Part 2: Erin

I stared at my phone, grimacing at the mailbox. Nothing…precisely what I got last time I tried talking to the police. With a pained sigh, I stopped pacing about my gloomy studio apartment and tossed the thing on the tattered, maybe second-hand couch next to the waiting maidbot skin. “I guess I’m doing this,” I told myself, looking at the mocha skin waiting to be filled.

But not yet. There were things I could do, things that needed doing which would also delay the inevitable. Turning my attention to the watch I bought yesterday, I swiped and tapped my way through the unfamiliar 3D interface projected in front of me until a small cube appeared in the lower left filled with a bust of myself. The red recording light began blinking. I probably should have put something on besides the lavender cami, but whatever. It was morning.

“Umm, hello again Detective Kim,” I said, taking extra care with my enunciation. “I’m sure you’re tired of hearing from me, but I’m about to do something really stupid.”

I glanced back at the couch before switching to the rear-facing camera. With the maidbot skin in focus, I stepped closer, floorboards creaking terribly, and continued. “I sent you some pictures yesterday, but I haven’t heard from you so I figured I’d contact you again. Sorry. This came in the mail yesterday. It was left in my mailbox with no markings. In it was this maidbot control skin.” I worked the serial number on its neck into the frame, reading it off before opening up the back to capture the rainbow sheen of the inside. I should have known what that was last year when I saw the ‘costume’ Lisa brought home. I should have recognized it as an interference pattern from the micro-wires of the bio-electronic interface, but Lisa had seemed so happy at her clever thought that all I could think of was supporting her. I loved her, and we had so little to be happy about. I wanted to give her the sun and the moon and every star in the night sky, how could I not help her carve a piece of happiness out of our dreary lives?

But now she was gone. “I haven’t seen or heard from Lisa since last Halloween when she put on what we thought was a maidbot costume she purchased at…” I pick up my phone and navigate to my notes, “Jackson’s Jack-o-Lantern Costume Fun Time Plaza on main street. Now the day before Halloween I get a maidbot costume in the mail? I don’t think this is a coincidence. I think this is a trap, but if it is, then Lisa will be on the other side of that trap.

“I’m going to try collecting evidence that might point to where she is. I’m not going to try saving her. I don’t – I know that’s probably beyond me and since there isn’t anything I can do if the same befalls me I’ll bail as soon as things look dicey. I’ll also be taking a number of precautions to render the suit safer. Since they are destructive in nature I haven’t started; I wanted to make sure you saw the intact items first.”

I shifted my weight from one foot to the other and then back before continuing.

“Also, I’ll have this watch on me the entire time, though I probably won’t be able to answer it. The number is…” I navigated through to holo-watch’s information, listing off the cell number, serial number, make and model, SKU number, software revision, and every other piece of identifying information I could find along with where and when I bought it. As my final life line should something terrible happen, I wanted to make sure someone could find me. The police may not have been sympathetic to a single black woman looking for her clearly more-than-roommate, but they didn’t seem dismissive. Not completely at least. Certainly if I were to disappear myself after contacting them they’d have to search for me. Right?

“The letter that came with the suit said a Robo-Maids’s bot would come pick me up at nine this morning. That’s when Lisa left last Halloween. I’ll be available to reach on my phone—not this watch—until then. Oh! Umm, hold on,” I said as I fished the letter from the box. “This is the box by the way.” I unwrinkled the thrice folded paper against the arm of the couch as best I could and held it up, reading the messily handwritten letter out loud.

Dear Unit 03,

I hope you’re doing well. It’s been a while since we spoke last and I miss you. I’m sending you this bioroid skin in hopes that you’ll join Unit 02 and me. The two of us are having a wonderful time. I’m sure you miss us as much as we’ve missed you, so please be ready for pick up at your apartment at 9:00 tomorrow morning.

Love,
Mistress

“Umm, as you can see, she isn’t terribly reserved. I’m guessing it’s that woman I told you about before, the one who came by our apartment last year.” Keeping the note in frame, I set it on the couch with everything else. Hopefully the police would be able to pull something off it like fingerprints, hair, fibers, or something they could match to the sender. I’ve read there are people who can identify the type of person writing something by the way they form handwritten letters. If nothing else, who handwrites letters these days?

I switch the cameras back to my face. “I guess that’s everything for now. I’ll contact you again after I put this thing on. If worse comes to worse, I want you to be able to identify me.” A sigh escaped me. “So that’s that. Please contact me. I – ” My gaze veers off to the side. “I don’t want to do this, but I don’t see many options if I’m to ever see Lisa again.” If the worst truly did happen, there would be no finding me. But maybe I could at least be reunited with Lisa. In a way, the brightest light shines from within the darkest tunnel.

With one last sigh, I ended the call: It was time to get to work.

Turning my attention towards the kitchen area where a hot butter knife waited on the range and an epoxy kit on the counter, I picked up the collar and skin. The epoxy would take time to cure, so I deposited the skin on the kitchen table and carried the collar over to the counter. A drop of this on the metal contacts behind the faux jade, a drop of that, then stir. Simple. In a few minutes I shouldn’t have to worry about the collar interfacing with anything.

I went back for the skin, but before I could bring it over, a smell hit me. “What the fucking fuck is that?!” Though I asked the question, it didn’t take two brain cells—both screaming from the fumes—to know the epoxy was off gassing something God awful.

I dropped the skin on the floor and rushed the collar to the bathroom, making sure not to breathe in any of the fumes—just a few steps—and placed the collar by the soon to be opened window. Only once I had returned to the main room and closed the door behind me did I dare take a breath, but I didn’t leave it at that. Within a minute I had opened the rest of the apartment’s windows, as well as the apartment’s only other door, to the outside. Though the incoming air might have been rancid from the industrial park a few blocks away, I’d take that over whatever brain-eating fumes filled my apartment.

A sigh escaped me and I glanced back to my phone. It’s set to ring. Ignore it and move on.

I moved on over to the range, picking up the maidbot skin off the floor and oven mitts from the counter on the way. The knife wasn’t hot enough to give off a glow, but it had been on there for half an hour on high and the metal handle would surely burn me. It certainly did a number on the maidbot skin as I pressed the flat of the knife against the skin’s back opening, melting it until the knife cooled and I’d have to heat it on the stove again. Rinse and repeat until the edges were thoroughly damaged beyond any self-healing the skin might be capable of. There was no way to find out for sure what precisely got Lisa, but I could guess at some of the things. Being sealed inside this skin happened to be one of them. Though it might seem a bit extreme to melt the skin, from what I read online, a clean cut might still be able to heal. By contrast, heat damages the circuitry and should inhibit self-repairs.

Regrettably, nothing could be done about the interior lining with such short notice, but I figured until it interfaced with a collar, it should remain inactive. An inactive skin is a good skin. At least as far I was concerned. When this was over, I could melt the whole thing in the oven. Until then, I needed this to find Lisa.

Also regrettable: I had completed all the preparations I seemed capable of. Whoever sent this simply hadn’t allowed me enough time to prepare. Not that I’d have expected that—this woman clearly wants me as some kind of slave—but it would have been nice. Now I had to put it on.

Though there was one thing left I could—and probably should—do first. For one last time before I had to take the watch off, I checked for new messages. Unfortunately, Detective Luna Kim met my exception: there were no messages awaiting me. I stared pensively at the nothingness, setting it to ‘do-not-disturb’ once I came to terms with this reality and taped the watch’s core over my navel.

Before I could change my mind, I tossed the skin to the couch and turned the range off, stripping once the blinds were closed. Then came pulling the skin on and making sure all three lower tubes lined up. I’d thought it looked remarkably suited for me when I first saw it and as I worked it up my body, that feeling only grew stronger. Whomever sent this clearly had my measurements. Despite everything else so far, this somehow surprised me. It shouldn’t have, but it did, and it gave me pause. I didn’t stop for long though—this changed nothing. That woman clearly had all kinds of information about me, so of course she can find a maidbot skin to fit me. Not so much over my middle, though that probably had more to do with the ‘maidbot look’.

Feeling the watch pressed against my belly, a sharp, “Shit,” escaped me. I sighed, bemoaning, “And I had just gotten it over my chest too,” as I rolled the skin back down. Scrunching over to poke at the watch—which I had to flip over because it was backwards—I found that I had not forgotten to start the tracking app and that the GPS was indeed active. “You really should have made a list.”

There was no time to make a list. Taken together, I didn’t even have enough time to execute everything I’d have wanted to put on such a list.

Yet another sigh. No list. Just more pulling, grunting, and wishing I didn’t have to do this. Not needing to do this would have meant Lisa was with me. Then everything would have been better. She was my everything and her absence ate at me like nothing I could have imagined before. Now I knew all too well. It wasn’t that things would have been perfect if she were here—we’d still be scraping by at best. That was what got us into this mess in the first place. My brave Lisa…

I shook the thoughts from my head. I couldn’t allow myself to get distracted. Not only did I fear running out of time, but that I might forget something important.

