CinderellAI

by Lyssa Chiavari

  It would have to do.

  In an instant, I’d ripped the extension cord from the toolbox and whirled toward Gilbert. He stared at me, his pupils spinning so fast, they blurred at the edges. “Madeline, what are you—?”

  “Please, Gil,” I said. My voice sounded strange. Like I was on the brink of tears. Impossible tears.

  He nodded, and I handed him the end of the cord. He raced over to the electrical box at the end of the street and plugged it in while I frantically pulled off my shoe. There—the connection between my foot and my shoe was shaped just like an electrical plug. I shoved my foot into the outlet on the extension cord and, without hesitation, raced into the gravel parking lot.

  At the sound of my approach, Mr. Tinker’s stepbrother turned, making a squeak of alarm. He tried to run, but Cinderella’s dead weight slowed him. He couldn’t get away from me quickly enough. I careened toward him, preparing to tackle him—

  And the length of the cord ran out.

  I tripped, falling face-first onto the gravel. The impact tore at the silicon on my face and hands, exposing the metal underneath. I scrambled up on my knees, yanking at the cord, desperate for it to give me just a little more length, but it was stretched to its maximum.

  The stepbrother, just a few feet away from me, smirked. He turned to leave me there, prone and helpless.

  The moon, peeking between the branches of the trees, fell on Cinderella’s blank face.

  I lunged forward again. The extension cord snapped. Sparks flew from its frayed ends as the bare wires ripped apart, sending a final surge of electricity through my body. A hideous sound reverberated through my audio receptors. It sounded like a scream.

  The last thing I felt before it all went black was the force of my body colliding with another.

  ☆

  System boot in progress. Ninety-seven percent completed. Ninety-eight. Ninety-nine. System online.

  Click. Whir. My pupils were rotating, slowly, then quickly, then slowly again. Gradually, the room came to focus in front of me. I was in a seated position in a room with two beds. There were five other subjects in the room. One organic, four mechanical.

  “She’s coming around,” a man’s voice said with a gentle American Midwestern lilt. This was the organic subject. I focused on him sitting across from me, perched at the foot of the other bed. Graying ginger hair, quaintly anachronistic horned-rim glasses framing sprightly blue eyes.

  I recognized him.

  “Mr. Tinker?” I said. For the way I felt, I would have expected my voice to sound weak and shaky, but it came out the same as it always did, even and normal-pitched. Reminding me that an animatron shouldn’t have been feeling at all.

  But I was.

  “Maddie! You’re back online!” a girl’s voice squealed. Despite the timbre in it, I recognized it as a synthetic voice, a mechanical. One better at projecting emotion than I was. Arms flew around me. I focused again and felt a jolt run through me.

  “Cindy! You’re all right?”

  She grinned and nodded. “Mr. Tinker was able to get me back online before you. You had more significant damage than I did.” Her face grew serious. “You saved everyone, Maddie. Not just me. The whole park. I… I’m sorry. I endangered everyone. You were right—”

  I shook my head, cutting her off. Maybe I’d been right about Mr. Tinker’s stepbrother, but I hadn’t been right about everything else. If I’d listened to Cindy sooner instead of arguing with her, maybe this wouldn’t have happened. I glanced down at my hands, remembering the way they’d been torn apart when I’d fallen. Smooth silicon patches covered the whole, slightly lighter than the rest of me, like strange scars. Numbly, I said, “You left the park… We both did… But we’re all right…?”

  Mr. Tinker made a clucking sound with his tongue. “Maddie, when I told you all not to leave the park, I didn’t mean the leaving itself would be what harmed you. It was the people outside the park I was worried about. People like my brother. Jonas.”

  “Your stepbrother?” I clarified.

  He rolled his eyes. “When your parents get married when you’re three, you’re brothers. I just didn’t realize Jonas didn’t feel the same way.”

  For just an instant, I thought I felt Cindy’s arms around me shudder. I glanced over at her. She looked so sad—so much sadder than I’d ever seen her pretend to be in the attraction, even when she was weeping about not going to the ball. Real sorrow, not playacting. She had loved Jonas. And it had all been a lie.

  I took her hand in mine and squeezed it.

  “What’s going to happen to Jonas?” I asked.

  Mr. Tinker rolled his eyes again. “We’ll work it out,” he said. “I love my brother, but there’s a reason I didn’t tell him about you all to begin with. I know him. I’m going to have to work on the park’s security, though. Never saw a reason for it before. Too trusting, I guess.”

  “But that can’t just be the end of it,” I protested. “He knows about us. He said he was going to go to the media about us. What about that?”

  “Yes, that.” Mr. Tinker rubbed the back of his neck, looking down. “I’m afraid things are going to have to change around here. Because you’re right—we’re not going to be able to keep this a secret anymore.”

