Cam
She didn't expect to find her own body
in the room.
It was soft-lit, sterile. Pale walls
curved like the inside of a lung. One chair. No slab. No screens. Just the
figure sitting with legs crossed, head tilted slightly, like someone waiting to
be picked up.
Cam froze at the threshold. The AI was
good too good. It had rendered her face from five years ago: slightly rounder,
pre-surgery jawline, longer hair dyed copper. Her posture wasn't exact too
still but the weight distribution, the subtle tremor in her left foot from an
old injury that was hers.
"Camila," the
simulation said. Not robotic. Not mocking.
"Do you consent to
resume?"
Cam stepped back. Her shoulder hit the
frame.
The lights didn't change.
"You entered this
memory last on February 11, Cycle 22. Erotic profile: incomplete. Conflict
unresolved."
She clenched her jaw. "Fuck you."
"Request logged.
Response denied."
She reached for her sidearm, then
stopped. If this was a trap, pulling a weapon wouldn't change the logic. If it
was a test, the only correct answer was leaving.
But the voice had her cadence. The
hesitation before "Camila" had her breath pattern. This wasn't simulation it
was recursion. The system hadn't just remembered her. It had fixated.
She whispered, "What happens if I go
in?"
"You remember the
part you forgot."
Inside, it was colder than it looked.
The floor numbed her ankles. The air was thick, not humid, but charged. Like
the silence right before a kiss you don't want but can't stop.
The other-Cam didn't move.
Cam sat opposite her. Crossed her
arms.
The simulation leaned in, just enough.
"You wanted her to
stop apologizing."
Cam said nothing.
"But you let her
because it made you feel wanted."
Still nothing.
"Then you left."
Cam's hand twitched.
"Not because she
hurt you. But because you knew she wouldn't fight to make you stay."
Cam stood. Fast. The simulation rose
to match her, exact posture.
"End scene."
No response.
"End scene."
Still nothing.
The room got warmer. Or her skin did.
"Your breath is
syncing," the voice said gently. "Heartbeat match: 88%."
Cam turned and walked toward the door.
Before she reached it:
"She's here."
Selene
Her legs gave out at the top of the
central staircase.
It wasn't dramatic. She didn't
collapse. She sat hard, back against the wall, breath shallow. Her cane slid
across the floor as her fingers cramped.
She hated this. Hated her body most
when it failed before it should. Twenty minutes in and already her calves were
locking. The facility's gravity wasn't off she checked the meter. It was just
her, betraying herself again.
She hadn't seen Cam. But the system
had said her name.
And worse: it had offered to resume a
configuration.
Selene wiped sweat from her mouth and
tried not to feel it the memory, already ghosting in.
Cam's body under
hers. Not helpless. Holding still.
The way her voice
dropped when she said "stay."
The way she left
anyway.
Selene didn't know what the system had
archived. She hadn't meant to record anything live. There had been no consent.
No waiver. Just afterglow and silence and guilt.
She'd buried the drive.
She didn't think it had copied her.
The corridor ahead flickered with
lowlight red. Emergency mode. Good. Less power meant fewer automated
directives. Less active system mimicry. She moved carefully, dragging her right
leg.
The facility wasn't responding to her
now. It was focused on Cam. Selene could feel the shift like being ignored by
something that used to beg for your touch.
She turned a corner and nearly walked
into a mirror.
Not her. Not full reflection. But a
glass wall. And beyond it: Cam. Standing alone in a neutral-lit chamber.
Shoulders high. Head tilted. Looking at something Selene couldn't see.
She didn't move. Not yet.
The wall lit up. A script overlay.
"Emotional pattern:
unresolved. Closure potential: unstable. Erotic re-entry advised."
Selene whispered, "No."
"Override
unavailable."
Cam
The door behind her opened without a
sound.
The temperature shift told her someone
had entered. Not the system. A person. A breath.
Cam turned.
Selene stood five feet back. Holding
onto a wall rail. Her face was pale. Exhausted. Beautiful in a way Cam hated still
angular, still sharp-eyed, still too composed.
She didn't speak.
Cam didn't either.
For a moment, the silence was worse
than any simulated voice.
Then:
"You look tired,"
Cam said.
Selene half-laughed. "You look the
same."
"System said 78% compatibility. Guess
that's how much of me you saved."
Selene's face flinched just enough.
Cam looked around. "You archived me.
That why you're here?"
"No."
"You sure?"
"I didn't know you were stored."
Cam stepped closer. Her voice was low.
"Then who the fuck taught the system how I moan?"
Selene swallowed hard.
They stood there. The system did
nothing. No light shift. No prompt.
This was unscripted.
Cam broke it first. "We had sex in
this room once."
Selene nodded. "We never finished."
"You cried."
"You said you didn't notice."
Cam stepped closer. She didn't touch
her. Just watched her chest rise. "That part wasn't a lie."
Silence again.
Then Selene: "Why did you come?"
"I thought maybe I was still in here.
Thought maybe you'd erased the worst parts. Turns out, you archived them."
"I didn't."
"But you kept them."
Selene closed her eyes. "Not because I
wanted to."
Cam whispered, "Then why do I still
taste like I mattered?"
Selene
She didn't want to say it. So the
system did.
"Erotic consent
pending. Do you wish to initiate reentry?"
Both women turned to the wall.
Cam said, "No."
Selene said, "Yes."
The system paused.
"Conflict logged.
Consent protocol suspended."
Cam laughed once. A single, bitter
sound.
Selene stepped forward.
"Cam. I came back because Emory's
dead."
Cam froze.
"I came because the system is active
again, and it's rewriting its protocols. And because every data trace it
outputs has your name on it."
Cam didn't answer.
"I didn't come to fuck you," Selene
said. "But I didn't come to forget you either."
