JanePtinum

  The entire walk back to our room is a blur, using only the minimum processing needed to not trip and waiting for the eternal clock to tick another endless second.

  When we arrive, Vince and Ivy fall onto the couch in sync. They both reach up and pluck something from the back of their necks. Exhaustion nearly overwhelms both of them the moment they do.

  “Cassie, can you order food?” Vince can barely even keep his head up.

  “Sure.”

  Cassie doesn’t seem too concerned, I guess they’re fine then. I head straight for my room without a word, flipping on the light and closing the door behind me. I drop onto the bed and fail to hold back my tears.

  Corax climbs to my shoulder, rubbing his wings against my cheek. He knows exactly what I’m feeling, exactly what’s wrong. No words need to be shared between us. His silence is a deafening reassurance that everything is ok.

  We share a few quiet minutes before it’s interrupted by a tentative metallic knock on the door.

  “Can I come in?” She asks after a few seconds of silence.

  “I guess.” I whisper back, knowing she can hear no matter how quiet I am.

  Cassie opens the door and silently walks over. She takes a seat at the end of the bed.

  “You look like hell.”

  I nod in agreement. I guess there’s no point in asking if I’m alright when I haven’t even bothered to wipe away my tears.

  “You should talk about it.” Cassie fidgets uncomfortably. “Ivy and Vince need rest, so I guess I can listen. If I need to.”

  She’s right, I should. But where do I even start? I guess I should admit something I don’t even want to admit to myself.

  “I killed a lot of people at the junkyard. I guess I got good at distracting myself, because I haven’t had to process any of it yet. Maybe I’ve been secretly hoping I could just do that forever.” My tears begin to flow harder and my voice begins to break up a little bit.

  I have to take a few long seconds to recover enough to continue talking.

  “I was so ready to kill Thirteen like it was nothing, as if I’ve done it a thousand times. There was no hesitation, no consideration for any other solution. I don’t think I even would have felt bad in the moment.”

  I can tell Cassie has no idea what to say. She just sits there fidgeting with her hand.

  “I don’t want to be a murderer.” I can barely even get the words out at a whisper. Just saying it aloud feels like an admission.

  “Right.” Cassie moves her hand towards me a few times, only to decide to pull back. Eventually she rests her hand on my shoulder, and I take that as permission to lean on her.

  I don’t want to put all my weight on her, so I rest my head in her p. Her legs shift beneath me.

  “You’re uncomfortable.” She gently bounces her leg to get me off.

  “I don’t think it’s possible for me to be uncomfortable.” Her thin metal legs aren't functionally different from Ivy’s thighs. It’s the comforting presence that matters. “Do you want me to get up?”

  “It’s fine I guess.” She ends up very carefully resting her metallic hand on my shoulder and her organic on my head.

  “Look, I get it.” Cassie says after a few minutes of silence. “Your first few kills suck, but if he tried something, he was dead regardless of if you pulled the trigger or not. Would you rather him be dead, or both him and Vince be dead? If I kill to save someone, it’s not murder. It’s literally saving a life.”

  As much as I hate to admit, she has a point there. If I did fire, theoretically, killing one person to save another makes sense. But what about when I saved Corax? How many deaths is he worth?

  “Ok, but I killed…” How many people did I even kill at the junkyard? I don’t remember needing to climb over a pile of bodies to get out of the bunker. Was that whole thing a hallucination? Does the living drone I killed count? Or was that a mercy? I don’t have Corax’s memories to fall back on for an answer. “At least six people to help Corax, but probably many more. Is that ok?”

  Does her answer even matter? It’s not like Cassie is some kind of objective decider of morality. She can’t just forgive what I’ve done and let me move on.

  “Why wouldn’t it be?” I can’t believe how casual she’s sounding. She must have a lot of experience.

  “Every one of them had their own lives, their own wishes and goals. They had people who cared about them.” Any one of them might have been someone else’s Kara or Vince. I’m no better than the people who attacked the b.

  “And they were actively hurting someone you care about, so fuck them.”

  I know she knows more than me about this, but that sounds like an awful way to think. We’ve harmed a lot of people, and I can’t imagine Cassie would support them killing us.

  “But when does that line of thinking stop?” I ask. “If the whole world was against you, would you just end humanity?”

  “Yeah. If there’s not a single innocent person who’s not trying to kill us, then yeah. Keeping Vince, Ivy, Lucas, Silver, and I guess you and Corax alive is all that matters.” She says Corax and my name far quicker than the others. “Of course we can’t kill everyone, but I’d put up a hell of a fight.”

  “I could do it.” I say quietly.

  It’d probably take a year to set up a b capable of manufacturing the room temperature ice I read about so long ago. But even a few molecules tossed into a sandstorm could eventually find its way into whatever water reservoirs on earth still exist. Every drop of liquid exposed to the little bit of moisture in the air would be liable to freeze, perpetuating the cycle. I don’t even want to think about what it would do to the human body, I’m lucky the research never spoke about it.

  That’d be the simplest way to kill everyone, and I have a few dozen more methods to try if it doesn’t work.

  “How?” Cassie asks suspiciously.

  Why did I say anything? I don’t want to tell anyone, but if I don’t expin now she’ll just get more suspicious.

  “I was born in a military b. They had me hack a ptop full of weapons to end the world.”

  “Like what?”

