The Man In The Machine Page 6

"I don't know." Willow shrugged, shaking her head and hugging Blake back tightly. "He- he gave me a tool that let me connect everything. If I didn't have that, I wouldn't have been able to do it." She gave Blake a squeeze, and then pulled away and rested her hands on her arms with a grin. "I'm just relieved that it worked."

  Terry stood, shaking Nych’s hand and looking him up and down. "I'm Terry. I'm Willow's brother."

  "Little brother." Willow looked over at him with a smirk.

  "Oh, shut up." Terry scoffed.

  Nych nodded his head, shaking the man's hand with a firm grip. He wondered if he'd be able to crush his hand if he wanted, but the thought faded quickly. He seemed like a nice guy. It was good of him to stay for Willow after such an awful event took place.

  "Well… I guess I'm here as part of the family." He said, looking to Aisling with a smile. He walked over to her and tussled her hair, careful to keep it away from the syrup.

  "Thanks, little one." He said quietly, so no one could hear but her.

  He could tell they'd probably get close. Perhaps close enough to call her his daughter.

  Aisling looked up at him, somewhat confused, but smiled nonetheless. "You have to be approved by Mitzy." She said, raising her chin. "She's the queen of the house."

  "Mitzy is the cat." Willow rolled her eyes, walking over to get herself breakfast. "Aisling, Mitzy likes almost everyone that walks through the door. I'm sure that she'll love Nych." She filled her plate full of food, and then walked over to sit down at the table.

  Dean wrinkled his nose. "She attacks my feet when I'm sleeping."

  "That's cause you're dumb." Aisling stuck her tongue out at him.

  "Well you're stupid." Dean scoffed.

  "Hey." Terry raised an eyebrow, his voice scolding. "None of that."

  Nych smiled as he turned away, walking back over to Willow. He wrapped an arm around her as he surveyed the room, looking at all of the people as they sat at the table.

  "So… Any plans for today?" He asked her, not knowing exactly what to do.

  To be picked out of one timeline and dropped in the next…

  It was nothing if not disconcerting.

  "Well… I'm going to have to move some things out of the house." She said after a moment, starting to pick away at her food. "And change the locks. And get you up to date on everything that has happened in the world since you've been gone." She looked up at him and tilted her head to the side. "… I should also probably pay a visit to the police station."

  Terry nodded solemnly. "I'll give you a hand with everything. And you're right. You should take everything you've documented down to the police station."

  "Can we get ice cream?" Aisling asked.

  Willow smiled, and nodded. "If we have time, we can go get ice cream."

  Nych nodded his head solemnly. "I'll go with you down to the police station. Where are we, by the way? Still in Vancouver?"

  "Yeah." Blake said, looking at him. "Willow finished college and is a full-fledged doctor now. I'm still living the same life, as you could imagine." Yeah, Nych wasn't too surprised by that one.

  Blake never seemed like the settling type.

  "Where do you work, then?" He asked her, curious. If Willow had become a doctor, he didn't know what Blake would have done.

  "I'm a nurse, I work at the same hospital." She said. It made sense, but it was almost funny that she worked under Willow.

  "I do work with patients, but usually I'm assigned only to very unique cases or amputees." Willow nodded slowly, and after a moment smiled. "I make prosthetic limbs for people who need them. I work frequently at a lot of the different hospitals in the area. My position is very unique, but… I do enjoy it." She tucked her hair behind her ears. Out of all the things in her life, her job was among the favorites. It was what she always dreamed of doing.

  "I'm at the children's hospital tomorrow." She said after a moment. "I won't be back until around dinnertime."

  "I can watch her if you need." Terry gestured to Aisling.

  "I'll go with you as a guest. It’ll be fun to show the kids a fully functioning robot." Nych said, a bit of a smile decorating his face. He was happy that he'd be able to entertain kids.

  "I'm going to a party tomorrow." Blake said, looking down at the table. "Emma wanted to meet me there, and so I told her I could go. I just… We'll see how things go, I guess."