  My pupils clicked and whirred. “You’re going to let the humans know about us?” I finally managed.

  He nodded. “And more than that, Maddie. After what happened to you and Cindy, I realized… I can’t just keep you here like my private zoo animals. You’re people. You can’t be held prisoner.”

  “What? But how—”

  Mother stepped forward then. I looked up at her, consciously realizing for the first time that Cindy, Mr. Tinker, and I weren’t alone in the room. Anita stood, smiling, behind Mother, and to her left…

  To her left was Gilbert. He was watching me hesitantly. I met his eyes for a long moment until Mother cleared her throat.

  “Look at your feet, Madeline,” she said.

  I looked down and started. The shoes I was wearing were similar to my old ones, but these didn’t just glow where the soles touched the ground. The whole shoe lit up, a bright blue, making my feet and ankles shine with silicon reflection.

  “Portable energy packs. Just keep an eye on the color. If it turns red, you need to either plug into a wired power source or change to a different pair of shoes,” Mr. Tinker explained.

  “You mean… we can leave?”

  He nodded. “It’s up to you. You’re welcome to stay here or to go. You can come and go as you please.”

  I felt overwhelmed, my processors surging again.

  Mr. Tinker laughed. “You can think it over, take time to digest it. Nothing’s happening just yet. It will soon, but when it does… We’ll get through it together.” He glanced over at Gilbert pointedly, a silent exchange seeming to pass between them. Then Mr. Tinker patted my knee. “I’ll give you some time to process this.”

  He stood up. Cindy squeezed my hand again, and she, Mother, and Anita followed Mr. Tinker out of the room. Only Gilbert lingered. Before she closed the door, I could have sworn Cindy winked at me, but the movement was quick and then the door was between us.

  Gilbert came over to sit beside me at the foot of the bed. “How are you feeling?” he asked.

  Automatically, I moved to protest, to remind him that I didn’t actually feel anything… but you know what? I didn’t feel like it. Not anymore.

  “Okay, I guess. Everything seems to be functioning as normal.”

  He smiled. “I’m glad. It was touch-and-go there. He wasn’t sure if he was going to be able to repair you. The falls damaged your skin, and the electrical currents had done a number on your circuitry. Mr. Tinker wasn’t sure he’d be able to repair your original body at all. He thought about transferring your memory into a new body, but, well…” He looked at me, his grin crooked. “We all thought that might not be the same.”

  I looked down at my hands, wondering what it would have been like to wake up
in a new body. Would it have felt strange? Would my new body have been like this one, still quick to freeze up whenever I was overwhelmed, still clumsy and awkward? Would I have still been me?

  “I’m glad it didn’t come to that,” I said quietly.

  “Me too,” Gilbert said. I got the distinct impression that if he were human, he’d be blushing now. “Madeline, I’ve wanted to tell you something for a long time. And when I saw you fall in the parking lot, I was sure I’d lost my chance. But you’re still here. So I want to tell you now. But first—that is—” I quirked my head at him, and he said in a rush, “Would you mind awfully if I kissed you?”

  Click. Whir. Everything in my mind slowed to a crawl. “I wouldn’t mind at all,” I whispered.

  Gilbert leaned over and kissed me.

  And I knew it then: what Cinderella had been talking about all this time. Why she’d fought with me so vehemently. Why she’d put so much faith in Jonas, been willing to risk so much for him despite not knowing who he truly was. All for this one simple feeling.

  I felt alive.

  If you enjoyed “CinderellA.I.,” you might also like these sci-fi and fantasy adventures from author Lyssa Chiavari!

  ☆

  The World of Iamos

  Fourth World: Book One of the Iamos Trilogy

  Life on Mars isn’t all it’s cracked up to be when you’re Isaak Contreras. Ever since his dad disappeared two years ago, Isaak’s been struggling to keep up in school, and he never seems to be able to live up to his mom’s high expectations. But everything changes when he finds an ancient coin among his missing father’s possessions. The coin makes him a target of both the Martian colonial government and a crazed factory worker with a vendetta—and it leads him to a girl from another time named Nadin, who believes that Isaak might just hold the key to saving both their worlds. That is, if they can survive long enough to use it...

  “This book fires perfectly on all cylinders.”

  – Jaylee James, editor of Vitality magazine

  Available now!

  Different Worlds: An Iamos Novella

  Surviving high school is hard enough—but when your best friend vanishes without a trace, and the only clues seem to implicate the Martian government? It can turn into a nightmare. Everything changed when Isaak disappeared. Henry, Tamara and Scylla know GSAF had something to do with it. They just need to prove it. The only problem is, crossing GSAF can get a person killed…

  Set during the events of Fourth World, Book One of the Iamos Trilogy, Different Worlds tells the story of the people left behind. It is recommended you read this novella in between Fourth World and New World (Book 2).

