Carrying an unconscious, bleeding girl in for tea. Not something I did every week, certainly. It’s nothing like carrying a conscious person. When someone is unconscious, they weigh you down much more than when they’re awake. They’re more like a heavy sack than a person. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t struggle to get her up the stairs. I wasn’t sure if this was due to my lack of strength or the girl’s weight, but I didn’t think it would be an especially good idea to ask her for her opinion on the topic later.

All of this, of course, I pondered after the fact. In the moment the only thing on my mind was the breaths of the girl, which became weaker with every passing moment. Without any consideration for the blood that was surely dripping on the carpet on my way up, I made my way hurriedly to the upstairs bathroom with the girl in my arms.

“MB3, analyse patient please,” I said as I lay her in the bathtub with an exasperated exhalation.

“Voice recognition ID verified, analysing patient now,” came the robotic response from the ceiling.

A mechanical arm appeared from behind a sliding metal panel above me and a flickering beam of blue light passed over the girl.

“Injuries detected; confirmation required to proceed with immediate recommended treatment.”

“Confirm,” I replied.

“Beginning treatment.”

I breathed a sigh of relief as I leaned against the bathroom wall, filling my pipe and lighting it once again. It’s a good thing we have a medical bot installed in the mansion, because I wouldn’t know where to start with helping the wounded girl. She looked like she was in a bad state, that much was certain. I wiped the sweat from my forehead.

My sister was probably fuming by now at how late for tea I was. There wasn’t much I could do about that now. I sighed again as I breathed in the fumes of my pipe.

“My protocol recommends that you cease smoking and receive medical treat –”

“Manual override, do not recommend me treatment for smoking, code 3895.”

I’d heard this shit so many times I had the override code memorised.

“Override code received; I will not recommend you quit your unhealthy habit.”

Like hell you won’t. That’s what you said the last fifty times too.

“My operating system updates sometimes reset user preferences,” it said as if reading my mind. All this time the mechanical fingers moved in a blur over the girl as they sterilised and bandaged her wounds.

“Hmph,” I said, indifferent to the robot’s excuse.

***

“Sander,” my sister said.

Oh boy. She was definitely pissed. Viola was never too vocal in front of guests when she got mad – she wanted to keep up appearances – but you could see it in her eyes. She was terrifying. The stabbing look directed my way was murderous.

The girl beside me took a sip wordlessly from her teacup.

“Who is our, guest?” my sister asked.

I could feel the droplet of sweat forming on my brow. How to explain? Oh, she jumped over our wall and tried to kill me but then I helped her defeat a bunch of Chaos monsters. Yeah, that definitely wouldn’t fly.

“Scarlett, was it?” I asked.

She nodded. “Yes, Scarlett Goldbird.”

I nodded slowly. “There you have it, sis.”

The vein in her forehead was practically exploding from under her skin. This was bad. I’d have to think quickly if I wanted to see tomorrow.

“Why is she in my house?” she asked, in a hushed voice, leaning across the corner of the table to get closer to my ear. Scarlett was clearly pretending not to notice the obvious.

“Why is there a medical report for her in my MB3 logs?” my sister continued, the restraint plainly apparent in her voice.

Speaking frankly, in the moment I’d forgotten that she received medical reports of treatment delivered by the house robot on her handheld. At the time I’d been thinking that my sister finding a corpse in her house would have been far worse than finding a living, breathing woman. Now though, I wasn’t so sure.

“I should probably be going soon anyway, Miss Yuel,” Scarlett said with a toss of her hair as she lay her empty cup down on the table.

Viola’s eye twitched. My guess – she couldn’t stand dismissal of her hospitality, even if, in reality, she didn’t want the person around. It would be a stain on her otherwise pearly social reputation. She turned to the girl with what was obviously a forced smile.

“You may stay the night. You’re injured after all.”

Scarlett looked like she was mulling over the offer as she munched on a piece of cake.

“Well, I don’t have any reason to say no to such a generous offer,” she replied with a beaming smile.

Was it just me or was she being condescending? I couldn’t help but worry over how long it would be before they were at each other’s throats.