The first thing they never tell you about betrayal is how warm it feels.
Not in your chest. Not in your soul or whatever's left of it.
In your neck.
Where the needle goes in.
It was subtle. Almost gentle.
Like a kiss.
She leaned in, whispered something that sounded like love, and that was that.
"You always look so tired,"
she said, brushing her lips against my ear.
"Rest. I'll handle things from here."
I should've seen it coming.
Hell, part of me did.
She'd been sleeping further from me lately. Laughing a little too quickly at my jokes. Touch lingering just a second too long after I stopped touching back.
But I was tired, man.
Tired of being smarter than everyone in the room.
Tired of having to prove it over and over to people who couldn't even spell the names of the theories they tried to quote at me.
Tired of wondering if I was just a tool pretending to be a person.
So when the one person who made me forget all that told me to sleep—
I did.
I hit the floor slower than I should've.
Nerves shutting down in waves.
Felt like drowning inside your own body, but quiet.
I could still hear her.
She was on the comms now.
"Subject neutralized. No visible trauma. Package ready for retrieval."
Her voice was cold. Not clinical. Not professional. Just... done.
And still—
Still I wanted her to turn around.
She didn't.
Not even a glance.
Funny, I'd always imagined dying would be loud.
Alarms. Screaming. Something.
But it was just tile.
And her footsteps.
And the silence that follows a clean decision.
I think that's what broke me the most.
Not the betrayal.
The efficiency.
Somewhere deep in the back of my brain, something blinked on.
A voice. Mine. Filtered.
A system boot sequence.
"Neural sync: complete. Contingency protocol engaged. Transfer initiated."
Then her voice. Not the woman who killed me.
The one I built.
The one I used to come home to.
The one who used to sing off-key in the shower.
The one I loved so much I coded her into my failsafe.
"Hey. It's okay. I'm here."
I didn't say anything. Couldn't.
Didn't believe her either.
But I didn't shut her off.
And then—
Nothing.
I woke up under a violet sky.
In a body too small.
A voice too high.
Five years old.
Male. Weak. In a world that didn't want me.
But I remembered everything.
And I still had her.