Chapter Twenty-Two

AD-214 had spent a long afternoon waiting in the janitor’s closet. The thick scent of heavy-duty cleaners assaulted his nose, and his stomach rumbled noisily. For a cyborg, such things were minor inconveniences. But he longed to come out into the hospital corridor, march down it like a captain, and rescue Amanda. Instead, he watched the time slowly tick by on his interface as he scanned through the same files over and over, wondering if there was a change in the data.

One maintenance man had come into the closet. AD-214 didn’t want to kill an innocent man, but he was prepared to do what was necessary. Hidden in the farthest corner from the door, he tensed up when the knob rattled. He would have to make sure he eliminated the janitor before he screamed or called out. Otherwise, everything he and Blue Squad had worked for would be wasted.

When the scruffy old man entered the closet, he didn’t bother reaching for the light. He swung the door open far enough to let in light from the hallway, reached for a roll of paper towels, and left just as quickly.

AD-214 relaxed after that. When he had studied the blueprints for the hospital, he had no way of knowing what parts of the building were more commonly used than others. Apparently, he had luckily chosen a maintenance closet that was out of the way and rarely visited.

Now it was time to get out. The guards were about to change their shifts. If everything had gone as planned with the rest of Blue Squad, PD-67 had been stationed outside Amanda’s room for the last several hours. The navigation specialist’s job was to keep anyone else from removing Amanda until AD-214 came to retrieve her. As much as he had wanted to rescue her immediately, he knew he needed to wait. He had to let the excitement from the press conference die down and get the cyborgs back into their routine.

His task now was to move from the maintenance closet to the third floor without being noticed. It shouldn’t be difficult, but his heart pounded in his chest as he quietly turned the doorknob. AD-214 opened the door slightly, just enough so he could see into the hallway and make sure no one was looking in his direction. The fluorescent lights gave a sickly glow to the pale linoleum and pea-green walls that hadn’t been touched for decades. The single beep of a heart monitor sounded from further down the hallway. No humans or cyborgs were present.

The captain slipped into the hallway and silently shut the door behind him. His next goal was getting to the stairs at the end of the hall. Focusing on the dark brown door, he confidently marched like he belonged there.

AD-214 heard a noise to his left. The cyborg continued his path, but he heard the sound again, more clearly this time. It was asking for something.

“Water.”

The voice was barely a whisper, like the rustle of dry paper being blown about by the wind. AD-214’s feet halted, waiting to see if the other part would continue speaking.

“Please.”

A door stood ajar a few feet down the hall on the left. A small tag next to the door indicated it was room 158. The light wasn’t on, but it was the only possible source of the whisper. AD-214 knew he had things to do. His prime directive was to complete his missions without letting anything else interfere, but he found himself wandering to the door and pushing it completely open. He groped blindly on the wall and turned on the light switch.

The room was small and smelled of rancid sweat. The light pulsed and flickered, as though it couldn’t quite decide if it wanted to be on or off. The light revealed a man lying in a hospital bed. He lay on his back, reaching out blindly around him. His lips were parched and cracked. Numerous tubes ran from his arm into a machine by the side of the bed.

“Water, please,” he repeated.

AD-214 stepped closer. The man was ancient, the skin on his face loose and wrinkled. Most of the hair on his head had vanished along with his youth, leaving behind dark blotches on his exposed scalp. The patient was withered, as though someone had left him out in the sun too long.

At first, the cyborg wasn’t certain what to do. AD-214 had never encountered an old cyborg before, and the only things in his medical files were instructions on applying first aid in the battlefield. He supposed the shriveled man was telling AD-214 what he needed. The pitcher of water on a nearby table was the solution.

Without a word, the cyborg poured water into a small plastic cup and handed it to the old man. The patient gratefully gasped as he poured it down his throat. He guzzled it with more strength than AD-214 would have thought possible, then removed the cup from his lips with a satisfied sigh.

“Thank you.” The elderly patient’s voice was stronger now as he focused his cloudy eyes on his new nurse. “A soldier, eh? I was a soldier once.”

