The Phoenix Code (25 page)

"Yes, you can force us," Raj said. "How does that make you any different from a terrorist?"

"Killing those androids is
genocide
."

"We've only seen part of one proposal," Raj said.

"We won't find the truth unless we look." Ander sounded as if he hurt inside. "Are your principles more important than those lives?"

"You want me to violate my beliefs for what you say is a higher good." Raj looked as strained as Ander. "You may be right. I don't know. How do I decide? I don't believe the people on that project could commit murder. With that decision, I can't do what you want, not of my own free will. I have to use my best judgment."

"
Damn
your judgment." Ander's voice cracked. "My species may be facing extinction. I don't want to die. I don't want to live alone either, the only one of my kind."

Megan spoke in a low voice. "Then you look for Phoenix." She left the rest implicit and hoped he understood; she wouldn't help him break the law, but neither would she try to stop him.

"I don't have the background," Ander said.

"You learn faster than we do," she said. "And you watched Raj work for hours today."

Ander looked as if he wanted to explode. He motioned with the rifle. "Get in the bathroom. Both of you." When they hesitated, he raised the gun like a club.
"Do it."

Megan felt as if the ground had suddenly dropped. Had any of what they said mattered? Or was he about to follow through on his threats?
 

Ander locked them in the bathroom. Then he worked on the door—doing what, Megan had no idea. When the noise stopped, they tried the door.

"I think he jammed the knob," Raj said.

Scrapes came from outside as Ander dragged a heavy object to the door. It had to be one of the chairs; they were the only things that weren't fastened to the floor. The knob shook. Then his footsteps receded and silence descended. Raj rattled the knob, shoved on the door, and tried to force the lock, all with no success.

"I might be able to break it down," he said.

"I don't think we should." Megan's apprehension eased into a tentative wonder. "Raj, he chose. He picked the path of conscience, even if he refuses to admit it. Instead of forcing us, he's going to try Phoenix himself. And I can't stop thinking about what he said. Genocide. I'm not sure we have the right to stop him."

"I don't know. This has no easy answers." He watched her with his dark gaze. "What if he's right? How could they consider destroying living beings that way?"

"Let's see what he finds out."

"I'll give him six hours." Raj leaned heavily against the door. "Aw, Megan, don't look at me like that. All right. Twelve hours."

"Why do you think I was going to protest?"

"I've seen that look of yours plenty these past weeks," he grumbled. "It usually means I'm about to lose a debate."

She wasn't sure what to make of that. "I didn't even think you noticed me much."

"How could I not notice? Do you know how hard it is to concentrate when my boss is a red-haired Valkyrie with the face of an angel and the body of an erotica model?"

That
caught her off guard. "Good grief."

He reddened. "Sorry. That was tactless."

Tactless? It sounded great. "No. I mean, thank you." She sat on the edge of the tub. Mischief lightened her voice. "I can't think of anyone I'd rather be trapped with in a Motel Flamingo bathroom."

Sitting next to her, he grinned. "No one has ever told me that before."

"And you probably hope they never will again."

With a laugh, he took a bar of soap off a tray in the tub, then pulled over the trash can. He scraped the soap with his fingernail, shaving off white slivers. The shape of a dog began to form.

"You're good at that," she said. "Does it help you relax?"

"I suppose." He made notches to resemble fur. "Or you could call it my proverbial eccentric behavior."

"Eccentric, pah. It's neat. You have talent."

Raj gave her a startled look. "Thanks." He went back to work on the dog. "I've done it since I was a kid. To forget."

"Forget what?"

He paused, as if he had just realized what he said. "Nothing, really. I liked doing it, that's all."

Megan didn't want to trespass on his well-guarded privacy. So she only said, "When I was little, I had soaps made like seashells."

He continued to carve. "When I was four, one of my adult cousins sent me a box of bath toys. Animal soaps. He signed the card 'Love from Jay.' " His fingers slowed to a stop. "I still have that card." He was clenching the dog now.

