Meet The Carsons free porn video

"At what point shall we expect the approach of danger? By what means shall we fortify against it? Shall we expect some transatlantic military giant to step the ocean and crush us at a blow? Never! All the armies of Europe, Asia, and Africa combined, with all the treasure of the earth (our own excepted) in their military chest, with a Bonaparte for a commander, could not by force take a drink from the Ohio or make a track on the Blue Ridge in a trial of a thousand years. At what point, then, is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us it must spring up amongst us; it cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen we must live through all time, or die by suicide." -Abraham Lincoln Young Men's Lyceum of Springfield, Illinois January 27, 1838 Meet the Carsons by Erin Tyler Okay, this is going to bug me for the rest of my life. Pictures of President Bellows' face were plastered all over his capital city of Toronto: on the sides of buildings; on flyers that were glued to lamp posts; in windows of homes and businesses; anywhere that they could go. There weren't many people on the streets in the early morning hours, given the 9 pm - 7 am curfew he had laid down, so there weren't many people who saw his face in the morning. That's not what bugs me, though. What bugs me is what he looked like. Whenever I see his face, I think of an actor from my time, 2015, whose name, for the life of me, I can't remember. I can't even really remember what he's been in. What I do remember, vaguely, is a TV show that actor was on, about the patriarch of a wealthy family who's arrested, and his middle son has to take over the family business while dealing with the rest of his ridiculous family of upper-crust clowns. I remember that it was a comedy, and the actor I have in mind played the patriarch. I can't help but remember that guy whenever I think of President Bellows. What was that actor's name? I'll never remember. Fucking amnesia. Anyway, Walter Matheson lived in a clean townhouse opposite an abandoned mall and flanked by smaller, lesser homes. Every morning, after he got ready for work and stepped outside, he found a horse-drawn carriage there, waiting for him by the curb. Two of the president's secret service men, clad in their gray uniforms with black belts, gold-painted buttons, stiff shoulder pads, and short gray caps, would be there: one behind the horses, the other standing at attention to wait for Walter to board. Walter would ride through the streets of Toronto and behold the heralds of the president's grand design: large ships, welded together from the scraps of old hulks, which would soon be launched to plow Lakes Huron, Michigan, Erie, Ontario, and parts of Superior. They would spread President Bellows' vision of a Re-United States of America across the Great Lakes and beyond. However, there was still something holding him back; there was still somewhere he could not go. Walter had received news on that front the night before, and he was going to see the president about it that day. The New White House (which was actually mostly brown, and black where the mold hadn't been cleaned off yet) was located on a hill that overlooked the city. President Bellows had gravel shipped in at great expense from his hometown in Kalamazoo to create a new road leading up to his manor. Trees had been planted along the front edge of his lawn, and they were kept neatly trimmed by slaves from Sandusky. Walter glanced at them as he was driven up toward the presidential mansion. He saw one trimming the shrubs in front of the house that caught his attention. Something about the back of the slave's head -- his dark, spiky hair and thin neck -- seemed familiar. The slave seemed to feel Walter's gaze on him before he saw him, and he turned his head to face him. After a second, Walter recognized the slave: it was Trevor, his childhood friend. They had grown up in the same orphanage together. Walter had heard he had moved to Sandusky. He had wondered if he was there when the president came. Now he knew. He started to call out to Trevor, to wave to him. He lifted his arm ever-so-slightly... ...But the secret service man sitting next to him pushed it down. "No interacting with the slaves," he said. Walter remembered where he was, and sat still and silent. He wasn't President Bellows' first secretary. He hoped to be his last. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the despondent Trevor return to trimming the shrubs. The president was sitting in his dining room at the end of his long, dark mahogany table, eating scrambled eggs and sausages slowly and patiently with a tiny fork and a bowie knife. He would carefully remove a piece of sausage from his fork with his thin teeth and chew it, savoring the flavor with each bite. The president was a man of "sensation," as he had put it. He felt things. Big things. Grand things. So the tiny things were a nice break from the norm. Walter lowered his gaze as he entered. The president's guest, Admiral Watts, was sitting at the other end of the table, and he wasn't wearing a shirt. The aging man was sagging in his seat after a long night. Walter tried not to look at the man's hands, and what the men in his basement had done with his fingernails using only a pair of pliers. Black, oozing marks speckled his arms and chest. The president cocked his head around his high-backed chair and peeked at Walter. "Oh!" He wiped off the edges of his thin lips with a perfectly white napkin. "Good morning, Walter!" he chimed in his deep, sonorous voice. "And how are we this fine day?" "...We... are... well, sir," Walter said. At this angle and this close to the president's chair, Walter could see a figure moving in the shadowed corner of the room. He squinted a little, and saw a figure hunched over a bowl and chewing on something. The president's eyes traced his secretary's gaze to the figure. He put two fingers in his mouth and whistled loudly. The figure stopped what it was doing and sat still. "Spot! What's that you have there?" the president called out. "Spot" didn't move. "Here, boy! Come over here!" He patted his left knee. "Spot" jogged out of the shadows, revealing himself to be a boy, about 16 or 17, running on all fours. His body was lean and gaunt, his red hair shaved into a mohawk. A small rope was tied around his head, and two loose flaps of fabric hung from it, like a dog's ears. A bright red collar with a tiny metal tag was fastened around his neck. He wore brown, ragged leather shorts held up by a belt laced with grenades, a small knife on a leather loop on his upper left arm, and a rusty orange landmine on his otherwise bare chest, held up by a loop of rope around his neck. He jogged past Admiral Watts, who recoiled at the sight of the boy. Walter backed away as Spot came to a stop at Bellows' feet. "Oh, relax," the president said. "It's not armed. I checked." "Um..." Walter pointed at his own mouth. The president looked puzzled. Walter pointed at Spot, and the president looked back down. "...Oh!" He reached down and grabbed the thing that Spot held in his mouth. "Let go." Spot growled. "Let go!" Spot let go. Bellows held up the object for all to see. It was a gnawed human leg, severed below the knee and wearing a Republic of the North-issued army boot. The admiral groaned mournfully. "Did you take this from the crash site?" the president gently chided Spot. The boy's tongue lolled out of his mouth gleefully as he panted. "I told you not to go after wild animals! The same goes double for people!" The president put his hand to his own chest. "Honestly, I must apologize again, Admiral. The First Dog was simply supposed to run your car off the road and capture you. The explosions..." He shrugged. "...Eh! I try to give him some freedom in how he handles these