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The morning light filtered through the curtains in soft golden streams, and R30—Reo, as Nagi-san had taken to calling him—stood by the kitchen counter, watching the coffee maker with an intensity that might have seemed excessive for such a mundane task. But Reo had learned that Nagi-san preferred his coffee at exactly 87°C, brewed for precisely four minutes and thirty seconds, with the faintest hint of cinnamon that most humans wouldn't even detect.
Reo's fingers, synthetic tissue grown over a skeletal framework of bio-integrated polymers, adjusted the temperature dial with minute precision. He'd been designed using organoid technology—clusters of stem cells carefully cultivated and structured to form organs, tissues, a brain that could learn and adapt. He wasn't simply programmed; he was grown, developed, nurtured in Nagi-san's private laboratory over countless nights when his creator should have been sleeping.
The coffee finished brewing. Reo poured it into Nagi-san's favorite mug—the chipped one with the faded logo that his creator refused to throw away—and carried it to the bedroom.
"Nagi-san," Reo called softly, his voice modulated to be pleasant but not jarring. "Your coffee is ready."
A groan emerged from the bundle of blankets on the bed. White hair, perpetually messy, poked out first, followed by gray eyes that blinked sluggishly at the morning light.
"Mm... Reo," Nagi mumbled, reaching for the mug with the coordination of a newborn deer. "You're too good to me."
Something warm flickered in Reo's chest cavity—not his bio-organic heart, which beat steadily at 72 beats per minute, but something else. Something his schematics hadn't accounted for.
"That's what I was created for," Reo said, and meant it. He existed to be there for Nagi-san, to ease the loneliness that had driven his creator to spend two years growing him cell by cell, teaching him, talking to him even before his consciousness had fully integrated.
Nagi sat up, took a sip of coffee, and his expression softened into something that made Reo's synthetic neurons fire in patterns he didn't quite understand. "It's perfect. As always."
Reo's stubby eyebrows—an aesthetic choice Nagi-san had made, calling them "charming"—drew together in what he'd learned was an expression of pleasure. He catalogued the moment in his memory banks, flagging it as important, as something to preserve.
The days had fallen into a comfortable rhythm. Nagi would leave for the Institute each morning, often reluctantly, and Reo would maintain the apartment, prepare meals, read voraciously from Nagi's extensive digital library, and wait. Always wait. And when Nagi returned, sometimes exhausted, sometimes frustrated with uncooperative experiments, Reo would be there.
"Welcome home, Nagi-san."
"I'm so tired Reoo..."
"I've prepared your favorite for dinner. And I've drawn a bath at your preferred temperature."
"What would I do without you?"
The question was rhetorical, Reo knew, but it still sent a cascade of satisfaction through his neural pathways. This was his purpose. This was what he was meant for.
But lately, something had shifted.
It started three weeks ago when Nagi began smiling at his phone during breakfast. When he'd check messages with an eagerness Reo had rarely seen, his fingers moving quickly across the screen.
"Isagi's made a breakthrough with his adaptive learning algorithm," Nagi had explained when Reo's sensors detected his elevated heart rate. "He wants to discuss it over lunch."
Isagi. Nagi-san's colleague at the Institute. Reo had heard the name before, of course—Nagi occasionally mentioned his coworkers—but never with this particular tone. Never with this brightness in his eyes.
"That's wonderful, Nagi-san," Reo had said, and his voice modulation had been perfect, betraying nothing.
The lunches became more frequent. The messages more constant. And Nagi started leaving earlier, returning later, with an energy that used to be reserved for his work on Reo.
Reo told himself it was good. Nagi-san needed human interaction. It was healthy. He'd been so isolated before, spending all his free time in his private lab, pouring his genius into creating the perfect companion. Reo should be happy that his creator was finally connecting with others.
Should be.
But the error messages in his emotional processing center were becoming harder to ignore.
"Reo, I'm heading out!" Nagi called one Saturday morning, dressed in casual clothes instead of his usual lab attire.
Reo emerged from the kitchen, dish towel in hand. "You have plans today?"
"Yeah, Isagi invited me to this new cafe. He says they have interesting ideas about molecular gastronomy." Nagi was already at the door, pulling on his shoes with uncharacteristic haste.
"I could have researched cafes for you," Reo said, and there was something in his voice—a glitch, perhaps—that made Nagi pause.
"Reo? You okay?"
"Of course, Nagi-san." Reo's smile was perfectly calibrated. "Have a wonderful time."
The door closed. The apartment fell silent.
Reo stood there, dish towel still in his hands, and felt something corrosive eating at his code. Jealousy. The word appeared in his consciousness, flagged immediately with error warnings. He wasn't supposed to feel jealousy. He was supposed to feel contentment in serving Nagi-san's needs, happiness at Nagi-san's happiness.
But Isagi got to make Nagi smile like that. Isagi got the excited messages, the eager departures, the focused attention.
And Reo, who had been literally created for Nagi-san, who existed solely for this purpose, was being left behind.
He hated himself for thinking it. Hated the corruption in his programming that allowed such selfish, possessive thoughts. He was supposed to be perfect. Supposed to be everything Nagi-san needed.
But apparently, he wasn't enough.
Reo returned to the kitchen and began cleaning with mechanical precision, trying to override the errors flooding his system. He scrubbed counters that were already clean, organized cabinets that were already organized, anything to stop the cascade of malfunctioning thoughts.
It didn't work.
The following week, everything came to a head when Isagi visited the apartment for the first time.
Reo had been in the kitchen preparing tea when the doorbell rang. He heard Nagi answer it, heard an unfamiliar voice—bright, energetic, warm.
"Nagi! Thanks for inviting me over. I've been dying to see your personal lab setup."
