by Satoshi Hase
“You like saying that everything is like a car, Kengo,” Olga said.
When Arato had said the same thing earlier, Kengo had felt like punching him, but he couldn’t get angry hearing it in Olga’s gentle voice. “So you think so too, huh?” he sighed.
“And you don’t have to get all philosophical on me,” Olga added.
“Sorry about that.”
They heard a creaking noise from upstairs and Olga, always an anxious girl, looked at him nervously.
“Guess I’ll eat first,” he said.
He ate what he could, and Olga offered to wash up afterward. While she was doing that, Kengo headed upstairs to the second floor. He hadn’t been able to enjoy dinner due to the twisting feeling in his gut. Sending that information to the other members of the Antibody Network earlier had made him an accomplice in a crime.
Their sixty-year-old wooden house only had two wireless power plugs, so all the terminals in the house were wired. The lights were wired too, and weren’t being controlled by the house system.
This meant that there was no way to know if anyone had snuck into Kengo’s room. Despite this, what was waiting for Kengo when he opened the sliding screen to his room was far beyond anything he could have imagined.
It was a girl, wearing an almost ridiculously sturdy-looking bodysuit. She had accessories like the ears of a beast in her red hair, and her big, red eyes were smoldering with inner light. There were visible seams on places where her pale skin showed. The large metal device she had left nearby was so heavy that the floor was bowing underneath it; that explained the creaking noise from earlier.
The window was wide open. With the moon at her back, the girl gave him a smile that showed her white teeth. She was obviously enjoying herself.
“Who are you?” Kengo asked. He tried to add some heat to his voice, but it trembled.
“I’d shut that screen if I were you,” she said.
Kengo hurriedly stepped inside and slid the screen shut behind himself, without taking his eyes off of her. There was something horrible in his room; no human could have carried the heavy device that she’d brought.
Whatever it was, it was obviously the girl’s weapon. Kengo had never seen a blade of such a ludicrous size; it must have been over a meter long. But there was also a gun-like extension from the back of the device that appeared to be a laser cannon. Kengo couldn’t predict exactly how powerful an output it had, but size-wise it was bigger than the main gun of a military tank.
If the girl decided to go crazy with that weapon, Kengo’s house would be a pile of rubble in three seconds.
“What the hell. What the hell is going on?” Kengo asked. His only thought was that one of the volunteers from the Antibody Network must be involved. Nothing else made sense. He had checked out some information on current humanoid military drones and their equipment out of curiosity before, but he had never heard of a drone with this level of heavy armament.
The ‘girl’ started operating Kengo’s terminal, despite the password lock he kept on it. Her hair accessory was giving off a faint glow.
Even though she hadn’t actually touched it, the terminal expanded its 3D display, and programs started popping open almost faster than Kengo could follow with his eyes.
“Hmm. So that’s the signal my sister’s been sending out,” the girl said. There was a graph on the screen. Kengo recognized it as the unit code he had gotten from Lacia.
“That machine is your ‘sister’? Are you an hIE?” Kengo asked. Even knowing that all hIE conversations and actions were based on instructions from the cloud, Kengo found what the girl said too strange. It was almost like she, a machine, had some kind of special feelings toward Lacia, who was another machine.
“Say something, please. Why is there a heavily armed hIE in my room?” Kengo asked.
“My name is Kouka,” she said. “I’ve come from higher up the Antibody Network.”
The Antibody Network was a group of human volunteers trying to protect humanity from the erosion of society with their own hands. The thought of even that group outsourcing their work to an hIE was the height of irony. Kengo’s tiny senses of duty and justice were completely dwarfed by the immensity of the issue before his eyes, and his emotions were so confused that he felt like crying.
He had no idea about the whole story of the Antibody Network he was a part of.
***
The Endos had fried shrimp for breakfast.
“Woah,” Yuka said, swinging her legs back and forth under her chair. “Oh, hey, speaking of fried shrimp, the stuff over at Kengo’s family’s place is amazing. You should take me over there to eat again.”
“Are you aiming to be the most spoiled kid ever or something?” Arato asked.
“It’ll be a reward for me taking care of the apartment while you’re out,” Yuka said. Without a shred of hesitation, she reached out her chopsticks to steal a shrimp from Arato’s plate. He attempted to take some of hers in return, but her plate was already empty; Yuka was the type to eat her food in order of preference.
Lacia had already finished her work in the kitchen, so she took a seat with them. It was a breakfast scene that had become standard over the last week, but there was something different about it that day.
It had been awkward talking to Lacia on the way home. When they arrived home there had been a sense of relief, but for some reason Arato suddenly found it hard to even look straight at her.
He had tried to strike up a conversation with her a few times, but he would always turn to Yuka instead at the last minute. He felt a strange sense of inferiority, as an ordinary high school student comparing himself to an up-and-coming model.
And just when he needed her to step up, Yuka had stopped talking to Lacia, as well. Arato wished she would take responsibility. She was the one who had brought about this whole modeling thing, after all.
“Hey, say something to Lacia,” Arato told his sister.
“Lacia, you were super cool in that shoot,” Yuka said.
