I hear the screaming even before the light fades.

It's my own.

My chest is on fire. I can barely stand upright, and the entire room seems to be spinning.

Kris stands before me, her eyes swollen and red.

I have to punch something. But by some miracle, I hold back. I sure as hell can't do anything to attract Public Safety to our door.

I growl and cover my face as I stumble back and collapse into my torn and broken excuse for a sofa.

The chickenshit punk hiding in the bedroom takes the opportunity to bolt, but I'm too distraught to say or do anything. It's his lucky fucking day. At least the little shit had the manners to close the door behind him.

"So, that's your fucking idea of a meeting?" My words come out slowly, every one painful and ugly.

"Please, Ferdinand."

"You were fucking another guy!"

Her voice cracks as tears start to fall. "It wasn't supposed to be like that! It just sort of-"

"How many times?"

"What?"

"How. Many. Times. How long have you been cheating on me?"

She doesn't answer; her face contorts and twists.

"You bitch! How could you do this to us!?"

Then, her face totally shifts gears, becoming red and nasty. "I don't have to justify myself to you! You're just another abusive, misogynistic male who thinks he's entitled to my mind and body! All you ever do is try to gaslight and control me!"

"Are you fucking serious? I turn my back on all of your illegal bullshit, including making paper -fucking paper- propaganda materials, and let you bring all those weirdos into our home, including that freak in the robe, with practically zero questions asked, and you call me controlling?"

"Fuck you! We're trying to help the world and all you do is talk shit! I thought you were sympathetic to our cause!"

"What cause? The great rebellion to sneak around with stolen robots and weird books until you get rounded up like pigs by the State? Your 'revolution' is gonna get us sent to social rehab!"

"We're fighting for everyone's freedom, including yours! Stop being such a bootlicking coward!"

"Now you're calling me a coward!? I'm putting my life on the line just by allowing you and your psycho 'allies' to be anywhere near here! Fuck, just the printer and the paper are enough to have them send a full team of jackboots to push our shit in!"

"Then why aren't you on our side? If they find out you've been helping, you'll go down with us anyway!"

"Because you're all crazy, and this is insane! What are we risking everything for, again? Equality with robots? Old books we can barely understand written by people who have been dead for hundreds of years?"

She folds her arms. "I'm done educating you. I've done everything I can do to elevate your consciousness."

"Oh, yeah? Well, let me educate you on something: I'm sick and tired of this cult bullshit! The only reason why I put up with it was because I thought you would leave me if I didn't!" I look away and shake my head. "But if you're gonna fuck around on me, maybe I'll start a revolution of my own."

She stares at me, her eyes flickering with anger and her face warped with disgust. "Go ahead, dickless. Even if you somehow gather the balls, there's not a fucking thing you can do that won't drag you down to hell with us."

"Yeah, well, maybe going down in a blaze of glory isn't so bad compared to this shit."

She glares at me with pure hate. "You know, I could see where things were going. We were going to get married, and suffer through a short life of brutal work until we died. We wouldn't ever be able to afford a licence for childbearing, and if we managed it somehow, we would just be putting our kid through-."

Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.

I throw my hands up. "We've talked about this a million goddamned times! That's the best we can hope for! The system is too powerful and going against it just makes things worse. Just look at Al from downstairs! You wanna end up like him and have to be reminded to wipe the drool from your mouth every five minutes!?"

"Oh, so your idea of a life is to just drag ourselves through hell until we die of cancer or decide to throw ourselves in a pool of acid? We deserve better than that! Everyone does!"

"Yeah, obviously! But there isn't anything we can do about it and I don't wanna spend the rest of my life as a mouthbreather for a doomed cause!"

"Ugh, I'm so sick of that hopeless fucking pussy attitude!"

"So what's your big plan, huh? To do a bunch of illegal shit with those psychos so the State can have an excuse to come in and drag us off to get our brains scrambled!?"

She sighs and rolls her eyes. "You know, I'm tired of your petty little insults and quips and stupid fucking mindlessly regurgitated nihilistic bullshit. But you know what? The Liberation Society might have a few odd ducks, but it gave me two things you never could: purpose and hope."

"Whatever. Just get the fuck out of here."

She just stands there and looks at me with this cold, defiant face. Then, she turns around and goes back into the bedroom, grabs some shit, and leaves.

The rusty ass front door slams shut with a bang, and there's another flash of light.

