White Out

All Noëlle could see was a vast expanse of white, like a bolt of muslin unfurled across a sewing table. The ice sheet rose and fell in gentle loping curves, and the whiteness of it was so pure, so bright, that Noëlle's eyes watered.

"Ready for you," barked Gabriel, who stood next to the station set up several paces away, the testing equipment marring the pristine canvas of the snow. Steam pumped out of the exhaust pipe, and the readers whirred back and forth, waiting for signals. Ami lay in his black reinforced box, unactivated.

Noëlle nodded and picked her way through the snow, her steps clumsy in the snow boots. She was used to working inside the dome, where the temperature was regulated and warm, where she could walk unencumbered down stone streets. But Ami had to be tested out in the open, away from the dome. If he couldn't run outside the range of the dome's energy pulses, he was worthless, and Autômatos Teixeira would cancel the project for certain, and the team would be split amongst the other projects, or sent back to Brazil to work at the company headquarters.

Alexandre was already crouched beside Ami's box, fiddling with the lock. He cursed, the word forming in a puff of white steam on the air. "These gloves," he muttered. "I can't do anything with them on."

Noëlle knelt beside him. Even through the heavy layers of wool stockings and thick skirts and her fur-lined coat, she could still feel the snow's coldness seeping in. "Let me try," she said. "I have smaller hands."

"None of us have small hands in these things." Alexandre lifted his free hand. It was wrapped in a thick leather glove, crusted over with ice.

"Relatively smaller hands," Noëlle said, and she picked up the lock and twisted it, listening for the hollow click as the tumblers fell into place. Three. Seven. One. One. A code she had memorized her first day here, her inauguration into the group.

The lock pulled apart in her hand. "There," she said, and leaned back. Alexandre pushed open the lid. Ami gleamed inside, a burnished silver that would eventually be painted dark red, to help him stand out against the snow. Alexandre twisted around and waved at Gabriel. "Ready for activation?" he shouted. Noëlle stared down at Ami, her heart pounding. Don't fail me now, she thought. She didn't want another project to be a failure. Not in this world of men.

"Instruments ready," said Gabriel.

Noëlle took a deep breath. Then she reached into the box and flipped the metal switch on Ami's side. Immediately, steam puffed out of his joints. His eyes shuttered open, revealing the ceramic irises that Alexandre's wife Estella had painted. They couldn't see anything, of course, but they gave Ami a face and an air of friendliness.

"Hello, Miss Noëlle," Ami said in his grating, steamy voice.

"Hello, Ami. We're going to run some tests today."

"Very good." Ami sat up. He was designed to look like a man, but the machinery required to make him run was bulky and impossible to compress, so he was bigger than any man Noëlle had ever seen. Boxier, too.

Alexandre had heaved himself up out of the snow and was making his way over to the station. Noëlle stayed at Ami's side. He was her creation; he was her responsibility.

"What shall you be testing me on today?" said Ami.

"Your ability to withstand the cold," said Noëlle. "Stand up for me." She stood up herself and then backed away from the box to give Ami room to maneuver. As he lurched up to his full height, Noëlle glanced back at the station. The instruments were whirring wildly. The ticker tape machine spat out ribbons of readings inside its heated glass box. Alexandre waved at her: things were good. Their faces were all wrapped up in scarves and so they couldn't see each other's expressions, but they'd developed other ways to communicate. Beneath her own scarf, Noëlle smiled, although the cold made her skin hurt.