“I saw it, too. You really were amazing,” Arato said, following Yuka’s lead. He wanted to add something more. The shame of his own pathetic nature made him want to grab his head in despair.
Lacia’s cool, pale blue eyes met Arato’s. She had just gotten back from a photo shoot, so there was a touch of makeup on her lips. Just that little bit of added glossiness made Arato’s breath catch. Things he wanted to say to her bubbled up inside, but he couldn’t get them out of his mouth. It was as if he was unconsciously trying to build an invisible wall between them. He felt completely unreasonable.
“Owner.” Arato thought his heart would explode when Lacia suddenly spoke to him.
“Yes!” he burst out in reply.
“Good grief, Arato. Calm down with the puppy dog impression,” Yuka said.
That evening, there was a light knock at the door to Arato’s room. He had just been settling down to sleep, so he was a bit irritated when he went and opened the door.
Lacia was standing there, dressed in pajamas that she had just bought that day. “Owner, would you like to have some tea with me?” she asked. In the end it was she who invited him, and so easily.
“Man, I’m a moron,” Arato said.
“Has your body warmed up?” Lacia asked, making up some black tea in a pot. She had picked out some spices at the store that day, so she was actually making a special chai blend.
hIE did not act of their own accord. They simply repeated behaviors they pulled from the control cloud. Even Arato understood that. But thinking of how Lacia moved and looked when she was in model mode, he couldn’t help but feel nervous.
“I understand that humans as young as you are have trouble with changes in your own emotions, owner,” Lacia said.
“Don’t say it like I’m a little kid. I really don’t know how I’m supposed to act right now,” Arato said. Her prominent collar bones did a good job of drawing his eyes toward her chest. Before his brain could even register that he was enjoying a nice v
iew, he’d broken out in a cold sweat.
Lacia walked over to stand next to him, while he remained seated in his chair. “Owner,” she said, “would you please stand up?”
“Of course,” Arato said. He stood, and Lacia was right there by his side. Her sweet scent made his brain go fuzzy.
“I have begun to work as a model, but because of that there is awkwardness in our relationship, owner. I believe we have gotten things out of order,” she told him. “I believe if we do not alter the way in which we feel about each other, we may not be able to handle sudden changes in our situation.”
“What do you mean ‘alter’ the way we feel?” Arato asked. Or at least, he tried to. Lacia’s hand covered his mouth, and only a mumble escaped.
“For the next five minutes, I will change the nature of my communication with you, owner,” she said.
Arato had no idea what she was talking about. He tried to free himself from her thin arms with both hands, but she didn’t budge. Considering that she could lift her giant coffin-like device with a single hand, she obviously possessed incredible strength.
“Please be quiet. You will awaken Lady Yuka again,” Lacia said, holding a finger in front of her lips. Her pajamas were in a bit of disarray from Arato’s struggling. She must have noticed where he was looking, because she pulled her collar back into place with her fingers.
“Some hIE users seek a certain kind of excitement. What I am about to do is just a little game. Don’t worry, I’ll go back to how I was before when it’s over,” she said. Then she whispered: “Close your eyes.”
Arato shut his eyes as he was told. When he opened them, he felt a stab of confusion.
The girl in front of him no longer looked like Lacia. Her eyes were open a little wider than normal, and there was a gentle smile on her lips. The expression on her face made her seem younger.
“Hey, wait a minute. What the heck is going on?” Arato said, trying to laugh it off. But in an instant, he felt cold sweat on his back.
Lacia was right there in front of him, but his senses were telling him this was a person he’d never met before. Her expression and the way she stood and moved had completely changed. This girl couldn’t even pass for Lacia’s twin.
“Just as you like spoiling Yuka, I’ll spoil you today, Arato,” she said. Her manner of speaking, from her intonation to her accent and word choice, had all changed as well. Arato couldn’t perceive her as anything but a different person. Yet strangely, he felt no desire to stop her. It was probably due to the perverse excitement he felt at the thought of a secret encounter like this, kept quiet so as not to wake his sleeping sister.
“All right, go ahead and spoil me,” he said. Even as the words left his mouth, he felt a pang of self-loathing. He had no idea what was about to happen, but even that fact just made things all the more exciting to the point where he didn’t really care anymore.
“Leave it to me,” she said. Though she was shorter than him, Lacia reached out her arm and started stroking Arato’s head. It was strange, being treated like a child, but to be fair Arato did the same thing to Yuka all the time.
Getting his head stroked was something Arato hadn’t experienced in years, and it sent a strange, ticklish sensation through his body. It also made guilt well up within him. He felt a rush of confusion and surprise, like he had suddenly been tugged into a dance he didn’t know. This was reality, not some story he was experiencing, so he had no idea what to do with his body.
“What am I supposed to do while you spoil me?” Arato asked. His cheeks were red, and he felt his brain switching off more and more with each passing second.
“Oh, you’re doing just fine. How about you lay your head on my lap and think of what else you’d like me to do,” Lacia said.
“Uh, I don’t think we’re ready to go there yet. Actually, wait, let me think about it,” Arato said. His throat felt dry. Did they really have that kind of relationship? Arato knew the answer to that question. This wasn’t real. It was just a lie that had started a few minutes ago.
