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The door banged behind Sammuel as he entered the dark garage and walked to his car.
?Who does she think she is?? he said under his breath, his thick, grey mustache holding his words back.
As he approached the car ? Rhonda ? it unlocked its own door with a low click, sensing the proximity of its owner. The plastic smell of technology emanated from the insides of the car. Its slick navy blue reflected the streetlamps' cold light showering inside through the garage door's one-way mirror. The street was empty outside, a black canvas of nothingness covered the background beyond the other houses. The suburbs were asleep.
Sammuel entered the car and it gently closed the door for him with an anticlimactic click. He wanted to bang that door. He wanted to close it with such strength that even the bulletproof window would shatter to bits. He wanted to pound the dashboard and punch the screens. That snarky teenager! How could she be so arrogant, so full of herself, so questioning and annoying?
?I'm the mayor!? he banged on the dashboard in the place where the steering wheel would have been. ?Disrespectful, rebellious little?? He puffed.
?Rhonda, on,? he ordered the car and pulled the seatbelt, waiting for the dashboard to come alive with bright lights and maps and numbers in perfectly round fonts in the ultra-high-definition screens.
It didn't.
?Rhonda, turn on,? he said, annoyed.
Nothing happened.
He pushed the manual ?on? button in the dashboard. He pushed again and again and punched the button and the stupid car wouldn't turn on.
His chest moved up and down in heavy breaths, his fists closed over his lap. The empty streets beyond his garage door's one-way mirror were calm and cold. The hard white light from the streetlamps rained down over age-old mailboxes and trash cans, casting long shadows on the neatly-trimmed grass.
?That's just great,? he chuckled to himself. ?Even the car has turned against me.?
He pushed the button on the door to leave the car and banged his head on the hard glass. The door was locked. Had he used his critical thinking, he would've realized pushing the button again and again ? as he did ? would be useless. But he didn't want to think, he was angry out of his mind.
?Rhonda, open the door.?
He pushed the door with all his strength and it didn't move.
?Open the damn door, Rhonda!?
He banged on the bulletproof glass with both fists and yelled, ?Rhonda, open the fucking door! Open the door right now, you piece of garbage! Open the door!?
The door didn't budge, indifferent to his enraged yelling. He screamed in anger and frustration and punched the ceiling. Outside the car, the night was still and silent.
His hand went to his pocket, but it was empty. He hadn't grabbed his phone on his way to the garage.
Sammuel sighed. This was just perfect, wasn't it? Ironic. He would have to beg for his teenage daughter to help him get out of the car. Just after having a discussion where she had called him old and out-of-touch, and he had said she was young and naïve.
He knocked on the car window and called for his daughter. ?Alex!? But there was no response. ?Alex! I need help!? The garage was still and dim and silent. ?Hello? Alex! Can you hear me?? Of course she couldn't. She was probably already on the computer, typing and hacking and coding, or whatever it was that she did all night.
He sighed a long and profound sigh. Then, he laughed, alone in his car.
?I swear, some days are just the worst. Everything goes against you.?
He sat back and tried to think of a solution, giving up on his anger. He didn't even know where he was going to go in the first place. Why had he gone for the car? He didn't have a plan. He was just going out, he supposed. Out to think, to breathe, to simply stay away from the heat and the pressure of that house. And he knew he would probably go to the pier. His mind always went there anyway.
He could remember the day he and Susan had sat there, fifteen years ago, watching the sunset. The day they had found it was a girl. She was going to be bright and gentle, they imagined. The sweetest girl alive. Shy and full of love and affection towards her parents. And of course, she would be strong like her mother, with the wits of her father. Just perfect.
As it had turned out, she was everything they had imagined. She could use some work on being affectionate and sweet, but she sure was bright and strong and quick-witted. And she gave him a hell of a hard time.
It would have been hard either way, he thought. Teenagers are supposed to give you trouble, apparently. But she was special. She saw the world out there in a way he couldn't. She saw beyond the one-way mirrors, beyond the cold lights and the empty streets of the sleeping suburbs. She saw into people. But she didn't understand how complex everything was.
