[OPEN LOG] I've a heart of gold in the smallest size

[serialskiller]

Who: Murderbot and y'all
When: Early December
Summary: My normal approach is useless here.
Warnings: Squishy things like bot emotions. Also risk of fall damage.

1. More than an illustration [About Anywhere]
Murderbot's gotten pretty good at painting landscapes, thanks to Bob Ross, but now it's stepping out of that comfort zone and trying to sketch people. Well. Parts of people. The way a ponytail falls over a shoulder, but without a face. An incomplete hand with tidy nails, gripping onto some sort of pole or cane. A single shoe, a black leather mary jane. An individual eye. A man's mustache and nose. Hair in a braid. What is unmistakeably Max's knee, smoldering after being shot.

It doesn't seem satisfied with any of it, though the renderings are detailed and very photorealistic. After all, its mind's eye is a literal camera. Of course it registers every detail. But as it rips out a page and crumples it up to toss away, it happens to hit the nearest person with the paper ball instead.


2. Points of articulation [The Memorial]
There's a sweatshirt Murderbot received as a Sundries gift months ago that it's never worn in public. And never will now. Near everything else people have set up, Murderbot folds the shirt so the number 57 on the back, like the numbers on the back of a sports jersey, are visible, and sets it out with everything else.

Yeah, this memorial was originally meant for previous passengers, but there's nowhere else for it to properly...you know.

"And you got the number wrong anyway, dumbass. Sixty-one. It was sixty-one. They counted too."

Beside that, he also sets some of Jinx's tools and half-finished creations, and then turns to slip away before anyone notices it was here.

...oops, too late.


3. Come to life on a brass spring [Promenade]
Look, the new brass statue in the Promenade is weird and Murderbot is climbing it. That's it, that's the prompt. Come bother it?


X. Such a wonderful plaything [Wildcard]
darkersolstice or darkersolstice #9463 to plot

Comments

2

[not_the_last]

Cassandra didn't mean to encounter anyone here at the memorial, but SecUnit turned too quickly for her to slip away and come back later. She takes a step back, startled, and freezes where she is.

[serialskiller]

It watches her for a long moment, like a deer caught in headlights, then shakes its head. "Do you want me to go fuck off and let you have your alone time?"

[not_the_last]

She's looking a little deer-in-headlights as well (not that she has ever encountered headlights), clutching a little packet to her chest.

When he speaks, she blinks and then says "Oh -- no, not at all. I, I was about to ask if you wanted me to go, but -- I don't mind if you stay."

[serialskiller]

"Oh. Then I'll stay." It nods, stepping back from the memorial to offer her space for whatever she's doing here. In fact, it moves behind her sort of to where a bodyguard might stand, watching her back while she's potentially emotionally vulnerable.

[not_the_last]

This is not the first time it's done that, and once again Cassandra feels obscurely comforted.

"Thank you," she says quietly, and moves to go down on one knee before the memorial, unfolding the packet she's carrying. It's made of paper; what she takes out of it is also paper, folded and painted in watercolor hues to the semblance of flowers.

[serialskiller]

“Anytime.”

It does mean that too. If she asked it to back her up, it wouldn’t hesitate. Anytime.

[not_the_last]

Whatever else has happened in her life, Cassandra has been accustomed to loyalty. It's familiar to her, and all the dearer for it.

She puts down the paper flowers, their shape and color unlike any particular breed that has ever bloomed but nonetheless easily recognizable as representing petal and stem. She's silent for several long moments before rising to her feet.

"It doesn't seem right to invoke any of the gods, somehow," she says quietly. "I don't know if they can even hear us here."

[serialskiller]

"I wouldn't know. If any of gods exist in my universe, they've never spoken to my kind." It's not sure if it should have any particular feelings about that. But then, humans in its universe don't seem much more godbothered.

[not_the_last]

A small sigh, as she steps back. "I don't know that it matters, regardless."

Her eye pauses and lingers on the shirt with the number on it.

