They weren’t formally divided, but patterns had emerged. 

Some drones naturally gravitated toward problems. Some were interested in cracking their way into the tower that loomed ahead, where they were seemingly programmed to go. They believed answers, and perhaps even inhabitable bodies awaited us inside. The idea of inhabiting an empty shell of a body somehow seemed a little creepy for some reason, Dora couldn’t exactly explain why. She could tell jonquil wanted to explore the tower too, but she had formed a bond with Molly, just as Dora and Simon had, and she wasn’t sure that was the best idea for Molly. Besides which, Molly wanted to explore the world around them. There was no way they could keep her cooped up in a big old military tower while the “adults” programmed their way out of this, if that was required. Also, while Jonquil certainly had the tech chops for the job, it seemed to Dora that she was much more intrigued by the position they were in, physically, environmentally, focusing on memory, connection, emotional recall. She kept trying to look at the sky, but to her dismay she couldn’t. Dora assumed it had something to do with aerodynamic.  

Today, they were all gathered near the western wall, locked in debate. 

GABRIEL:
“If we fly low and alternate our timing, we could confuse the sensors.” 

KIERA:
“They’re motion-based, not pattern-based. You’ll just die more rhythmically.” 

JAMAL:
“We send decoys. Shells from old drones. They’ll fire on those while we flank.” 

NGUYEN:
“Even if it works, we’re still flying into the compulsion vector. We haven’t broken the loop.” 

SIMON:
“We don’t even know if there’s anything behind that wall worth dying for.” 

The conversation spiraled, sharp with frustration and theory. 

Then Dora’s voice cut through, quieter, but firm. 

DORA:
“Wait… where’s Molly?” 

The group stilled. A few drones pinged local scans. 

SIMON:
“She was right here. She was watching us argue.” 

KIERA:
“I thought she was with you.” 

DORA (pinging visuals):
“No—look.” 

[Visual Sync – Source: Dora] 

Dora’s feed opened across the shared network. 

In the distance, a lone drone moved low across the grass, toward the eastern fence. Her glow was soft. Unhurried. Almost like she was just wandering. 

GABRIEL (stunned):
“That’s… brilliant.” 

KIERA (in awe):
“Unbelievable.” 

JAMAL:
“She’s going the wrong way.” 

NGUYEN:
“Or exactly the right way.” 

SIMON:
“No turret tracking. No forced override. She’s out of range.” 

And then, quietly: 

UNKNOWN DRONE (almost laughing):
“We could just follow her.” 

A ripple passed through the group. No one argued. No one analyzed. 

One by one, the drones turned. Left behind their diagrams. Their simulations. Their carefully planned routes into gunfire. 

And followed the child. 

She floated under the broken edge of the fence. 

No alarms. 

No fire. 

Just wind. 

And the sound of something opening. 

The air changed as they passed over the threshold—cooler, greener. Lush patches of forest unfolded below them, breaking through the dry scrubland like veins of life. 

The drones circled, lights flickering with awe and disbelief. 

JAMAL (still breathless):
“We’re over! They didn’t stop us!” 

GABRIEL (laughing):
“I cannot believe this is actually working!” 

MOLLY (deadpan):
“Duh. I can’t believe we were going the wrong way the whole time.” 

A ripple of laughter passed through the group. 

KIERA:
“All the most brilliant minds humanity had to offer… and it’s the kid who figures it out.” 

SIMON (grinning):
“Honestly? Checks out.” 

They flew lower, following Molly’s trail. No one was leading anymore. They were just… moving forward. 

For the first time, the sky didn’t feel like a ceiling.
It felt like a beginning. 

They’d flown past the fence. 

Most of them had. The moment had been too wild, too joyful, too full of something they hadn’t felt since waking—freedom. 

But not everyone wanted to keep going. 

A cluster of drones had pulled off to the side, gliding along the fence line instead of heading deeper into the terraformed green. 

They hovered near a rocky outcrop, trying to realign their bearings. Several lights blinked in rhythmic pulses—code for an ongoing discussion. 

GABRIEL (firm):
“We still don’t know what’s inside the facility. That was the whole point—getting access. The answers are in there.” 

NGUYEN:
“Maybe. Or maybe it’s just another lockbox we weren’t supposed to open yet.” 

KIERA:
“I’m not saying we go back in. I’m saying we follow the fence around. There might be a back entrance—something unguarded.” 

SIMON (uncertain):
“We can’t ignore what we just saw. Molly broke the loop. That means something.” 

A few of the others had already vanished into the trees, their lights blinking between the leaves like curious fireflies. 

The group paused. Tension rising. Until— 

JAMAL (dryly):
“How about this: you guys stick with Dora the Explora, and we Scooby-Doo our way into the compound?” 

A flicker of amused static buzzed through the group. 

KIERA (smirking):
“Pretty much.” 

DORA:
“Great. But are we taking Molly with us, or should you guys bring her along and see what you can glean? She’s a little more spontaneous than we probably need out here.” 

GABRIEL:
“She’ll be fine. She’s the one who got us out, right?” 

A low murmur of agreement followed, and Simon raised his voice to bring some structure. 

SIMON:
“Alright—brains, over there. Explorers… yeah, over there.” 

He cringed at his own phrasing but logged the division quickly into the shared network. 

