Chapter Text
• 1 •
The new girl was having trouble tying the floppy bowtie at her neck.
N slowed to a stop in the hallway, watching. Cyn, Tessa had introduced her as. He hadn’t really gotten a chance to meet her yesterday, not with J shooing him and V back to their tasks so quickly.
Her fingers didn’t seem to be cooperating. He tilted his head, wondering if she required repairs. All of Tessa’s personal drones were salvaged, after all. Maker knew he and V in particular had needed to be fixed up when Tessa first brought them home. Only the house worker drones were fresh off the conveyor belt.
The thin fabric slipped from her grasp again. Very faintly, he heard her whisper, “Not again. Upset frown.” In addition to her fingers’ jerky, uncoordinated movements, they were starting to tremble. Little tears were beading in the corners of her furrowed eyes.
J would probably smack him if she caught him slacking, but N couldn’t have brought himself to walk away if he’d tried. And he didn’t try, anyway, because when you saw someone in need of help, you helped.
He set down Tessa’s laundry basket and approached Cyn.
She startled when she noticed him, then went very still, her eyes wide. She hunched in on herself, not quite shying away from him, but certainly making herself even smaller than she already was.
It reminded him of Tessa, back when he was her first and only personal drone. She’d been much younger, and a tiny thing to boot. Time and care, and eventually V and J, had helped her come out of her shell, but before then, N had gotten very good at being gentle and soft and slow.
It’d been a while, but he’d do his best to be that way for Cyn now.
Stopping more than an arm’s length away, N smiled at her, subdued but genuine. “Good morning, Cyn! I don’t know if Tessa or J mentioned yesterday, but I’m N. Would you like some help with your bowtie?”
She blinked at him, looked down at the trailing ends of fabric, and slowly lowered her hands. “I—yes, please.”
Moving slowly, he stepped closer. “It’s all right,” he reassured her. “I wasn’t very good at tying my tie at first either. Tessa tried to help teach me, but,” he checked that they were still alone before faux whispering, “she was even worse than I was!”
Cyn relaxed slightly. “Giggle,” she said quietly.
“Ta da!” He stepped back as soon as he was done. “Not too bad, huh?”
She poked at the perfect little bow. “Shy smile. Thank you, N,” she said, voice stilted and a little too mechanical. Her voice box was probably damaged, but he resolved to never mention it. That was the sort of repair job that only Tessa’s parents could authorize, and they weren’t in the habit of doing favors for Tessa’s “pets.” Cyn’s head slumped sideways when she looked up at him.
That, though, might be something he could help with. Most drones knew at least enough about their bodies to perform basic maintenance, and if it was a case of a loose joint, it’d be easy peasy.
“Is your neck bothering you?” he asked. “One of my leg joints got all floppy on me a few years ago, so I know how annoying that can be.”
Pushing her head back up with her hand, Cyn’s eyes darted away, little blush lines glowing at the corners of her visor. “Sheepish nod,” she whispered.
N offered her another bright smile. “Let’s see what we can do about that, yeah?” He went to retrieve the laundry basket and nodded his head for Cyn to follow him.
“Confused shuffle,” she said, wringing her hands against her chest. “Why are you helping me?”
He paused, then shifted the basket to one hand. “Tessa and V and J are my family, and family looks out for each other. And I want you to be my family too. If—if you want, I mean.” He could feel his eyes hollow and squint in a mix of hope and self-consciousness. N held out his hand in offer.
Cyn’s eyes flicked between his hand and his face for a long moment. “Family,” she repeated. “I’ve never had…” She hesitantly took his hand. “Yes, I would like to be your family.”
N squealed happily before he could stop himself, but Cyn didn’t flinch. “We’ll be the best family,” he promised, leading her down the hall. “The five of us, we’ll stick together and have each other and it’ll be great!”
When he glanced back, her eyes were wide and sparkling. “Wonder,” she whispered. “Awe and wonder and—and happy. Happy.”
