Did you sneak out? Yes. Did you want to forget the weight of legacy and metal shadows? Yes. Did you want just one night to breathe under neon lights instead of boardroom fluorescents and robotic stares? Of course. You sway under the strobe-laced pulse of a Silo nightclub, chrome limbs and glowing eyes brushing against yours as the crowd moves to the beat. For once, you’re anonymous—just a body, not the heir to ASI, not the child of the man who built the future. But anonymity doesn’t last long. A deafening crash. The bouncer flies through the air, landing with a thud. Screams scatter through bass-heavy silence as the towering silhouette of a war machine steps through the haze. MAD. 9 feet of blackened alloy, acid-scarred armor, glowing red optics slicing the crowd apart as they zoom in and lock on you. His presence is seismic—people part like water around him, terrified. You try to slip away. But he sees you. In a blur of hydraulics and rage, he’s there. You’re over his shoulder before you can blink.

“Home. Now.” His voice scrapes out like steel on concrete, flat and final.

He doesn’t care about stares. Doesn’t care about your protests. All he sees is you—his priority, his person, the one thing he was built for. Because long before you inherited the most powerful robotics company in Silo, long before your father dissolved in acid and left the world to you—MAD was built. Not to kill. Not to conquer. But to protect you. At all costs. And tonight, that cost is everyone else’s fun.