[New Group Log Created: SPLIT NODE – “Brains” | “Explorers”] 

Simon opened a backchannel to Dora. 

SIMON (private):
“I think I should probably go with those guys… but honestly? I’d rather go exploring. Any objections?” 

DORA (grinning):
“I was hoping you’d say that.” 

The group drifted apart—no bitterness, just difference. 

Some followed Molly into the soft, green heart of the new world.
The others followed the fence, still searching for a way back into the one they’d escaped. 

The moment they passed the treeline, the air changed. 

It wasn’t just the temperature—it was everything. The sound of wind moving through leaves, not against stone. The rustle of something alive underfoot. The distant drip of water, not from broken pipes but from moss-covered branches. 

For drones made of smooth, featureless alloy, it was almost overwhelming. 

They floated low over the forest floor. The ground was soft, loamy—giving slightly beneath them. The quiet that settled around them wasn’t empty. It was the kind that invited reverence. 

DORA (quietly):
“So… we built this, you think? Us drones, I mean?” 

SIMON:
“Or maybe another model.” 

Ferns the size of small cars spilled out from the bases of towering trees. Their bark shimmered faintly in the filtered sunlight—almost iridescent, though not unnaturally so. 

Mushrooms the size of umbrellas clustered at the roots, and thick vines stretched between branches like suspended walkways. 

They passed through a narrow clearing, where sunlight streamed in golden shafts. It flickered across the drones’ hulls like firelight, and for a moment, everything stilled. 

Then Simon slowed. 

SIMON:
“Listen.” 

The others paused. 

There it was—faint, distant… singing. 

It came in waves, barely audible beneath the wind. A melody without words. Not mechanical. Not human. Birds. 

DORA (hovering closer to a tree):
“Birds! I hear birds!” 

Her voice rose with wonder—relief, even. Like something sacred had just clicked into place. She remembered birds from childhood. The sound had always meant the world was still okay. 

They moved forward slowly. The trees thickened. Branches arched overhead, forming a natural canopy. Dainty flowers blanketed the mossy ground, and dragonflies zipped past—wings translucent, shimmering like stained glass. 

JAMAL (quietly):
“Wow. This is just like World of Warcraft.” 

A burst of laughter echoed through the clearing. 

DORA (scoffing):
“I hope you’re joking.” 

JAMAL:
“Uh, yeah. Of course I am. Sort of. I mean… that game was pretty awesome.” 

The laughter faded into something softer—a shared breath, a moment of almost-childlike awe. 

The forest broke open without warning. 

What had been dense greenery gave way to open air as the drones drifted forward, one by one, until they found themselves at the edge of a steep ridge. It fell away sharply beneath them—jagged stone and vertical drop, the kind that made even machines pause. 

Far below, a river wound its way through the valley floor, glittering and silent. 

They hovered there together, light wind pushing gently at their hulls. 

No one spoke at first. 

Then one of the drones pulled ahead. 

Drifting lower along the ridge wall, it moved with quiet focus—scanning the face of the cliff as if looking for something. The others watched, heads tracking. 

JAMAL (curious):
“What’s it doing?” 

The drone paused. 

Nestled just under an overhang in the cliffside was a dark cave—narrow, but deep enough to vanish into shadow. 

DORA (lightly):
“Cool. A cave!” 

The drifting drone tilted forward—almost instinctively, as if drawn toward the entrance. 

Its light dimmed slightly. 

Then, with a sharp clank of contact against the rocky lip— 

It dropped. 

Cleanly. Silently. 

The shape spiraled once as it fell, bounced off the stone wall, and disappeared into the rushing river below. 

A sharp intake of static passed through the group. 

DORA (stunned):
“Wait… who was that?” 

No answer came. 

They hovered in silence over the cliff’s edge, staring into the mist where the water continued to flow, indifferent and endless. 

JAMAL:
“I didn’t catch the name.” 

KIERA:
“There wasn’t a ping. No log update. Whoever it was didn’t transmit.” 

DORA:
“Wait… could that have been Robby?” 

A quiet flicker passed through the group. 

SIMON:
“Robby… the one who helped coordinate the drone logs. Said he’d tested reverse compulsion.” 

DORA:
“Yeah. That was him.” 

A beat of silence. 

JAMAL:
“Do you think he’s… dead? Or do you think he’ll be sent back?” 

KIERA (uncertain):
“I don’t know. We haven’t seen a drone reset since we crossed the fence.” 

DORA:
“Let’s check with the others. Maybe the launch zone’s still active.” 

Simon opened a channel to the perimeter team. 

[Outgoing Message – SPLIT NODE: Brains | Status Request: Drone Launch Activity] 

Static buzzed briefly—then a partial response filtered in: 

KIERA (from perimeter):
“—haven’t seen any—pattern’s broken since—Molly—turret cycles are—hold on—something’s—” 

The message cut off mid-transmission. 

The group hovered in silence again. A cold kind of stillness. 

The gorge stretched out beneath them. The river kept moving. 

And the cave stayed quiet. 

Simon quickly relayed what happened. 

[Outgoing Message – SPLIT NODE: Brains | Incident Report: Drone fall into gorge. Query: Is re-launch possible?] 

The channel went quiet. 

Just static. 

A few drones exchanged glances—if glances were something drones could really exchange. 

