The True Master Ch. 03

"Unplug her." I said my voice shaky.

Beth reached around and unplugged Kate. I put the laptop down and went over to her. She was flushed pale, blood was dripping form her lips and her eyes were closed.

"Kate?" I said.

Nothing.

Beth moved her hand to Kate's neck and looked down at her watch. "She's got a steady heartbeat." She said.

"She should, the chip can't effect autonomic functions like I said."

"Is this normal?" asked Beth.

"I don't know!" I almost shouted frustrated. "Fuck!" I swore.

"God damn it I should have waited run more tests!" I said. The program had been perfect I had gone over it a dozen times and rewritten it just as many times to make sure there were not errors. I had messed up, somewhere I had done something wrong and I had killed her.

I was jumping to the worst possible conclusion but I didn't know what else to do.

Going to the kitchen I grabbed a towel and going back out tossed it to Beth who quickly put it to Kate's lips to staunch the bleeding. Picking my laptop back up I began to go through it looking at the different errors that had come up and tried to figure out what had happened.

I read through them, and the clock on the screen slowly ticked through the time.

I read through everything, I looked at everything trying to understand what had happened.

At two in the morning Beth stood up. "Anything?" She asked.

I looked up my eyes bleary from the screen. "I don't know. I could have done something wrong, or what Kate did to escape messed the chip up, or a hundred other things."

I closed my eyes and rubbed at them trying to clear them.

"So is she stuck like this?" Asked Beth.

I shrugged and turned back to the screen. "I don't know enough about the Dolls to do anything." I said miserable. I had killed her.

Kate sat up.

"Kate!" I said the laptop dropping to the floor.

She looked at me her head snapping to me. The eyes, her eyes were different instead of the joy and feistiness I had come to enjoy in them there they were as blank and unconcerned as a Doll.

I shivered and Kate slid off of the couch to kneel in front of me.

"This Doll serves the Master" she said.

"Kate?" I questioned.

She didn't move.

"Stand up." I said.

Kate quickly got to her feet and stood ramrod straight, almost at military attention save for the fact she was leaning forward making her breasts appear larger.

"Does Master wish to name this Doll?" She asked.

I felt the blood draining from my face, this was a part of the standard Doll startup sequence. The Dolls needed a name or a number something to identify them by it was in the first page of the manual in the tablet.

Kate was gone I had killed her or suppressed her. Whatever my program did it had destroyed that part of her that allowed her to resist the chip and be herself in some small way. I collapsed to the ground and I felt the tears welling up in my eyes. The Kate I had known for the past week was gone. It had felt like an eternity but it had only been a week, I had promised to help her but all I had done was kill her.