“The door said ‘push’!” 

“It most certainly did not!” 

They were stuck in an underground sewer. After being discovered by the hostiles, by choosing the wrong door, they were captured. When the interface found plans were found on them that would have destroyed the entire operation, it had decided to make their death slow and painful. So much for non-living beings not letting emotions dictate their responses. The act of cold malice at least allowed them to have a chance of escaping death. 

There was a dense pipe running the length of the room at chest level that they were both chained together around. The chain twisted into her wrists and anytime he yanked it she would be pulled forward into the pipe. 

“Would you stop that?” she complained. 

If the smell wasn’t enough to regret this trip then the rising liquid beneath them would. 

“You’re the one that wrote for us to come here.” he huffed. 

She took a line from his book and said, “I haven’t done that yet!” 

“Well, maybe skip it!” 

Distracted, he was trying to whistle different frequencies. It bounced off the enclosed walls. 

“What are you doing?”
“I’ve been trying to train Flan to respond to calls.”

“Has that been working?”

“No.” He strained against the restraints again, “You don’t have twenty knives or explosives  hidden under your skirt?” He flushed slightly at the mention. 

Good to see he still hadn’t lost the awkward innocence, she thought. 

“I stopped using them.” 

“Maybe a good time to start again, love.” 

“We live past this, right?” The murky water was now around her knees. 

He looked worried. 

“Right?” She asked for reassurance. 

“Hard to say, some time travel theories propose that each choice you make creates a new timeline.” 

“So we could die?” 

“Not if we find a way out in…” he checked his watch, “3 minutes.”

“Why only 3 minutes?” 

“The smell will start to gag us and there won’t be enough oxygen because,” he kicked to splash the gunk around for dramatic effect, “this is creating methane.” He started whistling again.

“Your watch measures oxygen now?”

“Believe it or not, it's a problem we seem to keep running into. Space travel and all that.” 

“Oh, just peachy!” 

She tried to remember her training, but years of deconditioning and panic were setting in. Her foot hooked on something under the gunk. The air became thick making it difficult for her to think.

“Find a way to get me someone wiggle room. Try getting the chain up over the pipe. Get me closer to the water. There's something loose down here.” 

He had to twist his body in order to get his arms over the pipe and allow her room to get under it. It was a strain since his shoes were covered in the slime making it impossible for him to use the wall as support. 

“Just hurry, please. This hurts,” he whimpered. 

“You are normally so fond of being tied up.” 

“Mel!” 

“Okay!”  She squealed, preparing to dive into the gunk. 

“One and a half minutes!” he reminded her, harshly. 

She had to almost submerge herself to be able to get her knees and then elbows around the piece of metal. When she came back up she was gagging from the smell. He was just able to grab the sharp object and hoist her back up so she wasn’t right at the water line. He found a weak link in the chain and got enough leverage to break it. It quickly unraveled. They heaved a sigh of relief, and then immediately regretted it. Exhausted, they were able to climb up onto a safety platform above the grime, still coughing. He hooked his elbow though the rung and held her so she could cut herself out of the heavy skirt. Once she was done, she turned back to see him weary and near collapse.
“So killer robots?”

“Killer robots.” 

“Robots don’t need bathrooms. You said this was a sewer.”

“Lots of different kinds of waste, my dear.” He said between struggling breaths. “I think this is discarded human remains mixed with a little normal sewage.” He kicked some off his shoe.
“Ew. “

“Ew,” he repeated. 

She looked like she might cry. 

“If it helps, you really do smell disgusting.” 

Playfully, she pushed him, which almost caused him to lose his footing. She grabbed his shoulder to help him steady.  Their eyes met like lovers do. Like the first time you lay eyes on a person and are stunned by everything about them. The universe that is contained behind their eyes. 

***

Alyssa was waiting when she returned. Alyssa, the ever faithful companion that she had done absolutely nothing to deserve and had done a lot to justify her leaving. She never did though. 

Her raven hair was pulled all on top of her head but small pieces cascaded out on all sides. Mel knew that meant that she had been working too long on whatever project into which she was pouring herself. It was a sign she had grabbed it in frustration too many times. Pausing, she looked up when Mel entered. 

 “Where did he take you this time?” She asked, trying to choke down her disapproval. She forced a small smile.

Absent-mindedly, Mel braided her hair, still shivering thinking of the muck that had clung to it. “To stop robots from using humans as fuel for the Victorian industrial complex.” 

“Destroying life to fuel progress, interesting.” Alyssa nodded. 

“You could say.” She unloaded her items from the past few days. Data crystals, old books, even some priceless artifacts with which she should be more careful. A now ruined pair of boots that had been very expensive. He will owe me for that one, she made a mental note. 

“And which Tim was it?” 

That question meant many things. The subtext was, How long can I expect you to be mooning over him this time? 

The overt text was, Did you sleep with him?

Mel swallowed. “Alyssa, you said you were becoming more okay with it.”

  “I know. I know.” Alyssa hugged her knees into her chest, continuing timidly, “It’s just hard. I see what it does to you. Also, you missed the reunification meeting.” 

“Oh no, again?” 

“We needed your historical analysis. I did my best… but I don’t have the credentials. We will see what the commission says.” She winced. “He needs to get better about dropping you off on time.” 

“He does.” Mel said it as a reassurance. She had watched him get better as he aged. 

“Right.” Alyssa got up and left the room. 

Their relationship had become increasingly complicated as the years came and went. They had gone through so much together since starting at the university. Part of what they constantly struggled through was the third member of their “family.” If you could call it that. 

The boy who sometimes turned up as a man they called Tim, because no one (including him) knew his real name. The orphan who found a way to travel through time and left the wreckage of his burning planet. At some point he would meet Mel and be instrumental in her deconditioning and humanity returning after years of training as a very successful assassin. She would be instrumental in keeping him alive long enough to meet her and in keeping him grounded. 

Mel looked out the window. The university was built on sister moons. The horizon was always some shade of purple because it was always night. She missed the sun of her home planet. It had a calming green tint making everything seem fresh. With as much as she was able to travel she saw plenty of suns. She hadn’t yet found another green sun. She smiled at the thought, maybe that could be her next trip with Tim, to find green suns.
Alyssa’s words cut through her moment of peace. “And has he figured out you killed him yet?”