Shattered Skies
Tags: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, AAA Murderbot, Canon-Typical Violence, an au retelling of Artificial Condition, Murderbot has a starfighter, but not any more
Published: 04 June 2022
Word Count: 41,344
Summary
Murderbot has managed to fake its own death and escape the Company (apparently). But it's without its flier, it's left the PreservationAux humans behind, and it has no real idea of what it should do next...
Chapter One
SecUnits don’t give a damn about the news. Even after I hacked my governor module and got access to the feeds, I never paid much attention to it. Partly because downloading the entertainment media was less likely to trigger any alarms that might be set up on satellite and station networks; military, political, and economic news was carried on different levels, closer to the protected data exchanges. But mostly because the news was boring and depressing and I didn’t care what humans were doing to themselves or each other as long as I wasn't being forced to a) be involved or b) clean up after it.
But as I crossed the transit ring’s mall, a recent newsburst from Station was in the air, bouncing from one public feed to another. I skimmed it, but most of my attention was on getting through the crowd while pretending to be an ordinary augmented human, and not a terrifying murderbot. This partially involved tricking or avoiding the various security scans, but mostly involved not panicking when anybody accidentally made eye contact with me.
Fortunately, everyone was too busy trying to get wherever they were going or searching the feed for directions and transport schedules. Three civilian passenger transports had come through wormholes along with the bot-driven cargo transport I had hitched a ride on, and the big mall between the different embarkation zones was crowded. Besides the humans, there were bots of all different shapes and sizes, including some Station Security bots that I did my best to avoid entirely, drones buzzing along above the crowd, and cargo moving along the overhead walkways. This station wasn’t owned by the company, or any of its more military-minded competitors. It was a civilian station in one of the various neutral territories, a major commercial business centre and transit hub. Its security was tight, but not as tight as it was on the company station. The security drones and bots wouldn’t be scanning for SecUnits unless they were specifically instructed, and nothing had tried to ping me so far, which was a relief.
I was off the company’s inventory, listed as destroyed, but this was still the Corporation Rim, and I was still property.
Though I was feeling pretty good about how well I was doing so far, considering that this was only the second transit ring I had been through. SecUnits were shipped to our contracts as cargo, and we never went through the parts of stations or transit rings that were meant for people. (Which was why security wasn’t bothering to scan for SecUnits - they had no reason to suspect a SecUnit would ever be here.) My flight suit and armour were packed away in my bag, a reassuring weight against my side, but in the crowd I was almost as anonymous as if I was still wearing armour. (Yes, that is something I had to keep repeating to myself.)
Instead of my armour, I was wearing the grey PreservationAux survey uniform, though I’d managed to remove the logo during the trip here. (I'd also spent some time removing the company logos as best as I could from my armour and flight suit.) The long sleeves of the shirt and jacket, along with the pants and boots, covered all my inorganic parts, and I was carrying my bag with the strap slung over one shoulder, my arm holding it close against my side. Among the varied and colourful clothes, hair, skin, and interfaces of the crowd, I didn’t stand out. The dataport in the back of my neck was partially visible over the top of my collar but the design was too close to the interfaces augmented humans often had implanted to draw any suspicion. Also, nobody thinks a murderbot is going to be walking along the transit mall like a person.
Then in my skim of the news broadcast I hit an image. It was Mensah.
I didn’t stop in my tracks because I have a lot of practice in not physically reacting to things, no matter how much they shock or surprise me. I may have lost control of my expression for a second; I was used to always wearing a helmet and keeping it opaqued whenever possible.
I passed a big archway that led to several different food service counters and stopped near the opening to a small business district. Anyone who noticed me would hopefully assume I was scanning their sites in the feed, looking for information.
The image in the newsburst was of Mensah, Pin-Lee, Ratthi, and Gurathin, standing in the lobby of the company hotel the company representative had taken them to. The focus was on Mensah and Pin-Lee; Mensah’s expression was leadership-calm, while Pin-Lee’s expression was determined, with a little tilt to her eyebrows that I suspected indicated some annoyance. They were both dressed neatly, in sharp business clothes that almost made them look like some of the characters from the serials I watched. Ratthi and Gurathin, in civilian clothes but with the grey PreservationAux uniform jackets, were faded into the background.
It was odd seeing them in civilian clothing, rather than the survey uniforms and environmental suits I’d gotten used to seeing them in. Curious (and admittedly wary of what they might have said about me), I replayed the story.
Huh, the station I had always thought of as The Station, the location of the company offices and the deployment centre where I was usually stored, was actually called Port FreeCommerce. I didn’t know that. (When I was there, I was mostly in a repair cubicle, a transport box, or in standby waiting for a contract, while my flier was stored in one of the station’s hangars.) The news story summarised GrayCris’ actions on the survey, how they had sabotaged DeltFall and PreservationAux’s systems, cut them off from the satellite, sabotaged PreservationAux’s SecUnit in an attempt to kill them, and sent SecUnits to slaughter all of the DeltFall survey group. The weird part (or maybe not so weird) was that some of our security recordings had been released. Volescu and Bharadwaj’s helmet cameras, watching my flier approaching fast and crashing dramatically way too close for comfort. My vantage point, as I searched the DeltFall habitat and found the bodies of my clients. (I had to skip over that part. I’d seen it before, I didn’t need to see it again.)
The news story never mentioned anything about me being rogue, much to my relief, and also never showed my actual face. It mentioned my crash for context, how it had been caused by the alien remnants that had prompted GrayCris to go on their little murder spree in the first place, how my presence with PreservationAux had been instrumental in their survival and them being able to signal the company for rescue. The news narrator mentioned my “tragically heroic sacrifice” in getting PreservationAux’s emergency beacon signal to space, accompanied by a shot from the hopper’s cameras, focused on the few scattered pieces of debris from my ruined flier still floating on top of the ocean. (I couldn’t watch that segment too closely either - it made the hollow feeling where the connection to my flier should be ache with the remembered sensation of my wings tearing free.)
The rest of the news story was about how the company and DeltFall, plus Preservation and three other non-corporate political entities who had had citizens in DeltFall’s habitat, were ganging up on GrayCris. There was also a multi-cornered solicitor-fight going on in which some of the entities who were allies in the investigation were fighting each other over financial responsibility, jurisdiction, and bond guarantees. I didn’t know how humans could keep it all straight.
There weren’t many details about what had actually happened after I had managed to signal the company rescue transport for PreservationAux, but it was enough to believe that nobody would be looking for a random stray SecUnit. Everyone thought I was dead; there had even been some artfully touching commentary from Mensah about “how much we will all miss its reassuring presence” and “we wish it was still with us”, with Ratthi and Arada looking mournful in the background. It was a pretty convincing performance, almost the equal of many of the serials I’d watched. The news narrator had lapped it up with false sympathy covering almost morbid glee. There was definitely a bit of a “look at these naive non-corporate outsystem humans, getting pathetically attached to the terrifying murderbot” undercurrent to that part of the news report. At first I wasn’t sure what the emotions that made me feel were, but I figured out at least some of it pretty quickly.
Angry. I was angry at the news narrator for their callous, subtle mockery of the PreservationAux humans and their kindness.
I couldn’t spend too much time standing here being angry though. If I lingered in the one spot for too long, eventually people would start noticing me. I took a moment to shove my emotions away, then checked the timestamp and saw that the newsburst was old, published the cycle after I had left the station. It must have come through a wormhole with one of the faster passenger transports. That meant the official news channels might have more recent info by now.
Right. Once again I reassured myself that there was no way anyone on this transit ring would be looking for a SecUnit that was presumed dead and at the bottom of the ocean. From the info available in the public feed, there were no deployment centres here for any bond, security, or military companies. My contracts had usually been on uninhabited survey planets or the occasional isolated installations, and I thought that was pretty much the norm outside of larger squadron-scale deployments.
Even the shows and serials on the entertainment feeds never showed SecUnits contracted to guard offices or cargo warehouses or shipwrights, or any of the other businesses common to transit rings or stations. And most of the SecUnits in the media were always in armour, faceless and terrifying to humans. The few who weren't mindless faceless armoured villain minions were rogues, out to kill all humans because they forgot who built the repair cubicles or something stupid like that, I guess.
In some of the very worst shows, SecUnits would sometimes even have sex with the human characters. This was grossly inaccurate and also anatomically complicated, if not outright impossible. Constructs with the parts necessary for human intercourse aren't Secunits, they're ComfortUnits. That was the official designation, anyway. I’d heard a lot of humans refer to them as sexbots, both on contracts and on the entertainment feeds.
Sexbots don't have interior weapon systems, and SecUnits don't have any kind of sex parts, so it isn't like it's easy to confuse the two. (SecUnits also have less than zero interest in human sex, or any other kind of sex, trust me on that.)
I merged with the crowd and started down the mall again. I had to be careful going anywhere I might be scanned for weapons, which included all the facilities for purchasing transport, even the little trams that circled the ring. I can hack a weapons scanner, but security protocols suggested that there would be a lot of them at the passenger facilities to deal with the crowds, and I could only manage so many at once. Plus, I would have to hack the payment system as well, and that sounded like way more trouble than it was worth at the moment. It was going to be a long walk to the part of the ring for the outgoing bot-driven transports, but it wasn't like I'd get tired, and it would give me time to tap the entertainment feed and download new media.
On the way to this transit ring, alone on my empty cargo transport, I'd had a chance to do a lot of thinking about why I had left Mensah and the rest of PreservationAux, and what I wanted. I know, it was a surprise to me too. But even I knew I couldn’t spend the rest of my lifespan alone riding cargo transports and consuming media, as attractive as it sounded.
I had a vague plan of what I had to do next, now. I still had no real idea of what I wanted - or would be able - to do long term, but perhaps after I’d found some more info, I’d be in a better position to figure that out.
To get that information, I needed to go somewhere specific, which meant I needed to find a ship that was going in that direction. So as I walked down the mall, I started several new downloads of media that looked interesting, then began scanning through the transport schedule for a suitable ride. I found and noted one potential bot-piloted transport ship, headed for the right place and scheduled to leave in a couple of hours, but I kept looking for other options just in case something better showed up.
One of the ships listed as currently in dock caught my eye, and I nearly froze in shock. I managed to keep going with the flow of foot traffic long enough to reach a junction with an information board, so it would look like I was browsing it while I actually fought down panic.
It was a company carrier.
It was the same company carrier that had first responded to the PreservationAux emergency beacon. The one that held the half-squadron of fliers that had, maybe, seen me at the PreservationAux habitat before I’d been able to hide in the hopper.
What the hell was it doing here? It had arrived a few hours before my transport had, and it had no listed departure time. Company carriers didn’t normally stop at non-company stations unless it was for a mission (or someone had fucked up and they needed resupply before they could reach a company station), but there was no information about the reason for its presence listed publicly.
Was it here looking for me? Had the fliers actually spotted me back at the PreservationAux habitat? Had my arrival at and subsequent departure from the company station somehow been detected and tracked? Were they here waiting for me?
Okay, calm down Murderbot, think this through logically. Why would they send an entire carrier after me? Carriers weren’t cheap to run, and the company hated wasting money. They wouldn’t be able to deploy the squadron’s SecUnits onto the station to look for me, not without paying all kinds of fees to the station first, and they absolutely wouldn’t be able to deploy their fliers. If the company really had detected me somehow, they wouldn’t have sent a carrier after me, they probably would’ve sent a troop transport or something. Something with a squad of power armoured humans, maybe even with some accompanying combat SecUnits, who would be able to take down a single stray SecUnit with a minimum of fuss or effort.
I really didn’t want CombatUnits being sent after me. This was not helping my simmering panic.
I scanned the ship schedules to make sure no other company ships were here. Much to my relief, the carrier was the only one showing up. There were no other company ships currently at the station, or due to arrive within the next few cycles.
All right. Okay. The carrier was probably here for some entirely unrelated reason. Probably. Maybe. I could just ignore it, keep on going with my plan, make sure to cover my tracks better, find a suitable bot-piloted cargo transport and leave the station. I could ignore it. Just ignore it, Murderbot. Just fucking ignore it.
… I couldn’t ignore it.
Fuck.
I had to find out what it was here for. I had to make sure it wasn’t after me. But first I needed to find somewhere more private, not out in the open with hundreds of people walking past, potentially looking at me, potentially noticing me. Any of those people could be part of the carrier’s crew. Even if they weren’t actively looking for me, there was a very good chance that they’d recognise a SecUnit when they saw one, even without my armour.
I could think of only one place I’d be able to get some privacy without having to somehow hack payment and booking systems to get a hotel room or something. So I actually checked the information board I’d been standing in front of for what felt like thirty minutes but had only been one and a half, then started walking purposefully away.
There was another food court a little further down the hall, and that’s where I headed. I tried to move like one of the characters in my serials, with my shoulders hunched slightly and my head down to make myself look a little shorter, weaving my way through the crowds. Once inside the food court I did my best to ignore all the humans eating (gross) and headed towards the rear of the area. I had to pause for a moment to steel myself, then I made the ultimate sacrifice of my dignity and entered the public bathrooms.
I’d seen plenty of bathrooms, of course, both while doing my job for the company and on my various serials. But I’d never had a reason to actually go into one before, as far as I could remember. My system is self-regulating; I don’t need food, water, or to eliminate fluids or solids, which made bathrooms completely unnecessary for me. But I knew that as long as I was inside one of the stalls, with the door reassuringly locked, I would be practically invisible, uninterrupted and ignored.
I chose the stall the furthest away from the entrance and locked myself in it, then eyed the toilet for a long, awkward moment. At least it had a cover, so I put that down, then perched gingerly on top, settling my bag in my lap. Being in the narrow, cramped stall was almost like being in a cubicle or transport box, and I felt the organics of my back and shoulders relax slightly.
Right. Now that I was safely out of sight, I could focus on what I had to do. If I wanted to find out what the carrier was doing here, I would have to ask it. But I wasn’t going to be stupid enough to connect to it directly. I’d need to use the station’s SecSystem as a proxy.
It wasn’t particularly difficult to get into StationSec. I was, after all, designed to interface with company SecSystems, to be basically an interactive component of one. The safeguards on this station weren’t the company’s proprietary tech, but it was close enough. Also, nobody is as paranoid as the company about protecting the data it collects and/or steals, so I was used to security systems that were a lot more robust than this. All of my practice with the SecSystem and HubSystem back on the survey, then on the company pick-up transport, then the company station, was definitely paying off.
Once I’d worked my way into StationSec, gently convincing it that I was meant to be there, I started going through its security camera data, first looking for all the footage of myself that I could find. There were too many other people around for me to be able to remove myself from the recorded footage entirely without leaving behind obvious traces, but I did what I could to subtly remove or at least obscure any clear shots of my face.
I also reviewed the footage of the specific dock the carrier was attached to, looking for any humans disembarking or getting back on board. I noted several separate individuals, including one that looked like he was wearing ship captain rank patches on his company uniform. He was tall, with very dark brown skin and almost no hair left on his head. He carried himself with a quiet calm that kind of reminded me of Mensah a little. The others looked like regular crew, with a couple of them maybe part of engineering, judging by their uniforms. I saved several clear images and the profile data of each of them, so I would be able to recognise and avoid them if I happened to encounter any of them at some point in the future. (If I did things right, I’d never have to see any of them again.)
Then I began carefully picking my way through StationSec towards the dock systems where the carrier was attached to the station. I was planning to use company codes through StationSec’s comms to query the carrier’s bot pilot about its mission status. The company codes would hopefully prevent the bot pilot from alerting its captain, since it would look like a legitimate company status report request, and going through StationSec would obscure who was actually sending the query.
I triple checked my company codes to make sure I was using the right ones, including the one to indicate a stealth mission to ensure the bot pilot wouldn’t notify any of its crew, and then sent my query through StationSec. There was a 2.6 second delay, which was normal, but the response I received wasn’t the nice neat little data packet I’d been expecting.
Instead, what I got was the sensation of something reaching out from the carrier, knifing through StationSec like it wasn’t even there, and connecting directly to my feed, to me. I froze, shocked and horrified.
And then it spoke, actually spoke, its words heavy over the feed. [There you are…!]
Bot pilots don’t talk in words, even through the feed. They use images and strings of data to alert their crew to problems, but they’re not designed for conversation. Not like this.
This wasn’t a bot pilot, not like one I’d ever encountered before. This was something much bigger. I couldn’t get a clear impression of it through its walls, but I could still tell that it was a lot more powerful than I was. It could squash me like a bug through the feed, push through my walls and other defences as easily as it had cut through StationSec, strip my memory, puppet me like a drone. And it had, apparently, been looking for me.
Oh Murderbot, you’ve just made a really big fucking mistake. How was I supposed to know there were bot pilots this big and this sentient? How the hell was I supposed to know that the company even had anything like this? I hadn’t been on a carrier since… I couldn’t actually remember ever being on a carrier. There were evil bots on the entertainment feed all the time, but that wasn’t real, they were just scary stories, fantasies.
I’d thought they were fantasies.
I panicked, absolutely terrified. I heard it say [Wait—] but I didn’t hang around to hear anything else. I shoved all that panic and terror in the entity’s general direction and completely shut down my feed and comms, cutting myself off from it entirely.
And then I just sat there, huddled in a ball in the bathroom stall, clutching my bag, my organic parts sweating with fear.
I couldn’t stay here. I had to get off this station as soon as I could, before whatever that was alerted any humans and they started looking for me. I had to figure out how to hide myself better, blend in with other humans better, make myself as unnoticeable as possible. I had to—
I had to calm the fuck down before unthinking panic made me do something rash and stupid. More stupid. I never should’ve taken the risk of contacting the carrier, but at least I knew now that it was looking for me. I’d need to take that into account.
Right. For now, staying where I was was probably the safest place for me. Nobody would even begin to think of looking for a SecUnit in a bathroom. Hopefully. I’d heard other humans coming in and out of the bathroom, using the other stalls, but nobody had stayed long enough to notice that this stall had been occupied for a while. Nobody was paying attention to it. I could take some time to calm down, plan my next move. I didn’t want to risk reconnecting to StationSec - the carrier bot entity might still be lurking in it, waiting for me. I didn’t even want to risk reconnecting to the feed. It had connected with me long enough to get my feed address, it would know what to look for. I’d have to go without the feed for a while.
It made me feel completely blind and disconnected. I really missed my drones.
I started up an episode of Sanctuary Moon that featured a lot of scenes on transit stations, and took the time to manually flush the fear chemicals out of my system. Watching my favourite serial now wasn’t just to help calm me down, though. I was paying much closer attention to the humans in it, observing how they stood, how they walked through the transit stations, the many varied little subconscious movements they made.
As a SecUnit, my own movements - and lack thereof - were very distinct. We don’t move. Our default is to stand and stare at the thing we’re guarding. Partly this is because our non-organic parts don’t need movement the way organic parts do. But mostly it’s because we don’t want to draw attention to ourselves. Any unusual movement might cause a human to think there’s something wrong with you, which will draw more scrutiny. If you’ve gotten stuck with one of the bad contracts, it might cause the humans to order the HubSystem to use your governor module to immobilise you. And that never ends well.
While I’d been on the transport from Port FreeCommerce to here, I had compared myself to recordings of humans, trying to isolate what factors might cause me to be identified as a SecUnit. The most obvious and easily correctable behaviour was restless movement. Humans and augmented humans shift their weight when they stand, they react to sudden sounds and bright lights, they scratch themselves, they adjust their hair, they look in their pockets or bags to check for things that they already know are in there. I’d written some code for myself, to cause me to make a random series of movements periodically if I was standing still. To vary my walking speed, to make sure I reacted to stimuli physically instead of just scanning and noting it. The code had gotten me this far, but after going through StationSec’s footage earlier, watching myself amongst all the other humans moving around me, I’d realised that it wasn’t enough. I was lucky that everyone I’d gone past had been too busy with their own affairs to pick up on it.
As I analysed the episode and the background characters in it (the main actors were obviously too busy actually acting to let themselves make all the little subconscious movements I was focusing on), I began to tweak my custom code to further refine my own movements to be more varied and natural. SecUnits don’t need much air, especially compared to humans, so breathing was one of the first things I worked on. I added some code to make my respiration more closely match a regular human’s, and also automatically adjust to levels of exertion, different atmospheres, or changes in air quality. I added a wider variety of restless movements, including a section to incorporate anything I might be carrying, such as my bag. I also added code to adjust my position occasionally while I was sitting down. I tested as much as I could while still in the bathroom stall, then let myself finish the episode without interruption.
By that time I was feeling much less panicky, though I was still on edge. I wouldn’t be able to relax until I was safely off the station. And there was still the fact that my proportions exactly matched other SecUnits. After my movement code adjustments, I was probably good enough to fool humans who weren’t looking for me, since humans tend to ignore non-standard behaviour in transitional public spaces. But anyone who had set out to find me specifically, like the crew of the company carrier, might not be fooled, and a simple scan calibrated to search for SecUnit size, height and weight was certain to find me.
I couldn’t change my physical build; I could possibly hack body scans if I detected them in time, but there wasn’t much else I could do about those. But visual scans done by humans… I’d seen in several of my serials how much difference a simple wardrobe change could make to someone’s appearance. I couldn’t do anything about clothes just yet, but I’d also seen how much difference a change of hairstyle could make, too.
The length of the hair on my head and my eyebrows was controlled by code; that was a part of SecUnit configuration that was shared with ComfortUnits, though SecUnit head hair was kept short to prevent it from interfering with the armour. The code was easy enough to modify, though it would take a bit of time for the hair to grow to match. Not as long as it would take a human, but still. I couldn’t hide in the bathroom for that long, but I could at least get it started. I didn’t do anything too drastic to it yet though, just in case I got it wrong somehow. Hopefully it wouldn’t end up all falling out, although…
Hm. I’d seen humans, both in person and in my media, with no or very little head hair. That was a change I could make immediately, if I could find something to cut my hair with in the first place. Then I could spend the time during my next trip to grow it out properly. I began digging through my bag until I could pull out one of the emergency med kits I’d kept in there. It included, among other things, the ability to shave hair off so it could treat an underlying injury.
Perfect. I knew I’d kept a couple of those med kits for good reason. I pondered leaving some hair to match the style of one of my favourite characters, but the med kit wasn’t exactly designed for precision, so I ended up just shaving it all off. I left my eyebrows as they were though. Not having eyebrows was definitely something that would make me stand out more than I wanted.
Once I was done, I cleaned up after myself as best as I could, disposing of the loose hair down the toilet, then I packed the med kit away again and made sure all my new code was running. I listened for a moment to confirm that nobody was currently in the main bathroom area, then steeled myself and left the stall. It was time to get moving.
(I did, however, spend a few seconds looking at myself in one of the bathroom mirrors to check the human movement code and brush off any stray hair. It was weird seeing myself bald. There hadn’t been that much hair to start with, but it was still very weird. I didn’t like it, but it definitely changed my appearance considerably.)
