"So, are we going to talk more about what happened last night, back there in the park?" I said while scratching the back of my head.
Judy and I were sitting next to each other on those couches in my living room once again. I was looking up at the ceiling, trying to get my thoughts together and in order. I made sure that we had some of our favorite drinks to help us stay focused, or at least to play with. "I mean, do you think that thing was really an AI or a child that has real human thought and maybe has a clue to what we are looking for? I mean, Zackary seemed friendly enough to want to go along with anything he asked us.
She shook her head slowly while looking down at the carpet, a thoughtful frown creasing her forehead. "No. Not in the way we mean, not in a way that would give us immediate answers about what happened.
He knew we were looking for a friend, that we too were sad, if what you picked up on was true, I mean, he appeared to be all smiles. Plus, he picked up on that much with an almost painful empathy.
Sensing our grief, he responded with empathy, as if absorbing the sadness that clung to us. But we hadn't mentioned Scott's name, hadn't dared to voice the specifics of our loss in that strange, surreal first meeting.
So there was no name for him to recognize, no story for him to connect to our sorrow. It was like… like talking to a very bright, very empathetic, and incredibly naive child — one whose sweetness masked something deeper, something we couldn't yet name.
A child who walked unknowingly through the center of a storm, smiling, unaware of the chaos surrounding him. who stumbles into the middle of a tragedy, feeling its dark but unable to comprehend why it is so."
That felt chillingly accurate. Zachary's innocence. Given the mystery surrounding Scott's death. This child was like a light in a very dark room, but what was the source of that light, and what shadows did it conceal or cast?
"So, what do we do with that?" I asked, swirling the last of my juice, the ice clinking as the concentration dilutes, becoming watery and losing its flavor. "He asked if we wanted to be his friends. It felt… genuine. Do we… go back? Is it even safe for us to meet him?"
"We have to," Judy said, her gaze firm, meeting mine with an unshakeable resolve. "He's a connection, Nick. A very strange, very unexpected, and potentially very dangerous connection, but he's inside the park. He's part of its deepest, newest systems.
He might have access to data streams, security logs, and internal communications that we can't even dream of reaching. If he's as advanced as I think he is," her voice dropped slightly, "Dr. Volkov has to be involved up to his reclusive, mad eyeballs in this matter. This 'New Intelligent Life' attraction… it screams Volkov. He is the only one in the park that makes sense."
Her logic was, as usual, impeccable, cutting through my fogged mind on the matter. Our suspicions had been circling Volkov and Thompson, the park's tech-wizard and its perpetually stressed-out, profit-driven owner. Zachary felt like a direct, if unwitting, line to whatever Volkov was truly working on, a potential key to unlocking the secrets of Future World, if not a way for us to get some direct answers that we need. I mean, it's not like we are going to hurt the kid.
"Okay," I agreed, a fresh wave of determination, mixed with a small amount of trepidation, washing over me. "So, the plan is to find out what we can about Volkov. His projects, his labs, any internal park memos or research grants associated with him, anything that might connect him to Scott's death or this new, secret attraction. And Thompson… we keep digging into him, too. His reaction at the grotto, trying to shut Dior down, his immediate concern for revenue over a potential homicide… that couldn't just be about bad PR. Right?"
The day was spent in a frustrating, eye-straining haze of online searches through public databases, archived news feeds, and obscure academic servers, leading mostly to dead ends and encrypted corporate firewalls. Dr. Alexander Volkov was a ghost in the public data banks. His professional profile was limited to a few glowing but infuriatingly vague blurbs on his education, a couple of white pages on machine learning, and Future World's official corporate site, praising his "visionary contributions to interactive animatronics and environmental AI."
There were no recent publications under his name in any reputable scientific journals, no appearances at tech conferences or symposiums for at least a decade, and absolutely no discernible social media presence. He was a digital hermit, a recluse whose current existence only existed within the carefully controlled confines of Future World's proprietary network.
Thompson was easier to find – countless news articles about Future World's grand opening, glossy interviews where he spouted well-rehearsed corporate platitudes about innovation and family entertainment – but nothing that hinted at anything sinister, just the carefully crafted image of a successful, if somewhat stressed-out, businessman keen on protecting his considerable investment. Our investigation was like trying to catch smoke with flypaper — frustratingly vague, the leads slipping through our fingers no matter how carefully we tried to grasp them.
The hardest part of the day — worse than the fruitless digging, worse than feeling like we were chasing shadows — was the call we knew we had to make. Scott's parents. The funeral. Just the thought of it sat in my stomach like a block of frozen lead, anchoring every movement, muffling every sound. That dread had been festering since Inspector Dior first spoke those awful words in my living room. Judy, steadier than I in that moment, took the lead. Her voice was flat, professionally detached, as she navigated the automated comm-system for their listed residence.
It rang. And rang. Each electronic chirp seemed to echo the emptiness Scott had left behind. Finally, a click, then a flat, unfamiliar, and distinctly unwelcoming voice – definitely not Scott's warm, perpetually flustered mother, nor his gruff, distant father. "Yes? Who is this?"
