“Damn you,” Mercury hissed. He watched in frustration as both Mojo and his robots continued to fail in their duties. “I suppose that if I want something done right, I should do it myself.” He keyed a button on the computer display and spoke clearly into the microphone. “Attention all servants! Emergency Protocols are now in effect. Link with the supercomputer and provide auxiliary heat relief. Mojo, this include you!”

Mercury crossed the control room in a few quick steps and picked a random USB port to connect to. “I was so hoping to avoid this,” He mused. “It’s so undignified.” He reached around his head to feel for the port and, very carefully, slid the cable in. Terabytes of information were sifted through in seconds and Mercury was plunged into the familiar world of cyberspace.


Frost carefully picked up her daughter and tiptoed from her cell. “We’re going now,” she whispered. “We’re going to get out of here, okay sweetheart? You just listen to what I tell you and we’ll be home in no time at all.”

Emma suddenly tugged at her mother’s shoulder and pointed at Mojo. “Look, look!” She cried, clinging to Frost for dear life. Mojo had abruptly sat bolt upright, her eye flashing an angry red. Frost put her daughter down and stood protectively in front of her.

Surprisingly, Mojo made no aggressive movement at all. She stood up, moved mechanically to a nearby intercom, and ripped off the protective casing. Frost watched as Mojo pulled apart one of the wires inside, stripped off the plastic coating, and shoved the end result into the port at the back of her neck.

The lights dimmed and the air became rank with the smell of burning rubber. “Let’s go!” Frost cried, snatching up Emma and running down the hallway.



Adrian paid careful attention as Rik marched his robots up and down the hallway. Several minutes before one of the rusty automatons had ripped the door to Adrian’s cell off its hinges and cut through his restraints. Now Rik was trying to explain how he could control them, but lacked the vocabulary to do so.

“I give up,” Rik finally grumbled, his first complete sentence in a very long time. Adrian watched one of the robots walking in a small circle, mindless when Rik was not trying to control it.

A peculiar feeling tickled at his spine. Adrian felt something in the air that he could not identify, like a shadow at the edges of his vision. All of the robots froze at the same time (occasionally falling over if they had been moving around), then assembled in a group and moved as one down the hallway. “What did you tell them to do?” Adrian asked. Rik didn’t answer, his face growing more strained every moment.

“Mercury called,” he grunted. “Servants must obey. H-Have to block him out!” Rik’s eyes grew big and frightened. “It’s Sister!” He whispered. “Mercury has her. Sh-She can’t fight back, not on her own!”

“Mercury,” Adrian soothed, “Sister was only a computer, and she was destroyed years ago. She never had a will of her own, no matter how realistic the imitation may have been.”

With an anguished howl Mercury leapt to his feet and began pulling at his hair. “You don’t understand!” He shouted, “Sister needs me! She’s alive, and he’s torturing her!” Mercury grew more and more frantic, no matter how Adrian tried to calm him. This makes no sense! Adrian thought as he watched Mercury lose it. I can’t stay here anymore. What about Frost? What about-

Something about the thought was unfriendly, but Adrian didn’t care. What about my daughter He had to find them. They needed him, and he had no idea where to begin. While Rik’s tirade continued, Adrian snuck away unnoticed. Rik will have to sort this out himself, he thought. I don’t have time to help everyone. It’s time to choose where my loyalties lie.



Rik didn’t have time to worry about Adrian. He could feel Sister calling for him, pleading for the nightmare to end. She had become a slave. He had to set her free, but how? His gaze drifted to where the robots were now congregating. Each of them had plugged in to the system of data relays that Mercury had installed.

“I’ll regret this,” Rik mused. He “commandeered” a cable, destroying the robot in the process. Rik cautiously felt around for the port in his neck. “Go,” he whispered, “Back to Hell. Funny.” The cable snapped into place, and Rik was immediately pulled out of his body.