Paige did her best to stay awake, but before long exhaustion got the better of her.
Trying his best to ignore the humans’ gurgling snores, Scrap let his mind wander. The journey gave him plenty of time to wonder how on Somewhere he’d managed to find himself on a train with the two children of the human who had built him. Gnat seemed to genuinely believe he was the King of the Robots. After all these years, someone still believed he had what it took to be a hero.
Scrap shook his head at the thought of it. He knew Gnat’s misplaced faith in him couldn’t last. Even if he wanted to help the humans, which he didn’t – he didn’t – how could he help anyone in this useless, good-for-nothing case? How could he hope to take them across the Elsewhere to whatever remained of the Pink-Footed Goose, and finally get them and their mother off-world? No, Paige was right – they were better off without his help. He should go home. He should go to his Pile.
He should go back to where he belonged.
Two hours and eighteen minutes of snoring later, Paige woke with a pained wail.
“…You all right?” asked Scrap. “You were dreamin’.”
Paige rubbed her eyes, and immediately checked on Gnat. Still fast asleep. After a moment she said, “Don’t you sleep?”
“Every now an’ then, to pass the time,” Scrap replied. Another minute went by, then he added, “What did you -zk- dream?”
“Why?”
“Didn’t sound like it was -zk- much fun.”
Paige stared out of the carriage.
“Me and Gnat were on the roof of this big house,” she said after a moment. “Across all these fields, far off, was another house, and on that roof were a whole load of other people, and we knew we had to get to that other house. But in the fields were these giants – big, huge giants, roaming the fields and we had to get past them. So the people started turning into birds – into hummingbirds – and flying across the fields. At first the giants didn’t notice.” Paige paused.
“At first?” Scrap prompted her.
“Then they looked up, and there were all these hummingbirds flying overhead,” Paige continued. “The giants, they started to lick the ends of their fingers. They swung their arms up through the air and if they touched the hummingbirds, the birds stuck to the spit on their fingertips. Then the giants licked the birds straight off their fingers and ate them.”
“Well, that’s … disgusting.”
“Suddenly me and Gnat were turning into hummingbirds, and I know there’s nothing else for it, we’re going to have to fly over the giants … then I woke up.”
Scrap saw tears welling in Paige’s eyes.
“It was just a dream,” he said, quickly. “Humans think dreams are their brains trying to give ’em therapy,” added Scrap. “But they don’t mean anythin’.”
Paige looked down at Gnat, still sleeping soundly.
“…Yeah,” she said. Then, “Do you dream?”
“You think humans have got the monopoly on unconscious hallucinations?” Scrap grunted. With a sad sigh he added: “Yeah, I dream.”
“Can’t you just turn them off?” Paige asked.
“You first,” replied Scrap. In the gloom he saw Paige smile. Then it fell from her face as quickly as it had come.
“The ship,” she said after a moment. “Do you know where it is?”
“The Pink-Foot? No. And even if I did, which I don’t, there’s not a ’bot on Five One Three who can get you there safely. An’ that includes— Wait. Shhh.”
The hum of the hovertrain had suddenly deepened.
“The train’s slowing down…” whispered Paige, grabbing her disguise.
Scrap glanced up out of the carriage. He could already see New Hull’s cube-constructed buildings reaching into the sky above them.
“The city…” he muttered. “We’re here.”
Paige had barely squeezed her helmet back on her head when the hovertrain came to an abrupt halt. “What do we do?” she whispered, giving Gnat a sharp shake.
“I’m Gnat-Bot Ninety-Nine!” blurted Gnat, sitting up with a wave of her arms.
“Shhh!” said Paige, grabbing Gnat’s arm and giving it a squeeze.
“New Hull’s goin’ to be crawlin’ with ’bots – I don’t want anythin’ to do with ’em and if you know what’s good for you, neither do you,” whispered Scrap. “Just keep your helmets on and your limbs out of sight. We sneak out the way we came in and then—”
“We split up,” interrupted Paige. “Me and Gnat go right, you go left.”
“Sure … fine … good,” said Scrap. “Split up and -zk- run.”
“And then meet up later and find the ship and get Mum,” added Gnat happily. “This is a best plan.”
“OK, on the count of three,” he whispered. “One … two—”
“Wait,” said Paige, glancing down at her core tracer. “There’s something out there. Something—”
In a flash, a blur of coiling, metal tendrils rushed over the top of the carriage. It took less than a moment for Scrap, Paige and Gnat to be ensnared, the tendrils twisting swiftly around them. While the humans had the breath squeezed out of their lungs, Scrap struggled against the tightening coils. Once he would have been able to break free with a simple flex of his arms. Now he heard an unnerving creak as his fragile frame began to buckle. An instant later, all three of them were hoisted off the floor and wrenched out of the carriage.
Scrap looked down and came face to face with the tendril’s owner.
It was a robot.
A big one.
“You’re on my train,” the robot said. “And I’m gonna kill you.”