She couldn't help but feel that this was familiar to her. Eunmi was surrounded by white nothingness. At first, it was impossible to see anything but the blinding bright color, so the girl kept her eyes shut. But after a while, the weird place seemed to darken. Hesitantly, she let her eyes flutter open. And it she knew where she was. The ruined city, far from the place they called home. Or was it? Even though everything lay in ruins, Eunmi couldn't get rid of one odd feeling. This place was familiar to her. Not because she'd seen it before on her trips to the outside, but because it looked like her hometown. The street they lived in. Just in a ruined and destroyed form. Strangely enough, she didn't feel the least bit sad about the chaos around her, the emptiness and silence. Lifelessness. It was as if she was nothing but an untouched observer who had ties to this city, but didn't care anymore. Eunmi let her gaze wander aimlessly. She attempted to heave a sigh, but as she did, all the air left her lungs. She was suffocating. And her last thoughts before drifting into darkness were: 'The shield must've been broken.'

Heavily breathing, Eunmi awoke, and it took her a few seconds to calm her heart. It was dark around her, so she didn't see much, but when her eyes slowly adapted to the darkness, she glanced around in confusion. She didn't know this room, it wasn't hers, and it was certainly not the room of any of her friends.

"Where the hell am I?" she muttered to herself, crawling to the edge of the bed she had been sleeping on. She sat up. But she still had no clue as to what was going on, her mind still clouded from waking up a bit ago. Clumsily, she made her way towards where she predicted the door to be, and was relieved when her hands found a doorknob. She tried to open the door once- a failure. With a frown on her face, Eunmi attempted again and again, without success. Had she been locked in? Very slowly, panic started to creep through her veins, and she tried hard to keep calm and think instead. I out from lack of oxygen. she remembered, just to notice shortly after that she must've messed up her dream with reality. She was relieved when she found her oxygen mask dangling loosely around her neck though, as usual. Unconsciously, Eunmi's hands clenched around the life saving mask.

"Oppa?" She called, as she grew more nervous at being trapped in the dark, foreign room. Maybe she was dreaming still. If so, she wanted her brother to save her. Now. And really, the lock clicked, and Eunmi stumbled backwards as the door was being pushed open by someone. Outside the room, it wasn't much brighter, but just enough for the girl to see the one standing before her better. Her eyes widened at the realization.

"I may be older than you, but I don't think we're close enough for you to call me that." A voice said calmly, and it all came to her. Where she was, how she'd gotten there, what she'd been doing. And also, that Hero had locked her in this room. Anger overcoming her, Eunmi ignored his words, though slightly embarrassed for having called him that.

"What do you think you're doing?! Why are you keeping me here?" she asked, furiously, and it bugged her that he didn't seem to take her seriously. Hero only glanced down at her clenched fists, and the silver eyes under the mask glinted in amusement.

"I had to think about something important. But you might be happy to hear that I intended to share my thoughts with you," he cocked his head. "If you behave well now." Eunmi opened to throw something back at him, but she was simply too curious. She knew she should have just refused to listen. She should've insisted on her right to be set free. But after everything she'd learned the day before, after knowing what was troubling her brother (or rather, how he was troubling others), she couldn't overlook all that. Eunmi found herself caught between two sides, unable to decide which she wanted to be on. Bravely, she demanded:

"Tell me here then. And after that, I'll leave." Hero narrowed his eyes at her, as if thinking 'we'll see about that', but surprisingly gave in to the demand. Where was the violent robot that would squeeze the words out of her forcefully? Something wasn't right. She wondered what the AI was up to. He leaned against the doorframe, and she found herself still standing around awkwardly, not having made even one step outside the room.

"This plan has three essential parts," Hero started. "First. You stay here for about a week."

"Why would I do -" His glare made her shut up.

"Don't interrupt. How am I supposed to explain?" He closed his eyes for a second, as if trying to calm himself down.

"So, as I said, first you need to stay. That will make part two easier. Which will be your unexpected return." She was listening attentively, but the AI still paused for a moment, as if he thought she - as a human  - was too stupid to understand it all in one go. "It'll be easy. You return home when everyone thinks they'll never see you again. Then, they'll welcome you gladly and probably won't ask as many questions out of consideration. And even if they do, you can pretend to not remember much. The most important part is that they'll be forgetting to be angry with you over the joy of seeing you alive." Eunmi nodded slightly, she got the idea, it wasn't bad actually. She just didn't get the use behind it. Why not return immediately?

"And then?" she wanted to know, deciding to let Hero finish his explanation first.

