Chapter 4 4

Keyon woke up with a headache that felt like a drill boring into his temples. He groaned and rolled over, his hand blindly slapping the nightstand.

"Water," he croaked.

His hand hit polished wood. Nothing.

He opened one eye. The glass of electrolyte water that was always there-fresh, with a slice of lemon, placed by Elodie every night before she slept-was missing.

"Elodie!"

His voice cracked.

Silence. The room was dead quiet. The humidifier, usually humming with a scent of eucalyptus, was off. The air was dry and stale.

Keyon sat up, fury rising in his chest. He threw the covers off.

He walked into the massive walk-in closet. He stopped.

His suit for the day wasn't hanging on the valet stand. His tie wasn't selected. His shoes weren't polished and waiting.

"Is she serious?" Keyon muttered. "She's on strike?"

He grabbed a grey suit at random. He couldn't find the matching trousers. He pulled a tie from the rack, but it was wrinkled.

He looked at his phone. 7:15 AM.

His alarm hadn't gone off.

"Why didn't the alarm go off?" he shouted at the empty room.

He didn't know that Elodie managed the shared calendar alerts. She had deleted the recurring event: Wake Keyon.

He stomped downstairs in his robe, his hair messy. He saw a figure in the kitchen.

"Where is my coffee?" he snapped. "And why is this house freezing?"

Mrs. Lee turned around, her eyes wide with fear. "Mr. Schneider... Mrs. Schneider isn't here."

Keyon stopped. Reality crashed back in. Right. She left.

"Fine," he spat. "Make me a coffee. Ethiopian blend. 195 degrees."

He sat at the dining table. Mrs. Lee brought him a cup. He took a sip and immediately spat it back into the cup.

"It's bitter! Did you burn the beans?"

"I... I used the machine, sir. Mrs. Schneider usually programs the grind settings."

Keyon slammed the cup down. "Useless. Everyone is useless."

Arlen Brewer walked in, clutching a tablet. He looked stressed.

"Sir, good morning. We have a problem with the schedule."

"What now?" Keyon rubbed his temples.

"Your dental appointment. It was this morning at 8:00 AM. They just called to ask where you are. There was a cancellation fee."

"Why wasn't it on my calendar?"

"Mrs. Schneider... she usually confirms the appointments on Sunday nights." Arlen looked uncomfortable. "It seems... there are holes in the schedule."

"She's doing this on purpose," Keyon said, his face reddening. "She's sabotaging me."

"We should cut her gym membership," Arlen suggested vindictively. "That will get her attention."

---

Elodie sat in the passenger seat of Carter Yost's beat-up Volvo. She was holding a paper cup of bodega coffee. It cost two dollars. It tasted better than the burnt sludge Keyon was currently screaming about.

Carter looked at her hair. He whistled.

"Woah. You went full G.I. Jane. I like it."

"It was in the way," Elodie said.

They pulled up to a red brick building in Brooklyn. This was Carter's lab. It looked like an abandoned warehouse from the outside. Inside, it was a fortress of servers.

Elodie walked to a terminal. She didn't sit down. She stood, typing with one hand while holding her coffee with the other.

"What are you doing?" Carter asked, leaning against a server rack.

"Cleaning up," Elodie said.

On the screen, a progress bar filled up.

Target: Schneider Estate Home Automation System / User: Admin

Action: Deep System Purge.

"You're wiping the smart home config?" Carter laughed. "That's petty. I love it."

"I wrote the script that integrates the HVAC with the lighting," Elodie said calmly. "It's my intellectual property. I'm revoking the license."

She hit Enter.

Executing Command: Lock Bootloader. Encrypt Root Directory.

User 'Wife' deleted. Admin Access Revoked.

In the Schneider estate, the blinds in the living room suddenly slammed shut. The lights went to full brightness, blinding white. The thermostat reset to default: 55 degrees.

"What the hell is going on?" Keyon screamed, shielding his eyes. "Alexa! Open blinds!"

I'm sorry, I don't have a profile for that voice command, the system replied in a robotic monotone.

Keyon grabbed a vase and threw it at the wall. It shattered.

Back in the lab, Elodie opened a new tab.

Stokes Global Careers.

"You're not serious," Carter said, reading over her shoulder. "You're going to work for Derrick Stokes? Keyon's brother?"

"He's Keyon's enemy," Elodie corrected. "And I need a cover. I need access to their server farm to run the Lugi-X simulations without burning out your grid."

She clicked on Executive Assistant - Administrative Support.

"You're overqualified by about ten PhDs," Carter noted.

"That's the point," Elodie said. "Nobody looks at the assistant."

She clicked Apply.

Back at the mansion, Keyon was trying to change the door code. He punched in the master override.

System Error: Firmware Locked by Developer. Contact Support.

"I am the administrator!" Keyon yelled at the keypad.

He wasn't. Elodie was. And she had encrypted the kernel with a rolling 256-bit key that he wouldn't crack in a hundred years.