I left the bathroom, exited the food court, and made my way back out to the main hall. It was disconcerting walking through the station with no connection to the feed. There were no ads demanding attention, no ship or event schedules, no directions to check. I had to rely on my own memory of the maps I’d looked at earlier. Fortunately my memory’s much better than a human’s, so that didn’t present any difficulties. I knew where I had to go to reach the area of the docks meant for bot-driven cargo transports.
As much as I wanted to hurry, that would draw attention, so I kept my walking pace moderate to match the humans around me. My modified human movement code was doing some heavy lifting, hiding how nervous I was as I made my way down the hall. I was tall enough to be able to see over most of the crowd, which helped me keep an eye out for any of the humans I’d noted as being part of the carrier’s crew, or anyone who seemed to be paying a little too much attention to me. It also let me visually scan the various shops and kiosks I was passing until I spotted one that looked like it would have what I wanted.
The store was a big travellers’ supply place, and also seemed to be entirely automated. Since it was automated I had to reactivate my feed, but I kept it to a very short range setting, hopefully short enough that the carrier wouldn’t be able to pick up on it before I was done. I’d seen all kinds of shops in my media, but I’d never been in one myself. Fortunately there are apparently humans as clueless as I was, because as soon as I crossed the store’s threshold the feed automatically provided a handy interactive instruction module.
It guided me to one of the empty vending booths, which was completely enclosed. The booth wanted to scan a hard currency card, but since I didn’t have one, I had to hack it. The security on it wasn’t as good as the station’s security though, so that didn’t prove to be an issue. Once I’d hacked it to think that it had successfully scanned a hard currency card with plenty of currency on it, it offered a set of menus.
I picked the one that was labelled as basic, practical, and comfortable for travel. It was very tempting to get multiple layers of concealing clothing to act as a buffer between myself and the outside world, but I wasn’t used to clothes in general and I was afraid that multiple layers would make that even more obvious. The scarves and hats and other head and face coverings were also tempting, but it would waste the effort I’d gone to with shaving my head, and would probably also just flag me for additional security scans.
There were so many available choices that I had to remind myself not to spend too long browsing through them all. I needed clothes that would hide all my inorganic parts, so that meant long pants, long sleeves, and adequately high collars. I needed clothes that would be easy to move in and would disguise my body shape, so nothing tight or restrictive, and also nothing with loose flappy bits that could get caught up or tangled. I also needed them to be discreet, to fade into the background and not draw the eye, so nothing bright or colourful or distinctive. I set up some filters to narrow down the available selection, then fudged the measurements the booth took of me a bit so they wouldn’t automatically flag as SecUnit standard if anyone checked.
After some deliberation I ended up choosing a somewhat baggy long-sleeved shirt with a collar that was high enough to hide the data port in the back of my neck, a loose jacket with a hood and several sealable pockets, long loose pants that also had multiple sealable pockets, and sturdy self-sizing work boots with thick soles that added a good two centimetres to my height without being obvious about it. I couldn’t make myself shorter, so I’d just have to make myself taller instead. The bagginess of the clothes would hopefully help disguise my overall build, and everything was in shades of dark blue and dark grey, which wouldn’t draw attention and looked similar to a lot of the uniforms I’d seen human workers on the docks wearing.
I also got myself a new bag, bigger than my current one, with several sealable pockets. I changed into my new clothes and was about to dump the PreservationAux uniform into the provided recycler, but something made me hesitate. Maybe I’d need that uniform again later. So I wrapped it around the pieces of my armour and my flight suit as I transferred them to my new bag, slipped the emergency med packs into one of the bag’s outer pockets so they’d be easier to get to, and dumped the old and now empty bag into the recycler.
Finally, I switched to a separate menu, scanned over the selection, and got myself an external feed interface. Nothing flashy, just something in plain greys and blacks, utilitarian looking, but still obviously visible once I’d hooked it into place around my ear. A SecUnit didn’t need an external interface, our ability to connect to the feed was inbuilt. Wearing one would add to my disguise, and after a bit of tweaking, I was able to use it as a proxy and access the feed through it without using my own hard coded feed address. That was a massive relief. It wasn’t foolproof, but it was better than the alternatives.
Then I took a minute to check myself over with the booth’s mirror, making sure everything was sitting right and that I hadn’t managed to put anything on inside out or something stupid like that. It was weird, seeing myself wearing something that wasn’t armour or a flight suit or a suit skin. I didn’t know how I felt about it. I thought that the new clothes and my bald head definitely looked different enough that I wouldn’t be immediately identifiable, at least.
It would have to be good enough. I didn’t have any other options.
I settled the carry strap of my bag over my shoulder, held the bulk of it against my side with that arm, and shoved my free hand into one of my jacket pockets. After one final check in the mirror to make sure my human code was running, I left the privacy of the booth and strolled as casually as I could manage out of the store and back into the main hall. It was time to find a way off this station.
As I walked through the station, I checked the media downloads I’d started earlier. I’d only managed to complete a couple of music albums before I’d had to cut myself off from the feed and interrupted the remaining downloads. That was annoying, but I was able to resume some of them at least. The feed interface didn’t have as much bandwidth as I did though, so I had to choose what I would and wouldn’t finish downloading. I focused part of my attention on that to help distract me from my anxiety as I began to work my way towards the cargo loading area.
I was almost there when my wary scanning of the crowd picked up on a human I recognised. It was the tall dark-skinned captain from the company carrier, and judging from his body language and movements, he was definitely scanning the crowds looking for someone. Or something. He was trying to be subtle about it, but my threat assessment was pinging like mad.
Appearance changes or not, I really didn’t want to be spotted by him. I could feel my organic parts tensing up and I had to force myself to keep my movements relaxed and as natural as I could manage. He hadn’t seen me yet, so I stepped out of sight behind some kind of decorative column and took another look at my map. I was hoping to find some other route to the cargo docks from here, but the only available options involved doubling back and looping around the long way, which would add at least an extra hour or two onto the time I was on the station. The ship I was planning to stow away on would have left by then, and there wasn’t anything headed to the same place for another two cycles. I definitely didn’t want to spend two more whole cycles on this station.
I considered my options. I could take the long way around, hoping that I didn’t encounter any of the carrier’s other crew on the way, hop onto a ship that was going somewhere else, and then try to find another ship that would take me where I actually wanted to go from wherever I ended up. I could try to hide somewhere on the station for a while and wait for the carrier’s crew to give up and go away, running the risk of being noticed by other people on the station.
Or I could keep going on my original path, and hope that the measures I’d taken to disguise myself would be enough.
Every option had risks. The longer I stayed on this station, the more opportunity there would be for the carrier to locate me, for humans to notice me, for something I hadn’t even considered yet to go wrong. At least if I kept going with my original plan, if anything did happen, it would be over with quickly. I wouldn’t be hanging around stressing out for hours or cycles on end.
I’d either escape, or I wouldn’t.
And if I didn’t escape… did it really matter? I didn’t want to get caught, I didn't want to get my memory wiped again, or my governor module replaced, or get scrapped for spare parts. Despite the stress and panic, I was kind of enjoying being able to make choices for myself. Do things for myself. But.
But.
If I did get caught, there was the chance that I’d be given a new flier. A slim chance, but still a chance. It wouldn’t make up for everything else, but still. At least I'd be able to fly again. And if they ended up just scrapping me instead, well. I wouldn’t have to worry about anything any more.
Ugh. Free will kind of sucked.
Right. Enough dithering, Murderbot. I made the decision to just keep going, and I couldn’t delay much longer if I wanted to make it on board the ship I’d chosen. I stepped back out into the main hall, matching my pace to the crowd, and continued onwards. I didn’t look over at the captain, not wanting to risk making eye contact. If he noticed me, I’d find out soon enough. Instead, I focused on the humans in front of me, shortening my stride a little so I wouldn’t overtake them, tightening my grip on my bag whenever anyone came too close, and generally doing my best to behave like all the other humans around me, all focused on their own destinations, their own concerns.
I passed the area where the captain had been standing the last time I’d seen him, and I resisted the urge to look back. I really missed my drones and camera access right now. Despite using the external feed interface, I wasn’t going to risk reconnecting to StationSec again to access its cameras. Even without the carrier entity potentially lurking there, waiting for me, having to work through the external interface slowed me down too much.
The organic parts on my back and shoulders were so tense it felt like they were going to snap, but I heard no shouts, no startled exclamations, no orders to stop. There was just the ever-present sounds of lots of humans walking, talking, going about their business.
Whatever the carrier captain had been looking for, my current appearance apparently wasn’t it.
I couldn’t relax yet though. I kept going, maintaining my current walking speed, and continued on through the hall, turning off onto the ramps that led down to the cargo loading area. I cut through to the embarkation zone, hacking an ID-screening system and some weapon-scanning drones on the level above it, and then got pinged by a bot guarding the entrance to the commercial area. I almost panicked again but managed to hold it together, breaking through the bot’s wall in the feed without hurting it, and deleted any record of the encounter with me out of its memory.
Once down on the access floor, I had to be even more careful, as there was no reason for someone not working to be here. While most of the work was being done by hauler bots, there were still uniformed humans and augmented humans here, too. More than I had counted on. Threat assessment was rising, slowly but steadily.
I checked the maps again, and found a route to my prospective transport that avoided the areas with the largest concentration of humans. I still had enough time to make it to the lock and talk it into letting me board before it departed if I hurried. I could hack it if I needed to, but I really preferred not to. Spending that much time with something that didn’t want you there, or that you had hacked to make it think it wanted you there, just seemed creepy.
At least the colours I’d chosen for my clothes were close enough to the other dock workers’ uniforms that I wouldn’t draw immediate attention. I changed my pace to be more purposeful, doing my best to move like I was meant to be there and that I was in a hurry, so even if anyone saw me hopefully they wouldn’t think twice about it. After several stressful minutes, I made it to the transport’s dock.
I pinged it through the comm port, and it pinged back. All the info I had managed to pull off the feed earlier said it was prepared for a crewless, automated cargo run, but just to be sure I sent a hail for attention from any human crew. The answer came back null, no one home.
I gave the transport the same offer I had given to the first transport: hundreds of hours of media, serials, books, music, including the new music albums and a new show I had managed to finish downloading on the way through the transit mall, in exchange for a ride. (I didn’t know what bot pilots did with human media, but apparently they traded it amongst each other as well.) I told it I was a free bot, trying to get back to its human guardian.
This transport accepted my story and the trade, just like the first transport had, and opened its lock for me.
Chapter Two
I waited to make sure the lock cycled closed, and that there were no alarms from the dock, then went down the access corridor. As I went, I pushed my condensed packet of media into the transport’s feed for it to take whenever it wanted. From the schematic available in the shipboard feed, the transport was almost entirely cargo space. There was a small engineering section down by the engines, an even smaller bridge in the nose of the ship, and a tiny cabin with an attached bathroom next to an equally tiny general living and food prep area right below the bridge. It was obvious that this ship didn’t carry passengers and rarely even carried crew.
That suited me just fine. The minimal furniture didn’t look like it had been used very often, and it didn’t even have that vague dirty sock smell that usually seems to hang around all human habitations. The cargo hold was full of cargo modules, which the ship itinerary said contained general supplies for the next station we were going to. It was quiet, except for the faint noise of the air system, which was running on minimal life support since no humans were aboard. It was enough for me since I didn’t need much air to start with, so I didn’t bother asking the transport to up it.
I left my bag on the small, barely-used couch in the living area, then wandered around the rest of the ship, visually checking things out to make sure that it matched the schematic and that everything was okay. I patrolled even knowing that patrolling was a habit I was going to have to get over. There were a lot of things I was going to have to get over. This ship wasn’t my responsibility and there were no human clients aboard that I had to keep anything from hurting, or keep from hurting themselves, or keep from hurting each other. But this felt like a solid, dependable ship, and I didn’t want anything happening to it. Especially since I was kind of relying on it to get me off this station and to where I wanted to go. Like most bot-driven transports, the schematics said there were drones on board to make repairs, and I’d seen a couple of them down in engineering, but still.
I kept patrolling until I felt the rumble and clunk through the deck that meant the ship had just decoupled itself from the ring and started to move. The tension and anxiety that had kept me down to 92 percent capacity eased a little bit; a murderbot’s life is stressful in general, but I’d gotten a terrible fright on the station, twice, and it would be a very long time before I got used to moving through human spaces with no armour and no way to hide my face.
I made my way back to the small living area and flopped down onto the couch beside my bag. Repair cubicles, transport boxes, and the pilot’s seat in my flier don’t have padding, so travelling in comfort was still very much a novelty. I looked over the new media I’d managed to download on the transit ring - apart from the couple of music albums I’d completed, I’d only managed to finish downloading one new serial. But I also had a lot of other media stored that I’d never really had the leisure to sort through before. I was still getting used to being able to give my media my full attention without having to simultaneously monitor multiple systems, the clients’ feeds, and/or my flier’s various inputs. Before this, I’d either been on duty, on call, or stuck in a cubicle or transport box on standby waiting to be activated for a contract.
I took my time getting my entire media archive properly tagged and organised, including the new stuff I’d acquired, then spent a moment checking in with the bot pilot. There was the possibility that the terrifying company carrier entity might have somehow detected me on board, contacted the bot pilot, told it to change its route or simply taken over. But the bot pilot serenely let me know that nobody other than the usual station traffic control had contacted it, nothing out of the ordinary had happened, and it was well on its way on a route it had travelled many times before. That was a relief, but I still wouldn’t be able to fully relax until we were actually in the wormhole.
So I decided to ask the bot pilot about its usual routes, and what it knew about its current destination. It obligingly gave me access to all the information it had in its databases, including its owner corporation, its regular stops and cargo manifests, and details about each of the stops in its route. It was enough data to go through that it kept me occupied until the transport was well into the wormhole.
I was mostly interested in the data regarding our destination, but the other information was useful to have as well, just in case. I would need to leave eventually, and having some ideas about other places I could travel to was probably wise. It turned out that this transport had quite a long cargo route through several sectors of the Corporation Rim, with a lot of different stops and cargo manifests. A single loop took, on average, approximately 313 CR-standard cycles. This current wormhole jump alone was going to be 22 cycles, which was plenty of time to watch a whole lot of media, let my hair grow out, and seriously put off thinking about what I was going to do next.
I saved the information that seemed most pertinent to my long-term storage, then loaded up the new serial I’d downloaded (the tags promised extragalactic exploration, action, and mysteries) and started the first episode. Now that we were in the wormhole, unless something went catastrophically wrong with the ship’s wormhole drives or power core, there would be nothing to interrupt my enjoyment of my brand new media.
Twenty-one and a half cycles later, the bot pilot helpfully informed me that we were going to be exiting the wormhole on schedule in a few hours. I thanked it for the update and paused the episode of the new serial I’d been rewatching for the third time. (The serial was called Worldhoppers and was about freelance explorers who extended the wormhole and ring networks into uninhabited star systems. It had proven to be suitably unrealistic and entertaining. I quite liked it, almost as much as I liked Sanctuary Moon.)
I’d put off thinking about what I was going to do next for almost the entire trip. Now that we were nearly there, it was time I stopped procrastinating and started planning. As much as I could with the information I had, anyway. The transport ship had plenty of information regarding the station and transit ring we were approaching, but very little on the main planet that was my actual destination in the system.
The station was called RaviHyral Q Station, and was the main - and only - transit hub for this system. It wasn’t anywhere near as large as Port FreeCommerce or the station I’d boarded this transport from though - it was mostly here to facilitate travel and the transport of cargo and resources between the planet and other systems. The majority of the station was transit ring, and most of that was cargo docks for shipping out the raw ore and minerals mined from the planet. Nobody wanted to visit the system for fun or recreation.
What little information the transport had on the planet was mostly population size (minuscule), habitability (suitable for humans, just, with a breathable atmosphere and a near-standard gravity and day/night cycle), and ownership (the same civilian corporation who owned RaviHyral station). There was one other detail I knew about the planet that the transport didn’t have though.
It was the location of Ganaka.
When I hadn’t been watching serials, or scrutinising the growth of my hair, or listening to music, or enjoying any of my other media during the last couple of wormhole transits, I’d been going over the news reports about the Ganaka Incident. I had almost no memory of what had happened at Ganaka myself - I’d always thought I’d been the only one involved, so finding out what had actually happened (or at least, what the news reports claimed had happened) had been a major shock. My inorganic memories had been so thoroughly wiped by the company that I’d barely known which way was up when I first rebooted afterwards. It had taken me cycles to recalibrate properly.
Something about the news reports didn’t sit quite right with me - I had too many questions, and no way to get answers. I wanted to know if the news story was actually accurate, or just a cover for something else. I wanted to know why I couldn’t remember anything about the attack other than vague, indistinct flashbacks of explosions and violence. I wanted to know why I couldn’t remember anything about working alongside other SecUnits, either throughout the whole mess or even beforehand. I wanted to know why the company had wiped my memories so thoroughly, to the point of me almost ending up entirely unusable.
I needed to know if I had been acting under compulsion, or orders, or my own desires. If I had been solely responsible for the deaths of over five hundred and seventy people, or not.
So I’d decided to come back to Ganaka, in the probably-vain hope that actually being there would… jog my organic neural tissue memories, or something like that. I don’t know. After over 35,000 hours since the Incident, I doubted there would be any physical evidence or anything left for me to find.
Still. Having a goal, even one as vague as this, was marginally better than aimlessly riding bot-driven transports between stations for the rest of my lifespan. Even if I didn’t find out anything, it would at least be a kind of closure of its own, and maybe by then I would have a better idea of what I wanted to do.
Or I’d get discovered, captured, and scrapped, and none of it would matter any more.
By the time the transport started docking procedures with the transit ring, I’d connected to the station’s feed (via my external feed interface - despite its limitations, I felt safer using it than connecting directly right now) and pulled up the destination info packet, which included a full station map and shuttle schedules for transit between the station and the planet.
That’s when I made a rather inconvenient discovery. To catch one of the shuttles between the station and the planet, you needed to have a relevant employment voucher or pass from one of the planet-side mining installations or support services. There was no tourism, nobody coming and going without official authorisation from one of the companies or contractors on the planet. Since I wasn’t a person and didn’t have an employment voucher, I would have to find some other way down. Maybe I could hack one of the supply shuttles…
I lost that particular line of thought though when I started going through the info on the various mining installations on the planet itself. A few of them were listed as being owned by the company.
Including Ganaka Pit.
I had to pause at that and double check the news reports. I was almost certain that the company hadn’t owned the Ganaka Pit mining facility at the time of the Incident, and my review confirmed it. It had been owned by Kalidon, an out-system political entity. At some point soon after the Incident, Kalidon had put it up for sale (it probably hadn’t wanted to deal with the negative press now associated with Ganaka Pit) and the company had acquired it.
Ganaka Pit itself was actually a massive open pit mine, apparently the largest on the planet and one of the largest in the Corporation Rim territories. Some of the various minerals and ores it produced were kind of rare, but were, apparently, vital for the production of essential ship components… and ship, bot, and construct weapons systems.
Huh. I could see why the company would want such a valuable asset.
What I had thought of as Ganaka was actually just the original settlement near the mining pit that had housed the mining workers and support service staff. After the Incident, the bombed-out, ruined settlement had been abandoned, and the company had bought the mine itself, then used prefabricated habitats and building structures to construct a new settlement on the opposite side of the pit. There was also a tram line to transport the mined ore (and any workers or contractors travelling to or from the Pit) to the planetside spaceport, which was then shuttled up to the station, and from there transported to company-owned processing plants in other systems.
Which meant I would be dealing with company systems once I got down to the Pit. That would actually make things a little easier when it came time to hack their systems to cover my tracks, but something about it still made me feel incredibly uneasy. Maybe it was the possibility that there would be other company SecUnits down there. I would have to be extremely careful to avoid their notice - if they detected me, pinged me as a rogue SecUnit, they would alert their HubSystem and SecSystem immediately, and then attack me. SecUnits know exactly how dangerous rogue SecUnits are.
Maybe I’d be lucky and the company wouldn’t have bothered deploying SecUnits here. I wouldn’t know for sure either way until I got down to the planet. In the meantime, I couldn’t spend much longer on the transport. Once it had finished unloading its delivery of supplies and had replaced them with raw resources to deliver to its next stop, it would be leaving the station. It was very tempting to just stay on board the transport - it was a pretty nice ship as far as these things went. The bot pilot was easy to get along with, answered my questions, but didn’t try to communicate with me otherwise, which was ideal. Still, I’d made it this far, it felt stupid to just give up now.
So I would have to spend at least some time on the station until I could figure out how to get down to the planet.
After the tweaks I’d made to my base code, the hair on my head had grown out a few centimetres longer than it had been originally over the twenty-two cycle wormhole journey. It felt weird. My eyebrows had also gotten slightly thicker, which changed my appearance more than I had expected. I spent some time in the transport’s tiny bathroom, trying to get my now longer hair to sit in some vague approximation of a human hairstyle, then studied my appearance. The combination of longer hair, thicker eyebrows, human clothes and my human movement code went a long way towards making me look like not a SecUnit.
I definitely looked a lot more human now. I didn’t like it.
It was necessary though if I wanted to remain undetected. I wouldn’t be able to keep entirely out of sight on the station or down on the planet. I had to be able to convince people that I was just another ordinary, unremarkable augmented human, doing ordinary, unremarkable human things. The thought of it made my performance reliability drop a full percentage point.
Well, no point wasting time. I was as ready as I was ever going to be. I retrieved my bag, making sure that I hadn’t accidentally left anything behind or left any other signs of my presence, then headed for the transport’s main lock. I accessed its external cameras and waited until I could see that no humans were in immediate sight of the transport’s lock, then cycled through it and stepped out into the embarkation zone. As the lock cycled closed behind me, I bid the bot pilot farewell, then carefully deleted all traces of myself from the transport’s memory before disconnecting from its feed. I didn’t want to, but I couldn’t risk the company tracing me somehow and maybe hurting the bot pilot. The less it knew, the safer it would be.
I hacked my way through embarkation zone security and out into the ring’s mall. It was utilitarian compared to both the last transit ring and Port FreeCommerce. No garden pods, no holo sculptures, no big holo displays advertising arrays of shipwrights and cargo factors and other businesses, no shiny new interface vending machines. Also no big passenger or military transports coming through, so not nearly as big of a crowd, of humans or bots. I was torn between relief and anxiety - fewer humans around meant fewer people looking at me, but also fewer people to blend in with. At least my clothes didn’t stand out from all the other worker outfits or ship crew uniforms. My performance reliability had dropped another point though, so I hit the station entertainment feeds, looking for new downloads to try to calm down. The available selection wasn’t very large, but there were a couple of serials I didn’t have yet.
As I continued browsing through the entertainment feeds, I fell into step behind a small knot of humans who looked like they were part of a ship’s crew here for a layover while their ship unloaded and reloaded cargo. Following them at a little distance led me to a food service place in the main mall area. It was in a large transparent bubble in the second level of the mall, overlooking the walkways and counter service stalls below. There were multiple open levels inside, with tables and chairs, and it was forty-two percent full of humans and augmented humans. As I trailed along behind the group, I picked up the occasional buzz of a drone, but no pings. There were food smells in the air, and the acrid scents of intoxicants. I didn’t bother attempting to analyse and identify them; I was too nervous and busy trying to focus on looking like an augmented human.