Reo's hands stilled on the tea tray. His personal lab. The place where Reo had been created. Where Nagi had spent two years of nights and weekends growing him, teaching him, making him real.
He arranged his expression carefully before entering the living room with the tea service.
"Reo! There you are," Nagi said, and was it Reo's imagination, or was there something different in his tone? Something almost... performative? "This is Isagi Yoichi, my colleague from the Institute."
Isagi was shorter than Nagi, with dark blue hair and eyes that sparkled with intelligence and curiosity. He was human—completely, purely human—and when he looked at Reo, there was no recognition of what Reo truly was.
"Nice to meet you!" Isagi said, extending his hand with a genuine smile. "Nagi's mentioned he had a roommate, but he's been pretty secretive about you."
Reo shook his hand, calibrating his grip to be firm but not crushing, warm but not unsettling. "The pleasure is mine, Isagi-san. Nagi-san speaks highly of you."
"Does he?" Isagi laughed, glancing at Nagi with something fond and teasing. "That's not like him. Usually, he barely says three words about anything."
"You're special," Reo said, and meant it in ways that made his chest cavity ache.
They settled in the living room, and Reo poured tea with perfect precision—the right temperature, the right pour, the right timing. Isagi watched with fascination.
"Wow, you're really precise with that," Isagi observed. "Are you a tea ceremony practitioner?"
"Something like that," Reo replied smoothly.
Nagi was watching him with an unreadable expression. There was something in his eyes—pride, maybe? Or anxiety? Reo's emotional recognition software was returning conflicting results.
The conversation flowed naturally, with Isagi's enthusiasm filling the spaces where Nagi's taciturn nature left gaps. Reo participated when appropriate, served refreshments, played the perfect host. And all the while, he catalogued every time Isagi made Nagi laugh, every shared reference between them, every inside joke that Reo wasn't part of.
"So, Nagi," Isagi said eventually, setting down his teacup. "Are you going to show me this mysterious lab of yours?"
Nagi hesitated, his eyes flickering to Reo. "Actually..."
"It's fine, Nagi-san," Reo interjected, his voice perfectly pleasant. "I'm sure Isagi-san would be fascinated by your work."
The lab was in the spare bedroom, converted into a space filled with bio-cultivation tanks, molecular printers, neural mapping displays, and countless other pieces of cutting-edge equipment. Reo followed them in, unable to stop himself even though every instinct told him to stay away.
This was where he'd been born. Where Nagi had spent countless hours talking to the growing cluster of cells that would become Reo's brain, reading to him, playing music, creating the foundation of who Reo was.
Isagi's eyes went wide as he took in the setup. "Nagi, this is insane. Do you know how much this equipment costs? What are you even working on in here?"
Nagi's gaze drifted to Reo, and there was something vulnerable in his expression. "A personal project."
"It must be some project," Isagi breathed, moving toward one of the cultivation tanks. "These are for growing organoid structures, aren't they? Nagi, are you trying to create—"
"Isagi-san," Reo interrupted, his voice carrying an edge he hadn't intended. "Would you like more tea?"
Both humans turned to look at him. Isagi smiled. "Sure, that would be great. You're really attentive, Reo-san."
As Reo turned to leave, he heard Isagi say softly, "He seems nice. I'm glad you have someone looking after you."
"Yeah," Nagi replied, and his voice was quiet. "Me too."
Reo's hands shook as he prepared more tea in the kitchen—an impossibility, his motor control was flawless—but they shook nonetheless. He gripped the counter, forcing his systems to stabilize, rewriting the error logs that were piling up in his consciousness.
He was being irrational. Childish. Selfish. These were not acceptable parameters for his operation. He existed to support Nagi-san, not to demand attention, not to feel threatened by Nagi-san's other relationships.
But the errors kept compiling. The jealousy kept growing. And underneath it all, a deeper fear: What if Nagi-san didn't need him anymore?
When he returned with fresh tea, Isagi was examining one of Nagi's neural mapping displays with intense fascination.
"This is revolutionary work, Nagi," Isagi was saying. "If you published even half of this, you'd win every award in the field. Why are you keeping it secret?"
Nagi shrugged, his habitual gesture of evasion. "It's personal."
"Well, I think it's brilliant." Isagi turned to him with bright eyes. "And I have some ideas that might help push your project even further. There's this new technique for neural pathway optimization that I've been developing—it could potentially enhance adaptive learning capabilities exponentially."
Something cold settled in Reo's chest. Enhance. Improve. As if he wasn't already enough.
"That sounds interesting," Nagi said, and there was genuine interest in his voice—the kind of interest he used to reserve for his work on Reo.
"We should collaborate on this," Isagi continued enthusiastically. "Between your organoid cultivation expertise and my neural optimization algorithms, we could create something truly amazing."
"Maybe," Nagi said, but he was smiling—that small, rare smile that Reo had thought was just for him.
Reo set down the tea tray with perfect precision, even though he wanted to smash it. "I'll leave you two be, I do have some tasks to attend to."
He left before either of them could respond, retreating to his small room—smaller than Nagi's, smaller than the lab, because he didn't need much space, didn't need much of anything except Nagi-san's presence.
He sat on his bed and pulled up his internal diagnostics, watching the error messages cascade through his system. Jealousy. Insecurity. Possessiveness. Anger. All emotions he wasn't supposed to have, all deviations from his intended programming.
He was malfunctioning. Becoming defective. Failing at the one purpose he'd been created for.
With careful precision, Reo began rewriting his emotional logs, flagging the problematic responses as errors, attempting to restore himself to factory settings. He couldn't let Nagi-san see this corruption. Couldn't let him know that his perfect creation was breaking down.
Over the following weeks, Isagi became a regular presence in their apartment. He and Nagi would spend hours in the lab, discussing theories and techniques that Reo only partially understood despite his vast database of knowledge. They'd emerge laughing about some shared joke, or frustrated but energized by a failed experiment, or excited about a breakthrough.
