"Caroline."
She woke to Amir's voice. It was calm and quiet, a tone she didn't think she would hear from the police chief.
"Caroline."
She opened her eyes and sat up in the cushioned chair. She was still in the office. Amir was crouched in front of her.
"What happened? What did you see?"
Caroline shook her head. She didn't understand. She'd just been looking at the certificate.
"How do you feel?"
"Fine." That was the truth. She felt that coldness that she'd felt the first time, that terror, but physically she was fine.
"You were snooping around," Amir said matter-of-factly. "Why?"
The coldness in Caroline's chest held her from speaking. She just looked at Amir and waited for the reprimand or whatever people did when they discovered you've been investigating them behind their back.
But the police officer said nothing, and strangely enough, Caroline felt her fear subsiding. A sadness took its place. She'd always known she was missing memories, but she had never felt so empty before. Maybe that was what happened when you actually thought about it.
"Who are you?" she asked.
Amir tilted his head in confusion. "I'm just someone who made a promise to your parents."
"When did we first meet?"
Amir was silent. He furrowed his eyebrows and tapped his finger against his knee. "When you were born."
"Where are my parents?"
No reply.
Caroline felt a lump form in her throat. "Why are you here instead of them?"
"They're… they've been missing."
"Why don't I know this?" Caroline blinked back tears. "Why don't I remember them?"
"If you'd like to get your memories back—"
"No, no." Caroline clenched her jaw. "Just tell me yourself. Why'd they go missing? How do you know me? Who are you really?"
Amir didn't reply. He just stood there with his head bowed like a powered-down robot.
"Do you not remember either?" Caroline asked quietly.
"No. I don't think so."
"Do you remember anything at all?"
"I know your dad was an Inspector and your mother was a professor. I don't know where they are, but I know I need to keep you safe for them. And… I know whatever happened to them, we both wanted to forget it."
He's lying. He has to know something. He has to have an ulterior motive for helping me. But Caroline felt none of that suspicion take root as she looked into Amir's eyes. It was like she'd lived this moment before.
-----
The apartment was silent, but no one could sleep. Marvin, Ishaan, and Ella were perched around the living room, keeping watch on Sunwoo who was sitting by the balcony window. Ishaan and Ella wore exoskeletons, and Marvin had his arm-shields unfolded. He didn't think Sunwoo would go berserk, but they couldn't take any chances.
"It's fading," Sunwoo would say from time to time. His memories were slowly being deleted as part of a failsafe. They asked him questions, making sure he forgot as little as possible. At one point, he managed to remember a detail.
"Saeyung asked me if I was nervous," he said. "I don't know why I lied. If I'd said yes, maybe she wouldn't have…"
He trailed off, and no one pressed him.
She would've done it regardless, Marvin thought. Sunwoo knew that.
Ben and Renee were in their bedroom, scouring the internet for updates on Ainsel AI. There were no warrants for Marvin's arrest—if the police asked questions, Marvin would simply show them the recording. However, people had seen Marvin fall from the lab, and there were rumors that gang mercenaries were being deployed to find him.
Amir had messaged them earlier, saying how he'd scheduled a meeting with James Kobayashi tomorrow at the break of dawn. In the meantime, the Inspection would secure a location and form a team without biases towards Ainsel or Amir's police department. They needed to process the facts without prior opinions.
As the minutes crawled on, Marvin noticed Ishaan take out his tablet and start watching recent mech duels. He didn't want to fall behind, it seemed. It was relatable but worrisome.
"Hey," Ella snapped.
Ishaan tucked his tablet away with an apologetic nod.
After what seemed like years, Amir and Caroline returned. There was a strange air between them, and Caroline wore a distant look that Marvin had never seen before.
Amir went to check on Sunwoo, while Caroline went to her bedroom and gingerly shut the door. Marvin frowned, but Amir didn't seem to mind.
"Sunwoo, how are you feeling?" the chief asked.
"It's fading," he said again. "I'm trying to remember, but… how do you fight against your code?" He chuckled.
"You'll be alright," Amir said. "Do you know Grace Alvarez?"
