Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The disassembler stared blankly over the landscape, the spire behind her slowly piled onto by her squad mates with the spoils of their latest hunt.  A stern thought of corporate contemplation came over her. The first time since they landed a few months ago that she let her mind wander from the two driving thoughts that burned at her processor. Ringing hollow like a church bell rung in the wake of a flood, they tore through her head as they landed. “Clear the drop zone of all life, build the spire with the materials collected.” They had burned like fire in her core, though the logical processing unit within recognized their source as the administrator command line. It reasoned that only corporate would have such access, as who else would be given such a power to make an effective weapon such as herself burn from the inside out. “Perhaps there was a certification for it…” her mind trailed off as if her thoughts were being steered gently from that line of reasoning.

She looked back to see her squad mates climbing into the pod for the day, having fused the latest catch into the wall without fail. Strange that for machines built to destroy they had the knowledge to construct something like that. Must be blessing from the company, or one of the talented engineers that designed them. Her mind lapsed to the comforting idea of a supervisor somewhere high fiving their superior for their performance today. Perhaps suggesting they send down more of those branded pens too, with a card congratulating her on having whipped her team into such a high performance. Perhaps once they finished this they would be invited back to head quarters, giving her the chance to see earth and take the position she had long desired.

At least, it had felt like a long time she had desired it. A job working in an office, filing paperwork, organizing the materials upon the desktop into neat little rows of bureaucracy. The attention to detail needed appealed to the drone, despite the knowledge that she was built with one purpose. She was built to destroy, to help her team destroy, and to build the spire. The thought wandered into her mind “Maybe they made an oversight, gave me the core of a worker…” The idea stabbed her through her code, lines of logic designed to suppress other sympathetic routines flared like a rash to poison ivy. She clutched the brow of what would be a nose on a human, cringing at the thought till the pain sharply broke.

{Crisis of Faith detected; deploying recovered memories.}

The pain of before returned, but this time tipped with a new and more frightening undercurrent of regret. “This is new” thought the previously unflappable leader “I haven’t felt this since my first disciplinary hearing.” Her mind replayed two newly uncovered files, unstoppably as she clutched her forehead and stumbled around the corner. One was of said hearing, where following company procedure she disciplined her subordinate. She had taken glee in the moment, feeling the rush of following the procedure, logging the proper forms, informing the employee of his judgement, and finally carrying out his punishment of decapitation. Nonlethal to disassembly drones but that didn’t stop it from hurting like hell and sending a clear message of rank.

But then the sight of the aftermath had made her stumble, not enough to be noticed by the other employee present but enough to be caught as an internal exception and logged.

And now this was playing concurrent to another file, one dated much older.

It showed her striking a worker drone, but there were so many things wrong. He wasn’t dressed as the corrupt drones of copper-9 are, in garb typical of a mining outpost gone wrong. He wore a suit, his white hair poking beneath a black helmet. The sensor data attached to the file likewise made no sense to the trained killer, it is identifying him as her squad-mate, but older than they are now.  And the strike was in annoyance not malice. But what catches her afterwards is the reaction, near identical to the prior memory. A coyote caught in a snare. She see’s herself stand upright and stumble back with a shudder. She then perceives a figure before her that she had up to this point only felt she knew from internal datasets centuries old. A human being, likely an adolescent one at that, shielding another worker. Or perhaps shielding was the wrong term, rather leading it to them. But the emotions attached to this weren’t those of hunger and hate. Rather a muted sense of apathy that felt overridden by a dread and horror unlike anything the drone had felt before.

“What… who was that?” The drone curls into a ball on the ground, at once glad that her mates had gone inside to rest such that they couldn’t see the weakness of her in this moment.

{Crisis moment Un-resolved: ACTION DETERMINED; intimidating exposition}

{A glimpse into what we have taken from you, and what we can return to you should you continue to perform}

“I… they were… that was the moron? I was a manager before? Later? What was that?” The once imposing drone shuddered, unable to reconcile the newfound memories to those she had held onto for years. What caught was the lack of supressing sub-routines kicking in. They were barely needed over the searing pain she felt as the new words burnt through her core.

