âBeta-39, do you see them?â
Beta-39 wraps the fingers of his incomplete hand around the manâs leather harness and curls his toes, bare of socks or shoes. He nods his head, then tucks his face away into the warmth of the skin he can feel through the kevlar and canvas.
âThey wonât hurt you,â the man says, his voice a reverberating susurration somewhat like the static hum that had come from Beta-23âs chest, before Beta-23 had been decommissioned. Beta-39 hopes that he wonât be decommissioned now, since his left arm lacks the biosynthetic sheathing of his right. It makes him lopsided, imperfect, disposable; he steals an anxious peek at the warm man who holds him so carefully. The man catches him looking and readjusts his grip, laughing gently. âCan you say it? Crows.â
Crows. Theyâre pecking at the scraps of burned flesh here and there, scattered upon the ground. The sight and smell doesnât bother Beta-39, but it doesnât seem to bother the man, either. The man isnât upset. Thatâs good. âCrows,â Beta-39 repeats, obediently. âCrows.â He says it again, because he can. The man is still not upset. Thatâs even better.
âGod, you sound just like he did when he was your ageââ The man shakes. He shakes so badly that Beta-39 tightens his grip on the straps, lest he fall. âSorry, sorry. BetaâI need to call you something other than a letter and a number. Do you have a name?â
The man doesnât sound strong anymore. He sounds all brittle. Beta-39 wonders if itâs because of Alpha. The man had found Beta-39 in Beta-39âs little white room. He had stopped Beta-39 from being decommissioned by his favorite guard. He had been too late to stop the decommissioning of Beta-38 or Beta-37, but he cradled Beta-51 in his arms in a way that Beta-39 had only ever seen with the researchers who were handling pieces of Alpha.
Beta-51 always, always cried, but in the manâs arms, Beta-51 was silent. The man had grabbed Beta-39 by the waist, and lifted him up, told him to hang on, hang on to him and Beta-51âthey ran past the rooms holding the Betas that had already been disposed of, but the man stumbled once they reached Beta-20. The man reached out and touched Beta-20âs face, closed Beta-20âs cold, clouded eyes. The man hadnât done that for any of the other Betas, but maybe it was because the man and Beta-20 looked to be about the same age.
They had run some more, but then Beta-13 had stepped out from behind a doorway. Beta-13 fired his gun, missing the manâs head but blowing out Beta-51âs. The man had released a terrible cry, something that could have been no, please, please, no, no, noâit was then that Beta-39 had become afraid. Beta-51âs body was left to the floor, and Beta-39 closed his eyes.
There was a crackling voice from the manâs cowl with a code of some kind; Beta-13âs cardiac motor burst. Beta-13 collapsed to the floor, and the man carried Beta-39 past him and into the next room.
Beta-39 didnât want to see anymore. He didnât want to see the high Betas reach critical. They were old, imprecise. The doctors had said that they had their parts replaced, not grown.
The man hadnât put him down, not until they had reached the laboratory that held the remains of Alpha.
Beta-39 isnât sure what he remembers more clearly; seeing Alphaâs archaic arm disassembled and suspended in the display upon the wall together with the cryogenic containment capsules for each limb and organ, or hearing the man wail where he stood on the white tile. Beta-39 had never seen Alphaâs face before. It looked sad, even disembodied in ice. Beta-39 wasnât sure if he was supposed to be in the presence of Alpha, who was Very Important, but he was the last Beta; Beta-39 supposed that made things acceptable.
The crackle in the manâs cowl sounded urgent, and the man wept for a moment longer before he clutched Beta-39 to his chest with both armsâhe ran out with fire chasing behind them, and here they are.
The outside is nice, Beta-39 thinks, even if his exposed skin is getting cold. âI donât have a name,â Beta-39 replies.
âEveryone has a name.â The man sounds only a little weak, this time.
Beta-39 reaches up to touch the manâs hair. Lit up by the fire and the sun, itâs bright in his eyes and soft to the touch. He touches the hair with his completed arm because itâs perfect, unlike his incomplete arm. Beta-39 isnât even done with being constructed. He hasnât finished his training. He doesnât know why he merits a nameânames are only given for field missions.
