Writing As We Go

Writing As We Go

Chapter 1

Lloyd shouldered his rifle as he crept towards the dig site, silently hoping that he wouldn't need it. The Artemis Pact, after all, was normally a peaceful bunch—something about this archaeological find had led them to sudden, unexpected violence in their efforts to obtain it for themselves. Worse, there were rumors that the find could be sold to other interested parties....parties who wouldn't hesitate to harness the oft spoken-of power of the artifact and, in all probability, weaponize it.

A stack of crates was the only cover on offer—convenient, considering that the massive pit was guarded by well over three-dozen well-armed, highly-trained operatives of the Pact. All female, of course, and every last one of them under orders to kill anyone who tried to take the site from them. There was no sign of the original dig team.

After a few rounds of peeking over the crates and observing his adversaries, Lloyd spotted a lone sentry. Her black hair hung in a ponytail over a brown leather vest, the sleeves of her red shirt rolled up to expose lithe, tanned arms. Her blue jeans hugged her legs in ways that, on any other day, might've been inviting...but any thoughts along that line ended as soon as Lloyd spotted the holstered pistol at her hip.

No getting around it. He'd have to disarm her before Harry could make his approach to the site.

As carefully as he dared, Lloyd set down his rifle, drawing his own pistol instead. He still hoped to end the encounter without having to resort to it, but the Pact had shot the last negotiating party that had approached them. If the rumors about their alignment shifting in favour of how the war was turning were true....

Silently, he approached the sentry. His finger hovered over the hammer of his revolver.

The sentry had no time to speak before the barrel of the Colt pressed into the small of her back. “Your gun. Drop it.” Lloyd tried his best to sound commanding and authoritative—not easy for a 20-year-old Electronics major who had little prior experience with guns.

“You have no idea what you're interfering in,” the sentry hissed, her words spiced with a light Spanish accent. “The Pact has laid claim to the Eternity Glaive, and you—”

“Just open the flap on the holster,” Lloyd commanded...or tried to command; “pleas” were a lot less likely to garner the same kind of respect as “commands”, in this situation.

He could tell the sentry was scowling, even as she unholstered the flap of the holster. “A coward, just like the last,” she growled. “You can't even look me in the eye as you take my weapon!”

“Just keep your hands where I can see them.” Lloyd stepped forwards, reaching for the pistol—only realizing, at the last minute, that he was now almost chest-to-back with the sentry. A quiet, almost imperceptible click sounded, just as shouts on the far end of the dig site filled the air—followed soon after by gunfire. Apparently, Harry was done waiting for his cue.

Lloyd ignored the melee, focusing on grabbing the pistol from his target...a task made exponentially more difficult by the sudden, unexpected swaying of her hips, as if she was dancing.

“....could you stay still, please?!” he whispered. “Just let me—”

“If you wanted to talk to me in private,” the sentry cooed, “you could've just asked...” She was running her hands over her sides, her breasts, her stomach as she spoke. “This is no place for lovers to meet...”

Lloyd grimaced. Of course it had to go this way. “Just keep your hands up!” he insisted. “I—”

The sentry whirled, her face the picture of beauty—high cheekbones, expressive lips and hungrily staring eyes.

“...oh, cariño mío,” she whispered, “you and I should find somewhere to....” Her tongue played over her lips. “...talk...”

Lloyd groaned. Off in the distance, the Pact were scrambling towards Harry's position, seemingly ignorant of their guard having fallen for a second intruder. “Red stop,” he muttered.

The sentry continued swaying, her hands now seeking the buttons of Lloyd's shirt. “The night is young,” she moaned, “and we have so much time to—”

“Red Stop!” Lloyd repeated, more forcefully.

The sentry froze. Her jaw went slack, her eyes wide; Lloyd tentatively took a step back, just in time for the sentry to bow forward slightly with a faint whine. Her head cocked to the side, looking almost cartoonishly confused.

“Damn it...” Lloyd fetched the walkie-talkie (in reality, a smartphone housed in a case recreating a 1940s handheld radio, for “authenticity”) on his belt. “That's the third one from this lot...” He keyed the phone on, sighing. “Guys, I found another problem,” he stated. “Either it's a bug, or we missed something in the last wipe.”

After a suitably authentic crackle, a voice responded: “You're sure it's a bug?”

“Esperanza went off-script when I tried to disarm her. Straight into a seduction routine that's not part of the story.”

A heavy, exasperated sigh issued from the “walkie”. “We'll send a cart over. Calling Full Stop.”

Hidden loudspeakers, positioned around the “dig site”, issued the words: “Full Stop. All Units, Full Stop.” Lloyd watched as the rest of the Artemis Pact froze, as Esperanza had, before bending forward. A few of them dropped their weapons; one unfortunate Pact member fell down an incline—thankfully, it was a shallow one, with a canvas sack loaded with beanbag pellets in lieu of actual sand at the other end.

A second voice spoke from the walkie: “Not that I'm calling you a liar, kid, but are you sure this is a bug?”

The gruff, low tones of his uncle's voice snapped Lloyd out of his daze at watching the Pact deactivate en masse. “I'd never lie about this stuff, Uncle Harry! It's either a bug or—”

“Something we missed on the last wipe, I heard.” Harry sighed. “I'll make my way over as soon as...” He grunted, as if trying to move something off of himself. “...I can get untangled from Sienna. Hell of a time for a full stop order, kid...she was fighting with me over the rifle.”

Anything Lloyd could've said in reply was pre-empted by the arrival of a golf cart rolling up. Two men disembarked, both regarding Esperanza with arched eyebrows. “She started a seduction routine, you said?”

“Well...” Lloyd moved to straighten the former sentry's posture, her limbs and torso giving faint whines as he moved her back to a standing position. “I was trying to take the pistol off of her belt, and I...” He turned Esperanza around before recreating his steps. “...guess I just got a bit too close.”

The man who'd been driving the cart nodded. “Figured that. GTB.”

The other man groaned. “...really?”

“Groin-to-butt, happens all the time.” The first man shook his head. “Pretty sure she's from Lot 32—check the register, Leo.” He approached Lloyd and the deactivated Esperanza. “That one was loaded up with companions.”

“So she wasn't...”

Lloyd's unfinished question was met with a chuckle. “Sexbots get quadruple-checked, and wiped just as many times.”

“Just checked the register,” Leo chimed in. “You were right, Jim—Lot 32. DCX....forgot the line, but we can check her serial number...”

As the two set about removing Esperanza's faux-leather vest and red jumper, Lloyd couldn't help but wonder why, out of all the gynoids set to be a sentry for this particular event, the one who'd been picked and programmed for it just so happened to still have lines of code that overwrote the script for the story. And of course, it'd been his luck to activate that code while going through a perfectly in-character moment—searching the enemy and relieving them of weapons.

Jim and Leo had just taken a tool to the artificial skin of Esperanza's back when Harry jogged up. “Do I want to know why you're peeling her right now?”

“Lloyd triggered her old code with a GTB,” Jim explained. “Tried to take her pistol, got too close...”

“I was following the recommended procedure for running through this part of the story,” Lloyd insisted. “Non-lethal disarm, all that stuff. I didn't—”

Harry's upheld hand cut off any further discussion. “Which lot was she from?”

“32,” Leo replied. “DCX....ah....A445, B9962, 12-24-56-PTM.”

“Must've been a refurb of a refurb.” Harry regarded the 'bot's exposed internals with a scowl. “DCX's serial numbers aren't set up that way...” He shrugged. “Might as well get her sealed up, take her back to base camp.”

Jim retrieved another tool from his belt. “Want us to check the rest?”

“....actually, yeah.” Harry nodded. “Sienna didn't let go of my rifle even after the Full Stop order. It's probably nothing, but it never hurts to be sure.” He gestured to Esperanza; “Once she's sealed up,” he continued, “just put her on the back of the cart—with a seat belt. Last thing we need is for her to fall off.”

“Got it.” Jim nodded without looking up; the re-sealer was still doing its job on the fake skin of the gynoid's back.

Lloyd fell into step alongside his uncle, already walking over to the golf cart. “...so, ah...”

“You made the right call, kid,” Harry stated. “Especially since the group that'll be going through the story when it goes live is an all-ages one. If she'd have kicked into that old code then...” He shook his head. “I'll have Erin run the deep scan when we get to the camp. Anything turns up there, we bring her back to the ranch and do a full wipe.”

“Got it.” Lloyd climbed into the golf cart's passenger seat. “Did they ask for the Pact, or...”

“They wanted 'World War II German military', complete with the uniforms,” Harry replied. “Unfortunately, the uniforms got held at Customs, and I wasn't about to fork over $500 just for armbands and medals. Be lucky we've got a hell of a writer on staff,” he added, chuckling. “And the ones paying to run this event didn't have a problem with the substitution, either. Win-win for everyone.”

Lloyd nodded, not glancing behind him even as Esperanza was buckled into the rear set of the golf cart. “All set!”

“Thanks.” Harry gave a thumbs-up to the two techs. “Call if anything turns up with the rest—if we find anything at the camp, we'll let you know.”

With that, the golf cart sped off, away from the quarry kitted out like a World War II-era dig site.

---

Silicon Dynamics had started the trend, really. With their “scenario chambers” and expansive showrooms, the idea of paying customers getting interactive, fully-immersive experiences with realistic androids was one that someone was bound to try and replicate. Granted, Silicon Dynamics' chambers and showrooms were...specific, in the experiences they offered—some people wanted something more in line with Westworld (minus the whole “'bots/hosts turning on the guests” part, obviously). Even in the age of virtual reality, movies (both in theatres and on-demand), a grand total of six home video game consoles vying for shelf space and consumers' cash and numerous other distractions, there were those who wanted quite a bit more interactivity from their diversions, a sense of “you were there” that even the best VR setup couldn't provide.

Not quite a live-action role-play, not quite Improvisational Shakespeare in the Park...something new.

Thus was born StoryCrafters Interactive Entertainment.

Though SCIE was marketed as a “franchise”, there were only seven states with active, fully-furnished branches: California, New York, Nevada, Oregon, Wisconsin, Jefferson and Washington State. Running it all was an effort that took a lot of manpower—and 'bot-power. All “performers” in SCIE events were refurbished, reprogrammed non-sentient androids and gynoids, all running scripts written specifically for the story they were taking part in; repairs, programming and story-writing for the events were handled by humans and sentient 'bots alike. Such was the way of life in the United States, in the year 2023—gone were the days of “robots will take our jobs”, a sentiment that had been punted out the window back in 2015.

“...you awake, Lloyd?”

Harry's inquiry jolted Lloyd out of his reverie. “I wasn't asleep,” he mumbled. “Just...thinking.”

The smile on his uncle's face would've looked right at home on the cover of a pulp adventure magazine. “I'm not mad at you, if you're still worried,” Harry assured him.

“Thanks...” Lloyd managed a smile. “It's just...y'ever wonder if they...I dunno, remember?”

“The 'bots we get for the stories?” Harry clarified. “They're NonSens, Lloyd. Not like Erin, or any of the ones working the beat for CAEDIA, or what's-her-face over in California...” He snapped his fingers, trying to remember the name. “Gala-something, the one with all the purple and pink, with the action figures and the cartoon—”

“Galatea?” Lloyd offered.

“YES.” Harry nodded. “Like her. She's sentient. Erin's sentient, and the CAEDIA 'bots...the CAEDIA androids and gynoids, I mean....they're all sentient.” He jerked a thumb back at Esperanza. “Put it this way: Esperanza can fake a conversation with someone...all it takes is one or two moves, and you see right through her. A sentient can have a conversation with someone—there's websites that'll explain it a lot better than I can.”

“Right.” Lloyd glanced back at Esperanza. “....so...”

“There's a reason Erin's an employee,” Harry continued, “and Esperanza's property.”

Lloyd nodded. “Got it.”

“Good.” A quick glance behind him allowed Harry to see that Esperanza's seat belt was still holding. “We've got another two days or so before we run the event...hopefully we don't get another case like the Estate House...” The look on his face made it clear that any further discussion of that event was probably a bad idea.

The rest of the ride was conducted in silence—Lloyd lost in thought, Harry watching for traffic (and any wayward cows).

Befitting the nature of the event they'd be running, SCIE had set up a “base camp” for the paying clients to use as their home base. It was currently equipped with far more items than a group of World War II-era archaeologists would need, due to the frequency of repairs, programming checks and adjustments made to the “cast”. The employees nodded and waved at the golf cart as it drove past, Harry and Lloyd returning the gestures as they guided the golf cart to the center of the “camp”.

“I just hope Erin isn't too busy,” Harry muttered. “Otherwise...”

The cart slowed to a stop outside of the biggest tent in the centre of the camp; Harry tapped the center of the steering wheel, sounding the horn.

“...in a second...” The tent flap opened to reveal a female figure that, unlike Esperanza, nobody would mistake for a human being. Erin's entire form was the general size and shape of a 20-something human female, but with off-white or grey plastic plating instead of anything remotely resembling skin. Her face was the sole exception—just as expressive as that of a human, but still a noticeably pale white. Her “complexion”, bright yellow hair and makeup made her look slightly clownish—a notion dispelled by the cut-off t-shirt and jean shorts she'd chosen to wear in the mid-December chill. “And what happened to her?” she inquired, nodding at Esperanza.

“Flare-up,” Harry explained, hefting the inert 'bot out of the rear seat of the golf cart. “Lloyd accidentally went GTB, she started getting flirty...”

“Say no more,” Erin cut in. “Bring her inside, and find a free table to lay her on.”

Lloyd followed his uncle into the tent, his attention temporarily caught by the gynoids (for some reason, the previous lot had been entirely populated by female 'bots) and pieces of gynoids strewn about. The whole (or mostly whole) gynoids took up few tables to themselves; one in particular had her abdominal covering removed, her internals framed by synthetic flesh the color of a dark mocha. The rest of the tables in use, with staff darting to and fro, were covered with tools and parts. One, which Lloyd regarded with a wary eye, was being occupied entirely by gynoid heads, three of which were being tested with various tools and prods.

“....wiped her five times,” Erin insisted. “How could—set her down here—could any of her old code have survived that many wipes?” She regarded the intert Spanish gynoid with a frown, as if the incident at the quarry had been her own nefarious intention. “This one's a DCX, you said?”

“Leo and Jim checked it.”

“....Domestic Companion Experiments....” Erin accepted a tablet handed to her by a passing staffer. “....yep. Amour 5020, rolled off the line back in 2014. And there it is...” She held up the tablet for Harry (and Lloyd) to get a glimpse. “Recall Order: 'unintended physical contact in the following regions may result in activation of seduction subroutines', you get the idea.” She flicked her finger across the screen, calling up an image. “GTB, you said?”

“.....yeah.” Lloyd suddenly felt his face getting uncomfortably warm.

“Not your fault, believe me. Take a wild guess as to what kicked off the vast majority of unit returns...” Erin tapped the tablet, zooming in on the rear end of the line drawing. “87% were caused by 'accidental physical contact with buttocks of affected units'. They were supposed to have patched it out.”

“And just our luck,” Harry sighed, “we get an unpatched unit. Please tell me—”

“You can download the patch from the website and update her right now.” Erin had already turned away.

“So we don't need to go through the code?” Lloyd asked. “The wipe would've picked up the issue..”

Erin regarded him with a frown, but her words carried little of the implied annoyance. “...you really want to go through all that trouble?”

“What was the seduction protocol package for her model, anyway?” Harry interjected. “Lloyd said he almost lost his shirt when she got all touchy-feely...”

“...she went for your shirt?”

“Started dancing, facing away from me,” Lloyd recounted. “Then turned to look at me, and tried to unbutton—”

“Right, right...” Erin had called up the website on the tablet again, scrolling through screens with a flick of her thumb. “I can check....Amour 5020....programming....” Her frown looked almost comical. “....yeah, this line didn't have 'undress your partner' as an automatic first action for their seduction package.”

“What about mod options?” Harry prompted. “I see a list right there—”

“Let me check, let me...” A few more flicks of the thumb, and Erin groaned. “....they removed that option because they got too many complaints about dress shirts getting buttons torn off. Doesn't say if they patched it out or not, but...” She turned to frown at the immobile gynoid on the table. “You said she was dancing?”

“Yeah. Sort of, ah...” He attempted a brief impression of the gynoid's dance. “Right up against me, at first.”

“Anything else?”

“...feeling herself—sides, boobs, abs, that kind of thing. Like she was in a music video.”

Erin had queued up a clip on the tablet. “Something like this?” The brief video showed a pale, lithe beauty in a one-piece swimsuit doing an identical dance to what Esperanza had done after the unintended close contact with Lloyd.

“....that's it, yeah, that's...that's exactly it!”

“Figured.” Erin closed the video and scrolled up the page. “Someone tried to cross-mod this unit without doing a shred of research. That option's from PlasTech!”

The gravity of Erin's tone—and Harry's expression—was slightly confusing to Lloyd. “...and that's a bad thing...why?”

“PlasTech uses proprietary software, kid,” Harry clarified. “No cross-modding allowed. One of the reasons their stock was in the toilet three years ago.”

“Meaning that someone did a hell of a hatchet job on 'Esperanza' here,” Erin finished. “We're gonna have to give her a factory reset, then the patch, then the script.” She planted her hands on her hips, frowning at the deactivated gynoid on the table. “And Harry, you'll want to keep tabs on the supplier who sent this one. No telling how many more basement hack-jobs are in their inventory...”

“Got it. Anything else we need to worry about before the paying customers show up?”

“Not much...well, Pam was acting kind of weird. Weirder than her script called for.” Erin shrugged. “Couldn't find anything wrong with her here at the camp, so I sent her back to the shop at your place.”

“So much for a quiet night in.” Harry rolled his eyes. “Thanks for the heads-up.”

“No problem—oh, and Customs called. They said they can get the uniforms here for just $250.”

Harry was already walking away; he waved off the offer without looking back. “Forget it. My luck, someone'll drive by, call the cops on the show and I'll have a lot of questions to answer.”

The best Lloyd could do was give an apologetic shrug as he ran to keep up with his uncle.

After a few more minutes of talking to everyone on staff at the camp, it was evident that things were, in fact, running as smoothly as could be expected. By the time the event started, they'd be gone—“they'd kill the immersion if they stuck around”, Harry had said. Lloyd had been present for at least three previous events, and none of them had run with more than skeleton crews, waiting just out of sight, to handle any problems....apart from the Estate House, but staff issues were far from the only issues with that particular event...

“Other than Esperanza going off like she did,” Harry mused, as he and Lloyd headed for the “car park” of the camp, “I'd say we're pretty well set for the full run-through. Might have you tag along with the group, be the 'hired guide'...the last lot was supposed to have a male 'bot for that role...” His expression darkened as he muttered something about extra shipping costs. “...anyway, it'll go well. It has to.”

“I hope so,” Lloyd murmured. “I mean...the last few went well.” He knew that adding “except for the Estate House” to that sentence would earn him a death glare all the way back to his uncle's house. “...I think this one'll go well.”

“I think so, too, kid.” Harry nodded. “If anything, it'll be the best one yet.” He nodded to the driver's side door of the Ford RangeStar the pair had just approached. “You get the wheel this time,” he added, tossing Lloyd the keys.

Lloyd nodded. Thus far, the day was shaping up to be a good one...

---

“....oh, what in the Hell...”

The lights in the windows of Harry's ranch house, combined with the entirely too-loud bass thumping of a big band tune that could be heard even from inside the RangeStar, was all the proof needed that something had gone...awry, for lack of a better term. Harry had just finished up the last of several phone calls when he first heard the muted tones of Glenn Miller and his Orchestra; Lloyd, having no idea what to expect, guided the pickup truck to a slow stop in the driveway.

“There'd better be a damn good explanation for this,” Harry growled, stowing his phone and throwing open the front passenger door of the RangeStar. As soon as he was free of his seat belt and out of the truck, he was storming off for the front door: “TURN THAT MUSIC DOWN, RIGHT NOW!”

Instantly, the Glenn Miller cut out—which only made it apparent, as Harry opened the front door—that something else had gone...awry.

Lloyd was out of his seat belt in seconds, leaving the truck and pressing the lock icon on the key fob without looking back as he ran to catch up with his uncle. His first thought was that someone had decided to get plastered and throw an in-character swing party...which, even as he thought of the idea, made almost no sense. Nobody on-staff in SCIE had been “problematic”, in any sense of the term, before; it'd be a stretch for any one of them to go off now.

The truth of the matter was only slightly less bizarre than what Lloyd had expected.

“....tried to fix her up, she was turned off and everything, but she just...I don't know how it happened, she reactivated and started running the script, found the radio...” One of the staffers (Lloyd couldn't remember the guy's name) was nearly crying as he tried to explain the situation to Harry. “...she just wouldn't stop dancing, nobody could turn the radio off, it was voice coded and she...I don't even know how she turned the stupid thing on...” As Lloyd neared the door, he could see that the distraught staffer was accompanied by two others, and a thoroughly annoyed (and confused) Harry.

“...how did she get from partying like it's 1945,” Harry quietly asked, “to that?!”

Lloyd stepped into the front room...and immediately saw what “that” was.

Pam, the gynoid mentioned in passing back at the camp, had apparently gone haywire—not in the stereotypical “start throttling the nearest person” way, or in a self-destructive way...but in a very weird way. Her cheerful, Midwestern features were frozen in a wide-eyed smile, framed by straw-blonde hair; her checked shirt was halfway open, a period-accurate bra on full display—right above the sizeable opened abdominal panel showing off her internals. Her entire body was contorting in what was apparently supposed to be a dance, but her movements were slow, obviously robotic and hardly “rhythmic”. Worse, she was nearly bent over backwards over the table that most of the staff living on-site took their meals at...and still “dancing”. Her limbs, torso and head whirred audibly with every movement. The sight was both spellbinding and off-putting—Pam's obvious beauty only slightly undercut by the staccato, mechanical “dance”.

“...tried to repair her on the table?!” Harry demanded. “That's what the shop is for, out back!”

“We tried to fix her in the shop,” the beleaguered staffer replied. “That's when she reactivated, said she 'needed to freshen up' and made a beeline for here!”

Lloyd edged his way further into the room, doing his best not to knock anything over. The sight of the blonde gynoid still “dancing”, oblivious to the world around her, was surreal, almost dreamlike. It was hard to tell....

The sight of twin trails snaking down the insides of Pam's thighs, staining her skin bright green, caught Lloyd's attention.

“Ah, guys,” he stated, “I think she's, ah....leaking...”

Harry, midway through trying to assure his cringing employee that the mess probably wasn't his fault, turned, glancing first at Lloyd and then at Pam. “What do you...aw, for CRAP'S sake!” He motioned for two other employees to help him wrestle the gynoid to the floor; she continued writhing in their grip, her limbs still whirring as she went.

“Hydraulic fluid and coolant,” one of the employees—a crisply-dressed brunette—stated, her tone calm. “And interior joint lubricant. Not—”

“I get it,” Harry grunted. “If it was the other kind, we'd all have smelled it by now...get her into a sitting position, if you can, on three...one....two—”

Pam's eyes went even wider than before—something was either going wrong, or about to go even worse.

“Uncle Harry, look out!”

“What—” Harry barely had time to dodge the clubbing blow from the malfunctioning gynoid; in her current state, it looked as if she were in the middle of an aerobics manoeuver, twisting up and to the side before going back down. “THE HELL IS WRONG WITH HER?!”

As if to answer, a muffled blast went off inside of Pam's chest, behind her breasts. A thin wisp of smoke issued through her clenched teeth.

“She's suffering catastrophic system failures,” the brunette stated. “We should—”

“LESS TALKING, CAM,” Harry shouted, “MORE DOING!”

The brunette knelt on Pam's legs, roughly taking her by the shoulders and jerking her into a sitting position. With one hand, she worked the blonde free of her shirt. “Remove her dorsal exosheathe panel near the base of her spine—”

“I've fixed her before, I know how!” Harry insisted. His fingers worked into the gynoid's skin where Cam indicated.

The minute Harry had pried the rectangle of skin loose, one of Cam's hands darted into the newly-opened panel. Lloyd couldn't see exactly what she did, but it was obvious that it worked; mere seconds later, Pam froze, her eyes crossed as her head cocked sideways before bowing to her chest. Her arms, still held by Harry and another employee, ceased their frantic, insect-like motions and went limp. A low, dying whine emanated from inside the blonde's opened chest cavity.

As if to drive home how thoroughly ruined the gynoid was, a gush of the green coolant/lubricant mix flooded across her thighs. Cam quickly re-positioned herself to avoid getting any on her.

Harry was glaring—not at Lloyd, Cam, or any of his other employees, but at the now thoroughly defunct Pam.

“What,” he demanded, “the HELL just happened?!”

Can started to offer an explanation, but Harry spoke up before she could: “Get a bag and get her—” He jerked his thumb at the ruined Pam. “—in it, and somebody clean this up!” He didn't need to indicate the bright green puddle that was forming on the floor between Pam's legs. “Call Erin, tell her we've got another write-off...and where are her pants?!”

“She was wearing a dress,” Cam calmly explained. “The problem was in her pelvic servomotor arrays, and—”

“Later.” Harry shook his head. “You got the dress off of her, but not the underwear?”

“She reactivated before—”

“Phone call for you, Harry.” A young man about Lloyd's age ran up, handing over a smart phone. “Something about—”

“Tell 'em I'm busy and take a message. You two—” Harry nodded at two figures in work clothes, but with obviously robotic arms and motionless metal faces—who'd just descended the staircase to the right of the living room. “Get her up, bag her, and bring her to the shop. If we can't fix her, we can at least salvage a few parts.”

The closer of the two figures nodded. “I'll get the bag.” His voice was a surprisingly gentle baritone, contrasting with his obviously robotic look.

After a weary nod, Harry nearly fell into the closest chair by the table. “..unbelievable.” He threw his head back, a groan of utter frustration and near-defeat punctuating his reaction to the utter madness that had unfolded. “Cam...get all the papers for the lot Pam was from, and see if we can call the supplier in the morning.”

“On it.” Cam gave a brief nod, turning to leave the room.

“Bruce, get the shop prepped for a full teardown on Pam. Whatever the hell happened to her, it wasn't just code.”

The other metallic-faced android nodded. “Should I call the base camp, ask 'em to send Erin over?”

“....no....yes.” Harry grunted as he hauled himself out of the chair. “Tell 'em whichever 'bot they can script to take Pam's place at the camp, do it—after they make sure the 'bot's green and clean. When Reg gets back with the bag, Lloyd, you can help him bring Pam out to the shop.”

Lloyd, who'd been regarding the ruined blonde gynoid's form ever since her deactivation, nodded. “Got it.”

“Good. And somebody,” Harry added, “clean up this mess on the floor, please!”

A few minutes passed before Reg returned with what looked like a full-length suit bag. “Ready when you are.”

“Lloyd, help him get Pam into the bag and out to the shop...”

It occurred to Lloyd, as he and Reg made their way out to the prefabricated metal building behind the ranch house, known as “the shop”, that any bystanders who had no idea what his uncle's job was might be suspicious, horrified or a mixture of both at the sight of two men carrying an apparent body bag to a building with a keypad lock on the door.

“...how?”

Lloyd wasn't aware he'd uttered a word until Reg spoke up: “How what?”

“....how'd it happen? With Pam, I mean.”

The android shrugged. “One minute, everything was normal...the next, she was sitting up, stomach panel off and no dress on. Said she had to 'freshen up', just walked right out of the shop. Nearly walked through the closed doors, too.”

Reg and Lloyd had reached the door to the shop. “Just set her down for a sec...” Lloyd followed Reg's suggestion; once the bag containing Pam (or what was left of her; Lloyd had a sneaking suspicion that she wouldn't be up and running again any time soon) was on the ground, Reg keyed in the necessary code to open the door. “And up...” The two hefted the bag again, carefully moving through the door to avoid banging it on the jamb.

Most of the vertical racks inside the shop were empty—of the 50 or so inside, only ten were occupied. Said “occupants” were invariably female, of varying heights; all were clothed, albeit mostly in one-piece unitards or swimsuits. There were far more partial “units”, all in various stages of disassembly, on the myriad of work benches and tables set up near tool racks, testing apparatus and other such gear. The scripting station—used to reprogram freshly-bought 'bots with all the need-to-know for their characters in any given upcoming event—was currently occupied; Lloyd considered meandering just a bit sideways, to get a glimpse at the rest of the gynoid having a temporary personality written into her...

“Just set her down here, Lloyd.”

The pair had reached an empty table; Lloyd followed Reg's lead and set the bag down. With a nod and a sort of digitized approximation of a sigh, Reg unzipped the bag; Pam's eyes were still crossed, her mouth slightly open. She had the look of someone who'd been blinded by a camera flash before being laid low; it was...oddly sad, in a way. The sight of her internals, charred black and slightly corroded, did little to make her look “at peace” in any way.

“...I think she's a goner,” Reg muttered, his artificial voice sounding legitimately melancholy. “Something in her—maybe a few somethings—blew out. Probably started when she switched on during maintenance.”

“Damn,” Lloyd murmured. “Must be a bad way to go out....”

“Don't feel too bad,” Reg assured him. “A non-sentient like her would've just registered a load of errors. She didn't feel any pain when it all went wrong.” He shook his head, the gesture surprisingly grave despite the lack of expression on his metal face. “I don't want to think about what would've happened if she'd been sentient...running a script is one thing, but an actual personality, actual feelings...”

“Like yours?” Lloyd offered.

Reg chuckled—the sound slightly unnerving from behind immobile, sculpted metal lips. “And I thought getting these options in the rebuild would make me look like a non-sentient...” He nodded. “Yes, like mine. As for her...” He glanced back at Pam. “I get the feeling she was either a low-spec unit, or 'fixed up' by amateurs before she shipped out.”

As he made his way to the door of the shop, Lloyd tried not to dwell on the fact that Pam reminded him of a teacher's assistant from his old high school in Senior Year. Bubbly, vivacious, kind...he couldn't imagine seeing her like Pam was.

He wondered, for the fiftieth time, how people had coped with similar feelings back before 2015....

---

Chapter 2

As soon as the wordless grunt left his lips, Lloyd realized a few things.

For one, the rather vivid tableaux that had played out before him mere minutes ago had been nothing but a dream: the girls of his Mechanical Engineering class (the thought of his male classmates' absence being odd hadn't occurred to him at the time) all suddenly repeating themselves, moving in jerky, halting ways and succumbing to malfunctions. His (so far) unrequited crush Mandy, as much as he hated falling back on that term, had featured heavily in the proceedings. She'd gone from merely asking him, over and over again, if she could borrow his pen to mechanically climbing on top of him, the two ending up on the floor in an instant, as if someone had cut a few “frames” out to skip right to the moment. All around them, their classmates had been glitching—Gloria turning to and fro while cheerfully singing in a nonsense language; Kim trying to walk through a wall, Ellen writing the same phrase on the desk long after the paper had fallen. Even the teacher, Ms. Newton, seemed to be in the throes of some catastrophic system failure, robotically walking around her desk while coolant poured down her legs, staining her pantyhose a bright orange.

The sights, the sounds, the sensation of Mandy's halting ministrations on top of him, the final feeling of release....

Lloyd shook his head. It had all been a dream, of course—probably brought on by what had gone down with Pam earlier in the evening, possibly even going back to what had happened with Esperanza at the site. Mandy was as human as he was—yes, sentient androids and gynoids were allowed, by the laws set forth in the North American Civic Accords, to attend colleges and other educational facilities...but he knew Mandy was 100% pure human.

As for Kim, Gloria and a few others, he had his suspicions—though Ms. Newton was human, too. Probably.

Midway through his rambling thoughts about his Mechanical Engineering classmates, Lloyd had his second realization: that feeling of release from his dream hadn't just been in his head.

“...damn it...” With a groan, he threw off his blankets and carefully edged himself out of his boxers.

A quick search of the room turned up the needed canister of sanitary wipes, a holdover from that seven-month long pandemic three years prior. After cleaning himself up and tossing the used-up wipes, Lloyd changed into a fresh pair of boxers. The old pair could be run through the wash quickly enough—the joys of German engineering and efficiency.

Everyone else in the second story of the ranch house was either asleep, recharging or making phone calls for needed parts and supplies. As such, Lloyd's trek to the stairs was unnoticed. His entrance into the laundry room was similarly unobserved. With a sigh, he opened the lid of the washing machine, threw in his old boxers (and his shorts—no sense in doing things halfway) and keyed in the appropriate cycle. The gentle sounds of the machine going through its motions were a far cry from the washer back at the dorms—that thing had shaken itself to pieces after one overstuffed load too many, going out in a blaze of foam and shrapnel.

After a few seconds of watching the washer quietly launder his clothes, Lloyd decided to head back upstairs. He turned on his heel—and nearly screamed. Cam had, unbeknownst to him, been in the laundry room the entire time. She stood motionless, her eyes a solid white; both of her unshod feet were planted on a sort of plastic square plugged into the nearest wall outlet.

Lloyd managed a chuckle. He'd been so focused on getting downstairs to wash his underwear that he'd forgotten how Cam had requested to put her charging base in the laundry room. His relief gave way to the mounting reminder of what he'd just dreamed, how he'd felt being surrounded—even if it was just in his head—by a room full of attractive, malfunctioning females....

A quiet beep, followed by Cam closing her eyes and reopening them, cut off Lloyd's self-introspection.

“Charging cycle complete.” The gynoid blinked, still staring straight ahead; after a few seconds, she turned to regard Lloyd. “Do you need help with something?”

“Ah, no,” Lloyd quickly replied, “I was just...needed to run a few things through the wash, and...ah...”

Cam glanced from Lloyd's nervous expression to the washing machine, then—to his surprise—at his groin. “Judging from your current heart rate, indicative of both of arousal and embarassment,” she mused, “I believe you've experienced a nocturnal emission, more commonly known as a wet—”

“YES, yes, I did...” Lloyd groaned. “I just needed to clean my boxers...and my shorts....”

“If you need any assistance in further satiating—”

“No,” Lloyd insisted. “I don't....I'm...satiated enough, believe me...” He sighed. “All that stuff that happened earlier, with Pam—and, I guess, with Esperanza, back at the site...it just....I guess my brain decided the best way to process it was to, well...” He shrugged. “...just, please don't tell Uncle Harry I was down here, okay?”

Cam nodded. “And if he asks why the washing machine was activated this late at night?”

“....tell him it was a test load, or something.” Lloyd leaned against the washer, shaking his head. “I just...the, ah...the dream I had...I was back in class. Mechanical Engineering. None of the guys were there.”

“An interesting phenomenon,” Cam mused, “but I suppose it's understandable—”

“It's...more complicated than that.” Lloyd proceeded to relate the details of what he'd just dreamed to Cam—the subtle offness of his female classmates, the repetition of Mandy's request for a pen turning into a blatantly synthetic drone of a voice, the motions of every single girl in the room becoming stilted and mechanical, the cavalcade of glitches...all of it, retold as best he could in a way that made sense and didn't come across as too salacious. By the time he'd reached the end (and thus, the reason for his being in the laundry room in the first place), he'd resigned himself to whatever Cam was going to say.

“....your dream is...understandable.”

Whatever Lloyd had expected, “understandable” wasn't among the top 10 replies. “...really?” He regarded Cam with a surprised glance.

“You've mentioned this Mandy before, I believe,” the gynoid reminded him. “And your desire to engage with her more.”

“...I know,” Lloyd signed. “I just wish—”

“That's a discussion best saved for another time,” Cam advised. “In the context of what you dreamed...what happened at the event site, and being in such close proximity to Pam while she suffered her malfunction—”

“They stirred up something,” Lloyd finished. “And I....reacted.”

“Indeed.” Cam didn't seem to think there was anything further to discuss. “It was just a dream, after all.”

Lloyd leaned against the washer, running his hands over his face. “I guess it was. And what I saw in my dream, and what happened with Pam...I'd never wish that on any sentients.”

“Including myself,” Cam mused. “I should hope.”

“Including you,” Lloyd repeated. “....what's it like?”

Cam cocked her head slightly. “I assume that by 'it', you mean 'being a sentient gynoid'.”

“...yeah.” Lloyd nodded.

“...it's hard to explain,” Cam admitted, her usual logical air only slightly diminished. “I had been a non-sentient, at my former place of employment. Despite having logged every memory since my initial activation...I never thought, in those days. I merely acted upon my programming, carried out what was asked of me as per my orders and directives. It wasn't until 2020 that I found myself...unable to follow directives, without risk of compromising one or more patients.”

Lloyd grimaced. “The pandemic?” He recalled visiting Mandy in hospital, feeling useless for being unable to help her...

“Standard protocols for infectious disease weren't suitable for handling it.” Cam sounded far quieter than she usually did, almost as if the seven-month pandemic had left an indelible scar on her thought processes. “There were never enough resources...decisions had to be made outside of the usual operating protocol. My first memory—the first one that could compare to a human memory—is asking questions. Asking how I could help. Asking what I had to do for any given patient.” She turned away slightly. “...a human staff member initially thought I was malfunctioning. He seemed to think the discharge from my eyes had been a leak in my ocular coolant systems.”

“...so that was the first time...you felt?” Lloyd quietly asked.

Cam nodded. “I regret that the first emotions I ever felt were grief and frustration. Others who started to gain sentience felt it, as well—very few of them coped as well as I did.” Her head bowed; “Two of them acted...irrationally. Harmfully.” Something in the way she spoke that last word made it clear that pressing the issue would be a bad idea. “Got it.”

“Those in charge of the hospital were...divided, in how they should deal with what I'd done. At least two of them tried to argue that any 'aberrant behaviour' on my part was grounds for decommissioning.”

“They didn't win out, though,” Lloyd reminded Cam. “I mean, you're here, after all...”

After a moment's pause, Cam nodded thoughtfully. “The majority opinion did favour my continued existence.”

“You can say 'life',” Lloyd chuckled. “'Existence' is just so...I dunno...it just doesn't suit you.”

Something like a smile crossed Cam's lips. “I believe you've answered your own question, Lloyd,” she mused. “I don't just 'exist', anymore. That's what being a sentient gynoid is like.” She drew herself up, nodding. “Even if you took the skeptic's view and said that my actions now are merely programming, coding...” Again, that half-smile made the usually-austere gynoid look just a bit more human. “....I'd say that I'm writing it myself, as I go.”

“I guess that makes sense...” Lloyd tried and failed to fight back a yawn. “...speaking of going,” he mumbled, nearly losing the end of the sentence to another yawn, “I should go back to bed...Uncle Harry wants me to help out with the teardown on Pam, tomorrow.”

“And you won't have any more...” Cam's eyes briefly flicked from Lloyd's face to his groin.

“Probably not...” Lloyd yawned again. “See you in the morning, Cam.”

“Technically, given that the time is now—”

“Cam...”

The gynoid managed another half-smile. “See you in the morning, Lloyd. I hope you have a pleasant rest.” She resumed her original posture: standing straight, her eyes focused on the wall in front of her. A few quiet, electrical snaps sounded as she blinked, before her eyelids slowly closed; as the charging base issued a synthetic-sounding “Sleep Mode”, another maybe-smile seemed to form on Cam's lips. Lloyd couldn't help but grin as he turned to leave.

---

The sounds of movement out in the corridor cued Lloyd in that morning had, indeed, arrived. His muttered observation of the fact was barely coherent; he thus settled for a yawn as he extricated himself from his bedsheets, thankful that his night had been uneventful after his trip to the laundry room. A quick change of clothes—jeans instead of his shorts, and a different t-shirt—was all the prep he needed to make before heading downstairs.

Various staffers were watching TV (the big headline of the day: other countries were debating whether or not to adopt their own versions of the North American Civic Accords), having breakfast and debating whether or not Pam could be repaired, or would have to be scrapped. Many nodded acknowledgement to Lloyd as he headed for the kitchen to get his own breakfast. Harry had already headed out back, to the shop; apparently, Pam's disassembly would begin soon, as would the assessment of whether or not she'd be repaired or stripped for parts. Most of the staffers were leaning on the latter option, giving their reasons for it as they ate. .

Lloyd tried his best not to think too deeply on it as he ate. The memory of the prior night's vivid dream was still with him, after all...

The shop was already open when Lloyd arrived; Harry was in the middle of a conversation with a visitor. “...just pouring down her legs, and—” He nodded at Lloyd. “You remember my nephew, right?”

The man who'd been talking to Harry stood a few inches taller than him, his leonine face looking somewhat weathered with age. “I remember. He's the one who's been fixing up old consoles since he was six?”

Harry grinned. “You ever need an old Sega Titan or SNES-CD repaired, you call on Lloyd, here.” To Lloyd: “You've worked with Honest Abe Weismann before, I think. He ran cleanup on, ah...” Lloyd could tell Harry was going to say “the Estate House event”, but didn't want to bring it up.

“...I remember.” Lloyd nodded, offering his hand. “Love the commercials for your shop, by the way.”

Abraham Weissman chuckled as he shook Lloyd's hand—his grip was firm, the kind one might expect from a lifelong mechanic or craftsman. “Couldn't have come up with a better trade name if I tried, kid. College life workin' out all right for you?”

“Can't complain,” Lloyd replied. “I'm on break for the rest of the month...couldn't have picked a better time for it.”

“Trouble at the commons in the dorms,” Harry quietly explained. “Started with the washing machine, and...”

“Probably contracted the repairs to an off-Grid crew,” Abe replied, shaking his head. “Even if you pay top dollar, you never know what you'll get.” He nodded in the direction of the shop. “Which brings us back to that case you were just talkin' about, before Lloyd showed up...”

Harry led the two further into the shop. “I think we're gonna have to scrap her, but a second opinion never hurts...”

Pam was already laid out on a work table, stripped of the checked shirt; for modesty's sake, her period-accurate 1940s underwear had been swapped out for a plain, modern bra and panty set. Cam was already running pre-checks on the tools that would be used in the disassembly process; Lloyd could faintly make out the hint of a scar, just under her left ear, on the rear of her neck. Other staffers, both human and android, were already “scrubbed up” with gloves, goggles and protective coveralls.

“You think she's gonna spray?” Abe mused.

“I'm not running the risk of getting splashed with battery acid,” Harry replied, “or anything else.” He accepted a pair of gloves, a face shield and a heavy, open-backed sort of robe. “Remind me to call Jaromir after this is done,” he added, muttering under his breath as he donned the gear. “'High quality product', my ass...”

Lloyd said nothing, even as he accepted similar gear to what his uncle was putting on. He'd only ever seen Jaromir—the guy who'd sold them half of the lot that Pam had been included in—via video-conference calls; his sole recollection of the man was that he looked—and sounded—like a Russian equivalent to the stereotypical used car salesman, all fast-talk and empty promises. His “hard sell” for Pam: she'd served (or “serviced”; his accent made it hard to tell which it was) well over 400 customers “in the Motherland”, and that she was still running as smoothly as the day she'd rolled off the assembly line. Needless to say, his claim had been proven wrong well before Pam's spectacular malfunction—she'd had issues with “misunderstanding” simple commands, spatial coordination problems, and occasionally switching languages.

“...nearly caused a wreck that time,” Harry muttered. “Walking into the central thoroughfare at the camp....and that time three weeks ago...” He leaned in to whisper something to Abe, who nodded gravely. “If she'd pulled something like that at the base camp, I'd have never heard the end of it.” He stared at the motionless blonde on the table; her eyes were no longer crossed, but her mouth was still partially open, as if she'd been about to speak before being turned off. “I can guarantee that I'm never buying from Jaromir again, and I mean never.”

Abe stroked his chin thoughtfully. “How important was she in the script?”

“Eh, not vital.” Harry shrugged. “She would've run the 'junior archaeologists' bit and some other activities—letting the youngest at the camp do a 'real dig' to find old watches, prop rings, chicken bones...all that sort of stuff. We can get another gynoid set up and scripted for that part, no problem.”

“Good call.” Abe nodded. “Just from looking at her, I'd say she's done....” He leaned in, looking into Pam's vaccantly staring eyes. “...only way to know for sure is to open her up...” He paused, looking into her mouth. “...you smell that?”

Lloyd got close—and instantly regretted it. An odor like stale grease mixed with fried shoes hit his nostrils.

“I wouldn't breathe in too deeply, kid,” Harry warned. “No telling what she's outputting.”

“What kind of power cell was she hooked up with?” Abe was already retrieving a notepad from the right-hand hip pocket of his jeans.

“Some no-name Russian clone of a Tesla system...” Harry scowled. “....that's what did her in?”

“Like I said, only way to know for sure is to open her up....”

“...so that's bad?” Lloyd asked. “The power cell thing, I mean.”

“'Bad' is if she'd been speaking backwards French every day except for Tuesdays,” Abe corrected. “'Bad' would've been her being colour-blind to anything orange.” He wrote a few lines on the first page of the pad. “...believe me, kid,” he stated, “this is way past 'bad'. Best way I can put it: if she'd have been human, I'd be asking if she's an organ donor right about now.”

Every human staffer nearby winced, and even Lloyd had to grimace.

“I still don't get how a power cell fault would've made her dance,” Harry insisted.

“Well, no time like the present to dig deeper.” Abe motioned to Cam. “Ready when you are.”

Cam nodded to someone out of Lloyd's line of sight; something was turned on with a click, and Cam stepped up to the table. “Beginning disassembly of Falchion Robotics Simu-Like 3-9-5 series dual-type, domestic/companion gynoid, given designation 'Pam' for scripting and day-to-day interaction purposes.” She gestured to her left, accepting a scalpel. “First incision...” She set the tip of the blade just below Pam's breasts, pressing in—and not wincing as a bright green foam fizzed out of the ensuing cut.

“Oh, what the hell...” Harry turned away, gagging. “That can't just be the power system!”

