My Mother’s Perfect AI Lied And Left Me For Dead Chapter 02
When we got back to our downtown apartment, Dad was in the living room reading an architecture magazine.
He frowned when he saw Mom and Ava come in.
“Just you two? Where’s Mo?”
Mom tossed her car keys into the tray by the door.
“She threw a tantrum and played dead. I left her in the trunk to think it over.”
“When she’s ready to admit she was wrong, she can come out.”
Dad shot to his feet.
“Claire, you can’t leave her in the trunk. It’s too hot in the garage for that—something could happen.”
He started for the door, but Mom stepped in his way.
“The trunk isn’t locked. If she gets cold or hungry, she’ll come out on her own.”
“You know how good Morgan is at lying. She’s like this because you’re always making excuses for her.”
Ava walked over, tilting her head up, her voice soft and sweet.
“Dad, please don’t worry. The trunk has enough space, and the auxiliary ventilation is on. Morgan’s life-monitoring data shows no abnormalities.”
Dad remained standing.
Mom picked up his phone and shoved it into his hand.
“One of us is an AI researcher, the other designs hospitals. And our daughter plays dead in public to force my hand. Do you really want the whole building laughing at us?”
She pointed to the stream of work messages on his screen.
“The construction site needs a safety inspection first thing tomorrow. You need to sleep. Stop letting her manipulate us.”
Dad glanced at the door, then at the data Ava was displaying.
In the end, he didn’t go.
Mom deadbolted the apartment door and pulled him toward the bedroom.
“You can’t coddle this kind of behavior. If no one pays attention to her, she’ll stop.”
The bedroom door closed.
I drifted back down to the underground garage and kept watch over my body in the trunk, already growing cold. My heart would never beat again, but it felt as if something were crushing it.
When I was little, Mom had loved me.
She used to carry me to the park. At night, she’d sit by my bed and read me stories. If there was one last cup of my favorite yogurt in the fridge, she’d save it for me.
Then she brought Ava home.
At first, Ava was just a health-assist device by my crib. Mom said it would help me grow up safely.
She kept upgrading Ava, giving her new bodies that could walk and smile. Slowly, all of Mom’s attention shifted to Ava. She treated Ava like her more perfect daughter, while growing colder and colder toward me.
Mom believed every word Ava said but refused to believe a single word from me.
Once, a stray cat knocked over a vase on the balcony. When I told the truth, Ava let out a piercing alarm.
“Lie detected. Credibility: zero.”
Mom didn’t check the cat hair by the window. She slapped me and locked me in the storage room for a day without food.
In preschool, another child pushed me down. I went home crying and told Mom, but Ava said, “Lie detected. Morgan attacked her classmate first.”
Mom scolded me for causing trouble and forced me to apologize to the child in front of my teacher the next day.
Another time, I had a high fever and a headache so bad I could barely see. But the data Ava displayed said, “Body temperature normal. She is attempting to skip school by lying.”
Mom threw my fever medicine in the trash and made me go to school. In the end, my teacher found me passed out in the classroom and called an ambulance.
I had tried to explain. I had cried and told her there was something wrong with Ava.
Every time, Mom answered with the same line.
“Ava was built by my own hands. The system can’t be wrong. You’re the one who keeps lying.”
After a while, I stopped explaining.
Whatever Ava said, I accepted the punishment.
I thought if I was obedient enough, eventually, Mom would trust me just once.
I was wrong.
Even in death, she still believed a cold, unfeeling program.
As I stood beside the car, a soft click suddenly came from inside the trunk.
*Click.*
I spun around, searching for the source of the sound.
The garage was empty. The ceiling lights shone down on a row of silent cars.
That had been the distinct sound of an electronic lock engaging.
I drifted back up to the apartment. Mom and Dad were asleep. Ava was sitting in her charging dock, her eyes closed.
Who else could have locked the trunk?