ReMade Season 1

Shadows and Dreams -- Part 3

Umta held up her hand. "This is not easy."

But Seyah got to her feet. "I'm going to keep a lookout. I've heard this all before." She stomped over to the service shaft and planted herself at the edge, her back to Holden and Umta.

"She woke up before you," said Umta. "But it is still hard for her."

"What is? Accepting that we're dead?"

"Not dead now." Umta poked him in the chest. "You are alive now, you are breathing now. But do you remember dying then?"

Holden remembered the headlights. He remembered Seyah screaming his name. That was it. But she was right about one thing—he didn't understand how anyone could survive a crash like that. "I'm not sure what I remember."

Umta grunted. "Maybe that is good for you."

Holden put his head in his hands. If he'd had anything left in his stomach to puke up, he would have done it. This wasn't happening.

"Where is this place?" asked Holden. "I mean, I know it seems like we're in space or whatever, but this place is huge! The US doesn't have anything like that. No one does. And what was that thing back there that chased us? Some kind of alien?"

Umta shook her head. "No. They are machines. They call themselves caretakers."

"They spoke to you?"

"Not with words."

"Then how?"

"Data . . . images. Ideas. I knew they wanted to help. To care for me."

It was hard not to stare at Umta. It wasn't only that she was truly ugly. There was something so odd about her, the way she spoke, the way she moved. He wondered if she had some kind of medical condition, but that wasn't the kind of thing you could ask a person.

"I thought I dreamed about you, but that wasn't a dream, was it?"

"No."

"And those metal spiders in my dream were the same thing. Caretakers, right?"

"They were trying to care for you," said Umta. "Not like the other one."

"But they were torturing me."

"They . . . they do not understand pain like we do."

"Look, if these things want to help us so badly, why was that one chasing us back there?"

Umta sat on her heels and picked at her toes. Holden hadn't even realized that she wasn't wearing shoes. She kept at one thick, yellow toenail as she spoke. "Yesterday more caretakers came. Like that one. Two tribes fighting over territory. The new tribe won."

"Let me guess," said Holden. "These new caretakers don't want to care for us at all."

"No." Umta wouldn't look at him. "I do not think so."

"Christ."

Seyah spoke up from her seat near the service shaft. "It doesn't matter. We need to get out of here. Get back home." She had been listening after all.

"There is a way," explained Umta. "I can take you there."

"What, like a shuttle?" asked Holden. "I don't think any of us can pilot a space shuttle."

"She says it's an elevator," said Seyah.

Holden got to his feet. "Excuse me? We're in space."

"Orbital elevator," said Umta. "From the station to the planet."