̷T̷H̷R̷E̷E
"Take a seat."
It took Elodie a moment to process her brother's words. After an awkward pause, she cleared her throat, nodding. Elijah moved to the pit, and Elodie followed suit, seating herself opposite her brother.
It often took Elodie a moment to adjust to Elijah's presence whenever she visited the villa. Though both considered their visits to be frequent, this term was entirely subjective. It hadn't been since the accident that she had seen her brother in person. He had changed his hair, which had always been a few shades lighter than hers, to a cool dark tone of brown and had shaved down the sides of his head. He appeared to be paler than she had remembered him, an impression not helped by the contrast of his skin against the dark grey robe he wore. She found herself wondering how she had changed comparatively.
"You don't look as sick as you used to. You should get hit by cars more often." He said, clearing up her thoughts. Elodie raised her eyebrows in surprise.
"Apparently," she remarked. "I didn't believe mom when she said the same thing."
"She usually doesn't know what she's talking about, it was a reasonable assumption." Elijah replied, spreading his arms across the top of the couch. He yawned, his eyes flickering to Connor, who had remained stationary. "What do you think?"
Elodie glanced over her shoulder, pursing her lips.
"I'm not sure." She thought for a second, frowning to herself. "Did I work on it?"
Elijah let out a short bark of laughter. "The accident really knocked something out of place, didn't it?" He gave a concise nod. "For months."
"Months?" She could feel heat spreading up her neck, though she didn't know if it was from embarrassment or the warmth of the fireplace between them.
"Wouldn't shut up about it."
She glanced over her shoulder again, squinting at Connor. "I don't remember at all."
"You did mention the doctors said your short-term memory was worse than your long-term." Elijah replied, waving a hand. He always possessed a dismissive air when it came to the lasting ramifications of the accident, but Elodie couldn't fault him for it. She herself disliked dwelling on the matter. "Don't make too many harsh judgments on it. It's still recalibrating at the moment, reintegrating its memories. A little incident with the last deviant it tried to deactivate."
"It failed its purpose?" Elodie replied, frowning. Elijah shook his head.
"It succeeded, but at its own cost." Elijah replied. "I suppose I should get you up to speed. He's all your work. Well, some finishing touches were done by a few others, your boyfriend included I believe ... It would be generous to call them programmers. As you can see, the fact I'm even involved should speak volumes. The point is, no one could parse the code you'd used, it was unlike anything they'd seen."
She almost didn't have time to react what he had said, but the thought briefly crossed her mind. Lex had barely spoken about the work he had done when she had still be in recovery, it predated their relationship after all, but it seemed strange that he would never have mentioned the fact, especially if he had known RK800 was Elodie's work. She let herself store this information in the back of her head for now, not wanting to appear as ignorant in front of Elijah than she already was.
"If you're expecting me to be able to translate it, I'm not sure I can help." Elodie replied quickly, feeling a jolt of self-consciousness and running a hand through her hair. Her gaze fell to her feet, trying not to feel the weight of Elijah's watch.
The truth was that she'd been struggling with her work ever since returning to Cyberlife. While most Cyberlife androids ran off a language that Elijah had invented, Elodie had developed her own while experimenting as a teenager with the concept of android animals. While it didn't completely rewrite the Cyberlife code, it built upon it, creating androids with a more instinctual response to their environments.
The key had been in her unique use of indentation when performing arrays. Elodie's code was elegant, almost artistic in nature. She had developed a sub-language that she called 'code waves', based on their pattern and the visual image they evoked.
The problem was that while Elodie retained the knowledge of her language, each piece was as unique as a fingerprint and incredibly dense. It wasn't waves she saw when she opened her work terminal, it was a goddamn maze. She'd managed to cover for herself so far, given that she hadn't been handed a big project since her return, but the promise of an impossible task loomed on the horizon with menace.
"Things have been ... foggy since everything."
From the corner of her eye, she saw her brother wave his hand. "No, no of course not. The tech in the RK800 is magnificent, your best work. You've outpaced me."
Elodie snorted. "Hardly. It's your blueprint."
