Random wasn’t back yet, so I continued to work on fixing up the bathroom. She may have been smart, but it takes a genius to hear what these machines were saying. Anyone can put together a few wires and gears. She could build things well, I’ll give her that. But that’s just the outer shell. The part of the machine no one sees is within the time you put into it, which she clearly didn’t put enough in.

 

“I thought she understood…” I murmured, as I continued fine tuning the water pressure.

 

After I finished adjusting the water pressure, I headed back to our room. I was thankful that she let me stay here, but it was hard to talk to her when she didn’t understand half of what I was saying. It was like talking to any other human; they didn’t understand. I turned toward what she was working on and questioned how she could have almost let that thing go off, causing a small explosion in no less than two days. I shrugged and went to sit on my bed.

 

The clouds outside looked unusually grey, but that didn’t surprise me. They’ve been shifting strange colors again recently. It didn’t bother me though because I was inside most of the time, working on my machines, most of which were waterproof thanks to the metal covering I’ve created for them. But that last storm we had a few weeks ago actually managed to short them out. I still couldn’t figure out this phenomenon.

 

“Are you hissing again?”

 

After averting my attention from the window I looked toward Random’s machine again. Ever since I prevented it from exploding, I could hear a faint hiss from it, like it was asking me to repair it once more.

 

“I’ve fixed all interior and exterior problems that could arise. What more could I give you?” I asked, not expecting a response.

 

I should have felt rather stupid talking to this thing, but machines were the only thing I could hear the “true” voice of. The human heart could either tell the truth or lie. A machine only spoke one language, one that didn’t betray or was filled with false truths.

 

“All right.” I push myself out of bed. “I’ll see if anything else is wrong with you, but Random doesn’t like me working on you.”

 

After I got over to it I looked it up and down for anything that could be causing it to sputter or malfunction, feeling along the exterior surface for any cracks or slits. After I finished I concluded I couldn’t find anything exteriorly speaking wrong with it. So I decided to open the side panel and look for anything wrong inside it. Wires crisscrossed back and forth, plugged in to various ports. Nothing looked frayed or severed, and all the lights on the side flashed blue and green in almost perfect harmony.

 

“What is wrong with you?” I ask myself as I slowly look up and down it.

Exasperated, I close the panel and take a step back.

 

I became flustered till I remembered having a similar problem, where it looked fine inside and out but still wouldn’t stop insisting that I’d take notice of it. I had used my OPA or “Optimized Personal Assistant” then. I had modified a few old iPads and laptops till I got my own personalized device, using parts from both sides. It had taken some time constructing it into such a useful device, but thanks to it, I could do as much as I wanted and more with a few button presses. It even had a scanner in it that allowed me to view machines on a deeper level, to tell what really was going on with them.

 

After turning on the scanner, I aimed it at her machine and pushed the button. It then emitted two, thin yellow beams on either side of it, sending a third, wider beam between them. This together created a thin, paper like beam that scanned it from top to bottom. Once finished, the results showed up on my screen. What I saw left mespeechless.

 

“Now let’s see-!” I stopped, unable to construct words.“This is impossible! It can’t b-“

 

A sound like a sliding door closing caught my attention.

 

“Dizzy, you here?” a voice called from the living room.

 

Crap, Random was home. If she saw this, she’d start hammering me with questions like I was a nail being pounded into solid wood. I’d modified a lot of her things, who’s to say I wasn’t responsible for this, even though even I didn’t have the knowledge to construct something such as this. But one thing was certain; something like this is something she didn’t need to see.

I could hear her footsteps echoing down the hall, getting closer to the room every second, and I knew she was going to walk right through that door any second. I needed a plan and I didn’t feel like talking to her right now, so I ran over to my bed, avoiding her various junk on the floor, and pretended to be asleep.

 

“Dizzy, you in…? Fast asleep already?”

 

I didn’t know what was going through her mind, but I lay there as steadily as I could. I wanted to get up, to leave and be able to understand what I’d just saw. But it didn’t sound like Random was leaving anytime soon. From what I could hear, she came in and sat on her bed. An hour had passed before I woke up and realized I fell asleep and not get to finish what I discovered. However, I could hear Random breathing behind me, so I just decided to stay there and go back to sleep; better to deal with it in the morning.

 

The next day I woke with a start. I sat up and looked around. Random was nowhere to be found and I was still holding my OPA.

 

“That’s right!”

 

I quickly opened the scan the OPA took last night and looked at it again. It was impossible to believe that she had stumbled across this, even by accident. I couldn’t let her know about it. So I buried the information under a file only I’d know how to get into and let it go for another day. For the rest of the today, I noticed that her machine didn’t hiss or hum or anything of the sort. It was like me scanning it had solved the problem. So I decided to just tinker with a new security system I had in mind for the home. She didn’t have one and I thought installing one might be a good idea. I didn’t know where Random was, nor did I care much. It wasn’t till late into the night that things got crazy.

