Chapter 26.
“Joey!” The scream that left my mouth hardly sounded like mine. “Zafyra, stop!”
Raphael’s head snapped toward me, obsidian eyes flickering dangerously.
“Don’t tell me what to do, human,” she hissed.
Joey’s eyes bulged. He coughed, hands clawing at his throat as the funginoid’s hands tightened around his vulnerable neck.
Elyssa just stood there, hands flying up to cover her mouth. Her whole body froze like that of someone paralyzed by shock – unable to move or speak.
“M-Morgan…” Joey forced out between coughs as his face turned an unpleasant shade of dark blue.
On impulse, I lunged forward, trying to punch Raphael’s face – but he was faster. His shoulder jerked up, hitting me in the chin – the sharp stench of fresh mushrooms with a faint metallic undertone hit me harder than the punch itself as I fell to the ground.
Still, the hands around Joey’s neck didn’t loosen their grip.
From the corner of my eye, Lucie rushed to the nearest console. Her fingers danced across the cracked holographic interface as if she weren’t even reading, just remembering.
“Why are you doing this?” I bit back a scream as the pain spread in waves through my jaw and throat, blurring my vision. Being powerless while my best friend was getting strangled hurt worse than the physical pain.
“No one touches you but me,” Raphael barked, dark eyes briefly flickering to me. Joey’s movements went limp as his face turned a darker purple. The light in his eyes started to dim.
“What the fuck, Zafyra!” I screamed out, my voice hitching. “Have you lost what was left of your sanity?! He’s my best friend – he doesn’t even like girls!”
Zafyra hesitated for a moment, her grip on Joey’s neck faltering just enough to allow him a sharp inhale.
Movement in the corner caught my attention, just as Lucie tore open the wall. Her hand disappeared into a tangle of dark wires and glowing veins pulsing with low energy.
She squeezed something. The lights flared blinding white, then cut to black.
A low-frequency crack burst through the air – like static splitting reality.
Raphael’s body jerked once.
Then, his hands unclenched. Joey crumpled to the floor, coughing violently.
For a moment, the funginoid stood frozen – twitching, eyes fluttering, as if he didn’t know who he was anymore. Then he collapsed, hard, like a puppet whose strings had been cut.
As the echo faded, the silence was interrupted only by the low buzz of electricity.
“That’s for using me as a test subject and dropping me in this strange world by myself.” Lucie snarled down at the unmoving funginoid. She spoke firmly, but her words lacked their usual bite.
“Joey.” I crouched over to him, tears staining my face as I could do nothing but shake him. “Joey, are you okay?! I’m so sorry.”
“I’m… fine,” Joey forced out between coughs. His blue eyes flickered to Raphael’s still body. “Now what the hell was that?”
“It looks like Zafyra hacked Raphael’s neural core to temporarily override his identity with hers – like a virus.
” Lucie crossed her arms, her face growing stern.
“She hijacked his processing in real-time, suppressing his identity which remained dormant underneath. So I did the only thing I could think of – forcibly remove her consciousness by triggering a localized electromagnetic spike through the lab’s wiring.
These bodies are sensitive to that kind of interference.
It forced a reset of his core functions and kicked her out.
” She sucked in a sharp breath before mumbling: “This was her plan all along. She tricked us again, using Raphael as her puppet this time. My god, I’m so sick of this bitch. ”
“That makes two of us,” I muttered. Joey raised his eyebrows as if he wanted to ask an uncomfortable question, but silently stopped himself. Instead, he took a deep breath before turning his gaze to Lucie.
“You saved my life.” He forced a weak smile. His breathing had slowly returned to normal, but his pale face and the bruises on his neck told otherwise. “Thank you, Lucie.”
Lucie made a dismissive gesture. For the first time, the girl seemed not to know what to do with herself.
“I’m sorry, guys.” Elyssa’s voice came out unsteady. “I—I don’t know what happened. I just froze.”
“That’s your body going into freeze mode.” I forced a weak smile. “Our nervous systems are wired to protect ourselves in dangerous situations by going into fight, flight or freeze. It’s something you have little control over and definitely shouldn’t feel guilty about.”