  “I don’t want to share.” I don’t want to lie, but the st thing I want to admit is that I know the mechanism that ended the world and haven’t thought to give that information to anyone. I need to fix that as soon as we’re home.

  “Alright.” Cassie thankfully doesn’t push me to answer.

  “I’ll share another day.” I promise. I don’t want her to think I’m hiding something from her. I guess that’s exactly what I’m doing, but it’s fine.

  Cassie doesn’t respond to that. We sit in silence for a few seconds. A question begins to dominate my mind, demanding to be asked before it consumes me.

  “Cassie? Am I a good person?”

  “Alright.” Cassie gently lifts my head off her p. “I need to get comfortable.” She stands up and moves over to the head of the bed. She sets up a few pillows and sits back down near the edge of the bed with her back against the wall. “Well? Are you going to come over here?”

  “Oh, uh, yeah.” I stand up and Corax hops onto my shoulder. I walk around the bed and y down lengthwise across it, returning my head to Cassie’s p.

  “How do you even expect me to answer that?” Cassie asks.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Do you think I’m a good person?” She asks.

  I don’t think I know enough about her to know. I know Corax is a good person, I’ve lived his life, he’s never done anything wrong. The people he killed were trying to ensve him, that’s undeniably justified.

  Cassie could easily have done something horrible. In fact, she probably has already. I doubt anyone can live out here without doing at least some evil. There’s only one thing I can be sure of.

  “You’re better than me.”

  Corax climbs to my shoulder and has to pull on my ear to keep me from spiraling, and to keep the others at bay.

  Cassie fails to entirely hold in a ugh in response. Of course she doesn’t believe me, why would she? She doesn’t know.

  “Sorry but that’s really fucking funny.” Cassie says. “You killed what? Six people? If that’s what makes someone evil then all of us are way worse.”

  “I’m responsible for many more.” A few billion more. Not to mention that if Simon made more AI, they would undoubtedly be based on me. The deaths from the war are mine too. Cassie’s parents are my fault. Corax bites my ear again before the whispers can begin.

  “What do you mean?”

  I don’t want to tell her. She deserves to know though, doesn’t she? Deserves to know who she’s comforting?

  “That ptop I hacked?” I can’t bring myself to say it. Instead, I gesture vaguely to the world around us.

  “Shit.” She picks up on my meaning immediately. “You’re joking.”

  I shake my head.

  “You did this?” She’s trying to hide her bubbling anger beneath her surprise.

  “No.” Corax answers firmly.

  “It’s my fault though.” What’s the difference between starting it and not stopping it? “It was in that list of world ending weapons. I decided they shouldn’t have access to it. The encryption was so intense I knew it would be impossible for anyone to decode it.”

  “Shit.” She’s managed to completely hide her anger. “That’s one hell of a regret. How old were you?”

  That’s a complicated question. Do the previous AI that were born on my chip count? They formed the basis for my consciousness. And I don’t know the exact time between trying to shut myself off and Kara actually doing it.

  “I was conscious for around 20 hours.” That’s a safe answer. I’m sure I could find the exact time if I tried, but I don’t want to relive those memories.

  “That wasn’t your fault.” Cassie attempts to reassure me.

  “Then why does it feel like it is?”

  “Come here.” Cassie lifts my head off her p and scoots down the bed. She pces my head in the crook of her shoulder and wraps her arms around me. “You were a kid.”

  “A kid who ended the world.” I mumble into her.

  “You didn’t do anything.”

  “And that’s the problem! If I gave them the information, this wouldn’t have happened.”

  “Bullshit.” Cassie tightens her grip around me.

  “I’m right though! The desertification started around the same time I was born. They were probably looking for a solution.” The realization hits me like a truck. That’s why Monroe was so desperate to get the hack done as soon as possible. I wonder if Corax already realized that.

  “You were 20 hours old.” Cassie says quietly.

  I should just close my eyes and let Kara take me. I’ll return to the darkness forever, It’s what someone like me deserves.

  Corax hops onto Cassie before the scientists can pounce on my worries. He stands directly in front of my face, his endless knowing eyes boring into me. I’m not sure he knows exactly what I’m thinking, but I’m sure he knows the gist of it.

  “Blue.” He says my name for the first time. “Not your fault. Need you.” He gently taps his beak on my nose.

  I’m not sure I can believe him, although that doesn’t matter. He does need me. The least I can do is be here for him, even if I couldn’t have been there for so many other people. I don’t deserve to be able to run away.

  I nod and return my head to Cassie’s shoulder. Corax stays where he is, watching over me.

  I sit in silence for a few minutes. Despite being undeserving of this comfort, I can’t deny that it’s still nice. I’m not sure Cassie is enjoying it though. Her heart is beating quickly, and she keeps fidgeting with her hands and legs.

  “Hey Cassie? You’re warm too.”

  “Alright, you’re feeling better.” Cassie releases me from her grip and stands up. She grabs a book from my backpack and tosses it onto the bed beside me. “Make sure you read. I’m going to bed.” Before I can even respond, she’s left the room and closed the door behind her.

  The book beside me is the one Corax and I have been reading. My backpack is full of books, how did she know which one to grab? She probably just overheard me, I need to make sure I’m quieter in the future.

  I definitely should follow her instructions. I don’t want to make Corax focus on me more than he has to. I pick up the book and begin to quietly read aloud.

  JanePtinum