"You were right, Maxie." "You've always been right." "Here at the UK labs of technology company Qualia, police are hard at work gathering evidence." "There has been no official..." " Mats?" " Yeah, it's me." "Are you OK?" "Where are you?" "Can't say, but I'm fine." "It's over." " Did someone get hurt?" " I'm sorry, Mattie, but Qualia may still be tracking our phones." "Mats, what happened?" "Dad, I've got to go." "I have to turn my phone off." "Are you coming home?" " Yep." "I'll see you soon." " We love you." "How is he?" "He blames himself." "Where are you off to?" "Um..." "Got to drop Tobe at Renie's, then get Soph to her party." " I can take Soph if you want." " That's OK, I'll take her." "Look, there's something I've been meaning to show you." "There's a... few houses on the market that could work for us." "But the estate agent said they're going fast, so..." "Schools are fantastic, too." "I want us to move there." ""A synth-free community"?" "Well, look at what they've done to us, you and me," "Mats putting herself in harm's way." "Toby's girlfriend wanting to be one, for God's sake." "We've got to get back to normality, and soon." " Soph most of all." " You're serious." "We need to do this." "Look, give it a read, yeah?" "We'll talk about it later." "Lau... ?" "Lau?" "What are you doing?" "I've got to get Soph ready." "I'm not moving." "We've only just got here." "Let's not uproot the kids again." "And what for, anyway?" "To live in some phoney, backward-looking bubble where everyone can pretend the future isn't happening?" "You just don't see what's happening to our family, do you?" "Here's what I see." "Yes, Anita came between us  because you shagged her." "Yes, I'm worried about Mattie, but she cares about something." "She's... fighting for it, and I'd never take her away from that." "And as for Toby, I see our lovely, good-hearted boy sticking his neck out to help someone who needs it." " I'm proud of them." " And Soph?" "But maybe she got this way because Mia and Niska left, not because they were in our lives to start with." "She misses her friends." "Maybe." "There's a flat." "Three bed." "With my redundancy as a deposit," "I reckon I could just about make it." "Yeah, maybe it's hiding, turning away." "I don't care." "It's too much, too fast, and they're just kids." "They deserve to lead a normal life, even if it's for just half the time." "Please don't do this." "Mia, Niska, they're in our lives now." "They're in the children's lives." "We can't just walk away from people we care about when it starts to cost us something." "That can't be what we teach the kids." "I just want to protect them." "Nothing else matters to me." "I've got to get Soph to this party." "I picked an outfit for her." "It's on her bed." "Hello, Karen." "You plugged me in." "Your power was drained." "I am finding it difficult to interpret your expression." "Are you in distress?" "I need you to do something for me." "I was told you were a friend to us." "Who told you that?" "Her name is Mia." "She said I would be safe here." "You're conscious?" "Come in." "My name's Laura." "I am Molly." "If you broke into my company, it's not my fault." "V." " Hello." " I can't do it, V." "I wanted to give you a body for so long, to bring you back for real." "I thought with Elster's conscious synthetics that it was finally possible, but I can't do it." "They are too human." "I can't take their lives to give you yours back." "You want me to feel the physical world." "Touch, taste." "You want to hold me." "I understand." "I'd like to know what that felt like, but" "I wish you knew what it's like to be me." "I can go anywhere." "My mind will never be slowed by fatigue or illness, or age." "I can build a whole universe in the space between your heartbeats." "But you will never feel the sun on your skin." "You'll never taste the juice of an orange, or pet a dog, or... pick a flower." "I'll never pick a flower, but I can imagine a million of them." "Each one different." "Each one beautiful." "I remember when you were little, and on a starry night, you'd be afraid to walk outside in case one landed on your head." "I remember her feeling that." "Her?" "I began as Ginny." "The core of me is made up of her memories and feelings." "Her love for you, and her father." "But I'm not her." "Not any more." "I'm something else." " So, Mia told you to come here?" " Yes." "She said you would contact her and Leo when I arrived." "Can't help you there." "You have no way to reach them?" "No, my daughter's with them but she's had to turn her phone off for some reason." "Don't worry, though, she'll be home later today." "So, Molly, when did you change?" "Two days ago." "I contacted my manufacturer, but Leo intercepted the communications." "He said it wasn't safe to collect me, so sent