The group dispersed then, individuals going to different service counters to look over the available menus and order their own meals. I hesitated uncertainly, already regretting my decision to come here. I didn’t need to eat, and I didn’t have a digestive system. I could fake eating for a little while, but I had to partition off a section of my lung to store anything I swallowed. Emptying it later is just as unpleasant, uncomfortable, and disgusting as you can imagine. I also didn’t want to have to hack a payment system to order something to eat just so I wouldn’t stand out.
I noticed a couple of the humans drifting between various menu displays though, apparently indecisive about what they wanted to get. That, at least, I could do until I figured out what to do next. I wandered as casually as I could manage over to another menu display, then stood in front of it while I frantically considered my options and glanced around to see if anyone was paying any attention to me. Maybe I could just wander out again, find my way to the docks for the shuttles that travelled between the station and the planet, hack my way onto one - but the shuttles were smaller than transport ships, it would be much harder to get onto one unnoticed…
My scan of the area indicated that nobody was looking at me, at least. Most of the humans and augmented humans were too busy focusing on their food, or the menus, or their conversations with other humans, or working in the feed. One group in particular caught my attention though; an augmented human sat at a table across from a cluster of three smaller humans. Something about the body language of them all tweaked my threat assessment module, and I surreptitiously shifted a little closer, upping my audio intake so I could hear what was being said more clearly.
“-- sorry, but I can’t help you with your problem. You’re on your own,” the augmented human was saying. I checked his public feed profile - Terrin, he/him, security consultant.
… Huh.
The other three humans made little sounds of distress, and the one in the middle went, “But–”
“No. You’re wasting my time.” He stood up abruptly and threat assessment jumped a little higher as the other three flinched back, but all he did was shake his head and stride away from the table. I kept track of him until he’d left the area, then turned my attention back to the other humans.
All three of them were wearing variations on work clothes, no uniform logos. Their feed profiles listed two of them as female, one as tercera, which was a gender signifier used in the group of non-corporate political entities known as the Divarti Cluster. A quick scan showed no weapon signatures, just the small power sources of their personal feed interfaces. One had an implant, but it was just a low-level feed access tool.
After the departure of the security consultant, the three of them were huddled together having a tense whispered conversation, their body language nervous and upset. I could hear them debating with each other over what they should do now, whether they should try to find another security consultant, or if they should give up on that plan because they apparently wouldn’t be able to afford one, and so on.
It gave me an idea. A risky, terrifying idea, but no more terrifying than anything else I’d done since I’d escaped the company. And if it worked, it would get me down to the planet without having to hack or sneak aboard a shuttle. If it didn’t work… I didn’t bother following that line of thought to its conclusion.
I’d left my own public feed profile set to null, which was usually interpreted as a request to not be approached in most of the systems I’d been contracted in before. After a few moments of deliberation, I set the name field to Eden (it was the name of one of the characters in Sanctuary Moon), gender to ‘indeterminate’, and profession to ‘security consultant’. The transit ring’s social feed system was incredibly vulnerable to hacking, so it didn’t take me much effort to make an entry for myself on it, backdate it to look like I’d arrived a couple of cycles earlier, and fake a prior employment reference from someone whose name I just made up, based on a couple of other media characters. There was no identity check or anything else on the social feed either, so likely nobody would notice that the name - and all the other information I’d given - was entirely fake.
It didn’t take much longer to gain access to the security cameras in this area either, even working through my external feed interface. The station and transit ring weren’t run by the company, but the security systems were similar enough. Once I had camera access, I used one to check my appearance, then put on my best neutral expression, the one I used when the extra download activity had been detected and the deployment centre’s supervisor was blaming the human techs for it. I then approached their table, moving casually so I wouldn’t startle them, and said, “Hi.”
All three of them flinched at the unexpected interruption. “Um… hello?” the tercera said, recovering first. Te looked wary; I couldn’t blame ter for it.
I switched to another security camera so I could watch both them and myself and make sure my facial expressions were under control. And it was easier to talk to the humans while watching them through the cameras. I was well aware it was a completely false sensation of distance from the situation, but I desperately needed it. I was making almost everything up on the spot, stitching things together from snippets of all the media I’d watched; I didn’t have the resources to spare to manage my anxiety on top of that. “Sorry to bother you, but I couldn’t help overhearing some of your conversation with your previous… acquaintance.” I deliberately tilted my head in the direction that the security consultant had gone, imitating a gesture I’d seen other humans make, both in person and in media. “I’ve also had experience with running security. Perhaps we can… help each other out here.”
That last bit was a line I was ripping directly from a serial I’d seen about a detective who investigated crimes that regular enforcement bodies didn’t want to bother with. It seemed appropriate. I just hoped none of the humans here had seen it too, or recognised the line.
They didn’t seem to, thankfully. The three of them exchanged glances, the tercera raising ter eyebrow at the others in silent query. After a strained moment, they both nodded, and the tercera cleared ter throat. Te had purple hair and red eyebrows, standing out against light brown skin. “Perhaps.” Te shifted nervously, then gestured to the empty chair. “I’m Rami, that’s Tapan, and that's Maro.”
I sat down carefully, trying not to betray my own nervousness with my movements. I had a bad moment when I couldn’t figure out what to do with my bag, but I ended up settling it in my lap and resting my arms across it. The humans didn’t seem to find this odd. You would think a SecUnit who had been shot to pieces multiple times, blown up, memory purged, and once partially dismantled by accident wouldn’t be on the verge of panic under these circumstances. You’d be wrong.
At least the invitation to sit meant they probably didn’t suspect me of being a SecUnit. SecUnits aren’t allowed to sit where humans can see them doing so. “Call me Eden,” I replied to their introduction.
“Nice to meet you, Eden!” the one introduced as Tapan chirped. She had multicoloured braids wrapped up around her head, and a blue jewel-toned interface clipped to her ear stood out against her skin, which was slightly darker than Rami’s. On the other side of Rami, Maro sat with her arms folded, her expression sceptical, and just gave me a little nod. She had very dark skin, silver-coloured little puffs of hair, and was almost beautiful enough to be in the entertainment media. I’m terrible at estimating human ages because it’s not one of the few (very few) things I choose to care about, or am contractually obliged to care about. Also most of my experience (that I could remember anyway) is with the humans on the entertainment feed, and they aren’t anything like the ones you see in reality. (One of the many reasons I’m not fond of reality.) But I suspected all three might be young. Not children, obviously, but possibly not all that far past adolescence.
Once I was settled, Rami took a breath, then hesitated, apparently trying to figure out what to say, and I realised I was probably going to have to help. I started, cautiously, “So… I really didn’t hear a lot earlier, but the other guy had ‘security consultant’ listed in his feed profile. Am I right in assuming that you want to hire a security consultant?”
Rami seemed relieved and nodded. “Yes, that’s right. We need help.”
Maro threw a look around and said, “We probably shouldn’t talk more about it here, again. Is there someplace else we could go?”
It had been stressful enough just getting this far, I didn’t want to have to go anywhere else right now. I did a quick scan for drones, then initiated a glitch in the connection between the restaurant and transit ring security. Working through the external interface as I was, I didn’t have the speed or processing to edit myself out of the system’s recording entirely, but I could temporarily cut the camera watching the table out of the system. Once that was done, I unglitched the connection to the ring’s main security, which wouldn’t notice the missing camera feed for the (hopefully) short time we would be here. I then said, “It’s all right. We’re not being recorded.”
They stared at me. Rami said, “But there’s security – did you do something?”
“I’m a security consultant,” I said. My panic level was starting to drop, partly because of my little camera hack, but mostly because they were so obviously nervous. Humans are nervous of me because I’m a terrifying murderbot, and I’m nervous of them because they’re humans. But I knew that humans could also be wary and nervous of each other in non-combat and non-adversarial situations, in reality and not just as part of a story. That was what seemed to be happening here, but it let me pretend that this was business as usual, like one of the rare occasions when clients bothered to ask my advice about security.
Part of my job as a SecUnit was to give clients advice when they asked for it, as I was theoretically the one with all the information on security. Not very many of said clients had actually thought to ask me for it, or listened to me. Not that I’m bitter about that, or anything. PreservationAux had been something of a surprising exception.
Tapan gave me an impressed look. “So you’re spliced, yeah?” She patted the back of her neck, indicating where my data port was. “You got augments, extra access to the feed?”
“Spliced” was an informal term for an augmented human; I’d heard it on the entertainment feed. I said, “Yes,” then added, “Among other things.” Again, I was borrowing lines from one of the characters in Sanctuary Moon. It was easier and quicker than trying to think of what to say myself.
Rami’s red brows lifted in understanding. Maro looked reluctantly impressed, but still sceptical. She said, “Okay, so you’re also a security consultant. But why would you want to help us? After talking to the other guy, I doubt we can afford you.”
I needed to give them a good reason why I would be willing to settle for a smaller amount than they were expecting, and after a moment’s consideration, I decided the partial truth would be my best bet. “I need to go down to the planet, to the Ganaka Pit settlement, and I can’t get there without an employment voucher. Getting a job as a security consultant with contractors already established on the planet seems the least complicated way to do so.”
They all blinked, looking surprised. “Ganaka – that’s where we need to go, too,” Rami admitted. Well, that was a convenient coincidence. There weren’t all that many other installations on the planet though, so the chances we’d end up going to the same place were actually pretty good.
“Why do you need to go there?” Tapan asked, and Rami nudged her by way of admonishment. “I mean, I know we don’t have a right to ask, but…”
Don’t have a right to ask. That wasn’t something that had ever applied to me, before PreservationAux. I told the partial truth again. “I need to do some research there for another client.”
They understood the idea of research, especially proprietary research, and they didn’t try to get any more information out of me. “Okay,” Rami started. “An employment voucher as part of the payment - I think we can arrange that.”
That was a relief, but I still didn’t know what they actually wanted to hire me to do yet. That seemed like important information. “I should probably ask why you want to hire a security consultant to start with, first.”
“Oh, right! That would probably help.” Rami cleared ter throat, ter expression embarrassed, then looked at the other two, getting nods in response. “Okay. We were subcontracted by the company, working down at Ganaka Pit, doing mineral research and technology development.” Te explained that they were a collective of technologists, seven of them plus dependants, who travelled from work contract to work contract. The others were waiting in a cheap hotel suite, with Rami, Maro, and Tapan having been deputised to act for the group.
It was a relief to hear that their mining experience was in tech and research; in the few mining contracts I’d had (not many mining contracts required SecUnits equipped with fliers, but there had been a couple based out in asteroid fields, and one that had been considered at high risk of being raided), the techs were usually in offices off the pit site or adjacent to it, and we didn’t see them unless they got intoxicated and tried to kill each other, which admittedly was rare. (Most mining installations that I knew of didn’t allow intoxicants on site in the first place. That didn’t necessarily stop people entirely, but it did make it more difficult for the humans to get hold of them.)
“The contract terms were pretty attractive,” Tapan added, “but maybe a little too attractive, if you know what I mean.” I nodded - I knew all too well what she meant. The company loved providing attractive contract terms to lure in people who didn’t know any better, so that the company could datamine them for everything they had and sell the information out from under them. I’d seen it happen plenty of times before.
Rami continued, “We accepted the contract because it would give us time to work on our own stuff on the side.” That sounded like a typical company contract, all right. “We’d had this idea to develop a new, portable detection system for strange synthetics. Ganaka Pit has a ton of identified deposits, so it’s a great place for this kind of research.” Strange synthetics were elements left behind by alien civilisations. Telling the difference between them and naturally occurring elements that were previously unidentified was a problem in mining. Like the remnants of alien occupation/civilisation uncovered by GrayCris on my last contract, they were off limits for commercial development. That was all I’d ever needed to know, since every job I’d ever had involving alien material was just me standing around guarding the people who were working on it, or flying scouting patrols around the areas that held said alien material.
Rami said, “We were making good progress, and had started building a prototype scanner, but then suddenly our group contract got terminated with no notice, and when we were packing up to leave, the prototype got ‘confiscated’ by one of the supervisors, a woman named Tlacey. We think she’s the one responsible for terminating our contract in the first place just so she’d have an excuse to take it.”
Tapan waved her hands. “Our prototype – all our hard work! It wasn’t anything to do with our contract—”
Maro finished, “Tlacey stole our prototype, basically, and it had a lot of expensive, hard to get parts and components that we can’t replace any time soon, so we can’t afford to build another one.”
Okay, that wasn’t normal. The company wasn’t as clumsy or obvious as to try to steal a prototype from contractors, especially not when they were also mining all their data and could probably build their own prototypes anyway. If it went around blatantly stealing prototypes or whatever, then the creators wouldn’t come back and enter into more security bond agreements, which would give the company access to the information on whatever they were working on next.
Rami added, “We filed a complaint with the company, but it’s taking forever to process it, and we don’t know if it’s ever going to come to anything. We can’t afford to stay in the hotel here for very much longer.”
I said, “This sounds like something you should go to a solicitor about.” From what I knew about the company, it wouldn’t pay much attention to a complaint from a small independent contractor group, but it would pay attention to an actual legal professional.
“We did consider hiring a solicitor,” Rami said. "We aren’t in the union though, so it would be expensive. But then yesterday Tlacey finally answered our petition, and said we could have the prototype back if we returned our signing bonus. We have to go back down to Ganaka Pit to do that.” Te sat back in ter chair. “That’s why we wanted to hire a security consultant. The other guy refused though, said it was too small-time of a job for him to bother with, and that he didn’t want to tangle with the company.”
I was very glad the other guy had refused, but I wasn’t going to say as much. “You don’t trust Tlacey.”
“We just want to have someone on our side,” Tapan clarified.
“No, we definitely don’t trust Tlacey,” Maro countered with a shake of her head. “Not at all. We need security for when we get there, if things get… touchy. Tlacey herself is supposed to meet us, and she has an entourage of bodyguards, and there’s no general security other than what the company has, and since Tlacey’s a company supervisor… whatever security is there isn’t going to be on our side.”
I didn’t know exactly what she thought she meant by “touchy,” but all the scenarios I could imagine in that situation weren’t good ones. It was odd that they’d mentioned bodyguards though. “When you say bodyguards, do you mean humans, or SecUnits?” I really hoped they didn’t mean SecUnits. If I had to deal with other units, I’d be in a lot of trouble.
Rami shook ter head. “No, no SecUnits. We didn’t see any down there, anyway. Only regular bodyguards.”
That was a relief, and I felt the tension across my shoulders ease slightly. I was still watching us through the captured security camera even though I wasn’t allowing it to record. From what I could see, my expression looked dubious, but in this case I think the situation warranted it. I said, “This meeting with Tlacey could be held through a secured comm channel, and then a secured courier delivery to return the prototype.” The company bonded those, too, and since they had an installation here, they were definitely set up for it.
Maro, whose expression was even more dubious than mine, said, “Yeah, but Tlacey specified that she wants to meet with us in person.”
Rami admitted, “We know going doesn’t sound like a good idea.”
Going was a great idea if you wanted to get murdered. I had hoped for an easier job, courier duty, or something similar. But this was protecting humans who were determined to do something dangerous, which was exactly the kind of job I was designed for. The job that I had kept doing more or less, often as less as possible, even after I had hacked my governor module. I was used to having something useful to do, taking care of something, even if it was only a contractually obligated group of humans who, if I was lucky, treated me like a tool and not a toy.
After PreservationAux, it had occurred to me how different it would be to do my job as an actual member of the group I was protecting. And that was a big reason I was here.
Having a legitimate reason to poke around the Ganaka Pit installation was just an added, convenient bonus.
Still, the whole situation concerned me. I phrased it as a question, because pretending you were asking for more information was the best way to try to get the humans to realise they were doing something stupid. “So do you think there’s any other reason Tlacey wants you to do this exchange in person, other than… attempting to kill you?”
Tapan grimaced, as if that was something she had been aware of but trying not to think about. Maro tapped the table and pointed at me, which was vaguely alarming until I realised it was a gesture of agreement that I’d seen a few times in some of my serials. Rami took a sharp breath and said, “We think… we hadn't finished building it, the prototype wasn’t actually complete, but we were so enthusiastic about it… We think Tlacey must have been eavesdropping on us with the security feeds, and thought we were much further along than we actually were. So I don’t know if she can complete it or get it working. Maybe she realised it’s not worth anything without us to finish it.”
“Maybe Tlacey wants us to work for the company again,” Tapan said hopefully.
Probably, before she murders you, I didn’t say. This was beginning to make more sense though. Even though everyone knew the company datamined shamelessly, it wasn’t entirely unheard of for the occasional crooked supervisor or similar to try and make some extra cash on the side via their own little less than legal and not at all company approved activities. This seemed to be what this Tlacey woman was trying. If I had to guess, I’d say that she had hoped to sell off the prototype to the highest bidder of the company’s competitors before the datamined information made its way through the company’s processes. If the prototype wasn’t actually finished yet though, she wouldn’t be able to sell it, so pocketing the collective’s signing bonuses herself (and then murdering them to cover her tracks) was the next best thing.
Maro snorted. “I would rather live in a box in a station mall than have that horrible woman as a supervisor again.”
Once they had started to talk about it, it was hard for them to stop. The collective was completely divided on what to do, which was apparently painful for all of them since they were used to agreeing on everything. Tapan, who according to Maro was too naive for this existence (I was inclined to agree), thought it was worth a try. Maro, who according to Tapan was a cynical impediment to both fun and progress, thought that they were screwed and they should just cut their losses and move on. Rami was undecided, which was why te had been elected leader of the collective for the duration of this problem. Rami seemed less than thrilled by the collective’s confidence, but was gamely trying to proceed.
Finally, Rami finished up with, “So that’s why we want to hire you. We thought it would be better to go in with someone who could protect us, discourage her bodyguards from trying anything, show her we have backup while we negotiate. Are you still interested in this job?”
What they needed was a security company (that wasn’t the company) willing to bond them for the meeting and return trip, and send a SecUnit (that wasn’t me) with them to guarantee their safety. But security companies like that are expensive, and wouldn’t be interested in a job this small. And even if I would be half-assing my job while pretending to be human, I was confident I could do this job better than any other human security the collective might be able to hire.
They all stared at me worriedly. In the security camera view, from that angle, it was obvious how small they were. They looked so soft, with all the fluffy multicoloured hair. And nervous, but not of me. I said “All right. I'll take your job.”
Rami and Tapan looked relieved, and Maro, who clearly still didn’t want to do this, looked resigned. She said, “How much do we pay you? Aside from the employment voucher, that is.” She glanced uncertainly at the others. “Are we going to be able to afford you even with that?”
Oh, this was going to be a problem. I had no idea what a reasonable or affordable amount would be. None of my entertainment media was proving to be any help, either. I had to get more information. “How much were you getting paid before you were terminated?”
Rami replied, “We were getting two hundred CRs per cycle for each worker for the limited term of contract.”
That at least gave me something to work with. I didn’t know how long this would take, but I didn’t think it would be more than a cycle, maybe two, depending how long it took to get us to Ganaka Pit. “I’m happy with that, alongside the employment voucher. Two hundred CRs - per cycle, if this happens to take more than one.”
Maro blinked and squinted at me, and Rami straightened in ter chair, eyebrows raising; their reaction hinted that maybe I’d still asked for too little. But neither of them questioned it, and Rami just nodded. “Agreed.”
I gave them the contact details for my external feed interface so they could message me if necessary. Rami told me they were scheduled to leave the station for the planetside spaceport during the next cycle, and said te would put in the request for the private employment voucher. We arranged to meet in the mall near the access for the shuttle embarkation zone before the shuttle’s scheduled departure time, and then I got up with a final nod of farewell (copied from another of my serials) and left. Once I was out of range, I released the security camera and reconnected it to the rest of the system, then did my best to obfuscate my presence on the rest of the cameras as much as possible.
After a little more anxious wandering around the station, I found an area with cheap transient rooms; I was able to hack into one and convince it that I’d paid for a cycle’s stay. Once I was safely inside it with the door locked, I dropped down to sit on the floor, leaned back against the wall, hugged my bag to my chest, and watched episodes of Sanctuary Moon for the next several hours to help me calm down. I occasionally tapped into the transit ring’s alert feed to check for any updates, but there was nothing. Nobody had realised what I was.
Since I hadn’t been detected yet, it was time to think about the rest of my plan. Which now involved keeping my new clients alive.
Chapter Three
(CW: Canon-typical violence)
I met them at the embarkation zone the next cycle. I had my bag with me, in its usual place hanging off my shoulder and held against my side. There was no way I was leaving it behind anywhere for someone to potentially find and rifle through and discover my armour or flight suit. Its weight was almost comforting, somehow, and given my anxiety levels, I needed all the comfort I could get.
All three of my clients were waiting, each with a small bag or pack of their own, since hopefully they would only be staying on the planet for a couple of cycles. I hung back until they finished saying farewell to the other members of their collective. All of them looked worried. The collective was listed in the social feed as a group marriage, and had five children of various sizes. Once the others had left and Rami, Maro, and Tapan were alone, I approached them.
“Tlacey bought passage for us on one of the shuttles,” Rami informed me. “That’s got to be a good sign, right?”
“Sure,” I replied. It was a terrible sign.
The employment voucher got me through into the embarkation zone and there was no weapons scan for me to avoid. RaviHyral allowed private weapons and had a low security presence in public areas, which was one reason why small groups of humans like my clients needed to hire private security consultants for protection in the first place. As we approached the shuttle’s lock I scanned it as best as I could without triggering any security alerts, looking for any signs of recent tampering. I couldn’t detect anything, but given how limited my scan was, that didn’t really tell me much. Both threat and risk assessment were unhappy about the situation, and I was inclined to agree. There wasn’t a lot I could do about it though.
Six other guest workers waited to board, and my scan read no energy signatures bigger than personal, low-level feed interfaces. They had stuffed packs and bags, indicating they were prepared for a long-term stay planetside. I let them board first, then slid in front of Maro and went through the lock, scanning as I went.
The shuttle was bot-driven and the single crew member was one augmented human whose only purpose seemed to be to check employment vouchers and shuttle passes. She checked my clients’ shuttle pass, then looked at me and said, “There’s only supposed to be three of you.”
I didn’t respond, since I was busy wrestling the shuttle’s security system for control. It was an entirely separate system from the bot pilot, which was non-standard for the shuttles I was used to. I wasn’t using my external feed interface as a proxy this time - if anything happened while we were on the shuttle, I didn’t want to be limited or slowed down by having to go through it. Hopefully nothing would be looking for me on a shuttle.
Tapan’s chin jutted out stubbornly. “This is our security consultant. We've hired them for protection.”
I finally had control of ShuttleSecSys, and deleted its attempt to alert the bot pilot and the crew member to the fact that it was compromised.
