Page 116 of Coldwire
Kieren splutters. “You do not have rights!”
Without any more prompting, Hailey puts her hands around the bot’s neck.
“What… are you doing?” I ask. A part of me is concerned that I’m about to witness the world’s first case of bot murder.
“Reset button,” she answers. “Clears the loading queue for me to write into.”
Hailey takes a few steps away to observe the results of the reset. The light on the front of Twelve’s chest flicks quickly through the entire color wheel, whirring twice before stopping on blue again. I almost expect the bot to malfunction or call the police, but Twelve only jangles a tune from its speakers.
“We are heading to the Land of Outer Frontier! Travel time approximating at seventeen hours and fifty-one minutes. Located at the far northeast of the country, this was the site of vast Medan exploration in the early days of mining gold. Offron’s significance has faded since then… but worry not, because the culinary experience far north is a delight!”
We stare at Hailey, silently asking whether she’s triggered actual movement toward Offron or only the tourist brochure. The bus doesn’t move. Neither does the bot, its arms staying at its sides. Hailey glares hard at Twelve, slightly unfocused to indicate she’s typing in her display.
A minute passes. Kieren is the first to break the silence, saying, “Hailey…”
“I’m fighting someone,” she grits out.
I blink. “Excuse me?”
“The controls,” Hailey goes on tightly, “of the bot. I’m fighting someone. It’s not an AI. An active user with real StrangeLoom credentials is popping in and out to take control. They’re trying to undo each new line I write.”
My jaw drops.
Kieren rears back. “Iknewit,” he insists. “I knew it was creepy—”
“Shut up, I need to concentrate,” Hailey interrupts. “I can pull the user ID and…” She trails off. With a blink, her gaze clears perceptibly, looking only at the bot without her display in the way.
“Hailey?” Kieren prompts.
Hailey grabs the bot’s arm. “Weston Murray,” she bellows. “You get out of that thing right now.”
I understand, by linguistic logic, the words that Hailey just said. I’m not comprehending what it means. When I turn to check on Kieren, he appears equally flabbergasted, his expression frozen in its previous state.
“Weston?” Rayna is the first one to break the spell. “What does Weston have to do with this?”
“He can speak for himself,” Hailey says. “Weston, I’m not going to warn you again!”
And then, with the sudden warp usually seen only at landing pads, a new avatar blinks into view. Where there was empty space before, now there’s shaggy-haired Weston, grinning with all his teeth.
“Hi,” he says.
Hailey’s entirely red in the face. “What are you doing in the Medan server?” she demands. “How long have you been following us?”
Weston squirms under her scrutiny. He inches closer and closer to Twelve’s unmoving inorganic body, looking like he wants to get back in.
“To be fair,” he grumbles, “I wasn’t followingyou. I was following Kieren.”
Kieren’s eyes bug. He smacks his hands to his head, then inhales so loudly that it makes a sound through his nostrils.
“You”—he drags his hands down—“what?”
The realization strikes me with a physical force. “You’re the cat!” I exclaim.Oh. I didn’t think it would be you.“You followed the wrong user ID when Kieren and I were both initially injected.”
Weston’s wince tells me everything. “I may have crept a little close. I didn’t realize the system was going to warn you.”
Kieren has entirely given up on trying to react in a normal way. He’s dropped to a crouch, both his hands braced on his knees. Hailey appears no better, like she’s caught between running laps around the bus or letting her avatar blow steam out of her ears.
“Weston,” she says, very low, very firmly, “what are youdoing?” She turns to check the time on the dashboard. There’s a twelve-hour time difference to Atahua, so it’ll be seven in the morning. “You have class soon.”