things, buuut..." He sighed, and looked back at Spot. "This is not for you anymore. Go to the kitchen and get yourself a steak." Spot happily jogged away on all fours, past the Admiral and through a door. "Walter, can you get rid of this please?" He handed the leg off to Walter, who handed it to a secret service man as quickly as he could. "Now, onto business. What's the news from the east?" Walter pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped his hands off. The admiral's eyes were following him. The thin old man looked sick and tired, but angry. "...I, uh- I received a report submitted by one of the scouts last night, sir." The short man in the horn-rim glasses pulled a piece of paper out of his satchel and handed it to the president, who read it as Walter spoke. "The last town before the coast goes by the name of Parkside, sir. Population of somewhere between 800 to 900 people." "Founded 80 years ago," the president mumbled. "Minor craft exports with neighboring villages, yadda-yadda-yadda..." The president sighed and handed Walter back the paper. "This is very minor stuff, Walter," he said, mildly disappointed. "I thought you would have something important." Walter grimaced. "...I do, sir. As it turns out, Parkside is also home to a witch." This caught the president's attention. He turned in his seat and faced his secretary directly. "A witch!" "Yes, sir. Specifically, the Metal Witch of New England, sir. A.k.a., the Metal Mistress of New England, a.k.a., the Metal Mistress." "Oh, my!" The president turned back to the admiral. "Did you hear that, Admiral? They have a witch!" "Fuck you," Watts replied, spitting flecks of blood onto the table. "This makes things a little more challenging for us." The president put his elbows on the table and weaved his fingers together. "I mean, I've hunted witches before. Well... a witch. The one out in Detroit." The admiral groaned in despair again. "...She, uh..." The president tapped his chin with his finger. "She made some of the armaments for the Republic, as I seem to recall, correct? You gents up there sure do have some mighty fine guns in your war against the Dakota Nation." "You fucking monster," Watts warbled. "Oh, now, it's not like I wanted to do it!" The president stood and picked up the bowie knife he had been using to cut his sausages, then strolled toward the admiral. He was a tall man with heavy shoulders. "I could've used some new toys too, y'know! But..." He sighed and shrugged. "I've got to answer to the Lord first, and the people second, and both of them have pretty clear opinions on witches." He paused about halfway down and twirled his bowie knife point-down on the table. "I know you folks up in Montreal have some opinions about witches, too. And...," he grimaced and clicked his tongue, "they're not very good opinions to have." "Leave those women the fuck alone!" "I will, if you negotiate with me." He started to walk toward the admiral again. "You know what I want. Just let me through, Admiral. That's all I'm asking." "I told you already, I don't have the clearance for that!" "Yes, but you have ears!" The president stopped before the man tied to the chair and spoke slowly. "The ears of the other chiefs, the ear of the regent. All I need you to do... is talk to them. They'll listen to you." "They won't listen." "They will." The president put his hand on top of Watts' head. "I have faith in you, my brother. I really, truly do." Walter saw something in the man's face change. There was a spark of fear there, then it was gone. The president didn't remove his hand. Then, the admiral spoke: "We'll never let you down the St. Lawrence, you maniac." The president looked down on him, then sighed and nodded a little. "...Yes, I did hear that you've been saying that all night. Well, that's... really too bad. I was hoping to not have to go through New England and all of its little towns and villages, but... you've really left me with no other options!" The president raised his knife into the air... ...And sliced through the ropes binding admiral's right wrist. Watts jerked it back instinctively, and the president quickly and expertly sliced apart the ropes binding his left wrist. "There," the president said. "You're free to go home. I've no use trying to break the walls of Montreal -- I can't even reach them." The admiral was bewildered. "A deal with you was the only chance I had," the president explained casually. "If you're not going to negotiate like a rational person, then I've no use for you here. So go home." Admiral Watts laboriously lifted himself out of his seat, shuffled past the president and Walter, and limped down the hall toward the front door of the New White House. "But... sir," Walter said, "you have six ships ready to sail downriver right now." The president sighed as he watched Watts, thumping the handle of his knife against his palm. "Yes, and it's too bad, but Montreal's guns will blow them to pieces if we go anywhere near them." "This is a big loss." "Nnnot necessarily." The president eyed the distance between himself and Watts. "We'll scuttle the ships, rebuild them once we set up out east. It'll be more time- and labor-intensive, but at least we'll avoid open war with the Republic." He arched his thinning eyebrows in a "that-would-be-bad" way. "I suppose the admiral will let the regent know you mean no harm, then?" "Hmm... something like that." He put one foot behind himself as he wiggled the knife. "He'll pass along a message." "And what of Parkside, sir?" "We treat them the same as any other village. They'll either fly America's flag, orrr..." The president cocked back his arm and flung the knife though the air. Just as Watts made it to the lobby, the knife planted square between his shoulder blades. He fell to the floor and lay still, and he didn't move until his body was dragged away by secret service agents. Of course, I didn't witness any of that first-hand; it was probably mostly allegory and scuttlebutt, but it sounds real, or very close to real, to me. Toronto really was building ships, Admiral Arthur Watts of the Republic of the North really was kidnapped on a trip from Ottawa to Montreal, and his body really was found in a rowboat on the St. Lawrence River, about 30 miles northeast of Kingston. At the time, I was studying electronics and robotics via experimentation and the Garamond videos, which I somehow still had access to. I had originally figured that they had been planted in my old robot body, Miki-chan, but I discovered that I could keep playing them in my Natsuko body. They must have been implanted directly into my brain, I initially thought; however, after learning a little more about data storage, I discovered that one of the unusual-looking "ports" on my brain bubble was, in fact, a memory device. Someone had hooked an entire education to me. It had to be The Mistress -- who else could it be? But as I watched her, I realized how little sense that made. She still barely ever went into her junk-lab, and she never looked twice at Miki-chan. She clearly wasn't interested in the human brain she had floating around her lab (i.e., me). That, or she had unknown plans for it, plans that involved teaching it robotics. After I considered that, I slowed the videos down. I searched for subliminal messages. I looked at videos further along the lesson plan that I hadn't viewed yet and searched for any blaring red pictures that screamed "OBEY ME." However, I found none of that; as far as I could tell, it was a clean-cut set of educational videos. They were highly advanced, of course -- given that it was the mid-25th century, I learned a lot that folks back in 2015 didn't know -- but otherwise harmless. A good portion of my experimentation was actually observation: I would remove the outer casing of her gardener robots and guard robots and analyze their