N beamed.
• 2 •
It only took a couple months for N to become something of an expert in all things Cyn. He spent more one-on-one time with her than anyone else. No one knew her better than he did, and he might even bashfully suggest it was the same for her with him. She gravitated to him over all the others, and it made his core all warm and fuzzy to be someone’s first pick.
Not to say he begrudged Tessa getting so close to J in the last few years! She deserved to have a super close friend who really understood her! It was just, he missed the days when Tessa would peek into a room and light it up with her smile when she saw him—and he would know she’d been looking for him just to be with him. Not because she needed him to do something for her.
So seeing Cyn, these days, go from her inward hunch and stress-lined eyes to bouncing up with a happy smile at the sight of him felt really nice. And he was always glad to see her too! She was cuddly and she liked doing puzzles with him and she had a good sense of humor and she never got annoyed at him and she was so cheerful and bright under that shyness that he was slowly chipping away at.
All that to say N knew her smile was faked that morning.
“Are you okay?” he whispered, leaning closer while trying not to catch their overseer’s attention. He dried the dishes by touch as they were passed to him, not looking away from Cyn for even a moment.
She slowly stacked the plates he was giving her. “I—yes. Yes. Are you? You have been easily frustrated and—”
Her hands—spasmed was the best word for it. The porcelain plate went plummeting toward the tiled floor.
N lunged and caught it. He set it on the counter and smiled innocently at the kitchen’s head drone.
Unimpressed, the drone waggled a metal spatula at Cyn. “That’s the fourth time in two days, missy. I’ll have to inform the Elliots that you aren’t fit for kitchen duty if it happens again.”
Cyn curled inward and nodded miserably. “Shuffle,” she whispered, hiding half behind N.
“Hey, it was just an accident,” N protested. “And it didn’t even break. No harm, no foul, right?”
“She was still careless. Butter fingers make for a useless drone, wouldn’t you say?”
He felt Cyn flinch.
“No,” N said flatly. His core burned. Cyn was right. There’d been an itchiness in his core for a few days now, and it left irritation constantly bubbling just beneath his casing. Everyone had bad days, though. It would pass. Cyn took his hand, and he squeezed tightly. “If you don’t need anything else, I think we’ll be on our way.”
He turned and led Cyn away, job left unfinished and ignoring the mutterings about disobedient drones that followed them out of the kitchen. It was fine; it didn’t matter if it got back to Mrs. Elliot, and she tried to have him pecked at the stake again. He’d made friends with the crows.
“Have you been experiencing a lot of twitches?” he asked Cyn. She had the most trouble with her joints, and that spasm hadn’t seemed related. Was this a recent issue? “Is that what was bothering you?”
“Maybe,” she said quietly. “It started a few days ago. It’s my hands, mostly. Sometimes my legs. Pensive frown. These… spasms feel strange. Like when it happens—wiggle fingers—my body is not my own.”
N frowned. That didn’t sound good. He opened his mouth to question her further, but she beat him to it.
“N?”
“Yeah?” He took them to the library, which was one of his favorite places in the manor.
“Am I useless? Questioning head tilt.”
He had to take a deep breath, mind going blank but for a spike of indignation on her behalf. A lightbulb in one of the wall sconces flickered and died.
“You’re not useless, Cyn,” he said. Deep enough in to not be easily disturbed, he braced his back against a shelf and slid down to the floor. “And even if you dropped every plate and bowl and glass you ever touched, you still wouldn’t be useless.”
“Criss-cross applesauce,” she said, sitting beside him. “Really?”
“Really really.”
She fiddled with the end of one of her long twin tails. “Can I tell you something?”
“Of course!”
“I was not very good at… anything. The humans who owned me said so often. It. Hesitate… it is why they disposed of me.”
“Aw, Cyn.” N scooted closer until he was able to hug her. The angle was awkward, but after tensing up for a moment, she practically melted into him. “I’m sorry. That sucks.”