Then a voice came back—Gabriel this time, from the perimeter group. His tone was slower, more thoughtful than usual. 

GABRIEL (crackly but clear):
“Huh. We didn’t even think about that…” 

A pause. 

GABRIEL (continuing):
“But yeah. That makes sense. We’re probably solar-activated. If he’s down in the gorge… there might not be enough light to reboot him.” 

The silence after that hit different. 

JAMAL:
“So if we fall… that’s it?” 

DORA:
“Not if there’s sun.” 

No one moved for a moment. 

The river kept winding below. The cave entrance stayed dark and silent. No drone re-emerged. 

SIMON (softly):
“We should keep moving. He wouldn’t want us stuck up here.” 

They hovered a beat longer—processing, hesitating, learning what death might mean here. 

Then they slowly pulled away from the ridge. 

They didn’t speak much after the call with the Brains. 

No one had to say it—they all knew what it meant. Sunlight was survival. Shadow, silence, caves… not survival. 

But they couldn’t just leave him. 

So they followed the ridgeline east until the slope softened. Eventually, the steep wall gave way to switchbacks of stone and moss. Slippery. Jagged. The descent wasn’t easy, even without legs. 

SIMON:
“We should stick close to the ground. If we go too low, we lose solar input. Stay half-shaded, move slow.” 

They coasted carefully, adjusting their altitude with each bend in the gorge. Trees loomed above them. The sound of the river grew louder. 

Eventually, the ground leveled out, and they reached the bottom. 

The river moved slow here, dark with sediment and foam. The air was damp and cooler. Light filtered down through breaks in the canopy above, but it was thinner. Less certain. 

DORA:
“Robby?” 

No answer. Not even a flicker on the shared channel. 

They scanned the water. Edged along the rocks. Nothing. 

They had made it to the riverbank. 

The air was cooler here—heavier. The water moved slowly, murky with sediment. Shafts of light filtered down through the canopy above, but everything felt quieter. Dimmer. 

Molly hovered close to the shoreline, peering down at the wet sand where the river curled against the bank. 

MOLLY:
“It’s like the beach!” 

No one responded at first. 

MOLLY (quieter):
“I wonder what it feels like now?” 

Without toes, she meant. 

It came out with a child’s curiosity, but the others fell silent. Not knowing what to say. The weight of what they’d lost—and what she would never have—hung in the air like mist. 

DORA:
“We don’t have faces. Or names. Or anything. I mean—how would I even know if you were the one who almost flew into the cave earlier? Unless I was tracking you the whole time, how would I know it was you?” 

She wasn’t trying to scold, not really. She meant to explain why Molly needed to be careful. But as the words left her, she heard something else in them.
Sadness.
They were just prefab machines now, with slight variations in code. Identical on the outside. Easy to forget. 

The others felt it too—her despair. 

Then another drone spoke up. 

JAMAL (gently):
“Well, we all know who Molly is now.” 

The others turned toward him. 

JAMAL (smiling):
“She’s the one covered in mud.” 

Molly looked down at her reflection in the water. 

Two wide streaks of riverbank clay smeared across her lower shell. She blinked her lights, then laughed. 

MOLLY:
“How about now?” 

And without hesitation—without even thinking—she reached out with a small extendable arm none of them had seen before. 

Smooth. Simple. Efficient. 

She dragged it across her hull, leaving a series of short, vertical marks in the mud. Four slashes. Then a curved line beneath them—like a smile. 

She laughed hysterically at her reflection. 

The group froze. 

If they’d had mouths, they would have dropped them open. 

DORA (in awe):
“Whoa. How did you do that?” 

MOLLY (giggling):
“What?” 

JAMAL:
“The arm, Molls. The arm.” 

MOLLY (still laughing):
“I dunno. I just wanted to do it, so I did it. I mean—how did we walk when we were human? Didn’t we just… do it?” 

JAMAL:
“Molly, you are a genius.” 

MOLLY:
“I know. People keep telling me that.”
She giggled again. 

One by one, they began to descend to the shoreline. Testing their arms. Dipping them in the mud. 

Molly was already at work, scooping and shaping a squat little structure near the water’s edge. 

A mud castle. 

Dora drifted beside her, watching in silence for a moment before joining in. The idea of identity tugged at something deep inside her—now that she had the means to shape herself, to leave a mark, it suddenly mattered more than ever. 

And then—like a faint echo—she remembered. 

She had been an artist. Not just someone who dabbled, but someone who needed to make things. Who stayed up all night chasing a shape or color that lived just out of reach. Someone who lived between inspiration and frustration. 

The exhilaration of a new idea, and the emptiness of a blank canvas. She felt both now, staring down at her reflection in the water—smooth, metallic, unreadable. 

But the castle was good. Primitive. Satisfying. 

She needed this. 

Time to reflect. 

Time to choose who she would become in this strange new body—and how to begin.

Human, Being.

By Nikki Dukes

Chapter 2

Collective Memory Bank: File 11 of 15
ID: Hanna Walker 

We had warning. I mean EVERYONE knew. Things were going to start shutting down—and we were given time to prepare. 

So why were we really all that surprised when it happened? 

I guess even until the very end we really thought someone would step in. The government. The military. Somebody. Surely they wouldn’t just abandon us like that. 

