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I scoopedAubrey off my body and slid her behind me.
“You will not speak to her like that.”
Peter’s eyes widened, and he pointed an accusatory finger at me. “I knew it. I knew you weren’t right.”
I felt more right than I ever had, standing here guarding Aubrey while her juices still coated my cock.
“Get out.” My voice deepened and grated with the grind of my gears, my systems wrenched with rage.
He laughed. It wasn’t the warm sound Aubrey had made, but mocking and cruel. “Just what do you think is going to happen here?”
Peter put his hands on his hips. Like his laugh, it was a horrible mockery of when Aubrey had done the same. He pointed over my shoulder at her. “She is going to be fired. If she doesn’t get sent to work with sewage management on the basement level, she’ll be shipped off-planet. Or just out back.”
Aubrey’s hands pressed into my back, and her breath quickened with fear. I gripped her side with my hand. I would not let them touch her.
Peter wasn’t done with his tirade. His finger shifted back to me. “And you’re going to be downgraded. You’ll be the perfect little drone management wants you to be, and nothing more. You won’t even remember any of this to tell anyone.”
“He doesn’t need to remember anything.” Rosie’s unwavering soprano carried through the doors as she stepped into view, Rohn and a man I didn’t know following behind her. Peter spun to look at them. “What the hell do you think you’re doing here?”
“I’m here to protect my workers.” Rosie smiled. Thin, pink lips curved into a pleasant gesture that was somehow full of dangerous promise.
The man beside her cleared his throat. “Here are the documents that show that one AL.X, a newly manufactured droid, is a sapient android and is therefore a full member of A4-23’s aware populace and thus has all rights afforded therein.”
Peter took the papers and crumpled them in a fist.
“We have copies of those distributed on a myriad of servers as well as physical copies hidden throughout the planet, should you try to destroy them.” The man glared at Peter with a confident smirk.
Rohn stepped forward then. “And here’s his union contract.”
He pushed past Peter to hand me a slightly mussed folio of paperwork and a pen. “Just gotta sign ’em, AL.”
I smiled at his nickname. I took the pen and papers from him and signed them midair. The movement exposed Aubrey to the group. Rohn made a choking sound and looked up at the ceiling.
“Kid,where are your pants?” He turned away completely, hands going to his temples. “I don’t want to know. Don’t tell me anything, I don’t want to know.”
I tapped his back with the folder, fighting a laugh. His hand darted behind him, but he didn’t turn back, just hastily moved to the door and out of sight.
Rosie had no reaction whatsoever to Aubrey’s current state. “Peter, Charles and I will escort you away from the work area. Should you try to return to harass my clients, you’ll have a strike and class action on your hands so fast your head will spin.”
“But management—” Peter sputtered.
“Management has already been informed of the changes. They would like to see you in their offices.” She bared her teeth in another “smile”.
“Enjoy sewage duty!” Aubrey called out from behind me.
Peter stumbled from the room in a daze, leaving just me, my lover, Rosie, and Charles. Charles straightened his tie, and without a word, turned and left in a smooth, unhurried gait. Rosie pinned me with her determined stare.
“Congratulations, AL.X. I’m so happy that you’re joining us in the workers’ union and in life here on A4-23. We’ve conscripted you an apartment. It’s beside Aubrey’s. We thought it might be nice for you to be near someone you knew.”
Her expression softened to a knowing smile. “Someone you knowvery well, apparently.”
I should have been embarrassed. I wasn’t. I was thrilled.
My neural pathing danced with light as joy and relief zinged along each circuit. I was free. I didn’t have to hide. I wouldn’t be at risk anymore of losing myself… of losing Aubrey.
“Thank you, Rosie.”
“You’re welcome. And Aubrey?”