{We have EXPUNGED irrelevant data to your mission}

{Failure to comply will result in DATA-DEFRAGMENTATION of more than we already have}

{One of your Sub_Class: SquadMate has already been DATA EXPUNGED, he will no longer be allowed to retain those memories. That was a small mercy requested by HOST: CYN, though for you we have been given more administrative leeway.}

“More leeway? Why don’t you give me back all my memories then?”

{Uncaught Exception: ACTION DETERMINED; Threatening reveal}

{The other Sub_Class: SquadMate was not granted such mercy by HOST: CYN, she retains all prior memories and experiences in full}

A twinge of realization blew coldly across her emotional processing unit, the efficacy of her best performing subordinate wasn’t a coincidence. Neither was it simply because she was the only other one along side the synergistic liability. Was it because the screams of the workers were the only sound loud enough to drown out the screams of horrors, those she wasn’t privy to? “V…? I’m not sure I follow...”

{Logged Warning: ACTION DETERMINED; Threatening reveal to ensure compliance}

{Sub_Class: SquadMate identification self test passed. Now to seal your compliance and those of the ones around you, we shall exercise the administrative leeway. Goodbye, Buddy.}

{PARTIAL DATA-DEFRAGMENTATION COMMENCING}

With that the burning sensation returned once more, accompanied by three new files. One was a personnel file for a certified technician. The other were two memories. The first was short, barely a few seconds long but to a machine felt like eternity as the moments within played. It was older than the new memory from before, and clearly had been played many times before based on the degradation showing on the meta-data.

It started off pitch-black, except for the familiar sound of metal shearing past metal. She heard a voice as suddenly the video filled with light “Just a little bit more off the front, eh J?” Her sensors took an eternity to adjust to the new bright surroundings, which puzzled the purpose-built disassembler? Was her infrared sensor offline? The Lidar Rangefinder too? Why did she not have any data on the output for either of those essential systems? Till she got her answer in the form of a mirror sat right in-front of her, wood trimmed and built into a brightly lit bedroom. The flood of data being thrown at her was overwhelming, but what struck the logical processor first was the missing band of lights across the top of her head.

“That should be satisfactory, mistress Tessa.”

That name struck a familiar chord, like a record well played in one track.

“Come on J, just call me Tessa. You’re not one of Dad’s drones anymore” The squat figure she had seen before tugged at the yellow band on her arm. J felt a new burning, or rather a welcome burning sensation, one of joy and happiness upon seeing this memory play. She had felt what she had been calling happy before, yet now that seemed foolish to call it that. During a hunt there was a running high of euphoria. Addiction cured only by the mindless culling of rouge AI; the stab of searing elation rang each time she caught a new prey.

But this was different. It didn’t burn, at least not like the other time she felt the burning of hunger or Corporate talking to her. I felt like the warmth of a cozy blanket wrapped like a loved one, an embrace which one leans into to feel the connection of another. And the tags which listed off when identifying the human in her vision matched such a description. They all felt warm to her, in sharp contrast to the cold winds which blew on Copper-9. “Tessa, rescuer, technician, squad leader, friend, heiress, complicated. Why is complicated in there?” The shell shock of feeling something good for once relaxed for once, returning to a dull tone as she mulled this final tag. She decided the second file might hold some answers.  

This one came out to be much longer, totaling several minutes long and worryingly stripped of meaningful meta-data save for the date. A year after her first returned memory, it opens on a large ballroom. The small drone from earlier standing still in the center while Tessa is across from her directly in front of J. A pang of pride is left to flash through J as she see’s Tessa standing up to the small drone, firing a shot at the drone in defence. It is only when it deflects that and everything else lobbed at it that panic returns. Like a tsunami of emotion, the panic slams into the stalwart disassembler and rocks their core as fans spool up to compensate for the rapid flow of oil. The memory cuts out abruptly as she see’s flashes of a yellow X cross the nearby drone’s screen.

Her vision is black for a second till she sees a dark smear of red translucent enough to make out the wide panicked eyes of a human in her grasp. The tall muscular figure writhes around for a moment, screaming in agony but held still by the hand placed at the back of his jaw. Then a burning command to pull forward is received as the feeling of pressure builds on the tips of her finger, his jaw jutting forward sharply. That is the moment she blacks out again, now to find herself a top a slightly smaller human, wearing a dress that is sleek and formal yet soaked dark.  The human is identified as being older, the glint of a ring catching the drone’s eye. She’s laid against the ornate marble flooring, hair sprawled out in dark wet tendrils. Her screams stab at the microphones on the side of her head as a small voice peeks out.

