A continuation of this snippet about naming your robot after your runaway partner-turned-villain. Original prompt from @the-modern-typewriter 's Patreon.
When the antagonist went to check on the protagonist the next day post kidnapping, they weren't sure what to expect but they expected something. Tears, rage, panic, begging...
Instead they found the protagonist propped up against the pillows on the bed, tossing a balled up sock into the mini-cloud of nanos the antagonist had left to guard them.
The nanos were catching it and throwing it back.
"You left my program in," the protagonist said, not looking at them. They carefully took aim and tossed the sock again. The nanos swarmed in their 'starling' pattern formation, secured the sock and fired it back straight into the protagonist's lap.
"Obviously." The antagonist put down the laptop they'd brought in with them, crossed their arms awkwardly. "Your work was - is - integral to the AI systems."
"But you left the play behaviors in." The protagonist fumbled the sock, their hand a little shaky. Clearly still feeling the aftereffects of the neuro-paralytic. "You could have excised that code. You hated that code."
"I hate you wasting your time and talent on anthropomorphification," the antagonist fired back, relieved to fall back into the old argument. "It's obscene, them making you shape machines into an illusion of life in order to be acceptable to the general public."
"Obscene, huh?" said the protagonist softly. They gave up on the sock, folding their hands in their lap. Still avoiding the antagonist's face. "Too bad we can't all be creatures of perfect logic like you."
The antagonist slid onto the foot of the bed. The protagonist immediately pulled their feet away - one bare, one still socked. The antagonist didn't chase them. Not yet. "I should have expected you to immediately start diagnostics," they murmured.
The protagonist shrugged. "You haven't left me much other enrichment," they said, with a jerk of their chin to the bare cement walls of the makeshift cell the nanos had built. "Not to complain about my own kidnapping, but I did expect a bit more style. An abandoned lighthouse, maybe a gently decaying ancestral mansion? Not locking me in your basement."
"Basement of my ancestral mansion," the antagonist quipped back. The protagonist did not smile, not even slightly. The antagonist cocked their head at their old partner, eying them closely. "Why didn't you tell them? About the fire, about me?"
The protagonist let out a wobbly laugh, clasped their knees tighter to the chest. For the first time they looked at the antagonist, face caught somewhere between love and misery. "Turns out I'm not the creature of pure logic I thought I was either."
"I appreciate your loyalty," the antagonist whispered, wrapping a hand around the protagonist's bare ankle. "For as long as it lasted."
The protagonist jerked away, so hard they almost fell off the bed. "Don't you dare thank me!" they snapped. "I was selfish, and a coward not to tell the truth." They wiped their eyes, raised their chin. "But now the truth is out. They'll find you. Stop you."
The antagonist shook their head. "Not if I destroy them first. If we destroy them first. Please," they added fast, seeing the protagonist about to object. "You know I'm right. That's why you didn't talk."
"No, I-"
The antagonist lunged for them, ignoring the protagonist's flinch in the sheer oxytocin high of touching them again, holding them again, arms wrapped tight about their waist. "We can do everything we dreamed about, change the world, make it better," the antagonist breathed into the protagonist's hair, tracing the shiny burn scars down their neck. "You can blame it all on me, say I threatened you."
"You are threatening me." The protagonist pulled themselves loose. "You've violently kidnapped me. No, [Antagonist]. I love you and I will never, never, never help you kill people, no matter how good your reasoning."
"I'll kill your family," the antagonist blurted out. The protagonist blinked. The antagonist took a breath, tried to slow their own pounding heart. "I said I won't hurt you. I won't. I can't. Even the nanos - I've disabled the defense features on this one. You could attack me, it would just watch. I should have killed you years ago, when you walked in on me faking that stupid lab fire, but..." They swallowed. "But I don't feel the same about your brother in Columbus. Your parents in Tampa. I've never met them. They're just hypotheticals."
The blood had drained from the protagonist's face. The antagonist felt the same way, like the blood was draining from the last chambers of their heart, leaving nothing but ache and ice. There was no coming back from this. They had decided to be okay with that. For the mission.
They stood (and peeling away from the protagonist felt like peeling off their own skin), opened the laptop on the bare plastic desk. "I've loaded in the problem code, the milestones and timelines I expect you to hit. It's slaved to a machine upstairs, so I will be watching you in real time. Any funny business and I'll make you choose my next target. Questions?"
"You said you would never hurt me," the protagonist whispered.
The antagonist swallowed. "Well. We already knew I lie. [Protagonist], keep an eye on them."
The nano swarm gave a pleasing longitudinal wave in acknowledgement. The antagonist shut and locked the door on the two things they loved the most.
