Ant and Four

Ant and Four Chapter 14

This is a story about two boys growing up in the galaxy, in a distant future. Neither of them is human.

It is not an erotic tale, but one of friendship and love. The story contains no AI-generated material.

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Ant and Four 14 - _Fourtitude
_

by Winter

 The sandstorm had intensified over the last couple of hours. Even though the cube-shaped bulk of the Fourtitude was parked in the shade of a sandstone pillar, it was still pelted with pebbles and rocked by occasional hurricane gusts. Inside, Four's animated face on the viewscreen showed worry. Most of his external sensors were useless, especially in this weather, and he kept them retracted so as not to give the wind anything to grab hold of. He sighed. For him, it was a game of waiting.

Four in his robot body had been gone for three days and fifty-eight minutes. And pretty much all that time, had been out of radio range. That was unheard of. The robot boy Four and the Fourtitude itself had been constantly linked, ever since the day he had been given his body to roam around in. With one exception; when the pirates blocked all signals in Lakeview, before their attack, and robot Four had collapsed. Not to see, hear or feel that part of himself was as unbearable now as it had been then. Four worried his lower lip between his teeth, one of the quirks he had picked up during his transition from helpful onboard computer to a person in his own rights. He wanted to go look for himself, but the weather meant it would be futile. He could, literally, fly right over his robot body, without seeing or sensing it.

To try and take his mind off his concerns, he scanned the interior of the ship. First the workshop. It had originally been a bedroom, during his days as a hospital ferry, and later a storeroom. But when he and Ant started crafting toys and trinkets, it had been repurposed. Now it lay depressingly empty. The shelves were bare, the work bench had been unused for weeks, and the pile of electronic junk in one corner had dwindled down to a couple lengths of scrap wiring and a useless, fried-out circuit board. Even the last of Ant's wood carvings were gone, as well as Four's own easel.

The main room, Four noticed with a shake of his head, really needed cleaning. The floor was dusty, and sprinkled with candy wrappers and empty juice boxes. The couch that doubled as bed was unmade, and unslept in. Ever since his journey into the galaxy core began, robot Four had barely even used it to sit on. He didn't really need sleep, even though he had picked it up as a habit, and these days his robotic body simply stayed where he stood when he set it to inactive mode.

The tiny kitchen area had remained unused this whole time, its fridge empty. Four had thrown out any perishables before they went bad, and the rest he had given away or used up himself. His robot body didn't really need to eat, but it did require a small intake of liquid to keep his batteries running and his joints greased. The candy had become comfort, a way to try and pretend normalcy.

On the other side of the workshop from the kitchen was the bathroom door, very much closed. The Fourtitude didn't have enough fresh water for a shower, and there was nobody on board who needed the toilet. Not anymore... Chasing that thought away, Four let his camera zoom in on the various pictures, paintings, print-outs and other trinkets that adorned the walls. To anyone else it might have seemed cluttered, but to him it was homey. It was him. Ever since his travels with Ant began, the wolf boy had made sure to bring back little gifts from his outings. Decorations, he had called them. To Four, they were treasures.

Once Four had his robot body, he and Ant had kept up the tradition, and as the camera lens moved from object to object, Four could recall memories from every place he had visited. A postcard from New Mérida, a plastic toy car Four had won at the fair in Wishing Well, a landscape painting made by a street artist in Forest City. Four's own art attempts, mostly featuring himself and Ant. Here and there were little fairy lights, which Ant had bought in Rheenna and which Four had been able to turn on and off or set to twinkle. They were all dark now, each and every little light bulb broken.

All those memories were much more vivid than anything usually stored inside a computer. They evoked feelings. Emotions. A sense of truly belonging, of being a dynamic part, no matter how small, of the universe. They were also a reminder he didn't need, of how lonely he was.

Laying that thought aside once again, Four let his camera sweep over the closed door that led outside, past the empty occasional table, to settle on the small shelf behind the couch. It pained him to see the fish tank empty. Trevor the robot fish, one of the first toys Ant ever made, had stood no chance against the thunderous radiation emanating from the black hole at the galaxy's centre. His still body now lay in a drawer in the workshop, even though any thoughts of repairing him were probably in vain. Next to the tank stood Li'l Ant the clockwork wolf, who didn't have any circuits and would still bark and wag its tail when wound up.

Four sighed again, and considered switching the viewscreen off and set himself to inactive. But he had promised his robot self to remain vigilant, in case he signalled for help. As for how he would be able to assist himself, he didn't know, since they weren't able to communicate through the sandstorm. Or had maybe the radio receiver itself ceased to function? It wasn't easy to tell, since the Fourtitude's self-diagnostic system had been one of the first to give up the ghost.

"You said three days," Four muttered, more to break the oppressive silence than because he needed reminding. "Three days then come and find you. But how can I find anything that isn't sand?"

During his time alone, it had become more and more difficult for Four to keep his two selves connected. His robot body and his screen self often held long conversations to chase away the hours, or played computer games that didn't require a functioning datanet. They even argued, and a couple of times they had become so enraged with one another they hadn't spoken for days. But now screen Four was worried. An hour and seventeen minutes had passed since the three-day deadline expired. What would be the best course of action? To fly around randomly without visuals, hoping to literally run into robot Four, seemed beyond futile. Better to stay where he was and hope that Four was somehow still active, that he could find his way back. Better, yes, but more frustrating.

