Axel's mind was occupied by thoughts of who his mother could possibly be seeing all day, but those all flooded to the back of his mind as Xion's eyes opened wide at the wonders of the competition, "Wow," Her jaw dropped /surprise/ /excitement/. "I've never seen so many AI." 'Well, except in The Database' she thought, "I can talk to all of them, right?" Like a puppy excited to be to its first dog park, she didn't know where to begin.

"Well Xi," Roxas stepped in with the cool voice or reality, "Just remember that some of them are demolition AI or will just be pretty to the eye." He didn't really know what 'aesthetics' entailed, but that seemed about right.

Axel snickered, "Not so much pretty. Just unique in their frame work. Think like an artist kind of deal, like we make a frame that looks relatively human all the time. We make the 'perfect frame' something in our own image since humans are all a bit narcissistic. The aesthetics group is usually making a frame that doesn't look human at all, has a unique person or is artistically pleasing to the eye, and still can fulfill its purpose. It's actually a decently hard category to perform in. Out of all of these, I'd say the demolition is the most entertaining to watch, the aesthetics one is cool to wander through before judging, and the reality composition is the most difficult since there's so many entries and if one line of code is off, you're screwed. That's putting it nicely."

Continuing on to check in, the redhead entered their names into the system and printed Xion's AI recognition tag as well as the rules, round guide, and terms and conditions. "Here you go." He smiled hanging the lanyard and tag around her neck.

"Ah, I'm nervous." She flexed her hands. "You're not just going to sign those, are you?" She hoped Axel would actually read them. There was always something slipped in there. After all, the Apple Corporation had terms like 'One can't use their devices to make nuclear weapons' and such. She didn't want Axel signing away his life.

"No," He assured her, "I'll actually read them. We can still participate in the challenges without signing them. I just can't accept a prize without turning this in."

"What's the prize anyway?" Rox questioned, "I haven't actually heard anything about it."

Axel cleared his throat, "Well it varies from year to year. Usually it's monetary and they offer you an internship at the robotics company of your choice. Usually people pick Moshiva. That's actually how my dad started working there. He won this competition about twenty something years ago, and they invited him into the fold. I feel like working there is kind of cultish, though, considering how we live in a neighborhood and go to a school with only people from and related to Moshiva employees." It was common for companies to do that now. They made little towns and communities so their employees would be taken care of and all know each other. It wasn't an uncommon practice. After all, the coal towns of West Virginia and oil companies of Texas had long been doing it before renewable energy became a way of life. It felt a bit oppressive at the same time, though.

The blond nodded and took Axel's hand, "So you're saying you could give or take the prize and mostly just care about title?"

"Well no, I would like the cash. I mean I really would because I could do some pretty cool stuff with it." Improve Xion's frame. Buy some nanobots… "But I don't want to have to sign with a company or anything, and I'd be under a lot of pressure to do so from my mom, who works there, and the audience." He'd be uncomfortable with it. "Plus…my code is patented, Rox, and my dad lost his patents to the company when he got onboard." The redhead didn't want to risk losing Xion. Even with the few lines that he had removed and would be adding when they got back, a discovery of what Xion was would be catastrophic. His father's good name would be tarnished, and he himself would go to prison.

Roxas seemed to show empathy. The redhead and his boyfriend were both aware that Roxas was not as experienced and was definitely a bit slower when it came to understanding things, but he made up for that in heart and his ability to listen without judgment. "I'm sure whatever you do at the end of this competition, Ax, will be the right thing to do." Giving his partner's hand a reassuring squeeze, the smaller teen looked around at the gobs of people flitting in and out of the kiosks around them to get tags for their AI. Moving further into the event center, Rox made sure Xion was still following them. He knew for a fact that she hadn't ignored their conversation and was fully aware of all that was said. The blonde knew Axel didn't like handling her like a dog or a slave, but that was sometimes what she became.

And sometimes, that's what she ignored about herself. She hadn't heard that conversation. She pretended not to acknowledge the fact that they could delete her, modify her, change her, sell her, kill her in broad daylight and no one would care. Witnesses might be a little surprised that an owner might act out like that, but that's what she was. She was non-living. Hitting a dog with your car was more traumatic than her hard drive being destroyed.

It hurt.

Or maybe it didn't, because all her emotions were simulated. Cold. Hard. Calculated.

Roxas' and Axel's faces were occupied by wonder as they followed the crowd through the vomitorium into the reality composition room. "I guess this is where you'll be answering questions." The redhead mumbled, "Holy cow. There's so many set ups." It was as if there were a thousand sets of Jeopardy. Copies of copies. One could watch the show forever here as if stuck in some twisted episode of The Twilight Zone.

"Yeah, but the games will be run by other AI, Ax." The blond pointed out as they headed over to a 3-D hologram that was giving a virtual walkthrough of how the first round would go down.

They waited a few seconds for the end of the tape to be run, and the beginning of the cycle picked back up. "Welcome to the Reality Composition section of this year's annual AI Competition. Yes, the name is a little bland." The holograph woman giggled a bit. She was breathtakingly beautiful, and Roxas wondered who had put so much painstaking detail into her features, "But that's only because the original creators could not decide on a name. Facts are cool, and so is your AI which I'm sure you're hoping will go far in this year's difficult rounds. As you can most likely see, the first round today will be similar to the old game show Jeopardy. If you do not know what that is, press simulation at the end of this presentation for me to show you. Your AI will go through several questions presented by the Host AI. Error, emotion displayed at a wrong or right answer, and code will all be analyzed during this process. The top one hundred AI will proceed to the second round later this evening. That round will not be revealed until winners are announced. The top one hundred will be picked fairly as the Host AI are unbiased by looks or emotion. The third and final round will be held late tomorrow afternoon and only ten will participate in it. Good luck! I hope you go far!"

"I wonder what the third round could be." Xion thought aloud as she mulled over the words.

"I dunno." Roxas hummed, "Oh look! They're starting to scan in AI, so they can find their places!" Taking Xion's hand, he escorted her over to the AI (he was guessing it was a Level 6) with Axel, "Do you want us to stay, or is it cool if me and Ax leave to go look at the aesthetics bots? We'll be back before the end, promise."

"Um…" Honestly she wanted them to stay, "You guys can go." She cocked her head to the side and smiled, "Be safe! Don't get lost. Take care and don't be too long!"

"Good luck! We believe in you, Xion!" The two hugged her and headed off before disappearing into the crowd.

Looking around, the onyx haired computer sighed. There were so many custom AI here, she wondered how humans could give a robot a lesser value based on being 'all the same' at all. Getting scanned in, she headed over to the small set that she had been assigned and took her seat. How long would Roxas and Axel be? She was well aware that they were going out, even if they tried to be relatively private about it. Their relationship had deepened greatly in the last few days as they overcome the 'honeymoon phase' and Roxas' personality had begun to change as well.

"Hello," The AI next to her hummed. It was pretty common for avatars to be female since most of the creators were male. She wished there were more male AI, though. It was hard to explore anything more than friendship with those around her. Then again, romanticism wasn't really in her program. Still, it wasn't as if the concept of love was impossible. Wasn't love just what she saw on the TV screen when they watched movies up in Axel's room? Was it not the closest of bonds where emotions were shared fully and completely? Wasn't it, to some degree, what she saw between the redhead and Roxas?

She would have to think about this.

The longer this competition went, the more she had to think about.

Does anyone actually like this story? I've heard from two people regularly. Review, please! Thanks Layla for Beta