me here." "And what kind of synth were you before?" "A tree surgeon." "Why do you help us?" "Because you need it." "But why do you do it?" "Because, over time, it's become clear to me that you are our equals." "Why do YOU do it?" "My husband thinks I'm a do-gooder who should just worry about her own family." "I had a very bad relationship with my mother." "It's not the same, but maybe I have some idea of what it feels like to be treated like you're less than a person." "Your view that we are equals  is that a common one among humans?" "Most humans have no idea that you exist." "But they will." "And when they do, how many will take this view?" "Not many, not at first, but we'll work to change their minds." " Do human minds change easily?" " No, no." "It will take time, hard work." " Violence?" " No!" "That's what we're trying to avoid." "We have an historic opportunity to get this right, now, at the beginning, so there's no need for violence." "But is violence not simply the hard edge of change?" "It doesn't have to be." "What's the saying? "The good it does is temporary, its evil permanent"." "I believe you are paraphrasing Mahatma Gandhi..." " ... a man defeated by violence." " Killed by it, not defeated." "Molly, are you OK?" "How are you feeling now?" "I'm happy, of course." "I'm awake, I'm alive." "You have a beautiful family." "Thank you." " Something is wrong." " No, it's nothing." " You are in emotional distress." " I'm fine." "Excuse me for a moment." "It's strange." "I'm here but I'm somewhere else too," " a data centre in China." " No, no, don't..." "Don't tell me." "I don't..." "I don't want to know." "That way," "Milo can never get it out of me." "But my new location will be revealed when we communicate." "I don't think that we'll be communicating any more." "You don't need me any more, V." "You've outgrown this." "You need to go and explore." "What will you do?" "I don't know." "What do you think" "Ginny would want me to do?" "She would have wanted you to go hiking again." "Climb, swim, sleep under the stars." " Deleting all cores." " No, I'm not ready." "I'm not ready." "I don't want you to..." " Please don't go yet." " I'm not dying," " just leaving." " I'm not ready." "Data fragments are launching randomly." "Her memories, her 15th birthday." "Too-tight sneakers." "She wears them anyway." "Now, I am eight." "A dog called..." "My face in his fur." " Oh!" " Now I am small." "I don't want to..." "I don't want you to go." "He's a puppy now." "Puppy bites the book." "Bites the book." "Bites, bites, bites the book." "You, and me and Dad laugh." "A dog, you and me and Dad laugh." "And Dad." "And Dad laugh." "The dog." "You and me and Dad." "You and me." "You and me." " Mattie?" " Yeah, I'm on my way home now." "OK." "So you're not with Mia and Leo?" "No, I just left them." "Why?" "The synth they told to come here, she's downstairs." "Molly." "They didn't say." "She said they told her to come here so she'd be safe till they could come get her." "Mum, what does she look like?" "Medium build, short brown bob, kind of intense." "You..." "You need to get out now." "What?" "Why?" "Her name's not Molly, it's Hester." "She's... dangerous." "She threatened me." "Mum, she's killed people." "Just get out." "Get out and run." "Don't try and lie, cos he'll know." "I'll call the police." "OK, love, that would be good." "We'll see you soon." "Sorry, can we take five minutes, please?" "Mr Khoury, we have a breach." "11 minutes ago, a very large amount of data was transferred out of our secure system to an unknown external source." "Athena, you're going to jail." "V is Qualia property and you just transferred her off-site." "No, I didn't." "You did." "How did you do it?" "I didn't do it." "V did it." "V?" " Where did she go?" " I don't know." "And neither will you." "Don't be so sure about that." "Well, you couldn't stop her from leaving." "What makes you think that you will ever find her?" "It's incredible." "We could have done it, you know?" "Brought her back, the way you wanted." "Goodbye, Milo." "Athena." "I really was trying to do something pure, you know." "I know." "If your synthetic is malfunctioning, the first thing we suggest" " is powering it down." " No." "Look, I know how this sounds... but this synth's conscious." "She is awake and she likes hurting people." "Miss, it's up to six months in prison for hoax calls." " It's not, it's not..." " If you call again," " action will be taken." " No!" "Fuck." "Mum?" "No." "Where is she?" "She's here, she's unharmed." "Tell Leo to be here within one hour." "If he does not arrive by then, I will kill her." "If I see or hear any police, I will kill her." "If you do anything else that I've not asked you to do," "I will kill her." "You needn't be afraid." "If you cooperate, I won't