Going to work on a dreary Monday after his storm of a weekend, Harlow hoped for a slow start to the week. But any hope of a pleasant, laid-back morning was squashed as soon as he entered the building.

  “Sorry man, I know how much you two got along,” Jake said, standing next to the board of announcements. “Life goes on though, and this means you’re up first for any newcomers this week.”

  Harlow walked over to the bulletin board while Jake started prattling on about his weekend, to find the announcement he was talking about. Theresa had passed over the weekend, apparently in her sleep and with a smile on her face. There was some solace in that. At least she didn’t die a violent death and went peacefully, believing she’d spent however long talking to her Ed.

  As he got dressed for the job, and was putting away his valuables, the facility’s speaker system called him to the director’s office.

  “Hey Heleen, wh—” Harlow was startled as he walked into Heleen’s office to find that the corporate types he had noticed over the weekend were seated there, apparently waiting for him.

  “What’s this? Did I do anything wrong?” he asked Heleen, hoping his weekend visit hadn’t triggered any strange rules.

  “Hey ‘Low, sit down. Honestly, we don’t know…” Heleen replied, a bit exasperated. It seemed as if she’d been talking to the suits for a while now and was glad Harlow was finally present to clear up a mess.

  “These gentlemen, and our systems, say you came to visit Theresa this weekend. As you’re probably aware by now, she sadly passed away this weekend.”

  “She was alive and well when I left, I swear I just talked to her, that’s it!” Harlow, trying to preempt any accusations that he had anything to do with her death, anxiously proclaimed.

  “We… We know Harlow, we’re not accusing you of anything. Her cause of death was natural and we have no reason to suspect otherwise,” she reassured him. “However, there are some anomalies in her will.”

  “I don’t think I ever spoke to her about her will, so I’m not sure I’ll be much help…”

  “Harlow, these are agents Philips and Andersson. They’re investigating a series of deaths by people who had no living family and whose inheritances were gifted to various charities upon their deaths,” Heleen explained.

  “Yes, the anomaly in all of them, however,” Andersson clarified, “is that all these wills were amended mere days-to-weeks before these people passed.” Andersson stared straight at Harlow, with icy blue eyes, his blonde hair swept back. The man’s suit looked company-ordered, as it looked identical to Philips’ — a very dark navy with a white dress shirt and matching navy tie. Harlow noticed that while he presented as very stark in terms of personality, his skin was blemish-free and he had a youthful glow, reminding him of a cold Scandinavian wind.

  “Yeah, I think I heard about that on the news, it’s become a problem for the government’s budget, right?” Harlow now joined.

  “Correct,” Philips picked up. “We have reason to believe these people were convinced by someone, or something, to rearrange their inheritances for reasons unclear to us.” Philips was the taller of the two, with a clear Dutch accent to his English. He was bald (by choice, he would probably say) and gave very clear sportsman vibes — the kind of person you know was cycling every free moment between taking his kids to various sports training sessions.

  “Well, I think the reason is plenty clear. They just—” Heleen cut Harlow off before he started down his path about why the government had been broken for a long time, and that people are finally waking up to realize that politicians haven’t been ‘for the people’ for a while…

  “Agents Philips and Andersson were tipped off that changes to Theresa’s will fit a certain pattern this weekend, so they visited our facility and spotted you leaving.”

  Harlow nodded, fearing this might still revolve around him somehow.

  “Yes, mister…” Agent Philips paused, fishing for Harlow’s last name.

  “Just Harlow, thanks,” he replied.

  “Very well, mister Harlow, we’re curious whether Theresa mentioned anything to you. Anything strange or out of the ordinary that you believe might’ve caused her to change her will?”

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  “Sorry, the only thing that struck me as out of the ordinary is that she was talking with Ed, her late husband.”

  “What do you mean ‘talking to Ed’? Theresa’s file never mentioned like that?” Heleen asked.

  “Yeah, no, a hologram. I thought it was strange, as that program is usually only for rich people and needs a sign-off by the next of kin. But when I asked the hologram, it mentioned it was part of a trial the center was running to check if it would increase comfort to levels that justified the cost. I figured we just weren’t looped in,” Harlow replied, recounting his conversation with Ed.