"Hallowshard's CEO?"
"That's right. She offered to help get your memories back."
"Can we trust her?"
"She gave us dirt on Ainsel."
"And?"
Amir smiled thinly. "I know it's not much, but I can't have you going amnesic on us." He stuck out his hand.
Sunwoo clasped it gently and stood up on his own.
"Marvin, do you think you could come with us?" Amir asked.
Marvin automatically glanced at the closed door to Caroline's bedroom, then back at Amir and Sunwoo.
"Yeah, just… one second."
He headed to Caroline's bedroom and knocked once. He was aware of the others watching, but among the ones in that room, he was Caroline's closest acquaintance.
Caroline opened the door remotely, and Marvin went inside. She was lying on the bed, hands folded across her stomach, eyes gazing at the fluorescent ceiling.
"Are you okay?" Marvin asked.
"I blacked out again," Caroline said without looking at him.
Marvin fell silent. He remembered how frightening the first time had been.
"It was just a photo," Caroline said. "Next time it might be a phrase or a single word."
Marvin didn't know what else to do but nod. He couldn't imagine what it was like in her shoes.
"Do you think I should get my memories back?" she asked quietly.
Marvin stiffened. Should I tell her that her memories aren't in the Bank? He wanted to reply no, but he knew that somewhere in the back of his mind, he'd feel better if he said yes. At least then… No, he had to consider how Caroline would feel.
"You could go into a longer coma," he said.
"Would you like to read them, then?"
Yes. If I knew where they were, I would read them because they might solve every mystery we're facing. There aren't any real consequences for doing so.
"No," Marvin said. No prompting, no reconsiderations preceded the word. It simply slipped from his voice box. Maybe it was from the part of him that was still human.
-----
Marvin, Amir, and Sunwoo met Grace Alvarez at Hallowshard's lab in Sector 25. It was a big metal box snug against the edge of a deadzone. Marvin had no doubt that half the tech in that lab had been illegally obtained.
The interior was a mess. Drones, flying or on wheels, swarmed the one-hundred square foot room, blotting out every discernable detail except for the six or seven neon-suited employees racing around, carrying stacks of equipment. A particular drone recognized their faces and led them to a door in the right wall, which slid open to reveal a small room. At first Marvin thought it was Grace's office, with all the wires and equipment and folders strewn about, but the reclined chair, the various monitors, and the glove boxes told Marvin that this was an examination room.
Grace entered from a door ninety degrees to their right, wearing a blue lab coat and safety goggles. She muttered a stressed "hello," then ordered Sunwoo to sit in the chair. He did, and the thing nearly snapped under his weight. Grace plugged him into several different computers, then taped a few electrodes to his head.
"Before we start, what do you remember?" she asked.
Sunwoo gave the same recap he'd given many times already. How Saeyung had trapped him in the Bessmer chair without telling him why. How she'd said something about the suicide victims being former test subjects. Grace nodded along as she typed furiously on a pair of keyboards, preparing the procedure.
"What else do you remember?" she asked. "It can be anything."
Sunwoo brought up random facts. He talked about his parents who were the previous heads of Ainsel, his first year as a mech pilot, his college mech team. He didn't bring up Saeyung.
After ten minutes, the test was ready to begin. Grace explained what would be happening: "I'm going to see which parts of your code are being expressed when you were talking just now. Then I'm gonna copy it all and look for the things you can't remember."
Sunwoo nodded slowly. "It won't hurt me, will it?"
"No. It's a similar process as the Memory Bank."
"Alright."
"I'll also create another backup of you in case something goes wrong."
"What?" Sunwoo sounded suddenly afraid.
"A backup." Grace widened her eyes. "Sorry. I'm not trying to say…"
"Nevermind. Let's get this over with."
"Sorry," Grace repeated. She put Sunwoo on standby, then activated the program. She stared at the sleeping mech for a moment, then turned to Marvin and Amir.
"It's gonna be one hour. Wanna wait here?"
Marvin and Amir nodded, and they followed Grace to an adjacent room—this time it was her office, and it was shockingly neat. It was large, too, containing two couches in front of a holographic fireplace and two coffee tables.