"Hello," Judy said, her composure admirable. "My name is Judy Dusza. I'm a friend of Scott's. Scott Rose. I'm… we're calling about… about him. About arrangements for his proceedings and the morning services. We wanted to offer our condolences and see if there's anything we can do to help."
There was a significant pause, a silence filled with an almost palpable indifference. "The family is not available at this time," the voice stated finally, devoid of any discernible emotion, as if reciting a pre-written script. "They request privacy during this difficult period. All necessary arrangements will be handled by their designated representatives. There is no need for further contact from associates." Another click. The line went dead, leaving only the faint hum of the open connection.
Judy slowly lowered her datapad, her face pale, her eyes wide with a mixture of disbelief. "Designated representatives? 'No need for further contact from associates? ' Nick, that's… that's not normal. That's not how grieving parents act. What are they? What are they even? A PR team for celebrities? Even if they're overwhelmed, wouldn't they want to talk to his friends? To us? We were like his siblings. I mean, Scott said he always bragged about us to his mother at least."
A new, colder dread began to seep into me, pushing aside the lingering awe and wonder of our encounter with Zachary.
This silence from Scott's parents, this impersonal, dismissive, almost hostile wall, felt wrong.
Just wrong. Deeply, disturbingly wrong. Just no. Was it connected to whatever happened to Scott? Were they being silenced, threatened? Was it something even worse, something that spoke to a darkness within Scott's own family that we had never suspected?
We didn't have any answers, only more questions, each one heavier and darker than the last, piling up like stones on our chests.
As evening began to draw in, the twin suns dipping below the horizon and casting long, mournful shadows across my living room floor, we met again at my place. The weight of the day – the fruitless research, the chilling phone call, the ever-present grief for Scott – pressed down on us. Sophie and Emily were out with friends from their respective clubs, and my parents were at a neighborhood council meeting discussing new zoning regulations for the expanding craze of greenhouses beautifying the neighborhood, leaving the house quiet and imbued with a sense of our shared, isolated mission.
"So, Volkov's practically invisible online, Thompson's a corporate stooge with something to hide, and Scott's parents are either indifferent, being deliberately isolated, or…" I couldn't bring myself to voice the ugliest possibility. I paced the length of the living room, the worn rug doing little to cushion my restless mind. "Not exactly a great day as the junior detectives, right?"
"No," Judy agreed, her voice weary. She had the park schematics pulled up on her datapad again, the intricate network of pathways and attractions glowing softly in the dimming room. "Which means our best, maybe our only, lead right now is Zachary."
Her finger traced a path towards the "Wonders of Tomorrow" pavilion, then hovered over the area where the new, secret attraction had been hidden. "We have to go back tonight. Talk to him again. See what he knows, what he can access within the park's network. He seemed so eager to help, so… open. But we have to be incredibly careful. We don't know if Volkov monitors him, or if our interactions with him leave some kind of digital trail that could lead them right to us, or worse, put Zachary himself in danger."
"And we still have the park's regular security to worry about," I added, the memory of that panning camera in the grotto still fresh and unsettling. "Even if the main recording system was offline last night – and that's a big 'if' – that doesn't mean it will be again. And that one night guard, the one we never seem actually to see, has to be somewhere. He can't just be a myth." I paused, then sighed.
"Look, Zachary asked if we wanted to be his friends. Given we're going back to pump him for information, we might as well lean into it, right? Be friendly. Maybe it'll make him more willing to help."
Judy shot me a look that was a perfect blend of exasperation and understanding. "Nick, we're not going there to make a new friend out of a potentially dangerous, highly advanced AI we know nothing about, just because he seemed 'lonely' and asked nicely. We're going because he might be the only one who can help us uncover the truth about Scott's death or other dark secrets that might be happening in the park. Let's try to keep our priorities straight, okay? We can be friendly, sure, but we need to stay focused."
We spent the next hour strategizing outside on the porch. We planned a different, hopefully less obvious, entry route, utilizing a rarely used maintenance tunnel that ran beneath the "Dyno-Domain." We discussed what specific, non-leading questions we could ask Zachary, how to approach him without revealing the full, horrific extent of what we suspected had happened to Scott.
We couldn't burden him with that, not yet. Not when he was our only fragile flicker of light in this ever-deepening, suffocating darkness. We had to protect his innocence, even as we sought to use his unique position—a contradiction that twisted in my chest. Was it manipulation, even if our intentions were just? I couldn't shake the guilt that came with needing something from someone so unguardedly pure. To uncover a truth that was anything but.
As we talked, our plans were taking shape, and I couldn't help but wonder about Inspector Dior. Was he making any progress with his "meticulous order" in the case? Or was he, too, lost in the labyrinth of his own mind, facing the same impenetrable walls of silence and corporate misdirection? He was the professional, the one with the badge, the resources, and the authority to hopefully get the job done.
The knot in my gut — the one that had been tightening ever since that first knock on my door — twisted a little tighter. It told me that whatever happened to Scott, its roots ran deeper and stranger than any ordinary crime. And Zachary, our innocent ghost in the machine, might be the only one who could lead us to them, even if he didn't understand.