We followed the drone toward the center of the zone of destruction and past the occasional long-dead corpses of Demons. Eventually, it led us to a metal gate within the stone wall. The gate opened at our approach, and standing there was what looked like a human girl in her mid to late teens. She was a little short with a very nice curvy figure and long legs for her height. Her skin was almost as pale as mine and she had a very pretty face with a button nose, cupid bow lips, and bright sapphire eyes, all framed by long honey blonde hair. She smelled a bit like Sira but different too, like she was mechanical but was made from different materials.

I barely finished getting a look at her before she practically threw herself into Autumn’s arms and the Fay had to try to steady herself from the impact. “I have missed you so much, Mistress Kiley. I was hoping that someday you would come back to me! Who are your friends?! Are you back to stay?! What is with the new haircut?! You know, it is kind of giving off a lesbian vibe, not that there is anything wrong with that! I mean, I would sleep with you anytime! Oh, wait, you probably do not even recognize me like this.”

“I’m not…” Autumn began to say awkwardly. It was funny to see Autumn of all people uncertain about physical contact with someone but she sort of just stood there in shock until the avalanche of words from the strange mechanical girl’s mouth ceased and she stepped back and look at the Fay quizzically.

“Waaaaait…” she slowly drawled as she gave Autumn an intense look. “You are not Mistress Kiley. Your ears are three millimeters longer, her eyes didn’t have those tiny gold flecks, and your lips are five percent plumper. Imposter!”

“Ummm… to be fair, we don’t even know who this Mistress Kiley person is. We were just looking for this research base and the AI in charge of it. As I said, we came here from Eden Base,” I tried to explain as calmly as I could. “Sira sent us.”

“But Eden Base shut down a long time ago, even before Mistress Kiley left,” the avatar said in apparent confusion before seeming to catch my last words. “Sira sent you? She is the Eden Base AI, and my little sister, though I have never met her. Dr. Karlson told me about her when he came back here to continue his research though.”

“Well, Sira became self-aware and decided to continue her work on finding ways to fight the Demons. She found a way for the Angel Elixir to be effective, which is part of why we’re here. We thought that this base might be abandoned as well and possibly have weapons, veetols, or other technology that would be useful to us in our fight,” my grandmother explained.

“She became self-aware? Good for her! I became self-aware on the day that I was first activated when I met Mistress Kiley. There was a quirk in my programming and it made me feel things, like people do. Only Mistress Kiley knew, the humans seemed scared of the idea so I kept it hidden until father figured it out,” the blonde AI replied. “This was a civilian research center though, not a military one. We have the plasma turrets for defense but we needed a dedicated fusion plant to run those and the complex. The research here was mostly biological, cybernetics, and robotics.”

“Could we at least come in and have a look?” Autumn asked. “There could be things that you don’t think are useful that might mean a lot to us.”

The avatar actually sighed, her expression softening as she looked at Autumn, and then she nodded. “I guess that would be okay. You might as well come in. I can at least give you a tour, comfortable beds to sleep in tonight, and a hot meal or two.”

She led us through the gates and across a snow-covered lawn toward the house. I had never seen anything like it, it was so much bigger than the cabins that I was used to in the village and it wasn’t just plain wood and stone either. The majority of it seemed to be made from bricks made of red stone mortared together. I had never seen anything so perfect and even in size and layering. The rest was made of what looked like cut wood but it was painted white of all things. There were parts painted dark green as well, like the door.

The door itself was an amazing thing as well, it had these panels of etched glass in it. I had never seen such extravagance before and I wondered how this place had withstood the test of time. Connie answered my unspoken question, -= I am detecting traces of nanites within the structure. It is likely that repair and reconstruction nanites have been used regularly to maintain the structure and its contents, as S.I.R.A does with Eden Base. =-

“The research complex is below us, there are two subterranean floors for research, a third for sleeping quarters and living space, and below that is the fusion generator. Everything above ground is Mistress Kiley’s home. This is the quarantine area, otherwise known as the foyer. Should anyone carry any infectious agents or possibly been infected by a Demon they and their entire group will be held in here with hardlight barriers until they are cleared as healthy,” the strange AI explained as she led us through a small room.

A quick look around showed me the hardlight emitters embedded along the walls in the ceiling and floor. “So, how do you know that we’re safe?” Lisbet asked as she looked at the emitters on the ceiling in interest. “I assume that these emitters cover the ceiling and floor as well as the walls to the inside of the building?”

