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   They descended from the sky, like rain. They didn’t fall hard on the ground but rather softly, walking slowly after landing. They looked like simple robots but everyone watching knew what they were: androids. The last generation that had been built in the Takashima factories, in what remained of Japan. They were the last remnants of technology as Takashima was the only company still spending so much money on technology.

 People didn’t like that and had tried, several times, to disable the factory. But that had proven impossible. The owners of Takashima had found out how to be independent, not relying on the energy generated by any of the public dams or energy plants. No one knew how although some speculated they had reactivated a nearby nuclear facility or maybe they were harnessing the power of the ocean waves.

 No matter how they did it, the androids were landing in small groups, all over the world. Takashima had been hired, in the midst of chaos, to ensure security wherever they could. Only fifty countries were chosen for the trial run and two hundred androids had been built to be the first to ensure the safety of the people. Those first hundred had the toughest job as humans did not like to be lectured or punished by what people in the slums called “inhumans”. And they called them liked that because they had no visible feelings, no remorse when killing or hurting someone.

 Their job was to protect people but in order to do that; other would have to be eliminated. For the next year, thousands of thieves, murderers, rapists, drug dealers and con artists, among many others, were arrested or killed on the spot if they had resisted. There was no way to escape one of the two hundred when they became angry, if that can be said. Because a machine does not become angry, it just enters another mode in it’s programming and responds only to those directives.

 The people that remained in the destroyed cities began to fear the robots. Small groups of rebels formed but they were always destroyed by the androids, not even having a chance at defying them somehow. On the other hand, the few governments that remained were very happy with these prototypes. They were behaving exactly as they had predicted and, in some time, the occupation of the now empty territories could be achieved with the help of a new generation of androids.

 Because, as always in the world, the powerful are the ones that really control all situations. It was them who paid Takashima Industries to build the robots in a time when money was not abundant. The needed that help because their rule was coming to an end and, effectively, the androids turned the tide in favor, again, of the powerful. The rebels, who were mainly poor and many more, had won several territory and were starting to colonize the remains that the war had left them. But the androids took that all from them in just a few weeks.

 The first two hundred were scheduled to be decommissioned after the first two years but that didn’t happen. Takashima assured the governments that those androids were still in pretty good shape and could serve as a support for the new generation of robots they were preparing in the factory, which had grown to the size of a small city.

 The United States invaded the “empty” territories shortly afterwards, when the second wave of androids was ready. They were another two hundred, better equipped for land and aerial assault. They were more military and had only one directive: obey the orders of their commanders. They did not protect civilians nor guarded for no one’s security. Although more evolved, they were brutes, cybernetic bullies at the service of the oppressor.

 The invasion of the territories was fast. Practically no resistance came from the few inhabitants that had remained, becoming slaves for the enjoyment of the new masters of the land. They formed several small states, each greatly relying in the strength and relentlessness of the new generation of androids.

The first two hundred, however, were removed from the colonies and returned to protect people in what became known as The Core. This was the most part of the northern hemisphere, where the wealthy of the new world were still settled. The androids there protect people, much like policemen and soon became loved by these inhabitants, which grew to like them and trust them. So much they did trust them that children even greeted any android they saw on the street and, as androids that they were, the artificial life forms began developing a relationship with the humans.

 That was not the case, at all, in the colonies. All artificial life was evil. That was what the native inhabitants knew and they were always very careful around them as any sign of rebellion was enough to be killed on the spot, it didn’t matter where it was. Their masters never cared, making the slaves clean the mess that the androids had caused. It was brutality at it’s best and no one dared to challenge the state of things.

 That is except the group that called themselves the Invisibles. No one really knew whom they were or if they were actually human. It was rather impossible they weren’t but slaves, in their quarters, loved to speculate that it was an advanced alien race that had come to save them from their masters. Of course, they were wrong. The Invisible were nothing more than people who had welcomed back their savage ancestry, behaving like animals and living in the woods and forests.

 Many territories of the world had not been recolonized after the war, so many of the survivors had gone into hiding there, slowly becoming more and more animal, losing themselves to nature and trying to forget the technology that they had used in the past. Not all survivors had taken this path and were now dead or enslaved. The Invisibles apparent goal was to be forgotten by the rest of the world, asking them to be left alone and leaving behind all trace of their disastrous humanity.