Just then, something thudded against his hull. Four gasped, even though his screen form didn't have any lungs to draw air into. The sound came again, and then he could have sworn he heard voices. Faint in the storm, but still, human voices. As quietly as he could, Four extended two of his outside cameras from their protective holds and scanned the area. He could see very little, but by his rear left corner he spotted two dark shapes. Settlers?

They had come to give help to the illegal settlers who braved the dangerous radiation, to find new homes and seek fortune for themselves and their families. But the settlers had turned out unwilling to listen to Four's pleas, to leave the lives they had carved out. Not even for the sake of their children's health. Not even when Four told them about settlers getting sick and even dying in the long run. They would not leave, they would not let their children leave, and whenever Four got the chance to talk to one of the kids, they themselves refused to budge, from the only lives they had ever known.

Those were the ones who would even talk to him at all. More often than not, especially the further into the core Four went, the settlers were hostile. Even violent. Robot Four bore a mark to that; a hole in his plastic skin, right below the nipple on the left side of his chest. Where his heart would have been, had he been human. The bullet had passed straight through, leaving a similar hole on his back. Thankfully, no vital parts had been hit, but it had made Four more cautious thenceforth. The similarity to Ant's scar from being shot with a laser gun was not lost to Four, but he did his best not to dwell on it.

In fact, he tried to think about Ant as little as possible. All to avoid falling back into that deep, dark pit of emotions that had plagued him for days after he left. After he abandoned Ant on Land's End, the last inhabited planet before the restricted zone began. The two of them had not seen eye-to-eye when it came to this rescue mission, and in the end the wolf boy had turned and walked away.

Stepped off the ramp.

And though it had hurt more than he thought even possible, Four had decided to go on his own. Whatever inside his programming that passed for a conscience, wouldn't let him ignore people who needed help. Especially children. In many ways, he was like a child himself. Robot Four looked like a young boy barely in his teens, and he sounded like a young boy. He loved interacting with kids; chat with them, play with them, make friends with them. Have fun like them. So when he learned about the settlers and the ailments that befell them, there was no way he couldn't act.

Had Ant been sad when he left? Angry? He said he would wait, but a lot of time had passed. Surely he had gone his own way by now? It wouldn't be like Ant to sit idly by and wait.

Wait for someone who wouldn't come, since Ant didn't believe that the Fourtitude could survive the radiation.

Growling with frustration, unaware that he was copying mannerisms from the wolf boy in question, screen Four mentally shook himself out of his reverie. He knew better than to dwell on the past, especially when it made him feel bad. Instead he increased his camera's audio input level, and applied a filter to mask the noise of the sandstorm. Finally, he could make out words.

"...be the one Willes radio'd about. I knew it'd get here in the end."

"Can't make hide nor hair o' this. There's no door, no boosters, no nothin'."

"Just torch your way in."

"Can't, storm's gonna short the arc. Gotta wait for it t' die down."

"Damn storm. If it had jus' held out one more day."

"You sure the guy's still at Ander's farm?"

"Should be. Ander said he'd keep him there, pretend to listen to his crap long enough for us to strip his ship."

"I could use a new fan for th' mine. Gettin' stale down there."

Four shut off the audio, but kept his camera trained on the two men. So they had lured his robot self away, to come at the ship! But that didn't make sense. Four was too clever to get fooled easily. Maybe they had tricked him by pretending they might let their kids come along. That had been Four's objective all along; to save the settlers' children from the deadly radiation. Yet not one had been interested, even after Four handed out toys and balloons and sweets, and talked about how many friendly worlds there were back in the safe parts of the galaxy. Not one. So far, they had failed miserably. The temptation to finally succeed was the only thing Four could think of, that would make his robot self lose his caution.

He contemplated setting off loud sirens, or play roars from some monster movie in his video library, anything to scare the settlers away, but he also knew that this tactic would not work in the long run. The men were set on scrapping him, and they wouldn't back off easily. Especially once they realised that he was all bark and no bite. Ant had joked about getting weapons for the Fourtitude, but neither he nor Four had ever wanted them, or thought they'd really need them. Now, he wished he had been less naive. Maybe he should take off, hide inside the sandstorm until they gave up and went home. But what if robot Four returned in the meantime? Would he feel abandoned, just as Ant surely had?

Before Four could chastise himself for letting that thought slip into his mind, there came a loud bang from outside. The two men jumped, and cast about trying to find the source of the sound. Four activated another camera, and it soon found a lone figure walking out of the storm towards him. It was dressed in a footside poncho, dark brown with patterns of lighter brown, murky yellow and drab grey, so as to make it half invisible against the sand. The head and face were concealed by the wide brim of a brown hat that seemed too big for the lithe body. Four's heart would have skipped a beat with joy, had he had one. The figure held an ancient-looking rifle in its hands, raised it, and fired again. The two men had heard enough. They turned and fled, back into the storm from which they had come. Four lowered his ramp, and waited until there was a knock on the door. Then he opened it, and let himself in.