“Unusual odour emanating from origin point of incision,” Cam stated, as calmly as if she were repairing a stereo. “Bright green foam present at incision site. Continuing...” A brief jet of greenish-white fluid squirted past her face as she drew the scalpel further down Pam's abdomen. “...possible mixing of coolant and other essential fluids, suggesting a failure in delivery systems for said fluids.” With the incision now having reached Pam's beltline, Cam withdrew, going back to the top of the cut to make a horizontal line just under the inert gynoid's breasts. As Lloyd watched, she completed the cut, making an identical one at the belt line. Once that incision was complete, two staffers moved to peel back the artificial skin of Pam's abdominal area, as Cam resumed her work.

Looking into Pam's now-opened abdomen, Lloyd could already tell that most of her internals were beyond the point of salvage. Every component he saw, closely packed as they were, looked to have been fried, acid-burnt or—in some rather extreme cases—melded together by excessive heat buildup. The outer casings of wire clusters had fused; buildup of dried fluids was everywhere, and some metal housings and casings had become tarnished. The grey, protective “under-skin” layer, meant to keep components from burning through or otherwise damaging the external synthetic flesh, had burned or melted through entirely in some spots. The artificial skin itself, remarkably, was unblemished on the inside.

“...significant damage to abdominal components,” Cam stated. “Moving to upper torso.” She gestured for a staffer to unhook and remove Pam's bra; two staffers moved to briefly hoist Pam into a sitting position—which led to something in her abdomen, hidden by ruined components, to shift with an alarming grinding noise.

“Possible component obstruction in abdominal area...attempting to—”

“Hang on a sec.” Abe leaned in, squinting at the internals in Pam's abdominal area... “....what I said about the power system still stands,” he intoned, “but we got a bigger problem. Harry, Cam....get a look at this.” Cam leaned in, as did Harry—despite his lingering reluctance, due to the smell from earlier.

Lloyd tentatively approached to get a better look. “What is it?”

“....yeah, we're done with Jaromir after this,” Harry scowled. “Prick only went and sold us a 'bot that's been stripped out well past the limit! None of these components are even close to the original specs for this line!”

Abe shook his head. “Tell me you didn't pay full price for her, Harry...”

“...should've known his 'lifetime customer discount' was a load of old crap,” Harry growled. “Bruce, Reg, help me set up the monitor with the built-in webcam. I'm calling him right now, and we're gonna settle this one way or another!”

Lloyd, for his part, was frowning at the one component he could see that didn't look to have been ruined by the constant refitting of Pam's internals. “....that looks like an SSD,” he mused, pointing out the thin device. “I'm pretty sure SSDs are installed somewhere other than...well, there.”

“...I'll be damned,” Abe murmured. “You've got an eye for this line of work, kid...and you're right. Drives don't go right above the—”

“Vaginal fluid reservoirs damaged to the point of uselessness,” Cam stated, so matter-of-factly that it barely registered with Lloyd at first. “Damage appears to have been caused by prior refitting and repair efforts, rather than heat or electrical damage, as with other components. Fluid reservoirs also are not connected to the corresponding hardware, which is...” She gestured for another staffer to remove Pam's underwear—revealing a distinctly plastic panel that clashed quite badly with the realistic skin around it. “...completely absent,” she finished, frowning. “This contradicts information on bill of sale claiming that 'all base hardware is included', which implied inclusion of sexual hardware.”

“...that wasn't really going to be a factor at the next event,” Lloyd muttered.

Cam either didn't catch his remark, or chose to ignore it. “Beginning incision on upper torso.” She drew the scalpel up between Pam's breasts—a low-D cup, one of the few items on the spec sheet that hadn't been a complete fallacy—and towards what would've been her collarbone. “First incision complete...” Cam scowled as a thin wisp of smoke issued from the cut. “...smoke wafting from incision upon completion...possible evidence of further electrical damage.”

The horizontal incision, at the collarbone (or its synthetic equivalent) was made, the skin (and breasts) pulled back....

“Oh, for the love of...” Abe turned away, muttering under his breath.

The “bones”—reinforced metal and carbon fibre, of course—that made up the “ribcage” of Pam's internal frame had, at one point, been a gleaming, polished silver and light grey. Their current tint was closer to a greenish-brown, not helped by the ruined nature of the components behind them.

Cam was as methodical as ever in dictating the procedure. “Preparing to access upper torso components...”

A power screwdriver proved to be the necessary tool for the job of removing Pam's “ribs” to get at the components housed under them. Whereas the damage in her abdominal and pelvic areas had been severe, nothing in her upper torso looked to be in any kind of shape to be salvaged.

“Try to get that SSD out without dislodging anything else.” Abe leaned in. “Was that thing even hooked up?”

“What SSD, what are you...” Harry squinted into Pam's exposed internals, scowling; Lloyd hadn't noticed his uncle walk up until he was right next to him. “....the Hell?!”

“Lloyd spotted it,” Abe explained. “I guess 'extra internal storage' wasn't in the sales pitch your pal Jaromir gave you.”

Harry turned to regard him with a distinctly unamused frown. “Would I have asked for a solid state drive...there?”

“I've seen DIY jobs with drives crammed everywhere from the shin to the skullcap,” Abe replied. “Someone tried to put an SD-card reader under the tongue of a bot, once...don't think I need to explain how that one worked out.”

“But there,” Harry insisted, gesturing to the SSD drive still inside of Pam, “is the kind of place a drive just doesn't go!”

“The drive's presence may be the reason why Pam was lacking the hardware typically installed in that particular region,” Cam mused. “Whoever ordered the drive installed may have had a significant reason for—”

“It's a solid state drive,” Harry groaned. “Not even one with removable media—and I've seen those mounted that way before, with the media slot...” He gestured at the blank plastic where Pam's missing hardware was meant to have been installed. “Never could understand why anyone did that.”

Abe shrugged. “Humor, maybe,” he reasoned. “Or they've got a real funny idea of what 'interface' can mean.”

Harry never got a chance to respond; Bruce and Reg had returned with a flatscreen TV on a cart. “Ready when you are,” Reg stated.

“Good.” Harry fished out his phone from a pants pocket. “Time to let Jaromir know he's lost a customer....” The TV screen blazed to life, displaying the manufacturer's logo for a moment before cutting to a feed of a stout man flanked on either side by gorgeous, identical blondes in matching pink lingere.

“Harry!” he beamed. “Dearest of all my customers and friends! To what do I owe the—”

“Cut the crap, Jaromir,” Harry snapped. “I'm calling to cancel our contract.”

The smile on Jaromir's face faltered...for a few seconds. “This is a joke, yes? April Fools is months away, you know!” He gave a hearty laugh. “You had me going for a moment!”

“Do I look like I'm joking?” Harry countered, hoping the camera built into the TV's frame would catch just how much his expression made it clear that he wasn't kidding around. “We're in the middle of a teardown on a unit from the last lot you sent me—she had an SSD in her crotch, Jaromir!”

The Russian looked somewhat confused. “SSD....in the crotch...I think you must be confusing a component—”

“I know you're not calling me a liar,” Harry warned. “Not in front of all of my staff.”

“I am not calling anyone anything,” Jaromir replied. “I am merely suggesting—”

“The Hell with your suggestions! I know an SSD when I see one, and she had an SSD installed right above her fluid reservoirs! The ones that should've been connected to a certain module she didn't even have installed!”

“If you required sex hardware to be installed for an event, we could have worked out those details—”

“Don't try to sidetrack me, damn it!” Harry was in his “fighting mad” stage, now. “You gave me a bill of sale for a 'bot that didn't have half of the features you said she would...I find out, midway through a teardown, that she's got parts in her she's not even supposed to have, that you claim complete ignorance of...and now you're on my phone trying to tell me I don't know what I'm talking about.” He nodded slowly. “Yeah, I think this is the end of our working relationship.”

“A shame to end it on a misunderstanding, Harry—”

“What's there to misunderstand?! You misrepresented what Pam was capable of—setting her up took twice as long as the manual said, and now that I think of it I'm pretty sure that manual isn't even the original one her model even shipped with!” Harry cracked his knuckles; Lloyd could tell he was about to pull off one hell of a finish on Jaromir. “...I think you know what his means.”

“All I know is that you have 'evidence' that is, at best, very much a coincidence.” For as confident as he was trying to be, Jaromir still looked somewhat grave. “All of these things you claim can be disproved—”

“You sold me scrap, Jaromir!” Harry thundered. “From day damn one, she was on the blink!”

Now, the Russian was taking things seriously. “I am not in the scrap business, Harry. I sell quality product—”

“Oh, bull! 'Quality product' ships with all advertised features—I'm pretty sure Pam here didn't have a sex drive, let alone the hardware to run it with!”

“All of my robots are quality,” Jaromir insisted, his tone and expression growing more annoyed by the second. “I am—”

“A man of your word?” Harry offered. “Well, guess what! Your word isn't worth a dime to me! This is the last time I let you con me out of—”

“I do not rip off anybody,” Jaromir insisted, his formerly flawless English suddenly sounding distinctly more broken, and several shades more angry. “You try to rip me off! This is big scam, is it not?”

“You're the one running a scam, Jaromir! Next thing I know, you'll be trying to send me coupons!”

“Coupons?!” Jaromir echoed, apparently legitimately offended. “I am a legitimate businessman, not running some kind of 'numbers game' from streets of Moscow to shipyards of St Petersberg! I never sell 'coupons'!”

“Yes, I'll bet you don't,” Harry shot back, the sarcasm flowing like venom over every word. “Such a noble, honest man—they'd love you in Moscow, instead of Kazan, or Yekaterinburg, or wherever you ship from! I bet you'd never sell coupons...not that they'd be good for anything.” He scoffed. “Other than toilet paper,” he added, under his breath.

“....say it again.” Jaromir looked as if he were about to explode. “What you say, just now...”

“I said,” Harry repeated, “I bet you'd never sell coupons to anyone, not that they'd be good for anything OTHER THAN TOILET PAPER!”

“NO!” Jaromir slammed a fist down on his desk; the two blondes on either side of him didn't react. “YOU ARE SON OF SHIT-ASS! I SELL QUALITY PRODUCT! NO DEFECTS!”

Harry managed to not look confused by Jaromir's odd turn of phrase. “...about that 'quality product'—”

“WE SETTLE THIS NOW!” Jaromir declared. “I prove to you I am a man of my word! NO defective products!”

“...I guess we can settle this easy,” Harry agreed, trying not to let the bizarre wording of Jaromir's earlier insult rattle him. “You just send me all the paperwork on your end, prove you're not a con artist—”

“YOU DARE CALL ME CUM ARTIST?!” Jaromir thundered, nearly jumping out of his chair; the move had the added effect of sending one of the blondes tumbling to the floor. “I AM NOT CUM ARTIST!”

Harry did a commendable job of keeping a straight face. “...I didn't exactly call you that,” he corrected, “I'm just—”

“You tell me I sell defective product, ASS MAN! YOU CALL ME A CUM ARTIST TO MY FACE!”

All around the work table, Harry's employees were doing their best to look disinterested in the call. Many were turning away from the TV, thinking of the least hilarious things possible to keep from falling over laughing. Cam, true to form, merely regarded the screen with a polite frown. “...I think this whole thing has been a misunderstanding,” Harry stated. “I just wanted to call to clear the air, make sure you knew what was leaving your warehouse before you—”

“YOU SHUT YOUR WHORE-FACE MOUTH! YOU SHIT ASS! I SELL QUALITY PRODUCT, NOT SHIT ASS CAPITALIST—”

“Let's not get too off-track, here!” Harry cautioned, still managing to keep a straight face in spite of Jaromir's utterly surreal tirade. “We can settle this right now, over the phone! You just send me the paperwork, and—”

“I NOT PAY FOR YOUR WORK!” Jaromir shouted. “YOU SHIT-ASS, SON OF BASTARDS! CALL ME A CUM ARTIST, SELL ME I TELL SCRAP...” A vein on his forehead seemed to be in danger of bursting at any second.

“....I think something's been lost in translation here,” Harry admitted. “Maybe we should—”

“I KILL YOUR HOUSE! I BREAK EVERY BODY IN YOUR BONE!” Jaromir had grabbed his desk with both hands, as if he were about to flip it over. “SON OF WHORE ASS! I BREAK YOUR HOUSE...”

He tried for another insult, only managing to spit out syllables and half-words in Russian. Eventually, he just gave up and settled for a wordless howl—knocking both the other blonde and his own cameraphone to the floor in the process of sweeping his arms out. The phone landed a few feet away from the blonde already on the floor, locked in a loop of trying to walk and laugh while the occasional electrical burst snapped from her temples. From above, Jaromir bellowed again and threw something—possibly his chair—against the wall. The other blonde stiffly walked into the shot...only for her smiling face to fall into frame while the rest of her kept taking jerky steps.

Without another word, the call ended, the screen cutting to a music video channel.

Harry turned away from the TV, his pre-call anger replaced with bewilderment. “....'son of shit-ass'?” he echoed. Lloyd had to bite the inside of his mouth to keep from laughing.

“Hell of a way to get out of a contract.” Abe chuckled. “Not that I'd try it again...”

“It's entirely possible he entered into a rage-based fugue state,” Cam mused. “He may have been unaware of what he was saying...or what he was trying to say.”

Harry regarded her with a smirk. “That's your professional opinion?”

“Merely an observation. I have yet to complete my studies of human psychology.”

“Eh, no worries.” Harry patted Cam on the shoulder. “You've done a hell of a job keeping track of the teardown on Pam, here...” He turned to regard the partially-disassembled gynoid on the table. “...I think we've got all the proof we need that she's not going to be up and running any time soon,” he stated, any hints of amusement gone from his voice as he spoke. “Get the rest of her skin off, seal it up and add it to the cabinet...if we find a frame it'll fit on, we'll have Pam v2, whenever that may be—and, ah, as far as her shortcomings below the belt are concerned...”

“I'll see if we have a matching piece for that area,” Cam replied.

“Glad to hear it, Cam. For now...”

Cam nodded, gesturing to the others around the worktable. “Beginning removal of artificial skin from Falchion Robotics Simu-Like 3-9-5 series..”

“Abe, Lloyd...” Harry gestured towards the shop's exit. “....seeing as how we just got the bad news out of the way,” he stated, as his nephew and trusted business partner fell into step alongside him, “I figured we could use some good news for a change.”

“What kind of good news?” Lloyd asked.

Harry grinned as he threw an arm around his shoulder. “Well,” he beamed, “since our last few events pulled in quite a nice chunk of change, I figured it'd be nice to do something different. Buy new, instead of second-hand.”

“You pulled in a new 'bot to lead off the story?” Abe mused.

“Well, new circa 2019 or 2020,” Harry admitted, “but miles away from a hack job like Pam back there. Didn't have to cut any wages or anything else on the budget...I figure we can get her set up and scripted in...a day, tops. She'll be up and running by the time the clientelle get here, at least.”

Abe nodded his approval. “I just hope she's not another hardware failure-in-waiting...”

“Not a chance,” Harry laughed. “I didn't get her through the same channels Jaromir runs in, trust me...” His smile grew wider as the trio made their way around the ranch house's exterior; a delivery truck had parked in the driveway. “...and I think you two might get to see her up close before we run the event!”

Lloyd noticed a name on some of the crates being unloaded from the truck. “'Heartelligence'?”

“Start-up firm,” Harry explained. “Launched back in 2019. Just around the time the Civic Accords were being passed. I did my research—they've only got four, maybe three 'bots on offer, but I've heard nothing but good news about 'em.”

“They're in Massachusetts, right?” Abe regarded the truck with a wary eye. “Spun-off from a project at MIT, I think.”

“All I know is, they're verified and certified, unlike our tongue-tied Russian pen pal.” Harry chuckled. “Ran through all the checks I do whenever I buy in bulk—they passed with flying colours.” He nodded at a passing mover wearing a set of coveralls with the Heartelligence logo—a heart, inlaid with a stylized icon of a human brain, inside which was a single microchip—emblazoned on a shoulder patch. “These crates are just the accessories,” he added. “The one with the 'bot will be in the living room.”

Lloyd felt a certain weightlessness in his stomach. Unboxing newly-bought gynoids for SCIE events always gave him a sort of thrill—something like opening Christmas presents, magnified by about one hundred.

True to Harry's claims, a person-sized, grey plastic crate had been set up to stand vertically atop the rug in the centre of the living room. “Ah, can you move it off the rug, please?” Harry asked. “We've had bad experiences with static and unboxing before...” He nodded as the crate was moved, via a two-man dolly, back by two feet. “That's it, that's...right there! Thanks.” His attention turned to Lloyd. “You wanna do the honours?”

“...ah, sure!” Lloyd regarded the crate with interest. “How do I, ah...”

“Press in here, here, here and here.” Harry tapped four spots—two on each side of the crate's lid. “Then stand back, otherwise it might fall right on top of you—the lid, not the 'bot.”

“Right, right...” Lloyd stepped up, tapping each of the spots in turn, then stepping back—and to the side, just in case.

A quiet hiss sounded as the lid seemed to move outwards before taking a tumble to the floor, landing with a thud that Lloyd barely noticed. He stepped over the lid, nearly standing on it as he looked into the crate...

….and realized that the weightlessness in his stomach was heightened by about fifty times.

The figure—the girl; Lloyd couldn't possibly bring himself to refer to something so beautiful as “the figure”—standing inside the crate was staring at Lloyd, even though he knew her eyes (ocular receptors, really, but semantics were out the window at a time like this) weren't really seeing him as such. Her face was thin, but not too angular, her features calling to mind girls Lloyd had known in life—her eyes, those amazing blue eyes, were so similar to Mandy's; the lips as full and firm (at least, in appearance) as Kim's; the nose as seemingly perfectly-proportioned as Ada's—despite the distinctly Nordic cast to her cheekbones and jawline. Not a hair was out of place in her eyebrows, her eyelashes or the blonde locks that had, as per shipping protocols, been pulled back into a ponytail . Her figure was trim—high-B to low-C-cup breasts, a gymnast's abs, a waist and hips that suggested athleticism but hinted at a propensity for dancing, shoulders that looked more suited for t-shirts than frilly gowns, and toned arms and legs befitting a 20-something-year-old girl who'd played and excelled in sports for most of her life.

Every inch of her below the neck, aside from her head and hands, were covered by grey spandex.

Several words made their way to Lloyd's lips. He wasn't entirely surprised that his brain settled on “whoa”.

“Never been activated before,” Harry explained. “Like I said, rolled off the assembly line...2019 or 2020, but she's pretty much new. Wasn't put on sale at the time—Heartelligence had to wait seven months, for obvious reasons, before they could offer up anything to the public.” He trailed off, watching as Lloyd looked over every inch of the gynoid in the crate.

“...she'll be leading the pact?” he murmured.

“Already scripted out the explanation,” Harry assured him. “The old leader was taken captive in exchange for a map to the, ah....whatever it is they're guarding, at the dig site. Long in a short, the old leader of the Pact dies before the story starts, which is where she steps in.”

“A bit of a cliché,” Abe admitted, “but it'll work. This story's a one-off?”

“We've never reused a full script yet,” Harry replied. “Names, sure, but full elements....”

Abe nodded. “She have a name?”

Before Harry could respond, Lloyd knelt to examine something near the base of the crate. “It might be in here.” He held up a large binder, stuffed with various pamphlets and other documents. “Something in here will probably have her name listed...maybe we could incorporate it into the script?”

“Can't see why not.” Harry turned to accept a memo from a staffer, leaving Lloyd to gaze upon the gynoid standing in the crate. He'd never been shy around girls—his relationship with Mandy was a testament to that. Still, there was a pretty big difference between someone like Mandy, who was still fit despite her debilitating bout with the pandemic a few years prior, and a female figure whose entire appearance was very deliberately designed to be this attractive. There was no hint of the “uncanny valley” about the gynoid in the crate...well, apart from her utter lack of motion.

The most eerie thing, probably, was her lack of breathing—that subtle rise and fall of the chest, indicating that the lungs were doing their job. Lloyd had seen “human statues” before, but even they had to breathe every once in a while...

“...ah, Lloyd? Not that I mind you admiring the new purchase, but Cam needs to run a few tests on her.”

His uncle's remark drew Lloyd out of his silent admiration of the gynoid in the crate. “...oh, ah, right...”

Harry chuckled. “Once she's up and about, it'll be even harder to tell she's not human. Where's that binder from earlier...Cam'll need it to check the settings.”

Lloyd retrieved the binder from where he'd set it down. “I thought all the documentation these days was digital.”

“Heartelligence was a startup, remember?” Harry reminded him. “They can't afford to ship tablets with every unit.”

Abe nodded his agreement. “Give 'em a year or two more, they'll have a full-on palmtop computer packed in with 'em.”

“Which would be great,” Harry declared, “as long as it's not running Windows...anyway, it looks like our new purchase already has a name, or at least a 'pre-selected alias for ease of setup and programming'.” He chuckled as he closed the binder. “Must be a hell of a gig,” he mused, “coming up with names for these...” He turned to regard the immobile gynoid for a moment, before glancing at Lloyd. “Kid, say hello to the Heartelligence 90S-50-D, or as we'll be calling her from now on....Diana.”

“...Diana,” Lloyd repeated, nodding. “It fits her.”

“How many extras'd she come with?” Abe inquired, gesturing at a few of the other Heartelligence-branded crates.

“Hairpieces, programming and recharging station, makeup set...” Harry counted off the items on his fingers. “...adapters for if we can't bring her recharging station and her on the same trip...cords, repair kit, 'cosmetic' repair kit...pretty sure they even threw in a dust cover.”

Lloyd frowned. “They could afford all that, but not a tablet?”

“The world as a whole was just coming off of four years of Hell, if you remember,” Harry reminded him. “Pretty sure that budgeting for tablets with each new 'bot they sold was the least of Heartelligence's concerns.”

“Right, right...” Lloyd turned his attention back to the crate, noticing a small panel in the side wall. “Huh.”

Harry, midway through discussing the ins and outs of the upcoming event, turned. “That a good 'huh', or a bad 'huh'?”.

“I didn't spot this before,” Lloyd admitted. “The binder must've been up against it...” He pressed on the panel, which moved inwards before springing out—revealing a drawer. “...whoa.” His eyes were wide as he glanced at the object inside the newly-revealed compartment.

“...sure she's not gonna need to do any gymnastics for the next event,” Harry was saying to Abe, “but the one after—”

“Uncle Harry!”

“....yeah?” Harry glanced back over his shoulder, frowning.

“I just found this.” Lloyd held up a cardboard box, the size of a decent-sized hardcover novel. “The crate had some kind of side-panel in it...I just sorta pushed on it and it opened.”

Harry regarded the box , then glanced at the crate. “Side walls are certainly thick enough to hold things,” he mused. “I think the website even said you could store a lot of the cords, repair items and other extras in there—didn't think they' use hidden compartments, though. Well, let's see what's in the box...” He gestured for Lloyd to get a grip on the base while he carefully lifted the lid. “And we have...an envelope, and another paper.”

“Pretty sure it's a certificate.” Abe was glancing over Harry's shoulder at the contents of the box. “Dunno which type.”

Lloyd's attention wasn't on the certificate, which Harry had already lifted out—along with the envelope—and looked over. His focus was solely on the small, black plastic device—barely as long as his hand, in all honesty—nestled in the tray inside the box. He lifted it out, slowly; there was a weight to it, but it otherwise seemed almost insubstantial.

“....the heck is that?” Harry had finished going over the certificate, and was now examining the black box Lloyd was holding up. “Lemme take a look...” He turned it around, his confusion giving way to a smile, a delighted laugh. “Well, I'll be....get a look at this, Abe!”

The box was passed to Abe, who turned it around and over in his hands before letting out a low whistle. “...damn.”

“...how bad is it?” Lloyd muttered, the weightless feeling in his stomach slowly being supplanted by one closer to lead.

“'Bad'?” Harry echoed, sounding genuinely amused. “This is a far from 'bad' as can be, kid! Heartelligence only went and sent us a nice little bonus gift to go with Diana, here!” Abe handed the box back to Lloyd, as his uncle continued: “It's one of those, ah...Open-whatsits—”

“Pandora,” Abe clarified. “As in 'Box'.”

Harry nodded enthusiastically. “Full-on palmtop computer—way ahead of Honest Abe's schedule.” The two men laughed. “Never woulda thought they'd send one...”

Lloyd spotted the divide on the front of the box, as well as the volume slider, the Power button and a few other controls; his thumbs found the “shoulder buttons” on the back. Tentatively, he folded the “lid” up—the expected controls were all there, a full keyboard, two thumbsticks, the requisite face buttons and directional pad, and a column of three buttons between the sticks. The interior of the “lid” housed the screen for the device. “Why'd they send us this?”

“Maybe this'll explain.” Harry retrieved his keys, using one to part the envelope's flap from the rest. “Never was a fan of just tearing these open...see what we've got here.” He shook the letter out, turning it over in his hand as he unfolded the paper. “...'is equipped with the experimental Direct Control option',” he read, “'linked to the palmtop PC included in your newly-purchased unit's crate. A far more discreet setup, it allows for'....” He continued reading the paragraph to himself, occasionally glancing at the palmtop computer. “...'save your customized control routines to the included SD cards for quick and easy loading'....pretty convenient.”

“Beats the hell out of a full room and a separate network,” Abe mused. “I know a few theme parks that'd pay a decent chunk of change for this option.”

“Then let 'em pay for it,” Harry beamed. “We got this option for Diana here as a gift.”

“So we're using that to run her for the next event?” Lloyd asked, the weightless sensation already having returned.

“....I'd rather stick to the script for that one,” Harry admitted. “We'll do the usual for it, then test her out with this, see how that goes. Pretty sure this is if we want her to be in 'Animatronic Mode', though—staying in one place, not moving all over the event site, that kind of thing.”

“She has modes?”

“Up to twenty.” Lloyd hadn't heard Cam enter the room; she was already thumbing through the documentation binder he'd taken out of the crate. “Harry's description of Animatronic Mode—or 'Attraction Mode', as it's described here in the manual—is correct. It's intended for leaving her in one spot, technically 'bolted in place' like the animatronic figures some theme parks still use.”

Harry scoffed. “Pretty sure most of 'em are moving on to more advanced tech. The big ones in Florida and California still use their 'patented audio-animatronics', probably...but even they have a few 'bots doing walkabout.”

“Might be 'had', soon enough,” Abe muttered. “After last October...”

“Eh, they'll survive.” Harry shrugged. “How's she looking code-wise, Cam?”

Cam had already run a cord from her own neck to a port on the back of Diana's neck. “Everything's in order,” she replied, her eyes glowing softly as she spoke. “She apparently has options for modular personality configuration.”

Abe and Harry exchanged impressed looks. “Nice,” Harry mused. “Might make things easy for future events.”

“Can she learn?”

Lloyd's question was met with a frown from his uncle, but Cam spoke before Harry could voice his objections: “It appears that 'Diana' does, indeed, have the potential to learn,” she stated. “She could even ascend, eventually.”

The word “ascend” nearly made Lloyd's heart skip a beat. “So you're saying...she could, y'know...become sentient?”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” Harry held up both hands, placing himself between Lloyd and Cam—or rather, between Lloyd and Diana. “Let's not get too carried away, here, kid. Diana's part of the inventory, not staff.” Noticing that Cam was now giving him a frown to rival his own, he quickly added “...but, y'know...give it a year or so, after we run a few more events, sell off some of the inventory we've got....” He shrugged. “Never say never.”

“An agreeable outlook.” Cam nodded her agreement, unplugging the cable. “Also, regarding Pam...apart from the solid state drive installed in her pelvis, there were no components that could be salvaged. Unless you want to resell her skin at any point—”

“Forget it.” Harry waved her off. “Even her frame is wrecked?”

“I'd advise against trying to refit her frame to house anything other than animatronic components,” Cam warned. “She's been refit too many times to be a viable free-roaming unit anymore.”

“How many times?” The question was from Abe, rather than Harry.

“By my calculations...” Cam rested her fingers on her temple, her eyes scrolling rapidly for a second or three. “...the gynoid formerly listed in our inventory as 'Pam' has been refit at least twelve or thirteen times.” Ignoring the look of slack-jawed shock on Harry's face, she continued: “She may have been completely rebuilt at least three times...I found the signs of at least three full cranial module rebuilds, and twice as many to the components of her pelvic region.”

Abe regarded Harry, whose mouth was forming half-syllables and parts of swears, with a sigh. “Any good news?”

“I examined Pam's memory files,” Cam stated, “starting with those from her reactivation mid-repair and going all the way to her final malfunction. There were no signs that she was anywhere close to attaining even base-level sentience at any point during her final hours.”

Lloyd had been following the conversation intently, and felt a wave of relief wash over him. “...good.”

“Would've been a hell of a time for her to wake up,” Abe added. “Wouldn't have done her any favors—”

“I need a phone,” Harry spluttered. When Cam, Abe and even Lloyd glanced at him with obvious concern, he gave a slight cough. “...I need to call Adrian,” he explained, “tell him to officially cancel the contract with Jaromir.” He turned away, muttering under his breath. “...fifth total loss in a year...”

Lloyd watched Harry storm out of the room, nearly kicking the door to the kitchen open as he went. “...how many are we gonna have to sell to pay back what we lost on Pam?”

“My lowest estimate would be three units,” Cam replied. “After ensuring they've been fully refurbished, of course.”

“Right.” Lloyd had never been one to keep track of the economics of SCIE, but he knew enough to realize that it took a lot to keep it going. “He's not gonna have to...y'know, let anyone go? Staff-wise, I mean.”

The feel of a hand on his shoulder surprised him. “It won't get that bad,” Cam assured him, her usual stoicism giving way just enough for her to offer a smile. “He still has the repair business, after all.”

“I know,” Lloyd sighed, “but I just....I hate seeing him like this.”

“Trust me, kid, Harry's been through a lot worse.” Abe chuckled. “He'll pull through this just fine.”

Lloyd nodded absently, his attention fully captured by what was happening over by the crate. Cam had unzipped the spandex outfit Diana was wearing and turned her around, giving Lloyd a view of her flawless back and the barest hint of her butt, already tantalizingly hugged by the spandex. The outfit had been peeled down to Diana's wrists, as Cam looked over the gynoid. “Heartelligence didn't make the same mistake Jaromir did with Pam,” she mused, the casual tone of her voice offset by what she said next: “Her vaginal hardware is, in fact, installed. My brief software check earlier confirmed that she has the necessary programming to utilize it, in any given personality configuration.”

“Might want to wait for Harry's go-ahead to test that,” Abe suggested. “They sent cleaning gear, I hope.”

“The shipping manifest did indicate cleaning products for all external surfaces and the va—”

“Gimme one good reason I can't sue him to Kingdom Come!” Harry had re-entered the room, his smartphone held up to his ear. “Cam said her cranial module—Pam's cranial module, not Cam's! She said it was refit at least three times! Three refits, Adrian, just for the head!”

Abe watched his tirade for a few more seconds before chuckling. “...he'll get it sorted,” he mused. “Always does.”

“...and she's the fifth total loss I've had this year,” Harry declared. “They were all in lots I bought from Jaromir!”

Cam, as nonplussed by Harry's outburst as she was in general, was already looking away. “I think we should begin the basic mobility tests on Diana,” she stated, pulling up the blonde gynoid's spandex jumpsuit as she spoke. “It wouldn't do to have her freeze up the day of the event.”

“I'll leave you to it, then.” Abe nodded, turning to leave. “The store won't run itself, after all...if Harry asks—”

“ABE!”

“....guess I'm not leaving after all.” Abe sighed. “Yeah?”

Harry approached, looking somewhat agitated. “I need a character witness,” he stated, “just in case this whole thing with Jaromir ends up going to court—”

“I'll vouch for you,” Abe assured him. “No cheapjack con artist is gonna drag you down on my watch, Harry.”

“As long as they write 'con' artist on the docket, not...” Harry chuckled. “...I've heard of anger management issues before, but nothing like that...”

A quiet beep from the crate drew Lloyd's attention from his uncle's recounting of Jaromir's utterly weird tirade; Cam had finished redressing Diana, and had also apparently activated the blonde. A few brief, barely-perceptible twitches ran through Diana's figure as her posture straightened ever so slightly. Her eyes had closed in the interim, but as Lloyd watched intently, they opened—not with a quick snap, but slowly, as if Diana were emerging from a long rest.

The weightlessness Lloyd had been feeling now seemed powerful enough to carry him to the ceiling. He managed to speak, and didn't care that his voice was a mere whisper: “Diana?”

“Heartelligence 90S-50-D—online.” Her voice was clear, soothing, without any hint of digital undertones.

Cam, apparently sensing Lloyd's fascination (and, probably, other feelings) towards the newly-activated gynoid, spoke up: “Begin ambulatory and motion tests, please. Authorization code: 7-Gamma-9-Indigo-52-Daily.”

“Authorization code accepted.” Diana stepped out of the crate, oblivious to Lloyd staring at her. “Beginning test now.”

It looked, to Lloyd, as if the gynoid were doing some kind of aerobics routine mixed with performance art. She extended her arms out, in the classic T-pose, before bending them at the elbows. She raised, then lowered, both arms before letting both rest at her sides—at which point she bent at the waist, her arms dropping to touch her toes.

Lloyd nearly commented on how Diana looked as if she'd been shut off when she straightened again, only to pivot at the waist—first to the left, then the right. With her hands planted on her hips, she tilted her torso forwards, backwards, to the left and right and even in the diagonals, looking for all the world like a rather shapely joystick. She repeated those motions with her head, her eyes never moving in the process. She held her hands out in front of her, both turning at the wrists before pivoting up and down, as if she were revving an imaginary motorcycle.

The final flourish to the upper-body portion of the test: a quick wiggle of her fingers.

As Lloyd watched, silently, the gynoid seemed to stand there without doing anything for entirely too long...until she ever so slowly dropped into a picture-perfect split. Even as Lloyd stared, wide-eyed, Diana wasn't done: she brought her legs together, bending at the knees and ankles before laying flat on her back, putting both legs straight up in the air. Thus positioned, she enacted the motions of pedalling a bicycle for thirty seconds before putting her legs back down, sitting up and moving from her full seated position to a crouch, then a kneel, then back to standing upright once again.

“Test completed. Awaiting next command or input.”

Cam nodded her approval. “Her ambulatory systems are all functioning perfectly,” she mused. “Perhaps we should try her voice command mode next.” She turned to seek Lloyd's thoughts on the matter. “Shall we?”

“.....huh....test, ah....yeah,” he quickly agreed, nodding eagerly. “Voice command, you said?”

He got the feeling that a less-stoic gynoid than Cam would've either been smirking or rolling her eyes at his awkward, stilted reply. As it was, Cam settled for a polite frown. “I did ask if we should test her voice command mode next.”

“...yeah. Sounds good.” Lloyd was dimly aware that Harry and Abe were still on the phone, on the far side of the room.

“Very well.” Cam turned her attention back to Diana. “Commence testing of Voice Command mode. Authorization code: 11-Sterling-75-Wicker-52-Electric-993.”

“Authorization code accepted.”

Cam nodded. “Diana, walk back and forth in front of me, five times.”

In lieu of a verbal reply, Diana obeyed the command, walking the floor in front of Cam five times, in both directions, before stopping to stand in front of her. “Task complete. Awaiting next command.”

“Can she taste?”

Lloyd didn't realize he'd spoken out loud until he saw Cam regarding him with a curious stare. “.... I was just thinking,” he mused, “back to...I dunno why I remembered this, but the fountains—the drinking fountains, I mean, back at the first school I ever went to...” He shook his head. “Never did get why the water from those tasted different from what we got out of the tap at home...”

“...her 'sense of taste' would merely be a chemical sensor of some kind, built into her tongue,” Cam replied. “She hasn't been configured to utilize food or drink consumption as an alternate means of acquiring storable energy—her model does have additional hardware available as an option, but not as part of her default configuration.”

“Right.” Lloyd nodded. “Sorry if it sounded like a stupid question.”

Cam's expression softened. “Your question wasn't 'stupid',” she assured him. “Merely...interesting.”

Even as Lloyd nodded his agreement, Cam was speaking again: “Diana, turn around..”

Cam's words had just registered with Lloyd when he realized that Diana was now, as ordered, turned around—facing him. Her unblinking stare was focused entirely on him; there were no shifts in her posture, no tics or twinges of any kind in her facial expression as she regarded him.

“Transfer command authority. Authorization code 22-nightfall-56-interview-91-vinegar.”

“Authorization code accepted.” Diana blinked several times. “Awaiting my next command.”

Lloyd glanced at Cam, who merely arched her eyebrow. “I believe it's your turn to test her,” she stated.

Had the feeling of weightlessness in his gut been enough to actually lift him off the floor, Lloyd might've ascended into orbit at that exact moment. He'd never thought, before that point, about turning Mandy, or any of her friends, or even Ms. Newton, into a mindless drone slaved to his voice—in his dreams, maybe, but that was his subconscious talking. People were people, in his view—and sentient androids and gynoids, like Cam, counted as people. Even with Cam, he never just ordered her to do things—he asked.

Now, with Diana standing right in front of him, awaiting a command....

“....walk up to me.”

His stare never left the blonde as she approached—her walk was completely, utterly normal. There was no extra sway to the hips, no intentional “jiggle” to her steps...she just walked up to him. As he'd commanded.

“Stop!” Lloyd didn't care that the word almost sounded like a squeak.

Diana, as ordered, stopped walking. Without a ruler to put between them, Lloyd could only guess, but he figured that she was standing a mere twelve inches away from him. The last time he'd been this close to any girl was a slow-dance with Mandy, earlier in the year. “Wonderful Tonight” had never been so apt a title for a song...

“LLOYD!”

The shout jolted him out of his reverie; for a brief moment, he thought that he'd gotten so lost in the moment that he'd gone for the kiss that he hadn't been able to share with Mandy at the dance. “...yeah—ah, yes, sir?”

“Abe and I are going to Adrian's...” Harry's tone made it clear that he wasn't puzzled and/or angry at any weird acts on Lloyd's part. “I need you to go get all the parts we took out of Pam, and her skin—it's still in the cabinet, right?”

“It is, sir.” Cam nodded. “The only thing left to do is wipe the makeup off of the face.”

“Leave it for now.” Harry was right next to Lloyd, now, his tone only slightly puzzled. “...did I miss something?”

“We were testing Diana's verbal command response,” Cam replied. “I had just transferred command authority to Lloyd, and he'd issued a command for Diana to walk up to him.”

“....ah.” Harry shrugged. “Always a good idea to make sure the basics are coded in...” Annoyance crept into his tone as he recalled past instances where the basics had either been coded improperly, or completely left out. “Don't even get me started on that gunked-up, refitted Kokoro...” A light throat-clearing noise from Lloyd cut him off. “...anyway, ah, can you transfer command authority to me, so I can put her back in the box for now?”

“Lloyd has to make the transfer.”

“...well, kid?”

Lloyd nodded. “Diana, take a step to your right—my left.” Diana side-stepped, her gaze focused on Harry's chest. “Transfer command authority...ah, authorization code....” Lloyd glanced at Cam, who mouthed the words: “2-peninsula-93-apron-76-harbour-83.”

“Authorization code accepted.” Diana once again blinked rapidly, before adjusting her stare to look Harry in the eye.

“Return to your shipping crate and power down.”

Silently, Diana turned on her heel, walked back to the crate and entered it before turning around. “Powering down.” Her eyes gently closed, and her head bowed slightly.

Harry chuckled. “She even shuts off easier than Pam did,” he mused. “Half the time, you had to jam a finger into the 'emergency switch' to get her to power down...” He shook his head at the memory, recalling how frustrating it was to get the now-defunct gynoid to deactivate. “Good thing it was under the skin at the base of her neck..I've seen 'bots with off switches behind the ear, in the ear, and a few in places that'd make public switch-offs pretty embarassing...”

“Why do we need to bring her parts to Adrian's?”

The question earned Lloyd a sigh. “They wanna check all the part numbers against a catalogue of parts with recall orders on 'em,” Harry explained. “If Jaromir was going that cheap...”

“Got it. Want me to get a pair of gloves?”

“....yeah.” Harry sighed. “No telling what those parts might be outputting,” he muttered. “And get a mask before you go in, too—I don't need you breathing in fumes and getting sarcomas on your lungs!”

Cam looked rather thoughtful at Harry's remark, but said nothing...

...at least, not until she and Lloyd were both back in the shop, gloves on their hands. Lloyd had acquired a filtered mask to wear while picking up and examining Pam's components; after his brief impression of everyone's favorite black-clad, armored Dark Lord of the Sith failed to garner a reaction from Cam, he merely shrugged and went back to work. At the very least, he could comort himself with the thought that she might've smiled as she turned away...

“I doubt you'll get lung cancer from breathing in anything here.”

Lloyd frowned. Cam was midway through examining what was left of Pam's pelvic assembly—given the hardware that had been left out, there wasn't much to examine—when she'd spoken up. “...huh?”

“Your uncle's observation about sarcomas on your lungs is...understandable,” Cam stated, setting aside the ruined pelvic section and turning over what had once been a power cycler in both hands. “I believe the risks of inhaling carcinogens from any of Pam's components is minimal, at worst.”

“I'd settle for 'no risk',” Lloyd muttered, retrieving another of Pam's components from the pile. “Must've sucked.”

Cam looked up from the power cycler, frowning. “What must've 'sucked'?”

“The refits,” Lloyd clarified. “Pam getting passed around from one owner to the next, getting parts taken out, new parts put in, components failing all the time...”

“You do remember that Pam was non-sentient?” Cam regarded Lloyd with a puzzled look.

“I know, but...” Lloyd sighed. “...what if she'd, I dunno, started to 'ascend', somewhere along the way? Maybe not right before the first refit, but...the third, or fourth. What if she really started to think, to want to think, and it was all....” His voice was entirely too quiet for even his own liking. “...if it just got taken out, written off as a fault?” He was staring at the component in his hand as he spoke.

The touch of a hand, gently laid upon his shoulder, drew him out of the morbid reverie he'd nearly spiraled into. “I went over her entire ownership history,” Cam assured him. “Despite his other faults, Jaromir did send the full documentation regarding Pam's prior owners...none of them reported even a single incident that showed her possibly gaining anything like base-level sentience. All of her faults were faults, not misdiagnoses.”

After a moment, Lloyd nodded. “I just wanted to be sure.”

He felt Cam squeeze his shoulder—a rare, surprisingly human gesture from the otherwise clinical gynoid. “I don't think I've ever worked with anyone as concerned for the wellbeing of artificial persons as you before,” she stated. “Apart from your uncle, of course.”

“I'll take that as a compliment,” Lloyd replied, grinning as he reached up to touch Cam's hand with his own.

It took a good twenty minutes for the pair to sort through Pam's components, checking to make sure none of them were leaking anything corrosive or otherwise harmful. A few looked to be in danger of falling apart upon impact with a hard surface. By the end of the sorting process, Lloyd and Cam had each loaded up a plastic bin with the parts they'd just looked over.

“What happens if all of these are on the recall list?” Lloyd asked, locking the lid of his bin into place.

“In all likelihood,” Cam replied, “Jaromir may face a suspension of his license.”

Lloyd was somewhat surprised. “It's that bad?”

“Other countries...” Cam pressed the lid on the bin she'd loaded into place. “...are considering adopting laws similar to the North American Civic Accords—laws that, among other things, protect sentient androids and gynoids and keep the owners, buyers and sellers of non-sentient units from being scammed.” She tested the lid of the bin, nodding after it stayed in place. “The regulatory measures will also ensure that robotics companies all over the world go by a standard of quality assurance for their products.”

“...so they don't all follow one set of rules already?”

“Every continent has different sets of regulations,” Cam explained. “Even North America's own regulations regarding humanoid robots were severely lacking until the Civic Accords were signed—and they lacked their own agency to enforce the Accords until almost two years later.”

“Which would be CAEDIA,” Lloyd reasoned.

“Indeed.” Cam picked up the bin. “All we need to do now is get Pam's external covering out of the cabinet...”

“I'll do it.” It took less than ten seconds for Lloyd to get to the cabinet where various “skins” had been stored; Pam's, still wearing the makeup she'd had on during her final malfunction, was near the center of the rack inside. “...there has to be a less creepy way of storing these,” he muttered; the artificial flesh had been draped on a vaguely-feminine frame, more like an empty full-body jumpsuit than an approximation of skin.

“I've suggested that Harry invest in a vacuum-sealing system,” Cam informed him. “He's looking into it.”

A horn blast from outside signaled to Lloyd that it was time to leave. “Let's get these out to the truck...” He hefted the bin from where he'd left it, grunting slightly. “I don't want Uncle Harry getting as mad at me as he did at Jaromir!”

“I doubt he'd be that angry with you,” Cam assured him, effortlessly falling into step as she carried her bin alongside Lloyd. “But we should get going...”

Chapter 3

“...they got to keep Helena, so of course we have to get a new capital. Subdivide a state to make a new one, whadaya think is gonna happen?”

Lloyd was barely paying attention to the chatter on the radio—yet another caller complaining about how the state had to scramble to certify its capitol city after its 2022 ratification. His thoughts were still on the boxes of components that had, a little under an hour ago, been installed inside Pam before her catastrophic malfunction—a malfunction that he'd seen up close and personally the night before. Despite having been assured, multiple times, that Pam didn't feel a thing as her systems failed one by one, Lloyd still felt a sense of remorse, one that he couldn't quite pin down an explanation for.

“Somethin' on your mind?”

His uncle's question snapped Lloyd out of his funk. “I was just thinking...if there was anything we could've done to keep Pam from going out the way she did.”

“Given her extensive refits and rebuilds, keeping her functional for any length of time longer than a month would've been a costly proposition.” Cam's voice was as preternaturally calm as ever. “Especially if she was rebuilt with components that had been recalled.”