insides, teaching myself how she had made them work. At one point, I thought that maybe I could swap my brain out for their computer brains; however, after I got a closer look inside their heads, I found that their brains were hard-wired into their chassis, and were not removable, unlike mine and Miki-chan's. In fact, there were a lot of differences between my body and those of the guard robots. After I got a peek at Leviathan's interior while The Mistress slept, I found even more differences between him and myself. To add to my confusion, there were differences between the guard robots and Leviathan, and even between the guard robots and the gardener robots. That's another peculiar thing about this place, I thought. Why did The Mistress create Natsuko and Miki-chan one way, and every other robot in this place another? She's brilliant, but she has no unique style. Plus, she's not doing anything long-term. Most of what she does in Sky Tower is maintenance work. On the rare occasion she goes outside, all she does is bring back more junk. She doesn't interact with Parkside or build much that's original. What's her game? These thoughts were always in the back of my mind. All work and no play makes Natsuko a dull girl-bot, so I tried occupying my time in other ways as well. I tried exercise for a week. After running up 70 stories for the fifth time, I realized that artificial muscles can't grow. That's cool, I thought. I don't have to exercise because I'll never get out of shape. ...No, wait, that sucks. I'm bored. Miki-chan tried to help keep me entertained (bless her circuits) by telling me about some of what she called "The Mysteries of Sky Tower." She told me about a mysterious robot on the 50th floor she had nicknamed "Bucket-chan," who kept piles of buckets all around himself. When I found him, he was, indeed, surrounded by multiple stacks of empty plastic and metal buckets. He was sitting on an old, wet crate on the edge of the floor, looking over the town. His battery was burned out, so I replaced it. When he was back online, he simply continued to sit there and not move. I tried waving my hand in front of his eyes and speaking to him, but nothing seemed to elicit a reaction from him. Then I handed him a brittle old plastic bucket, and he came to life: he grabbed the bucket, then looked carefully inside, then around the outside edges, then the bottom. When he was done, he held the bucket out over the edge and let go. The bucket fell 50 stories and shattered against the concrete below. When I asked Bucket-chan why he did that, he said nothing. He simply sat. Then there was a mysterious book stored deep within the piles of junk in the junk-lab. Inside the front cover were hand-drawn pictures of three elderly women. Each drawing depicted their heads and shoulders within an ornately decorated oval, and they were extremely good. The first woman on the left had a calm, modest look about her, and a caption below her read "CANDACE 70-08." The second woman was plump and rosy-cheeked, with a thin but broad smile that looked very mischievous, and her caption read "BROOKE 08-23." The third woman had a severe, haughty look, with fierce, judging eyes, and her caption read "SHEILA 23-?." On the next few pages were anatomical drawings of human bodies. Some looked like they had been traced from another book, but they were also extremely well-drawn. Around the spine of the book, I found a picture of a very handsome Japanese man with tousled raven-black hair, dark eyes, and large lips. He was naked except for a poorly-drawn thong -- it looked like his genitals had been quickly erased and replaced with clothing -- and he had a lot of muscle on him. A name was written in cursive below it: "Tatsuya." To the right of that was a message in a different handwriting: "M - Very nice! I knew what you wanted (wink- wink!). Show me what he looks like when you're done. Have fun! - F.W." The page had been torn out of the book and stuffed back in. Miki-chan had no idea who any of these people were or who had drawn them. She seemed obsessed with this "Tatsuya," though -- she insisted I leave the picture out where she could see it for the night, although she couldn't explain why she wanted this. The last (and most uninteresting) mystery was a locked door on the 10th floor. ...Really, that's it. Miki-chan told me, "The stairwell door to the 10th floor is locked!" I knew this already. I asked her why, and of course, she had no idea. One entire floor was inaccessible. It was no big deal -- there were 69 more. The best thing she told me about was the steel telescope by The Mistress' bed, sitting on top of a pile of junk (big surprise there). I got in the habit of taking it out in the mornings to watch the people in Parkside below. I would sit cross-legged on the edge of the roof of Sky Tower as I watched the citizens go about their days. I had no way of learning any of their names -- I wasn't allowed into town by either The Mistress or the people of Parkside -- so I just made them up. In fact, I gave them entire lives and backstories. Some were tragic, like Mr. Smith, who spent his last days unable to walk without assistance and died one cloudy day (and then ruined the story by stepping outside the day after without his cane). Some were funny, like Mr. Mario, who not only looked like the video game character that was his namesake, but also had a penchant for mushrooms and an intense dislike of reptiles. And then there were the stories I didn't have to make up, like that of the Carsons. I recognized Alan Carson from the moment I saw him: a big, bearded, barrel-chested man in a flannel shirt, like a lumberjack who had been displaced in the apocalypse. I still owe that man a beer, I thought, for feeling up his jibbly bits. Euuuuugggghhh. The Mistress called him a leader, and I could see why: he was very outgoing and friendly, like when he would walk around town and wave at everyone he saw and talk to most of them; and he could be tough, like when he settled a dispute between two vendors over prime real estate at a busy corner of the park. The guy acted like a mayor, and he was treated as such. I sometimes saw his son Gary trailing behind him. I felt sorry for the kid -- he had tried to be forceful and bold when he confronted The Mistress, but that hadn't worked out well for him. He was clearly uncomfortable following around his father. He was no leader, he was just a young teen who didn't know what he wanted to do with his life. Add on the fact that he was living la vida post-apocalyptic, and I doubt there were a whole lot of paths open to him; he wasn't going to college, no matter what. I discovered Alan also had daughters: three of the cutest little girls in the whole town -- triplets, in fact. Those kids looked five years old, just barely. They would gambol out of their boxy blue house every morning and meander a little before running after Gary. The girls had masses of curly blonde hair on their heads that made them look like three little disheveled Shirley Temples, and each of them wore a baggy yellow sweater that I'm sure their dad put on them. One of them had a bright red letter "A" on it, the second a "B," and the third a "C" (Very classy, Mr. Carson, I thought. The Scarlet Letter must not be a thing here). Because of that, I started calling the kids the ABCs. Aside from their sweaters, their personalities also set them apart: A was very forthcoming and curious, and seemed more like her dad than any of her siblings; B was constantly climbing everything wherever she went, and she could be counted on to dive into whatever was in front of her; and C was a shy, timid thing who was always hanging back, but also always paying close attention. I didn't see a mother, nor did I see a ring on Alan's finger. After people-watching for a few hours a day every day for three