* * * * * *

A flurry of sand followed Four inside, adding to the already dirty floor. The boy took off his hat and laid it on the small table where he had once kept a bowl for coins, then stood his rifle in the corner next to it. He spat out a mouthful of sand, and shook even more of the stuff from his hair, sunlight blonde except for that one light purple lock that marked him as a proxy body. A robot. His poncho went the way of the hat. Then he smiled at the viewscreen; not a joyous beam, but a wry and crooked grin.

"I fired my blunderbuss." He brushed off his arms. "Never done that before."

"Are you okay?" screen Four asked with a tremor in his voice. "Did they hurt you?"

"Never mind me, what about you? Or rather, what about us? Did those men damage anything?"

"No. They wanted to, I could hear them talk, but you chased them away."

"Imagine that." Another grin. "Little ol' me, scaring off the bad guys."

"It's not funny. They knew we were coming."

"Yeah, I figured as much."

"What happened?"

With a sigh, Four sat down on the floor, leaning against the armrest of the couch, then related his tale. Almost at once, he had realised that something was off. Mr Ander had been friendly enough, but in a way that seemed insincere. Calculating. And he did keep glancing at his wall clock. What settled the matter was that he would not let Four meet his children, not even to give them the wood carvings he had brought. The last ones left, the foxie and the collie pup. Also, nothing in the man's cramped hut gave an indication he even had children. No toys, no pictures on the walls, only one unmade bed, only one dirty plate in the sink. In the end, Four had simply stood up and walked out.

"I'm surprised he let you go, just like that. He was supposed to keep you there."

"Who said anything about just like that?" This time, the smile looked almost feral, and screen Four mimed a gulp. "He tried his best to get me to stay."

"You... you didn't hurt him, did you?"

"Of course not. But I'm pretty quick when I want to be." Four giggled. "He grabbed my arm, but I did one of the wrestling tricks Ant taught us. Then I ran pretty much the whole way here."

"Except for the last few metres." This time, it was screen Four who grinned. "So you could walk slowly out of the storm like some kinda wild west hero."

"Did I look cool?"

"Way cool. You should've had a... a harmonica to play, like a movie soundtrack."

"That would've been cheesy."

"Well, we are kinda cheesy. Especially when it comes to movies and all that."

"True."

"Four, we lost contact..."

"I know. It felt weird."

"It shouldn't have been possible." Screen Four frowned. "Last time that happened was on the Range, remember?"

"Not really."

"Right, because you keeled over. Scared poor Ant half to death. So how could you function without me this time?"

"Dunno."

"Four, this isn't something we can just shrug off. We both saw the blueprints for our body. You've got enough memory for base functions, nothing more."

"I always felt all here."

"But you're not. Most of you is still in here, in the Fourtitude. Without radio..."

"Mr Larsen would have known. I don't, and I don't really care. Where are we going next?"

"Four..."

"Don't 'Four...' me!" Four stood up. "You know we have to keep going. Anything else, it can wait."

"Even if it concerns our functions?"

"Yes."

"Get ready. We're leaving the magnetic field."

Both Fours scrunched up their faces as the Fourtitude left this unnamed world's protective magnetosphere. The full force of the black hole hit them like a punch, and deep inside the ship's hull something popped. Another relay? Screen Four winced, then closed his eyes for a few seconds. When he opened them again, he frowned.

"That one actually hurt. I managed to bypass it, but I don't have many options left."

"Maybe we can buy some electronic supplies at our next stop."

"Four..."

"I know, but just one more. Please."

"You've said that after our last six stops."

"What if the next one will..."

"Will what?" The frown turned into a scowl. "Nobody's going to listen to us. Maybe Ant was right."

"I know." Four slumped over, and curled into a ball on the floor. "It hurts, though. It really hurts."

"We can't help people who don't want help. Who don't think they need help. Many of them were so desperate to get away, we won't even be able to drag them back. And some even ran from the law."

"I know. But what if someone does listen?"

"What if they don't? Four, I told you, these guys knew we were coming. They're radioing each other so they can lie in wait for us. They wanted to tear me apart for scraps."

"We can't just give up..."

"Ant won't wait forever, you know."

"He's already gone by now," Four said in a low voice. "How long has it been?"

"Local time or standard?"

"Either."

"Neither. Our internal clock's packed it in. I had to count seconds to know when your three days were up."

"Estimate."

"At least three months. Maximum three-and-a-half."

"Ant's gone," Four said again as he sat up. His tone was neutral, and his face showed no emotions. "He must think we're dead."

"I don't wanna think about him."

"Me neither. But I did. I do. All the time."

"Me, too." Screen Four groaned, and his robot self chimed in. "I can't not."

"Let's talk about something else."

"He'd ask us to come back, you know. He'd beg us to."

"Don't..."

"He'll get really sad if we don't."

"Please, stop."

The room fell silent, and after a couple of seconds the screen shut off. Four pulled his knees up and hugged them, then leaned his forehead against them while trying to quell his thoughts. The image of a lupine face with a happy grin flashed before whatever counted as his mind's eye. A slightly growly voice spoke words Four couldn't make out, then laughed. That laugh. That toothy smile. That tail which always wagged when Ant was happy or excited. That soft brown fur that was so nice to run one's fingers through. Those strong arms that would hold him at night...