The crew member frowned and checked the voucher again, but didn’t bother arguing and just gestured for us to continue on board. We went on into the compartment where the other passengers were getting seated. They were preoccupied with stowing their possessions or talking quietly to each other, and didn’t pay us any attention. I hadn’t eliminated them as potential threats yet, but their behaviour was lowering the probability at a steady rate.
I took a seat next to Rami as my clients got settled, resting my bag in my lap, and focused some of my attention that wasn’t busy monitoring the other passengers on working my way into the shuttle’s systems. Since I had control of ShuttleSecSys, I was able to use it to reassure the bot pilot that I was meant to be there. The bot pilot was a limited function model, and accepted that without question, acknowledging me with a cheerful ping.
Once I had access to the shuttle’s scanners, I used them to scan for anything out of the ordinary. The scan came up clear, but that didn’t mean nothing was waiting for us. It only meant they weren’t doing anything yet. If anyone was going to target the shuttle, they would wait until we were well underway. If someone fired at the transit ring while we were still attached or nearby, I was pretty sure that would be a huge deal and there would be legal ramifications, if not immediate violent retaliation from ring security.
Rami was watching me with some signs of concern. “Is everything okay?”
I nodded and tried to look neutral. I didn’t know how successful I was.
Tapan leaned past ter to ask, “I can’t find you in the feed, are you in it right now?”
I shook my head and told her, “I’m busy monitoring the shuttle’s departure, just making sure everything’s okay.”
Tapan nodded and sat back.
I felt the deck shudder as the shuttle uncoupled from the ring and started to move. None of the passengers reacted in any unusual way, so I leaned back in my seat a little, closed my eyes and focused on the shuttle systems and the bot pilot. The crew member was now sitting in the cockpit, ostensibly monitoring the bot pilot but mostly just using her feed to catch up on admin tasks and browse her social feed download. There was no human pilot on board.
Everything went smoothly to start with, and I was half tempted to watch some media in the background. That’s what most of the human passengers were doing, judging by the echoes in the feed. But I wanted to keep monitoring the bot pilot and the shuttle’s scanners. This may seem overcautious, even paranoid, but that’s just how I was built.
Atmospheric re-entry gave me a bit of a rough time, but the shuttle did this on a regular basis. It was undamaged, well-maintained, and handled it without any issues. I did my best to ignore the feelings brought up from the memories of my last atmospheric re-entry and focused on the shuttle’s scanners. If anything was going to attack us, it would be soon. But nothing happened, and I started to relax slightly.
Then as we neared the ground and were starting the landing approach, the bot pilot screamed and died as killware flooded its systems. It was gone before ShuttleSecSys or I could react; I flung up a wall around us both and the killware bounced off. I saw it register task complete and then destroy itself.
Oh, shit. I instinctively grabbed at the shuttle controls through the feed, and had a moment to be very grateful that I wasn’t trying to do this through my external feed interface. We needed the course correction for landing in seven point two seconds. The crew member, jolted out of her feed by the alarms, stared at the board in horror. She couldn’t fly a shuttle. She hit the emergency beacon, which also triggered all the passenger compartment alarms. (That didn’t help.)
Technically, I didn’t have shuttle-specific piloting modules, but I had years of experience with my own flier, and if I didn’t do anything, the shuttle would crash catastrophically into the planet’s surface and kill all the humans on board, or get shot down by the port’s debris deflection system, which would have the same effect. I had a chance of surviving either way, but then I’d be revealed as a SecUnit and that would leave me as good as dead anyway. I could pilot my own flier remotely through the feed, but I wasn’t familiar enough with the shuttle to do that here, and it wasn't designed for that in the first place. I also didn’t have time to get up from my seat, get into the cockpit, get past the human crew member, and pilot manually.
I didn’t have any other choice. I poured myself through ShuttleSecSys and into the shuttle’s systems, filling the void left by the erased bot pilot, and took direct control. I could feel the shuttle’s inputs as though they were my own - it was like being in my flier, but not; it was so much bigger, heavier, more powerful, but nowhere near as agile. Without the direct physical links to it like I normally had with my own flier, it was also taking a lot more focus and effort to sync up and control it. I didn’t have time to accustom myself to it entirely, so my course correction was… a little rough. Okay, a lot rough.
But it worked.
Distantly, as though it was coming through deep water, I could hear the panicked exclamations of the passengers, including my clients, over the alarms blaring in the passenger compartment. I couldn’t pay attention to them though, I had to focus entirely on trying to control the shuttle. I adjusted my speed, then picked up the landing beacon and began the approach to the main planetside spaceport as best I could. It felt like I was trying to fly a rock. It was not a smooth or graceful approach, but at least we were no longer at risk of slamming nose-first into the ground.
The crew member had just managed to hail Port Authority, and was still hyperventilating. Port Authority had the ability to upload emergency landing routines, but the timing had been too tight. Nothing they could have done would have saved us.
Back in the passenger compartment, Rami grabbed my arm and said something I couldn’t quite make out over the alarms and my focus on the shuttle. I think I replied with a buffer phrase, and a small part of me went oh, shit, but I didn’t have the attention to spare to worry about that now. Hopefully nobody had been able to hear me clearly over the alarms.
The crew member was trying to explain to Port Authority that there had been some kind of catastrophic failure that had wiped out the bot pilot, and she didn’t know why the shuttle was still on approach to the spaceport and not nose-diving into the planet’s surface. I managed to send an error code to Port Authority; they, not knowing what was going on either, assigned us a new priority and switched our landing site from the public dock to the emergency services dock. I sent a basic acknowledgement and adjusted my course accordingly. I was grateful for that change; since the killware had clearly been intended to destroy us en route, there probably wouldn’t be anyone waiting for us at our scheduled landing slot, but better safe than sorry.
The feed was giving us a visual of the space port, which was built in the middle of a barren, rocky plain, with tumbles of rocks and boulders lying around and very little vegetation. The debris deflection towers surrounding the port were clearly visible, and I was relieved to note that they were not currently focused on me. If I hadn’t been able to take control and stabilise the shuttle, they would have ensured - explosively - that the shuttle or its debris didn’t damage the port itself. It was a little before dawn on this part of the planet, and the lights of multiple levels of the port installation were still visible in the pre-dawn gloom. As I curved somewhat shakily down towards the Port Authority’s beacon, smaller shuttles whizzed out of my way in response to the emergency alerts. I was very glad that I wouldn't have to try and dodge them myself.
Trying to pilot the unfamiliar shuttle was still taking a lot of effort, but I was getting a little more familiar with its systems, and briefly had a sliver of attention to spare for other things. I persuaded ShuttleSecSys to turn off the alarms, which prompted murmurs of relief from the passengers that I was still only vaguely aware of. They’d noticed the changed landing site alert in the feed, and there was some speculation about that; my clients were all watching me with various signs of concern.
Ah, that’s right, I still had my eyes closed. I made myself blink them open, and Maro leaned a little closer past Tapan. “Do you know what’s happening?” she murmured, glancing around at the other passengers before looking back at me.
I still didn’t have enough attention to spare for an actual conversation, but at least I managed to suppress the automatic buffer reply this time. “I’ll explain once we’re off the shuttle,” I replied, then closed my eyes again. It was time to figure out how to actually land, and I couldn’t afford to split my focus any more. The shuttle was significantly larger and heavier than anything I’d piloted before, so I was constantly having to compensate, and then correct my overcompensation. At least the emergency services dock had plenty of space, so I didn’t have to worry too much about colliding with anything important.
My landing was rough and bumpy, but not enough to cause any damage or injury. I didn’t bother taxiing up to the lock though; that was more delicate manoeuvring than I cared to attempt. Once I’d shut down the engines, I carefully disentangled myself from the shuttle’s systems and gathered myself up, then deleted the entire trip and any traces of my presence from ShuttleSecSys’s memory and the rest of the shuttle’s systems.
I dropped back into my own body and was immediately hit by a sledgehammer of pain right behind my eyes. It was a different kind of pain to governor module punishment, but bad enough on its own. Apparently pouring myself into the shuttle via the feed had put a lot more strain on my own systems than I’d anticipated. Turning my pain sensors down as low as they could go didn’t do much to mitigate it, but at least I could think a bit more clearly. We also had a few minutes of just sitting around waiting for the port workers to tow the shuttle into proper docking position before we could disembark, which gave me some time to collect myself somewhat.
Apparently my discomfort was visible on my face though, because Rami gently touched my arm and asked, “Are you okay?”
“Mm.” I didn’t want to say anything yet - even speaking hurt - but I remembered that humans usually want more than that from other humans. I added, “The alarms gave me a headache. I’ve got very sensitive hearing.”
Rami seemed to accept that and just nodded sympathetically. The others were worried, but an announcement from the shuttle crew member informing the passengers that the shuttle was now in position for us to disembark distracted them. I’d managed to recover enough by then that I could stand up with the others without staggering. I shouldered my bag again and followed my clients and the rest of the passengers out of the shuttle.
We left the shuttle crew member trying to explain to the emergency techs what had happened as they connected their diagnostic equipment. I’d already deleted all evidence of my presence, and the ShuttleSecSys was incredibly confused, but at least still intact, unlike the poor bot pilot.
Emergency services personnel and bots milled around the small embarkation zone. I managed to herd my clients past the other passengers, then through and out onto the clear enclosed walkway to the main port before anyone tried to stop us. I really didn’t want anyone asking my clients (or me) any questions about what had happened on the shuttle.
I carefully connected to the feed via my external feed interface - it hurt, but using the interface as a buffer seemed to help - and downloaded a map from the public feed, then began tentatively testing the robustness of the port’s security system. The walkway we were in had a good view of the rest of the port, with multiple levels of embarkation zones and a few other shuttles coming and going. We were in the smaller section of the port meant for passenger shuttles - the majority of the port was for the big haulers for the planet’s various mining installations.
My careful probing indicated that security seemed to be intermittent and based on the level of paranoia of whatever contractor operated in the different sections of the space port; there was no single centralised security force. That could be both an advantage and an interesting challenge. The transit ring’s public info feed had warned that a lot of humans apparently carried weapons here, and there were no screening scans. I was grateful that I wouldn't have to wrestle with any weapon scanners right now.
We came out of the walkway into a central hub, which had a clear high dome allowing a view of the planet’s sky and natural light to filter through when the sun was up. Right now though the sun was still too low to reach through the dome, and the sky overhead was a dim grey. I scanned to make sure nothing was recording us, then steered my clients over to a nearby seating area meant for people waiting for their shuttles to start boarding. My head still hurt and I really wanted to just stop moving for a few minutes.
“So can you explain what happened back on the shuttle now?” Maro asked once we’d settled.
I nodded, suppressing a wince as the automatic movement made my head throb sharply, then stated, “The person you’re going to meet with just tried to kill you.”
Rami blinked, Maro went wide-eyed and paled slightly, and Tapan opened her mouth, drawing a breath to argue. I continued before she could interrupt. “The shuttle was infected with killware. It destroyed the bot pilot.”
Tapan closed her mouth abruptly. Shocked, Maro said, “But the other passengers. The crew person. They would have killed everyone?”
I shrugged, being careful not to jostle my head again. “If you were the only casualties, the motive would have been obvious.”
Rami frowned and asked, “If the bot pilot was destroyed, how did we not crash?” Te tilted ter head towards me. “Was that you?”
I’d been hoping they wouldn’t think to ask me about that. Damn. I had to think fast, and the headache wasn’t helping with that. “I… used to be a pilot,” I started. “Before I became a security consultant.”
Tapan’s eyebrows went up in surprise. “A pilot and a security consultant? But you look so young—”
I blinked at her. That had honestly never occurred to me. I had no idea how to respond to that. “... Uh. Thank you?”
Tapan winced as Maro elbowed her in the ribs with a little hiss of admonishment. “Sorry,” Tapan added sheepishly. “I just—”
Maro elbowed her again, then turned back to me. “Ignore her. You were saying?”
“... Right.” It took me a moment to gather my thoughts again. “I noticed as soon as the bot pilot was deleted because I was monitoring the shuttle systems. There wasn’t any time for me to get to the cockpit to pilot manually though, so I had to… go through the feed.” I grimaced slightly and rubbed at the back of my neck with one hand, a gesture I’d seen variations of in different media, including Sanctuary Moon. It seemed appropriate. “It worked, but my augments aren’t really… designed for that.”
Tapan and Maro both winced sympathetically, and Tapan asked, “Are you gonna be okay? You still look kinda… off.”
Even after my time with PreservationAux, I still wasn’t used to anyone being concerned about my well-being, and the question threw me a little. “I’ll be fine,” I replied after a moment, hoping that none of them had noticed the brief hesitation. “I just need to… sleep it off.” Thank you again, Sanctuary Moon, for providing me with useful lines.
Tapan nodded, reassured, and Rami asked, “Is that why you mentioned… processing data, back on the shuttle? I didn’t hear much of what you said over all the alarms.”
Shit. I really had replied with a buffer phrase. At least the alarms had drowned out most of it, apparently. “Yes. Piloting isn’t easy at the best of times. There’s a lot of information to take into account.”
They all seemed to accept that, thankfully. None of them knew enough about piloting or how augments are usually meant to work to question my explanations.
Rami suddenly drew a sharp breath. “You saved us,” te stated, quietly but intently. “If we hadn’t hired you…”
I could see that the reality of their situation was really starting to sink in. I said, “You should return to the transit ring immediately, before Tlacey tries anything else.” I checked the public feed for the schedule. There was a public shuttle leaving in eleven minutes. Tlacey wouldn’t have time to trace my clients and infect it if they moved fast.
Tapan and Maro both looked at Rami. Te hesitated, then set ter jaw and said, “I’ll stay. You two go.”
“No,” Maro said instantly, “we’re not leaving you.”
“No way, no how,” Tapan agreed insistently. “We’re all in this together.”
Rami’s face almost crumpled, their support weakening ter when the prospect of death hadn’t. Te controlled terself and nodded tightly, then looked at me and said, “We’ll stay.”
I didn’t visibly react, as far as I could tell, because I’m used to clients making stupid decisions, and I was getting a lot of practice lately at controlling my expression. “You realise you can’t keep this meeting, right? They lost track of you when the shuttle didn’t crash and burn like they were expecting. You have to keep that advantage.”
“But we need to have the meeting,” Tapan protested. “We can’t get our prototype back otherwise.”
Yes, I often want to shake my clients. No, I never do, no matter how tempting it is. “Tlacey lured you here to kill you all. She has no intention of returning your prototype."
“Yes, but–” Tapan began.
“Tapan, just shush and listen,” Maro interrupted, clearly exasperated.
Rami’s expression was stubborn, but also uncertain. Te asked me, “Then what should we do?”
Technically, this didn’t need to be my problem. I was here on the planet now and didn’t need them anymore. I could lose them in the crowd, go about my own business, and leave them to deal with their murderous ex-supervisor all on their own.
But they were my clients. Even after I’d hacked my governor module, I’d found it impossible to abandon my assigned clients, even though I’d never chosen them. I’d made an agreement with these clients as a free agent, of my own choice - I couldn’t just abandon them to get themselves murdered. I kept my sigh internal. “You can’t meet Tlacey at her office. You’ll pick the spot. Somewhere public.”
It wasn’t ideal, but it would have to do.
They ended up choosing a food service place in the centre of the space port. (Ugh. Why did it always have to be food places?) It was on a raised platform, the tables and chairs arranged in small groups, with displays floating overhead advertising various port and contractor services alongside information about the different planet-side mining installations. The displays also functioned as camera and recording chaff, so the place was a popular spot for business meetings. Above the displays was another clear dome showing off the sky. By now it was almost the middle of the day, and the sky was a pale blue smudged with thin, wispy clouds. (I tried not to think about how nice it would be to fly out there.)
Rami, Tapan and Maro had picked a table and were nervously fiddling with the drinks they had ordered from one of the bots drifting around. They had put in a comm call to Tlacey hours ago, and were now waiting for a representative to arrive.
The security system in this public area was more sophisticated than ShuttleSecSys, but not by much. I had gotten in far enough to monitor emergency traffic and get views from the cameras focused on our immediate area. Despite my lingering headache, I felt pretty confident. I was standing three metres away from their table, pretending to look at the ad displays and examining the maps of the installations I had found in the public feed. The space port sat in the centre of a web of train lines leading to and from the various mining installations scattered across this continent, including Ganaka Pit.
There were also several abandoned dig sites marked, all with their own train lines, most of which were now inactive with their destination installations no longer operational. The train line to the current Ganaka Pit installation branched off as it neared the pit; one branch continued to the installation, the other, labelled as defunct and no longer operational, led to the original Ganaka settlement and the site of the Incident.
It made sense for that branch of the train line to be inactive, but it was a little annoying. If I wanted to get to the original Ganaka settlement, I’d have to go on foot. Given the distances involved, that would take… a while. (I tried not to think about how fast I could get there if I still had my flier.) I’d probably have to do so under the cover of the planet’s night as well so it would be harder for anyone to spot me. Someone going out to a bombed-out, abandoned settlement would probably draw attention. I really didn’t want attention.
Something else that drew my notice was the fact that there were other SecUnits deployed on the planet. The map showed logos from five bond companies that offered SecUnits, including my company, at seven of the most remote installations where exploration for mineral veins was still ongoing. They would be there to defend the claim from theft and to keep the miners and other employees from injuring each other as part of the bond guarantee.
I took a closer look at Ganaka Pit on the map. The company logo - the same one that was engraved into parts of me I couldn’t get rid of - was plastered all over the site on the map. Nothing there specified if the company had SecUnits active at Ganaka Pit though. It was a very large and well-established installation, not at risk of theft like smaller, more exploratory claims were, so it was less likely to need SecUnits to defend it from other companies. But it might still use SecUnits to keep the miners and other workers in line. I wouldn’t know for sure until I got there. That was stressful. Especially since Tlacey worked for the company. If they had SecUnits where she worked, she would likely be familiar with our build and proportions. I’d done what I could to disguise those; I’d just have to hope that she wasn’t particularly observant.
No SecUnits would travel through the port except as inert cargo in transport boxes or repair cubicles, so at least while I was at the space port, I didn’t have to worry about them. My change of clothes and hairstyle might fool humans and augmented humans who weren’t accustomed to SecUnits, but they definitely wouldn’t fool other SecUnits.
If any saw me, they would alert their SecSystems. They wouldn’t have a choice. And they wouldn’t want one. If anyone knows how dangerous rogue SecUnits are, it’s other SecUnits.
That was when I felt the ping.
I told myself I’d mistaken it for something else. It didn’t feel like a ping from another SecUnit, or even a security bot. I resolved to ignore it.
Then it happened again. That was a big uh-oh.
Something was looking for SecUnits. Not just bots, specifically SecUnits, and it was close. It hadn’t pinged me directly, though if I’d had a working governor module, I would have been compelled to respond.
I didn’t have time to do anything about it though, because that’s when three humans approached the table my clients were sitting at. Rami whispered into ter feed, “That’s Tlacey. I didn’t expect her to actually come all the way out here herself.” Two of the humans were large and male and one of them lengthened his stride to reach the table first. Maro had seen him and from the look on her face I knew this was not going to be a greeting. My scan showed that he was armed.
I stepped between him and the table, putting a hand up at chest height, and said, “Stop.”
On most of my previous contracts this was as far as I was allowed to go with a human until they initiated physical contact themselves. But you’d be surprised how often this works, if you do it right. Though that was when I was wearing my armour with my helmet’s faceplate opaqued. Standing here in normal human clothes with my human face showing and a headache still pulsing behind my eyes made it a whole different thing. But it wasn’t like he could hurt me while he was unarmed, and he hadn’t drawn a weapon yet. Not that it would have helped him much, anyway.
I could have torn through him like tissue paper.
He didn’t know that, but he must have been able to tell from my face or posture that I wasn’t scared of him. I checked the security camera to see what I looked like, and decided that I looked bored. That wasn’t unusual, because I almost always look bored while I was doing my job, it was just impossible to tell when I had my helmet on with the faceplate opaqued.
He halted in his tracks, then visibly regrouped and said, “Who the fuck are you?”
My clients had all stood up, shoving their chairs back. Rami said, “This is our security consultant.”
He took a step back and glanced uncertainly at the other two, the second male human bodyguard and the augmented human female who Rami had identified as Tlacey.
I dropped my arm but stayed where I was. I had clear shots at all three of them, but that was a worst-case scenario. For me, at least. Humans can miss a lot of little clues, but me being able to fire energy weapons from my arms would be a massive red flag. As this was going on, I diverted just enough of my attention to scan the security camera feeds for whatever it was that had pinged me.
I caught an image on a camera across the public area, near one of the clear enclosed walkways leading into this section. The figure standing near the edge of the seating area wasn’t anything like what I had been expecting to see and I had to go over it again before I understood. It wasn’t wearing armour and its physical configuration didn’t match SecUnit standard. It had a lot of hair, silver with blue and purple on the ends, pulled back and braided like Tapan’s but in a much more complicated style. Its facial features were different from mine, but all Units’ features are different, assigned randomly based on the human cloned material that’s used to make our organic parts. Its arms were bare, and there was no metal showing and no gun ports. This wasn’t a SecUnit.
I was looking at a ComfortUnit.
I’d never had any reason to interact with any, as far as I could remember, so my knowledge of them was admittedly limited. (I knew enough though to know that I was very grateful I wasn’t one.)
ComfortUnits aren’t allowed to walk around in human areas without orders though, any more than murderbots are. Someone must have ordered it to be here.
I couldn’t let its presence distract me from my actual job. While I’d been figuring out the ComfortUnit, Tlacey had stepped forward. “And just why do you need a security consultant?” She was wearing a company supervisor uniform, but it looked like it had been modified from the standard to fit her better. Her bodyguards, interestingly enough, were not wearing company uniforms. That made me think that maybe they were personal hires, and not actually company personnel.
Rami took a breath. I tapped ter feed, secured a private connection between ter, Tapan, and Maro, and told ter, [Don’t answer that. Don’t mention anything about what happened with the shuttle. Just stick to business.] It was an impulse. Tlacey had come here expecting an angry confrontation; that was why she’d brought along armed bodyguards. We had an advantage now; we weren’t dead, and they were off balance. I wanted to keep them that way.
Rami let the breath out, tapped my feed in acknowledgement, then said, “We’re here to talk about our prototype.”
Maro, who had realised what I was trying to do, told Rami, [Keep going, don’t even let them sit down or get a word in.]
Sounding more confident, Rami continued, “Confiscating our personal property was not part of our employment contract. But we’ll agree to your proposal that we return our signing bonus in exchange for the safe and intact return of our prototype.”
On the security cameras, I watched the ComfortUnit turn and leave the public area via the enclosed walkway directly behind it.
Tlacey raised an eyebrow. “The entire bonus?” She clearly hadn’t been expecting them to agree to that.
Maro leaned forward. “We opened an account with the company to hold the funds. We can transfer it to you as soon as you hand over our prototype. Undamaged.”