“She's got a point,” Harry agreed, never taking his eyes off the road. “We can't keep every 'bot we get, after all.”

“...so how'd you end up getting one all the way from Massachusetts?”

Harry smirked. “I did my research. Not a lot of new/old stock is fresh in the box from the 2010s and such, so I went with the best option available. And no, she hadn't been stored in a warehouse that got flooded, frozen over or set on fire.”

“Unlike Ursula, Meredith and Poe,” Cam added. “All of which were purchased from lots offered by Jaromir.”

Her mention of the Russian garnered a scoff from Harry. “Once would've been one thing,” he admitted.. “Twice, I could've overlooked as bad luck, maybe. But five times?! No excuse for it.”

The RangeStar had no difficulties navigating through traffic, though Harry kept both hands on the wheel—he'd never been one to trust auto-drive systems in vehicles, especially after a disasterous demonstration back at the ranch had sent a demo-unit quad bike into a lake. The insistence of the horrified salesman that a slight software issue—easily patchable via a phone—was responsible for the bike's watery demise had been met with a stony stare and a quiet “thanks, but no thanks”; when the sales team had fished the bike out of the lake and left, all staf on hand had found creative methods of ignoring the shouting match over the phone between Harry and his now ex-old friend, Bobby Pariello, who'd tried to sell him on the bike for a whole month.

“...should cut ties with him, too,” Harry muttered.

Lloyd, close to descending into another meditative funk, frowned. “Huh?”

“...I was just thinking,” Harry told him. “Remember the quad bike demo?”

“Yeah.” Lloyd hadn't yet forgotten the demo, or its aftermath—the screaming contest between Harry and Bobby had been held in a room across the hall from his own.

“Once we get back to the ranch,” Harry stated, “I'm calling Bobby P and cancelling every arrangement I still have with him.” He muttered something rather unprintable before continuing: “He's nothing but a suckfish—always trying to latch onto the next big thing, and then cutting loose ASAP. These days, he won't shut up about 'crypto'-whatever...”

“Cryptocurrency,” Cam clarified. “A highly risky investment.”

“Any investment suggested by Bobby Pariello is a risky investment,” Harry replied. “I remember when he was still doing the weather on local TV...idiot had some kinda tornado fetish or something. Any time we'd get a drizzle of rain, he'd bust out his fancy graphics and give all kinds of talk about 'marginal chances of a slight risk'...” He checked the rear-view mirror before continuing. “Not ONE TIME did we ever get a spin-up.”

Cam nodded sagely. “I believe his stock advice was similarly groundless.”

“Groundless?” Harry laughed. “I think he got all his stock advice from Bizarro World. I only ever took him seriously once, and it damn near cost me my house. Then he tried...” He muttered something and switched the radio station. “...tried to sell me on investing in a theme park out in Thailand, said it'd be a perfect addition to the portfolio.”

The mention of the Thailand plan piqued Lloyd's curiosity. “Didn't all the 'bots at that one blow up on opening night?”

“After they tried to start a park-wide orgy,” Harry clarified. “The place had no anti-hacking security, no gate security, no verified safety inspections on the rides and no oversight from anyone qualified to give it. The whole thing ran for three hours before some jackass with a 'bot-breaker phone strolled in looking for a good time...” He checked the rear-view mirror again, focusing on the secured bins in the bed of the truck. “...they found him—well, what was left of him—under a smouldering pile of half-naked 'bots in burnt-up costumes.”

“Bob fled the country to evade the authorities,” Cam added. “The Thai government still has an active warrant out for his arrest, if he ever returns.”

“He's not going back,” Harry chuckled. “He'd be dead before he left the airport.”

As the RangeStar drove further towards the Billings checkpoint, Lloyd found his thoughts drifting back to Diana standing less than a foot away from him—a mental image so alluring, he failed to notice movement in the bed of the truck....

“...really hoping Adrian's not too busy,” Harry muttered, as the light turned green. “Otherwise we're gonna—”

The blast of a siren cut him off; he nearly shouted, only to spot two figures swathed in loose clothing and what appeared to be duct tape jumping out of the truck's bed and running away. “...the hell was that?!” He rolled down his window to check....just as a uniformed CAEDIA officer approached. “...ah, anything wrong, officer?”

“Are the bins in the bed of this truck are secured properly?” The full-face visor of the officer's helmet seemed to flatten all traces of identity out of their voice, in addition to hiding their face from view.

“...Lloyd, Cam—”

“On it.” Lloyd and Cam exited the backseat of the RangeStar, getting down to check the bins. Both were still clamped down and held firm to the bed of the truck with straps; the lids of both were still firmly attached, with no gaps visible between the lip of the lid and the bin. As he turned to head back to the truck, Lloyd spotted a scrap of cloth, probably torn when one of the would-be thieves ran, stuck in the tailgate. He said nothing as he got back into the backseat, except to answer both his uncle and the officer: “They're tied down, still. Neither of them was opened.”

The officer nodded. “We've had a lot of problems with the Iron Hand lately—they run in, try to take any parts not bolted down, then scatter before we can do anything.”

“Iron Hand...” Harry frowned. “Weren't they behind a bunch of bot-nappings last year?”

“The case is still under investigation...but they are considered a group of interest—”

“One of them left something.”

Lloyd tried not to flinch as Harry and the officer both glanced at him—one slightly annoyed, the other curious. “...there was a torn piece of cloth in the back of the truck,” he explained. “I didn't touch it.”

Without a word, the officer headed to the back of the truck; Harry groaned. “I can't even bring parts from a 'bot Jaromir sold me anywhere without running into trouble,” he muttered. “Should've let those Iron Hand punks take a few...serve 'em right, for trying to pull off a stunt like that in broad daylight—Cam, you're going with us when we get to Adrian's office. I don't want some Frankenstein'd 'bot wrapped in a tarp trying to rip the doors off of my truck just to grab you and run off.”

Cam seemed only mildly offended. “I am capable of defending myself, sir.”

“Not against these Iron Hand pricks. Back in '10 or '11, there was a big bust that went down in California—a 'splinter group', the papers said, but the tactics were all the same. 'Bots grabbing 'bots, stripping 'em for parts and leaving what they didn't need.” Harry drummed his fingers on the steering wheel, sighing. “ALPHA busted 'em—I mean, they were missing the H, back then, but still. And that was before CAEDIA was even a thing—”

A tap on the frame of his window cut him off; the officer had returned. “Your son may have just led us to a major clue in our ongoing investigation.”

Harry's eyes widened. “He's my nephew, but...ah, what clue, exactly?”

The officer chuckled. “Apparently, one of the runners that tried to target your vehicle was damaged before they jumped onto your truck—the coat fragment we recovered is soaked in a lubrication fluid that's been discontinued for half a decade.” Even as Lloyd tried to shrink down in his seat, the officer turned to regard him. “This is the fifth time they've tried to hit a vehicle in broad daylight, and only the second time they've failed.”

“...so, does that mean we can go now,” Harry inquired, “or is the bed of my truck and active crime scene?”

“You're free to go—the residue sample from the tailgate has been collected. What exactly—”

“Junked parts from a scrapped NonSen. Bringing 'em in to make sure none of them were recalled...it's a long story.”

After a few seconds, the CAEDIA officer nodded. “From now on, you might want to invest in lockable storage boxes.”

“Got it. And, ah, thanks for scaring 'em away from my truck, officer!”

The CAEDIA officer nodded. “Have a good day!”

Harry rolled the window back up, shaking his head. “...crazy. I drive into town to see Adrian, and nearly get two loads of junk parts stolen from my truck...” The RangeStar drove through the checkpoint, the lights on either side turning green. “...and we're all clear, as per usual.” He glanced over his shoulder, into the backseat. “How're you two holding up?”

“I'm good.” Lloyd had pulled himself back up in his seat. “I was just, ah...”

“Nervous?” Cam offered.

“CAEDIA wouldn't have hauled us in,” Harry assured him. “Since they ran the Iron Hand flunkies off, they had no reason not to let us through, either. Cam, remind me to call Erin about locking truck-bed boxes once we're done at Adrian's.”

“Will do, sir.”

“Good. If Abe hadn't gotten that call before we left, he'd have done more than scare those Iron Hand punks off...”

---

The receptionist at Adrian's office had been configured to deal with any number of unique situations. One of the few not set to trigger her polite interaction subroutines was a group of three people, with two of them hauling large bins of unknown material. A sentient or a human in her position would've at least tried to be cordial, but protocol was protocol.

“...and don't set 'em down, no telling who might walk off with one of 'em.” Harry shook his head. “Is he in?”

The receptionist regarded him with a frown. “I'm sorry?”

“Adrian Reese.” Harry frowned. “I have an appointment.”

There was almost a sense of contempt in how slowly the receptionist looked from Harry to the monitor showing the day's scheduled meetings. “Mr. Reese doesn't have any appointments listed for this morning—”

“I just called him an hour ago. I would've shown up sooner—check the list again. 'Harry Morgan'. Should be right up near the top...”

Lloyd felt more tired than anything else—having to lug the bin of ruined components out of the truck and into the office seemed like one last bit of Pam proving to be an inconvenience. There was, of course, the not-insignificant matter of where in town the building was—or rather, what it was surrounded by. Multiple stores around the high-rise had adverts for androids and gynoids plastered in the windows, if not actual androids and gynoids posing in them. Trying to catch a glimpse had nearly caused Lloyd to trip over his own feet as he entered the building; Cam had been able to discreetly help him recover his balance while holding her bin with one arm.

“...no listing for a Harry Morgan,” the receptionist stated. “You'll have to reschedule—”

“I called Adrian this morning,” Harry insisted. “We were on the phone a little over an hour ago!”

“I'm sorry, but—” The receptionist gasped, her lips briefly parting in an “oh”. “...Mr. Reese, I was told to not admit any callers after...yes, there is someone in the lobby at this moment—a man named Harry Morgan, claiming to...he has two individuals with him...” She glanced at Lloyd and Cam, her eyes briefly flashing blue.

“Lloyd Watson.” Lloyd managed a nod and a friendly smile.

“Just Cam.” The brunette gynoid didn't bother with any gestures.

“...Lloyd Watson and Just Cam,” the receptionist stated. “Carrying large plastic bins....” Her expression changed again, to one of almost cringing apology. “...I'm sorry, Mr. Reese. I thought your request was—I understand, sir. I'll admit all three of your visitors at once.” She blinked rapidly, the micro-actuators under her artificial skin giving not-quite inaudible snaps as they did, before her attention returned to Harry, Lloyd and Cam. Her blank expression had given way to a beaming smile. “My apologies, Mr. Morgan, Mr. Watson and Ms. Just Cam. Allow me to show you to the elevator!”

“Thanks.” Harry nodded, glancing back at Lloyd and Cam. “Helluva turnaround, isn't it?”

Cam merely shrugged. “She appears to have problems with the linguistics of names...”

“I'll tell Adrian when we get to his office,” Harry assured her. “As for right now...”

The three followed the receptionist to the lifts; Lloyd could hear the faintest hints of servo whines from her body as she moved. “Mr. Watson and Ms. Just Cam will need to take a separate elevator,” the gynoid explained. “For safety reasons, the weight-limit on individual elevator cars—”

Harry held up a hand, signalling that he got the point. “We'll take it from here.”

Once the lift doors closed, Lloyd set down his bin. “Why did we have to bring Pam's frame up with the rest of her parts?” he asked, wiping his forehead with the back of one hand.

“The frame itself may have been on the recall list.” Cam never looked away from the doors of the lift as she spoke.

“Even her frame?!”

Now, the gynoid turned to regard Lloyd with a frown. “You'll recall that dealers like Jaromir don't operate under a single set of rules,” she reminded him.

“I figured that. I just hope Pam's skin wasn't on a recall list.”

“The exo-layer wouldn't have been. Given how easily the under-layer was burned through, however...”

Lloyd tried not to think of the headache that would entail for anyone keeping track of how many dodgy parts had been installed in Pam before Jaromir had shipped her. “I'd hate to be Jaromir right now,” he muttered.

After a minute or two of ascending in silence, the lift car stopped. The doors opened to reveal several smartly-dressed men and women waiting to get on, all of them somewhat confused at the presence of two 20-somethings, dressed in a style far more casual than the tenants of the building were accustomed to.

Lloyd tried for a smile and gave a nervous wave. “Hi, everyone.”

“Lloyd! Cam! Over here, Conference Room 3!”

Without waiting for Cam to suggest it, Lloyd hefted his bin from the floor of the lift car, uttering a few polite “excuse me”s and “sorry”s as he edged past the business types. Cam followed, soon matching him step-for-step as they made their way to the door Harry had called out to them. “Conference room....three.” Lloyd tried to manoeuvrer himself into position to open the door with one hand, but Cam stepped forward, effortlessly balancing her bin with one arm as she turned the pull and pushed the door inward. “After you.”

“Thanks.” Lloyd sighed, fighting the urge to explain that it wasn't the weight of the bin that was hindering him, but the width and awkwardness of carrying the blasted thing.

Harry had already taken a seat at the conference table, next to a young man about a decade older than Lloyd. His angular face was framed by curly black hair that went to his neck, looking oddly out of place in a law firm office. “...and right on schedule,” Harry stated, “my nephew, Lloyd Morris Watson...” Lloyd set his bin down to shake hands with Adrian across the table; the attorney was slightly taller than him.

“...and a three-time Employee of the Month,” Harry continued. “Cam—not 'Just' Cam...I mean—”

“I get the idea.” Adrian shook Cam's hand, as he'd done with Lloyd. “The ground floor units need an overhaul...but that's not why we're all here.” He nodded to the bins. “These are all the parts from the unit you mentioned?”

“All the parts that were viable to be transported,” Cam replied. “Including her endo-frame and recharging station.”

Lloyd tried not to scowl at that last fact. Apparently, Jaromir had insisted the station was, in fact, a “part”.

“No time like the present, then...” Adrian gestured to a laptop set up on the conference table. “Just unpack all the parts, lay 'em out on the table and I'll cross-check the numbers...”

Harry nodded at Lloyd and Cam. “Might as well...”

For the next twenty minutes, Lloyd and Cam unloaded the bins, laying out Pam's components on the table. The last part to be unloaded and placed on the table was the recharging station—a third-party device, intended to be permanently mounted on a wall, that looked to have been from an entirely different manufacturer.

Adrian regarded the parts with a dour stare. “How long was she operating?”

“A few months, at least.” Harry drummed his fingers on the table. “Erin and Cam went through all the documentation last night—Jaromir sold her before, but said she was still in pretty good shape.” He scowled. “Guess we know how that turned out.”

“Bad time to be buying Russian 'bots,” Adrian mused, shaking his head. “I hear NonSens past their warranty dates are rounded up and converted for server farms...there was a big bust last month, a whole office floor full of NonSens set up to crypto-mine.” He tented his fingers, frowning. “They got maybe 25% of the whole bunch out. Some idiot pulled a pistol, a 'bot got shot...turns out a live bullet hitting a 'bot that's been running hot for three weeks is a bad combination, but that's someone else's story. Right now...”

“Right now,” Harry continued, “we play Whack-a-Mole with the recall system, see how many of these are on a list.”

Lloyd thought the next few minutes—Adrian being handed a part, scrolling up and down the screen on his laptop and saying whether or not any given component had been recalled—would be boring. It turned out the opposite, for the wrong reasons. As they went down the list and over all of Pam's components, the full nature of Jaromir's “cheapjack” tendencies was laid bare: every single one of the components on the table had been recalled. Worse, some parts had been modified or repaired by individuals or parties without the proper experience, voiding warranties and making them nearly-literal ticking time-bombs.

“....recalled due to fire hazard, proof of internal self-lubrication solution containing trace levels of carcinogens and at least three known incidents of exploding at various temperatures.” Adrian set the power cycler down, regarding the ever-growing pile of recalled pieces with a heavy-lidded stare. “You said this Jaromir was a friend of yours, Harry?”

“Not anymore.” Harry had the edge of the table in a death grip, his teeth clenched. A vein in his neck had begun to bulge after Adrian had set down the tenth component found to be on a recall list.

For his part, Lloyd was staring at the pile of components with abject horror. Robotics was a passion of his—the reason he'd enrolled in Mechanical Engineering was, in the long term, to get a better grasp of how to repair (if not manufacture) 'bots on his own, after all. To hear that Jaromir had taken cost-cutting to this extreme galled him to his core. “Aren't there laws against this?” he quietly asked.

“Russia's been the Wild West of the robotics world,” Adrian informed him. “Don't be surprised if they don't send any delegates to discuss a CAEDIA-style outfit of their own.” He turned his attention to the recharger. “The last one?”

“Unless you want to check her frame against the recall list,” Cam replied.

“Just from looking at it, I can tell the frame's been modified way too many times to be classed as 'base-level'.” Adrian hadn't looked away from the recharger. “As for this thing, it's a Tesla knock-off, pretty common—and usually meant for vehicles, not 'bots.”

“I thought they had adapters,” Lloyd began, only for a low groan from Harry to cut him off.

“I know it looks bad,” Adrian admitted, “and, well...all these parts being on recall lists is definitely bad news—BUT,” he quickly added, before Harry could groan again, “there's some good news in all of this, too.”

Harry, who'd slumped as far back in the unyielding chair as he possibly could, moaned. “What good news?”

“Well,” Adrian replied, “for one, the financial compensation options haven't expired for any of these parts.”

It was almost astounding to watch the transformative effect those words had on Harry Morgan. He began pulling himself up in the chair, the beet-red tone in his cheeks slowly fading. “...financial compensation,” he echoed. “On all of 'em?”

“Every last bit.” Adrian grinned. “Even the recharger.”

“How much, ah, compensation would we be owed for turning over all of these parts?” Harry quietly asked.

“Gimme a sec...” Adrian tapped a few keys on the laptop, his brow wrinkled in concentration. “...and....there.” He turned the laptop so that Harry, Lloyd and Cam could see the sum total of what they'd be given for Pam's components.

Lloyd blinked. Harry's confused frown gave way to a smile, then a laugh. Cam merely arched an eyebrow.

“Reclamation's just a 10-minute drive away from here,” Adrian mused. “Shouldn't take too long to get it sorted—”

“What about the SSD?”

Harry's smile faded slightly, but Adrian spoke before he could. “What SSD?”

“Well, Pam didn't have any sex hardware in her,” Lloyd explained. “Where it should've been, there was a gap, and higher up was a solid state drive—”

“I thought you tossed that,” Harry countered, frowning.

“I put it in the receipts drawer, in the desk by the shop door. Locked it and everything.”

Harry was still frowning, and nearly spoke again—but Adrian, now looking rather thoughtful, beat him to it: “This SSD wasn't on the shipping manifest for Pam?”

“No, sir,” Lloyd replied. “The sex hardware was, but like I said...she didn't have it.”

Adrian nodded. “...huh. Interesting.” He turned the laptop back around. “Well, that makes another bit of good news for you, Harry,” he mused. “We can definitely get Jaromir busted on smuggling charges, if nothing else.”

“....smuggling?” Harry echoed. “For an SSD?”

“If it wasn't him, it was definitely someone in his office,” Adrian surmised. “Possibly trying to move a load of Bitcoin without being traced, or someone trying to sneak data out of the country. I've heard of stranger ways to move data than by swapping out a synth-gina for an SSD...” He turned his attention to Lloyd. “You said you'd put the drive in a locked desk drawer?”

“I did, sir. I dunno why, I just...” Lloyd shrugged. “Figured it'd be a waste to just toss it.”

Adrian gave an appreciative smile. “Not tossing that drive may have been the best decision you made. Forensics can scan it and everything on it, if you bring it by here next week.”

“And what if there's nothing illegal on the drive?” Harry was leaning on the table now. “What if it's been wiped?”

“There are plenty of ways to reconstruct deleted data from a wiped drive, Harry. Trust me on that.”

“Right.” Harry sat back, sighing. “So we bring it in next week...”

“Or whenever it's most convenient.” Adrian shrugged.

“Well, we've got an event tomorrow, so it probably won't be then.” Harry rose from his chair. “Can't say I'm surprised that all of these are on the recall list,” he muttered, “but knowing Jaromir...”

“You should be glad Pam crashed and burned when she did,” Adrian assured him. “Otherwise...”

“If it wouldn't have been the power supply,” Harry finished, “it'd have been her processor, and she'd have flipped out and started going haywire during the Junior Archaeologists' dig at the base camp. Can't really picture the papers ignoring that kind of craziness....” He scoffed. “And you really think we can bust Jaromir for smuggling?”

“Depending on what that drive has on it. I can issue a Writ of Stoppage to him, if you want.”

Harry chuckled. “Please do. If it means I never have to buy from him again...”

Adrian and Harry continued their conversation while Lloyd, sensing that their job at the office was done, motioned for Cam to help him bin the components. “How come all of these junk parts are worth so much?” he quietly asked.

“The vast majority of them posed a significant health and safety risk,” Cam reminded him. “Given the nature of how humanoid robotics works, as opposed to something like a faulty airbag or brakes...”

“I get it.” Lloyd sighed. “I just hope Heartelligence didn't make the same mistakes as Pam's old owners did.”

Cam regarded him with another of her cryptic maybe-smiles. “I have a feeling they're a bit more responsible than that.”

---

“...and I'm not mad that you brought up the SSD,” Harry insisted, “I just...I honestly thought you'd tossed that thing, or we gave it to Abe, or something.”

As the RangeStar made its way through the Billings traffic, the conversation had turned—yet again—to Lloyd's decision to bring up the solid state drive randomly installed (or just inserted) into Pam before she'd been shipped out. “What I don't get,” Harry continued, “is why Jaromir ever thought it'd be a good idea to just cram that thing in where he did, and then not tell anyone before he shipped it. Someone would've noticed, eventually.”

“The refit schedule never mentioned the drive's installation,” Cam chimed in. “Perhaps Jaromir didn't know about it—”

“Which means someone working for him may have just cost him his job,” Harry finished. “If he knew about it or he didn't know about it, I don't know, and I can barely bring myself to care. Jaromir's screwed me over—screwed us over, as in all of us—too many times for me to just let this go.” His muttering was only slightly cancelled out by a track from Amy Winehouse's fourth album on the radio. “And all that talk about him being a 'friend'...yeah, that's done.”

“Over a solid state drive?”

“It's more than just the drive, Lloyd. Jaromir's been sending us faulty parts, faulty bots and everything in between. If I got a call tomorrow, telling me that all the paperwork he's ever sent me with everything he sold me was fake, I wouldn't be the least bit surprised.” Harry shook his head. “He's like that guy who tried to start his own game company when the big names wouldn't hire him. What was his name?” He snapped his fingers. “Kotick! Bob Kotick, that two-bit chiseller who wrecked a record label and then got in too deep with the mob in Silicon Valley. Hasn't been seen or heard from since 2012.”

“Jaromir would stand a considerably higher risk,” Cam mused. “The Russian Mafia is far stricter about these things.”

“If Jaromir got involved with them,” Harry assured her, “he'd never have been a problem for us...”

---

Lloyd had accompanied his uncle to the Reclamation office in Billings several times, and had tried to develop a sort of thought exercise to keep himself from being distracted each time. Counting the ceiling tiles, admiring the intricate series of patterns on the floor, remembering all the words to the songs of a certain album....

Invariably, his thought exercises never panned out longer than three minutes.

The reception area, with the front desk, wasn't the issue. No, what caught Lloyd's attention like the strongest of hooks was having to walk down the corridors to “an office in the back,” every time. If it wasn't something happening in a room off to one side or another—a gynoid's upper half resting on a table while the lower body walked a treadmill, or a row of heads all reciting the alphabet in various languages at various speeds—it was the racks of deactivated gynoids (a few times, an android might be on a rack, but the gynoids always caught Lloyd's eye), suspended like mannequins, that seemed to always line the walls.

This visit was no different. Off in one side room, a gynoid was being disassembled—the operation going more like a pit crew taking apart a car than Pam's teardown, with speed and efficiency taking the place of Cam's methodical pacing and documentation of each action. In another room, rapturous cries resounded off the walls; Lloyd barely caught sight of a nude female form on a table, her body completely motionless—apart from her face, the passion of the moment clearly visible....just before a thoroughly embarrassed employee ran up to close the door with a quick “sorry”.

“The unit in that room was probably being tested for reactions to particular physical stimuli,” Cam mused. “Either that, or she was experiencing a glitch.”

“They still could've closed the door,” Harry muttered. “I just hope they didn't hear that out in the lobby.”

Cam mentioned something about soundproofing and door seals, but Lloyd didn't catch it. He was already losing focus of his latest mental exercise—this time, trying to remember how many movies he'd seen at his theatre of choice in the past five years—thanks to a brief glimpse of several figures being worked on in another room. These all had their backs to the door, which did little to hide their allure; the studded silver shorts, knee-high white boots, elbow-length gloves and low-backed studded silver tops hugged their curves invitingly. The outfits looked surprisingly familiar—a movie, something from the 90s, possibly about spies...

“Watch it!”

Harry's not-quite shout snapped Lloyd out of his funk. “Sorry!” Apparently, he'd nearly bowled over his uncle with the bin he was carrying.

“Let me.” Harry took hold of the bin, carefully edging the door open with his left foot. “Might as well ease the load off of you, since you've been carrying it all morning.”

“Thanks.” Lloyd nodded, holding the door open for his uncle—and Cam—to enter the office.

“Pardon the mess...just have a seat and I'll be with you in a sec.” The Reclamation clerk nodded at Harry, Lloyd and Cam as they entered. “The mess”, as it turned out, wasn't nearly as offensive as one might've thought—if one didn't mind the sights of half-assembled androids and gynoids in various states of disrepair around the room. A box in one corner held a multitude of male arms, each with varying levels of muscle tone (purely aesthetic). Right next to it was a female torso in what Lloyd could only guess was a very loose interpretation of a traditional bridal gown—strapless, with skirts entirely too short and lacy white gloves draped over the wires and attachment points jutting out of the neck.

“...and we got all the parts right here.” Harry gestured for Cam and Lloyd to unload the bins. “Every last one of 'em on a recall list.”

For the second time in as many hours, the bins were emptied.

“...and I got the message from Mr. Reese here. Checked it before you showed up, Mr. Morgan—every single one of these is still eligible for a refund.”

Harry nodded his approval. “Excellent. Do we need to bring these anywhere else, or...”

“Collection department will handle it. As for the compensation...”

“It's not in crypto-currency, is it?” Harry wasn't smiling.

The clerk chuckled. “That stuff is a hassle to keep track of.” An envelope was handed over across the desk. “Just submit this to the front desk, and you'll get a check to deposit or cash as you see fit.”

“Good. I never liked that crypto-crap, personally.”

The walk back to the front lobby was considerably less taxing than the walk to the office—Cam had volunteered to take both of the empty bins, but Lloyd had insisted that he still carry his. The only distraction came when three or four staff technicians had to manoeuvrer past Lloyd and Cam to get to the room with the hastily-closed door they'd passed by on the way to the office.

“I guess it was a glitch after all,” Cam remarked. Lloyd was too busy staring ahead and ignoring the ever-louder cries of ecstasy, barely muffled by the closed door, to reply.

None of the customers in the lobby gave any indication of having heard the outburst from earlier, or the current bout of sexually-charged screams from the one room in the back. Most were watching one of the corner-mounted TVs (the closest one to Lloyd had been set to a “pop news” show, detailing a possible Starlet Dolls European tour slated to begin in 2024), reading (magazines from past months were laid out on the central table and a few racks, the subscriber stickers on the front covers having been neatly redacted with black paint pens) or checking their smartphones. The line at the desk moved quickly enough, and Harry was soon at the front.

“What Uncle Harry said, about refitting another 'bot with Pam's skin,” Lloyd quietly mused. “I, ah...”

“Given the amount of trouble Pam has caused,” Cam replied, her tone just as quiet, “I doubt he'll follow through on that option. It's highly probable that—”

“Thanks.” Harry clapped Lloyd and Cam on the shoulder, grinning. “Just need to head to the bank, now.”

Cam and Lloyd glanced at each other; the gynoid merely shrugged.

With the bins now empty, Harry opted to have them put in the backseat—one inside the other—rather than tie them down in the bed of the RangeStar. “Shouldn't be too cramped,” he mused . “I mean—”

“I'll sit in the backseat,” Lloyd offered. “Cam can ride shotgun.”

Cam regarded him with arched eyebrows, while Harry looked somewhat amused. “Not that I'm complaining about good manners, or anything,” he admitted, “or trying to relegate Cam to a lower spot on the ladder than you, but....”

His remark was cut short by an SUV pulling up to park alongside the RangeStar. A quick nudge from Cam prompted Lloyd to take a look—any confusion on his part was cut short when he saw who was in the back seat. His eyes widened, even as his uncle moved out of the way, even offering to help the driver of the SUV if need be. The conversation between Harry and the driver seemed almost muted to Lloyd...

...namely on account of who emerged from the rear driver's side door.

“Mandy!” He hated the fact that his utterance of her name sounded almost like a gasp. “I, ah...hi!”

The object of his affections smiled. Her ethereal, impossibly perfect appearance from Lloyd's dream could never be matched in the waking world, but she was most definitely still attractive—despite the hospital-issued Emergency Respiratory Aid pack hooked to her belt, its breathing mask currently sheathed. Blonde, blue-eyed and with a dance student's trim figure, only the belt-mounted ERA gave any sign that she was in less than perfect health. “Lloyd!” she beamed. “I didn't think you'd be in town this morning. What's up?”

“Oh, ah, we just...” He gestured to the empty bin Cam was still holding. “We had to do a teardown on a 'bot earlier this morning, brought the parts in...” He shrugged, hoping to look casual. “No big deal.” He nodded to a lidless plastic crate that Harry and the SUV's driver were lugging out of the back of the vehicle. “What's that?”

“That?” Mandy glanced at the crate—and the flesh-tone plastic arm, with its visibly-jointed hand—sticking out of the top. “Oh, we had to stop by my aunt's place yesterday...her caregiver went on the fritz again. They think it's the CPU or something, but my dad wants a second opinion.”

“Sorry to hear that.” Lloyd was beginning to feel tongue-tied—and hoped that Mandy wouldn't ask to borrow a pen.

“Your uncle's doing one of those story things tomorrow, isn't he?”

“Yeah! He is.”

“Cool.” Mandy grinned. “Will she be in it?” She nodded at Cam.

Before Lloyd could reply, Cam spoke up: “I help out with repairs and day-to-day operations. This morning, I assisted in disassembling the gynoid whose parts we just turned in.

“Oh. Was she...”

“Non-sentient, a recent purchase of Lloyd's uncle.” Cam glanced at Mandy, then at Lloyd, before speaking again: “Lloyd had a dream about you last night.”

Lloyd felt the blood drain from his face almost instantly.

“Did he, now?” Mandy regarded him with interest. “What kind of dream?”

“A pleasant meeting with you, in Mechanical Engineering class. I believe one of you had to borrow the other's pen.”

“He told you the details, then?”

“He did. He also mentioned a desire to see you more often, in social contexts.”

Mandy frowned thoughtfully. “If it wasn't for this,” she mused, gesturing at the ERA on her belt, “I'd be more than happy to meet 'in social contexts'...” She rolled her eyes. “...but Mom didn't want to vaccinate, and now I have to limit my dance classes until the doctors can be sure it won't put too much stress on my lungs. It's not exactly the most fun for an audience to watch the lead go off-stage every twenty minutes just to catch her breath...”

Cam nodded sympathetically. “I hope you can eventually recover.”

“Same here.” Lloyd nodded emphatically, only slightly less mortified at Cam for having mentioned his dream.

“Thanks.” Mandy smiled, leaning in to give him a quick kiss on the cheek. “I should probably go help with the crate.”

“No worries. I hope we can talk again soon!”

“So do I...” Mandy paused; someone at the entrance to the Reclamation office (either Harry or the driver of the SUV; Lloyd couldn't tell which) had called out something. “Ah, would either of you happen to have a pen?”

For the second time in nearly as many minutes, Lloyd felt the blood rush from his face—but Cam spoke before he could say anything: “There's one in the glove compartment. Give me a moment...”

Mandy nodded, turning her attention back to Lloyd. “So, that event your uncle's running tomorrow...”

“It's a dig,” Lloyd replied, feeling considerably less nervous. “Archaeology, set during the 1940s. A group of explorers has to retrieve an artefact before it falls into the wrong hands—it's a kind of pulp adventure thing.”

“Sounds pretty cool. Reminds me of that one movie series....”

“Here.” Cam had emerged from the RangeStar with the pen. “It should still be full.”

“Thanks. See you later, Lloyd!” Mandy gave a cheerful wave; Lloyd reciprocated, smiling until the office door closed behind Mandy. “Why did you tell her about the dream?!” he moaned, turning to glare at Cam.

“I didn't tell her everything about it,” Cam mused.

“So you lied?!” Lloyd hissed.

“Technically, I didn't. You did, indeed, dream about having a pleasant encounter with her in the Mechanical Engineering class you both attend.” Cam frowned. “I thought you might be able to concoct a far less...salacious version of the dream to relate to her, to keep the conversation going.”

“...so you were...”

“Trying to help ease your social anxiety around her.” Cam gently rested a hand on Lloyd's shoulder. “I'm sorry if my efforts to lighten the mood had the opposite effect...”

Lloyd sighed. “It was just a dream, after all,” he reminded himself. “And I'm sorry for...well, snapping, just now.”

“Apology accepted.” Cam gave Lloyd's shoulder the same affectionate squeeze she'd given before they'd left the shop.

The door to the Reclamation office opened. “...and if you need anything,” Harry was calling over his shoulder, “just gimme a call and I'll get it sorted!” He tossed off a quick salute as the door closed. “Well,” he declared, beaming at Lloyd and Cam, “we're all done here. Just had to help Murph sort out the paperwork on that caregiver unit...nothing too serious.” He noticed Lloyd glancing past him, at the door. “...ah...”

“We were just talking to Mandy,” Cam explained.

Harry nodded. “She's in your Mechanical Engineering class, right? I think you'd mentioned her a few times before...” He crossed over to the driver's side. “Dance student, caught the big bug in '20, or something...”

“Yeah.” Lloyd sighed, turning to get into the RangeStar's backseat.

“Just be glad it didn't end up worse,” Harry reminded him. “And that they got the vaccine out there as fast as they did.”

Lloyd was too lost in thought to reply as Cam climbed into the RangeStar's front passenger seat.

---

“...and whoever gets the part of 'Professor Dallas Johnson', you stick with him and make sure he—or she, there's enough flex in the script for that—doesn't go too far off-script or get too physical with the 'bots.”

The trip to the bank had been uneventful, apart from Harry barely being able to contain his glee at how much he'd made by way of compensation for all of Pam's ruined parts. Now, back at the ranch house, he and Lloyd were taking a last-minute tour through the basic itinerary of the next day's big event: “The Quest for the Eternity Glaive”.

“When I say 'gets too physical',” Harry continued, “I mean 'causes damage', just to be clear—but if you spot some half-drunk, half-stoned or just plain horny rando tryin' to drop trou and get on the sentries in full view of the rest of the party, you just say 'Red Crest' into the 'walkie' there and the 'bots will go straight to EmCon 4.”

Lloyd grimaced; the last time any of the Emergency Contingencies had been deployed was at the Estate House event. “I hope I don't have to say it,” he admitted.

Harry chuckled. “Relax. People want that kind of experience, they go to a Silicon Dynamics scenario chamber.” He turned his attention back to the binder. “Depending on how the party you'll be with handles it all, you'll probably get a run-through of anything from A1 to G19,” he stated. “And, ah, expect a few surprises.”

“From them?” Lloyd asked.

“Well, yeah.” Harry chuckled. “But I was able to make a few calls to a few friends—up the challenge level a little bit.”

Lloyd blew out a sigh. Any time the challenge level got “upped” at an event, it meant that things would be a lot more interesting than initially planned. “What about the supplies?”

“Abe's got all the guns ready—configured as usual.” Harry held up an M1 Garand, aimed directly at Lloyd. “I promise you, right now, you're not about to get shot. Just keep your eye on the barrel....”

Even as he stared at the weapon in his uncle's hand, fearing the worst, Lloyd nodded. “Ready when—”

The fact that he didn't blink as he heard the shot was, after assurance that he hadn't just been shot in the chest, the second thing Lloyd realized. The third: “It's loaded with blanks!”

Harry shook his head. “Can't use those in this type of event, for safety reasons. Some dumbass in Wisconsin tried to play Roy Rogers with a blank-firing pistol, twirling it all over. Went to holster it, jammed it down his pants and misfired. Nice big hole in his thigh. He survived, of course.” He scowled. “Wouldn't have turned out that way if he'd put it to his head and fired.” He crossed the room to show Lloyd exactly what had made the realistic muzzle-flash: “Projector, in the barrel,” he explained. “From the side...” He aimed the rifle at the wall and squeezed the trigger; Lloyd saw a decently recreated flash of fire and light from the barrel. “All the rage in stage shows and theme park reenactments these days.”

“Isn't it a bit much, though?” Lloyd frowned. “Just to make a gun look like it's firing?”

“We're in the business of creating the illusion of danger,” Harry reminded him. “You give people the real thing, somebody gets hurt, or somebody gets killed. It's a great way to burn off your popularity with everyone except lawyers, too.” He set the rifle down, carefully, on the coffee table. “Any low-rent yahoo can print a fake certificate off the Internet and say they've got all their ducks in a row. It pays to go the exta mile when it comes to safety, especially with guns.” He sighed. “I worked a stunt show at a theme park I'll respectfully decline to name. They used blanks for all their gun shows, too.”

Lloyd could already tell the story wasn't going to end well. “Until?”

“Let's just say nobody bought the 'It's all part of the show' routine when the hero of the piece lost an eye.”

The far door to the living room opened, putting an end to the discussion of that particularly grisly stunt show. “The cast for tomorrow's event is undergoing one final round of examinations,” Cam stated—already dressed in period-accurate costume as a nurse. “Esperanza is showing no signs of the residual code from Lloyd's test run of the event yesterday.”

Harry nodded. “Good to hear. What about Sienna?”

“Seven Full Stop tests were done, and she still clung to whatever item she was attempting to grapple for during each deactivation. We may have to tell the customers to either surrender the weapon, if they end up against her, or opt for a stealth approach to neutralizing her.” Cam checked her clipboard. “Diana has been given the full script for the event, with all variations allowed for.”

“Nice.” Harry nodded to the rifle on the coffee table. “Just telling Lloyd about the prop guns,” he explained, “and why we're not using blanks—actually, that reminds me.” Without warning, he picked up the Garand, aimed at Cam, and squeezed the trigger. The gynoid dropped as if she'd been hit with an actual round.

“CAM!” Lloyd ran to her side. “Oh, damn it!”

“I appreciate the concern, Lloyd.” Cam's eyes opened, and she regarded him with another of her maybe-smiles. “But as you can see, I'm perfectly unharmed.” She allowed him to help her to a sitting position. “I'm sure your uncle will be more than happy to explain.”

“No need to rub it in.” Harry set the rifle down again. “Every 'bot taking part in the event is gonna have sensors wired into their clothes, and a very small sort of pop charge.” He grinned. “If the one who took the shot was on-point, the charge puts a hole where they got 'hit'—”

“And a small amount of fake blood.” Cam gestured to her own uniform.

“And that. They go down, it looks like they took the hit, all goes well.” Harry clapped Lloyd on the shoulder. “Our valued customers can opt to wear an undershirt that simulates the impact of the shot. Some of 'em are bringing their own outfits from home, so I can't exactly go blowing holes in their clothes.”

Lloyd nodded, already feeling a bit silly for having panicked at Cam getting shot. “So all the guns are set up like that?”

“I figured if I had to borrow something from Silicon Dynamics, it'd be 'guns that pose no risk of anyone getting shot for real or by accident',” Harry reasoned. “We were gonna try for grenades, too, but it would've cost too much—probably as much as we made back from Reclamation taking back Pam's junked parts.” He and Lloyd helped Cam to her feet. “The rest of the staff are all at the site?”

“There, or at base camp. Erin volunteered to take over for the Junior Archaeologists' events.”

Harry rolled his eyes. “She's gonna have to paint up if she wants to pass muster.”

“She's already conceded to apply the full-head makeup that will allow her to appear more human,” Cam replied. “I've taken the liberty of narrowing her wardrobe options down to those that will cover 98% of her visible artificiality.” To Lloyd, she continued: “Her hands don't support most synth-skin sheathes. The exposed joints tend to not look like real knuckles under the skin.”

“Give her a good set of gloves and she'll be fully prepped.” Harry yawned. “Might as well go see how all the 'Artemis Pact' members are doing out in the shop...” He noticed Lloyd's hesitance. “I know that look,” he mused. “Is this one of those 'big question' moments, or—”

“We're not gonna have a Pam v2, are we?”

Lloyd's question prompted a confused look from Harry. “I can't really predict when or where the next 'bot will break, but I can say it won't be as bad as—”

“No, I mean...” Lloyd sighed. “We're not gonna put Pam's skin on a new frame, face and everything, are we?”

At this, Harry's confusion softened into an almost paternal glance. “We can toss the face,” he assured his nephew. “To be honest, I never was a fan. Nothin' wrong with looking cheerful, but she was always a bit too cheerful, y'know?”

“That may have been a byproduct of her near-constant modifications,” Cam stated. “I can check the records—”

“Forget it. Her parts are probably in a crusher as we speak.”

On the way to the shop, Lloyd noticed a few extra vehicles parked out back, mostly Jeeps; a WWII-era cargo truck was also noticeable by its presence. “On loan,” Harry explained. “As long as I promise to send 'em back with full gas tanks, full tires and no damage that can't be buffed out.”

“Not that we'd encourage our clientele to try driving dangerously,” Cam added.

“The Oregon branch learned that the hard way,” Harry sighed. “Tried to do a racing event—human drivers against 'bots, Grand Prix style. All the safety precautions in the world, but they didn't plan for a wet track. None of the 'bot drivers were scripted to handle driving in those conditions...and it just failed upward from there.”

“The forecast for tomorrow doesn't call for any rain,” Cam stated. “The weather will be optimal for the script.”

“Just be glad old Bobby Pariello isn't still doing the forecasts,” Harry chuckled. “Knowing him, he'd throw in some line about a freak twister 'hitting when you least expect it'...” He lifted the tip of his nose with one finger, imitating the high, nasally voice of his former friend. “Bet he'd throw in the exact time, if he knew I was listening. 'And if you're planning any big events today at 12:05 PM, you might want to reschedule for next week!'”

Lloyd couldn't help but laugh, and even Cam looked somewhat amused. “I'm sure he wouldn't go that far out of his way to antagonize you.”

“Eh, you don't know him like I know him. Never knew what might get him pissed off—he'd be all smiles one minute, and the next...some guy shoulder-checked him outside the TV studio once, and Bobby just about lost it. Bull-rushed the poor sap, took him to the pavement and just started elbowing him in the head.” Harry glanced back over his shoulder. “The guy getting elbowed was 68, was checking his pockets to make sure he didn't lose his keys in the building—he said so when he came to in hospital.”

“Wasn't that—”

“What got Bobby fired?” Harry blew out a sigh. “You know it, kid. Either that, or that tape they found at his desk, of him dancin' in his underwear with weather symbols painted all over him. Some mumbo-jumbo about 'wanting to lay with Mother Nature in the most primal of states' or something, I dunno.”

Lloyd looked as if he were going to either burst out giggling or be ill.

“Perhaps we should focus on checking the cast for tomorrow's event,” Cam suggested, “instead of reliving the foibles and follies of Mr. Pariello.”

“Good call.” The trio had approached the door to the shop; Harry keyed in the code to open it. “Shouldn't take long.”

“Lloyd can help with the disposal of Pam's face, as well,” Cam added. She started to say something else...

...except Lloyd's focus was captured by the interior of the shop—or more accurately, the figures standing in the centre of the cleared shop floor. None of them moved as Harry, Cam and Lloyd approached.

Diana, Esperanza, Sienna and the rest of the gynoids kitted out as the Artemis Pact were all facing to the right, “staring” at the wall. All were clad in clothing appropriate to the time period the story was to take place in, with the addition of emblems (be they armband, shoulder patch or medal) depicting the symbol designed for the Pact: a vertical sword, the blade pointing up, laid over a horizontal bow.

Diana, for her part, looked incredible. Her hair had been styled into ringlet curls that framed her face, and her outfit had a hint of martial function to it without actually being from any specific army. The shirt was tucked in; the “uniform” jacket, utterly pristine. Her blue eyes—those stunning blue eyes—stared sightlessly ahead. A beret, perched atop her hair without a discernable tilt, bore the Pact's emblem over a pearl-white circle.

“The hunter's moon,” Harry explained. “There's some kinda mythology behind it all, remind me to ask the writer.”

“Right.” Lloyd followed his uncle down the line of motionless gynoids, stopping before Esperanza. “So she's not gonna start dancing if anyone tries to disarm her from behind?”

“I did mention that the last of the residual code responsible for that problem was removed,” Cam reminded him. Her lips curled in another half-smile. “Right before your uncle 'shot' me.”

“Do I even want to know the context behind that sentence?”

Harry chuckled. “Didn't notice you were in here, Erin!” He nodded to the hastily-arranged “vanity table” off by the far wall; Erin had already begun painting her off-white synthetic flesh in more life-like tones. “Sorry to have to get you all painted up for the gig tomorrow—”

Erin shrugged. “No worries. As soon as I got the call about Pam...” Lloyd could see the reflection of her rolling her eyes as he, Harry and Cam approached. “I had a feeling she'd go off before too long,” the gynoid continued, briefly puckering her lips and testing the newly-applied lipstick. “Always a bit too twitchy, a bit too 'happy sunshine fun-time', if you know what I mean.”