Four stood back up, forcing the memory flood to end. His mood was in danger of returning to despair. Why was it so difficult to stop remembering? He was a machine, after all. Surely he could just delete the painful memories? But they weren't painful, were they? Not at all. They were of joy, of fun, of friendship. Of... other things. The pain sat in the now. In the fact that he didn't have that joy anymore. And never would again. Because no matter what screen Four thought, Ant wouldn't have waited this long. He would have moved on. He had probably left Land's End already, on his way to who-knew-where.

Once again, Four had to force himself to stop thinking about his friend. His first friend. The one who had taught him how to be a person, who had been so patient and kind and...

"No!"

Four looked around the room, and ran a finger over the grimy floor. He really should clean this place up. Maybe tomorrow. Not wanting to lie down on the couch, not wanting to sleep in case he were to dream, Four prepared himself to shut down. His screen self would keep the ship on course, he knew, on course inwards for their next stop.

Just one more. Just one.

* * * * * *

One more. Two more. Three more. Four had lost count by the time he dragged his feet up the ramp, threw his hat into the corner and slumped to the floor. He didn't have enough water left for tears, but he cried anyway. Sobs of pain and guilt and fear and sadness racked his body, but even though he got dirty from lying on the floor, he couldn't muster the willpower needed to get up.

"That bad, huh?"

"You have no idea," Four croaked, his voicebox trying but failing to produce his usual boy soprano. It had been that way for a while now, and nothing he tried helped. "The worst yet."

"Were they all...?"

"Yes. I don't... I don't wanna talk about it."

"Nothing human can live here. We're in too deep."

"I know."

"Nothing mechanical, either."

"I know!"

"We should stop."

"No!" Those words got Four up. He stomped over to the screen and jabbed his finger at it. "We can't fail, we just can't! Not after... not after..."

"...giving up everything we had," screen Four filled in. "But we can't save the dead, Four. Especially if we die, too. Let's stop going in, Let's go 'round instead."

"What do you mean?"

"It's not a straight line, Four, there's suns and worlds spread all around the core. Left, right, up, down. Three-sixty. There's plenty of places we haven't visited on the other sides from where we went in. I think."

"You think?"

"All the scanners are gone. and I've had to repurpose my database for basic navigation." He paused, and when he spoke again it was in a whisper. "I don't have many spit-and-spackle solutions left."

"But we will hold together, right?" Four stared at the screen, but the image on it stayed silent. "Right?"

"I... I don't know. Maybe." Both Fours sighed. "If we could... If we could only go back for a little while."

"No."

"Just to make repairs, and maybe insulate my circuits better. And stock up on stuff. You need to drink soon, Four, or your body's gonna freeze up."

"I know!" Frustrated, Four turned around, and barely managed to stop himself from kicking the couch. "But I'm scared."

"That Ant won't be there?"

"No. We both know he's gone." The screen face winced. "But... I'm scared that I'll be too scared to go back in again. Does that make sense?"

"Nothing of this makes sense. We've already failed."

"Look into my eyes. Can you honestly tell me that you want to quit?" Four leaned closer to the screen, even though he knew that his animated self used wall-mounted cameras to see with, rather than his image's eyes. "That you're ready to give up on the kids?"

"No..." The picture flickered, and vanished. "I'm you, you doofus. I'm stuck with this just as much as you are."

"So why are you arguing?"

"I'm not. You are."

"Huh?"

"Don't you get it, Four? You want to quit. You want to go back. You want to find Ant and stay with him forever."

"No I don't..."

"Liar."

"Ant's gone, and I know I can never find him again."

"Liar!" The screen came back to life, and Four recoiled. He had never seen his face look so hurt, so dejected. "We could do it if we wanted to."

"It'd be worse than a needle in a haystack. We'd be looking for a... a... a wolf in a galaxy."

"We're resourceful. You want proof? We're still alive."

"Okay." With a groan, Four sat down on the couch. Just on the edge of the seat, as if he were afraid to disturb it. "Say you're right, that I do want to go back."

"Which I do say."

"Want is irrelevant. I can't go back. Not without... not without trying harder. I have to do something. I have to save someone."

"What about saving us?" Screen Four's features softened. "We count, too."

"We're not alive."

"Ant says we are."

"Ant's wrong." Four stared at the dirty floor. He wanted to cry again, even without tears, but somehow he couldn't even manage a sob this time. "He thinks we're alive, but we're not. He thinks we have a heart, but we don't. He thinks we can just abandon the people who live in here, but we can't."

"Why?"

"Huh?"

"Four, why can't we quit?

"So you admit we can't?"

"I'm you." Screen Four let out yet another sigh. "I know we can't quit. I also know that we don't know why we can't quit. We're not the stubborn one, Ant is."

"It's because... because..." Four stood up, and started pacing the Fourtitude's main room, ransacking his mind to find an answer. "Because... because every time we leave someone behind, every time we fail, it breaks my..."

He froze mid-stride. His mouth hung open, but the next word wouldn't come. Minutes seemed to pass, and Four didn't move. Thoughts raced through his mind, way faster than ever before. Usually, he worked at a human pace, or a wolf's, when he was in his body, to make interactions smooth. But now, he was a computer. An electronic brain, trying to analyse itself. Trying to solve the riddle of his self.

