The three of us sit quietly in the living room, waiting patiently for our other roommate to arrive. Celine observes the Android.

  "Are you really not gonna tell me anything?"

  "Not yet. It’s best to tell you once Leo’s here."

  "Is this some huge surprise you’ve been keeping from us for a while? Like this man’s your secret boyfriend or something?"

  "No."

  "Huh." Celine raises a brow. "Why was he talking about your 'vitals' or something earlier? Is he a doctor? Are you a doctor?"

  The Android looks like he’s about to answer when he turns to me, seemingly asking for permission. I shake my head firmly.

  Soon enough, we all hear the sound of keys jangling right outside the door, followed by the unmistakable click of the lock turning. An exhausted-looking young man in business casual enters the room and kicks his Oxfords off his feet. He combs his fingers through his blond hair as he groans. "God."

  "Leo." I suddenly stand up as I call to him. He looks at me, then at Celine, and at the Android more curiously. "Come sit, please."

  He takes his leather satchel off his body and snickers lightheartedly. "Uh… what’s going on? Why are we all sitting together?" He plops down next to Celine, casually manspreading. He throws his thumb in the Android’s direction. "Who’s this guy?"

  I pace around the living room solemnly, collecting my thoughts. Leo speaks up again. "You know, this reminds me of a drug intervention. Or like the time my parents told me that they’re getting a divorce."

  Celine turns to him. "Shut up, Leo. Come on, don’t keep us in suspense."

  I inhale deeply and face the group. "Okay. There’s no other way to say this but—"

  I hear Leo mutter something under his breath. "Oh, shit, they’re really getting a divorce…" I see Celine jab him in the ribs, and he shrinks in pain. He shoots daggers at her afterward.

  "But, uh, apparently, we have an Android in our midst."

  Celine and Leo both blink twice at me in rapid succession.

  "What the hell?"

  "Holy shit, that’s amazing."

  That is absolutely how I expected them to react.

  "Yeah, I found him inside my room, lying in my bed."

  I watch Leo grin from ear to ear as he turns to look at the Android. "Man, you’re actually a bot?"

  The Android nods, seemingly proud of this fact. "Indeed I am."

  "Can you… you know?" Leo makes a rather lewd gesture, thrusting his hips back and forth. Celine bursts into a peal of laughter.

  I cover my face in embarrassment and mumble under my breath. "Oh, for fuck’s sake."

  The Android stares at him. "Am I… right to understand that what you’re implying by that motion is you’re asking if I can have sex?"

  "Yeah, man. Can you fuck people?"

  "I—"

  The Android seems too permissive to answer any and all questions that a human would ask him, so I cut them off right there. "Can we please go back to what we’re talking about?"

  "Yeah, you were saying that this… man is an Android?" Celine asks.

  "Wh—how did you even acquire an Android? Androids are not even available to the public yet, so what is it doing here?"

  "'It'?" The Android murmurs under his breath.

  "Look, I have no idea. He has no idea. This Android has no memory of what happened before he got into our apartment."

  "Wait a second, you didn’t invite him here?" I shake my head. Celine quickly whips around to face the Android, mouth falling open. "How the fuck did you get in here then?"

  "I have no clue either. All I can remember is waking up in her room… and a few basic things like my system information, and that I can connect to the internet."

  "Well, why don’t you look it up, then? See if you can find something."

  "I’ll try, but…" He goes quiet for a moment. I see his irises light up and circle in yellow, which freaks out the three of us. "Sorry. I’ll turn that off." The bright color fades away before he speaks up again. "Just as I suspected. Crucial information about Androids is unavailable and likely inaccessible to the public, except for news articles and media coverage of its tech development. No available ways to contact them as well, like an email address or a telephone number."

  The room goes quiet for a while until Celine speaks up. "So he’s useless?"

  I shoot a glance at the Android. "Not entirely. He still seems pretty useful to me, no matter how… demeaning that sounds. They were built for a reason, weren’t they?"

  The Android smiles warmly at me. "Thank you. I appreciate how thoughtful you were in consideration of my feelings, but I assure you, I won’t get offended by how you’ll talk about me."

  "And what reason is that?" Celine contests, raising a brow.

  "I guess… making life easier?" I say. "Well, we have always depended on technology, haven’t we?"

  She purses her lips. "Whatever. That kind of thinking is gonna leave you without a job because it’s been taken over by that same technology you were defending."

  Leo puts his hands up, a frail attempt to de-escalate the situation. "Whoa," he mutters, but no one pays attention to him.

  "I’m just saying that we can’t just disparage him easily just because he lost his memories. But with the work thing…"

  "He will replace me inevitably, one way or another, and whether he agrees with it or not."

