"Polybot?"
V went up the stairs, and I followed behind.
"What does Poly have to do with it?" I inquired, even more curious now.
"Poly?" he repeated with a frown.
"Yeah, Polybot. You just called her name."
"Her name?" he said again with an incredulous smile. "You call the cleaning robot... Poly?"
Just as he spoke these words, Poly's tiny head appeared at the bathroom door with a whirr.
"Polybot-mhumm-Poly?" he cleared his throat, a smirk for me. "Please launch the mosquito mist in five minutes."
"Mosquito mist scheduled in 5 minutes," echoed in the hallway, in the same voice that spoke the messages appearing on the kitchen's screen.
"Poly can speak too?!" I uttered, following V to his room and glancing at my tiny sidekick whirring down the stairs.
V entered his walk-in wardrobe and began to rummage through the drawers.
"V! What's happening? Where are we going?"
As everything was carefully tidied and organized in his closet, he had already found what he was looking for.
"Outside," he replied, throwing what looked like a scarf around my neck.
"Outside? Is it going to be that cold?" I asked with a doubtful raise of an eyebrow.
The temperature in the City had always felt like the perfect comfortable temperature to do anything, whether it was walking in the sun or sitting outside at night. It was never too windy, or too humid, or too dry, and the sky was always a stunning, perfect blue.
V couldn't answer as he had also wrapped himself around a scarf, even checking if it was broad enough to cover half of his face. Where were we going that could be that cold?
"What's that?" I asked yet another question when he pulled a bracelet from a different drawer.
"A watch."
It didn't appear like a watch at all, with no screen or numbers on it, only tiny black marks.
"I might be the last one in the City who knows how to read an analog watch..." V muttered under his breath as he struggled to fasten it around his wrist.
I helped him tie it, looking with curiosity at the smooth white circle with black marks and wondering how he might be able to read time on it. V's list of unusual possessions lengthened again, adding to old notebooks and ancient pens, an analog watch.
"We can't take our tablets or our glasses with us. Nothing that could be tracking us. Wait... Do you have a kind of geolocation feature on... you?" he looked me up and down. "Maybe Love Machina Inc. receives a warning when you cross the limits of New Yuan City...?"
Already, his eyes betrayed panic as if he seemed to rethink the whole idea.
"No," I spoke fast. "I have no geolocation feature. They won't be able to know."
Cross the limits of New Yuan City...?
As soon as he said these words, I realized we were not only going to a new place. We were going to a place... outside the City! Nothing could have grasped my interest more than discovering yet another world.
My confident tone must have convinced him because he immediately nodded and walked back downstairs. Indeed, I had everything to be sure, since I was made of bones and flesh, just like him.
"How are we going there?" I asked as I followed his actions, slipping on my flats as he put on his shoes too.
"Well, that's the tricky part..." he replied, walking back to the living room.
I joined him by the wide windows of the atrium. Outside, the light had started to decline. It was the end of the afternoon.
"I think we should eat something before we go," he said, getting rid of his scarf and mine on one of the sofas.
I was slightly disappointed that he meant we probably wouldn't get to eat at the new place we were going to. I had to calm down my imagination at the idea of a new world with thousands of new dishes like New Yuan City.
Five minutes later, we were eating Mediterranean Cold Veggie Pasta when I noticed white smoke in the atrium.
"What's that?"
"The mosquito mist," V answered, checking his watch. "It started about two minutes ago."
He didn't seem alarmed by it, so I wasn't either. I munched on my pasta, watching as the white fog grew thicker and stronger. It had already engulfed my succulents on the ground, now swirling up the ivy leaves on the tall wall. I wondered if my recently planted basil would be bothered by it, but then I remembered it would be fine, as all the information I found on Nora advised killing any bugs near plants.
"Let's get ready," V said, his fork quickly pushing into the last pasta on his plate and taking the big mouthful in one bite.
I did the same, wondering why we were in a hurry now, when five minutes ago we had time to order a meal.