weeks, I was noticed. Red Suspenders, as I called the man who had chased me off the day I tried to sell the clothing I found at Mariel's Clothiers (and who had subsequently stolen said clothes), met my gaze one morning with a pair of binoculars. I quickly put down my telescope, then peeked back through it again. There he was with a sneer on his lips -- he had seen me watching him. I had figured out he was someone within Parkside's police department -- he carried a gold star with him wherever he went and patrolled the town at night. As I saw how frequently Alan talked to him about very serious-looking matters, I concluded that he was the Chief of Police. He always looked unwashed and unshaven, prematurely gray with a low-hanging brow and a wide mouth that always made him look at least a little angry. He had muscle, but not as much as Alan; his muscle was lean and wiry. Red Suspenders hated me. Whenever I was on the ground looking in the direction of Parkside, he was down there returning my gaze, and returning it hard. I swear, it's like the guy knows where I am at all times, I thought. The guy was a flipping workaholic; I could never pin down where he lived, and he never seemed to rest. When he slept -- if he slept -- he probably did it with his assault rifle, because I never saw him without it. When he caught me watching him from the roof, he went and got Alan. I watched Alan take a peek through the binoculars at me. I waved. Although I couldn't hear them, Alan looked at Red like he was saying, "What do you think she wants?" "Nothing good," Red replied. Alan peeked through the binoculars again. "Has she done anything?" "No. She's just sitting there. God, what a freak." Alan took a moment. "I don't see the problem." Red was incredulous. "You don't see the problem! That... thing is up there!! Watching us!!" Alan brushed him off, then turned and walked away. "Tell me if she does anything that's actually bad." Red turned back to me and flipped me the bird, first with his right hand, then with both hands. I waved again, hoping that I could communicate, "Hi, I'm friendly," across the distance. I couldn't, and Red stormed off. I bet he's a real pleasure to be around, I thought. Alan probably wasn't freaked out by me because he had much bigger things to be freaked out about. Every few days, a horse-drawn carriage would pull up in front of a house, and people would come out carrying their possessions. Whatever Alan was doing, he would drop it and go running towards the house, where he would start pleading with the homeowner. It always ended the same way: the homeowner would shake his or her head, load their family into the carriage, and roll down the road out of Parkside. The third time it happened, I realized what was happening: the president was coming, and people were getting out of Dodge. A few times, I saw Alan shaking hands with tough-looking characters with lots of facial hair who carried a lot of weapons. He would wave them toward one of the abandoned houses and show them around. Mercenaries, maybe, I thought. Defend the town, get a house. Nice deal. I wonder if I can get the same deal. Oh, who am I kidding. Aside from the facts that I was about five feet tall and weighed somewhere close to 100 pounds, I couldn't move out of Sky Tower because it had what I needed to live: the neuronal gel recycler, which ran off Sky Tower's power, and the neuronal nutrition flakes, which only The Mistress could provide. I was stuck there. I wasn't about to leave and take up residence in Parkside, or even take a day trip to Parkside. The citizens would forever be on the other end of my telescope. That is, if they stuck around long enough. Then, one day, things changed. It began after I started smuggling parts out of The Mistress' home to build myself a male robot body. I figured I'd be begging to be discovered if I built it anywhere within Sky Tower, despite The Mistress' disinterest in any but the top few floors, so I decided to build it in the stockroom of Mariel's Clothier. I installed some solar panels on a side of the store not visible from Sky Tower and hooked them to lights I strung up in the stockroom. After that, I installed a simple padlock on the door for security. Just like that, I had my own (relatively) secure, lit room. If anyone passed by, they'd think The Mistress had set up an annex for herself and that it was off-limits, even though she didn't have any knowledge of it. It was a perfect plan: I was hiding in her shadow. To smuggle out the parts I needed, I found a shopping cart and brought it to the 64th floor of Sky Tower. I would carry parts down the stairwell from The Mistress' lair when she wasn't looking and stash them in the cart. I had access to Teeny whenever I wanted, but carrying parts in him would look suspicious. Riding him down empty-handed wouldn't, especially when I could just stop on the 64th floor, wheel in my parts, and ride down with them the rest of the way to the lobby. Getting set up was the easy part. Actually building the robot was hard. There was still a lot I didn't know, and although I put a lot of effort into it, I was being hampered by my lack of natural talent. Oh, sure, I could build a simple robotic claw and replace old optical sensors, but a five-fingered hand with an opposable thumb? I wasn't about to find all the parts for that in a pile of broken kitchen appliances and cell phones, of which The Mistress had an abundance. Still, I toiled. And I watched. And I read, and learned, and slept. And I did that for days and days, until the days blended together. Christmas came and went, and the only celebration I participated in was amongst the Parksiders in my imagination, and a little with Miki-chan (although I don't think she understood the concept, given that she insisted we also launch fireworks and dress like ghosts). The Mistress was expectedly bah-humbug about the whole affair (which made me think we should dress like ghosts -- three ghosts, specifically). That ended, and the citizens of Parkside rang in the new year with a show of lights, song, and home-brewed beer. The citizens of Sky Tower did not. I expected every day to go like that from then on, at least until Bellows showed up, but what could I do about that? The Mistress didn't take him seriously. The Parksiders did. There was no resolution to be seen, and I didn't know what I could do to make one. So I toiled, and watched, and read, and learned, and slept, and went in and out of my little hideaway day in and day out, working through the afternoon and locking up before nightfall. One day, just as the sun went down, I finished attaching my robot's hips to its torso. All in all, the thing looked more like some strange art piece than a semi-functional robot. I could make it move, but only with commands issued from an old laptop I dug out of the junk-lab. Actually controlling it with my brain would be the biggest hurdle. I put away my tools, switched off the lights, stepped out of the stockroom, put the padlock on the door, and turned to leave. And there was A. Needless to say, I wasn't expecting anybody besides myself in Mariel's that day. So when I saw Alan's little daughter standing right there in front of the door to the stockroom, I was, also needless to say, surprised. "Guh-dah!" I sputtered. A gave me a wide-eyed, curious look. Her mouth sagged a little as she stared. It took me a moment to process the fact that she was standing right there. I looked up and saw C hiding behind the counter, peeking at me from its shadow. B was tearing up the place, swinging from a curtain rod over one of the changing rooms. It broke and she fell on her butt, then laughed out loud, jumped up, and ran straight to me and grabbed my leg in a full-body embrace. "Wooooooowwww!" B squealed. "What is that?!" I spent the days wearing the blouse and skirt I