  Nych was shocked. "You're still with Emma, after all this time? Damn, Blake. Didn't know you had it in you."

  She sighed, looking up at him. "Yeah, well, neither did I. We had a falling out. I'm trying to fix it."

  "You had a falling out?" Willow looked up at Blake, and then frowned. "I'm so sorry. I hope everything goes well."

  Aisling soon finished her food and then took her plate to the sink before she left the room. She came back a moment later, holding a Bengal cat who was meowing unhappily in her arms, and marched up to Nych.

  "Here." She held the cat out towards him, and it looked up at him with big blue eyes and a pathetic meow. She loved her human, but she didn't always love the way she packed her around.

  Nych smiled, taking the cat in his arms and holding her the proper way. He loved cats, and this one reminded him of his kitten from oh-so-long ago. It made him a bit sad, but happy at the same time. He supposed this cat would be living with him now as well.

  "Hey, girl." He muttered, scratching the cat on top of the head. "Mitzy, right? I'll be around for a while now."

  He held the cat up close and rustled its fur with his nose, smiling.

  It had been too long.

  Mitzy looked up at him and laid her ears back as she snuffled at his face, trying to work out just what exactly Nych was. He certainly wasn't human, and she knew that. But after a moment or two of the wonderful scratches and being saved from Aisling, she started purring and rubbed her cheek against his face affectionately.

  "She likes you!" Aisling smiled. "You can stay." She patted Nych's arm, and then wandered over to the fridge to go get some apple juice.

  Nych chuckled, letting the poor thing down and walking up to Willow. "Alright, so we've got the day off. What do you want to do?" He asked, pulling her close and pressing kisses to her cheek.

  He was aware there were people in the room.

  He didn't care. He'd waited fifteen years for this.

  Kind of.

  "We can go to the police station, and then you get to show me a good time in modern Vancouver."

  Willow smiled, secretly relishing in the affection as she stood up to go put her plate in the sink. "Alright. We can drive around and I'll show you what changed while you were gone." She put her plate in the sink and stretched. "I'll need to go grab my laptop. And put proper clothes on." She looked down at herself, and then back up at Terry. "… Will you all be alright here while I'm gone? Do you need anything from me before I go?"

  "It's fine, Willow." Terry waved her off. "We'll take care of things. Go do what you need to do."

  Willow hesitated, before she relaxed with a smile. "Alright. I'll go get changed, then." She turned to walk off.

  Nych sat down at the table with Terry and Blake, smiling at the two of them. "So I guess I'm back. I wish… I wish I wasn't gone for so long. I never would have let the guy get within a mile of her."

  He was very, very pissed off at him. So pissed off that he had migrated into the pissed off state of calm.

  "I'll make sure he gets what's coming to him."

  It wasn't hard to see that Nych meant it.

  Terry nodded and sighed. He waited until Aisling and Dean ran off to go play, and then looked up at Nych. "Yeah. I'm glad you two are here for her now. It was… A rough couple years. The shit was off and on. It… It was really hard to get her away from it." He ran his fingers through his hair, and he looked tired. He had seen his sister's entire descent into the dark hole she was living in, and it hadn't been pretty.

  He took a sip of his coffee. "Take good care of her. She pushes herself too hard." He shook his hea
d.

  There was silence for a moment or two. "This is the most I've seen her smile in a long time."

  Nych smiled slightly at that, glad that he was the cause of Willow's happiness. He wanted nothing more than to see her happy, and he would make sure the first few years were focused around helping her with what she had gone through.

  She had never deserved anything like that.

  "I'll never hurt her. You can trust me with that. And besides, she created me. I'm pretty sure she's got a way of turning me off."

  He didn't know everything about his robotic body, but he knew Willow enough to know she had made an off switch.

  Terry nodded, and looked up as Willow walked over to the kitchen once again. She was wearing a pair of black capris and a white t-shirt. She had pulled all of her hair back into a bun, and had her laptop bag slung over her shoulder. "Okay. I think I've got everything." She looked down at herself, and brushed herself off with a smile as she looked back up at everyone else. "I'll grab something for lunch or dinner on the way home. We'll see how long I take."