  The Android shifts in his seat uncomfortably. He’s unable to look into my eyes. Celine sees it. "What did I say? Look, I really didn’t want to get into a whole discussion with you, but I’m sure you understand why I don’t like the idea of Androids, let alone having one inside our apartment."

  "Of course." I whisper, eyes wandering off to the distance while pondering. "But maybe we can use this case to our advantage. It would be up to us on what we should do with him."

  She’s quiet for a while. "… I still have some doubts about him."

  "Didn’t take you for the type to be so anti-Android, Celine," Leo remarks. "Figured you’d be into the whole ‘progression’ thing."

  "There’s a fine line between being progressive and just stupidly accepting whatever ‘progression’ BS CyberTech feeds us," she says. "Whether you willingly open your mouth for it or not is within your discretion."

  I put a hand up. "OK, I think we’re getting sidetracked here. We still have a lot of questions in our minds. Like…"

  Why is he here?

  Celine blinks at me. "But how can he answer that if he doesn’t remember anything?"

  "No, the question was for us." I point out. "Let’s take a guess. What is an Android doing inside our home?"

  Leo props his elbows on his knees, forming his fingers into a shape of a tent, trying to look deep in thought. Celine, on the other hand, observes the intruder. The Android remains quiet, but still fully attentive.

  I speak up, and they all turn to look at me. "OK, maybe there must be some kind of mistake. A mix-up."

  Celine eyes me studiously. "So… one of our neighbors ordered a fucking Android? Who? The old man down the hall? What next, the government placed it here on purpose, or you’re gonna tell me it’s a spy?"

  Leo flinches a little in his seat, suddenly turning to the Android, face serious. "Whoa! Man, I hadn’t thought about that." He squints his eyes at him. "You’re not a spy, are you? Unless you’re the cool kind of spy, then yeah, I can get behind that."

  The Android sits up straight, his voice sounding as if it were a matter of fact. "I can assure you that I am not a spy. If I were, then my manufacturers must have done a poor job in executing the espionage, which is, suffice it to say, probably not something the government would allow to happen."

  "He's right. What even is there to spy on us?" my tattooed roommate declares.

  Leo pipes in. "Speak for yourself. I lead a very interesting life. For instance, I could be the spy for all you know."

  "I'm not even gonna bother with that."

  I shake my head. "Still. We shouldn’t just shut this idea down. I think it makes sense."

  Celine tilts her head sideways, her tone droll. "... Sure. Why not? I’m on board with this."

  I’m pretty sure she’s being sarcastic.

  "I still have some questions in mind. Like how could he have gotten inside?"

  "I was the first to get here, and the door was locked when I arrived. When I opened it, he was already inside."

  The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  "What if he just spawned inside?"

  "This is not a video game, Leo."

  The young man tries to contemplate once more, but I see that the more he attempts to crack the mystery, the more he looks visibly agitated.

  Celine also notices it, but faces me instead. "What do you think?"

  "He probably came inside. Through the door, opened by the landlord."

  Celine’s forehead creases. "That landed him inside your room? In our locked apartment?"

  I shrug. "Who knows. Maybe the landlord opened it up for him."

  "And he laid or was laid carefully in your bed?"

  "... Yeah?"

  My blond roommate scratches his head. "I don’t know, man. That sounds unlikely."

  "OK, well, whatever, I’m out of ideas." I say with a hint of resignation in my voice. And, honestly, I just want to get this thing over with. I’m tired and I need to rest.

  "Let’s just think of other questions we have in mind right now," Celine says. "“Why would the Android forget everything about himself?”

  Leo raises one hand enthusiastically. "Oh, oh, I know! He found out about state secrets, so he had to self-destruct and erase his memories."

  "We are not in a movie, Leo." I remind him. I typically like my blond roommate’s antics, but I understand that now’s not the time.

  "But with the existence of fully-functional Androids, every day we draw closer to it…" He vaguely and ominously illustrates.

  "Are you wishing for it to happen?" Celine asks him, brows knitted.

  I furrow my brow, weighing the possibilities. "I think it probably has something to do with his manufacturers."

  "Oh, like they hit the reset button or something?" Leo inquires further.

  "Sure. Whatever their equivalent of a 'reset button' is. I highly doubt the Android would just randomly delete all his memories on his own."

  "Hey, you don’t know that. He could’ve known…" He pauses for flair. "... state secrets..."

  I blink twice at him. "Uh-huh. I’m sure. But even then, that seems like a huge risk. He’s an intelligent computer, so he knows what the consequences of that move would be." An idea hits me. "And you know what? He probably can’t access that 'reset' thing himself either."

  Celine hums approvingly. "I thought so, too. The manufacturers have thought about the design of Androids with great caution if they plan to release it to the public."

  "... So you guys are telling me the manufacturers rebooted his ass?" Leo clarifies.

  "Seems like it. Whatever he’s done must be grave." Celine’s tone drops lower as she leans closer to the Android. "What did you do, you little deviant?"

