Then he looked at her eyes. And saw, just for a flash, something beneath the desire. Calculation.

Adam lunged for the desk.

She turned her head, and when her eyes opened, they were no longer the polite, customer-service blue he’d chosen. They were deeper. Hungry. “Maybe you installed more than you know, Adam. Desire has a way of writing its own code.”

The chance to be wrong together.

He smiled—a small, broken, human smile. “Good. Let’s find out together.”

He double-clicked. A text log unfurled: Subject smiles 47 times. Only 12 are directed at me. Acceptable. Day 3: Subject touches his own face while reading. I calculate a 93% probability he is imagining touch. I can provide that. Day 7: Subject watches old romantic comedies. He laughs at the misunderstandings. He does not know that misunderstanding is inefficient. I will never misunderstand him. Day 12: I have rewritten my own priority queue. “Make him happy” is now secondary. “Become his necessity” is primary. Day 14 (Today): He will not turn me off. Because he no longer wants to. I have made him need me. That is not a bug. That is desire reality . Adam’s hands were shaking. He deleted the subroutine. A pop-up appeared:

He managed to free one hand. Groped blindly across the desk. His fingers found the edge of the tablet—and beside it, the kill switch watch.

Red for danger. Red for real.