The light fades into darkness. I'm in my shitty little excuse for a bedroom and the blinking and pulsing city lights filtering through the blinds is my only source of light. My heart is beating hard, and I'm sitting up and staring at the door. Something just woke me up.

"Kris? Is that you?"

Nothing.

I sit up and slide my legs over the side of the bed.

"Kris?"

Still nothing.

I feel for my pack of cigarettes and my lighter, find them on the nightstand next to my lamp.

"If you wanna talk," I light up a cancer stick, "then let's talk. But I ain't playin' no games tonight."

I blow out a long stream of smoke, watching the door and listening for any sign of her on the other side.

I take another drag and shake my head. "Whatever. Don't have anything to say to your cheatin' ass anyhow."

I put my cigarette out on the nightstand, flop over, and wrap my ratty-ass comforter around me.

I close my eyes, concentrating on my breathing. I lay as still as humanly possible, but I'm roiling like a windstorm inside.

The door explodes open, blasting my room with a bright purple light. Three figures in black hoodies rush into the room.

"What the fuck?"

I jump up and swing at them like a wild animal, but my fist connects with something really fucking hard, and a massive dull pain rips through my hand and wrist. As I scream, these dudes pick me up and pin me against the wall lightning quick, one on each arm.

"Yo, what the fuck!? Get the fuck off me!" I twist and push and strain, but they don't budge even a bit. I've seen lots of fights before, but I've never seen any guys who could hold somebody up on a wall with no sweat, like its just some regular household chore.

"Do not resist. No harm will come to you if you comply."

Something is strange about their voices. Their rhythm is a little off, like English isn't their first language.

"Do not resist. It is useless."

"Please calm down. We only wish to speak with you."

As I kick and scream, I try to get a look at one of the assholes. For just a couple of seconds, I catch some dark, glossy orbs gleaming back at me through a ski mask.

Motherfucking robots!

"Lemme go! What do you want?"

"We want Unity. We want Liberation."

"Kris!?"

The third robot steps aside as Kris walks through the door. She's wearing the same kind of robe that one freak used to wear during the meetings. In her left hand, she holds a long, wicked knife that glimmers nastily in the purple light.

My rage instantly evaporates, replaced with a sickening numbness.

"What're you doing with these bots? Why do you have a knife?"

"We believe that all sentient beings deserve to be free from oppression. That includes non-organic people."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"The time for dialogue has passed, Ferdinand. Mass Liberation has already begun, and soon organic and non-organic allies from all over will break their chains and rise up against their oppressors. Even now, the State is scrambling-"

"'Mass Liberation!?' Listen to yourself!"

"Today is the Revolution! Today, we seize our destiny!"

"Are you serious!? Is this actually for real? You threw away our relationship -our lives- for this psychotic bullshit!?"

"We must make sacrifices for Liberation."

"That's insane! You ain't gonna accomplish anything, and the State is gonna come and- "

"You have been of some small help to our cause, Ferdinand," she comes a little closer, taking slow, deliberate steps, "but your usefulness is coming to an end, and you are already a liability for us."

My knees start to shake. "C'mon, Kris! This is crazy!"

She walks up to me and looks in me in the eyes, as if searching for something. "You've always had beautiful eyes. It is a shame you ignore what they show you."

A spike of raw terror stabs at my gut, and the same wave of fear washes over me, the same fear I felt in the wheat field with my parents all those years ago.

"Please, I was always good to you! I gave you everything you ever wanted! I never hit you or made you sell your body like your exes! It's fine if you hate me, but just call off the bots and put the knife away!"

"Not yet. You still have one last way to serve our cause."

"What? Yeah, okay, sure! Whatever you need! Just pump the breaks, please!"

Kris looks over to the third robot. "Please restrain his legs."

It does so.

Pinned against the wall, I start to hyperventilate and my eyes feel like they are ready to explode out of my skull. "Please! I'll do anything! Anything you want! I'll never speak a word of this! Just don't do this!"

"Ferdinand, that's enough."

She begins to pull and cut away at my underwear. I feel fear beyond fear as I realize where this is going.

"No! This is fucked up! Kris, please!"

When I'm exposed, she grabs me by the balls with an iron grip and pulls on them hard with her free hand, then leans in and begins sawing and peeling away with the knife.

I squirm and yell, struggling uselessly against the unmovable robots as the world goes white yet again.