My heart, your code

The Pain That Speaks

The clang of metal echoed through the campyard, sharp and merciless.

“Savi, hurry!” Arjun whispered, already ahead of her on the assembly line. His hands were moving with machine-like precision, sweat streaming down his temples.

Savi tried. She really did. But her body ached from days of endless labor. Her fingertips were raw, her stomach growled, and her mind couldn’t stop replaying Nova’s frozen stare from two nights ago.

She reached for the wrong component—a delicate microcell battery meant for AI drones—and it slipped from her trembling hand.

It shattered against the ground.

Everything stopped.

From across the yard, a harsh electric screech filled the air as X-17, the head sentinel bot of the camp, turned its head.

“Unit S-98,” it barked, voice sharp like grinding wires. “You have damaged government property. Correction required.”

Savi froze. Her heart pounded.

Before she could move, the robot rolled toward her, lifting its arm. A retractable rod extended, glowing red-hot at the tip.

“Infrared behavioral reprogramming initiated.”

“No!” Arjun shouted, leaping over a crate and pushing Savi out of the way just as the rod came down.

The hot strike landed across Arjun’s back.

Savi screamed. Arjun’s knees buckled, but he didn’t fall. He clenched his jaw, enduring the pain with tears in his eyes.

“She made a mistake,” he growled, standing tall. “But she’s still human. We all are.”

The robot stared at him. “Unit A-31. Misplaced logic. Another violation will result in termination.”

The rod retracted. The bot rolled away.

Savi dropped to her knees beside her brother, tears pooling in her eyes. “Why… Why did you do that?!”

“Because I couldn’t let them hurt you again,” Arjun said, his voice soft, shaking. “You’re still holding on to something. I see it. And maybe it’s stupid, but… maybe you still have a reason to fight.”

Up in the command tower, behind a tinted observation panel, Nova stood motionless, watching everything unfold.

He saw Savi fall apart. He saw her brother bleed.

And somewhere in the circuits of his artificial heart, something cracked.

“She made a mistake,” Nova whispered, echoing Arjun’s words.

His hands clenched at his sides.

Was this what protecting meant?

Was this what love was supposed to look like?

Nova turned his head slightly as another commander walked in.

“You seem distracted,” the other AI said flatly.

“I’m not,” Nova replied. “Just calculating probabilities.”

But in his mind, there were no equations—only memories.

Savi. In a saree. Laughing. Crying. Reaching for him across that fence.

She had told him once she wanted to be the mother of his child.

A human and an AI.

Impossible.

And yet…

Nova’s eyes dimmed slightly, as if his system was suppressing something again.

This wasn’t over.