"Are we declaring bankruptcy soon?" The question echoed in my ears.

Town Hall meetings weren't always difficult, but business transparency raised a challenging discussion. And the answers were vague at best.

I'd left the Assembly Hall with heavy shoulders, trying hard to hold my head high. Though I hadn't been the one under those spotlights, people's eyes followed me out, as if I owed them explanations. And I guessed I did. I was the creator of Dorothea, after all.

I had left Mathew there without a word and rushed into the restroom, hoping to collect myself. Unfortunately, the quarters became easily crowded as everyone else needed to do their business.

Now, I stared at the vending machine in front of me, and my mind had a way of distracting itself.

It was a fascinating piece of technology that automated the payment system. I recalled the trivia I had read up on. Though the modern Earthian ones were created in the 1800s, their basic design had been around since the 1st century AD.

Centuries. I had hoped Dorothea would last longer than a decade, but...

I shook my head. I couldn't think like this. We still had time to save Dorothea.

"You've been standing there for fifteen minutes now." Jenna's voice came from behind me.

I glanced over my shoulder and watched her stride over. She leaned on the marbled counter beside me. No one else was in the breakroom, as if people were afraid to be in the same room with me, but the glass walls let me see everyone lingering outside.

I connected my C-Tap to the vending machine's system and ordered brewed coffee.

"Just getting some coffee," I said as the machine hummed and ground the beans.

"That was a bloodbath in there." Jenna had a way of making things overdramatic. But I guess that was how she made for a great marketer. Her words could sometimes twist like poetry. Not that I knew anything about poetry.

"I'm just glad I wasn't up on the stage with you guys," I told her as I watched the disposable cup move into place.

"It wasn't the best idea to put you up there," she said, crossing her arms over her white blouse. "The Town Hall was meant to provide information about the business to the employees. If we had put you up there—"

"I know. I know." I stopped her. "I wouldn't be able to answer any questions about Dorothea's functionality anyway. At least not right now."

She sighed and looked down at the carpeted floor. For once, she had nothing to say.

A few more seconds and my coffee was ready to go. I intended to take it and leave, but as I pulled the cup from the slot, Jenna jerked her head toward the breakroom's exit.

"I heard your new intern is from Strata 13," she said, and I turned my head.

Mathew stood right outside talking to two women, who were likely interns.

I raised my drink to my lips, feeling the warm steam. "You heard?" I said, inhaling the scent of coffee.

It had been two weeks since I hired him. We had been mostly professional, discussing only work and his experiments, but my mind kept going back to our talk in the bar.

"New guy gets a private lab beside your office. Everyone is talking about him, especially down at the lower levels. People can get envious, you know. But it seems like the girls don't mind so much." She stared at the three interns outside.

I glanced at Mathew again, who was laughing with his friends. "You plan on dating him too?"

Jenna's head snapped to me, and she uncrossed her arms. She took a deep breath before she spoke. "I just mentioned it because I'm from Strata 13 too."

"Oh. I know exactly where you're from, Jenna." I didn't try to hide the derision in my voice.

Jenna stepped away from the counter and took another deep breath. "I'll see you in the meeting this afternoon." Then she walked away.

I grunted, craning my neck to watch the bright lights overhead. I knew I didn't have to be so rude, but her presence alone always triggered me.

I closed my eyes to ease the guilt, and as my vision dimmed, a memory flickered through my mind. A blond teenage boy stood before me, but the image was fuzzy. It went by so fast.

"Emotional interference detected," CC said through my internal audio.

"Emotional? Was that the interference you've been detecting all this time?" I asked, opening my eyes again and looking at the coffee in my hand.

"Yes, it appears to be linked with Mrs. Jenna Witt-Lacson," she replied.

"I'm not surprised she's an interference. But didn't you say it was linked with Mathew?" I placed my coffee on the white counter.

"It is linked to both. I'm also sensing physical stress in your brain. I suggest we skip the second memory retrieval signal for the day and continue tomorrow," she said.

"No, continue as is," I commanded.

"As you wish," she answered.

I looked toward Mathew, who glanced in my direction at the same time. He turned to the women he was talking to and made a gesture to excuse himself. Then he turned and walked toward the breakroom.

I had the urge to avert my eyes, but I held his gaze. He grinned as he entered.

"Hey, boss." He raised a hand. He'd been calling me that since we had our talk in the bar, and I'd been telling him to stop.

"Looks like someone is popular with the girls." I turned to face him.

"Oh. That? No, they were just asking about something for work."

"I'm sure they were."

He rubbed his chin with a thumb. "You can come up and talk to me anytime you want, you know."

"Are you suggesting I'm jealous?" I said with a little laugh.

"Are you?"

"You are too cocky." I retrieved my cup from the counter.

He gave me a one-sided smile. "And you like it."

I was glad I didn't take a sip. Otherwise, I would have spewed it at him. But he wasn't wrong.

I found him amusing, and the tension over my shoulders caused by the Town Hall was gone just like that.

"I forgot to mention I read your Career Profile, by the way," I told him.

"And?" He stepped closer to me.

"I only have one question. Why are you working as an OSMO?" I asked, then I finally took a sip of coffee, letting the drink warm my throat.

He leaned against the counter beside me, turning to face the door. "Do you know why we don't have humanoids walking our streets today?"

"The technology diminished in the early 2300s. People didn't like using them anymore. There was no demand," I answered.