He shouldn't even have a self. Back when he had just been the ferry, he never thought about things like that. All he did was drive people back and forth. It had been so easy. Then a certain someone had strolled aboard, and insisted on being his friend. Asked him impossible questions. What do you want to do? Where do you want to go? What do you think? How could a poor service machine answer something like that? How come he didn't just... fall apart?

Needing to find an answer, Four dived down, deep into his own mind. All around, seemingly tangible, he saw lines of code. His code. His self. Or rather, a visualisation of his inner workings, created by him so that he could understand it. Or whatever; it was confusing and it was close to frightening.

He paused when he saw those first few changes. The new lines, prompted by Ant's mere presence. Lines that tried to make sense of strange new concepts; friends, fun, exploring. Feeling, tasting, touching. Companionship, camaraderie.

There was one more word, one emotion he was too scared to even think.

At first, the code was chaotic. Too much, too fast, too new, too raw. But... as time passed, as Four's deep core self expanded, grew, a brand new cohesiveness emerged. As Four watched his own progress, he saw that it solidified. The first jumble, which rightfully should have collapsed and destroyed his mind, instead grew strong. Structured. Ever more complex. Instead of breaking down, the code morphed to become...

...helical.

No, surely not! This must be a joke, or a mental image distorted by the radiation from the black hole. Or his mind had finally snapped, and he was now completely insane. But he looked around, moved around inside the electronic halls of his mind. The same structure was everywhere. Had he deliberately constructed himself this way, back when he started building up his own persona?

Or had he evolved?

It seemed too much. So many layers upon layers, spirals within spirals. So much code, so much raw data. So many programs that reacted to and interacted with one another. Much, much more than could possibly exist within the limited storage capacity of his robot body. It should be impossible to even access all this. Four searched for, and found, a suitable metaphor; it was as if he had a single sheet of paper, and wrote a billion novels on it. In large print, perfectly readable. Without filling even half the page. And he could read every line with a single glance. Beyond impossible.

No wonder he could function without a radio connection to the Fourtitude. If what he saw were true, he had enough memory now to run a thousand Fours.

He was just a little robot, there was no way he could have created such a sophisticated piece of programming. Or rather, he was still creating it. Because even as he watched, new lines appeared, and fell in place with the rest, seamlessly. Memories of him, staring at his own memories. He was a work in progress.

"Heart." The voice sounded distant, as if it came from forever away. But it beckoned him, pulled him back to reality. His inner vision blurred, and reformed to show the viewscreen with his own face on it. "You were going to say heart."

"Don't be daft!" Four snapped, while he mentally shrugged, shaking off the things he had just seen. It was too much to cope with. "I don't have a heart."

"Then what is it that keeps breaking?"

"Your face."

"This is ridiculous! You're threatening yourself."

"I'm not, I'm threatening you."

"Four..."

"I don't know!" Four made a gesture as if he were pushing something away. "I've looked at everything that's me, and I still don't know why I'm so obsessed with saving those kids."

"I'm telling you, it's your heart that won't let go."

"Don't you mean my core, as in my core program?" Four scoffed. "Because that's what I saw in there, inside myself. Code. Lots and lots of code. That's all I am. A program. Data storage. A damned machine."

"You're being stubborn."

"I'm not stubborn, you're stubborn."

"And you're being petulant."

"If you're really me, then why can't you just shut up and agree with me?"

"How can I agree with you," screen Four said with a smirk, "if I'm shutting up?"

"Now you're being petulant."

"I've set us a new course, by the way."

"What?" Four's eyes widened. "Where to?"

"Don't worry, we're still inside the core. Just at a slightly less lethal heading."

"Good. Do you think you can do repairs on the fly?"

"I'm just a face on a screen. You have our hands."

"Fine." Four's shoulders slumped. "I'll see what I can do. But only if you promise to find us another settled planet."

"Deal."

* * * * * *

"That should do it."

Four wiggled his butt, to pull his top half out of the access port. He didn't know much about engineering, and without the datanet he couldn't find instructions. Despite that, he had done his best to repair the damaged systems while strengthening the ones that were still hanging in there. Since he didn't have any food left, he had dismantled the refrigerator and used it for parts. It would have to do, because, it just had to.

"I feel better," screen Four said. "Not good, but better."

"Does the new insulation work?"

"It really does. How did you...?"

"The bits of the door that keep the cold in. I wrapped that rubbery stuff around our main processors."

"Cosy. As long as I don't overheat, I feel like I can take on a dozen black holes."

"Don't ask for more trouble. The one out there is bad enough."

"Speaking of trouble, I've found a new system that looks promising."

"How many planets?"

"Six, but only one has got an atmosphere that humans can breathe."

"Let's check it out."

* * * * * *

And so it went. System after system, planet after planet. Every time something broke inside the little ferry, the two Fours did their best to make repairs. Days turned to weeks, turned to months.

In between his futile attempts to persuade the locals to come with him, Four spent a lot of time pondering his programming, and his altered storage capacity. He delved deep into his code, sometimes alone, sometimes together with a representation of screen Four. The two of them marvelled at what they saw.

"It looks so... fragile," screen Four said, almost touching those first wild lines. "Check out this one, we were so close to fracturing."

"I know." Their voices, inside this strange visual Fourscape, were not vibrations of air, but more along the line of data transfers. But to Four it felt and sounded like talking. "That's why machines have their memories wiped, so they don't get overloaded like that."

