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this, just like this forever, I’d be a very happy man.” His voice is soft, soothing. I snuggle closer to him.
       “Mmm,” I say as I drift off. For a moment, I’m standing on an island, surrounded by dark waters and dark skies. I’m alone and my entire world is this tiny patch of nothingness, except I’m not alone. I’m caught in a tangle with dark things all around me and even darker things lurking below the surface of the water. There are so many—numbers beyond counting. Writhing. Pulsating. Slithering.
       From out of the void something approaches. Its bright luminescence draws my eyes like a star falling in the night sky. My thoughts reel at the sight of it. It’s something I shouldn’t know but I do.
       I scream out. My eyes fly open. Luke’s fine, tanned face and bright brown eyes with flecks of gold greet me.
       “Cedes, what’s wrong?” he says softly.
       I curl up against him. “I was lost. Lost in darkness. I was alone, but not alone. They were all around me. Then something came at me from out of the darkness.”
       He puts me at arm’s length. “A dream, nothing more. You only just drifted off. I was about to join you too.”
       I see movement in the shadows and feel a presence. I slide away from Luke, looking up. I don’t mean to pull back at the sight of Dakota. The cruelty of fate is that we react in ways we don’t mean to when we’re startled.
       Dakota’s eyes stay on mine and his jaw is tight. I feel a twinge of regret for what must have been a look of horror on my face. I want to tell him that it wasn’t him, that it was the darkness I slipped into.
       “Didn’t mean to startle you,” he says, approaching. “Your jumpers. They’re dry. I thought you should have them.”
       I get up. My eyes move from the metal that has become his right arm to the angry red scars. I don’t want them to; they move of their own accord. I reach out to him. He pulls back, putting the jumpers into my hands.
       “Thank you,” I say, trying to remember him as he was.
       “Sierra asks for you,” he says. Then he turns and leaves.
       Luke and I dress. As he pulls the zipper on the back of my jumpsuit into place, he brings me to him. “Not just yet,” he says.
       “You either,” I say. I want to check his wound, so I spin him around and push him to the wall. He extends his hands and grips the wall while I peel back the fabric. The warm pink glow below is less worrisome than the angry red hole I saw before. “Looking better by the moment. How does it feel?”
       He twists his trunk. “Better than I hoped. You?”
       I rotate my shoulder. “Good to go, if it comes down to it, but I hope it doesn’t.”
       Luke nods. “Let’s hope Sierra’s plans don’t include us.”
       I kiss him before he can step away, knowing that in this moment I shouldn’t. I kiss him for longer than I should with Sierra and the others waiting for us. I do it because for this brief space I don’t care about anything else.
       “They’ve all changed so much,” I say when I finally release him.
       “I don’t trust—” He starts to say.
       I cut him off and step away from him. “Don’t say it. We’ve changed too. None of us are what we were.”
       He presses his lips to mine. “You asked me about priorities before. We should be looking for whatever the machines want. If it’s valuable enough for them to tear each other apart, we need it if there’s to be any hope for us.”
       I listen, hoping the part of him that is human is speaking and not the part of him that is Cogent.
     

 
     
     
Chapter 7
    Node: 100
     
     
     
    Sierra is hunched over the plans she’s drawing in the dirt when Luke and I enter. She has an uncanny ability to capture the fine details of the streets, buildings and the park itself. From what I see, I don’t doubt that she can see things almost perfectly in her mind’s eye.
       Dakota is