  "Take your time." Terry nodded at her. "Call us if you need anything."

  "Don't parent me." Willow scoffed at him. "God, you sound like mom."

  Nych didn't exactly have anything to bring with him; that was what struck him next. He didn't have any of his old possessions; his phone would be useless, currency had probably changed drastically, and a lot of his inventions were probably in Willow’s possession.

  He didn't know anything about what he'd missed.

  But he went with Willow all the same, getting into the passenger seat of her car.

  Cars had definitely changed.

  "This car… It's way more advanced than anything I've seen." He muttered when she climbed in.

  "Yeah. A lot has changed." She nodded, starting the car and pulling out of the driveway. She started driving down the streets of the suburban neighborhood, and sighed to herself as she turned on the radio to have it in the background. "I'll take you shopping soon. You need clothes." She looked over at him. "And… Anything else that strikes your fancy I guess. You won't need most toiletries anymore. But I'm rich, so I can buy you whatever you want."

  Considering her profession, Willow was most certainly well off.

  The gold she had created over the years had helped as well.

  Nych nodded his head, sitting back against the chair and sighing.

  So the man hadn't been necessary for payments, or rent, or anything of the sort. Willow had genuinely fallen for him, and wanted to be with him.

  It made Nych a bit sad, but he knew he didn't have a right to be. Willow had thought he was gone, and had found someone who made her happy. At least, for a little while.

  It didn't work out too well, apparently.

  "At least the roads aren't too different." He said, looking around them. Vancouver itself hadn't changed much in the past fifteen years. Only the world around them had.

  "No. Not much has changed." She shrugged, and then looked over at him with a smile. "The diner is still there. I'm shocked it is, really. The place is still the exact same as when we were in college." The diner would be a very nostalgic place for the both of them. She pulled up at a stoplight, and once it was green turned down onto another, somewhat busier street.

  As always, the traffic in Vancouver was horrendous.

  "… I don't know how long this will take." She said in reference to the police station. "We'll see."

  "Yeah. I'll be there for you if you need me. But you're strong as all hell, or at least you were when I knew you. For some reason, I doubt that much has changed in that regard either."

  She was different, but… She was still his Willow.

  "I'm sorry I wasn't there for you all this time. I would never have let him hurt you."

  It was the first time he'd really talked about this with Willow, and it was evident he was angry.

  Just not angry at her.

  "It's okay, Nych." Willow sighed, keeping her eyes on the road as she spoke. "… I was in a dark place for a long time, and he took advantage of that. I don't blame you in the slightest. I- I really hope you're not angry with yourself about this." She glanced towards him, and then her gaze shifted back towards the road. The years had taken a toll on her, no doubt, but she was beginning to feel a lot better in the knowledge that he was never coming back.

  "The only good things that came out of that relationship were Aisling and Bain." She clearly loved her children with all of her heart. "And I would do it again in a heartbeat just to have them here."

  She didn’t say anything about Bain being missing. Nych didn’t say anything either.

  Eventually, they pulled up to the police station. It was in that moment that Nych remembered something; the cops had known him quite well in his early days, before he'd gotten his laboratory. He'd blown quite a few things up in his day.

  "So… A few of them in there might recognize me. That would be… Interesting."

  Nevertheless, he got out of the car and opened her door for her, prepared for a few awkward conversations.

  "But we'll see how it goes."

  "Well, we'll explain everything when we get there." She got out of the car, sending him a thankful glance and grabbing her laptop from the backseat. She sighed, slinging it over her shoulder and taking a deep breath as she looked up at the police station. Admittedly, she was nervous. She didn't really want to talk about what had happened to her, but… It needed to happen. She would keep that man from ever coming close to hurting another person again.

  She silently willed up the courage inside herself and began walking towards the front doors of the police station.

  This cycle of abuse was going to end.

  As soon as Nych opened the doors for her, the excitement started.

