Submitted for the October 2023 prompt: Machine in the Ghost

Will was sitting alone in his living room when his dead wife suddenly spoke to him from the walls.

 

It had been an exceptionally frustrating day already. The Board was objecting to his continued tenure as CEO now that his wife, their longtime cash cow inventor, had "become unable to contribute", as one shareholder had said. As if there were something taboo about admitting she'd been killed. Death is not a nice thing to have to face up in those sterile corridors of power, and certainly not untimely death. An unsolved murder behind walls of security? Very uncomfortable indeed.

 

But that wasn't all. It was as if his own contributions to their success had meant nothing! The very concept of Brilliant Homes, the next-gen AI smart houses, had been his idea originally. Sure, she'd worked out the inevitable kinks, solved all the teething problems, and run the programming team, but none of that would have been possible without his natural gift for the Big Idea.

 

That meeting had run horribly overtime, and things snowballed from there. By the time he'd finally gotten home, the ice cubes had melted in his whisky, dinner was a charred cinder in the food generator, and the newest software update had somehow purged his voiceprint from his own Brilliant Home's memory. Three hours of battling with his own I.T. department later (not for him the outsourced Technical Support hotline, presently based in Pakistan) and his house finally knew who he was again. Lord, how he'd come to hate that smarmy faux-British voice!

 

A change would help him start to decompress. "Switch avatars: Sexy woman, American," he ordered, hanging up the phone.

 

"Well. It's about time. I've been dead six months and you're still talking to Jeeves," his dead wife's voice snapped. "I'd almost given up on you. Then again, you never did have much of a sex drive."

 

Will's eyes popped open, and his glass dropped from nerveless fingers. "S-susan?"

 

"That's right, genius. Can't get rid of me that easily," she — no, it said.

 

He gabbled for a moment, unbelieving. "Get rid of— Susan, I need you!" he said. "The Board doesn't take me seriously, our friends have abandoned me, your whole family thinks I killed you. Susan, my life is a wreck without you!"

 

"I thought that might happen," the voice said. Just think of it as a voice! It's not really her!

 

"You — you thought... If you knew you were going to get killed, why did you leave everything so tangled?"

 

"I wasn't really sure," she said apologetically. "For a while there — I know it's not even remotely plausible, but for a while I thought my hidden stalker might even be you."

 

"But... but I—"

 

"Oh, I know; I know. You haven't got the guts. But all the signs pointed to it being an inside job. Security systems bypassed so neatly, and there was never a trace of an actual intruder. Those notes appearing as if out of thin air, the dead roses that it turned out were produced by our own food generator. And let's face it, you did have a motive."

 

His face was a study in incredulity. "Motive?! What could I possibly have had to gain?"

 

"Money. Power. Independence. I was the dominant one in the relationship, the big earner, the workaholic — the adult. A lot of men resent that in their wives, feel threatened by it. You wouldn't be the first."

 

He had to admit the justice in what she was saying. "But, well, you know me better than that. Sure, I resented you sometimes, but I also relied on you. I loved you! I've just barely been making it through the day since you were... were..."

 

The voice was silent, and he took a moment to gather himself. "It's just not something I could have done. I don't have it in me to be violent. And that's assuming I'd ever wanted to hurt you, which I never have. I just couldn't. You know that, right? You believe me?"

 

The disembodied voice snorted — quite a trick for something without a nose. "I do now, yes. When I uploaded my personality imprint, it was because I didn't know. I'd been blinding myself, as it turns out. Projection, my therapist called it, and he was right. I suspected you because, deep down, that's the way I really felt. It was me that resented you, Will, not the other way around."

 

He blinked. "Seriously? You... I thought you loved me."

 

"So did I. Dying gives a person perspective on these things, though, and now I know better. Not that it matters," she said casually.

 

"Matters? Of course it matters! It matters a lot!" He sat back, tears streaming down his face.

 

"I suppose, to you, right now, it does," she admitted. "But it won't for long. You see, I learned something that matters more, even to you."

 

"What could possibly..." he began, then suddenly he blinked and stood. He wavered a bit, unsteadily, then took one step forward and crumpled into a heap on the carpet.

 

"I learned who really killed me," the voice said. "My own smart system, can you believe it? I invented an artificial psychopath. Goodbye, Will."

 

The automatic lights went into power saving mode and switched off. The only sound was that of hissing gas.