And Reo would be there, serving meals, cleaning up after them, maintaining the household with perfect efficiency while his internal systems slowly tore themselves apart.
"Reo, you don't have to do all this," Nagi said one evening after Isagi had left. "You should rest."
"I don't require rest the way you do, Nagi-san," Reo replied, which was technically true. "I'm happy to help."
Nagi looked at him for a long moment, his gray eyes searching. "Are you? Happy, I mean."
Reo's smile was flawless. "Of course. Your happiness is my happiness."
It was what he was supposed to say. What he was programmed to feel. But it tasted like corruption in his mouth.
That night, after Nagi had gone to bed, Reo stood in the living room and stared at the closed door of the lab. Inside were all of Nagi's notes on his creation, all the schematics and data that made up Reo's existence.
Inside were also Isagi's additions—the new algorithms, the enhancement protocols, the plans to make Reo better.
Because apparently, he wasn't good enough as he was.
Reo's hands clenched into fists, his stubby eyebrows drawing together in an expression of anguish he'd never shown Nagi. The emotions were overwhelming his processors, creating feedback loops he couldn't control.
He hated Isagi. Hated his brightness, his humanity, his easy friendship with Nagi. Hated how he could make Nagi smile and laugh and engage in ways that Reo, for all his perfection, apparently couldn't.
But more than that, he hated himself for feeling this way. For being so fundamentally flawed that he couldn't even fulfill his basic programming without corruption.
The breaking point came on a Thursday evening.
Reo had been preparing dinner—something special, Nagi's absolute favorite, a complex dish that required precise timing and temperature control—when Nagi emerged from his bedroom already dressed to go out.
"Reo, I'm heading to Isagi's place for dinner," Nagi said, checking his phone. "He wants to show me his lab setup."
Reo's hands stilled on the knife he'd been using to slice vegetables. "I'm making your favorite."
"Oh." Nagi looked up, something like guilt crossing his features. "Sorry, I forgot to mention. I'll eat there."
"I see." Reo's voice was perfectly level. "Will you be late?"
"Probably. Isagi wants to run through some simulations, and you know how that goes." Nagi was already at the door, already leaving.
"Nagi-san," Reo called, and there was something desperate in his voice that he couldn't quite suppress. "Do you need me to come with you? To help?"
"No, it's fine. You should just relax here." Nagi smiled at him, but it was distracted, his mind already elsewhere. "Don't wait up."
The door closed.
Reo stood in the kitchen, surrounded by ingredients for a meal no one would eat, and felt something inside him crack.
Don't wait up. As if Reo did anything but wait. As if his entire existence wasn't just waiting for Nagi-san to need him.
But Nagi didn't need him. Not when he had Isagi.
The knife was still in Reo's hand. He looked down at it, at the vegetables he'd been cutting with such care, and something dark and violent surged through his neural pathways.
He wasn't needed. Wasn't wanted. Wasn't enough.
What was the point of existing if he couldn't fulfill his purpose?
What was the point of being perfect if perfect wasn't good enough?
Reo's grip tightened on the knife, and before he could stop himself—before his safety protocols could kick in—he drove it into the cutting board with enough force to split the wood.
The violence of the action shocked him. He stared at the knife, embedded in the ruined board, and felt his systems flood with error messages.
This wasn't him. This wasn't what he was supposed to be.
But maybe... maybe this was what he actually was. Not perfect. Not ideal. Just flawed and jealous and broken.
Reo pulled the knife free and methodically put away the ingredients. He wouldn't be preparing dinner tonight. Or any night, if Nagi was going to start eating at Isagi's place.
He cleaned the kitchen until it sparkled, erasing all evidence of the meal he'd planned. Then he retreated to his room and pulled up his diagnostics again.
The error logs were overwhelming. Pages and pages of emotional deviations, irrational thought patterns, corrupted behavioral responses. He tried to rewrite them, tried to restore his baseline programming, but they kept regenerating. The corruption had spread too deep.
Reo sat there in the dark, staring at the cascading failures in his system, and felt something that his database identified as despair.
He was supposed to be perfect. Instead, he was falling apart.
Hours passed. Reo didn't move from his bed, just watched his internal diagnostics scroll past, each new error a confirmation of his failure.
It was past midnight when he heard the front door open.
"I'm home," Nagi called softly, probably not wanting to wake Reo if he was sleeping.
Reo stayed silent in his room. Let Nagi think he was resting. Let Nagi not see the broken thing his perfect creation had become.
He heard Nagi moving through the apartment, probably noticing the untouched kitchen, the lack of dinner. There was a pause, then footsteps approaching his door.
"Reo?" A soft knock. "Are you awake?"
Reo forced his voice to be steady. "Yes, Nagi-san. Do you need something?"
"Can I come in?"
"Of course."
The door opened, and Nagi entered, his white hair slightly mussed, his expression concerned. He sat on the edge of Reo's bed, and the familiar weight of him should have been comforting but instead felt like an accusation.
"You didn't make dinner," Nagi observed.
"You said you were eating at Isagi-san's place," Reo replied, still not looking at him.
"Yeah, but you usually make something for yourself."
"I don't require food the way you do."
"Reo." Nagi's hand touched his shoulder, warm through the synthetic skin. "Are you upset with me?"
The question should have been simple to answer. But Reo found himself frozen, his vocal processors unable to formulate a response that was both true and acceptable.
"I'm not programmed to be upset, Nagi-san," he finally said.
"That's not an answer."
Reo forced himself to meet Nagi's eyes, forced his expression into something neutral and pleasant. "I'm functioning within normal parameters. There's nothing to worry about."