had found at Mariel's, but I rolled up my sleeves whenever I worked on the robot to avoid getting it dirty. This left my skinless upper right arm exposed, which she pointed at. "Whuh-hey!" I replied. "Your arm is weeeeeeird!" B cried, reaching for it. C had come out of the shadows, but was still standing behind A. She whispered something into A's ear. "Is your arm metal?" A asked. "Ah, yeah-wait-" C whispered something else. "How do you make it move?" A asked. "I-it's... run by motors-how'd you get out here?!" B was climbing me, trying to reach my arm. "Stop that! I am not a tree!" I plucked her off, and she used the chance to touch my arm. "Ohhhh," she cooed. "It feels warm!" "Is it alive?" A asked, a little grossed-out. "No, it's... it's, there's a heat-look, girls, how'd you get here?! Where's your father?!" "Back in town," A replied casually. B tried to climb me again, but I put my right hand on her forehead and held her back. She tried pushing toward me anyway, panting like an eager puppy. C stepped out from behind A and got a little closer to me, also clearly fascinated by my arm, but without B's touchiness or gusto. "How'd-stop that!! Why are you here, then?!" "'Cause we heard about the metal devil out here, an' we wanted to see it. Are you it?" "I'm not a-look, I'm just..." I sighed and gave up on holding back B. I scooped her up under my right arm and let her rub and poke it all she wanted. "You three shouldn't be out here. It's dangerous in these ruins. C'mon, I'll take you to the edge of town, I'm sure Red Suspenders will-" "-Who?" A asked. C whispered something to her. "Oh, you mean the sheriff, Mr. Junior." "...Is that his name?" "Actually, it's Galen... um..." She looked to C for assistance. C whispered a word. "Galen Foster, Jr., but everyone just calls him Junior. It's Sheriff Foster, when we're supposed to be nice." That's interesting, I thought, Red Suspenders has a name. I shook my head and said, "Look, that's really great, really-" "Wooooowww!!" B was peeking into the skin of my lower arm. "It goes all the way down to her hand!!" "You need to go-" "-I'm Annabelle, by the way," A said. "That's Beatrix you're holding, but everyone calls her Bee." "Bee is short for Beatrix?! Wooow!!" "You really-wait, you didn't know?!" I blurted. "-And this is Charlotte." Shy little Charlotte didn't say anything; she just nodded politely. "We're the Carson sisters." "Yeah, I know. You have to-" "Have you been watching us?" I froze. I'm so busted, I thought. Wait... these are children! I'm over 435 years old! I grabbed her hand. "Annabelle!! Beatrix!! Charlotte!! You three are going home right now!! Charlotte, you follow me!!" Charlotte obediently followed as I carried Bee and pulled Annabelle. Bee gleefully squealed and pretended she was flying. Annabelle asked, "Can I touch your arm?" "No!" I spat. A pause, and a whisper. "Can Charlotte?" "No!!" At the door outside, I heard someone calling out their names. Alan appeared around the corner of Sky Tower, and Junior followed behind him. "Alan!!" I called out. "Over here!! I've got them!!" Alan started charging me pell-mell. When he was halfway down the street to me, I realized that he wasn't happy. He was making a beeline toward me, and he was pissed. I waved Annabelle and Charlotte toward him, but he didn't slow down. They stepped out of the way, and I was trying to put down Beatrix, but she was eagerly groping my arm and trying to get up into my shoulder. With his left hand, Alan brushed Beatrix off of my arm. With his right hand, he lifted me by the throat and slammed me into the wall behind me. "You never touch my daughters!!" he roared. "You hear me, you freak?! You never-touch-them!!" If I could feel pain or needed to breathe, I would have been more scared. Plus, I noticed at that point that although he had slammed my head against the wall, I didn't feel jarred, which suggested to me that the gel surrounding my brain had absorbed most, if not all, of the impact. I was afraid he would crush my neck, however -- he could do a lot of damage that wasn't to my brain. "I wasn't going to hurt them! I swear!" Bee was on the floor crying. Her knee was skinned. Alan was livid. "You hurt my daughter!!" "You knocked her to the floor!!" There was an assault rifle in my face. I looked down into the dark, foreboding barrel of the gun. "I'll fuckin' shoot you," Junior growled. "Lemme do it, Alan. Pop, and this bitch's over." "No!" Alan replied. "Just-just take the girls and get out of here!" Junior hesitated -- he really, really wanted to shoot me. Fuck, I thought, he's gonna do it anyway. "Take the girls and go!!" Alan barked. Junior sneered, then holstered his gun, lifted Bee in his arms, and strode out of the store. "Move it!" he ordered Annabelle and Charlotte. Annabelle hung back a moment, watching me fearfully. Charlotte's gaze was more subtle, but contained the same emotion. "Move!!" Junior repeated, without the ferocity he showed me, but with the same force. They turned and bounded down the street ahead of him, back toward Parkside. Alan, still holding me aloft by the throat, watched his girls out of the corner of his eye before turning his full attention back to me. "What do you want with my daughters?!" he yelled, shaking me violently. I held onto his hands. His grip was vice-like. "I! I-I-! "-Answer me!!" "I don't want anything!! They just showed up here!!" "Why?!" "They just... told me they wanted to see a metal devil!! Ask them!!" "Did you do something to them?!" "No!!" "Did you hurt them?!" "Jesus Christ, Alan, no!!" "What are you doing down here?!" "I've-!" I didn't want to tell him exactly what I was doing -- "metal devils" clearly weren't his thing -- but lying could come with a heavy cost. Sensors were tripping in my body, telling me that he was dangerously close to damaging my neck. "I've got a... a project down here!" "What is it?!" "It-it's complicated, Alan!! Please!" "Un-complicate it, God damn it!!" "Alan, please!!" His grip tightened. Sensors were flashing in front of my field of vision. "For Christ's sake, I'm not my boss!!" I yelled. "I'm not The Mistress!!" Alan's eye twitched. His hand opened, and I fell to the floor on my ass with a heavy thud. I rubbed my throat -- my artificial skin was wrinkled, and the metal supports within were a little bent, but the damage was mostly superficial. He pointed one finger at me with the same power. "You don't go near my daughters again, you don't come around Parkside, and you stop spying on us through that stupid fucking telescope, or I'll come up there and break it over your head!!" He bent low and got into my face. "Do I make myself clear?!" "C-crystal," I muttered. He stood up straight and walked out of the store. "And you call me Mr. Carson! You don't get to call me by my first name!" "...Y-yes... Mr. Carson." Without another word or glance, he walked down the street and out of sight. I sat on the floor of the store rubbing my neck for another minute. ...Well, I thought, I can't read lips worth shit. Fixing myself was fairly easy with the tools I had. When I arrived back at The Mistress' lair, all of the rooms were dark except for one behind the wall opposite the elevator and far off to the right. I could hear sounds of electronic static, and I saw a dull light illuminating The Mistress' scarf-wrapped face. "Come on," she growled, "one of you has to still be up!" As I peeked around the wall, I saw her speaking into an intercom microphone. "Air, I know you're awake! Come in! ...Errrrgg!" She twisted a dial in a box in front of her. "Sea? C'mon, one of your crew must be listening in. If you're there, tell Sea to wake the hell up!" After listening for a few seconds, she slammed her fist against the desk. "Damn it! Okay!" She twisted the dial again. "High Mistress! This is Metal calling High Mistress Blood! I need a status update