The car continued moving through the city.

Soon, they abandoned his neighborhood and entered the bustling part of the city. The streets became avenues, and the cars appeared by the dozen from different arteries. Here, there were no longer any human traffic officers on motorcycles to be seen. Here, where traffic was packed, there were only robot transit officers; Cyclops-like androids, but with a single wheel instead of legs, specially designed to move between very narrow spaces.

Traffic lights and vehicles’ position lights glittered along with dazzling skyscrapers and giant billboards.

There, on his right, was The Stars Mall; and in front of it, the big sign of the shop Bunny, showing the cartoon of that beautiful lady in lingerie throwing a kiss at no one in particular. There was also the ad with the athlete holding up a gold medal, guaranteeing you that J.M. was the best health insurance company; and a little further back, the cone-shaped tower where Morris & Co. operated, the much-hated competition of Homam Enterprises. All buildings and things that were familiar to Uri. Now, more than ever, he needed that familiarity to make him feel safe.

Being surrounded by so many cars and so many people gave him some of that, though not enough.

He saw two robot traffic officers moving between the cars, not far from them. Perhaps further ahead there had been an accident or a traffic jam. Better to stay away from there. He avoided a row of buses and veered into the fast lane.

“So, the police thing is out of the question; are we gonna seek refuge somewhere or something like that?” he asked. “Where are we headed?”

“Nowhere,” Juzo replied. “We’re driving around. If Broga and his companions are following us, it will be harder for them to find us while we’re on the move.”

“Perfect.” Uri nodded. “And why don’t we ask your superiors for help? You can ask the embassy for amnesty and—”

“There’s no use. We are alone in this,” Juzo said.

“Right. Right. You and your girlfriend have not only escaped the fascists on your continent, but you stole those thrusters; surely those files, too, and who knows what else, right? How could we not be alone in this?!”

“Malin is not my girlfriend; she is my partner. And the files were handed over to me by an informant.”

“Yeah, whatever…” Uri pointed out the backpack that Juzo was carrying. “Do any of the files name the company involved in the project’s development? Surely, I must know it. The company I work for may have made deals with them.”

“For what purpose?”

“To know the identity of those behind the project, what else? There could be one who survived the lab accident. With the license code of this Broga droid, we could find them. And one other thing, what’s in your pocket? I see you don’t take your hand out of there. Because when you—”

Once again, Uri had a nosebleed, and annoyed, he wiped it with the back of his hand.

That was when Juzo finally figured out what was going on.

“They are tracking us!” He startled. “Hurry! Pull over the car! Hurry!”

Frightened, with a hand holding the bleeding and with the other on the wheel, Uri sought the best way to avoid traffic and get out of the middle of the avenue to pull over. He was fenced off by cars and trucks, and it was impossible to turn at a ninety-degree angle without running over someone. He slowed down, and upon reaching a traffic light, he took the lane to his right.

“Faster!” Juzo insisted.

“Don’t you see I’m doing everything I can?!”

The sensation of piranhas eating him alive became so real Uri wanted to scream. He stopped pressing his nose to use both hands to maneuver. The blood dripped down his chin and fell on his chest. With the turn lights on, he swerved and got in front of a sedan that complained by honking the horn. He shrugged, apologizing to the driver, repeating the same maneuver, he changed lanes until he got out of the expressway. There were a lot of honks against him; he even thought that he heard the siren of the robot traffic officers.

“Your epistaxis isn’t a side effect,” Juzo said, “it is the effect. That woman must be using it as some kind of tracking signal.” He snorted. “How stupid I was! How come I didn’t see it before? They’re doing it remotely and—”

Uri approached the sidewalk, and not having a spot to park his car among the others, he took the precaution of having no one behind, slowed down, and he double-parked. The traffic went furiously down his side.

“You were saying—?” But when he moved his eyes back to the front, he froze.

Right there on the avenue, exposed to anyone’s eye, was a person performing a show that night Uri had already witnessed: that of staying suspended in the air. A show that kept taking his breath away.

What appeared to be a man in a purple raincoat had descended from the sky to stop before the light towers, several feet above the pavement. Two motorcyclists passed right next to them and were so stunned by the newcomer they almost lost control of their bikes. More honks sounded.

“Broga,” Juzo called him and got out of the vehicle.

Uri felt a stitch of terror. It wasn’t a man; it was the machine that could well end up being their executioner. Letting himself be carried away by momentum, he got out of the car too. As he stepped onto the avenue, his feet trembled. He clung to the door and stood behind it, on alert in case he should go back inside.

That faceless chrome head, that single visor in the center that functioned as an eye… There was this wonder of technology, dressed as if he were a human being as the protocol dictates.

The so-called Broga was wearing a purple trench coat, so torn that he had already lost his left sleeve and a piece on his right. There one could see those arms with solid silicone muscles and filled with circuits, covered in part with metal plates. Under his trench coat, he had one of those dark jumpsuits that Cyclops used to dress; they were so ripped below the knee, though, that his robot legs were exposed through the tatters of fabric.

Uri didn’t see thrusters attached to him or anything like it; surely, the android had an antigravity system incorporated in his legs or his back.

“He can’t hurt us, can he?” He said to his brother. “If Directive 001—”

Juzo slid over the SUV’s body and stood in front of Uri to cover him.