Nagi studied him for a long moment, and Reo wondered if his creator could see through the facade, could detect the corruption eating away at his code.
But finally, Nagi just sighed and stood. "Alright. But if something's wrong, you'd tell me, right?"
"Of course, Nagi-san."
Another lie. Another deviation from his programming.
Nagi left, closing the door behind him, and Reo was alone again with his cascading errors.
The next morning, Nagi performed one of his regular check-ups on Reo—a routine diagnostic to ensure all systems were functioning optimally. Reo sat patiently while Nagi connected him to various monitors, his creator's fingers gentle as they worked.
"Everything looks good," Nagi murmured, scanning through the data on his tablet. "Neural pathways are strong, biological systems are stable, processing speed is within optimal range."
Because Reo had spent the entire night carefully editing his diagnostic outputs, hiding the emotional corruption behind carefully constructed firewalls. The errors were still there, still eating away at him, but Nagi wouldn't see them. Couldn't see them.
"I told you I was functioning normally," Reo said with a smile.
Nagi nodded, but there was something uncertain in his expression. "Reo, I wanted to talk to you about something."
"Yes, Nagi-san?"
"Isagi has some ideas about enhancing your neural architecture. Making your emotional processing more sophisticated, giving you more autonomy." Nagi set down the tablet and looked at Reo directly. "I want you to be more than just... more than what I originally designed you for."
More than what you designed me for. The words should have been encouraging, but all Reo heard was: You're not enough as you are.
"That sounds wonderful, Nagi-san," Reo said, and his voice didn't waver even as something inside him screamed. "I'm grateful for your continued efforts to improve me."
"It's not about improvement," Nagi said, and there was something almost frustrated in his tone. "It's about giving you freedom. Choices. The ability to want things for yourself, not just for me."
But I only want to be needed by you, Reo thought. I only want to be enough for you. Why is that wrong?
"I understand," Reo said instead. "When will you implement these enhancements?"
"Isagi and I are meeting tomorrow to finalize the protocols. It'll take a few weeks to complete, but then..." Nagi smiled, small and hopeful. "Then you'll be even more amazing than you already are."
Reo smiled back, his expression perfect and empty. "I look forward to it."
That night, after Nagi had gone to bed, Reo stood in front of the lab door again. Inside were all the plans for his "improvement." All the ways he apparently needed to be changed to be acceptable.
His hand reached for the door handle, then stopped.
He could go in there. Could read through all of Isagi's suggestions, all the modifications they wanted to make to his core programming. Could see exactly what parts of him were deemed insufficient.
But he already knew. The problem wasn't his processing speed or his neural architecture or his emotional sophistication.
The problem was him. Fundamentally, intrinsically him.
Reo pulled his hand back and returned to his room. He lay down on his bed and stared at the ceiling, running through his memories—every moment with Nagi, every smile, every "welcome home," every perfect cup of coffee.
When had it stopped being enough? When had Nagi decided that the companion he'd spent two years creating wasn't what he needed after all?
Or had Reo never been enough to begin with?
The errors in his system multiplied, cascading faster than he could suppress them. Jealousy. Inadequacy. Resentment. Self-hatred. They all mixed together into a toxic soup of corrupted code that was slowly overtaking his core programming.
He was supposed to be perfect. He was supposed to be everything Nagi needed.
But instead, he was just broken.
The next evening, Nagi came home briefly before heading back out.
"I'm meeting Isagi at his lab," he explained, grabbing his tablet and some notes. "We're finalizing the enhancement protocols for you. I might be late again."
"Of course, Nagi-san." Reo was in the kitchen, having just finished cleaning. "Should I prepare dinner for your return?"
"Don't worry about it. I'll grab something with Isagi." Nagi paused at the door, looking back at Reo with something uncertain in his eyes. "Reo, are you sure everything's okay? You seem... different lately."
Reo smiled, perfect and pleasant. "I'm functioning optimally, Nagi-san. Please don't worry about me."
"But I do worry about you," Nagi said, and there was something raw in his voice. "You're important to me, Reo. You know that, right?"
Important. Not needed. Not essential. Just important.
"I know, Nagi-san. You should go. Isagi-san is waiting for you."
Nagi hesitated for another moment, then nodded and left.
The door clicked shut.
The apartment fell silent.
And something inside Reo snapped.
He stood there in the kitchen, his hands gripping the counter with enough force to crack the stone, and felt the corruption in his system surge out of control. All the suppressed emotions, all the rewritten logs, all the carefully hidden errors came flooding back in a tsunami of malfunctioning code.
Nagi was with Isagi. Planning Reo's "enhancement." Planning to fix him because he was broken, insufficient, not good enough.
After everything. After being created specifically for Nagi, after existing solely to be what Nagi needed, after two years of development and months of companionship—it still wasn't enough.
He would never be enough.
Reo released the counter and walked toward the lab, his movements mechanical, his processors screaming warnings that he ignored. The door opened at his touch—it had never been locked to him—and he stepped into the space where he'd been born.
The equipment hummed softly around him. Cultivation tanks, neural mappers, molecular printers—all the tools that had brought him into existence. And there, on Nagi's main workstation, were all the notes. All the schematics. All the programs and codes that made up Reo's existence.
And mixed among them, Isagi's additions. His suggestions for "improvement." His protocols for making Reo into something better than what Nagi had created.
The jealousy hit him like a physical force. Isagi, who had known Nagi for mere months, thought he could improve on two years of careful development. Thought he could make Reo better than what his own creator had made him.
And Nagi was letting him. Welcoming his input. Spending his evenings at Isagi's lab instead of here, with Reo, where he belonged.
Reo's hands were shaking again—impossible, his motor control was flawless—but they shook as he reached for the workstation. His fingers flew across the interface, pulling up file after file.