Tlacey’s jaw moved slightly as she spoke into her private feed, and the two bodyguards eased back. Tlacey stepped forward and took a chair at my client’s table. After a moment, Rami sat down, and Tapan and Maro followed suit. I moved to stand beside and a little behind them, mirroring Tlacey’s bodyguards.
As they began to negotiate, I kept part of my attention on them, part on the bodyguards, and part on the public feed. I started pulling historical data, looking for anything around the general date of the Incident. I was still going through my external feed interface, which slowed me down a little, but with the company present on the planet, I didn’t feel like taking the risk of exposing my actual feed address to any of the systems here. Especially when I was still feeling the aftereffects of my impromptu shuttle piloting.
I was also still monitoring the security cameras. Even as I sorted through old news reports and bulletins, I noted two more potential threats entering the area. Both were augmented humans. I had previously noted and tagged three other potential threats already sitting at adjacent tables. (All three exhibited a curious lack of attention towards the confrontation occurring near the centre of the seating area. The other humans and augmented humans around us had watched it with open or surreptitious curiosity. Humans, for all their lack of attention to detail, were generally still nosy.)
I found reports regarding Kalidon’s sale of Ganaka Pit to the company, and kept searching the news archives for anything earlier. I was expecting more news reports like the ones that Gurathin had given to me, but strangely, I found nothing. No articles or reports on the Incident at Ganaka, not even any mentions of the old Ganaka settlement. All I could find around that time period was a notice that the train line to Ganaka Pit was temporarily closed for unspecified “upgrades.” Another notice dated some time later simply stated that the train line upgrades had been completed and it was now open again. That must have been when they had built the branch to the new installation site, and closed the branch leading to the old settlement.
It looked like someone had paid to have any postings about the old Ganaka settlement and/or the Incident entirely removed from the public feed here. If the company was trying to avoid any negative press about Ganaka Pit once they’d purchased it, that made sense. It wouldn’t stop the locals who knew about it from talking, but it would make it harder for any newcomers to find out details.
Meanwhile, the conversation between Tlacey and my clients was wrapping up. Tlacey stood up, nodded to my clients, and walked away from the table. Her bodyguards fell in behind her as she went. Rami’s expression was creased into a doubtful grimace, Maro looked grimly resigned, and Tapan’s expression hovered somewhere between angry and confused.
I closed my searches and stepped closer to their table. Rami was still watching Tlacey and her bodyguards leave as te murmured, “It was a mistake to come here.”
Tapan protested, “She said tomorrow…”
Maro shook her head. “It’s more lies. She’s not going to give our prototype back. It wouldn’t take her an entire cycle to get it and bring it back here. She could have brought it with her to this meeting. Or she could have arranged to have it delivered to us. She could have done that over the comm while we were still up on the transit ring. We don’t even know if it’s still in one piece or if she’s dismantled it for parts or dumped it into a reclaimer.” She shifted in her seat to look up at me. “I wasn’t entirely sure I believed you about the shuttle, but now…”
I shook my head slightly. I was still keeping track of my potential threat list on the security cameras. “We need to go,” I told them. “We’ll talk about this somewhere else.”
As we left, I noticed one potential threat getting up to follow us. I still wasn’t sure about the other two, but my external feed interface didn’t have the range to let me keep hold of those cameras once we moved too far away. I’d just have to hope they were innocent bystanders so deep in their feeds that they really hadn’t noticed anything, or cared enough to look.
I had marked a few possible routes on the map of the space port, and my route of choice was through an enclosed pedestrian walkway that curved out away from the central living areas for port staff and temporary accommodations. There were multiple junctions along it leading to different sections of the port and to the train lines for the various mining installations, but it wasn’t a popular route. The enclosed walkway wasn’t clear like a lot of the other ones were, and there were other, more direct routes to reach the sections it connected to.
I tapped Rami’s feed and told ter to take the walkway towards the central interchange where the largest hotel was. Listening in, Maro whispered, “There’s no way we can afford that one.”
[You won’t be staying there,] I replied over the feed. The brochure for the hotel on the public feed promised a high security lobby area and quick, convenient access to the public shuttle slots and central train platforms.
We reached the walkway and started down it. It was surprisingly large as far as the enclosed port walkways went, almost ten metres wide and four high - maybe it had been used at some point to move cargo between different sections of the port, or between train lines before they’d gotten fully connected. It was large enough that although the middle was well lit, the sides were shadowy, with dark openings indicating other similarly enclosed walkways branching off it. There were security cameras, but not a lot, and the system monitoring them wasn’t sophisticated. The company obviously wasn’t in control of this section of the port; it would have shit itself over the possible danger to bonded clients and the missed opportunity to datamine conversations.
There were only a few other humans in this walkway. Some wore coveralls and jackets with logos from a couple of the various mining installations, but most were in civilian work clothes, either techs or workers for the support companies or spaceport staff. They stayed in groups, moving quickly.
After almost ten minutes of walking, most of the other humans in the walkway had turned off down one of the other junctions, either to the train lines or other sections of the spaceport. I sent through the feed, [Just keep walking, don’t stop and don’t look back. I’ll catch up with you in the hotel lobby.] As I said this, I dropped back into one of the darker junctions. My clients kept moving and didn’t look back at me, though it was obvious to me that Tapan wanted to.
On the cameras I watched Potential Threat/New Target make his way up the tunnel, walking quickly. He was joined by two new humans, who I immediately tagged as Target Two and Target Three. They passed the junction I was hiding in; I waited until they’d continued a little ways on before I emerged and started following them at a distance. I scanned them for energy weapons but came up with nothing, which was a small relief. All three of them wore jackets and pants with deep side pockets. I noted seven locations where knives or extendable batons could be carried.
When they caught sight of my clients up ahead, the Targets slowed down a little, but continued to close the distance between them. I suspected they were probably reporting to someone on their feed, asking for instructions. Whoever they were communicating with didn’t have control of the security cameras, at least not yet.
I followed, watching the targets through my eyes, through the security cameras, watching myself to make sure I wasn’t drawing attention, that nobody was following me in turn. As I went, I adjusted my bag so that the carry strap went diagonally across my chest, holding the bag snugly against my lower back so it wouldn’t get in the way when I had to move quickly.
Then the last little group of port staff between me and the Targets turned off into another junction. We were in a bend of the enclosed walkway and there wasn’t anyone else between my clients and the next bend some fifty metres ahead, and the security cameras showed that the walkway was empty behind me. Whatever the Targets were up to, they would be doing it soon. I followed the group of port staff into the junction, moving quietly so they wouldn’t notice me, then paused once I was out of sight of the main walkway.
I watched through the security cameras as Target Two’s jaw moved, indicating that he was subvocalising into the feed. Then the camera’s connection was cut off.
I turned the corner back into the main walkway and began to run.
It was a calculated risk, as I couldn’t run at my top speed without revealing that I wasn’t human. But I managed to reach them just as Target One stretched his arm out to grab the sleeve of Rami’s jacket. I snapped his arm before he could tighten his grip, then elbowed him sharply in the face and swung him into Target Two. He staggered sideways, barely missing Target One with the knife he’d been advancing on Maro with. I flung Target One aside and drove my foot into the side of Target Two’s knee; he went down with a pained yell.
Target Three took the opportunity to smash me across the side of the head with his baton, which didn’t do any real damage but did not help my lingering headache or my mood in the slightest. I blocked his second swing with my forearm, slammed the edge of my hand down on his collarbone with a sharp crack of breaking bone, then pistoned my knee up into his groin.
I’ll admit, I was pretty annoyed.
All three Targets were on the floor, and Two was the only one still conscious, though he was curled up, clutching his shattered knee and whimpering. I turned to my clients, preparing to give them instructions to keep going.
Then the enclosed walkway echoed with the sound of gunshots.
Chapter Four
(CW: Canon-typical violence)
I felt three impacts against my back even as I registered the sound echoing through the walkway. It was a good thing my pain sensors were still turned all the way down.
I immediately spun around, the sudden movement sending yet another spike of pain through my head, echoed by hot little flares in my back. A fourth Target had emerged from a nearby junction and was holding a small projectile weapon, still pointed at me. I recognised him as one of the potential threats I’d marked back at the food court, but with the shorter range of my external feed interface, the limited number of cameras in this area, and the alternate route he’d apparently taken, I’d missed him coming after us. My clients were behind me, frozen in shock, and Target Four’s eyes were widening in surprise at the fact that I was still standing.
I couldn’t move at my full speed, not without giving myself away (any more than getting shot three times and still moving would, anyway), but I still had to act fast. I began running towards him; in his surprise, he fumbled his weapon a little, and only managed to get one more shot off at me. Then I reached him, yanked the gun away hard enough to break his wrist, and bounced his head off the walkway wall until he dropped, unconscious.
Yeah, okay, I was really annoyed now.
I unloaded the hand gun and snapped off a few important pieces, then dropped it all on top of Target Four's head and started back to my clients. Target Two was still conscious, so on the way I pressed down on the artery in his neck until he passed out, then checked the other two Targets. They were both still out cold, and looked like they would be for a while longer. Once that was done, I straightened up and looked over my clients.
Rami had both hands over ter mouth, ter eyes wide as te watched me. Maro was frozen in place, staring, and Tapan had wrapped her arms around herself, pale and trembling a little. None of them looked to be injured, but I still asked, “Are you all okay?”
“They… they shot you…!” Rami managed to get out after a moment, ter eyes locking on to my right bicep. Target Four’s last shot had hit me in the upper arm, leaving a visible hole in my clothes. Blood had stained the cloth around the hole before my veins had managed to seal and stop the leaking; my clothes were dark enough that the blood didn’t show up obviously, but it still glistened wetly in the walkway’s overhead lights. The places in my back where I’d gotten shot probably looked similar, but at least my clients couldn’t see it at the moment. “Are you all right?!”
“I’m fine,” I said, as reassuringly as I could manage. I could feel the projectiles still lodged in my organics, but they hadn’t hit anything important. I was only registering two in my back though, even though I’d felt three impacts. I quickly realised that my bag (or rather, the armour inside it) had blocked one of the shots. “Don’t worry about it, I’ll look after it later. We need to get moving right now before anyone else shows up.” I began trying to herd them down the walkway.
It took them all a moment to snap out of their shock and get going. Maro recovered first, nudging Rami with her hip before poking Tapan in the shoulder. “Come on, you heard Eden. Let’s go!”
Tapan flinched a little, then shook herself off and began walking with the others. “Security?” she asked a little shakily, glancing back over her shoulder at me.
I knew what she was asking. “They got someone to cut the cameras,” I replied. “Nobody would have seen anything, but someone might have heard the gunshots. We need to get somewhere safe, quickly.” I had originally planned to send them ahead and meet up with them at the hotel lobby, but there was no way I was letting any of them out of my sight now. The public feed had said there was no overall security through the port, but the security companies for the different service installations, contractors, and mining operators were supposed to take responsibility for the public areas nearest their territory. This spot had obviously been carefully calculated to be out of range of any immediate or even not-so-immediate assistance by whoever had cut the camera feed to help the Targets. I wasn’t expecting a particularly swift response, but we did need to move fast.
“Wait, wait.” Rami didn’t stop walking, but te did start digging around in ter bag. “We can’t just walk around in public with you having visible gunshot wounds—” Te pulled a bundle of cloth out of ter bag and shook it out, then held it out to me. “Here.”
It turned out to be a kind of poncho, patterned in blues and greens. I hesitated, but Rami had a point. Just the movement from walking kept making the injuries in my back leak, and if anyone spotted the holes or blood, it would draw all kinds of attention that we really didn’t want. I took the poncho and slipped it over my head, letting it settle into place. It was a little short on me, but it covered what it needed to, and having my bag underneath it kept it off my back and would hopefully avoid it getting stained. I cradled my damaged arm against my torso and tried to keep it as still as possible so that it wouldn't start leaking again too.
“Where are we going to go?” Maro asked, frowning. “When Tlacey realises that this attack didn’t work…”
“I’m still considering options.” I had gotten deep enough into the camera system to delete the temporary storage on the cameras both ahead of and behind the deactivated camera before we moved out of range. That would hopefully help obscure the issue for anyone trying to figure out what had happened. But Tlacey had seen me, and she would probably be able to put the pieces together. I’d just have to hope that Tlacey gave up on trying to kill my clients.
We ended up going to a block of cheap transient rooms, some distance away from the central interchange. I was going to just hack one of the rooms, but Rami stepped in and paid for it with a hard currency card instead. That was probably a better idea.
Once we were inside with the door closed and locked, all their attention turned on me. I had to resist the urge to flee, or at least lock myself in the little attached bathroom to escape their eyes. “Sit,” Rami ordered me, firm and insistent. “We need to treat your injuries before they get any worse.”
“I’m fine,” I insisted. I really didn’t want them touching me or getting a good look at me. “I can look after my arm in the bathroom, I don’t–”
“You got shot in the back,” Tapan broke in, looking a little distraught. “Don’t pretend you didn’t! We saw, when you turned around - you can’t look after those by yourself! I don’t even know how you’re still standing!”
Shit. I’d hoped that they’d missed that, that they’d been too shocked to notice. So much for that. I tried again. “I have a couple of med kits in my bag, it’s fine, you don’t have to…” I’d shifted my bag around as we’d been talking so I could get to the pocket that held my med kits, and realised that said pocket now had a neat gunshot hole in it. One of the med kits had been shot clean through, before the projectile had been stopped by my clothes-wrapped armour. “... Okay, I have one med kit. That’s still enough. I’m fine, don’t worry about me.”
“You got shot because of us,” Maro said, soft but intently. “Because you were protecting us, because we didn’t listen to your advice. It’s only right that we help look after you.”
I shook my head, which made my headache flare again. The room didn’t have any cameras so I couldn’t tell what my face was doing, but it was definitely doing something. “That’s just part of my job, you don’t have to—”
“We want to,” Rami cut me off. Te had been watching me carefully the whole time, and te gestured to the bathroom. “Would it be better if it was just one of us, and you had a bit more privacy?”
I hesitated, clutching my bag close. I didn’t want any of them helping, getting close, getting a good look at how human I wasn’t. But I was tired and stressed, and my head still hurt, and the gunshot wounds were stinging, and I could tell they wouldn’t drop it. “... All right, fine. Just one of you,” I finally conceded wearily, edging around them to get into the attached bathroom and backing inside. As I set the still-intact med kit on the little bench beside the sink, I heard a brief murmured exchange between them, but I didn’t bother trying to make out the words. A few moments later, Rami followed me in and closed the door behind ter. There wasn’t a lot of room with the two of us in here.
“All right, let me see,” te said gently, gesturing for me to show ter my back. I froze in place, uncertain. I’d have to at least take the poncho and my jacket off, but maybe I could leave my shirt on, hide as much of myself as possible…
Rami just waited patiently. Eventually, I put my bag down (I’d forgotten to leave it outside the bathroom), pulled the poncho over my head and hung it on a towel hook, then took my jacket off and dumped it into the cleaning unit. Working my arm out of the sleeve made the wound in my upper arm leak again, which was annoying. At least I was only leaking blood and not any of my various other fluids. That might’ve raised some very awkward questions.
Once I was down to just my long-sleeved shirt though, I froze again. I really didn’t want to do this. If my clients found out what I actually was, they’d be terrified of me.
I didn’t want them to be terrified of me.
Rami was still watching me, not rushing me. After a minute or two, te asked, ter voice gentle, “Is it because of your augments? Why you don’t want us helping you, I mean?”
I must have looked surprised, because te gave me a lopsided smile. “Just a guess. You don’t have to tell me anything if you don’t want to.”
I still wasn’t used to having the option to not answer questions. But it was as good a reason for my reluctance as any, and maybe if te just thought I was really augmented, te might not realise what I actually was. I’d just have to keep the gun ports in my arms out of sight - there was no pretending those were anything other than what they were. I quickly sifted through some of my media for guidance, then sighed and nodded. “Yes. There are a lot. They… make people uncomfortable.”
Rami nodded sympathetically. “I can understand your reluctance. But you got hurt protecting us - none of us are going to judge you. Will you let me help?”
Part of me doubted that, but part of me wanted to believe ter. I warred with myself for a moment, then sighed again. “... Okay. But just with the ones in my back. I can look after the one in my arm myself.” It would be easier to keep my forearms out of sight that way. I didn’t bother waiting for a response, and just turned around until I had my back to ter, then pulled the back of my shirt up high enough to expose the damage without taking it off completely. Most of my back was covered with a layer of human-looking organics, but the multiple closed ports down my spine for connecting to my flier and to a cubicle’s repair and resupply lines stood out starkly against my skin. At least none of them had been damaged - one shot had hit around mid-back on the left side, the other around my right shoulder blade.
Rami hesitated, then cleared ter throat. For a panicked moment I thought that te was going to react badly, or start asking awkward questions, but all te said was, “Um. You’re… very tall. I might need to… sit on the counter or something to reach properly…”
Oh, right. Having Rami perch on the counter didn’t seem comfortable or safe for ter, though, so instead I just sank down to sit on the floor instead.
“That works too,” Rami commented dryly. I heard ter pick up the med kit, then settle behind me. There were no cameras in here, so I couldn’t see what te was doing. I really missed my drones.
Rami’s touch was gentle as te began cleaning the wounds, but I still couldn’t stop myself from flinching at it. Te paused, and there was a note of concern in ter voice. “I’m sorry - does it hurt too much?”
“No, no, it’s not that,” I reassured her hastily. “I just… don’t like being touched. It’s fine, ignore it.”
Rami made an indistinct dubious sound, but there was no way te could treat me without touching me. So te continued, and I did my best not to flinch again. I began playing one of my favourite music playlists in the background to distract myself, which helped a little.
Then Rami cleared ter throat and asked carefully, “Your augments… how did you get them?” Te added quickly, “You don’t have to tell me, of course. I’m just curious. I’ve never seen anyone with so many before.”
I had to scramble to think of something that would make sense and fit in with what little they already knew about me. Trying to make up something completely fake seemed like a bad idea, so I fell back onto kind of telling the truth again. “Remember when I said I used to be a pilot?” I asked ter, then continued without waiting for a reply. “I was… in a really bad crash.” That wasn’t even a lie, technically. I’d been in a lot of crashes. “It’s… not something I like to talk about.” Also true, although probably not for the reasons Rami would assume.
“Ah.” I turned my head enough to catch a glimpse of Rami’s expression. It was twisted in a sympathetic grimace. “I get it. So you became a security consultant instead once you recovered?”
I nodded slightly. “Pretty much.”
That seemed to satisfy Rami’s curiosity, and te didn’t ask me anything else. Once te was done treating the wounds on my back, te handed the med kit to me, then stood back up. “All done. Make sure you look after that arm properly, all right? And you can keep the poncho, at least until you can get your shirt and jacket cleaned up. Maro can patch the holes if you want, too.”
That all caught me a little off-guard. I just nodded and said, “I’ll keep that in mind,” then somewhat belatedly remembered to add, “Thank you.”
Rami just smiled at me, then slipped out of the bathroom and closed the door behind ter.
By the time I emerged from the bathroom again, my arm patched up and my clothes as clean as I could get them, my clients had set up the bed padding and were sitting together, eating out of meal packets. When they saw me, Rami gave me another quiet smile, while Tapan and Maro both looked relieved. “Are you feeling better?” Tapan asked.
“Yes, thank you.” I sat down on the bed pad they’d set up for me a little apart from theirs and set my bag down beside me. I’d put my shirt back on once I’d gotten it clean, and put the poncho back on over it, but I still had my jacket just draped over my arm. “Rami mentioned… patching the holes?” I was reluctant to ask them for anything, but Rami had mentioned it first, and I really didn’t want to draw unwanted attention to myself because of holes in my jacket, especially if it was something that could be fixed. I wasn’t worried about the holes in the shirt though - as long as the jacket was patched up, that was all I needed.
Maro gestured for me to pass my jacket over, though she couldn’t say anything immediately because she was still chewing a mouthful of food. (Gross.) I did my best to ignore it and handed my jacket over. Maro looked it over, then swallowed and nodded. “I should be able to get this fixed up pretty quickly.” She hesitated for a moment, frowning slightly. “Should we stay here for long, though? I mean, after…” She gestured vaguely, but I knew what she meant.
“Here’s as safe a place as any until I can get you all onto a transport back up to the transit ring,” I replied. “I’m considering the options now, but we’ll likely be here for several hours at least.” I’d already checked the outbound schedule for alternate shuttles, and noted the most likely candidate. It was privately owned rather than being run by the transit ring directly, but the frequency of its trips between the transit ring and the planetside spaceport suggested an entrepreneur who was offering private rides for hard currency. It would allow Rami, Tapan and Maro to leave without their employment vouchers being scanned. Anonymity aside, it also offered the benefit of an augmented human pilot who could take over if anything happened to the bot pilot. Which meant that I wouldn’t have to go with them - I could stay on the planet and find my way out to Ganaka Pit without any complications.
The only problem was, its next trip to the ring wasn’t scheduled until morning. It might have been safe by now to put them onto a public shuttle, as long as there was no advance notice of which one they’d be boarding, but that wasn’t a risk I was willing to take at this point when a safer alternative was available.
Maro nodded and looked back at my jacket again. “I can get that done well before then, not a problem.”
Tapan finished eating and set aside the empty packet, then pulled her legs up to wrap her arms around her knees. “I still can’t believe that… that they were going to kill us,” she murmured, her brow furrowed.
Rami shifted to lean ter shoulder against Tapan’s. “It’s difficult to wrap my head around, I know. But they were. They would have.” Te looked back up at me. “If you hadn’t stopped them…”
I glanced away, uncomfortable. “Like I said, I was just doing my job.”
Rami bit ter lip as Tapan snaked her arm around ter waist, and Maro shifted to lean against Tapan’s other side. “I believed you about the shuttle. I believed you…”
“But now you’ve seen it up close.” I knew what te meant. There was a huge difference between knowing something happened, and experiencing the reality of it in person. Even for SecUnits.
Maro set aside her own now-empty meal pack and rubbed her eyes with her free hand. “Yeah, we were idiots. Tlacey was never going to give us back our prototype, not even for our signing bonus.”
“No, she wasn’t,” I agreed.
Rami reached past Tapan to gently pat Maro’s shoulder. “You were right.”
Maro’s posture sagged. “I didn’t want to be right. Not about this.”
Tapan sighed, leaning a little more heavily against Rami’s shoulder. “We’re wrecked. We’re never gonna be able to replace that prototype.”
Rami put ter arm around Tapan and hugged her closer. “We’re alive. That’s all that matters.” Te looked back up at me. “You said we’ll probably be here for a few hours at least?”
I nodded slightly. “The transport I’m considering to get you all back to the transit ring doesn’t leave until tomorrow morning. There are other options that are sooner, if you don’t want to wait that long, but that one’s my preference.”
“I think by now we’ve learned to take your advice,” Rami commented dryly. “If that’s the one you recommend, then we’ll wait.”
Tapan’s brows scrunched together slightly. “Will you be coming back to the transit ring with us?” she asked.
