I Will Breathe (Forbidden Book 1) (2 page)

Boy clicked and clinked across the wooden floor, dragging a broom along behind him. Liberty at last overcame her surprise and asked, “So what do you have that I need to load onto Airus? It’s getting dark and I still haven’t replaced that pressure valve yet. If I don’t get back soon, I won’t have enough light to do the work until the morning. I can’t keep Airus grounded overnight. You know as well as I do how dangerous that would be.”

Shatter pulled at the collar of his shirt, as if it were suddenly too tight. “Boy showed up here out of the blue with a note, day before yesterday. Tinker wants you to take Boy with you.” Shatter scratched the side of his nose and avoided looking at Liberty.

Her mouth silently opened and closed before she finally spluttered, “What?” She looked back at the robot. It stood just a couple of feet away, still holding the broom.

Shatter nodded at Boy. “Tinker wrote that since your father’s death you’ve been alone. He thought Boy could be of some help, and it would keep him from being used for spare parts.” He leaned closer to Liberty and whispered. “Just between the two of us, I think Tinker might be a little off his rocker.” He chuckled. “But then who isn’t? You have to be a little crazy to survive in these conditions. After the devastation caused by The Great War, there’s only a handful of people still alive, as you well know, if you can call this living.”

Liberty backed out of the doorway. “I can’t take a robot. What the hell would I do with him? There’s only so much sweeping that can be done on an airship, and besides, I can barely take care of myself. What do I know about looking after a robot?”

She was ready to bolt when a small voice stopped her. “Please.”

Liberty looked down at it. “What?”

Boy pointed his metal fingers at her. “Please. My father’s dead. He told me you would be my sister.”

All Liberty’s inner voices screamed at her not to be sucked in by the sight of Boy’s large, soulful metal eyes. How had Tinker managed to make those thin strips of metal so expressive? The thing was just a pile of glass and metal made to resemble a child, but the longer she stared into its eyes, the more her common sense crumbled. Damn. Another problem she didn’t need. Well, at least she wouldn’t have to feed it, but it would need a good oiling every once in a while. One small voice broke away from the crowd in her head and whispered, “
He’ll need to be wound up every day, just like clockwork
. “ She countered that with, “
I guess I can spare a few seconds to do that. Maybe I can find something for him to do on board. “

Damn. She was going to go against her better judgment and take the pile of junk with her. She turned to Shatter. “Okay.” She sighed and motioned for Boy to follow. Before she left, though, she said. “But if it turns into more trouble than its worth, I’m dumping it the first chance I get.” She didn’t bother waiting for an answer but hurried out to Airus. She was well aware Boy was following close behind, because its joints clicked with each step it took. That racket was sure as hell going to get annoying after a while.

If she’d had all night to sit around and watch the hilarious sight of Boy attempting to climb the rope ladder, Liberty wouldn’t have given in and helped haul him aboard. As entertaining as that might have been, there was still too much to do.

Before Liberty headed below deck, she told Boy, “Keep an eye out and tell me if you see anyone getting close to the airship. Do you think you can do that?”

“Yes, Sister.”

There wasn’t time to debate the fact she wasn’t his sister, so Liberty headed down to get her toolbox. The job with the valves turned out to be more difficult than she first thought because the old seals had melted into place. For an hour, she scrapped the burned rubber off two of the four pistons.

Pieces lay everywhere on deck when the sun set. Liberty tried working in the dusk light but finally had to admit defeat, resigning herself to the fact that in spite of the danger she would have to stay grounded until the next day.

Liberty was throwing the tools back into their box when Boy walked over. She rocked back onto her heels. “There’s not enough light left, so I’m going to have to finish this in the morning. You up to helping me keep guard all night? It shouldn’t be possible to sneak aboard without the ladder, so we should be okay. We can’t take any chances, though.”

Boy blinked a couple of times but didn’t answer. He turned toward the pressure tank, and without warning, two beams of light shot out from his eyes.

Liberty jumped up. “No way! How long can you keep that up for?”