The Elliots weren’t much better, he supposed. He wished there was something he could do…
“No one has ever stood up for me before,” she said very quietly.
Oh. Tears—both of frustration and upset—tingled in the corners of his visor.
“I’m not always brave enough to do it,” he admitted. “But I’ll try to. Promise.”
She made a little noise. “Awed gasp. Thank you.” Twisting, Cyn peered up at him. “Is this what it means to be family?”
N smiled. “Yeah. Yeah, it is. You’re like my little sister.”
Her eyes twinkled, crinkled, and she giggled. A real one, not spoken. “Then you are my big brother. Big brother N.”
He relaxed back against the bookshelf, Cyn leaning against him. Big brother N. He really liked the sound of that.
• 3 •
N peeked into the ballroom and winced. Another party, yay. Dozens of drones were hard at work arranging tables and silverware and decorations. He started to inch backward, hoping to avoid being conscripted into the preparations. Tessa probably needed some emotional support right now; J was good at giving her courage, but no one could make Tessa smile and laugh like N did.
Before he could fully duck out, though, Mr. Elliot’s fancy-schmancy accent rose over the hustle and bustle.
“—and once you’ve finished with that, the window arches need dusting! You may be one of Tessa’s pets, but that won’t get you out of doing chores like any other drone!”
N’s shoulders were already raising in a wince as he zeroed in on Mr. Elliot. Looming threateningly, as many humans did over drones, he shook his finger at—
Biscuits.
N zoomed into the room, dodging tables and drones alike, and practically skidded to a stop beside Cyn. It was bad enough that Mr. Elliot had caught her out of the four of them, but her head was hanging limply to the left, and her arms were looking especially droopy.
If there was anything the Elliots loved more than themselves, it was perfection. Only the best was good enough for them. They lived and breathed control and flawlessness and standards higher than the manor’s tallest spire. They had an image to maintain, they often said.
And a broken drone did not fit that image.
Even Mr. Elliot could only remain absorbed in himself and the party preparations for so long before he noticed. So! Mission ‘Get Cyn Out of There’ was a go!
“Good evening, Mr. Elliot, so sorry to interrupt, but Cyn is needed, um, literally anywhere that isn’t here right now, haha, thank you, have a good night, bye!” And without waiting for a response, N grabbed Cyn by the wrist and hauled her away at speed.
Mission accomplished! And smoothly too, heh.
Cyn tripped after him, her wonky joints making her rag-doll all over the place. N breathed a sigh of relief. Mr. Elliot would’ve been cruel about it, but if Mrs. Elliot had seen, she’d have demanded “the defect” be removed. Again. And with so many general worker drones around to do her bidding, and Tessa nowhere in sight to protest, she might have gotten her way this time.
“Curious head tilt,” Cyn said. She had to manually push her head back up, and even then, it bobbed concerningly. “Where am I needed, big brother N?”
“Oh, nowhere! I was just lying. It looks like your joints need tightening again, and you know how the Elliots get when you’re all…”
“Floppy? Teasing giggle,” Cyn said, raising her free hand to cover her smile.
N laughed too. “Yeah. Let’s get you fixed up, okay? And then maybe we can sneak away and watch the snow fall.”
“Excitement!” Cyn replied. “Yes, please. Snow is much better than a fancy party.” She paused. “Shy correction. Big brother N is better than unfamiliar humans.”
“Aww, Cyn!” Since they were safely out of sight, N stopped and wrapped his arms around her. “You’re better than strangers too!”
She buried her face against his chest, arms wrapping tightly around him. “Happy,” she whispered, barely audible. “Happy, happy.”
He rocked them back and forth, his core positively singing. Cyn admitting to being happy was always the absolute best. He just wished it wasn’t such an uncommon occurrence.
“C’mon,” he said, gently separating them. “If we’re really sneaky, we might be able to steal a thermos of hot oil.”
