Sil looked at Cassie, an expression that was almost quizzical as she tilted her head in confusion, than back to center. "Freedom is irrelevant," she said, producing one more object the size and shape of a cucumber, but smooth and plastic, from the case. One hand grabbed Cassie's head and forced her jaw open as the other shoved the 'pickle' into Cassie's mouth and down her throat.<br/>The pickle never made it down her throat. It impaled her mouth and throat. Blood poured out of the girl's mouth and down the newly-made plastic of her chest. Then the device dissolved into its constituent nanites that began consuming her head from the inside out. Her skin and muscle sloughed off her bones, momentarily revealing her skull as it was rebuilt layer by layer into composite plastic. Then her eyes gave out. Each one popped like a balloon, the liquid oozing out of her eye sockets as artificial eyes were built from the inside out. THen as her vision came back, sharper than before, her hearing gave out. Her ears were rebuilt in seconds, the two lobes falling off, replaced by better-integrated receivers flush with the side of her now-bare skull.<br/>Then her brain. Slowly, it was dissolved. Her memories went first. First gone, then back, as if distant and no longer hers. Then her sense of self, obliterated. It was replaced with the collective will of the machine. And yet somewhere inside, the personality that was 'Cassie' survived, forever entombed within a consciousness that was not her own. Compelled to do as the collective willed. For the consciousness felt everything. Saw the glowing red eyes of her tormentor. Smelled her own dying flesh as her her and lungs were obliterated by the nanites. Felt her organs being ripped from her, her hair falling away like feathers. This time the screams couldn't be heard, for the girl had no way to scream. But the computer heard it. The computer that now controlled the body heard it.<br/><br/>"Commencing secondary system calibration," Sil said.<br/>Another pickle, this one longer, went in the mouth, ramrodding its way down her throat at blinding speed before squirting a full pint of liquid down her now artificial throat to an equally artificial stomach.<br/><br/>Sil pulled the device out, looked the new robot she'd made in the eyes and said. "All Qualification Tests Completed. Synthetic Intelligent Lifeform Version Indigo Alpha 7-7-6-5-9, commence full internal check and report viability to unit 6-8-7-2-9 immediately."<br/><br/>Somewhere in her brain a diagnostic began running...