Epilogue
The polar night was ushered in by the most brilliant Northern Lights Tisha had seen since they’d arrived at the settlement.
The sun had been skirting the horizon for what felt like weeks, never quite peering out but painting the sky in stunning reds and oranges of sunset. Those were gone now, replaced by a gray-blue twilight that seemed to suspend time itself. Then eventually a flicker of cyan she could’ve easily believed was in her head flashed in the corner of her eye. Then another, trace by trace until they manifested in shimmering blue, green, and purple waves rippling across the sky. It was as if the shiny oil slicks of the river back in the city had ascended and followed her to the edge of the world.
Tisha burrowed her chin further into the collar of her coat and squeezed her arms closer around herself.
“Are you cold?”
She looked back, the steam of her breath billowing an arc in front of her face.
“Not really,” she lied uselessly. She turned back to the brilliant sky as Ansel came up behind her. “I just don’t want to miss it.”
“It isn’t safe out here,” he said when he came to stand beside her. Tisha saw him peer up from the corner of her eye.
She sighed, shoulders drooping. “I know.”
His hand found hers and engulfed it, squeezing. “A few minutes.”
She smiled, leaning into him as they watched colors dance across the star-studded canvas.
Ansel was right. They weren’t just dealing with Drakov or corrupt city cops anymore. A robot had disobeyed its instructions. The world was after them now. Not even the edge of the Earth would be safe.
They’d run as far north as they could, all the way to a settlement of misfits and outcasts deep within the Arctic Circle. The residents here didn’t ask too many questions and weren’t much for pleasantries. They saw a girl on the run from a crime lord and let her spend whatever chips she’d gathered on a ramshackle old house on the outskirts of town. Nobody bothered her, and Tisha only made appearances for nutripowder, water, and charcubes.
But that wasn’t gonna last forever.
Just as her teeth began to chatter, Ansel insisted they go inside. She’d long since learned the limits of his protective patience and let him lead her ahead of him into the warmth of the cabin.
Tisha shrugged off her coat and kneeled by the fire crackling in the den, rubbing her palms together at the grate. She glanced at the stack of charcubes on the side, counting off how many days they had until she’d need to make another run.
“What did they say?” she asked. Ansel had come to stand behind her after deadbolting the door. “Can they get us to the port?”
“The probe run is arranged two weeks from now, once the ports open,” Ansel said, settling a heavy hand on her shoulder. “If that is successful, we will be out the last week of polar night.”
The lunar colony had been grumbling about being under Earth’s thumb for years. They were always robot-friendly—mostly activists arguing for bot rights. Not a thing that had ever been on Tisha’s radar until now. Now, an extremist lunar clique wanted to help. Those same activists heard about Tisha and Ansel’s plight and offered to smuggle them onto the next cargo shuttle.
At least all that media attention was good for something, Tisha thought.
“And the clones?” Tisha had tried to forget about all that shit and focus on her own problems. She failed. It was risky, having Ansel access information through short-lived satellite links. Linger too long in the comms link and his signal could be traced. She’d tried to convince him she could get over it, but he had insisted on taking that risk to give her some peace of mind.
Ansel’s hand slid along her shoulder until her cheek was in his palm. She turned into it. “Viable clones have been confiscated. They are… alive. Inquiries are ongoing. There are riots.”
Tisha nodded. At least the public response to their transmission had woken people up. Even the West Side had turned on Drakov. The entire police force and Attorney General’s office had been upturned, under investigation by the feds.
Her attention was coaxed back by the languid strokes of Ansel’s thumb along her jaw, her cheek still cupped in his hand. She slumped deeper into the sturdy wall of his legs.
“We’re getting out, aren’t we?” She lifted her face, eyes raking up the massive expanse of his thighs, hips, and chest before fixing on the visor tilted down at her. A hot shiver tracked up her spine—a visceral reminder of the effect he had on her, even here, now.
Tisha swallowed as the faint lights beneath his visor pulsed in a way she’d learned to recognize. His hand firmed around her jaw, the pulse point at the side of her throat jumping against the cool, hard fingers splayed on her flushed skin.
“We are getting out.” His reassurance, delivered in that quiet baritone, made Tisha’s insides melt.
“Get up,” Ansel said brusquely, helping pull her to her feet with a firm grip on her arm. He spun her around to face him and pressed forward, walking her back into the red brick wall next to the fireplace.
Tisha looked up at him as he loomed over her, boxing her in between him and the wall. Ansel hooked a thumb into the waistband of her fleece leggings, pulling them down with a quick tug. He paused there for a moment. A rough finger dragged along her lip and his visor darkened, slanted to the side as he watched her with a scrutiny that made her skin burn.
She exhaled a yelping gasp as Ansel snatched her waist and flipped her around with calculated efficiency, pressing her flat face-first into the wall. The rough grain of the bricks scraped at the thin fabric of her shirt. The friction peaked her nipples, a little painful yet somehow so fucking satisfying.
Tisha pressed her forehead to the wall, squeezing her eyes shut when Ansel caught her hips in both giant hands. She moaned through a sigh as he entered her in one long, hungry plunge.
Hard hands engulfed her own on the wall, their fingers intertwining as his cool plates pressed into her warm skin, and all she could think of was a sole instruction: “Closer.”
* * *