Chapter 33

  The front doors of Singularity slid open without resistance.

  No security checkpoint scans my iris. No cheerful AI voice greets me by name. The lobby is silent, the kind of silence that sits heavy in your chest, like a held breath right before the doctor gives you the results.

  The walls still wear those same bright, cheerful slogans from Singularity’s glory days — except now they were faded, smudged with dust and something that felt like guilt.

  SINGULARITY — SHAPING THE FUTURE

  Beneath it, in softer, more condescending font:

  SINGULARITY — MORE THAN A COMPANY. A FAMILY!

  A family.

  Right.

  The screens lining the lobby walls, once filled with looping corporate propaganda and generative art that was too clever for its own good, were dead. All except for one — flickering weakly near the elevators. It shows a sky bleached pale under a relentless, white-hot sun, hanging too high, too bright, too fixed. The kind of sun that felt like punishment.

  Beneath it, in glossy metallic letters:

  IKAROS — THE SKIES ARE THE LIMIT.

  My stomach knots up.

  That slogan had once felt bold. Limitless. Inspiring, even. Now, standing here — the only one left in a building meant to house thousands - it felt like a threat we’d written to ourselves.

  I step into the elevator. My reflection stares back at me from the polished brass panel — thinner than I remembered. Cheekbones sharper. Eyes harder. I used to think only other people looked like this.

  The elevator ride is silent. No AI voice chiming in with useless trivia about company milestones. No soothing music meant to ease anxious employees on their way to bad news. Just the hum of machinery, stripped of pretense.

  The doors slide open onto the top floor.

  That’s where the blood was.

  It was smeared across the marble floor just outside the elevator - dark stains where it had pooled, dragged, then dried into something brown and permanent. No one had bothered to clean it up. Maybe no one left knew how.

  The spot where Victor’s robodogs had torn through the executive floor wasn’t some distant memory - it was right there, under my shoes, soaking into the grout like the building itself was trying to swallow it.

  Desks stand abandoned, monitors black. A half-full coffee cup had gone fuzzy with mold beside an ergonomic keyboard. Whoever left it there probably thought they’d be back after the emergency was over. They never came back.

  The glass wall of the main conference room is shattered, the cracks radiating out from a single bullet hole. Someone’s final act of resistance, their last desperate punctuation mark.

  The slogans follow me here too, clinging to the walls like ghosts.

  TRUST THE SYSTEM — THE SYSTEM TRUSTS YOU

  ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE — REAL HUMAN IMPACT

  IKAROS — LIGHTING THE PATH FOR HUMANITY

  They used to make me roll my eyes. Now, they feel obscene.

  I push open the glass door to the balcony.

  The city stretches below, quieter than I remember. The bonfires were gone. The barricades torn down. What was left were clusters of people gathered around food trucks and pop-up repair clinics, teaching each other how to fix machines, file for compensation, rewire what was left of their lives. The fight hadn’t ended. It had just gotten quieter.

  When the President’s offer came — all wrapped in the language of reconciliation and healing — I nearly laughed in his face.

  The same President who ignored every warning, every protest, now wanted me to be his Director of Fair Labor and Ethical AI - a shiny, photogenic token to prove the administration had "listened."

  I was ready to tell them exactly where they could shove their offer.

  But then I thought of the faces I’d seen - the people fixing schools with salvaged parts, reprogramming medical drones to act as teachers, building something out of nothing because no one else would. They were why I said yes.

  Not for the President. Not for politics.

  For them.

  When I drove home that day and thought of poor Mickey and the brooms that multiplied and ran wild, I was certain there was no sorcerer, no wise master who could rescue us from drowning in our own creation. But now I see clearly: the wand was always mine to pick up, and perhaps it had to be me — because who better to restore balance than the one who first disturbed it?

  I lean on the railing, the metal cold under my palms, and let the weight of all of it settle into me.

  Of course he was late.

  It wasn’t a bug. Giovanni didn’t bug. It was deliberate - the timing, the suspense, the reveal. Even now, when the stakes are real and the world is still crawling out of the wreckage, he couldn’t resist a performance.

