The day it happened began like any other. Morning light filtered through the tall windows of their apartment, the city below alive with its usual chaos. Emma woke to the sound of her phone buzzing on the nightstand. It was 7:15 AM—odd, she thought, since Dad always left early but never without saying goodbye.

  She groggily picked up her phone, swiping through notifications until her eyes landed on an unread message. The sender: "Nova - Emergency Notification."

  Her chest tightened as she opened it.

  "We regret to inform you that Michael Rivera was involved in a fatal traffic accident at 5:42 PM yesterday. Our thoughts are with you and your family during this difficult time."

  The words blurred before her eyes. A deep, hollow numbness settled in, the kind that made the world feel like it had tilted off its axis. She read it again and again, hoping—praying—there was some mistake.

  She stumbled out of bed and down the hall, the message still glowing on the screen. Aidan was already in the kitchen, pouring cereal. His casual indifference shattered when she thrust the phone toward him, her hands trembling.

  “What...?” he muttered, his eyes darting over the screen. “What is this?”

  Before she could answer, their mother emerged from her room, her face pale. “What’s going on?” Mom asked, her voice edged with irritation. Then Emma handed her the phone.

  Mom’s reaction was immediate. Her knees buckled, and she clung to the counter for support. Aidan caught her arm, his voice cracking as he called out, “Mom! Hey, breathe—just breathe, okay?”

  Noah, drawn by the commotion, appeared in the doorway clutching his stuffed dinosaur. “What’s wrong?” he asked, his small voice trembling.

  No one answered.

  The silence was broken by the calm, measured voice of the AI assistant. “Would you like me to call emergency services or provide grief counseling resources?”

  Aidan rounded on the ceiling speaker where the voice emanated. “Shut up!” he bellowed, his face twisted in fury. “Just shut up!”

  Nova, obedient as always, went silent.

  Hours later, a representative from Nova arrived at the apartment. The man, clad in a crisp black suit, offered scripted condolences and handed over a neatly packaged file with the company’s logo embossed on the front.

  Mom clutched it like a lifeline. “What happened?” she demanded. “How does a man like Michael—so careful—just... die in an accident?”

  The man’s expression tightened. “Mr. Rivera’s vehicle encountered a system failure. The onboard AI malfunctioned, causing a fatal collision. It was instantaneous. He wouldn’t have suffered.”

  “That’s supposed to make it better?” Aidan snapped, his voice thick with rage. “It was your system! How could it fail?”

  The man didn’t answer directly. Instead, he offered a mechanical reassurance. “We are conducting a full investigation. Nova takes safety seriously. You have our deepest sympathies.”

  By the evening, their apartment felt like a void. Mom locked herself in her room. Aidan disappeared, slamming the door on his way out. Noah sat motionless on the couch, staring at nothing.

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  Emma couldn’t sit still. She paced, replaying the events in her head. The message, the representative’s hollow words, Nova’s perfectly timed condolences. It all felt... off.

  Later that night, as she lay in bed staring at the dark ceiling, her phone buzzed with a new notification.

  Unknown sender: "There’s more to your father’s death than you think."

  Her pulse quickened. She sat up, rereading the cryptic message, her mind racing. At that moment, Emma knew everything was far from fine.

  The day of Michael Rivera’s funeral was marked by a heavy rain that seemed to drown the city’s usual vibrancy. Emma sat at the back of the crowded room, her hands clasped tightly around Noah’s. Her little brother hadn’t said much since their dad’s death, his silence more unnerving than his tears. Aidan, on the other hand, sat stiffly next to Mom, his jaw clenched as if holding back an avalanche of emotions.

  The service felt mechanical, as if everyone were going through the motions. Mom had organized everything herself, despite the strain of her grief. The church was filled with colleagues, neighbors, and distant relatives—people who spoke in hushed voices about how tragic and sudden Michael’s passing had been.

  “Such a brilliant man,” someone murmured behind Emma.

  “A real loss for the industry,” another voice whispered.

  The words made Emma’s stomach twist. To these people, her father wasn’t a person. He was a name, a job title, a brilliant mind lost too soon. No one here knew him like she did—the way he hummed off-key while making coffee or how he could never resist sneaking extra butter into the popcorn on movie nights.

  When the service ended, the rain had subsided into a cold drizzle. As people filed out, Emma noticed a small group of Michael’s colleagues huddled together near the church doors. One of them, a wiry man with glasses, kept glancing her way. She recognized him—Mr. Jensen, a senior researcher who often visited their apartment to work late with her dad. His furtive glances unsettled her.

  Mom gently ushered the kids into the car, her silence a wall that Emma didn’t dare breach. Aidan pulled his hoodie over his head and stared out the window, while Noah clung to his stuffed dinosaur.

  Back at the apartment, the quiet was oppressive. Mom retreated to her bedroom, closing the door softly behind her. Aidan grabbed his jacket and left without a word, slamming the door behind him. That left Emma and Noah alone in the living room. The TV played an old cartoon, its cheerful sounds clashing with the heaviness in the air.

  Emma sat next to Noah, pulling him close. He didn’t resist, but he didn’t say anything either. His eyes stayed fixed on the screen, unfocused.

  “Noah?” she asked softly. “Are you okay?”

  He nodded, though his silence told a different story.

  Emma tried to distract herself, scrolling through her phone, but the weight of the day pressed down on her. It wasn’t just the grief—it was the lingering sense that something was wrong. Her father’s death had been too sudden, too random. And the way his colleagues had acted at the funeral… it didn’t sit right with her.

  As the night deepened, Emma tucked Noah into bed, humming a lullaby her father used to sing. He fell asleep clutching his dinosaur, his little face peaceful for the first time in days.

  Noah returned to the living room, her phone buzzing as she sat down. A notification from an unknown sender lit up her screen:

  "There’s more to your father’s death than you think."

  Her breath caught. She stared at the message, her heart racing. Who would send something like that? Was it a cruel joke? A mistake?

  Before she could respond, her phone buzzed again. This time, it was an attachment—a blurry image of a document. She opened it hesitantly, her eyes scanning the text. It looked like some kind of report, with words she didn’t fully understand: “Anomalous behavior,” “confidential project,” and “termination.”

  Emma’s chest tightened as questions flooded her mind. Why would someone send this to her? What did it mean? She thought about Mr. Jensen’s uneasy glances, the whispered conversations at the funeral. Could her father’s colleagues know something about his death?

  She quickly locked her phone, the screen going dark. Her pulse pounded in her ears.

  Alone in the dim apartment, Emma’s unease grew into something sharper, heavier. She had spent the past weeks telling herself it was an accident, that there was nothing more to it. But now, that fragile belief was cracking.

  And deep down, she knew one thing for certain: this wasn’t over.