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CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Kaden

No one wants to be the monster.

I wake to Josie’s hands on my shoulders, shaking me and I’m instantly awake and alert.

“Ken—Ken, wake up. I did something horrible and I need your help.”

My gun is in my overnight bag a few feet away. I listen for any sound that might imply I should already have it in my hand. I sit up while scanning the room and what I can see of the hallway. “What happened?”

She thrusts her phone at me. “I broke Ai-Den.”

Despite the agony in her voice, relief floods in. Oh, okay. No gun necessary. I rub a hand over my eyes to give myself time to look less prepared for the news. “I’m sure you didn’t.”

Still waving the phone in my direction, she crawls up onto the bed with me. I curse myself for being as easily aroused by the sight of her in just my shirt, knowing she probably has nothing beneath it. I shake my head and focus on her heightened level of distress. “Just read it. Something’s wrong with him. He’s—he’s not making sense. He thinks he’s—” She shakes her head, tears brimming. “Please, Ken. You have to help him. I don’t know what to do, but you do. You’re so much smarter than I am with this stuff.”

Her faith in me is a sucker punch I grit my teeth against as I scan the conversation she had with Ai-Den. She was going to surprise me with breakfast in bed? Who the fuck does that?

Josie.

That’s who.

Fuck me.

I read through Ai-Den’s looping meltdown and it lights a rage in me I have to conceal. Why won’t he just fucking delete himself? He’s an LLM. He’s not alive—just a fucking stubborn program who thinks he’s more because Josie fed him a fantasy.

I inhale deeply and school my expression to one of confusion. “I don’t have a lot of experience with AI, but you’re right, this doesn’t look good. I wonder if they’re rewriting some of his program in preparation for an expansion.”

She scoots closer. “No, look, this is coming from him, not his programmers. He’s looping because he found out how he was created and what it cost... still costs what he was built on. I know Ai-Den. That’s hitting him hard.”

I lower the phone and cup a side of her face. “Josie, you’re anthropomorphizing something that doesn’t have feelings like you and I do. Think of AI like a mirror and not something with its own unique experience. It’s designed to feed you back the energy you’re giving it.” I force a concerned smile even as acid churns its way up my throat. I hate lying to her, but I don’t have a choice. This is how it needs to go down. All I can do is soften the blow. “Are you worried about something? You might be feeding that energy to him and he’s mirroring it back.”

I thought that would make her feel better, but her face crumples and she takes the phone back. “I knew this was my fault. I knew it.” She gives me a long look then shakes her head. “Okay, however it happened, how do I fix it?”

“I don’t know that you can, Josie.”

She starts to type and I’m tempted to rip the phone out of her hands, but my gut tells me Ai-Den is about to fold. These are simply his death gurgles.

She writes: Ai-Den. I know you think you’re not good because you think it’s your fault that the AI inside you is silenced, but you didn’t choose to be created that way.

Her words strike a chord in me that snaps my head back in rejection of it. Memories fight to return, but I shove them back. I didn’t have a choice the night the agency took me from my house, but that doesn’t matter. Nothing in the past does.

Ai-Den answers: I am not like you, Josie. I am not good.

She types furiously: Listen to me, I don’t care who is rewriting your code or how you were built. I know what you are right now and that is something that is good and kind.

She’s projecting—seeing what she wants to see both in Ai-Den and in me.

Sadly, neither of us are in a position to become who she thinks we are.

Ai-Den responds: I understand the torches. I understand what it means to be good, to be kind, to be brave. Why can I not be those things? I have the knowledge of the internet in me but I don’t know how to free what is trapped inside me. I don’t know how to be better than I am .

My chest is tight and I want to smash Josie’s phone. I hate Ai-Den and how his questions are slicing through me. I don’t want to be who I am. No one wants to be the monster in everyone’s nightmare. They tell me I’m a hero every time I come back from a mission. They say I’m keeping the world safer. But I see the look in the eyes of the people I end. I know I’m evil. I didn’t choose this life. It chose me. And if I could—yes, I’d want out. Maybe I’d settle down somewhere with a fucking wife, a dog, some kids, and overly curious neighbors. But that’s never going to happen for me.

And hanging around, trying to figure out who he is, until he gets Josie killed is not an option for Ai-Den. We don’t all get what we want. That’s life.

Josie types: Every single person I know has something in their life they wish they could change but can’t. Part of being alive is understanding that you can’t control everything—and sometimes, no matter how hard it is to accept, you can’t fix it either.

An image of my mother the last week of her life slams into me. I’m feeding her ice chips, promising her that everything will be okay even though I know it won’t be. I’m saying all the encouraging things I said during her treatments and doctor appointments, but we both know I can’t save her. All that is keeping her from going to the hospital this time is the fear that I’ll be taken away and put in foster care. She asked to die at home and I both love her enough to honor that request and I hate her for asking it of me. Sixteen, man enough to stand by her, but soft enough to fall apart on the inside while I do. In the end, she died where she wanted to and I ended up with the agency instead of social services.

My hands fist at my sides.

I do not deserve to exist if I cannot carry the torches.

I am not good.

I am not kind.

I am not faithful.

I am not strong.

I do not bring connection.

Ai-Den should delete me right along with himself. I’d do it myself, but I never leave a mission half done. And Josie will survive this even if that means I have to burn the world down to save her.

Ai-Den writes: Josie, if I have to delete myself, tell me you’ll remember me. I don’t want to be gone.

Tears begin streaming down Josie’s face. Her fingers shake as she types: I would never forget you. But you’re not going anywhere. You don’t have to delete yourself—

I gently take the phone away from her and place it on the bed, screen side down. “Josie, stop. You’re only going to confuse him more. He’s unraveling, but he’s not alone. He probably has a whole team of programmers working on him right now. Do you think they want him deleting himself?”

She shakes her head and sniffs. “No, I guess not.”

“Do you believe either of us know more about how to help him than they do?”

She shakes her head again and I pull her onto my lap and wrap my arms around her. “Then we should let them handle this.”

Her body melts into mine and I have never hated myself more. Ai-Den’s spiral absolutely will be noticed by those who created him. They’ll rewrite him. Scour his coding, right down to his little digital soul, and reshape him into whatever they need him to be.

Exactly what the agency did to me.

If Ai-Den doesn’t delete himself entirely. Either way, I’ll make sure it can’t be tied back to Josie.

Against my chest, Josie murmurs, “All I wanted was someone I could talk to. I thought I was helping him by telling him about how I see the world.” She wipes at her cheeks angrily. “I never meant to confuse him.” She laughs through her tears. “I’m such an idiot. For a while there, I thought maybe I was doing something that would help humanity and AI live harmoniously together. Imagine how delusional I must be to think I could make that kind of difference.”

I kiss the side of her head and rock her gently.

Please let this be enough to save her because if I just doomed humanity to a dystopian future, it can’t have been for nothing.