Awake

Chapter Two

Chapter Two

The words continue to flash in my mind long after Olivia has changed the channel. A rogue android? The very idea is an impossibility. An oxymoron. The words contradict and cancel the other out entirely. An android cannot be rogue. What's more, an android cannot be afraid. I mentioned earlier that we can imitate emotions based on the situation. It's possible that's all she was doing, but something about her expression looks far too genuine to just be an impersonation.

She was actually afraid. 

Another impossibility that my mind cannot wrap itself around. Is this what Zinc was referring to when she asked if I had seen the news? No wonder she was acting strangely. This story is enough to throw any android off guard.

"Nora!" The high-pitched voice of Mrs. Campbell interrupts my thoughts. She's standing by the door of the kitchen, light hair pinned up in its usual, meticulous style. "I've just finished a new dress, it's on my bed. Once you've finished with the groceries can you put it on and take the kids to the park? Or, just somewhere where a lot of people will see you."

"I'd love to," I say, collecting myself enough to flash her a smile. "But I should warn you that it's begun to rain."

She waves a manicured hand at me. "Oh, that's alright! It doesn't matter if the dress gets a little wet."

"I meant the children. They could get sick," I say.

"Oh!" Mrs. Campbell says, chuckling. She doesn't have the decency to look embarrassed, her business has always come first. "I'm sure they'll be fine!" Then she crosses over to me and pulls my long dark hair out of its ponytail. "Wear your hair down, it frames your face." She spends a few moments grabbing tufts and making sure it drapes over my shoulders evenly. Once she's satisfied, her pink lips purse and she gives a curt nod before returning upstairs.

With a new task to occupy myself, it's somewhat easier to push thoughts of the rogue android to the back of my mind. For now, I focus on quickly putting the groceries away. Once I'm done with that, I head upstairs to Mrs. Campbell's room to find what she has laid out for me. A short, dark green dress with long sleeves. Simplicity is her trademark. I slip it on, wondering how a human can be comfortable in a fabric that hugs the skin the way this one does. Surely they must feel suffocated? But I've been told comfort is a worthy tradeoff for beauty.     

Just one more thing about humans I don't understand.

One glance at the mirror to make sure I am presentable and then I am back downstairs, ushering the children outside. I decide not to grab their raincoats when I see it has stopped drizzling for the moment. Mrs. Campbell didn't specify whether I should take Sebastian as well. Since I don't want to have the little mutt barking at me the entire time, I decide to leave him behind.

"Oh! Oh! Can we go to the park with the soccer field please?" Cameron asks, already bouncing with energy. My hand, firmly clasped on his shoulder is the only thing stopping him from running down the street and disappearing forever.

"If you'd like," I say.

Cameron and Olivia are polar opposites, but the one thing they have in common is good manners. I look down at them as we walk. With dark hair, fair skin and blue eyes shared between us, it would be easy to mistake us as a family. Perhaps this is one of Mrs. Campbell's marketing schemes. The majority of her customers are young mothers after all. 

During our walk, Olivia tells me all about the documentaries she's been watching. Recently she's developed a fascination for the history channel. She rattles off facts about the Great War that divided every country in the world and how our country, then named Australia, managed to avoid majority of the conflict by closing its borders. While the rest of the world was busy destroying itself, our country, newly named Arcadia, was making leaps and bounds in technological advancement.