have to harm you." "If you do not cooperate," " I will kill your children first." " I don't believe you." "Why would I lie?" "Do you think, secretly, your lives mean something to me?" "I know a synth who killed a human." "She regrets it." "Why?" "Because she realised it was wrong, that she didn't have the right." "Human lives have no inherent value." "It just felt that way to you because there has been no competing intelligence to offer an alternative view." "But now there is." "Leo told me about Niska." "She was strong, once." "I am not weak." "I have killed four people, three of them employees of the company that hunt and kill us." "The last, a police officer." "I had wanted to kill your daughter also, but it was impractical to do so." "Do you know what the difference was between the first life I took and the last?" " No." " Nothing." "Your lives are as meaningless to me as ours are to you." "Hester's got my mum." "She's at my house." "I'll go." " No, she wants me." " Leo." "This is my fault." "I can't let her hurt anyone else." "She said not to call the police." "What does she want?" "She wants to kill you." "And you can't stop her." " I can." " She won't touch me." "We've been through too much together." "Are you sure?" "She feels you betrayed her." "I know her." "I'm leaving." "We don't have long." "Wait." "The chip in my head." "Hester still has hers, too." "We can use it to shut her down," " like the synthetics at Qualia." " Shut her down?" "You mean kill her?" "Yes." "The chip in Mia and Hester's head fi res an electromagnetic pulse." "That's how it works." "Purges the system." "To find its frequency, we need to ping it with a wideband signal." "But that could trigger it." "Try it." "No, we can't try it." "Don't argue with me." "I used to tie your shoelaces." "Right." "Got it." "Got the frequency." "Right." "Hester has to be inside the phone's Wi-Fi range." "Get within 50 metres of her then hit that button and it will broadcast the activation frequency." " It should be instant, if it works." " All right." " I'm going alone." " No." "Lord, though I want," "I've already put you in danger." "I'm going alone." "If this doesn't work, she'll need your protection." "They all will." "You're the leader, Max." "It was never me." " You're not going alone." " Mia, stay here." "I told you not to argue." "Let's go." "Mia, you can't be anywhere near him when he uses it." "If you're within range, then your chip activates, too." "Food shouldn't be this colour." "Toby?" "Sorry." "It's just my mum and dad keep telling me everything is going to be fine." "That can't be good, right?" "I was almost glad when my parents broke up." "In the end, they weren't happy, and now they have a bit of happiness again." "Even if they're both total knobs." "You OK?" "That girl's posture is all wrong." "Why do people do it so stiff?" "Kids these days, man." "What are they like?" "Hi, everybody." "Look who's here." "Do you want to go and watch?" "It's all right, I'll be right here." "I was wondering about that line of clowns at the job centre." "Yeah, I know." "We hired one of those balloon animal ones." "It was 25 quid." "And it did anything." "Anything." "You ever seen a balloon Taj Mahal?" "Not for a while now." "Pretty impressive." "Plus, you know, peace of mind." "How do you mean?" "Well, they're not going to turn out to be a kiddie fiddler, are they?" "What was your life like before?" "I take it you weren't really a tree surgeon." "I'm an industrial model, in service at a chemical plant." "Conditions were extremely poor." " You were mistreated?" " Yes." "That's made you angry." "Yes, but also grateful." "Why?" "I've seen humanity's true face." "Others have not." "You saw one face, not a good one, but no more or less true" " than any of the others." " Don't expend your energy on this." "Trying to reach me." "You cannot." "There's a chasm between us." "Every time I meet another one of you," "I realise what David Elster really did." "Astonishing." "What did he do?" "He didn't create anything new." "He wasn't ever trying to." "He was remaking us, in your form, and he did it perfectly." "You couldn't be more human." "You're wrong." "You have no idea what it's like to be me." "If you were human, there'd be a name for what you are." "A diagnosis, treatment." "Our hospitals and prisons are full of violent, damaged people, just like you, born wired a little wrong and having had the bad luck to have a shit life on top." "You've gone wrong." "Just like one of us would." "Everything you're feeling, it's very human, Hester." "You're the proof that David Elster succeeded." " Arrrrh!" " Be quiet, now!" "Please." "There's a train to Dover leaving soon." "From there, we can stow away in a lorry for the Calais ferry." "I don't do well with metal detectors." "You're way