Chapter 4
Unit Thirty-One watched in curiosity as his creator paced back and forth over the length of the room.
Logan cursed under his breath, demonstrating frustration that his romantic partner had been unwilling to perform sexually with him.
He sighed and slumped back onto the bed, pulling his phone from his pocket.
The glow of the holoscreen bounced off his face, casting the hollows of his skull in shadow.
He tapped a few buttons and held it to his ear.
Thirty-One’s hearing far exceeded a human’s, so he was able to clearly hear the conversation that followed the distant ringing.
“Hey, man. So did she go for it?”
Logan glanced at the door before answering in a low voice.
“No.” He huffed, rubbing a hand over his forehead. “I should have known this wasn’t going to work.”
Thirty-One looked down at himself. Was he not pleasing to the eye? No, that didn’t seem likely.
So far, his sexual performance had been measured only with other androids. It was considered in poor taste for the employees to test his ability to bring pleasure, some human inhibition that he only vaguely understood.
He had thrust his cock into his hand, into clear casts of women’s vaginas, into cushioned holes with a camera at the end, all without any inhibition.
He’d had sex for hours in front of a crowd of human researchers.
He and a female android, calibrated to measure his performance, had done it in every position imaginable, and it had not felt strange to him.
It must be this modesty that he didn’t understand, which held the human woman back.
Ophelia, that was her name. Engaged to be married to Logan Doyle, one of the coding experts working to refine the performance of the seventh-generation Automata models.
He’d known Logan as long as he’d existed.
If this creator wished him to pleasure his woman, he would do so merrily.
It pleased him to please them. That was one of the foundational aspects of his code.
He lived to please his creators, as he would one day live to please his primary user.
“She’s such a prude,” the man on the other end said.
“She’s sweet,” Logan shot back. “She’s just… Shit, yeah, she’s a prude.”
The other man laughed. “Dude, you’re so screwed. Are you still going to marry her?”
“I have to.” He blew out a harsh breath, scrubbing a hand over his face. “I want to. Just… not like this.”
“You could always come clean and see if she’ll take pity on you. She’s gotta be in her dad’s pocket, right?”
“And if she doesn’t feel inclined toward pity once I explain it all?
” He made a bitter sound. “Besides, she barely talks to the guy. We’ve been engaged for a year, and I still can’t convince her to introduce me.
I’m not… I’m not sure it’s gonna work the way they want it to, even if I take this all the way.
I could be married to her for years without getting any results.
God only knows what they’ll ask for, then. ”
The other man sighed. “You want me to take another crack at it? If you warm her up, I bet I can persuade her.”
“Please, man. If she won’t go for robot Adonis over here, I doubt you’re gonna be the one to change her mind.”
“Ouch, brutal.”
Logan’s expression softened. “I don’t want to scare her again, man. She’s never looked at me like that before. Like I’m the enemy.”
“You’re getting too caught up in her. You know how this has to go down.”
“I know,” Logan grunted. “Of course I know. It doesn’t make it any easier. You don’t get it.”
“Alright, alright. You’re right, I don’t get it. I just don’t want to see you get crushed when this reaches its only inevitable conclusion.”
“Yeah, whatever. I’ll see you Monday.”
The call disconnected, and Logan set the phone down on the wireless charging dock on the nightstand. He looked at Thirty-One for a long moment, frowning, then threw himself back on the pillows with a grumble of frustration.
The lights dimmed as he rolled onto his side, dragging the blankets over himself. Thirty-One sat in the dark listening to the change of the rhythm of his breath, knowing the moment he was asleep.
His eyes drifted toward the door, to the seam of dancing light spilling through at the bottom. Someone was droning about cinnamon roll batter on the TV in the living room, obscuring the noise of the other inhabitant.
A strange curiosity prompted him to rise to his feet and cross to that door, easing it open silently. He stepped out into the hall, watching as a woman wearing a bright red sweater covered in poorly-crafted felt reindeer cracked an egg into a large bowl. Mesmerized, he walked closer to the TV.
He knew what it was, but he had never seen one.
There were many things he could identify and yet had never seen or experienced.
He stepped into the living room, luxuriating in the strange sensation of the plush white area rug beneath his bare toes.
He wiggled them, squishing the fabric between them, oddly pleased by the experience.
His eyes drifted over the room, falling on the figure curled up on the couch.
She looked much younger in sleep, without worry pinching the muscles around her eyes.
Her light brown hair spilled over the cushions like silk, shimmering as the light of the TV danced over it.
Her eyes were red and puffy, and she had one hand pressed up against her lips like a child about to suck their thumb.
Vulnerable. That was his assessment. With her knees tucked to her chest and cheeks still wet with tears, she looked fragile to him. He stepped closer to her, crouching beside the couch, studying the way the shadows on her face shifted in the light.
Her eyes had been gray, dark against the pallor of her skin.
There had been a great deal of emotion within them, so many feelings moving so fast that even his considerably complex programming could not decipher them all.
Hurt, he thought he’d seen. She’d been wounded by the proposal of sleeping with him.
What do you find unsatisfactory? He wanted to ask.
Perhaps she needed to see him without his uniform on. He plucked at the fabric, looking down at himself. It was an unflattering cut. Technically, he was not required to wear it within a private domicile.
He abandoned the train of thought.
She shivered, tucking in more tightly on herself. Cold. His sensors told him the temperature in the apartment was sixty-five degrees, and her thin cotton pajamas were not suitable for such an environment.
With a frown, he rose to his feet.
That was not his problem to solve. He had been brought to this place to pleasure her sexually.
Her needs outside of that fell beyond the parameters under which he was meant to operate.
She was not his primary user. He turned to leave her, but she cringed again, rolling to tuck herself against the cushions as though they might preserve her body heat. Hesitation locked up his joints.
If she remained cold for a sustained period of time, her immune system could become compromised.
Should that happen, she would become prone to illness.
If she were ill, his programming would not permit him to have sex with her until she was well.
Clearly, such an incident would waylay his creator’s plans to watch him pleasure her.
Satisfied that caring for her needs now fell within his scope of operation, he left to search the apartment.
There was a closet in the hall that contained several blankets and sheets.
He pulled down the thickest comforter within and quietly closed the door before returning to her.
Careful not to rouse her, he draped the heavy blanket over her, folding it in half so it would not drag on the floor.
She sighed, one hand grabbing at the edge of the comforter and tucking it up under her chin.
He knew she would be comfortable, no longer in danger of contracting illness from her lowered body temperature. He did not know why he then lingered.
His fingers trailed over her temple, luxuriating in the sensation of the soft, baby-fine hairs that grew there.
She turned her face toward him. The deep wrinkle between her brows softened as he cupped her cheek, and she pressed it harder against his palm.
One of her delicate hands wormed free of the blanket to grasp at his wrist. She held him close in a surprisingly firm grip, trapping his hand between her face and the pillow as she rolled toward him completely.
Another sigh escaped her, so big that her whole body heaved with it.
Her lashes fluttered open, and her unfocused gaze fell on him. That tender look seemed to hook around something in his chest. He felt a tug as though some invisible cord had pulled tight between them.
“Don’t go,” she mumbled, nuzzling him. “I love you.”
Her eyes fell shut again.
It had not been for him. It could not have been. What knowledge he had in his system about human love suggested it was too complex to form in such an instant. He knew she must have meant her words for Logan. And yet. And yet.
He stayed frozen like that, cradling the soft warmth of her cheek, even hours after her hand went slack and released him.