“We’re not living beings to him. We’re the target,” Juzo said. “If he needs to kill us to extract our proteins, he will.”

Uri couldn’t accept it.

“Cyclops Android,” he called Broga aloud to make himself heard above the traffic noise, even though his jaw kept shaking. “What kind of model do you belong to? Answer and rectify your orders!”

Broga remained silent.

“He won’t answer you,” Juzo said to Uri, and taking a hand back, took him by the wrist.

“Every Cyclops comes from the factory with a primary order of obedience,” Uri said. “If he tells us his license code, maybe we can overwrite his Protocol 128 so that—”

“Surrender and everything will be over quickly,” Broga said.

Uri looked at Juzo with wide eyes. That synthesized voice announced that everything was going to hell.

Broga extended one of his cybernetic arms towards them. A long barrel sprouted from the palm of his hand, and his stiff fingers glowed, drawing the electric discharges from the air itself like little antenna-fingers, and condensing them in the weapon’s muzzle. The static bristled at the threads that hung from the trench coat.

Juzo grabbed Uri by the arm tighter. Was he going to use him as a human shield?

At the tip of the Broga’s cannon, the energy formed one of those blue light spheres, though considerably bigger than the one Juzo had shaped in the loft. The android’s arm had turned into a laser cannon on the verge of spitting hell.

Uri held his breath.

Broga fired.

Uri closed his eyes, and before he could shield himself to bear the scourge of the discharge—if that was possible—he felt a sharp tug on his wrist where Juzo was holding him, and his feet stopped touching the ground. Something seized him around the waist, and his face was pressed against a cloth that smelled of damp. He heard a boom followed by a small shower of debris falling to the ground. Chunks of pavement, he knew—the bomb had exploded on the pavement! He opened his eyes, and found himself in the gloom, with Juzo hugging him. He tried to wriggle out of him, but couldn’t, so he looked away and found himself flying. Vertigo took his breath away.

Uri was anchored to a kind of human-projectile that shot into the sky. They were many feet above the avenue, high above the passing cars, his double-parked car, and a pothole wrapped in a dust curtain, which had been dangerously close to his vehicle as a result of Broga’s attack.

In a blink of an eye, Juzo had activated the thrusters on his back, deploying them under the backpack and between the shoulder straps.

Uri panicked, clung to Juzo like a scared kitten, and screamed until he was gasping for air.

“Shut up!” Juzo shook him.

Uri hushed and distinguished a crackling whistle coming toward them, a hiss that wasn’t coming from the turbine wings. Juzo took a turn, and one sphere of energy passed by really close. Broga was flying behind them with electric clouds in the cannons of his hands, ready to become power grenades.

Oh, God! The last shot was still buzzing in Uri’s ears.

The android was about to catch up with them.

Juzo evaded the third attack and swooped down the avenue like an airplane amid a suicidal demonstration. The twins went from being in the dark of night, flying over the building tops, to diving into the city lights, falling straight into the street.

Uri felt the influence of gravity acting on him at its finest, like a giant hand pulling him from his head to the ground. Vertigo devoured his guts, more than the worst of the roller coasters he had climbed on in his life.

They were in free fall, ready to slam into traffic. The wind slapped him.

He took hold of Juzo with all his might and begged for his heart to withstand tension. He heard the crackling of another sphere coming toward him, waved his head, and the ball of blue light grazed him. His hair bristled.

The lightning sphere, instead of blowing his brains out, went on straight to the avenue and hit the chassis of a truck. The truck overturned and collided with two other trucks, causing a pile-up with endless stamping, honks, and tire squealing.

The trailer of the vehicle exploded, lifting a fireball that shot at them and nearly devoured them. The smoke engulfed them. Uri pressed his face against his brother’s chest. The stench of burnt gasoline covered his nose, and his eyes stung. Uri let out another scream.

Juzo was descending, and not of his own free will; he was losing altitude. It was difficult for the thruster to continue working at full capacity; the extra weight Uri represented had demanded too much from it.

Juzo was an easy target, and Broga struck again.

Juzo twirled and made sure that the grenade did not hit them fully; however, the discharges touched his backpack and tore the old fabric apart, cutting off one of the straps. The hanging bag swung, and it spat out the project files. The folders opened in the air, and the papers and photographs scattered all over the avenue as the confetti of a macabre celebration; most of them ended up burning in the accident’s fire.

Uri saw them burn. Goodbye to the possibility of knowing a little more about the experiment.

Juzo got rid of what was left of his backpack; without the files, a torn bag was useless.

Another attack struck one of the thruster wings, which burst with a roar and millions of silver sparks. The other one whistled louder, but the aura it emitted lost power, causing them to lose even more height.

Juzo spotted Broga’s location and deviated his course to a vast park next to the avenue: a green space of several blocks, full of trees and gloom that would serve as a hiding place. He looked at the terrible accident caused by Broga’s grenade and thought entering the park would also avoid putting more innocent lives at risk.

Uri noticed the Android coming right behind them. His heart was beating so hard it was hard to breathe.

Entering the park, trying to stay away from lamps and any source of light, Juzo took shelter in the shadows, skirted the bushes, and descended on the pedestrian walkway, in a hill near the trees. Pressing the X-straps, he retracted the only thruster left.

“Stay alert,” he warned Uri and let him go. It took Uri a few seconds to let him go.

The android came down a few feet from them.