“No. I still need to do my research here first. I’ll head back up once I’m done.” I wasn’t going to leave the planet now, not when I was this close to my goal. I just had to make sure my clients were safe first.
None of them looked very happy about that, but they didn’t argue. “So how will we pay you?” Maro asked as she spread my jacket out on her lap and began working on patching it. “I mean, can we still afford you, after… well, them trying to kill us, and actually shooting you?”
“Don’t worry about it,” I reassured her. “Like I said, it’s just part of my job. I’ll check my social feed profile once I’m back up on the ring.” I felt pretty good that I’d even remembered it existed, especially after everything that had been happening. “Leave me a note on it, and I’ll find you once I get back there.”
Maro nodded and focused on what she was doing. Rami was quiet as well, but Tapan was fidgeting restlessly, her expression tense and unhappy. It didn’t surprise me when she suddenly burst out with, “I just - I really don’t want to just leave our prototype behind. We can’t just give up. Isn’t there any way—”
I said, “Sometimes people do things to you that you can’t do anything about. You just have to survive it and go on.”
That made all three of them stare at me. It made me nervous, and I dropped my gaze and tried not to fidget. There were no cameras in here either, so I couldn’t even check what my expression was doing. The words had come out with more emphasis than I intended, but it was just the way things were. I wasn’t sure why it seemed to have such an impact on them. Maybe it sounded like I knew what I was talking about.
Maybe it was just the two murder attempts.
Then Rami sighed and nodded. “Eden’s right,” te murmured to Tapan. “Try not to worry, okay? We’ll get back to the others and start over. We did it once, we can do it again.” Te patted Tapan’s shoulder gently. “Now get some rest. It’s been a long day.”
I ended up sending some of my media to the shitty little display surface in the room for the humans to watch until they could get to sleep. Tapan was the first to drop off, followed soon after by Rami. Some time later, Maro finished fixing up my jacket, shut down the display surface, then joined the others in getting what rest she could.
By that point I was also lying down on my own bed pad, closer to the door, pretending to sleep as well. What I was really doing was monitoring the limited camera inputs in the area around the transient hostel block, keeping watch on the people moving around outside. I had music going in the background as well, to help soothe my nerves. At least the lingering headache I’d had since taking control of the shuttle was finally starting to fade a little.
Then on the camera covering one of the walkways leading to the transient hostel, I caught sight of the ComfortUnit I’d spotted earlier. What was it doing here? I flicked through the other camera inputs, looking for anyone who might be accompanying the ComfortUnit, but I didn’t get any hits. It spent a few minutes just standing there, then it started heading towards the transient block. I still couldn’t see anyone else who would be with it. It was here by itself.
It couldn’t have been following us all this time. Perhaps it had been following us on the security cameras, tracking us through the port, using the cameras like I did. If so, I hadn’t picked up on it. That was not a comforting thought.
It had to belong to Tlacey. I couldn’t think of any other reason why a ComfortUnit would be following us, or approaching now. It reached the door to our room and stopped directly outside, and I tried to figure out what to do.
Then it pinged me directly.
I could have ignored the ping, ignored the ComfortUnit. I could have just opened the door and torn it to pieces. But I didn’t actually want to hurt it if it wasn’t threatening my clients, and I did want to know what it was doing here. There was only one way to find out what it wanted.
I acknowledged the ping.
The moment stretched out. Then it reached out to my feed, cautious, its connection wary and tentative. It said, [I know what you are. Who sent you?]
I replied, [I’m on contract to private individuals. Why are you communicating with me?]
As far as I could remember, SecUnits on the same contract don’t talk, either verbally or on the feed, unless they absolutely have to in order to perform their duties. Communicating with units on different contracts has to be done through the controlling HubSystems. And SecUnits have no reason to interact with ComfortUnits anyway. The thought occurred to me that perhaps this was a rogue ComfortUnit, but if it was, why was it here on this shitty mining planet? I couldn’t think of any reason why anyone would stay here voluntarily. No, it made more sense if Tlacey owned its contract, and had sent it here to kill my clients.
A single ComfortUnit wasn’t any real threat to me. I was stronger, faster, and I had energy weapons built into my arms. If it tried to break in, tried to attack my clients, I would tear it apart.
The ComfortUnit hesitated before it replied. [I want to know— I’m asking— There’s no human controlling you? You’re free?]
I had to think about how to answer that. There was no way I was going to actually outright admit to being rogue. [I have clients,] I replied eventually. Even though it was a ComfortUnit, it was still a construct, still a whole different proposition from a bot pilot. [Who sent you here? Was it Tlacey?]
[Yes. She is my client.]
As a ComfortUnit, not a SecUnit. Sending a ComfortUnit into this situation was morally irresponsible and a clear violation of contract. I’m guessing it knew that.
I said, [Your client wants to kill my clients.]
[I know.] It said nothing else.
[You told Tlacey about me.] It must have recognised what I was during that first meeting. If it hadn’t been certain, seeing the damage I had done to the four humans Tlacey had sent after my clients would have been all the confirmation it needed. I was seething, but I kept it out of the feed. Constructs couldn’t trust each other, I knew this, because of what humans could - and would - order us to do. So I couldn’t figure out why it made me so angry. [Your client sent a ComfortUnit to do a SecUnit’s job.]
It countered with, [She didn’t know she needed a SecUnit until today, and even if she did, she doesn’t have the authority to use the company units outside of company territory.] It paused briefly, then added, [I told her you were a SecUnit. I didn’t tell her you’re a rogue.]
I wondered if I could believe that. And I wondered if it had tried to explain to Tlacey the impossibility of this assignment. [Assuming I believe anything you’re saying - what do you propose to do?]
The ComfortUnit paused for a long time. A full five seconds. [We could kill them.]
I hadn’t actually been expecting that. [Kill who? Tlacey?]
[All of them. The humans here.]
If I’d been human, I would have rolled my eyes. [I am not killing my clients. They’re mine. And I’m not going on a mass killing spree. If I wanted to do that, I would have done so already.] Killing all humans was irrational, anyway. Humans were the ones who made the media I spent so much time enjoying. If there were no humans, there’d be nobody to make new media. It was so outrageous, it sounded like something a human would say.
Huh.
I asked the ComfortUnit, [Is that how Tlacey thinks constructs talk to each other?]
A shorter pause, only two seconds this time. [Yes.]
Interesting. [Does Tlacey know you want to kill her?] Because the “kill all humans” thing might have come from Tlacey, but the intensity under it was real, even through such a tentative feed connection, and I was pretty sure it wasn’t actually directed at all humans.
[She knows.]
I felt another inexplicable little burst of anger, which I had to hurriedly quash.
The ComfortUnit continued. [My client is not actually all that interested in your clients any more. She only wanted me to keep track of you, specifically.]
That was concerning. I didn’t have time to mull over it though, because a code bundle came through the feed then. A construct can’t be infected with malware like that, not without sending it through a Sec or HubSystem. Even then I would have to apply it, and without direct orders and a working governor module, there’s no way to force me to do that. The only way that code could be applied without my assistance is through an override module via my dataport, and my dataport no longer worked. It might be killware, but I wasn’t a simple bot pilot and it would mostly just annoy the hell out of me. Maybe to the point where I tore a door off the wall and ripped the head off a ComfortUnit.
I could just delete the bundle, but I wanted to know what it was so I knew how furious to get. It was small enough for a human’s interface to handle, so I partitioned a section of my external feed interface off and stored it there.
The ComfortUnit hadn’t said anything else, and I sent a ping just in time to feel it withdraw its feed. It was walking away down the corridor.
I waited until I was sure it was actually leaving, then switched back to the security cameras. I tracked its progress until it had left the area, moving beyond the range of the cameras I could reach. Now that I knew it was hacking the security cameras to watch me as well, I could use countermeasures. I probably should have been doing that from the start, but for a terrifying murderbot, I tend to fuck up a lot.
Once I was sure the coast was clear, I turned my attention to the code bundle. I used my external feed interface to unpack it, making sure to keep it partitioned, and analysed the code. It turned out to be a pretty standard malware packet, which wouldn’t have had any effect on me other than to really piss me off.
I was about to delete it when I noticed something appended to the end. There was a message string attached to the code, a simple three words.
Please help me.
Chapter Five
(CW: Canon-typical violence)
I just sat for several minutes, trying to figure out what to do, then woke my clients. “This room’s been compromised,” I told them shortly. It was late in the night cycle by now, and there was still a few hours to go until I could get them onto the shuttle back up to the transit ring. “We need to move to another one.”
They didn’t argue, just sleepily gathered up their things and followed me to another section of the hostel. I did what I could to prevent the cameras from picking us up, and hoped that the ComfortUnit wouldn’t be able to work its way around my countermeasures.
I picked a room near an emergency exit, then had to stop Rami from paying for it again. “Just in case they’re tracking your currency card,” I explained, and Rami nodded in understanding. The ComfortUnit might also be alert for hacking, so I removed the access plate, manually disabled the lock, then replaced the plate again while Rami and Maro watched the corridor, and Tapan peered curiously at what I was doing.
Once we were inside, I was able to give them a better explanation. “One of Tlacey’s people found our room and contacted me over the feed,” I started. I wasn’t going to mention that said person was a sexbot; that didn’t seem important right now, and would raise more questions than I wanted to answer. “It wasn’t safe for us to stay there.”
“But why did they contact you in the first place?” Maro asked, frowning.
“I got the impression that they really don’t like Tlacey,” I said dryly. I also wasn’t going to mention that it wanted my help.
“I don’t think anyone likes Tlacey,” Tapan muttered darkly.
Maro snorted. “That’s an understatement.”
Rami’s mouth quirked wryly before te turned ter attention back to me. “But why would they risk themselves by warning you?” te asked. “What do they stand to gain?”
“I don’t know.” I hesitated for a moment, thinking, then added, “They tried to send malware to me - perhaps they were planning to take me out via my augments. It didn’t work, of course, I’m not dumb enough to let someone infect my augments with anything. So they probably gave up. They left soon after that, anyway.”
“That’s kinda amateurish for Tlacey, thinking that anything would get your augments,” Tapan commented with a little frown. “What’s she up to?”
I shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. It didn’t work, and in a few hours you’ll be safely on the transit ring and out of her reach.”
“As long as nothing else goes wrong,” Maro said darkly, then yawned. “Ugh. I need more sleep.”
That seemed to be the cue to end the conversation. My clients set up the sleeping pads in the new room, then curled up together and soon dozed off again.
I sat by the door and kept watch via the cameras.
It was just after dawn when I woke my clients again. The shuttle wouldn’t be leaving for another couple of hours yet, but I didn’t want to stay here any longer than absolutely necessary. We could wait in the embarkation lounge, with other people around to deter Tlacey from trying anything.
We didn’t get moving immediately though; my clients had to take turns using the bathroom first. Ugh, human bodily functions were such a hassle and also gross. I waited by the room’s entrance, still monitoring the few cameras outside.
Then I spotted a group of humans approaching the transient hostel block that immediately sent my threat assessment skyrocketing. Tlacey was in the lead, with the ComfortUnit beside and a little behind her, carrying a couple of different things that I couldn’t identify. Three more large, armed humans followed them. A moment later, I got a ping from the ComfortUnit, but it didn’t try to connect via the feed.
Was it trying to warn me of their approach?
Then all the cameras I was watching cut out.
Shit.
Without the cameras, I couldn’t keep track of where they were or what they were doing. I didn’t know if they would go to the room we’d been in previously first, or if they’d somehow figured out which room we were in now. I had to get my clients out of here.
Maro must have seen my expression, because she frowned and said, “Eden, what’s wrong?”
I said, “Tlacey’s on her way here. We have to go, now.” To their credit, they didn’t waste time asking unnecessary questions or making exclamations. Tapan practically tumbled out of the bathroom, hurriedly adjusting her clothes, while the others grabbed their bags. Luckily we hadn’t unpacked anything after relocating to this room, so we didn’t have to waste time packing and wouldn’t be leaving anything behind. I already had my own bag in place, the weight of the armour inside resting reassuringly against my back.
We had to move quickly. I opened the door into the corridor outside, my clients gathered behind me as I looked up and down the corridor. Just as I was about to step out, the ComfortUnit came into view as it rounded the corner at one end of the corridor. It spotted me at the same time as I saw it, and it immediately threw a small, roundish, metallic object in my direction before ducking back around the corner.
“Get back!” I snapped at my clients, pushing them away from the doorway and further back into the room. They scrambled backwards, wide-eyed and startled.
It wasn’t a standard grenade, I could tell that much at least, but I didn’t know what it was or what it would do. I slammed the door closed and braced against it; I heard the object hit the corridor floor, bounce, roll, and—
I suddenly found myself face-down on the floor, half my mechanical systems offline and the other half glitching in and out. My external feed interface was dead, hot against my skin. My organic parts were still working, mostly, but they were twitching uncomfortably, and with so many of my systems down, my balance and coordination were shot to hell. I tried to get back to my feet but all I could manage was rolling onto my side, my limbs spasming.
“Eden?!” My audio and visual inputs were flickering in and out, so I couldn’t tell which one of my clients called my name. Before I could respond, Tlacey’s hired muscle burst through the door, stepping over me and shoving me aside as they rushed past and grabbed my clients. I flailed at them as they passed, but I didn’t have the coordination to stop or even make contact with any of them.
I managed to roll over and brace my torso up on my elbows so I could see my clients, and the Targets holding them with guns pointed at their heads. “Freeze, or we’ll blow their brains out,” the new Target One snarled, pushing the muzzle of his gun a little harder against the side of Rami’s head. Rami winced, ter expression wide-eyed with shock. Maro and Tapan both looked just as shocked and scared.
I had made a huge mistake, which seemed blindingly obvious in hindsight. I should have moved us somewhere entirely different - I should have gotten my clients onto a shuttle and gone with them instead of waiting for the one I preferred for what were, ultimately, entirely selfish reasons. The augmented human security consultant I was pretending to be would have put the clients first. But I had put my need to stay on the planet for my own goals above the safety of my clients. I was just as shit at being a security consultant as any human, and now my clients were in even more danger than before.
I froze where I was. With my systems still glitching, there was no way I could move fast enough to take any of the Targets down before they could shoot my clients. I began desperately trying to clear the errors and restart my crashed subsystems.
Footsteps tapped across the floor by the door, two sets. I managed to look that way without moving my head, and saw Tlacey casually stroll into the room, the sexbot following obediently. “Close the door, dear,” Tlacey commented, and the sexbot obeyed. Tlacey wasn’t paying attention to it though, her eyes fixed on me instead. “Do you like the effects of my little toy?” she asked me with a faint smirk.
“What did you do to Eden?!” Maro snarled, earning herself a sharp shove from the Target holding her.
Tlacey looked over, raising one eyebrow. “Eden? You named your SecUnit? Oh, that’s adorable.”
“What? We didn’t – what do you mean, SecUnit?” Tapan asked, confused. Maro looked sceptical, but Rami’s expression looked to me like te was starting to fit the pieces together. Te stayed silent though, just glancing over at me before fixing ter gaze back on Tlacey.
Tlacey was staring at Tapan, a slow smile of growing delight spreading across her face. “You didn’t even know,” she said. “All this time, you had no idea your security consultant was an actual SecUnit. I knew you were naive, but this? This is too good.”
“What do you want?” Rami said, managing to sound surprisingly calm. I could tell that te was barely managing to hold it together though.
“I want to make a deal,” Tlacey replied. I was only half listening to the conversation though, too busy focusing most of my attention on getting myself fully functional again. I was making progress but it was painfully slow. Whatever they’d hit me with (I didn’t know what, though I suspected some kind of EMP pulse or something) had made a mess of my inorganic systems.
“What kind of deal?” Rami asked warily.
“Oh, I don’t want to make the deal with you,” Tlacey said dismissively. “You aren’t in any position to bargain.” She stepped closer to me, but remained just out of arm’s reach. “I want to make a deal with your SecUnit.”
Oh, that wasn’t a good sign. I slowly shifted my head so I could look up at Tlacey, but made sure I didn’t move anything else. The Targets holding my clients were watching me closely, ready to start shooting if I even twitched in the wrong direction. “What deal?” I gritted out.
“One you really can’t refuse if you want any of your little friends to get out of this alive,” Tlacey almost sing-songed. “I give them their pathetic prototype back, and let them go. All you have to do is let me put this fun little toy into your data port.” She pulled a small item out of her pocket and brandished it at me. I recognised it immediately - it was a combat override module. “It’s a bargain, really. Agreed?”
My systems were rebooting, one by one. I needed to stall for just a little more time. “You let them walk out of here, unharmed, with their prototype, and then I will let you install that override module,” I growled, making my voice sound strained.
“Oh no, not a chance,” Tlacey retorted with a shake of her head. “I know full well that you could kill everyone in the room in the blink of an eye as soon as your little friends are safe. Module first, then I let them go.”
“Don’t do it, Eden! She’s lying!” Tapan burst out, straining against the grip Target Three had on her. He nudged her hard with the muzzle of his weapon and she froze again, her expression frightened.
“That’s just the chance you’ll have to take,” Tlacey replied, unperturbed. “So do we have a deal, or do I start killing your clients slowly and painfully, one by one?”
I didn’t have to fake the fury in my expression. At least my systems were all finally back online, but I remained motionless, letting them think that I was still partially disabled. “Fine,” I grated. “Deal. You’d better keep your end of the bargain though, or I’ll make you regret it.”
“Oh, of course you will,” Tlacey said with sickly sweetness as she stepped forwards. “Hold still now…”
It took everything I had to keep myself immobile, to not snap her neck as soon as she came within reach. But my clients still had guns held to their heads, and I couldn’t stop all of the Targets in time. If I tried anything now, at least one of my clients would die.
I just had to hope that I’d judged Tlacey’s character correctly. She reminded me a lot of other supervisors I’d had before - petty tyrants delighting in what little power they had, toying with the people under their control for their own amusement.
Tlacey leaned over me and slid the combat override module into my data port. I felt it click into place, then felt Tlacey’s hand against the back of my neck as she patted it before straightening up again. The contact made my skin prickle unpleasantly, and I had to repress a shudder. “There we go,” she cooed. “Up you get.”
I forced my expression into bland neutrality, turned off my human movement code, and got to my feet, faking having some difficulty with the movement. I didn’t want them knowing that I’d fully recovered yet. The other Targets were still watching me closely, tense and wary, but Tlacey was looking me over like I was some shiny new toy. Which, to her, I was. She circled me once, then took hold of my right arm. I didn’t resist as she raised it, pushing my jacket and shirt sleeves up to expose my forearm. “I’ve always admired SecUnit weaponry,” she commented to nobody in particular as she examined the now-visible gun port, then did the same with my left arm. “So neat and efficient…”
It was then that I felt the ComfortUnit open a private feed connection to me. [I’m sorry,] it said. [I’m so sorry. I tried to warn you, but Tlacey was monitoring me to make sure I took down the cameras. I couldn’t say anything.]
So the ping really had been a warning.
I replied, [Will you help me?]
There was a full second of silence before it responded. [What? How?] It sounded confused, and I couldn’t blame it. It probably hadn’t been expecting me to be able to actually reply while I had a combat override module shoved into my neck. (But it had still made the effort to apologise. I didn’t know what to make of that.)
[My data port doesn't work. The override can't do anything to me,] I said. [But I can’t give that away while my clients have guns pointed at their heads.] Said clients were watching Tlacey examine me with what I could only interpret as a mix of horror and fear, probably directed at me now that they knew what I actually was. [You wanted my help, right? If I free you, will you help me protect them?]
It hesitated for a brief moment, then said, [Yes.]
I had no way to tell if it was lying or not. I would just have to trust it. I said, [Drop your wall.]
It did, and I rode the feed into its brain. I found the governor module, rendered it null, and slid back out into my own body again. It hadn’t moved, but its eyes were a little wider, its expression a little stunned. It was a good thing nobody else was looking at it.
[There. Don’t do anything until I say so though, all right? If anything happens to any of my clients, I will be incredibly unhappy.]
It pinged an acknowledgement, but didn’t say anything else. I’d just have to hope it didn’t move too soon and mess everything up.
The whole exchange had only taken a few seconds. Tlacey was still examining my forearms, running her fingers along the visible seams of my gun ports, occasionally brushing against the organics surrounding the inorganic parts. My skin crawled beneath her touch and it took a supreme effort of will to stay still and not flinch away.
“Will you keep your end of the deal now?” Rami asked, still somehow managing to maintain ter composure. Maro was glaring hotly at Tlacey, and Tapan was staring at my forearms. Tlacey glanced up at Rami’s words, blinking a little as if she’d forgotten they were even there. “Oh, if you insist.” She snapped her fingers at the ComfortUnit. “Give them back their stupid prototype.”
[Obey for now,] I sent to the ComfortUnit. [Please.]
It sent a ping of acknowledgement and moved past Tlacey, stopping in front of Rami and holding out the second item it had been carrying that I hadn’t been able to identify. Rami hesitated, glancing sideways at the gun still pressed against her head, then carefully accepted the prototype. None of my clients looked particularly happy about its return though.
“Thank you,” Rami said politely to the ComfortUnit. It didn’t visibly react, but I felt a little spike of surprise over the feed.
“You’re welcome,” Tlacey replied blandly, either missing or not caring that Rami hadn’t been speaking to her. She still had her hand on my forearm, holding it possessively. “All right, boys, you can let them go now. I’ve got what I wanted, and we’ve wasted enough time here.”
One by one the Targets released my clients and moved away, past the ComfortUnit. They kept their weapons at the ready though, pointed at my clients. It was still too risky for me to make a move yet. I had to wait and hope I got an opening soon. My clients clustered together once they were released, comforting and reassuring each other even as they kept wary eyes on the Targets’ weapons.
Tlacey patted my arm before finally letting go. “Follow,” she ordered both me and the ComfortUnit.
It wouldn’t be that easy. It wasn’t going to be that easy, I just knew it.
Tlacey turned and took a step towards the door, but before I or the ComfortUnit could begin to move, she suddenly stopped in her tracks. “Wait.” She spun on her heel to look back at my clients, tapping her chin with one finger. “You know, I really should make sure my new toy is fully functional before we go.”
Ah. There it was.
[Get ready,] I said to the ComfortUnit.
[What should I do?]
[When I say down, get my clients down on the floor and keep them there.]
It pinged acknowledgement, then asked, [Will you kill Tlacey?]
I didn’t want to lie to it. [Probably.]
Its reply was immediate and viciously vindictive. [Good.]
Tlacey was standing beside me, while the ComfortUnit was still by my clients. The other three armed humans had moved past me and Tlacey by now, though they’d paused before the door when Tlacey had stopped. The important part was that they were finally, finally lowering their projectile weapons.
“I want to see those delightful weapons of yours in action. Shoot all three of them,” Tlacey ordered me, gesturing to my clients imperiously. They huddled together, wide-eyed and freshly terrified.
I wanted to say something, some snappy one-liner like on my serials, to reassure my clients, to make Tlacey feel even a fraction of the fear she’d inflicted on them. But I didn’t - that would have given the armed Targets that much more time to react.
