“I’m go­ing to take over the world,” she says, look­ing up at you from her spot cud­dled into your side.

“I know.” You take a sip of your wine. You’re not sure pre­cisely what she wants with the world, but to each their own.

“It just an­noys me too much,” she claims. You’re not sure you fully be­lieve her.

You know Anna would lead the army in a heart­beat. You glance over at the mur­der­ous ro­bot, dressed in her pink apron, sharp­en­ing her knives. As soon as Han­nah said the word, Anna would make it hap­pen…

For that mat­ter, Anna might even do it if y­ou asked, and she hates you. In­deed, she might just go do it on her own some­day if Han­nah does­n’t pull the trig­ger.

You gaze out the win­dow and into the sky.

“Liz…” she whines, “May I…” She looks long­ingly at what lit­tle wine re­mains in your glass.

You look her right in the eyes as you swal­low the rest.

“Pour me an­other,” you say, “and if you’re good, I might let you have some.”

“I will take over the world,” she says, again.

“I’m sure.”

“I will. I just haven’t found the right time.”

“I be­lieve I asked you to re­fill my drink?”

“They’ll call me Han­nah, Em­peror of the World.” She climbs atop you, and waits. You don’t oblige.

“Well, in the mean­time, Em­peror Han­nah—“

“Han­nah, Em­peror. Of. The. World.” She punc­tu­ates it with hard pokes to your chest. It does­n’t have her in­tended ef­fect, you think. You don’t re­act. You don’t “get an­gry,” take con­trol, or even so much as tell her off.

On the one hand, you love her, and want to give her what she wants. On the other, she can wait a bit. Be­sides, at­ti­tude like that can­not be re­warded.

“Yes, that,” you say. “But un­til then… Do I need to ask you a­gain?”

You re­ally do need a drink to get into it prop­erly, any­way. She knows it, too.

“Re­fill it with some­thing in­ter­est­ing this time,” you call af­ter her. She just laughs.

You pon­der what re­sponse she would best en­joy.