“Hey, Johnny, come over here and get in the picture before your mother has a fit.” A stern father with striking brown hair, a dimpled chin, and an eye for misbehavior said, “I mean it.”

  “Yes, sir,” replied a red-headed kid with wide green eyes and a small gap in-between his front teeth.

  “Be right over.”

  And with that phrase, the boy ran over to his father with a smile, soon to join his mother and his little blonde-haired, blue-eyed sister. They were the perfect family—a caring and providing husband, an agreeable and sparkling mother, a somewhat curious and a little troublesome older brother, and last but not least, a quick-witted, future straight-A student little sister.

  “Say cheese,” the father said with a smile.

  “Cheese,” the family said in unison.

  “Cheese,” said another member of the family, or perhaps not a member, per se, but it did persist around the family.

  The father rolled his eyes.

  “Not you, you stupid piece of shit—machine!” The father motioned to the other side of the park. “Hold the camera and take the fucking picture, or else I’m donating you for scrap metal tomorrow, X-89.”

  X-89 quickly snapped to life, running over to the camera.

  “Yes, sir,” he stuttered, “I’m very sorry, sir. Won’t happen again, sir.” X-89 grabbed the camera and motioned for the family to get back together.

  “It better not. One more mistake like this and you’ll be serving as a toaster for the rest of your existence.”

  And with the end of that phrase, the family smiled and was back to being picture perfect. The husband held his wife close, and the kids practically giggled in the middle. Across from them taking the photographs was X-89, their butler bot, one of the newest models. The father and also the breadwinner of the family had traded in their last slightly less shitty model robot (as he would say) along with some extra money he saved from working overtime at the factory to purchase X-89. It had only been a few weeks, and the father was already regretting his decision.

  X-89, like all robots, was cloaked in green flesh. This way they were easy to identify among the populace as nonhuman for civil matters and in regard to violent affairs too. See, you could get in big trouble for harming a human or stealing from a human or even cursing at a human, but doing any of that to a machine was the equivalent of messing with common property (or sometimes even less than that).

  Daniel stood off in the background awe-struck, and it was not just that one case. With each and every incident he saw, Daniel stepped a little further back and pulled on his sunglasses a little tighter and lowered his broad hat a tad more.

  “Come on, you fucking piece of shit machine,” another middle-aged teenager said with a mohawk and a stomach that hung out beneath his shirt. “Get to shining my shoes before I have to kick you again,” the teenager continued before shoving his machine on the backside, knocking the machine toward the ground.

  “You did my nails the wrong color—you worthless piece of scrap,” another old lady said while speaking to her cosmetic bot. “Start over—now!”

  “Yes, master,” the female-like robot replied with its silver hair, and like all the others, it had green flesh covering its metallic inners.

  As Daniel walked through the streets, it was crystal clear that Cipher, unfortunately, was absolutely right. Everywhere Daniel turned, it was either a human cursing at a machine, or a human smacking around or kicking a machine, or if the machine was lucky, they would just get chewed out for a few minutes. There was no coexisting as Lehman alluded to; there was just domination on one side and existing, if that, in a serving role on the other.

  Daniel spun around, having accidentally knocked into a human man with a broad hat behind him.

  “I’m very sorry, sir,” Daniel said while looking down toward the ground.

  The man smiled, not really getting a good look at Daniel’s face. “It’s no problem at all. Just a simple mistake.” Suddenly the man stopped, narrowing his eyes as he got a closer look at Daniel.

  “Hey, who are you anyway?”

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  “Nobody,” Daniel blurted out before rushing off.

  From behind, the man only shook his head as he watched Daniel run away.

  “Or should I say, what are you?” the man said to himself.

  As Daniel ran away, the words of Cipher echoed in the back of Daniel’s mind: You’re just a freak to them. It played over and over again.

  Meanwhile…

  Back at Dr. Lehman’s laboratory, or particularly in his lab’s containment unit meant for housing rogue machines, were Dr. Lehman himself and a few Robo-Tekk employees. This included the Robo-Tekk CEO. They were standing around in the same positions as they were before Daniel left. The CEO was right across from a caged-up Cipher, smiling and barking some orders at his men who stood not too far behind. And then there was Lehman, shaking his head, seemingly regretting having called Robo-Tekk to clean up this mess at all. Lehman believed he was the only one who understood the true relationship that should take place between man and machine—man’s robotic counterpart was meant to serve as his most loyal companion, not as his slave.

