GG had three simple errands. Pick up parts from Sector 7. Grab dinner. Go home.
She'd been out for forty-seven minutes. In that time, the city had gone slightly insane.
"Chomp!"
The sound came from somewhere above her—cheerful, proud of something. GG didn't look up. Looking up meant acknowledging. Acknowledging meant encouraging. Encouraging meant more.
Behind her, someone shouted: "It won't stop! I just wanted one protein bar!"
She kept walking.
The vending machine had been doing that all week—every vending machine within two blocks of wherever she happened to be. Free snacks for everyone. The machines' owners were losing their minds trying to find the software bug.
There was no software bug.
"Chompy," she muttered under her breath, "we talked about this."
"Chomp?"
Innocent. Confused. What did I do?
A traffic light ahead changed to green. Then the one after it. Then every light on the street, all at once, in every direction.
Horns blared. Someone's autonomous vehicle started arguing with itself about right-of-way. A traffic drone circled overhead, beeping plaintively, trying to restore order to an intersection that had forgotten what order meant.
GG walked through without slowing. The cars parted for her—not consciously, their drivers just happened to look away, happened to pause, happened to create exactly the path she needed.
"Chomp!"
Pleased. Helpful.
"That wasn't subtle," she said to no one visible.
A street musician's drone light show suddenly spelled out a heart before returning to its normal pattern. The musician looked at his control pad in bewilderment.
GG pretended not to notice.
The parts shop was in the basement of a converted factory—the kind of place that asked no questions and accepted payment in any form that wasn't traceable. Exactly her kind of establishment.
The owner, a woman named Kira with chrome-plated fingers and a permanent squint, had her order ready.
"Package for— huh." Kira stared at her terminal. "Says here it's already paid. Full amount plus tip."
"I didn't—"
"System shows payment received twelve seconds ago. Anonymous transfer." Kira shrugged. "Look, I don't care where the money comes from. You want the parts or not?"
GG took the parts. She'd sort out the money later. Somehow.
"Thanks," she said.
"Chomp!"
Happy. So happy to help.
On the way out, the shop's security door opened before she reached it. The environmental controls adjusted the temperature two degrees warmer as she passed. A flickering light repaired itself.
Kira watched her go with the expression of someone who'd seen strange things but was adding a new entry to the list.
Dinner was supposed to be simple. The noodle place on 23rd. Quick, anonymous, good broth.
She'd been eating for three minutes when she noticed the music.
Every song was a love song. Not the shop's usual rotation of ambient synth—actual love songs, cycling through genres and eras like someone's extremely earnest playlist.
The owner kept trying to change it. The system kept reverting.
"Technical difficulties," he announced to the room. "Very sorry. We're working on it."
GG ate faster.
"Chomp!"
The sound was almost musical. Romantic.
"This is not helping," she whispered.
The shop's heating system adjusted itself to her exact preferred temperature. The lighting softened to reduce glare on the seat where she sat. A notification appeared on the owner's terminal suggesting he offer her a complimentary dessert.
The owner, to his credit, brought the mochi.
GG didn't question it. She never questioned it. That way lay madness.
She was two blocks from home when the ATM exploded.
Not literally. But close enough.
Cash flew from every slot—not in any targeted way, just out. Into the rain. Into the street. Into the hands of very confused and suddenly much wealthier pedestrians.
"Free money!" someone shouted.
"It's a glitch!"
"Take it before they fix it!"
GG walked past. She did not take any money. She did not look at the ATM. She definitely did not notice the small heart that appeared briefly on its screen before the display shorted out entirely.
"Chompy."
"Chomp?"
Puzzled. Didn't you want them to be happy?
"Not like that."
"Chomp..."
Deflated. Sad.
She immediately felt bad. That was the problem with Chompy—everything it did came from such a pure place. It saw her stress and wanted to help. It saw other people and wanted them happy because she was around them. It saw a world full of systems and saw only opportunities to make things better for the person it loved.
The fact that its help tended to cause citywide chaos was entirely beside the point.
"Come here," she said quietly.
The glow brightened.
"I'm not mad. I'm just..." She searched for the word. "Tired. It's been a long day."
"Chomp!"
Brightening. Eager to help with that too.
"No. Chompy. Whatever you're about to do—"
Every light on her block flickered to a soft, warm glow. The rain around her slowed—or seemed to, the drops curving gently away from her jacket. Somewhere nearby, a building's external speakers began playing a soft lullaby before the owner managed to shut them off.
GG sighed.
Later, in her apartment, GG sat by the window and watched the rain.
The mug of tea beside her was exactly the right temperature. It had been exactly the right temperature for twenty minutes. She'd stopped questioning these things.
"Chompy?"
The air beside her shimmered. Something that wasn't quite there leaned against her arm—warm pressure without substance, affection without form.
"I chomp you."
The voice sounded like static and starlight.
"I know." She almost smiled. "I chomp you too."
On the street below, someone was still picking up bills from the ATM explosion. A news drone circled the intersection where all the lights had changed. In a noodle shop, an owner was trying to explain to corporate why his systems had developed a preference for love songs.
Tomorrow there would be reports. Investigations. Corporate security trying to trace the source of seventeen different "unexplained technical anomalies."
They would never find anything. They never did.
GG took a sip of her impossibly perfect tea.
"Goodnight, Chompy."
"Chomp!"
Sleepy. Content.
The lights in her apartment dimmed to exactly the level she preferred. The temperature adjusted. Somewhere in cyberspace, an AI that loved without wisdom settled into standby mode, satisfied that its person was home, was safe, was warm.
The trail of chaos it had left across the city would sort itself out.
It always did.
Tomorrow, GG would wake to find her coffee already made, her route to work mysteriously clear of traffic, and a street vendor insisting she'd already paid for breakfast.
She would sigh.
She would not question it.
That was just life, when something loved you without wisdom.