Such as checking that the watch’s battery was charged.

Actually, no. Either it was or it wasn’t; it didn’t have time to charge it.

I checked anyway. Finding the battery at 98%, I leaned back against the couch. For a time, I stared at the ceiling. I was getting too tense, I needed to calm the fuck down or this would all fall apart. A few steadying breaths later, each made harder by this damned skin, I resumed dressing. Again. Ideally I’d have shaved my head, but I figured with my hair clipped close it wouldn’t make that much of a difference.

As it turned out, even a bit of wiggle room would have made this much easier. Chest, shoulders, arms, and head: each one harder than the last to get on as the skin grew taut, and the inside of the skin pulled at the hair I wish I had just shaved. At one point, I couldn’t breath due to misaligned nose tubes, but I managed before passing out. It also pressed the watch further into me. That particular discomfort faded quickly into an ocean of emotional security: It was my life-line to the outside world. So long as I had this, I couldn’t be trapped.

The thought encouraged me, propelling me forward. Next came the uniform. A veritable walk in the park in comparison, especially since I had no intention of lacing the corset any tighter than need be and that need wasn’t so great. Unlike Lisa, I didn’t care nearly as much about getting caught. I figured the worst that might happen would be the police finally starting an investigation in earnest, leading them to whomever sent this to me. That’d be a win as far as I was concerned.

Thinking of the police…

I grabbed my phone again. It may annoy the hell out of Luna, but too bad for her. Hers was the number I had been given and the only number I had. That made me her problem. Besides, maybe if I left enough messages she’d decide to grease this squeaky wheel.

Standing before the mirror on the back of my door, I began recording one last video message. “Me again,” I said, cringing. Those were the first words out of my mouth since donning this thing. Lisa had sounded odd, but hearing my own voice reinterpreted by a machine put everything in a new perspective. As did examining myself in the mirror. This maidbot rendition of me matched far more closely then that synthesized voice. My hair was styled in a bob of dark violet and green, and my figure more culturally conformant—skin lighter and smoother, waist drawn in, breasts high and round—but I still looked a lot like me. I wasn’t sure what to think of that.

I knew exactly what to think of the serial number on my throat.

“In case you can’t tell, it’s Erin Hill. I thought it may be a good idea if you could identify me in the skin.” Indicating myself with my free hand, I continued. “So, uh, this is it. I still need to put the collar on, but I want the epoxy to finish off-gassing fumes before I put it on.”

I glance at the clock. “I still have 15 minutes until they come get me. I’ll be resting…Please call me.” With those words, I hung up.

Though I might have said that, I really did need to put the collar on first. With no way to tell if the fumes had cleared thanks to the tubes in my nose, I erred on the side of caution and held my breath before heading into the bathroom. And I didn’t linger. I just grabbed the collar and closed the door again. Back in the main room, I picked up the star-headed screwdriver and walked back to the mirror.

I needn’t have bothered.

No sooner had I closed the collar around my neck then it sprang to life, whirring and tightening. It all happened too fast for me to react. But maybe there was something I could do after the fact. Pushing down my rising horror, I turned so as to better see the screw that secured the collar. Slotting in the screwdriver, it turned. It took a bit of effort, but the collar loosened, allowing me to remove it.

I breathed a sigh of relief. Harmless or not, I did not want to be locked into this thing. Repeating the process, the collar again tightened all on its own which wasn’t terrible. In fact, it seemed like a good thing. Should I need to remove the collar and put it back on in a hurry while out, it would take that much less time.

Thinking of which, I stowed the screwdriver in my rubber cleavage.

As a last bit of prep work before lying down, I wrote the serial number on my forearm using the pictures I took the day before for reference. There was no telling when I’d be expected to recite it. I might not have cared that much about getting caught, but I wasn’t about to lose this lead due to some silly oversight of mine like not being able to recall the serial number I’d been assigned. And though the maidbot skin was a lighter tone than my own, it was still plenty dark that noöne should really notice the lettering.

Then all I had left to do was wait.

  As I lay on the couch.

   Thinking.

Though being left with my thoughts might have been uncomfortable, it could have been worse. At least this suit doesn’t itch, I thought wryly, before slamming the palm of my hand against my forehead. As if that ever helped. “God, I was an idiot!” Of course Lisa’s suit would have itched. Having billions of nanowires burrowing through your skin and attaching to your every nerve ending would itch.

I groaned, recognizing yet another failing among a multitude of others. The sheen on the inside, the itch, the way the collar initialized…I should have made the connection. If not that, I should have taken some kind of precaution. Simply taping the edges of the opening or the metal contacts might have saved her. I could be holding her right now as the two of us shrugged off sleep instead of laying on a filthy couch in a disgusting apartment I couldn’t afford, waiting to be picked up by God only knew who or what!

I wanted to scream. I wanted to cry. With the suit on, I could only manage to let slip a pained sound from the voice synthesizer as wetness blurred the lenses holding my eyes open all the same. In that moment, I wanted to be caught. Whatever it took, I wanted to be with Lisa again. What’s more, I wanted to pay for the transgression of ineptitude—for being the one Lisa depended on yet to fail her so thoroughly.

But that kind of thinking helped noöne. It didn’t bring Lisa back and it didn’t help me prepare for what was to come. I needed rest. Here in my home, I was safe, I could exert a modicum of control over my environment, but out there anything could happen. What if someone decided to try taking advantage of me? Not only did I make a tempting target dressed like this, but maidbots were already sexually objectified. And they didn’t complain. Before that woman could do whatever she was planning some creep could –

I tore myself from that line of thought, cursing. More useless thoughts. Completely, and utterly useless right now.

Just like me.

I was doing this. As a means of distraction more than anything, I tried thinking of what else I might do, but I seemed to have exhausted those possibilities as I lay awake last night. Instead I thought of what I should have done last year. And what I shouldn’t have. I shouldn’t have let Lisa go of course. I knew better. I told her of all the reasons not to do it, but I didn’t stop her. I could have stopped her.

Instead I helped her.

“Stop,” I whimpered, or would have if not for the voice synthesizer. The word came out flat and dead and carried none of the meaning behind the intent. I needed to stop thinking.

“Stop thinking?" I laughed. Manic mirth turned into a mechanical cackle. “Yes, that’s what I need. To be a mindless drone. Unit Zero-Three, that’s my name. Think of nothing, that’s what that woman wants!”

I surged to my feet and paced about, the pain in my feet eclipsed by the need in my heart. She would not win. She would not have her prize, nor would she keep the life she stole away from my beloved. I could do this. I could save Lisa. I would!

A knock at the door shook me from my mania. Before answering it, however, I got my phone for one last message. I didn’t have time to dial Luna again, but at least I could leave my phone for the police. They would come by my apartment. I just had to believe that, if only so as to maintain the courage needed to open the door.

“Unit 219E7CD, follow,” one of two vaguely female bots said. Then they just walked off without so much as scanning me.

I had an excuse cooked up, but who was I to argue with simplicity. Following behind the pair suited me as well as anything else. Okay, not entirely true as that meant walking in these wicked heels on metal grating, forcing all my weight on the balls of my feet. At least I didn’t have far to go. A few short steps through a catwalk overlooking factories and warehouses, their lights bathing the world in grimy orange, and we came to the elevator. The scissor gate sealing the car already stood open. We continued past it, instead using the dimly lit stairwell cluttered with broken bottles, needles, spent condoms, and an assortment of other things I refused to think about.

Needless to say, I typically avoided the stairs. And if ever there was a time I didn’t want to take these stairs, it was while negotiating the balance that came with the unfamiliar bend of my ankle. If I made it through the day without a sprain, I’d count myself lucky.

I swallowed a sigh—there was no helping it—and at least the torturous footwear gave me something mundane to think about. In fact, the staccato tapping of the transport bots’ high-heeled boots mixed with the shuffling scuffing of my own almost made for its own music.

And on the plus side, I didn’t have to smell the place.

The thought brought my mind back to the present, and the smell earlier. And to my apartment. With it’s opened windows and unlocked door. Well, nothing there to steal and it’ll be that much easier for the police to let themselves in. The police would investigate my apartment if something happened. They had to. I refused to accept any other reality until I had to and that time was not now. Hopefully, not ever.

The stairwell opened into an alley in much the same condition, distinguished mostly by more trash and a homeless family seemingly intent on reminding me that my life could be worse. Theirs were the first human eyes to lay into me this morning, but they didn’t seem to think anything of it, merely noting the procession of a trio of bots with tired, dead eyes.

It could always be worse. If not for the generosity of my landlady, that could easily have been me.

We made a left, past them to the mouth of the alley where a powder blue van waited. The bots did not wait. Without pausing, as if following some prescribed path, one walked to the front and another to the back.