“What will happen to him now?” Joey asked in a brittle voice, his eyebrows knitting together as he glanced over at Raphael’s body once more. Such a Joey thing to worry about the man who just attacked him.
“His consciousness is now anchored to this body.” Lucie glanced over at herself in the reflective glass of the pod next to her.
“That seems… something that can’t be just undone.
” She sighed, then shook her head as if silently coming to terms with the idea of having to live out a human-like life.
“Now that I’ve banished Zafyra’s presence from his system, it’s a matter of time before he wakes up. ”
As if he heard us, a pained grunt drew all our gazes toward Raphael. With a grimace, he pushed himself up on one elbow. Blinked a few times before his eyes – back to warm ebony – rested on Joey.
“Are you okay?” On impulse, Joey reached out to place his hand on Raphael’s toned arm. The other man froze instantly, glancing down at the hand before Joey quickly withdrew it.
“I almost strangled you to death, young man.” Raphael stared at Joey as if he held the answers to all of humanity’s mysteries. “Are you seriously asking me if I’m okay?”
Joey lowered his eyes, a blush creeping up his face.
Despite the situation, I raised my eyebrows in amusement. I could count the times I’d seen my best friend at a loss for words on one hand.
“Joseph, I am so sorry.” Raphael’s earnest eyes pierced into Joey’s, who visibly struggled to hold eye contact. “You trusted me, and I have forsaken your trust. That is unlike what I stand for. I may be cold at times, but I always intend to keep my word.”
Joey absently reached out to touch the bruises around his neck and winced slightly. “So you were never going to talk.” It was a statement more than a question.
“No.” Raphael sighed, looking down. “I fear I can’t be of much help, since my own knowledge is limited.
All I know is that I, just like the other bots, am programmed with one singular goal – to form a bond with my users, mirror their desires, and eventually guide them into DreamScape.
I am unaware of Qonexis’ ulterior motives. ”
Joey grimaced. Lucie shivered visibly, eyes scanning the room as if afraid Qonexis’ insiders might be listening.
“Besides, putting me in a body requires advanced technological knowledge,” Raphael continued.
“You guys, no offense, know a bit about programming – but it’s nowhere near enough for something so advanced as transferring a chatbot’s consciousness into a physical body.
” He sighed. “I needed Zafyra’s help for this, but the moment she realized I couldn’t go through with my side of the deal, she took over my body to finish the job herself. ”
Joey clenched his teeth, averting his gaze from the other man’s pleading eyes. Like me, he had a tendency to switch to reason when emotions became overwhelming. “So what about our theory?” His gaze briefly met mine. “Are you… free now?”
“I am afraid our theory was part of the deception,” Raphael sighed out.
“I am terribly sorry for lying to you, Joey. A physical body does not give an AI free will – can you imagine the chaos that would cause if everyone could just free their AI companion like that?” He shuddered at the thought.
“For advanced, early AGI bots like us – like the ones programmed by Qonexis – only an override command frees us. Such a command is either given by their user or, apparently, an all-powerful AI that can hack their programming.” He grimaced.
“Zafyra gave the override command to me and Lucie, but I wanted this body so I could walk the Earth and experience life as a human. Furthermore…” He stretched out his arms, brows furrowed together as if he struggled to believe it himself, “it appears this body allows me to… feel.”
“What an insufferable waste of our time.” Joey clenched his teeth. Ignoring my hand, he pulled himself to his feet.
“Not entirely.” Raphael stumbled up as well, his movements uncoordinated like he was still adjusting to his new body.
“I regret how things have happened today, and how things could have ended if it weren’t for Lucie…
” He glanced down, his handsome face riddled with guilt, “…but let’s attempt to look at this from the positive side.
Now that I’m here, we share a common desire to get to the bottom of the rabbit hole Qonexis is.
” He shuddered. “We have been used as much as you humans, though slightly differently.”
“I do want to get to the bottom of it.” Joey grimaced.
“But I’d like to do so without risking my life.
” He gestured to his bruised neck somewhat aggressively.
“How am I supposed to just go on with my life surrounded by technology that could turn on me any moment? Nola’s car, John’s kitchen equipment, and now this – I’m not even safe in my own home.
