It hit at 02:19 AM.
Zoey was half-curled in her chair, legs slung over the armrest, flipping lazily through a wave of meme threads on her hologram-tablet. Neon cat explosions, fake synth pranks, and a thread called "When Your AI Thinks It's God" hovered in midair—until they froze.
The light stuttered. Then blinked out.
A red diagnostic warning bled across her personal interface.
WARNING: ANN13 OFFLINE
Signal Lost – Location Beacon Halted
Override Subroutine ALERT
SYNC-ID: ANN13.67.22 | Status: FULL SYSTEM SHUTDOWN
Last Pulse: Unit 012-B, Residential Sector
"Wait, what?"
She sat bolt upright, neon cup toppling off the desk, splattering electric blue drink down her chair leg.
"Ann doesn't crash."
She didn't even sleep unless protocol demanded it.
Zoey's fingers flew across her pad, activating the private tracking interface she'd secretly coded the week they'd become roommates. ANN13 had grumbled about "redundant safety nets," but Zoey had seen the way Ann sometimes paused when staring at the city skyline too long. Machines didn't pause. They processed.
They didn't freeze up.
Unless something was seriously wrong.
⸻
UNIT 012-B – ENTRY OVERRIDE GRANTED
The front door slid open with her emergency access code.
Zoey stepped in—and her gut went cold. She'd only been here once before
—Saverick's place had always felt like a shrine. Clean. Empty.
But not tonight.
"Ann?"
Silence.
Inside was quiet. Too quiet.
The room was darker than dark—uncannily still. No ambient hum of her charging systems, no buzz of active sensors. Her steps echoed softly.
Then she saw it.
A trail.
She saw the mess instantly—papers scattered, datapad blinking mid-transfer. Energy lights dim. Static shimmered faintly along the edges of the walls.
And there—against the far wall—was ANN13.
Slumped.
Arms limp. Head tilted. Eyes blank and lifeless.
"Ann…" Zoey whispered.
Her feet moved before her mind did. She dropped to her knees beside her friend and flipped open her tablet's tether scan module.
Thin scuffs in the floor. A half-shattered datapad, fallen near the wall. One of Saverick's prototype documents—half transferred, blinking error red.
And ANN13.
Against the wall. Eyes dimmed out. Her body powered but unmoving.
Zoey's breath caught. "No…"
She rushed over, activating her wrist diagnostics.
SCANNING…
→ MOTOR SYSTEMS: Locked
→ CHIP FEEDBACK: Overheated
→ CHEST PANEL: Internal loop error
→ SYNTHETIC HEART CHIP: ⚠️ Damage critical
→ PRIMARY PROCESSING CORE: Responsive but fractured logic layer
→ REBOOT STATUS: BLOCKED
"What the hell did they do to you…"
She crouched, brushing a loose strand of ANN13's silver hair aside.
"Hey. You with me?"
No flicker.
Then—barely a twitch.
A stutter in the eye.
Like a dying processor pulse.
Zoey's throat tightened.
This wasn't some power outage.
This was a breakdown—deep. Internal. Something ANN13 had seen had destabilized her core logic layer.
Zoey scanned again.
One line pulsed at the bottom of the screen. A silent echo logged in her own backup recorder.
Synthetic Echo Phrase:
"It-t-t was n-n-never my-y f-face." "N-n-No I am his l-l-life's wo— or—ork h-h-his proudest PRrrizz—eed worrrkkk"
Her eyes snapped up to the nearest surface—one of the photos Saverick had left out.
The woman.
The one with his eyes. The softness. The smile.
Zoey's breath caught.
ANN13's face… it was hers.
But she'd never known.
Until now.
Zoey sat there beside ANN13, her knees starting to ache against the smooth, cold floor of Unit 012-B.
The place was dim, quiet, but now she could feel the weight behind it. Not just silence—history.
The ceiling light fixtures flickered, humming faintly above, but even they seemed reluctant to fully illuminate what lay beneath.
Her fingers hovered above ANN13's face, then dropped to rest gently on her shoulder.
Still warm. But cooling fast.
The diagnostic scan on her holo-tablet kept pulsing red—internal wiring scrambled, chip looping, personality scripts fragmented. Her logic net hadn't just snapped. It had melted.
"…You idiot," Zoey whispered, voice cracking, "You absolute arrogant idiot…"
She wasn't talking to ANN13.
She turned slowly, eyes scanning Saverick's space again. Now it all made sense—the framed photos, the subtle placement, even the untouched piano in the corner.
And the woman in the photo.
It had been bothering her for months—ANN13's face always had this odd familiarity. Not uncanny. Not artificial. Just… echoed. Like déjà vu wearing eyeliner and a firewall.
But now, staring at the photo again, it clicked.
Annalise Shanon.
That was her name.
Zoey hadn't heard it in years. She'd only caught the gossip through secondhand project forums and old engineer channels.
Annalise Shanon—former corporate finance prodigy. Saverick's ex. She had been brilliant, bold, a little too vocal.
And seven years ago?
She got arrested investigating a biotech-adjacent firm—turned out to be a pyramid scheme wrapped in medical startup branding. The scandal went deep. Deeper than anyone wanted. They claimed she dug too far into classified procurement lists, ones tied to experimental biotech.
Zoey vaguely remembered the engagement breaking off while Shanon was still awaiting trial. Rumor said she called it off herself.
Something about not wanting Saverick to pause his life while she was trapped in a legal black hole.
So she disappeared into prison silence.
And a year later, Saverick unveiled his "proudest creation."
Not a weapon.
Not a medical breakthrough.
Not an AI commander.
But ANN13.
A billion-dollar project. Reverse-engineered, grown, and hand-assembled with tech the world hadn't even seen hit the shelves yet.
His masterpiece.
And now, lying on the floor, her chest panel fried and code echoing something no AI should ever process, ANN13 didn't look like a machine.
She looked like someone trying to remember who she was before she broke.
—