"Then you go back to living normally. However, you get the chance to question your brother. He'll have to answer you since he'll most likely have developed a bad conscience by now, for having kept it from you." Basically, his idea seemed to rely on predictions, and the girl wasn't sure if they'd even turn out right. What counted for now was that she'd get to return home. She didn't have to play along with the rest of the plan, right? But then again, looking into the silver orbs piercing right through her, she didn't think that'd be a wise choice. He'd kill her if he ever found out. Since she had no further remarks, Hero went on: "If you find out why they've decided to go against us AIs, you have to report to us. That is part 3." She squinted her eyes.

"Why should I?"

"Because you said you were sad about the conflict going on. Or did your small brain forget already?" Her first reaction was to complain about him calling her dumb, but that would've (kind of) underlined his statement, so she ignored the insult, which was a pretty mature action in her opinion.

"I didn't forget, and I meant it," Eunmi muttered, lowering her gaze to the ground.

"And that's why you'll help us. Because this will end it all." Her eyes went wide, as she dared to glance up at Hero again, hoping to read from his expression whether he was joking or not. That turned out impossible though. He didn't seem to kid around with her. "You also don't want your brother to risk his life outside the shield all the time, right?" There was no denying, the AI was right. Now that she had been pulled into all of this, she could as well help to end it. Maybe the weird nightmares would stop then. She wondered why they came to her mind in that moment, but didn't breed about it any longer.

"Can you do that or not?" Not being fully convinced yet, Eunmi bit her lip, then asked reluctantly:

"What if I can't?"

"Then you're of no use to us." Hero didn't need to say what that meant for the both of them to know. Eunmi exhaled shakily, having a strange feeling about this deal with a robot. But did she have a choice?

"I can do it. But must I stay here?" He shrugged, lips curling up a little. A small change in his expression that fascinated her- though she still madly wanted to know what his face looked like under that silver mask.

"I don't care where you stay, but if you stroll too far away from here, another AI might pick you up and eliminate you." He said it as if it was insignificant, just a small detail not worth worrying about. Eunmi kept her fright to herself though. She finally passed him to get out of the suffocating, barely lit room and walked into the living room, head held high to keep as much of her dignity and confidence as possible.

She would definitely not enjoy this, being imprisoned with a stoic robot. Then she spotted movement to her right, and saw another figure approaching her. Right, there's still JR, she thought, surprised at herself. Here she sat preferring the one who almost accidentally killed her over her savior. Well, she had to admit that she found Hero handsomer, even without having seen his whole face, but that didn't mean a thing. He wasn't nice to her, so she wouldn't be nice to him. Easy as that.

"Has hyung told you everything?"JR asked as he sat beside her. She gave him a smile.

"Yeah. Since I'll be staying for now- please take care of me!" Eunmi laughed, and the young AI smiled at her in return, enjoying the sound of her laugh. This must've been the part of Hero's idea he liked best. Suddenly, a loud, grumbling sound could be heard, and the girl held her stomach, shy grin on her face.

"I must be hungry," she declared, not having noticed the emptiness of her stomach before. JR's expression went from happy to panicked. He hastily wrote:

"I'm sorry, I totally forgot you're not like us! What do humans eat?" She thought for a second.

"That depends on the person, but I'm really not picky. Anything will do." Again, JR looked around nervously, he knew most of the apartment by then,  but never had he seen any food. "You don't have any..?" Eunmi carefully asked, at a loss. There was no avoiding it, she'd have to eat, or else her future wouldn't look too bright. "Too bad. I should've brought some from the city." Since returning there was out of the question, she glanced at JR, who took the hint. He shot up faster than her eyes could follow.

"I'll get something for you!" And with that, he had stormed out of sight. He most likely didn't hear her 'Be careful!' anymore. She shouldn't doubt his capabilities though, JR was seemingly young, but he certainly knew how to take care of himself, didn't he? Eunmi couldn't refrain from worrying nevertheless. So she thought of doing something to distract her. Something like- exploring the whole apartment. She didn't have allowance to do so, but it wasn't like Hero had forbidden it either. Slipping into one unlocked room after another, she tried to memorize where what was located. The most important things were manageable. Kitchen, bathroom, bedroom. But then there were other rooms she couldn't see the use in. Figuring that it was none of her business, she eventually ended her tour around the AIs place. Only when she returned to the living room after quite a while in which JR hadn't returned yet, it struck her again. That she wasn't alone.

On the sofa, resting with his eyes closed, was Hero. He lay perfectly still, she couldn't even tell if he was breathing. If he needed to at all. For a few seconds, she found herself staring at him in that sleep-like state. Then, she tippy-toed back to 'her' room, careful to not make any noise disturbing the AI.

This would be the longest week of her life.

Yes, this is an update xD I managed to write something of for this story again.

Even though I'm more motivated for other stories, I don't intend to abandon this one.

I won't make it that long either (hopefully), but for now, no end in sight.

Not the best chapter, but deal with it. >_< I tried.

Lots of love and leave me some comments please ;3; It's my sorce of power xD

♥