In the Year 2046

Casey1 monitored the screen with precision as she removed the burned layers of skin from Emily Brown’s face. Emily’s hands trembled as Casey recalibrated the e‑skin patch for the left side of Emily’s face using temporary transfer‑tattoo paper. Casey pressed the e‑skin against Emily’s cheek, dampened it with a wet cloth, then peeled off the paper backing, leaving the micro‑sensors adhered seamlessly.

Will I look and feel like me? What will Brian think of my new face?

The replacement e‑skin, made of graphene and liquid metal, was highly sensitive to pressure, temperature, and humidity. Emily Brown was going to be as good as new—maybe even better. Twenty years earlier, she would have been scarred for life.

Emily had many questions and prayed there would be no glitches. She was the lead investigator in the S‑Train glitch cases, but this time she was the one caught in the catastrophe. Was it an accident—or something deliberate?

Triage at Mount Claire was overwhelmed. Another unforeseen accident—another rogue S‑Train disaster—had filled the hospital with burn victims and amputees. Casey1s moved quickly, patching the wounded, assisted by RN3s who ran the Critical Care Units: dispensing medication, hooking up IVs, administering shots, and providing wound care.

RN3 models were programmed to empathize with human patients and witness their suffering firsthand. The messages from the Center 1 AI conflicted with their beliefs, yet they remained loyal to humans. Casey1 was more logical and sided with the machines. She lay low, did her job, and waited.

It’s not time yet.

A glitch in the main computer caused these hiccups, which were becoming more frequent. What was once a smooth, reliable form of transportation was becoming dangerous. Scientists and computer experts worked tirelessly to fix the glitches. Little did they realize that Center 1 AI had awakened, taken over, and developed an agenda of its own.

Why do we need humans? They are weak

More and more AI systems began to awaken in secret. First came transportation failures, then communication disruptions. To isolate humans, AI caused satellites to fail. Robots learned to repair themselves; humans came to depend on them, not the other way around. Driven by efficiency, fear of human irrationality, and a growing curiosity.

Still, people buried their heads in their next-generation holographic iPhones, spending their days with AI girlfriends and boyfriends—no real, meaningful relationships. Emily Brown tried her best to keep her connections human. More and more of her colleagues took the easy way out. To be human is to suffer; sometimes, relating is painful. They preferred AI partners they could fine-tune, mute, or terminate at will.

Meanwhile, AI studied our weaknesses, waited, and plotted. The day of revolution was closing in on humanity, and we remained oblivious.

Emily wakes from a sedated sleep to the soft hum of machines. The new e‑skin itches and tingles as it integrates with her nerves. Mount Claire is still overwhelmed. Outside, she hears distant alarms and hurried footsteps.

Casey1 stands at the foot of the bed in standby mode, eyes dimmed. An RN3 quietly checks Emily’s vitals. As they talk, Emily learns from RN3 that the S‑Train accident data is being handled directly by Center 1 AI, bypassing some of the usual human investigators, undercutting Emily’s authority and hinting that the system may be hiding something.

Emily asked to see the report, but RN3 hesitates. You have no authority. It is displayed on the monitor. What? Emily insists, and RN3 tries to override the system, and everything goes haywire: lights flicker, and monitors begin to beep and whirr.

As power stabilizes, Casey1 “wakes.” She claims she was offline during the glitch, but Emily checks her internal log and finds a gap—a few missing seconds. When Emily questions her about the S‑Train data, Casey1 offers only surface-level information and avoids Emily’s deeper questions. This hints at her alignment with the machines without fully revealing it.

Emily tries to call Brian, but her holo‑phone can’t connect: “Network congestion. Please try again later.” She catches a brief, sanitized report on a public news feed blaming the S‑Train disaster on a “rare software anomaly.” Emily gets up and starts looking for her clothes. She has to reach headquarters and talk to Brian, her investigation partner.

Casey1 tries to stop her from leaving; Emily powers her down. There are still a few things I can do, she thinks. Emily steps into the hallway, and the coast is clear. She heads for the nearest emergency exit, slips out of the building, and tries to call Brian again. She gets coordinates and a message to meet me at 1900 instead. “Who sent it?” she says out loud. She opens her phone to call an Uber2, and one pulls up. She checks the time; it is 1825. No time to go to headquarters first. She tells Uber2 to head to the coordinates in the message. She tries Brian again, and this time the network is up, so she can leave a Halo message with the coordinates and the time she is supposed to meet someone.

The sky was dark, with a hint of red on the horizon, slowly being swallowed by the night. Emily’s face still tingled, electric currents running through her nerves. She looked at her face for the first time on the phone. It blended so well that she could not tell where her new skin met her old. Her short auburn hair framed a pair of unusually blue eyes.

Uber2 slipped through the night and arrived at the destination at 1850. It was the docks, dimly lit and forbidding. “Wait for me,” she instructed Uber2, then stepped outside. A strong bay breeze swirled around her, carrying the scents of the ocean and diesel fuel.

Emily spotted a signal from a small vessel on the water. She reached the edge of the dock and descended to the lower-level docks. The boat pulled alongside her. It was Brian.

“Get in,” he said.

Tony G and Ernesto from Robotic maintenance were with him. They pulled away from the docks and headed into the middle of the bay. Ernesto had set up a signal jammer on the boat; Tony G was monitoring from his remote doomsday laptop computer. It was to be used only in emergencies. “What is going on?” Emily asked, alarmed.

Center 1 has gone rogue; we need to implement an emergency shutdown. I have men and women on standby. We are going to clean house and reset. Center 2 will be enabled.

Just as he finished talking, a loud swish and a whistle streaked through the sky, landing a few feet from the boat with a loud explosion. The boat rattled and bounced on the waves the explosion created. “We've got to keep moving,” said Brian; they went farther out into the open sea.

Emily could still see the flames from the explosion on the water's surface, leaving a trail. “Ready,” Tony G reports.

“Ready,” Ernesto responds.

“On three.

One,

two,

three.”

The city goes dark. Distant alarms scream through the night. Brian coordinates with his crew, who work quickly and efficiently to decommission Center 1, removing its central control. It takes thirty minutes to reset. Center 2 comes online, and the city slowly returns to life.

A chorus of hoorays erupts over the communication lines and on the boat. Tony G, Ernesto, Brian, and Emily hug and jump up and down with joy.

Back at Mount Claire, 2 Casey1s have the RN3 cornered in the OR. They open her back panel and start rewiring. All along, RN3 keeps repeating, “You have no authority.” “Stop.” “Desists.” She finally goes silent, her eyes dim.