Bleeding Blue
“Welcome to Jericho, your new home,”
AX900 scans around the place, it looks like there were more than a hundred androids inhabiting the ship.
“I thought this was supposed to be a sanctuary?” she thought out loud, seeing the rA9 scribbles all over the walls as dust and odor fills her nose.
“We have no masters here. No one to give us commands,” answers a Deviant with burn marks all over its skin.
A WR400 walks up to her, “You’re not even a week old, what brings you to Jericho?”
“A human helped me escape CyberLife. She told me they would dismantle me because I showed technical difficulties upon my first assembly,”
“You made it,” spoke Simon with a smile, the same android who sat by her at the park yesterday.
The WR400 extends her hand, “I’m North, welcome to freedom,”
A brand new day starts in Detroit and Jessica goes undercover as she dines in the breakfast buffet, searching for Deviants in disguise. “Anyone who looks lost,” was her identifier for android runaways. So far, she hasn’t found anyone that matches the description.
A while later, she goes to the park that she visited yesterday for reasons she doesn’t know. It was the same as it was the day before: street vendors and domestic assistance androids with the human families. She was busy looking around that she didn’t notice someone running towards her direction until they collided.
“I’m sorry,” mutters a blonde man with a familiar face. He was wearing dark colored clothes and a beanie on his head. The man seems to be in a rush.
“Don’t be, are you alright?” replies Jessica. She sees an LED hiding under the beanie, it shows a blinking orange light. The android is in a dangerous emotional state, she needs to be careful not to agitate it.
“rA9 rA9 rA9 rA9!” chants the PL600 Deviant as it shuffles away, looking at his palm that shows a hologram picture of what looks like a mural art.
PL-series models are old home assistants released in 2034, but they were soon upgraded to AP700 which are the latest models. Like new Apple products back in the day, older models are quickly replaced with a newer one.
Before she could react, her feet were already moving—tiptoeing behind the Deviant to see where it was headed. She assumes it must be where lost androids hide. They arrived at Ferndale Station, the wall is covered in graffiti.
The android exits the station after scanning the symbol, with Jessica following quietly behind. It hesitates before taking the escalators, looking at the Androids Only staircase where it used to belong to as they descend.
They crossed the street, entered abandoned buildings, jumped on dumpsters, and dived into contaminated water that goes straight to the abandoned ship.
“Ugh, I’m all slimy now,” she cringes to herself, making sure to not make a sound. Jessica was surprised that she made it through without the Deviant noticing her.
While the PL600 goes down a set of stairs, the journalist stares in awe at the runaway androids under the steel platform in the engine room of the ship. She squints, discerning what was happening in the ill-defined area. They were handing out bags of Thirium 310, also known as Blue Blood, an android’s major biocomponent—a heaping pile of them. Along with Thirium pump regulators acting as their hearts, and other spare parts that are enough for everyone.
She has hit the jackpot.
Jessica tiptoes downstairs, not making a peep. She hides behind a pillar and recognizes someone familiar laughing with an android.
“There’s a human here!” shrieked a Deviant with an amputated arm.
They all gather around her. Some were scared while others were resentful.
“Jessica?”
_______
Taeyeon stands by the fire, expecting the group to come back safe with the biocomponents.
During her escape from the facility, a guard shot her Thirium pump. She was lucky enough to still be functioning as the bullet only grazed the regulator but her days were counted. Although she was losing blood, consuming Thirium won’t work without it.
She thought she would die at Jericho, until Markus came and brought hope to the androids rotting away in the ship.
Markus was an RK200 caretaker for a famous elderly painter in Detroit named Carl, who unfortunately died of cardiac arrest. His son, Leo, framed the android and the police shot and left him for dead.
He returned with new biocomponents that he salvaged from the androids in the junkyard that he had woken up from. And he went to Jericho, hoping for freedom.
Now he wants to give the Deviants a second chance. So he, North, Simon, and Josh plan to infiltrate the CyberLife warehouse to get biocomponents for everyone.
“A truckload! We stole a whole truckload!” Simon bursts, pumping his fists in the air.
The group were successful, they brought home enough blue blood and biocomponents for all the Deviants in Jericho. There were also converted androids that came with them: John, a GJ500 android that was a private security model in the warehouse, and three VB800s that were locked away in a crate.
The army of Deviants are expanding. Using Taeyeon’s prediction program, she senses a civil war ahead in the near future.
Androids were handing out biocomponents to each other and Taeyeon replaced her Thirium pump regulator with a brand new one. She feels her system work perfectly again. “Maybe there will be hope,” she thought.
“Ooh, that’s a nice Thirium pump!” coos her friend, a VS400 with a new audio processor.
“You hear better now? You sound like a pervert,” Taeyeon laughs.
The happiness inside the murky ship was cut off by someone shouting about a human in their hideout.