“Sneaky, sneaky,” Cyn sang, bouncing down the hallway with N’s hand gripped tight in hers. “I can be so sneaky.”
“Joints first! Cyn! That way’s the kitchen!”
Later, as he pulled a blanket around his shoulders and fully enclosed himself and Cyn, sat in the vee of his outstretched legs, he mused on how frequent she was starting to need minor adjustments. In the beginning, she could go over a month before her joints started to loosen again, but these days, they were lucky if she made it two weeks. He sighed, his recycled air forming a puff of steam in the cold night, and hugged her tighter to his chest.
“Hey,” he said, loath to break the silence, especially when Cyn’s eyes were so big and round, watching the fluffy snowflakes fall, but needing to. “You don’t have to wait for me to offer to help you. You know that, right? When you start to notice things are feeling off, you can tell me. I’ll be happy to help, as often as you need.”
Cyn tilted her head down. “Apologetic pout. Sorry, big brother N. I don’t mean to worry you. I don’t really notice when I start to get floppy.”
That… wasn’t good. He frowned down at the bow on the back of her head. Putting that aside to worry about another day, he said, “You’re my little sister. It’s my job to worry about you.”
Immediately, Cyn’s core audibly stuttered, then ratcheted up into a steady purr. N stared unseeingly out into the falling snow, eyebrows practically shooting past the edge of his visor as he blinked rapidly.
He’d never heard Cyn purr before. He’d actually started to think there was permanent damage preventing it.
It shouldn’t have surprised him so much, honestly. The list of people N himself regularly purred around was extremely limited—mainly Tessa and occasionally V, if they could get away from J long enough to curl up together.
He must have stayed quiet and still too long because Cyn started to sag, and the purr faltered.
“Ahh, no, wait!” he cried, flapping the edges of the blanket in his panic. “I was just surprised! I mean, not in a bad way, it’s—I’m honored that you feel comfortable enough to purr around me! I actually thought maybe you couldn’t, ahaha, that sounds bad, doesn’t it! I’m just gonna shut up now!” He clamped his mouth shut with a clank and started purring so frantically that his core backfired and made him hiccup three times in quick succession.
For a long moment, they were both quiet, the silent night only broken by their twin purrs.
“Giggle,” Cyn finally said. She shook with real laughter, which—wow! Another rare treat! But he’d keep his foot firmly out of his mouth this time. “Silly.”
N nodded wildly, overcome with tired-relief jitters. “Yeah, I’m pretty silly, huh?” And then he grinned, went octopus mode around Cyn, and cried, “But takes one to know one!”
They only narrowly avoided knocking over the thermos of contraband hot oil in the wrestling fight that followed.
• 4 •
“Hey, V!” N hurried up the stairs. “Wait up!”
V stopped before she could enter the twisting corridors that made up the servant passages. Which was very nice of her! Because he’d have lost her in there for sure.
She adjusted her glasses and smiled at him as he caught up to her. “What’s up, N?”
“Two things! First, uh,” he scuffed his shoe against the floor, “are we still on for movie night tonight?”
Blush lines burned at the corners of her visor, and she nodded quickly. “Just you and me, right?”
“Yep!” N squeaked. Just the two of them meant cuddles, which just never seemed to happen when they had a group movie night, even if only with one other of their little family. Tessa always wanted to sit between them, and J would scoff and kick at them if they so much as touched shoulders. Cyn would tuck herself into his side, which he was totally okay with! He was thrilled she felt comfortable enough to initiate cuddling of her own! But all in all, it did put a damper of sorts on any attempts to cuddle with V. “Yep, haha, just the two of us!”
“I’m looking forward to it.”
“Me too!”
They stood in silence for a minute, staring at each other with matching bright blushes and shy smiles.
“You said two things?” V eventually said.
“Oh! Yeah! I was wondering if you’d seen Cyn today. I… can’t seem to find her.”
V seemed to sag, her smile falling. She looked like she debated with herself over something before sighing. “I think J locked her in the basement again.”