  There were two officers in the lobby, each of them older, and each of them holding a small styrofoam cup of coffee. The one facing the door dropped his cup when Nych and Willow walked in, pulling his gun from the holster and holding it at the ready.

  Nych immediately held his arms up and sighed. So this was how it was going to be.

  "Y-You're dead." The officer said, looking at him with wide eyes. By this time, the other officer had turned around, though he hadn’t pulled his gun out.

  Willow blinked, and after a second stepped in front of Nych, arms outstretched. "Wait!" Her eyes were wide. "I- yes, he was. But please- let me explain. Please, put the guns away. I promise you there is a completely rational and scientific explanation to all of this."

  Rational… Maybe not. But scientific, yes.

  Willow Grace really was a genius inventor.

  The officer didn't put his gun down, but the first one nodded at her.

  "You're Willow Grace. Anastasia's daughter, I know you. You're… You're the one that was with him when he died." His voice had a dangerous edge to it, but that made sense. The man in front of him was supposed to be dead.

  "Explain yourselves." The second man said, looking quickly back and forth between them.

  This definitely wasn't an everyday occurrence for the deputies.

  "I- here." Willow carefully lowered her bag to the ground and then turned towards Nych. She pulled his shirt up, and after a second glanced up at him. "… Sorry. I hope this isn't too weird." She sent him a worried glance, and then pressed her finger to a specific spot along one of his 'ribs'. The panel on his chest opened, and she showed it to the officers. "This isn't an organic body." She tilted her head to the side and then closed the panel.

  "This is Nych, yes. His brain tissue has been rigged up to the robotic body seen here. The robotic body carries all the functions of a regular one, but… It's robotic. So this is Nych, just in an upgraded body I suppose." She put a hand on his arm, looking to them nervously.

  She wasn't sure how they'd take it. "… I'm sure this is quite jarring. My apologies."

  To his credit, the cop put his gun away.

  Unfortunately, a strange look spread across both of their faces
.

  "How did you get the brain, miss?" One of them asked.

  Uh-oh.

  Willow stared at them for a couple seconds, somewhat taken aback by their question.

  "… It was sent to me about a week after his death." She said, lowering her eyes. "I- I don't know what happened. Or who it came from. At the time I didn't really want to delve into it, as I wasn't really in a very good mindset. I figured that whoever sent it to me sent it for a reason, so I just… Put it away until the idea for the body came to me." It was a bold-faced lie, but she had an alibi during the time the brain was taken.

  "But… I made it work." A smile spread across her face. "Isn't it remarkable? A human brain inside of a robotic body. It's revolutionary."

  The first cop nodded to the second, who walked over to the computer and began typing. When he looked up and nodded his head, the first one sighed.

  "Ma'am, I'm sorry, but… You've just confirmed our suspicions. The only prints we found on the key to Nych Haywiyth's lab were yours, his, and Blake Medea's. Until this time, we had no reason to suspect that the brain had been stolen by any of you. But now… The only way that the brain could have survived this long is with the box that he invented, which he patented just before his death."

  He nodded to Nych, whose jaw was beginning to drop. No… They couldn't be…

  "We're sending an officer to your address to search for Ms. Blake Medea, who will be arrested on the charge of desecration of a human corpse."

  "What?" Willow blinked. "No- you can't do that!" Her brows furrowed with alarm, and she walked up to the officers. "There was no way she could've done it. That was fifteen years ago, and I know for a fact that there are other tunnels leading into that laboratory." She crossed her arms in front of her chest, panic starting to grow in her chest. This couldn't be happening. "And do you really have to worry about this now?"

  She looked away and sighed. "Even if she did do it, who has it hurt?" She looked up at them with saddened eyes. "Nych is alive because of what that person did. I have made the biggest scientific breakthrough in history and you care about someone who stole a brain fifteen years ago?"

  She grit her teeth. "I came here to show you guys the evidence I have been compiling for months of my past partner beating me black and blue on the regular, and you're going to arrest my best friend? Fuck- this is exactly what I need right now."