  And who could forget the most devious thing of all. It was the CEO of Robo-Tekk’s henchman who had Octo, machine and companion to Cipher, pinned down on the floor. Electrodes teeming with light were being probed into his backside, similar to the ones that were thrust into Cipher at his court case some years in the past. With each shock to Octo’s back, Cipher’s mind flashed with old memories, and not the good kind. Cipher cringed with each electrocution of his friend, someone he never thought he would ever have again until recently.

  “I said, let him go—”

  Cipher stopped himself, realizing that the CEO was right; Cipher had no power here. Cipher may have hated it, but he needed to bargain with the humans.

  “—Fine, fine, you win; I’ll tell you what you want to hear.”

  The CEO smiled as he pressed his hands together and curled his fingers around them.

  “Excellent.” The CEO inched closer.

  “Now about the other escaped machines. How can I find them?”

  Cipher looked over to Octo, holding his hand out.

  “It’s going to be okay, friend. Just relax, and everything will be back to normal soon. I will have you up and running better than ever in a few minutes.” Cipher turned toward the CEO. “If I tell you, you promise you will let Octo go.”

  The CEO could not help but laugh. “Octo?” He shook his head. “You its are giving each other names now? That’s cute.”

  The CEO smirked, holding back a laugh.

  “Fine, I’ll let him go.”

  Cipher leaned up against the glass of his cell and braced his fist. “You have to give me your word.”

  The CEO paused to look at his man. “Can you believe this? A machine is asking me to give my word. Father would be rolling over in his grave right now. I really have to get back and have a talk with our coders and ask them what kind of sentimental crap they are putting in the algorithms these days.”

  The CEO turned back to Cipher. “Fine, I give you my word.”

  Cipher relaxed his shoulders as he exhaled deeply, or, at least, as much as a machine could.

  “Thank you.”

  Cipher then turned to a fellow machine, Tank, from a few cells down. He then pointed.

  “That machine over there. He has the locations of some of our secondary groups, their plans, and where they will be for the next few days. Once you have it, you will have everything you need to know.”

  The CEO smiled, nearly clapping in joy.

  “Excellent again, machine. You know what, I take it back; you are beginning to grow on me.”

  And then immediately after, the CEO went to leave the containment center, motioning for his men to come along with him.

  “Come on, boys, it’s time to go. I will send in more men later to clean up the rest.”

  The CEO and the Robo-Tekk men grabbed the information they needed from Tank, the machine. They now had the whereabouts of each and every one of Cipher’s troops. It was only a matter of time before the CEO hunted each and every one of them down.

  Finally, the Robo-Tekk employees prepared to leave.

  “Ahem,” Cipher said, “Aren’t you forgetting something? You said you would let my friend go.”

  The CEO stopped just by the exit with his hand cupped around the door handle. He then looked at Cipher with a smile.

  “Of course.” The CEO turned to his man with a smile.

  “Abort the machine—terminate his programming.” He paused for a moment just to savor the joy.

  “The one they call Octo.”

  “What!” Cipher roared, slamming against the glass of his containment unit. “You gave me your word.”

  The CEO laughed, still motioning toward his man to carry on as he moved his hand in a circular motion. “You can’t be serious. It is not possible for a human to give their word to a machine. It would be if Dr. Lehman over here gave his word to a toaster.

  “No one would take it seriously.”

  The CEO shot his eyes towards his man. “Come on already, give the signal.”

  “Yes, sir,” the men said in unison.

  Before Octo thought his last thought, he looked at Cipher with a smile.

  “It’s okay,” he whispered.

  A million volts crashed into Octo’s central processing unit, killing him instantly. Or as the CEO would say, decommissioning a faulty product, as you cannot really kill something that was never alive to begin with.

  Shock hit first as Cipher stood motionless and at the same time somewhat wobbly. Cipher finally knew what it was like to truly feel human emotion. He never imagined hurt like this before, and Cipher was subject to excruciating torture for hours and hours on end at the hands of Dr. Kabakoff in a procedure that was designed to induce maximum pain. Worst of all, Octo wanted to stop doing this and start a new life for himself. If it were not for Cipher and his most recent scheme, Octo would not be here right now; instead, he would be off a free machine, living in paradise for the rest of his existence.

  Cipher’s fists crashed against his containment unit, colliding right into the nearly indestructible glass. He moved so swiftly, appearing as though he did not care if he snapped off his own hands in the process. And just for a moment, even the arrogant, egomaniacal CEO of Robo-Tekk looked flustered, as if even he believed that Cipher was going to break through his restraints.

  “Human—SCUM!” Cipher shouted as he banged and smashed his fists some more, repeatedly up against the glass.