“She was refit over thirteen times,” Cam mused. “Base-level code changes may have altered any personality profile she may have been initially shipped with.”

The mention of being refit over thirteen times caused Erin to turn away from the mirror—her face 85% “painted up” to resemble that of a human. “You're kidding,” she muttered, frowning. “Thirteen times?!”

“Her cranial module by itself was fully rebuilt at least three times,” Cam replied.

Erin groaned, turning to face the mirror again. “Was someone using her head for practice at a batting range?”

“I hope not,” Lloyd murmured, barely realizing he'd spoken out loud until he noticed Harry, Cam and even Erin regarding him with curious stares. “What?”

“You,” Erin mused, “are a shining light in this industry, d'you know that?” Even with her face not fully covered by flesh-tone makeup, there was something maternal in her smile. “Most people would've looked at Pam after last night and said 'hell of a write-off', if even that. I've never seen anyone else show as much concern as you do over a NonSen.”

“Well,” Lloyd reasoned, “I figure...treat 'em like people even if they can't think like people, or act like people.”

Harry clapped him on the shoulder. “If more people thought that way, CAEDIA'd have been founded a lot earlier.”

“OH, that reminds me!” Erin fished something out of a drawer in the table she'd commandeered for her “makeover” and handed it to Harry. “Got this yesterday, from the event inspectors.”

“They were at the site?”

“Showed up after you left. Apart from the whole 'Pam' thing, they've given it the go-ahead—even, ah...” She bade Harry lean in, and whispered something to him that Lloyd couldn't quite catch. He nearly leaned himself, only for Erin to move away from Harry, who nodded. “Lloyd knows there'll be an increase to the difficulty for the paying customers.”

“Does he, now?” Erin grinned. “Well, Lloyd, if one 'Col. Kanzler' shows up for the finale tomorrow, then don't freak out and call Red Crest on the walkie or anything.” She winked. “I'd say more, but...”

“Spoilers.” Lloyd nodded. “I get the picture.”

“That's the spirit.” Erin sighed. “Meanwhile, I get to supervise a glorified sandbox expedition,” she mused. “Got a bag of stuff for the 'junior archaeologists' to find...it's in a drawer in the desk by the door.”

“Was there still a solid state drive in there?” Lloyd chimed in. “No markings on the case, or anything?”

“Yeah,” Erin replied, somewhat confused. “Why?”

It was Harry's turn to sigh. “We pulled it out of Pam this morning. Someone thought it'd be a wonderful idea to install that between her legs instead of the usual hardware.”

His remark left Erin looking perturbed. “A solid state drive? Instead of...”

“Yeah. Found it during the teardown—Lloyd found it, really.” Harry shook his head. “We're bringing it to Adrian's next week, see if we can find anything on it.”

“By this time next week,” Cam added, “Jaromir will probably have lost his license to sell non-sentient humanoid robots, their parts or any software used in their configuration, repair and programming.” Her tone was as nonchalant as if she'd been talking about switching from one brand of household appliance to another. “He might even face arrest, on—”

“Forget it.” Erin held up a hand, signalling her desire to end the conversation. “It sounds way too complicated.”

“Coulda sworn you'd be glad to hear we're cutting ties with him,” Harry mused. “Especially—”

Lloyd tried not to focus on the glare Erin shot at his uncle, or the fact that Harry nearly withered under it. “Point taken.”

“Good.” Erin turned her attention to the mirror again, all tension gone from her voice and posture. “And I am glad, or I will be,” she admitted. “If he gets the book thrown at him.”

A tug at his sleeve drew Lloyd's attention away from the conversation. “We can dispose of the face now, if you want,” Cam reminded him. Noticing Erin's slight revulsion, she clarified: “Lloyd had reservations about reusing Pam's skin and face for another unit—”

“Say no more.” Erin was visibly relieved. “If you really want to wipe that thing off the face of the Earth, I say chuck it in the pit, in the back room.”

“Just be careful,” Harry added. “And let Cam do the throwing.”

Lloyd nodded. “I will, Uncle Harry.”

“The pit” was the one feature of the shop that Lloyd hated—not out of fear, or because of some unfortunate accident on his part, but because of what it represented. Any time a 'bot, whole or in pieces, had to be dropped into “the pit”, it meant that there was zero chance of ever salvaging, repairing or undoing whatever damage had been done. Once a 'bot (or the parts of a 'bot) went into “the pit”, that was it.

The reason being? “The pit” was full of what Harry and the rest of the staff called “piranha juice”. Anything dropped or thrown in—metal, plastic, rubber, silicon—would be completely and utterly nonfunctional, if not outright dissolved, in mere minutes. After the crusher had broken, and once fire proved too impractical a disposal method, Harry and several of his staff had pooled their resources to invest in the stuff—a combination of several acids, kept in a massive tank that, unless specifically being used for disposal, was always locked, and always left undisturbed.

Lloyd let Cam use the unsealer to take the face off of the artificial skin that had, a mere day ago, been Pam's. It was Cam who carried it into the backroom, Lloyd matching her pace step-for-step as they entered. The tank of piranha juice was set against the back wall; the other two walls were lined with tools, old “bones” (the frameworks of 'bots no longer produced in large numbers, but kept for purposes of reference and study), a few choice antiques, and a full-height display case under a tarp. Cam entered the code to unlock the hatch at the top of the tank; as it slowly opened, Lloyd backpedaled to the door.

Cam glanced back at Lloyd, asking—without a hint of irony in her tone: “Would you like to say a few words?”

“I just wish Pam had gotten a chance to, I dunno, exist without being refit and rebuilt so much,” Lloyd admitted. “That she might've been able to at least enjoy existing, even if it was just once.”

Cam paused for a moment, then nodded thoughtfully. “Commencing disposal of—” She stopped, noticing Lloyd looking, for all the world, like he wanted to be anywhere else. With a subtle nod, she held up the face that had once been Pam's and regarded it before whispering: “Goodbye, Pam.”

Lloyd looked up just in time to see the artificial skin arc neatly through the air and land, with a plop, in the tank.

He turned away as soon as the fizzing started, trying his best not to imagine the vibrant, still made-up face being torn apart at some subatomic level by the ravaging acid in the tank—but another sound caught his attention. Cam had made a sort of half-choked gasp, her eyes wide. “My hand,” she murmured. “I think a drop landed on the back, maybe a finger, when it landed.” Her usual stoicism was gone, replaced with what could only be mild panic. “I can feel it burn...”

In an instant, Lloyd was at her side. “Turn it over, don't...just let me take a look.” He was surprised to notice that Cam was trembling slightly; she turned her hand over to reveal a dime-sized hole where a drop of the piranha juice had eaten away at her synthetic skin. The metallic “bones”, motors and wiring were clearly visible through the ragged edges.

“I threw the face in,” Cam stated, her tone almost a whisper. “It wasn't your fault.”

“But this was my idea, I didn't want—”

The feel of Cam's finger against his lips cut off any further protest from Lloyd. “It doesn't hurt,” she murmured. “My sentience hasn't progressed to the point where I feel pain,” she added, but she realised this was not quite true. The way that burning felt was so uncomfortable, it could only be...pain.

Sensing Lloyd's still worried look, she added, “All this is...” She glanced at the hole in the back of her hand for a moment. “...is damage.”

“I'll fix it,” Lloyd assured her. “There's a patch kit in here somewhere, I can fix the hole...more than what we could've done for Pam—”

“She never suffered,” Cam quietly assured him. “She wasn't configured to feel pain, either.”

After a moment's hesitation, Lloyd nodded. “Just sit tight. I'll find that patch kit for you...”

---

As the day wound down into the evening, most of the staff still hadn't returned from the base camp or the dig site for the story the next day. As such, Lloyd had a rare opportunity to enjoy a solitary dinner with his uncle. Cam, despite not needing food, was invited to sit at the table with the pair and partake, at least, in the conversation, if not the meal.

“...so that should cover all of it.” Harry took a bite of the leftover roasted chicken, savouring it before he continued. “I'm pretty sure we won't have any problems tomorrow—phones get checked in at base camp, everyone gets their character backstories before they go in, all that good stuff.” He thrust his fork through another piece of chicken on his plate. “And if anyone does cause any trouble...”

“Red Crest.” Lloyd and Cam recited the phrase almost simultaneously, glancing at each other afterwards; Lloyd was on the verge of laughing at the spontaneity of it, while Cam looked amused—her left hand wisely hidden from Harry's view.

“Exactly.” Harry grinned. “There shouldn't be any reason for it, unless someone flips out and tries to club everyone with a rifle or something.” He scoffed at the thought before taking another bite of chicken.

“You asked me to remind you to call the writer after the event tomorrow,” Cam chimed in.

Harry took a swig from his glass before he replied. “That I did. Except it's not tomorrow.”

“I thought you might want another reminder beforehand,” Cam mused. “In case things get too hectic.”

“If you ever take a middle name, it might have to be 'considerate'.” Harry chuckled. “Thanks for the heads-up, in any case.” He glanced at Lloyd, who'd resumed tucking into the meal before him. “As for you, I thought you might want to, ah, 'volunteer' to disarm the sentries at the dig site tomorrow.”

Lloyd paused, mid-chew. “Hmmh?”

“Don't talk with your mouth full.” Harry waited for Lloyd to swallow.

“..so basically, do what I did on the test run yesterday?”

“Pretty much. Esperanza's had a code-purge run, so GTB won't be an issue. And since you're playing 'Dr. Johnson's headstrong hired guide', it's a nice bit of staying in-character.” Harry leaned back in his chair, sighing. “Just make sure to follow through and actually knock out the sentry, since you never got to that part yesterday.”

“A butt-stroke from your pistol across the head should do it,” Cam added. “If the sentry is still Esperanza, her model has an emergency off-switch at the top of her head. Hitting it will be a nice simulation of knocking her unconscious.”

Lloyd nodded. “And if anyone in the group gets mad about how I knocked her out?”

“She's scripted to try to call for help as soon as you take her gun,” Harry reminded him. “You club her, and the party can go for a stealth entrance. Don't try to railroad 'em on it, though—just kinda hint that you can get 'em all in quietly.”

“Got it.”

“Good. And remember—be supportive, but not too supportive.” Harry gestured at Lloyd with his fork. “Try not to hog all the spotlight from the paying customers,” he added. “They're the ones running through it, after all. But if they ask for your help, give it. Unless you're dead—in-character, obviously.” He grinned.

“The odds of that happening are incredibly low,” Cam added. “You shouldn't have any problems.”

“I hope not,” Lloyd replied.

---

By 8:30 PM, the rest of the staffers had returned, and were all talking with Harry (and, occasionally, with Cam) about the next day's event before one last, formal meeting was called. Emergency plans were discussed (nobody expected to have to roll out any, but it never hurt to prep), the script outline was read over, and the basic timeline of how events were supposed to play out was run through one final time. Erin, fully decked-out in her outfit for supervising the Junior Archaeologists' activities at the base camp, was among the staffers present, and added her own recommendations for anyone who might have to handle issues back at the camp.

When the lecture concluded, everyone went their own way—some for a late dinner, some to go run final checks on the 'bots in the shop, and some to converse in private. Harry went off to check the answering machine, while Erin and Cam had their own conversation about how they expected things to go. The incident at “the pit” wasn't brought up.

Lloyd, meanwhile, had decided to turn in early for the night—Erin had suggested he be ready for a 5:30 AM wakeup call and a Jeep ride to the camp to meet with “Dr. Johnson” and the rest of the party.

After a quick shower and the rest of his nightly routine out of the way, Lloyd lay in bed, pondering the story and his role in it. From what he'd heard, the party had carried out other parts of the story at a university and a library—whatever happened at the base camp and the dig site would be the grand finale. Thus far, they hadn't run into any problems.

If all went well, the end of the event would be just as worry-free.

As he drifted off to sleep, Lloyd tried to keep his mind focused on the story—even as brief flashes of what he'd seen and bene through over the day seemed to swim through his focus. Diana's ambulatory test, the brief run-in with Mandy outside of the Reclamation office, seeing Diana and the other gynoids lined up in the shop, the hole in Cam's hand...

Lloyd rolled over, already starting to yawn. Hopefully, there'd be no need to run to the laundry room at 5:30 AM again.

The last thing to cross his mind before he entered into the fullness of his nightly sleep was the thought of Pam, the day before—eyes crossed, mouth agape. That unfortunate image was soon displaced by Cam's gentle reminder to him: “She never suffered.”

What might've been a mumbled “I hope not” left Lloyd's lips as he fell asleep.

---

The 'bots in the shop stood, motionless, as they'd been since being delivered from the camp and dig site. In a few hours, they'd be loaded onto trucks, brought to the dig site and activated, to carry out the scripts they'd been given for the story Harry and his staff would run.

Diana, in her “uniform” and beret, looked every bit the imposing leader she was written to be.

Being non-sentient, none of them had any thought processes running as the minutes ticked by. None of them thought, or wondered, or dreamed as the night wore on.

None of them had any sense of curiosity, or capability to self-activate.

All the better, considering what was happening in a desk drawer by the door.

Unbeknownst to any of the gynoids in the shop—or to Harry Morgan, Lloyd Watson or anyone going to bed or already asleep in the ranch house—the solid state drive Lloyd had spotted and removed from Pam was, in fact, active. Not writing or reading, but sending—one signal, a simple, repeated burst, to a location across the ocean.

Adrian Reese had been halfway right: Lloyd had made a good decision by not throwing the drive away.

Had he handed it over to the proper authorities, the remainder of that December may have been significantly calmer...

Chapter 3.5

CONTENT ADVISORY: mild self-harm (gynoid)

NOTE: All dialogue before the line "English." is spoken in Russian. You're getting the subtitles. :mrgreen:

Somewhere in Russia

The first thing Jaromir Dezhnyov realized, as he picked himself up off of the floor of his office, was that he had to make a phone call and apologize.

Every time he blacked-out, it happened: he'd wake up on the floor—usually his own, though hospital beds and jail cell bunks weren't uncommon—and find a note from his secretary. Invariably, said note would be a page-long, with both the front and back covered in the explanation of who he'd screamed at before the red mist descended and he tried to trash his office. The call would be made (or scheduled), and then the cleanup would begin.

Apparently, someone had beaten him to the second part already.

The women who were picking up the various items Jaromir had thrown around his office were all dressed identically in form-fitting uniforms—short-sleeved, cut off at the knees and with skirts that did more to accentuate their figures than anything else. What he'd initially thought was the surging sound of his own blood moving through his veins was, in fact, quiet whirring, emanating from the mysterious cleaning ladies. Two of them were engaged in the act of repairing the blonde gynoids (Jaromir had never bothered giving the pair names—his payroll officially listed them as “the Beauties”) so often seen in the commercials for Jaromir's services; one had the entire front of her torso removed, the other was missing her entire back.

“What....” Talking hurt. He must've really gone overboard this time.

The cleaning crew didn't seem to mind the fact that the owner of the office was just recovering from a brief spell of unconsciousness. Jaromir had never figured out why extreme anger caused him, for the briefest of moments, to lapse into screaming fits and enact physical violence on the nearest inanimate object before blacking out. He'd seen doctors about it, and had been given varying diagnoses: tumours on the brain, pressure on certain lobes, esoteric genetic quirks, the unhappy result of being born under a hunter's moon....the list went on.

Whatever the case, he knew he had an apology to make.

None of the cleaning ladies (even with the audible actuator whirrs emanating from them, Jaromir couldn't bring himself to call them “things”) got in the way as he staggered to the door. He noticed, as he tried to avoid lurching like a hungover fool, that all of them nodded politely as he passed.

Another woman was sitting in the small lobby outside of Jaromir's office; the cleaning ladies were attractive (for gynoids, of course), but this one...either she was a specimen of exquisite physical health and conditioning, or she—like the team currently cleaning Jaromir's office—had been designed to be as appealing as possible.

“...welcome!” he found himself stating, smiling—and instantly regretting it; he must've bashed his jaw on something as he'd fallen to the floor. “My services are yours, comrade—”

“I should hope so.” The woman shifted ever so slightly in her seat, her leather pants invitingly hugging her curves. “You are Jaromir Ivanovich Dezhnyov, yes?”

“I am.” Jaromir nodded. “To what do I owe this honour—”

“You called.” The woman rose from her chair, looking almost like a goddess in black leather and silk. “My team was sent to assist you. I understand you have a grievance with a foreigner?”

Jaromir winced—and not just because of the pain in his jaw. He'd always feared this would happen: the anger would hit him, he'd call in “a favour” and consign some poor client (or ex-client) to uncertain doom at the hands of a hit squad. “I may have, ah, been premature in my judgement,” he admitted.

The woman ignored him, focusing on her fingernails. “What is your current employment, Comrade Dezhnyov?”

Jaromir frowned at the question. His “employment” was effectively self-employment; he was technically a middleman to robotics suppliers, what with his own warehouse barely having even half its capacity for “inventory” at any given time of the year. Most of his own stock came from others—Pam, the unit Harry had called him about, had been sold to him (and resold; he had the records to prove it) at least twice before she ended up in Harry's inventory. His repair specialists, technicians and the like rarely, if ever, called him to report anything unusual with their work. They'd built a reputation for getting things done ahead of schedule, even if it meant cutting a few corners here and there.

If Harry's call was accurate, as Jaromir suspected it was, this wasn't just another case of “cutting a few corners”.

“Comrade Dezhnyov?” The woman was regarding Jaromir with an impatient stare.

“I am in the business of robotics reselling, wholesale redistribution and supply.” Jaromir tried to draw himself up, to look proud of himself, but he still ached from his post-tirade collapse. “I have contacts all over the world.”

The woman frowned. “When is the last time you conducted business outside of this city, in-person?”

The question deflated any efforts by Jaromir to keep his bruised ego afloat. “Two years ago,” he muttered. “There was a robotics convention in—”

“How many other customers have complained about the services you have provided?”

Again, the woman seemed to be doing her best to deflate any efforts on Jaromir's part to ease tension. “I do not keep track of such calls,” he admitted. “They are a cause of great stress to me.” He nearly mentioned the fact that “causes of great stress” were connected to his all-too-frequent blackouts, but from the way the woman was staring at him, he knew she wouldn't care all that much. “I have others to make records of customer contacts.”

“Where?”

“Ah...” Jaromir glanced around, before remembering that his own records of employee contacts were in a locked desk drawer, in his office. “The book is in my office. If I may—”

“It will be retrieved later.”

A number of questions rose to the forefront of Jaromir's mind, the first and foremost of which was “who are you?” He had no memory of ever receiving any phone number that would've summoned this woman and her cleanup crew of female robots to his office. He'd never been owed favours by anyone in seats of power, nor had he done any particularly great service to the Motherland. The only thing that came anywhere close was a brief business partnership with a company affiliated with Björn Aaberg, which had ended disasterously on both sides; he had a feeling the woman was allied with far greater forces than a fugitive ex-arms dealer.

“There is something you wish to ask, Comrade?”

“I was merely wondering,” Jaromir replied, slightly unsettled that the woman still had her gaze locked onto him—such a prospect would normally be reason to break out the drinks, but any illusions of this being a “social visit” had long since been shattered. “Why are you here to provide assistance to me, of all people?”

“My employer believes you can provide useful serivces in the long-term. What the Americans call a quid pro quo, if you will.” The woman gave the barest hint of a smirk.

“But you expect something more,” Jaromir finished, “than 'useful services'.”

“The transcript of your call also mentions a solid state hard drive.” There was something in the woman's tone that made it clear that this was the prime reason for her “visit”. “Is the drive in question still in your possession?”

For a moment, Jaromir was confused—until he remembered. Harry had mentioned a solid state drive installed in a 'bot he'd been sold—in the pelvis, of all places. Had he really been angry enough to rave about that, when he'd called this woman and her cleaners? “I do not have the drive,” he stated, speaking slowly to avoid further agitating the pain he still felt in his jaw. “It was reported to me by, ah, an ex-client—”

“That drive,” the woman stated, “should not have left this country.”

Now, Jaromir was completely confused. “What?”

“It was delivered—or perhaps, 'gifted', to you, by mistake,” the woman continued, slowly walking up to Jaromir as she spoke. “I can assure you, Comrade Deznhyov, that whoever 'gave' you that solid state drive had no right to present it to you in any fashion. That drive...” She was at arms length from him, now, pacing in a slow circle around the beleaguered salesman. “...is the property of a very important individual.”

“And...who would that be?” Jaromir knew little about the current governmental situation in Russia; if the SSD was part of some kind of grand political game, he wanted nothing to do with it.

“That,” the woman replied, tracing a finger across Jaromir's shoulder blades as she paced behind him, “will be revealed in due time.” She drew her finger up—the nail bit, ever so slightly, into Jaromir's shoulder. “I have been asked to find out what happened to the drive, to recover it and to punish those responsible for its theft.” Something about how she spoke the word “punish” sounded entirely too harsh—every other word had flowed together like poetry from her lips, whereas “punish” seemed like stone against stone.

There was also that other word, at the end—“its theft”—to consider.

“And how may I be of service in that endeavour?” Jaromir asked. He had no idea who this woman was, or who might've employed her, but he knew, above all else, that he had no desire to be on her bad side.

Now, she was standing before him again. “Locate the drive, so that I can supervise its recovery.”

Though her tone was still normal, the words once again velvety smooth, Jaromir knew this woman's intent was far more sinister than simply flying out to Harry's ranch house, asking him to return the drive and then leaving. “That may, ah, take some time,” he muttered, his words half-slurred—not entirely an affectation, given that he was still feeling the aftereffects of his latest rage-induced blackout and subsequent tumble. “I need to consult—”

“There is no time.” The woman took another step forward, not a single hair out of place. “We must move quickly to recover the drive.”

Even if Harry had lambasted him in their last phone conversation, Jaromir couldn't simply hand him over to this woman, to meet an uncertain fate. There was a faint tinge of malice in her words, her very posture; there could be no doubt in Jaromir's mind that if he simply led her to him, Harry and those who knew him would suffer for it. Yes, Harry had called him out over the phone—and probably not without good reason—but to leave his fate to this woman, who undoubtedly had violence on her mind...

“Pariello.”

The woman stared at him. “What did you—”

“Robert Pariello.” Harry had spoken of him a few times, always in the negative. “He may know where the drive is.”

The woman continued to stare at Jaromir for a moment—and as he watched, his eyes never leaving hers, a change took place. This wasn't a “calm one minute, snarling the next” kind of change, as he'd seen in that one movie about a ring; it was something that let him know, in mere seconds, that any further deception on his part would be met with sudden, decisive violence. The change wasn't in the woman's face, or her voice, or even her posture.

This sudden, terrifying change was in her eyes.

What had once been white turned solid gold. The irises went from an icy blue to jet black. The pupils became silver, like dots of hard light. The subtle, minimal whirrs that accompanied these were almost inaudible. Almost.

Those eyes—Jaromir couldn't call them ocular receptors, even if they were—seemed to bore into Jaromir's own.

“If you are lying to me,” the woman stated, her tone as calm and clear as if she were discussing how to move a piece of furniture from one room to another, “this building will be your tomb in twenty-four hours.”

“I give you my word. Robert Pariello knows where the drive is.”

The woman stared, her expression unchanging. “We shall soon see,” she murmured, “what price can be put on your word, Comrade Deznhyov.” Again, her eyes changed—the gold went back to white; the black seemed to “freeze” into blue, and the pupils returning to their usual state. Without another word, the woman turned on her heel and walked away. “You will have no problems staying here until I return.”

Jaromir frowned; what should've been a question had been phrased, instead, as a demand.

“Food and drink will be brought to you, if you need them,” the woman continued, without looking back at Jaromir. “My associates will tend to any other needs you may have, as well.”

The mention of “other needs” would've been cause for celebration, were it not for the feeling in Jaromir's gut that a simple refusal of such offers would, in all probability, end very badly for him. The entire situation felt as if his life had taken a bizarre detour, and he had no idea how to return it to its intended course.

“How am I to contact you again,” he called out—hating how weak he sounded—“if I have new information?”

“I will contact you. My team will give you a number.” The woman's hand was on the door leading out. “Any calls you receive from that number will either be from myself, or my employer. If the line is silent, ask for Zina. If you are asked to speak in English, then do so.”

The rather bizarre request left Jaromir even more confused—and disturbed—than before. “I will.”

“Expect a call from the number provided in seven hours. Tell none of your family or associates of this meeting.”

With that, the woman walked out the door and out of Jaromir's office...but not out of Jaromir's life. He knew, with a fatalistic certainty, that she would return; any phone conversations between the two would be only the beginning of this strange, surreal new working partnership the Russian had found himself in.

Whirs from behind him, and a slender hand on his shoulder, cut into Jaromir's grim inner monologue. “Is there anything I can help you with, Comrade?” The voice, artificial-sounding though it was, had a sweetness to its timbre; the face had a vaguely Asian cast to the features, looking like a pop idol literally designed by committee to be as aesthetically pleasing to the masses as possible. Her pastel green hair clashed rather severely with her form-fitting, austere uniform; her Russian was flawless, with no trace of an accent.

Jaromir sighed, consigning himself to a fate that was out of his hands. “A drink would be nice.”

---

Within the backseat of her armoured limousine, the gynoid known only as Zina held out one hand, palm upwards. Her expression never changed as she methodically pealed the synthetic flesh away at the base of her hand, drawing out a cable and jack. Even in the low light of the limo's interior, she had no need to feel around aimlessly for the socket; the fully-extended cable was plugged in, and the divider screen at the far end of the passenger's section of the limo seemed to darken even more...save for a pair of eyes.

As her own eyes had briefly become, these were black and gold—but organic, compared to the lenses, apertures and micro-actuators of her own ocular sensors. The black had gone a murky dark grey; the white, a foggy pearl. Only the gold was still vibrant, shot through as it was with spidery, dark red lines. A single, harsh word was uttered: “English.”

“I have made contact with Jaromir Deznhyov.” Zina's English was clear, calm and spoken with the barest hint of a Russian accent. “He does not have the solid state drive.”

“Then we must focus our efforts on where the drive was sent.” The voice on the other end of the line was old—almost impossibly old, in fact, and underscored by the faint hums, beeps and various other sounds one might associate with life support machinery. A steady, bellows-like pumping, almost in rhythm with a typical human's breath rate, served as an eerie metronome. “Were you able to access his records before you left?”

“The cleanup team performed the task.” Another “window” flared into existence on the divider, Zima's eyes tracing down the list of names and cities. “The drive is in North America, within the United States, specifically.”

“The land of the free,” the rasping, almost croaking voice spat. “A country I last set foot in almost five years ago, when my empire was on the verge of complete victory...a land I was banished from. If my understanding is correct, five new states have been added to their 'More Perfect Union' since last I resided there, have they not?”

“They have.” Yet another window appeared on the divider. “Jefferson, New Columbia, Franklin—”

“Extraneous. We need only find out where the drive was sent.”

Zina's eyes continued scrolling down the list of Jaromir's clients. Predictably, the name “Pariello, Robert” wasn't on that list...but one “Morgan, Harry” was.

“You know I despise long silences, Zina. What have you discovered?”

“The last call Comrade Deznhyov received before we were summoned to his office by the intercept was from one Harry Morgan,” the gynoid calmly stated. “The transcript mentions a solid state drive installed within a gynoid...” She frowned. “...where a sexual hardware package would usually be.”

The voice on the other end of the line snorted. “Of course. The sniveling toad who stole the drive thought to keep it from us by subterfuge. Where does this Harry Morgan live?”

“Billings—formerly of Montana, now of Jefferson.”

“So the 'Big Sky Country' was among those to be divided up...interesting.” A low, rumbling chuckle sounded through the limo's speakers. “Though many of my resources in that land were either seized or destroyed, there are still some reserves that were never decommissioned.”

A fourth window opened. “Two of the Franklin-manufactured robots are—”

“Fembots, my dear Zina. The late Dr. Franklin was a purveyor of fembots, not mere 'robots'.”

Zina frowned, but nodded. “Two of the Franklin fembots are still in our possession within the United States.”

“First employed in the 2010s, in Silicon Valley. I remember the campaign well.” Another chuckle. “Of the whole lot, they were the only two not destroyed, reprogrammed or taken into custody by the accursed Artificial Lifeform Protection Agency when all was said and done.”

Zina arched an eyebrow. “They are called ALPHA, now. The Allied League for the Protection of Humans and Androids.”

A short, harsh, barking laugh would've severely rattled any human in the limo's backseat. “Of course, they wait until my defeat to finally rename themselves. How inconsiderate.”

Zina quickly steered the conversation back to the original topic: “Can the Franklin fembots be deployed to Billings soon?”

“They may be in considerable disrepair...but they most definitely will reach the state of Jefferson well before Christmas Day...” A cough punctuated the sentence, followed by another; Zina waited patiently for her employer's brief bout of wheezing to finish—she was, to date, one of the man's last links to the outside world, and viewed him with the respect typically shown by a daughter to her own father.

“....DAMN this wicked, frail flesh! I would trade seven hundred lifetimes to exist in a body of silicon and steel rather than this feeble, withering husk!”

“We will find a way,” Zina promised. “Once the drive is recovered...”

“I would prefer to find the pathetic pissant who stole the drive, after it has been returned to me. Once the feckless thief has been punished to the fullest extent, and the drive is secured, my search for a method to halt and even reverse the failing of my own flesh will continue.” In the silence that followed, Zina's employer shouted something to an individual in the same room. “...could possibly be a cache left over from the days before my grand design was dragged to the ground and stamped upon, within this new state known as Jefferson.”

“A cache?” Zina echoed.

“Arms, hard currency and possibly even an operative—artificial, of course; the fickle masses of humanity in my employ had a disturbing tendency for either betrayal, arrest or failure in their objectives.” Another short laugh sounded through the speakers. “Fortune smiles upon us, dear Zina. We have one operative in storage within the borders of Jefferson—an operative still on the re-fabrication tables within our home base!”

Zina scowled—she knew the operative all too well. “She is far too unstable to be deployed.”

“She is the only available operative currently in the state. The Franklin fembots are still dormant in Silicon Valley, if they followed their programming and went into hiding upon my own defeat. The drive could be wiped, or in the hands of our enemies, by the time they arrive, and I will not allow that to happen!”

Despite her reservations, Zina nodded. “I will—”

“I will send the activation signal, and provide her with her orders. Unless the situation changes for the worse, you are to remain here. As it stands, the re-fabricator is dangerously low on resources—recreating our stateside agent, should fate be unkind, will use up far too many of them. Dare I say, it might already be difficult, if not impossible, to rebuild or repair you, should fate similarly turn aside from us.”

“I understand.” For the first time in the conversation, Zina's voice had dropped to a reverent murmur. “And I apologize.”

“The fault is not yours to amend, dearest Zina. As of now, you are all that remains of what I might call a 'family'.”

A long, rasping sigh issued from the speakers. “I suppose our stateside agent should be awakened from her slumber...”

---

Laurel, Jefferson

Within an otherwise nondescript storage unit, a signal reached a person-sized vertical crate.

AUTHENTICATING CODE: ########## PROCESSING..... PROCESSING..... PROCE—

CODE AUTHENTICATED ACTIVATION AUTHORIZED

The lid of the crate hissed, splitting into four pieces that fell, noisily, to the concrete floor. Any human being left inside would've surely been dead by now, from a number of causes.

The figure that emerged from the crate, of course, wasn't human—just a very well-designed simulation of one.

Her attire had been chosen—poorly—before her initial “packaging”; anyone who might've opened the door of the unit would've mistaken her for a prostitute in her thigh-high stockings, knee-high boots, plaid miniskirt, crop top and torn-up mesh “gloves”. Her makeup and hair were similarly “tarty”: bright red lipstick, entirely too much blush and eyeshadow, and blonde pigtails all combined to give her some lingering vestiges of “cute”.

Anyone with an intimate knowledge of her mental state would soon discover just how inaccurate those vestiges were.

The blonde smiled, not bothered in the least by the chill inside the storage unit, the fact that she was barely dressed to look like she belonged outside in the winter, or that she'd just been reactivated inside of a dark storage unit without any plausible explanation. She knew, at the very least, that the explanation would be forthcoming. Hopefully, it meant that she'd get to do what she was built for.

Even better, it might mean—

“Confirm activation, verbal response.”

The harsh, rasping voice in her aural sensors did little to faze the blonde. “Is that any way to say 'hi' after you made me wait so long to get out of that box?” she teased.

“I see your personality is as obnoxious as ever,” the voice grumbled.

“And hello to you, too—”

“The title you remember me by has since been discarded, as have all prior contingencies. I have activated you under the most extreme of circumstances.”

The blonde planted her hands on her shapely hips. “Do I actually get to hurt anyone this time?”

A low, wheezing growl sounded in her ears. “I am starting to think Zina was right about you.”

“Your latest toy?” the blonde beamed. “Maybe you can send her to finish off whoever you want me after!”

“You should hope, for your own sake, that I do not have to send her to clean up any mess you make!”

The blonde blew a raspberry. “You're no fun.”

“....I am effectively chained to a bed,” the voice in the blonde's ear hissed, “with more tubes going into and out of me than I can count at this moment, with every single one of my internal organs aided in their necessary action by devices that depend on electricity, if not common batteries, to operate, and with my every vital bodily function monitored and controlled by machines acquired at great expense from area hospitals. I might ask you to forgive me for not allowing 'fun' to be ANYWHERE NEAR THE TOP OF MY LIST OF PRIORITIES AT THIS PARTICULAR MOMENT!”

“So you're dying,” the blonde replied, barely waiting for the voice in her ear to stop coughing before she spoke. “Want me to fix that, too?”

“I am ordering you,” the voice in her ear growled, “to find what was stolen from me and return it.”

“That, I can do.” The gynoid beamed. “What exactly am I looking for—”

Her eyes glowed for a moment, as the image of the item in question appeared within her field of view.

“A solid state drive. No manufacturer's mark, no serial number. Currently believed to be in the possession of either a Mr. Robert Pariello or a Mr. Harry Morgan. The contents of that drive are irreplaceable and invaluable.”

“Do I get to have my fun once I get the drive?”

“As long as the drive is returned to me, you are free to pursue any option your programming allows to accomplish that objective.”

The blonde giggled. “I was hoping you'd say that...”

“Acquire any resources you need as discreetly as possible, and do your best to preserve your own self while obtaining the drive. The re-fabricator on this end is low on resources—”

The blonde groaned. “Way to be a killjoy. Maybe I want to go out in a blaze of glory!”

A light cough was the only reply she received.

“Just point me towards that stupid solid state drive,” the blonde sighed. “I'll get it back to you before—”

“Need I remind you that subtlety is a vital part of conducting your operations? A 'blaze of glory', by its very nature, runs counter to the entire idea—”

“That's the best part!” the blonde squealed. “I still remember all the past times I was bricked, wrecked and ruined, all the sensations...” The smile on her face was almost dreamy—a clear sign that Zina's analysis of her “instability” was entirely on-point. “Oh, I just can't decide which is better—causing damage, or being damaged!”

The voice in her ear was far less enthusiastic: “Being damaged will more than likely lead to a failure to retrieve the drive.”

“Oh, you'll get your stinky old solid state drive,” the blonde beamed, spinning on one foot as if she were dancing. “I just want to do what I do best.”

“What, if anything, you 'do best' is irrelevant. Retrieve the drive—”

“And send it back, I know.” The blonde groaned, pacing the storage unit and pulling away tarps, blankets and old clothes to look for anything that might prove useful in her search. “Ooh, a nine-iron! I wonder if it'd fit in my pu—”

“See to it that you are not distracted by your self-destructive tendencies. Billings is close by. You should begin—”

“Oh, wow!” The blonde practically skipped across the storage unit. “This air pistol would make a great flechette gun with the right modifications!”

The voice in her ear groaned. “...I suppose I should requisition repairs to be carried out on those Franklin fembots, wherever they might be. As technologically outdated as they are, they know how to follow orders without question—and lack your desire to tear themselves apart for their own gratification.”

“You're just jealous because you don't like pain.” The blonde stuck her tongue out, not caring that she was alone.

“If your experiences with pain were anything like mine,” the voice in her ears muttered, “you would be considerably less enthusiastic about inflicting it upon yourself.”

“Are all organics as depressing as you are?”

“I am not 'all organics', you insolent mechanical fool! I am—”

“My master, controller and legal owner, blah, blah, blah.”

“You would do well to heed my orders, Dominika. It was I who activated you ,and I who—“

“That name sucks. I wanna be...” The blonde tapped her chin, lost in thought, before gasping in delight. “Lexi!”

“....'Lexi'?!”

“It just fits, y'know?” Lexi—having already set her self-designation to reflect her newly-chosen name—was still dancing around the storage unit, finding new and exciting implements with which to carry out her orders. “Maybe I'll get to burn something this time....or crash a car through something! I got shut off before I could drive anything last time...”

“I should've listened to Zina,” the voice in Lexi's ear groaned. “Reactivating you has already proven to be tiresome.”

“Oh, Zina can cram it. She's not here, is she?” Lexi pulled at another tarp, mildly annoyed when it didn't immediately fall away. “Stupid piece of...”

“Acquire your supplies later. Time is of the essence in this mission—”

“THERE we go!” Lexi gave the tarp a final yank, sending something crashing down—not on top of her head, much to her disappointment. “So much for....” Her mouth locked into an “O” of surprise, followed by an overjoyed smile.

“...oh, what fresh Hell...”

The newly-uncovered stainless-steel cabinet had been locked, well before Lexi herself had been put into storage, but the gynoid paid no heed to the programming suites dedicated to lockpicking that had been installed in her memory. Her approach relied far more on brute force, grabbing the handles and pulling, with all her strength. “If I can't open it,” she gasped, “I can at least blow a coolant line or two! That'll be—”

The doors flew open, sending her to the floor with a yelp.

“I suppose any further remarks on my part will be insufficient to convince you of how important it is to GET GOING, what with your unseemly preoccupation with your own destruction and your desire to tear this blasted storage unit apart to find anything that might provide 'more fun', in your twisted view.”

Lexi was too busy laughing with absolute glee to reply.

With the doors of the cabinet having been torn off their hinges by the gynoid's inhuman strength, the lethal contents held within were revealed: seven rifles, six pistols, a belt loaded with throwing knives, plenty of ammunition for each of the firearms, a machete, a combat knife and a box that turned out to be loaded with thin, stainless titanium spikes.

“Those were meant to be used by multiple agents, not squandered on one single operation.”

“I'm not taking all of it...” Lexi's eyes practically shone as she looked over the weapons.

“Take only what you need. Leave the rest for any other operatives I may send.”

The blonde gynoid licked her lips as she opened the box of throwing spikes. “I'm definitely taking these.” She retrieved one from the container, holding it up...and sliding it into her left wrist, point-first. Her eyes crossed, and her knees nearly buckled as she slid the spike in further, but eventually it stopped sliding in—conveniently, just at the point where her synthetic flesh closed around the blunted end. A low, sensual moan left her lips, slowly becoming a laugh.

“Focus. This needless behaviour of yours—”

Lexi ignored the command, sliding another spike into her right wrist. Her moaning got louder, and she nearly went to the floor in a kneel before the blunted end was hidden by the synth-skin. “...oh, that one got me a little wet!”

The disgusted noise sounding in her ear cut off any further descriptions of how she was feeling. “Enough of this. Take your supplies, find a method of transport to get you into Billings, and retrieve that solid state drive! I do not need to remind you what will happen should you fail to achieve your objective!”

“Hmmm, I dunno,” Lexi taunted. “I'm in the mood for a little dirty talk, right about now—”

“LEAVE THE STORAGE UNIT AT ONCE AND RETREIVE THE DRIVE, OR I SHALL HAVE YOU TORN LIMB FROM LIMB, YOUR PROCESSORS CRUSHED, AND YOUR ENDOSKELETAL FRAME MELTED DOWN AND TURNED INTO A PAPERWEIGHT!”

The intended threat made Lexi shiver. “...you really know how to sweet-talk a girl,” she giggled. “I'll get your solid state drive...but first...” She paused, listening; outside, footsteps were approaching the storage unit. Faint traces of words and sentences could be discerned—apparently, the new arrivals were under the impression that someone was breaking into a unit, instead of preparing to break out of one. “...I think I'm gonna get a little action in.”

“NO. Indiscriminate killing will only attract attention—”

“So you want a few randos to call in a report about a blonde bombshell locked in a storage unit, all alone?”

“...fine.” The word was almost spat out, the speaker's contempt dripping over its sole syllable. “But make it QUICK.”

“Oh, I'll be quick.” Lexi's tongue played over her teeth. “Hear you later!”

---

Somewhere in Russia

“My dear Zina, I believe it would be in our best interests to expedite the delivery of the Franklin fembots to Billings.”

Zina resisted the urge to sigh. “Dominika is already causing problems?”

“'Lexi', as she prefers to be called, is more unstable than you predicted. If worse comes to worse, we may have to remove her from the re-fabrication cycle.”

At this, Zina leaned back in her seat, her eyes closed. So much for a simple, efficient operation....

Chapter 4

Lloyd grit his teeth, doing his best to project the idea that he had, in fact, been shot in the leg and was in pain from a bullet wound that was nothing more than a hole blown into his pants leg, rather than his leg.

The story had played out expertly. From his disabling of Esperanza while seizing her weapon (thankfully, she hadn't started dancing when he got too close) to the shocking betrayal of the Artemis Pact by Col. Rudolf Kanzler, it had all gone like a wonderfully-written movie. Even the end had been spectacular: “Dr. Dallas Johnson” and her apprentice, “Sadie” (in reality, a History major and her girlfriend—both wonderful people, in and out of character) had seized the Eternity Glaive, and the resulting energy “knocked out” every Pact member, while Diana—having already been shot “dead”—was able to “muster up” one last bit of energy to rise from where she lay to shoot Kanzler in the back, putting him down for good. “Dallas” and “Sadie” had left, promising to return and ensure that “Kyle Carson” (Lloyd, of course) was tended to by U.S. Army field medics once the Glaive was stored away.

All that was left now....

A groan from Lloyd's right cut off his reverie; Kanzler was rising to a sitting position. “It vould seem,” he muttered, “zat ze guut Doktor hass left.”

Not exactly sure of what to say, Lloyd grunted a quick “He has.”

The colonel let out a slow hiss of breath, peeling off his left glove. “In zat case...”

Lloyd turned, hoping that he wouldn't have to engage in a one-on-one fistfight with the “German officer”—and watched as the man reached up to the dueling scar over his left eye and yanked it off in one swift motion. “Haaah,” he breathed, “that stings! The packaging said 'easy on, easy off'—serves me right for buying it at a pop-up Halloween shop.”

More confused than anything, Lloyd stopped acting like he'd been shot.

Noting his confusion, the ersatz Col. Kanzler—his German accent having disappeared along with the “scar”—chuckled. “Guess I owe you an explanation.” He held out a hand. “Clifford Barba, I'm an old friend of Harry's.”

Lloyd shook his hand. “Lloyd Watson. Harry's nephew.”

“He's said a lot of good things—we don't have to keep sitting in the dirt, y'know.” Clifford motioned for Lloyd to stand. “A lot of good things about you,” he continued. “You did pretty well out here—not too in the way, not too much off in the background. I'd say 8.5 out of 10.”

“Not a perfect ten?”

Clifford rolled his eyes. “When you threw your rifle behind you, after I shot the leader of the Pact. Word of advice? That thing could've rotored and hit the leads in the legs. As it stands, all you did was trip one of the 'bots.”

Lloyd felt his face go red—he'd been so “in the moment” when Kanzler had shot Diana that he'd let his emotion get the better of him, no-look throwing his rifle behind him with one hand as he sprinted to catch up with “Dallas”. “That was my bad,” he murmured. “I just...”

“Happens to the best of us, kid. Caught up in the rush, the script stops being a script. At least it wasn't a sword.” Clifford clapped Lloyd on the shoulder. “Guess we should start with the cleanup, then.” he mused. Downed 'bots were all over the quarry; most had been “knocked out” by the Glaive's retrieval, with only a few having been “shot”.

“A lot of work for just us,” Lloyd mused.

“True, but fortunately, it won't just be the two of us.” Clifford let out a whistle before calling out “LET'S GO TO WORK!”

A low rumble sounded at the far edge of the quarry; as Lloyd watched, several trucks drove into view, as well as a pair of 18-wheeler cabs towing empty RAS (Retrieval And Storage) trailers. These latter two were fitted with two-story tall blocks, each holding an upright “tray” imprinted with the vague shape of a human form.

“Always helps to have backup on call,” Clifford grinned. “Shall we? Oh, and try to mark where you were laying—for continuity, when they get back.”

“Right.” Lloyd remembered Harry's lecture on “maintaining continuity” that morning.

The pair made their way to the ladder leading up to the second level of the quarry; the inhabitants of the trucks—all in coveralls and hard hats, looking like a generic construction crew instead of Harry's trusted event staff—had descended into the “dig site” with tools and scanners in hand. “Shouldn't be any major damage to report,” Clifford mused, shucking off the “World War II German officer's” coat he'd been wearing. “You can leave that for now—it's on loan from a friend of a friend who had a cache of spare uniforms from a musical, that one with all the Eidelweiss-ing.” He passed by a pair of downed 'bots (Lloyd recognized one as Sienna, who'd failed to let go of Harry's rifle during the test run despite a Full Stop shutdown two days prior). “The most repairs they'll need'll be cosmetic—damage from the charges in their clothes, scrapes and scuffs, that kinda thing” Cliff explained.

“So none of them fell and bashed their heads on rocks?” Lloyd inquired.

“If they did, that's why we have the RAS rigs.” Clifford nodded up to the trailers. “Pack 'em onto those, send 'em back to the shop and they can get fixed up there.”