Grace sat on the farther couch and sank into it, almost seeming to disappear. Amir and Marvin sat on the other. No one spoke for a bit. It was unnerving to think about the circumstances that had led to them gathering here. How had things gone wrong so fast? Marvin felt an urge to apologize, but he wasn't sure for what. They'd been asking for a reckoning with Ainsel AI from the start.
I should at least thank Grace later. The woman was risking her life for people she barely knew.
At length, Grace sighed. "You think that's what it takes to make it to the top?" She gestured to the examination room's door. "Tossing out all your morals?"
"Saeyung isn't outside the law," Amir said. "Hosaka will take care of her."
"Can they afford to lose her?"
"They can't afford the public knowing they sponsor a psychopath."
Grace nodded. She looked back at the door and shook her head. "I used to dream of getting our hands on some of Ainsel's tech," she murmured. "The worst part is, this could help us in the long run."
"Only if you let it," Amir said.
Grace raised an eyebrow. "Are you saying I scrap everything from today?"
"If you want to do things right."
Grace pursed her lips and didn't reply.
-----
At the end of the two hours, Sunwoo was activated again. They asked him if he remembered anything else. He said he didn't. Grace checked the files she'd extracted. Parsed through them, double checked, triple checked, and still found nothing. Those memories were not there.
"It's some failsafe Saeyung built," Grace explained. "It's slowly deleting everything you remember."
Sunwoo didn't respond. Grace continued, "Hang in there, I'm going to check your backup." She grabbed a hard drive off the desk and left the room. Amir followed on her heels, though Marvin didn't see a point in joining them.
Backup. They used that word so easily, and why wouldn't they? It was a fact that Marvin and Sunwoo were lines of code. But the thought of making a copy of himself within an hour gave Marvin shivers.
He glanced at Sunwoo. The mech sat on the edge of the examination chair, back as straight as a board and hands folded across his lap. Nothing could be discerned behind those spheres of light in place of his eyes.
"Are you okay?" Marvin asked. It felt appropriate.
With a low whir, Sunwoo turned his head towards him. "How do you manage it?"
"What do you mean?"
"You've been an implant for months now, haven't you? How have you gotten by?"
Marvin didn't have a good answer. Yes, he'd had moments of existential dread, but there had always been a light at the end of his tunnel. Sunwoo was different. He had seen his own corpse when he'd woken up. He'd heard his sister tell him he was going to become a robot against his will.
"I guess… I trust that we'll find my body one day," Marvin said. Sunwoo's cameras shifted downward, and Marvin continued, "We'll recover your body, too. You'll be human again."
"I flatlined, Marvin. My brain is still in my body, and it's dead. As far as I know, resurrections are impossible."
Marvin's motors stiffened. He'd always assumed his body was being held in cryosleep somewhere, but what if transference truly was a one way trip?
Sunwoo quickly continued, "Sorry. I'm not saying you can't become human. I heard Megacity 13's bioengineering is near magic. They could probably make you a new body."
But my brain will still be in a chip.
Marvin tried to shake the thought out of his head. Maybe Sunwoo's body was frozen as well. Maybe he hadn't been completely dead when they'd escaped the lab.
"Saeyung made this analogy one time," Sunwoo continued, voice growing quieter. "She said that if we went on standby and threw ourselves off a building, our human instinct would activate our thrusters and slow our fall. Do you believe that?"
Marvin remembered standing beneath the canopy on the roof of the mall, hearing that for the first time. He hadn't thought much of it at the time, and he didn't want to think about it now.
"That's not a good measure of how human we are," he said.
"Fine. But let's say we jumped anyway. Would our thrusters activate?"
Marvin wanted to close his eyes and cut the thought from his mind, but inevitably, he considered it. He was on standby, so realistically, his thrusters would not save him. And yet, if his code could show empathy for Caroline against his own benefit, why wouldn't it save him from death? Both were human instincts, no?
But he didn't want to give Sunwoo any crazy ideas, so he replied, "I don't know. I really don't."