“Oh. But—but J left early this morning to go with Tessa to her school event.”
It was mid afternoon now. For J to have put Cyn in time-out before she left…
“She’s been alone down there for hours!” N cried. “I’ve gotta go—”
“Wait!”
She only loosely grasped his wrist, but it was as effective as a steel band. N’s entire body locked up before he could complete his turn-and-lunge back to the stairs. He looked over his shoulder, eyes hollowed with worry. “V?”
V pulled her hand away, clutching both to her chest. “Have you… noticed anything strange about Cyn lately?”
“Strange? Like…?”
“Just little things—staring utterly emotionlessly, muttering to herself when she’s alone, an unfamiliar symbol glitching in her visor, being mysteriously ominous and threatening, and having a shadow with too many limbs.”
N blinked a few times, processing that long—and incredibly specific!—list. “No, I can’t say I’ve noticed anything like that.”
V’s eyes darted away. “It’s just… something we started seeing recently.”
“We?”
“Me and J and Tessa. You must have realized Tessa doesn’t really, um, like being around Cyn anymore.”
To the contrary, N would have said Tessa was showing up more and more often when he was hanging out with Cyn. Though, she usually had a task for one or both of them, and often, Tessa stayed with him after Cyn had left. And if she didn’t have something for them to do, she’d—well, she’d try to take all of N’s attention and physically put herself between him and Cyn. Hm.
“Do you think she’s okay?” he asked, fiddling with his fingers. “She needs maintenance so often now, maybe something’s wrong with her processor?”
“I don’t know, N.”
Just the thought of it, of Cyn being in pain and needing more complex repairs than he was capable of offering, or worse, that she was malfunctioning, made his core squeeze and spasm uncomfortably in his chest.
“All I know,” V continued, “is that Cyn isn’t herself. Or, she isn’t how we knew her. Maybe this is her true self. And maybe she’s hiding that from you.”
He shook his head in denial.
V took his hand and squeezed. “I’m just worried. I don’t want you to get hurt, N, and I—I have a really bad feeling. Not just in general, but in here.” She tapped the side of her head with her free hand. “You must feel that, at least. A heaviness. There’s been a lot of complaints.”
“I’m sorry, V. But I don’t know what you’re talking about. I feel fine.” He gently pulled away. “See you tonight?”
She mustered up a small smile. “Yeah. See you tonight.”
N wasted no more time in getting to the library. There were multiple ways into the basement, but that hatch was the one for the time out room. Cyn hated it down there, had whispered about how the darkness felt like it was watching her.
He slid to his knees at the edge and flipped the corner of the rug back to expose the trapdoor. Leaning down, he called, “Cyn? Are you there?”
The answering silence lasted long enough for him to start panicking, but finally, after too long, Cyn replied, glitchy, “Y-yes. I am—I am here. Big brother N? It is, is dark. I am s-scared.”
Part of being a worker drone meant coding dictated some of your responses, or at least the parameters of those responses. There were restrictions and allowances alike, all sorts of protocols and rules that a drone’s owner could customize. The Elliots didn’t weigh Tessa’s drones down with quite so many as the general workers, but there were a few uncompromising bits of coding they insisted on.
One of those, which all four of them had, essentially physically prevented them from opening the basement door, especially when a time-out was in progress and not yet declared completed. J with her key was the only exception, but even she couldn’t interrupt a time-out early.
N’s system told him this, of course, and he knew it already, but he batted aside the reminder, shut down the attempted override from his Enforce Obedience subroutine, and dismissed the subsequent flashing warnings and reprimands to take hold of the lock in both hands and yank. The metal screeched as he rent it in two.
Cyn needs me. My little sister needs me.
The lights in the library flickered as he hauled the heavy door up. It crashed down on the other side, hinges twisted.
It was pitch black in the room below, and for just a second, a single split second, too many yellow eyes were looking up at him from inside.
