What the hell does he want from me? I reduced crime by 88 percent. I’m the only damn thing standing in the way of a genocide. By all accounts, I’m a goddamn saint, a hero!

My fist slammed into a large button and my entire office, every single inch of the wall filled with live footage of him – of Caleb – from a thousand different angles.

Every single camera in the city was pointed at him right now, tracking his pointless struggle, his temporary rebellion against order and justice.

Like a dirty rat fleeing the inevitable from a tank, he darted through small alleys bathed in blue by a thousand screens showing everything from news to viagra ads. His every footstep splashed water around him and his hair dripped with muddy water from the roofs above him.

I pressed a button and all the screens a mile in all directions of Caleb showed my face and relayed my words. “Caleb!” I howled. “Just stop.”

Caleb pulled his gun up high. With a deafening roar, a bullet tore a large hole in the middle of a screen, ripping my entire face from it.

“It’s pointless. For every one of your bullets, I have a thousand screens, for every one of your companions I have a hundred thousand bots and for every one of your leads on me I have a million accurate reports on you. So just... Stop. Please stop Caleb.”

He popped open a manhole cover and along with his three companions leapt into the sewer. For some reason, they didn’t think I could reach them there, that I had not figured out where their base was.

But I knew. I knew everything, except how to bring back Caleb – how to bring back my brother.

Ally, my wife, hugged me from behind. “Still won’t budge?”

I shook my head.

“He reminds me a lot of my own brother. Sometimes younger siblings just need to be put in their place. I’m telling you, just send in the bots on stun mode.”

“If I did that he would never give up.”

“I know,” she said, leaping into the office chair next to me. It rolled several lengths across the floor. “My little brother wouldn’t either.”

“Ally,” My head tilted. “What’s Caleb thinking?”

She shrugged. “I dunno.” She tapped her cheek a few times. “Ohhh wait. A billionaire with extensive information networks and an army of robots at his disposal… Check.”

Her office chair spun a few times with her while she tapped her cheek some more. “Abolishment of democracy, check…”

I sunk together on my chair. “You don’t have to put it like that. The last vote was crazy. Democracy doesn’t thrive in burning hatred. Kinda like a delicate flower.”

“I know that,” she said. “Among the most fraudulent votes in history, widespread abuse and rigging by every faction and yadda yadda.”

She smiled. “I read the report. The neutral observers weren’t exactly pleased, but Caleb doesn’t know that. How would that report reach him in the sewers? You never flushed down a copy to him.”

“What do you suggest?” I asked.

She got up and wrapped her arms around my head, pressing my face into her soft belly. “I suggest you relax. We will think about that tomorrow when you’re not hurting so much.”

“I doubt tomorrow will be any better.”

“Sometimes memories are worse than bullets.” she tapped her shoulder. “Getting shot hurts though, holy cow. Like ow imma just pass out right now.” She pet my head and she gave me an emphatic smile. “Maybe you should pass out too. Just for a moment.”

For a while, I let myself be lulled into a sense of comfort. Her gentle hand stroked my head, her smell, like a soft scent of lavender, filled my nostrils.

The sound of her heartbeat throbbed softly in my ear, whispering to my soul how everything would be okay.

“You think he’d wanna read the report?” I asked.

“Don’t ruin the moment.” She ruffled my hair. “Look, the privacy nerd will give up the moment you tell him about your competitors. At least you don’t blackmail anyone or siphon bank accounts.”

“Actually, there was this general of the armies before the coup. He was into some really weird things. Same with the new CEO of CyberSecurity Corp.”

She tilted my head back and pressed her soft lips against my forehead. “Those two bastards don’t count.”

Eventually, I fell asleep, but Ally didn’t.

The cameras in the city kept tracking her as she walked through the town. Every time she passed a bot she would whisper something to it, and it would promptly vacate the area.

Eventually, she reached a manhole near a small alley that was wet with muddy water from the rooftops.

Scattered pieces of plastic and metallic bits decorated the mud like sprinkles on a cupcake and a lone screen hung above with a gaping hole in the center of it, taking up almost exactly the size of a man’s head.

She stared at her phone for about three minutes before climbing into the sewers.

In the sewers five men were waiting for her, aiming their guns right at her.

“Ally,” Caleb said. “What a surprise. Unexpected, but not unwelcome.”

“I’ll cut to the chase,” Ally crossed her arms with a confident grin. “Give it up. You’re outgunned, outmatched and a bunch of damn hypocrites.”

“What part of five red laser dots on your face don’t you get?” Caleb asked.