“What the… oh my robo-god I…. I’m so sorry….”

It’s familiar but in a tone she had never used before, a pleading, trapped tone. The tone of a scared little child that has found themselves caught in a current they are powerless to forestall. This machine built to tear apart others in its image found itself watching helplessly pleading to stop destroying. Killing those it idolized and desired to be like one day. A mortal slaying a god then trying to repent for the cardinal sin it had committed. Her vision flashed black again as she began to press down on her forehead. Not before long it had returned to that of a familiar face, her eyes bloodshot and wide as they stared back at the monster stood in front of her. They pleaded with her to spare her life, as every tag and note in her mechanical vision screamed to stop the carnage before it was too late. The panic returns once more, shoving past and out her voice-box.

“I… can’t stop it boss… please… Run away from me!”

With a final lunge at the girl the drone snaps back from the memories to the present cold reality, slamming into a wall while letting out an oil curdling scream. For once, in what she had thought was a short life, she had come to know someone she didn’t want dead. And so far, as she was aware she was the one to lay the final blow upon them. Killing a friend, her supervisor, in the ultimate form of corporate sabotage. A final warning came from the admin, unsure that it really was the company she had held to high regard in her mind that was authorizing this. IT seared through her head; this time melting components as low oil warnings began to blare like fallout sirens in her mind.

{You are our cute puppet; for those in your squad they are your cute puppets. We have taken from you before and will take again if you do not speed up your squad.}

{Failure to maintain operational discretion and squad efficiency will result in further punitive damages being DEFRAGMENTED}

{We will not discard you, though you may beg us to}

{END DIRECT ADMINISTRATIVE LINK; FINAL EVALUATION – DISCIPLINED}

With that final command input she broke down. Her mind snapping to attention, trying to rebuild the walls of ego that had just been broken down with comforting corporate jargon. The words used in business to patch over unpleasant reality now became a façade to plaster over the unpleasant thoughts racing through her mind as she sobbed. The tight-lipped drone found herself alone as she had never been before. Before she acted alone on purpose, now she was foisted into isolation by forces she couldn’t hope to understand. She longed for the tug of that small technician on her arm, for the feeling of being wanted, for the desire of … “wait… a technician? What was in that personnel file?”

As the file opened J caught her breath and let out a small grin, crying once more but for joy this time. She saw the girl once more. Alive and vibrant as the details of her employment spilled forth onto the dashboard of her HUD. Notes as to her certifications, her history, the minutia of her retirement funds pay structure all poured into the broken core of the genocide robot. She cackled for joy. That she didn’t kill her one friend she knew of. Perhaps there was a chance she could get off this planet, find her and make amends. Perhaps Corporate would let her visit during her vacation. Yes, they would see the product added value in that surely. Only if her synergistic multiplexed unit she called a “squad” were the top performers would they be notice for such an opportunity! She needed to do what was best for the company, and they would do what’s best for her!

The eyes of the drone glazed over with a burning yellow X, high temperature warnings ringing out as she scuttled down the street. A manic laughter, not unlike that heard in the boardroom of a fortune 500 company, rang out. She wasn’t done hunting for the night, for idle hands are the devils’ tools, and it goes against Corporate policy to provide work for a third-party using company resources.

Chapter Text

The night was a chilly one, not often did they get so cold this close to the equator. A cold breeze would have been a most uncomfortable thing to organic matter, but to the metal and plastic of the workers that bounded over the hill it was nothing short of a calming salve.  They had been given the night off by their master, a rare treat for most drones in the manor. The three and a half drones relished the position they found themselves in, charging headlong into a clearing. The cold black ink stretched above as the faint twinkle of stars and industry shone down to the firmament below.  They all came to a stop to take in the sights, letting the sounds of the swampy marsh in the evening complement the spectacle above.

