The lifelike thought a long while before he answered.
“This is Eve’s choice, Lemon. And she never really had one before now. I know it’s hard, but we can’t force her to leave. That’d make us just as bad as Monrova and Silas.” He ran his hand over his stubbled chin and sighed. “Ana was the girl who taught me what it was to be alive. And if she’s still out there somewhere? I owe it to her to find her. These past two years, walking through this wasteland…Sometimes thoughts of her were all that kept me going.”
“So let’s say fairy tales come true and you manage to track her down,” Lemon said. “What if the girl you find isn’t the girl you remember?”
“She’ll always be the girl I remember. She’s the girl who made me real.”
Lemon felt fear dig its icy fingers inside of her. Ever since she’d been left behind in that detergent box as a bub, she’d been afraid of being alone. It’d taken her years to work up the courage to trust Evie, trust Silas, trust anyone not to abandon her the way her folks had. And now she was on the verge of losing it all.
“Look, I know she’s important to you,” she told Zeke. “But with Eve staying in Babel and Cricket OOC, I’m rapidly running out of crew. And true cert, without Evie, I don’t even know what I’m doing out here. I’m the sidekick, Dimples. I can’t carry this show by myself.”
Ezekiel’s eyes softened, and he gently squeezed her hand. “I won’t bail on you, Lemon. I’m coming back, I promise.”
Looking into that pretty, plastic blue, Lemon felt a lump rising in her throat. Stomping the tears down with her oversized boots, she tossed her bangs out of her face and replied with her customary bravado.
“Spit on it, then.”
“…What?”
Lemon spat into her palm, offered it to the lifelike.
“Rule Number Nine in the Scrap. Spit makes it stick.”
With a smirk, Ezekiel spat into his hand, sealed the pact with a shake. Lemon felt the weight on her shoulders ease off a little. The night shine a little brighter.
“Okay,” she said, raising a finger to his face. “Don’t be a welcher now.”
Ezekiel smiled, pulled the oversized gunner’s helmet back on Lemon’s head. “Stay in the tank. Pony-ride salesmen or no. I’ll take one of these headsets, so if you want anything, you just yell, all right?”
Lemon pressed the transmit button on her comms rig and yelled, “Clean socks! And something to read!”
Zeke ripped off his headset with a wince.
“Walked into that one,” Lemon grinned.
The lifelike leaned down and kissed the top of her helmet. “Stay safe.”
Ezekiel stole off into the night, just as quiet as the rest of it.
With a sad sigh, Lemon locked the hatch behind him.
* * *
________
She woke to the strangest sound.
Lemon’s eyes shot open, and though she was sitting in the turret of a top-of-the-line killing machine, she reached instinctively for the small knife stashed in her belt buckle. She used to slit pockets with it, back in her Los Diablos days. Slit anyone who got too far into her face, too, talking true.
Seeing no immediate threat, Lemon pawed the crusties from her eyes. From the heat radiating through the tank hull, she guessed the sun was already up—she must’ve slept the whole night away. Did she imagine that noise or did she…
Nope. There it goes again.
It was weird. A sort of bubbly gurgling. And with growing alarm, Lemon realized it was coming from her own stomach.
“Ohhhh, crap…”
Lemon leaned forward and vomited all over the floor. It was the kind of sick that left you feeling like you’d been hollowed out with a spork. Groaning, she wiped the puke off her chin just in time to vomit again. Eyes filled with tears, toes curling, she gave the can of Neo-Meat™ she’d scoffed last night right back to the world.
“Urgggg,” she moaned at the end of it. “Septic.”
She drew a few shuddering breaths, trying to make up her mind if she was going to chuck again. Deciding she was safe for the moment, she grabbed her bottle of H2O, rinsed her mouth and realized too late that she had nowhere to spit.
Ezekiel had ordered her not to leave the tank.
He’d been very specific about it.
Cheek ballooning, Lemon stabbed at her console, lighting up the turret cams. She could see the ruins of the scavvers’ machina outside, the tumbled sandstone, Cricket lying sprawled where he’d fallen.
Looks safe enough?
Deciding Dimples would have been a little more relaxed if he knew she’d be trapped in here with the stink of fresh vomit, Lemon cranked open the hatch, stuck her head up and spat. Rinsing her mouth, she spat again, pulling down her goggles against the blinding light and peering at the gully around her.
The sun had only just cleared the horizon, but the air around her was already rippling—it was going to be a feral day. Lemon scoped the rocks one last time, but seeing no trouble, she crawled out of the tank to escape the smell. Her belly was aching kinda fierce, her hands a little shaky.
Hopping down to the dirt, she made her way around to peer up into Cricket’s face. His new head was styled like an oldskool warrior helmet from the history virtch—a smooth faceplate, square jaw and heavy brow, his once-bright-blue optics now dark.
“Crick?”
Lemon heard a buzzing in her ear, swiped at a fat blowfly circling her head.
“You hear me, you little fug?”
The bot made no reply. The girl sighed, rubbing at her stomach. She’d tossed up everything she’d eaten, but she still felt puketastic, her skin damp with sweat. She took an experimental swig of water, swallowed with a wince. She’d never heard of a can of Neo-Meat™ going bad before—the stuff was more preservatives than actual food. Maybe it’d been locked inside the tank too long?
The blowfly returned, swooping in lazy circles about her head. She took another half-hearted swipe, but as it buzzed up into her face, Lemon realized it wasn’t a fly at all. It was a fat, angry-looking bumblebee.
She’d only ever seen pics of them on the history virtch—she’d always been taught they’d died out before the Quake, so it was true strange to see one all the way out here in the wastes. Its little furry bod was banded yellow and black, its sting gleaming. She took a serious swing, almost knocking it out of the air. Buzzing angrily, the bumblebee beat a hasty retreat back over the gully walls.
“Yeah, that’s right,” Lemon growled after it. “Tell your friends, friendo.”