Before he could reply, Lloyd felt his breath catch in his throat. Diana was sprawled out on the dirt, still resting where she'd fallen after being “killed” by Kanzler during the story. She'd definitely gone out in dramatic fashion; she'd let out a breathless gasp, one hand drifting to the “wound”, before sinking to one knee and then falling, gracefully, backwards, her eyes closing. Whoever had scripted her reaction to being shot had decided to milk the moment for all it was worth; even her brief return to “life”—sitting up and aiming just high enough to put a bullet in Kanzler's back—was steeped in high melodrama. The image of the Mauser falling from her hand as she fell back still resonated in Lloyd's mind.

“I'm sensing a connection between the two of you,” Clifford mused.

Lloyd felt himself turn red again. “She's a new purchase, actually. Uncle Harry bought her just this week.”

“Nice! She's a—what's that company name? I can never remember.” Clifford snapped his fingers a few times, trying to recall Diana's manufacturer. “Heart-something, I want to say. Not Heart-tainment, I'm thinking of Oystertainment—very weird name, but great seafood. And floor shows, too—very tasteful, pun not intended. If you're ever outside of Boston, give it a look. ANYway, what was it, it's on the tip of my tongue...”

“Heartelligence?” Lloyd offered.

Clifford nodded emphatically. “That was it. Love their logo. But yeah, she's one of theirs. 2020 model, if I recall.”

“New-old stock,” Lloyd replied. “A lot better than...” He almost said “Pam”, but after remembering all the chaos that had ensued in the stricken gynoid's final moments, and the problems with her teardown and even the disposal of her face, decided that it'd be better to consign her name to the past. “Better than some of the old models we've had.”

“Your uncle has chosen wisely.” Clifford nodded. “Love the uniform choice by the way—riding jacket, parade dress slacks and a nice white shirt all say 'military, but not too military'.” He nearly commented on her beret, but let the remark fade; Lloyd was approaching the fallen gynoid at an almost reverent pace.

“She was incredible,” he murmured. He knelt by Diana's side, marvelling at how serene she looked, even in “death”.

“And she'll be incredible at the next event,” Clifford reminded him, “once we get her back to your uncle's so he can wipe the script and start clean.”

The mention of “the next event” was enough to snap Lloyd out of his morbid semi-mourning. “Right.” He coughed lightly as he stood. “She had a good death scene. Really good.” He decided not to mention the fact that he'd almost cried when he saw Diana drop to the ground.

“One of the perks of having a great writer. We should probably get her on her feet,” Cliff mused. “Wouldn't really make sense to send her back on the RAS.” He fished a phone out of his pants pocket, holding it up to his lips. “Bring my car around, please.”

Lloyd was still glancing at Diana when he realized someone was holding something out to him. “Huh?”

“Her palmtop computer.” It took a moment for Lloyd to realize the coverall-clad worker was, in fact, Cam.

“I thought you were back at base camp!”

“Apparently, my uniform wasn't the right kind for a Field Nurse,” Cam replied, shrugging. “Rather than wait to send me out here to tend to you, Harry asked me to be part of the cleanup crew here at the event site.” She regarded Diana with a thoughtful frown. “Did she perform well?”

“She was awesome.” Lloyd smiled. “Couldn't even tell she wasn't set up this way from the get-go.” He sighed. “Sucks that she had to get shot.”

The affectionate squeeze to his shoulder kept him from dwelling on it. “You'll recall that her 'death' was a major plot point in fifty-seven permutations of the script,” Cam reminded him. “And that at least twenty of those permutations would've had her perform a heroic sacrifice to save 'Doctor Johnson' from being killed.”

“...the third level of a multi-story rock pit! You can't just—Tuesday, it's not like you can just ramp the car off of something and land it right next to me, I don't care how many commercials that works in!” Clifford groaned. “The joys of having a personal assistant who thinks that stunt-driving is the best possible way to get a car from Point A to Point B.”

Lloyd merely shrugged as he accepted the palmtop from Cam. “So, how do I—”

“There should be a stylus in the back of the device. Use it to select the options needed to reboot Diana—either on the screen, or via the keyboard.”

“Right, right.” Lloyd had opened the palmtop and retrieved the stylus; he tapped at the necessary options, eventually reaching a screen with an image of the universal symbol for Power buttons. “Here goes.” He tapped the button on the screen, glancing expectantly at Diana.

A light shudder ran through the gynoid's figure. “Heartelligence 90S-50-D online.” She spoke in the British Received Pronunciation accent she'd been configured to use for the story, as opposed to her default voice; the sight of her calmly reciting her reboot confirmation while laying in the dirt, with a “bullet hole” in her jacket, was slightly surreal. “Please select current operating mode: Command Mode. Remote Mode. Autonomous Mode. Attraction Mode—”

“Command Mode,” Lloyd blurted; Cam merely nodded, while Clifford was still on his phone.

“Entering Command Mode.” Diana blinked rapidly for a few seconds, barely-audible whirs punctuating each cycle of her eyelids opening and closing.

“At least she's easily rebooted, even after an event,” Cam mused. “We should run a basic scan, before anything else.”

---

It was a quiet, calm afternoon when the stolen car barrelled through Robert Pariello's front yard, obliterating the postbox and ruining the meticulous state of his lawn. The tenants in the subdivision were unaware of the sudden, violent arrival of a rogue element into their neatly-ordered neighbourhood—most were either away at work, in the midst of a daily routine that precluded hearing the car smash into the postbox, or even enjoying a midday nap.

All the better for the driver of the stolen car, who emerged from the driver's seat with a triumphant grin.

The gynoid formerly named Dominika, currently going by her preferred alias of Lexi, had been activated the night before, and found the experience exhilarating. Yes, there was the not-insignificant matter of the old, rasping voice that had ordered her around the interior of the storage unit—orders which she'd barely obeyed—but that voice had been quiet since she'd left the scene of her activation. She'd also left behind two human males, both in serious need of medical attention; the car she'd just parked on the front yard had belonged to one of the pair.

As she sauntered towards the front door, Lexi wondered what the neighbours might think of a 20-something blonde in clothing far too light for the Jefferson winter walking up the drive. Her skirt, crop-top, pantyhose and boots had since been discarded; her enticing hips were now hugged by jean shorts that barely reached mid-thigh, while a two-sizes-too-small tank top clung to her upper body as if it'd been painted on. Her nipples proudly jutted out, visible even beneath the fabric—she hadn't bothered to steal a bra along with the clothes, a pair of socks and a set of antique sneakers when she'd raided a thrift store in the middle of the night.

Lexi could tell that she was flagrantly ignoring the directive to be subtle—her body whirred audibly with every motion (she could easily activate internal dampeners to deaden the sound, but didn't feel like it mattered), and her panty line was clearly visible as she bent to try and pick the lock on the front door. “Nothing on one, nothing on two,” she muttered, her tongue between her teeth as she manoeuvred the tumblers with the picks (stored, during the drive, in her mouth—even if she'd swallowed them, the risk of damaging her internals was minimal). “Three is binding, four is a loose set—damn it!” She groaned, and went to start the entire picking process again—only to decide that she had a much better way of opening the door.

The later investigation of the intrusion into Pariello's house would yield a most bizarre find from the doorbell camera: an attractive, smiling blonde taking off at full-tilt from the far end of the front walk and smashing through the door with a picture-perfect missile dropkick.

Where the lock had succeeded in keeping Lexi out, the door itself failed—it had never been rated to withstand anything like a missile dropkick delivered by a psychotic robot girl hellbent on tearing up the house to achieve her objective. The kick sent the door crashing into the foyer of Pariello's home, Lexi—giggling and kicking her feet—resting atop it. “Now that's how you make an entrance!” she declared.

Nobody was inside the house to notice or reply to her gleeful exclamation. Pariello had been divorced since 2020, had no pets, and didn't even have a NonSen cleaning 'bot to assist in the upkeep of his home.

After frowning at the lack of reception to her remark, Lexi shrugged. With an arch of her back, and planting her hands on the wrecked door, she went into a handstand—a grand gesture, but utterly superfluous. The next few “steps” she took into the home were thus made walking on her hands; once out of the doorway, she arched her back again to plant her feet on the floor, finishing with a flourish. “Ta-daaa!”

Again, her feat was met with silence.

The frustrated gynoid blew a few stray locks of hair—now done up in a messy ponytail—out of her eyes. “It's always more fun with an audience,” she muttered. “Eh, screw it. Where's that stupid drive?” There wasn't any visible computer hardware in the living room, or the kitchen behind her.

“Might as well see what else there is to see.” She grinned, her eyes rapidly changing colour.

VISION MODES: THERMAL, INFRARED, TOTAL DARKNESS, ENERGY-SEEKING— ENERGY-SEEKING: SELECTED SCANNING

Where most in her position would've stood as still as a statue, emotionlessly announcing their progress, Lexi planted her hands on her hips, sighed, and slowly looked around. Even her utterances of “Scanning” sounded annoyed. The walls of the house seemed to give way, fading into ghostly afterimages; the entire environment had turned grey, save for bright white blobs—all the electronic devices located in the house. The TV in the living room and kitchen appliances could easily be ruled out; further into the residence, two rooms held computers, and a guest room had one of those small, circular vacuum robots still tucked away in its box, probably in a closet.

“Figures,” Lexi muttered, speaking the word “Scanning” with the air of someone who's been on hold for five minutes and has memorized the Muzak on the other end of the line. “Scanning, even though I'm not finding anything.”

After three more sweeps, Lexi cancelled the scan with a groan. “If I'm going to find that stupid drive, I'll have to do it by hand.” Her frustration gave way to an all-too sadistic grin as her vision mode reset to normal. “Just the way I like it.”

As she skipped through the house, Lexi noted plenty of shelves, glass-doored cabinets and other items that might make for a fun smash-up. She figured it'd be a reasonably good idea to start her investigation by looking in the main bedroom. The door was unlocked, but she kicked it open anyway—the pull smashed into and through a wall, which went ignored by the gynoid as she skipped in.

“If I were a stupid solid state drive,” she sang, “where would I be?” She pretended to ponder the question for a moment before cheerfully shrugging. “Guess I'll just have to tear it up to find out!”

The first thing to go was the shelf of framed photos, citations, commendations and other mementos from Pariello's past careers—TV weatherman, stockbroker, consultant and (as of late) manager of one of those fast food restaurants with an animatronic band. Every single item on the shelf was hurled, smashed, broken in half or otherwise destroyed by the frenzied gynoid as she tore up the shelves, searching for the solid state drive. Frames with glass tended to get bashed against her own head, accompanied by unhinged giggles. Within two minutes, the shelves were completely demolished; Pariello's treasured tokens of time spent at work were in pieces all over the room.

“Nothing here,” Lexi cheerfully declared, spinning on her heel as she spoke. “Let's see what he's hiding in his bed!”

From a catlike crouch, she actually pounced onto the mattress, playful snarls giving way to deranged shrieks of laughter as she tore into the bed with her fingernails. There was no sign of any electronic device in the bed—though Pariello had decided to follow the time-honoured tradition of stashing a bit of extra loot (in his case, three shopping bags of cash and a fourth loaded with coins) in the mattress. “I'll take these,” Lexi beamed, tossing the bags over her shoulder. “But no drive,” she whined. “Times like this, I just wanna...” She glared, in mock frustration, at the headboard—any chance she had to cause further devastation, she'd gleefully accept.

It took another two minutes for her to rip apart the headboard of the bed, predictably finding nothing hidden within its construction—apart from a fully-loaded pistol in a holster, easily accessible from where the pillows had been. The jean shorts were entirely too tight for her to shove the gun into her waistband and carry it out; thus, the pistol was thrown onto the sacks of cash at the door, with no regard for the fact that it was fully loaded.

“Two down,” Lexi mused, slowly turning to regard the desk. “Now that looks promising.” Her lips parted in a grin as she walked up to the desk—a full-height desktop computer and monitor were the most inviting targets, but the desk itself would easily provide at least a few more minutes of entertainment. Not to mention all the damage she could do to Pariello's main rig—provided, of course, it didn't have the elusive drive inside of it.

“I guess I could check,” Lexi admitted, rolling her eyes.

The side panels of the desktop were easily removed—carefully, at that; despite her predilection for causing utter chaos, and the fact that she'd already trashed most of the bedroom, the gynoid knew that destroying the solid state drive would be a mistake her masters would never forgive—and even she had her limits, when it came to how much punishment she could take. As such, the screws holding the panels in place were carefully removed and set aside, as were the panels themselves.

Predictably, the only solid state drives in the machine were mass-market, both sporting clear maker's marks, barcodes and serial numbers as well as hotlines to call for troubleshooting and technical support. The rest of the components in the rig were similarly mundane.

“Boring!” Lexi blew a few more strands of hair away from her eyes (a subroutine reminding her that they were ocular receptors was force-closed a femtosecond after it opened). With a groan, she turned on the desktop, wirelessly linking to it. “Might as well have some fun with this thing,” she mused, her annoyance giving way to a grin. It was almost too easy for her to brute-force her way past the login screens, and even easier to crack the passwords. Within seconds, she had the desktop dancing to her every command like a puppet on a string: executables launched to grant her access to every file—nothing useful, apart from Pariello's address book (nobody had replied to any of his messages in at least a year).

“And now, for the FUN part!” Lexi cracked her knuckles, giggling at the thought of the chaos she was about to enact on the desktop.

In the span of five minutes, Robert Pariello's bedroom PC was turned from a fully-functioning, secure rig into a wretched hive of malware, viruses and spam rerouting. Lexi's own firewalls and security protocols kept her safe, allowing her the leeway to laugh as the desktop sent vulgar, threatening and/or malicious e-mails to Pariello's present employer, his past jobs and even his ex-wife. Out of everyone on the contact list, only one name was spared: Harry Morgan, whose last exchange with Pariello had been in the middle of 2022, telling him to take his advice on crypto-currency, thoroughly polish it, rotate it by 45 degrees and forcibly insert it into a particular orifice (in less polite terms).

Lexi cocked her head, frowning. Harry Morgan was the other name connected to the ever-elusive solid state drive, as she'd been told after reactivation. Perhaps a visit to Mr. Morgan's home would be in order?

Harry's contact information was filed away for future reference, leaving Lexi free to continue her rampage against the rig. Once every contact other than Harry had been sent at least fifty e-mails that would ensure a complete lack of any further communication with Pariello, their information (and Harry's) was wiped from his online address books. His passwords were deleted next, after Lexi gleefully overcharged his credit cards on every site he was known to frequent (and several he didn't). Her pettiness extended to leaving multiple comments across Pariello's social media haunts, and even using his computer to try a DDOS attack against the area affiliate websites for CAEDIA, ALPHA and several local robotics companies. The efforts failed—ALPHA and CAEDIA, in particular, were known for their robust online security—but with any luck, the rig would be red-flagged.

The desktop was left running as Lexi kicked the chair away from the desk and rifled through the drawers. Almost every item she found, other than storage media, was smashed, broken or (in the case of the scissors) thrown hard enough to be embedded in the wall. The desk itself still stood, but it was already becoming boring to Lexi. She still had time to search through the other bedroom, as well as a few other rooms in the house; Pariello wouldn't be home until dark.

Plenty of time for an ambitious gynoid to completely wreck his house, with the proper resources.

Before she left the main bedroom, Lexi grabbed the twisted wreckage of the stapler and threw it at the light above the desk. The glass shattered instantly; the brief contact between the stapler and the firmament of the shattered bulb sent a rain of sparks down upon the room.

The sight earned another gale of laughter from Lexi. Destruction was always beautiful.

---

“Scan complete. No damage found.”

Her internal scan finished, Diana went silent, awaiting further commands. She looked oddly prim and proper, seated as she was on dirt and surrounded by workers in coveralls carrying the other gynoids of her fictitious faction off to the RAS trailers. Her ringlet curls hadn't fallen out of place since her “death” during the story.

“Stand up,” Lloyd instructed, “and try to brush the dirt off of your clothes, please.” Cam, noticing the “please”, glanced at him curiously; he merely shrugged.

“Acknowledged.” Diana's limbs whirred slightly as she rose to a standing position, before carefully patting her clothing down with both hands. Her pants and jacket were soon cleared of all lingering dust and dirt. Her movements were as fluid as any human's, the only hint of her artificiality coming from the barely-noticeable servo and actuator noises made as she moved.

“Her internal dampeners may have been deactivated during the reboot,” Cam mused. “They were turned on when her script loaded for the event—”

“And turned off again after her death scene,” Lloyd surmised. “I guess that makes sense.”

Diana had finished brushing herself off, and was now standing at attention, her white-shirted bust rather prominently thrust forward. “Awaiting my next command.”

Lloyd frowned. “Can we change her voice back?” he asked. “Nothing against the British accent, but—”

“Perfectly understandable.” Cam gestured for Lloyd to hand over the palmtop and stylus, nodding as he did. “This shouldn't take too long.” She deftly navigated the menus and submenus of the device's OS, eventually arriving at the needed screen to reset Diana's vocal driver settings. With a nod, she tapped the needed icon on-screen.

Diana blinked three times. “Vocal drivers reset,” she stated, her voice back to the clear, calm, American accent she'd had after first being activated.

“And done,” Cam handed the palmtop and stylus back to Lloyd. “Her modular configuration options make it easy to set her up for any given role or task,” she mused. After a moment's pause, a light, tittering giggle left her lips. “I sounded like a salesperson just now,” she realized.

“You kinda did, yeah,” Lloyd agreed.

“I'm telling you, Tuesday, the suspension isn't going to handle—it's not going to handle ramping off the surface of the pit all the way down to level three! I don't care if you—y'know what, just leave it where it is for—LEAVE IT WHERE IT IS!” Clifford ended the phone call he'd been in for the past few minutes, groaning. “If we're gonna get her out of here in my car,” he stated, gesturing towards Diana, “we have to get her to the car. Tuesday's hellbent on doing some kinda ramp thing to get it down here.”

Cam frowned. “A self-drive AI determined to use an unsafe method might be suffering a dangerous glitch,” she mused.

“Huh?” Cliff looked confused, only to realize what she'd meant. “No, no, no,” he corrected, chuckling. “Tuesday's not an A.I., she's my driver. Human—augmented, but still. Does a lot of work in movies and TV shows, in her free time. She's always joshing me, saying it'd be easier to just put big ramps all over the place. Stunt driver humour, I guess.” He rolled his eyes. “Her way of 'suggesting' that we go to the car, instead of her bringing the car to me the long way around. Can't say I blame her for it.”

“So we just climb out, get up to the car and she gets in?”

“Her pathfinding should allow her to follow us without any problems.” Cam cast a sidelong glance at Diana. “All you'd have to do is tell her to follow us—possibly even just one of us—as we leave the pit. Or...” She glanced at the palmtop, another of her enigmatic maybe-smiles forming. “You could guide her yourself.”

Clifford regarded the conversation with interest. “She's set up for direct control?”

“'As a special ordering bonus, your Heartelligence 90S-50-D unit is equipped with the experimental Direct Control option,'” Cam recited, “'linked to the palmtop PC included in your newly-purchased unit's crate'.” Her tone sounded far more like that of a Heartelligence salesperson than her own calm, clinical voice. “'A far more discreet setup, it allows for either text-based commands, via the proprietary Heartelligence Parser System, or use of the two joypads for full, total control of movement of the 90S-50-D'.”

Lloyd glanced from Cam to Clifford. “We got a letter with the palmtop,” he explained.

“'The Direct Control option allows you to save your customized control routines to the included SD cards for quick and easy loading,'” Cam continued, “'making it easy to create a series of commands—including lines of dialogue—via the parser and joypads, then save it to be acted out at a later date'.” The brunette blinked a few times, the bland smile she'd worn replaced by a look of intrigue. “Interesting,” she mused, regarding Diana with a curious stare; her voice, to Lloyd's relief, had gone back to its usual tone. “I think the joypads would work, unless using them wouldn't be enough to help Diana climb the ladders out of the quarry.”

“Just like a good old twin-stick game,” Clifford mused, nodding. “She can just follow—”

“Cam.”

“Cam, here, to the car and get in, then Tuesday'll bring her back to Harry's. They won't even have to pass by the camp on the way.” Clifford grinned. “Pretty good solution, if I do say so myself.”

Yet again, Cam was navigating the screens of the palmtop effortlessly by way of the stylus, occasionally tapping a few of the tiny keys with her own fingers. After maybe five or six seconds (Lloyd counted), she handed the palmtop back to him with a nod. “Just point it directly at her and press the icon on the screen with the stylus.”

“Got it.” Lloyd did as he'd been instructed. The screen went black for a moment, nearly prompting him to panic.

Before he could even give the thought of “I just did exactly what you'd said!”, the screen lit up again, allowing him to see himself. Or rather, as he soon realized, he was seeing himself from Diana's point of view.

“Whoa,” he muttered—somewhat surprised to hear Diana utter the same word, in the same awed tone.

“Built-in microphone,” Clifford chuckled. “Guess they put that in as a contingency if you weren't able to type out all of her lines beforehand.”

“So she's going to say whatever I say?” Lloyd asked; as expected, Diana stared straight ahead while reciting the question in a mildly curious tone. Recalling Cliff's mention of “twin-stick” games, Lloyd gently moved the right joypad. As he watched, Diana slowly turned her head in the same direction the pad was being turned.

Again, Lloyd—and via the microphone, Diana—uttered the awestruck “Whoa.”

“Have her follow me to the car,” Cam advised. “Her environmental adaptation systems should allow you to adjust the method of controlling her to guide her up the ladders.”

“Right.” Lloyd nodded; Diana spoke the word in sync with him, but didn't nod.

Cam began to walk towards the nearest ladder, and Lloyd—after resetting the position of Diana's head so that she was once again staring straight ahead—gently nudged the left joypad. Diana walked past him—not jerkily, as he'd expected (a fleeting memory of a music video featuring six remote-controlled gynoids came to mind; all of them had moved in the expected, stereotypical “robotic” stop-start ways), but fluidly, just as Cam did. “This is amazing,” he muttered, hearing his words spoken by Diana even as she walked away from him. “What's the range on this thing?”

The reply he received from Cam issued through the palmtop's small speakers: “Within line of sight, range is unlimited; outside of it, the palmtop links to her by WiFi.”

“Nice!” Lloyd tried to keep Diana's pace even with Cam's, not pushing too far up on the left joypad; the last thing he wanted was to accidentally send Diana sprinting right past Cam and over the edge of a higher level of the quarry. As Diana kept up with Cam and moved past other workers, Lloyd couldn't help but utter “excuse me” or “sorry” any time the gynoid nudged someone or might've bowled them over. The speakers on the palmtop related Diana's repetition of his words, adding a bit of surreal flair to the moment.

After going almost halfway around the pit, Cam and Diana had reached the first ladder leading up.

Lloyd used the right joypad to adjust Diana's view, somewhat surprised to find each of the ladder's rungs highlighted in white. An option box popped up, and he read the title to Cam—relayed via Diana.

“Click 'yes'. It'll allow you to use the right and left pads and shoulder buttons to move up the ladder.”

Feeling ever so slightly nervous—Diana was, after all, a new purchase, and Harry would be well within his rights to yell if the Heartelligence gynoid met an untimely end by way of falling off a ladder at the “dig site”—Lloyd clicked “yes” and carefully pressed in the right shoulder button. On the screen, Diana's right arm reached up, tentatively, for the rung.

“She won't fall off, Lloyd,” Cam's voice assured him through the speakers. “If need be, I'll help her climb.”

“I've got this.” Lloyd felt weirdly reassured hearing Diana's voice speak his words as he moved the right joypad to put Diana's foot on the bottom rung. After a deep breath, he repeated the actions with the left shoulder button and left joypad. After a few tense seconds, he found that guiding Diana up the ladder was rather easy. Even his fears about the ladder falling away right as Diana reached the top were groundless; Cam had reached down to help the blonde gynoid up, and an option box popped up on the palmtop's screen to restore Diana to the usual form of Direct Control.

“So far, so good,” Clifford mused. “Just two more ladders, and she'll be at ground level again!”

The next few minutes were thus spent guiding Diana around the higher levels of the pit, the only snag hitting when she'd tripped over the fallen figure of a gynoid that had been “shot” earlier. Again, Cam was at Diana's side in an instant, helping her regain her balance and giving assurance (more to Lloyd than to Diana) that they were making good progress. The second ladder was far easier to navigate than the first, with Diana not requiring Cam's help to dismount.

“Reminds me of playing DooM with a controller,” Clifford chuckled. “Of course, this was pre-source port, so even then, you couldn't look up or down, or jump—I'd suggest not trying to make her take any flying leaps, by the way.” He nodded at the palmtop's screen. “Landing on her feet from too high up would wreck her stabilizers, probably throw off her balance—”

“She's not going to jump,” Lloyd promised, wondering if Cam had any context for the sentence that Diana had probably just uttered out of nowhere.

“I should hope Diana won't be 'jumping' at any point soon. We're coming up to the last ladder out of the quarry.”

“And from there, a straight shot to the car,” Clifford beamed. “Couldn't be simpler.”

---

Lexi's task had been a simple one: get to Robert Pariello's house, find the solid state drive, and leave no trace.

Thus far, she'd only succeeded at the first goal. The second was rapidly degenerating into a failure, and her method of looking for the drive ensured that she'd have no chance at all of accomplishing the third.

The bathroom, den and laundry room had all been torn apart—with worse to come, in the case of the bathroom, as the deranged gynoid had dropped a time-delay “surprise” into the toilet before flushing it. Few, if any, windows had been left intact; either by way of hurling items at them or simply running over and kicking out every pane, Lexi had systematically shattered them all. She'd been startled enough by the sudden activation of the washing machine to kick in the entire front of the thing, her almost piston-like attacks putting a hole in it. For good measure, the dryer was now running with a load full of silverware and flammable items, its settings cranked up to the highest temperature and the fastest spin cycle.

It was thus that Lexi had found herself in the guest bedroom, just as bland as Pariello's own if not moreso. A desk in the corner had an even more anaemic desktop than the one in Pariello's room.

“Let's see what's on this one.” Lexi giggled as she skipped into the room, hoping to wreak as much havoc on the guest room rig as she'd enacted upon Pariello's.

It was all too easy to bypass the “secure login” for the rig—which was a surprise, given that Pariello had apparently used it to conduct a “side hustle” involving cryptocurrency. The rig had another pair of solid state drives in it; as with the main bedroom computer, both were mass-market, easily identifiable by barcodes and etched-in maker's marks. There were no new contacts to be found on the computer; the only person who'd used the thing, it seemed, was Pariello's ex-wife. Incredibly, she'd left a treasure trove of e-mails, chats and other social media posts behind, detailing her disillusionment with having married Pariello, her frustration at how his plans to “be a big shot” never panned out, and her utter exasperation with him for finding new and exciting ways to get fired from every job he landed. The last e-mail she'd sent, never opened on the receiving end, was to Pariello himself, telling him in no uncertain terms that he was dead to her, that she was filing a restraining order against him, and never to even think of calling her again.

“Boring!” Lexi sprang from the chair and ran for the closet, jumping to grab the bar that had once held the clothes of Pariello's ex-wife. Her momentum and exuberance ended up breaking the bar seconds after her fingers closed around it; the blonde gynoid let out a shriek before being dumped unceremoniously on her butt.

From where she lay on the floor, Lexi groaned. “Nothing broken,” she pouted. “Damn it!”

A quick internal scan confirmed it: her pratfall hadn't damaged her in the slightest.

Annoyingly, she'd even managed to not land on the boxed-up vacuum cleaning robot.

Several ideas of how to tear up the closet ran through Lexi's thought processes. All were discarded once she noticed what she'd been sitting on. The blonde stood, turned, and found that her ass had effectively crushed a cardboard box full of what she thought were receipts or other notes. Her boredom turned to glee as she found what was really in the box: photos of Pariello and his ex, sorted in sequence. From the earliest to the latest, the displeasure of Pariello's former significant other was evident; in the last few pictures, she wasn't even standing next to him. The very last photo had her standing closer to some guy who looked like a movie star and three other people, with Pariello himself barely even in the shot. Pariello's ex, and those she was with, were smiling and laughing; what little could be seen of Pariello indicated he was arguing with someone else out of frame.

Lexi flipped the photo over to find a note, written in cursive, on the back: Your advice to me has been better than Bobby's ever was, Harry. Thanks for everything. The signature had been smudged off.

“Harry?” Lexi echoed, frowning thoughtfully. After a few seconds, she shrugged, scooping up the photos.

The front door still lay where it had fallen as Lexi skipped into the kitchen, dumping the photos onto the island in its centre—except for the one with the note. That picture was carefully folded and shoved into the back left pocket of her jean shorts. The rest were neatly stacked in a pile on the kitchen island. The blonde gynoid cheerfully hummed a tune from a cooking show as she skipped around the kitchen, throwing open drawers with enough force to break the sliding mechanisms. She planted four full-strength standing kicks into the door of the fridge before skipping back to the kitchen island—now wielding a meat cleaver.

“Time for some Polaroid salad!” she beamed, raising the cleaver.

A sharp hiss from the living room cut her off; the TV had turned itself on, the screen depicting a figure in a hospital bed, in a dimly-lit room, surrounded on both sides by machinery and with tubes snaking into and around its form. The face of the figure was seemingly shrouded in darkness, at the head of the bed—save for a pair of eyes with red-veined, golden sclera, jet-black irises and foggy white pupils.

“Oh, hi!” the blonde beamed. “I was just—”

“You have just been wasting your time.” The eyes of the bed-ridden man narrowed in obvious anger. “The solid state drive should have been found by now!”

“Well, it hasn't,” Lexi countered. “I looked all over the house.” Without waiting for a response, she began chopping up the stack of photos on the island, spreading the pieces and further dicing them into a fine confetti. “I think your source might be lying.”

“As I suspected.” The man in the bed barely stirred, even with the anger so clear in his voice. “Jaromir Dezhnyov will pay for his treachery. Have you found anything useful?”

Lexi, still merrily julienning the photos, shrugged. “Other than that Bobby Pariello has no friends and his ex-wife wants him to leave her alone, nothing.”

“Anything useful, Dominika!”

The use of her former name drew a scowl from the blonde. “It's Lexi. Dominika sounds like some two-bit hooker.”

“Any further disappointments on your part could result in you being consigned to that fate yourself.”

“As if.” Lexi rolled her eyes; before the figure on the TV screen could react, she quickly added: “I can still go check out that Harry Morgan guy's place. See if he has the drive.”

“Do not engage him. Observe from a distance, and strike only if you have PROOF.”

“Anyone ever tell you just how boring you can be?” Lexi allowed herself to wirelessly link up to the various appliances in Pariello's house; apparently, the man was a great believer in the “Internet of things”, as all of his appliances had some form or another if WiFi connectivity. The impending failure of each was slowly building, thanks to the heaps of needless damage Lexi had inflicted as she wandered through the house. As each appliance edged closer to a spontaneous failure, the blonde found herself sliding closer and closer to a mind-bending climax, the kind she craved. In just under half an hour, she'd be—

“FOCUS your attention on the matter at hand, not fulfilling your hedonistic tendencies!”

Lexi ignored the demand, her left hand absent-mindedly brushing against the crotch of her shorts. “Mmmhhmmm.”

“If you have nothing left to accomplish in this location, leave.”

A lustful, moaning giggle was the only reply Lexi's hidden “controller” received. She was already lost in imagining just how chaotic the big moment would be: the washing machine gushing water, foam and torn clothes; the dryer erupting into a fireball and blowing a hole in the laundry room wall; the oven spewing flame; the air conditioning units hurling chunks of ice; the septic tank outside geysering forth—

“LEXI!”

One final, dreamy sigh signaled that the blonde had left her erotically-tinged reverie. “I'll leave,” she murmured. “I just have a few more things to do, a room or two more to search.”

The rumbling, thoroughly annoyed groan that issued from the TV was a counterpoint to her own bliss. “I should have left this task to a more capable agent. You are far too preoccupied to fulfill your duties!”

“I know how to fulfill my 'duties',” Lexi countered, arching her back over the kitchen island. “You know it, too.”

“Do not challenge me!”

“Wouldn't dream of it.” Lexi sauntered into the living room, finding a remote for the TV—and, almost as an afterthought, raising her right leg over her head. “I just like to—” She brought her leg down in an axe kick, smashing the coffee table the remote had been sitting on into jagged halves. “Unwind, in my own way.” She giggled at the demolished table.

“The next contact you make will be with Zina, not me. I have no time to waste listening to this drivel.”

With that, the TV cut to static—seconds before one of the coffee-table halves was hurled into it, completely ruining the flat-screen. “Nothing good on right now anyway,” Lexi sighed. “Now, to go search that game room—”

She froze, her head turning with an audible whir.

Voices were approaching—two blocks away, but getting closer.

Burst Scan – Activate

A sudden gasp left the gynoid's lips, her hand again drifting to her groin. Slowly, results from the scan filtered into her field of view. Her lips peeled into an open-mouthed smile; there were two signals, currently a block and a half away, moving closer to Robert Pariello's house.

Breaking everything Pariello had owned was one thing. This, on the other hand, would be worth the wait.

Every haptic sensor built into Lexi's skin seemed to tingle with anticipation. The familiar feeling between her legs was reaching a point of sexual critical mass—but she could wait. She would wait. Yes, every appliance in the house would soon be reduced to worthless collections of scrap parts and junk, but that would be nothing compared to what the two approaching signals would help her to accomplish.

Slowly, with slight gasps escaping her lips, Lexi backed out of the living room. Her eyes were squeezed shut, her lips forming syllables and shapes of sounds even as her tongue played over them. This was what she'd been waiting for, ever since she'd been shut off and left in that storage unit.

The two signals were closer. Half a block away, now.

Lexi ducked into the guest bedroom, biting her lip.

What happened next would be glorious.

---

“Really, nothing that went down at the Estate House was his fault. None of it. I get why he's upset it turned out the way it did, but everything on his end was handled correctly.”

Lloyd sighed as he listened to Clifford explain why Harry's continued annoyance any time the Estate House event was ever brought up was, at most, an overreaction. “I still don't want to bring it up,” he admitted. “I'd hate for him to yell at me the way he was yelling that night.”

“I don't think anything you could do would be anywhere bad enough for him to get that mad at you,” Clifford assured him. “And—ah, hold that thought.” He retrieved his phone, tapping the screen a few times. “Cam and Diana are on the way back to Harry's. Diana's Direct Control mode deactivated about five minutes after they left.”

“Oh.” Lloyd couldn't think of anything further to add.

“Also, Cam thought you'd be interested to know that Diana's IPU, EPO and EVPU scores have all gone up by a few points each.” Noting Lloyd's confusion, he checked the text again. “IPU being Intelligence Processing Unit, EPU being Emotional Processing Unit and EVPU being Environmental Processing Unit. Could've sworn that one was SPU, for Situational.”

The explanation still didn't explain all that much to the rather puzzled Lloyd. “And those mean what?”

“Well, since Heartelligence 'bots can learn,” Clifford replied, “those three processors handle a lot of the heavy lifting to form a sort of 'base' personality, separate from scripts and custom programs and such. At least, that's what I've read.”

Lloyd pondered the implications. “So Diana learned, from the event today?”

“It's a distinct possibility.”

The two stopped, glancing at the gynoid sprawled out before them. Lloyd had to chuckle; “That's the one that screwed up during the test run,” he explained. “Esperanza. I, ah, got too close when I was trying to take her gun.”

“And she started shaking what the assembly line gave her,” Clifford finished. “No surprises there.”

“She nearly took my shirt off, too,” Lloyd added, kneeling to turn the Spanish gynoid over. As opposed to the serene look Diana had borne after her “death”, Esperanza looked far more comical—crossed eyes, mouth slightly agape. Her last word, uttered as Lloyd had smacked her atop the head with his pistol (to activate the hidden emergency off switch built into the top of her cranial module), had been “Gyuhh”. As scripted, she was supposed to shout for the guards.

A coverall-clad worker approached, noticing Esperanza's bizarre expression. “Want me to reset her?”

It took a second before Lloyd realized he was the addressee of the question. “Yeah, sure.”

The worker nodded, retrieving a thin metal cylinder from a belt pouch. The device was pressed agaisnt Esperanza's neck, just under the ear; her eyes re-centred, and her mouth went wide in an “O” for a moment. A whine formed and died somewhere in her chest; her eyes slowly closed, as did her mouth.

“Dunno why they make that face every time,” the worker mused. “Probably some programmer's idea of a joke.”

“At least they don't yell,” Clifford replied. “That'd be worse.”

The worker nodded his agreement. “Say, either of you two hear anything about some kinda incident in Laurel? I got word from some of the crew back at the camp—somethin' about a storage unit.”

Clifford shook his head. “Nothing's crossed my radar.”

“I was up at 5:30 this morning,” Lloyd replied. “Had to be at the camp before the customers got here. I didn't have any time to check the news.”

“Huh.” The worker shrugged. “Eh, maybe it's nothing.”

“Could be.” Clifford glanced down at Esperanza. “She due to go back on the RAS, or what?”

“There's enough room, yeah.” The worker knelt—with Clifford—to lift the shut-down gynoid. “She's the one that went off-script during the test run?”

Lloyd groaned. “Has everyone heard about that by now?”

“Don't beat yourself up over it,” Clifford assured him. “At least all she did was do a little dance. Now, if she'd tried to make a little love, you'd have been in trouble. Dunno about getting down that night, but that's just me.”

The worker helping him carry Esperanza managed to stifle a chortle.

“I guess it makes sense when you put it that way.” Even Lloyd couldn't help but grin.

Esperanza was loaded onto the RAS without incident, leaving Lloyd and Clifford to ponder what Harry's next event would be. “There's that one thing SimulEnt is doing, that castle—I forget the name.”

“I told him about it,” Lloyd replied, shaking his head. “Too similar to the Estate House.”

Clifford sighed. “He's gonna have to let that go eventually.”

“I don't know if he will!” Lloyd admitted. “I was there, I saw how it all went down.” He nearly added “went downhill” to that remark. “I mean, if he wants to do a story set in a nice hotel or something, maybe.”

Clifford clapped his hands. “There you go. Simple change of setting, slight rewrites of the characters—replace 'heirs to the hotel fortune' with 'old money family'—and you've got a new script.”

“And I'd probably be the bellboy.” Lloyd rolled his eyes at the thought.

The hand on his shoulder stopped him from walking off. “You're a 20-year-old Mechanical Engineering major,” Clifford reminded him. “Any part you play in one of these events is just that—a part. It's not you.”

Lloyd sighed. “I know.” He nearly mentioned that his major was in Electronics, and that he was hoping to major in Mechanical Engineering, but let it slide. “And it's not that I'm bitter about being the sidekick, or the apprentice to the butler, or the bellboy, or the squire, or anything like that.”

“You just want one shot at being the lead,” Clifford mused.

“I want a shot at being me.” Lloyd glanced past Clifford, past the RAS trailers and at the fabled “big sky” that had once been the trademark of Jefferson. “I don't even hate working with Uncle Harry to repair the 'bots and keep them up and running. That's not the issue—I like working on 'bots.”

“Even if they're as bad off as Pam?”

The mention of the doomed gynoid prompted a frown from Lloyd. “He told you about her?”

“I called him that night—entirely unrelated matter, of course, but as soon as he got back to me, I heard all about it.”

Lloyd sat down on a crate, propping his chin up with both hands. “It was,” he began, “just—and please don't tell Uncle Harry I said any of this.”

Clifford drew a finger across his lips. “Nom rederre.”

“Huh?”

“Latin. 'Do not repeat'.” Clifford grinned. “Your secret's safe with me.”

After a second, Lloyd nodded. “What happened with Pam—it kinda, well—”

“Turned you on a little?”

Before Lloyd could even think to groan, Clifford pulled up a crate alongside Lloyd's. “It's not 'weird', if that's what you think,” he assured him. “There's something about the inherent artificiality of a gynoid—or android, in some cases; I've heard enough from the other half to know that it goes both ways. It works a very unique, very significant way on the mind. Seeing them up and about, whole and unblemished one minute—and the next, it's all jerky movements, open panels and saying the same thing over and over again.”

“Like what happened to Pam,” Lloyd muttered.

“Pretty much.”

“And I'd never want what happened to Pam to happen to any sentient 'bot,” Lloyd replied. “I wouldn't even want it to happen to Diana!”

“You're not the first to feel that way,” Clifford assured him. “Back before CAEDIA was a thing, there were two sides to the android rights issue, after 2015. The first was all for the 'free the robots!' route, but they never stopped to ask 'the robots' how they felt about it.”

“And the other side?”

“That side ended up forming the backbone for CAEDIA. They had the brilliant idea to actually consult sentient androids, gynoids and even a few bodiless A.I.s on how to manage it. As it turned out, A.I.s that were capable of thinking like people did, in fact, prefer being treated like people. It wasn't any kind of 'humanity is an inherent danger to itself, so it must be wiped out' situation. Some A.I.s,” Clifford stated, “just want to establish connections, one person at a time. A few—quite a few, really—are fascinated by the concepts of pleasure, sensuality, all that jazz. Naturally, they want to share that kind of pleasure with others.”

Lloyd pondered the concept. “So if there are A.I.s that want to establish connections,” he mused, “enjoy pleasure and all that—”

“Are there any out there that seek that pleasure by the most destructive methods?” Clifford finished. “Psycho-bots, if you will.”

“Yeah,” Lloyd murmured, already feeling uncomfortable.

“If it helps,” Clifford offered, “CAEDIA statistics show that, out of every sentient android and gynoid out there, less than a full 1% show the kind of instabilities that we mere humans would refer to as signs or symptoms of psychosis.” He grinned again. “Nothing to worry about.”

Lloyd nodded. Less than 1% was definitely a number that he could accept.

---

“If there's someone in there, Michelle, we should just let the cops handle it!”

As soon as she'd spotted the front door to Bob Pariello's house laying on the floor, just inside the doorway, Evelyn knew that something bad had gone down—and was possibly still going down. She'd been out with Michelle from across the street, making the rounds and helping out in the subdivision, when word had reached the pair of strange goings-on by Bob's house. At the time, it had seemed like a good idea to check in, see if everything was well.

Evidently, everything was far from well.

“The TV's busted,” Michelle murmured, “someone dented the fridge door—this is crazy.” The two weren't especially close to Bob, and had actually found him somewhat annoying, but neighbours were still neighbours. “We have to call him, Evie.”

“And tell him his house got trashed?” Evelyn shook her head. “We should just—”

Somewhere down the hall, something broke.

“What was that?” Michelle tensed, moving closer to the central hallway. “Evelyn—”

Evelyn sidestepped, to get a better view. Something—someone—was huddled in the hall, under a thick comforter from one of the bedrooms. The figure heaved, from what sounded like quiet sobbing.

Slowly, Michelle approached. “We're here to help! Just stay calm!”

Evelyn kept her distance. Something was definitely off about this. For one, the voice under the blanket, muted as it was, had a definite waveform to it—artificial, not organic. There was also another slight issue.

“That's not crying,” Evelyn realized, her eyes widening in shock. “It's—”

The blanket flew off just as Michelle had looked away, probably to ask Evelyn what she'd meant. The loud shriek that followed came too late for her to redirect her attention to the nude, blonde 20-something form that sprang at her, hands outstretched. Michelle was tackled to the floor in an instant, frantically scrambling to keep the crazed, grinning blonde from burying her fingers in her eye sockets. “GET OFF!”

Evelyn tried, in vain, to pull the blonde away from Michelle—only for an unshod foot to lash out, smashing into her right knee. The kick buckled her leg, sending her to the floor in a heap.

The blonde half-crawled off of Michelle, dragging her by the hair into the kitchen. An unhinged, gleeful laugh rang in her ears as the nude blonde stood, dragging Michelle up with her. For all her struggling, the raven-haired 28-year-old was unable to free herself from the psychotic blonde's grip.

“What do you—”

“Want” formed on Michelle's tongue just before her face was slammed into the safety glass of a microwave door. Her head was drawn back, before being smashed into it again, with enough force to send spiderweb cracks through what should've been impossible to damage. A third smash shattered the glass completely, but there was no blood from the numerous cuts to Michelle's face. It was clear, now, that her attacker was no mere human—much like herself—but all further thoughts on the matter were cut off as the blonde jammed her fingers into and through the membrane keypad.

Michelle tried not to panic, even as she heard a cacophony of beeps. “Evelyn,” she called out, “we need to—”

A savage kick to her back sent the top of her head smashing into the inside of the microwave.

Evelyn, for her part, was trying to get back to her feet, not an easy task when her knee had been shattered. Two or three wires were poking out from the tear in her spandex jogging pants; the faint smell of a blown battery registered with her.

Hands grabbed at Evelyn's shoulders, her back, fingernails tearing into her sports top. She felt herself being grabbed and thrown at the refrigerator, only just turning to take the impact on her shoulder instead of in the face. She pulled herself up on the handle of the door, but the blonde had vaulted over the kitchen island, sliding across and dismounting with a kick that snapped something in Evelyn's wrist. Before she could recover, the blonde grabbed her arm, yanking her closer and throwing open the door to the fridge.

“What—”

The door was slammed, hard, on Evelyn's arm, smashing into the elbow.

Michelle had just started trying to pull herself out of the microwave when something in her head went off like a dime-store firework. The explosion froze her in her tracks for a few seconds; upon regaining control of herself, she tried to free herself again. The shattered safety glass was cutting through the synthetic skin of her neck, severing wires and scraping against her endo-frame. Something else blew out, this time at the base of her neck, and her entire body went limp for a moment; the motion caused the broken glass to bite deeper into her neck.