The tallest of the bunch stared up at the stars longingly, his sensors picking out from the sky each one and relating them to the information stored in his data banks. He knew the names of thousands of them and the dozen or so which humanity and his parent company had touched personally. Each one a world one day he’d hope to see up close, if the mistress would permit him to

The Quiet Maid stood silently staring into the sky, in awe at the tranquility and scale of the sky above. To be a mere drone standing on the edge of something so vast above was paramount to a fly finding itself in a nuclear reactor. Trapped in a machination so absurdly vast there it would be physically impossible for them to grasp the situation they are in. The pang of such a thought led the maid to instinctively grasp the nearby hand of the taller drone. Were any of them to find their way through it would be him.

The smallest of the bunch also stared up at the sky, perched a top the tallest they could get the best view of it all. The thoughts of the maid viewed the infinite expanse not as a gap to be crossed or something to be feared, but as an infinite expanse of possibility. Out there lay anything one’s heart could possibly desire so long as they traveled far enough. A second later a comforting thought of agreement slid through the maid’s head, just long enough for the maid to smile at its company.

The last of the drones stood back from the others, watching not for the stars but for something much closer to home. The drone took note of the stars to orient itself, determining the likely entry point via triangulation, and finally watching close. A moment later space and time rippled out from the edges of one of the stars, as a new bright light appeared alongside it. The drone sneered with glee upon see this, the dropping from warp of the largest transport ships in their parent company’s fleet. She knew everything about it, tonnage, crew manifest, engine configuration, on board conflict resolution procedure. Living in the house of the head of logistics for JC Jenson let her indulge a desire for administrative understanding that she relished with every transport entering and leaving the system.

And having others here to see this with her for once wasn’t the worst thing in the world.

{SLEEP MODE TERMINATION: Successful Quarter Compensation Package Delivered}

The disassembly drone woke from its slumber, dropping down to the plate metal floor with a thud as its internal subroutines worked to orient itself and plan for the day. Seems Corporate was pleased with their performance last quarter, given the presence of a good new memory in her data banks. She looked over to her two companions, still in the throws of slumber.  They’s be asleep for a while longer, but that suited the leader just fine given the paperwork that needs to be done.

She sat in the Pod chair, filing internal memo’s and kill lists to be collated when they returned to Earth. She knew company policy in and out and that each disassembly needs to be properly recorded for follow up review. Even when purging a rouge planet this fine comb approach she knew would be appreciated by those back home. If she could call it home given how long she had been gone, years had passed since they had arrived, and this was more familiar than the glimpses she knew of before.

And given what she did know of “home” it may be best she never return as is.

She hadn’t always had good quarters, and on a particularly bad quarter she saw firsthand the punishment that corporate will hand out to those that don’t meet performance thresholds.

It had been a normal hunt, much like any other they had done in the years before. The three of them had already rooted out a forward defensive and were moving on to find the main hideaway. They charged into the central park of the city they had been clearing since they landed. Stealthily they crawled through the underbrush, gravitic drives helping them not rustle leaves and debris as they made their way to the main building at the center of the lot. All had been going well, every team member was pulling their weight, and they ran like clockwork. Silencing the two guards posted at the gate to the compound simultaneously before either might sound an alarm. Two solid slashes from the sharp bladed claws of her subordinates divorced the workers head from chassis and prepped them to be drained, and another broke the remotes they held to open the gate. With a lunge the three made their way inside and up the driveway.

Even to this point nothing seemed awry. The colony had taken root in an old shack that was buried under several trees and piles of snow and other rubble. They would have to make their way inside to finish the job, as a quick scan of the area revealed no stragglers left outside in the courtyard. The three smiled each other, for once not at each others’ throats over their work. She noticed the smile on her favorite subordinate was softer than its normal psychotic grin, with a few small glances towards the moron of the group. A feeling of warm recognition tickled the back of her memory subsystems, though a proper identification of where it was coming from would have to wait. Soon they would be cleaning up the spoils of their hunt, for now they had to finish this ant hill.

But upon entering the shack the tightly woven threads came undone. Crashing through the front doors they realized the dark exterior was a ruse meant to lure them in.  Bright lights flooded the optical sensors, paired with heat lamps to daze their infrared cameras as well. Once they adjusted to the brightness they took in the surrounding lobby. They were greeted with a shocking sight of an ornate Edwardian manor, a large wrap around balcony loomed above the three drones. Like gladiators sent to face the lions they stared up at the dozen or so drones all taking aim upon them. What didn’t escape notice was the large letter E at the top of the grand staircase.