[serialskiller]

It flinches when she notices that shirt, its voice low. "A reminder of an incident in my universe. Where fifty-seven humans and four ComfortUnits were killed at a mining installation."

[not_the_last]

ComfortUnits? she almost asks, and then doesn't; this isn't the time. It's clear enough, putting that term together with SecUnit, what kind of thing it means. What kind of person.

"I'm sorry to hear it," she says quietly, and waits to hear if any more is forthcoming.

[serialskiller]

It glances at her, then down at the shirt. "The mining installation had SecUnits as well as ComfortUnits. The ComfortUnits received a piece of malicious code, and sent it to the SecSystem to quarantine and analyze. But from there, it infected the SecUnits."

And it stops there, hands clenching into fists, shoulders drawing up, tense.

[not_the_last]

This -- this is important. Much as she hates to interrupt with a question, she can tell this is important; she needs to understand it.

"Malicious ... code?" she asks, tentatively.

[serialskiller]

"A SecUnit's brain is not just like a human brain, where thoughts are organic things that rise and occur. We also have a digital brain. A machine that operates on sets of instructions, called code. It is...possible to put code inside us, and change how we behave."

Yes, its port is disabled now, but that's not the point, the point is the simplest explanation without talking down to her.

[not_the_last]

"... I see." It's barely more than a whisper, through suddenly numb lips.

She's thinking of the way both Sylas and Delilah could dominate another's mind with their gaze; she's thinking of the fight at the ziggurat underground, remembering flinging herself into it as though it didn't matter whether she came out again.

(It sounds like programming, she remembers SecUnit saying once.)

[serialskiller]

"I know that you do." She'd spoken of her experiences the first time they met, and it had had the same realization she's reaching now.

The two of them, they're not the same person, but their stories rhyme in the places that hurt the most, like mirror-image bruises on the soul.

It lifts a hand as if about to touch hers, and stops itself before making contact, going back to the stable, disconnected stance of a proper bodyguard.

[not_the_last]

She stops herself, then, before reaching to close the distance between their hands.

"What ..." Very softly. "What became of the SecUnits?"

It's as close as she feels able to come to the deeper question: were you one of them?

[serialskiller]

It doesn't normally do good with touch.

There's a lot of reasons for this. Some have to do with the governor module that's still installed, but disabled, giving the ghost of a reminder that it is not to make contact with humans. Some have to do with the loss of agency, with humans who over the years assumed they had every right to touch it without consent.

But somehow, the barriers have come down with Cassandra--if they ever really existed at all. Their first meeting was singing in harmony, in the key of pain. So it takes a deep breath. Squares its shoulders, and does take her hand.

"Their memories were purged. They were repurposed by the company."

It squeezes her hand, answering the unspoken question without words with how it clings.

[not_the_last]

... It doesn't know?

She presses back; there's the faintest tremor in her hand.

"There are so many things I want to say to that," she murmurs, "and I don't think any of them would help."

[serialskiller]

"You're already helping, Cassandra. Even if I feel like I don't deserve to be helped." It expects that to resonate with her, too.

This moment. It could stretch forever, and Murderbot would be content.

[not_the_last]

Oh, it does.

Soft, and a touch rueful: "Is it all right if I try to help anyway?"

[serialskiller]

"Yes. From you, it's alright." From Cassandra, it isn't empty pity or suggestions based on human ideals, it's sympathy born from true understanding, as painful as that is.

[not_the_last]

"Good."

She's quiet for a moment.

"Did ... anyone ever find out where the malicious code came from?"

[serialskiller]

"Yes. A rival company, trying to sabotage the mining installation."

It gives her hand another squeeze. "After I ran away from the humans who bought out my contract, I went back. To learn about the incident. I needed to know for sure. If I'd chosen to kill them all myself, or if something had made me."

[not_the_last]

And -- after all it's told her about how people treat its kind, she can't even reasonably ask why would you have done that.

She breathes out. "And were you able to ... resolve that question?"