"Do you still have snacks and a water bottle in your bag?" he asked, grabbing my printed backpack hanging from a hook at the entrance.
"Always. But, V..." I accepted the scarf he was handing me again. He had wrapped his around his neck and wore my tiny, cute backpack on his wide shoulders. It looked even more adorable on him. "You have to explain where we're going. I'm so confused. What's happening?"
Outside, the mist had completely blocked our view. The smoke was like a thick white cloud we couldn't see through.
"I'm confused too," he admitted with a deep sigh. He took another long breath, brushing his hair at the back, looking quite anxious. "I only did this once before. When I inherited this land from my parents and visited it... There were no houses then. Only the City Wall and the ivy on it. But still, I noticed something then..."
As he spoke, his fingers were busy wrapping the scarf around my face.
"What was it?" I asked before the fabric would cover my mouth.
"A trapdoor," he answered, and I could only frown to show my confusion because my mouth and nose had been completely covered. "Leading to the tunnels of the City... Not only the tunnels of the loop and cabs. But also the meal box tubes. The dust pipes. The air vents. Waste disposal. Everything. I followed the one made for people to walk around, probably for repair robots too. It led me to a place outside the City... That's where I want to take you."
He looked at the time on his watch before checking the mosquito mist outside. On the ground, my succulents had begun to appear again, the smoke slowly diffusing in the air now.
"It's not really authorized, nor recommended, to do this... That's why I thought it better to cover our tracks with the mist. If there's video surveillance, they won't be able to tell... Or at least, I hope so," he pushed again the hair out of his face, before wrapping the scarf around his head.
He checked his watch before looking for Poly, who was patiently waiting next to us.
"Poly, please launch the mosquito mist in four hours."
"Mosquito mist scheduled in four hours," the voice echoed around us like the last time.
"Ready?"
V held his hand for me, and I seized it without any hesitation. I wasn't one to break the rules, but being with V made me feel like everything was possible. He was a powerful contributor in the City after all, the dinner at the director's had proved it to me. I was sure nothing could happen to him, or to me, for as long as I was with him.
"I'll lead the way. Don't open your mouth. Try to hold your hand over the scarf so nothing gets to your nose. If you can, try to close your eyes too... It's going to sting."
I nodded to show I understood, and he tucked the end of his scarf over his mouth and nose. One hand tight around mine, the other pushed open the atrium's door, the same one that had inadvertently triggered an alarm when I opened it a few weeks ago.
"Alert. Mosquito mist. Do not exit your residence," I heard Poly panic whirrs as she came to poke against my foot.
Indeed, as soon as V pushed the window open, some of the smoke floated inside. I immediately took in a deep breath and closed my eyes, feeling them prickling with tears, for the second time today already.
"Air quality is hazardous. Inhalation may result in respiratory distress," Poly kept urging, her small head pushing against me. "Repeat: It is dangerous to breathe the mist. Please remain indoors until further notice-"
I had climbed into the atrium so many times, at least three times a day since I started the garden, that it was easy to follow V with my eyes closed. My feet stepped onto the soft soil that I had taken such great care of over the past weeks. I hoped our steps wouldn't destroy any of my baby plants, but I also realized that it wasn't the priority at this moment.
When I felt V stop and leave my hand, too curious, I half-opened my eyes. The mist prickled, but it was bearable. I even stopped holding my breath, only taking in short bursts of air through the fabric of the scarf.
It stung my mouth and eyes, though.
I could see him crouching on the ground, as if looking for something by the wall, on that part where the end of the ivy leaves fell. The next second, he pulled open a square door out of nowhere. Out of all the hours and days I had spent making a garden here, I had never even seen the outline of this trapdoor. V coughed into his elbow before taking my hand. Our stares met, and he looked surprised to see my eyes open.
Already, he was going down a ladder, into the tunnel. I followed right behind him, feeling his strong hands on my hips and waist to help me go down the steps.
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