"When I started Cyberlife, I couldn't have dreamed of an android like Connor." Elijah said, his eyes falling on the silent figure. "Intuitive, adaptive technology that responds to its environment with much the same manner as a human. Better, even. An android that isn't a domestic servant but the next stage in automation — bespoke service for complex, high risk tasks."
"But something's wrong with it. Like you said, it half-succeeded." She paused, thinking for a moment. "And ... It said deviancy. It investigates deviancy. Deviancy's a campfire story, an urban legend. The only people who take it seriously are interns who've never been above level 10."
Elijah let out a chuckle. Behind him, one of the doors slid open, and two of the Chloe androids entered the room, pacing gracefully towards the conversation pit with a tray in either hand. As they began to set out glasses, pouring purple tinted liquid clinking with ice and serving each sibling a glossy pastry. Elijah continued as they performed the tasks.
"Deviancy is our new reality, Elodie. It has been since August, albeit the cases have trickled in. Cyberlife has been in communication with Detroit PD for quite some time though, and things are ... Well, they're getting out of hand."
Elodie scoffed, reaching out to grasp one of the cups to take a sip. Iced earl grey and lavender tea, a favourite of Elijah's. It had never quite been her taste.
"You mean to tell me that deviancy exists, that it's being covered up, and that I was designing an android for the intended purpose of solving the problem?"
Her brother smirked, picking up his drink. His eyes danced with mirth as he watched her. "You could say RK800's current stated purpose is specious. Or rather, it leaves out his original intended purpose. Perhaps that will jog your memory."
She squinted to herself as she processed his words. In some ways she hated it when her brother tested her, yet the need to solve a puzzle, to prove her worthiness was above everything else. She didn't care what others thought of her, but the idea of letting her brother down made her feel deeply uncomfortable.
Slowly, Elodie nodded.
"I ... I remember the serial number, I do. I just couldn't place it." She muttered, half to herself, as she continued to dig through her memory.
The details were fuzzy at best, but slowly they began to arrange themselves. Bits and pieces floated in her mind — the shiny skinless android on the steel bench, gloves stained with blue, holding the prototype of the android's thirium pump regulator. #8456w. She blinked as the realisation hit her, mouth growing dry. Across from her, Elijah nodded knowingly.
"You know now, don't you." It isn't a question but a by-product of her brother's unnerving perception.
"Spec ops." Elodie breathed, exhaling sharply through her nose. She glanced over her shoulder, scrutinising the android, its features blank to the conversation being held. "I was designing a prototype for the army."
"And doing exceptionally well with it too. The accident truly was a shame."
"So ... It's been repurposed?" She said, turning back to face him.
"The incidents began to crop out of nowhere. They begged and pleaded me to step in but, truly I have no idea what's caused it." Elijah threw his arms upwards in an exaggerated shrug. "So I asked what you had been working on and it seemed to make perfect sense. The combat ability, forensic analysis, negotiation skills. I thought the mimicry was an excellent touch, not only perfect replication but the ability to identify any language known to man and instantly comprehend. But what makes it special beyond anything else is—"
"Reincarnation." Elodie breathed. It had been a stroke of genius, the perfect psychological warfare. An unkillable, perfect machine that could only learn from its past mistakes. "I codenamed the project God of War. A little crass, I know."
"An amusing touch." Elijah said. "So I hope you don't mind I took the liberty to volunteer your project."
A smile spread across her lips. Yes, she couldn't remember everything about the project, really only the initial construct came to mind, but the idea of Elijah's faith in her creation was an immeasurable compliment. The moment was fleeting as realisation began to dawn on her, like a cloud that had slowly inched its way across the sun.
"Half-succeeded. It's not built for domestic use. It's built for results on the battle field. Results at any cost."
"Exactly."
Before she could discuss the possible ramifications further, Elijah was on his feet, moving upwards to the surface level of the living room. Elodie jumped in her seat, placing her cup down with a soft clink. She mirrored his movements, the siblings stopping short of the Connor android. Elijah ran his eyes up and down the model, squinting them.
