Manuel Gonzales - The Regional Office Is Under Attack!

Rose hadn’t been told there’d be a robot.

That hadn’t been in any of the literature, hadn’t been part of any Assassin Training Camp seminars or lectures, hadn’t been part of any post — Regional Office debrief, not that she’d gotten any real post — Regional Office debriefing. Everyone had somehow failed to mention that one day, ten years into her future, ten years after the attack on the Regional Office, a robot would show up hell-bent on ruining her life — not to mention killing her — for all that Regional Office bullshit.

Ten fucking years.

Jesus, a long fucking time. They waited a long fucking time for revenge.

Not that she was bitter that no one had told her about there being a fucking robot.

Not that she cared that the men and women she had trained with those years ago, had assaulted the Regional Office with, had all but completely fallen off the face of the earth. But Jesus Christ, was it too much to expect a card at Christmas? A phone call on her birthday? Forwarding information and a new phone number just in case, oh, who knows, a fucking robot stomped into her fucking yarn and bead shoppe and started tearing shit all to hell?

It swung its robot arm at her. She pivoted, grabbed it by that same arm, heaved it through the wall, except that how that actually transpired went more like: It grabbed her by her face and smashed her head through the cash register.

Fucking robots.

Rose often pictured them coming in here, Henry and Emma.

Not right at that moment, though. God, what a fucking embarrassment that would have been if those two showed up just as she was getting her ass handed to her by some two-bit-looking robot that wasn’t even fully covered in synthetic skin.

No. If it were a choice between suffering a painful and brutal death at the hands of this crusher or suffering that kind of embarrassment in front of Henry or Emma? Rose would take the painful and brutal death every time, friend, and thank you very much.

Not that she hadn’t pictured that moment, though, that awkward and awful reunion.

The bell over the door would tinkle. She wouldn’t look up, not right away, even though she would know it was them, would sense it in her skin. Maybe Henry would clear his throat or Emma would say, “Hello, dear,” the way she did, and Rose would look up and smile at them, briefly, just so they knew that she knew they were there and that something was in store for them. She would offer them something to drink, some cookies, maybe, because for whatever fucking reason, whenever she pictured this moment, she pictured herself in it having just baked a batch of chocolate-chip cookies. They would catch up on what was new and relive old times, and then, just when they were comfortable, just when the last tattered shreds of awkwardness and discomfort had fallen away, bam, she’d pull out the banker box of files she kept in her storage closet, throw that shit on the table in between the two of them, and then yell at them: Ten, there are ten more fucking boxes just like this one.

Then she’d pull out a file, it wouldn’t matter which one, and open it up and read from the top:

Subject suffers violent and debilitating nightmares.

Subject often uses sex as a weapon.

Subject suffers from deep trust issues.

No shit, Sherlock, she would say. That’s the thing about being the subject who was abducted when you were fucking sixteen and trained to be a superpowered assassin with the promise that you’ll help save the world when really all you’re doing is settling a fucking score.

Subject is often violent to herself and others.

She wouldn’t show them the scars. She wouldn’t have to.

Subject often lies for no apparent reason.

She could go on.

She would go on. She would go on and on and on.

She kept all the receipts, too. Every therapist visit, every prescription filled, ever since the attack on the Regional Office. Just in case. She had the receipts taped to individual sheets of blank paper, all professional and shit, and then tabulated in a spreadsheet — a highlighted spreadsheet. She had all of this ready for the day that one of those assholes showed up, not that they ever would, but had it just the same, neatly organized, and then, stapled to the front, a fifteen-page itemized bill, and at the bottom of that bill, in all caps and in red, next to the line “Total Due,” she’d stamped: “YOU OWE ME MY LIFE BACK, YOU FUCKERS.”

She’d ordered that stamp specially made online.

She had pictured this moment often — the banker’s box, the invoice — but no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t make it feel as delicious a moment as she wanted it to be when she imagined it happening.

A failure of her weak imagination, perhaps, or maybe she just knew them too well, knew they wouldn’t care. They wouldn’t even fucking apologize. They weren’t the type. There’d be no, Sorry we took you from the life that you knew, from your family, from your friends, sorry we whisked you away and made promises, so many goddamn promises, all of which we failed to keep. No, Sorry we made you cut that one dude in half, that you still think of him from time to time, wonder about his family, whether he had one, what they might’ve been told about him, about how he died, sorry you can’t stop picturing the stunned look in his eye.

They would justify. That’s who they were.

She had wanted to leave the life she had been living, they would remind her.

She had wanted to get away from her dumb and neglectful father, her overbearing and angry mother, her pitiful and untempered sister.

She had hated her friends, hated her hometown.

She had hated her life.

She had told them so herself. They came for her just when she needed them most.

And what about those promises? What about what they gave her, the training, the powers they helped her discover within herself, helped her unleash and hone? The adventure, the thrills. Not to mention, she had been paid handsomely. She had been offered work after the Regional Office job. She had been offered a new life if she’d wanted it, an apartment in Biarritz, a new name, a new way forward, and she chose. She chose the life she chose. They had done everything they said they would. They molded her, taught her a craft, and then watched her become so very, very good at it. Could she give them that, at least?

And yes, she could give them that at least.

She was very good at what they trained her to be, but so what?

So what if she was good at this thing?

It wasn’t her life, wasn’t the life she had thought she’d wanted, wasn’t the life she was supposed to live.

Not to mention they broke her fucking heart.

She couldn’t help but think that the whole robot thing just seemed so dated.

The whole fucking enterprise just seemed so dated to her now. Coldhearted revenge, a comeuppance for crimes she’d committed in her past, etc., and so on.

Not that the robot looked dated. It looked sleek and ultramodern, and kind of feminine. Kind of like a girl.

Although every robot that wasn’t sheathed in some kind of humanlike skin — and this one wasn’t — reminded her of Robocop. Even the sleek, newer-looking ones. Maybe that was the new thing with robot design, though, some hipster kind of return to the retro. No more hiding the robot bits underneath synthetic skin and wigs and clothes. Less T-1000 from Terminator and more Maximilian from The Black Hole, or B-9 from Lost in Space . It was sad, really, she thought. This whole fucking thing would have been easier to swallow if Rutger Hauer were on the other end of this battle to the death.