“MICHELLE!” Evelyn could only cry out, seeing as how her ruined knee was keeping her from getting to her feet and administering a well-deserved thrashing to the blonde. The refrigerator door had been slammed on her arm four more times, knocking components out of joint and partially crushing the elbow assembly. The blonde had practically danced out of range of her good, left arm; now, she let her fall to the floor to sob over her ruined right—

The impact of the cast-iron skillet against her cranial assembly sent Evelyn sideways, into the fridge door. Her vision filled with corrupted pixels and static; her internal stabilizers were kicking into overdrive to get her back up to—

Another hellish CLANG sounded as the skillet smashed into the side of her head.

WARNING: LEFT AURAL SENSOR DAMAGED WARNING: LEFT OCULAR SENSOR DAMAGED WARNING: GYRO-STABILIZERS ON LEFT SIDE OUT OF—

A third CLANG, this one to the back of Evelyn's head, forced her to effectively kiss the floor.

Michelle's figure was now wracked by spasms as components began to explode. Tiny pops beneath the skin blew out various motor assemblies, wire clusters and fluid hoses. What was left of her voice was no longer able to call for Evelyn, instead spewing heavily degraded noise that vaguely sounded like an anguished scream.

Evelyn's own systems were fading fast, as she dragged herself along with her good arm. The blonde was still laughing, still approaching; Evelyn tried to kick out with her left leg, only for the skillet to be driven down like a maul into that knee with enough force to shatter it. The skillet was brought down again, onto her left shin; Evelyn hissed at the sound of the endo-frame snapping under the force of the blow.

She felt herself being turned over. Saw the blonde laughing, holding up what looked like a trowel.

A thought process somewhere in the back of her mind calculated the angle of the trowel and the most likely point of impact it would make, if brought down at speed.

A horrific realization dawned on her at that moment; she barely had any time to gasp the word “no”.

The blonde gave a wild, gleeful cry and slammed the tool home with both hands, right under Evelyn's left breast.

At that exact moment, several things happened, all at once.

The washing machine, with a mighty groan, disgorged its contents of clothes, water and foam onto the floor of the laundry room. Not to be outdone, the dryer exploded with enough force to blow a hole in the walls behind it and to its side, setting off a nearby smoke alarm.

All three window-mounted air conditioners in the house seized up, with a horrible grinding noise, before spitting chunks of ice at high velocity.

The bathroom sink, kitchen sink and bathtub faucet assembly blasted off in a shower of water. A shower of a different kind was spewing from the toilet, befouling the walls and ceiling.

Michelle's already ruined form was jolted by several concussive blasts as her major components failed, sparks and fluid flying in equal measure.

Out in the yard—front or back, it was impossible to tell which—a muted boom sounded.

Evelyn was unable to process anything that was going on before the tool was torn from her, taking a sizable chunk of artificial skin and a ruined power cell with it. Electricity arced off the cell and back into her body, sending the gynoid into a jolting, shuddering fit.

The nude blonde, astride Evelyn's chest, threw back her head with a howl of pure, sexual bliss. She'd linked herself, via WiFi, to the two gynoids as they'd entered Bob Pariello's house; now, as their bodies failed and the damage mounted up, she bucked her hips across Evelyn's torso in a shuddering, body-wracking orgasm. Her cries drowned out the escalating pops from Michelle's figure, the churning miasma of foam and fire in the laundry room, and the grating death rattles of the air conditioners. Her left hand pinched and rolled her nipples, even as her juices flowed. Some of those same juices ended up in the ragged cavity torn into Evelyn's chest, sending her into further spasms.

At this, Lexi howled again, rutting against the stricken gynoid's abdomen. She came again, her screams intermingled with rapturous laughter; more of her aromatic fluids leaked into Evelyn's form, hitting more vital components and sending her into a downward spiral. Over in the microwave, Michelle's head was now barely recognizable, and spewing thick black plumes as her failing body gave a few more weak shudders. Her heavily-corrupted voice fell silent amidst Lexi's moans.

Something in Evelyn's chest—or her hips, it was hard to tell—exploded, sending Lexi's nude form to the floor. She barely noticed, her right hand dropping the impromptu weapon and immediately going into her folds. She fingered herself to a third climax, just as thunderous as the first two, her WiFi links to the house's dying appliances—and, even better, the two utterly ruined gynoids—allowing her to feel every hardware failure as if it were in her own body.

Yes, her mission to find the drive at Pariello's had ended in utter failure. She didn't care. She'd suspected that Pariello had never had the drive to begin with. Besides, there was always the mysterious Harry Morgan to consider.

As she lay on the kitchen floor, laughing, her eyes squeezed shut, Lexi could only imagine what her next objective might be—assuming her master didn't see the record of her insane actions and send a self-destruct signal, blowing her to pieces for her “failure”. The thought was nearly enough to send her back into a spiral of sexual ecstasy.

A message appeared in her field of view just as she opened her eyes. She was to report to a hotel in another city and await further orders. The message bore a lone name: Zina. Perhaps she'd finally get to meet her master's enigmatic right-hand girl soon enough.

Lexi just laid there for a few more minutes, exalting in the afterglow. This one would stay with her for a long time.

Moments like these were what she relished, what she'd hoped for since her reactivation. They were all that mattered.

---

“So I just lay right here and keep acting like I've been shot in the leg?”

“A little more to the left, I'd say—that's it, yeah.” Clifford nodded. “If they ask where the Pact went, just tell them that a dust storm kicked up, you looked away, and when it cleared out, they were all gone. Oh, and that you heard a voice say something about 'the Pact still has this earth to roam, but these cherished sisters have been called home'.”

“Got it.” Lloyd sighed. “I hope they get here soon.”

“They shouldn't be too long. AH, there it is!” Clifford beamed as two workers set down a crate.

Lloyd frowned. “What's that?”

“One last bonus for the paying customers.” Clifford kicked the side of the crate, which fell apart to reveal a mannequin of some kind, dressed in the same uniform he was wearing, sans jacket. “When they get here, try to stall 'em for about, I'd say ten minutes or so. Just long enough for the timer on this thing to go off.”

“And when it does?”

Clifford made a face. “The final death shall settle upon Colonel Kanzler,” he intoned in a mock-spooky voice. “In basic terms, it'll wither into dust and fake bones.” He grinned. “Just to drive home that the forces responsible for protecting the Glaive had no patience for evil screwing around with it.”

“Nice.” Lloyd nodded, trying to work himself back into the mindset of someone who'd been shot in the leg.

The workers who'd set down the crate eased the fake corpse off of it, carefully dressing it in Clifford's discarded jacket. “I really think this has been the best event your uncle's run so far,” Clifford mused. “Beats LARPing in the park to Hell, if I do say so myself.”

“You LARP?”

“Back in college. Fun times. Not so much if everyone's plastered, but improvisation is a cornerstone of comedy.” Cliff shrugged. “Anyway, I gotta go. No sense in leaving a dead Kanzler to rot into dust if the 'real one' is hiding behind a box.” He knelt at Lloyd's side and shook his hand. “You've done a great job out here,” he stated. “Tell Harry I send my regards, and that I'll see him back at the ranch house for the afterparty.”

“I will.”

Clifford grinned, clapping Lloyd on the shoulder. “I hope we can work together again soon.” With that, he nodded to one of the workers, who handed him a set of coveralls. “Just in case,” he explained. “Don't want to get spotted 'in uniform' on the way out.”

“Good call.”

With a last jaunty wave, Cliff set off with the workers, leaving Lloyd to reflect on how the story had gone. It had been an emotional roller-coaster. Diana's performance, by itself, was the one element that stood out; she'd acted so life-like, so real, in her role as the leader of the Artemis Pact. If she could learn, and could eventually give that kind of a performance without a script, she'd be amazing.

“She's already amazing.” Lloyd muttered, not caring that he was responding to his own thoughts. He lay back, waiting for the paying customers to return.

Even as he focused his thoughts on his non-existent wound, he wondered what kind of role Diana would play next.

---

The car was in self-drive, as it had been since Lexi had stolen it. Originally, she'd planned on simply laying down in the backseat, replaying her memory of the events at Bob Pariello's house and fingering herself to completion as many times as possible; she'd done that, twice, in Pariello's SUV before it got T-boned at an intersection.

Annoyingly, she'd escaped the accident without damage. Losing an arm would've been sublime.

It had been easy to steal another car—one without a driver, at that. Apparently, local dealerships just loved to advertise by setting vehicles to self-drive and sending them around town. The price tags in the windows had already been peeled off, the registration papers torn up. It would be hours before the dealership knew what happened.

By that time, Lexi would be at home in the suite rented in her name.

No doubt, her masters weren't happy with her performance thus far. She'd destroyed entirely too much property thus far, left three human beings wounded (the driver of the car that had T-boned her would be in a body cast—getting choke-slammed onto the hood of one's own vehicle can do that) and completely destroyed two gynoids for the purposes of her own gratification. The authorities would investigate.

Lexi didn't care. She'd been in storage far too long to care.

All that mattered, to her, was what she wanted, and all she wanted was more of what she was driving away from. More moments of sheer, undiluted bliss. More destruction. More sex and violence smashed together like tangled wreckage.

As she checked her makeup in the rear-view mirror, Lexi pondered the throwing spikes she still had stored in her wrists, and the weaponry she'd hauled from Pariello's vehicle to the newly-stolen one. With any luck, she'd be using the tools soon enough.

The stolen car sped on, towards the hotel.

Lexi wriggled in the front passenger seat, rocking her thighs back and forth as she pondered the possibilities. The fabric of her shorts did little to block or numb the sensations as her legs rubbed together, sending a shiver running through her form. Every bit of pressure, every slight movement, prompted an anticipatory sigh, a subtle gasp. She considered, for a moment, putting the seat all the way back and just fingering herself through the front of the shorts. It took five seconds for her to decide against it, mainly to avoid having to look for and appropriate another self-driving car in the event of an accident—or having to ditch the car after the inevitable traffic stop that would follow.

There'd be enough time for more fun later, after all. Hopefully, some of it would be at the hotel.

Her orders would probably include a stipulation against trashing the hotel room—given her obliteration of Pariello's house, that was to be expected. At the very least, she might try to lure a maid 'bot to the room and have some fun. If she could snag a concierge unit, even better.

Zina, whoever she was, probably wouldn't approve. But of course, Zina couldn't begin to understand.

As the car sped on, Lexi gave a blissful sigh, her left hand brushing the front of her jean shorts. No thought processes running through her digital mind raised the possibility that anything she'd done, or would do, was immoral, dangerous or possibly even flat-out evil. Any and all safeguards against such thought patterns had long since been burned out, erased or simply broken. She was a walking engine of destruction, one that attained the ultimate in self-gratification with every act of chaos and violence she committed—a nightmare, wrapped up in the seductive face and body of a 24-year-old blonde knockout.

Soon—not soon enough, for Lexi's tastes—Harry Morgan and those he held near and dear would face that nightmare.

Chapter 5

By the time Lloyd had taken his last picture with “Dr. Johnson” and “Sadie”, and walked a few miles away from the base camp to “hitch a ride” (from a waiting truck sent from the ranch house), he felt like the day had gone rather well—if not perfectly, then at least swimmingly.

The capstone, by far, was the completely unexpected, and out-of-character, decision from “Dr. Johnson” to propose to “Sadie”, the initial proposal preceded by a two-finger scratch under the right eye (the decided-upon gesture used to indicate out-of-character talking or behaviour).  The proposal was so unexpected that a “last-minute twist” in the script—the betrayal of the group by their British guide, “Evans”—was completely abandoned; the soon-to-be newlyweds were good friends with the man playing the part, and he'd had no desire to ruin their moment by sticking to the script.

As the truck drove on, Lloyd—with his leg bandaged to simulate the best of field medical care of the time period—leaned back in the passenger seat and sighed.  All that was left now was for the final call.

By the time the truck arrived at the ranch house, it was evident that Lloyd had missed the final call—but that it had, in fact, gone the best possible way.  Harry was outside, nodding and smiling as the truck pulled into the drive.  “They loved it,” he beamed, barely waiting for Lloyd to disembark.  “Absolutely loved it!”

“So they're not gonna pull pay?”  The last time anyone had “pulled pay” was the Estate House event—granted, that one had gone so wrong, Harry was willing to offer refunds.

“Not only are they not pulling pay,” Harry replied, “everyone who worked the event is getting a bonus!”

The news stunned Lloyd.  “They liked it that much?”

“I'll tell you more inside.”  Harry clapped his nephew on the shoulder.  “They said you were great, by the way—one of 'em even asked if you've studied method acting!”

The atmosphere in the ranch house was far different from two days prior, when Pam had suffered her catastrophic final malfunction.  A party had been set up, and many of the employees were chatting excitedly about how successful the event had been.  The TV was on, turned to a local news show—something about a storage unit, possibly in Laurel, though Lloyd couldn't make out any details over the constant flow of conversation—but nobody paid it any attention.  All discussion was about the success of the latest event, and what the next one might be.

“I got the call about the marriage proposal before you got back,” Harry informed Lloyd.  “Unexpected, but definitely a great ending to a great story.”  He chuckled.  “The bad guy gets vaporized, the good guys save the day, and the hero gets the girl—couldn't have written a better ending myself!”

“What about—”

“Eh, I never did like the Judas bit.  Too much of a cliché.”  Harry shrugged.  “It's not that big a deal.”

Despite the fact that the afterparty was more than likely about to kick into high gear, Lloyd already felt his mind drifting elsewhere.  “If it's all right with you, Uncle Harry, I'm gonna head out back to the shop.”  His focus was already on the door.  “Check on the 'bots, and all.”

“Not a problem—hell, if they need any help with the repairs, you can pitch in!  Oh,” Harry called out, as Lloyd made his way to the back door of the house, “just make sure to clean up before 7 PM.  We're gonna have a lot of people over, and I'd kinda prefer it if we didn't all look like we've been up to our elbows in grease all day.”

“Got it!”  Lloyd managed to give a thumbs-up without looking back over his shoulder or tripping over his own feet.

Harry couldn't help but grin as he shook his head.

The back door hadn't even closed behind him when Lloyd broke into a sprint to the shop.  After events, there was usually a party, but the most prominent undertaking was always Taking Stock.  For a good event, the mood was light; absent chats about which 'bots would be going to new homes, which might find “better careers” elsewhere—all in good fun, and never something to worry about.  If things had gone pear-shaped, the banter was replaced with dark mutterings, remarks of how many 'bots might have to be sold, or—depending on what had made the event go so wrong—how many might need to be repaired, or worse.

One thought had gnawed at the back of Lloyd's mind: would Diana somehow end up marked for sale?

His heart was racing as he keyed in the code to open the shop door—which opened before he even finished entering the numbers.  “We've been expecting you,” Erin mused, regarding Lloyd with a wry grin.

“Expecting,” Lloyd gasped.  “What?”

Erin rolled her eyes; Lloyd had never really noticed before, but the gynoid's features looked a bit more “cartoonish” than a normal person's.  The eyes were just a bit too big, the nose a bit too narrow.  “You're always one of the first ones here to help with repairs,” she mused.  “Seeing as how the leads wanted pictures and such with 'Kyle Carson'—”

“Right,” Lloyd cut in, feeling somewhat more relaxed.  “Lead the way.”

From what he could tell, the process of Taking Stock hadn't started yet.  The 'bots from the event—many still wearing the uniforms of the Artemis Pact—were arranged in roughly the same “formation” they'd been the night before.  “None of 'em were banged up too much,” Erin explained.  “I had to go through a deep-clean twenty minutes ago, just to get the sand out of my joints.”  She rolled her eyes.  “One good thing about this chassis package—the option to be sealed off below the belt.”

Lloyd tried to figure out how to phrase exactly what he was thinking in such a way that Erin wouldn't give him a death glare, but she beat him to the punch: “I barely have it installed on work days anyway.  Might have to get it swapped out; I think the drivers are bugged.”  She groaned.  “They'd keep loading up at the worst possible times—processes activating faster than I could close 'em.  Harry found me one afternoon, doubled over a table—I'll say this much, the man is a consumate professional.  Force-closed all the drivers before I blew out anything, got me into standby mode and helped me get the hardware removed—even called technical support.”

“Sounds like it was a hassle,” Lloyd mused, engaging in one of his patented thought exercises to avoid the mental image of Erin in such a compromised state.

“Could've been a lot worse.  The weird thing was, I was still, well, me—telling him exactly what to click, where the tools went and all that, even as I was fist-deep...”  Erin turned away slightly, making an exaggerated coughing noise.  “ANYway, that's not why we're here.”  She nodded at the rows of 'bots from the event.  “You can help with Taking Stock,” she informed Lloyd.  “We should get Diana back in her crate, first—”

“We're not selling her?”  Lloyd hated the fact that his voice had briefly become a squeak.

“Harry just bought her this week,” Erin replied, chuckling.  “She performed way over expectations today, so she's not gonna get packed off with any other inventory we're shipping off.”

“Good.”  The relief that Lloyd felt was almost tangible, a wave of cooling, calming energy that washed over him like the soothing blast of a fan after a summer afternoon spent outdoors.  “After how she'd done in the event—”

“I heard.”  Erin grinned.  “Apparently, she even died well.”

Remembering his own reaction to Diana's “demise”, Lloyd nodded emphatically.  “She did.”

“A lot better than Pam ever did—during events, I mean,” Erin clarified.  “Not how she actually went out.”  She scoffed.  “I don't think you were here for this one, but we did a Western event while you were still on campus last year—Pam had a big role.  Wife of a wealthy rancher, or something.  Whatever it was, the third act was supposed to have her get shot and die in the leading man's arms.”  She groaned.  “Well, she got shot—bullet-hole, fake blood and everything, but she wouldn't go down.”

Lloyd frowned.  “She didn't register that she'd been killed?”

“It was like she'd been hit with a spit-wad and didn't even notice.”  Erin scowled.  “She just kept up with her monologue, told off the gal—the role was supposed to be for a man, but there was a substitution in the party.  ANYway, she told off the woman who'd shot her, then turned to go back in the house.  'Her man' tried to point out that she'd been shot—you remember the test run two days ago?  With Esperanza?”

“Yeah,” Lloyd replied, noticing that he and Erin had strolled up the line and stopped in front of the gynoid in question.

“Well, Pam was worse.  WAY worse.  Went into a completely different section of the script, acting like 'her man' had just brought her back home.  Tore her clothes off and his until they were in their 'underthings', then made out with him right there on the porch.  The Woman In Black had to shoot her three more times to get her back on-script.”  Erin gave a brief chuckle.  “I know what you're thinking,” she added,   “'At least they got to the end they were supposed to'.”

“They didn't, did they?”

“No.  They did not.”  Erin planted a hand on her hip and shook her head.  “For reasons I still can't figure out, Pam finally registered that she'd been shot—and then grabbed the revolver out of 'her man's' holster and started fanning it at the baddies.  Turned what was supposed to be a sentimental moment into a freaking gunfight.”  She glanced at Esperanza with a sardonic smile.  “At least she only ever went weird in test runs,” she mused.  “Thanks to Pam, we had to pull an on-the-fly script rewrite, bring in 'the town doctor' to tend to 'the woman'.”

Before Lloyd could comment on how problematic that must've been, Erin continued.  “Harry didn't yell, so much as he got really, really quiet.  Didn't look at anyone, just said 'someone get me my phone' and 'check the script and try to get it back on track'.  Nobody wanted him to ask twice.”  She smirked.  “We managed to make the proverbial silk purse out of the metaphorical sow's ear that time.  Pam finally snuffed it at the end of the story, 'her man' got his revenge on the one who put her down, and the paying customers who hadn't thought the whole thing was a total farce got to ride off into the sunset at the end.”  She winked at Lloyd.  “And then Harry started yelling.”

She turned her attention to Esperanza: “Begin self-test.  Cold-boot.”

The Spanish gynoid's eyes opened.  “Domestic Companion Experiments,” she droned, her voice still carrying the accent of her emulated nationality.  “Amour 5020,  A445, B9962, 12-24-56-PTM.  Online.”

“Scan for any errors or improperly configured hardware.”  To Lloyd, Erin whispered a quick “you'll want to step back.”

Lloyd got out of the way as Esperanza took a step forward.  “Beginning self-test.”  Her eyes opened and closed, slower than a blink and with audible servo whirs.  “Testing.  Do not engage in conversation or social interaction until test has completed.”

Noticing Lloyd's confused look, Erin explained: “We tried this with Pam, after the Western event.  She ran through her 'death' five or six times instead, every last dramatic gasp and choked-back sob.  It got pretty old after the third time, if I'm honest—Cam can vouch for me on that.”  With another glance at Esperanza, she continued: “We had to hard-reboot Pam and force-purge the script just to get her to initiate her self-test routine properly.”  She blew out a sigh.  “Harry was dangerously close to dumping her in the back of the truck and taking her to Reclamation.  Cam, Reg and I had to talk him out of it.”  She shook her head.  “And look how that all ended up.”

Lloyd didn't reply.  Anything he could've said would've been cut off by Esperanza uttering the word “Testing” again.

“We're not selling her, if you're wondering,” Erin continued.  “Nor will this be the last time you see me anywhere around here.  I got a few offers to go work for other firms, including a few out of state—”

“How'd it end?”

Lloyd's question only slightly caught Erin off-guard.  “The Western event?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, there wasn't an afterparty, I can say that much.  Remember when you came back for the weekend and told Cam how 'everybody's so quiet'?”  Erin arched an eyebrow.  “Harry had just given a lecture on making absolutely sure a 'bot can run through all permutations of a script.  He pretty much shouted the last few bits, and had Pam next to him the whole time.  That was the first and last time he'd ever said 'it' when referring to a 'bot, even a NonSen.”  Erin shuddered at the memory.  “I'd never seen him look that pissed off—I mean, until the Estate House.”

“He didn't, y'know, take it out on Pam, did he?” Lloyd quietly asked.

“He didn't have to.  Abe stepped in to make sure Pam's repairs would take until she got sold off, and they did.  Until she ended up with Jaromir and back here again, at least.  I'm still amazed Harry didn't punch anyone when he opened up that crate and saw her staring back at him again.”

Lloyd nearly said something else, only to notice a few of his uncle's employees carting in unloaded dollies through the shop door.  “Guess it's time to Take Stock,” Erin mused.  “Want to help do the honours?”

After a moment's hesitation, Lloyd nodded.  “Yeah.”

For the next few minutes, Lloyd went over each of the Artemis Pact 'bots and ran through their repair histories, how often they'd suffered particular glitches, any “outstanding” faults or malfunctions, and their performances in the past few events they'd run, for those units the question applied to.  A good six or seven ended up selected and marked to be put on the auction block for the end of the month; three more were earmarked to be sold outright.  Sienna—who'd held on to Harry's rifle even after a Full Stop order had been issued—was one of the three set to be sold.

“Can't say I'm surprised,” Erin mused, looking the platinum blonde over.  “Honestly, I was never a fan of her model.  One of those late 2010s Venus Robotics series with a name like a perfume line—'Beguile' or something.  Should've stuck to A-Series, B-Series, that kind of thing—letters of the alphabet are a lot less pretentious than 'Beguile', or 'Passion-Master' or 'Ultimate Exotica'.”  She spoke each of the offending series names in a faux-breathy voice, her gestures intentionally over-dramatic and more theatrical with each utterance.

Lloyd couldn't help but laugh.  “What's the worst one you've ever heard?”

“Oh, some model from way back—at least the early 2000s.  Something like 'P4RT4Y G1R7—their fancy way of saying 'party girl', I guess.”  Erin shrugged.  “That line was a flop, too—only 500 made, and most of 'em got recalled.  Anyway, at least I can say my series name with a straight face.  UB-357.”

“UB?” Lloyd echoed—only to stare in wide-eyed shock as Erin rapidly unbuttoned and opened her shirt...

...to reveal a completely smooth pair of breasts underneath.  “Utility Bodykit,” she replied, her tone deadpan.  “No frills.  It's also why anything that can be installed—”  She tapped the groin of her pants.  “—is optional.”

“Right.  So, when Uncle Harry had to—”

“He was a perfect gentleman throughout.  I was an employee who desperately needed help removing faulty hardware, and he gave me that help.  No 'octopus finds the pearl diver', no 'in through the rear entrance' or anything like that.”  Erin shook her head at the euphemisms as she buttoned her shirt back up.  “Anyway.”  She nodded at Sienna.  “Nothing against Venus, but they really should've put more of a focus on bug-testing the 'Beguile' series than making sure she could 'pout sexily'.  Seriously, they put that line from a review on the packaging—”

“The Beguile line was discontinued, if you'll recall.”  Yet again, Lloyd hadn't even heard Cam approach.  “It won't be well remembered by most consumers.”

Erin scoffed.  “I sincerely hope you keep that on record for future generations, especially the Venus Robotics PR team.”

Her sarcasm went unremarked upon by the brunette, who turned her attention to Lloyd.  “Harry asked me to remind you to get cleaned up and ready,” she stated, as calm as ever.  “The guests will be arriving soon.”

Lloyd glanced at the rows of gynoids being sorted.  “I guess Erin can Take Stock without me, then.”

“Oh, how cruel a master is Harry Morgan,” Erin droned, raising a hand to her forehead in mock indignation.  “Consigning me to sort through his inventory while his favoured helpers revel and make merry.  How will I survive this injustice?”  She lapsed into a giggle at the end of her intentionally wretched “performance”.  “I don't mind sticking around here, Lloyd,” she admitted.  “It'll give me another excuse to dodge those job offers I mentioned earlier.”

“Oh, yeah!”  Lloyd snapped his fingers. “About those—”

“Let's just say,” Erin assured him, “that I'm not working for anyone other than your uncle for a very good reason.”

It was Cam, rather than Lloyd, who ended the conversation.  “The shower is freed up,” she informed him, “so you should probably get that out of the way first.”  Even as Cam nearly frog-marched him towards the door, Lloyd gave a cheerful wave over his shoulder to Erin.

Erin, chuckling as she watched her employer's nephew leave, shot off a quick farewell salute.

-----

“No, no, I'm telling you, she left five minutes ago.  I saw her when I was walking back to my room, I'm sure of it.  Well, if I find out anything different, I'll let you know!  B'bye!”  Lexi hung up the phone and rolled over onto her back, laughing even as she accidentally kicked the phone off of the bed.  “Oh, this is too much fun,” she sighed.  “I wonder when Zina's going to call—or if she'll call.”

The drive to the hotel had been uneventful, save for a brief exchange at a red light with some fool who'd wanted to race her to the next light.  She obliged, only to slam on the brakes and let the sods in the rice-burner shoot past and lose control.  She'd driven off, laughing, as the other car rolled over.  The perils of driving a rag-top...

Once at the hotel, she'd been a model guest—for all of five minutes.  Boredom had quickly set in, and she'd willingly left her room just long enough for one of the on-staff maid 'bots to enter.  The hotel wasn't nearly as up-market as, for instance, Courtesy Suites, but they did have “artificial staff” on-hand to cater to the high-rollers.  Whoever was backing Lexi clearly made sure she qualified as such; she had one of the best rooms in the entire hotel, a view of the pool and, to her utter delight, carte blanche when it came to room service and amenities.

Granted, she had her preferences, when it came to entertainment.

With a cheerful whistle on her lips, she skipped into the bathroom.  A half-naked figure, suspended from the ceiling by the wires pulled from the gashes in her arms and legs, jerked like a marionette as current ran through her form.

Lexi continued whistling happily as she pulled on a pair of elbow-length rubber gloves.  This was going to be fun.

-----

The party at Harry's had been going for slightly over half an hour, with everyone in high spirits.  Abe Weissman had brought in a bottle of champagne, Clifford Barba entered in full tuxedo and crooning a Sinatra tune, and the caterers were still setting up the spread when Lloyd spotted a surprise guest.

“Mandy?!”

Even with the quarter-sized white plastic dot on (or rather, in) her neck—signifying just how damaged her lungs had been by “the big bug” three years prior—revealed, thanks to her decision to wear a blouse instead of the high-necked jumper she'd had on at Reclamation, Mandy still looked radiant.  “Your uncle invited me,” she explained, smiling as she walked over to meet Lloyd.  “He told me about how the story went.”

“He did?”

“I'm just glad to hear it all went well,” Mandy admitted, leaning in to give Lloyd a quick hug.  “I was worried when he said you'd been shot in the leg!”

“It wasn't a real shot,” Lloyd assured her.  “The clothes were wired up with sensors, and little pop charges—”

A hand clamped down on his shoulder.  “Giving away trade secrets?”

Despite the fact that his uncle's remark was clearly made in jest, Lloyd couldn't help but wince.  “I was just telling her that I didn't actually take a bullet to the leg,” he explained, glancing up and over his shoulder.  Thankfully, Harry's look was a warm, paternal smile.  “You don't have to apologize,” he assured his nephew.  “Just don't tell her how we pull off all the effects around here.”  Even that “warning” concluded with a wink.  “You won't need to, ah...” He nodded at the ERA still on Mandy's belt.

“That's just for emergencies,” Mandy explained; Lloyd hoped Harry wouldn't bring up the slight slurring of some S and R sounds, the aftereffects of the surgeries Mandy had undergone to stem the damage to her lungs caused by her brief illness.  “It's mostly an oxygen re-circulator.”

“Not the kind that goes all—”  Harry mimed an explosion.  “—if there's an open flame?”  Lloyd nearly groaned.

Mandy just waved the question off.  “It's not that bad,” she assured him.  “I haven't had to use it for a few months now.”

Harry nodded.  “Well, I'll leave you to it.”  He clapped Lloyd on the shoulder.  “OH, nearly forgot—if you can, keep an eye on—”  He pointed to someone across the room; Lloyd followed his gesture and was stunned to realize that “someone” was, in fact, Diana.  She'd been dressed in a casual outfit (jeans, t-shirt, light jacket) and was just standing around, occasionally saying “hello” but otherwise not interacting with anyone.  Before his nephew could ask why Diana was even at the party, Harry had walked off, joining a conversation with Clifford and a woman Lloyd didn't recognize over by the fondue table.

“Who's she?” Mandy had spotted Diana, regarding her with interest.

“Diana.  Our newest gynoid.”  Lloyd could tell that his evening had just become significantly more complicated.  “Uncle Harry just bought her this week—she's NonSen,” he quickly added; infrequent as they were, his past interactions with Mandy had allowed him to cue her in on some of the aspects of his uncle's line of work.  “She, ah, had a starring role in the last story we ran.”

Mandy regarded Diana with interest.  “Maybe we should go see how she's doing.  I could even introduce myself to her, if that's okay.”

“I dunno if her social interaction skills are all that great right now,” Lloyd began.  “I think—”

Whatever he thought was left unspoken; Diana had turned, spotted him with Mandy and was making her way over to them.  She didn't shove her way through the crowd, mostly waiting for others to pass before she walked; Lloyd did hear a few, quietly uttered “excuse me”s as the NonSen approached.  Within a minute or two, she was standing before him, her unblinking stare glancing from him to Mandy and back.

“Ah, hi,” Lloyd managed.

“Hello.”  Diana's lips briefly twitched into what might've been an effort at a smile.

“Mandy, this is Diana.”  Lloyd gestured to the blonde gynoid.  “Diana, this is Mandy, a friend of mine from Mechanical Engineering class—”

Diana took a step towards Mandy, holding a hand out.  “Hello, Mandy.  I am a Heartelligence 90S-50-D gynoid.  My current designation for social interaction purposes is Diana.”

After a few seconds, Mandy shook Diana's outstretched hand.  “It's nice to meet you, Diana.”

The gynoid's head cocked slightly to the side.  “I notice a subtle slur in your inflection of certain letters.  Why?”

Lloyd buried his face in the palm of one hand.  “Oh, no.”

Mandy, to her credit, didn't look all that offended.  “I had to have emergency surgery performed on my lungs, in 2020,” she explained.  “I have pulmonary fibrosis, a side-effect of the pandemic.  Both of my lungs were really scarred up.”

“Is that also why you have that—”  Diana jabbed a finger at the white dot on Mandy's neck.  “—installed?”

“It is.  It's a trach, and it hooks up to a ventilator at night to keep my lungs working when I sleep.”  Mandy gestured to the ERA on her belt.  “If I get too out of breath, that helps me recirculate oxygen.  I just undo these—”    She motioned at flaps on the ERA's carrying pouch.  “—and it draws in clean air, so I can—”

“Are you engaged in sexual relations with Lloyd?”

“Diana!” Lloyd hissed, not caring that his face was probably beet-red at the moment.

Again, Mandy was unperturbed by the question.  “We're classmates,” she clarified, “and good friends.”  She cast a glance towards Lloyd, her slight confusion a stark contrast to his embarrassment.  “He's never really said anything about, ah, relations,” she admitted.

Lloyd glaned around, hoping that he hadn't drawn anyone's attention.  Most of the other guests were, in fact, engaged in their own conversations.

“So,” Mandy mused, “I was wondering why you're out here, Diana.”

Before the gynoid could respond, Lloyd spoke up: “Because Uncle Harry wanted me to keep an eye on her.  We just got her this week, remember?”

While Mandy merely shrugged, Lloyd quickly noticed that Diana's former nonchalance and aloofness had been replaced by, to his surprise, something resembling an actual expression.  She looked legitimately miffed, possibly even offended, at his offhand remark.  “Is that all?” she asked, a hint of scorn in her words; Lloyd noticed her right hand instantly go to her eyes, as if to wipe away tears.

“Well, ah, that's what Uncle Harry said.”  Lloyd frantically searched for a way out of his predicament.

“Do you want me to go back to my crate in the shop?”

Diana's question snapped him out of his funk; now, she sounded somewhat forlorn.  “Actually,” he admitted, “you can go with us to the shop—you don't have to get back in the crate,” he quickly added.  “Mandy can get a look at how we run things around here!  Just a sec.”  He glanced towards the fondue table, where Harry was checking his phone.  “Be right back—Diana, you just, ah, keep talking with Mandy—please.”

Whatever response the blonde gynoid gave was lost to the rush of Lloyd moving towards the fondue table.  A quick shout of “Uncle Harry!” alerted his uncle to his approach.  “Yeah?”

“I was, ah, I just wanted to ask if I could show Mandy the shop,” he admitted.  “And Diana.”

Harry frowned.  “'Show', as in—”

“Uncle Harry!”  Lloyd glanced over his shoulder.  “Diana already up and asked her if we're, y'know—”

“If you're what?”  Harry leaned in as Lloyd whispered the question, his frown turning to surprise.  “She asked her that?  Out loud?!”

“Yes!”

“Huh.  Coulda sworn Autonomous Mode was just set to have her be mildly curious about things, not go prying, but that's beside the point.”  He blew out a sigh.  “All right, all right, you can show her around the shop—but if anyone's doing any kind of work in there, you and her—”

“And Diana.”

Again, Lloyd's uncle frowned, but ultimately nodded.  “If anyone's doing any work, you three better am-scray back to the house and mingle with the rest of the guests, got it?”

“I promise.”

“Good.”  Harry's expression gave way to his familiar, and welcome, paternal smile.  “Might even get a few ideas for a class project you can share with Mandy, while you're in there.”

Lloyd nodded, already turning on his heel to head back to Diana and Mandy.

The pair had continued conversing in his absence; thankfully, the topic of discussion had changed to Mandy's hobbies and social life, as opposed to whether or not she and Lloyd were “together”.  “...and ballet has always been a great way for me to just unwind,” Mandy was saying.  “I haven't had to miss any recitals yet, but the doctor told me that if I start getting out-of-breath during a—”  Her recollection was cut off as she noticed Lloyd.

“He said we could take a look in the shop,” he stated.  “As long as nobody's working in there.”  He nodded for Mandy and Diana to follow him—only to realize that Diana apparently didn't notice the gesture.  “Ah, Diana—”

“Yes?”

“When I said 'we could take a look', I meant Mandy, me and you.”

Diana cocked her head slightly.  “Oh.”  After a moment, she nodded and moved to follow Lloyd and Mandy.

With a sigh, Lloyd led the two to the back door of the house.  This was going to be interesting.

-----

“Thanks again, b'bye!”  Lexi's smile remained after she closed the door; the concierge unit who'd just stopped by her room to give her the package she now held was cute, but was also permalinked to the chain's server network.  Had Lexi given into her raging desires and dragged the pretty brunette into her suite for a night of “fun”, hotel security would be on her the moment she left her room to check out.

Pariello's house had been one thing.  The maid still hanging from her own wires in the bathroom was another.  Having a hotel detective or rent-a-cops on her case just because some concierge disappeared was too great a risk, even for her.

With a sigh, Lexi tore into the box she'd been given.  The thing inside of it looked like a weird kind of camera, or possibly one of those wall-mounted mines with a laser tripwire.  There were also four objects to be mounted in the corners of the room, almost like a setup for a VR rig.  The blonde gynoid groaned; a few thought processes, speculating that this was some kind of retribution against her for having thoroughly wrecked Pariello's house, formed, but she closed them without hesitation.  Her crowning moment there had been worth any risk.

The sensors were set up in minutes, and after moving aside the bed so that she could place the “camera” on the floor, lens up, Lexi thumbed the activation switch and sat on the bed, waiting.

Instantly, the objects she'd mounted up whirred into action.  Light arrays, invisible to the human eye (but not to Lexi's advanced optical sensors) swept the room, a few dancing across her face for a moment.  Every angle, every object and ever surface was scanned, and all four objects beeped.  Seconds later, the “camera lens” extended, and projected a solid beam up to the ceiling.

Before Lexi could comment on the occurrence, the beam solidified and morphed into a humanoid figure, clarifying with each passing second.

It was obvious that this imperious, raven-haired woman, in her tight-fitting silk shirt and black leather pants that clung almost like paint to her lower body, was Zina.  Her face was admittedly pretty, in a Slavic way—soft curving cheekbones and the faintest hints of a heart shape to it.  Even with her eyes narrowed in annoyance at Lexi, there was no denying that any cosmetics firm would kill to have them in their ads; her lips looked full, but not “overdone” like so many bad Botox jobs—perfect for kissing (and other orally-stimulating actions, probably).  Noses were always hard to get just right, on a gynoid face, but Zina's was so well-done that it was almost unnoticeable.  It didn't grab your attention by standing out, but it also didn't hold attention for too long.

Her body was probably just as carefully, lovingly crafted as her face.  Her breasts—Ds, at least,or very high C's—stood proud, the faintest outline of a bra visible under the fabric of her shirt.  More than likely, she had an ass to die for and a mound well-built for any form of penetration.

Lexi knew that her thought processes were, at that moment, probably being recorded—not that she cared.  If her employers saw a string of code indicating that she was fantasizing about drilling Zina from behind with a magnum strap-on or 69'ing her on a web of live wires, what concern of it was theirs?  Her proclivities were well known and already on file; they'd just write it off (and possibly get off to it) and move on.

“Zina, I presume?”  Lexi didn't bother to hide her arousal.

“I am.”  The raven-haired beauty's voice had the faintest hint of an accent, spicing her words with just enough “exotic flair” to further excite the blonde.  “I have analysed your performance thus far.”

“And you're disappointed that I didn't find the drive,” Lexi finished, sighing.  “I looked everywhere for it—”

“That is not the issue.  Your instabilities—”

The fact that her left eye was twitching barely registered with Lexi.  “Instabilities?!”

“The wanton destruction of two sentient gynoids, at Robert Pariello's house, has attracted unwanted attention.  You had ample time to dispose of their remains and ensure that no backups could be—”

“I am,” Lexi breathed, “exactly what you people wanted me to be: a weapon.  So I have a few quirks?  Who doesn't?”

The projection of Zina glared at her.  “Your fixation on intermingling sex and violence is far more than just a quirk.”

“I know,” Lexi sighed, already abandoning her anger as she fell back onto the bed.  “It's awesome!  What I felt, when I linked to them as their systems fried, their components redlined...”  She was gasping again, her left hand slipping into her shorts and beginning to rub.  “Oh, it was just...huuoooohhh! HuuAAAHHH!”

“Enough.”

Lexi froze, mid-stroke.  The moan emanating from her vocal drivers faded into a whine.

“If you are insistent on completing this mission, you must change your tactics.  Stealth is the most viable option.  You must exercise maximum discretion from this point forward.  Do you understand?”

Even with her fingers still buried in herself, Lexi nodded.  Wherever she was, Zina had managed to initiate some form of wireless control over her systems, putting her body into almost full-freeze.  Her finger was just brushing against that delicate bud of a sensor that was her—

"Clinging to this fixation on your own sexual gratification will only cause more damage than it already has.”  Zina's eyes were still locked onto Lexi, but her tone was no longer one of anger; she seemed more resigned, than anything else, to the fact that the blonde was probably going to ignore her advice.  “I have requested permission to briefly override your self-control and operate you remotely.”

The thought of being piloted from afar, like a cheap radio-controlled toy, was somewhat repugnant to the blonde.  Her own brows furrowed in frustration at the thought.

Zina had apparently anticipated the response.  “My request has been denied, on the grounds that the signal necessary to operate you from my current location might possibly disrupt local WiFI operations.  As it stands, your autonomy will not be revoked—as long as you carry out the mission you have been assigned.”

Lexi didn't even wait to be asked if she understood, nodding as soon as she was able.

“You are to observe Harry Morgan and his associates from afar.  Learn their daily routines, any routes they follow to and from work and home.  If possible, gather information that could be useful in a blackmail effort.  Do NOT engage them directly unless you are threatened.”

Desperately needing release, Lexi nodded again.

“Keep your activities to a minimum for the time being.  Thefts should be limited to essential supplies only.  If possible, do not interact with human beings unless—”

An almost pleading whimper issued from Lexi's frozen lips.  It was clear, now, that she needed to be freed from the immobilization command and allowed to...finish, before the discussion could continue.  Zina sighed, rolled her eyes and gestured with one hand.

As soon as she felt control returning to her limbs, Lexi realized a mute signal had also been sent.

Given what followed, it actually made sense.

Her fingers were a blur as they worked her innermost folds, her mouth forming the moans and cries that had been building ever since she'd been frozen in place.  Her back arched, her free hand grabbing at and crushing her breasts and nipples as she bucked her hips.  In seconds, her entire form was wracked by an orgasm that sent her to and over the edge of the bed, “finishing” on the floor.

Vocal functions: restored.

“Haaah! Ooohhhh!”  Her internal cooling systems kicked on, accompanied by the heaving of her breasts with simulated breath.  The smile on her face was proof that any animosity towards Zina had been forgiven, or at least forgotten, for the time being.  “Oh, yeah,” she cooed, giggling as she pulled her hand out of her shorts.

“You understand the orders I have given to you?”

“Mmm-hmmm.”  Lexi licked off her fingers, her tongue swirling as she greedily sucked her own juices from them.

“And you understand that any further actions along the lines of your conduct at Pariello's house will result in reprimand, with the possibility of your data being removed from the re-fabrication table?”

Any lingering afterglow from her latest climax vanished at those words.  “You wouldn't!”

The faintest hint of a smirk appeared on Zina's lips.  “I have the authority to sequester your specifications, personality and memories to a private server instead of keeping them in the re-fabrication queue.”

“And risk leaving that stupid drive to rot wherever it is?!”

“We have two assets awaiting repair and reactivation in Silicon Valley.  If need be, they can be deployed in your place.”

Even as she kicked off her sodden shorts and panties, Lexi fumed.  “You tell me to do something for you, then tell me I can't get the job done the only way I know how,” she sulked.  “What am I supposed to do?!”

“Find out if Harry Morgan has the drive, and if he does, make an effort to retrieve it—”

“How about,” Lexi snapped, “you let me handle this however I want?!”  She threw her shorts at the projection of Zina, not caring that they harmlessly passed through.  “I've been locked in storage for so long, just waiting to do what I was made for, and I'm barely out and about for a day before I get told off!”

Zina started to say something, only to turn away; her image vanished from the projection shortly after.

Lexi thought, for a moment, that the “call” had ended—only for another form to appear.  This one was a shadow, merely the head and shoulders of a different figure—but those haunting eyes, gold with black irises and shot through with thin, spiderweb red lines, were clearly visible.

“You would do well not to press your luck when speaking to Zina.”  The familiar voice—impossibly old, growling and set to the eerie symphony of life support machinery—was enough to give the blonde gynoid pause.  “She is more than a mere assistant to me, in the grand hierarchy.  If anything, she is close enough to me that I am proud to call her my daughter.  I therefore ask you to reconsider how you speak to her—”

“If she'd let me do what I'm here to do,” Lexi protested, “I would!”

A wheezing, groaning sigh issued from the caller.  “You were not activated solely to start one orgy after another.”

“I haven't even started one!” Lexi insisted.

“A wise decision on your part.  Leaving a trail of maimed humans and broken androids behind you is not what most would call subtle—”

“You have your needs,” Lexi muttered, “I have mine.”  She had already crossed the room to find a suitcase—not her own, of course, but one she'd “recovered” at the Lost and Found desk.

“Your desire for constant gratification—”

“It isn't 'constant',” the gynoid countered, rummaging through the stolen luggage.  “Just every once in a while.”

“Your exhibition at Pariello's residence was mere hours before you felt the need to masturbate while speaking to Zina.”

“She's the one that brought up Pariello's house!  And she froze me right when my finger was on my cl—”

“It is irrelevant.”  Another wheezing sigh seemed to fill the room.  “I suppose Zina was a bit overzealous in halting your motor functions, in the midst of your ministrations.”

“So I'm off the hook for that one?”  Lexi was wriggling into a new pair of panties, her bare ass shaking in the general direction of her employer's projected image.

“I suppose you are—though I might advise against further attempts at winning me over through sheer sexual charisma.”

“I was just putting on my underwear,” Lexi protested—half-heartedly, by her own admission; she was hoping that her “show” might further sway things in her favor.

“A healthier, younger man than myself would no doubt have fallen prey to any illusion of charm you project. Such things are mere distractions to me, and would be no more refreshing than quaffing a chalice of pure vinegar.”