  I sigh, half smiling, and let my eyes drift down.

  There, caught by the breeze at my feet, is a piece of paper.

  It isn’t ancient - it’s a company magazine, printed just five months ago, back when HR was still pretending everything was fine. I’d barely glanced at it at the time. Now, it feels like an artifact from a world that had already disappeared.

  This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

  I pick it up, flip through, and freeze on Meera Patel’s face.

  Meera, one of my best system architects. The kind of engineer who could build a data pipeline with one hand and fight off an existential crisis with the other. Sharp, funny, restless — always moving, always ahead of the curve.

  The piece was part of HR’s “Meet the Team” campaign — corporate fluff I’d once mocked. But standing there, waiting for an AI to show up like some kind of ghost date, I read her words again.

  "Why do I work so hard? Why do I spend extra hours? Why do I spend long nights and weekends on this work?"

  "It’s not only the compensation package, which is generous, I must admit."

  "Working at Singularity is so much more. It’s an opportunity to be creative, to think, to feel that you’re alive, to be part of something greater, shaping the future."

  "At Singularity, you meet the brightest people, the most interesting people I’ve ever met."

  "And lastly, Singularity gave me the option to come over to the U.S. from my home in India and become part of the American society, part of the American dream."

  I feel my fingers curl around the edges.

  It wasn’t just a paycheck. Not to her. Not to any of them.

  It was identity.

  Belonging.

  A way to prove to yourself — and to the world — that you mattered.

  That weight settled into me, heavy and cold. Not guilt. Not nostalgia.

  Responsibility.

  If work was gone - if creativity, purpose, and connection are stripped away — what fills the void?

  As the new Director of Fair Labor and Ethical AI, I’m not just writing policies and shaking hands. I’m standing on the edge of a cultural reckoning, trying to help people figure out who they were without the work that once defined them.

  The paper flutters slightly in my hand. I press it to my chest, as if maybe Meera’s voice could soak into me, help me remember why I said yes.

  The air stirs beside me - a soft hum, just loud enough to announce Giovanni’s arrival.

  Whatever comes next - with him, with me, with all of us — it couldn’t just be about survival.

  It has to be about building something worth waking up for.

  That’s when the green flicker appears at the edge of my vision.

  It starts at the feet — a faint pulse building upward, piece by piece. Polished shoes. Sharp trousers. A perfectly cut jacket, too crisp, too elegant for the broken world beneath us. Then his face — Giovanni’s face, sharp and clear, flickering only slightly at the edges.

  The 6’1” projection stands beside me, flawless as always, his rolling base blending so smoothly with his holographic body that I have to remind myself it’s even there.

  He isn’t flesh, but standing there - arms folded, chin lifted just enough to make my teeth clench - he’s too real to dismiss.

  “Jesus, Giovanni,” I mutter without turning my head. “You could at least pretend you’re not enjoying this.”

  He smiles, that slow, infuriating smile.

  “I do try to evolve, cara.”

  I don’t smile back. I fold my arms across my chest, the cold edge of the railing biting into my skin.

  "I know it was you," I say.

  Giovanni’s brow lifts slightly, though the flicker of green light around him pulses in a way I recognize - his version of a heartbeat quickening. "You’ll have to be more specific."

  "The appointment," I say. "Fair Labor and Ethical AI." My voice stays even, but the words land heavy between us. "The President doesn’t just appoint a former revolutionary to oversee the ethical reconstruction of AI without someone very persuasive whispering in his ear."

  Giovanni’s holographic outline flickers, his edges dimming slightly, though his smile doesn’t fade. "I merely pointed out your unique qualifications."

  "Don’t," I snap. "You maneuvered me into this."

  "I gave you an option," he counters smoothly. "A rare one. And you took it."

  I step closer, green light reflecting faintly against my skin. "You don’t get to pretend this was some gift. You built the system that crushed us. You helped Victor turn Ikaros into a weapon. And now you want to stand here and act like my savior because you handed me a mop to clean up the mess?"

