At first Sasha couldn't take in the words she was hearing. Klar was saying what? Was he threatening to keep Nug from her?

"I'm gonna fetch him home--and you ain't gonna stop me." There was defiance in her voice. She didn't want him to know how scared she felt.

"Home? You call living in a clapped-out Underground carriage home?" He smiled, his close-set eyes shining with amusement.

"You fuck off!" she yelled, mustering her courage. "I'd rather be living in a stinkin' pigsty than a place like yours, full of ugly furniture and crap carpets and everything painted fuckin' white."

His smile became a tight thin line. Lois nudged his shoulder. "Hasn't she seen your place since you put in hardwood floors and smartwalls?"

Lois giggled and Klar's face darkened. The eemee began dropping toward the center of a complex of buildings, drawn to a gray rectangle with a white circle in the middle.

"You better bring Nug here right now, or I ain't gettin' out."  

"Too late, Sasha, you've already made your choice. Pretty soon you'll be stretched out on your queen-sized bed, thinking about soaking in a nice hot tub."

Lois's voice had a creamy quality that pissed her off even more. "I told you--I ain't gettin' out of this rig. Bring Nug in here."

Klar glared at her. "We don't have time for this, Sasha. I'll bring in a couple of purples if I have to." There was annoyance in him now.

"Purples? Ha! I eat 'em for breakfast."

Her heart began to beat fast. At the mention of the purples, the robot police, she remembered how the bots crushed a scuffle among a bunch of homeless men with maximum violence. They had put five guys in the hospital and left one, a friend of Nug's, with deep slash marks across his stomach that stayed as thick ugly scars.

The white circle got bigger as they dropped toward it. The vehicle centered itself above the circle before coming down to a gentle halt. Two purple security bots were waiting on the landing pad and they hurried forward, bending their heads as the door of the vehicle opened upward. Her heartbeat raced. 

The bastard must have alerted 'em on his aj.

"Okay. Sasha, let's get going." Klar stood up and gestured to the purples to wait. Lois reached for Sasha's arm, which she refused to give. She remained seated, her arms tightly folded.

She weighed up her options. Staying put would get her yanked out by the purples. Slapping Lois and kneeing Klar in the groin would be satisfying, but she would definitely get mashed. And she wanted to see Nug.

"Come on, Sasha," Klar coaxed, standing in the doorway. "I can't wait to watch you and Nug get acquainted again."

"You ain't gonna watch nothin' we do." Her voice was dripping with contempt. "You make me wanna puke."

He smirked and turned to Lois. "See, I told you--she fancies me."

"It's your Mellowmint  she loves," Lois murmured, and they both snickered. The purple bots stood aside as they climbed out. 

"Wankers." She slowly got up and slouched onto the landing pad. 

She was escorted across the landing area by the two bots. A sixty-meter tramp across the flat gray rooftop led to a door on the outside of a building. It clicked open after one of the bots barked an entry code. She shuffled into a deep-carpeted passage, followed by the bots, and the door closed behind them. White curtains shrouded the closed windows.

The two bots marching behind her, she clumped down a long corridor. It had the air of a quiet suburban hotel and in the distance she glimpsed a landing with stairs and an elevator well. Everything was painted white except for twelve black doors, six on either side. All of them were closed.

She trailed along the corridor, taking in every detail--the doors, the chairs beside them, and the bland, corporate-looking pictures on the walls. She was weighing up the possibility of escape, which she considered infinitesimal. The place whispered maximum security, sensors embedded in every door frame and invisible laser beams crisscrossing the corridor. Her heart sank.

This place is like Fort Knox.

Descending the stairs, they came to a lounge with a kitchen area. A couch and an armchair next to a glass-topped coffee table furnished the room, in tones of pale brown and muted yellow. Klar sauntered in and sat on the couch. Lois plopped down beside him. The two purples positioned themselves on each side of the door.