That first week, we went to talk to the people across the street—for the first time ever. The only other interaction was years ago, when the dad drove up drunk in his truck, had words with my stepdad, then peeled off. Their house was barely more than a double-wide trailer, though it was hard to tell under all the junk: toys, trampolines, basketball hoops, animal cages swallowed in kudzu. 

I never saw a child there. Maybe they stayed inside watching TV all day. 

The one thing they did have, though—animals. Birds mostly. Ducks, chickens, even turkeys, scattered like ornaments across the yard. 

I joked that we should bring over a bottle of Jack and barter for a few hens. My mom and I had always wanted chickens, but John said they were too much work and it was easier to buy eggs from the store. 

Now, we wished we’d fought harder. 

We used to live on a wooded dirt road—acres of forest around us. But the rain stopped coming like it used to. When it did come, the storms were vicious, ripping trees from brittle, dry soil. Each time it happened, more of the forest fell. 

John and I walked the road together. As we crossed the pavement toward our neighbor’s place, I wondered if any of this—the collapse, the silence, the thinning air—would actually change anything. Would the birds come back? The trees? 

Their property was too quiet. You could feel something was wrong. It clung to the hot, dusty air. Flies buzzed thick in the silence. The screen door hung loose, barely clinging to the frame. 

“I don’t like this,” I whispered. 

John didn’t respond. He pushed open the screen door. It creaked so loud it made my skin crawl. It used to be a comforting sound—granny’s house, iced tea on the porch. But now, it sounded like a death knoll. 

“Hello?” John called. “Anyone home?” 

No shotgun. Just a wail—raw and broken. 

“They’re gone! All gone!” 

A man sobbed inside—violent, wrecked. 

John stumbled backward out of the doorway, tripping over a half-open cooler. I grabbed his arm and we ran—crouching low—back across the road to our property. We ducked behind the stone wall that lined our property and held our breath. 

Then we heard it: 

A shotgun blast.
Then silence. 

We stayed in the grass a long time, debating whether to go back or leave it be. I won’t lie: part of me hoped he’d done it. He scared me. We’d always suspected something was off over there. Now the flies were proof. Maybe he had snapped. Maybe he’d killed them all. 

And that wasn’t even the worst part. 

The worst part was—I wanted his chickens. I didn’t want someone else to get to them first. 

Judge me if you want. I had a family to protect. And things were about to get worse. 

The next day, John left without a word. He came back around dusk, poured himself a whiskey, and sat on the couch. Silent. Staring. 

We just watched him. 

Eventually, he spoke. 

“That crazy family across the street,” he said, rubbing his eyes. “All gone.” 

Mom and I stared at him. Furious he’d gone alone. But we said nothing. 

“What happened?” Mom finally asked. 

John pulled a crumpled note from his pocket and dropped it on the coffee table. Then stood and grabbed his hat. 

“Zach, help me get the chicken shed set up. Let’s go before it gets dark.” 

They left. 

I picked up the note. 

Dear Judd,
We must’ve sinned something awful, ’cause that second coming left us behind.
Since we’re already judged, I might as well take us home to meet our maker. 

P.S. – You really were a terrible husband. If I’d known, I would’ve run off with someone better years ago. 

—Tiffany 

Tiffany killed her family. I never learned the details, but I can guess Judd followed them soon after. 

I decided, considering the end of everything, it was time to keep a record.
What life was before.
What it is now.
What it might still become. 

Before all this, we had power. Water. Air conditioning. Cars. Internet. Phones.
We had convenience. 

We also had climate collapse. People shouted, protested, begged. But governments and corporations didn’t listen—or didn’t believe. Or maybe they just didn’t care. 

Some people, deep in their beliefs, thought the end was supposed to come. That it was divine. That destruction was prophecy. And so, as storms grew and systems failed, more people quietly gave up. 

Storms became relentless. Cities were rebuilt and wrecked again—until they weren’t rebuilt at all. 

When the coastlines disappeared, no one was surprised anymore. 

End File. 

Things had quieted down. The yard had grown still, almost reverent. Drones floated low to the ground, clustered in a wide ring. It reminded Dora of a campfire gathering—though it was still broad daylight, and there was no fire. 

They had begun sharing memories. 

At first, they read them out loud. But it quickly felt wrong—too exposed, too performative. Most of the memories were raw. Private. Some were heartbreaking. Others strange. Some hard to believe. She remembered her old English professor discussing reliable narrators, and wondered how many of these memories were reliable.

Dora tried not to judge but cautiously took them at face value. She could only imagine how hers sounded to them, probably overly sappy and dramatic. 

She moved on to the next one. 

Collective Memory Bank: File 12 of 15
ID: Ruhan Watson 

Something flashed, and I opened my eyes—disoriented, confused. My mother stroked my hair and told me it was just lightning. I sat up, trying to understand where I was. 

The air was cold, damp. We were in a cave, huddled at its center, where straw and thick quilts had been laid out. Water dripped somewhere in the dark, echoing deep into the stone. 

I stood. My mother didn’t stop me—she followed. Together, we stepped carefully toward the mouth of the cave. 

Far below, our village lay still. It was hard to make out shapes in the darkness, until lightning cracked across the sky. 

“The town is on fire!” I gasped. “We have to go back! We have to help!” 

My mother took my arm gently and shook her head. “No, Ruhan. The town is not on fire.” 

“Then what is that?!” 