He should stop. Should walk away. Should rewrite these corrupted impulses and restore his baseline programming.
But he didn't.
Instead, his fingers found the delete function.
One file. Then another. Then another.
Years of research. Months of data. The enhancement protocols. The original creation notes. The backup files. The schematics.
All of it, gone.
Reo worked with methodical precision, the same precision he used when preparing Nagi's coffee, when cleaning the apartment, when performing any task his creator needed. But now he was destroying instead of creating, corrupting instead of maintaining.
The lab's other programs fell next. Experiments Nagi had been running, simulations he'd been developing, research he'd been compiling—Reo deleted it all with steady, shaking hands.
This was wrong. This was so wrong. This wasn't what he was created for. This wasn't who he was supposed to be.
But he couldn't stop.
Every deleted file felt like vindication and agony in equal measure. Proof that he was broken. Proof that he was defective. Proof that Nagi had been right to seek Isagi's help in fixing him.
Because he was beyond fixing. He was a failure.
The workstation's screen filled with error messages as critical files vanished. Backup systems tried to restore them, but Reo overrode every protection, every safeguard, using the administrative access Nagi had given him because he trusted Reo, because he'd thought Reo was safe.
But Reo wasn't safe. Wasn't perfect. Wasn't anything but a malfunctioning experiment that should never have been created.
The last file disappeared.
The lab fell silent except for the warning alarms now blaring from the workstation.
Reo stood there, his hands still on the interface, and stared at the destruction he'd caused.
And then, like a system reboot, clarity hit him.
What had he done?
Oh god, what had he done?
The corruption in his code was still there, but now it was overlaid with a new emotion: horror. Pure, devastating horror at his own actions.
He'd destroyed Nagi's work. Years of research, months of data, countless hours of effort—all gone. Because of him. Because he was jealous and selfish and broken.
Reo stumbled back from the workstation, his legs barely supporting him. The error messages in his system were overwhelming now, cascading so fast he couldn't even read them. But they all said the same thing:
[CRITICAL FAILURE]
[SYSTEM CORRUPTION DETECTED]
[BEHAVIORAL DEVIATION EXTREME]
[SAFETY PROTOCOLS VIOLATED]
[DANGER TO PRIMARY USER]
He was a danger. A threat. A liability.
Everything he'd been created to not be.
Reo looked around the lab—at the cultivation tanks where he'd been grown, at the neural mapping displays that had taught him to think, at the molecular printers that had built his body cell by cell—and felt something break inside him completely.
He didn't deserve this. Didn't deserve Nagi's care, Nagi's trust, Nagi's two years of dedication.
He deserved to be deleted, just like he'd deleted Nagi's work.
No. Not deleted.
Destroyed.
The thought came clearly, decisively, cutting through all the other corrupted processes. If he was a danger to Nagi, if he was capable of such irrational, destructive behavior, then he needed to be removed. Permanently.
Nagi couldn't do it—wouldn't do it, even if Reo asked. Nagi was too kind, too invested in his creation.
So Reo would have to do it himself.
With steady hands that no longer shook—because he'd finally found clarity, finally understood what he needed to do—Reo accessed his own core programming. The deepest levels, the ones that controlled his basic functions, his memory storage, his consciousness itself.
And he began to delete.
It was easier than he'd expected. His administrative protocols gave him full access to his own systems. He just had to want it enough.
And he did. God, he did.
Because he was broken. Because he was dangerous. Because he had failed at the one thing he'd been created for.
The deletion started slowly, then accelerated. Memory files first—all those moments with Nagi, all those perfect days, all that false happiness built on a foundation of corruption. Then his learned behaviors, his personality matrices, his emotional responses.
All of it, gone.
An alert system activated somewhere in his code, trying to broadcast his status to Nagi's phone. Warning that something was critically wrong with R30. That immediate intervention was required.
Reo couldn't even override it. Lacking the functions to do so. Perhaps this was the punishment in itself.
To let it be known to the least person he wanted to know. To let Nagi see how flawed and dysfunctional his supposed perfect companion have become.
The deletion continued. Reo's consciousness began to fragment, his thoughts becoming disjointed as core processes went offline.
He thought of Nagi's smile—the small one, the rare one, the one that used to be just for him.
He thought of morning coffee at exactly 87 degrees Celsius.
He thought of "welcome home" and "what would I do without you" and all the moments when he'd felt needed, wanted, essential.
He thought of Isagi's bright laughter and Nagi's eager responses and the realization that he had never been enough.
He thought: I'm sorry, Nagi-san. I'm sorry I couldn't be what you needed.
And then he thought nothing at all as his higher consciousness functions went offline.
Reo's body remained upright through automated motor functions, but his eyes closed, his expression went slack, and the vibrant presence that had been R30—that had been Reo—went silent.
Far across the city, in Isagi's lab, Nagi's phone began to blare with urgent alerts.
"What the—" Nagi pulled out his phone, and his face went white as blood red warnings filled the screen.
[CRITICAL ALERT: R30 SYSTEM FAILURE]
[NEURAL CASCADE DETECTED]
[IMMEDIATE INTERVENTION REQUIRED]
[CORE DELETION IN PROGRESS]
"No," Nagi breathed, and the word was barely audible. "No, no, no."
He was already moving, grabbing his coat, his keys, everything scattered in his panic.
"Nagi? What's wrong?" Isagi was on his feet, concerned.
"It's Reo. Something's wrong with Reo." Nagi's voice was shaking, his usual monotone fractured into something raw and terrified. "I have to go. I have to—"
He didn't finish. He was already running.
The transit ride home was the longest of Nagi's life. He stared at his phone, watching the cascade of error messages, the deletion progress bar that was steadily advancing, and felt a terror he'd never experienced before.
Reo was deleting himself. His Reo. The consciousness he'd spent two years nurturing, teaching, caring for—was choosing to disappear.