Klar began to rub the mousy hair flowing back from his temples. He had a smug, patronizing air and he directed his stare at her. She plonked herself in the armchair and glared back at him, pulling her hoody up. Her camo shirt, which had been on her back all day, was sweaty. She longed to shed it and kick the boots from her itchy feet. She was dog-tired and her throat was painfully dry.

He gave her a knowing smile. "Sasha, you look like you could use a drink."

The last of the evening sun was filtering through the window blinds and she could see, across the room, an enormous white cabinet full of bottles and flasks of all kinds. 

"Lois, get Sasha a long cold drink," he commanded. "In fact, make it three."

Lois strolled over to the cabinet, and selected an array of bottles. She fished out three tall glasses and a frosted cut-glass decanter, into which she mixed the drinks, and brought them to the coffee table.

She leaned forward in the armchair and picked up her glass. She had been awake since early morning, and her body was starting to go numb. Klar smiled and raised his glass. "Here's to a very successful session."

After mumbling a few choice cuss words, she sniffed the concoction and drank deeply. The flavors she tasted--a rich mixture of violets, nasturtiums, hibiscus, and jasmines, shot with pure alcohol--were so complex she lost herself in a reverie. Her fear of experiments vanished, like a bad dream fading in the light of day.

Klar and Lois were talking, but she barely heard them. She was reliving the time she and Nug had snuck out of their foster home in the dead of night, while their pig of a foster dad and his girlfriend were asleep. Nug asked her if she wanted a smoke. He stuck a joint in her mouth before she could reply. They were sitting on the lawn. It was so dark they couldn't see jack-shit except for the glow of the spliff. She inhaled a lungful of weed and handed the blunt back to him. He waved it away. "I'm wasted, you have it."  She shrugged, double-dragged the rest of the joint and flicked the roach across the lawn. It could burn out on the grass for all she cared. If it burnt the place down, so much the better. 

Nug was her nicest foster bro. He didn't try to jump on her bones like the others, so she didn't have to batter him. He was sweet, which is why she shagged him later that night. They were laying on the couch, getting turned on by a porn holo, and did the dance with no pants, even though they were both stoned. It made her laugh to think about it. 

Klar's voice droned on, and she took a long gulp from her glass to keep the fantasy going. She felt radiant, savoring the memory of what she and Nug had done. Someone started nudging her inside her brain. Tinker was sending her a message and it had to do with her drinking.

"Okay, I get it. Slow down..," she muttered. She took a final swig and put the glass back on the coffee table.

Klar stopped talking and looked up. "You look tired, Sasha. Are you ready for bed?"

Not with you, you wankstain.

"Nah, I just don't wanna get pissin' drunk." She closed her eyes, dropping with fatigue yet willing herself to sit up straight, basking in the afterglow of her memories.

"You're drinking on an empty stomach. Lois, let's have some nosh before we all turn in."

The last patches of sunlight had faded from the walls. Lois put down her drink, stood up and padded across the room, causing the lights to come on. She flitted about in the kitchen while Sasha, beginning to succumb to the effects of the amazing concoction, forced herself to stay awake.

Lois returned with a platter of open-face sandwiches and she looked at hers through bleary eyes. It smelled like something Italian, and, when she took a bite, turned out to be a bruschetta of grilled Italian herb-crusted bread topped with tomato, basil, and garlic. As she bit deeper she tasted marsala, mushrooms, and roast lab pork. Sighing, she surrendered to the fact that, as well as being desperately tired, she was ferociously hungry. She wolfed the bruschetta and reached for another.

Klar and Lois ate lightly, their munching a counterpoint to her noisy chomping. 

"How are you feeling, Sasha?" Lois was picking at the toppings of her bruschetta.

"Knackered." She swallowed a chunk of lab pork. "I'll feel better when I get to see Nug."

Lois looked up from her nibbling and smiled. "No worries, Sash, we'll let you see him tomorrow."