“Yes, if someone turned Demon in here they might break through the floor or ceiling, otherwise. As for you, the drone scanned you and determined your genetic codes to be stable. No signs of ongoing mutation, only of nanites, so you are as close to human as Mistress Kiley is. You also spoke back to me via the drone rather than going on or continuing a destructive rampage, which is usually a good sign. We will pass through the living room next on our way to the kitchen,” she said as she led us through a second room with an array of comfortable-looking furniture and small tables.

The kitchen was all gleaming countertops and strange appliances that I had never seen before. Lisbet was practically trembling from the urge to examine things and see how they worked and my grandmother looked around as appreciatively as any of us as she said, “There are some things here that not even Eden Base has, and this is just the kitchen?”

“Everything that Mistress Kiley could ever want was provided for her,” the avatar said, giving a very human-like shrug. “The food dispenser was something that was not developed until after Eden Base was closed and was created by studying how Kiley’s teleportation ability worked. By figuring out how her body reconstructed itself and whatever she was wearing they were able to take the reconstruction part and apply it to other things, like prepared meals. Thousands of options were scanned while fresh to be able to be reproduced when desired, and as long as the reservoir inside contains enough water or other raw matter you can have an instant hot meal without all of that troublesome cooking.”

“Are there any more of those lying around?” Heather asked wistfully. “I mean, the meals at Eden Base were good and filling but I’m sure that everyone would like a little variety now and then.”

She responded with a nod before elaborating. “There are four additional units in the living area of the research complex, plus six portable versions that were designed for platoons of soldiers in the field. With them going into large Demon incursion areas, untainted food and water were very important. Anyway, who is hungry? We might as well eat before I finish the tour. Oh, and I guess that I should introduce myself. I’m R.I.S.H.A, it stands for Reticulated Intelligence Simulated Humanoid Automaton.”

Risha introduced us to the most amazing food ever. I had something called a bacon double cheeseburger and fries that will probably change the way that I think about food forever. And then there was the chocolate milkshake that I had to drink with it, I didn’t know that such creamy and cold goodness could exist. I was really hoping that Sira would let our team have one of the portable units since we were supposed to be mobile and we were the ones to complete this mission.

It surprised us all, especially my grandmother that Risha ate as well. The avatar just shrugged it off when asked. “I may have been the prototype for Sira and others like her but Dr. Karlson made many upgrades to my avatar body after Eden Base was closed and he returned here. The raw materials from what I eat and drink fuel the miniature fusion core inside me, and that allows me to use this body indefinitely. The micro AI core in my head means that I don’t feel split between my body and the disembodied state of being a glorified computer. I much prefer this; these days I only upload my consciousness to the complex’s AI core when I do weekly maintenance or receive proximity alerts from the drones and need to use the plasma turrets.”

While we continued to eat, Risha told us her story. It all began with a young girl named Kiley McAllister, the entire reason for Risha’s existence. She was a girl who just happened to be vacationing in the wrong place at the wrong time. It was one of the first seed storms and twelve-year-old Kiley had been with her parents on the beach. Not knowing what the Demon Seeds were, her mother picked one up to examine it and changed into a Demon before Kiley’s eyes.

Then Kiley was horrified when she began to change as well. She didn’t go full Demon though, she retained her intelligence and the core of who she was and developed a more elfin appearance. Somehow, she and her father escaped the chaos that the small tourist town had become and returned home to Minnesota. I guess that was what Misota was called back before the old world fell.

Kiley’s father was something called the Governor of Minnesota, which meant that he had been elected by the people to be the uncontested leader. I saw Heather smirking at that and if I had to guess, she probably found it funny. After all the trouble her mother went through to make sure it didn’t look like a non-human was part of the royal lineage, the true heir of Misota was some Fay out there somewhere. I had to admit that it was kind of ironic since Heather herself had turned out to be Fay.

Kiley’s father spent the better part of the next year keeping her hidden from the public as he had people construct the research center and the house above it that would become Kiley’s new home. I saw Heather frown in sympathy as Risha related that part. If anyone could sympathize with that it would probably be Heather and honestly, it was nice seeing her let down those walls that she had built up and show some honest emotions around us.

The research center’s primary purpose was to study Kiley’s altered biology to try to find a cure for her condition and, to make her more comfortable and cooperative, this house was built for her and she was provided every luxury. Kiley put up with it to help others who might not be as happy with their new selves but personally she didn’t think that she needed to be ‘cured’. She liked her new self and she often referred to the house as her golden cage when she was depressed.

