Sounding the Fall

by Jei D. Marcade

Sometimes, Narae can almost convince emself that the AI's Voice was a dream. Some kind of minor stroke misremembered, a neurological glitch retroactively given recognizable shape.

But sometimes--less frequently of late, but still, sometimes--Narae wakes to find emself sitting up in the dark, jaw slack, a sustained, atonal note spooling from the back of eir throat.