CA Chapter Forty-three (Patreon)

It’s dark.

Dark, and nothing hurts. Is this what death feels like? Surely she didn’t survive. Is she being reincarnated? Ava floats, and she wouldn’t have been surprised to see an umbilical cord, extending out from her center, into the darkness.

If she could see anything.

“I want to see you again,” she murmurs, and she’s shocked to hear her own voice, sounding just like it always did.

“See who?” a voice asks, and she thinks she turns her head, looking for the source.

“You,” she admits. “Who else?”

“Ah,” Amythyst says, and she appears, as she likes to do, floating cross-legged in the black depths of wherever-they-are, wearing her goddess gown. She smiles, and if it’s strained, who could blame her?

“Where are we?” Ava asks.

“You’re in a hospital. The university hospital just got two pods. Out of an excess of caution, they were still familiarizing themselves with them, so they were empty when Bridget blew in and commandeered them.” Her lips quirked. “She promised to give them two more for free if she could use these for a few weeks. They’re careful, not stupid, so of course they said yes.”

“So I’m… not dead?” Ava asked.

“Not dead,” Amythyst confirmed. Her full lips flattened. “Though it was… close. Closer than it should have been.”

Ava let that go and said, quietly, “Amy?”

The AI smiled, eyes lighting up. “In better shape than you, actually. She was on the floor, so she suffered heat damage, but didn’t breathe nearly as much smoke. Since she was so thoroughly sedated, her body didn’t need as much oxygen to keep it going, either.”

Ava’s eyes closed, and she felt a rush of relief so strong she could have cried. “I thought… She wasn’t moving, so-”

Warm arms wrapped around her. “She’s going to be fine. They’re actually going to decant her in a few days.” Amythyst leaned back, her face so close Ava could count the golden freckles spattered across her rosy cheeks. She chuckled. “That’s what Bridge calls it. Decanting. Like she’s a fine wine.”

Ava reached up, distantly surprised to find that she did, in fact, have hands. Her pale skin was stark against the healthy color of Amythyst’s face. “I’m glad,” she said. “I’m so, so glad.”

Amythyst leaned her face into Ava’s palm, closing her eyes, and they hung there like that, suspended in space, for an eternity of moments.

“Why did you do it?” Amythyst murmured, blinking her beautiful mossy eyes open again.

“Do what?” Ava asked, her eyes tracing the swoop and flutter of long eyelashes.

Amythyst pulled back, eyes narrowing. “You know what! I told you to get out, and you just… You just kept going.”

Sighing, Ava allowed the separation, and shook her head. “Do you know the hardest thing about losing my mom?” she asked. “I mean, besides losing the only person I loved, and my home, and my future, all at once?”

Amythyst wrapped her hands in her skirt, clutching at the gauzy green fabric. “Oh, yes,” she murmured, “besides that.” She shook her head. “No. What was the hardest thing?”

“That I couldn’t sing for her,” Ava said, simply. “Maybe it’s stupid, but the hardest thing was that she was dying, and I couldn’t give her something I’d given her a hundred thousand times before. And I thought that was it. I would never sing again. Never be happy again. Never love again. I thought all of that was my punishment for failing her.” She lifted her hands in a shrug. “And then you came along, and you gave it all back to me.”

She took a step forward again, and, greatly daring, tilted her head down to press her forehead gently against Amythyst’s. “So, I decided that no matter what, I wouldn’t fail you, too. I would give you the one thing you asked me for.”

“And you did,” Amythyst murmured. She leaned her head back, eyes searching Ava’s. “Thank you.”

Slowly, with great deliberation, Ava tilted her face and pressed her lips against Amythyst’s warm, soft ones. Neither of them moved, but she tasted salt as one of them began to cry. When Amythyst stepped back, her face flushed but dry, Ava realized they were her own tears.

“Why are you crying?” Amythyst asked, lifting a hand as if to wipe away Ava’s tears before dropping it back to her side. That hollow smile was back, and Ava bit her lip at the sight of it.

“Because you’re saying goodbye,” Ava answered, and Amythyst’s eyes grew wide.

“I… You… How did you know?” she stammered.

Ava’s lips twisted. “I always knew,” she said. “You dropped enough hints. Here and there, like breadcrumbs for me to pick up. Comments about how Bridget’s AIs always went crazy. Never making promises about what would happen after we got Amy out.” She pinched her lips together. “Never quite letting me tell you how I felt. Well, here we are, and, Amythyst, I love you.” She closed the distance between them again. “I love you.” More tears trickled down her face, dripping from her chin. “Please don’t leave me.”

Amythyst shook her head, and even though neither of them moved, there was suddenly a chasm between them. A yawning, open space that Ava knew she could never cross without Amythyst’s permission, no matter how fast she ran.

“I can’t,” the AI whispered. She struck a tear from her own cheek. “Everything’s back to the way it was always meant to be. The baby bird is back in her nest. Amy and Bridget are together, and-”

“Did you love her?” Ava asked, breaking through the flow of words before Amythyst could reach goodbye. “When you were Amy. Does Amy love Bridget?” She raised a finger as Amythyst opened her mouth. “And you know what I mean. Not as friends. Not even as sisters.”

“I…” Amythyst shrugged helplessly. “Maybe? If so, she refused to see it. Refused right up until the last memory I have from her. But I don’t think so. Not quite.” She sighed, looking tired. “I think if Bridget had ever shown even the tiniest speck of interest, she could have, but Bridget never did, so… It was a moot point, and she knew it. Knows it.”

“But you know,” Ava said. A statement.

Amythyst nodded reluctantly. “I do. But I don’t… feel that way. When the pieces of Amy got all jumbled up with the pieces of other people they’d borrowed memories from, some of those pieces belonged to Bridget, and,” she glanced at Ava from the corner of her eyes, “some of those pieces were from men, who didn’t struggle with the idea of being attracted to a beautiful woman.”

