Welga shuddered. She’d never felt this alone, not even in the blacked-out regions of North Africa. At least there she had her squad mates. She missed Por Qué—the real one. She hadn’t bothered to talk to her agent since the stellas crashed. The majority of Por Qué’s capabilities resided in remote servers, not in the small bit of hardware embedded in her body, but maybe some company was better than none.

“Por Qué, what’s the network status here?”

“Emergency access only.” Christ, her agent sounded so stiff when she was off-line.

Welga climbed into the truck. “It’s good to hear your voice. Por Qué, my location is the corner of Golden Gate and Leavenworth. I need real-time guidance to get home. Emergency network access code is—” She read the numbers from a physical encryption key.

A map popped up in her visual. Welga sighed in relief as the overlay showed her where to drive. The way home posed challenges, but the zip took the edge off her tremors and Por Qué’s help allowed her to focus on steering.

She parked along the curb and had to run over half a washing-bot, smashing it further. “Sorry,” she muttered as she passed through the entry into their hive.

Someone had propped the door open with a chunk of metal. No doubt from another abused, destroyed bot. The wiser people would turn off their WAI-based devices rather than trash them, but everyone would pay to restore the world when sanity returned. Had this accomplished what the Machinehood wanted? People refusing to use their WAIs seemed temporary madness, not a change in the way of life. Her grandma had told stories of the days when only rich people or the military had access to AIs. Bots came even later, during her parents’ time. Would this fear last long enough for society to learn how to function without machines?

The hive’s elevator was out of service, so Welga ran up the stairs, two at a time, through warm, still air. Someone must have shut down the building WAI. She knocked on the door to her apartment. Por Qué couldn’t let her in today. The door swung inward to reveal a care-bot.

“Your name,” the bot said through its speaker.

“Olga Ramírez. This is my apartment. Where’s Connor Troit?”

“In here,” Connor called out. His voice, raspy and weak, came from the bedroom. “Care-bot, I authorize entry.”

The bot moved aside, and Welga ran to the bedroom as fast as the duo-zip let her. Connor lay on their bed and struggled into a sitting position as she entered. His blond hair stuck out in greasy tufts, and his skin looked more pink and raw than hers. Ugly green bruises mottled his bare, pale torso.

“Christ, you look like shit,” Welga said.

“Thanks. What are you doing here? Are you off the mission?”

“I’m happy to see you, too.”