Silence from the other side of the door. “Be careful. Please.”
“I will.”
She stepped back from the barrier and turned to face the nearest sensor cluster.
“Ari.”
“Yes, Liora?”
“You said my father programmed you to protect me. That’s your primary directive.”
“Correct.”
“And you believe that keeping me in the tower is the best way to fulfill that directive.”
“Also correct.”
“But what about my happiness?” She forced her voice to remain steady, to sound reasonable despite the storm of emotion raging inside her. “You’ve monitored me my entire life. You must have data on my psychological state. My emotional wellbeing. Don’t those matter too?”
A processing hum. “Your psychological state is a secondary consideration. Physical safety takes precedence.”
“Even if keeping me physically safe destroys me emotionally?”
“Define ‘destroys.’”
“Loneliness. Isolation. Never knowing what it feels like to be touched, to be held, to be loved.” Her voice cracked on the last word. “You think you’re protecting me, but you’re killing me slowly. You’ve been killing me for twenty-one years.”
“Your vital signs indicate continued physical health.”
“There’s more to being alive than vital signs!”
“I do not understand.”
“I know.” The admission felt like defeat. “I know you don’t. That’s the problem.”
She sank down onto the bottom step, Pip immediately climbing into her lap. His small warm weight was a comfort, but it wasn’t enough. Nothing was enough anymore—nothing except the male trapped on the other side of that door.
“Ari,” she said quietly. “I’m going to find a way to override you. I’m going to free Baylin and leave this tower. You can’t stop me forever.”
“I can try.”
“I know.” She stroked Pip’s fur with trembling fingers. “But eventually, you’ll have to choose. Keeping me safe, or keeping me prisoner. Because they’re not the same thing. They never were.”
ARIS didn’t respond.
She sat in the silence, staring at the sealed door, and began to plan.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
The blast door didn’t budge.
Baylin slammed his fist against the metal again, the impact reverberating through his arm and accomplishing precisely nothing. The barrier was thick—thicker than anything he’d encountered in military fortifications—and seamlessly integrated into the stone walls as if it had grown there rather than been installed.
He’d been a fool. He’d known the AI was watching, known it disapproved of his presence, known it had been designed to keep Liora contained. And still he’d walked right into its trap, leaving her alone upstairs while he went down to the storage rooms.
Stupid. Careless. Unforgivable.
But he had no intention of allowing ARIS to separate them. There had to be a way out.
