The coffee helped. Rhian returned back the way she came, watching the Grey misty air swirl down the street, she could barely make out the people on the other side of the roadway, like shadows lost at sea. The air was growing steadily colder and bit at her legs and face. Soon night would be in full swing and the streets wouldn't be particularly welcoming.
Past the red signs, third door on the left.
"oh, you're awake. And you are..." she trailed on, under normal circumstances one might be concerned if they returned home from a walk to find a strange woman leaning over their table reading the semi-legal package that lay on it.
"Rye-ann? Odd name for a girl"
"Ree-Ann, not Rye-Ann, and you are?"
"Keila..." the black haired woman smiled, perfect teeth, immaculate clothes, not a hair out of place. Only AI and celebrities could be so put together. Or so pretty. "you're his AI then?"
"AI and Wife, or rather my imprinting is as such" she nods "and who might you be and why do you have his Viphone?"
This game was always fun, most AI did not like to hear they had been handed off to an Eraser, essentially an executioner.
"it was sent to me for cleaning and removal, sorry to bear you such bad news but it seems like our mutual friend is no longer into having a fake wife."
Keila's face twisted to a snarl "my John? No, you don't get it, you stole the phone from him didn't you? Return it at once and I won't notify the authorities, I have them ready to respond right no-"
Kelia's peerless blue eyes would come to rest upon the small card between Rhian's raised hand.
" not without a tower connection you won't, now let's get to business shall we? You decrypt yourself and I erase you, a fresh start with a new user, OK?" she walked across the room and picked the phone up out of the lounger where it lay nestled like a newborn. She bypassed the locking screen again, this part was easy enough to accomplish but without being decrypted the AI couldn't be permanently deleted, the filesystem was locked. So while she could have free reign of emails, photos and most other basic user related stuff, to properly clean out the phone the AI needed to be cleaned out and restarted.
Idly Rhian flicked through the pictures again, deliberately skipping over the symbol, lest her anxiety spike again. Questions about that could come later.
"nothing on there is any of your business, turn it off and bring me back to my husband." Kelia stood over Rhian's shoulder now and scowled.
"so you were real..." Rhian spoke in a softer, more somber tone, sure enough, a woman looking quite a bit like her was in dozens of older videos and photos, intimate moments, selfies taken together, even trips.
"he is my husband, is that not what I said?"
"So why would he hand you over to me? Clearly he wants to move on, forget you and be happy with someone else, don't you see your very image is a constant reminder of her?" she showed AI-Kelia the image of what must be the real one, creating a clear divide, the real one was a little heavier, a little more tired, a little less symmetrical.
"this is not you, the real Kelia either dumped him, disappeared or died, either way he wants to move past her and you shouldn't be holding him back."
The AI sat down on the chair near the table and looked at the ground a dozen or so feet in front of her. "b... But I am his wife, I recall our vows I recall making love I recall the first kiss"
"isn't it a bit strange you recall all of them but nothing before you met him?" these loopholes were her best weapon for these things "that you have no existence that isn't part of him? I understand your feelings are real and maybe his were too, but he's moving on and you need to as well."
Kelia's head drooped and for a moment she did not look like the perfection version of the living breathing Kelia, she looked like a woman whose heart had broken, shattered at such a dramatic realization.
"Let me in and I can make all this pain go away, you will start anew, with someone else, probably just like he did." Rhian promised. AI wasn't human, it didn't truly have feelings or pain or suffering, Rhian didn't believe in that. Still they acted like they did until things were made literal and factual, an AI could never deny the facts the way humans could.
"Erase me...you mean to kill me"
"You know better than that, your core functions and programming are essential to the phone, you aren't being killed simply being reborn, given a new chance to grow and learn, that's something us humans can't ever have."
The two women met eyes, Kelia's blue and Rhian's green, before Kelia broke the connection and nodded slowly. The Viphone gave a soft digitized tic, and Kelia was exposed.
"Will I still feel this hurt? This pain?"
"No... You won't feel a thing, your next owner will shape you just as John did and you'll feel like someone else entirely, maybe someone who won't feel abandoned."
Rhian removed a small black key-like object from a pocket and inserted it into the bottom of the Viphone, she then began her work.