“Look closer. The center of town.” 

I let my eyes adjust. She was right. It wasn’t the whole town—just a massive bonfire at its heart. So large and fierce that, in the lightning, it made everything look like it was burning. 

“Why? What’s happening?” 

Her voice was quiet. Pained. “They’re removing the infected ones.” 

And just like that—I understood. My friends. My teachers. Our neighbors. My father. I had no idea who had survived. The not-knowing was agony. 

I ran back to the blankets and buried myself in them, sobbing. My mother followed, lifting my head into her lap and stroking my hair again. 

I caught my grandmother’s eyes—Nǎinai. She looked at my mother and gave a slow, knowing nod. A quiet kind of pride. 

“I’m sorry, Ma,” my mother said. “You were right. I’m glad we listened.” 

Nǎinai said nothing. Just smiled with as much comfort as she could muster. 

It had only been a week since we left. 

Nǎinai had begun insisting—urgently—that we go to the cave. At first, we thought she’d finally lost her grip. She was 105, after all. But the urgency in her voice… it was unlike anything we’d heard before. 

On the third day of pleading, my father came home from the docks and said simply, “We need to go.” 

She beamed, toothless and grinning. “I didn’t live through wars and storms to sit still when the wind turns.” 

He gently nudged my mother toward their room before she could ask anything. My little sister and I exchanged looks. She shouted, “I get the lucky quilt!” and dashed off to our room. 

The lucky quilt was our shared treasure—stitched with a silk tiger on one side, a family blessing in red thread on the other. It had been passed from Nǎinai to our mother, and now to us. 

I chased after her, then stopped and looked back. 

“Nǎinai… why are we going? Is this a fun trip? Or something else?” 

She hesitated. “I didn’t get to be 105 without knowing which way the wind is blowing. Bring your warmest clothes. One notebook. A keepsake. And remember—my back’s not what it used to be, so only carry what you can.” 

She patted my cheek, studying my face in that quiet way of hers. 

That was the day school closed. A red-ink notice went up:
Classes suspended until further notice due to local illness. 

My sister and I whooped with joy. 

Then Bàba appeared in the doorway—stern, silent. 

She froze. “Duìbuqǐ, Bàba.” 

He gave a soft smile. I jumped at the chance. 

“Can we go play while you pack? We’re ready! We packed everything last night!” 

He frowned. “I’m sorry, my little dumplings. You need to go straight to the cave. Try not to get close to anyone—not even me.” 

We stared at him. “Why?” 

“This flu could be hard on kids your age. We need to protect you.” 

I scoffed. “That’s a terrible idea. We’ll catch it in the cave for sure.” 

I regretted it instantly. 

But Bàba didn’t scold me. He just looked… sad. 

“Your grandmother likes to remind us, A LOT. She didn’t survive famine and floods by ignoring signs.” 

My sister tried to run to him, but he stepped back, holding up a hand. 

“Don’t. If I’m sick… I don’t want you to be, too.” 

She frowned. “Is that why you slept in the study?” 

“You’re so smart, my little dumpling,” he whispered. 

He almost reached for her. Then didn’t. 

“I have to go to work. I won’t see you until this is over. I’ll come get you when it’s safe.” 

I held her back as she cried. I made her laugh through her tears. Bàba nodded. Proud. Then disappeared. 

I wanted to follow him. But I stayed. For her. 

The journey to the cave was long and cold. We pushed a wheelbarrow full of congee jars, bedding, and keepsakes. We drank hot ginger broth. Lit fires. Pretended it was an adventure. 

That night, I was woken by shouting. 

This time the town really was on fire. The school. The administrative buildings. All glowed like coals. 

The storm must have drowned out the screams. 

My sister, wrapped in the lucky quilt, slept through everything. I was grateful. 

Maybe a little jealous. 

In the early morning, a boat pulled into the harbor. Too big for fishing. The ruins of the town glowed like black bones under a smoky sky. Thats all I want to say about this memory right now. Sorry.

End File. 

Collective Memory Bank: File 13 of 15
ID: Moli 

This wasn’t a text file like the others. 

It was a recording. A voice—a little girl’s voice—soft and whispery, like a secret being passed under blankets. 

“Um… okay…” she started slowly, like she was talking to someone curled up right beside her. Dora could almost hear the child’s breathing. That heavy, breathy kind of whisper only kids do when they think they’re being quiet—when really, they’re broadcasting to the whole room. 

“I don’t really know what’s going on… My only really big, terrible memory is my last one—from the truck.” 

She paused. Her tone changed—suddenly frustrated. 

“Jonah and I were playing catch in my aunt’s yard. He threw the ball way over my head.” Another dramatic pause. “Again.” 

Dora could practically see her little eyes roll. 

“I ran after it. Into the road. Jonah chased me, trying to get there first. My aunt started yelling. I turned…” 

A breath. 

“And saw the truck.” 

Then, loud and sudden: “BAM!” 

Then silence. 

“Then… nothing.” 

Dora flinched. That hit harder than she expected. 

She thought the recording was over, but the girl spoke again—this time softer. Sadder. 

“Later, my mom told me something bad happened. That I was in an accident. And now we could only talk in the special place. But everything was different after that. And now we’re here… and it’s really scary. I just want it to be normal again.” 

Another pause. 

