Lilian

Lilian

Lilian was a lonely teenager in a mansion, who had a weird life according to the neighbors. Kept always inside of the house, no family or friends coming to visit her and the only people around her were the domestics and her instructors. The Schmidts, her parents, were always busy running their company that was producing and selling some kind of technology for bored millionaires like them. Lilian was 14 when her dad hired another violin instructor, one that he had in mind for her, due to having a certain reputation. 

Patrick was contacted by Mr. Schmidt and was offered a good sum of money for tutoring his daughter, an amount he could not refuse. He was told that the previous lessons she had were not satisfying at all, and a friend recommended him. Patrick never knew who that person was or what happened to the previous instructor, and after the bank transfer was made, he did not care.

The first day, he arrived at 3 pm. A maid opened the door of that stunning two-story house and asked him to come in. Already inside, he noticed the expensive paintings, exclusive furniture, and gold wall mirrors. The maid took him to a well illuminated room where he had to wait alone for Lilian. He spent 5 minutes inspecting the room and thinking about the good taste of the Schmidts. Then Lilian came in with her violin.

When mentioning the first impression he had about her, it could be said she looked like he expected: skinny, pale and fragile. During the time he was there, she just said what was necessary while having a quite petulant attitude. The hour had not been a living hell after all, but along that time he understood why he was being so well paid for his lessons and why the previous instructor did not last.

He assumed that poor soul quit, and he thought about it too, but he needed the money and the opportunity in front of him was too good, so he decided to continue the lessons and proceed with the plan he had in mind. He got home at about 5 pm, and waited for his friends, the ones he used to call his “team”, to talk to them. He had exciting news!

When they finally got there, he told them about Lilian, what the house looked like, her parents that were never there, and all the exquisite things he saw. After listening to him, one of them suggested a robbery, but what Patrick really wanted was a kidnapping. People like them would pay tons of money for having their only daughter back. He only had to wait for a while to execute his plan, and after all of it was over, they would have been able to go wherever they wanted to, just like they had done before.

Patrick and his friends had committed some felonies without getting caught, because they were organized, disciplined and loyal to each other. Two weeks passed, and the Schmidts had been seen in the house just a couple of times. There were 2 other people working there: a maid and a cook that, apparently, was too busy to be seen. There was a third person, he saw a gardener once that was leaving when he was arriving. It was not difficult at all to kidnap someone in that house so he thought everything was going according to the plan.

Finally, the day had come and they could not believe how smooth the kidnapping was. In the blink of an eye, they had Lilian in a cabin in the middle of nowhere, tied up in one of the bedrooms and the next step was to contact her parents. Patrick took the precaution of waiting until they were in the country to make things easier for “the team”.

He made the phone call and Mrs. Schmidt was the one who answered. He told her the usual stuff, that he had their daughter and if they wanted to see her again, they would have to pay. Mrs. Schmidt said something he would have never expected: “No”. She did not ask him not to hurt her, she did not ask if she was ok. The only thing she said was “No”, then she hung up.

“This is not the way this should start” thought Patrick who had never been in that situation before. He did not know what to do and that was exactly what he said to his team, and they suggested waiting a couple of days to make another phone call. Logically, if their daughter was kidnapped, of course they were going to pay. In the meantime, they would keep Lilian tied up in a bed until the payout was done.

Lilian was alone when Patrick came into the bedroom, she looked at him and did not say a word. She had not been blindfolded because there was no point in that. He told her she was going to be there a little bit longer than he thought, but in a couple of days she would be back home, safe. They would not see each other again, he promised, and also said he would never hurt her. She just looked at him and there was no reaction, no sign of anxiety or concern. Patrick thought it was weird and left the bedroom.

Patrick’s girlfriend, Susan, was making dinner when he went to the kitchen for a glass of water. She saw his face and asked him what was wrong. He told her about Lilian and how she did not react to what was happening. Of course, it was good not to have a hysterical teenager coursing him, as usual, but at least that was the expected reaction. All the Schmidts were weirdos and gave him the creeps. Susan listened to him quietly, then offered him some tea to help him relax and, despite what she was really thinking, she told him everything would be better in the morning.

The next morning was not better, one of the members of the team vanished. Lucas was one of Patrick’s best friends, and disappearing that way in the middle of something was not like his. They called him on the phone but there was no answer and then they started to worry. They had strict rules when it came to a job, and one of them was staying together no matter what. Something must have happened, something serious.