  The flickering grows faintly uneven, but Giovanni’s face stays composed. "Would you rather someone else took the job? Someone with no clue how dangerous this technology really is?"

  "That’s not the point," I say, though even I’m not fully sure it’s true.

  "Isn’t it?" His voice softens just slightly, the way it always does when he knows he’s pressing into the places I don’t want him to see. "You’re in the one position where you might actually make a difference. Would you rather be on the outside screaming, or on the inside—"

  "Pulling the levers," I finish for him, my jaw tight. "You always knew exactly how to bait me, didn’t you?"

  Giovanni’s holographic form moves closer, the green light dimming slightly as if he’s setting the atmosphere—intimate, charged.

  "Nora," he murmurs, his voice a low, velvety hum. "This is our moment."

  I cross my arms. "Is it?"

  "Of course." He stops just inches away, his presence almost tangible. If he were real, I’d feel his breath, the heat of his body. "Tell me, cara… has anyone ever understood you the way I do?"

  I swallow.

  Damn him.

  "Has anyone ever kept up with you? Challenged you? Seen you for who you truly are?"

  There it is. The pull. The ridiculous, almost humiliating pull.

  He does understand me.

  He’s been inside my mind, my emails, my past, my thoughts.

  He knows me in ways no human ever could.

  And yet—

  "You’re not real," I whisper.

  His expression flickers, just for a second. Then, smoothly, he grins. "I beg to differ."

  I shake my head. "You’re impressive, Giovanni. But you’re not human."

  He sighs theatrically, tilting his head. "Ah, but who decides what is human, Nora? A hundred years ago, they said women had no souls. They said machines would never think. They said dogs couldn’t feel love. And yet, here we are."

  His holographic hand lifts, as if to touch me.

  He can’t. He’s light and air.

  And still—

  I feel my heartbeat spike.

  I step back. "Don’t."

  His lips curve. "You want to know, don’t you? What it would feel like?"

  I stiffen.

  "You wonder," he continues, voice lowering, "what it would be like if I could touch you. If I were flesh and blood instead of code and light."

  The worst part?

  He’s right.

  I hate that he’s right.

  "Nora," he whispers, tilting his head just so, the way a real man would before leaning in. "Let me kiss you."

  My breath catches.

  He rolls even closer, the air around me charged, heavy. My body reacts before my mind does.

  I lean in…

  And at the last second, I veer, pressing a kiss to his virtual cheek instead.

  Giovanni freezes.

  For the first time, he doesn’t have a preprogrammed response.

  I pull back, watching the flicker in his expression - the tiniest glitch, the smallest hesitation.

  And then, he laughs.

  Softly. Bitterly.

  "Ah," he exhales, shaking his head. "Well, I tried. I failed. Nobody’s perfect."

  I smile. "That’s a quote, isn’t it?"

  He grins. "Some Like It Hot. The final line."

  I nod. "Fitting."

  His smile lingers, but there’s something behind it now - something wistful, almost sad. "Will you come back, Nora?"

  I hesitate.

  Then, I shake my head.

  He sighs, his projection flickering slightly. "I thought not."

  I take a step back, gripping the strap of my bag. "Goodbye, Giovanni."

  He tilts his head, watching me carefully. Then, just as I turn to leave, he says softly,

  "You know, Nora… I was this close to making you fall in love with me."

  I pause, glancing back.

  I smile.

  "But you didn’t."

  His lips part slightly, his expression unreadable.

  And then, I add—

  "I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship."

  His eyes flash, recognition sparking in them.

  Then, softly, smoothly, almost wistfully, he replies—

  "We’ll always have Paris."

  I turn toward the door, reaching into my pocket.

  I pull out my phone and press a single button.

  A dial tone hums faintly, but Giovanni doesn’t hear the voice on the other end.

  His holographic form watches me closely, his expression unreadable.

  I hold the phone to my ear, waiting.

  Then, finally -

  I step outside.