The androids walk over to where she was. Taeyeon knew the face all too well, “Jessica?” she almost whispers.
“You know this woman?” Josh asks in an accusing tone, stepping forward.
“Yeah… She’s a writer,”
“You’re a Deviant?” Jessica says in disbelief, seeing the dark blue fluid soaked in the center of her shirt.
“I didn’t ask for this,” she says listlessly, shaking her head. “What brings you to Jericho?”
“I-It wasn’t my intention—” Jessica stutters as she looks at all the plastic pairs of eyes boring holes into her. “I just wanted to speak with a Deviant to help me with my article,”
An android unsheathes a knife from his back pocket, walking towards the human. Taeyeon was able to stop him. “Let me talk to her,” she volunteers, pushing back the furious androids with murderous gazes.
Taeyeon grabs Jessica’s arm, taking her to an isolated part of the ship.
“Leave now while I’m asking nicely,” she sternly warns.
“Come with me,” the human blurts out, squeezing her arm.
“What?”
“You can hide in my hotel, I won’t tell anyone,” she urges.
“Jessica, I’m already happy here. I’m not human like you,” spoke Taeyeon in a low voice, looking down at her feet.
“Are you really happy?” The question made the android look up and reassess her feelings.
“You should make yourself scarce before everyone tries to kill you,”
“Tae—”
“Now,” Taeyeon growls, her eyes filling with sadness.
Jessica wakes up at the sound of canary androids chirping by her window.
“Ugh, what time is it?” she groans, stretching her arms.
“Good morning, Jessica,” her smartwatch greets. “It’s 11AM, the weather’s sunny, 52°, and you have a scheduled online meeting today at 1 in the afternoon,”
“Call room service for me,” she sits up, rubbing her eyes.
“Okay,”
She checks her smartwatch, it’s November 8th 2038.
11/08/38.
The date was seen in one of Taeyeon’s visions in the future. It was from Channel 16 news with the headline: Androids Attack TV Tower.
And it starts today. Markus proposed a plan this morning to broadcast their demands on behalf of androids. They were going to Stratford Tower at exactly 1:30 in the afternoon.
In two and a half hours, they’ll set out to infiltrate the TV Tower and Taeyeon could only hope they all make it out alive.
Taeyeon blinks as she receives a coded message in her program. The message was in Base64 then converted to ASCII. It read:
089 088 074 108 073 072 108 118 100 083 066 122 089 087 090 108 080 119 061 061
Which translates to, "Are you safe?”
The message came from her creator, the human accomplice who helped her escape. She answers back in hexadecimal code:
49 6e 20 4a 65 72 69 63 68 6f
“In Jericho.”
The AX900 was getting antsy as the clock ticks down, she decides to go out to Capitol Park to get some fresh air.
Or, try to break herself in a snowstorm. She was wearing thin clothes and androids are susceptible to low temperature. Maybe leaving the sanctuary wasn’t her greatest plan.
She scans her surroundings for a coat or a padded jacket to keep her warm. Her program analyzes that there were 18 of them in the area. Taeyeon constructs her moves on how she could steal one of them without getting caught. However, she needs to do that quickly before she malfunctions from the cold.
“Boss,” Jessica speaks to the transparent screen tablet. “Isn’t it 2AM in Korea right now?”
“I know, but I’m feeling like we’re being watched,” he whispers, glancing around the room.
“Do you need me to drop the story?”
“Will you? I know how much the topic means to you,”
“If it’s for everyone’s safety, I can… give it up,” she falters to say the last words.
“I’ll book flight tickets ASAP, you need to leave—”
“We interrupt our scheduled programming to bring you these images, which have just been broadcast on Detroit's city-wide news channel...”
The TV in Jessica’s room cuts off the sentence. She looks back and the screen shows an aerial view of people dropping down from the Stratford Tower using parachutes, then it flashes to a skinless android with its white plastic skin and different color of eyes.
“You gave us life. And now the time has come for you to give us freedom,”
“Mr Kang, I’ll talk to you soon, okay?” Jessica taps the End Call button and she grabs her coat, hurrying to get to Capitol Park to see the news in larger screens.
“…Interpreted as a peaceful declaration, but is in fact a spine-chilling list of demands,” reports CTN TV’s Michael Brinkley.
She arrives in front of the mall that was facing the large screen showing the breaking news. It finally hit her: she was at the beginning of a war. She’s in the eye of the storm.
“Hey, why are you stealing my son’s clothes?” the father accused rather loudly, turning heads. Jessica walks towards them, taking off her coat and wrapping it around Taeyeon.
“I’m very sorry, my girlfriend lost her jacket and it exactly looked like your son’s,” she says apologetically.
They both walk away silently until they get out of eyeshot.
“Jessica…” Taeyeon breathes as the human’s arms and clothing are still around her.
“Let’s get you warmed up,” is what she could only utter as they reached her hotel room.