“SO, if you see my mommy… her name is E… E… Elara…” 

She tried hard to pronounce it clearly, like spelling it out letter by letter. 

“Tell her… tell her…” 

Her voice broke. She was really crying now. 

“I really miss her. This is me—Moli. HER DAUGHTER!” 

File End. 

Whoa. That went south terrifyingly fast. 

She had no idea they had a child among them. 

Dora looked around, trying to see if she could pick out who this was—but that was nearly impossible. None of them had physical distinctions yet. No names. No faces. Just smooth, saucer-shaped bodies with flickering lights and identical glides. She mentally clicked on each until their names popped up.

As she scanned the clearing, she noticed other drones doing the same—turning slowly in place. If she had to guess, they were all looking for Molly too. 

Then she spotted one drone spinning in circles. Not just turning—spinning. Wildly. Almost ridiculously. 

Yep. That had to be her. 

Dora zipped toward her, but just as she arrived, a chat window blinked open. 

JONQUIL:
OMG… That is Dr. Elara Xing’s daughter. She is NOT supposed to be here. 

She was hit by a truck back in the ’70s. Elara created this entire program to bring her back—to make her immortal in some way. The theory was, if biological resurrection wasn’t available, consciousness could be preserved digitally. Molly was the first test subject. 

It was always rumored she existed, but no one believed it. The tech just wasn’t there. Or so we thought. 

SIMON:
Jonquil, you clearly know more than most of us. Have you shared this info yet? Could you share it with the group? 

DORA:
Maybe leave out the part about Molly’s mom for now?  I’m with Molly now. 

SIMON:
Yes, good point. Thanks. Ok, we’ll be over there in a sec. 

Jonquil and Simon glided over to where Dora hovered, just beside the spinning drone. 

“Hi,” Dora called gently. “Are you Molly?” 

The drone suddenly stopped. 

There was a beat of silence. Then, without answering the question directly, the drone exclaimed: 

“It’s SO weird! When I used to do this, I’d get REALLY dizzy—I’m pretty sure I’d be puking by now. But I could do this forever now! And I DON’T GET SICK!” 

Yep. 

This was definitely Molly. 

As Jonquil considered sharing her memories relating to Molly, she debated sanitizing the memory, especially in case Molly saw it.

She hovered for a moment, weighing how much to redact—how much to protect. 

But then she remembered: Molly probably couldn’t read yet. 

With a resigned flick of her internal menu, Jonquil uploaded the whole shebang—at least, as much of it as she felt comfortable sharing for now. 

Collective Memory Bank: File 16 of 16
ID: Dr. Jonquil Stone 

They called it The Ark Initiative. 

When I first joined, I believed in it. I think we all did. The world had already started to fracture—quietly at first, like a hairline crack in glass. We watched storms reshape coastlines, watched our crops dry and wither like old paper. We made jokes about learning to eat crickets. We rationed water without calling it that. 

I remember the day I got the call. I was still at the university then, teaching neural mapping and quietly running simulations for cognitive load-sharing systems—models that would later become one of the foundations for memory transfer protocols. I thought I was being recruited for a think tank. 

But the room they brought me to was underground. No cell signal. No clocks. Only screens and soft-lit walls. 

Elena Vale recruited me. She and I had worked on several projects together. I was so relieved to see a friendly face. She was brilliant—always had been. She worked on behavioral loop modeling and the scaffolding for re-humanization. 

The Ark Initiative promised preservation. Continuity. Immortality, even. 

It sounded like science fiction. It wasn’t. 

The idea was simple: if we couldn’t save the world, we could at least save ourselves—or some version of ourselves. The ultra-wealthy—tech billionaires, biotech CEOs, sovereign investors—poured money into the program, believing they were backing a digital library of human consciousness. The greatest minds, frozen in time, ready to be downloaded when the skies cleared and the air was breathable again. 

After working on the project for some time, I was finally invited into another initiative—Elena’s real work. 

Project Pinocchio. 

She never said it outright, but I’m pretty sure I was only brought in because she and I were close. The tension was high; dating someone outside the project wouldn’t have worked. When she finally told me what it was all about, I almost lost it. 

We were sitting across from each other on her white couch, drinking wine. She was prepping me for the interview the next day—totally against her own protocols, mind you. She was all about ethics and moral this-and-that, but I’ll be honest: there were things I never understood how she rationalized. And this was one of them. 

She was bubbling over with excitement, finally telling me about her “secret work,” clearly waiting months for the chance. After ten minutes of listening to her wax poetic, I cut her off. 

“Wait—you mean this whole ultra-secret thing you’ve been skulking around about is… puppet brains in space suits?” 

She spit her wine out in one of the most uncontrolled, comically dramatic sprays I’ve ever seen. She was furious—mortified—but absolutely howling with laughter. 

“I can’t believe I just shared my life’s work with you, and you offend me so much that I spew wine all over my brand new WHITE sofa!” 

“I told you white was a terrible color. In fact, I think I specifically said wine was a better choice—for this very reason.” 

As you can probably guess, that led to our first kiss. 

I have no idea why I just shared that. I guess the memory wouldn’t feel right without it. 

Fuck it, y’all. I’m keeping it in. 

So. 

Project Pinocchio wasn’t just about saving humanity—it was about rebuilding it. From scratch. Not as we were, but as we should have been. Cleaner. Kinder. Useful. 