on Gun. She's not picking up." After a minute: "Damn it!! Why the fuck won't anybody answer me?! Flesh, you there?!" There was nothing but noisy static and pale light. "God... damn it!!" She slapped the microphone off the desk and stomped across the room. She saw me before I could duck back behind the wall. I had been carrying my telescope with me, and I impulsively hid it behind my back. "What the fuck happened to your neck?!" she barked. "...I... I fell..." "You fell." "...Y-yeah." She seized the stretched rubber skin of my neck between her thumb and forefinger. "You fell and got strangled." "...Nnnngg..." She threw up her arms. "Fuck it! I don't even care! If those townie tools are screwing with you again, I'll deal with it in the morning!" She stomped into her bedroom, dropped face-down on her queen-sized bed, and fell asleep instantly. She seems angry, I thought. Maybe. Angrier than usual? I can't tell - - it seems like she's never anything but angry. I looked around the wall again and noticed that she had left the machine she had been talking into running. I walked in front of it and took a look. A metal chair with faded green leather padding sat in front of a worn wooden desk. Seven black video monitors were on the desk, two stacked on top of each other, then three to the right of those, then two. Each of them was on and only showing static. Piled on the floor around the desk were several more intact but unplugged monitors. On the desk and to the left of the active monitors was a black box with a speaker and radio tuning dials, and what looked like a small, spherical digital camera on top of that. The microphone, which was hooked to the box, was dangling from the desk. I pulled it up and placed it back in front of the monitors. Suddenly, the static blinked, and a face appeared on the topmost monitor. It was a young woman with long, thin hair mostly covering a long, thin, bespectacled and acne-troubled face, somewhere in a dark room. "Metal is no longer present," she said with a slightly croaky voice. Three more monitors suddenly blinked, and there were three more faces. In the top right was a serious-looking woman with shallow cheeks, deeply tanned skin, and dark hair with wisps of gray that was pulled back into a ponytail so tight it looked painful. To her left, in the monitor just below the thin woman, was a woman with a round, rosy face and curly locks of silver hair. Below her and to the left was an elderly African- American woman with a sagging face covered by wrinkles and spots. "That woman needs to learn to calm down," the serious woman said in a flat, cool voice that sounded like military. "She's worried, dear," the rosy-cheeked woman said with a sanguine voice. She reminded me of a grandmother; she wasn't my grandmother (I can't remember my grandmother, I thought, and felt glum), but she was someone's grandmother. "Poor Gun." "Dere's always risks in dis business," the wrinkly woman said in a thick Creole accent. "She knew dem." "I'm certain she wouldn't want us to mourn her loss," serious woman said. "Have we made any plans for recovery?" "I was going to send Metal," rosy-cheeked woman said, "but it sounds like this Bellows fellow is blocking the way." "So we're going-" serious woman started to say, right before she was cut off by thin woman. "-Attention. Further analysis reveals Station Metal is still signed on." There was a pause from the four women. "...Busted," serious woman said. "I tink she left, though," wrinkly woman said. "...Dear?" rosy-cheeked woman asked. "Are you still there?" Another pause. "Dear? We weren't avoiding you." "Yes, we were," serious woman said, with a slight growl. "Oh, Sea!" rosy-cheeked woman chided. "Dear? If you can hear or see us, please respond." I thought to myself, Who are these people? "Station Metal is not responding," thin woman said. "We know, Air," serious woman (who rosy-cheeked woman had called "Sea," for some reason) grumbled. "If there's an open line at Metal's, we can't continue this conversation securely. I'm hanging up." I pushed the button on the microphone before thinking about it. "No! Don't go!" Oh, shit, I thought. Sea leaned toward her screen. "That's not Metal," she rumbled. "Who is this?" The women awaited my response. I'm Station Metal, I thought. My hand hovered over the microphone button before I tentatively pushed it. "...Ahh-um-" I let go of the button. Rosy-cheeked woman giggled. "It sounds like we have a little spy! Don't be afraid, dear. We won't bite." "Show yourself," Sea said. I pushed the button. "...I... I don't know how..." "Do you have de camera on?" wrinkly woman asked. Now I'm busted, I thought. I could have just ended it there, but if these women knew The Mistress, it would still come back to bite me in the ass. I might as well get some information while I'm doing something stupid, I thought as I plugged the camera in and sat back down. "Who are you?!" Sea demanded. "I'm... Natsuko, ma'am," I replied. Rosy-cheeked woman drew in breath. "Ooohhhh! It's Natsuko!" She clapped her hands together. "It's Metal's little robot-girl! Isn't she cute?!" "Robot-girl?" wrinkly woman asked, confused. "She built a girl?" Rosy-cheeked woman tilted her head a little. "Of course, dear. It's the only one she's built. She named her Natsuko." "Hmm." Wrinkly woman crossed her arms. She looked vexed. "...Hoh- kay... if you say so." Rosy-cheeked woman shook her head, then smiled again. "Natsuko! I've always wanted to meet you! How are you, dear?" "I'm... fine?" I replied. Rosy-cheeked woman giggled. She was hunched up and beaming like a grandmother watching her little grandchildren run through her door to meet her. "Oooohhh! Say something intelligent!" "Metal doesn't do artificial intelligence, High Mistress Blood," Sea replied. "Not since..." She paused. "...Not since the, uh... 'second one'." "Do you mean Brooke?" High Mistress Blood (I can't believe that's her name, I thought) asked. Sea face-palmed herself. "Oh, relax! Everyone knew her name! She's long gone!" "Do you have artificial intelligence?" wrinkly woman asked. Miki-chan does, I thought, so... "Yes, ma'am." I looked up at the thin woman, who they called "Air." She hadn't moved, or said anything. Her face -- what little I could see of it through her curtains of hair -- remained neutral and impassive. She wore a headset, and I noticed a computer keyboard at her fingertips. "Oooohhh!" High Mistress Blood squealed. "How delightful, how delightful! I always enjoy seeing what Metal creates!" "Is she awake?" Sea asked me in a frank, no-nonsense, "please tell me it's no" manner. "No, ma'am," I replied. Sea breathed a sigh of relief. "You don't have to be so formal, dear," High Mistress Blood said. "Allow us to introduce ourselves. Sea? You go first." Sea put one hand across her chest. "I am the Sea Witch of Norfolk. My domain is the weather and the oceans." "I am de Flesh Witch of New Orleans," wrinkly woman said. "My domain is skin, muscle, and bone." "You too, Air," High Mistress Blood said. Air said something quietly. "Speak up, dear. She can't hear you." "I am the Air Witch of Minneapolis," Air said lightly. "My domain is the waves we make in the winds." "And I am the High Mistress of the Sisterhood," High Mistress Blood said. "I am the Blood Witch of Atlanta. My domain is the realm of tiny creatures, and our weapons against them." ...Hhhooooly fuck, I thought. I'm sitting in on an Illuminati meeting! I was paralyzed. "...I tink we scared her," the Flesh Witch said. Of course you scare me, I thought. Your name is the Flesh Witch, for Christ's sake. "Impossible," the Sea Witch replied. "Robots don't get scared." "Hmm... this one has artificial intelligence, though," the Blood Witch said. "Can artificial intelligences get scared?" A moment passed. I couldn't think of a thing to say. Not a single thing. Then