She hesitated, wondering what was wrong. "Did your uncle like the figures?" If she recalled, he had gone to live with his uncle when he was four.

The dog suddenly broke, one piece falling out of his fist. It hit the floor by his feet. Opening his hand, he stared at the other pieces. Then he dropped them in the trash can. "Jay sent the toys after my mother's stroke. He thought they might console me."

She watched his face. "Raj?"

He wouldn't look at her. "What?"

"You're angry."

"No."

"Did something happen with Jay?"

"I—no."

"Did you miss your parents?"

At first she thought he would retreat into silence. But then he said, "So much. They were so easy to love. Tender, absentminded I suppose, but loving and affectionate."

She couldn't imagine what it had been like for him to lose both parents so young. "It must have been hard."

Raj picked up the piece of the dog that had hit the floor. "My uncle Devon found me playing with the toys. He threw them out and sent me to bed without dinner."

"But
why
? Didn't he understand?"

He rubbed his thumb over the dog's head as if he wished that simple motion could smooth away all the rough spots. "Devon meant well. He just had no idea what to do with me. The social worker probably should have put me in a foster home. But he was family." He spoke in a low voice. "Have you ever read how Mozart's father pushed him to the point of obsession? My uncle was like that. He couldn't have me wasting my mind by
playing
. Diversions, emotion, demonstrations of affection—those were for weak people."

"Ah, Raj. I'm sorry." No wonder he had bristled at Richard Kenrock, then eased up when he saw the major's sensitivity toward his children. "It must hurt."

"Not anymore." Raj dropped the soap into the trash. "I went for counseling during most of my twenties. I'll probably always have some odd coping mechanisms and a fear of heights, but I've made my peace with my childhood."

"Do you mind if I ask why heights bother you?"

It was a moment before he answered. "I climbed trees to get away from the kids who beat on me. I fell out a lot. Devon didn't know why I hated trees. He got it into his head that I had to 'overcome my fears by facing them.' So he made me climb the blasted things. He never meant to harm me, but he had no idea how to deal with the problems."

"Couldn't you tell anyone?"

"I was so proud. Too proud." Although he was staring ahead, Megan didn't think he saw the sink across from them. "I believed if I sought help, it would mean I was just as weak as my uncle made me feel."

Megan would have liked to give this uncle a piece of her mind. She thought about what Raj had told her in NEV-5. "Is that why you learned to fight? To defend yourself without asking for help?"

He turned to her. "I started lifting weights when I was twelve. The day I fought back against those kids—and won—was one of the best damn moments in my life."

She tried to understand the undercurrent she heard in his words. "And that bothers you? That you enjoyed it?"

"Of course it bothers me. I did to them what I hated them for doing to me." He curled his hand into a fist, then relaxed it. "It's why I've sworn never to use violence."

"You were defending yourself."

He was silent for a moment. "I still think, at times, that if something hadn't been wrong with me to start with, it would never have happened."

"That's bullshit. You have no control over people's cruelty." She wanted someone to blame for Raj's pain. "Where were the school counselors when you were taking that grief? Why didn't they
do
something?"

"I hid it. I think one suspected, but he couldn't reach me. I wouldn't let him. I believed I had no refuge, so for years I retreated into my own mind and cut out everyone, including those who could have helped."

"It sounds like a nightmare."

"It's long over." In a low voice, he repeated, "It's over."

Megan touched his cheek. "You turned out well."

To her surprise, he laughed. "I'm a nut case. But you know, I like myself now. Given how much I used to hate myself, it feels good to have reached this place."

"You should like yourself. You're a good person." She tried to imagine his life. "It must have felt like a miracle to have your parents back when you were fourteen."

"I suppose." He picked up a piece of his carving from the trash and began scraping again. "By that time, I was a mess."

Megan wasn't having any of that. "So messed up, in fact, that you went to Harvard at fourteen and had a Ph.D. from MIT by the time you were twenty."

He smiled, an expression he used all too rarely. "I think the swan is coming out to fight."