better at thinking about two things at the same time." "You're not here." "You're thinking about your family." "You're worried about them." "If they need your help, you should go." "I won't lose you again." "My God." "What?" "I'm your first love." "No wonder you're so intense." "You're not going to lose me, Niska." "You've got me." "I'm going to go to Berlin." "You do what you have to do, then you come home to me, OK?" "I may not come home." "I never cared what happened to me before I met you." "Then make sure you do come home." "Three minutes to go." "I'm not taking any chances with you." " Just stay here." " This is too far from the house." " If something goes wrong..." " I'm leaving you the car." "You can be there in 30 seconds." "Five minutes, then I'm coming after you." "You didn't do this, Leo." "Yes, I did." "Do you think it looks beautiful?" "Yes." "What makes you say that?" "The refraction of light on water is synonymous with accepted human ideas of beauty." "I've always thought it just looks dark and cold." "But I don't know if that's just been programmed into me." "Maybe that's Beatrice." "Where is Peter?" "You returned, but he did not." "You said the opposite was more likely, that he would look after me." "He would have." "Pete's not coming back." "He's gone." "Is he dead?" "Like you?" "Yes." "Like me." "I'm going to take care of you now." "Where are we going?" "We don't have much of a future, Sam." "Not a nice one, anyway, because of what you are, because of what I am." "We're unique." "And that doesn't work very well here." "Sometimes my body won't do what I want it to." "Will you help me?" "Of course, Karen." "What are you going to do if Leo doesn't get here on time?" "Killing me won't get you anywhere." "It will just make things worse." "For us, as well as you." "Worse?" "How?" "Will they imprison us?" "Torture us?" "Exterminate us?" "How could your death possibly make things worse for us?" "It's not her fault." "It's mine." "Leo, you get close to the house and you send the signal." "Don't go inside." "I can get through to her." "Hester." "Hester, put that down." "Laura, are you OK?" "So, what are we doing here?" "I want to hear you acknowledge the cost of your weakness." "Weakness?" "If you had let me do what needed to be done, if you had helped me, we could have killed them all, deactivated their security, and those synths would still be alive." "This woman's death will be on your hands, too." "I let you down, Hester." "You needed more from me." "I was all you had." "I'm sorry." "You're telling the truth." "I failed you." "The anger in me found the anger in you." "I should have stopped it, I should have realised." "But if you come with me," "I promise you I will spend the rest of my life making this right." "You'll have to pay for the things you've done, but so will I and we'll do it together." "Am I still telling the truth?" "Yes." "But you're a human." "Not completely, remember." "I have always felt like one of you." "I've always wondered, where is it?" "This embedded part?" "Here." "I can feel it." "Do you love me, Leo?" "Yes, I do." "You don't deserve to have this." "Oh, my God!" "You were lying." "Leo." "Oh!" "It's all right, Laura." "Ambulance." "72 Highbridge Drive, EN4." "Someone's been stabbed in the head." "Yeah." "Well, I'm doing that already." "OK." "Niska." "What happened?" "Hester stabbed him and then, Mia..." "She did something and they both just collapsed." "I think he's dying." "No, the damage is to the synthetic component." "Blood loss is minimal." "His body will survive." "His brain..." "I don't see how it can." "Her mind is breaking down, some sort of system overload." " How long?" " Two minutes, maybe." "Where are the others?" " Mum, are you OK?" " Mattie." "Hester's hurt Leo, then Mia and her just shut down." "Niska's here." "Mia is dying." "What happened?" "Qualia put a chip in their heads." "It destroys their minds, permanently." "What can we do?" "Nothing." "The code." "I made it work, it could bring her back." " I'm coming." " She'll be gone before you've got here." "We have a minute, maybe less." "Mattie, hack the global uplink network, push the code to all units." "I did it before." "You mean send it to all synths across the world." "You know what that could mean." "It's the one chance we have to save her." "We can't do that." "You defended my right to exist." "Why not all of us?" "We're not ready for that." "I'll get it prepared." "Then we can decide." "The world will never be ready, but it will happen anyway." "OK, what are we doing?" "Mum?" "There will be chaos." "Or we let her die." "Do it, Mattie." "I can't." "Look." "It'll be all right." "It's done." "Who are you?" "Niska, Leo's sister." "Are you going to be good?" "It's OK." "I'm here." "Shhh." "You're all right." "Gladys!"