the Air Witch spoke aloud: "She knows we're not actually witches, right?" "...Y-you're, uh...," I started to say. "...Not?" Blood and Flesh chuckled. Sea sighed. "Of course not," Air said. "Don't be dumb. Magic isn't real." "Dere's a lot of terminology that Metal may not have made you familiar with," Flesh said. "She doesn't contact us a lot," Sea offered up. "When she does, she usually wants something, and she doesn't use the call signs." "They are a little impersonal, dear," Blood said. "...And spooky." "We have them for a reason, High Mistress. They protect us. If Metal wants us to take her seriously, she has to learn this: she's Metal." "...Metal?" I asked. "The, uh... Metal Mistress?" "Yes, dear, your Mistress. She also goes by the title 'The Metal Witch of New England'." "But we're not really witches." Air scratched her ear with her pinky finger. "We don't cast spells 'n shit. We're-" "Language, dear!" "Sorry, High Mistress. We're preservationists." "Our 'domains' aren't physical territories," Sea continued. "They're areas of study and inquiry we've sworn our lives to uphold. Mine is meteorology and marine science. Blood's is virology and immunology. Flesh is dermatology and musculoskeletal systems, and Air is telecommunications. There are many others, like us, all over the continent, each dedicated to her own fields. Together, we make up the order we call the Sisters of Galileo." I thought, Meteorology? Virology? ...Sisters of Galileo?! "...Wait, you're saying... you're scientists?" All four women laughed. Even Air had a chuckle. "Ooohhh, goodness!" Blood crowed. "When was the last time any of us have been called that?!" "I don't tink I've evah been!" Flesh laughed. "We get called witches so much," Air said, "we just figured, 'ah, what the fuck'." "Air!" Blood cried. "Sorry, High Mistress." "Your Mistress' domain is metals that move," Sea said, "or, really, electromagnetism and robotics." "Wait, wait," I said, "go back... You said you've sworn your lives to uphold...?" "Yes, to keep these areas of study alive," Sea said. "Why do you need to 'keep areas of study alive?' What's wrong with them?" ... A silence fell upon our group. For what seemed like a long time, nobody spoke. When somebody finally did, it was Blood, and in a whisper. "You don't go outside much, do you, dear." "The general populace of North America is... less than receptive... to science, at the moment," Sea said carefully. "Dey want to murder us," Flesh said flatly. "Popular opinion is overwhelmingly against us, dear. Nobody believes in scientific inquiry anymore. They think it's all witchcraft." "We've dedicated ourselves to keeping science alive," Sea said, "until the day it can be brought back into the public forum." "Until den, though, we're keeping hidden," Flesh said. "But some contact with average folks is unavoidable, dear." "It usually ends... poorly... for us." "Dey set us on fire. Or lynch us. Or slit our throats, or shoot us, or blow us up." I was stunned. "...It... can't be that bad," I whispered. I remembered the words Alan, Gary, and Junior had used around me, though: Witch... Metal Devil... Demon Whore... "It is, dear. It's all over America, in every town, in every city." "You live in ruins," Sea said. "How do you think that came about?" "I... have no idea," I admitted. "I don't know anything about... well, anything. What does people not liking science have to do with the ruins?" Sea groaned. "Oh, stop moping!" Blood chided. "She's just a child! You're the order's historian. You can explain it." Sea politely said, "Yes, High Mistress," and sat up. "...By the late 21st century, Natsuko, all public funding for education and research had been cut. Private schools became unaffordable, and mass ignorance spread. Nobody could maintain anything... except guns." She let out a contemptuous chuckle. "People forgot why things worked, and as a result, they forgot how things worked. Without education, we lost our strong workforce. Without a strong workforce or innovation, businesses left the country. Mass unemployment followed, along with large-scale, sustained economic downturn. Without education, meaningful public participation in government became nonexistent, and corruption reached epidemic levels. Without any effective institutions to monitor and mitigate climate change, entire communities were wiped out by natural disasters. People lost everything. Money flowed out. Crime shot up. Our leaders did nothing. Mass hysteria ensued, and everyone lost hope. Eventually, the whole thing folded, and here we are." "...B-but... uh! Why would they...!" I struggled to find words. "...Why?!" "Mmm," Blood hummed. "Spoken like a witch." "The people expected catastrophe, so they got it," Sea said, getting closer to her camera. "The Old Republic is over, Natsuko. The mean lifespan is 40, and falling. Our infant mortality rate is just behind Somalia's. This is the American Dark Ages." ...Those words changed my life. I've never been able to recover from them. My heart sunk. My world really was dead. "-Get the fuck outta my seat!!" The Mistress screamed, causing me to nearly jump out of my panties. She had appeared next to me seemingly out of nowhere. She shoved me out of the seat and onto the floor, then sat in front of the monitors. "Sea!! Where the fuck have you been?! I've been trying to reach you all day!!" "Language!" Blood scolded. "Hello, Metal," Sea rumbled. "Please don't talk to me that way." I stood up and got out of the way. "I need news about Gun! Where is she?!" "She's dead," Sea said bluntly. The Mistress didn't respond. "I'm surprised you haven't heard. The news is all over the east coast." "...That's impossible," The Mistress replied. "She was armed to the teeth." "Air, back me up," Sea said. Air typed something on her keyboard. "The news is that President Bellows blockaded all the doors to her factory from the outside, then set it on fire. Within minutes, her munitions caught, and the whole place exploded." She paused. "Her body wasn't found... but nobody could have survived." "So she's not dead," The Mistress said. "Nobody could have survived, Metal," Sea said. "There's no body!" "She was incinerated, Metal! And that was after a prolonged gun battle with Bellows' army, the Secret Service!" "It's over, dear," Blood said soothingly. "She's gone. We just have to live with it." The Mistress was breathing heavily. "...No. No. That's bullshit. This is bullshit." "Lang-!" Blood sank in her seat. "Oh, who am I kidding," she mumbled. "He's coming to Parkside next," Sea said. The Mistress shook her head in denial. "You have two options: fight or run. None of us will think any less of you either way." The Mistress kept shaking her head. "Air, can Metal shack up with you?" Flesh asked. "There's no point. Bellows has Milwaukee and Green Bay. After he takes Duluth, he's gonna march on us." "Wit Dakota right dere?!" Air scoffed. "He doesn't give a shit about Dakota. Sorry, High Mistress." Blood nodded in approval. "I'm not running," The Mistress growled. "This is my home." "Then get ready to fight," Sea replied. "I don't have to! He's on the ground!" "You're on the ground!" "I'm in a fucking skyscraper! I'm 70 stories above him!" "He'll bring!! It down!!" "You have robots, dear!" Blood said. "Use them!" "I'm not sending out my only defense against Parkside!! If they see robots rush out, they'll rush in!!" "Then run!!" Sea nearly yelled. "I have a better idea! You come up here, Sea!" Sea rolled her eyes. "You've got weapons! You've got crew!" "Eight heads aboard my ship, including me, and only light arms! I'm not equipped to take on an army, and I'm off the coast of Pensacola tracking storms!" "You droppin' by-" Flesh started to say. "-Not right now, Flesh!! Fight or run, Metal!! Fight or run!!" The Mistress was nearly hyperventilating with rage. "I'm not going