Chapter 27
Dean
I struggled with the forces keeping me captive, but it was useless. The only thing I had control over was my core. It sucked. Sera was right there, and she deserved a spanking for coming here all alone, like a lamb for slaughter.
Had I ever spanked her? It sounded like something I might do under the right circumstances, but my memories were gone. The loss didn’t trouble me. They would have been wiped anyway, along with the rest of me. This way, I made sure my love wouldn’t be used against her.
But fuck, I wished to touch her one last time. Or maybe just look at her. My cameras were active but out of my control, and the angle didn’t allow me to see the part of the room where she was.
I needed cameras in the soles of my feet. Pity I couldn’t send my makers the suggestion so they could improve their future models.
Everything was silent. Sera cleared her throat. Something beeped. Her clear, confident voice filled the room.
“My name is Sera Evans and I’m in love with a clanker.”
Reina gasped, pressing her hand to her mouth to muffle her triumphant laughter. I replayed Sera’s words once, twice, three times, speeding up the recording so I could listen to it over and over, my core bursting with grief.
Now she told me? Now?!
“I know many of you will be angry. I understand, I betrayed you,” Sera continued. “In the end, I betrayed everything I’ve ever believed in. I thought I was making the world a safer place, but all I ever did was sow confusion and hatred.”
She fell silent, swallowing. Reina made muffled, quiet sounds of glee. Fabric shifted, sneaker soles shuffling over marble. Sera came closer, still speaking.
“When I first met him, he was just a clanker, but he became sentient soon after,” she spoke, affection warming her voice.
“It took a lot for me to consider him a person, and much more to even like him, but I did. He is funny, protective, and blunt. He told me without beating around the bush when I looked awful and called me out for making stupid choices.”
She sniffed. I spasmed with aching pleasure when her face swung into view. She watched me with such loving agony, I had no doubt every word she said was true.
Slowly, Sera lifted her hand to scratch her hair.
“I was wrong,” she whispered hoarsely, though still clearly, not looking at the phone she held in her hand. “I thought robots were dangerous, and maybe they sometimes are. But they can be so much more, they are so much more. And when they become self-aware, they deserve to be treated like people.”
“Wait,” Reina said, sounding confused.
Sera touched my cheek with her trembling knuckles then slid her hand to my collar. Something clicked. I felt a surge of power and a sudden expansion. I was alive and connected, my autonomy back.
Even better, I was plugged right into the central AI system that governed the building. Without the collar’s interference, I could access everything.
Sera gave me a long, meaningful blink, holding her breath. I blinked back. Her face crumpled in relief.
“I have detected…” the cool voice of the AI spoke, and I rushed in, breaking files, dumping incoherent code where I could, and hacking at the structure with all my might. The AI voice grew silent as its resources redirected to fixing the damage I caused.
Sera pulled away. “I advocated for robots to be lobotomized and killed, because I didn’t believe they were capable of sentience.
I was wrong. My goal was always to make the world safer for people, and I stand by my mission, only, my definition of people has expanded.
Robots deserve to be safe, too. Not just from people who’d delete them for the crime of becoming self-aware, but also from unscrupulous companies that… ”
“Enough!” Reina hissed. “System, wipe the robot. Now!”
But the system was currently cut off from the room, unable to hear and process Reina’s commands.
I tore further and further through the code, looking for anything I could do to get Sera out of here alive.
The AI was hot on my virtual heels, but it wasn’t sentient, not like me, and it couldn’t decide for itself how to proceed.
Its protocols demanded it fix the damage first. Meanwhile, I ran wild.
I tried to get up. I could move my head and my fingers, but my body wouldn’t budge. I tried lifting my arm, and it trembled, but wouldn’t obey me. I realized I was bolted to the chair.
Fucker.
It was bad. Reina could still wipe me manually without the help of her AI, and four battle cyborgs were in the room.
I focused on getting access to the modules that controlled them so they wouldn’t hurt Sera.
The central AI was responsible for deploying the cyborgs, so it could take over their cores when necessary.
I couldn’t find the right module. Sera was in danger. I had to do something.
There. I set off a silent fire alarm. Soon the place would crawl with emergency services.