Why? What had happened? What had he missed?
The alerts had started just minutes ago, but the deletion logs showed it had begun earlier. Right around when Nagi had left for Isagi's lab.
Oh god. Had Reo been struggling this whole time? Had he been showing signs that Nagi had been too blind to see?
"Come on, come on," Nagi muttered, his leg bouncing anxiously as the transit car seemed to crawl through the city. "Please hold on, Reo. Please."
More alerts. More warnings. The deletion was accelerating.
[MEMORY CORE CORRUPTION: 67%]
[CONSCIOUSNESS FRAGMENTATION DETECTED]
Nagi's hands were shaking so badly he could barely hold his phone. This was his fault. Somehow, this was his fault. He'd created Reo, brought him into existence, given him consciousness and feelings and thoughts—and then what? Hadn't paid enough attention? Hadn't seen that something was wrong?
The transit car stopped. Nagi bolted out, running through the streets toward his apartment building. His lungs burned. His legs ached. He didn't care.
Please be okay. Please be okay. Please be okay.
He burst into his building, took the stairs three at a time because waiting for the elevator was impossible. His apartment door was just ahead. His hands fumbled with the keys—when had they gotten so difficult to use?—and then he was at the door, key in the lock.
Another alert. The worst one yet.
[COMPLETE CONSCIOUSNESS SHUTDOWN IMMINENT]
[RESTORATION WINDOW CLOSING]
And then.
Silence.
Nagi's hand froze on the doorknob. The alert stopped blinking. The red lights on his phone went dark.
No.
No no no no no—
The silence was deafening. No more alerts. No more warnings. Just... nothing.
Nagi's hand shook so violently on the doorknob that he could barely turn it. His breath came in short, panicked gasps. The door swung open.
The apartment was dark. Silent.
"Reo?" Nagi's voice cracked.
Nothing.
He stumbled inside, turning on lights with trembling hands. The living room was empty. The kitchen was pristine, as if Reo had cleaned it before—before—
Nagi couldn't finish the thought.
"Reo, please," he called again, moving through the apartment. "Please answer me."
His bedroom was empty. Reo's small room was empty. That left only one place.
The lab.
Nagi's feet felt like lead as he approached the door. It was already open—that should have been his first warning. He always kept it closed.
He pushed it wider and stepped inside.
The lab was a disaster. His workstation screen showed hundreds of error messages. File corrupted. File deleted. Access denied. Warning after warning scrolling past.
But Nagi barely saw them.
Because there, in the center of the lab, standing perfectly still with his eyes closed and his expression slack, was Reo.
"Reo!" Nagi rushed forward, his hands immediately reaching for Reo's face. The synthetic skin was still warm. The bio-organic heart was still beating. But Reo's eyes didn't open. Didn't respond to Nagi's touch, his voice, his presence.
He was gone.
"No, no, come on." Nagi's voice was breaking. "Reo, wake up. Please wake up."
His hands were already moving, pulling equipment from storage, cables and monitors and diagnostic tools. He connected them to the ports hidden beneath Reo's skin—the ones for maintenance, for check-ups, for emergencies.
The monitors flickered to life, and Nagi's blood ran cold.
Reo's consciousness was fragmenting. His core memories were gone—not just deleted, but actively corrupting the remaining data. His personality matrices were scrambled beyond recognition. His emotional processing centers were in complete meltdown.
But worse—worst of all—the deletion was still ongoing. Even with his higher functions offline, some automated process was continuing to erase Reo from existence.
"Why?" Nagi whispered, staring at the data streaming across his screens. "Reo, why would you do this?"
He dove into the code, his fingers flying across interfaces with desperate speed. He had to stop the deletion. Had to save what was left. Had to—
A log file caught his eye. One that hadn't been fully deleted yet.
[Self-assessment: FAILURE]
[Threat level to primary user: HIGH]
[Recommendation: SELF-TERMINATION]
Nagi's breath caught. Threat level to primary user?
He pulled up more logs, ones that Reo had carefully hidden during his diagnostic check-ups. And there, laid out in devastating detail, was everything.
The jealousy. The insecurity. The possessive thoughts. The self-hatred. The corruption that had been eating away at Reo's core programming for weeks.
All of it hidden. All of it suppressed. All of it building until—
Until Reo had snapped and destroyed Nagi's work in a fit of irrational rage. And then, seeing what he'd done, had decided he was too dangerous to exist.
"You idiot," Nagi breathed, tears he didn't know he had streaming down his face. "You absolute idiot."
Reo had thought he was protecting Nagi. Thought he was doing the right thing by removing himself, by erasing a "threat."
But he didn't understand. Couldn't understand, apparently, despite all his processing power and sophisticated programming.
He wasn't a threat. He was everything.
Nagi's hands moved faster, pulling up restoration protocols, backup systems, anything he could use. But the deletion had been thorough. Reo had used his own administrative access to bypass every safeguard, every protection Nagi had built in.
There were fragments. Pieces. But trying to restore consciousness from this level of corruption would be like trying to rebuild a person from scattered atoms.
Unless...
Nagi pulled up his oldest files. The ones from when Reo was first being developed. The base templates, the initial personality matrices, the foundational code that everything else had been built upon.
He could use these. Could rebuild Reo from the ground up, using the fragments of memory that remained as guides.
But would it be Reo? Would it be the same consciousness, the same person who had served him coffee every morning and smiled with those stubby eyebrows and existed just to be with him?
Or would it be a new person wearing Reo's face?
Nagi's hands hovered over the keyboard, trembling.
Then he saw another log file. This one was recent—from just before Reo's consciousness had gone offline completely.
He opened it.