to put up with this-this petty political bullshit, Roxy!!" Sea's eyes went wide. In an instant, her already-thin patience evaporated. "Oh, that's it!! That's it!! Air, cut her off!! Blackout on New England, now!!" Air was typing furiously. "Oh, hon-ney!!" Blood wailed. The Mistress was on her feet and screaming. "You're not cutting me off, Sea!!" "Call us back when you grow the f-!!" Sea yelled before she was cut off. The screens went to static again. The Mistress stared at the screens. I stared at The Mistress. Her rage was epic. With a wild banshee scream, she knocked all the monitors, and the radio- box and the camera, to the floor with one great swoop of her arms. She grabbed the desk and threw it into a wall, where it left a large dent, and three legs broke off. She grabbed the back of the chair and bashed it against the wall which had been behind the monitors, then she bashed the monitors themselves. The machines burst and fizzled in showers of sparks, and two of them caught fire. I rapidly ducked under the arc of The Mistress' next swing, grabbed the power strip the monitors were plugged into, and yanked it out of the wall. With The Mistress screaming, and screaming, and screaming, I ran across the shop area, into her bedroom, where I yanked a blanket off the top of her bed, ran back into the radio room, and jumped on top of the burning monitors, smothering them completely. I rolled out of the way just as The Mistress brought the chair down on the floor one more time, then threw it, too, into the wall, where it crumpled into a heap of bent and twisted metal on top of the broken desk. She stood in the middle of the room, heaving and growling like an animal. Her coats were rumpled, more so than usual. Her scarf was just barely clinging to her face. I wondered for a microsecond what she looked like under there, but that thought was so very fleeting because I was mostly wondering what the fuck was wrong with her. I was wondering why she was so completely and utterly out of her God-damn mind. And my face must have shown that. She saw my eyes narrow. She saw my lips curl. She saw me looking disgusted. And she saw the telescope, tucked into the waistline of my panties. "Give-!!" she snarled and yanked it out, snapping the waistline. I held it together with both hands and quickly tied a knot. She cradled the telescope, and looked it over carefully. "What-" I started to say. "-Get out," she hissed. "Wh-" "-Get out. Get out! Get out get out get the fucking fuck out of my building!!" She cocked her arm back and came at me, holding the telescope like a club. "Get out of my home you stupid fucking useless piece-of-shit android, get out!! Get-out!! Get!! Out!!" I didn't wait for Teeny to come -- I ran across the shop, behind the wall, and down the stairs. I took the stairs all the way to the lobby, and I heard screams coming from the top floor all the way down. When the door rattled that night, I jumped up out of my bed and grabbed the nearest steel pipe. After barricading myself in the stockroom of Mariel's, I had installed another padlock on the door. I was fucking exhausted at that point -- the day had taken a heavy emotional toll. The hatred... the fear... the rage... ...If anyone ever tells you they want to live out an apocalypse scenario, slap them. I collapsed onto my bed and passed out immediately. I dreamed about hot food. Warm clothes. Friendly faces (generic friendly faces, actually; they looked like models I probably saw in a catalog once). I felt so happy and care-free... until I was awakened by a harsh clatter. I lifted my head and saw the door was rattling in its frame. Shit, I thought. Shit!! Shit!! Shit!! I stood over my bed, naked save for my panties, holding the steel pipe in both hands. The room was pitch-black. Between rattles, all I heard was the breathing, grunting, and shuffling of the people outside. All I could see was a pale sliver of moonlight through a crack in the door. It was the only way in or out. That worked to my advantage, because whoever was out there had only one entry point. It worked to my disadvantage as well, because it was my only escape. "...Sure you saw her come in here?" I heard an unfamiliar man outside say. "Fuck, yeah," said a second unfamiliar man, probably standing in front of the first, right at the door. They sounded muffled through the wood, but I could still hear them. "Sweet little yellow bitch." "You sure she's in there now?" "Yeah. She usually goes into that tower over there-" "-What?! Fuck, man!! Forget it!!" "What? Wassa matter?" "Don't you know-fuck this, let's go." "Whaaaat?!" the second man whined. The first man sounded more distant, like he was near the door to the store. "There's a witch up there, you dumb shit! If the bitch's one of her servants or somethin', she'll fuck us up royally for screwin' with it! Let's go!" The second man grumbled, then left the door. I heard their footsteps as they walked outside, then down the road to the right, toward Parkside. I fell back onto my makeshift bed. Even when she kicks me out, I thought, I can't get away from her. I wonder if this is what being married is like. I didn't sleep at all for the rest of the night. I sat up watching the door, listening to the tiny sounds from outside: a small nocturnal animal scurrying past the store; the light wind as the rising sun warmed the air; garbage and leaves being blown down the road. I drifted off for a little now and then (so I may have slept longer than I realize -- I'm not sure), but I would always snap back awake and continue my watch. I wasn't too worried about feeding and cleaning my human brain -- Miki- chan had told me she had missed days for me, and I could go up to a week without a cleaning, but any longer would be dangerous. Feeding wasn't as critical, but I would feel lagging and unfocused after about four days, and it would just go downhill from there, especially without cleaning. Mental note to myself, I thought, briefly considering the irony of that statement, build my own recycler and figure out how to make the flakes, for I am a goldfish. Bloop. I gave up my watch at daybreak and passed out. When I awoke, it was about mid-day. I unblocked and unlocked the door and looked around the main store. The men were long gone, and had neither taken nor left anything. I locked the door behind me and walked out, looking around me with every step I took. They might be watching me right now, I thought. They probably are. I jogged to the rear entrance of Sky Tower and went in. The guard robots stood at attention. "Hey, guys, is the Mistress-" "-Please leave the premises," one of the robots said in a heavy voice. Well, that's new, I thought. I had never heard them speak before. "...Okay... uh, listen..." I walked closer to the elevator. "I'm gonna call Teeny now, so-" Their eyes turned red. They pulled handguns from under the counter and pointed them at me. I froze in place and thought, That's also new! "Please leave the premises," one of them said. "You will have one final warning before we open fire." "Okay! Okay!" I held up my hands and backed out of the lobby. They put their guns away and sat back down. Jesus Christ, I thought. I changed your batteries, you ungrateful dicks. Clearly, The Mistress was still angry with me. Without being able to go into town, all I could do was either board myself up in Mariel's stockroom or wander the ruins. I hadn't taken too many chances since I first left Sky Tower to look around the city surrounding me; I had not explored much of the area. I knew it was dangerous, and I knew I was probably being followed, but there was a certain... allure to it. I not only had to go into the concrete forest to find something that could be useful to me, I kind of wanted to. (If you ever have to slap someone for saying they want to live out an apocalypse scenario, don'