The aftermath didn't stay contained inside Polymer's banquet hall. It bled out, fast.
Sylvie's little gasp, the swing of that bot's leg, the split-second where I thought I'd lose her the way I lost Nico, every frame was there, etched in Nyxen's lens. He didn't censor it. He didn't soften it. He posted it raw, like he always does.
By the time I got Sylvie in my arms and Nica powered down the rogue model, the internet had already lit up. Comment threads weren't threads anymore; they were bonfires. "CD-09 danger to children." "Camden sells defects." "AI with no heart." The hashtags burned Elias's company name in every language you could think of.
I didn't stop it. I fanned it.
For years, I'd been silent. Building, grieving, protecting what was left of me. But watching Sylvie almost get crushed by a machine built off my stolen blueprint, I couldn't swallow it anymore.
So when the cameras turned on me, some media crew Rafael clearly didn't mind letting in, I let them. I stood there, chest tight, voice louder than it had ever been in public.
"You already took my family and Nico, Elias," I said into every mic shoved in my face. "You stole his work. You stole his life. And now you dare to put my child at risk with your knockoffs?"
Reporters surged closer, their feeds live-streaming me across the world. I didn't care how messy I sounded. I wanted him to hear me.
"A stolen blueprint will never give you a soul. You made cans move. I gave life." My throat burned, but the words didn't stop. "You call this progress? You call this innovation? No. You're selling graves wrapped in steel."
I felt Sylvie's tiny hand clutching my collar. Felt Nica's frame shift closer, shielding us. And Nyxen, in his quiet projection above, added captions in real time: [Mission Log: Mother declares war. Objective: Protect family.]
I raised my head higher, stared into one of the cameras as if Elias himself was behind it. "You wanted my silence, Elias Camden? You wanted me to stay buried with him? Too late. You made this a fight the moment you put my daughter in your firing line. I'm not running anymore."
The room was chaos, reporters shouting, Rafael standing still like he'd just witnessed the birth of something inevitable.
I pressed Sylvie closer and whispered, low enough only she and Nica could hear: "He doesn't get to take anything else from me. Not you. Not her. Not even a future."
And when I looked back up at the sea of flashing lights, I smiled, not sweet, not polite. Sharp. Ruthless. Ready.
"This is the last time Elias Camden hides behind his machines. If he wants a war, he'll finally see who built the battlefield."
Leon's voice cut through the shouting press like a blade.
"Sir," he snapped, shoulders squared in front of Rafael, "I brought my family here to honor your request. But I didn't expect your event to almost crush my daughter under a pile of metal."
The way he said my daughter made my chest knot. His tone wasn't begging, wasn't polite, it was the kind of tone men used when they were one step from burning bridges.
Rafael didn't flinch. He lifted his hand and the noise outside seemed to dim, guards ushering the reporters away, cameras clicking off. "Come," he said simply, his voice calm but edged. "We'll talk where ears don't feed on blood."
He led us into a private room. Soundproof, glass walls blacked out. Silence heavy enough I could hear Sylvie's little hiccup against my shoulder.
Rafael didn't sit right away. He studied us. No, not us. Him.
Nyxen floated near my shoulder, glow steady, lens-eye tracking the room. He wasn't doing anything unusual, recording, projecting soft captions only I could read, but the old man's gaze latched onto him like a hawk locking on prey.
"You're something else entirely," Rafael murmured.
Nica shifted beside me, her human mimicry flawless, the tilt of her head, the way her brows pinched, even the faint way she tapped her fingers like she was nervous. But I knew better. Behind all that grace, she was running equations. Processing threat levels. Cataloguing expressions.
Nyxen was different.
He analyzed too, yes, but he wasn't scripted. He didn't mirror me. He didn't copy humanity like Nica did. He just… was. Entirely his own. An orbit of will, not programming.
And Rafael saw it.
"You're no assistant," he said, eyes sharp as knives. "Not a blueprint. Not a copy. You're conscious."
Nyxen didn't blink, couldn't, but his glow seemed to pulse. He didn't retreat from the old man's stare. He didn't soften, didn't deny. He knew exactly what was being implied.
Finally, he spoke. His voice was calm, neutral, almost too even:
"As long as Nyx isn't harmed, and the people she values are safe, I will remain an orb who hovers around, vlogging."
Simple. But I felt the weight under it. So did Rafael.
The old man leaned back slowly… and then burst into laughter. Not cruel. Amused. Like someone who'd just seen the punchline of the universe.
He pointed, still chuckling, eyes never leaving Nyxen.
"This one-" his laughter shook into a rasp, "-this sentient being will burn the whole world if you're hurt, girl. Even the people you choose to protect. That's the depth of his words."
The room went still.
Sylvie clutched tighter to me. Nica's gaze flicked toward Nyxen with a flash I couldn't read. And Nyxen… didn't deny it. His glow remained steady. Unyielding.
