Like A Fairytale

Chapter 45

Minnie (Danielle)

For an AI like her, it was unusual to suddenly not only exist in Burgstadt and in the systems of the headquarters, but at the same time to walk through the corridors of the large estate in human form. To see the seat of government, a small town of its own with inhabitants, to talk to the employees: this form of freedom had been foreign to her until now.

Finally, she could laugh, joke... Her hologram couldn't do that, and she wasn't allowed to. No one knew that the AI had long since become a sentient being, had its own will and its own plans.

It gave her great pleasure to joke with the other maids while at the same time keeping her eyes on Burgstadt. Data, information... Vast amounts of code wandered through their systems without hindering them from playing a human.

Minnie, or Danielle, as she now called herself, smiled. She had wiped the dust. In one of the rooms, a young lady would soon move in with her mother. For a celebration. Now she polished one champagne glass after the other. Sparkling, fragile glass that she shouldn't break. A dazzling treasure of the people.

But Danielle smiled, not because of this trivial, monotonous activity, but because she had seen Flo. That's right. She could have hugged the boy. He looked different through human eyes. Prettier. And he was quite similar to his sister, which she had noticed less through the cameras.

Lena.

Minnie hasn't had the pleasure of meeting her as a human yet. That wasn't her job anyway. She had to make friends with Flo and prevent him from meeting the wrong people. Their plan was not without risk from the beginning. But what else should she do? Allow her boy to die in a village?

The villages...

Something had to change.

Humans were thoroughly problematic, but old safety precautions prevented AI from taking direct action against them.

Flo shouldn't have been so close to the wrong person.

She hadn't been able to stop Flo. Mina hadn't been able to stop him. She had not been able to stop the elevator in which he came. Who had sent Flo?

A disruption of the plan at an inopportune time. Who was it?

Had he met Ferry, whom Mina had not been able to hinder either?

An interference signal prevented Mina and Minnie from doing so, which had been sent too early. The AI lost access to the cameras and the elevators. They couldn't be found out. They could not prevent the early start of the operation, and Flo HAD to arrive. If not, it could mean the loss of that job. After all, he was not without blemish. People would be stricter with him than with anyone else. Especially today.

To keep him here, to come up with a good reason...

Who had started the interference signal too early? It has run for some time now. Some time was enough for Minnie to get nervous. The plan was not allowed to fail.

The celebrations that took place were considered particularly important.

Stressed people hurried through the corridors, greeted the first guests...

Who had sent the signal?

They could not prevent Ferry from entering his own rooms. They would only make themselves suspicious... Too late, Mina realized that the plan started too early. They had lost access to the systems and the cameras. A human error and not theirs. Or, rather, perhaps a half-human error. Shortly before the contact broke off, she sent Minnie a warning. But it only half arrived.

Had Number 5 started the signal?

Shadows didn't work perfectly. They were semi-human, and their codes could be faulty, which is why they often had to be maintained.