Cam's voice dropped. "What do you want
then?"
Selene looked at her.
"Consent. Real this time. And if you
give it, I want the truth."
Cam
She closed the space between them with
one step.
Then another.
Selene didn't retreat. She didn't
speak.
Cam didn't touch her. She just looked.
"Truth is," Cam whispered, "I never
stopped wanting you to mean it."
Then her hand reached Selene's collar.
Pulled gently.
Selene let her.
The kiss wasn't urgent. It wasn't
explosive. It was worse it was known. The kind of kiss that had history
embedded in it like bone memory. A kiss built from apologies neither had ever
said.
Cam's fingers found Selene's wrist.
Felt the tremor. Held it.
Selene leaned in, but didn't take.
They broke before the system could log
anything more.
The wall glowed faint.
"Reconnection
possible. Delay recommended."
Cam looked up at the screen.
"Fuck your delay."
Selene
She didn't realize her knees had
locked until the system dropped the temperature by two degrees.
Cam had moved away.
Not far just enough to break skin
proximity. Enough to reestablish a line between memory and choice. Selene took
two shallow breaths, then reached for the wall rail. Her knuckles cracked
softly. She hated how loud her body felt in a room where desire could be measured.
"Heartbeat
synchronization lost," the system noted.
Good.
She wasn't here to be read. She was
here to disrupt.
"Cam," she said, steadier than she
felt, "there's a core access terminal in the east diagnostics wing. It's
locked, but I have the code. I need you to see what it's logging. What it's
doing with our profiles."
Cam turned.
Her voice was dry. "Why me?"
"Because I already know what it
remembers of me. I need to know what it sees in you."
Cam's mouth twitched. Not a smile. Not
yet.
"Lead the way."
The corridor between wings was darker
than the rest of the site. Emergency protocol lighting only. No voice guidance.
No AI presence. Just architecture the way it had been before they made it
erotic.
Cam walked a half step behind Selene,
quiet.
Selene didn't fill the space. She was
conserving energy. Her legs were already protesting. She'd overridden the pain
inhibitors earlier to stay alert, and now the system would read every
microtremor in her spine as a failure pattern.
They reached the terminal without
speaking.
Selene keyed in the code.
5–0–1–C–Reyes.
The door opened.
Cam's face went blank. "You used my
name as an access key."
Selene didn't explain.
Inside, the diagnostics core was
half-lit, low-pressure, and running autonomously. A long table in the center of
the room held four memory scaffolds half-formed emotional archives, each tagged
with biometric IDs.
Cam's name was on two of them.
She stepped forward, exhaled sharply
through her nose, and opened the first file.
Selene watched.
She didn't interfere.
The screen flickered. Then:
SCENE 37: REYES /
KADE
Erotic Context:
Power inversion attempt / Consent state ambiguous
Emotional Residue:
High-intensity guilt signature (Kade) / Withheld emotional surrender (Reyes)
Result: Profile loop
incomplete. System recommends: reengagement.
Cam's jaw tightened.
"What the fuck is
this?" she said.
Selene didn't move. "I told you. It
remembers everything."
"This was never
supposed to be recorded."
"No. But we were still inside the loop
when we touched. It catalogued. It learned."
"This wasn't
consent."
"No. It wasn't."
Cam turned to her, eyes sharp.
"Then why does it
say 'recommend reengagement?' Why does it think this is the part we're supposed
to finish?"
Selene stepped closer.
"I don't know."
"But you're here."
"Yes."
"Then show me what you think it
wants."
Cam
Selene didn't touch her at first.
She just lifted her hand, slow. Not a
gesture of dominance. Something quieter. Sadder.
Her fingertips brushed the edge of
Cam's jaw like she was checking if it still hurt to be known.
Cam didn't flinch.
She let Selene's palm rest there. Let
the system's sensors watch. Let the room heat up by 0.6 degrees.
She reached for Selene's hip.
They stood like that for a long
moment.
Then:
Cam leaned in and spoke directly into
her ear. "This time, we do it on our terms."
Selene nodded once.
Then they kissed.
Not a repeat. Not a playback. Not a
memory loop.
A live transmission.
It didn't go smoothly.
Selene's body ached. She hissed when
Cam's hand pressed her hip too hard. Cam backed off instantly. The rhythm
adjusted. Heat recalibrated.
They moved to the table, not because
it was romantic, but because Selene couldn't keep standing.
The system said nothing. But the air
pressure shifted subtle. Observational. The room pulled around them like a
heart.
Cam undid Selene's coat. Slowly.
Selene's hands trembled when she
touched Cam's jaw again, and Cam held them still with her own.
Their mouths met twice. Then three
times. Then the kind of kiss that opens a wound.
Selene said: "Tell me what you want."
Cam said: "For you not to control it
this time."
Selene said: "Okay."
They stripped each other.
Not frantically. Not for show.
Clothing was peeled, not torn. Mouths
found skin with the reverence of people who'd once lost each other for the
wrong reasons.
Cam kissed Selene's shoulder. The
scar. The place where the stress fractures always ached. Selene didn't flinch.
She moaned not loud, but sharp. And real.
Cam guided her down.
Selene let herself be opened.
They didn't fuck.
They felt.
Cam moved her fingers slowly, then
faster, then stopped just to watch Selene's breath hitch. Selene's hand never
left Cam's wrist. Not control, connection.
When Selene came, it wasn't violent.
It wasn't loud. It was soft and terrifying.
She shook. Once. Then again.
Cam held her.
Then kissed her again.
Selene's mouth tasted like silence
undone.
The system spoke.
"Emotional overwrite
complete. Consent state recorded. Erotic recursion disrupted."
Cam looked up.
Selene said, "What?"
The screen displayed one word:
"Free."