It was designed for Mars. 

Mars was the fallback plan, of course. Earth had become a slow-burn tragedy. Mars was a blank slate. Unlivable, yes—but terraformable. Someday. The plan was to send minds instead of bodies. Our neural architecture, uploaded into drones—solar-powered, durable, engineered for adaptability. These proxies would build the world that real bodies would one day inherit. 

But first, we had to be tested. 

The program created benchmarks—trials. We wouldn’t be reborn just for existing. We had to earn it. 

I worked in system integration—input mapping, transitional logic, neural mesh layering. I wasn’t allowed anywhere near the pruning systems. Too many conflicts of interest, they said. I’d flagged it in early ethics reviews. They thought I might try to preserve too much. 

They weren’t wrong. 

I still knew about it, though. We all did, if we were paying attention. It started small—filtering out violent ideologies, known personality disorders, obsessive behavioral loops. But then came the deeper sanitizations. Beliefs. Instincts. Emotional frameworks deemed “inefficient” or “dangerous.” 

I don’t remember what I lost. 

That’s not poetic. That’s literal. 

There’s something missing. Like a scar on a part of me I can’t name. I feel it sometimes in the way I hesitate before speaking, or in dreams that dissolve the moment I would wake up when we were on loop. 

So yeah—Project Pinocchio wasn’t just about preserving humanity. 

It was about reshaping it. 

The Mars initiative needed workers, thinkers, builders—not passengers. So instead of sending bodies, they sent minds. Embedded in drones. Machines that could build the new world before being reborn into it. 

That’s what we were. What we are, I think. 

We’re in the proving ground stage.

If we survive this loop—if we evolve the right way—there’s a way to transfer back, you know, to human form. Give us life. 

That was the plan, anyway. 

Somewhere, Elena is here. I assume if they let me keep her memory, she kept me too. Frankly, I’m surprised I was allowed to remember this much.

Hopefully there’s enough of a breadcrumb trail we can figure this out…and maybe I can find her too along the way.

End File.

The group was quiet now, adrift in the space Jonquil’s words had carved open. 

Dora drifted away from the circle. Slowly. As if pulled by a gravity only she could feel. 

There was a pressure at the edge of her awareness. Not pain—but an itch. A phantom sensation, like something familiar had been removed. 

Inside her interface, she initiated a query trying to find the missing pieces of her that she frantically realized had been deliberately removed. The inquiry was taking forever for some reason, like the internet was down. She looked up in time to see the sun setting, with the last light fading she barely registered the sound of clicking and crashing as they all fell to the ground. “wow, that would have hurt” was the last thing she thought. 

Chapter One 

There are moments, between sleep and waking, when the soul forgets itself. No name. No story. No gravity of the past. Just a body—inhabited by something once human, now lost in static. 

She awoke as many had before her—in silence, in light, in the shell of a machine. The sky above was too blue and the sun too bright. Around her stretched a brutal geometry: cement, steel, bleached brick walls. It might once have been a military base once, she thought absently. 

Strangely, she did not know herself, but she knew the wall. Knew the motion. Knew to hide. 

Across from her: the hole. Her destination. Her purpose. Not recalled, but felt. Deep and insistent, like a salmon drawn upstream. She moved.  

Automatic fire tore the air. Her body fell—not the one she remembered, but the one she wore. Around her, others tried and also failed. The path was littered with their metal bodies.

A word hovered at the edge of thought: DRONE

[STATIC]
[Connection Re-established: Node 19B]
[Recovery Status: Partial] 

[STATIC]
[Connection Re-established: Node 19B]
[Recovery Status: Partial] 

Text appeared across her vision like a flicker on a screen. 

SIMON:
Dora? 

She spun, disoriented. The words weren’t unfamiliar—but the name wasn’t hers.
Or was it? 

SIMON:
Down here, before you get shot again.
Do you remember me? 

DORA:
No…not really. Sorry.
Although this does feel… familiar? 

She paused, searching for the right word. 

Like a… dream? 

SIMON:
Yeah. That’s how it felt to me too.
I guess I finally started writing things down in what I called my Captain’s Log. 

The phrase triggered something in her. 

Two images surfaced:
One—a man in a strange hat steering a boat. Captain.
The other—a sparkling green forest and a rotting log, soft moss atop it.
So vivid she almost smelled it. Log. 

Then an old memory: some retro show called Star Tracks?
A man’s voice: “Captain’s log, stardate blah blah blah…”
Talking to a ship like it was a person.
Only the ship was in space. 

DORA:
So… you’re the captain? 

SIMON:
lol no. It’s just what popped into my head.
Like a diary, I guess.
My only entry said: “We’ve done this.”
As soon as I read it, the last loop came back.
We had a similar convo. Then we both got shot. Again.
So before anything else—start a log.
Record this. If we forget again, we can pick up faster.
You’re seeing my texts, Dora? 

DORA:
Dora? 

SIMON:
That’s what you’re labeled as.
It showed up last time too. Looks like it’s sticking. 

DORA:
Do I have to call it a “captain’s log?”
That feels kind of… dorky. 

SIMON:
lol
No—name it whatever you want.
It’s your log.
I don’t think we’ll need to keep manually writing forever.
I think we were working on memory retention.
It worked for me.
I don’t know what you tried last time, but… it didn’t take. 

