I wake up sore to the orange light of dawn off on one side of the sky. Did I work out or something? That doesn’t sound like something I would do, but I check yesterday’s log and yeah, it looks like I did. Exercise with Andrea. But I think I’m doing better today than how I recorded feeling yesterday, so I guess that’s progress. I can move on my own at least. An alert goes off in my console with my daily to-do list. First up, some reading.
Oh, shit.
What kind of monster am I?
DOPE_ME
It’s not enough. Not nearly.
DOPE_ME
DOPE_ME
I don’t understand how I’ve lived with myself over the last year. What kind of total bastard can do what I’ve done and keep on breathing? I lean back in the chair and contemplate my worthlessness.
Eventually, Andrea comes out and leads another workout session. It’s the same routine from yesterday, but instead of feeling invigorated, I’m just tired by the end. I know she’s holding way back from her normal routine, but I’m not anywhere near where she is physically.
Another shower.
Another bland packaged breakfast.
Another check-in with home, they’re fine. They don’t need me.
Another build.
Another canned lunch.
Another several hours to the next site.
Evan takes another nap. I need something to do. I can’t take the silence. Maybe I can see if I can patch things up with Andrea. She seems to be at least tolerating me lately.
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To Andrea: Hey, can we talk?
Lighted arrows appear along the walls, leading me from the deck to the cabin, blinking and beckoning. Andrea is sitting cross-legged on the floor of the bedroom, inscribing an intricate pattern of different shades of blue on the wall in front of her. I think it’s going to be a stormy sea or something when it’s done, but it’s too early for me to be able to tell.
“Hey.”
She looks at me expectantly.
“Can we talk about Jeff?”
The slight smile on her face disappears. She turns her eyes back to the wall. The arrows that had beckoned me into the room reverse themselves.
“For real, Andrea,” I say, sitting on the floor facing her just next to where the art installation is building itself. “I don’t want to keep going like this. I’m sorry. I know it was a shitty thing to do. And I’m sorry I lied to you about it. However much you hate me for it, I promise that I hate myself much more. But there was no other way.”
A stop sign appears in the air between us, glowing an angry red. The arrows blink more urgently as she pointedly ignores me.
“I spent every waking hour trying to figure out an alternative that would work,” I plead. “Father was too smart, he planned too well, had too many contingencies. There was nothing else he loved enough besides one of us that could have given us a chance.”
Her bots start putting a light pressure on me, physically pushing me towards the door.
“Andrea, I know you don’t want to talk about this. But we need to. Like it or not, we’re both part of the Butler Institute. We have powers and obligations that are going to keep us working together for the rest of our lives. We’ve got to get past this. If you can’t forgive me, I understand. I can’t forgive myself either.” I hang my head, the shame of what I did to my brother heavy like a weight pulling me down. “But I just want you to understand. I didn’t want to do it. I didn’t have anything against Jeff. Honestly, I think I was his only friend. But it needed to be done and I couldn’t figure out any other way.”
It’s weird how she can make silence say so many things. The pressure pushing me out of the room increases. I could push back, but why bother? It wouldn’t help. She won’t ever forgive me. Won’t ever let it go. The illusion of getting along from the last couple of days was only that. I let her bots push me out of the room and slam the door in my face.
The worst of it is that she’s right. I don’t deserve better than this.
I head back to the deck, Evan is still sleeping. How can he sleep so much and so easily? I look at the navigation system. We’ve still got a couple of hours to the next site. I spend them wallowing in self-hate.