She grinned, though it only held a shadow of her usual laughter. “But once I saw into Bridget’s head, there was no way I could love her, not that way. Not because she’s not brilliant, and amazing, but because it would be like falling in love with myself, which,” she wrinkled her nose. “Ew.”

Ava actually laughed, and Amythyst’s grin grew until it slowly faded again.

“Goodbye,” she said.

“No,” Ava whispered. “Please.”

The AI shook her head. “I can’t stay. You know I can’t. I’m just a cuckoo, a little wooden bird taking the place of a lost child. I was never meant to live forever, and the longer I do, the more dangerous it is for everyone. You need to let me fly away now.”

Even though she knew it was useless, Ava stepped forward.

Step.

Step.

But the distance didn’t close.

“I finally managed to isolate the code that allows Aspen’s vampire buddy, William, to drink fruit juice instead of blood. I adjusted your character. Changed a few things. I hope you like it.” Amythyst said.

“I don’t care about-” Ava stopped. Shook her head, the tears flowing freely now. “What about my lottery ticket?” she asked, desperately grasping at straws. “You promised you’d make sure any ticket I bought was a winner. That was the deal! You can’t go until you do that.”

Amythyst swirled her finger, making the ‘amazing cosmic power’ gesture Ava hadn’t seen in far too long. A pink and white piece of paper appeared, floating in the air above the whirling digit. “I had Felicia buy it for you. She did it in your name, and everything, so there’s no way anyone can claim it isn’t yours. The drawing is tonight, and you’ll win about half of four billion dollars.”

Ava blinked. “Half?” she asked, dumbly.

“You know what they say,” Amythyst laughed, “there are only two things in this world that are certain; death and taxes.” She froze, eyes widening as she realized what she’d said.

Ava’s throat closed. She began to run, flat out, her chest aching until she gasped for breath. “Don’t,” she yelled. “Don’t do it! Amythyst! Don’t die!”

Amythyst hovered in space, and just as Ava had expected, nothing she did brought the AI any closer.

“I’m sorry,” the other woman whispered, her voice coming easily to Ava’s ears, even though she should have been too far away to hear. “Keep singing for me, Ava.”

And she was gone.

Ava continued running for two more strides. Three, and her legs gave out. She fell, even though there was nothing to fall towards or away from, in this blank space. Empty space. She curled up and cried, harsh, rasping sobs that should have torn at her throat, but she felt no pain except for the anguish that bloomed in her chest like a rose with a thousand thorns.

A hand came to rest on her shoulder. She shrieked and whirled, ready to leap into Amythyst’s arms, and at the same time ready to smack the other woman for frightening her. For making her believe she would really leave.

But a stranger was there instead. A stranger with a familiar face.

“Um, hi?” the petite redhead said, waggling her fingers lamely at Ava. “I’m… so sorry. You don’t even know me, and-”

“Bridget,” Ava gasped. She looked around wildly. “Why are you here? Where’s-?”

The awkward smile faded from Bridget’s face, and she shook her head, frowning just a little. “She said she was going to tell you goodbye. Didn’t she?”

Ava glared at the idiotic, brilliant woman standing in front of her. “How could you let her do this? Turn herself off? And then just stand there like it doesn’t matter?”

Bridget looked down at her hands, twisting the base of her left ring finger, though her avatar wasn’t wearing a ring. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Amy told me… that you care for her. But it’s her choice. I’m not making her do it, but I won’t stop her either.” She looked up, blue eyes bright and sincere. “If you believe she’s an independent person, then she has the right to make her own decisions. If you believe she’s… just a program that has become indistinguishable from a person, then she’s right. She’s too dangerous to remain as she is. If she did lose whatever remains of her humanity, programmed or otherwise, she could crash every bank in the world, or start a nuclear war with a single thought.”

Ava barked a disbelieving laugh. “But she wouldn’t.”

Bridget sighed, running a hand through the loose waves of strawberry blonde hair that perfectly framed her pretty oval face. “But we don’t know that. I never should have run her program in the first place. Frankly, the world as we know it only still exists because she chooses to let it. And has to keep making that choice, every nanosecond of every day. It must be exhausting, keeping all of that power, all of that knowledge, under control. Reining yourself in so you only lightly touch anything, because if you look too long, or press too hard, the thing you focused on will crumble. She’s been cutting pieces of herself away for months. Much more, and the being you know as Amythyst wouldn’t exist anyway.”

“You’re just saying that,” Ava whispered. “To make me accept this. But I won’t. Never.”

“No,” Bridget said, with such sincerity that even Ava couldn’t deny it. “I’m sorry. I’ve seen the mess she’s made of her code. I’m amazed she’s been able to keep so much of herself intact for this long. And she did it for you.”

“She did it for Amy,” Ava said bitterly. “And for you.”

Sorrow filled the cerulean gaze. “Maybe it started that way, but that’s not how it ended. She knew when Amy was freed, she’d have to go. I think in the beginning, that was a relief, but by the end she didn’t want to. Didn’t want to leave you.” It was Bridget’s turn to laugh, and it sounded just as harsh as Ava’s. “She may not have been as perfect a copy of my best friend as I meant for her to be, but she was close, and I can read Amy like a children’s dictionary.” She laughed again, slightly more genuine this time, before sighing and shaking her head.

“She loved you,” she said, “but she couldn’t stay.”

Ava tilted her face up, or what felt like up, and breathed through the pain. Finally, she managed to whisper, “Loved? Past tense?”

“Yes,” Bridget confirmed, and though Ava couldn’t bring herself to look at the other woman’s face, she heard the compassion in her voice. “It’s already done.”