Unlike them, I did pause, though not for long. Seeing the bot opening up the back, I knew to get in. But then I paused again, or more accurately, stood gobsmacked at the sight before me. If I thought the looks I got from the homeless family qualified as lifeless, then those of the real maidbots were otherworldly, empty of anything at all. If they had been looking at me with those glassy eyes, I may have reconsidered this venture, but they weren’t. The doll-like robots—each a variation on the same theme of thin, pale-skinned, and leggy—stared fixedly forward. Almost imperceptible was the slow rise and fall of their large, heaving chests. Aside from that, they might as well have been lifeless dolls lined up in harnesses, smiling their empty smiles.

Before I could allow myself the chance to reconsider my actions and just take what I already had to the police, I stepped into the van, actively not thinking of how short the skirt was.

The scene did not improve. Not by seeing them up close and not by closing the door, rendering the world down to monochrome red once the interior light kicked on. But whatever. It wasn’t as if the danger I faced would come from these shadows. I wasn’t sure how whomever sent this skin and collar intended on ensnaring me, but I was certain it wouldn’t come like this. With any luck, that creep hadn’t counted on my own proactive precautions. That didn’t mean I could let my guard down.

Carefully, I ventured through the sanguine gloom to the nearest open harness, scanning the confined space for unseen dangers as I kept my eyes on a pair of dark spots on the floor. Good thing too. They turned out to be depressions the general size and shape of a high-heeled foot, perfect for twisting an unsuspecting ankle. Or, I supposed, helping to keep someone—or something—upright. Either way, if I wanted to secure myself in a harness, that’s where my feet needed to go, and so that’s where they went.

Once I had the harness around myself, the buckle closing with a snap, the van headed out for its next destination. Yep, those heel holders had a definite function! I wouldn’t say the transport bots were driving recklessly, but I was definitely being rocked around. Which was quite nice, actually. I had nothing to do at the time except wait and be thankful there wasn’t a maidbot across from me. Had there been eyes on me, I’m not sure I could have relaxed enough to doze off, lulled by the motion of the van and the knowledge that I could do nothing more than rest. I might not have been able to shut my eyes, but my mind finally managed to shut down.

Occasionally the opening of the door to my left or the rushing of water to my right would jostle me from my nap, but I’d just fall back to sleep. And I’d see things.

My harness clicked open and the pressure on my feet released. At first I had a sense of falling and panicked, not knowing where I was. Reality slammed into me all too quickly as the fleeting dreams of Lisa in that maidbot skin retreated.

I groaned. That dream again.

I shook myself one last time, ridding myself of my nap’s remnants. These empty dolls were not the maidbots I sought; my princess was in another castle. I would do this. As for what ‘this’ might be, I supposed just cleaning houses, possibly with a side order of ass-grab. Or perhaps I’d get to skip all that and find out who was behind all this. Regardless of waited for me next, it required me to step out.

The van door swung open easily and I jumped down onto a concrete driveway leading to a moderately-sized, two-story house. Though I knew of many larger homes in the area, they were outside city limits. Looking around, I could see skyscrapers on all sides peeking over a wall of trees. I’d have whistled if I could, but I didn’t gawk. I was already walking towards the front door when I heard the van drive off. Taped to the door was a note that looked as if it might have come off a typewriter rather than a printer.

You are to clean for 3 hours, one for each floor.

Simple, if somewhat ambiguous. I tried the handle and found it turned easily under my gloved hand with a click I couldn’t feel through the double layers of glove and suit. Normally such a disconnect would be mildly disconcerting, but not today. Today it meant I didn’t have nanowires burrowing into my skin. I let myself in.

Waiting inside on a table to the side was another note. Use this. On top of the note: a feather duster. Really? A feather duster? I thought as I grabbed the antiquated cleaning device. What bullshit. What was I even expected to do with it? Wave the thing at random objects like I’ve seen in movies? Whatever. At least the place wasn’t large.

With that thought, I sighed—or some disquieting facsimile of a sigh—and got to work. At least at first. I probably hadn’t been waving the duster at random items for more than 5 minutes before I questioned myself. “What the fuck am I doing?” Really, why do this? I didn’t have a supervisor to report to and I wasn’t getting paid for this, I was under no compulsion to actually do anything. I didn’t even care that much if I got caught.

What I did care about was the burning in my calves. I’d had enough of being upright and I was tired. The nap in the van recharged me a little, but I had one hell of a sleep debt from all the recurring nightmares. Also, that was one hell of a plush leather couch the renter had. Like, seriously. It fit in perfectly with the dark, hardwood floors and textured, slate grey wall paper, looking more like a giant leather pillow with three more sewn around it. Not caring about decorum, I allowed myself to flop down.

The plush cushions seemed to swallow me as if the furniture was alive and hungry. This was exactly the sort of thing Lisa would have loved. The only thing that could have made it better would be if I were sitting in her lap as we read together, her looking over my shoulders as I turned the page. Hell, right now I’d have been happy to hear her yell at me for using up the hot water. I’d do anything to see her again. What was walking around a house in heels with a feather duster for a few hours compared to the year spent without her?

I struggled to push myself up out of the couch’s cushy embrace and to my feet. This was likely better for me anyway. In the van I had the rocking to soothe me, and nothing to do. I had planned all there was to plan and strapped into the harness, there was nowhere to go. Only rest. Neither were true here and I had rested enough in the van. What’s more, I couldn’t get caught, not yet at least, and not here for something stupid like goofing off. While in motion, I could pretend like I was advancing my plan.

More importantly, I needed something to focus on other than my greatest failure, and cleaning in such a frivolous fashion seemed as good of an activity as any. That and complaining to myself about my uniform. Cleaning the place wasn’t terrible, and there were a lot of interesting things to see here. In some ways I felt like I was walking through a small museum with the home owner’s collections of art—sculptures, paintings, pottery—and oddities collected from around the world. These, I did not touch. I’d have hated myself for damaging something so unique…and I was sure there wasn’t a reproduction among them. The kitchen was modern, the bedroom bed huge, and the entire place otherwise spotless. I just needed to wave around a duster like an idiot.

Then came the basement.

Whereas the first two floors were clean, and an amalgam of modern and baroque in a way that would have felt at home in a retro science fiction film, the basement could have come straight out of a horror movie. Only darkness filled the stairwell and I could find no light switch, but closing it again, I noticed a wan red luminescence bleeding out from under the door. I squatted down to better look at the bottom of the door to confirm that yes, a light lay beyond the door. Perhaps I shouldn’t have opened that door again. Perhaps I should have simply dusted everything on the two sane floors.

Perhaps I shouldn’t have put on the maidbot skin in the first place.

It was too late for that, my curiosity had been piqued and like I said, I was getting a horror movie vibe so naturally I had to do the stupid thing and investigate. Besides, people didn’t keep creepy shit in their actual house. Right?

Wrong! Stepping into the stairwell and closing the door indeed turned on the lights, but the sourceless scarlet did nothing to make the place seem welcoming. The stairs of creaky, unfinished wood ended in a large room filled with maidbots. By ‘large’ I meant the room seemed to extend beyond the exterior walls of the first floor and by ‘filled’ I mean there had to be hundreds of them, each lined up in rows upon rows of uncovered charging pods.

I promptly turned around before I could catch more than a glimpse and went back up the stairs to discover the door was locked.

I pushed and I shoved and I pounded on the unyielding wood door, but in the end I gave up. There was no opening that door and my efforts only earned me a throbbing in my hands and shoulders, and had threatened to send me head over incredibly high heels down the stairs. That would do nothing to improve my situation. Instead I sat and took a breath. Then another. I continued to sit at the top of the steps in the bloody light taking stock of my situation. In the end, I had only seen part of the room, and nothing so far had moved. Noöne else seemed to be around. I was safe. If nothing else, I had the watch on me and could presumably call for help if need be, but not yet. Once I made that call this opportunity will have passed, and I very likely could find myself in jail for breaking and entering. Though I doubted this place had another exit, I had to try. Perhaps I could find a window or something and crawl out.

Wait, the owner had said to clean three floors of a two story house with a basement. They had to have known I’d end up here. This was a trap! They were kidnapping maidbots! That didn’t make a damned bit of sense since the companies involved would notice, but…fuck it, it didn’t have to make sense. I was in a basement full of dolls with no way out and a very good chance at joining them. Fortunately, trapping mindless machines didn’t require as much effort as ensnaring a person, so perhaps there would be some kind of safety hatch. It wouldn’t do for the owner to get trapped down here too, right? Yeah, that was the way out. I just had to find it. And if not, I had the watch. Simple. Presumably the owner wouldn’t be back for another hour at least, so I had time. More than enough time in fact.