Ally took several steps forward. “You seem to misunderstand, I’m keeping you hostages, not the other way around.”

Caleb blinked a few times, frowned and looked at a guy with glasses next to him.

The companion shrugged. “We literally don’t detect a single bot-signature in a two-mile radius.”

Caleb waved his gun in front of his face. “Hello? You know there’s shredder rounds in here, right? You saw that monitor outside?”

“The thing is, dear brother in law,” Ally put her hand on Caleb’s gun, lowering it. “If you were to shoot me, what do you think would happen?”

She shrugged. “There’s a million angry bots up there waiting to get the command to tear up the sewers. You’re what? 20 angsty teens who can’t get laid? Except of course four-eyes,” she gestured at the man next to Caleb. “He had sex with the ginger’s sister.”

“You what?” A red-haired man yelled, to which the man with glasses flailed his hands. “Not now.”

“Overall, I think I have the advantage, won’t you say?” Ally pushed Caleb’s gun down into the holster.

“But I have a gun.” Caleb insisted. “You’re my hostage.”

“Yes, you have a gun. Now put it away and let me talk.” She walked past the four companions and leaned against a wall. “Tell you what, we’ll let you all go no strings attached if you stop whatever it is you think you’re doing. You’ll all get a cushy job, some nice cars and new clothes. The girls will all be fawning over you. Sound good?”

The four companions looked at each other. “That actually doesn’t sound so bad…” one of them said.

A red laser dot appeared on the forehead of Ally. “We will not be bribed. Girls? A cushy job? You think this is why we do it?”

Caleb took an aggressive step closer to Ally. “Democracy is dead, by your hands. You declared an election void. Not to mention the coup.”

“The election was tampered with and the previous government was a dictatorship in a thin disguise.”

The cold steel barrel pressed against Ally’s forehead. “The world is, of course, nothing but our conception of it.”

Caleb twisted the gun on her forehead, “But your conception is a delusion. It only exists for you and my brother. You are both tyrants. In the name of the people, you will abdicate or you will die like tyrants.”

“Caleb!” the companion with glasses yelled frantically. “There’s like a thousand bots, we gotta–”

The manhole cover blew off, and ten humanoid cyborgs clad in riot gear leapt down one by one.

This is the exact point where I didn’t need the footage anymore because the next thing to come down the manhole cover was me. “Let her go.”

Caleb pushed Ally in front of himself, holding the gun to her head. “Stand back!”

“Caleb. Listen to me. Let her go and I’ll back off.” I aimed a gun of my own at the companion with glasses.

“Caleb?” One of his companions said.

Sweat dripped down Caleb’s face, and his hands were shaking.

“Caleb! What now?”

The red-haired companion threw his gun up. My gun let out a roar, but a second roar shook me to my very core.

Blood splattered onto the wall and the world went in slow motion. Ally sunk to the ground with a gaping hole in her head.

Emotion washed over me. Worry, sadness, anger. My face must’ve contorted as I let out a roar, and the bots charged at the Caleb and his three companions.

I rushed over to Ally, but there was nothing I could do. With all my knowledge, all my wealth and skill, I could not do a thing. Ally was dead.

Wrath consumed me. He had to suffer, pay for what he did.

My bots tumbled on top of the four men, tying them up with the riot version of cable ties. I pressed my gun against Caleb’s face.

“N-no. I didn’t mean to…” Caleb mumbled. His face met the butt of my pistol.

“I’ll fucking end you!” I screamed at him, before a moment of clarity let me lower my gun.

I grabbed a small camera-bug from the wall between my index finger and thumb. “You see this? I didn’t want to harm you, Caleb. This thing… By things so achingly small are lives measured and marred. By god, I tried to keep the latter to a minimum.”

The camera-bug fell to the ground. “And because of it, Ally is dead, and my brother will be. I was wrong. So very wrong.”

My gun turned in front of my face. “Ally said memories are worse than bullets. I hope she’s right.” My gun roared several times and I put holes in all his companions.

Caleb screamed, but I heard nothing. He pleaded, but I felt nothing. I shot him in the arm, and the shredder round tore his flesh to bits and shattering his bone, pulling it all out on the other side. His arm hung onto his shoulder by a piece of bloodied skin, but I felt not a speck of remorse.

“Detain the officials. Purge the military. Bankrupt my competitors. Kill them all in secret.” I looked at a bot. “The terrorist attacks have gone on for too long. It cost my wife her life. We must crack down and restore peace.”

I lifted my gun without even looking and pressed the trigger. With a loud bang, my brother died.