l.l' That isn't like James, Annie. Trust me, something is not right here.” Annie sighed. ”Yeah, tell me about it. There's something weird about the whole place, if you ask me. The mayor doesn't know how the town was constructed.”
”He probably wasn't designed for construction work,” Gar said. ”All the humanoids were programmed with specific knowledge for the task they were built to fulfill. James wouldn't have the faintest notion how to build a hut, either, although I'm sure he could learn if he needed to. There are probably humanoids here who are construction workers, so Charles didn't need to learn.”
”But the mayor should at least have an idea how the metal was obtained, shouldn't he'”
”You'd think so. But perhaps he wasn't mayor when the town was built.”
”And the water,” Annie went on, thinking out loud. ”He didn't seem to have the slightest clue how they
were getting water.”
Gar nodded. ”I have to agree, that surprised me.”
”And when I tried to press him on it, James pulled me aside. He distracted me.” Annie frowned in