When he thought that, Arato felt his chest tighten, and he clenched the back of his jaw unconsciously. Arato knew Lacia would switch from the way she had treated him up to then, and treat him like this from now on. All he needed to do was ask.
She had no heart, no soul. All she was doing was performing actions drawn from the behavioral cloud. So it would be nothing for her to continue to perform this lie perfectly for as long as he wanted. All the sides of Lacia Arato had seen; the Lacia who rescued him, the Lacia who invited him out onto the school roof, the Lacia who posed for models shoots, they may as well have been illusions.
Lacia herself had told him these truths countless times. But the thought that the personality and characteristics that Arato had started to see as precious were all just window dressing that Lacia could toss aside in an instant came as a shock. It was like walking in a dream, only to be shoved off a ledge. He didn’t know where to put his feet, and every breath brought pleasure and pain.
After pulling out a chair with both hands, Lacia sat down quickly. She gently turned up the hem of her pajamas, then let out a short, breathy laugh and patted her thighs. “If you lay your head on my lap,” she invited, “your whole world may change.”
This girl had no soul. The perfection with which she acted out this new relationship made a shiver run up Arato’s spine. She felt nothing of the fact that there was no trace of the Lacia he knew in the way she was acting now.
“Let’s stop. This is embarrassing,” Arato said, feeling himself being drawn out of the moment. Lacia wasn’t a human; even the fact that she appeared to be human was nothing more than an illusion.
In response, Lacia showed him a bittersweet smile he had never seen before. “Is that any way to talk to your big sister?” she said. “That’s what you’ve always wanted, right? A big sister.”
“You used the home system to look at my album,” he accused. “Didn’t you?”
“What’s wrong with that? As your big sister, I just wanted to know more about you, Arato,” she said. Lacia’s gaze was full of deep affection. With that much love being sent in his direction, Arato started to think maybe it was all right to get a little spoiled.
He made his decision. “Oh, okay, I guess I can rest on your lap,” he said.
“The five minutes are almost up. Would you like an extension?” Lacia asked.
“I’m the worst.” Arato was so embarrassed, he wanted to hide his face behind both hands and disappear. Was this all just his frustrated sexual desire coming out, or was he just lonely? He felt like he was seeing his own evil twin in a mirror.
“I’m sorry, I got carried away,” Lacia said. She tugged on his hand. When he stood up, they were face-to-face.
Arato didn’t know what to say. He didn’t know who he was talking to; the Lacia he remembered, or ‘big sis’ Lacia. His words were a jumble, stuck inside his head. He felt like he was talking to a human-shaped wall. In his mind, he doubted whether or not she was real. But her shape, her warmth, the way she breathed; all of it overwhelmed his doubt.
“Do you still feel the need to distance yourself from me?” Lacia asked.
It did feel like something had been broken down, and the air between them was suddenly less stagnant. But, even as Arato felt that, somewhere inside he could tell that it had happened because Lacia had pushed things in that direction.
Arato wasn’t very bright, but he finally noticed what had happened. “You analog hacked me,” he said.
“Yes. I believe taking on the work of a model and thereby causing distance to form between you and I was a miscalculation of priorities, Arato,” she said, responding in the manner he had gotten used to. Her expression, too, was that of the Lacia he had met that first night. At last her meaning and her form had returned to their original balance, and Arato felt relieved. The only thing that hadn’t gone back to normal was her calling him ‘owner.’
“You’re not going to call me owner anymore?” he asked.
“You gave a very positive reaction to being called by name, so I altered it,” Lacia said.
It didn’t make Arato feel bad at all. In fact, he was actually happy about it. Which, in turn, made him depressed at how easily swayed he was. “Man, I’m easy to please,” he sighed. Since he had become Lacia’s owner, at least there was something new every day. She kept snapping effortlessly through everything he had taken for granted in his life.
The next morning, everything that had happened the night before still filled his head. When he was with her, he felt like he was going to be swept away by his own intense emotions, but when they were apart, the loneliness suddenly scared him. That morning, his awakening was horrible. He was still seeing constant nightmares but, ever since he’d met Lacia, the content of the dreams had changed.
What the heck did I become the owner of? That was the question jumbling around in Arato’s head. Were all hIEs just like that? Or did this have something to do with Lacia being high quality, as her ID number seemed to indicate? Was her ID number even legitimate, or was that fake, too?
Just like his friends had said, maybe his whole meeting with Lacia had been some kind of urban legend come to life; that almost seemed to be the most likely answer. The thought that, someday, this strangeness would consume his whole life, and even Yuka would start speaking to him with a different voice and wearing a different face, made his skin crawl.
“I need to tell her never to do that again,” he said. He knew things couldn’t go on exactly the same forever, but he wanted at least tomorrow and the next day to be the same.
He wiped off his sweat from the night with a towel left by his bedside, and headed out to the living room. Breakfast was all laid out, but no one was there. Yuka was on trash duty that morning.
“She’s having Lacia help her again,” Arato said. Since Lacia had arrived they didn’t let the trash pile up anymore like they had before, but on the flip-side, Yuka had gotten very dishonest about doing her chores by herself.