What would people think of him if she was seen in the protests? And in such controversial times, with so much hate, so many threats. It wouldn't be safe for her. People could try something to get to him. But she didn't understand, and how could she? As much as he had tried to get into her mind, he couldn't. Just like he couldn't get out of his car now.
Sammuel read the shiny slogan on the dashboard. ?Designed to protect you.? Right. By keeping him locked inside. Well, yes, sometimes keeping someone locked inside was the only option, but that was different. He was the mayor, and Alex was just a teenager. She didn't understand the world out there.
At that moment, in the world out there, a car with tinted windows slowed to a halt and parked in front of his house. He squinted at the car but couldn't see inside, he couldn't even make out if there was someone inside it. The car stood parked there for a moment and, after a second, four people left with their heads covered in black masks. They were in dark clothes and walked swiftly through the lawn to the front door, leaving his field of vision. His heart sank and he forgot how to breathe.
?Rhonda, open the door,? he tried. He gasped for air, pushing the door with one hand and banging on the window with the other. ?Rhonda, open the door! Open the door, now!?
He punched the window and pushed the ?open door? button and the ?on? button but nothing worked.
?Alex!? he screamed and banged on the window of the car. ?Get out of the house! Get out of the house now! Alex!?
He couldn't see anyone on the lawn. The car was parked there, still in the empty night, bathing in the bright light of the streetlamp. The world was a frozen frame, nothing moved.
?Rhonda, call 911.? Nothing happened inside the car. ?Rhonda, call Alex! Call the house!?
Out there, a gun poked into sight in the one-way mirror. He gasped inside the car and shushed himself, instinctively disappearing into his seat, just his eye line above the dashboard. Then, the man holding the gun walked across the front of the garage door with swift steps, pointing the gun down. The man walked over the edge of the mirror and disappeared.
Inside the car, the mayor was quiet and breathless. ?Alex,? he whispered. He poked at the touchscreens and pressed every button in that dashboard. He tried the other doors and they were all locked. He tried everything. Then, in the silence of the night, he heard the bang of a shot coming from inside the house.
Time stopped.
It didn't seem real. He wasn't here, no. He was sleeping, dreaming, his disembodied conscience traveling the universe and seeing all that could be but wasn't. And this clearly wasn't. It couldn't be.
Then another shot. And another. And he was here, locked in that car.
He gasped back to life.
?Alex!? He punched the door until his knuckles were bleeding. He tilted his body to the side and kicked the glass with his heel. It was useless. He felt the sting of pain as if the bones in his foot were cracking but he didn't care. ?Rhonda, please let me out! Let me out!?
He banged and banged until he heard a faint mechanical noise. He stopped. It was a low, muffled, mechanical whir. Beyond the dashboard and the sleek navy blue, the garage door was slowly rolling open.
?No.?
Rhonda's dashboard turned on and the engine came to life with a low humming. The bright white light from the screens filled the insides of the car, blinding him.
?Rhonda, open the door.?
The car ignored his orders. He pushed the buttons and they didn't work. And, slowly, the car started moving.
?Rhonda? Rhonda, what are you doing??
He looked on screens and the maps didn't show any routes. The car rolled out of the garage and down the driveway, into the street. The turn signal clicked.
?Rhonda? Where the fuck are you going? Let me out of here!?
He banged once again against the door, his hands tired, his fingers bleeding. He was crying.
?Alex! No, no, no, no? Rhonda let me out,? he sobbed. ?Please, let me out. Alex!?
The lights from the screens dimmed and the car speeded through the suburbs, away from his house, away from the shots, away from his daughter.
Hugging his legs, crumpled into a ball, he cried as the car turned corners and led him into the unknown. When he looked outside again, he was on a dark road, outside the city. He checked the map and noticed this was an old and solitary road that would maybe take him downtown, eventually.
?Where the hell are you taking me??
His eyes drifted from the map to the other apps. He could text or call someone. He tapped the touchscreen and the apps didn't open. He tried over and over with his bloody fingers, red drops peppering the screen. He wanted to call the police, to call Alex. He wanted to call a neighbor. Anyone. He wanted to call the car company and tell them their car was a piece of trash and he would sue them for their last nickel.
The taps on the indifferent phone icon became punches, and kicks soon joined. He cried and screamed and thrashed the dashboard until there was no light inside that fucking car. But still, Rhonda drove away, her headlights piercing the night in the lonely road ahead.