 The official of the Core knew about them but they regarded them only as intelligent animals, nothing more than a chimpanzee or a gorilla. But the Invisibles had not shed all of their humanity yet. They still had enough to seek revenge. And for many years they planned, away from everyone and everything. They sought to destroy the Takashima factory, once and for all.

 Although they did not speak that much anymore, they knew that this had been their target for a long time and the only logical thing was to proceed with their old plan. Once it had been done, they could go back to the forests and just live a peaceful life in the nature. They had no intention of breaking the rule of the Core, nor of liberating the many slaves of the world. They were a small group and they were going to use that only to avenge their deceased. That was it.

 Slowly, for some years, they travelled the wilderness until they arrived to the ancient country of Japan. That wasn’t the name the Core used anymore, changing the world so much, even the names, for people not to remember who they were. All of those all country names had ceased to exist.

 Takashima Industries was located on a small island, off the coast of Kyushu. The savages waited, scouting the island from afar, planning their strategy with care. The island could only be reached by boat and the place was heavily guarded. So it was best to do it at night. After all, they had dragged with them a secret weapon, which they knew would be essential to their plans. They stayed hidden for some weeks until they had a raft ready to sail closer to the island.

 On the raft travelled only two people: a woman, partial leader of the group, who used to be a scientist and a strong man, who used to be a military officer. There was a third passenger though. It was one of the first two hundred, an android that the Invisibles had defeated in battle, the only one that had ever fallen to them. They sailed the raft midway towards the island and then the woman pushed a few buttons on the back of the robot. The creature lit up and people on the shore could see their plan was working. The android was blind but functional. The man whispered a few coordinates to his cybernetic ear and then waited. The android then stood up and fired a rocket from his hand.

 The rocket flew up and this gave time to the raft to go back to the shore and escape with the rest of the Invisibles. Shortly after, the bomb fell on the factory, fully destroying every single piece of equipment on the island and killing hundreds of workers. It was the end of Takashima Industries as the Core decided to build new androids by themselves, even going as far as torturing the founder of the factory and making him give them all his research on artificial intelligence. Afterwards, he was killed by fire squad, falsely accused of treason.

 The Invisibles returned to the forest, with their android companion, and disappeared for years in the thickness of nature. But they would return again, very soon.

The Winter

   Helena worked in one of the many factories located along the river, a fast-flowing stream filled with waterfalls and whirlpools. Every single worker of the factories and the people from the town knew that it was very dangerous to play or stand near the river. But Helena always did, just right before work and just after it. She loved to see the big chunks of ice go down the river, fast, as if they had a rush to get the waterfalls lying only some kilometers further ahead.

What she loved about the river was that she felt strangely alive when looking at it. For her, it was almost as looking a group of children play ball or a market filled with buyers and sellers. Anyway, not much happened in town so when winter came and the river started its battle against the low temperatures, it was always entraining to see which one of the two won the match.

Helena’s post inside the factory was just next to one of the big windows. She had to stitch together two pieces of fabric in order to make underwear, which would be sold in many stores around the world. At least that was what they told all the women working there and, as most of them would have never had the money to pay for such nice clothes, they had no idea if they got only to the next town or a fancy store in Japan, or something.

Through the window next to her, Helena saw the river trying not to lose its power, its grace and insistence. People around her never understood her fascination with it but she had no need to tell them. After all, it was her thing and no one else’s so, she kept this particular enjoyment to herself.

One winter in particular, it was clear that the river would lose the battle. Helena lived upstream and many sections there were already frozen. It did look beautiful, she thought, but it was better when it was liquid and it could do everything, even if it got dangerous and often devastating. By the factory, some waterfalls had frozen over too and it was clear the river wasn’t going to hold much longer which was particularly bad for town.

The electric energy provided to the houses, the factories and so on, were generated by a dam upstream but if they reservoir froze over the electricity would stop arriving. And that’s exactly what happened on the third week of January, when the hum of electricity coming from various machines suddenly stop. The heating system in the factory failed too and they were told by their bosses to get to back home. If they received a call, it meant they wouldn’t need to come to work the next day. Helena knew there would be no call.