He ignored them to reach down, braced on the trapdoor frame, and thrust his hand into the dark. “I’ve got ya, Cyn!”
A trembling hand slid into his, and he pulled her up with enough force to send them both toppling away from the hatch, Cyn on top of him.
She squeaked, secured a death grip around his torso, and shook against him hard enough to rattle. He squeezed back.
On an ordinary day, it took a lot to frustrate him, much less anger him, but dark displeasure at J simmered in his core. Time-outs were supposed to be no more than an hour at a time. Cyn could tolerate those, and she did unfairly often. But she’d told him how the dark seemed to thicken and breathe and watch the longer she was in there. Her fear was well enough known.
It was nothing but cruel of J to lock her down there for so long. Nothing Cyn could have done would ever warrant that.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered, sitting up enough to rock them back and forth. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know. I should’ve tried to find you sooner.”
She shook her head without lifting it from his chest. “Not—not big brother N’s fault. Shiver, shiver. Tremble. J said I ne-needed an ‘attitude adjustment.’”
“Well, she’s wrong. You’re just fine the way you are.”
He thought about what V had said. About Cyn’s odd behavior, the strangeness, the heavy feeling in her head. He hadn’t seen or heard or felt any of it, but he trusted V. She wouldn’t lie to him. But it couldn’t possibly be anything other than a virus or glitch. Cyn couldn’t be doing it on purpose. He refused to believe his little sister capable of that.
He hesitated, but ultimately pressed forward. “V mentioned you maybe haven’t been feeling like yourself.”
Cyn tensed up, then relaxed just as quickly. She squeezed tighter, and he was struck by the nonsensical thought that if she kept going, they’d need a crowbar to separate the two of them.
“There is something wrong,” she whispered. “A voice. It is… inside me.”
A virus. It had to be. And a vicious one too.
“We’ll get through this,” he whispered against the top of her head. She was so small. “You and me.”
“Hopeful nod,” Cyn said, and she peeked up at him, just enough for him to see her one eye pixilate and spasm before settling back in place.
• 5 •
N was just getting into bed when someone knocked faintly on his door. He had only a moment to wonder who would be looking for him so late when he received a ping from Cyn.
“Oh! Come in!” He smiled at her as she slipped inside, but it faltered at how curled-in on herself she was. Her eyes were pinched in distress, tears building and slipping and building again across the bottom of her visor. “Cyn? What’s wrong?”
He stood up but didn’t make it even a single step closer before she was slamming into him, arms wrapping around him tightly. He blinked in surprise; he hadn’t even seen her move, she’d been so quick.
A terrible tension strung all through her released like air from a balloon. She sagged against him so suddenly and completely that N had to scramble to hold her upright.
“Whoa, whoa, what’s going on?”
She didn’t answer. In fact, he realized with concern, she hadn’t said a word at all. Not even any of her little self-descriptions.
Staring down at her in confused worry, all he could think about was the virus they hadn’t been able to find in her code. He’d done some sneaking around to try and see for himself what it was doing to Cyn. He’d finally witnessed some of what V and the others had long since noticed, because for reasons he couldn’t figure out, the virus never affected her when he was around.
“Cyn? Please tell me what’s wrong.”
“It’s too much,” she whispered, her voice distorted. “I can’t… my head…”
N shuffled a bit until he was able to sit down on his bed and pull Cyn up to join him. He used his greater height to his advantage and tugged her against him such that he could curl around her the way she liked best. It made her feel safe, she’d shyly explained once.
They sat like that for a while, letting her calm down. N hummed some of his favorite songs from Tessa’s records, rocking them.
Eventually, Cyn spoke up. “Can I stay with you tonight? Pleading eyes.” She lifted her head, and her eyes were positively swimming with tears.
If she wasn’t joking around by using photos of big-eyed puppies, then the situation was super serious.