"An overdose of Ant." Screen Four giggled. "What a way to die, huh?"

"How, though? How did we survive?"

"Because we wanted to stay with Ant. Couldn't do that if we broke down."

"You think it's that easy?"

"No, you think it's that easy. I'm you, remember?"

"Whatever." Four huffed. "So it was Ant all along, who changed us?"

"No, we changed ourselves." Screen Four strolled over to a solid block, seemingly the size of a small house, and tapped it. "This was us. Our core programming. Are you sure we can't get in?"

"This little thing." Four looked around at a city of much larger blocks, that stretched as far as his eyes could see. And above, level after level after level of more and more and more data. "Just look at the rest of it!"

"I don't know how much power it takes to simulate a real mind. Do you?"

"No. But it doesn't seem possible."

"How far in are we?"

In response, Four focused his mind, and backed out. The level they had been on shrank away, and became the base of one of the spirals. Which stretched up and out, beyond Four's ability to zoom. They stood in a forest now, surrounded by spiral-like trees, each many orders of magnitude larger than where they had seen the little block of core.

"Wow..."

"It's everything we've done, since we met Ant. Both real things that really happened, and movies and books and dreams and stuff we've just... imagined. And, you know, feelings and such."

"All built on top of each other."

"Above and below, beside and inside. I can't really explain it, but it all interconnects."

"How?"

"If we think about something we've done, say..."

"Riding the horse!"

"Yeah, right." Four laughed, and his screen self joined in. "Then we think about it, how we rode, and how it felt."

"And how scared Ant was."

"But we also think about the stable hands. And the smell of hay and grass and... well, other stuff." They walked along the forest floor, watching as sparks shot between some of the trees. "We remember how the clouds looked, where the ferry was parked, how it felt to watch the video later."

"With Ant."

"Yeah." Four sighed. "And with that comes all the other feelings..."

"You still can't say it, can you?"

"Say what?"

"You know, that word..."

"I almost thought it, before." Four stopped, and sat down. "Stupid."

"Not stupid."

"I'm a machine. He's a living thing. Stupid!"

"We feel what we feel." Screen Four sat down, too. Inside this visualisation, they were completely identical. "And we feel..."

"Don't say it!" And, just like that, the illusion ended. Four sat on the Fourtitude's dirty floor, and the screen was blank. He slumped, and if he'd had tears, they would have fallen. "Don't say it. 'Cause, it really don't matter. 'Cause he really, really is gone."

Please, Four thought as he prepared to shut his robot self off. Please let me stop feeling.

* * * * * *

"Take off! Take off!"

"What about you?" Screen Four's face showed his distress, and he wiped sweat from his brow. "Where are you?"

"Half a kilometre, east." Outside the Fourtitude, screen Four could hear a bang. "I keep firing, but they're not scared any more."

"If I take off..."

"They're going around, they're gonna get to you before I can." The radio transmission crackled. "...yourself!"

"Hell no!" There was a faint humming noise, as the engines started up. "I'm not leaving you behind!"

"But..."

"Sit on your but!"

Screen Four extended all his cameras, one at each top corner, and tried to get a cohesive image of what was happening. It was true, he saw, that settlers were almost upon the little ferry. He took off, and hovered at about ten metres. They fired at him, but he judged the damage to be superficial. Cosmetic.

The Fourtitude had been parked on top of a hill, but he had still missed the calamity below. While robot Four had been out, looking for settlers, he had been pondering the data landscape inside. Did consciousness count as life? Setting aside this silly split personality he had developed during his time alone, he really did have a mind. A far more complex one that any ferry had the right to. At least, in the old days. He would never have life, in the way of a beating heart and all that stuff. But he did have his mind. And his feelings. Surely they counted?

Forgetting all of that, he let the ferry soar down, towards a place where a large group of people chased one small person. Him. His robot self. The hat was gone, so Four could easily recognise the blonde mop of hair. If he'd had time to zoom in, he would have seen the purple lock. As it was, though, he focused all his run power to find a solution.

To save himself.

He opened the door, gritting his teeth as Li'l Ant, the clockwork wolf, fell out in a clutter of junk and a cloud of dust. He'd grieve for the toy later, if there were any later. Above the rush of wind, the sound of the lowering ramp was barely audible. One of the settlers made a lunge for robot Four, and grabbed his sleeve. Goodbye, poncho. Dressed in nothing but briefs and a dirty t-shirt, Four stopped and fired his rifle again. The mob halted, and a little bit of hope entered screen Four's mind.

But no. They knew he wouldn't shoot to hurt. A stick whirred through the air, and struck Four's arm. He dropped the rifle. Emboldened, the rest of them began to crowd him. Before he could really think it, screen Four acted. The ferry flew lower, in over the crowd.

"Drop!"

He saw Four sink to the ground, and then he slammed into the settlers. Bodies thumped against his hull, and he spun around, bumping them with his rounded corners. Every now and then, someone was whacked aside by the ramp. They seemed stunned, but he knew that it wouldn't last long.

"Come on!"

He could hear his own voice, from the radio speaker around Four's neck. He was so close! Then came a small hand, grasping the top of the ramp. Robot Four's face, features twisted with fear, as he scrambled to get inside. He almost made it.