I stood and resolutely made my way back down the stairs. Then I just stood and loosed a whimper. “Okay…fuck that plan,” I said waveringly, staring wide-eyed—wider still than the lenses in my eyes demanded—as I took in the details of the beings around me. Alternating in light and dark were me and Lisa, reimagined as maidbots. One after the next. Row after row. They weren’t moving—thank fuck—but they didn’t have to in order to project menace. Their existence in this space did that well enough. Just one would have been concerning, but there was a God damned army of them down here each looking like me and my missing love.

But standing here rooted to the spot didn’t help me one bit. That’s what prey does. I was not going to be the victim in this story. I was the hunter, seeking the one who stole away Lisa. And I had a plan which started with fumbling for the screwdriver.

And then the lights went out.

And then they were on me; I couldn’t breathe.

And then nothing.

I gasped and struggled to free myself as I looked around at the inside of the van. A tall feminine figure walked past, illuminated by a wan red light not unlike the one from my fading dream. Sagging back into the harness, I caught my breath. They really did look so much like Lisa.

No more napping in strange places Erin, I told myself as I focused on the reassuring pressure on my middle that the watch provided.

The maidbot secured itself to the side of the van like the rest of us, and the van took off for the next destination. I did not fall back asleep. The only way to stem these nightmares I’d been having was to stay awake, an easy task when you only have a lumpy couch to sleep on. Or are surrounded by creepy doll-like bioroids, each looking disconcertingly similar to Lisa. So long as she was on my mind, I would surely keep having those dreams. But so long as I kept her in my thoughts, I could keep her in my heart. I feared that should I ever lose that, I’d lose myself too.

My mind continued going in circles, a maelstrom of negative thoughts and the emotions to go with them, whirling around that singular moment a year ago today—empty, adrift—and as useless as I was.

Except ‘useless’ would mean I did nothing. I wasn’t doing nothing, I was actively trying to find Lisa. So long as I continued to forge ahead, I couldn’t discount my efforts. As many times as I had to, I would tell myself that to keep my demons at bay.

The van stopped before I could abuse my psyche any further; the harness clicked open and whatever held my feet in place released. I felt a sense of déjà vu, something that told me all was not well—to turn back and forget all about my quest. Of course I did no such thing. I was no stranger to the sense, but this time it was just so strong. Pressing my hand against my corseted stomach where I knew my escape route waited provided enough comfort for me to step out of the foot holes and onto the floor of the van. I had committed to this. I would do this. For Lisa, I’d do anything.

I’d have exited the van and gone to whatever my next assignment was, too, had the door not been locked.

The sound of rushing water seemed to fill my mind, and I turned to look behind me. There, waiting in the back, was a Plexiglas cylinder, its rubber lined door hanging open like some kind of menacing maw. I hadn’t seen it being used, but I had heard it. It seemed the maidbots polished up or something before each assignment. I guess that meant me, too.

I gave the door one more tug, but if it was locked, it was locked.

A shiver crept up my spine. I did not like the idea of being locked in this red room. Not one bit. Not with these maidbots. I needed that door unlocked and if that meant getting into that weird cleaning tube, I was getting into the tube. I took a step towards it, then another, longer one, and all but leapt for the third and quickly climbed through the small door.

I yelped and hissed as my foot found a depression on the floor like those lining the sides of the van and my back hit the wall of the cylinder with a thump. Crumbling to the floor, I pulled the door shut, obscuring the scene out there as some kind of tube fell in front of my face. I was safe, but from what? Why was I letting a fleeting nightmare, one I couldn’t even remember, affect me so?

Rotating my foot, I discovered that I had not sprained anything and my back seemed okay. So that worked out. Correction: nothing was okay about this, but nothing hurt which was a start. Good enough.

Above me hung a mask with a pair of short tubes along with another, longer tube, both seeming to have dropped from the ceiling when I closed the door. It didn’t take a lot of imagination to figure out how these were to be used. I stood carefully, once more confirming my uninjured state as I slotted my feet into the floor, and put the mask on. The short tubes slotted into my nose as excepted, just as the longer one plugged into the suit’s catheter. Despite everything feeling secure, the strap wasn’t at all tight and the suit’s design ensured I didn’t even notice the tubes.

Then several things happened at once.

Fluid rushed over me from somewhere at the top of the tube as more fluid flowed in through the mask and others flowed out below. I had kind of wondered why I needed the security of the foot things in the tube which presumably only was used while stationary. Now I knew. This went beyond disoriented and I reflexively tried curling up on the ground, but couldn’t with everything securely slotted into place. That was fine, I guess, but how the fluid seeped into the opening of the maidbot suit and had started filling it most certainly was not. I had no idea what was in this stuff. I did know it wasn’t intended for use on human skin. For that matter, what the fuck was in that slurry sliding down my throat? Was that how the person who sent me this skin planned on capturing me? Did she plan on drugging me? Could she arrange that?

Not that it really mattered. I could do nothing to stop it with the sleeve of maidbot skin stretched down my throat.

As abruptly as the cleaning cycle had started, it stopped, but I hadn’t even managed a sigh of relief before soft balls, like plush towel-covered foam, flew all over the fucking place. This too passed…just for some unseen mechanism to unlace and relace the corset.

Stepping out of that infernal contraption, I could tell even in the wan light of the van that I was noticeably shinier. Not just my uniform, but the skin that encompassed me as well. The same skin that I couldn’t possibly get off fast enough, though that too had to wait. I fumbled the screw driver to the floor when I thought of the goop that now filled my stomach and knelt down to pick it up. “Shit!” I had to do something about that first and thrust my fingers down my throat.

Try as I might, I didn’t so much as gag.

Well, it wasn’t as if the stuff was poison. And if my would-be captor wanted to take me, she could have filled the van with gas as easily as replace the goo dispenser. Actually, that would probably have been easier. In all likelihood, I had merely been given something to keep me fed and hydrated. I had any number of reasons to panic, but that wasn’t one of them.

For example, what the fuck was that funky feeling stuff on my skin. That was much more likely to mess me up! Maidbots were essentially human clone stock with a high-tech skin over them. Inside, they and I were much the same. Outside…not so much.

I grabbed the fallen screwdriver and with trembling hands, guided it to my neck.

I missed. I tried again, but the result was the same with the head of the screw driver jabbing me in the neck rather than slot in. One deep breath later, I made another attempt, this time feeling for the screw head with my free hand. That didn’t exactly work. Between the gloves and the skin, I couldn’t feel much. Maybe I also had nerve damage from the cleaning fluid?

That made me laugh. It wasn’t a pleasant sound, and I fell back, staring fixedly at the ceiling. Now seemed like a great time to have a mental breakdown. So I laughed and laughed, my synthesized voice filling the small space until a horn and indistinct shouting from outside broke the moment. Apparently the van was holding up traffic. Well, tough shit.

I sat up and tried again. This time my hands weren’t as shaky. Still couldn’t feel a fucking thing—an annoyance I took to be a positive—but at least I was able to eventually slot in the screwdriver and release the collar.

“Oh God…” I sighed as I turned to jelly on the floor of the van. Relief washed over me in waves of tingly relief. I could finally breathe again. Only now that tightness in my chest began to abate could I tell how anxious that had made me. Still, I didn’t have time to revel in the notion of freedom. I still needed to get this thing off of me. Fortunately, that wasn’t an issue: the back had not sealed. Another relief. I couldn’t say everything had gone as planned so far, but at least I hadn’t been trapped in a maidbot suit.

The suit peeled off more easily than it had gone on, and within a minute I had it pulled down to my waist and was inspecting my skin. The good news was that I still had skin. The fluid didn’t seem caustic and the lack of scent implied it was free of organic solvents that might make their way into my blood and wreck my insides. They still could have other bad stuff in it, but overall, not terrible. What was terrible was the damage it had done to the watch.

Ignoring the car horns outside, I sat quietly with the watch cradled in my lap, mourning the lost device. It wasn’t just the most expensive purchase I had made in years, it was my life line. I sighed, glad to hear the sound of my own voice.

I could put the uniform on over my human flesh and take off for the police station. I could explain what happened. Could they really ignore me after something like this? If I were going to do that, now would be the time. Once I entered someone’s home, they might arrest me. Though not the worst thing to happen to me lately—and certainly not within the last year—it would complicate my rotation at the temp agency if I had anything but a squeaky clean criminal record. Which was to say, I’d likely never get a job again. Not in the current job market.

But would this really spur them on to do their job? Luna Kim wouldn’t even return my calls anymore.

No, I had to keep going. Lisa wasn’t coming home on her own, and the police were doing fuck all to bring her home. That meant it fell to me. Somehow. The finer details still escaped me, but this was a fact finding mission, as they say, and the facts I found were sparse.

“Lisa…” I whispered, as much to hear her name as to hear my own voice. “I’m coming. I swear.”

I laughed, thinking of the very Lisa reply of Yeah, you do swear. A lot. God I love that woman. And I missed her so much. She’d have also told me I should have given up or let the police handle it. Or something else to keep me safe. But I couldn’t be emotionally safe until she was home. She is safety and happiness and every other good thing in this rotten world that’s done nothing but swallow me up since she left. My kindly landlady had done what she could to make things easier on me, but she could only do so much. She wasn’t Lisa.