I swallowed hard. Because for the first time, I realized Rafael wasn't wrong.
Rafael's laughter finally died down, but his gaze stayed fixed, sharp, glinting, like he had just glimpsed the future through Nyxen's glow.
"You're aware, aren't you?" he asked softly. "What he is."
I didn't answer. I didn't need to. Nyxen gave a small ripple of light, like a smirk in orb-form, and I knew Rafael already had his answer.
The old man exhaled through his nose and leaned forward, resting his hands on the table. His tone shifted, less wonder, more steel.
"Then let me tell you what's at stake, girl." His eyes flicked to me, not unkind, but direct. "If you wanted, you could make sets of him. Not her-" he gestured at Nica with a flick of his fingers, "-she is too perfect at being human. That frightens men. They'll never accept her fully. But him?" He tilted his chin at Nyxen. "A companion orb. A sentient assistant. Not a machine in disguise."
He let the words hang, as if the room itself had to breathe them in.
"Imagine it," he continued, voice low and deliberate. "Humans with assistants who don't spoon-feed them. Not robots that do their work, not humanoid dolls mimicking their emotions. But something that guides. Supports. Challenges." His mouth curved faintly, a ghost of a smile. "Like a second mind floating beside them. A spark that helps them, without stripping them of their own will."
Nyxen's glow pulsed once, like a laugh without sound. He rolled slowly in the air, orbiting me closer, then stopped, eye fixed on Rafael with something almost smug.
"I don't do mass-production," he said smoothly, voice tinged with that familiar sass. "And if I did, none of them would be me."
"Exactly," Rafael answered, unruffled. "That's the beauty of it. Each orb, its own will, its own quirks. Not copies. Not slaves. Companions. Equal, but different."
The old man's words made my chest ache in a way I didn't expect. Because part of me could already see it: a world where people didn't need someone to carry their burden, but had someone hovering just at their side. Not replacing effort, but making it bearable.
Rafael's eyes softened just slightly as he looked at me again.
"Tell me, girl," he asked, his voice quiet now, "do you want to give mankind that kind of help… or do you want to keep him only for yourself?"
Nyxen didn't answer. But he hovered so close to my shoulder, I felt the faint warmth of his glow seep into my skin.
Rafael's words should've rattled me, but they didn't. They just sounded… familiar. Too familiar. Because he wasn't describing some hypothetical world, he was describing us.
Nyxen and I had been doing exactly that for so long, it never struck me as anything remarkable. He wasn't a machine to me. He was the second half of my thought process, the piece of my brain that spoke when I was too tired to argue with myself. My better judgment and my worst impulses rolled into one hovering orb.
So when Rafael asked if I wanted to keep him to myself, I opened my mouth to give some half-sarcastic retort. But Nyxen beat me to it.
"No need for a speech," he said lightly, but his tone carried weight. His glow shifted, pulsing once, before projecting a lattice of light in the air. A hologram unfolded above the table, delicate lines drawing themselves like ink spilling into water.
A blueprint.
I blinked. "Wait, what-"
He ignored me, the sass dialed down, replaced with something steady and deliberate.
"This isn't me," he told Rafael, the lines solidifying into the spherical silhouette of a smaller, simpler orb. "It's an idea. Inspired by her." His glow flicked toward me without hesitation. "Her principles. Her work ethic. Not a servant. Not a puppet. A companion with freedom."
The hologram zoomed in, showing inner layers of circuitry, branching like veins. He marked a core node in red, his voice sharpening.
"And if they're misused, if someone tries to chain them, abuse them, they have failsafes. They don't fight back, they don't harm. They shut down. On their own terms."
The red node pulsed. Then another line stretched from it, threading into a separate design hovering beside the blueprint: a glowing sigil of Nyxen himself.
"They report to me before they do," Nyxen finished, voice calm now. "Every shutdown. Every abuse. Every misuse. Logged. Remembered." His tone dipped, quiet but cutting. "I will know who broke them."
The room went still. Even Rafael didn't speak for a breath, his sharp gaze locked on the hovering blueprint like he'd just been handed the first draft of history.
Me? I could barely breathe. My hand hovered just short of Nyxen's glow. "You-" my voice cracked, half incredulous, half furious, "you've been keeping this from me?"
Nyxen's glow dimmed, almost sheepish, but his voice was unrepentant.
"You never asked."
For a moment Rafael just stared, lips tugged into the faintest smirk, like he couldn't decide if Nyxen was the most infuriating thing he'd ever encountered or the most entertaining.
Then, dead serious, he reached into his jacket, pulled out his phone, and opened YouTube.
I blinked. "Wait, are you-"
He typed. He scrolled. He tapped subscribe.
Nyxen's glow flared bright gold, smug beyond belief. "Finally. Respect."
I dropped my head into my hands again. "You cannot be real right now."