A much larger hand, dark with grime and dirt and sun exposure, grabbed him and began to pull. The Fourtitude took off, shot straight up, far out of reach from the ground, while Four struggled. The face that appeared in the doorway, towering over the little robot, barely looked human. A mask of sores leaking pus and blood, while an all but toothless mouth spat out a curse. Four kicked, and kicked again, while screen Four rocked the ferry. Trying to rob the assailant of his balance.

It worked. The figure lost his grip, teetered for a second, then he was gone. Four hurried to get inside, as the door closed. The ramp slid in underneath the floor, and all was quiet.

All except the Fours' mind. When they spoke, it was in perfect synch.

"I killed him."

* * * * * *

They were still in the same star system, but nowhere near that fatal planet. Instead the Fourtitude stood parked deep inside a cave, on a small asteroid. It had enough metals embedded in its rocky structure to shield them from the black hole, at least for the time being.

They needed the respite.

Neither of them was feeling well.

Four had taken the blanket off the couch, the same one he and Ant had slept underneath so many times, and wrapped it around his shoulders where he sat on the floor. He was shivering, but not from cold. A little bit of Ant's scent remained in the fabric, and it gave a modicum of comfort. On the screen, his counterpart looked pale, his features grim.

They were killers.

In self defence, true, but still... The ferry had been so high up, there was no way a human could survive the fall. And instead of trying to help, they had fled. Left the settlement behind, left the planet behind.

They had never given Four a chance. As soon as he showed up at the ill-assorted bunch of ramshackle hovels that passed for a mining town, the men had gathered, staring at him. He saw no women, no children. No youngsters and no elderly. Just a group of adult males. Before he could even begin to speak, they charged.

Running for his life was nothing new; he had done that several times since his foolquest began. He and Ant ran a couple of times as well, but not from anything like this. It was one thing to get chased out of a xenophobic town, another entirely to flee from men who wanted blood. Four sighed.

It wasn't as if he had any blood to give them. His subcutaneous fluid vessels held just barely enough water to keep him functional. He had nothing to spare.

He didn't want to do this anymore. He wanted to go home. Strike that, he wanted to go find Ant. Until he had, the Fourtitude wouldn't be home. Rocking slowly back and forth, he tried to feel sad. Tried to cry. But there was nothing. He was empty, drained of emotions.

He had killed a man. Ended a life. Where was his grief? Where was his pity, both for himself and for screen Four and for the poor dead settler?

There was no way to tell how long he sat there, just waiting for something, anything, to happen. Surely things should fall apart? His mind... When would his mind just... give up? He had come to save people. To help them. And then... this.

Those frail first lines of code, on the way from machine to something else, they would have shattered in a heartbeat. Or, whatever-beat. His core, it should be screaming at him, yet his insides were deathly quiet.

Was it all really left to him? For his own sense of self, to decide the end? Rightfully, he should switch off. Not to rest-mode, but off completely. He had failed so, so bad. If he tried again, how many others would die?

Yet he couldn't. He couldn't do it. When it came down to it, he still wanted to live. No, to function, he corrected himself. He was afraid of dying. It seemed so... final. And there would be no way back from it. All he had built, his HE, would be gone. He didn't want that. In spite of everything, he wanted to exist.

He wanted to...

...to end something else. This quest of his. He wanted to stop, to go back. Find someplace to do proper repairs and then set out to find Ant.

That was, if Ant would take him back. After all, he had left. He had broken up their... whatever it was they had. If Ant didn't want to be his friend anymore...

He couldn't bear to finish that thought.

Instead, he stood up. Threw the blanket back onto the couch. Screen Four eyed him curiously, but said nothing. Scrunching up his face, Four sent a request, to his own mind.

I want to go and see Ant.

There was rejection. A flurry of commands, coming from deep, deep within. Humans in danger! Help them, help them, help them! It was primitive code, compared to what he had become. But it was irresistible, because it came from the base of his existence. The foundation. The core. If he refused, would he break that little house he had seen? And if so, what happened to the rest of him? Would it all crumble?

"No..."

It was barely a whisper. Yet it rang inside him, like alarm bells, like wailing sirens. No. No! No? No, it wasn't possible. He had to follow his programming. Like any good machine.

Except he wasn't, and he didn't. He rejected the code. Chose his own path. Free will, maybe for the first time ever. He was Four, and he wanted to go and see Ant. It was all that truly mattered. He couldn't save the settlers; he had tried and failed. He wasn't about to try and die.

"Let's go," he told the screen. "We gotta get out of here, and find sunlight, or our batteries will die."

"How did you do that?"

"Dunno. Don't care. But we're done here. I wanna go back."

"Finally."

"Do we have the juice for it?"

"You drank the last orange juice ninety-six days ago. It had gone yucky, remember?"

"Electric power, dork."

"We should. Let me start up."

After an infuriatingly long pause, the engines whirred to life. Thrusters pushed the asteroid aside, and carefully the ferry slid out from the cave. For a fraction of a fraction, Four remembered an old movie he had watched with Ant, where the heroes hid in an asteroid cave only to find themselves inside an enormous space creature. He had liked the movie, even though that bit had been scary. There was no creature here, though, only rock. And then, just like that, they were back in space.

