I yawned, stretched, and climbed the stairs. It would be easier with hoverfeet! I thought, somewhat angrily. I was tired, and when I was tired, I was cranky. I knew that my parents couldn’t afford cyborg parts, and “we’re lucky to live here, at least we can blah blah blah…” I don’t care! All of my friends were like me, longingly looking at the metal body parts of our superiors.

I swung my bag over my shoulder and set out to go to work. My boss, Reflise, an 80 percenter, was somewhat hard to get used to, but after years of working for her, I was used to it. She was almost all metal and thought she should get whatever she wanted. 

We did Reflise’s bidding, and as “main caretaker,” I was in charge of the daughter, even though I was only 10 years older than her. I hated her smug glances by now, nonverbally saying “I am infinitely better and richer than you.” I almost wanted to “accidentally” mess up and bathe her incorrectly, or give her the wrong type of food, but jobs were hard to get as a human. After all, why have a human do anything when someone could just do 20 of the same thing at the same time using a metal hand? I thought, somewhat bitterly.

My assistant, a girl about my age, perhaps a little younger, was already working by the time I got there. I knew she was saving up to get a metal hand, which was still way more than I could afford, having to feed my siblings and myself, while Mom and Mam were busy trying to keep the house.

I got to work folding laundry. I was used to doing any task required of me, and if no one told me what to do, I would find my own work. Maybe, just maybe, Reflise will notice one day and give me… what? A raise? A promotion? I shook the thought away and got back to work. Every day was the same: wake up, go to work, wake up the girl, do whatever is needed, go home, feed Shrilet, go to bed.

However, when I went to wake up Tykersi, I noticed something bad: she was not moving. Normally, she would be yelling at us to leave her alone, but she didn’t even stir. I tried again and noticed that her forehead was cold. I then realized that I hadn’t seen Reflise either. A cold feeling settled in my stomach. Then, suddenly, as I was debating whether or not to try to wake Tykersi up again, I heard a scream from the kitchen. I raced down the stairs, and straight into the assistant chef.

“What’s going on?” I asked, trying to get past.

“The head chef collapsed! We don’t know what to do!” I raced inside and saw a range of children, all 100% human, from ages 6 to 17. They were all staring blankly at the head chef, who collapsed onto his metal arm. I started to feel sick. We ran outside and discovered people keeled over everywhere. What was going on? “Round up the children!” I ordered the assistant chef. She ran away to grab them.

I noticed a couple of humans watching us. “You! Up there!” I shouted at a woman at the top of a balcony. “What’s going on?”

“All of the cyborgs have collapsed!” she replied. “I’m not sure what’s going on!” But I had a feeling that I had heard of this before.

Just then, a servant staggered in. She had 1 metal finger but was otherwise human. She was sweating and could barely walk. “He’s… got…” she managed to get out, and then collapsed to the floor. My suspicions were confirmed. I ran upstairs to grab a tablet, searched up “computer virus” and a lot of results came up.

Books, shirts, computers, COVID, and… an extremely interesting website. “A computer virus is something that occurred in the human days, and would ‘infect’ devices to malfunction. The aliens are plotting to take over the world by spreading one throughout…” I stopped reading. It was only a conspiracy theory! I slumped down in my chair, defeated.

However, one word kept cycling through my head. Infect… infect… infect… I couldn’t stop thinking about it. But who could be so good at hacking, or programming, that they could take over everyone with any hint of metal on them? I sighed and sat down.

I guess it’s up to us to save them, I jokingly thought. Then, it struck me. We were the only people who could! Everyone more capable was either passed out or about to be. It was up to us to stop this unknown evil… alone.