*

A week after Elm’s funeral, Adam was again at the foot of the bridge. He had been told to stay away from the site of Elm’s death for the time being, so he had told his parents that he was going to visit a friend – a lie that he felt was true in a way.

          During his absence, the snapped cable had been repaired. The Grid was working again. Working and hungry. Adam had been correct all along – the Grid was a taker. It had taken his friend, just as it had taken many others. Adam knew that one day it would take him too.

          He got off his racing cycle and rested it on its stand. He walked up the incline and stood in the centre of the railway bridge and stared up at the brooding cables. Their buzzing filled the hot afternoon air. They were still and calm.

          “I know all about you,” Adam whispered. “And I’m going to tell everyone.”

          He was aware that the entire Grid was listening. At that moment of awareness, he was more afraid than he’d ever been.

          The Grid only buzzed quietly in response. The cables remained still.

          “I don’t suppose that anyone will believe me at first,” Adam continued, “but eventually you’ll kill too many and then someone will get suspicious and you’ll be found out and destroyed. On that day, I’ll be there cheering, because I’m not going to let you get away with killing my friend, you bastard!”

          His last sentence came out as a strangled croak, for tears had filled his eyes and his throat had constricted as he’d involuntarily recalled the death of Elm in all its vivid detail. Quickly, he brushed the tears from his eyes and stared at the cables.

          “I know you’re an evil taker and I hate you, Grid. I hate you because you killed my friend. The only way to stop me is to kill me – if you dare.”

          The challenge thrown out, Adam turned abruptly away from the overhanging cables and started back towards his cycle.

          High up on the nearby pylon, the end of the recently-repaired cable slowly came uncoiled from around the large retaining bolt that served to hold it in place. As it slid undone, its own immense weight pulled it, without difficulty, out of the huge ceramic insulator.

          Adam heard the sibilant screeching of tortured metal and instantly knew what was going to happen. He stopped walking and turned to face the descending enemy. Then he waited.

          The untethered cable sliced down through the thin, dry air and wrapped itself around the boy, biting into his soft flesh.

          Just before the Grid sent its invisible assassin into his body – to melt his eyes, char his flesh and burst his heart with its terrible power – Adam – in a moment of clarity – suddenly realized that he had been wrong – the Grid was not sentient at all.

          It’s me who’s given it its power! he thought.

          As his father had told him frequently and clearly, the Grid was there to serve its human masters. It had been built by humans for a specific purpose. It had no conception of good or evil – or of any other human emotion.

          The Grid didn’t want to take at all. It only wanted to do what it was constructed to do. It wanted to give… and give… and give… and give…