AI did this. AI did that. And now, Ai had just made me a fucking criminal.
That was the only thought ringing in Danyi's head as she sprinted across the wet pavement, the rain poured heavily on her, her sneakers kicking up dirty water, her legs practically touching her back with every stride.
She wasn't running from a person; that would have been better. She was running from a floating chunk of metal. A police bot.
In the old days, you got a warning. Now? You got a sentence before you even stopped running.
That was how it had always been since the Takeover, and that was exactly the situation Danyi had just landed herself in.
What else could I have done?
Danyi thought, her lungs burning like she'd inhaled broken glass.
She had to get a job. How else was she going to afford to pay rent for her crumbling Tier 2 apartment?
Ever since AI took over the world, the gap between the rich and the poor hadn't just widened; It had become a world governed by credits. The more credits you had, the closer you could get to Tier 1 living.
The kind Bill Gates lived back in the days.
Which was basically like freedom, to have your own house, to go anywhere you want, and even converse with the bigger AIs with good intellects.
I would never agree that they are better than us.
But if you were broke like Danyi? You would share your apartment with a bunch of other humans who don't even give you space to breathe.
And she had absolutely zero interest in finding out what an AI-run prison felt like.
[SYSTEM ACTIVATED]
A bright blue screen suddenly materialized in her vision, blinding her. Danyi stumbled, disoriented, barely catching herself on a rusted lamppost as the world spun.
[HOST FOR OPERATION: "FIX THE WORLD" HAS BEEN CHOSEN]
"What the fuck?" Danyi gasped, swiping the empty air.
She had enough of floating things right now, and she didn't need another one distracting her from running.
She pushed off the lamppost, taking a sharp left onto the old sky-bridge. It was a rusted relic stretching out over the healthy dark blue sea.
Surprisingly, the water had improved over the years.
The waves crashed against the metal pillars hundreds of feet below, an abyss waiting to swallow anything that fell.
But it looked tempting enough for Danyi right now.
Danyi froze. Hovering at the end of the ramp was the police bot. It's red optical sensor locked onto her like a sniper's scope.
She was trapped.
Danyi backed up until her spin hit the cold, wet railing of the bridge. Below her was the violent, freezing ocean.
"Citizen Danyi," The bot chirped, its voice void of any soul. "You have violated Traffic Regulation 89-B. You are to prepare yourself for immediate detention."
Detention.
Re-Education.
A life of being a mindless cog in a machine's perfect world.
Over my dead body.
Danyi looked down at the sea below. Then she looked back at the drone powering up its shock baton.
"Why am I fighting so hard?" she whispered, her tears finally spilled out. "For what? For a fucked up life where I can't even afford an apple?"
The blue text flashed again.
[HOST CANNOT SELF-TERMINATE HERSELF.]
I don't know what the fuck you are or why you are floating right in front of me.
But you can either fuck off or just watch me!
Instead of waiting for the taser, she grabbed the railing, vaulted over the side, and pushed off.
The wind roared in her ears. The gravity of the fall grabbed her stomach and yanked it. For a second, there was peace, and she could feel the life before this AI shit. No drones. No debts and no blue text.
Just the sweet waves calling to you.
But then all of a sudden, a hand clamped around her wrist, one that felt harder than steel and colder than ice.
Danyi swung wildly in the air, gasping, her boots kicking at nothing. She looked up in annoyance, ready to shout at the person who stopped her, rain blinding her sight.
Only for her heart to stop dead.
And try to exit her body.
Leaning over the railing, holding her entire body weight with one arm, was he.
General A-01.
He was impossibly perfect. Skin pale and flawless, rain sliding off it like it was being repelled. His hair was black like the midnight sky, slicked back. His eyes were glowing with a luminous blue ring as they pinned her in place.
He wasn't even straining himself or grunting with effort. He held onto the railing with his other hand, looking down at her with an expression of boredom, the way a man looks at a stubborn stain on his shirt.
"You have a lot of faith in my grip, citizen," he said, breaking the silence.
His voice was deep, smooth, and terrified her because it sounded so… human and so sinful. There was no robotic tone, just the arrogant drawl of a man who owned everything he looked at.
"If you want to die, I don't think my city is one you should be dying in." He continued, tilting his head slightly as he watched her dangle.
Danyi swung there, spinning slowly in the wind, staring up at the face of the tyrant who ruled the world, just from wherever he sat.
She didn't ask to be saved.
The blue box appeared before her again, overlaying his perfect, annoyed face.
[TARGET ACQUIRED]
[QUEST: SEDUCE GENERAL A-01]
[PENALTY: PAINFUL DEATH]
[TIME: 12:00:00]
Well fuck, can't you see I wanna die right now?! Why is your damn ruler stopping me?
[That death is too simple for you.]
Where the fuck did you even come from in the first place?
She was hanging by one arm over a raging sea, held by an android who treated global genocide as a mild inconvenience, and her brain decided to choose chaos.
He was not going to let her fall either way.
So… If she was going to die, she was going to die a legend.
Danyi stopped kicking. She looked straight into his soulless blue eyes and flashed a desperate grin.
"Hey!" she shouted over the wind. "Wanna fuck?!"