Holidays, family, visitors, and being sick nearly every freakin’ day. No more flu shots; ever. It was made worse that this is still a very, very hard part to write. Saw it weeks, nearly a month ago, but still shied away from it. Cowardice, mostly.

So, there will be three parts to the End of Gordon. Graf gets some backstory from Cursed Hearts, then Pai reactivates and takes final measures. This arc will end at midnight on the electric beach of La Jolla. But there is a great expanse of blood between now and then.

Enjoy my content? Buy me a beer!

Wondering what to do with his wife’s unanimated android body in his lap, Graf looked up, startled at a voice.

“Everything okay there, sir?” an older lady asked.  A dark skirt and jacket, but with patch announcing UCSD Housekeeping.  Her auburn hair was streaked with white and up in a bun.  She leaned into the cane in her right hand.  They make an old lady like this a cleaning woman?  That’s a little harsh.

“We’re fine!” he lied, getting things off on the wrong foot.  “My wife and I were walking around, on our way to the beach, to the west, but she’s tired and needed a nap.  The sun is so warm here.”

“Yes, I can see you two are not from around here,” she noted.

“Yeah,” he admitted.  And in that moment decided to stop lying.  “I’m from the old Upper Midwest; cold up there, most of the time.  My wife is from Russia.  We’re just tourists passing through Alta California.  I’m Graf Winstead and this is Pai.”

“What a lovely young lady.  She must be tired to not wake up with us talking.  And I’m Emma Smith.” She waved with her cane toward the ugly building.  “Semi-retired, but like to help clean up here and there.  Keeps me busy.”

Years with Pai, Graf had learned to pay attention to details.  No rings.  Spinster?  Widows usually kept theirs. 

“A pleasure to meet you,” he replied.  Pai, wake up!  “If I’m keeping you from your job, I apologize.”

“Oh, not at all,” she smiled while brushing at a strand of white loose from her bun.  “To be honest, I don’t talk to other much.  And certainly not from so far away!  You two are really from such remote places?”

The mother of our children has been to the Moon, how’s that for remote?

“My wife is rather well connected, where I’m, well, was, just a farmboy in the middle of nowhere.  Also,” he leaned forward, knowing Pai was still off, “please call me Graf.  There are times I can’t stand this big-city formality.”

“Then I’m Emma,” she said.  A look to the building, her watch, and the little bit of space at to his left on the bench.  Pai won’t know.  He scooted them right to let her sit.  She obviously is lonely.

She didn’t know much about what went on with the coders and the “big computer” as she called it.  “My grandma was one of the coders but something awful happened when she was in her late twenties.  Never told me, but I can still read old newspaper archives.  Some kind of terrorist was loose on campus.  Kill Grans’ roommate and several others.  The Guardia National did their best to cover everything up.”

Emma took a half-empty water bottle out and drank from it.

“Grans quit the Computer Center.  Married.  One kid.  Divorced.  She later killed herself by walking out into the ocean and drowning.”

“I…” why am I hearing this?  “I’m very sorry.  Emma.”

A rueful smile.  “You’d think this is the last place I’d want to work, right?  But it is a place connected to my family.  It can be spooky, though, what with the ghosts.”

“Excuse me?”  I’ve seen much in the last three years, so am not going to call her crazy…but, ghosts?

“Oh, come now!” she patted his left knee; her hand just not touching Pai’s head.  “I’m just some crazy old cleaning lady you met!  I need to…”

“No,” he said in low tone.  “Tell me.  I, well, I’ve learned a lot recently.  In the imperium we visited, they call it the Change.”

He watched her finish her water and shove the empty bottle into her bag.  Emma looked straight ahead for nearly half a minute.

“Sounds from overhead speakers,” she began.  “Phones ring for no reason.  Messages on screens.  The coders see and hear most of this and say nothing.  But in the off-shifts I’m here, I see enough to know there is someone hurting very bad.  And I cannot do a thing to help them.”

Graf waited just as much before making a reply.  “I’m not at all a good Christian, but do you think it might be your grandmother?”

Her head shook and he saw her eyes were getting wet.  Pai, wake up and get us out of here!  “No.  I don’t feel that at all.”  She dragged her sleeve across her face.  “I’ve taken too much of your morning.  Please tell your wife I wish I could have said hello.”

As Emma stood, Pai first sat up, then also stood.

She looks terrible.  Scared and sad.  What do I…?

Graf leapt to his feet and took his wife into his arms.

“I know you are going to do something.  It’s written all over you, which is rare.” He held on knowing she could tear him in half.  “I’m asking you to wait a moment.  With me.”

“Guh!” was her odd gasp into his chest.  “You will hate me!”

“I’ll do no such thing.  Hold onto me.” He couldn’t help but push.  “Just don’t break me, okay?”

“AAAHHHHH!”

Graf and Emma staggered back from the yell.  A few windows of the Supercomputing Center Building shattered.

“BREAK!”

She walked away, toward the building.

“But, it’s locked…” Emma said.

And tore the front door off of its hinges.  She continued inside.

“Is your wife okay, Graf?” she asked.

“No.”  Not caring if he was trespassing, he ran after Pai.