She walked home but first stopped by the baker.  It was clear he was having problems to as they were trying, with his son, to turn on a generator that worked on gasoline. Not that gasoline wasn’t expensive but the baker couldn’t afford to lose the job of one day. So they turned the machine on and Helena took home a baguette and a couple chocolate croissants. She ate one as she walked towards home to make her heart feel warmer.

When she entered her small cottage, she looked through the window and saw how the river was almost entirely frozen. Only a small stream of water passed through the ice and it wasn’t enough to make the dam work; that was obvious. Helena left her bread in the kitchen and went up to change off her work clothes. She put on a thick sweater and loose pants, the kind you use to exercise. She went down to the kitchen and checked the time on a clock hanging over the oven: it was one o’clock.

Realizing they had really been let go rather early and wondering if this time the call would be real, she decided to make herself a proper lunch. She normally ate something like a sandwich in the factory’s cafeteria but the bread there was normally stale and the meat seemed to have seen better days. Helena decided she would take this chance to make herself something delicious to eat. So she checked the cupboards and the fridge, which wasn’t working anymore, and decided to make a nice fish on herbs and roasted potatoes to go with it.

She checked her oven and it did work. Thankfully, it worked on gas and not with electricity so she could cook her dinner there. In an hour, she was seating down to a small table by a window, the one from which she could see the frozen river. She started eating the fish, enjoying herself despite the cold. Then, for a moment, she stared again at the river but her expression was now pensive, almost sad. She seemed to scare the thoughts out of her head, in order to continue eating. But when she finished she was again looking at the window.

Several minutes passed until she stood up, washed the dishes and went to her room. Somehow, she didn’t really feel cold or tired. She just wanted to lie down and think. From her room, the river could be seen to but she deliberately lay with her back against the window. She didn’t want to look at it, at the water, anymore. She had tried hard to have a nice relationship with it but sometimes it got hard. It was as if winter made it harder on purpose, in order to make her remember.

 It had happened in winter too, so maybe that was why. One day, Helena had been walking upstream with her, holding hands, looking at every animal remaining in the cold and at every plant that looked as if they were also fighting the winter, just like the river. They had stared at the beautiful shapes of a frozen waterfall and the silent and peaceful sound of the remaining water, sometimes underneath the thick layer of ice.

The next day, she woke up suddenly, like scared or as if her body was warning her of an incoming danger. And it did: she looked through the window just in time to see how her only daughter, age five, was taking a first step into the frozen water. She ran as fast as she could, in her pajamas, almost falling to the ground, getting mud and frost all over. But as she drew near she heard that horrible sound, the sound that she would never forget.

It was the ice cracking beneath the feet of her daughter. In that moment, she screamed, calling her. Nowadays, she wished she hadn’t. The little girls, got even more scared because of this and decided to walk back to shore but then the sound coming from the ice became louder and Helena saw how her daughter was engulfed by frozen water. When she got to the spot where her daughter had been, she realized the river was only superficially frozen. Underneath, water still moved fast.

She ran downstream, screaming for help and then falling mute, as she saw her daughter’s body floating face down underneath a thin layer of ice. She broke it with her fists, dragged the girl from the water and held her in her arms as people gathered around and saw what had happened. Her daughter was dead, in the blink of an eye. From that day on she respected the river but she hated it too because it had taken her life from her.

Her daughter, a bright young girl, was going to be such a better person that she had ever been. She was going to be someone amazing and outstanding, fearless and strong. Helena was going to help her do whatever she wanted to be the best of all. She would have the courage to leave town and really live the life she wanted for herself. And Helena would have been proud and happy for her, because her life dream would have come true.

But the river ended that. She ended that. She blamed herself, even if it was worthless to do it. During winter, she remembered her daughter almost every day and tried to be strong enough to keep living but sometimes it got extremely difficult, because Helena realized she was truly alone in the world. She fell asleep crying in silence, in her bed.

But the following morning she went, as usual, to work. The dam was still no working but they had to work anyway. She stopped by the river on her way to work and looked at it for a couple of minutes, paying her respects. She got hold a beautiful surviving twig, with some leaves on it, and threw it in the water. Then she moved on, to work and to the rest of her life.