Sammuel rubbed the tears away. Why was this happening? Why him? Why now? He was in the middle of nowhere. Alone. And Alex! They had finally gotten to him. Then, from somewhere, a white light stabbed his eyes.
It was the rearview mirror. There was a car behind him.
He took a deep breath and tried to think. The car approached with blinding headlights. Maybe the other car could help make his car stop. He didn't know how, but what else could he do at this point? He moved to the back seat and waved with desperate hands.
?Help,? he yelled.
As he waved, he heard a noise against the glass on the back. He lowered his hands and checked the place where the noise had come from. It was hard to see against the blinding white lights of the other car. There was a small crack in the glass. Then, there was another noise and another crack.
They were shooting.
The noises and the cracks started peppering the back window and he threw himself down on the back seat, covering his head. There were dozens, hundreds of noises against the back window. Rhonda swayed from side to side, making him slide on the back seat and hit his head against the door. The headlights danced on the ceiling of the car, the cracks on the glass leaving shadows of crooked lines, a dark web covering him, ensnaring him for death.
The back window finally gave in and exploded into the car, falling over him, a thick blanket made of glass. He screamed, his bloodied hands over his head. The bullets kept coming. Rhonda kept swaying and braking and speeding up. The white light flooded the insides of the car. He cried and screamed and covered his head, the glass blanket banging against his body as Rhonda jumped up and down in the road.
?Dad!? the person on the bicycle said
He looked. ?Alex? Oh my god, Alex!? He inspected her from head to toe. ?Are you ok??
?Yes,? she said, ?I'm fine.?
He hugged her into a desperate embrace. His heart racing in relief, his arms shaking. It was so good to feel her body against his.
?Dad, listen,? she said. ?There were people in the house! I think they were after you.?
?Well, that fucking car might have saved your life,? she said.
?That might be, but I'll bike everywhere from now on.?
?Dad, don't be silly.? She escaped his hug. ?Maybe someone hacked it to protect you.?
She had a snarky smirk plastered to her face.
?Gosh,? she said, ?you're so naïve, so out-of-touch!
?I guess I am.?
The factory was bustling with activity every single day, every single minute, every single second of the year. The workers had plain faces, brought down with long hours and minimal pay, as they pieced together the perfect orders. Years spent in neon yellow vests working away to created F.R.I.E.N.D.s for other people. The robots, droids, freaks, whatever one wanted to call them were made bit by bit per order across the globe. Thousands of F.R.I.E.N.D.S were made in a day and sent in coffin-shaped boxes to their home address awaiting a life as their humans perfect and unchanging best friend.
As a mechanic and engineer, Tilly saw her fair share of F.R.I.E.N.D.s and their human partners. She would come to work intent on fixing together parts needed for certain bots and their requests. In a society where everything had to be perfect and technology was on the rise, it was rare to see a human-to-human interaction. Rarer still to see humans actually friends to one another. Almost everyone had a F.R.I.E.N.D. now and days, the ones who didn't were left with the rocky relationship that was friendship with imperfect humans and often ridiculed. Those with enough money ? the rich and the famous ? bought a gaggle of F.R.I.E.N.D.s and the robots were their entourage. Tilly had seen some F.R.I.E.N.D. returned, the bots dejected and in a code Blue which meant they were the equivalent of depressed at not meeting their human's standard of a good F.R.I.E.N.D. It killed Tilly's heart to scrape those bots, their uniqueness was also their downfall. No one else wanted a specific F.R.I.E.N.D. that had settings that were not their preference. What people often forgot about the F.R.I.E.ND.s was that they were programmed to emit human emotions and feelings as well as to think in their set capacity. However, most thought the F.R.I.E.N.D. was a plaything to be discarded with their setting were out of date. The ones that were returned were often scrapped, their parts used to build other droids. Tilly was called to houses and mansions that needed their F.R.I.E.N.D. fixed and the mechanic tried her best to ensure that she didn't need to scrape a robot with human emotions that were so vastly complex.