The lights flickered when Boy blinked. “For as long as you need the light.”

She shielded her eyes from the glare of his own and grinned. “Let’s get to work then.”

Chapter Three

Liberty woke to a sunlit cabin. She wiped the sleep from her eyes, but as soon as she could see clearly, she shrieked. She breathed a sigh of relief when she realized it was only Boy.

She sat up and slipped her legs off the bed, enjoying the feel of the cool wood beneath her feet. “What are you doing here? I thought I told you to stay out on deck last night.” She pushed the covers away and reached for her clothes. When Boy didn’t answer, she stood and walked over to him. He was sitting on the only chair in the cabin, staring without blinking at the opposite wall. She waved a hand in front of his big metal eyes but nothing happened.

She patted the top of his glass head. “You need to be wound up, huh?” It was a little disturbing getting no reaction, seeing how chatty the robot had been the night before – excessively so. At one point she’d had to tell him to stop talking, long enough for her to think, but the silence had only lasted until he’d made another observation and asked yet another question. It wasn’t until she had Airus in the air again that she realized his prattle had kept her from worrying about the danger they’d been in, being anchored. Sometime during the night, she had decided to keep him.

Liberty washed her hands and face before dressing. She attempted to run her fingers through her tangled hair, but decided it was a lost cause. With her morning lavations taken care of, she went over and slowly turned what she dearly hoped was the right key in Boy’s back. With each turn, Boy slowly came back to life. He blinked and turned to watch her as she continued with the task.

“Good morning, Boy. What made you come into my room last night?” She gave the key one last turn before patting his head and stepping back.

Boy blinked a couple of times, as if getting adjusted to being up and going again. He finally answered, “I was afraid of being alone.”

Liberty sat on the edge of her bed. “What do you know about being afraid? You’re a robot.”

He moved his legs and fingers, as if testing to make sure they still worked properly. “I know all about feelings. I’m afraid one day I’ll wind down and no one will wind me back up. I loved my father. He created me and made certain I was always wound up, so I would never die.”

“You think winding down and dying are the same thing?”

Boy blinked, as if considering her question. “Isn’t it? Father wound down and never woke up.”

She nodded. “But you’re a robot. You can’t die.”

“What if I wind down and there’s no one around to wind me back up? Won’t I be dead then?”

It must have been the lighting in the cabin, because it almost looked as if Boy’s eyes were filling with tears. “I see your point.” Liberty slipped on her boots. ”I understand fear too. I feel it at least twenty times a day for one reason or another, but the one thing my father drilled into my head, for as long as I can remember, was never to give in to feeling love. He said love was too close to hate and that’s why the world is in the shape it is today. Without those two emotions, The Great War would never have been fought.”

Boy blinked so slowly it gave him the appearance of considering what she had said. He finally asked, “Did you not love your father?”

She wasn’t certain how to answer that. What was love anyway, and how did a person know if they loved someone or not? “I miss him.” She stood, to put a stop to their conversation. She wasn’t used to so much thinking, not so early in the morning. She waited for Boy to slide out of the chair. “Remind me to wind you up before I go to bed tonight. I can’t do anything to bring your father back, but I’ll do what I can to keep you from being afraid.”

The sounds of metal clicking along behind her on the wooden deck followed Liberty all the way to the galley. Instead of the clatter being annoying, like she had at first thought it would be, it was comforting not to feel so alone.

Liberty pulled a round of cheese from the cooler and sliced off a couple of small chunks. It saddened her every time she opened the fruit locker. She only had eight apples left to last until fall. She shouldn’t have given in to Shatter’s negotiations the day before. Out of everything she’d had to trade, he’d demanded ten apples in exchange for the pressure seals. At least she had received the apples’ value plus more, by demanding an entire case of seals in return. That case would probably last though her lifetime, and with any luck, even longer. Besides, Shatter wasn’t getting any younger and might not even be alive the next time she stopped at his trading post.