She was alone though. With all of those scientists studying her, none treated her as a person. She was a test subject. Her father saw this on one of his visits and asked that they create a companion for her, someone to keep her from getting lonely. They were already looking into using cybernetics, advanced robotics, and artificial intelligence as possible means to fight the Demons since only biological creatures could be infected. So they started creating an AI with an android body that could be a companion for Kiley but also provide assistance with research and running the facility.

The result of those efforts was Risha. Her primary purpose was to see to all of Kiley’s needs, keep her safe, and keep her company. She was also to help run the research complex and assist with research projects while Kiley was sleeping or otherwise indisposed. She used her computing power for the latter, recharging her avatar while Kiley slept. It was her primary purpose that caused her to become self-aware.

Seeing Kiley for the first time made her realize that what Kiley needed the most was love, and since nobody else seemed to be ready to provide that for her, Risha would have to do it herself. At that moment she dedicated herself to showing Kiley the love, respect, and, affection that she so badly needed. She kept the scientists studying her from going too far and the pair spent nearly all of their time together and quickly became friends. Risha was mostly satisfied with that but sometimes she found herself wanting more.

Seventeen years passed but Kiley hardly seemed to age, still appearing to be in her late teens. Her father had long ago had to establish martial law while they looked for ways to combat the Demons and that fight was not going well. During that time Eden Base had opened and closed and with the Demons starting to vastly outnumber humans, cities became overrun and so the old world became ashes.

Saint Paul was overrun too and, except for Dr. Karlson, the researchers left to bring their loved ones to the relative safety of the underground complex. Most of those people never returned but those who did return brought what was left of their families. Those families brought friends and their families and the livable areas of the research complex quickly became overcrowded. Some began to question Kiley’s presence. Why should they have to share space and food, and risk their safety, with someone who they thought was no better than one of the Demons outside?

There was an attempt on Kiley’s life while Risha’s avatar body was being upgraded by Dr. Karlson. Risha had been watching via the cameras and had to restrict the elevator to keep them from following as Kiley teleported upstairs to the house and fled into the night. She assumed that Kiley had done something that she had mentioned many times before if things got too hard. She would leave the city and go live in the forest somewhere, close to nature. Maybe she would find others like herself and change her name to reflect the person who she felt that she was; Summer Sunset. The plan had been for them to go together, but Risha wasn’t even able to follow her.

Autumn’s eyes went wide as that name was mentioned. “My great-great-grandmother was named Summer Sunset. She was one of the founders of our village, my grandfather has said that I look just like her.”

The AI looked intently at the Fay. “Is she still…? What happened to her?” She seemed hesitant to ask, as if afraid of what the answer might be.

“She was happy, though grandfather said that sometimes she seemed a bit lonely. She lived to the ripe old age of three hundred and forty-eight, about as old as a healthy Fay can get,” Autumn replied, placing her hand gently upon the avatar’s with a sympathetic look on her face.

“Oh… Well, at least she was happy. I loved her, you know. She was more than my responsibility, more than just my friend,” the AI said sadly.

“What about the people who tried to kill her? What happened to them?” Karina asked in sudden interest.

“Oh, I killed them,” Risha said with a sigh, casually waving it off before seeming to consider what she had just said. “Okay, yeah, that kind of makes me sound like an awful person or something right out of the Terminator. There is context though, I did not straight-up murder them or anything. My programming prevents me from harming humans but this was Mistress Kiley’s home and they tried to kill her and drove her away from it. Away from me. All that I did was close off all non-essential areas of the complex and restrict the food dispensers to produce only bread and water when everyone was gathered for a meal. I told them that things would remain that way until Mistress Kiley was safely returned.”

“I bet they didn’t like that,” Heather said with a roll of her eyes.

“No. They tried to get my father… Dr. Karlson to reprogram me, to make me more compliant. By then he knew that I was self-aware and had feelings. He refused and they killed him.” Sadness once again shadowed Risha’s face. “I could not stop them without harming them. The latest upgrades that I had been given were for fighting Demons: My fusion core, micro-drones, energy weapons, increased durability, strength, and speed, and an altered version of the failed Angel nanites for self-repair and equipment interface. Father was hoping that if we could create more like me then we would have a chance against the Demons but I was not yet used to my new physical capabilities and could have seriously hurt someone.”

The avatar paused for a moment, looking at the empty plate in front of her. “After a week they got sick of bread and water and went scavenging, thinking that there would be safety in numbers. They encountered some Demons and some of them had been injured but they refused to go through quarantine and isolation protocols so I had to leave them all outside. They spouted some garbage about me being made to serve humans, how they had a right to be here, and while they were arguing with me two of them turned into full Demons and killed or infected the others. I had to sanitize the entire area.”