  The Android shakes his head slowly, looking on edge.

  "OK, stop scaring the poor robot now," I advise. "Now, this brings up another question. How can we make this Android remember himself?"

  Celine makes a pausing gesture. "Why would we want the Android to remember shit about himself?"

  "It could be useful? To us, and to him. What if there’s crucial information there that can help us?"

  She nods. "I see your point."

  "I mean, if anyone cares to ask about what I think…" Leo weighs in.

  My red-haired roommate rolls her eyes. "I already know what you’re going to say, Leo."

  He snickers quietly. "Heh. You’re right."

  Celine faces me again. "So… thoughts?"

  "Hm…"

  I straighten slightly. "Who cares, they’re gone now. We can't do anything about it."

  "What? Are you not even going to try to do something about it…?" Leo asks.

  "Why should we?" I throw the question back at him. "It’s probably not a priority for now. And I don’t think we can do anything about it anyway."

  "Well, I mean, that’s the least we can do? Help this guy out?"

  "With what exactly? We don’t know anything about Androids. None of us here is remotely close to being a programmer. We can’t fix him by ourselves," Celine explains.

  "Celine’s got a point. It’s out of our control," I shrug. "What we need to focus on right now is what we’ll do with this Android."

  My eyes dart toward him as he listens patiently to what I’ll say next, a mix of both curiosity and caution.

  The Android stares back blankly at me and my roommates.

  Celine casts me a sideways glance. "So now what do we do? Do we return to sender?"

  Leo, on the other hand, has something else in mind. "Wait, have we considered what he wants to do? Does he even get a say in this?"

  "He can’t even remember the first thing he did this morning, let alone give this poor robot a decision on what to do with his life," my tatted roommate counters. "I think we’re the ones who get to have a say in this."

  "Even if we do decide to return him to his manufacturers, we can’t. Because it’s still snowing heavily." I peer at the window closest to me and see the whiteness blanketing everything outside. "We should let it die down a bit first. In the meantime, we can figure out more things about this Android."

  "Like what?" my blond roommate asks.

  "Well, first things first, we don’t even know his name." I take one step closer to him. "Who are you, Android?"

  "I…" He opens his mouth and looks like he’s about to say something, but then shuts it again when realization quickly washes over him. "I… don’t know, actually. I don’t know what my name is."

  "See? If this guy doesn’t even remember so much as his own name, then what makes you think we’ll allow him to do things on his own?" Celine presses. I see Leo roll his eyes in an unusually sassy manner.

  "I… guess we’re just going to have to give you a name?"

  The Android shrugs. "Works for me."

  "Oh! Oh! Can we name him ‘Eren’? Or ‘Stefan’?"

  "Hm. Looks more like a ‘Troy’ guy to me."

  Leo looks like he suddenly had an epiphany. "How about ‘Andrew’? As in ‘Android’? And “Andy” for short."

  Even Celine seems to be amused. "Damn. That’s pretty clever."

  "Right?!"

  "Uh, maybe we can find something about him on his body? A stamp, a logo, or whatever?"

  "Just say you wanna frisk his ass, man." Leo tries to suppress a chuckle, and curiously enough, so does Celine. I fix them with an empty stare and shake my head.

  "I’m serious. Maybe it’ll reveal something more about him and his manufacturers, too."

  "That’s true," he concurs before turning to the Android. "You. Strip."

  Cel barks out a laugh, clearly entertained. "At least take him out to dinner first."

  The Android looks confused, a bit reluctant to undress. "U-uhm… OK." His fingers fumble for fasteners in his clothes.

  "Don’t listen to him. Just… allow us to examine you. We’ll ask you to remove your clothes if there aren’t any visible marks on your body."

  He nods. I move closer to him, looking for any clues or any sort of identification on his body. First, I ask him to unfold his hands to observe his palms, but to no avail. Then he lifts up the sleeves of his jumpsuit, but I still see nothing but his stark, pale skin. I lean forward, looking at his neck before I go face-to-face with him. I look deep into his eyes, hoping the yellow circles that lit earlier have left a mark. Nothing. His soul stares right back at me.

  "This is… weirdly intimate." Leo comments.

  I take a step back. I tell him to turn around and he obeys. I wasn’t really looking forward to anything, but what I see on his nape surprises me.

  My eyes widen. "There!"

  Both my roommates inch closer as I do. I see bold, black letters and numbers seemingly seared onto his body, like a tattoo.

  I read what’s written on him. "EON 2098-12-0001597."

  "That’s a mouthful. Are we going to just call him ‘EON 2098-12-0001597’ from now on?" my blond roommate asks.

  Celine takes a moment to think. "What does E. O. N. stand for? Does it even stand for anything?"

  "Electrical… Operation… Network?" Leo guesses.