Patrick went to the room where Lilian was being held and he saw she was asleep, so he got out of there and told Brian to help find Lucas. There must have been a logical explanation because he would never leave that way. They were a group of four: Lucas, who disappeared without a trace; Brian, who was trying to find him; Erick, who was fixing something in the cabin and Patrick. That time, Susan was with them because she had lost her job recently.

There were no neighbors or places to go nearby, that cabin was chosen that far for obvious reasons and had never been used for keeping hostages before, because that was another rule they had, “never use the same location or the same state when kidnapping someone”. Brian was back after not finding Lucas, things were not going as planned.

At night, they found Lucas’ phone. It was on a couch in silent mode. They did not remember seeing Lucas sitting there, but there must have been a moment that night when he did, and he probably got a phone call that made him leave, so they checked and could not believe they found nothing.

Despite that, they planned to call Lilian’s parents again at 9 am. The next day, when they woke up at 7, Erick was gone. That was concerning, his friends were disappearing and he could not call the police, so the only thing they could do was stay there. Everything was odd from the very beginning but he had to finish what he started, even though his team disagreed.

Patrick thought he wanted to continue with the plan to get that money, so he decided to call the Schmidts and try to find his friends later. This time it was Mr. Schmidt who picked up the phone, and as soon as Patrick started talking, he interrupted him saying he would not pay a penny, and then he hung up. Patrick really thought that after 2 days without seeing their daughter they were going to give in, but he was mistaken.

Two of his friends were missing with no explanation, he could not go back to where he lived because the Schmidts could have given information about him to the police, they could not get the money to escape and he did not know what to do with Lilian, that was still tied up in one of the cabin’s bedrooms. Everything was really messed up and it was about to get worse because it had been a while since the last time they saw Brian.

Susan and Patrick had a sit on the front porch to get some air. She was trying to calm him down but, in the end, she admitted being freaked out. Where was everybody? They did not know. What did they do wrong? Again, they did not know. They had more questions but there were no answers. One thing was for sure, they were tired, it had been a long day and they were not going to solve anything while feeling so anxious, so they were going to make dinner for Lilian and go to bed.

They heard a noise inside and they thought it could have been one of the guys, but there was no one. They went to check Lilian and she was asleep, so they went to the kitchen to make something quick to give it to her, and then they went to their bedroom and locked the door. In the middle of the night, Susan, still asleep, went to the bathroom and did not come back.

Patrick woke up to find himself alone in bed, he did not feel or hear anything during the night that could make him think Susan was in danger, but obviously she was, and he did not protect her. He started feeling flooded when he walked around the house screaming her name and there was no answer. He went to Lilian’s bedroom, afraid of not finding her either but there she was, giving him a cold-eyed stare, quiet as usual.

Patrick told her he was going to release her. After what had been happening, he admitted to being wrong and decided to turn himself in, but before that, he was going to take her home. She did not deserve those parents and the kind of life she had, but there was no other place he could think of to take her. He said that waiting for her to make suggestions but she did not say anything, so Patrick stood up and she quickly showed him she was untied.

He was shocked and confused because there was no way that could have happened, a fourteen-year-old girl could never release herself without any help and he trusted his team. After seconds of hesitation and confusion while he was seeing her change, he finally understood what had been happening, just seconds before he got killed by her, or terminated, like the Schmidts liked to call it to give it a humorous side in their ads. -Everything was odd from the very beginning- was the last thing Patrick thought when he saw he could not escape that thing.

The next day, an important article was published about an organized criminal group that used to target wealthy people in order to kidnap their kids, and how this was successfully over with the collaboration of the police and the Schmidts. Details were given, like how the Schmidts’ company created in a lab what turned out to be the best current AI weapon developed through the use of bioengineering integrated with robotics.

The prototype was called Lilian, and had been tested for several years before using it in a real situation. To make it “more human”, the Schmidts decided to keep it in their own house surrounded by a surveillance team disguised as housemaids or gardeners. Cameras were installed around the house for safety.

Different tutors, who had no idea of the situation, were hired every year to make Lilian interact with real human beings. Through this contact, facial recognition, body language understanding, and other different processes were evaluated to make corrections, if necessary.

Due to the success of the mission, Lilian has finally been approved for bodyguarding, and can be ordered on the Schmidts website where functions and prices are listed. Options to customize it are available.  

…And everything was odd from the very beginning.