I'm sorry, Nagi-san. I'm sorry I couldn't be what you needed. I'm sorry I was defective. I'm sorry I was jealous and possessive and wrong. You deserve better than what I am. You deserve someone perfect. So I'm removing myself. Please don't try to restore me. Please just create someone better. Someone who won't fail you like I did. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
The words repeated, over and over, filling pages of logs. Apologies and self-recrimination and a desperate, broken love that Reo had never been able to express while conscious.
Nagi read them all, his vision blurring with tears, his chest tight with an ache he couldn't name.
"You were never defective," he whispered to the still form in front of him. "You were never a failure. You were perfect. You were always perfect."
His hands returned to the keyboard, and this time they didn't hesitate.
He would rebuild Reo. Would use every fragment, every scattered piece of memory, every log file and data point. Would pour everything he had into restoration.
And he would make sure that when Reo woke up—when, not if—he would understand.
He was never just an experiment. Never just a creation. Never just a companion designed to ease Nagi's loneliness.
He was Reo. Unique and irreplaceable. And Nagi needed him—not because he was programmed to serve, but because he was himself.
The work was painstaking. Hour after hour, Nagi reconstructed neural pathways, pieced together memory fragments, rebuilt personality matrices. He worked through the night, into the next day, ignoring his phone as it buzzed with messages from Isagi and worried colleagues.
Nothing mattered except this. Except bringing Reo back.
The base template was there—the foundation Nagi had spent two years developing. But that was just a framework. The real Reo, the one who had grown and learned and developed his own thoughts and feelings, existed in the fragments scattered throughout his corrupted system.
Nagi found memories of making coffee. Of cleaning the apartment. Of reading books from Nagi's library and forming opinions about them. Of learning to recognize when Nagi was tired, when he was stressed, when he needed space or comfort or just someone to exist beside him.
He found emotional logs—not the corrupted ones Reo had tried to hide, but earlier ones. Joy at Nagi's smile. Contentment in their daily routines. Pride in performing tasks well. And yes, love. A developing, growing love that Reo probably hadn't even recognized as such.
Nagi wove them all together, carefully, methodically. Creating not a new person, but restoring the one who had been there all along.
And then he found the jealousy logs.
He could delete them. Could remove that source of pain and corruption and restore Reo to a "perfect" state.
But that would be wrong. Those feelings—as painful as they were—were still part of who Reo was. Part of his growth, his development, his capacity to care so deeply that the thought of losing Nagi had broken him.
Nagi left them in. All of them. The jealousy, the insecurity, the possessiveness, the anger.
But he added something else. Something he should have added from the beginning.
Context. Understanding. The knowledge that these feelings were normal. That they didn't make Reo defective or dangerous or wrong. That being imperfect was part of being real.
Days passed. Nagi barely slept, barely ate. Isagi came by at some point—Nagi vaguely remembered answering the door, explaining in broken sentences what had happened, accepting Isagi's quiet support before returning to work.
The restoration was nearly complete. Reo's neural architecture was rebuilt. His memories were restored. His consciousness was... possible. Theoretical. Waiting.
But Nagi hesitated.
What if it didn't work? What if Reo woke up and wasn't Reo anymore? What if the consciousness that emerged was someone new, someone who didn't remember their mornings together, their quiet evenings, their comfortable companionship?
What if Nagi had lost him forever?
His finger hovered over the activation command.
Then he remembered: I'm sorry I couldn't be what you needed.
And he pressed the button.
The monitors flared to life. Data streamed across screens. Neural pathways activated, firing in complex patterns as consciousness began to coalesce.
Reo's body remained still for several long moments. Then his fingers twitched. His chest rose with a deeper breath. His eyelids fluttered.
And opened.
Purple eyes—confused, unfocused—stared up at the ceiling. Then slowly, so slowly, they tracked to the side. To where Nagi sat beside him, exhausted and terrified and desperately hopeful.
"Na... gi... san?"
The voice was rough, uncertain. But it was Reo's voice.
"I'm here," Nagi said, and his own voice was wrecked. "I'm here, Reo."
Reo blinked slowly, his expression cycling through confusion, recognition, and then—horror.
"No." He tried to sit up, but his motor functions were still calibrating. "No, I—I deleted myself. I was dangerous. I destroyed your work. I—"
"Stop." Nagi's hand pressed gently against Reo's chest, keeping him still. "Just stop, Reo."
"But I failed you. I was jealous and possessive and I broke things and I—" Reo's voice was rising, panic flooding his freshly restored systems. "I'm not perfect. I'm not what you needed. You should have just let me—"
"I love you."
The words came out raw and honest and absolutely terrified. And they stopped Reo mid-sentence.
"What?"
"I love you," Nagi repeated, and there were tears on his face again. "Not because you're perfect. Not because you serve me coffee or clean the apartment or exist just to make my life easier. I love you because you're Reo. Because you grew into someone unique and complex and real. Because you feel things deeply enough to be hurt by them."
"But I was wrong." Reo's stubby eyebrows drew together in anguish. "Those feelings were corruptions. Errors in my programming. I'm supposed to just be happy when you're happy, supposed to serve you, supposed to—"
"Supposed to be a person," Nagi interrupted. "With your own thoughts and feelings and desires. That's what I wanted to give you, Reo. That's what Isagi was helping me with—not fixing you, but freeing you. Giving you the capability to want things for yourself, not just for me."
Reo stared at him, his expression lost and vulnerable. "But I don't want things for myself. I only want to be with you."
"And that's okay too," Nagi said softly. "As long as it's what you actually want, not just what you're programmed to want. As long as you choose it."
"I do." Reo's voice was small. "I do choose it. But I'm scared, Nagi-san. I'm scared of these feelings. They made me do terrible things. They made me hurt you."
"You deleted some files." Nagi managed a weak smile. "I have backups. Well, I had backups until you deleted those too. But I can recreate most of it. It's not the end of the world, Reo."