"Just look what you've accomplished."

"Being smart doesn't mean I wasn't screwed up." He whittled the soap, carving a small cat this time. "My parents didn't know what to do with me. My father was one of the first Alzheimer's patients to recover. The doctors didn't know as much then about helping people readjust. And it took my mother years of physical therapy just to walk again." Softly he said, "When I was little, I wanted to build legs for her and a mind for him."

She could almost feel the hurt that underlay his words. "So you went into robotics and AI."

"Yes. It took a while, though." He roughed out the cat's tail. "I wasn't the world's easiest fourteen-year-old. After the second time I took my father's car without permission, and then crashed it at two in the morning, he was at his wit's end. Packing me off to Harvard was a desperation move. It was either that or send me to the juvenile authorities."

Enrolling an angry youth at a high-powered Ivy League college would normally have struck Megan as a bizarre solution for juvenile misbehavior. With Raj, it made sense. "You must have been bored in high school."

"Bored to screaming." He gave a wry laugh. "At Harvard, for the first time I had competition. It outraged me when other students got better grades. I straightened up so I could beat them at academics." His hand slowed as he added finishing touches to the cat. His voice became thoughtful. "Then I started enjoying school for its own sake."

"You just needed a better environment."

Raj set the cat on the tub. "I apologize for unloading all this on you. With most people, I say far too little. With you, I seem to say too much."

"You shouldn't apologize." She took his hand in hers. "You're a remarkable man."

Raj studied her face as if to gauge whether she meant what she said. He leaned toward her, paused, put his arm around her shoulders—and then they both lost their balance, falling into the tub.

"Ah!" Megan groaned as her shoulders thudded against the back wall. Raj fell against her and they smashed into the faucet. She barely managed to keep from smacking on the water.

"I do
not
believe this," Raj said. "I can't even hug a woman without knocking her over." Seeing her laugh, he grinned. "You look graceful, sprawled there."

"Well, so do you, with your arms and legs all askew."

"Askew?" Laughing, he tried to untangle their limbs. "Megan, no normal person says 'askew.' "

"It gets worse," she confided. "I've even been known to say 'refulgent.' "

They shifted around and ended up seated across the width of the tub, their backs against the tile wall, Raj's legs hanging over the side and Megan curled next to him. When she put her arms around his waist, he wrapped her in a muscular embrace and pressed his lips against the top of her head.

After the strain of the last few days, it felt good to hold him, knowing that whatever else had happened, they were all right for now. His embrace gave her a sense of shelter, one that came from a trust more basic than any social roles. She knew how to stand up for herself, and valued that trait, but it didn't make her any less appreciative of his strength.

Megan made a decision. She might later have to reevaluate it, but she couldn't keep hanging in doubt. So she chose, for now, to trust Raj.

As they sat together, her relief merged into the simmering arousal she often felt around him. She rubbed her hand across his torso, then played with the zipper of his jumpsuit. It would be so easy to pull it down and have his wiry curls and well-developed chest under her hand.

"You smell good." He nuzzled her hair. "Like soap."

"Genuine Motel Flamingo soap, no less."

He spoke near her ear. "I may not be the world's most articulate man, but I'm good with ideas. And I have one now. I think we should take a bath."

"Raj!"

He put his hand on her stomach, crinkling her nightshirt. "This robe is nice."

"I've had it for ages."

He was watching her with that look again, as if she shone like a new coin. She liked it as much now as she had in NEV-5. He touched his lips to hers, a light kiss, more of a question than anything else. She closed her eyes, trying to relax, and he drew her close. After a while, he undid her nightshirt. It fluttered open, leaving her bare under his touch. When he slid his hand across her stomach, it stoked responses in her body that she enjoyed even more than a spring day in the Montana mountains.

"You're so warm." He slid one arm around her back, taking it slow, giving her plenty of time to stop him.

Did she want to stop? They had no way to know what would happen when Ander opened that door again. He might shoot them, let them go, or take some random action they couldn't predict. This could be their last time together.