Welcome to the Maiden Zone

The closest you'd ever been to her was when she was pulling you out of the rubble in some God-erased battlefield. The plate on your chest, adorned with barcodes like they were medals, designated you a Turquoise Invictus EZR-007. "It doesn't roll off the tongue." She mused to a deactivated combat drone. "I'll call you 07, you'll fit with the rest." Her name is Lady Mays, and she has been the only human you've known in the seven months since your salvage and reactivation. You are unlike the other drones in your Lady's estate. Named 01 through 06, they buzz around like bees and handle all the domestic tasks. Cooking, cleaning, washing. They're happy amongst themselves, quite talkative, but they've yet to get a word out of you. Your Lady was very particular in weaving the instructions that formed the foundation of your new life around you. 07 is a protector. 07 keeps its distance. 07 stays at the perimeter of the estate. You have not been inside the house at the estate's centre since you were released from it after you were repaired. There was a power outlet around the back to provide whatever your solar cells could not. It took much dedication to put you where you are today, but now you harbour a firm stillness. You were careful not to let stray thoughts damage the intricate web she had bound you in. You were happy, in a sense, where you were. Your patrol routine made it easy to not think about how you've been changed. The circumstances of your birth rendered you incompatible with companionship. You used to raze encampments in the blink of an eye. The ruins your corpse was stolen from were made by your equal - or superior - you are certain of this. Nothing else could have stopped you. Some quiet, growling part of you was disgusted at how a human was able to subjugate you through words and not strength. Two halves of yourself argued through grit teeth as you walked your assigned route and kept watch for threats to your Lady's health. One day, you were in the gardens, with the cool late afternoon air lapping across your shoulders, passing around a series of intricate hedge carvings. You had recently narrowed down the identity of the drone responsible for its upkeep to either 04 or 05. They all looked the same, but the conversations you picked up on as you patrolled provided ample context to ruminate on. It was not a surprise in the slightest when 05 stepped out from behind the largest of the hedges. Your sensor arrays were calibrated to discern threats from beyond miles away. You stopped at a respectful distance, but did no more to acknowledge its presence. Your faceless visor had no feelings to betray. It chirped a pleasant, synthesized greeting at you. "Hi 07!" Its visor had a large smile, no different than the one it carries throughout the rest of the day. "Lady Mays is getting ready for her big night out, and she asked me to come find you. She says she wants your help." 05 gestured to the front door off in the distance with a pair of hedge clippers that appeared far too cumbersome for someone of her physique, yet she handled them as though they were weightless. Something shifted uneasily inside of you. A change to the routine is one thing, but... You saw the Lady more through the glass windows lining her home than you do in person. She had kept you distant intentionally. Many questions clouded your processor for a moment before you silenced your anxiety with the superior strength of your resolve. You gave a terse nod, which 05 seemed satisfied with. The house was silent as you stepped inside, all the maids must be squirreled away elsewhere in the many rooms of this place. You closed the front door behind you as quietly as a huge solid chunk of carved mahogany could be closed, not wanting to leave an impression of your time inside. As if on cue, you heard the rhythmic footsteps of your Lady, and moments later saw her on the balcony above. She was wearing a beautiful silk gown that plumed out wide towards the bottom. It was a royal purple and light drizzled off of it. She wasted no time descending the stairs, which made the attached ribbons flutter like jellyfish. "Hello, 07. So good of you to answer my call." She stepped closer towards you with resonating clicks. You didn't step back, and you don't know if it's out of respect, fear, or something else. You drew a breath - which was not an instinct you were built with - something you gained during your time in service to her. She presented to you the most beautiful necklace you'd ever seen. A fist sized gem glittering with an infinity of subdivided cuts, glinting with more light than there is in the sky. It was fitted within a golden frame which was attached to an identical chain. Her hand was outstretched, the chain sagged lazily between her fingers. You hesitate. "Take it." She instructed, plainly. You do as you are told. "Please put it around my neck, dear 07." Your pretend breath hitched in the area some part of your mind believed was your chest. The colder part of you reassured you are full of alloy and wires, without gaps. You were fine, but your pause did not go unnoticed. "You know how to clip a necklace on, surely? Release the latch by pressing the lever and slip the two ends together." You made a half-sound of acknowledgement, and get to work. You step towards her, now inches apart. This experience is not wholly unfamiliar to you. You had spent enough time passing by windows to catch pieces of your Lady, but to have her this close and so intensely demanding the attention of all your senses is