Shutdown (Glitch)

suddenly resurfaced—her shoving Adrien through the door. She’d had no thought for herself. When I’d first met her, I couldn’t understand her animosity toward me. She had visions like Adrien used to, but, unlike his, hers only happened every few years and were vague and sometimes unintelligible. But she’d known I was trouble the first moment she met me. She told me she’d foreseen that I would do harm to her son. Why hadn’t I listened?
    I went over and put a hand on Adrien’s shoulder, guilt weighing heavily. “I’m so sorry about what happened to her.”
    He didn’t respond, just stared blankly ahead like he couldn’t hear me. Or was pretending he couldn’t. I could never tell what was going on in his head anymore. I used to be able to read him so easily before he was taken by the Chancellor.
    I shook my head and sat down. Several of the needle-leaves poked me, but with a few readjustments, I could sit comfortably. I would get Adrien to safety, that was all that mattered now.
    “Let’s check the map,” I said.
    He nodded and touched his arm panel, pulling up the section of map that showed both southern Sector Six and northern Sector Five. He settled himself beside me, his forearm glowing in the dim evening light.
    “So are we somewhere around here?” I pointed at the bottom of the small screen embedded in his arm.
    He leaned his head closer and nodded. Even though we’d been close all day, him holding on to me as we flew, I hadn’t allowed myself to focus on it. But now with him crouched beside me, his face only a half foot from mine as he leaned in to see the map, my heartbeat started to quicken.
    I couldn’t stop staring at him as his eyes searched the map. His eyes had changed colors while he’d been captured. The bright blue-green had become a translucent gray. Now they were strange, even eerie to look at, but still beautiful in their own way.
    “You should get the blanket out of your pack too, and have something to eat,” I said, a lump forming in my throat. How could a person be so close, and yet so far away?
    He nodded and opened his pack. First he pulled out a small lamp and set it up between us. I blinked at the brightness of the lamp after getting so used to the darkness. It created a small penumbra of light in the circle between several tall trees where we’d settled.
    “How much farther till we hit the border fence?”
    “Half a day, maybe more.”
    I dragged the blanket out of my own pack and wrapped it closer around myself, wishing I was comforted. My teeth chattered.
    Adrien frowned, looking down at his pack. “Aren’t there supposed to be twenty protein bars per pack?”
    I nodded. He laid the bars in an orderly line, then looked back up at me. “I only count nine.”
    “That can’t be right.” I emptied my own pack on the ground, sorting through the contents. I only counted seven bars.
    “Shunt,” I swore loudly. “It must have been the refugees. We caught them breaking into the pantry last week. They must have realized the escape pods would have rations too. Idiots!” I kicked at the empty pack. “Didn’t they realize they might have to survive on these packs one day?”
    “When you’re living life on the run, you tend to just worry about today, not tomorrow. Besides,” Adrien said, his voice calm and reasonable, “if we ration ourselves, we should be able to survive on two bars a day. Even if it takes us three days to get to the Rendezvous site, we’ll be fine.”
    I tried to let go of my frustration as I looked through the rest of the contents to see if they’d stolen anything else. The heat lamp, blankets, extra change of clothes, and the coolant harnesses were still there, at least. I turned on the small lamp so I could see better in the darkness.
    “They took the external tablet and the small laser weapon too.” I tossed over the rest of the objects. “Even the water bottles!” I sat back, suddenly feeling inordinately thirsty now that I knew there was no water.
    “My pack’s got one bottle, at least,” he said. “We can share it till we find some more fresh water. There are streams all over these mountains.” He took a quick drink and then handed the bottle to me. I tried not to sip too much, but ended up taking out a quarter of the bottle anyway. I replaced the cap and handed it back to him.
    “At least the info chips were stored in a side pocket,” he said. “They must not have seen them. And we’ve got the arm panels, so we