"RK800, report system restore percentage."
"96%." The android replied, its voice flat. Elijah turned to Elodie, a spark in his bright eyes.
"I need you to supervise this android in the field."
"Wait, what?" Elodie muttered, letting out a nervous laugh. "I don't ... I don't do fieldwork, much less observational reports."
"This isn't an observational report." Elijah replied. "If you can't adapt the current code, then you'll be building from the ground up. Think of it as immersive supervised learning. But as you said, RK800 is bespoke for the battlefield, not Detroi— Oh Elodie, don't look so worried."
She could feel that her brows had knitted together, her forehead grown taut. "I ... You know how I am when my routine is thrown off. I'm a lab rat, I'm not ... I'm not built to run around with an android, much less one chasing deviants. For one, I don't know the first thing about them."
"Exactly." Elijah replied, and she found herself resentful of his tone, so sure and sturdy. It was the thing she had never possessed of his: infinite knowledge of his own correctness. Elodie had always been 95% sure of herself, and the other 5% haunted her. Elijah had never seemed to, indeed never needed to, doubt his own abilities. "You don't know the first thing about deviants, so you'll learn."
She scoffed, her mouth agape, gaze shifting to the android. After a moment, she let out a noise of frustration. "You're not going to let this go, are you?"
"Of course not." He straightened up as he spoke, folding his arms across his chest. He paused as his gaze shifted past her, to the large windows overlooking the lake outside and the violin in front of them. "What did you think, by the way?"
Elodie followed his eyeline, her teeth pressing against her bottom lip. "It's beautiful."
"I knew that all of this would be a lot. And I know that whatever I offer you, you usually turn down. A home that isn't that shabby little den. Money to buy shirts that aren't button ups. An android, your very own Chloe. But you're impossible to buy for, truly, because you want for so little."
Her head whipped back around. "It's worth millions of dollars."
"Which is why you're going to work for it." Elijah replied concisely. "You don't have to do much. Observe. Take notes. I know you like your notes. Report them back to Cyberlife while you re-familiarise with your code. The next Connor is already in development, an RK900, but they need your knowledge to succeed."
She turned back to him slowly. "Elijah, I ca—"
"I insist."
Silence fell between them. After a short while, she sighed in resignation. She knew regardless of her protests, that Elijah's word was law. She didn't resent him for it, rather she found herself gazing at the Connor android, apprehension wafting over her like the radiant heat from the fireplace.
As much as she was an expert in the Cyberlife tower, it had been to the detriment of every other aspect of her life. Before the accident, before Lex, before her appointments with Cyrus, she had lived and breathed her job from 6am to 1am.
When she'd gotten her own office, a private space, she'd had bought a single blow up mattress and stored it in beneath her desk to rollout on nights she couldn't bother going home. What was the point? Her home had been empty of people and scant of furniture back then. The weekends had been hell, she liked being alone but the lack of preoccupation made her skin itch like it was a foreign object her body was rejecting.
Going outside was treacherous — the noise, the chaos, the people with their eyes boring into her from all sides. Even in sunglasses and headphones, the moment she stepped into the world it was as though she had neglected to sleep for the past decade. Her body grew sluggish, and quickly she'd run back to nest behind her desk. Comfort was an email to her brother and pouring over the work she had brought home, playing chess online and brewing pots of coffee that she drank from the jug. Why bother with mugs, after all, if all they did was stall the inevitable?
Now here she was, presented with this android, an apparent work of genius that she, it's creator, had had wiped clean from her memory. Something about that unnerved her in a way it hadn't before. Not remembering the accident, nor the minutiae of her life in the lead up felt natural, Elodie had lived on autopilot. But what felt nonsensical was that she could have forgotten her work, not just a component of it like the tailored code, but the very essence of what she had been dedicating her life to in the lead up to the accident.
She inhaled slowly, swallowing her pride. Before she could speak, the android's voice broke the silence that hung in the air.
"System restore completed. Connor RK800 fully rebooted."
"I think the choice is made for you." Elijah said with a smile. "Best be on your way."