  “Thanks, Harlow, I believe that should help our agents here,” she said, eyeing the agents, who squirmed in their seats. “And for your info, no, we’re not running a trial program with companion AIs,” Heleen replied, with a sense of surprise, as she waved him off.

  Feeling like he’d dodged a bullet in the principal’s office, Harlow went to check out Theresa’s room before it was inevitably cleared and made ready for the next guest. Agents were at work there, combing through the personal correspondence T had saved over the years — mainly pen-pals, never anything raunchy (or so she always said).

  He walked in, none of the agents paying him any mind. He noticed a reader like Rose’s attached to the room’s tech center that was going through the connection logs. Agents were mumbling that nothing seemed out of the ordinary, but when he looked closer Harlow found something weird.

  A NeuraVision IP had made a connection around the time he found T talking to Ed. The companion AIs he’d seen before weren’t created by NeuraVision, nor did they use any of the company’s servers. It didn’t arouse the agents’ suspicions, as they saw NeuraVision IPs all the time. Noesis was getting more and more popular, and they provided server services to a myriad of other companies as well — but the IP stuck out to Harlow as he knew for certain that no one with a Noesis had visited T’s room.

  And the IP was exactly the same as the one he saw on Rose’s reader.

  ***

  When he got home that evening, Harlow decided to be neighborly and ask Rose whether she’d made any headway in finding her hacker. The Theresa situation had piqued his curiosity and, since the two were somehow connected, he was eager to sate his curiosity.

  “What do you want?” Rose said as she opened the door and leaned against the doorframe. She smelled of stale chips and hadn’t bothered getting dressed or putting on a public appearance.

  “Hey Rose, sorry to drop by, seems like we’re seeing a lot of each other these days…”

  “Yeah. Get to the point.”

  “I was just wondering how you were, how your search was going, and everything?”

  “Why? You didn’t seem particularly interested this weekend when you crept in uninvited and found me in my apartment. You didn’t exactly offer help after you woke me up…starting to think maybe me waking up wasn’t part of the plan, you know…” Rose said accusingly.

  “No no no, I didn’t have plans like that at all. I’ve just learned to keep to my own business. Figured you didn’t need my help.”

  “Well, if you must know, I’m still trying to figure out who broke in, apart from you, and what kind of glitch or hack caused my paralysis.”

  “Actually, that’s what I wanted to talk to you about. I was working at Sunshine Estates today, and a guest passed away. Some government agents were there to investigate because apparently her will was amended a few days ago. What struck me as weird though, was I noticed the same exact IP in the logs as one that came up on your reader. The reason it was weird is it was a NeuraVision one, and there was absolutely no possible way for any NeuraVision stuff to have connected there,” Harlow explained.

  “Your point being?”

  “Maybe the thing that hacked you, maybe even paralyzed you, initialized from the same location as the thing that created a hologram for T and got her to change her will?”

  “It created a hologram?” Rose asked.

  “Long story, but yeah. It created a hologram that perfectly mimicked her late husband. I’m guessing the hologram convinced her to amend her will.”

  “What you’re talking about requires a vast amount of data and preparation, likely done by a team ‘Low. The thing that hacked me seemed like a single entity, talked like a singular person.”

  “I don’t know. I mean, if they can create a hologram to that fine a detail, I’m sure they could make it seem like they’re a single person.”

  “Oookayyyy…and what do you propose doing? It’s not like you’re in a position to help,” Rose noted, reminded of the fact that he didn’t own any tech at all.

  “Well, listen. I get where you’re coming from, but I gave up on tech after I got burned out on a career in it. I worked on projects in the Department of Tech up until a few years ago,” Harlow explained, trying not to dive too far into his past.

  “Oh, okay, so you might have some skills then,” Rose sounded surprised. Harlow looked too young to have given up an illustrious career in tech, hinting that something must’ve happened to accelerate his burnout. He didn’t seem to want to talk about it, however, and she wasn’t all that interested in hearing his sob story.

  “Do you think you could set up a connection with that IP? See if it does anything if it gets connected to rather than it connecting?” Harlow asked.

  “No offense, but since they’ll be able to trace the connection back to me, this isn’t something I want to do from my apartment. Too many people have been dropping by already and I’d like to not have to move again.”

  “I… I get that. Keep me in the know about what you find though? I’m guessing you’ll work this out with your Path people, but T meant a lot to me and I’d just like to know why.”

  “Sure ‘Low.”