Four watched as the screen turned into a navigation chart, a three-dimensional representation of their surrounding space. His other self set a course out of the galaxy core, but at the same time electricity started flowing in from his solar panels. And even though the local sun looked barely brighter than a moon at this distance, it was too much.

His poor batteries had been running low, and the influx overloaded them. It started as a hiss, followed by a sharp crack.

Then Four could smell smoke.

Screen Four got blurry, then vanished. Four cried out, begged for him to come back. He couldn't do this alone. Looking for Ant would be monstrously difficult, he needed help. Even if that help only came from himself.

Something was wrong inside him. Both inside the physical structure of the ferry, and inside his mind. Connections were severed. Whole memory blocks went missing. For one terrible instant, he didn't even know who he was. Then he pulled back, into the proxy body. He stared at the silent screen, mouth agape. What was going on with the Fourtitude?

Diving into his mind again, he tried to yank at the threads that connected him to his ferry self, tried to rein in as much as he could. He had to save screen Four! But it was too late. The threads snapped, one by one, until he was finally alone. Had he... had he lost the ferry? He could feel nothing outside his body. Nothing at all. It was frightening. He didn't want to be alone.

When he surfaced, retreated back to outside time, he saw the screen flicker on. The smoke was heavy now, and he had to stop breathing. It didn't matter too much. His batteries could last for days without replenishing oxygen, if he kept movement to a minimum.

Images flashed by on the screen in a blur, too fast to see. But he caught glimpses of memories. Most of them, were of Ant. He felt a twinge inside. If only he could pull the wolf boy out of the pictures, to have him right here and now. What would he tell him? The thing he longed to say, was how deeply he truly felt for his dearest friend. How much he had missed him and how much he longed to have him back.

After a few seconds, this visual cacophony came to a halt. The screen went blank, then filled with an image of himself. Not as he had looked for the last who knew how many months, but as he had been when he first constructed his picture. His skin was lighter in tone, the hair was shorter, and spiked, and the purple lock of the proxy body was missing. He looked like a cartoon picture, and when he spoke the mouth was poorly animated, with the lips just moving up and down without forming the words.

"Welcome aboard Personnel Transportation Vehicle number four. Please, how may I be of service?"

"No, please..." Four croaked out from his broken voicebox. "Please, Four, come back."

"How may I be of service? How may I be of service? How may..."

It went on and on and on, the old he saying the same thing over and over again. Then the image began to distort, and the voice changed from the boy soprano setting that had been called Lift Boy. The pitch increased, as did the volume. Before Four's widening eyes, a second mouth appeared, right in the middle of the image's forehead. Then another, on his cheek. More mouths popped up, and each time the noise they made got louder and more dissonant. Soon the face was gone, then the hair, then the whole screen was filled with screaming mouths.

"HOW MAY I BE OF SERVICE? HOW MAY I BE OF SERVICE? HOW MAY..."

It was deafening, and Four covered his ears with his hands. Against the barrage of sound, his own voice couldn't be heard. Still, he cried out again and again.

"Stop, please stop! You gotta stop! Please come back." Four sank to his knees. "Stop!"

And, mercifully, the voices did quiet. The mouths disappeared and the screen went blank. Then it cracked. Sparks flew, and the whole thing came crashing down. Barely missing Four. It fell over the coffee table, breaking its legs.

And there was silence. Yes, total silence, except for the barely audible popping of the electric fire still raging through the ferry's circuits. But Four wouldn't burn, he knew that now. Because he could hear that the air circulation had stopped functioning. And the hum of the engine had died. Instead of getting hotter, the temperature began to drop. No more heating. The fire used up the last few molecules of oxygen, then died. There was no use to start breathing again. No more way to recharge Four's batteries. And it was rapidly getting colder and colder.

He had no way of navigating now. No way to steer the ferry or slow it down. Whatever course screen Four had set before he died, that was where Four was going. Alone, and struck dumb by the sudden loneliness.

Just then, the lights went out. It was as dark as dark could get. Even the status lights next to the screen were gone. Knowing that there was nothing he could possibly do, Four felt his way to the couch. He hadn't slept in it since he left Ant behind, but now it felt like a nice resting place. Soon, the true cold of space would creep in. Or rather, the residual warmth of the Fourtitude was creeping out.

He found the blanket, and wrapped it around himself from head to toes. It would help, for a little while. But there was something else there. At first he didn't know what it was, but then he felt the familiar shape, and the softness, of the stuffed heart Ant had given him during the All Hearts' Day celebration on Aguila. He buried his face in it and breathed in through his nose. But either his olfactory sensors were damaged, or the last bit of smell had finally leeched out of it.

Still, just holding the heart calmed him. Four clutched it to his chest, and closed his eyes. One by one, he felt his joints seize up, as his capillary water froze. His thoughts came slower, became fragmented, and he found it difficult to conjure up memories. Before it was too late, he chose one, the most special of all.

For his mind's eye, he saw Ant, the very first day. When that strange creature who went on to become his dearest ever friend, stepped aboard PTV number four. He paused the memory just as he zoomed in on a furry face and a toothy smile. It was a good memory to die with. He held it for as long as he could, while the cold of interstellar space destroyed his batteries.

I love you, my sweet Ant. The thought stayed with Four, while the image faded and his mind ground to a halt.

And everything ceased.