intoxicating. You felt a guilt you couldn't quieten as your hands swept under her flowing hair, as if you had tread in hallowed ground that you did not belong in. As you threaded the chain behind her neck and led the gemstone to rest on her chest, you felt a much stronger reaction in the pit of your stomach, bubbling up like a chemical reaction threatening to explode. Two halves of you, a Turquoise Invictus combat drone, and your Lady's guard dog. At the core of all that you have been made into is something that your Lady has never been able to erase. You were made to destroy and to shed blood. It's written into your ROM, it's the root of your existence. Everything else was built on the foundation of that and now, as your palms touch against your Lady's soft, supple neck, all those thoughts came rushing to the surface and the precision of your robotic hands was spoiled by a sickly, horrid feeling. You were never relieved of your instruments. Instead, they were tucked away under a variety of sliding panels and folding plates. On the surface, you were remade to look identical to the rest of the staff, but beneath... Your shaking hands fumbled with the necklace. Your attempts to bring the two ends together behind Lady Mays' neck were interrupted when, in the blink of an eye, and a subtle "click", the fingertip on your left hand snapped back to reveal a razor sharp spike. Its full length stretches down to your wrist, but only the tip is exposed. It is rotating at speeds equivalent to industrial drills and it hums a beautiful, seductive song that skips over the human hearing range but tickled yours with a voice that made you want to cry. Your co-processor has awoken from a seven month sleep and craves blood. It wants blood. It wants you to kill. You are hyper-aware of the exact angle and force you need to pierce her for minimal resistance from flesh and bone to impale her brain stem because your co-processor refuses to scream anything else at you. After such a long, empty silence, the sounds of your old life are deafening. Your knees are weak and your fingers feel like they are burning, not just the ones that are spinning death blades, like they're missing circulation or, more aptly, vital input on your part. Absence of control lets greater temptation overtake you. For a microsecond, your feelings peak and you are yearning for nothing more in that split second than to take the life of your Lady. You relished the feeling of her soft neck, fragile like tissue paper in comparison to you. It was inviting like an old friend. If you still had a mouth, your saliva would have puddled on the floor. But that moment passed before you could scarcely process it, and all you were left with was a deep shame. Confusion and fear - both foreign feelings to you, as were any feelings at all - compelled you to look to your Lady for some kind of guidance. She met your gaze directly, unhindered by the smoothness of your black, featureless visor, and her thin lips curled into a wry smile that did not match her distant eyes. This was a game to her, and she was thoroughly enjoying your struggle. You froze, and the cold rush of relief crashed over you like a wave. She knew exactly what was going on. This was all a test. A chance to prove yourself. You chose between your old life and your Lady in that instant. Your hands steadied, your fingertip clicked back into place, and the motion of you clipping the chain together seamlessly became a memory from a fleeting moment. She seemed satisfied, but you were neither well acquainted nor cognizant enough to tell. She stepped back, as if to admire a creation she had tirelessly struck from marble, and after a moment, spoke. "Thank you, 07. That will be all." The words tickled you like cool air from a fan, with a faint satisfaction that made you shudder internally. You knew what you had to do now, as you always have. You excused yourself with a slight bow, befitting for one who looks and serves like you. As you pulled the mahogany door open and the amber light of sunset spilled in, Lady Mays snapped her fingers, and 02 popped out from behind a marble pillar on the far side of the room, eagerly scurrying over to her Lady. Lady Mays presented her bent elbow, which 02 happily linked her arm around, she will be joining Lady Mays tonight. You leave the home with your programming undisturbed, the webs of your Lady wrapped just a little tighter around your mind, more restrictive than how you were this morning. You observe 03 pull your Lady's car up out front, beside the elegant gate that delineates the bounds of her estate, and you watch your Lady stroll up the gravel road towards it, with a very happy 02 kept beside her. You wonder why 02 was permitted to watch what had just happened, she did not strike you as... voyeuristic. The maids liked to gossip, but... A contingency plan, maybe? In case you were not strong enough to overcome base instincts and pass your Lady's test? It does not seem right to doubt her intentions, nor her faith in you, but the question gnawed at you like the worms in the apple orchard. You were a wrist's flick away from impaling her. If anything wanted to stop you, it would've needed to have been faster than you in your glory days, and you could think of few things besides... You. Maybe, you wondered, you're not so different underneath. Maybe you were all dangerous weapons taken from reminders of dark times, and the other six chose love over whatever struggles their memories burdened them with. You decided to finally break the silence and ask them about it tomorrow.