âIâm a Beta. We donât have names.â
The man grunts, and his arms pull Beta-39 snug and tight. Around them, the crows flutter. Beta-39 doesnât know how to describe them, other than, thanâŚpretty. The man is pretty, too. Objectively, the gleam of his incomplete arm is pretty, but he tucks it into the manâs chest between their bodies to hide it from the light. âCan I give you one?â The man whispers. The man turns his face to press his nose to Beta-39âs hair.
Itâs a foreign feeling, being held like this. Itâs warm, which is nice, but the man is so strong that Beta-39 feels safe, too. He feels secure, which is why he concedes with another nod.
âJamesâno. Not that one. Jacob? Joshua? Jonah?â A big whirring comes from above, and Beta-39 flinches at the wind that smacks into his face. âShhh, shhh, itâs ok, donât be afraid.â Beta-39 trusts him. Beta-39 ceases to be afraid, and looks at the machine in the sky. He recognizes it as a helicopter, and when it lands, the man carries him over to it and straps himself in without releasing Beta-39 from his arms.
There are three other people in the helicopter. They are all pretty, and Beta-39 feels so secure that he tells them so. The man will keep him safe. The woman chuckles, but she looks so sad. They all look so sad. They say nothing.
Beta-39 tugs on the manâs sleeve. He wants to hear more names. âDesignation,â he states, and the manâs eyes turn from clouds to stars. The manâs big hands are warm on his back.
When he speaks, itâs so soft that Beta-39 has to press closer to hear. âHow aboutâŚJesse? Jeremiah? Or maybe a different letter altogether, huh? George, Gabriel, Gregory? Ryan? Thomas? William? Elliotââ
Beta-39 stops him before he gets too far and Beta-39 forgets the one he likes best. âJe-re-mi-ah,â Beta-39 tests. He decides that yes, he does like this one after all.Â
The man looks like heâs about to cry. Thatâs fine, Beta-39 has seen him cry already, in the lab that held Alpha. âJeremiah. Jeremy. Jerry.â Beta-39 likes those variations, so he nods to everything. He has a new designation, a new name. It feels, it feelsâhe ignores the blood flaking on the manâs clothes and tries to burrow into the manâs chest because his face is getting too hot.
"Heâs a clingy one, Steve,â another man comments, hesitantly. âWe might need to pick up a stuffed animal to distract him so you canâŚwash off.â
Beta-39-now-Jeremiahâs man, whose name is apparently Steve, trembles. âWeâll get Jeremy a, aâŚâ He flounders; his face splinters into a rictus of choking laughter. âA bear. A Buâa, a Buckââ
Jeremiah doesnât know what to do about the hysterics, and looks to the woman for guidance. She reminds him of Beta-19, who was, oddly, female. âA Jer-Bear,â she offers, and her voice is so tender that Jeremiah blinks in bewilderment. His eyes are getting wet.
Steve laughs. He laughs, and laughs, and his face looks like itâs leaking because heâs crying so hard. âThatâs right,â he wheezes. âA Jer-Bear, for Jeremiah.â
Jeremiah wheezes, too. Steve squeezes him. Jeremiah squeezes back. Jeremiahâs sensors are picking up on his stress and they ping, behind his heart, to stop sobbing. Jeremiah doesnât stop, because everyone at the panels which would display the error is dead. He feels like a toy in Steveâs arms, and they rock back and forth in the helicopter as it lifts higher into the sky. Jeremiah feels very small, and very safe, and very sad, because Steve is very sad. However, Jeremiah is warm. That makes up for the sadness.
Distantly, Jeremiah wonders if Alpha is warm, too. His parts were always kept frozen, and Jeremiah and Steve had left them behind in the fire. Jeremiah wonders if the parts had burned, or if they had melted away into vapor like the ice in which they were encased. Either way, Alpha had been dead for a long, long time. The dead only ever get colder.
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