AD-214 didn’t respond but stared down at the crumpled figure on the bed. He didn’t look anything like a soldier. His arms jutted awkwardly out of his paper gown and what little flesh he had remaining seemed to hang off his bones. The old man didn’t look like he could sit up in bed on his own, much less fight a battle.

“Will you stay here and talk to me?” the old man asked feebly. “I’ve been here forever, and nobody comes to visit me. I want to hear about what it’s like to be a soldier these days.”

AD-214 frowned. He couldn’t reveal anything about himself to the man. “I am on a mission.”

The old soldier smiled and nodded, head bobbing on a skinny neck. “I understand. Well, good luck to you, son. And thank you again.”

The cyborg turned on his heel, left the room, and headed once more for the staircase. The patient had disturbed him. He should never have deviated from the path that would complete his mission, and he had wasted valuable time talking to the man. Still, he didn’t regret it. There was something about the elderly man that didn’t fit into his operating parameters.

The stairwell was unoccupied for the moment. AD-214 and his other soldiers had assumed that most of the staff and patients would be using the elevators. The stairs would keep them away from people more than any other route. The captain reached the third floor with ease. His body had fully adjusted to life without the support system of Cyborg Sector.

This section of the hospital was as busy as the first floor was deserted. Nurses checked charts on the doors of patient rooms and consulted with doctors. Several patients shuffled slowly down the hall in sock-clad feet, clinging to their IV poles for support and not paying attention to hospital gowns which flapped open in the back. AD-214 held his breath as he studied the activity, but he let it go in a rush of relief as he saw that the only soldier on the floor was a member of Blue Squad.

PD-67 stood in his place next to a patient door down at the opposite end of the hall. He stood at parade rest with his hands clasped behind his back and feet placed shoulder’s width apart. His gaze rested on the wall opposite him.

AD-214 headed through the door and into the hallway. Since it was right before the time for a scheduled shift change, nobody bothered to acknowledge the presence of a second soldier. He marched up to the navigation specialist, and they quickly saluted each other.

Before he let PD-67 go on his way, he touched the inferior officer’s arm and whispered in his ear. “There’s an elderly man in room 158. He can’t leave, but make sure you trigger the alarms on his life support system on your way out.”

The younger officer nodded and headed in the direction of the patient’s room.

AD-214 took up the post at Amanda’s door with tense muscles. He couldn’t enter the room too early. Each stage of their rescue mission brought him closer to her, but the wait made it seem like she was farther away than ever. It was tempting to go in now, but the third-floor hallway was full of people. It was wiser to bide his time and wait until the floor was less crowded.

After what seemed like an eternity of watching the other occupants of the building out of the corner of his eye, AD-214 saw his opportunity. The patients had returned to their rooms, and most of the nurses had followed them or disappeared to other parts of the hospital. Nobody was paying attention to an insignificant soldier at the end of the hallway.

Reaching behind him to release the electronic lock on the door, AD-214 slipped inside. The patient room was much larger than the male patient’s. The light fixture worked, but a long curtain blocked his view of the room. The only thing he could see was an open door to the private bathroom off to the left.

“Is someone there?” Amanda’s voice called from the other side of the curtain.

The cyborg didn’t answer. AD-214 had planned every step and prepared for every possibility, yet he didn’t know what to say to Amanda now that he was finally in the same room with her.

“Yes?” She sounded a little more impatient this time. The curtain whisked aside to reveal the blonde scientist. Tousled hair hung about her shoulders. The slightest remains of mascara clung to her eyes, giving her a smoky appearance that set AD-214 smoldering deep inside. She had been in the process of changing into her night clothes and hadn’t had the chance to button up her shirt all the way. Round breasts peeked at him from between the placket, tempting him to rip the clothing off and carry out the fantasies he had in the cave. The nightshirt hung down to her bare thighs. AD-214’s breath caught in his throat, and his tongue went dry in his mouth.

As soon as she saw him, the hand that had yanked back the curtain immediately went to her mouth. Her feet padded softly on the linoleum as she took two steps back, and her eyes flicked to the door behind him. He knew it was locked. He had secured it personally.

“AD-214?”