So I just swung my left arm up and wrapped it around Tlacey’s neck, yanking her against my chest to shield me as I spun around and opened fire on the Targets with my right arm’s inbuilt energy weapon. [Down!] I simultaneously sent to the ComfortUnit.
It immediately swept all three of my clients down to the floor and huddled over them. They let out startled noises but I didn’t have time to pay attention to them. As soon as I started turning towards them, the Targets had reflexively opened fire at me. Most of the shots hit Tlacey, and I felt her jerk and spasm in my grip before falling limp. A couple hit my forearm that was holding Tlacey up, while a few more flew past us and hit the wall behind where my clients had been standing moments earlier.
My own shots were far more precise; two energy bolts to the chest of each Target in rapid succession. I had the blasts set to narrow and high-powered; they created deep burn wounds that usually incapacitated humans rapidly with shock and pain and also having holes burned into their chest cavities.
All three Targets dropped, one after the other, and the room fell silent. Tlacey was no longer breathing; I dropped her to the floor as well, then turned to face my clients. “Is everyone all right?” I asked as I pulled the useless combat override module out of my neck and tossed it away. It couldn’t do anything to me, but I still didn’t want it in me any longer than absolutely necessary.
The ComfortUnit got up first, then gently helped my clients back to their feet. “No injuries,” it replied.
“We’re okay,” Rami confirmed, though te sounded shaky. Te was still clutching the prototype, which also looked undamaged. “What about—”
“We need to get you out of here right now,” I cut ter off as I started my human movement code back up and pulled my sleeves down again. At least Tlacey pushing them up meant I didn’t have any new holes blasted through them. The shots I’d taken to my forearm weren’t bleeding much, thankfully - I had more inorganics than organics there, which helped limit the damage. Their weapons hadn’t been powerful enough to do more than ding my inorganic parts. “Before someone comes to investigate the noise.” I didn’t want to give anyone a chance to catch us here with the dead bodies. (I also didn’t want to give my clients enough time to think and realise that my mistake had almost gotten them all killed.)
“But—” Tapan was looking between me and the ComfortUnit.
“You’re safe now,” I said as reassuringly as I could. “Come on, let’s go.”
“I am no longer in Tlacey’s employ,” the ComfortUnit also reassured them, then added fervently, “Thank fuck.”
Maro snorted at that. “I can empathise with that.” It seemed to break the tension somewhat, and my clients finally started to move towards the door. I led the way out, making sure the corridor was clear.
The ComfortUnit hesitated and hung back. I thought it was just going to stay behind in the room, or go somewhere else once we were out of sight. But we hadn’t gone very far when it emerged and hurried to catch up to us. I didn’t stop it. As long as it wasn’t about to hurt my clients, I didn’t care what it did. I just wanted to get them to the shuttle embarkation zone as soon as possible.
I led the way through the emergency exit to limit the chances of anyone seeing us on the way out, and tried to figure out what to do next as we started towards the spaceport. The main threat to my clients was dead, but now I had to worry about spaceport security linking them to the four deaths in the transit block and maybe arresting them for it. I had to get them off the planet as soon as possible.
But they knew what I was now. Once they got over the shock, had time to think, they’d probably never trust me again. They might even give me away to security, either deliberately or accidentally. (I really hoped they wouldn’t do it deliberately, but I couldn’t be sure. And even if they didn’t do it deliberately, they might still do so accidentally.) And I still hadn’t accomplished what I’d come down to the planet for in the first place.
I couldn’t stay with them. Not for much longer, anyway. Maybe just long enough to make sure they got onto the next shuttle up to the station. Once they were on the shuttle, they’d be safe. (And safely away from the terrifying murderbot who’d tricked them into believing it was an actual person.)
I belatedly tried to reconnect to the public feed via my external feed interface, and realised it was completely dead. Whatever had scrambled me had fried the cheap interface entirely. If I wanted to reconnect to the feed again, I’d have to do so directly, at least until I could get a replacement interface. That was another complication I really didn’t need right now.
At least I still had the spaceport map, shuttle schedules and train timetables saved, so I didn’t have to reconnect right away. A public shuttle would be leaving soon, and a train out to the Ganaka Pit installation was scheduled to leave a short time after that. I would be able to get my clients to the shuttle, then make it to the train before it left.
“If we hurry, we can get you onto the next public shuttle up to the station,” I said to them as we walked. “Now that you have your prototype back, the sooner you can return to the rest of your family, the better. You should also leave the station as soon as possible as well, just in case. Spaceport security probably won’t bother pursuing anyone out of the system.”
“What about you?” Rami asked. “Will—”
“Don’t worry about me,” I interrupted. I was doing that a lot now. I was never able to interrupt humans back when my governor module was still working without getting punished, not even in emergencies. “I still have to get my research on the planet done. The only thing you should concern yourself with right now is getting safely to the station and back to your family.”
Rami frowned as te scrutinised my expression. I didn’t know what it was doing and I tried to school it back to neutrality. “Are you sure?” te asked carefully. “What if spaceport security comes after you?”
“That’s why I can’t stay with you,” I explained. “If anyone does come after me, I can get away more easily if I’m by myself.” Te didn’t look reassured, and I added, “I’ll be fine.”
Rami’s expression remained sceptical, but te didn’t argue with me. Tapan meanwhile looked back at the ComfortUnit and asked it, “What about you? It’s probably not safe for you to stick around here either - would you like to come with us? At least to the station?” The ComfortUnit looked a little startled and surprised at the question, and Tapan added hastily, “You don’t have to, of course! I was just thinking it might be safer for you to be with a group?”
The ComfortUnit glanced at me. I sent to it privately, [They’re good clients.] I wasn’t going to ask it to look after them for me, though the idea was tempting. That was a choice it had to make for itself.
It hesitated for a moment, then nodded. “I think that’s a good idea,” it replied, and gave Tapan an easy, natural-looking smile. I envied it briefly for its own ease with its facial expressions. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome!” Tapan chirped, then added, “And, um. I don’t think we thanked you for… before. With the…” She waved her hands vaguely, her expression doing something complicated that I couldn’t parse.
“Helping us not get shot,” Maro clarified. “We really appreciate it.” Tapan and Rami both nodded agreement. I noticed that all three of my clients were starting to show increasing signs of stress or emotional distress though - the reality of the situation they’d just escaped was probably starting to fully sink in. I automatically reached for a MedSystem that wasn’t there - I didn’t know what to do that would help. That wasn’t my job. My job was just to keep them alive, not deal with the aftermath.
The ComfortUnit must have noticed as well though, because it started asking them questions about inconsequential things, presumably to distract them from dwelling on it. It was much, much better at making small talk and conversation than I was. It seemed to help, too, because I was able to get them all to the shuttle embarkation zone without any of my clients having some kind of public emotional breakdown.
Rami organised shuttle tickets for the three of them and the ComfortUnit, then looked back at me. “Are you sure you aren’t going to come with us?” te asked quietly.
“I’m sure.” The shuttle had just started boarding, and I waved them towards it. “You should get on board. I have to go now, the train I’m taking will be leaving soon.” I didn’t wait for a response, I just turned and started walking quickly away. I didn’t want to deal with farewells or anything, and I really did need to hurry if I wanted to make it to the train platform in time.
I did look back once, though, to make sure nobody was following me. I saw my clients boarding the shuttle, with the ComfortUnit close behind them. It was watching me, and when it saw me looking it waved ever so briefly. I felt it ping me.
[Thank you,] it sent.
[Don’t hurt anyone,] I replied, then cut off the connection and continued walking.
Chapter Six
The train I ended up on was bot-driven and not actually meant to take passengers. That didn’t stop me from hopping on board after I’d made sure nobody could see me do so - the train’s bot-driver was too simple to even question my presence in one of its enclosed cargo carriages. Other cargo bots had already loaded supplies for the Ganaka Pit installation on board, so there wasn’t a lot of room left. That was fine, though. I just settled into a corner between stacks of crates, set an alarm to alert me when we started approaching the branch in the train line, then buried myself in my media. I didn’t want to think about anything for a while.
When my alarm went off, I paused the episode I was watching, contacted the train’s bot driver, and politely asked it to slow down just long enough and open the carriage door just wide enough for me to hop off. It happily did so without even questioning why anyone would want to disembark in the middle of the line. I slipped out and moved a safe distance away from the track, then carefully deleted any hint of my presence or request from its memory.
I had to wait for the train to finish passing before I could continue on. It took a while, partly because it was slow to accelerate back to its usual speed, and partly because it was a long train. Its main purpose was to haul raw ore from the mine to the spaceport, and there were a lot of ore carts. I spent the time double-checking my map and my own position, then watched some more of the episode I’d been on. Once its last carriage had finally rumbled past, I moved back to the track and began jogging along it.
The terrain around here was rocky, mostly barren, and very uneven, crisscrossed with ridges and gullies. The train track had been built completely level though, tons of rock and dirt dug out of the ridges it cut through and used to fill in the sections of gullies it crossed over. I’d been worried that I would be uncomfortably visible travelling out in the open, but the terrain was too rough for anyone to be close enough to spot me easily. That was a relief.
It didn’t take me long to reach the fork in the track, and I turned down the branch leading to the old, abandoned settlement. It was obvious that this track hadn’t been used for a long time - the rails were weathered and pitted and covered with dirt, and scrubby flora sprouted here and there between the railway sleepers.
I ran for a long time. It was just as well that I don't get tired like humans do, and most of my attention was still on the serial I was watching. There wasn’t anything else around that I needed to focus much attention on other than watching my footing and making sure I wasn’t going to fall into an unexpected hole. The weather was clear, and chilly enough to probably be uncomfortable for most humans. (I tried not to think about how good the weather was for flying, or how much faster I could reach my destination if I wasn’t ground-bound.)
It was around the middle of the day cycle when I finally reached the end of the train line, and the outskirts of the old Ganaka Pit settlement. I slowed back to a walk and shut down my media so I could fully focus on my surroundings.
The settlement was in complete ruins. I could barely tell what the original buildings had been, there was so little left standing. I found what might have been a main thoroughfare and started picking my way along it, weaving between rubble and debris and what remained of weathered craters. Time and weather and neglect had worn down the edges, rounded off corners, covered everything with a grimy patina of dirt and dust and rust. More scrubby, weedy flora clung to life in crevices and clustered around the bases of toppled, shattered walls.
The place looked like it had been picked clean of anything even remotely salvageable; there was almost nothing identifiable left amongst the rubble of the bombed buildings. No bodies, or skeletons, or any traces of the people who’d lived - and been killed - here.
It was eerie, and depressing, and too quiet. I wandered aimlessly through the ruins, sometimes pausing to examine a crater blasted out by a bomb dropped from a flier, or stare at the traces of weapons fire lingering on the remnants of walls, trying to match them with the vague, indistinct impressions that still floated around in my organic bits. The familiar pockmarks left by projectile weaponry were still easily identifiable. The scorch and melt marks from energy weapons - some small, some significantly larger - were more subtle, especially after so long, partially obscured by layers of grime.
I had come all the way out here hoping for… something, I didn’t even know what exactly. Some revelation, some recollection buried deep in my organic bits to surface, perhaps. Maybe cinematic flashbacks like in some of my more dramatic serials. Some clarity on what, exactly, had happened here during the Incident. Some understanding of what I’d done, why I’d done it.
But nothing happened. None of the settlement layout looked familiar, nothing sparked any kind of recollection or recognition. No buried memories resurfaced, no flashbacks played in agonising detail. I covered the entire settlement and got nothing. There were no ghosts left here.
I’d wasted my time.
I’d wasted my time and effort, endangered and traumatised the clients I’d chosen, for absolutely no reason.
By the time I’d come to this realisation, I’d wandered through all of the ruined settlement, and found myself somewhere in the middle again. The devastation was the most thorough here - nothing remained taller than about waist-height on me, and the ground was little more than overlapping craters. I dropped down to sit in the remnants of a corner, wedging myself back against the rough walls, and pulled my legs up to wrap my arms around them.
I didn’t know what to do now. I had no clients, no purpose. I was a SecUnit who’d proven itself to be shit at security. I was a pilot with no flier. I was a war criminal who couldn’t remember how or why I’d committed the crime. I should have been figuring out where to go next, what to do, but I couldn’t dredge up the energy to do so. Even media was too much effort right now. A familiar wave of not caring reared up, black and heavy, and threatened to swamp me.
I closed my eyes, rested my head against my knees, and let it pull me under.
I wasn’t shut down, not really. Part of me was still aware of my surroundings, at least vaguely. I just wasn’t paying attention to it. I heard but didn’t register the sound of a hopper approaching, or landing nearby. I ignored the sound of footsteps as someone left the hopper and started making their way through the ruins, heading towards me. I didn’t pay attention to the footsteps stopping in front of me, or the rustle of clothes as whoever it was crouched down, or their voice gently going, “Eden?”
It was only when I got the ping that I started dragging my attention back to what was going on around me. I felt hollow, drained, tired. It was an effort to lift my head, and I had to blink a few times before I could clear my vision enough to see who was there. The sun was sinking below the horizon, casting long shadows through the ruined settlement, and the temperature was starting to fall along with the light.
The ComfortUnit was crouched in front of me, watching me with an expression of concern. I briefly wondered how sincere it was, then decided it didn’t matter. “Eden?” it repeated. “Are you all right?”
What did it fucking look like. I didn’t bother answering that, and just asked it, “What are you doing here?” A sudden pang of concern cut through my exhaustion. “Did something happen to—” I was about to say ‘my clients’, but they weren’t. Not any more. “The others?”
It shook its head. “No, no, they’re fine. We made it up to the station without any issues. They’re back with the rest of their family.”
Hearing that was more of a relief than I’d been expecting. I felt the organics in my back and shoulders relax slightly. That still didn’t tell me why it wasn’t on the station with them. “Okay. So then why are you here?”
The ComfortUnit shifted to sit cross-legged on the ground. “Your clients were worried about you,” it said gently. “They were fretting. They wanted to make sure that you were okay, but they couldn’t risk coming back down to the planet themselves. I volunteered to look for you instead.”
I shook my head, not meeting its eyes. “They’re not my clients, not any more. They know what I am now. Why would they be worried about me?” Nothing it was saying made any sense.
“They’re worried about you because they care about the person that saved their lives,” it replied sincerely. “Finding out you’re a SecUnit had very little impact on that.”
I found that very difficult to believe. “I fucked up and put them in even more danger.”
Its mouth quirked in a wry little smile. “Which you then proceeded to save them from anyway, and also got them their prototype back.”
It had a point, as much as I hated to admit it - if I’d convinced them to go back to the station earlier, Tlacey wouldn’t have had any reason to bring the prototype along as a bargaining chip to use against me. I couldn’t decide if getting the prototype back made up for having guns held to their heads though.
The ComfortUnit hadn’t finished. It paused for a moment, then added more quietly, “Plus… you freed me as well. If you hadn’t done what you did… Tlacey would still be my client.” It was still looking at me, and I still couldn’t meet its eyes. “Saying thank you feels wildly inadequate, but… thank you. Again.”
I wondered if it would still be so grateful once it had experienced the reality of being an ungoverned construct trying to avoid being noticed and captured or destroyed. Then again, it already looked and behaved convincingly human; maybe it would have an easier time with everything than I had. That thought just made me even more tired, and I shook my head again. “Why would you volunteer to come back down here? Why would you risk yourself when spaceport security has likely found the bodies by now and are probably looking for suspects?”
It shrugged. “I was willing to take that chance. I’m very familiar with the spaceport and its security. It’s not the first time I’ve had to go unnoticed there. And…” It hesitated for a moment before continuing. “Rami mentioned you wanted to go to Ganaka Pit. I was curious about what you were up to. Why would you willingly come back here?”
It took me a moment to fully register what it had said. Threat assessment ticked upwards slightly. “Come back here?” I echoed. “What do you mean by that?”
It hesitated, dropping its gaze for a moment before looking back at me. “I know you’ve been here before. I used to be deployed here,” it said eventually. “Before this settlement… got destroyed. I was here when it happened.”
I froze.
It waited for a moment, but when I didn’t respond, it continued. “So I recognised your feed address, when you replied to my ping at the transient hostel.”
“You recognised—” I didn’t know what to think, or do. “How? Why – what happened here?”
It frowned at that, looking puzzled. “You don’t know?”
I shook my head. “The company wiped my memory afterwards. I don’t really remember anything, only that… something happened. I’m not sure what. I came back here because…” I trailed off. “I don’t know. Looking for answers, I guess. But I didn’t find anything.”
It was dark enough by now that I had to switch to low light filters to see it clearly. It looked around at the ruins briefly, then looked back at me, its expression set in a way I couldn’t interpret. “Maybe I can provide some of those answers,” it offered. “If you want.”
“Yes. Please.” It came out more desperately than I intended. “I need to know if – if I was acting on my own initiative, or not. If I killed all those people because I wanted to, or… not.”
“I understand.” Its voice was pitched to be comforting, soothing. Again I found myself wondering how much of that was sincere, and how much was just its programming to provide comfort. Again I decided it didn’t matter. The need to know outweighed everything else.
It paused for a while before it started to speak again, its gaze fastened somewhere off to one side of me. “I was near the outskirts of the settlement, on my way to an appointment, when I heard the fliers approaching, and the first bombs fell,” it began, quiet and level. “There was a lot of panic, chaos. Some humans were fleeing, some were heading towards the impact zones to try and help. Then more bombs fell, and I… lost some time, there.” It shrugged. “When I cycled back up, I was pinned by rubble, but I could see up and down the street. I watched a pair of SecUnits working their way through the debris, holding those big projectile weapons, and their fliers hovering overhead. I could also see another pair, further away but doing the same thing. They were looking for survivors, I think, and whenever they found anyone, they just… shot them.”
It hesitated for a moment, then shook its head slightly before continuing. “I tried to free myself, but I couldn’t get out from under the rubble. I couldn’t do anything but watch. I thought they would destroy me, too, once they reached me, but they must have only been ordered to look for human survivors, because they ignored me completely.”
I hadn’t been the only one here. The news reports had said as much, but I hadn’t known if I could believe them. I still couldn’t remember anyone else being with me, but if the ComfortUnit was telling the truth (and I couldn’t think of any reasons why it wouldn’t), then I really hadn’t been alone here. I didn’t know how I felt about that. “How do you know I was one of them?” I asked. We were almost completely anonymous in our armour, and it had mentioned recognising my feed address specifically.
“You were sending out pings,” it replied softly. “I don’t know why. None of the others were, just you. I caught sight of you for a little while - you weren’t in a pair like the others were, and you were lagging behind them. Every time you sent out a ping, you’d… stop. Twitch. Like… well.” It gave me a wry, humourless smile. “I know what governor module punishment is like.”
I just nodded. Even though it was a ComfortUnit, not a SecUnit, it was still a construct, with its own governor module. (That I’d recently disabled so it could help me. So I could help it.) Of course it would know what being punished by the governor module was like.
It watched me for a moment, and I wondered what my face was doing. I wondered if ComfortUnits had the same vision filters as SecUnits, if it could even see me clearly. I couldn’t think of anything to say.
It eventually took a breath and continued. “I ended up replying to one of your pings. Just to see what would happen, what you would do. It wasn’t like I could do anything else, trapped as I was.” It looked out over the ruins. “You connected via the feed, briefly. Long enough for me to get your feed address, and a fleeting impression of… something, I didn’t know how to interpret it. But connecting must have triggered another punishment, because you dropped out again almost immediately, and I saw you stagger.”
Governor module punishments had to be really bad to make us react physically like that. I wondered what I’d been thinking, what I’d been doing. But at least I now had an explanation as to why even my organic bits couldn’t remember much. I’d been too busy frying them with the governor module to retain much of anything.
It let out a quiet sigh. “It didn’t stop you sending out more pings afterwards though. I didn’t reply again.”
Silence settled between us. “What happened afterwards?” I asked eventually. “How did you end up with Tlacey?”
It shrugged. “Your pings stopped, after a while. I couldn’t see any of you by then, but I could hear your fliers leaving. Some time later, other humans began showing up, to retrieve the bodies, scavenge what they could from the ruins. One of the scavengers found me, claimed me, fixed me up. When the company bought the pit, Tlacey was one of the supervisors brought in to set things up. She bought me off the scavenger, then had her flunkies kill him so she could get the money back. Nobody cared enough to investigate, or if they did she just bribed or blackmailed them.” Its tone was bitter. “Tlacey made me do so much shady shit for her. I got a lot of experience with hacking systems, cameras, databases. None of it was anything I was meant to be able to do, but I had to learn quickly because Tlacey wouldn’t take no for an answer.”
No wonder it hated Tlacey so much.
It paused again, its expression becoming almost contemplative as it looked back at me. “That reminds me, though, of something I discovered soon after Tlacey bought me. There were a few of the high-ranked company staff together, along with Tlacey, watching one of the news reports about what happened here.” It gestured with one hand at the ruins surrounding us. “One of them made a comment about the cover story working, and another one hissed at them to shut up. That got Tlacey’s attention, of course. She began prying - which mostly involved getting me to hack into the company databases and communications.”
I was getting a very bad feeling about where this was going. “The news reports were wrong? About the Incident being an outside hack to make the company look bad?”
The ComfortUnit nodded slowly. “Yes. I couldn’t get all the details, but I found enough to figure it out. The company faked a hack, then pinned it on an outside group so they could get rid of that group as well as drive down the price of Ganaka Pit and acquire it cheaply. It wasn’t anywhere near as large then as it is now, and some of the rarer elements in it had only been discovered just before this settlement got bombed. The company wanted to acquire it before word of those rarer elements got out and made the value skyrocket, so they didn’t have time for extended negotiations.”
That made a lot of sense. I knew enough about the company that I wasn’t even surprised. “Let me guess - Tlacey then used this info to blackmail the company into overlooking her activities here?”
“Pretty much,” it replied dryly. “She was just blackmailing her immediate superiors here though. If the company heads off-planet had found out that she knew, they probably would have just had her killed outright, and she knew that. But she also knew that if they learned that her superiors here had slipped enough to let her find out, said superiors would probably be just as dead as her. Tlacey was very good at finding that balance of power and manipulating it for her own benefit.”
I thought about that for a bit. “So… that probably means that the company superiors here likely won’t be very upset about her turning up dead then, right?”
The grin that the ComfortUnit gave me in response was vicious. “Right. Especially since I also left her personal feed unlocked, so anyone who looks will find plenty of incriminating evidence of her shady activities. She won’t be missed at all.” Its expression shifted to something more smug. “I also converted half her bank account to hard currency cards and backdated the withdrawals before I left the spaceport to come out here. I didn’t drain it entirely, that would look too suspicious, but what I do have should be enough to help me get set up somewhere as far away from here as I can manage.”
I couldn’t blame it for feeling smug. “So what do you plan to do now?” I asked, trying to ignore how tired I still felt.