Tears fell. I didn’t try to stop them. Soon they’d be locked away by the suit’s lenses. Because I’ll be damned before I turn back now.

And I may be damned by staying the course. It didn’t matter. Would it really be that horrible to end up captive with Lisa?

Donning the suit a second time was easier. Or at least I noticed the struggle less. My mind was elsewhere. Which was fine given where I was at the time and what I was planning on doing. ‘Elsewhere’ was much more comfortable. By the time I had to think about what I was doing, I had the collar securely around my neck, placed there by my own hand.

The watch, too, went back to where it had been before the cleaning fluid ruined it. It didn’t have to function. It just needed to be there to provide a physical connection to the outside world. Or something. I don’t know, but I felt like if I had it, I could focus on something that wasn’t part of being a maidbot.

I stepped down to street level and tried squinting against the early morning sun reflecting off the glass of the buildings around me, but of course, I couldn’t. Which is why it was a good thing that the lenses tinted all on their own, perfectly adjusting to the light.

“You are to clean the apartment of Mr. John Smith for fifty four minutes,” a waiting transport bot said. It was pointing to one of a number of apartment buildings.

Seemed simple enough. “Sure,” I replied and began towards the door. Even to my own ear, the casual reply struck a discordant note with the synthesized voice.

Beside the door of glass and brass was a touch screen. Swiping through a list of names, I found J. Smith.

“Hello?” called an aggravated man’s voice.

“Hi, I’m here to – ”

The voice groaned his displeasure. “Took long enough.”

A burst of static signaled the end of the call, followed shortly by a click from the glass door beside me. I glanced once more at the apartment number and repeated it in my head before turning towards the door. It opened easily, revealing a sight so unlike my own apartment. Rather than the stained concrete and harsh, flickering lights, the atrium—the existence of which was a step up—sported warm wood under soft lights almost like natural sunlight. I half expected lounge furniture, but no, this was nothing more than an entrance and place to collect your mail.

A short hall led to an elevator and stairwell. I got the impression that I was expected to take the latter. Even though I could be certain these were far from the repulsive mess found at my place, I still didn’t want to take them. I didn’t want to walk in these heels, let alone climb six flights of stairs.

Another person—a young man—got in with me. Whether he had somewhere to be, or just wanted to spend a minute openly ogling me, I didn’t know. I didn’t ask. Rather I did my best to ignore him. This was something I had practice with. Being poor as I was, most of my ‘betters’ already looked at me like an object so this was nothing new. And unlike those other times, it was hard to fault him since maidbots really were things. If I told myself he wouldn’t have done that had I been outside this skin in real clothes, I could almost forgive him.

Almost.

Either way, I needed to get used to the disgusting feeling pouring from his eyes.

I didn’t wait to see if the sixth floor was his stop as well, and all but bolted out the door. I also didn’t look back to see if he – well, any of what he might have been doing. Ignorance truly is bliss sometimes.

John’s apartment wasn’t far from the elevator, fortunately, making for a short walk. The wait for him to open the door after ringing the bell was short, too. The man dressed in a grey polo and tan slacks seemed to have been waiting. “And this is why I asked for the extra half hour,” he grumbled. Then sighed. Apparently his temper was short too. “Well, they comped my time last year.”

He stepped back for me to step in. The place was much like the rest of the building, the hardwood flooring softened by a number of colorful rugs and the sort of furniture, bookshelves, and knickknacks that turn a place into a home. Like so much else, it reminded me of Lisa.

The sound of the door closing behind me saved me from my own thoughts. I turned around to look at him. He was already looking at me. “What is with these Halloween maidbots,” he mumbled. “Do they install special software into you to make you…?” He waved his hands while looking at me in disgust.

What.

The fuck.

My heart did a somersault in my chest at the thought he might have been talking about Lisa. It didn’t seem that unreasonable. Whomever set me up may very well have established her schedule, too. I couldn’t have been sure how well this would work out, but now I was almost certain I had done the right thing by pressing forward. “Was there a problem with the last unit sent to you?” I asked, keeping my voice as steady as possible. I needn’t bother, not with the voice synthesizer doing all the talking for me.

“Last one, no. But the one from Halloween was also crazy late and acted weird with a broken voice synthesizer.” He gave me an appraising look before shaking his head. He tsked. “Look, I just need you in the kitchen cleaning up the mess so my mother-in-law doesn’t tear into me like she did last year. Or as much. I swear that woman – anyway…”

He inclined his head in the direction of a doorway and walked past me. I followed.

“Everything you need is on the counter,” he said, gesturing with his hand.

Then he was gone, leaving me alone in what looked less like a kitchen and more like the remains of a war zone. Stacked on the counters, and even the floors, were pots, pans, and assorted cookware with splatterings of something everywhere, like gore on a battlefield. If it smelled as bad as it looked, then I was quite glad for the plugs in my nose, though the smell of whatever was cooking might have overpowered it.

I shrugged. I followed the gesture up with a grimace: maidbots don’t shrug. They also don’t grimace, but looking around, there was noöne to see it, so I shrugged once more. Having been doing a lot of dishwashing lately as a temp, I could almost pretend this was just another day at work. Better actually, since I have a boss who’s too preoccupied to breath down my neck and the double protection of the suit and gloves ensures I stayed clean.

Pulling my hand out of some soapy water and watching gunk just slide off, I had to wonder if there really was something to the assertion that the choice of material for the maidbot uniforms wasn’t just someone’s fetish. That didn’t explain the heels. As much as that van gave me the creeps, I looked forward to letting the harness take the weight off my feet.

Except they didn’t hurt. I felt the pressure on my feet, but the shoes seemed to distribute my weight exceptionally well. Perhaps the company wanted to make sure they took care of their equipment, unlike my cheap ass buying whatever footwear I could afford. It was still awkward shifting and stepping with several centimeters under my heels, but at least it didn’t hurt.

No, instead something else did. Without the distraction of my footwear, my mind did what it always did these days when left by itself for more than a minute: it wandered back to one year ago and the biggest mistake of my life. This time I could tamp it down. After 365 days of learning jack shit, I finally seemed to be on track to finding her, or at least finding out something. If nothing else, I now knew she made it to her first stop. That alone made this risk worth all the while.

Time flew as I redoubled my efforts. Focusing on the task at hand, I scrubbed dishes, wiped down the counter, and was just finishing up mopping the floor when the doorbell rang.

John popped his head in, and sighed. “Thank God,” he said before getting to the door. In the distance, I heard, “I’m guessing you’re here for the maid?”

“Yes sir,” I heard a transportbot say from where I stood in the kitchen. “Your rental unit’s time is up.”

I leaned the mop against the wall and pushed the bucket out of the way. I was basically done. If he couldn’t see himself in the floor, well, I had bigger issues on my mind. I didn’t have any definitive proof that Lisa had been here, but unless there was some other maidbot last Halloween with a busted voice acting uncharacteristic, it must have been her.

Perhaps I was deluding myself, or perhaps not. Either way, it helped to keep the flame of hope alive in my chest.

“It hasn’t finished yet,” the man said without rancor. He turned towards the sound of my heels on the wood as I entered. “I assume I’ll only be charged for half an hour?”

“Your concern has been noted.” Looking at me, the bot said, “This unit and unit 219E7CD will now depart.”

I continued walking to stand next to the maidbot, and she turned around to walk out.

From behind us, John called, “I’ll have you know, if there was more than one maidbot service in town I’d absolutely use them instead. Regardless of price.”

“Your concern has been noted.”

I followed behind the maidbot who seemed to keep her eyes more on the floor than in front of her or on signs and landmarks within the building. Maybe it was some demur thing ‘perfect women’ are expected to do or perhaps she was seeing something I couldn’t? Whatever the reason, I kept my head up. It seemed better if I wanted to avoid running into someone. One such gaffe would surely lead to another, and then I’d be in trouble. I might not have cared that much about getting caught when I started, but now, I felt like maybe this was the right path after all. Being abruptly torn from it due to something as silly as a misplaced word or reaction would be an insult to Lisa.

So I made sure to plaster one of those fake smiles on my faces as I walked through the halls, down the stairs, and out into the street, ignoring the looks and leers. They didn’t exist. My world only had room for Lisa and they weren’t her. Other people’s thoughts and their feelings meant no more than those of this mindless automaton I followed.

With renewed resolve, I climbed back into the nearly empty van and secured myself to the side. Presumably, most of the other maidbots were out doing their own thing. I was grateful for that, though right now, resolute as I was, I think I could have faced an army of those dolls without flinching away. I certainly wouldn’t be having any more panic attacks nor thoughts of turning back. I didn’t know what tomorrow would bring, but I had a lead and I would follow it. I would follow Lisa.

