The man did not know whether to be repulsed or intrigued by her but either way he told her in no uncertain terms they weren’t taking any handicapped people. She began to cry in the hallway and by the time she reached the lobby of the building she could hardly see because of the tears. Perhaps that is why she stumbled going down the stairs. That is how she met Decker; he caught her in time to save her from a nasty fall.
When he looked at her she could tell he saw her and not the half steel creature she had become. He did not wince at the touch of her cold metal hand. She smiled as she remembered being annoyed that he read the papers he pick up from the ground that had fallen from the folder in her hand. It took some coaxing by Decker to get her to go back into the building to face the horrible little man that had dashed all her hopes and dreams and effectively sentenced her to death a moment before. Susan no longer remembered what the man said but she remembered what Decker told him. “I want her on the next shuttle up to the ship.” It was the day that he had saved her life. The cybernetic prosthetics that enabled her to get around and interact with the world around her were also slowly killing her and she needed to be in a zero gravity environment if she was to have any hope of growing old.
It was a strange memory that intruded as Susan eyed the android sitting on the worktable in front of her. “There is nothing wrong with you,” she said.