 

I had woken up in the middle of the night because I was thirsty and decided to get a glass of water. When I came back to try and lay back down, I noticed Random fidgeting and struggling in her sleep, like she was having a nightmare.

I tried to ignore it and crawled back into bed, but then she started muttering random things in her sleep. It was beginning to get difficult to sleep and I wanted to get up and slap some sense into her. Unable to sleep soundly, I decided to walk over to her and watch her, deciding if I wanted to wake her or not.

 

As I watched her I was able to make out bits and pieces of her dreams through her sentences.

 

“Damn you Aurora… Cocoa was…”

 

“Mom and Dad, no! That damn wolf… I’ll kill it…”

 

“If it wasn’t for Dizzy… Maybe Cody would…”

 

“Mrs. Natsume… It’ll never… How could you…”

 

“If it wasn’t for me?” I whispered, trying not to wake her.

 

What did she have against me? It was her decision to allow me to stay here with her, so she can’t pin blame on me. And what was that about a wolf? I could never interpret dreams all too well, but I kept listening anyway. The more I watched though, the more agitated she became. I wanted to wake her up, to get her to stop squirming and struggling, but I was starting to become afraid of her. Like any sudden movement would cause her to confuse a dream for reality and result in me getting hurt, or worse. I didn’t want to think about it.

 

“Why!” she cried out, causing me to nearly stumble over backward.

 

“Are your d-dreams always this c-crazy?” I ask, knowing I’ll get no response.

 

She continued to toss and turn as she lay there, gripping and digging into her palms with her nails. I thought I imagined it at first, but eventually I started to see blood drip from them. That’s when I decided I couldn’t let her stay in this state much longer, or she’d end up destroying her hands.

 

My heart was racing and I could feel sweat starting to bead along my forehead. I didn’t know what to do or how to react to something like this. If a machine broke down, I’d be able to just replace a part or make minor adjustments. But this was a human, and my mind was racing faster than light to come up with a solution, and even then I could come up with nothing short of going over to her and trying to shake her. So I slowly began to shake her, to see if she’d wake up. It was too little too late to step back then. She grabbed my shoulders so quickly I staggered back, but she held on and began shouting at me as if I was the cause of all her problems.

 

“You caused her to be like this! She was killed by you!”

 

She continued to shout and scream as I struggled to break free from her grip. Never in my life would I have loved a security turret pointed at her right now, ready to stun her and let me go. She was freaking me out now and I couldn’t get away. My heart raced faster and faster as I struggled to break free of her grasp, but her hands were like bear traps; they held on no matter how hard I tried to pry them away. They were starting to dig into my arms the same way she dug into her palms.

 

“Random, wake up!” I yelled at her, hoping she’d snap out of it. No such luck.

 

“My parents! Give them back…” she replied, sobbing slightly.

 

“Random, it’s a dream, wake-“ I said as I struggled, but it was useless.

 

I was on the floor and momentarily dazed before I realized what had happened. I raised my hand to my cheek and flinched. She’d slap me hard enough to send me halfway across the room, a red hand print left across my left cheek to prove it. Even after that, she was still struggling and fighting, almost as if she was wrestling with someone. I was so afraid to approach her now and in total shock I didn’t move; I didn’t want to be hit again. That’s when she got up and began walking toward me, almost like her business with me wasn’t finished. Her eyes were halfway open but I could tell she was still asleep, walking toward me like a zombie, muttering things I couldn’t hear.

 

Cornered with nowhere to go, I screamed.

 

In a blinding flash, Tipsy ran through the door and leapt toward Random, clawing her across the face.

 

“Wake up, Miss Dadalian!” she cries as she landed on the other side of her.

 

I didn’t quite understand it, but it looked like she had those fits more often than tonight, and I knew I didn’t want to be part of them.

 

“Tipsy, why did you-“

 

She stopped mid-sentence and turned toward me. She must have noticed me shaking or the hand mark across my face where she slapped me 20 seconds ago or the marks on my arms. At that point I couldn’t tell who was shaken up more; me or her. She looked ready to burst into tears at her mistake.

 

“Dizzy… I d-didn’t mean t-to…”

 

“Forget it,” I tell her coldly as I get up and headed toward the door.

 

Even in her dreams she didn’t like me. If it wasn’t for Cocoa… Those words buzzed in my head as I walked toward the door. I didn’t want to look back; I wanted to keep walking, maybe even run. But I wasn’t going to let my fear get the better of me. I turned back one last time.

 

“I’m sleeping in the living room. If you want me, you know where to find me.”

A tear trickled down my cheek but I quickly wiped it away. Truthfully, I wanted to cry. I thought I had found someone who understood me, who I could relate to. But maybe it was all a lie. Maybe there wasn’t anyone who I could truly relate to.

 

Once the sliding door shut behind me I ran toward the couch and piled my face into a pillow, crying and sobbing till my emotions finally let me sleep.