Deciding on a splurge, she carefully unwrapped the paper from around an apple and sat to enjoy her feast. It would have been easier to savor her breakfast had Boy not kept distracting her with his endless prowling through drawers and looking into cupboards. She giggled and accidentally spit out a chunk of apple when he held a jar of applesauce millimeters from his eyes, as if a closer examination would somehow explain the mystery of what was inside.

“Sit down. I’m going to choke on my breakfast if you don’t.”

Boy put the jar back into the cabinet. Maybe he wasn’t going to be so hard to live with after all. He was neat, did what he was told without question and could be used as a light when needed. Those were all good qualities in a shipmate.

Once seated, the robot, without blinking, watched Liberty eat her apple. He finally said, “I’ve never seen a real apple before. Of course I have photos of them in my files, but Father thought the trees were extinct.”

Liberty ate the remaining last few bites, core and all, before answering. “My father found a source on the upper east coast. We’re heading toward the coast now. We’ll stop first and trade for a load of dried fish, take that and trade it for cheese, then head farther north to swap the dried fish and cheese for apples, applesauce and cider. Our last stop before winter will be to trade for honey.”

“I did not know bees still existed either.”

“That is my favorite stop. It’s in the most beautiful valley. There are wild flowers growing everywhere.” She closed her eyes, trying to bring the sights and sounds of that special oasis into clearer focus.

Liberty reopened her eyes and sighed. She chewed on the last two bites of cheese before remembering what Boy had said earlier. “What do you mean you saw photos of apples? I’ve only seen a couple of photos in all my travels. I didn’t know others had survived The Great War.”

Boy slid open a plate on his chest, and like magic, images appeared. They flashed by in quick succession, photos of apples still on trees, row after row of them in baskets and others of people picking them. Liberty had never seen so many apples or people together in one place before. People were rarer than apples these days. In a few years, there would probably be no one left, because everyone she came across didn’t trust anyone else enough to let them get close. They traded goods to stay alive but no one let their guard down long enough to carry on a conversation, let alone procreate.

“Where did you get these pictures?” She reached over and touched his chest. “I’ve heard stories of the times before the war but didn’t think they were true. Everything seems to have been in such abundance then.”

As soon as she’d said that, the photos changed from apples to unfamiliar things. She had visited the ocean before but had never seen what she now saw jumping out of it, or flying above it like her airship. “They’re beautiful. What are they?”

“Whales, dolphins, seagulls and pelicans.” Boy named each photo, “Flamingos, giraffes, elephants, deer, lions, swans, cats, dogs, a newborn baby, cars, Times Square at night, ballerinas, wheat fields, people ice skating…”

Soon Liberty no longer heard his words because the photos were so beautiful, but at the same time so very strange. So many things she had never known existed. The world she lived in was so stark by comparison. Each day was just another one to survive, but right there on Boy’s chest were scenes of beauty and happiness. If these wonderful things had really existed, how had people been able to hate so much that they had to destroy it all?

“Why are you crying?” Boy reached over and trailed a metal finger down her cheek.

Liberty hadn’t realized she had been crying until he’d pointed it out. Her chest hurt. She whispered, “So much has been lost.” She cleared her throat. “How do you have these images?”

“My father downloaded them into me when he knew he was dying. He was the Keeper, his father was the Keeper, and his father too, and his father before him. Father only had me to pass this honor down to, so now I’m the Keeper. Father had never viewed them until the day he died. Do you know why?”

She shook her head.

“He said he could never bear to see what the Great War had stolen from us. It was easier living in these hard times if he didn’t know about what could have been, if not for the hate and ignorance.”

He slid the cover back in place. “These things shouldn’t be lost. Someone has to keep safe what has been lost, and what we can have again if we don’t give up.”

“That’s a great honor.” Now she understood why Boy was afraid of dying.

Chapter Four

“May I steer?” Boy stared without blinking as he waited for Liberty’s reply.

“No.” She checked the gauges and repositioned her goggles, trying to work out the kink in the strap. Once they were settled back onto her face, she looked over at him. Just to be certain he understood, she repeated, “No.”

“Please?”