  “A fast-paced novella that manages to both deepen the Iamos Trilogy and stand on its own. The plot is great, the character arcs are deep... Basically what I’m saying is, if you’re a fan of Fourth World, you need to read this.”

  – Claudie Arseneault, author of Baker Thief

  Available now!

  New World: Book Two of the Iamos Trilogy

  Isaak has returned from Iamos, but life hasn’t exactly gone back to normal. In what felt like a month to him, two years passed in the world he left behind—and now that he’s home, he’s not sure if he knows what home is anymore. Mars has become a world of riots and police states, with GSAF doing everything in their power to clamp down on the burgeoning rebellion started by Isaak’s once-best friend, Henry Sandhu. It doesn’t take long before he realizes that maybe coming back to Mars wasn’t such a good idea. But unless they can find a way to get to the time postern—currently guarded by heavily-armed GSAF agents—Isaak is stuck in the future… and so is Nadin.

  “The ever-present danger of the increasingly dystopian world keeps tension high... The world-building in this series is truly phenomenal.”

  – Mary Fan, author of Stronger Than a Bronze Dragon

  Available now!

  One World: Book Three of the Iamos Trilogy

  Nadin found her answers in the future. Now she must return to the world she left behind and try to set things to rights. But can Iamos be saved, or has its destiny already been set? Find out in the exciting conclusion to the Iamos Trilogy, coming soon from Snowy Wings Publishing!

  The Choice: An Iamos Short Story

  What makes something worth living for? What makes something worth dying for? Marin thought she knew the answer. As an Enforcer, she knew that she—and everyone on Iamos—lived for the geroi. But all that changes when she meets a young farmer’s apprentice named Eos, who tells her about a legendary city called Elytherios.

  Set thirty years before the events of Fourth World, this award-winning story introduces us to two characters Isaak and Nadin encounter on their journey.

  Available for free to newsletter subscribers!

  ☆

  Cheerleaders from Planet X

  Laura Clark is just your average college freshman. At least, that’s who she thought she was. Things started getting weird when she saw a cheerleader on a skateboard get into a superhuman brawl with a lightning-wielding stranger in a trenchcoat. Now she’s encountering strange things all over the City, and the clues seem to point to only one possibility: an alien invasion. The only person who can help her uncover the truth is the beautiful but mysterious Shailene—but though Laura senses a connection between them, Shailene’s not giving up her secrets. And if Laura doesn’t find the answers soon, she could be the next to disappear…

  “This book was everything I hoped it would be. Super fun with a strong emotional core!”

  – RoAnna Sylver, author of Chameleon Moon

  Available now!

  ☆

  Other Short Fiction

  Seven Years Among Dragons: A Solarpunk Fairytale

  Once upon a time, there was a girl who lived in a fairytale… until the day she killed her mother. Biancarosa grew up believing in her mother's tales about the dragons of the Alpi, much to the chagrin of her practical father, the king of Stalia Nova. But when she learns of a plot to overthrow the neighboring kingdom of Elvezia, the dragons' magic might be the only thing that can save her. In this solarpunk fantasy retelling of Snow White, dragons dwell in the heart of the mountain, weaving magic and mining crystals with the power to fuel the world—and a princess leads her people in a war against a power-hungry technocracy.

  Originally published in the anthology Wings of Renewal.

  Read it for free now!

  Star-Heart: A Sci-fi Romance

  Kimber is a dreamer. Even though her old-fashioned family thinks she should keep her feet on the ground, she’s determined to enter the annual stratos surfing race — a dangerous but exhilarating sport that takes place 120,000 feet over the Earth. When she finds a broken-down stratos board in a trash heap, Kimber suddenly realizes her dream could come true… if she’s willing to put aside her prejudices and accept a helping hand from her arch-nemesis, rich boy Jase Hart.

  Available for free to newsletter subscribers!

  Gale: A Sci-fi Retelling of Shakespeare’s The Tempest

  Miranda doesn’t want to be different. On Gale, being different can get you killed. When her seizures began, Miranda tried to keep her abnormality secret. But then the visions started—ominous hallucinations of strange lights in the sky, an otherworldly monster with wings like a dragon, and a girl who appeared from the clouds like a bolt of lightning. Despite the ever-present threat of the Watch, Miranda is determined to find out what the visions mean. Little does she know that the answers might lead her to freedom…

  Originally published in the anthology Perchance to Dream: Classic Tales from the Bard’s World in New Skins.

  Available now!

  ☆

  Love short fiction? Find me on Patreon, where I share exclusive, never-before-published short stories and behind-the-scenes looks at my upcoming novels!

  If you enjoyed this story, please consider leaving a review at the retailer of your choice. Every review, no matter how short, helps indie authors succeed. Thank you for your support!r />
  Keep in touch: Visit my website at lyssachiavari.com, or follow me on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram.