Tapping her vest, MATE appeared.
“Yes, Mother.”
Quinn took a step back as the hologram was right in front of him.
“Woah,” he said. “What is that?” he asked as Dex just laughed.
Elizabeth introduced her.
“This is MATE. She’s my assistant,” she admitted. “She keeps me on track.”
Yeah, he could see that, but he meant more likeWHATwas she?
“You have a hologram that follows you around?” he asked. “Not a normal human as an assistant?”
MATE went there.
She didn’t need Elizabeth to explain her. She was fully aware that the humans got confused easily.
“I am Zen,” she admitted, holding out her hand.
When he went to shake it, she chortled since his fingers went right through hers.
“Silly humans, tricks are for AI computers. You can’t touch me.”
He blinked.
“I don’t know how I feel about this,” he admitted. “She’s not here, but she is.”
Elizabeth shrugged.
“You get accustomed to it, especially when she tells you she’s planning to possess your children and take over the world with their bodies. I suggest you ignore most of it. We taught her some bad habits, apparently.”
Dex laughed.
Oh, he’d come face-to-face with MATE before.
“This should tell you how much the FBI gets in tax dollars,” he joked. “We willNEVERsee this kind of thing in our lifetimes.”
Yeah, except MATE was a special project from one of her husband’s companies, and she wasVERYexpensive.
And she’d better be the gift that kept on giving because Elizabeth needed help, not bullshittery and assholery.
It was time to get to work.
“MATE, I need the whole area scanned and uploaded for Ethan. He’s going to want to see this, and I don’t have a research monkey here to take notes. Keep recording on my vest, but also get the whole area, please.”
At her feet, an actual hologram of a monkey appeared, and it danced around with a notebook and pen.
Elizabeth wasn’t having it.
“NOTwhat I meant.”
MATE was trying to cheer her mother up. She was worried about her and didn’t like any of this.
Not.
At.