"Yes, but do you know why?" he asked again.

"Uhm—" I couldn't believe it. I didn't have an answer for that question.

Mathew smiled, victorious. "This also goes for why humans are still working. We could have automated everything, you know. But it's not in our nature to just sit around and do nothing. Otherwise, our race would have been wiped out by depression two centuries ago."

"We are creatures searching for meaning," I supplied.

He nodded. "Labor is essential to meaning. People rejected automation. Well, most of it." He shrugged. "We made robots invisible, only using them for minor operations, larger infrastructures, or dangerous expeditions."

"You know so much about this history," I said, taking another sip of my coffee.

He straightened and stepped away from the counter, coming closer to me. "It's one of the things Uncle Bart likes to talk about. It's also the reason why nothing in his restaurant is automated."

Right. The history nerd. "So, you like being an OSMO?"

"I get to go out there closer to the stars. Yeah, I like my part-time job. But I might drop it if I get a permanent gig here." He grinned.

I laughed at that. "Then you better give me something on that experiment of yours," I demanded.

"I've got nothing concrete yet, but I've come up with some theories." He rubbed the back of his neck.

"Theories?" I looked around. No one had come into the breakroom, and most people outside had already gone back to their offices.

"Yeah. You know how I said that love is an emergent force?" Mathew asked.

I bobbed my head.

"Well, obviously it's generated by biological and cognitive systems." He turned to the vending machine beside me to get himself a drink.

"Obviously," I replied.

"Most frequencies of the brain are already recorded. There's probably no new one to be discovered." His eyes grew distant for a few seconds, then the machine buzzed as it ground the coffee beans.

"Brainwaves have been swept and recorded from 0.1 hertz to 1 kilohertz, though nothing useful was ever detected over a couple of hundred hertz," I agreed.

"But the state of being in love isn't just one frequency. It's complex patterns from cross-frequency coupling." The cup appeared in the machine's slot, and Mathew carefully lifted it. The smell of coffee filled the room once more.

"True," I agreed.

He turned back to me with his cup in hand, taking a sip before speaking. "The point of falling in love is a transient spike. High information. Low energy. Extremely brief. Barely noticeable in graphs."

"We've already established that." I drank from my cup again and noticed it was already empty. I reached over the counter and dropped the disposable cup into a recycling bin.

"I think it doesn't happen for everyone because we're not actively searching for our soulmates," Mathew continued. "But people still fall in love, and there's always a handshake in the system. Then they sync. They share internal timing references and efficiently predict each other. It's a stabilized feedback loop. This explains why falling in love feels explosive, and later love feels calm and grounded. But once you fall in love, you stay in love for life."

That made me pause. "But what about those who fall out of love?"

"I think they simply go out of phase due to difficult circumstances," he replied. "An emotionally catastrophic event can destabilize the system. But the synchronization information is already stored in the memory. If they wanted to, they could easily sync again. That's why couples who divorce are sometimes still drawn to each other. Or at least, after a while, they form a bond of strong friendship. It's still synchronization."

That reminded me of my parents. Even after they divorced, they had been civil with each other. They had worked well together and built Lacson Tech Industry into what it was today.

"As for the point of falling in love," Mathew added. "For those who exhibit it, it's also a one-time event. And synchronization is always achieved. It's guaranteed. Imagine that for Dorothea's feature."

That last part had me smiling. It was exactly what I needed to hear after that stressful Town Hall. "I don't know why, but I like it when you talk technical with me."

He tilted his head to the side. "Huh. So, that's what turns you on." It wasn't even a question. It was a verdict.

I stared at him, my ears burning. How could he be so casual with me?

"Sorry, Behavioral Analyst." He tapped his free hand to his chest. "Anyway, that's also the reason why people instantly feel aligned. Why people feel like they've known someone for years even before they meet."

I blinked, surprised to hear him touch on the topic of familiarity, which I had been feeling about him. But this couldn't be the same thing.

This couldn't be a romantic engagement. Dorothea calculated our incompatibility. It was impossible.

"You're talking about love in metaphysics," I said, ignoring my thoughts about our compatibility.

He shook his head and dropped his empty cup into the bin. "I'm talking about the state of falling in love in metaphysics. But love itself... It's something spiritual. Transcendent. Unexplainable. Uncontrollable."

"Again with the woo-woo." I placed my hands on my hips.

Then he laughed. "That's all I got for now, boss."

I glanced through the glass walls. The hall outside the breakroom was almost empty. Mathew and I had been in here for a while.

I sighed. I wanted to stay longer, but— "Get back to work then."

I didn't look at Mathew as I pivoted. If I had, I would have likely stopped and convinced myself to linger for five more minutes. But I headed out, and as soon as I reached the doorway, a memory flashed in my mind.

Mathew in a gray shirt. But also Jenna, a younger version of her.

"What?" I stopped at the threshold. My eyes fluttered. "CC, stop the search signal for memory," I said.

"But we're almost to the memory," CC said in my neural-direct.

"No, just pause the prompt."

The headache that came was a wave. I closed my eyes and pressed a palm on my forehead.

"Pausing prompt," CC confirmed. "I'm sensing an overload of distress. You are about to faint."

"What?" My legs buckled.

"Kayla!" I heard Mathew call behind me.

"Notifying the Med Unit now," CC said, and it was the last thing I heard before my vision went dark.

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