I would follow her to all the corners of the earths and to the end of time.

With any luck however, it wouldn’t take more than a day. I was hoping for a day. Regardless, time seemed to be going faster, my mind swimming with possibilities as we headed from one stop to the next. Anxiously I waited for my turn as some bots were dropped off and others picked up. When my turn came, I didn’t even bother with the door and went straight back to the cleaning thing in the back, walking through the gauntlet of empty stares unfazed. This time, however, I made sure to tighten the corset as much as possible. I couldn’t get it as tight as the lacer in the tube had, but hopefully this would help keep fluid out.

It kind of worked. I didn’t feel quite as gross afterwards and without the surprise of it, the experience wasn’t so bad. The tighter lacing didn’t even adversely affect my breathing. It did, however, push my tits up and out more than the outfit already did. And as far as the goop the thing pumped into me…it completely bypassed my mouth which made it far from the worst meal I had suffered through. Better still, it was free!

The first thing I noticed after opening the door was the sound of a fountain. Once my eyes—and the lenses propping them open—adjusted to the mid-day sun, the scene resolved into…something.

Some people have too much money. Whoever lived here was one such person with a massive Victorian-style home walled off from the rest of the world by hedges. This much land in the Chicago area by itself was impressive, but this gilded house could have been sold for an amount to keep thousands of mouths fed for their entire lives.

My stomach churned at the sight of it.

A whirring sound behind me broke me from the thought, and I turned in time to catch the van setting a cart down before driving off. I guessed everything was self-explanatory, or the transportbots would have told me what I was supposed to do. Which made sense. I grabbed the cart handle and strode towards the door. With no further indicator of what I should do, I rang the doorbell and waited.

I didn’t know how long I should wait, or if anyone was home to even answer—though I had great difficulties picturing this place not coming with a complimentary English butler named Jeeves—but I figured it was better to at least give it a minute or two. After all, even if someone were here, without its own transit systems, it would surely take at least that long to get to the door. And that assumed they were sprinting.

The wait did remind me of the broken watch still taped to my stomach. I’d like to have known how long I’d waited before chancing an uninvited entry, but presumably maidbots had their own internal timekeeping devices. Well, my internal timekeeper told me I was tired of standing outside. I reached for the handle…

…just for it to pull me forward, into the foyer. “I’m so sorry!” a teen girl said, hiding a grin behind her free hand.

Uh-huh, sure. Maybe that I didn’t end up faceplanting! Was she snickering? Ugh! “No worries, miss.” Probably not the most maidbot-like response, but I didn’t have a lot of time to think up something better and I didn’t have a lot of experience as a subservient maidbot. So instead I had reached for my repertoire of subservient third-class citizen responses. I doubted she could have told the difference. Or cared.

“Yes, nothing to worry about.” She pulled her hands back, keeping the mischievous smile in place, and clasped them behind her back. “It would be terrible if you were to make a mess. You have enough to clean as it is, and only an hour to do it in.”

Looking around the opulent entrance hall, and specifically the already polished cherry floors, I wondered what might need cleaning. Probably the toilets. Toilets, at least, always need cleaning. Maybe they don’t usually use this entrance? That would explain the lack of dirt. Without so much as a mat, I couldn’t imagine any other explanation.

The thought of going around with a feather duster and dusting everything in the house sent an unexpected shiver down my spine.

No. No, that seemed unlikely. Involuntarily, I glanced back at the cart I had brought with me. A quick scan of it’s contents showed that in the place of a duster was a small, handheld vacuum cleaner. Realizing my mistake, I froze before I had a chance to sigh in relief.

“On the subject of cleaning, let’s get you started on the kitchen.” The girl turned around and strode off. A few rooms later she looked back to make sure I was following. It seemed silly given the sound of my heels. Then she stopped and turned around. “I’m Eva,” she said, flashing a guileless smile.

I opened my mouth to give her my own name, but caught myself. Not soon enough though. Poised to speak, I had to say something. Glancing to my arm, eyes safely hidden behind one-way lenses, I said, “This unit is designated 219E–.”

“That’s a boring name,” she interrupted before continuing towards the kitchen. “Hence forth, I proclaim thee, Lisa!”

My heart skipped a beat and I stood fast. That choice of name couldn’t have been a coincidence. Surely not.

“Well, Lisa, are you coming?”

“Pardons miss,” I replied. Thank fuck for the voice synthesizer. The words came out loud and clear and steady, all things I couldn’t have projected in that moment without the help. I found my stride. I seem to have left it somewhere between ‘Jesus fucking Christ, what the actual fuck’ and ‘I need to learn more’. Could Eva have gotten that name from my Lisa? Was such a thing possible?

Might she or her family have been responsible for Lisa’s disappearance?

They had money, that much was certain, and money could make all kinds of things happen. Like disappearing people to keep as pets or slaves. I’d seen such things on the news. I needed to keep my guard up if that was the case. Still, it seemed like a really weird trap. Why would she put me on guard if she planned on being party to my kidnapping? Maybe Lisa was here and also encountered Eva, but had made the mistake of giving her name? Could she have then passed it off as a name some previous renter gave or an internal model designation for her line? Or might she have been taken after giving herself away.

“Umm,” Eva said, spreading her arms to indicate the kitchen.

My head snapped up to look at the girl. “Yes miss.” Well, if getting outed as a real human wearing a maidbot skin resulted in a kidnapping, I had better make sure I redouble my–admittedly poor—efforts to play the part. Turning to the cart…I hadn’t the first clue as to how the damned thing worked. Hoping it was simple, I reached for the handle sticking out of the tightly packed cart and lifted it out.

It was a mop, the head of which poofed out as it came free. As for the water, lifting the only lid I could find revealed the basin. Having located all that I needed, I got to mopping the already sparkling tile floor of the kitchen. I wasn’t entirely sure why she was having me do this at first. Then I noticed her watching me. Intently. She wasn’t undressing me with her eyes, and rather than a lecherous or mischievous grin she appeared almost wistful as she watched from where she sat in a kitchen chair, straddling it with her arms crossed over the back.

“You’re beautiful,” she said in time. It almost sounded as if she admired me, but I didn’t ask and she didn’t offer clarification.

Looking at myself in the mirror-like marble, I had to agree. Wrapped up in the events of the day and that year old memory, I never really considered my appearance beyond ‘objectified’ and ‘inhuman’. Lisa had originally purchased the maidbot skin for our love making, not to get herself into trouble. With smooth, poreless skin, free of blemishes or variation or any of life’s wear and tear, I did look good. I might not have looked like me, and I was somewhat offended by my would-be kidnapper bleaching me, but I did look good. Especially in this outfit. The corset drew in my middle, giving me an hourglass to be envied and together with the top, presented my breasts at their best. I couldn’t quite get a good look at myself from behind, but the skirt and stockings did an equally amazing job of framing my hips and legs. Regardless of how I might have felt about being dressed up like this, I looked good.

And it felt good to be appreciated as such. Nobody had told me I was beautiful in, well, a year. I’d been ogled, whistled at, and groped, but never appreciated, be it my work or my looks. I hadn’t donned the maidbot skin this morning to feel good about myself but…That’s what happened.

The emotions of it came out of nowhere and slammed into me like a hurricane. I needed a moment. If not for the stiff corset, I doubt I’d have been able to keep myself upright. I needed to sit down, put my head on the table, and have myself a good cry. I’d earned it. But I couldn’t. Not with my nose and eyes blocked off, and certainly not with someone observing me.

“Thank you miss.” I couldn’t say nothing. It might not have been the maidbot thing to do—or maybe it was—but it was what I needed. There’s power in thanking someone.

Nothing more was said for the remainder of my hour except for more directions. I continued to mop spotless floors of marble, wood, and ceramic, and she kept watching me. Whatever brought on her mean trick earlier seemed to be a one off thing. Eva had even opened the doors for me as I pulled the cart into some of the rooms.

By the time the doorbell rang, I actually wished I could have stayed longer. I needed a vacation from my worries and this had provided that. In a way, it had been a vacation from myself.

“Thank you for coming,” Eva said, waving as I followed the transportbot back to the van.

Unsure what to do with the cart, I looked at the transportbot. Whether it recognized my plight or not, she took it and placed the cart beside the van where it was marked ‘cart’. Well, now I knew. The corner of the van unfolded and a mechanical claw grabbed it and pulled it into wherever it’s stored when put away. And now it was my turn to be put away.

Climbing into the van didn’t bring with it any of the anxieties I had experienced before. Rather, I felt refreshed and ready for whatever might come next in the day. Even the hated red light couldn’t upset me. In spite of everything, I felt good.

The rest of the day went much the same with pick ups and drop offs—sometimes for me, sometimes for them. When it was my turn, the transportbot would give me directions, relaying any special instructions from the renter. I listened as best I could, but never heard them conversing. This belief was reinforced by how quickly the van took off after dropping the other bots off. The only reason to stick around would be for the van to deposit the cleaning cart, but that was an oddity. Most of the time our renters had stuff there for us.

