New Elysium: Breakout

Death Wish Part 40

Red listened to Dag talk about how nervous he was to see his wife after so many years, but his own thoughts were running to the fact that it was his fault that Dag had missed that many years in the first place. He remembered that moment, when he'd lost it, and because he'd lost it Dag had come to his rescue, literally pinning him down so he wouldn't fight the scandroids to death.

It had been suicide, he known that and went anyway. That's what he'd intended. Dag had known that and tried to stop him. Well, he had stopped him. Dag's metal arm had held him firmly in place and he hadn't wanted to hurt Dag. 

He held up his hand and Dag stopped talking.

"Dag, I'm sorry." He'd never apologized before, not for any of it. For some reason he was compelled to now.

Dag's face turned puzzled. "What for?"

"You're in this mess because of me."

Dag stopped his pacing and sat down. "Red, I'm where I was supposed to be. I wasn't about to let my friend get himself killed." He knew exactly what Red was talking about. 

"You shouldn't have been. Then you'd have been on New Elysium this whole time."

"We don't know where I would have ended up," Dag laced his fingers together as he looked at Red, his silver fingers stood in stark contrast to his brown ones. "I could be dead now, or just ended up in prison later than you."

"Dag, it's—"

"No Red, stop." This time Dag held up his hand, his expression firm. "I am where I was supposed to be. And I don't blame you. I'm the one who chose to remain behind, I got out of that car to stop you. It was my choice. This whole thing was a series of choices made by many people. Maybe I should be asking you if you blamed me? Tell me, do you want to live?"

Red stared at him. "Yeah, I do." Only Dag knew he'd wanted to end everything. Charging all those Scandroids was suicide. 

"That's a step up from the man who entered that prison. You spent every moment trying to get out, and then when you ran out of ideas, you simply turned into a robot."

Red's lips quirked at the old expression. Dag paused for a moment and then snickered himself. When the expression had first been coined, robots were considered lifeless, merely a poor copy of life itself.

But after they'd been developed into autonomous being in their own right it was considered bad form to use the expression. But old habits die hard.

"So, tell me what happened," Dag smiled. "I've been babysitting for days."

"Sorry about that," Red was sorry, but there was very little Dag could have done in any event. "You saw the Commander..."

"Yeah, she was something else entirely," Dag shrugged. "Her androids were helpful though, supplies were nice. It was great eating something besides protein bars every day."

Red shrugged wondering how he was going to get through this next part. "She's two people, there's an AI in her head somehow... Ember had wondered how her piloting skills were so good, even for a human."

"And?" Dag didn't bat an eye. Augments had been everywhere before. Why not an AI?

"It's Lars." Red's voice dropped down to almost a whisper and he stared at the wall. "I thought he was dead. Gone, but somehow he's inside that woman."

Dag didn't say anything for a minute. "Are you sure?" He rubbed his face with his normal hand, tapping his knee with the other. "I mean that's... That's great news. I hope." He stared at Red, trying to read him.