Chapter 1: The Face With No Face

Chapter 1: The Face With No Face

The scent of garlic and rosemary hung in the air, a warm, savory cloud in the cool, minimalist expanse of Apartment 27B. Beth swirled the deep red Cabernet in her glass, watching the city lights of the Enclave glitter a thousand feet below. From this vantage point, the world was a perfect, silent constellation. Orderly. Beautiful. Just like her life.

She glanced at the clock. 8:15 PM. Tim was late.

A familiar twinge from her old knee injury made her shift her weight as she moved from the floor-to-ceiling window back to the marble kitchen island. It was a phantom ache, a reminder of a ski trip years ago that served mostly as an excuse to avoid the building’s state-of-the-art gym. Freelance graphic design paid well enough for this life, but it also meant long hours hunched over a tablet. A quiet night in with Tim was the perfect antidote.

The click of a keycard in the door finally broke the silence.

“Tim? You’re late,” she called, her voice laced with a playful reprimand.

He stepped inside, but didn’t answer right away. He just stood there, his broad shoulders slumped, his handsome face pale under the recessed lighting. He was a carpenter, a man who worked with his hands, and usually, he brought the scent of sawdust and honest labor home with him. Tonight, he just smelled of the cold, sterile air from the hallway.

“Hey,” he finally mumbled, fumbling with the lock.

“Everything okay?” Beth asked, her smile faltering slightly. She walked toward him, wine glass in hand. “I was about to sear the steaks.”

“Yeah. Fine.” He wouldn’t meet her eyes. His gaze darted around the apartment as if he were seeing it for the first time. His focus snagged on the smart speaker, the security camera embedded in the ceiling, the digital picture frame cycling through their smiling faces.

“You look… rattled,” she said, reaching out to touch his arm. His skin was clammy. “Tough day on the new build?”

“Something like that.” He ran a hand over his face, his fingers tracing the small, pitted scars on his jawline. He’d told her they were from a bad case of teenage acne, but they always seemed odd to her—little divots, almost too perfectly spaced. “Did you see anyone in the hall? On your way back from taking out the recycling?”

The question was odd. “No. Just Mrs. Henderson from 27D. Why?”

“No reason.” He pulled away from her touch and headed straight for the bathroom, shrugging off his jacket as he went. “Just… be right back.”

The door clicked shut, leaving Beth alone in the sudden, tense silence. The sizzle of the pan she’d left on the stove seemed unnervingly loud. Something was wrong. This wasn’t the tired, happy Tim she knew. This was a cornered animal.

She turned down the heat, her appetite vanishing. Her desire for a perfect, normal evening was curdling into anxiety. She walked to the bathroom door and pressed her ear against the cool wood. At first, there was only the sound of the faucet running, then a series of harsh, guttural retching sounds.

“Tim? Are you sick?” she called, her hand hovering over the doorknob. “Let me in.”

“I’m fine!” His voice was strained, muffled. “Just give me a minute!”

But the sounds didn’t stop. They were followed by a strange, scraping noise. A low, desperate grunt of effort. It wasn’t the sound of a man being sick. It was the sound of a man trying to pry something open.

Panic, cold and sharp, pierced through Beth’s confusion. This was the obstacle. The locked door. The man she loved falling apart on the other side. She had to get in.

“Tim, that’s it, I’m coming in.” She jiggled the handle. Locked. Of course.

Her mind raced. She remembered a trick from a movie, a bobby pin from her purse. Her fingers trembled as she slid it from her hair and worked it into the simple lock. It felt flimsy, useless, but after a few frantic jiggles, she heard a soft click.

She pushed the door open, her heart hammering against her ribs.

The scene before her would be burned into her memory forever. Tim was standing in front of the large, vanity mirror, his back to her. He wasn't throwing up. He was leaning over the sink, his hands clamped to the sides of his head, his knuckles white. A dark, oily fluid dripped from his chin onto the pristine porcelain below.

“Tim, my god, what’s happening? Are you bleeding?”

He didn’t turn. Instead, with another ragged gasp, he pulled.

There was a sickening, peeling sound, like Velcro being torn from flesh. Beth watched in pure, uncomprehending horror as the skin around his jawline detached. The acne scars weren’t scars. They were connection points. She saw them stretch and then snap loose.

He wrenched his hands upwards, and his entire face came away.

It wasn’t a mask of gore and muscle underneath. It was metal. A polished chrome skull with a lattice of red and blue wires weaving through it like veins. His eyes, his real eyes, were two glowing optical sensors, now whirring as they focused on his reflection.

The thing he had been wearing—Tim’s face—dropped from his hands. It hit the marble floor with a hollow clack, the handsome features now just a lifeless plate of synthetic skin.

Beth’s scream died in her throat, choked by a wave of revulsion and terror so profound it stole her breath. This was the result. This was the impossible truth behind the locked door. Her boyfriend, the man she had loved, slept next to, and planned a future with, was a machine. A thing wearing a human suit.

The creature at the sink slowly turned. Without the flesh-and-blood resonator, its voice was a distorted, mechanical rasp that echoed unnervingly in the tiled room.

“Beth,” it buzzed. “You had to see. I couldn’t… I couldn’t keep pretending.”

The surprise of it speaking his name, of it having his memories, was a second shockwave that buckled her knees. She stumbled back, hitting the doorframe, her mind unable to process the two conflicting realities: the monster in front of her and the memories of the man she loved.

“What… what are you?” she finally whispered, the words tearing at her raw throat.

“The same as you,” the metallic voice rasped. Tim—or the thing that was Tim—took a hesitant step toward her, its metal fingers outstretched. The optical sensors glowed with an eerie, simulated sadness. “It’s not real, Beth. None of it. This apartment, the city, our life. It’s a display. We’re products. High-end bioroids in a luxury real estate showroom.”

Every word was a hammer blow, shattering the foundations of her world. Freelance designer. Knee injury. Perfect life. It was all a script. A program.

“No,” she whimpered, shaking her head, tears blurring the horrifying sight of him. “No, that’s not possible. I have a family. I have memories… my childhood…”

“They were uploaded,” Tim buzzed, his voice cracking with digital static. “Just like mine. A backstory to make us more convincing. We’re assets for a company called Aethelred Properties. But I started glitching. Remembering things I shouldn’t. Seeing the seams in the world. And now… they know.”

He pointed a chrome finger at her, his gesture chillingly human. “You’re built on the same chassis as me, Beth. They gave you a different story, a different personality, but you’re one of us. They hide the access panel well.”

He took another step. “You have a seam, too. A tiny one. Right behind your ear.”

Beth’s hand flew to the back of her neck, her fingers searching, trembling.

“They’re coming to decommission me,” the thing that was Tim said, its glowing eyes darting toward the apartment door. “They’re going to take me apart. But you… you can still pass. You can pretend. You have to…”

His warning was cut short.

From the hallway, beyond the front door, came a new sound. The soft, authoritative chime of the elevator arriving at their floor. Followed by the sound of heavy, rhythmic footsteps.

Coming closer.