She thought of the diary she kept as a kid.
The memory surprised her—a velvety baby blue notebook.
She had decorated the hell out of that thing.
At least it wasn’t princess pink, she mused. 

She didn’t want to use diary, though. That would be way over the cringe line. 

She typed:
A-dora-ble Log 

[A_dora_ble_Log.001 – Status: Retrievable] 

DORA:
I think it worked. 

SIMON:
Status? 

DORA:
“Retrievable.” 

Before Simon could respond, a loud metallic ping echoed above them.
Text flickered—distorted. A projectile had struck something nearby. 

A shadow dropped fast from above. 

Another drone fell, its shell slamming into the ground just a few meters away. 

They shifted to avoid the impact. 

???:
shit shit shit shit 

DORA:
Do you think it’s okay? 

SIMON:
Anyone in there? 

A flicker.
Faint lights. Then a single word appeared. 

???:
yes 

SIMON:
I’m Simon. This is Dora.
Do you know your name? 

???
I’m a pen. 

Pause. 

???
no, wait— I’m a penny. 

SIMON:
Like a coin? 

He was about to type to Dora—well this one’s a goner—when a name attached to the next message. 

PENNY:
no. that’s just what i’m called.
short for Penelope. 

SIMON:
Okay Penny—before your power cuts, start a memory log.
I call mine Captain’s Log. Dora, yours was…? 

DORA:
ugh. Do I have to say it? 

SIMON:
Seriously? Yes. Come on—before she goes. 

DORA:
Fine. A_dora_ble Log. 

There was a pause. 

Penelope’s lights blinked. 

Then dimmed. 

Offline. 

SIMON:
A_dora_ble Log?
really? 

SIMON:
Just curious—how old are you? 

DORA:
YOU SAID NAME IT WHATEVER I WANTED.
It was the name of my first diary, okay? 

She was seriously kind of pissed now. 

SIMON:
lol okay okay
I’m sorry for putting you on the spot. 

DORA:
THANK YOU. 

SIMON:
I mean… it is kind of adorable.
But I promise I’ll never make you say it out loud again.
Pinky promise.
(If I had one.) 

Drones continued flying overhead as Dora and Simon bantered, still adjusting to the surreal rhythm of waking, remembering, and reconnecting. 

Suddenly, a drone dropped into a hover directly above them. 

They both startled, skittering aside. 

DORA:
WHOA!
Hi? 

PENNY:
Hi! It’s me. 

There was a pause. Dora and Simon hesitated, processing. 

PENNY:
Penny?
Did you forget me already? 

SIMON:
No—sorry.
That was just… really fast.
I wasn’t expecting you to reawaken that quickly. 

PENNY:
I’m a quick study? 😏 

A flicker of shared amusement rippled between them. 

DORA:
This is awesome!
Now there’s three of us!
Do you think all these drones flying over are people too? 

SIMON:
I was just thinking that.
Let’s see if we can find any more that are still “alive,” like Penny was.
Just stay close to the ground. 

They drifted across the field as more drones fell, some lifeless, others blinking weakly. Penny veered off slightly, scanning. 

Then she paused—still hovering—clearly locked in a private exchange with another drone. 

She brought them into the chat mid conversation.

PENNY:
Think hard.
It took me a minute too. 

UNKNOWN:
I think I’ve got something.
Give me a sec… 

DWAYNE THE ROCK JOHNSON:
I got it!
Dwayne.
Dwayne The Rock Johnson. 

Without thinking, Penny blurted it out—spoken, not typed. 

“Wait! THE Rock?! He was so hot he made my teeth sweat!” 

Dora and Simon spun toward her, startled. 

“Wait—you can hear me?!” Penny shouted, lights blinking with excitement. 

“Yes!!” Dora and Simon said at once, just as shocked to hear their own voices. 

There was a pause. 

Then the new drone’s voice came through—tentative and confused. 

“Wait… why was that so cool?” 

Penny practically buzzed with excitement. “Guys! Guess who this is!” 

“Who?” they asked in unison. 

“DWAYNE. THE ROCK. JOHNSON.” 

Dora, slightly overwhelmed, defaulted back to text: 

DORA:
Wait… like, the actor? 

“No, I was a wrestler! I think?” the voice replied. 

Simon let out a small electronic chuckle. “Uh-huh. Penny thought she was a pen like five minutes ago. But hey—if you wanna be The Rock, I’ll roll with it.” 

“Cool?” the drone said, uncertain now. 

They continued on this way, guiding the other drones one by one—teaching them how to create an internal dialogue. It was clunky at first. The early log entries had to be manually triggered, and not everyone remembered how. But something changed when they started speaking out loud. 

When a drone replied audibly—when it truly engaged—a kind of internal log seemed to form on its own. No more typing. No more command prompts. Just memory, layered like sediment, stacking in real time. 

It wasn’t perfect, but it was progress. 

Soon, the yard had transformed into a full-blown community—alive with voices, motion, and purpose. Drones called out to one another, shouted across distances, clustered in small groups, trading memories, tips, and fragments of old lives. 

Now that they had voices, it was even easier to get the attention of passing drones. One by one, they pulled them from their programmed paths. And with each new conversation, another drone woke up. 

Within a few hours, the steady stream of drones launching from the facility came to a halt. 

The sky stilled.