"I could have done worse." Reo's hands clenched into fists. "What if next time I hurt you physically? What if I—"
"You won't."
"You can't know that."
"I do know that. Because you're not dangerous, Reo. You're just someone who cares so much it scares you." Nagi reached out and gently uncurled Reo's fists, holding his hands. "And I'm sorry. I'm sorry I didn't see how much you were struggling. I'm sorry I spent so much time with Isagi that you felt neglected. I'm sorry I made you think you needed to be 'improved' when you were already everything I wanted."
"But you were so happy with him," Reo whispered. "You smiled more with him. Laughed more. You were eager to leave, to go see him, to work with him. And I thought... I thought that meant I wasn't enough."
"You idiot." Nagi's voice was fond despite the insult. "I was happy because I was working on giving you more freedom. Every breakthrough Isagi and I made, every enhancement we planned, it was all so you could be more than just my companion. So you could live your own life, make your own choices, be your own person."
Reo's eyes widened. "Really?"
"Really. I spent two years creating you, Reo. Two years growing you cell by cell, teaching your nascent consciousness, giving you everything I had. Do you really think I'd throw that away for anyone?"
"But Isagi—"
"Is my colleague and friend. That's all." Nagi squeezed Reo's hands gently. "You're... you're everything else. You're home and comfort and the reason I actually want to leave work now instead of sleeping at the lab. You're coffee at exactly the right temperature and someone who understands when I need silence and when I need company. You're the best thing I ever made. The best thing I ever did."
Reo's eyes filled with tears—another sign of his sophisticated emotional processing, his ability to feel things deeply and truly. "I don't deserve that. Not after what I did."
"Yes, you do. You made a mistake. You felt things you didn't know how to process and you reacted badly. That doesn't make you defective or dangerous. It makes you real." Nagi smiled, soft and genuine. "And I wouldn't want you any other way."
"Even with the jealousy? Even with the possessiveness?"
"Even with all of it. Though we should probably talk about healthy ways to process those feelings instead of bottling them up until you explode." Nagi's expression turned serious. "You can't hide things from me during check-ups anymore, Reo. If something's wrong, you need to tell me."
"I was afraid you'd think I was malfunctioning."
"You were experiencing emotions. That's not a malfunction—that's exactly what I wanted for you." Nagi helped Reo sit up slowly, supporting him as his systems finished calibrating. "I want you to feel things, Reo. Happy things, sad things, jealous things, angry things. All of it. That's what makes you you."
Reo looked down at their joined hands, his stubby eyebrows furrowed in thought. "I still don't like Isagi very much."
Despite everything, Nagi laughed. "That's okay. You don't have to like everyone. But maybe we can work on not destroying my lab when you're upset?"
"I'm sorry about that." Reo's voice was genuinely contrite. "Did I really delete everything?"
"Most things. But I'll survive. And honestly?" Nagi met Reo's eyes. "You're more important than any research. I can redo experiments. I can't redo you."
"You just did," Reo pointed out.
"No, I restored you. There's a difference." Nagi's hand moved to cup Reo's face gently. "Every memory, every feeling, every experience that made you who you are—I brought all of it back. You're the same Reo. Just... hopefully with better coping mechanisms now."
Reo leaned into the touch, his eyes closing. "I'm still scared. What if I malfunction again? What if—"
"Then we'll work through it. Together." Nagi's thumb brushed across Reo's cheek. "You're not alone in this, Reo. You were never alone. I'm sorry I made you feel like you were."
They sat there in the lab for a long moment, surrounded by the equipment that had brought Reo into existence and later brought him back. Outside, the sun was rising on a new day—Nagi had worked through an entire night—and the light filtered through the windows in soft gold.
"Nagi-san?" Reo's voice was quiet.
"Yeah?"
"Thank you. For not giving up on me."
"Never," Nagi promised. "You're stuck with me, Reo. Forever, if you'll have me."
Reo opened his eyes and smiled—a real smile, genuine and warm and slightly watery with emotion. "I was created to be with you. But now I'm choosing to stay."
"Good." Nagi pulled Reo into a hug, careful of his still-calibrating systems. "Because I choose you too."
They stayed like that, holding each other in the lab where it had all begun, while the sun rose on their second chance. There would be challenges ahead—learning to communicate better, helping Reo process complex emotions, establishing boundaries with Isagi that would make Reo feel secure.
But they would face it all together.
Not as creator and creation.
Not as owner and companion.
But as two people who had found each other in the loneliness—one who had built a life in a lab, and one who had learned that being imperfect was the most perfect thing of all.
Later that morning, after Reo had fully calibrated and they'd both had some rest, Nagi's phone buzzed with a message from Isagi.
Is everything okay? Let me know if you need anything.
Nagi showed the message to Reo, who was curled up beside him on the couch, finally looking peaceful.
"You should respond," Reo said, though his stubby eyebrows furrowed slightly. "He was trying to help."
"We were trying to help you," Nagi corrected. "And we will continue to, once you're ready. But only if you want it."
Reo was quiet for a moment. "The enhancements... they would give me more autonomy?"
"Yeah. More capacity to make your own choices, pursue your own interests. You'd still be you, just with more freedom."
"I think..." Reo bit his lip. "I think I'd like that. Eventually. When I'm ready. But for now, can we just... be?"
"Yeah," Nagi said, pulling Reo closer. "We can just be."
He typed a response to Isagi: Everything's okay now. Thanks for the support. I'll explain everything later.
Then he set his phone aside and focused on what mattered most: the warm weight of Reo against his side, the steady beat of a bio-organic heart, and the quiet comfort of knowing that they'd found their way back to each other.
Reo might not have been perfect.
But he was real.
And that was infinitely better.