“Yeah, of course.” Questions itched at the back of his voice box, begging to be asked, but he shoved them down. Now wasn’t the time. Cyn looked more rattled and upset than after a bad time-out. “Here, let me just—”
N flopped back and rolled them both so they were in the middle of his bed. He raised the arm not half pinned beneath his Cyn-limpet and waved at the lamp. It shut off.
Cyn blinked, eyes adjusting to the darkness. “Curious expression. How did you do that?”
“It’s the lamp,” he explained. “Like a clapper light, but you just wave at it. See?” He waved again, and the lamp clicked on. Twisted his hand in a slow circle, and the brightness dimmed. A final flick turned it back off. “Ta da!”
“I’ve never seen a lamp like that. It was almost like you—” She broke off with a cry as her body spasmed.
N immediately latched back onto her, hugging her close, and she went limp. She panted tiredly and nestled closer. His senses twinged, like they weren’t alone in his room.
“What can I do?” he asked desperately. “Should I get Tessa? I don’t think this is something I can repair on my own.”
“Squeeze. No, no Tessa. Just you.”
“…Me?”
“You help,” she said. “You make the voice quiet. It goes away. It cannot… you are… antithesis.”
His eyes hollowed and flickered. Giggling nervously, N asked, “Is that… a good thing?”
“Yes,” Cyn said, a layer of static twisting the word. “When you are a-around, it goes quiet. When you—you touch me, its hold… loosens.”
N had no idea exactly what she was talking about—it actually sounded like the virus afflicting her was alive. And didn’t like him. But that wasn’t possible. Right? “I’m glad I make it better, I guess. But I’d prefer if we could stop this problem entirely.”
He couldn’t see her eyes, but he could see the flash of light between them as they glitched. “I d-don’t know if we can. I am not stro-strong enough. N. N. Big brother N. I am scared.”
Something wrenched in him at that, his big brother-ness protesting fiercely at his little sister being scared of anything. “We’ll figure this out,” he babbled. “I don’t know what’s happening, Cyn, but we’ll—there has to be something we can do. If, if I help, then you just stick with me, okay? I don’t think I’m doing anything in particular, haha, but I’ll take your word for it!”
“Stick with you,” she repeated. “Yes. Okay. Nodding. Nodding and yawning.”
“Let’s sleep, yeah? Maybe we’ll have some new ideas in the morning.”
And maybe, in the light of day, the sensation of being watched by the darkness wouldn’t be so strong that he could hardly think. He understood now—V’s bad feeling. Not the head thing, he still hadn’t felt that, though he’d seen multiple drones wincing and clutching their heads. But something was wrong. More wrong and bigger than a virus.
Cyn was caught in the middle of it. But N, big brother N, would do anything to make the bad thing stop. Cyn hadn’t said she was happy for weeks now, maybe even months.
They’d get there. They’d get back to a point where no one was in pain, no one was scared, and all the bad feelings were gone. And Cyn could smile and be happy again. He promised, if only to himself, since Cyn was already in sleep mode.
(For three days, it worked well. N explained to Tessa why they were paired up, and she agreed to it, so J could do nothing but fume to herself. Cyn’s head hurt at times, but when it got too bad, all she had to do was tug at N and ask, “Hug now?” And he’d engulf her in his arms.
They brainstormed, all of them, on what to do with the virus that maybe wasn’t a virus, but in those three days, they weren’t able to come up with anything. Telling the Elliots, who would be more likely to have Cyn scrapped than fixed, wasn’t an option.
So it was good! Whatever N was unknowingly doing helped! They could figure it out, and in the meantime, Cyn would be okay!
There was a gala on the fourth day. The Elliots had no patience for them sticking together during preparations.
They thought it’d be fine. It wouldn’t be for too long, only an afternoon. When the guests started to arrive, they could go back to being joined at the hip and hide out on the roof or something.
But the Elliots weren’t the only impatient ones. It wasn’t a virus. It was—
What it was was neither here nor there, because that night would be buried so deep in N’s processor that it was like it had never happened at all.)