Page 43 of Even Robots Die (Even Ever After #3)

Florentine

I ’m not an idiot.

I know Paris is a mess right now and I would be a fool not to accept the protection Brice is giving me.

I’m stubborn, yes, but not to the point I would endanger myself or my sisters by being rash.

And maybe, just maybe, I like the idea that I need a bodyguard.

It makes me feel like my person needs to be guarded, that I bear value for someone.

Even if that someone is just an overbearing boss who thinks that I might disappear on him and that if I do, he will be stuck with a broken brain.

Brice is silent for an awfully long time, his green eyes peering at me like I’m some puzzle he needs to decipher.

“I’ll order a jet for you to go home,” he tells me, still not moving from the side of my bed.

“I need to change before I go,” I say when I still don’t see him getting up. “Now.”

But he’s still not leaving and I’m starting to lose patience.

“Go,” I say vehemently.

A satisfied smile stretches on his face and I wonder what he is preparing in his mind that would grant me the sight of this smile. I’m not sure I want to know.

I won't know anyway, because he finally stands and walks to the door.

Before he reaches it though, he turns to look at me.

“Be ready in ten minutes,” he says and then he opens the door.

“Wait,” I stop him. “Any chance you have more of those pills? Maybe in a smaller dosage?”

I don’t think it’s safe for me to take a full pill like he gave me yesterday. I’m going to need to be wide awake while I look for Dad, but since I woke up, I barely feel any cramps and the migraine completely disappeared.

Maybe if I get a smaller dose, it might only remove the pain and not make me sleep for so long.

Will I take the risk, though?

Because if I end up sleeping for another day, I don’t see how it’s going to help solve the mess we’re in again.

The only answer I get from Brice is a nod and then he’s closing the door after him.

Ten minutes.

I better hurry. It’s not like I have a lot to pack. Brice provided the clothes I have here—since he’s the one who paid for them—so it’s not like I’m going to miss anything once back home.

The only thing I brought with me is Milton, but it’s always with me no matter where I go. Its core being in my earrings helps a lot with that.

Milton can be plugged into a whole lot of devices so it means it can take over anything I coded beforehand, but what makes Milton, well, Milton is in my earrings.

Not that anyone would know. They all think Milton is the various cases and devices I keep carrying around, without ever really getting a confirmation.

I probably could have plugged Milton directly into the machine Brice brought me to be honest, and we would have saved days of coding if Milton had been inside, but I don’t make a habit of trusting shapeshifters.

And amongst the shapeshifters, I trust the birds least.

They came to this world with their wings out, falling from the skies like an omen, and made humankind believe they were angels. A lot of people still believe they are.

Angels, I mean, not an omen.

Or, if they are an omen, it’s not a good one and it heralds the end of the world.

At least it was the end of the world as we knew it—not me, I wasn’t born yet, but from what I understand, it was a huge setback for the people of my country.

It was a huge setback for any country that had moved on from any sort of religious government.

I slip out of my panties and jump into the shower.

I wish I could take a bath to soothe some more of my nerves, but I definitely don’t have time for it now.

I quickly clean myself and get dressed. By the time I tie my curls up into a ponytail, there is a knock on my door.

Right on time.

“Can I come in?” I hear right when I pull the door open.

Daniel smiles at me when he sees me.

“Ready?” he asks.

I open my arms to show I’m not bringing anything and then shrug.

“Not like I needed to prepare a lot.”

I hook my arm in the crook of his and close the door to my room.

“Lead the way,” I tell him.

He looks at my arm like he’s unsure of exactly what I’m doing but seems to accept I'm not going anywhere, and after a shake of his head he leads me out of the corridor and through the castle until we’re outside.

A jet is waiting for us right next to the entry door.

Daniel helps me inside and then we both buckle in.

I toy with the jet commands and look at which destination Brice asked to be input. It’s the exact address of my home. I’m tempted to change it to my sisters' school, knowing that normally a few, if not all, of them should be there at this time of the day, but I stop myself.

There is no way they went to school if Dad is missing.

Amélie probably didn’t go because she’s worried sick. Juliette maybe a bit too. Coralie might be the only one actually there.

And Elodie? She probably used it as an excuse to skip school and find other activities to occupy herself. Or tried to drive the others mad, or in this instance, even madder.

I leave the address as is and try to relax. It shouldn’t take more than twenty minutes to arrive home, but I better enjoy the calm before the storm.

Except I don’t.

Or more precisely, Daniel doesn’t. I can see him fidgeting in the seat in front of me and I don’t know if it’s the lighting, but I could swear that he looks a bit greenish.

He’s also looking very pointedly at the ground, like he’s avoiding the huge windows that make up the two ‘walls’ at our sides at all costs.

“Are you alright?” I ask him just to make sure.

Maybe it’s wrong of me, but I don’t want to be covered in puke in the jet. Yes, it would be better for him if he was okay, comfy or whatever, but the only thing I can focus on now that I’ve started to think about it is that I don’t have time to deal with changing once I arrive home.

“I don’t like flying,” he tells me, and the look I give him in answer—dumbfounded for sure—prompts him to add a bit more.

“I don’t like heights.”

“That doesn’t make much more sense,” I say. “You’re a bat. It’s in your DNA to fly. How on earth, or maybe I should say how in the sky, can you fly if you don’t like flying or heights?”

Daniel raises his head to look at me, but drops his eyes quickly .

The jet is basically made of windows, the only part that isn’t a window consists of the ground under our feet, the bench-style seats we’re currently sitting on, and what’s under them—the engine under mine if I believe the sweet rumbling sound I can hear, and the luggage compartment under Daniel’s.

“It’s not the same. I’m in control when I shift. Now we’re just in a glass can that could drop at any moment,” he says, and his voice reaches a high pitch I’ve never heard from him.

This is hilarious, but I refrain from laughing out loud.

“Do you know why we have flying cars and jets?” I ask him.

He shakes his head and I have a feeling he thinks they are just made to annoy or unsettle him.

“In the past they realized there were way fewer accidents from airplanes than from cars. The ones that could be driven on roads. So instead of trying to make the ground cars safer, they decided to bring the cars to the sky with the same safety rules that were implemented for planes. There is nothing safer than these flying cars and jets. They’re all linked together in a system that knows exactly where each of them are in the sky.

What level, what speed, what autonomy, and how many passengers, all of this is in a database, and there is absolutely no way one could fall or crash into another. ”

As I explain everything, I can see that he doesn’t believe me, but it’s okay. At least he’s listening to me and is focused on my words and what he can say to refute what I’ve just said.

He can’t. Well, he could, but I’ll have an answer for any of his questions.

Why?

Because I hacked the central database for flying cars—jets are basically just faster cars—in Europe three years ago and I will never be able to unsee how beautiful the coding was and how any and all scenarios were accounted for within it.

“I’ll still feel better when we’re on the ground,” Daniel says.

“No one is forcing you to fly inside the jet, you know,” I tell him .

He looks at me like I’ve grown a second head. I choose to believe he’s slow to comprehend what I mean only because he still looks a bit greenish and unsettled, despite me keeping his mind busy.

“You could shift and follow the jet,” I tell him with a shrug.

Brice would probably think that I’m trying to ditch Daniel, but this is really just me trying to help him. I have no desire to land covered in puke, but I don’t plan on trying to lose Daniel, either.

I don’t know yet how he can be useful, but I’m not worried about it.

In the meantime, he’s useless if he can’t even look at me.