As for the time spent waiting, it was fine. I found my mind unusually at ease. My most prevalent thoughts had turned to how this beat the hell out of my usual temp work. If Lisa was stuck as a maidbot…well…I was almost happy for her. Our life before had been less than comfortable and rife with all kinds of financial stress and work stress and just life stress. In this van full of dolls, I had none of that. Even my shift seemed shorter.

The van pulled to a stop and our harnesses clicked open. All of them. Not seconds later, the door opened allowing warm sunlight to pour in. At first I wondered why the doors hadn’t opened on their own before, but then I saw the maidbots waiting in two lines with space between them for two more columns of biomechanical maids. Room enough for those of us in the van to walk through. Beyond the assembly was a cinder block wall with a large loading bay door in the side through which I could see…not much. It seemed to just be some kind of entry way. I was more interested in examining each of the maidbots about to take our place, hoping Lisa in her bot skin might be among them.

Not that I expected her to be there, but I had to look. Speaking of looking, did I really want to look inside what must be some kind of service center? What I had done so far today had been risky. Going into a service facility would ratchet that danger up to the next level. Was that a risk I was willing to take?

Yeah. Yeah it was. Besides, the rest of the day had gone so well. Surely this next leg of the journey would be no different.

By the time I had made my decision, I was already standing in the loading bay where we were taking turns entering through a much smaller door. I couldn’t see much from my place in the back, but it didn’t project menace. Nothing today had. Maybe Lisa had just been mistaken for the maidbot she had been impersonating. Why must there be some kind of nefarious plot to kidnap her?

I started at the thought. Had I not been walking down a strange hallway lit in more of that red light, being observed by God only knows who, I’d have smacked myself. I was here because someone sent me a maidbot skin, someone who wanted to own me and who claims to already own Lisa. Presumably she was the same person who came by the apartment last year to collect the maidbot Lisa had rented. That the day had been pleasant mattered not at all. I needed to leave here. Now.

As if someone had been reading my mind, the door closed behind me.

“Fff–” I caught myself, clamping my hand over my mouth, itself a give away that I didn’t belong there. Or worse, that I was exactly where someone wanted me and I had just painted a giant target on my back. Not that I didn’t already stand out due to my darker skin-tone, but still.

The whole place had a sterile, hospital-like feel to it, reinforcing my belief this was some kind of service center. Speaking as a very defective maidbot, I did not what to be here, but for the time being, I didn’t seem to have a choice. Pretenses abandoned, I turned back, looking for a handle on the door we had just come through. Nope, no handle. I didn’t remember seeing one on the outside either. Well, it wasn’t as if I didn’t want an opportunity to look for Lisa inside here. And when else would I get the chance?

I retook my spot in short order, the space I had vacated having moved with the flow of artificial bodies—just a few quick strides past featureless doors that almost blended into the walls. At least these doors had handles. Our procession turned into one of those unmarked doors, opening on a large room with chutes in the otherwise featureless walls, save for another door on the other side. Those maidbots ahead of me had already stripped out of their uniforms and some were pushing them into the chutes. It had been a while since I saw one naked, but I still had to wonder why whoever made them decided to ensure they were anatomically correct. My first thought on the matter was that they were designed to be multi-purpose. The same clone base used for maidbots could be used for sexbots.

The other was that they all had been human women once.

I chose to assume the former. Past the other lay madness, something I did not need right now as I stood in the belly of the beast. That horrifying thought set aside, I started undressing, but thought better of it. I’d need clothes once I figured out how to get out of here. These weren’t exactly what I’d call appropriate for a human, but they were what I had right now. It seemed exceedingly unlikely that I’d find anything better.

That decided, it was back into yet another creepy hallway with my creepy new coworkers for me. There was no handle on the door I came through and this hall ended in two doors with each maidbot stopping before going through the door with a green light over it. As it so happened that was, without exception, the door on the right. I had a sneaking suspicion I was destined for the left—the sinister door, one might say. The sense only grew as we hobbled onwards.

Two steps forward. Pause. Beep. Two steps forward…

An interminable procession. I may have marched slowly towards the front over the period of a minute. I may have marched slowly towards the front over the period of an hour. For certain, time was marching slowly. Very, very slowly and all I could think about was how I’d make it out of this one. Without any idea as to where I was, either in the facility or in the city—if I was even still in Chicago—there wasn’t much purchase for my mind to grab onto. My gears just spun furiously trying to think of something to do that didn’t end with me sealed in a functional maidbot skin. It was all I could do to not think about failing Lisa once more and being trapped in a maidbot suit for the rest of my life.

A blue light blinked over the door to my left. Yeah, no. I tried the other door, but it was locked. That failed to surprise me. I don’t know why a facility such as this would need a lock there, but someone seemed to think it did. Without any other options, I took the only door available to me. Then I went down the stairs because of course this nightmare ended with me in a basement.

A basement bathed in harsh white light with a tangle of wires, tubing, and assorted metal tools attached to multi-joined mechanical arms hanging from the ceiling. In the center of it all was what looked like a metal dentists chair. Or rather the frame of one. I immediately wished for the unsettling decor common to the rest of the building.

I tore my eyes away from the chair and the artificial vines. Focusing on that did me no good. Looking around, on the other hand, did me a lot. My eyes fixed on a computer terminal with all kinds of less frightening, though no less inexplicable, diagnostic tools strewn about. And a comfy looking mesh chair. A chair, very much intended for a human and not a maidbot or techbot nor any other word ending in -bot. Since people didn’t wirelessly communicate with the building or receive invisible messages, there had to be an easy, logical way out of here.

Once I knew to look, it didn’t take long to notice a door off in the corner to my left with ‘EXIT’ over it in glowing red letters. Among all the four letter words in the English language, I think that one might be my favorite.

I nearly collapsed. This was too much, but I had to keep going and found my jelly-like legs held me well enough to carry me the few meters to the very clearly marked exit. I’d have run if I could. I could not. I also wish I could have searched the place for Lisa, but I had just about taken one risk too many. I could search for her later, after I’d told Luna what I’d learned. I had two people for her to speak with, one of whom may know where Lisa was. That would have to do.

On the other side of the door was a short hallway with a bare concrete floor lit in more of the same white LEDs and a stairwell at the end. Overall it seemed less welcoming than what I was starting to think of as the maidbot side of the building, but I found it easier on the heart all the same. Also easier on the heart: an elevator beside the stairs. Any lingering doubts I might have had that this hall was meant for humans evaporated as I pushed the button to summon the car. As far as I could tell, maidbots exclusively used stairs.

One exceedingly smooth elevator ride later, the doors opened on a less harshly lit hall. It had the same hospital-like aesthetic, but without the red light it seemed more…well, human. Unfortunately, that also meant running into humans.

I needn’t worry: Barely anyone so much as looked at me. I suppose when you work with maidbots for a living, they all kind of blend together. That was more than fine by me. I hadn’t actually cooked up any excuse for this situation. Things just spiraled too far out of control for me to have imagined I’d need to walk past a bunch of workers at a maidbot facility. But so long as I ended up walking out of that building, it wouldn’t matter.

And I can confidently say, it didn’t matter. I had escaped. For a moment it seemed as if I’d never see another crimson sunset, but that was exactly what I saw. The sun hung low over the cityscape, washing away all colors of the industrial district save for red. I’d seen too much of that color today to truly appreciate it, but I still could cherish the brilliance of the haloed buildings I had grown to know over the last year. As much as I hated living here, it was home and right now, I couldn’t return soon enough.

That wasn’t entirely true.

Before I did anything else, I ducked into an alley, hid behind a dumpster, and stripped out of the maidbot skin. It might not have been the smartest thing, but being caught naked seemed a lot better than being mistaken for a runaway maidbot and returned for processing. I knew the chances of that were essentially zero, but I could say the same about so much of today. No more chances!

In no time at all, I had the tubes out and the skin off. The uniform still had to go back on since I didn’t have any other clothes, but I could live with that. Feeling the bare skin around my throat, I very much could live with that. What wasn’t so great, ironically, was the stench of the place. Or lack thereof. As awful as this neck of the woods smelt, I didn’t care for the idea that the tubes might have leached some kind of chemical and damaged my nose. Not good, but compared to ending up in that metal chair, I’d take it.

With the skin and collar under one arm, I continued home, hardly able to believe my good fortune that the service center was so close to my apartment. Better yet, I hadn’t run into any of my neighbors. Lady Luck seemed to have finally taken pity on me. Though I’ve seen more than a few in quite a bit less than what I wore, that didn’t mean I wanted word to get around or that I was into something like this. That was just asking for trouble I’d rather avoid.

“It’s so good to be home,” I moaned, closing my apartment door behind me. “And it’s so good to hear my own voice.”