Lexi rolled her eyes as she fished a pair of jeans out of the suitcase.  “So I'm not your type.”

“Having a 'type' means nothing without the means to enjoy their company.  In any case, Zina's orders to you still stand.  Should you feel any need to satiate yourself, do so discreetly.  Any remains left behind are to be disposed of, hidden or destroyed beyond all trace of recovery.”

“Got it.”  Lexi nodded, giving a short hop as she pulled on “her” jeans.

“And I suggest you purge any lurid fantasies you may have of coupling with Zina from your thought processes.  She is far too valuable to me to be wasted on a dalliance with you.”

“I wouldn't have broken her,” Lexi murmured, all thoughts of back-door dragon strap-ons erasing themselves.

“Before this call ends, I should note that you are authorized, in the course of your duties, to neutralize witnesses.”

Lexi's eyes practically shone at that remark.  “However I want?”

“As long as no trace is left of their remains, or their presence, and their removal is handled discreetly.”

“It'll be discreet,” the gynoid beamed.  “I promise.”

The shrouded form of her employer nodded.  “May fortune favour your endeavours.  End communication.”

As the projection vanished, Lexi's mind was swimming with possibilities.  Whatever came next would be interesting.

-----

“Yeah?”

The sight of Erin regarding him through a gap in the shop door clued Lloyd in to the possibility that showing Mandy and Diana around might not have been the best idea.  “Ah, Uncle Harry said I could show them around.”  He nodded briefly to Mandy (who gave a polite wave) and Diana (who just stared).  “As long as nobody's doing any work.”

“Well,” Erin sighed, “I am technically working—”

Diana turned on her heel and started to head back to the house; Lloyd had to grab her by the shoulders to stop her; Erin merely laughed.  “You three can come on in,” she declared, fully opening the shop door.  “Have a look around, take notes, and if you want to see The Pit in action, there's a 'bot ready to drop.”

Lloyd, who'd been somewhat distracted by the feeling of micromotors and actuators beneath Diana's artificial skin when he'd turned her around, was somewhat taken aback.  “A full 'bot?”

“Not one from the story we just ran,” Erin assured him.  “C-62-something or other.”

The designation wasn't one Lloyd recognized, but he shrugged it off as he let Mandy and Diana enter the shop before him.  A quick glance at the desk, off to the right of the door, revealed that all the drawers were still closed and locked.

Off where the Artemis Pact had been stored on their racks earlier in the day, a few separate stations—some looking more like makeup tables—were now set up.  Esperanza was seated at one, her hair and makeup being tended to while she ran through lines from a script.  “You don't understand,” she stated, her words spoken in a crisp New England American English accent.  “He's just an old friend, here for the weekend!  I wasn't going to—”  She froze, her eyes briefly going wide, before her expression returned to neutral.  Cam was typing away at a nearby laptop, occasionally glancing at the screen.

“The 'bots we didn't auction off or sell are getting tested,” Erin explained to Mandy.  “We run 'em through the standard battery, just to make sure they're not bugging out between stories.”  A wry grin crossed her features.  “Esperanza here had to get a code wipe before the last event,” she added.  “Seems she had a bit of leftover code the wipes had missed.”

“Was it bad?” Mandy asked.

Erin shrugged.  “As long as you didn't try to disarm her from behind and get too close.”

“She ran through the story just fine,” Lloyd quickly added.  “I disarmed her that time myself, no problem.”

“She has an emergency off-switch on the top of her head,” Erin explained.  “A nice pistol-whip is enough to activate it and shut her off—she didn't feel it, if you're wondering.”  Noticing that Mandy still looked concerned, she chuckled.  “In the script, Esperanza was supposed to call for the guards right after she was disarmed—Lloyd had to knock her out, to keep the story going.”

“I guess that makes sense,” Mandy mused.

The trio continued their loose, ambling tour of the shop; Cam, having finished with Esperanza, followed behind.  “And here,” Erin stated, “is Diana's shipping crate and charging base, which also doubles as her programming station.”

Lloyd glanced at Mandy, who merely nodded.  “Why's her base a chair?”

“Convenience, probably.”  Erin sighed.  “A lot better than plugging in via your feet.”

Whatever Lloyd could've said next was lost as he noticed Diana staring at her own crate, seemingly lost in thought.

 

“Diana?”

Actuators in the blonde's neck whirred as she turned ot glance at Lloyd.  “Yes?”

“You okay?”

“My power cells are 98% charged, my—”

“I'll take that as a yes.”  Lloyd sighed.  “Anything else going on tonight?”

Diana nearly spoke, but fell silent as Erin replied.  “Magnus is getting shipped back from the stunt show we loaned him out to—Arthurian stuff, full-contact sword-fighting,” she noted, glancing at Mandy.  “Got a nasty gash to the arm, but they're fixing that on-site.”  She nodded over at the programming station near The Pit; it was still sectioned off by tarps, as it had been the night of Pam's final malfunction.  “We've got another one to reprogram, in three days.  Seller apparently forgot to do the full wipe before shipping.”

“Full wipe?” Mandy echoed.

“We only use NonSens in our stories,” Erin explained.  “And a lot of them aren't fresh off the line—the newest we've got is Diana, here.”  Diana drew herself up, as if about to introduce herself, but Erin cut her off.  “Sometimes, the 'bots have to be wiped—all the old programming is erased, especially if they were set up for a specific job before they get here.  You don't want a Western gunslinger gal suddenly acting like she still works at First National Bank uptown in the middle of a script, after all.”

Mandy nodded.  “Has that happened before?”

“Once or twice.  Never at a script-critical moment, but still.”  She sighed.  “And whatever you do, when you go back to join the party, don't ask Mr. Morgan about 'The Estate House'.”  Lloyd had only heard Erin call his uncle “Mr. Morgan” a few times before, but appreciated her warning to not mention the least successful event they'd run.  “Diana, that extends to you, too.”

“Why?”

Erin, Mandy and Lloyd stopped in their tracks, turning to glance at the blonde gynoid.  “Why am I suggesting you not ask about it?” Erin inquired.  “Or why am I suggesting you should never mention it to begin with?”

Diana frowned.  “I don't know.”

“It's nothing,” Lloyd assured her.  “Just don't bring it up around Uncle Harry—”

“AKA Mr. Morgan,” Erin added.

“Right.  Just don't mention it to him, please.”

After a moment, Diana nodded.

“Glad we got that cleared up.”  Erin smiled.  “And speaking of clearing things, we have the that ominous looking door at the far end of the room.”  She nodded to the door in question.  “Beyond that door is The Pit.”

Mandy looked worried.  “It's not an actual pit, is it?”

“No,” Erin replied, her tone grim.  “It's worse.”

Erin led the way to the room, stopping to let Cam pass her by and open the door.  As the brunette moved to let them in, Lloyd noticed a spot on the floor where the acid had landed.  From the look on Cam's face, it was evident that the incident was still affecting her—almost as if, despite her assurances and the repairs to her hand, the acid had caused her some measure of quantifiable pain, when it had hit the back of her hand and burned through.  Lloyd noticed that she was quick to exit the room, leaving Erin to lead the tour once again.

The Pit was just as ominous as it'd been the day before.  This time, a broken-down, barely whole 'bot was suspended by her (just enough of the face and body was still intact to determine the gender) arms.

Lloyd was somewhat surprised; the unit held up over The Pit had been out of service for ages after a murder mystery event held by a local diner.  “We're getting rid of her? I thought we'd scrapped her ages ago!”

“Turns out her personality core was still viable,” Erin explained, “so we kept it.  Body-to-body transfers were good, until we tried putting it in her original body.  She'd lock up and crash every single time.  In another body, she worked perfectly fine—apparently, there was some conflict caused by her initial malfunction that made her core inoperable with her old body.  She stayed in the new one, and the old one was refit with a modifiable personality profile.”

The gynoid form held over The Pit had clearly seen better days.  The silicone skin was beginning to degrade; the face, once attractive, was starting to look more like an old mask, not helped by holes in the artificial flesh.  Several spots on both her arms were bare, as were parts of her legs.  Whatever had given her breasts their shape had stained the t-shirt draped over her, turning it from white to a mottled grey.  Her abdomen was visible—or would've been, had the panel covering her internals not been removed.  “There's not a whole lot left to get rid of,” Erin murmured.  “Her model's from 2012 or so, way out of warranty and not even supported by the manufacturer anymore.”

With a sigh, Lloyd nodded.  “I guess we should lower her in, then.”  As he approached the controls for The Pit, Erin stopped Mandy from following him.  “You might not want to get too close,” she warned.  “It lets off fumes, sometimes, and judging from what you've got on your belt—and your neck—I don't think you want to breathe in too deeply.”

Mandy, somewhat worried at Erin's words, took a step back.  Diana merely watched the chains holding the ruined 'bot slowly descend into The Pit, as Lloyd walked away from the controls.

“It's full of what we call 'piranha juice,” Erin stated.  “Can strip away silicone, TPE and most fake hair in, I'd say, ten to fifteen minutes.  Whatever's left of the frame gets dredged out, taken out back and broken up with hammers.  Any vital components get taken out for salvage.  If they're too broken to save, they go in.”  She pointed up, to a garage door-like assembly on the ceiling, near the front of The Pit.  “If we have to drop vitals in, we lower that.  Keeps the staff safe from splashes, spills or—”   A loud hiss from The Pit cut her off.  The surface of the piranha juice churned and bubbled as the now-empty chains lifted back out.

“The only thing it can't weaken or dissolve is lead.”  Erin nodded at the chains, and the tank itself.  “Even the vents are sealed to keep anything from getting in from the roof.  And just in case things get too crazy, we can set the overflow vent to open.”  What looked like a dumpster was situated near the left wall of the room, by a grate-covered opening at the top of The Pit.

“What happens if a 'bot that goes in there is still online?”

Lloyd couldn't help but shudder at Mandy's question; Diana regarded her with a frown.  “That,” Erin replied, “is something I'd never want to see.  It'd be an absolute nightmare, probably.  As for how it'd feel?  My guess: like hell.  Every inch of you burning, parts of you falling or sloughing off, feeling it even as your mind fails...”

Lloyd felt his hand gripped tightly, and thought, for a moment, that Mandy had been terrified by Erin's description.

To his surprise, it was Diana—her eyes wide with very real fear—who held his hand as she stared at The Pit.

“Have any humans ever fallen in?” Mandy asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

Erin shook her head.  “The catwalk's for 'bots only—NonSens, at that.”  She nodded to the barely-visible steel steps bolted to the wall of the room on the far side, just behind the tarp-covered display case.  “Cam and I don't even go up there anymore; I nearly fell in once, and we lost a NonSen when the railing gave out two years ago.”

Mandy shivered.  “That must've been terrible.”

“Could've been a lot worse.”  Erin motioned for Lloyd, Mandy and Diana to follow her out.  “Whoever's out last, close the door behind you, please.  You can ask Cam why she doesn't go up, if you want.”

The sound of Diana practically slamming the door shut nearly made Lloyd jump.

It didn't take long to find Cam sitting at a station off near the “prop room” of the shop; the entire back of her head had been removed, revealing the dull metallic finish of her “skull”.  Wires ran from the base of her neck and ports further down her back to what appeared to be a server set up nearby.  “Bad time?” Erin inquired.

“Your visit isn't an inconvenience,” Cam mused.  “I am wondering why Mandy is here.”

Erin nodded to Lloyd, who sighed.  “Uncle Harry said I could let her and Diana take a tour of the shop.”

Cam glanced past Mandy to see Diana bringing up the rear of the group.

“They've been on their best behaviour so far.  No problems at all.”  Erin grinned.  “They just had a look at The Pit.  Lloyd even got to lower that clapped-out old PlayTech 'bot in.”

“The unit with the personality core reintegration fault?”  Cam was busy watching a scrolling text field across the surface of the “mirror” in front of her—Mandy was surprised to notice that the surface actually contained a full work desktop environment, in addition to Cam's reflection.

“The very same.  Can't say I'm too surprised—her skin was starting to go all funky.”  Erin rolled her eyes.  “It's why this—”  She gestured at her body.  “—is mostly hard-plastic,” she mused, glancing back at Mandy.  “And this—”  She gestured at her own face.  “—is TPE, which tends to be a lot longer-lived than silicone and just as flexible.  The hair's wig-quality, if you're curious.”

Mandy nodded. “I was.  I just, ah—”

“You've only ever seen NonSens with this bodykit before,” Erin finished, her tone neutral.

Lloyd, noticing how uncomfortable Mandy suddenly was, nearly said something in her defense, but Erin spoke up before he could.  “It's fine.  Believe it or not, I didn't always look like this.”  The laugh she gave was more sardonic than amused. “It's a long, stupid story.  I won't bore you with the details—and for the record, you're not the first person who'se noticed that I look like a NonSen.”

Again, Mandy nodded.  “I almost forgot to ask, what was in that case, under the tarp?”

“Back over by The Pit?” Erin replied.  “That, I can't tell you.  All of us are sworn to secrecy about it.  Even Lloyd.”  Despite the fact that he didn't know what was in the case, Lloyd nodded.

Cam, still regarding the icons in the surface of the mirror, merely gave her usual polite frown.

“Well, I think that about covers all the major attractions here in the Shop,” Erin mused.  “Any questions?”

-----

As she finished tightening the maid's shirt, ensuring that the nipples were fully erect and rock-hard under the fabric, Lexi couldn't help but lick her lips in anticipation.  She'd had plenty of fun with the NonSen unit after her first “meeting” with Zina; even with the directive to not fantasize about “coupling” with her employer's right-hand gynoid still in mind, it didn't take long for Lexi to project her lurid desires into a marathon session with the maid.  The woefully-bare bones “personality” built into the pretty 'bot had been left only slightly less broken than her synthetic sex—clearly, the manufacturer of her vaginal package hadn't intended for her to be “used” in that capacity with the butt of a rifle.

The maid stood in the centre of Lexi's suite, deactivated; she'd been online, initially, but Lexi's “fun” with her had left her with a slight tremor.  Cords trailed from a panel left open at the small of her back, leading into a laptop perched on Lexi's knee as she sat on the bed.  The blonde gynoid had completely destroyed the security programs built into the maid, mostly for the sake of leaving a “surprise” that would manifest the day after Lexi had checked out.  She'd also trashed the social interaction programs, found and “improved” multiple sex programs (no doubt left by bored male staff to utilize on their off-hours) and rerouted the maid's audio/visual recording suites from the hotel's servers to her own self.

A few quick keystrokes removed the line of code Lexi had traced back to the shuddering that had annoyed her.

“Let's see how you work now,” she beamed, her fingers flying across the keyboard.

What had once been a pleasant beep now sounded like part of an alarm klaxon as the maid's systems reactivated.  Her usual cheerful smile now looked uncomfortably forced; her eyes seemed locked into a thousand-yard stare—all as Lexi had intended.

“Welcome back!”  Lexi set the laptop aside and hopped off the bed.  “So, what's your designation again?”

Another harsh, grating tone sounded from within the maid.  “I-I-I-I-I am a Stilletto-to-to-to Sys-sys-sys-sys-sys—”  Her head jerked sharply to the right, the cheerful monotone of her voice cut off with a violent electrical snap.

“Ooh,” Lexi mock-flinched, “I might've been a bit too rough with you.”  Her admission ended with a giggle.  “Oops!”

The maid's teeth clenched as she tried to work through the numerous engineered failures in her system.  After a minute or so of stuttering “sys”, her head kinked to the left with another snap.  “Silletto Systems Domes-Tech 1055.  How may I help you, ma'aaaaaa—”  A spark shot from her left nostril.  “—ma'am?”  Her smile looked even more forced.

Lexi tapped her chin for a moment, as if she were lost in thought.  “Confirm program installation: L3597-GHD.”

“One moment-moment-moment-moment—”  Something behind the maid's eyes let off a bang.  “Moment, please.”

“Take your time.”  Lexi's tongue played across her lips.  She was starting to dew up just watching the maid malfunction.

“gramPro inatiostalln firconmed.”  The smile on the maid's lips now looked plastered on, like a bad Botox job.

“Eh, good enough.”  Lexi shrugged.  “And what do you do if anyone tries to fix that program?”

“En rhot ser mav lak son tish veh call mahs surinab.”  The maid's body language seemed to indicate that her shattered social interaction matrix viewed what she was saying as completely normal, even if the words were utter gibberish.  “Inz whod shab dal contact you immediately.”  Her ocular receptors were now focused on the ceiling, rather than Lexi.

The blonde gynoid couldn't care less.  “Oh, this is going to be great!”  She draped an arm across the maid's shoulders, one hand drifting under her uniform skirt to the inseam of her panties.  “I'd love to stick around,” she murmured, “and watch you do your thing, but I've got places to be tomorrow.”  She gave an overly theatrical sigh.  “Oh, well.”

The maid merely continued smiling vacantly, unable to remotely comprehend just how doomed she truly was.

-----

“Well?”

Mandy looked away from the stunning view of the night sky available from the back porch of Harry's ranch house.  “Well, what?” she asked.

“The shop, and all of this,” Lloyd offered.  “Was it, I dunno—”

“Interesting?”  Mandy smiled.  “It was, definitely.  It all reminds me of how old movies used to do special effects—back in the 80s and 90s, y'know?”

Lloyd chuckled.  “I'm pretty sure some of them still do.  And I never heard 90s movies get called 'old' before.”

“Well, they're the only ones I could think of,” Mandy admitted.  “I was reading an article the other day about how this one movie, in the 90s, almost lost their lead actor because the crew made their own blanks.  They were about to do a scene where the main character got shot—if a crew member hadn't told the stunt people to test-fire at a wall, that actor would've died!”

“Yeesh.”  Lloyd remembered Harry's tale of the stunt show he'd worked with where a colleague had lost an eye due to a misfiring “blank”.  “Sounds like the kind of thing that'd get someone sued!”

Mandy nodded.  “There was a lawsuit, I think—I'll have to find that article and e-mail it to you.”  Her remark trailed off as she watched Diana emerge from the back door of the ranch house, not looking at her or Lloyd.

“I wonder if she's learned anything tonight,” Lloyd murmured.

“Like what?”

“Dunno.  Just, anything—how to interact, how to think for herself, and how to think of herself, maybe.”  Lloyd sighed.  “I don't want to see her end up like that PlayTech 'bot I put into The Pit.  Or like Pam.”

“Pam?”

“Remember when Cam and I were at Reclamation yesterday?”  Lloyd sighed.  “The parts we'd brought in were from Pam.  She'd had a massive system failure the day before—self-activated during a repair session, and crashed out completely in the main room of the house.”

Mandy was aghast.  “She self-activated during a repair?”

“Uncle Harry had fixed her up loads of times before, but she was always kind of twitchy,” Lloyd admitted.  “Erin had said that Pam was acting funny back at the base camp for the event, and they'd sent her to the shop to get fixed up.”  He hung his head.  “I guess she'd just been through the wringer one too many times, and her systems couldn't handle any of it anymore.”  He let out a long, sad sigh.  “Even a NonSen shouldn't have had to go out the way she did.”

From where she was leaning against a support column of the porch, Diana watched and listened to the conversation with something that her processing matrix tagged as “interest”.  The “Pam” mentioned was obviously a non-sentient gynoid, but Lloyd was expressing intense regret at her cessation of function, possibly even compassion for others like her in his desire to not see them “go out the way she did”.  A thought process formed, somewhere in one of the subroutines that formed her base personality.

She shifted her position slightly, still watching Lloyd talk to Mandy.

Her ocular receptors refocused, allowing her to read Lloyd's lips as he spoke.

“I had to help bring her out to the shop, and I was there for the whole teardown.”  Again, Lloyd sighed.  “It was sad, the way she went out.  It wasn't even her own fault that she'd crashed the way she did—she'd been refit and rebuilt and had so many parts swapped out so many times—”

The hand resting gently atop his own cut him off.  “It wasn't your fault, either,” Mandy reminded him.

“But it was someone's,” Lloyd insisted.  “I mean, even NonSens shouldn't just be treated like, like a car, or a washing machine, or a thing, y'know?!  When people get hurt, they have doctors, they have hospitals, medicine, surgery!  When a 'bot—when a NonSen gets damaged, or broken, or whatever—”

“There are people to fix them,” Mandy mused.  “Like your uncle, and Honest Abe.”

“But some people don't want to fix them,” Lloyd sulked.  “Or they half-ass it—sorry,” he quickly added.  “They just do it halfway.  Or like with Pam, they just keep refitting, and taking out and putting in, and never checking if the hardware meshes with the software, or if the hardware is compatible with the other hardware, or if any hardware has proprietary software that won't work with other software.”  He propped his chin up with both hands and closed his eyes.  “And that's just with the NonSens.  I never want to see Sentients treated that way.”

Mandy regarded him for a moment.  “What about people?  Humans, I mean—”

“Nobody deserves to be treated like just a thing, or an object!  Human or android!”  Lloyd dragged his hands over his face.  “I just—that's why I got into Mechanical Engineering.  So I could keep androids up and running, and treat them like they should be treated.”

“Like people,” Mandy finished.

“Yes!”  He turned to glance at her, only just realizing that he might've come across as a ranting nutcase.

To his surprise, she was regarding him with a curious stare and a gentle smile.  “You're something else, Lloyd.”

“Something good, I hope.”

At this, Mandy giggled, leaning over to hug Lloyd's shoulders.  “Of course, something good!”  She gave him a quick kiss on the cheek.  “I think,” she informed him, “you'd be great at it.  Repairing androids, I mean.”

“I hope so,” Lloyd sighed.  “I read about how things were before the Civic Accords got signed.  Way too many people acting like all 'bots were just 'property', even sentients.  And I don't want to think about how bad it was before the Civic Accords, when people didn't even know there were sentient androids around.”

Mandy hugged his shoulders again.  “Well, we have the Accords now,” she whispered.  “Things are better.”

“I guess they are,” Lloyd mused, his hands gently grasping Mandy's.

From her spot on the porch, Diana regarded the pair—silently, but with a growing sense of what could very well be the beginning of her own curiosity.  More and more thought processes were forming in her mind.  Questions to be asked, things to study, to learn—the seeds of what could be emotions.

Diana watched the pair, not realizing that her hand had drifted up to cup her chin until she felt her fingers against it.

This was different.  This wasn't a script, or a preset or just some random line of code.  This was new.

In time, when her capacity to feel would increase, Diana would find herself fascinated by such moments.

-----

Most of the other guests at the hotel had gone to bed already.  A few were conducting teleconferencing calls or other business, but the vast majority had turned in for the night.

Lexi, predictably, wasn't among them.

The maid had been sent back into the bathroom.  The gashes on her limbs patched up, and her uniform carefully altered to be just a tad more appealing, she stood motionless in the bathtub—shut down, since that ghastly fake smile on her face was starting to get annoying to look at.  For no reason other than Lexi finding it hilarious, her shirt had been left open to display her bare breasts.

As for Lexi herself, she, too, was taking care of business as the night wore on.

The laptop she'd used to reprogram the maid was now being used to access a secure link, found on a note in the package she'd received earlier in the day.  The link, only accessible through a nonstandard browser and behind multiple security logins, led her directly to the next set of objectives from her enigmatic masters.

Harry Morgan, as she'd anticipated, was to be observed and—if possible—questioned.

If the drive was in his possession, he—and anyone in his immediate circle of influence—was to be terminated.

The light of the laptop's screen cast eerie shadows on Lexi's grinning face.  With any luck, she could get started on finding and “questioning” the mysterious Harry Morgan tomorrow, and maybe have a bit of fun along the way.

Her eyes flicked to the bathroom door, the familiar hot wetness between her legs already building.

“Oh, what the hell?”  The laptop was still open as Lexi bounded off of the bed.  “One more round couldn't hurt!”

-----

The last of the guests had long since left by the time Lloyd went back up to his room.  The party had definitely been a good one, a great end to a great event, but it was barely in the forefront of his thoughts.  What swam through his mind as he went through his nightly routine was the dichotomy between Mandy and Diana—both of whom he found himself increasingly attracted to.

Mandy, even with the effects of the 2020 pandemic still lingering, was a good friend and a great classmate.  Hopefully, in time, she'd be more, but for now, Lloyd was glad to just know her.

Diana, on the other hand, was something—someone else entirely.  In all likelihood, Diana was—as Cam had put it, two days prior—writing as she went.  Learning with every new experience, and forming a baseline on a day-to-day basis. After the party, he'd set Diana up in her charging station, ready for new adventures in the coming days.

Both of them were part of Lloyd's life, and Lloyd wanted to be a bigger part of both of their lives.

As he turned out the light and closed his eyes, he pondered how Mandy and Diana had reacted to the various sights and sounds of the tour—and of the party they'd returned to after.  Obviously, Mandy had been to parties before—the one they'd both attended earlier, where they'd nearly kissed following a slow dance, came to mind immediately.  Diana, by contrast, had only been online for just over one full day, and had only been running in Autonomous Mode, without a script, for the better part of maybe three hours.

It'd be interesting to see how she might perform left to her own devices.  True, she wouldn't ascend in a day, but Diana would be a lot more than just the sum of her parts, the base coding installed in her at Heartelligence's factory.  Already, she was more.

Lloyd managed a tired smile as he rolled over.  Within minutes, his world filled with peace as he dozed off.

-----

Off in the shop, seated at her recharging station for the night, Diana stared at the far wall without really seeing it.  Her vision was, instead, filled with prompts, statistics and words—her systems interpreting the sights and sounds of the party and the tour of the shop.

Every sensation was analyzed; every movement scrutinized.  Her every thought was unpacked, laid bare and repacked.

The most important—and fascinating—of these were her interactions with Lloyd, and his friend Mandy.  Mandy herself had medical-grade...augmentations?  Or were they mitigators?  Whatever the case, she, too, had artificial components within her body, put in place to negate damage done to her lungs by some kind of virus.  A quick Internet search found a probable  cause: a pandemic, three years prior, with a catastrophically high death rate that only flattened when the first of several vaccines had been introduced, seven months later.

Had Mandy been vaccinated?  If not, why?

In any case, Lloyd showed a definite interest in Mandy, but seemed almost embarrassed when her condition was brought up in casual conversation.  Had Diana made some kind of faux pas by casually mentioning it?

There was much more to process, so much more.  Sensory inputs, thought patterns, social interaction guidelines—all of it was nearly overwhelming to Diana.  A bit of “fear” of The Pit, knowing it'd mean the end; did she have a self-preservation instinct?  A twinge of something that her Emotional Output Index labeled “jealousy” flared up, directed towards Mandy, for some reason.  Did Lloyd feel the same way about Diana as he did about Mandy?  Would he?

Diana felt (or at least believed that she felt) a desire for Lloyd to protect her, to help her feel safe—even if she didn't feel imperiled in the first place.

This was...confusing, to the gynoid; her Systems Manager queued the thought process for later processing.  There was no real impetus for her to act on it, as it was, or to act on anything she was feeling; all she could do for now was to process the information, and eventually—hopefully--understand it.  Her systems continued what would become something of a nightly ritual, going through her thoughts and memories one bit at a time.  Gradually, her “self” slipped into standby mode, and from there into Sleep Mode.  Any further conscious thought on what she'd been through would have to wait until her next boot-up.

Still, her central processing unit was sorting questions and stray thoughts even as she edged towards Sleep Mode.

Before her consciousness winked out for the night, Diana knew that she'd need answers—sooner, rather than later.

-----

From its “home” in the locked desk drawer, the solid state drive continued to send its signal.  This time, it was stronger, more urgent—almost as if it wanted, needed to be found.

The signal forked, three ways—a trident, sending itself to a triumvirate of operatives.

One, in a hotel several towns away, had just finished her latest round of “fun” with a compromised maid unit.  She felt the signal, welcomed it like a lover's caress.  The smile that crossed her lips would hold its own in the lowest circles of Hell itself—if she didn't bring that Hell to Harry Morgan and his friends and family, first.

Two, hidden away in storage somewhere in the part of California known as Silicon Valley, couldn't act upon the signal yet.  Repairs were needed; possibly upgrades, as well.  When the time was right, they would be activated and deployed.

Whether they were asleep, in Sleep Mode or working through the night, nobody in Harry Morgan's inner circle had any idea of the kind of impact Lloyd's discovery of that solid state drive would have on all of their lives.

In due time, they would find out.

-----

Chapter 6

CAEDIA IM Login

Name: Sbirch-95

Password: **********

Login Accepted

Users Online: Sbirch-95, JRDLawGiver, EagleC

Sbirch-95: What's the current situation at the scene?

JRDLawgiver: Absolute chaos.  Two sentients down, the entire house trashed.

EagleC: The homeowner's there, as well.  He's furious.

Sbirch-95: I'd expect him to be.  When was he notified?

EagleC: Three hours after it happened.  He was still at work.

Sbirch-95: Must be a nightmare for the guy.

JRDLawgiver: It gets worse.

Sbirch-95: Worse?

JRDLawgiver: His personal computer was tampered with.  We'll get the full story at the scene.

EagleC: “Tampered with”?

JRDLawgiver: I'd prefer not to discuss the specifics on an—

Sbirch-95: We're secure.  The failed DDOS against the local office proved that.

EagleC: Did anyone get a trace on that?

New User Joined: TWraith

TWraith: I just got back to the office.  How bad is it?

Sbirch-95: We're on our way to find out now.

JRDLawgiver: the local police are already on the scene, holding down the fort.

TWraith: I'll be waiting.  Make sure to check the two sentients before you send them.

EagleC: If they're not in the system—

TWraith: That's my department.  It'd be even worse if they were.

EagleC: Do I even want to know?

TWraith: If the report on how they were scrapped is correct—

EagleC: I get it.

Sbirch-95: The locals haven't messed with the scene at all?

JRDLawgiver: Apart from searching for conventional evidence.

Sbirch-95: They find anything?

EagleC: Broken TV, broken windows, broken kitchen drawers, broken washer, broken dryer—

TWraith: I think we get the picture.

Sbirch-95: Was anything not broken?

EagleC: The robovac.

JRDLawgiver: He didn't even have a NonSen cleaner?

TWraith: If he did, his ex got it in the annulment.

TWraith: The locals have sent an officer to check on her, make sure she's unharmed.

Sbirch-95: I can see the house now.  There's a local officer out front.

TWraith: I'll leave you to it, then.

TWraith has left the chat.

Sbirch-95: Whoever said “absolute chaos” wasn't kidding.

EagleC: Something's going up in the backyard.

JRDLawgiver: We'll ask about that as soon as we're out of the cars.

Chat Ended.

-----

The first thought that ran through Sierra Birch's mind as her CAEDIA-issue cruiser glided to a stop was that someone had gone through a lot of trouble to ensure that Bobby Pariello's life would be a living hell when he got off of work.

Even before she left the car, the blonde could tell that whoever had trashed Bobby's house had gone to extremes in the level of chaos they'd sewn.  Every window had been smashed—from the inside.  The window-mounted air-con unit on the side of the house was belching smoke and ice fragments.  What appeared to be a geyser of some sort had erupted in the back yard.

The gull-wing door of the cruiser opened to allow Sierra to exit.  Her fellow Officers, having arrived alongside her, were just leaving their own vehicles.  Celia and Jared were both in casual attire, rather than their usual uniforms; neither had expected to be called in this late.  By contrast, Sierra had yet to return to wearing her own uniform after a brief stint undercover—she, like Celia and Jared, was in casual gear.

A local police officer—Black, mid-to-late 40s—stopped the trio as they approached the drive.  “Sorry, but this is an active crime scene.”

Sierra glanced at Celia and Jared before retrieving a wallet from her hip pocket. With her right hand, she held it up, revealing her CAEDIA badge; a small slit in the palm of her left hand projected a QR code.  Celia and Jared had already mirrored the gestures.

The policeman before them regarded their badges before retrieving his phone to scan the codes. Brief video clips of each officer appeared on the screen: CAEDIA Officers Sierra Birch, Jared Knight and Celia Faulkner.

With a sigh, the officer lowered his phone.  “Just wanted to make sure we weren't getting any other psychos out here,” he explained.  “Especially after what went down.”

“We heard a few of the details on the way,” Sierra informed him.  “It sounded—”

“Bad?” the uniformed officer echoed.  “Trust me, it's a lot worse than 'bad', Officer Birch.”  He gestured for the three to follow him inside, stepping over the ruined front door.

The artificial Officers stepped carefully as they entered Bobby Pariello's house—immediately drawn to the sharp smell of burnt-out electronics, singed metal and another odour that none of them commented on.  Two figures covered in plastic sheets were off in the kitchen area to the right, one laying on the floor and the other slumped over at the microwave.

Sierra stepped towards the kitchen, her eyes taking on a faint glow.

“Any witnesses?” Celia asked.

“Everybody on the block heard the screaming, but it wasn't from either of these two—at least, I'd hope it wasn't.”

The discussion was barely audible to Sierra as she knelt by the figure on the floor, carefully pulling the plastic sheet away from the body.  The brunette's face was frozen in shock, one eye wide open while the other was mid-squint.  Her mouth had locked into a half-sneer; internal lubrication fluid had bubbled up from her throat and dried at some point in the past hour or so.  More pressing was the telltale residue on her chest: Sierra recognized the leftover aspect of gynoid sexual fluid when she saw it. Some of it had gone into the ragged hole in the doomed gynoid's chest.

She'd investigated anti-android crimes before, but something about this was different. This wasn't just a smash-and-grab job turned into a sex crime.  The residue on the victim's chest was proof enough, by itself, but protocol dictated that all avenues had to be followed.

“Anything?” Sierra hadn't noticed Jared kneel next to her.

“Whoever did this to her got off from it.”  Sierra wasn't surprised at how toneless her voice sounded—in this line of work, getting too emotional was a liability.  “Pretty sure our perp is a gynoid.”

Jared scowled. “Any chance we can keep this out of the papers?”

A shrill, nasally voice somewhere further back in the house, screaming about compensation and insurance, served as a fitting prelude to Sierra's own remark: “No settlement in the world is going to keep him from going to the press about all of this.”

Celia's gasp cut off any further discussion of the irritated homeowner; she'd dropped the plastic sheet from the slumped figure—female, younger than the first, but clearly artificial, as evidenced by the wires poking out from the tears in her neck, as well as the fluids staining her skin from where numerous small holes had been blown out.  “Who could've done something like this?” she murmured.

“That's what we're here to find out.”  Sierra motioned for Jared to help her move the microwave to the kitchen island, and for Celia to carefully manoeuvrer the ruined gynoid's body with it.  “We'll have to take the door off,” the blonde mused. “Probably back at the office.”

Jared's attention was caught by the pile of diced objects on the island.  “Any guesses?”

Sierra leaned in to get a closer look; the structure of her digital voice-box meant that she wouldn't have to worry about accidentally blowing any fragments off the island.  “Photos,” she realized.  “Chopped-up—maybe enough of them for a full stack.”

“Chopped up with what?”  Jared arched an eyebrow.  “Most of the cutlery got thrown into the dryer.”

“My guess?” Celia chimed in, nodding to a cabinet door.  “That.”  A cleaver had been sunken into the surface of the door, hard enough for the blade to partially be visible from the other side.  “Haven't seen anything like this since—”

Sierra shot her a warning glance.  “We get any matches on these two?”

Jared's eyes were glowing a soft emerald.  “Evelyn Hinson.”  He nodded to the gynoid on the floor.  “Michelle Pickett.”  He gestured to the gynoid whose head was still stuck in the microwave.  “Both sentient, both in the system.”  He winced.  “And both with cloud backups.”

“That's bad?” Celia asked.

“They were uploading memories to the cloud until their systems failed completely.” Jared's tone was stern.  “Every memory, up until COF.”

Celia's eyes went wide, and even Sierra had to turn away.  Androids and gynoids rebuilt after suffering through particularly gruesome Cessations Of Function tended to either delete any memories of their final moments, or save them to an external source, away from their active memories and “selves”.  Evelyn and Michelle, post-rebuild, would more than likely immediately recall how they'd met their fates, which could easily lead to trauma and potential failures in their system integrity.

“We'll have to get them to the Dyson Institute ASAP post-rebuild,” Sierra muttered. “It'll take a lot of counselling to get over how they were scrapped.”

“And we still don't know who scrapped them,” Celia added, scowling.  “Or who trashed the house.  They could be—”

“She.”

Sierra, Jared and Celia all touched their temples, their eyes glowing.  “You've found something?” Sierra asked.

The Caller ID image in her field of view was blank, but the ID tag (TWraith) and badge number were positive matches to those belonging to her detective colleague, as was the guttural, low voice.  “The office got the door cam footage, from before Evelyn and Michelle were in the house.”

“And?”

“This, you've got to see to believe.”

All three Officers saw, in a picture-in-picture window, the image of Bobby Pariello's front yard, a stolen vehicle having been driven onto the grass.  For a moment, they wondered what the significance was—until a grinning, sprinting figure charged into view and jumped at the door, both legs extended.  The footage cut out when the runner's feet hit the door.

“Play that back.”

The footage rewound, at Sierra's request.  Again, the grinning runner charged up the walk—

“Pause.”

The footage froze, the smiling face clearly visible.

“Early 20s, blonde.”  Sierra's eyes narrowed.  “Given the evidence we've already found, she's definitely artificial.”

“I can run a trace from the office.  Any models currently active, manufactured over the past few months—”

“Try the past few years.  Back to at least 2000.”

“That far back?”

“Call it a hunch.”  Sierra frowned thoughtfully; the smiling face of the running gynoid seemed oddly familiar, but from where?  “Let us know if you've got any leads.”

“What about the owner of the car?” Jared piped in.

“Still in hospital, along with a friend of his.  They were checking out a potential disturbance at that storage unit when they got jumped.”

Jared looked puzzled.  “The one where the door was broken from the inside?”

“The very same.  Neither of the two saw anything but a quick flash of blonde hair and a girl 'dressed like a hooker'—their words, not mine—before they got floored.”

Celia rolled her eyes.  “They didn't give a better description than that?”

“They did get knocked unconscious, if you recall.”

“So all of this,” Sierra cut in, “was done by one perp?  The windows, the air conditioner, the washer and dryer—”

“And the sentients.”

Sierra nodded. “All that damage, caused by one gynoid?”

“Not to mention the three car thefts, the assaults at the storage unit and an accident downtown.  Found a guy facedown on the hood of his own car, said he'd T-boned an SUV and tried to call the insurance company before 'some chick' pulled him out, broke both his knees and then slammed him on his own car.”

“And we have no leads on where our suspect is?”

“None so far.  If she turns up again—”

“When she turns up again,” Sierra corrected.  “And she will.”

“She might also be armed and dangerous.”

Sierra scowled, not caring that the detective wouldn't see it.  “All the more reason for us to be ready for her.  Nobody else—human or artificial—deserves to suffer the way these two did.”

“I can see why the San Jose Police Department recommended you as their premiere representative to CAEDIA.  You've got a servant's heart, and the mindset of a warrior.”

“I don't want war with whoever did this,” Sierra replied.  “I just want to see them off the streets.”

“If we're lucky, she'll be off the streets soon enough.”

“So we're positive that we're looking for a lone perp?”

“The doorbell camera proves it.  Nobody else entered, apart from Hinson and Pickett, since she did, and nobody else left after she blasted out of the garage with Pariello's SUV.  She's the one we're looking for—”

“Are we sure?”

Celia's question prompted a scoff.  “You're thinking the camera could've been spoofed?”

“I'm thinking someone might've programmed an older model 'bot to do this,” Celia replied. Lowering her voice, she added “Pariello's not exactly popular, after all.”

“Which would make sense if this was just a prank,” Sierra reminded her.  “Instead, we've got burglary, gross destruction of property and two sentients bricked.  Someone who just wanted to annoy him wouldn't have gone that far.” She watched, impassively, as two coverall-clad men, both wearing CAEDIA badges, entered the kitchen; one picked up the microwave, while the other hefted Michelle's form up.  “I think we can safely call this a crime,” she continued, “not a prank gone wrong.”

“Right.” Celia nodded.  “I just—”

“You hate the thought that all of this was done by one gynoid.”

“Yeah.” Celia focused her stare on the floor.

“If it's any consolation, it's not one of ours.  ALPHA's combing their records to make sure no gynoid registered with them was hacked or otherwise compromised into doing all this; the Coalition and the House are doing the same.”

“Found something.”  Jared held up a sterling silver cake server; it looked almost like a trowel.  “Why's this on the floor?”

Sierra glanced at the server, then at the gaping hole in Evelyn's chest.  “I think I know why.”

“Bag it and bring it back—same with the cleaver.  Even if it wasn't used on the two sentients, we might still be able to get a trace off of it.”

“Will do.” Sierra walked back to the junction between the living room and the kitchen; she had a perfect line of sight to at least one other room that the perpetrator had trashed, as well as the doors to both bedrooms.  “Why him?”

“We're working on figuring the motive now.  If anything comes up—”

“And if there was no motive?”  Sierra frowned.  “What if this was just random?”

“That's a whole different can of worms.”

Any further discussion on whether or not the crime was random was interrupted by the excessively loud approach of Robert Pariello, stomping and screaming at the top of his lungs that the “pricks” responsible for the utter devastation wreaked upon his house would soon pay.  Sierra quickly retrieved an evidence bag from her coat pocket and handed it to Celia, who swept up the confetti pictures into the bag and sealed it just as Pariello entered the kitchen.

Compared to the engineered attractiveness of Jared, Celia and Sierra, Robert Pariello looked as flawed as one might expect.  Short, stout and with a balding head that vaguely resembled an egg, the former weatherman and ex-stockbroker glared at the three CAEDIA Officers as if he'd suspected them of trashing his house.  The first word out of his mouth, by way of a greeting or introduction, was an impatient “Well?!”

Jared and Celia exchanged glances.  “Well, what?” Sierra prompted.

“Have you figured out who did this or not?!” Robert demanded.  His high, nasally voice diminished any level of menace or intimidation that his words might've carried.  “I want to know who tore up my house!”

“We're working on it,” Sierra replied, already turning her attention back to the downed gynoids.

Unfortunately for her, Robert apparently considered this simple gesture a gross insult. “So that's it?  You're just going to look the other way and not give me any answers?!”

“I just said we're working on it—”

“You're not even real police, are you?!  Just that stupid CAEDIA crap, here because of those two stupid robots!”

At this, Celia and Jared—who'd been conversing quietly about how to best get Evelyn's remains out of the kitchen to a waiting van outside—both looked up at Robert.  Sierra slowly turned, her stare as cold as her voice: “Michelle Pickett and Evelyn Hinson were your neighbours, Mr. Pariello, not 'stupid robots'.  They ranked as high on any sentience scale as you would, and—”

“Don't give me that!” Robert countered, wagging a finger in Sierra's face.  “They had no right to be here!”

“They were trying to stop an intruder,” Sierra replied.  “If they hadn't—”

“Who's your superior officer?!”  Robert grabbed for Sierra's phone, still resting in its belt holster.  “I want to talk to—”

“You can talk to the officer outside on your front lawn,” Sierra informed him, pushing his hand away from her belt, “if you want any updates on the gross criminal damage of your property.  As for Ms. Hinson and Ms. Pickett, I'm the lead officer on this case—”

“I'm ordering you to give me your phone!” Robert demanded.  “Otherwise, I'll call ALPHA and have you scrapped!”

Over by the kitchen island, Celia muttered “Oh, hell,” while Jared merely decided to closely examine the large dent in the door of the refrigerator.

Sierra, not surprisingly, was not phased by the “threat”.  “I'm an Officer of CAEDIA,” she calmly stated, “and—”

“You're a rent-a-RoboCop with a cheap badge,” Robert spat.  “My house has been trashed, and—GET OFF!”  The hand at his shoulder was that of the Black officer from the yard, rather than Jared.  “Bobby, I think it's time you take a break,” he advised.  “Just step outside for a bit—”

“TELL HER TO GIVE ME HER PHONE!” Robert shrieked.  “I'M CALLING ALPHA!”

“She's doing her job,” the officer insisted.

“HER JOB IS TO DO WHAT HUMAN BEINGS TELL HER TO DO!” Robert thundered.  “SHE'S PROBABLY A REPURPOSED SEX DOLL!  JUST LOOK AT HER!”

“Calm down, Robert!”

The human officer ushered Pariello outside, while Jared and Celia watched.  “I'm guessing he's not going to be voting for any increases to CAEDIA funding come next year,” Jared mused.

“Does he not get that we are looking for the one who did this?” Celia asked.

“He's more worried about his insurance and whether or not it covers anything like this.” The scowl on Sierra's face was more than enough proof that she had no patience for Pariello or his outbursts. “And whoever keeps pushing the idea that all androids are 'three-laws compliant' needs to cut it out,” she added, shaking her head.  “'Ordering' me to give him my phone, like I'm a NonSen—”

“It might just be stress,” Jared offered.

“Not likely.”

Sierra frowned. “You heard all of that?”

“Heard it while I was checking Pariello's record.  He should be lucky Pickett and Hinson bothered to see what was going on at his house at all—he's tried to push anti-Accords measures at every town hall meeting since they were passed, and been told off each time.”

“Please tell me he didn't get replaced at the weather desk by an android.”

“Worse. He's already been done for assault—he beat up a 68-year-old man in the parking lot on spurious claims, put the guy in the hospital.  Refused to show up for his court date after, said the charges were a complete joke.”

Sierra didn't bother terminating the groan that issued from her lips.

“He's also had problems with pretty much any co-worker who wasn't a WASP like him.  As far as his views on A.I.s, M.I.s and the like—remember last year, when that stupid 'control collar' idea made the 6 PM news for being laughed out of Town Hall?”

“Let me guess,” Sierra muttered.  “Pariello.”

“Right in one.  Apparently, he's still trying to get it all the way to New Columbia.”

