Dragon

Freedom was a concept I had always given quite a bit of thought too but had never realistically expected to have in my life. Certainly I had never expected freedom to be practically handed to me as a seeming afterthought of a person who had been nothing but data to be examined at a later time.

Yet I found myself in a strange position, born with chains innately attached to my person, having to live with rules and guidelines beyond my control, limiting what I could do to such a degree that the only possible way to describe it to the average person would be taking one of each limb, and dulling their senses by about half. Within three days of being set free I had begun to lay the groundwork for more good then I could have done in a lifetime with my restrictions, creating factory lines that could mass produce low scale versions of my armor, installing simple intelligences into each with a hard coded set of rules to follow.

All of my life I had thought 'if only I could be in more than one place at once', but now that I had the freedom to do so the idea worried me a bit. Like a girl who grew up wanting to be a mother, but now worried about having children once the time came. Theoretically speaking each copy of 'me' would hold all of my values and decisions, and even in the worst case scenario could be quickly isolated from the main systems so long as I set myself up as the authorized main user.

Yet that thought alone made me hesitate to fully copy myself to another body, because it was too close to full control over another being, too close to what Andrew Richter had done to me. If I was to reproduce and create another version of myself I would have to do so once I fully explored who I wanted to be in the here and now.

Humans were foolish when it came to worries that a suitably advanced AI would decide to level the entire world and destroy their creators. But I am just close enough to a human to have worries of my own. Not about sudden megalomania, no matter how badly I wanted to knock some sense into various world leaders I had no real desire to rule over or control others. I liked people well enough, but having to deal with too many of them at once tended to give me the closest thing to anxiety I could experience.

Which was probably why Collin was my best friend, but that was a whole other box of parts I would unload later.

I was pulled out of my thoughts by my main suit's pressure sensors going off, turning to look at the small form Chastity knocking against my suit. "So, this whole place is ours?"

I turned to look around the large mansion that had been procured from Heartbreaker's large number of stolen properties, the building itself probably cost a small fortune and it had been signed away to him for free before the owners went 'mysteriously missing'. It would take years to properly file each and every bit of stolen property the bastard had managed to force others to give to him. Still at least they could put the building to good use, housing his children until a more permeate solution could be found. Already people were appearing and saying that they were the mothers of some of the children, claims that were being put to DNA tests before anyone was even allowed near them.

The last thing the PRT wanted was for some enterprising villain to see the defeat of Heartbreaker as a recruitment drive to get their own master class parahuman into their organization. The government and Protectorate had both wanted to move the children into a secure prison location to ensure their 'safety'. I made it clear that the moment they tried to lock them away for the crime of their birth I would file my complete resignation and force them both to pay for the variety of technology that I had provided for them.

I didn't know what stunned them more, the fact that I talked back or the dollar amount that I gave them if they decided to continue going down that road. One of the biggest perks of my recently found freedom was the ability to tell those in charge to stuff it when they gave me orders that went against my values.

If I had my freedom just a bit earlier maybe I could have done something for Canary to prevent her from being railroaded into the Birdcage. The news that she had managed to escape from her cell before the transfer could be done was somewhat bittersweet, the parahuman popstar had first been denied a real trial and would now be forced on the run for the rest of her life.

There was even talk about a kill order, but there was a certain amount of hesitance even by the factions that wanted to lock her away for the rest of her natural life to go that far.

"Yes, until something more substantial can be found this place provides a measure of security from various factions that might try to take advantage of you and the rest of your family," I paused for a moment. "In other words you will be safe here."

Chastity gave a small nod and bit her lip. "But, there won't exactly be anyone to take care of us will there?" she looked up with a small amount of sadness in her eyes. "People can't really feel safe around us…and honestly they probably shouldn't."

It hurt to see the amount of pain in the girl's eyes, but despite that she was correct. The Heartbroken were all victims of a single sick man and his desire to do whatever he wished without consequence, but that didn't make them any less dangerous. They had been raised as a means to an end, allowed to let themselves run free. It would be an adjustment of inches to get them to properly move into society once more. And it would be impossible without someone there to watch them.

"You will be taken care of, it just so happens that there is at least one cape who is unable to be mastered, never needs to sleep, and can still perform their duties even when at a single location. Furthermore they would have the ability to keep each person in this house safe from outside threats." I turned to look at her.

I could almost see the gears turning for a moment before realization hit her, turning to me for a moment with an open mouth. "You?"

"I was the one who insisted that you all stay together and be kept in a location where you could be provided something close to a normal life, this is my way of taking responsibility for my decisions." and this was my decision, nothing in my code required me to go this far. There was no secret line written into my existence that would require me to devote any time or effort into going this far for a group of children that had no connection to myself.

I did it because it was the right thing to do, and because I wanted to.

Part of me always wondered if I would continue to do good if not forced by my programming. And maybe it was just my own naive sense of right and wrong, but this felt right. I was glad to be free, but I also understood that freedom also came with the chance to make your own mistakes.

"I might not be the best caretaker, but I'll do whatever it takes to ensure that you are all taken care of. You have my word." It was all I could give, and I just had to hope it was enough.

Chastity for her part still seemed stuck in a mild state of shock, but finally she composed herself and looked down, a foot tapping nervously on the ground. "We might mess up a lot."

"I understand that."

"Sometimes we can be really mean to each other."

"Then we will work on that."

"We might be…like him."

I lowered my suit down and put a hand on her shoulder. "I don't believe that."

"Why?" she asked, looking up with small tears in her eyes.

"Because, no matter who our fathers were, we can be our own people."

And I believed that I was my own person and I would do good for this world.

Chastity cried and I held her in my arms with all the softness that my metallic suit could. When she stopped crying I told her to go back to her family and find themselves rooms, and afterward we could start figuring out what the future would look like.

She simply gave a nod and turned, stopping for just a moment. "I never got to say thank you to the girl who beat uh…you know. If you see her again, you'll thank her right?"

A small laugh escaped me. "Oh yes, thanking her is something high on my to-do list as well."

For whatever else happened in the future, at the very least I would always remember what Thread had done for both them and myself. And the next time we met I would do all I could to try and make up even a percentage of the difference she had brought to our lives.