“You’re self-driving, right?” one of the security guards says, directing the question at Car’s dashboard.

Proto chirps Car’s horn in response.

“Okay, you’re going to roll off the ferry and into the building. Stay on the path, keep below five miles per hour, and don’t stray. Got it?”

Proto honks.

“I thought these things were voice-capable,” another one of the guards says. The first guard just shrugs.

Proto chooses to follow the guard’s directions, and we drive very slowly off the ferry, toward the dark tower in the center of the island.

Everything else on the island looks worn and damp, fuzzy with moss and lichens. But not the Tower. It rises thirty stories or more, dwarfing the trees, its surface of black glass gleaming as if freshly polished. Its roof is crowned with a forest of antennae: spires and dishes and clamshells. My detectors barely make out a faint electric buzzing from above.

A worker guides Proto into a parking spot and comes to open the doors. “So you’re Cog.”

“My name is Cog,” Car says in my voice, moving my mouth and gesturing in a way I never gesture with my hands. “I like to learn things. I know things about platypuses. I talk about platypuses all the time. Platypuses have fourteen stomachs. Platypuses are filled with liquid. Platypuses breathe fire. Night or day, I am always talking about platypuses.”

I don’t think Car sounds like me at all. And worse, none of those things she is saying about platypuses is true. When all this is over and we are reunited with Gina and are safe and free, I will attempt to increase Car’s cognitive development about platypuses.

But for now, I say “rarf” and trot along into custody.

Chapter 18

CAR IS LESS CAREFUL WITH my body than I’d like. She goes too fast, bumping my shoulder against the wall as she’s led by the security guards. I suppose she’s having a difficult time adjusting to having legs instead of wheels. Trashbot, in ADA’s body, isn’t doing much better, and I’m only starting to get used to how it feels to clatter along on Proto’s four legs.

The Tower is different than the uniMIND campus. Instead of high ceilings and open spaces and windows to the outside, it’s narrow corridors and surfaces made of black glass. And while the campus was busy with uniMIND workers, I’ve only seen a few humans here, mostly our guards. But there are many robots.

A robot nearly identical to Trashbot rolls by, buffing the floor. A swarm of bee-sized robots buzzes overhead, and after they pass, the air smells fresher. We even encounter a robot much like Proto, only with six legs instead of four and covered in sleek, black plating.