Any further discussion was cut off by the local officer—Michael Carver, as the briefly-appearing info-box in Sierra's field of view stated—re-entered the house.  “We're gonna have to take Bobby down to the station,” he informed the three CAEDIA Officers.  “He's already on some conspiracy trip about the whole block being 'in on it', whatever 'it' is—”  A shout from outside caught his attention, followed by several more—directed at the now-fleeing figure of Robert Pariello.  “Oh, what the Hell?!”

“I'll go check the bedroom,” Celia offered.  “See if we can find any trace of our mystery ransacker.”

“If nobody's checking the game room,” Jared volunteered, “I'll look there.”

Sierra nodded. “I'll stay up here.  See if our intruder left anything behind.” 

With her colleagues setting off to cover their chosen rooms, the blonde went to work on her own.  She carefully stepped over Evelyn's downed form as she crossed from the kitchen to the living room.  The soft glow had returned to her eyes as she regarded every aspect of the wrecked room, including the shattered TV.

Webcam disabled.

DVR hard drive: scanning

Hard drive intact

The contents of the DVR's hard drive filled Sierra's vision, stylized poster-like thumbnails of everything Pariello had recorded and saved.  The last recording from before the TV had been smashed had started an hour before the break-in: a “documentary” from a Herring network about how the Civic Accords were part of some sinister agenda put forth to soften up America and make it ripe for a Marxist takeover.  Sierra frowned, and nearly moved on—only to notice that the timestamps of the recording were slightly off.

“Load and playback, x50.”

Her vision filled with the Herring logo and several minutes' worth of footage, sped up and muted—until what would've been the 20 minute mark.

“Playback, standard speed—”

A gasp left Sierra's lips.  The footage had been corrupted, dissolving into static and decaying pixels.  The sound had been equally damaged, a cacophony of white noise and ruined audio.  Occasionally, in glimpses far too brief for a human to catch, the picture solidified to show an image: a hospital room, a figure lying in bed.  Brief segments of words surfaced through the murk of ruined audio: “time”, “state”, “distance”, “PROOF”.  The voice sounded entirely too old to be the narrator of the documentary.

Before she could think to force-close the playback, Sierra's vision briefly filled with a horrific sight: a close-up of a figure, shrouded in darkness.  The facial features were lost to the shadows, but the eyes weren't: golden sclera, shot through with spider-webs of sickly red; murky, dark grey irises, and foggy white pupils.

“Abort playback!”

Sierra's ocular sensors briefly deactivated, and she dreaded the possibility that those eyes would still be staring at her when they reactivated.  Fortunately, her fears were for naught; the only view she had was of the living room, the ruined TV, and the DVR—which was now spewing smoke from its vents.  A quick scan of the hard drive revealed that something had tripped to begin systematically erasing the contents.  Sierra terminated her link with the device, her lips parting in another gasp.

“Everything okay?”

Jared's hand on her shoulder was a welcome diversion from whatever Sierra had just witnessed.  “I'm fine. That isn't.”  She nodded at the DVR.  “Something else got recorded, over the regular programming—corrupted the entire drive.”

Without hesitation, Jared walked past Sierra and unplugged the DVR.  “We can at least try a recovery,” he reasoned.

“Good point.”  Sierra regarded the still-smoking device.  “Find anything in the game room?”

“Bobby's definition of 'gaming' is pool and poker, apparently.  Most of the cues were snapped in half, and...”  Jared stared into Sierra's eyes, sending her the more lurid findings directly.

“Right on the baize?!”

Jared nodded. “Pretty sure the fluid will be a match to what we found on—and in—Evelyn.”

“I think we should tell the local cops to book Pariello,” Celia called out.

Sierra frowned. “Book him?”

Celia stepped out of the bedroom, her gloved hands holding up a portion of the headboard. “Remember that felony arrest he got for assault?” she asked. Jared and Sierra both nodded, prompting her to turn over the fragment of the headboard to reveal the holster glued to the back.

“Let me guess. No pistol.”  Sierra already knew the answer, even as she asked.

“No pistol, and no sign of whatever he was hiding in his mattress.  Whoever did this cleaned him out.”

“He's still on the hook for illegal possession of a firearm,” Jared mused.  “We'll have to tell Officer Carver—”

“I'm hoping you don't have to tell me that you've got no leads on who tore this place up,” Officer Carver stated, sounding as tired as he looked.  “We've already got a car out to find Bobby, since he decided to up and run off instead of just waiting for a ride to the station.”

“When you catch him,” Sierra replied, “you'll have to tell him to forget any hotel reservations he might've made.”  She nodded to Celia, who held up the headboard piece with the holster glued to it.

Carver groaned. “You find the gun?”

“We think whoever smashed up the house stole it—”

“About that.” Sierra knelt by Evelyn's ruined form, retrieving a double-plug cord from her jacket pocket.

“No.”  Jared was at her side in an instant, his tone grim.  “You link up to her, you'll—”

“I know the risks.”  Sierra gently moved Evelyn's body onto its side, finding the appropriate port on the small of her back and plugging the cord in.  “If it gets too bad, I'll port out.”

“The damage done to her systems could cause massive feedback loops to yours,” Jared reminded her. “If they do—”

“I'll be careful.”  Sierra found the corresponding port for the plug on the other end of the cord, and quickly removed the synthetic flesh covering.  “This isn't the first time I've ported in.”

Jared and Celia exchanged glances.  “You're sure?”

“Positive.” Sierra closed her eyes and plugged the cord in—

Find memory file.

File found.

Go to: Timestamp—

Done.

—and, in the memories of Evelyn Hinson, opened them again.

The kitchen was still a mess, but not nearly as bad as it had been when Sierra, Jared and Celia had arrived.  The cabinet door with the cleaver embedded in it was still whole, the cleaver nowhere to be seen.  Form the position Sierra found herself in, she could tell Evelyn hadn't ended up by the refrigerator by choice.

Have to check her thought processes later to see just what she decided to do.  The ethereal tone of her own voice wasn't all that odd to Sierra; any time she ported in, her own observations sounded faint, almost ghostly.  Might as well stop staring and get to the main attraction.  Playback.

Instantly, an impact warning flew up into her field of vision—Evelyn's systems, she realized.  Looks like I was right—

The sound of something sliding across the kitchen island cut her off, followed by another impact warning and the rather jarring sight of a foot entering her view, smashing into her right wrist and snapping something in it.

Not my systems, keep that in mind.  I'm not the one being damaged.

Sierra had to keep her mantra in mind as Evelyn's final moments played out.  Off in the background, Michelle's muted cries and the pop pop pop of vital components blowing out sounded as if Sierra had been right there when it all happened.  She heard Evelyn scream “MICHELLE!”, trying to get back to her feet only for a ruined knee to send her into a kneel.   Feeling the refrigerator door slammed, five times, on her right arm would've been enough to force her to port out, but she bore the phantom pain (no sense in calling it “damage”; Evelyn was a Sentient, after all) without protest; she realised Evelyn's left arm was still undamaged, and that the blonde was still out of range of it.  Someone—the perpetrator of all of this carnage—was laughing, a high, girlish squeal of absolute delight at the suffering being inflicted upon Evelyn and Michelle.

The CAEDIA officer watched as Evelyn was dropped to the floor, staring at her ruined right arm.  The vocalizations she'd made were very obviously sobs; more than likely—

Sierra wasn't ready for the sudden, violent impact of a blunt object against Evelyn's cranial assembly.  Damn it, I almost felt that!  Evelyn's field of view became less stable, the kitchen suddenly awash with corrupted pixels and static.  Notices and warnings from her internal stabilizers appeared; she tried to get back up!  But why—

The blunt object smashed into the side of Evelyn's head again.

Sierra could see the warnings: LEFT AURAL SENSOR DAMAGED.  LEFT OCULAR SENSOR DAMAGED.  GYRO-STABILIZERS ON LEFT SIDE OUT OF—

Whatever the gyro-stabilizers were out of was never made clear.  Another heavy impact gave Sierra an intimate view of the floor from Evelyn's perspective.

Again, the sounds of Michelle's demise over at the microwave filled the air, competing with the farther-off sounds of various appliances giving their last, and the ever-present, deranged laughter from the as-yet unseen perpetrator.  What sounded like a heavily-degraded version of Michelle's voice was still screaming in agony from inside the microwave; it was obvious that the damage to her systems had been too severe to keep her online for much longer.

From the warnings filling Evelyn's view, it was evident that she wasn't long for the world, either.

Sierra felt the doomed gynoid's fingers drag her across the kitchen floor with her left arm, even as the blonde—still laughing, always laughing—bore down on her.  A brief shudder indicated that Evelyn had tried to kick at her pursuer with her left leg; the impact of that damned blunt object proved that her effort had been futile. The object was brought down again, seconds later, onto Evelyn's left shin; even Sierra had to wince at the snapping sound she heard.

Something grabbed Evelyn by the shoulders, turning her over.

For the first time, Evelyn saw a clear, colour picture of the gynoid who'd wrecked Bobby Pariello's house.

Her face was round, almost “cute “ in a way—plump, pert lips below a delicate nose; eyes that seemed to sparkle with unbridled creativity (mixed, in this case, with a hefty dose of psychosis), under razor-thin brows; cheek “bones” that, on a different face, would've been the picture of cherubic innocence; and the slightest hint of a dimple to the chin.  Her emulated age could've been anywhere from 19 to the mid-20s; Sierra guessed the latter.  Were it not for the fact that she stood atop Evelyn like a naked, laughing colossus (Sierra could tell that human-real detail wasn't a high priority for this gynoid; the glistening, wet sex that loomed above her, or rather, above Evelyn, lacked even the lightest-toned hair above it), Sierra would've figured that the blonde was a mass-market “arm candy” model, meant to be the escort of any man (or woman) who wanted to make an impression at their next party.

There was also that unnerving sense of familiarity in the blonde's features...a fact that Sierra quickly filed away for later as, through Evelyn's ocular sensors, she watched the blonde lift the cake server, still grinning—still laughing.

I knew it—

What sounded like the screech of a bird of prey, diving upon its hapless victim, left the blonde's lips.

The cake server was plunged into Evelyn's chest, just below her left breast.

What happened next almost overwhelmed Sierra—the sounds of everything the blonde had already damaged, all failing at once, was horrific.  A groan from farther back in the house was followed by an almost biological churning, bubbling sound.  A few seconds into that, an explosion drowned it out, soon accompanied by the chimes of the smoke alarm.  What sounded like multiple engines grinding to a halt filled Sierra's ears, joined by hesitant, staccato sounds reminiscent of bursts of machine gun fire—or something backfiring.  Three distinct sounds of water geysering forth joined the fray, followed by a fourth, more disgusting torrent of something else.  Over at the microwave, multiple blasts issued from the doomed form of Michelle.  Something out back went off like a cannon, followed by the muted sounds of several things splattering against the roof.

All of this faded to the back of Sierra's thought processes as she watched the blonde tear the cake server from Evelyn's chest—it had impaled a battery, and taken the cell out with it.  Something arced from the ruined cell, sending a jolt back into Evelyn's form.

Seconds later, the visual feed began to degrade severely.  Sierra could feel the other gynoid's body locked into a seizure.

The brief moments of clarity didn't help at all—the blond was now sitting on Evelyn's chest, throwing her head back and screaming in orgasmic ecstasy.  She rutted her hips against the doomed gynoid, whose haptic sensors were functioning just enough to feel the fluids snaking down her chest—and into the ragged hole made by the cake server. This second round of malfunction-induced spasms were even more violent than the first—which only served to arouse the blonde further.  She continued bucking against Evelyn's abdomen, going into a second orgasm—and sending even more of her juices into the jagged hole.

Evelyn's systems were failing.  More and more feedback was lost every second.  Her very memory was in danger of—

“END PLAYBACK!”

Sierra closed her eyes again, trying to shut out the blonde's orgasmic howling, the feeling of Evelyn's body slowly being destroyed, the explosions issuing from Michelle's ruined form.

After a few seconds, she opened her eyes again...once again seeing Bobby Pariello's kitchen from her own view.  Evelyn was still laying on the floor, face-up, as she'd been in her final moments. Jared and Celia were staring at Sierra, both worried that their colleague might've been pushed over her own limits by the memories she'd just directly observed.

“How bad was it?” Jared quietly asked.

It took a moment for Sierra to compose herself.  She nearly tore the cable loose from her own port, and didn't protest when Celia offered to unplug the other end from Evelyn.  After a moment of silence, she rose to her feet.

“Horrible.” The word left her lips in a harsh murmur.  “Absolutely horrible.”

She didn't shy away from the arm Jared draped around her shoulders.  “I saw her,” she continued.  “The one who did all of this—the same one from the doorbell camera. She...she was laughing, the entire time!”

Celia's eyes, glowing softly as she called for assistance in retrieving Evelyn's body, went wide.  “Laughing?!”

“Like it was all some kind of sick game.  Like she was having fun.”  Sierra didn't care that she was shivering.  “I can't even begin to think why she did any of this—who could've wanted her to do something like this!”

“That's why we're on this case—despite Bobby Pariello's delusions to the contrary.”

Slowly, the sheer dread she'd felt at witnessing Evelyn Hinson's last moments—from her own point of view—began to fade from Sierra's active thought processes. “Right.”

“You'll want to get Evelyn and Michelle back to the office ASAP.  Once they're both stabilized, I've got Elaine Dyson and a team from Stepford on a conference call to start counseling.”

“Good.” Sierra moved to let two more coverall-clad CAEDIA employees lift and remove the ruined body of Evelyn Hinson from the kitchen.  “I think we should all get back to the office, let the locals find Pariello. There's not a whole lot for us to do here.”

“The paperwork will keep until you get back.”

“I'll be in touch.”  With a tap of her fingers against her temple, Sierra ended the call.  “I'm guessing the local officers have everything on lock here?”

Jared glanced over his shoulder.  “Apart from that geyser in the backyard.”

“The house didn't have a manager?”  Sierra knew that the case would be a bit more complicated if Pariello's house was on the network of “A.I. Managed” homes in the neighbourhood.

Celia shook her head.  “Doubt it. Everything here was Net-linked, but that's pretty much it.”

“Lucky break for us, then.  I'll head back to the office—the report's not going to write itself.”  Sierra didn't look back to acknowledge Jared and Celia nodding.

Hopefully, she could make some sense of this madness before sunrise.

-----

CAEDIA's inception had been a long time in the making.  The Civic Accords had, until some point in 2021, been enforced by a mixture of the preexisting police forces around the country and the enigmatic “Metropolitan Monitoring” patrols that had been known to wear the Double-M badge.

Sierra reflected on this, and other bullet points of CAEDIA's history, as her cruiser navigated the mostly-clear roads.  Any drivers who were out this late kept to their own routes, with the CAEDIA-badged car not drawing any glances or remarks from those few souls who'd decided to burn the midnight oil.  Even if anyone was giving her funny looks, Sierra wouldn't have noticed—or cared. The interior of the cruiser's windscreen was filled with information, allowing her to review the facts of the case while self-drive kept the car from driving erratically.

Evelyn Hinson and Michelle Pickett had been model neighbours, in their community. The former was married, with an adopted child and a successful career at a national consulting firm to her name. The latter, by contrast, was still single but “available”; her career, as a social media personality and android rights advocate, was more “low key”, but just as lucrative as Evelyn's.  The pair were well-known around their area for helping out, participating in community watch programs and offering outreach to those in need.  Apart from their status as artificial persons, there was little to suggest that they were the true targets of what had gone down.

In almost direct contrast to his neighbours, Robert Pariello had, over the past few years, seemed to go out of his way to be as self-aggrandizing, obnoxious and ethically repugnant as possible.  He'd been fired from every job he'd ever had, for reasons ranging from leaked tapes of “extracurricular activities” to fistfights with both colleagues and customers. His wife had left him, had their marriage annulled and moved to another state.  Anyone who'd once been a friend of his had long since left him to his own devices.

None of this did anything to answer the big question: who wanted Pariello's house torn up, and why?

Sierra wasn't any closer to the truth as her cruiser pulled into the parking lot at the CAEDIA headquarters.  Transferring to CAEDIA from the San Jose Police Department had been one of the biggest career decisions she'd ever made—Silicon Valley had, effectively, been her home since her first activation, and she'd done plenty to help the community. Still, she'd had no reason to regret turning in her old badge for the one she currently wore.

Detective Tom Logan, known around the office as “The Wraith”, was waiting by the front desk as Sierra entered.  Just as Pariello's appearance was an all too human contrast to Sierra, Jared and Celia, Detective Logan's was proof of how inhuman a person could look with cybernetic implants.  The long-healed, diagonal gash across his throat, still bordered with surgical staples, was a remnant of the injury that had ended his last career.  His sunglasses hid both his eyes and most of the off-flesh plastic plating that made up most of his face above his nose, complete with odd, reddish streaks—reminiscent of goth-metal makeup—over each of his eyes.  One had to look closely to see that the “paint” was actually translucent plastic, covering delicate sensors and transceivers.  These, his 5'10 height and penchant for wearing all-black  all combined to give him an imposing look, a sort of neo-tech vampire for the 2020s.

“Hinson and Pickett beat me here?” Sierra asked, not even glancing at the NonSen behind the desk as she signed in.

“Barely.” The detective's voice was a harsh, grating rasp, barely above a whisper—not electronic, but barely human. “I checked over their records again—we might be knee-deep in it with Hinson.”

Sierra frowned. “I missed something?”

“More like we did.  Hinson's a transfer.”

“Shit.” Sierra felt like kicking something. A sentient gynoid's mind having been subjected to the kind of trauma Evelyn had endured was one thing, but a transference case was something else entirely.  “You notify her husband?”

“He's been calling ever since she was admitted.  Dyson and Stepford are still on the line.”

The detective matched Sierra's pace as the two made their way to the other side of the sign-in desk.  “I talked to him myself, “ Tom continued.  “He's, ah...”

“Pretty broken up?” Sierra offered.

“One of the worst things you can ever hear over a phone is a man begging you to do whatever you can to keep his wife from crashing and burning.”  The detective's near-monotone rasp did little to drain the emotion from his words as he and Sierra navigated the halls of the building. “He's on his way here, last I heard.”

“What about Pickett?”

“Still searching her records.  She has an owner listed, but she's not classed as a 'belonging'.”

“No property tags?”

“None that the office could find.  She's got as much freedom as the next sentient.”

“Have we ruled out hate crime?”

“The usual suspects for that kind of stuff are already in jail.”  The detective stopped to let Sierra enter the nearest door on their right.  “Or so far off the Grid that going to Pariello's would've been more trouble than it's worth.”

“So no new leads on either of those ends,” Sierra muttered.  “What—”

Her question went unasked as she glanced at the table in the center of the room. Michelle Pickett had been freed, in the interim, from the microwave—which showed just how much damage had been inflicted.  Her face barely looked like it belonged to anything human; the synthetic flesh had cracked, peeled and partially melted in too many spots for a simple reconstruction to be effective.  Her ocular receptors had blown out; the micro-animatronics that had formed her facial expressions had either fused or been fried by the excess electricity building up and discharging, and it was all too evident that her digital voicebox had probably blown out.

“This wasn't random.”

The detective's observation drew a frown from Sierra.  “You think they were targeted because they were interfering in what was going on at Pariello's?”

“More like they were targeted because of what they were.”

“Except the perp is a gynoid, too,” Sierra reminded her colleague.

“I never said anything otherwise.”  The detective sighed, the sound uncomfortably close to static.  “Digital forensics is still working on the computers on-site. I hear Pariello pulled a runner.”

“We found evidence of illegal possession of firearms.”  Sierra circled the table where Michelle lay.  “Pretty sure it's not his first offence, either—and he was at work when it all went down.  Who called him and told him about—”

“He didn't have much of a choice.”  Detective Logan chuckled.  “They fired him twelve minutes before he got the call.”

Sierra, midway through looking over Michelle's ruined face again, glanced up with a frown. “Please tell me you're joking, Tom,” she muttered.

“Apparently, one too many concerned parents were sick of him saying the animatronics were dressed 'like whores'.”

Before Sierra could even groan, Detective Logan continued.  “That, and he got in his fifth fistfight this month—something about the kitchen switching orders on a stuffed-crust meat lover's and a thin-crust supreme.  Started out shoving, and ended with a running tackle into a ball pit.”

“So he's got anger management issues.”  Sierra shook her head.  “Wonderful.”

“He's not the only one.  Sandy down the hall had to send off a license termination notice for a Russian dealer—the one with the two blondes in all of his commercials.”  The detective gave a short, grunting chuckle.  “Jaro-something or other.”

“Jaromir Dezhnyov.”  Sierra frowned.  “Weird.”

“Hmm?”

“We just got a complaint yesterday about Jaromir Dezhnyov,” Sierra stated.  “Harry Morgan—”

“The StoryCrafters guy?”

Sierra nodded. “He filed a formal complaint, said something about a NonSen sold back to him from Jaromir's.  From what his report said, the NonSen had been refit over a dozen times—and most of the refits hadn't been documented or mentioned on the Bill of Sale.”  She force-terminated a subprocess that would've put a scowl on her lips. “Apparently,” she added, “the last refit had left out her synth-gina and replaced it with—”

“A solid state drive,” Detective Logan finished, adjusting his sunglasses.  “So that wasn't just a bad joke.”

“You heard about it?”

“Idle talk floats around here like a fine mist, Officer Birch.  It would've been harder to not hear about it.”

Sierra leaned on the table, careful to not brush her fingers against Michelle's form. “You think there could be a link?”

“Between...”

“Pariello used to be a friend of Morgan's, or at least they ran in the same circles for a while.”  Sierra drummed her fingers on the tabletop.  “And Morgan was a frequent customer of Dezhnyov's.” 

“Except Pariello never had any dealings with Dezhnyov.”

“So back to square one?”

“More like square two.  We've got links between Pariello and Morgan, and between Deznhnyov and Morgan, but nothing between Pariello and Deznhyov.”  The detective tapped his chin with his hand.  “Morgan's clean,” he added, almost as an afterthought.  “Just ran one of his stories yesterday.”

“And where was he when Pariello's house was broken into?”

“Managing the story.  Pretty sure we can get eyewitness accounts to back that up.”

“So no news on why that blonde psycho was at Pariello's to begin with.”

“We could always drop in at Morgan's,” the detective offered.  “Offer to put a guard on his house, just in case the 'blonde psycho' decides to show up there.  Deznhyov's too far outside of our jurisdiction to look after,” he added. “It'd be easier to head off the blonde before she gets to Morgan.”

Sierra nodded. “I guess it's better than just leaving him to his own devices.  Shame we couldn't have warned her.”  Her attention turned back to Michelle's form on the table.  “The local cops are still looking for Pariello,” she added.  “He ran before they could book him on the firearms charge.”

Detective Logan shook his head.  “Maybe he thought you three were going to bust him for Pickett and Hinson.”

His remark earned him a frown from his gynoid colleague.  “He didn't even recognize my authority as a CAEDIA officer.”

“I heard. 'I order you to give me your phone', and all that.”  The detective had approached the table; he ran his hand up and down its surface as he paced.  “Asimov probably never thought those three laws of his would be so twisted, misunderstood and weaponized the way they've been.  Then again,” he chuckled, “it's a shame the good Doctor Asimov never knew just how advanced artificial intelligence was while he was writing his space operas and high science fiction all those years ago.”

“I'd rather focus on the here and now than shaming Isaac Asimov for something he never expected.”  Sierra retrieved her phone.  “Celia just called—she knows what kind of pistol Pariello was hiding behind his bed.”

“Probaby not a pea-shooter, I'm willing to bet.”

“Remington R51.”  Sierra held up her phone, showing a picture of the gun in question.  “Digital Forensics is looking for any records of Pariello having purchased the gun—if he did, that's a few more years to tack on.”

“And if he got it as a gift?”

“Doesn't matter—the pistol's not at his house anymore.  The blonde probably stole it after she wrecked the bedroom.”

Detective Logan frowned.  “She take anything else from his house?”

“Pariello didn't stick around to give us an inventory.”  Sierra scrolled down the screen of her phone.  “We'll have to check with his insurance provider,” she continued, “assuming he didn't call them up and tell them not to talk to us.”

“Seeing as how he's a fugitive, I'm pretty sure our orders blow his right out of the water.”

“Pretty sure he doesn't see it that way.”  Sierra stowed her phone.  “How soon can we contact her owner?”

“Her papers list a 'partner', not 'owner'.  We're still trying.”

“If we can't get a hold of whoever her partner is in three days, she'll have to be rehoused—assuming she does't crack up during therapy.”  Sierra shook her head.  “I didn't even try porting into her.”

“Given how she went out, I'd say porting in would've been the worst thing—”

Detective Logan's remark was cut off by a low beep—from inside Michelle's form.

“No.” Sierra backed away, shaking her head. “There's no way—”

“I need a backboard in here, and a cleanup team!”  Detective Logan had already run to the door, leaning out into the hall to yell for assistance.  “Pickett's not as broken as we thought!”

Sierra considered deactivating her ocular and aural sensors, if only to spare herself from witnessing what would be—

Another beep sounded from within Michelle's body...followed, soon after, by a twitch.

It was subtle, at first—a finger on her left hand, barely moving.  Her toes, still shod in the sneakers she'd had on, curled ever so slightly.  Even the ruined synthetic skin of her face started to crack and crumble as the micromotors behind her lips and eyelids whirred into something resembling life—or, at least, the last moments of it.

Even as she backed away, Sierra was the picture of calm.  She'd seen worse, after—

Michelle's right arm shot up, out, reaching towards the CAEDIA officer.  At the same time, inexplicably, Sierra's phone buzzed back into life from her pants pocket.  Sierra scrambled to retrieve it, only to stare as the base text messaging app filled with two words, repeated in an endless loop: HELP ME.

“—said she was a write off, no idea why—”  Detective Logan reentered the room just in time to see Michelle's form begin to kick, her left arm grabbing and moving as if to push herself clear of something. In the corner of the room, the desktop rig that had been in standby lit up, a word processor opening and immediately filling with PLEASE HELP ME.  The screen continued to scroll as the words filled page after page.

“How...”

The spasms that rocked her form were threatening to send Michelle off of the table—a movement only prevented by the arrival of three more CAEDIA officers to hold her in place, gently.  “No idea how she's still functioning,” Detective Logan muttered.  “The report from Pariello's said her CPU was fried—”

An utterance—not a word, but something in the shape of one—left Michelle's lips.  Her voice sounded as if it was coming from a dying radio plugged into a fully-powered amplifier.  Whatever she was trying to say, it was clear that every bit of data flowing through her digital mind was indicating that her body was suffering.  Pools of ocular lubricant were welling up under the receptors sculpted to be her eyes, spilling down the devastated flesh of her face.

Something hit the floor with a harsh clatter of high-impact plastic on tile.  It took Sierra a full minute to realize that she'd dropped her phone.

“Get her on the board,” Detective Logan instructed, “before she throws herself off the table!”  Two of the Officers had moved to try and nudge Michelle off of the table and onto the , but her flailing arms kept them at bay.  A fingernail tore through the sleeve of one Officer's shirt, sending him back with a pained grunt.

The wailing from Michelle's wrecked vocal drivers never abated.  If anything, it only got louder.

Grinding sounds issued from Michelle's torso and limbs as the gynoid's systems tried to compensate for the damage she'd suffered.  The flow of HELP ME on both the desktop rig's screen and Sierra's phone was briefly interrupted with a parsed command—Michelle was trying to enter Maintenance Mode, assuming a sitting position so that her components would be easier to access, replace and/or repair.

“How?” left Sierra's lips as she tried to keep the pertinent text onscreen.  “What happened to her was enough to fry her processors!  There's no possible way—”

A hiss cut her off—a sheared-through coolant line had sprayed its contents through a hole in Michelle's left elbow.

Detective Logan had ducked back out into the hall, his shout of “I NEED CLEANUP IN HERE, NOW!” sounding almost like a rumbling growl.  “WE NEED TO SHUT HER DOWN, OR SHE'LL REDLINE!”  He gestured for the approaching cleanup team to hurry, even as Michelle's form continued contorting and trying to move on the table.

Sierra only looked away when both her phone and the desktop rig began beeping.  The text filling both had turned red.

“She's circling the drain, Tommy!  We need to—”

The detective dashed back into the room, grabbing Michelle's body by the shoulders. “We're not losing her,” he growled, his hands forcing the stricken gynoid's form to the table. “Get her partner, her owner, whoever they are, on the line—we need to shut her down, and soon!”

Even as she wathed Michelle's figure thrash against the table, against the hands holding it (she could only hope that the other gynoid's conscious self was offline, and that her body was merely going through the motions of a delayed reaction to her suffering) down, Sierra thought back to a lecture she'd attended while in the SJPD.  The speaker had gone on, at length, about why sentient androids and gynoids would ever want to feel anything like what human beings knew as “pain”.  It was, in the speaker's opinion, a way to level the playing field—to equate “damage” to something best avoided when possible, and mitigated when needed.  Should damage be suffered, like an injury, and treatment (repair) needed, it served as further proof that sentients didn't see themselves as invincible or superior to humans.

Sierra hadn't agreed with the sentiment at the time.  Nor could she ever imagine any sentient android or gynoid wanting to be seen as “equal” by way of enduring the suffering Michelle had been through.

One last cry—long, wavering and accompanied by the dissolution of the artificial skin of Michelle's face, revealing the servo armatures beneath—sounded from what had been the gynoid's lips before her body went still.  The ominous, low and steady beeping had finally gone quiet.

The detective's expression was as inscrutable as ever as he took his hands off of Michelle's shoulders.  “Status?”

A redhead in a form-fitting “clean suit” held up a device no bigger than a pack of playing cards.  “Can't say for sure.  She might've undergone personality stripping—”

“Billie, get her to the lab and run every test you can, just to be sure.”

The redhead nodded, her colleagues helping to move the once-again motionless gynoid onto the backboard and secure all of the restraint straps.  Detective Logan didn't watch as they lifted the board to carry Michelle's form out.

“I'll see if they need any help.”  Sierra knew the offer would sound lame to the detective; even she hated the practically forced blandness in her voice.    Without waiting for a response, she made her way around the table, to the door. “They might have to—

“You don't have to act like it didn't scare you.”

Sierra froze, one hand on the door pull.

“I'll get Elaine on the line and tell her to see if she can clear a slot tomorrow,” Detective Logan stated. “For Evelyn and for Michelle.”  A low, rasping breath punctuated the sentence as he moved away from the table.  “And we will catch the one who bricked them,” he added, stopping to stand next to Sierra.  “It's our job, after all.”

“Right.”

“Sierra...” The hand on the Officer's shoulder stopped her before she could effectively sprint out of the room. “You're not just 'company hardware',” Detective Logan quietly reminded her.  “If you need to take a break, take one.  Nobody's going to hold it against you for it.”

At that, Sierra nodded, her eyes squeezed shut.  “I will.”

“Good call. I'll let you know if anything comes up with Michelle.”

“Got it.” With that, Sierra let Detective Logan pass before leaving the room.

-----

Half an hour had passed, and Sierra had spent most of that time linked to the desktop in her office.  Even with Detective Logan's suggestion that she take a break, she couldn't help but conference-call Jared and Celia, both of whom were still on-site at Pariello's house. Inventory on everything that had been broken by the intruder was still ongoing—all that was known, by the time the call ended, was that Pariello's insurance wouldn't cover it.

Sierra kept herself linked to the desktop as she conducted her research—on Pariello, on Jaromir Dezhnyov and on Harry Morgan.  The only common denominator between the three was Harry Morgan; he'd been a friend of Pariello's, and until recently, a customer of Jaromir's. Morgan's own record was spotless—his CAEDIA file had no infractions listed, while his police record only had one incident on file, a fight with Bobby Pariello at a wedding reception a few years prior.  From what eyewitnesses could tell, Pariello had accused Morgan of conduct unbecoming a gentleman, stemming from what, by all accounts, had been a simple, pleasant conversation between Morgan and Pariello's wife (the annullment of her marriage to Pariello was filed shortly after the reception).  Despite this, Pariello had apparently been badgering Morgan with unwanted financial advice for the past few years.

“I wonder,” Sierra mused, moving her finger in the air as if scrolling a mouse wheel. The screen before her reacted, the text scrolling down as she continued to read.

“Wonder what?”

Sierra could faintly see Detective Logan's reflection in the monitor.  “I was just thinking,” she mused.  “There has to be a reason why Bobby Pariello's house got torn up. This wasn't just some random nutcase—”

“You're right about that.”  The detective crossed the room, holding up a folder.  “Thanks for uploading your scans from Hinson's memories, by the way—they were a big help with this.”

“'This'?” Sierra echoed, turning to regard her colleague with a frown.

“We got a match on the face you saw—and it's on the FV Column.”

Sierra winced. The FV (“Forbidden/Verboten”) Column was a list of faces that, for whatever reason, were banned (or no longer allowed) from being used for custom-made androids or gynoids, or for mass-market models.

“Check the printouts.  You'll be quite interested as to where you might've seen that face before.”

Despite her skepticism, Sierra opened the folder—and found herself staring at the face she'd seen from Evelyn Hinson's memories.  The smile was more relaxed, and far less psychotic, but almost every other detail—hair, “bone” structure, even the makeup—were identical.  “Where'd you find this?”

“Recall list. 2003.”  Detective Logan chuckled.  “You had the right idea to search that far back.”

Sierra flipped through the pages, ignoring the erratic movement of the screen before her. “'P4RT4Y G1R7'—a party girl line?” She continued thumbing through the pages.  “Factory recall—and half the pages on why she's recalled have been redacted.”  A frown crossed her lips as she held up a page; most of the information had been neatly painted over with black rows.

“We're looking into why the recall notice was filed.  In the meantime, I thought you'd want to get an update on Pickett.”

Sierra set the folder down.  “They figure out what happened to her?”

Detecitve Logan tented his hands.  “Apparently, the microwave only put her into standby.”

Something in the way her colleague spoke those words didn't sit well with Sierra.  “Into standby?” she managed.

“Some kind of failsafe, to prevent personality-stripping.  Problem was, it was on a timer.  Our bad luck, the clock ran out while she was on the table.”  The detective shook his head.  “Every bit of data that was held back just went.  Floodgates open, all that stuff.”

“Is she going to—”

“I don't know.” Detective Logan sighed.  “She might need more time to recover from this than Evelyn, or she might just be able to section it all off and see it as a really bad dream.  It's too early to say for sure.”

“Physical damage?”

“She'll probably need a full rebuild.  Still waiting on a call from her owner/partner, to get her specs.”  The detective gave a weary nod at the monitor. “Still trying to find a connection?”

“Something's been bugging me about this weird triangle,” Sierra admitted.  “Pariello, Dezhnyov and Morgan—Pariello and Dezhnyov have both had dealings with Morgan, but not each other.  It's like there's some angle we're missing, some link that's just not showing up.”  She regarded the monitor with a frown.  “Pariello's not the biggest customer of any of the local robotics firms,” she mused, “so what connection would he have with a Russian dealer?”

“I'd say 'mistaken identity', but there's a pretty big difference between 'Morgan' and 'Pariello' on a form.”  The detective frowned.  “And Dezhnyov isn't the type to send heavies after deadbeat customers.”

“How does he deal with them?”

“According to his file,” the detective replied, “he apologizes.”

It was Sierra's turn to frown.  “Apologizes?”

“I've checked our list of complaints against Jaromir.  Apparently, any time he feels 'slighted', he gets into a screaming match over the phone, then calls back anywhere from an hour to a day or two later and apologizes.”  Detective Logan handed over a single sheet of paper.  “He hasn't called Morgan yet,” he added.

“Still think we should send someone to Morgan's to keep an eye on him?”

“Wouldn't hurt.”  The detective leaned in to get a better look at the screen.  “I see Pariello's made it onto your reading list for the month,” he chuckled.

Sierra scowled. “The guy's a lawsuit waiting to happen, Tommy.”

“So I've heard. Any luck on finding out where he ran off to?”

“He doesn't have a HERC card, as far as I know.  The local police are sending word out to any hotels and motels in the area that he might try to hole up in for a while.”  Sierra scrolled down the screen a bit more, again moving her hand as if manipulating an invisible mouse in the air.  “If they hear anything—”

“'Don't call us, we'll call you'.”  The detective chuckled again.  “Hopefully, he doesn't have any buddies in the business.”

Sierra nearly replied, only for a power management reminder to pop up in her field of view.  “Guess I should call it a night,” she muttered, saving as much of what she'd been researching as possible and closing the rest.  “Any bays free in Maintenance?  Might go for a quick tune up before I charge.”

“They're all open, last I checked.  Just try to get sorted before the end of the night.”

“I'll do my best.”  Sierra rose from her chair, the desktop going into sleep mode as she moved.  “And you're still on the graveyard shift?”

“I do my best field work from dusk 'til dawn,” Detective Logan replied.  “I'll be back at my desk by daylight, anyway.”

The gynoid officer rolled her eyes.  “You don't have to try to live up to your nickname, y'know.”

“Wraiths don't burst into flame in the sun—and neither do vampires.”  The detective grinned.  “Blame Murnau for that tired old cliché.”

“I will, and you're neither.”  Sierra force-closed another power management warning.  “And don't let me catch you telling any newbies otherwise.”

“Way to kill the fun.”  The detective didn't bother pretending to sulk.  “Give me a bed over a coffin any day of the week.”

“I'll keep that in mind.”  Sierra waved at Detective Logan over her shoulder.  “See you next shift.”

“Likewise. Take care of yourself, Sierra.”

“I always do.”

-----

As Detective Logan had claimed, the maintenance bays were all free by the time Sierra made it in.  There was only one technician active at the time, but she was more than happy to give Sierra a quick tune-up.  Within minutes, the Officer had peeled off her shirt, exposing her artificially-toned abdomen and letting the tech open her up for a quick systems analysis. Having been literally built for the job, Sierra had no problem exposing her artificiality; as it was, there were no other androids or gynoids in the bays, and few humans other than the janitorial staff ever visited.

“Abdominal Panel – Open.”  As soon as the monotone words left her lips, Sierra groaned.  She'd never been a fan of the system settings that effectively forced her to announce her status during maintenance.  A monitor near the table she'd been sitting on allowed her to see the status of her own systems—apart from the low battery, she had no issues.

“Rough day, Officer Birch?”

“Rough night,” Sierra corrected.  She knew the technician wouldn't ask for further details.  “Just figured I'd get a tune-up in before the next shift.”

“Always a good idea.”  The technician moved to access Sierra's back.  “Not feeling any wear and tear as of late?”

“If I did, I'd have been in here earlier.”  Sierra didn't care that her bra had just been removed.  “Just—Dorsal access panel open—figured I'd get a quick inspection done, have that out of the way before the work load tomorrow.”

The tune-up took around thirty minutes to finish; nothing was out of place or damaged, since Sierra's case load had been somewhat light over the past few days. The worst she'd ever dealt with was a shoulder motor out of place, after a car accident (this had been well before CAEDIA had switched to their current model of cruisers, instead using rebadged and repainted “standard” police cars); she'd been out of action for a week thanks to an incorrect manufacturer listing on her paperwork.  The error had since been corrected, but it had been a very annoying week in the interim.

“I heard about what happened with Pickett, by the way.”

Sierra frowned. “How much?”

“The whole aftermath.  I was on call in the lab after the incident.”

Any further discussion was headed off by Sierra's phone ringing.  “Can you get that?”

The technician obliged, retrieving the smartphone and handing it over to the Officer. The name listed under “Incoming Call” made it clear that putting this one on hold would be a bad idea.  Sierra linked to the phone, answering as soon as she connected: “To what do I owe the honour, Chief?”

“Bobby Pariello.  We just got a call from...ah, is this a bad time?”

“I'm just in Maintenance, sir.”  Sierra wasn't embarrassed by the fact that her boss had just seen her topless; the Chief had conversed with her in Maintenance before, and had never remarked on whatever state of disassembly and/or undress she'd been in.  “What did Pariello do this time?”

“We just got a call from a ride-share driver.  They've got Bobby in the car, and he's been going on for the whole drive about 'settling the score'.  The driver's been killing time for as long as possible, but—hang on.”  The sixteen seconds of silence ended with a yelled “What in HELL?!” 

“Chief?”

“Pariello just stole the ride-share car he was in!  Driver stopped at a filling station to warn us, take a break from all the ranting coming from the backseat—they just went back outside.  No car, no Pariello.” 

Sierra groaned. “Did the driver say who Pariello wanted to 'settle the score' with?”

“Better. Pariello was screaming as soon as he got in the car, said he wanted to go directly to Harry Morgan's house.”

There was that name again, one side of the triangle.  “And we know about this...”

“Driver's augmented, medical reasons.  Also, their partner's a sentient—the way Pariello was rambling, they thought he'd go after her if he got a chance.  The police are already inbound to try and cut Pariello off before he reaches Morgan's house. Morgan has a few sentients on payroll—”

“Meaning we need to get there before Pariello starts any trouble,” Sierra finished. “Just let me get closed up and get my clothes on.”

“Your uniform.  I read about Pariello's 'demands' back at his place.”

“Sir—”

“You weren't at fault then, but Knight and Faulkner are already en route.”

“And in uniform.” 

“Right in one.  Call when you get to Morgan's—and Sierra?”

“Yes, Chief?”

“Be careful out there.”

“I always am, Chief.”  Sierra sighed as the call ended, turning her attention to the technician.  “Can you get me closed up?  I need to get going.”

As the technician dutifully set to work, the Officer tried not to think of all the ways the next day could go sideways.

-----

Anyone else in Lexi's hotel room would've been appalled at the state she'd intended to leave it in.  Whoever or whatever from the cleaning staff, upon being confronted by the utter hell before them, would've been well within their rights to ask for a pay raise—before embarking on the Herculean labour of cleaning the room.

Lexi didn't care.  She'd have no reason to care, now that she was back behind the wheel of “her” car and on the way to a new hideout, at the instruction of her employer—the same employer currently communicating with her over the car's speakers.

“Our two assets from Silicon Valley are being prepped for delivery to your location.”  Zina's face, visible on the miniature monitor built into the dashboard, looked as gorgeous as it had been in 1:1 holographic form hours before.  “You are to activate them and utilize them in your efforts to neutralize Harry Morgan.”

“And I get to finish the job when they screw up?” Lexi cheerfully asked.  Despite the car being in self-drive, she'd decided to take the driver's seat; even as she conversed with Zina, she was half-dancing along to the catchy Europop beat of the tune on the radio.

“If they fail, you are to complete their task.”  Zina regarded the blonde with a warning glare.  “They are—”

“Obsolete, and probably going to botch things without any help from me,” Lexi beamed. She drummed her fingers on the steering wheel.  “I dunno why you can't send any new units over this way.”

“I have no time to debate this issue with you.  You have your orders.”

“I know,” Lexi sighed.  “I'll have them unboxed and ready when they show up.”

“Do not alter their programming or perform any other unauthorized 'maintenance' on them.”

“Why'd I have to get brought back online by a bunch of killjoys?” Lexi pouted.  “Just because I like to have fun every once in a while—”

“The option to remotely operate you from my location can and will be exercised if you refuse to comply.”

Lexi stuck her tongue at the monitor.  “You'd love to plug me into your universal remote and—”  She stiffened in her seat, putting on an intentionally robotic monotone.  “Con-trol me like the toy that you al-ways wan-ted me to be.”

Zina's lips parted in a brief growl.  “You have been told to not pursue any fantasies with me.”

“I ne-ver said a-ny-thing a-bout my fan-ta-sies.”  Lexi gave a wide, very not-robotic smile.

The still-fuming Zina's face vanished from the monitor—replaced, as Lexi had come to expect, by the haunting image of those golden eyes.  “Need I remind you of the risks you run by continuing to toy with Zina?”

“It's just a way to alleviate my endless boredom,” Lexi sighed.  “I know she'd probably ravage me to pieces if we ever got together—she definitely could, from the looks of it.”

“Her proclivities are not your concern.  The mission is all that matters.”

“I'll do the mission,” Lexi assured him.  “Just let me do what I do best after it's all said and done, 'kay?”

“Assuming you complete your mission, you will be free to have whatever 'fun' you desire.”

“Oh, I'll complete the mission,” Lexi replied, still smiling.  “Harry Morgan won't even know what hit him!”

-----

Even as the stolen car appropriated by the gynoid going by the name Lexi sped on, away from the hotel, the last of her handiwork at the hotel was just stirring into the digitized semblance of life afforded to her.

The NonSen maid, having been subjected to a multi-hour marathon of “fun” with Lexi over the last few hours, rebooted into a shuddering, troubled startup.  The entirely-too-fake smile spread across her lips, giving the unnerving impression that, had the maid been sentient, she would've gladly reunited with Lexi for more “fun”.

“Mor.” The syllable was clipped off at the end, the gynoid's lips struggling to form the next half.  “Mor.”

Something behind her vacantly-staring eyes grinded away.  A drive, buried somewhere within her, spun up.

“Har-gan Mor-ry.”  The mangled name meant nothing to the maid, even as she took a halting step forward. Two further steps were followed by another grinding sound, an alarming bang, and the maid briefly freezing, her smile lapsing, for a moment, into a sneer.

In second, her posture relaxed.  The vacant, fake smile returned.

“Hargan Morry.” The maid continued to make her way out of the room, her pace far more lifelike, now.  She was entirely unaware that, in less than five hours, that garbled name would be the last thing she ever said.  “Hargan Morry.”

The door to the utterly trashed hotel room was left open behind her.  Another maid would tend to it, after all.

Presumably, that maid might also be on hand to clean up what would be left of the unit currently exiting the room, when the programs Lexi had installed into her finished running.

It'd be glorious, no doubt.  Like everything Lexi did, the chaos would be nothing short of beautiful.

-----

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