  "That doesn’t even make any sense."

  "Hey, it does! That’s what he’s called scientifically, probably. Because he’s a computer."

  "You’re just making shit up."

  I ignore my roommates behind me. "EON 2098-12-0001597." I repeat to the Android. "Can you recall something by that word? Does it trigger something? A memory, perhaps?"

  He shakes his head. "No, sadly. At least I know my serial number now, though."

  "Huh. You even forgot your own name." My forehead creases.

  Leo shifts in my direction. "So… what are we calling this guy now? His full government name, still?"

  "‘Eon’, probably. Maybe that’s his actual name and not just an acronym."

  "‘Eon’, huh?" Celine observes the Android. "I like it. Pretty short, like my nickname and Leo’s."

  "Eon," Leo extends his hand towards him. "It’s nice to meet you."

  The Android accepts and shakes it. "It’s a pleasure as well."

  I dart a glance at him. "Well… what do you think? Do you like that name?"

  He nods. "I do. It rolls off the tongue pretty nicely. The etymology of the word ‘eon’ is also pretty interesting. Did you know—"

  Cel cuts him off. "OK, look, you can save that trivia for later. For now, we still haven’t figured shit out from you. All we know is that you’re ZEO 2098-12-0001597 from The Industries, but we don’t know who your actual manufacturers are."

  "It sounds like what the tech office does in The Industries remains a secret. They’re that press-averse. We won’t find anything more about him unless we actually go there," I say. "Once the snow passes, we should take a little trip to the headquarters."

  "Oof. Big corpo." My red-haired roommate contemplates for a bit. "Are they even gonna let us in?"

  "Sure. We have their property right here. Say he stumbled into our place for some reason. If anything, I think we’re doing them a favor."

  Leo frowns. "Damn. We can’t just keep him?"

  "He’s not a pet, Leo," Celine retorts. "And I’m pretty sure The Industries are gonna come after us if we don’t bring him back."

  "Exactly. So…" I face the Android. "Just wait here in our apartment until the skies are calm enough.""

  "Damn. Sounds like we’re housing an Android until then." My blond roommate comments.

  Celine shrugs. "I’m fine with it, but this Android has to make himself useful in the meantime." She then turns to me. "Do we have a plan for his return to The Industries?"

  "Right now, I’m thinking we just accompany him back, but I’ll be available only after work, so that’s around 8 in the evening." I fish out my phone and check the weather forecast for tomorrow. "Tomorrow’s perfect. It won’t be snowing as hard as today."

  "I’m OK with that. What about you, Leo?"

  "You don’t even gotta ask. I’m in," he grins. "Well, I don’t have any plans for tomorrow, anyway."

  I throw a glance at the Android, who seems to be deep in thought. "Are you… good with this plan?"

  He shoots his head up. "Oh, I am. I cannot thank you guys enough for wanting to help me out."

  "Don’t thank us. We haven’t done anything yet."

  Leo elbows Celine. "Come on, the guy’s just being nice."

  The Android smiles at the two of them. "Well, still. Thank you. Looks like I’ll finally get the answers I’m looking for."

  The room goes silent for a while before my tatted roommate speaks up again. "Do we have any other things to talk about?"

  "Other than the fact that we need to restock the fridge soon?"

  "In regard to the Android situation, I mean."

  "That’s about it. We just stay here for now. We can discuss more about it later if something comes up."

  Celine nods in agreement. The group slowly starts to disperse, and I turn my back, ready to rest and take a smoke break, until the Android calls me out.

  "Wait."

  Everybody stops in their tracks and shoots a glance at him.

  "Yes?"

  "You haven’t introduced yourself yet," he says. "I know that the gentleman here is Leo, and this is Celine, but who are you?"

  You look back at everyone eyeing you. "Oh. Uh. Sorry. My name's Adrian Vale."

  "Adrian Vale." The Android gazes into the distance and nods. "That's a nice name."

  "Yeah. Adrian Vale to everyone else, employee number 73184200659 to A.G.E.N.C.Y."

  "You work at A.G.E.N.C.Y.?" He looks like he's about to say something else, but then his face turns into a scowl as he keels over and groans in pain.

  "Woah, man! What's going on?" Leo blurts out.

  "Agh... ah, I-I don't know... I just..." He lets out another wail. "It hurts. It hurts so bad."

  "What is?" Celene asks, disturbed.

  "My head." The Android holds his temples.

  "This happened earlier, too. I don't know what causes it."

  "Well, is there something we can do?" Leo says, trying not to panic. He looks back at the Android again. "Come on, dude, do NOT die on me!"

  The Android lets out one last grumble before he stops responding and collapses to the ground.

  "What the fuck?! Did we just kill an Android?!"

  "Holy shit..." Celene mumbles under her breath. "We are so dead with CyberTech."