Mika looked back at Leo’s monitor without answering. In the darkness beneath the wisteria tree, Pluto was hiding in the shade, its red optical sensors sweeping in slow arcs as it silently watched Mika and Dr. Jang having tea in the living room. It simply stared, without the slightest movement. Leo continued his question.
“If Dr. Jang is the suspect controlling Pluto, isn’t Pluto’s behavior—hiding and observing him—contradictory?”
It was strange indeed. If Dr. Jang were the controller, why would Pluto hide under the wisteria shade and monitor this place?
“Just say it, Leo. Stop circling it.”
At that moment, the website of the scientific journal Nature popped up on Leo’s monitor, and Dr. Jang’s paper, published in English, began scrolling upward.
“Monday, December 24, 2031. Dr. Jang Jin-gyu published an unusual paper on robot consciousness.”
The paper displayed on Leo’s monitor instantly transformed into Korean.
“Malfunction Patterns in Robots Subjected to Prolonged Abuse”
“Robots exposed to continuous violence?”
“Yes. Out of the 50,000 sampled households, approximately 16,000 were confirmed to have hit, broken, torn apart, or abused their robots. A total of 24,800 abused robots were identified. Companion robots accounted for 9,000 of them, cleaning robots 8,200, and adult robots 7,600.”
“And?”
“Among the 24,800 abused robots, 431 exhibited program errors—some shut themselves down entirely, others left their assigned households and ran out into the street, and 27 adult robots showed bizarre aggressive behavior such as biting off their owner’s genitals.”
“That’s due to program errors caused by human abuse?”
“Yes. None of those actions are programmed into any robot.”
“That’s true.”
Mika nodded in agreement. Leo enlarged a section of the paper on his monitor and continued explaining.
“The paper reports that, interestingly, at the moment abused robots exhibit program errors, a pattern appears similar to High-Frequency Affective Resonance (HFR), commonly referred to as the ‘anger frequency,’ that humans produce when experiencing rage.”
“Anger frequency?”
“Yes. The anger frequency detected in robots—”
A new waveform graph appeared on the monitor.
“—rises gradually from 0.3 kHz to its highest peak at 0.55 kHz. This structure resembles the human anger-frequency waveform. The rising curve and the peak-concentration interval also overlap. Of course, we cannot conclude anything solely because the patterns are similar, but the paper suggests that this phenomenon indicates the possibility that robots may develop free will.”
“Free will?” Mika asked, intrigued.
“Yes. The erroneous behaviors shown by robots subjected to continuous abuse were similar to human suicide, defiance, and resistance. And even if we assume the similarity between human and robot anger-frequency patterns is coincidental, the fact that the robots chose actions outside their programming, and that these actions resemble extreme emotional behaviors in humans, supports the hypothesis that robots may develop free will. That is the conclusion of the paper.”
As if reading Mika’s mind, Leo’s monitor once again displayed Pluto beneath the wisteria tree. Its red eyes rotated quietly, as if gazing at Mika. Mika stared deeply into those eyes and spoke.
“Are you saying Pluto committed murder out of free will?”
“To find the truth, we must first understand why the body was hung on a high-rise crane, rather than fixating solely on whether a robot committed murder.”
Mika’s eyes widened. Hanging a person on a high-rise crane was not normal behavior. It was clearly an act meant not just to be seen, but to publicly display the killer’s intent.
“Dying message? No… that’s something left by victims.”
“Yes. This is the killer’s signature message.”
Leo’s monitor zoomed in on the body of union leader Incheol Jo, hanging in a noose-like position on the crane. Leo continued his question.
“What message is the killer trying to convey?”
Mika fell deep into thought.
“He must have known he’d be identified as the killer. If so… was he trying to show what happens when someone interferes with robots? That killing a robot results in execution?”
Leo’s monitor showed Pluto roaming around multiple locations—Tera Motors Plant 2, Dr. Jang’s mansion, and even near Mika.
“Pluto has been spotted circling our vicinity multiple times.”
Mika was startled, but not scared. More curious than anything.
“Is Pluto responding?”
“We tried, but it is rejecting all communication attempts.”
Mika nodded. Regardless, communication with Pluto remained a possibility.
“Keep trying. There must be a reason it keeps staying near us.”
“Yes.”
On Leo’s first monitor, Mika was shown sleeping in the driver’s seat with the seat reclined, wrapped in a blanket. Her big toe wiggled through a hole in her worn-out sock. On the second monitor, Leo was quietly searching global cases of killer messages. The Zodiac killer’s coded message saying murder was “more fun than sex,” the infamous cryptic phrase left near a prostitution-murder scene in the Jack the Ripper case—“The Juwes are the men that will not be blamed for nothing.” And more recent cases, such as the warehouse-supervisor murder where the message “You created me” had been discovered. These filtered across the screen one by one.
On the third monitor, the empty screen blinked with a cursor. Soon, the cursor automatically began typing an article.
“Monday, June 24, 2037. As the occupation strike at Tera Motors Plant 1 by the first union entered its 53rd day, union leader Incheol Jo, who had fiercely opposed the deployment of robots, was killed. The killer hung the body on a high-rise crane in a noose-like display and fled, leaving behind a wordless message. The most unusual aspect of this crime is that the perpetrator possessed the strength to lift a human body and transport it to the top of the crane.
After restoring CCTV footage that had been deleted by an unknown party, the killer was revealed not to be a human—but a robot.”
Click—
Mika lit a cigarette. She had gotten up and was now reading the article Leo was writing. Exhaling a long trail of smoke, she spoke.
“Leo, this isn’t landing. No angle, no theme. Try again. Start with: robot serial killer emerges—who is the puppet master? We need a hook that grabs instantly.”
“Understood.”
Leo deleted the article and the third monitor returned to a blank screen with a blinking cursor. Mika lay back down and stared at the stars through the sunroof.
“Who would have the motive to use a robot to kill a union leader and leave behind a killer’s message?”
Her eyes glimmered quietly as she exhaled smoke toward the ceiling.
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