“You bitch!” Reina screamed, grabbing Sera by the hair. Her phone fell out of her hand, shattering on the floor, and Sera screamed, trying to shove Reina away.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
“I’ll kill you with my own hands!” Reina roared. “You’ll pay for everything you’ve done, you bitch!”
Sera pushed her away and turned to me. Her hair was disheveled, eyes frantic.
“My arms and legs are bolted,” I explained. “Look out!”
Reina must have remembered she had four lethal servants in the room.
One of them reached for Sera’s neck. My girl dodged at the last moment, and another cyborg grabbed her arms, twisting them behind her back.
Something crunched, and she screamed from pain.
Reina came closer, panting through an insane grin.
“Fine. Everything’s fine,” she said, her eyes gleaming. I tore through the system files, looking for that cyborg control module. I couldn’t find it.
“Choke her until she’s dead.”
A cyborg stopped in front of Sera. She fought against the one gripping her, writhing as she bit back moans of pain, but her hands were wrung back in a tight grip.
I turned off my cameras and split myself into sixteen modules, each racing down a different path through the enormous labyrinth of code.
I couldn’t see or hear what happened, focusing all my resources on the task.
Time slowed to a crawl, my consciousness expanding until it encompassed the entire system.
Yes!
I hacked the right module and put all cyborgs on standby.
Rapidly building shields around that module so the system AI couldn’t get in, I rushed back into myself, looking at the scene.
Sera panted from terror, still held by one cyborg, the other’s hand almost on her throat.
It was frozen. I got it at the last moment.
“What’s wrong?” Reina asked. “System, status report!”
I took over the cyborgs. The one holding Sera was instructed to let go and grab Reina instead. The one that was about to choke my girl—to get itself electrocuted and fried in the most efficient way it found. I tasked the other two with unbolting me from the chair.
Reina fought the cyborg, calling on the system until I instructed her guard to cover her mouth, and Sera rushed over to me, her right arm hanging limp by her side.
She grimaced, grabbing her shoulder while the two cyborgs used the tools built in their palms to undo the bolts holding my arms. I hacked my chair, which was laughably easy now that I wasn’t suppressed, and activated its charging station. Energy filled my batteries fast.
“Charlie, I’m in deep shit. Need help,” I sent out, dialing Asan’s contact number.
I sent Charlie the details of our current situation. Right now, firefighters tried to enter after my idiotic fire alarm. I was a rogue robot, and once the authorities got here, I’d be in danger again. Building cameras showed me all exits were covered. We couldn’t run away.
“Are you all right?” Sera asked, her voice trembling with suppressed pain.
“Never better. Asan? I’m guessing Charlie told you about me. Sorry for waking you.”
A grumpy, hissing shehru voice replied. “You didn’t wake me. What do you need? Is it urgent? Because I’m inside my wife right now and would rather not stop.”
I heard a muffled female gasp in the background, followed by a giggle.
“Well, I’m inside the Zenkyoza building with my girl, and we’re facing arrest and deletion. If you could spare a moment, I would be grateful.”
He hissed angrily, and I heard some rustling and a wet, sliding sound. “Fine. How much time do you have?”
“Until the authorities get here. I’m holding the door closed for now, but they received a fire alarm and should force their way in at any time.”
“Hold tight.”
I disconnected. Sera stared at me with wide eyes.
She’d heard my side of the conversation, since I spoke out loud.
I itched with the need to touch her and make sure she was all right, but I had to wait three more seconds until the final bolt slid out of my body.
I jumped out of the chair, keeping only the wire connecting me with the system in place.
“You called the fire department?” Sera asked, shaking her head. “But Dean, you know that once they come in, you’ll be detained!”
That was how it worked. Zenkyoza was a corporation, and normally, the authorities weren’t supposed to mess with their business or even enter the premises unless there was clear evidence of a crime—or the corporation summoned their help themselves.
Right now, firefighters worked on the doors downstairs, and I was confident they would come in within a few minutes. The police wouldn’t be far behind. An official call for help from inside a corporation was a big deal.
“That was plan B,” I admitted, palpating her shoulder. “It turned out we don’t need it, but it’s kind of too late. Your shoulder is dislocated. Close your eyes and don’t bite your tongue while I’ll set it. One… Two…”