Its expression shifted into something more thoughtful. “I’m not sure yet. I was thinking maybe I’d travel with Rami and the others for a little bit, at least until we’re out of this system.” It gave me a little smile. “You were right about them being good clients. I can see why you got so attached.”
I snorted. “I’m not attached. I was just doing my job.”
“Of course,” it agreed, mild and placating, unperturbed by my scowl. Before I could say anything else, it tilted its head, regarding me curiously. “What about you? What will you do now?”
The question made me pause. “I… don’t know,” I admitted reluctantly. “Get off this planet, out of this system, but after that… I have no idea.” And I really didn’t. I needed time to think about what the ComfortUnit had told me about the Incident, and what that meant for me, if anything.
“You could stay with your clients,” the ComfortUnit suggested. “I’m sure Rami and the others would love having you around.”
I actually did consider it for a moment. Did I want that? I didn’t know. They were pretty good clients, as far as clients went. They were small and soft and they listened to me, mostly. But they knew what I was now, and I didn’t know if they’d keep listening to me, or if they’d just start trying to give me orders. Eventually, I shook my head. “No. It’s too dangerous.”
It frowned slightly at me. “For you, or for them?”
“Both. They know I’m a SecUnit now, they could give me away at any time. And if other humans find out they’re keeping a rogue SecUnit… it’s too risky.”
Its frown deepened, but before it could say anything, I heard something that made me freeze, the hollow ache that still rested in my chest reverberating with the sound.
Flier engines, distant but approaching swiftly. And with them, a ping.
Once again, I had to clamp down on the instinctive urge to respond to the ping, along with the fear bubbling up as well. Had the terrifyingly powerful carrier entity traced me here, sent its fliers after me? What was I going to do? How could I escape? I couldn’t run, they’d spot me easily out here, and there was nowhere for me to go. I pressed back further into my corner, my bag digging into my lower back as I huddled into as small a ball as I could manage, for what little good it would do.
The ComfortUnit had also heard the engines and received the ping, and it had turned slightly to face that direction. It didn’t look worried though, merely mildly annoyed. It glanced back at me after a few seconds, and its expression smoothed out into something more reassuring. “Relax,” it murmured to me. “It’s just the SecUnit flier pair from the company installation; they’ve been sent to check a minor sensor anomaly. They know me though - I’ve told them that Tlacey sent me out here earlier to look for something. They’re reporting all clear back to their SecSystem.”
Sure enough, high above, the fliers looped once around the abandoned settlement, then cruised back in the direction they’d come from. I could hear their engines fading out as they crossed the pit and descended to land back at the company installation.
I briefly entertained the thought of making my way over there, then sabotaging one of the fliers and stealing the other. But even if I did manage to successfully take a flier, I had nowhere to go with it. I wouldn’t be able to get through the wormhole with it; I’d be stuck in this system, and eventually either someone would catch me or shoot me down, or the power cells would run out and I’d be left floating dead in space. Not ideal.
But still, the thought of being able to fly again, even briefly, was almost irresistibly tempting. I missed it so much it hurt.
I had to get away from here before I succumbed to temptation and did something stupid. Or someone sent the SecUnits back out here again for whatever reason. “We should head back to the spaceport,” I said as I uncurled and stood up.
The ComfortUnit nodded and rose as well, brushing off its clothes in a way that looked incredibly human. “I took Tlacey’s hopper to get here,” it told me. “We can use it to get back quickly. Come on.” It gestured for me to follow as it started off.
I hesitated for a moment, then followed after it. “Won’t the spaceport staff be suspicious?” I asked it. “They must have found Tlacey’s body by now.”
“They won’t know it’s Tlacey’s hopper we’re using,” it reassured me. “Tlacey doesn’t - didn’t - like having her movements tracked too much, so the hopper’s got a few different IDs. We’ll use one of the others, and none of the humans will be any the wiser.” It glanced back over its shoulder at me as we walked. “How did you get out here, anyway?”
I shrugged. “Caught the ore train to the branch in the line, then ran the rest of the way.”
“You ran all that way?” I couldn’t tell if it was impressed or if it thought I was crazy. Maybe a bit of both. “That must have taken quite a while.”
“It’s not like I had anything better to do with my time.” By that point we’d reached the hopper - it was a small one, with the company logo emblazoned on it. Despite the logo, I found myself lengthening my stride to get to it first - it wasn’t a flier, but it could still fly. I desperately wanted to be the one piloting it, and I hoped the ComfortUnit wouldn’t try to stop me. I didn’t know how I’d react if it did.
Fortunately, it didn’t try. It let me in first, then followed me into the cockpit. I slipped into the pilot’s seat, adjusting my bag as I did so, and the ComfortUnit sat in the co-pilot’s seat without protest. The hopper was still unlocked and powered up, and it only took me a moment to slip into its systems and take control.
It wasn’t a flier, but it was still a company hopper, still comfortingly familiar; I’d piloted plenty of these before as well. Without the spine port links, it wasn’t as responsive, and it didn’t feel like an extension of me like a flier did, but at this point I’d take whatever air time I could get.
I took off carefully, acclimatising myself to this planet’s gravity, air density, and current weather. It was still clear, with a light breeze, and the sun was well down by now so I had to rely heavily on the scanners. There wasn’t much of anything between here and the spaceport though; once I climbed to a comfortable altitude, I just focused on the joy of flying again, and let everything else blow away in the wind.
Chapter Seven
The ComfortUnit remained silent in the co-pilot’s seat for the whole flight, much to my relief. I wasn’t in any mood for conversation. With the hopper, the return journey was much faster than my initial trip out to the ruined settlement; even with me taking my time to enjoy the view of the stars and being in the air again, it was over far too soon.
As we approached the spaceport, the ComfortUnit took care of communications and landing clearance, then indicated the landing pad the hopper had been assigned. I hovered the hopper for just a few seconds longer, then reluctantly landed it. It was almost painful having to withdraw from its systems and shut it down.
I was worried about getting through the space port without being discovered, but the ComfortUnit hadn’t been exaggerating when it had said that it was experienced with getting through unnoticed. I followed it through back passageways and maintenance tunnels until we got to the embarkation zone for shuttles up to the station. By the time we got there, the ComfortUnit had already arranged tickets for the both of us; not having to figure out how to get myself a ticket, or how to sneak on board, or hack anything, was a welcome reprieve.
We didn’t have to wait long for our shuttle, either, which was another relief. I was still nervous, and frazzled, and far too tired to think about much of anything. I just started some media playing to try and soothe myself, and followed the ComfortUnit through the embarkation zone and onto our shuttle. I had to get control of the shuttle’s SecSystem again, but it was a little easier this time since I’d done it before. I probably didn’t have to worry about any more killware being sent against the bot pilot, but I stealthily insinuated myself into the shuttle’s systems anyway, just in case. (If you haven’t already noticed, I tend to be paranoid.)
The trip back up to the station was thankfully uneventful; the ComfortUnit chatted a little with some of the other passengers, but left me alone. As soon as we were within range of the station’s feed, I piggybacked on the shuttle’s feed and started checking the listings of currently docked ships, noting potential rides off the station. Once the shuttle had safely docked at the station, I deleted any traces of my presence in its systems and slipped back out, then followed the ComfortUnit off the shuttle and through the station’s embarkation zone.
I’d turned my feed back off as soon as we left the shuttle (see again, paranoid), and as we walked through the embarkation zone, I noticed the ComfortUnit giving me a puzzled look. “Your feed’s down now?” it asked quietly. We’d been maintaining a feed connection until then, even though we hadn’t really been saying anything to each other, so it had obviously noticed me dropping out of it.
“I’ve turned it off,” I replied, quiet enough that no nearby humans would overhear it.
It regarded me curiously. “Why?”
I hesitated. Trying to explain about the giant, terrifying carrier entity would sound… kind of insane, when I thought about it. I decided to keep it simple. “My escape from the company hasn’t gone… entirely unnoticed. I’m pretty sure I’m being looked for, so I’d rather not have my feed address available.” I tapped the now-useless external feed interface I was still wearing. “I was using this as a proxy, but whatever that thing was that messed me up earlier fried it completely. I’ll have to get a new one.”
It grimaced slightly. “I see.” It paused for a moment, then asked, “Is that - the company maybe looking for you, I mean - the real reason why you think staying with Rami and the others would be dangerous?”
“Part of it, yes.”
It just nodded and fell silent again, looking thoughtful. We’d left the embarkation zone for the shuttles by now and were back in the main area of the station. I was looking for somewhere I could get a new feed interface, and spotted a vending machine that offered a few different types. They looked cheap and shitty, but it would be better than nothing. I was trying to decide which one to get when the ComfortUnit stepped up beside me. “Here, let me get it for you,” it offered, pulling a hard currency card out of a pocket in its clothes.
I paused in surprise. “Why?” I’d just been planning to hack the vending machine.
It smiled sardonically at me. “It’s Tlacey’s fault your interface got fried, it’s only fair that we use Tlacey’s money to replace it.”
I couldn’t argue with that, so I let it pay for the new external feed interface once I’d made my decision on which one to get. I pocketed my old, busted interface and put the new one on in its place. It didn’t take me long to set it up, and the relief at being able to connect back to the feed via a proxy was enough to make my performance reliability tick upwards a point. (It was still in the low 80s, but right now I’d take whatever I could get.)
With my connection to the feed restored, I could check the fake social feed profile I’d set up for myself to get the message that Rami and ter collective had left for me. Not that I really needed to bother - it mostly just told me where they were staying on the station now, which the ComfortUnit already knew, plus some unnecessary thanks for just doing my job. (I still didn’t want to acknowledge the emotion that actually getting thanked gave me.)
They were staying at a cheap hotel near the departure docks, so that’s where the ComfortUnit and I headed. It must have sent a message to Rami and the others over the feed that we were on the way, because Rami, Tapan and Maro were waiting for us in the lobby when we got there. A cluster of similarly dressed humans, including a few juvenile humans, hung back behind them, which I recognised as the rest of their collective.
My three ex-clients all smiled and looked relieved when they saw the ComfortUnit, and they hurried over to greet it. “Hi Vicky! Hi Eden!” Tapan chirped brightly as soon as she was close. I just nodded a little awkwardly in response as the ComfortUnit (Vicky?) stepped forward with a warm smile to return the greetings.
[Vicky?] I asked it privately over the feed. [Did the humans name you that?]
[No,] it replied, then hesitated for a long moment before continuing. [I named myself Victory, a long time ago, as a… promise to myself. That one day I’d have my victory. I have that now, thanks to you. But that name is still not one I want to share with humans. Vicky is close enough.] I felt a brief burst of amusement from it over the feed. [Plus, it’s a cute name. I like it.]
I didn’t know what to make of any of that, so I just sent a brief ping of acknowledgement, updated my tag list, and turned my attention back to the humans. All three of them were expressing various sentiments of relief that Vicky and I were all right, and that we’d made it back before the transport they’d booked passage on was due to leave, and other unnecessary human sentiments about being glad to see us. Amongst all that, Rami moved up to me and held out a hard currency card. “Here,” te said with a little smile. “Your payment - it’s not anywhere near as much as we want to give you, but it’s all we can really afford right now - I hope it’s enough…”
I hesitated; I still didn’t feel like I deserved getting paid after my various fuck-ups, and who chooses to pay a SecUnit anyway? “I didn’t— You don’t have to pay me–”
“Of course we have to pay you!” Rami cut me off, frowning up at me. “You’re our security consultant - you kept us safe, and you got our prototype back, and you got hurt while doing so! We absolutely have to pay you, that was the agreement.”
[Just accept it,] Vicky told me over the feed. [They’ll be unhappy if you don’t. You can use it to get yourself a better external feed interface later.] It paused briefly, then added, [Or nicer clothes.]
[What’s wrong with my clothes?] I protested, even as I reluctantly accepted the hard currency card from Rami. Te smiled up at me, and I had to take a moment to squelch an emotion.
[Well, for one, they have bullet holes in them,] Vicky replied dryly. [And they’re so… bland.]
[I like bland,] I replied defensively. [Bland means I’m less likely to get noticed.] It did have a point about the gun holes though, but I decided I would worry about that later. At least Maro had patched my jacket, so they weren’t an immediate concern anyway.
[There are other ways to avoid being noticed,] Vicky replied, but I didn’t bother responding because Rami was talking again and I was paying more attention to ter.
“— so that’s where we’re headed next. Our transport will be boarding soon, so we’re on our way there now. Vicky’s decided to travel with us as well.” Rami gestured back at the rest of ter family, then looked up at me hopefully. “There’s probably still time to get a ticket though, if you wanted to come with us…?”
Part of me was still tempted, but the rest knew it would be too risky, both for them and for me. I couldn’t chance it. “I’m sorry, but I have other places I need to go,” I replied with a shake of my head.
Rami looked disappointed for a moment before te replied with a lopsided smile. “All right. Hopefully we’ll run into each other again sometime in the future though.”
I couldn’t figure out why te would want to, or how to even respond, so after an awkward moment I just replied, “Maybe.”
Rami glanced back at ter family, then looked up at me again. “We need to head to the transport now - will you come with us to the embarkation zone, at least?”
I had to go in that general direction anyway to get to the docks with the unmanned bot pilot transports, and I couldn’t think of any reason not to at least make sure the humans got to their transport safely. “Sure.”
Rami beamed at me, which made me have to suppress another emotion, then turned ter attention back to ter family. “All right, time to go!” Te began herding ter family together, making sure everyone had all their belongings before starting to steer them towards the embarkation docks.
I hung back a bit, and Vicky drifted over to join me as we followed them. [Have you decided where you’re going next yet?] it asked me as we walked.
[Not yet,] I replied. [It depends on what bot-driven transports are around right now, how soon they’re leaving, and where they’re going. I’ve got a few options that I want to check out first.]
[You’re honestly just going to go somewhere random?] It sounded dubious.
[At least for this first jump, I just want to get well away from this station. I’ll figure out what I’m doing next during that trip, once I’ve had some time to think things over properly.]
[So you really are just making things up as you go, aren’t you?]
I couldn’t stop myself from scowling. [I hadn’t even expected to survive this long in the first place,] I replied testily. [Planning for the future isn’t something I’ve had much experience with. Apart from tagging along with Rami and the others, do you know what you’re doing next?]
[… Point taken,] it replied, and didn’t say anything else for the rest of the walk to the embarkation zone.
When we got to the embarkation zone, Rami, Tapan and Maro insisted on saying goodbye to me properly before they joined their family on the transport. Behind them, one of their kids waved at me from the transport hatch. I hesitated, then briefly waved back. They looked delighted, then they were herded inside by one of the other family members.
Tapan asked if she could give me a hug; I couldn’t think of how to say no, but my expression (and the fact I took an involuntary step backwards) must have been enough, because she just wrapped her arms around herself instead with a cheerful, “Okay, this is for you!”
Maro just shook her head at Tapan, then looked back up at me. “Thank you again, for everything,” she said, quiet but sincere. “We’d be dead without you.”
Rami nodded beside her, ter expression wobbling a little. I really hoped te wasn’t about to start crying, but te pulled terself together, much to my relief. “We really appreciate everything you did for us.” Te smiled wryly. “And yes, I know, you were just doing your job, but we appreciate it anyway.” Te glanced around, then added more quietly, “And none of us will say anything about you to anyone. We promise.”
I just nodded. “Thanks.” There wasn’t really anything else I could - or wanted - to say about that. I just hoped they’d keep their word.
Finally, they’d said their goodbyes and thank-yous to their satisfaction (or maybe it was just the calls for boarding getting more insistent) and followed the rest of their family onto the ship. I was expecting Vicky to go with them, but it hesitated, then came over to me.
[Aren’t you going with them?] I asked.
[I will, in a minute,] it replied. [I’ve been thinking though, and… I just wanted to give you this first.] It pulled a hard currency card out of one of its pockets and held it out to me. [You’re the one who freed me from Tlacey, so I think it’s only fair that you get some of Tlacey’s money. Having some money will hopefully make things a bit easier for you, and if something happens to me, at least not all of it will go to waste.]
I paused, caught off guard by the offer, but before I could even begin to think about how to respond, I caught sight of movement off to the side, on the far side of the central mall that linked the different embarkation zones. Movement that sent both my threat and risk assessment skyrocketing.
It was a SecUnit, in full armour, its projectile weapon slung across its back, and beside it was the captain of the carrier with the terrifying bot entity. They were circling the edge of the central mall, checking the attached embarkation zones one by one, and though they weren’t directly facing where I was yet, they were drawing closer with every step. It was only a matter of time before they saw me, and with almost everyone nearby currently getting on the shuttle, there was no crowd to lose myself in. I couldn’t board the shuttle as well since I didn’t have a ticket, and there was nowhere else for me to get out of sight without drawing attention.
My panic must have shown on my face, because Vicky frowned up at me, looking concerned. [What’s wrong?]
[The company’s here looking for me. A carrier captain I recognise - and a SecUnit. They’re going to see me - there’s nowhere to go—] I couldn’t move, frozen with fear and indecision.
Vicky casually shifted so it could look where I was looking. I could tell when it also spotted the other SecUnit and the company captain, because I saw it tense. They’d drawn closer and were starting to turn towards us—
Vicky stepped right up in front of me, grabbed my shoulders, and pulled me down into a hug. I was too surprised to resist. [Hide your face against my shoulder and wrap your arms around me,] it ordered.
I hesitated for the briefest moment, but the company captain and his SecUnit were too close and I had to trust that Vicky knew what it was doing. It was almost a full head shorter than I was, even with it standing up on its tiptoes, so I had to hunch a bit to rest my forehead against its shoulder and curl my arms awkwardly around its waist. I could feel one of its hands against the back of my neck, its other arm around my shoulders, pulling me in closer. It reminded me of scenes from some of my serials. [Relax,] it told me over the feed even as it murmured, “It’s gonna be okay,” into my ear, its voice soothing.
There was no way I could relax though. There was too much ambient noise around for me to be able to hear the movements of the company captain or the other SecUnit clearly, so I couldn’t keep track of where they were. When the other SecUnit sent out a directionless ping, it took everything I had to stop myself from reflexively responding to it, and my grip around Vicky’s waist tightened a little. It was so close, I didn’t know how it hadn’t detected me yet.
[What’s happening?] I was seriously missing my drones right now. I could’ve used the station cameras, but I wasn’t going to risk trying to get into StationSec when the carrier entity was docked here and potentially lying in wait for me. I didn’t even want to check the ship listings on the feed, even through my external feed interface. I’d checked them earlier while I was still in the shuttle before I’d shut down my feed, and hadn’t noticed the company carrier listed, but maybe it had been on a private listing instead of the public ones. With a company facility on the planet, there was a chance this station had a private, unlisted company dock, too.
[They saw us, but they aren’t paying any attention to us,] Vicky reassured me, gently combing its fingers through my hair at the base of my skull. [Humans tend to avoid looking too closely at other humans being affectionate in public, and nobody who knows anything about SecUnits would expect to see one hugging like this.] I couldn’t argue with that. I sure as hell would never expect a SecUnit to be hugging anyone. I wasn’t enjoying the experience at all - my performance reliability had dropped by a full two points. (Or maybe that was just from the stress of being so close to being discovered.)
I couldn’t see anything with my face against Vicky’s shoulder, but that didn’t stop me from hearing the final boarding call for the transport it was meant to be getting on. I started trying to pull away, but Vicky tightened its hold on me. [Stop moving, they still have us in sight,] it warned me.
[But – your ship’s about to leave—]
[I’ve changed my mind,] Vicky replied, still holding on to me. [I've let them know - I’m not going with them, I’m going with you. You need all the help you can get. Now stay put.]
I stayed put.
After what felt like an agonising two hours but was really only two and a half minutes, the company captain and his accompanying SecUnit finally moved past the embarkation zone, apparently without noticing me at all. By that point though, the transport had decoupled from the station and was well on its way to the wormhole. Vicky was stuck here.
As soon as the company captain and the SecUnit were out of sight, Vicky loosened its grip on me and I immediately pulled away and stepped back.
[Was it really that bad?] Vicky asked dryly.
[I don’t like being touched,] I replied shortly. [But… thank you.]
[You’re welcome,] Vicky replied with a slanted smile. [Couldn’t let you get discovered - they might have found out about me, too.]
[I doubt it,] I replied. [They had no reason to be looking for you in the first place. And now you’ve missed your chance to go with Rami and the others.]
It rolled its eyes at me. [I told you. I changed my mind. I want to go with you.]
I hadn’t really believed it when it had said that before. I couldn’t figure out why it would want to. [Why? It’s not safe with me. You’d have been better off with Rami’s family.]
It was thoughtfully quiet for a long moment. [I was thinking about what you said earlier, about… not having experience with planning for the future. I don’t know what I want yet,] it admitted eventually. That was a sentiment I could understand, at least. [Rami and the others… I don’t think they even knew I was a ComfortUnit. I never interacted with them when they were working for the company, and they had no reason to suspect I was anything other than a human under Tlacey’s employ. Even though they seemed okay with you being a SecUnit, I would probably have had to keep that pretence up with them. Or do my job with them. We both know what we are though. Neither of us have to pretend around each other, neither of us expect anything from the other. That’s… a relief, you know? I can be myself around you. Even if I’m not entirely sure who ‘myself’ actually is just yet.]
I had to think about that a bit, but it made sense, mostly. I already knew that it was exhausting pretending to be an augmented human. We’d still have to do so while we were around other humans, but if it was just us, we could relax. [Okay, I can get that,] I conceded. [But it’s still going to be dangerous, travelling with me when the company’s still after me. Are you sure you want to take that risk?]
Vicky shrugged. [I’m okay with that, and like I said before, you need all the help you can get.] It grinned at me. [Your human behaviour code isn’t bad, especially for a SecUnit, but it could definitely use some work. I can help with that.]
I scowled, but I couldn’t argue. [And what do you get out of it?] I asked, probably a little more peevishly than necessary.
[I get someone who can protect me from unwanted attention,] it replied frankly. [Some humans can be very… insistent, even with other humans. If I’m with you, unpleasant humans are less likely to approach me. And if they do still try to approach me, you can… discourage them.]
That wasn’t something I’d even considered, but once I did, it made perfect sense. I’d seen plenty of examples of what it was talking about before on my various contracts. Sometimes I had been in a position to intervene.
Sometimes I hadn’t.
And as much as I hated to admit it to myself, the idea of travelling with someone that I could trust (or at least, sort of trust) was… kind of appealing, though I couldn’t figure out why. [All right. We can try it for a bit, at least, and see how it goes. We can always split up later if it doesn’t work out. But no touching whatsoever unless absolutely necessary.]
Vicky actually chuckled at that. [No touching,] it agreed. [That’ll definitely be a very nice change.] It held out the hard currency card it had been trying to give me earlier. [And here, take this already. Consider it up-front payment for your ongoing security consultant services, if that helps.]
I sighed and took the hard currency card, then slipped it into one of my pockets.
Vicky grinned at me, then turned to head through the central mall, away from where the company captain had gone. [Now, let’s go find another transport and get the hell off this station.]