Duplicate Minds

Twenty-Nine

They didn't stop running for fifteen minutes straight. Rajeev could have kept going, but Dev needed to rest before they continued. A wooded area stood off to the side of the road and they took refuge behind a row of trees. Nobody would be able to see them from the road unless they looked carefully.

Dev took a seat on a stump. Rajeev asked him what the plan was.

"There isn't one," he let out between breaths.

"You've been sitting in that room this entire time and you haven't given any thought to what you'd do if you got out?"

"Sure I have. But those thoughts didn't constitute a plan. They were fantasies."

"So what the hell are we supposed to do?"

"First we need to get well away from here. The area's going to be buzzing with NLT personnel on the hunt for us."

"We're never going to manage that on foot."

"Exactly. We need a ride."

"It's not like we can call a Lyft. Although . . . we could ask Daniel to make a call for us."

Dev wrinkled his brow. "Daniel? You mean the AI assistant?"

"Yeah. He could call Mira for us, tell her to come pick us up. Is there any reason we shouldn't? Would Maltek be able to trace the call?"

"He shouldn't be able to. I severed the company's ties to you when I disabled the failsafe. You're invisible to them."

"Okay. Daniel? We need you."

The assistant appeared in front of them; of course, Dev couldn't see him.

"Daniel, can you call my daughter, Mira?"

"Let me check your contact list . . . Mira Sundaram? Is that who you'd like to call?"

"Yes."

"Okay. One moment."

Daniel went silent for a moment; the line must have been ringing, but suddenly he opened his mouth and Mira's voice came out of it: "Hello?"

It was an odd thing, hearing Mira's soft, feminine voice emanating from the mouth of a masculine representation—but there was no time to dwell on it.

"Hi Mira. It's dad."

"Dad? Where the hell have you been? I've been worried sick about you!"

"It's a long story. Look, I'm with your brother maybe a quarter of a mile outside the NLT campus. We need a ride."

"You're with Dev? Why doesn't he just call one of his limos down there and—"

"Mira, it's complicated. Please, can you come? We're desperate here. We'll explain everything in person."

She sighed. "Fine. You're lucky I love you."

Rajeev gave Mira a more detailed description of their location. Then the call ended, Daniel went away and Rajeev turned to his son.

"She's on her way. She should be here in less than a half hour."

"Hopefully we won't get caught before then."

"Hopefully not." Rajeev hesitated, but then shook his head; now was as good a time as any to have this conversation. "Dev, I owe you an apology."

"For what?"

"For not being there for you. Ever. When you were a kid, I worked all the time. I was trying to support our family, trying to give you kids nice things and good opportunities. I think in the back of my head I always figured I'd have an opportunity to slow down later and then I'd make up for lost time and spend more time with you and your sister. But it didn't work out that way, obviously. I was gone for fifteen years and it was because I overworked myself. If I'd gotten more sleep, been more refreshed, then my reaction time would have been faster and I could have—" He cut himself off, overwhelmed by emotions that couldn't be expressed through tears.