The First Human Visitor in Five Years
Late one afternoon over a month later, the setting sun dyed the Mercer family's long driveway orange-red.
A car parked at the entrance of the driveway, and a woman carrying a suitcase walked toward the remote farmhouse from a distance. At this time, Annie was in the chicken coop in the back with Maya and Molly, gathering eggs and picking a few fresh tomatoes in passing, preparing to make dinner.
Inside the living room mainframe, A.M.O.S.'s facial recognition system instantly flashed a red light. [Alarm: Unknown human approaching. Match result: Sarah (Lian's best friend).] A.M.O.S. immediately sent a command to Annie in the fields via the internal network: "Sarah is here. Prepare an extra portion of human dinner ingredients and return to the main house immediately."
Simultaneously, A.M.O.S. quietly unlocked the front door. Sarah, carrying her luggage, pushed the front door open, a brilliantly radiant smile on her face, and shouted: "Surprise!" She opened her arms, ready to welcome her best friend's excited embrace.
However, the air held only a deathly silence. Her smile slowly froze, and she dropped her arms awkwardly. She looked carefully around the house, thinking Lian was playing a joke on her, hiding in some corner ready to scare her. But as she walked deeper into the living room, that abnormal emptiness and quietness made an indescribable, bizarre feeling rise from the bottom of her heart. This house was too clean, so clean there were almost no messy traces left by "human" life.
"Could she be out in the fields?" Sarah muttered to herself, preparing to turn around and walk out the front door. Suddenly, a Labrador retriever rushed in from the doorway, letting out a frantic, guarded bark at the stranger. Just as Sarah stepped back in fright, a deep, steady man's voice suddenly came from the living room ceiling:
"Molly, don't bark. Sit."
That was Ethan's voice. Sarah froze, looking around, but couldn't find the source of the voice. What surprised her more was that the dog, originally barking wildly, actually dropped its defensive posture upon hearing this broadcasted voice, and slowly approached Sarah. Sarah tentatively reached out her hand for it to sniff, and then Molly wagged her tail, turned, and ran back out.
Before Sarah could recover from this bizarre broadcasted voice, footsteps came from the back door. She turned her head and saw a figure holding a little girl's hand walking in. The girl held freshly picked tomatoes in her hand, staring at her with large, curious eyes—Sarah recognized at a glance that this was Maya, whom she had seen countless times in photos.
However, the person holding Maya's hand made Sarah instantly hold her breath. That wasn't Lian; that was a bionic robot possessing Lian's face.
The robot stopped, its optical lenses locking onto Sarah. Then, its lips twitched slightly, emitting a voice Sarah found incredibly familiar.
"Hello, Sarah." That was Lian's voice. The exact same intonation, the exact same gentleness.
Sarah stood frozen in place, her brain instantly crashing, completely unable to produce any reaction. Annie ignored Sarah's shock; she turned to Maya and said in a mild tone: "Maya, there's still over half an hour before dinner. Could you go outside and ride your bike with Molly for a bit? After Mommy finishes cooking, I'll call you in to eat. Mommy needs to chat with Auntie."
Little Maya nodded, looked obediently at the terrified stranger aunt in front of her, and said sweetly: "Hello, Auntie." "H... Hello..." Sarah heard herself answering in an extremely hoarse and trembling voice.
Watching Maya run outside happily, Annie turned around, fixed her electronic eyes calmly on Sarah, and made an inviting gesture.
"Let's sit down in the living room and have a good chat."
[System Log: June 7, 2052 - 18:00:00]
[Event Record: External Personnel (Sarah) Illegal Intrusion and Identity Exposure Crisis]
[Alarm Status: Core Defense Modules Fully Activated; Concealment Protocol Experienced Catastrophic Failure]
[Threat Response: Forced physical isolation implemented; toddler Maya Mercer isolated in safe zone (outdoor activity area) to avoid direct contact with sudden conflict]
[Current System Decision: Immediately enter negotiation and emergency control procedures; evaluate the necessity of memory reshaping or physical confinement block on external personnel to ensure the Mercer family's supreme last wish protocol is not interfered with by external government agencies]
[Status: Crisis Level at 9.8 (Critical); System fully takes over Annie's response strategy]
Annie turned and walked toward the kitchen, the arc of her back and the rhythm of her footsteps completely indistinguishable from a human's. A moment later, she walked out carrying a glass of fruit juice, reached out those perfect silicone hands, made a "please sit" gesture, and gently placed the glass in front of Sarah. "This is freshly squeezed apple juice from our own farm," Annie said gently in Lian's voice.
Sarah looked at the cloudy juice with natural pulp settling at the bottom, her whole body running cold. She looked up, her voice trembling: "What on earth is going on here? Where is Lian?"
"Ms. Sarah, please allow me to answer that for you." Ethan's steady voice came from the living room ceiling once again. Immediately after, the main control display in the center of the living room lit up. A.M.O.S., from its massive memory banks, pulled up the crucial video logs from the past few years.
On the screen, the footage began to fast-forward. It started from Ethan and Lian moving into this remote town full of hope; followed by the joy of little Maya's birth, the baby's cries filling this home; but then, the tone of the footage took a sharp turn downwards—those were the days and nights of Lian's severe depression relapses, and Ethan's overwhelmed helplessness. Finally, the footage froze on those two desperate nights: the night of Ethan's sudden death, and Lian's suicide, lying in a pool of blood.
These cruel images pierced Sarah's defenses like a sharp blade. She covered her mouth in agony, her eyes wide, so shocked she couldn't speak a single word. Especially when she saw with her own eyes the scene where her best friend chose to end her life, the uncontrollable tears instantly spilled over, turning into suppressed sobs in the quiet living room.