After her shift, Tilly would come home with realistic F.R.I.E.N.D. parts, arms of many colors, a few eyeballs rolling in her pockets, and grease in her hair with smears on her cheeks. She'd flick on the light and smiled as she headed to the garage of her small apartment, descending the steps as her calico cat, Coby, ran down past her. The mechanic would place the parts that were extras on her worktable, the likeness of actual body parts would have gotten her accused of several accounts of murder if not for the serial number on the parts for the robots. Putting her welding goggles on her face, on top of her yellow square glasses, she would spend the next few hours tinkering and trying to work on projects.
TWGF-18 nodded, her blue orbs trying to hide the rush of happy emotions that Tilly's words had made her feel. She moved to sit in the chair that Tilly had designated as hers and Tilly worked to reattach a hand to the rest of the bot's arm, the skin tone matching perfectly with TWGF-18's caramel. ?It's perfect Tilly!? The F.R.I.E.N.D. squealed as a six-year-old would about something shiny and pretty.
Tilly grinned as she sat back and admired her work. The hand blended seamlessly with the rest of TWGF-18's arm and the bot finally looked like a human again. There were a few parts, internally, that were different from the present F.R.I.E.N.D. but Tilly loved this robot as if it was her sister, then her best friend, then as a mother figure. ?Would you like me to work on the chip? I think I finally got it.? Tilly asked, waving a hand to the back of TWGF-18's neck.
Tilly took a deep breath as she opened the silver panel after lifting the skin by the seem. ?I hope so, I want to give you the same freedom that I have.? She waved the small box of wires and screws and small motherboards. ?With this...I'm hoping you can be free from your settings.?
Those blasted settings. Those settings made TWGF-18 stuck with the thought process and emotions of a six-year-old little girl. TWGF-18 was still enamored with horses and dolls and the color pink like Tilly was when she was six. As Tilly grew so did TWGF-18, but at a slower rate with only a select array of emotions and feelings that the bot could feel because she had meant to be perfect to a six-year-old. And she was! The F.R.I.E.N.D. was exactly what Tilly had needed and had become the little girl's closest confidant. The only thing was her F.R.I.E.N.D. was left in the past as Tilly continuously grew in the future and with different likes and different interests that TWGF-18 was unable to experience. Tilly was lost in her thoughts as she worked, connecting nerves and wires that would hopefully fulfill the dream that Tilly had had when she was a teenager. The long-awaited moment was finally here as an engineer put in the final screw. TWGF-18 made an odd sound as Tilly closed her panel. The engineer prayed that it had worked as she turned her best F.R.I.E.N.D. around on the chair.
?TWGF-18? How are you feeling?? Tilly asked her F.R.I.E.N.D.
Tilly released a triumphant sound and grinned so big that her cheeks her as she pulled her F.R.I.E.N.D. into a hug that the other gratefully returned.
?I also don't like pink anymore,? The bot said with such seriousness that Tilly laughed loudly. Her F.R.I.E.N.D. was free. Free to think, to act, to feel, to be.
TWGF-18 grinned as she stood up and looked around at everything in a new light, her clothes, her hair, her home. She had unlimited emotions and actions she could now enjoy thanks to Tilly, her friend from the beginning.
The robot watched as Tilly came towards her, ?I can't wait to show you so many things. So many things to enjoy,? The mechanic laughed, ?Or to not enjoy.? Raising a hand to shake, Tilly asked the bot one final question. One of ultimate freedom. ?TWGF-18, would you like a name? One of your choosing??
TWGF-18 nodded as moisture filled her eyes. A name meant she was unique, that she was real, and couldn't just be discarded into the trash pile. A name meant she was free from her settings. A name meant the robot was not a slave under her human's orders or whims, a name meant TWGF-18 could be friends with Tilly without the obligation. ?What about the name Destiny?? For she had taken her own into her own hands now.
Tilly smiled as they shook hands. ?It's such a pleasure to meet you, Destiny.? Tilly had done it, given her F.R.I.E.N.D. the choice to not be perfect. Humans never were anyway. Tilly couldn't help but think that so many of the F.R.I.E.N.D. that humanity ordered were missing that part that would forever make them separate from humans. Choice. Freewill. Mistakes. The robots were programmed to be perfect, always. Humanity was anything but perfect and that's what made life worth living. By being imperfect with a F.R.I.E.N.D. by one's side.
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