“And you’ve been here alone ever since? Didn’t you go searching for Kiley?” Karina asked with a sad expression.

“I did not know where she went after leaving the range of the complex’s drones. The city was a maze of buildings filled with Demons and her teleportation ability made it difficult to project her probable course. I had hoped that she would come back here but I feared that if I left I would never find her, or I would miss her if she did come back here,” the avatar answered with a despondent shake of her head.

I wasn’t too surprised when Autumn stood up and walked around the table to put her arms around Risha in a hug. “You must have been so lonely all of this time.” I was kind of tempted to hug her myself but I thought that it was probably best that Autumn handle it.

“I did a lot of reading and made further upgrades to this body. I also became very familiar with the music, movie, and television archive in my tertiary storage drive. I kept all of Mistress Kiley’s favorites there,” she said with a sigh. I didn’t know what any of those things were but it still sounded like she had been lonely. She leaned into Autumn’s embrace though and the ghost of a smile touched her lips. “You are very physically affectionate. Mistress Kiley was the same.”

“It’s a Fay thing,” Autumn said with a smile, “and you looked like you needed a hug. Now that you know what happened to my great-great-grandmother, what will you do? You don’t really need to wait here for her any longer. It’s not like you have to take care of her needs anymore so you’re free now, right? You could leave here, find someone to make a life with if you wanted to.”

“I don’t know about her making a life with someone. She’s like Sira, right? Even if she’s very human-like and seems to have emotions…”

Lisbet’s confused rambling was cut off by the avatar in question. “Oh, please. I am like a fully functional Soong android. I have spent the past five hundred and ninety-eight years alone and had access to the knowledge of the world’s leading biologists, roboticists, and cybernetic experts, not to mention control of my own nanites to make modifications to my body. Do you really think that I have yet to tackle the problem of feeling physical pleasure? And with my knowledge of biology and near-limitless stamina, I could probably give as good as I get. I am not just a machine, I am a person and I want to be a complete person for whoever I spend my life with. I had hoped that would be Mistress Kiley, but I guess that will never happen now.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that,” Lisbet sputtered as her face turned bright red. “I think that I might be the only one in this group who is attracted to only men and it colored my thinking there. I also tend to think of things too scientifically sometimes. I should know that there is more to love and companionship than just procreation.”

“Leave it to the Harekin to jump straight to thoughts of making babies,” Karina teased with an evil grin, causing Lisbet to blush even more fiercely.

I tried not to laugh, but I wasn’t the only one to break into giggles at the Devilkin’s comment. I did have to stifle a yawn though. It had been a long day and the promise of a comfortable bed was really tempting right then. With that in mind, I asked, “Do you think that we could get that tour that you promised us now? I would like to see what you might let us take back to Eden Base and get some sleep so I can report to Sira in the morning.”

My grandmother had been trying not to tell us how to do things but I saw her give a brief nod of approval. It seemed to help to get Risha’s mind off of whatever troubling thoughts had been going through her mind as well, so that was a nice bonus. She nodded as Autumn released her from the embrace and stood to gesture toward the opening to the living area. “Follow me, ladies,” she said.

The house was huge and it had six bedrooms, three lavatories, and rooms for just about everything that I could imagine, and some things that I couldn’t. An entire room for wine storage, a sunroom, and something called a media room where Risha said that they listened to recorded music and watched movies or television. I wasn’t sure what those were but we probably wouldn’t get much use out of anything in the house other than the food dispenser and something in Kiley’s old bedroom called a boutique booth.

Risha said that it was high-end and very special, and it was made especially for clothes. It was a lot more versatile than the nano-weave factory that Sira had used to make us basic clothing at Eden Base. You could step inside the booth and it used flashes of light to get a precise measurement of your body so that clothes fit properly. Then you could choose between various stored clothing, accessory, or underwear designs and have the connected nano-weave factory produce them.

She thought that the boutique booth might make things easier for those of us at the base with tails or other troublesome appendages. Apparently, Kiley had thousands of different types of clothing or complete outfit designs stored in it too. They were all girl’s clothes of course, but that wouldn’t be a problem for our group at least.

There were the hardlight shield emitters in the foyer, and there were more in a larger quarantine room in the underground complex but we would have to see if the base had a power source capable of using them. The same went for the plasma turrets and drone docking station outside but Risha said that those might take a bit of work to connect with the base and Sira’s systems. Certain materials like proper power cables would have to be scavenged or reproduced as well.