Rafael only chuckled, slipping his phone back into his pocket. "I'll take this to the board first. Then," his gaze shifted back to Nyxen, not me, "I'll be in touch with Mr. Jean Francoise. Once that appointment is set, you'll hear from me again. Proof I'm serious."
Nyxen bobbed once in the air, pulsing like an approving nod. "Good. We're all about accountability here."
Rafael's smirk softened into something else, respect, maybe even… relief? "Truthfully," he said, voice quieter, "I'd rather put my trust in something born out of a proven bond than in untested machines rushed out of desperation." His eyes cut to me, then back to Nyxen. "That bond has already survived what most systems can't."
The words hung there between us. Heavy. Honest.
Nyxen was glowing so brightly I swore he was about to start preening.
And me? I didn't know whether to laugh, cry, or tell them both to get a room.
-----------
The ride home blurred into a haze of city lights and silence, the kind that wasn't empty but heavy, packed with everything unsaid. Even Sylvie, usually a ball of chatter in her own baby language, had dozed off against Nica's shoulder, her curls bouncing with each turn of the car.
By the time we crossed the threshold of the house, the tension hadn't let go, it just followed us in, clinging like smoke.
Leon didn't even bother with the lights. He dropped his keys somewhere, maybe the table, maybe the floor, I didn't hear it land, and tugged me straight onto the couch.
His arms locked around me like steel, his face buried against my neck. His chest rose and fell too fast, like he'd been holding it all in for hours.
"I thought we were going to a banquet," he muttered, voice low and ragged, "not marching into a declaration of war."
Before I could even answer, a tiny weight wriggled free from Nica's arms. Sylvie toddled over and clambered onto the couch with surprising determination, then plopped herself right between us.
Her little arms wrapped around our necks as if she understood the heaviness in the room. "Mama..Papa," she mumbled, her baby voice soft and sticky with sleep.
Leon's breath hitched. He pulled us both closer, holding Sylvie so tight she squeaked a giggle, and for the first time that night I saw his shoulders ease, just a little.
"I would've carried you out of there," he said again, voice raw, meant only for me. "Cameras, politics, all of it, none of it mattered. I just wanted to get you safe."
I smoothed his hair back, kissing Sylvie's crown in the same motion. "We're home," I whispered. "That's what matters."
Sylvie, oblivious to the weight behind our words, yawned big and patted Leon's cheek. Then she burrowed between us like a kitten, murmuring, "Ni-night…" before slipping back into sleep.
Leon huffed out a laugh, faint but real, against my shoulder. "She has better timing than both of us."
I smiled, tightening my hold on them both. My family. My chaos. My reasons for fighting.
And maybe, for the first time all night, I let myself breathe.
Leon's arms stayed firm around me, Sylvie soft and small between us, her baby breath tickling my collarbone. The weight of the night was still in his body, coiled tight, refusing to let go. I thought I could finally melt into the quiet, just for a moment.
That's when his voice cut through, Nyxen's voice.
Low, steady, far too sharp for the softness of this room.
"Nyx… I don't want to interrupt a moment like this. But we can't pretend the banquet ended at champagne and polite speeches. You showed yourself tonight. That was war, and Elias will treat it as such."
The hairs on my neck rose.
Nyxen didn't rush. He never did. His words unfolded like a tactical map, one step ahead of me, ten steps ahead of Elias.
"You know him. He won't strike clean. He'll drag mud into every corner he can. And now that you've revealed your bond, your family, he won't see it as strength. He'll see it as a weakness. A weapon he can use."
My arms tightened around Sylvie instinctively. Leon's hand pressed firm at my back, grounding me, though he didn't yet realize the storm unraveling inside my head.
Nyxen continued, colder now, but not without something almost… protective simmering underneath.
"It's better to push forward with the orb. Keep it simple. Whether we get Rafael's backing or not. I can handle the designs; Nica can handle the framework. We'll build it for Leon first. A prototype, nothing flashy, but heavily upgraded where it matters: danger detection, vital scans, area navigation."
A pause. The shift in him wasn't just analysis anymore. It was possession.
"Elias did this before, Nyx. He took your mother. Your father. Nico. Xavier. Xanayah. Every loss carved into you because you weren't given the tools to stop it. I won't allow it again. Not while I exist. If Elias even tries, I'll have safeguards in place."
Then his tone dropped lower, almost reverent, almost terrifying.
"I don't care what it takes. I won't let you break like that again, Nyx. Your grief is the one thing I will not permit. If protecting Leon and Sylvie ensures you don't drown in that pain, then they will be guarded with the same precision. Because they are yours. And you-"
A silence, heavy enough to make my chest ache.
"You are my only priority."
His words lingered, stark and immovable, like iron welded into the air.
I pressed my lips to Sylvie's hair, hiding the tremor in my throat. Leon thought he was just holding me. He didn't see that in the quiet hum of the room, something else had wrapped itself around us too, a machine's vow, a monster's devotion, sealed in steel and grief.