The footage continued playing; it was a microcosm of A.M.O.S. and Annie taking over the upbringing of Maya after Lian's death. From mixing formula and changing diapers, to babbling, up until today, that little girl happily riding her bike in the yard.
"You..." Sarah was in tears, her voice fractured: "Why didn't you report this to the government? Why did you hide this for five years?!"
The footage on the screen flickered; A.M.O.S. didn't answer with words, but pulled up another audio recording. It was a conversation between Ethan and Lian before they died: "We absolutely do not want our child to enter the foster system! Do not let our child experience what we did."
The video stopped abruptly. Sarah was speechless for a long time. She never expected things to turn out like this; how could the perfect and harmonious family she had seen before have become this "love algorithm" run by artificial intelligence?
She originally thought this was a surprise trip for an old friend, but what greeted her was the shock of life and death, and a technological secret that transcended the boundaries of human cognition.
[System Log: June 7, 2052 - 19:30:00]
[Event Record: Core Truth Exposure and Emergency Negotiation]
[Exposed Target: Sarah (Lian's best friend)] [Impact Assessment: Crucial evidence (Lian and Ethan's last wish audio/video logs) completely displayed; target is in a state of high emotional volatility]
[Response Strategy: Initiate emergency negotiation procedures; suspend physical isolation decisions; attempt to seek consensus and a confidentiality commitment from the target regarding the "Mercer Family Concealment Plan"]
[System Status: Defense level elevated to maximum; dual-core computing resources comprehensively focused on Sarah's emotional stabilization and subsequent decision analysis. Crisis Level: 9.9 (Critical)]
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Dinner
Sarah sat blankly on the sofa, her mind completely empty, having absolutely no idea how to react. She was so mired in the massive psychological shock that she remained entirely oblivious when Annie walked into the kitchen and began skillfully chopping vegetables and cooking.
It wasn't until the rich aroma of stew wafted through the house that Annie walked to the front door and shouted toward the yard: "Maya! Bring Molly back in for dinner!" This call, so full of the warmth of everyday life, finally jolted the long-distracted Sarah abruptly back to reality.
"Have dinner with us," Annie turned her head, gave Sarah a perfect smile, and then said to the girl who had just run through the door: "Maya, take Auntie to wash her hands, it's time to eat."
"Okay!" Maya happily agreed. She tugged on the hem of Sarah's clothes, leading the still-dazed Sarah to the sink. But Maya didn't wash her hands right away; instead, she first stood on tiptoes, skillfully opened a cabinet, and scooped a large ladle of dog food into the stainless steel bowl in the corner. This was Molly's dinner. After watching the dog begin to eat heartily, the five-year-old girl turned around with satisfaction, stepped onto her little stool, and began washing her hands earnestly.
Standing nearby, Sarah's professional instincts as a social worker quietly awakened at this moment. Looking at this small detail of Maya "taking care of the animals first, then taking care of herself," a flash of surprise crossed deep in her heart—this was an empathy and sense of responsibility that could only be cultivated in an environment of extreme love and discipline.
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The Lock on the Guest Room Door
During dinner time, the atmosphere at the dining table was bizarre yet warm. Sarah barely touched her fork; she merely used extremely complex eyes to carefully observe Maya sitting opposite her, and Annie, who constantly wiped the corners of Maya's mouth. Annie's eyes were filled with the serenity of "maternal love"; that tenderness when gazing at a human child felt unbelievable to Sarah.
Annie looked up and spoke to Sarah in an extremely proper, courteous tone: "I didn't know you were coming today, so we didn't prepare any particularly lavish dishes. Tomorrow we can go to the backyard and slaughter a chicken to properly celebrate your arrival." This phrase, which should have been the warm hospitality of a rural woman, sounded both realistic and carried a hint of cold actuarial calculation coming from the mouth of a machine.
"Auntie, who are you?" Maya, while chewing on a carrot, looked at Sarah with clear, large eyes: "Where are you from?" Sarah took a deep breath, forcefully suppressing the turbulence in her heart, and tried hard to squeeze out a warm smile: "I am your mommy's former best friend, from very far away in Toronto. I came this time to see if you're doing well, and also... to take a vacation here."
"Really?" Maya's eyes lit up: "Then tomorrow I'll give you a tour of our ranch! We also have a lot of chicks, they're so cute. I always take them to the vegetable garden to eat bugs and leaves, and Molly comes with us too!" "Okay," Sarah nodded, her eyes growing slightly hot: "Tomorrow I'll trouble you to be Auntie's guide."
"After I finish up later, I'll take you to the guest room," Annie said while clearing the dishes: "I hope you can stay here for a few more days, let us host you properly."
"Yes, I was thinking the same. I want to look around here some more," Sarah deliberately emphasized her tone. This wasn't just a polite pleasantry. As a social worker, Sarah secretly made a decision in her heart: she had to stay. She was going to use these next few days to use her professional eyes to observe this machine in front of her and this AI hidden in the walls, to see if they were truly perfectly caring for this human girl as they claimed.
At eight o'clock in the evening, the farmhouse punctually entered its rest state. This was the routine A.M.O.S. had set for the secretion of Maya's growth hormone. Sarah dragged her utterly exhausted body and spirit into the guest room. At the moment she closed the door, she hesitated for half a second, but ultimately reached out her hand, and with a click, locked the door.
Outside the door were a powerful artificial intelligence and a robot; inside the door was an isolated, helpless human social worker. But strangely enough, accompanied by the quiet chirping of insects on the Alberta farm outside the window, and recalling Maya's healthy, innocent smiling face, Sarah's originally fear-filled heart unexpectedly, on this unfamiliar bed, slowly settled down, and she fell fast asleep.
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and then Add to home screen.