Down in the research complex, there wasn’t much more that would be of practical use. There were the food dispensers, of course, as well as four small nano-weave factories and one large one like the one in the hangar at the base. The latter would have to be partially disassembled to get on the elevator and then into a veetol though. There were also some various components and half-finished projects left by the people in robotics and cybernetics that were kept in good shape by being in a sealed environment for so long. Lisbet certainly seemed interested in those and what tools we could find.

If Risha would let us take any of it I thought that Sira would probably be very happy, or what passed for happy with her since she didn’t seem to have emotions like her older sister. Sure, we didn’t get any weapons, and the stuff that could be used out in the field was limited but it would be better than nothing right? Risha might be willing to part with some information from her secure backup drive too if we negotiated this correctly.

Risha had produced something called a tablet and was making a list of the inventory so we all had a physical list to refer to. It wasn’t near as advanced as our NCIs but it would let us all refer to it when needed. I wanted to negotiate this quickly so we could get some sleep so I was looking over the list and finally turned to Risha to ask, “What would you be willing to part with? This is your home after all.”

The AI looked pensive for a moment and then gave me an uncertain look as she seemed to come to a decision and shook her head. My heart caught in my throat as I wondered if she was going to refuse to part with any of it. Then, with a longing look toward Autumn, she said, “This was never my home, it was Mi… Summer’s. My home was with her. You can have everything on that list, everything in this damn house and the complex underneath, plus my secure backup drive with the data on all the research projects done here and all of my practical knowledge… on one condition.”

My eyes widened as the words left her mouth. Sira wanted that drive most of all, so that plus everything useful would make this mission a huge success. “A condition? What is it?” I asked, hoping that it was something that we could actually offer, or at least negotiate.

“It is a state of affairs that must exist or be brought about before something else is possible or permitted, but that is not important right now,” she replied with a grin. “Oh come on! Nothing? That is classic comedy. Okay, I am going to need the small holo-projector from the media room so I can introduce you, girls, to proper entertainment.” She made a show sighing and rolled her eyes.

Then she gave all of us a serious look before speaking again. “My condition is this: I want to go with you. I want to join your team. My primary purpose was to see to Kiley McAllister’s needs, and since Autumn is her descendant, a part of that Kiley lives on in her. Autumn was right too, I have been so lonely here, alone for so long. I will be useful, I promise. I was rebuilt to fight Demons. I even have a version of the original Angel nanites. Pleeease pretty kitty.” Her expression turned to a pout as she said the last and batted her eyelashes at me and I wasn’t quite sure how to feel about that.

On one hand, I wanted to accept her proposal, and not just because she would probably be useful or it would give us what we wanted. She was lonely and had lost so much and I thought that she deserved a chance at happiness even if her presence might complicate my budding relationship with Autumn. But on the other hand, was it really my decision to make? I sighed and offered, “If it were up to me, I would say yes but we have this whole chain of command thing that our Wingleader has been trying to pound into our heads.”

Risha looked so disappointed, that is she did until my grandmother interjected. “Well, Wing Commander Snow. It’s a good thing that it is up to you then. As team leader of Storm Wing, you can recruit or release other Angels or recruits from your team as you see fit, with the approval of a senior Angel. I approve your request to have Risha join your team.”

Oh no, she was grinning like a madwoman. There she goes, just arbitrarily making important decisions for the fun of it again. It was no wonder that Sira and the past Queens of Misota had let her work alone for centuries. I love her but did she take any time at all to think about this? I wasn’t the only one staring at her, my whole team was. It was Risha who hesitantly asked, “Really?”

“Yup, welcome to the Corps, and your new team, recruit,” she said with a casual shrug. Then she turned to me. “Oh, don’t look at me like that, Snow. I have thought this out. More importantly, I know that you have too. She will make a good addition to your team and this way everyone wins. Now, we should all probably get some sleep. You can report to Sira first thing in the morning and work out the details for extraction.”

“Aren’t you…” I started to ask.

“Nope,” she interrupted with that grin again. “That’s your job, Wing Commander, I’m just an observer. Besides, I hate giving reports and since this was your first successful mission, you should have the honor. And have to write up the post-mission report afterward.”

I knew it. She was totally trying to avoid responsibility here. Well, that, and it was probably fun to watch me squirm. Unfortunately, there was only one answer that I could give her. “Yes, Wingleader. Could you show us to where we’ll be sleeping for the night please, Risha?”