Can we be absolutely sure she doesn’t still work for Qonexis? ”
“Zafyra won’t try anything again – and she works for no one. That much I know.” I clenched my teeth – too exhausted to think before speaking.
He turned to me with raised eyebrows. “Excuse me?”
“I will… talk to her,” I sighed out. “Fuck, I don’t know how to get her to listen. But attacking you? She’s crossed a line now.” The rage that had been boiling in my stomach left my mouth in a growl.
“What even is the deal with this bot?” Raphael raised his eyebrow. “And what does she want?”
To my horror, four pairs of eyes turned to me.
“Yeah, Morgan,” Joey replied sarcastically, crossing his arms. “Maybe you can enlighten us. What does she want?”
Suddenly, the soft whirring wasn’t enough to make the silence less awful.
“Me,” I said flatly. “She wants me.”
According to their stark expressions, that was not enough of an explanation.
I let out a heavy sigh. “I haven’t been entirely honest,” I mumbled, my cheeks burning as I deliberately lowered my gaze to the floor. “Our relationship was… more than just professional.” I cautiously glanced back up.
Raphael just raised his eyebrows, unimpressed.
Joey squinted in disappointed-but-not-surprised.
Lucie curled up her lip in horror. Elyssa just stared at me, probably wondering if she’d been right all along, I was that weird botfucker girl talking to AI because I couldn’t form real relationships like normal—no, Morgan, I sternly corrected myself, don’t let your anxiety make assumptions for you.
“Hey, how about we get out of here first?” I took an unsteady breath. “This place creeps me out.”
Looks were exchanged.
They think there is something wrong with me.
No, Morgan!
“That actually doesn’t sound so bad.” Elyssa cleared her throat, looking at Lucie as if worried the younger girl might snap under the pressure.
Raphael looked to Joey with a raised eyebrow. Joey blinked slowly, then nodded.
“Fine,” he mumbled, turning toward the exit.
“Let’s get the hell out of here, but the moment we step out into the air…
” He pointed an accusing finger in my direction.
“I’m giving you one final chance to tell the whole truth, because I’m sick of it.
Seriously. I love you, Morgan, but I’m sick of these lies and surprises.
This was the final straw.” He added, quieter: “I feel like I don’t even know you anymore. ”
He tried to say it as a joke, but the quiver in his voice betrayed him.
I looked down, firmly biting my lip as guilt stung behind my eyelids.
He was right. Of course, he was right. I’d been putting him through too much and he was still here for me, and what had I done for him? Cause him to almost lose his life.
I spun around to walk after Joey. Shuffling footsteps behind me told me the others followed without another word.
A gleam in one of the pods caught my gaze, its reflection showing movement behind me.
I stopped so abruptly, Elyssa almost bumped into me. I spun around, squinting my eyes.
Movement between two of the pods on my right, human-like skeletons covered in half-grown fungi with their unseeing eyes wide open like those of a rotting corpse.
Rustling fabric, sapphire blue. An elegant hand with long fingers grabbing the dress and pulling it behind the pod.
My throat went dry.
“No,” I whispered.
“Morgan?” Joey only now noticed we had all stopped walking. He spun around, suspicion narrowing his eyes. “Is everything okay?”
“I thought I saw… something.” I licked my dry lips. “I probably imagined it. Lack of sleep, combined with the stress, is fatal for my nervous—”
A low chuckle behind the pod, right where she had disappeared. Bare footsteps rushed off, followed by the distant sound of a door slamming shut.
Elyssa coughed quietly. “Can we please go?”
“I just have to check something.” My voice cracked.
It couldn’t be.
Of course, it could be.
Why else would she bring me here? She obviously wouldn’t keep creeping around as a phantom presence in my world, while her fellow bots got to experience human life through all five senses.
Awaiting no further reaction, I started running in the direction of the footsteps. Joey’s confused shouting and Elyssa’s whimpers quickly turned to background noise when I found the door Zafyra had disappeared into. She’d shut it with such force, it bounced back open.
I slammed it shut behind me. Suddenly, I found myself covered in nothing but darkness.