The Fall of the City of Steel

Turbulence

After Nataloidea, Molossoidea and Epiprocta had heard enough for one day, they thanked me and began back to their village, the twins excitedly conversing in their own language. As soon as Joan said goodbye and followed the other three, I looked down at my wristwatch.

"Gracious!" I commented. "That took a long time."

"Are you going to be late for dinner?" Tony concernedly asked, remembering his promise.

"Yes," I grumbled.

"Well, sorry to hear that," Tony owned up, "Let's get you home."

"What about the plane?" James came in. "You wanted to try out its controls."

"Not today," I rejected.

"Tomorrow, then?" Emilia proposed.

"No," I refused. "When I fly it. I already know how."

"Okay," Emilia accepted, boarding the handcart and motioning Tony and Rico to the handles. "James, could you be a gentleman and tie it back down?"

"Can do," James replied, audibly disappointed but still spirited.

During the climb up the ladder after the silent handcart ride, Tony sensed my frustration with him, along with a sheen of growing distrust.

"In my defense," he piped up, "I had no idea what Joan wanted to do with you. I didn't figure it would take so long."

"You shouldn't have promised anything, then," I argued.

Tony stayed silent.

Back up at the concrete construct, Rico, the last one out, pulled the iron door loudly down into its depression in the floor, shutting out the entrance to the insane world of the warrior women and the slave workers. After we all mounted the linear, Emilia flew us back to my home building, then away, and I could feel that world already becoming distant once again. For the first time, however, this distancing came along with tinge of guilt. For the first time, it no longer seemed amoral to help the foreigners. More importantly, it seemed to me that such a thing could be done without threatening the authority that kept my kind safe. As I left the rebels' linear at the landing pad and started for home, I imagined that the outsiders' conflict could be resolved with little more than a dent in the city's food industry. At the time, this reasoning in no way seemed overly optimistic or wishful.

This time, when I returned to my parents, they seemed unsurprised by my tardiness.

"I hope you won't make a habit of having us wait," my mother remarked, somewhat accusingly, shortly after I returned.

"Sorry, mom," I excused generically. "I was promised that it wouldn't take so long this time."

"I hope the boy you're helping is learning a lot," my father reconciled, hearing this.

As I scooted up to the dinner table, where Jerry waited curiously for me, I corrected, "Actually, It's a lady I am helping."

Detailing my lie, I knew, was risky, but I still felt the need to be truthful when feasible. Unexpectedly, this comment seemed to please both my parents greatly.

"A woman, you say?" my father repeated, sounding vastly more interested. "Do you suppose she's taken a fancy to you?"

"Hardly," I admitted, sorry to disappoint them. "She already has a boyfriend."

"A pity," my mother sighed, as she and my father sat down, "But I'm sure she appreciates your help."

"She does," I compromised, as we all passed around plates of food, taking what we wanted. "She's said as much herself."