I open my eyes, hearing a constant beeping. My head isn't restrained, but everything else is. I look to my left and see the edge of the metal table I'm strapped to. When I turn my head to the right, I see Cai on a table similar to mine, he not only looks to be unconscious, but completely deactivated. Looking at my body, I am met with a rather frightening sight. The area over my core has been opened up completely, revealing my brightly glowing core, only it's glowing red, not a good sign. Luckily though, it seems that someone has been working on me since there are multiple external wires plugged into the glowing energy source. Surprisingly though, my pain receptors aren't reacting to the gaping hole in my chest. I hear the clacking of boots getting steadily closer to the room I'm in until that someone shuts the door. The person makes their way to the table I'm on. "Oh, you're awake!" A kind sounding woman's voice says. I try to look over at her, but can't move my head enough. "Oh yes, I forgot, you're restrained." She says, reaching a hand down and pushing a button. I feel the straps across me loosen. I sit up slowly, looking at the woman in the room with me. She's tall and official looking. Square black glasses adorn her face, complementing her emerald eyes. Her hair is as black as coal with bangs swept across to the left. Her hair reaches down to the middle of her back.

"Who...are you?" I ask, my voice coming out quietly at first. She gives a small, almost sad smile, some form of adoration or pride.

"You really don't know?" She half remarks, half asks. "You, you don't even recognize me a little bit Selene?" The woman asks, that smile still on her face. I shake my head, confused as to what she could possibly mean. I recognize almost everyone I've met due to a, well, remarkably good memory. "Alright, let me explain then." She says, pulling over a chair from a desk and sitting in it. "My name is Amanda Viier, of course, most people around here just know me as Professor Viier. I know you're asking why this would cause you to know me right? Well, Selene, I created you, I was the one who was asked to try to further reduce the restrictions of programming, and well, here you are." She says, stopping to think. "I suppose they wiped your earliest memories then, to take away any attachment you may have had to me. Anyway, I just thought you might want to know." I stare at her, taken aback at the sudden rush of information.

"So, you made me?" I ask.

"Yes." She answers simply, then starts up again. "Now, I'd like to know personally, how the heck did you two get so messed up?" She asks, gesturing to myself and Cai.

I sigh, "We got caught up in some anti-robot protest that turned really violent. He got shot a bunch of times and I got trampled." I explain. Prof. Viier gasps in a mixture of surprise and horror.

"You were at the riot yesterday?!" She shouts.

"Yeah, it was not fun." I remark.

"Oh my god, you're lucky the two of you survived! Anyway, Cai will be okay after I repair some of his wiring and patch up those gunshot wounds. I, of course, do have to fix multiple other things on him, but those are the most major. As for you, something overloaded your energy systems, you werent designed to handle things like what you went through, I'll have to upgrade your core and fix a couple small wiring issues." She explains, standing up. "Now, tell me, do you want to be asleep or awake while I make the repairs?" She asks.

"Asleep please, I have no desire to watch myself be torn apart." I say with a small chuckle.

"Alright, no problem. I just thought I'd give you a choice." She says, grabbing a small, pen-like device from a table. She softly presses it against where a human's pulse point on their neck would be. "I'd just like to say Selene, it's nice to be able to talk to you again." She presses a button on the pen and my vision fades.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I open my eyes, and as far as I can see, everything is normal again. There are no holes in my body, and I can definitely feel pain again. I sit up, clutching my head, which hurts for an unknown reason.

"It'll take just a bit for your body to get used to the more powerful energy core." Prof. Viier says from where she's sketching out something at her desk. I shakily stand up and walk over to the desk looking at the sketch. It seems to be of me, except with my new upgrades and even some armor designs to the corner.

"Armor?" I ask. I have no need for armor. I'm not a soldier, just a steel worker.

"They're not necessarily for you, you're just the model I decided to sketch out. I've been commissioned to make some more models except with more of the bells and whistles I just put in you so naturally you were the model I decided to work with. With all these riots and things, I figured I should design a armor suit compatible with the new model.  But yeah, if you ever want me to design some for you, you need to ask. Things are getting a lot more dangerous with these riots and I would personally recommend you let me make you something to protect yourself with, if not offensively, then defensively. It would be so easy to whip out a practical set of armor for you." She offers, not looking up from her paper.

"No thanks, use those resources for robots and people who need it, I don't need armor to be a steel worker Professor." I state.

"Well, my offer will stand for as long as I live." She says, looking at me over her shoulder and flashing me a smile.

"So, how's Cai?" I ask.

"Well, he's doing better, I'm restarting his systems one by one over an extended period of time, so he's currently about twenty five percent activated." Professor Viier states.

"Okay, I was sorta worried. He got really messed up, he couldn't even stand properly." I say. Cai has been my friend for the entire time the both of us have been activated. We were actually activated around the same time, so we couldn't help but be close.

"Yeah, he did get pretty hurt. Selene, there are a lot of people who don't understand. Some of these people end up being dangerous, like what you saw at the protest. Be careful will you? You may not know me, but I definitely know you, I designed every aspect of you, well except for personality of course, that's up to you, but I know it would kill me if you died." She says, the look of a worried mother in her eyes.

"I wonder if she has kids." I think.

"Don't worry Viier! I'll be fine." I say, smiling to reassure her.

"Alright then, well, you're all fixed up. If you wanna go, you can." She says, returning to her sketching. I walk out the door and back into the city. She seemed very nice, and I can't deny I feel a tug in my heart when she gets worried. Must be what having a mother feels like.