Discarding the skin and collar beside the door, I made my way to the couch. Somehow I missed the way the springs poked me in the back in one place and failed to support me in another. It was a terrible couch, but it was my couch. Maybe in a few weeks, it would also be Lisa’s, too. With that thought, I got up, invigorated by my triumphant return, and checked my phone.

I tsked. I couldn’t say I hadn’t anticipated that the battery might not hold up after a day of recording, but one can always hope. Besides, I really needed to change my clothes. Now.

I tossed the phone onto the couch stripped out of the uniform with some effort. It seemed reluctant to come off, though, as it pulled at my skin in the process, clinging to it. It felt delicious, and I could definitely see myself wearing this while I straightened up the place later. But for right now, I needed normal, and that meant tank top and sweatpants.

Sifting through the mess in one corner, I pulled out something that probably wasn’t too dirty. My cleaning habits kind of fell by the wayside the last few weeks. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the only thing I had neglected.

A knock at the door startled me, almost causing me to trip as I pulled the pants on. “Shit!” I hadn’t paid the rent this month! My landlady might have been generous, charging rent on a sliding scale, but that didn’t mean I could live here for free. Worse, she seemed so good-natured that every time she came by to collect—itself an oddly personal, and appreciated, touch in an age of intimidating robo-collection agents—I felt like I had done something terribly wrong. But did I even have rent to give? Also, wasn’t it a bit early for my landlady to come get it herself? Or had I also forgotten last month’s, too? Maybe it was someone else. Really, it could have been any number of collectors, but looking through the peephole confirmed my hunch. Wreathed in the red of a setting sun, stood a willowy figure dressed in a sharp pantsuit with hair styled in a pixie cut.

I wrenched open the door. “Miss Macher,” I said. “I’m so sorry, things have been – ”

With a raise of her hand, she cut me off. “I know,” she said, smiling pleasantly. “The last year has been very hard on you.”

Hand still on the door knob, I accepted her words with a nod.

“May I come in?” she asked and not in a tone I’d expect from someone here to collect money, not that she ever did. Again I nodded and stepped back which was all the permission she seemed to need. She closed the door behind her, but the sunset seemed to follow her into the apartment like some kind of luminous sanguine shadow, banishing the gloom. “Thanks.”

She continued to the couch and sat down, not seeming to mind it’s state. I, however, did and cringed knowing she just got poked in the ass by a spring. “Thank you. And I really am sorry about the rent. I should get paid Friday.”

“I know. That’s part of why you’re my favorite tenant.” Then she smiled like the sun, and I could have sworn the room actually got brighter. “That’s not why I’m here though. I wanted to talk about today. Did you enjoy yourself? Wasn’t this a nice break from the life you’ve had this last year?”

My mouth went dry. “What do you mean?”

She gestured to the maidbot skin and collar on the floor beside the door with a sweep of her arm. “Your day as a maidbot. That could be every day. You wouldn’t need to worry where your next meal will come from or if your rent is late. You wouldn’t have to be alone. You can stop searching. And you can be safe.” Though I had kept my now wide eyes on her, Macher seemed to pull a collar from outside my vision. ‘03’ was etched on its face.

I took an involuntary step back as if the collar might strike at me and shook my head. There were no words for this.

“Oh, don’t be like that,” she said with a moue of disappointment. “You enjoyed today, save for those parts of your own making. It’s impolite to damage gifts, though Zero-Two did warn me you would. She said you were smart and driven. She also said that you loved her.” Macher frowned as if I’d kicked her puppy. “It tore me up just separating your two last year. If you love her, why do you insist on being apart from her? You can be with her! I love you just as I love her. All I want is for you to be happy.”

“Then why did you take Lisa from me?” I managed.

“Because you both need my love.”

“That’s not love.”

Again she frowned, even more deeply this time. In the growing red light, a light that threatened to swallow the world, I thought I saw her crying. “Then let’s try something else.”

I gasped and tried turning to run away, but my feet wouldn’t budge. In the unnerving red light of the van, a feminine figure walked past. Sagging back into the harness, I caught my breath. They really did look so much like me.

Epilogue: Dorothea

With elbows on my mahogany desk and head in my hands, I sighed. This part always took time, I knew that, but that didn’t make it any less painful. At least Zero-Three looked happy at this point in this cycle. It had been the same for Zero-Two and she, too, learned how to accept my love. Surely Zero-Three would as well.

I switched my visual feed from Zero-Three’s world to a view of her pod. In some ways it was a shame that I only used these for educational purposes. They look so beautiful with cabling suspending them in the chamber like my own marionettes. Of course, when I tried showing Zero-Three that one time, she made a rude comment, likening it to a spider’s web. She says I don’t love her, but if that were true would I not have simulated something horrible for her? I could do that. I don’t. I won’t. No, I couldn’t. You don’t harm those you love.

“You love me, don’t you?” I asked.

“Yes Mistress,” Zero-Two answered, her voice euphonic and artificial.

I cut the feed and blinked away the sour scene. Assorted plants and walls papered over in abstract patterns of muted colors replaced it. And standing to my side was Zero-Two, my beautiful obsidian statue dressed in a baby blue maid uniform, featureless save for the hint of a nose and plastic hair of burgundy flowing down her back to her waist. I showered her with a smile. She made me happy and that made her happy. That’s what love is: making each other happy because it makes you happy. “I love you, too.” Just saying the words made me feel all warm and gooey inside.

The world would be a better place if people were motivated by love instead of greed or hate or lust. But some people couldn’t accept that. Case in point, my next appointment.

“Would you go get the detective?”

“My pleasure, Mistress.” Zero-Two curtsied and left, stride confident and languid, hips swaying as she placed one ballet booted foot delicately in front of the next.

Against my better judgment, I resumed watching Zero-Three pensively wait in the van. Maybe she wasn’t happy enough. She had no reason to be unhappy in my carefully constructed paradise, and yet, here we were. It hurt to see her like this. Not one for pain, I increased her estradiol, testosterone, and oxytocin levels, and increased her sensitivity. Given enough time stewing in the van, she’d figure out the rest.

I cut the feed at the sound of a knock at my stained mahogany door. “Come in,” I called.

Zero-Two led the way, with a lean-muscled woman of Latin and Asian descent following her into my office. Wearing a tan pantsuit with inky black hair cropped short, her beauty neared that of my own rubber pets’. Or as close as such a miserably imperfect creature could get.

“Thank you,” I said, nodding to Zero-Two before acknowledging the detective with a nod of her own. My smile faltered as I looked into the woman’s cold eyes, devoid of the liveliness found in the ones I have installed in all my maidbots. I tried propping my smile up again, trying to keep the world around me a little brighter. I failed. “Detective Kim.”

“Miss Macher.”

“I’ve already answered all your questions. What is it now?” I’d have offered her a seat, but I didn’t want her here. Besides, she always chose to stand.

She smirked at me. “Yes, well. It might have taken a few months, but the courts finally let us peek at where Erica Hill’s watch went. Care to guess?”

I sighed. I never should have trusted Justice Collins. “Where?”

“The watch’s last known location was your house. Wanna come down to the station and explain how it got there?”

I sighed again. “Is that all you have to say Luna? I don’t imagine you have an arrest warrant, do you?”

Projecting smugness like it was an Olympic sport, she crossed her arms and looked down her nose at me. “It’s just a matter of time, why not save yourself some trouble.”

I pulled out a business card from a drawer. “You could save us both even more time by talking to my lawyer instead,” I said, holding the card out. She didn’t take it. Fed up, I tossed it at her. It was small of me, an ugly gesture, but I did it anyway. “Please leave.”

She nodded and uncrossed her arms, her stance shifting to do as I asked. “I’ll be back,” she said and walked out.

Why was this happening? Why did that woman have to dig up things best left alone? I sagged in my chair.

The crunch of carpet under heels brought me hope. Loving arms over my shoulders and the scent of latex brought me warmth. I glanced up into the featureless face of Zero-Two. “Thank you.” I patted her arm and sat up straight. I knew what I needed to do. That wretched woman, so intent on ruining my life and the lives of Zero-Two and Zero-Three, didn’t deserve it, but I didn’t have much of choice.

I punched in my secretary for an audio call. “Adam, it seems like the detective is planning to harass me after all. Please have Luna Kim’s latest psyche report on my desk before you leave today. Also, I’d like you to put together a charity dinner for the Chicago Police Department.”

“As you wish Miss,” he replied.

The call ended and I looked back up at Zero-Two who still had her arms around me. “Don’t worry. I won’t let anyone steal your happiness. I promise you this.” Returning to the feed of Zero-Three’s world, now filled with her song of pleasure, I added, “And Zero-Three, too. I’m sorry it’s taking so long.”

“Thank you Mistress. I love you.”

“I know. You always will.” And so too would Zero-Three. And Zero-Four.