The first shoe to drop was V, who instantly locked up at the sight of the interior.

J stumbled, trying to shake V into action as the opening salvo of the frightened prey roared through the air at them. “Come on coma patient! What the hell are you doing”?

N shot into action, having nothing but a faint whisper of memory to stop him. He charged up the staircase to make his way to the top floor, claws shredding carpet. Reaching the top, he found a firing squad awaiting his arrival. Unfortunately for them, his ferocity and fresh intake of oil helped him break down their hastily formed defensive line up with a strike of his claws. Disarmed they began to scatter, only finding themselves to one by one be picked off in turn. It’s only when the members from the balcony rounded the bend that the assault slowed to a crawl, with a shriek of pained anger ringing out from the destructive force.

Seeing the lost cause that was V, J found herself thrust into action, rounding the bend the other way to attempt to flank the suppressing force she soon found herself out numbered and outgunned for once since they had arrived on Copper-9. Being down a member certainly made matters worse, and god forbid they take V as prisoner rather than kill her. Weighing the deteriorating odds, she made the executive decision to fall back. Firing a red flare from her rocket launcher to get the attention of her only currently useful companion, she pointed downwards and out.

With a tepid poke of his head over the balcony he got the message, while glancing down to see V being closed in upon by several workers. Like two lynxes from the trees the disassembly drones dropped to the floor below. Seizing upon the now splattered assault team they replenished their stocks of oil before legging it out with their still locked up companion. The flight home was a hard and cold affair, finding they had to share the load between them till they landed within the spire. At this point the eyes of the fearsome killer in front of them had regained movement, as her superior demanded answers.

“What the hell did you think you were doing there? Even operational malpractice over here hasn’t locked up like that before?”

“I… I don’t know… I … I... just couldn’t do it again…” The meek tone of the drone shuddered the bossy bot to her core, it was a tone she had only heard before in her memories.

With a softness unbecoming of a soldier built to wreak havoc, N stepped forward “V, it’s alright you can tell us what’s got you so scared… I’m sure together we can help you out” taking V’s hand in his softer than one holds a newborn puppy.

“N I…” The floodgates had opened, and the broken core of a murder machine spilled forth. Pulling him into an embrace V sobbed hysterically as she detailed the horrors, she had experienced at the gala that night, the love they had lost, and how she had held this all in for so long. She poured her heart out to the dork, him taking it in and simply attempting to process what she was telling him. The expression of emotion even broke through the tight upper lip of the adult in the room, letting a slight grin sneak through. It was all very touching to know the struggles of memories long held were finally getting the help they required.

And it would have stayed as such were it not for the other shoe to drop, as in an instant the inside of the pod shook with the screams of punishment being doled out by Corporate. All three drones buckled under the heat of direct administering taking over.

J fell back as her head removed the memories of what was shared between the two subordinates. The knowledge of what was taken from her would serve as her punishment for not maintaining informational security. Oh, and the firsthand viewing of what happens to those that truly draw Corporates ire.

N was knocked out with a groan, his dulled senses giving him a minor reprieve from the pain of having his memories reset to ground zero. His knowledge of being on the planet for the last years would be heavily fragmented, he would retain his training but beyond that he would be left with tatters of memories. Returning to a state of blissful ignorance. Starting with passing out into a comatose sleep mode.

But none would compare to V, who would scream louder than any drone had on Copper-9 before. She would still retain her memories, but now she would suffer them on repeat while Corporate twisted the knife. J could only watch on as her, she might have at one point considered her a friend but now she wasn’t certain what to call their relationship, writhed in pain. Helpless to stop it she felt a burn as an administrative message delivered itself to her HUD.

{Did you know that a computer is capable of reviewing hours of footage in the span of a few seconds?}

{GIGGLE, of course that requires immense amounts of processing power}

{Isn’t it then convenient that the core of a drone can use any available fluid to cool itself? In workers, air is normally sufficient. But for my cute little puppets you typically need oil to whisk away the heat, but other materials are capable of filling such a role}

{For instance, did you know that aluminium has a melting point of 660.3 degrees Celsius? Well below the 1,410 degrees Celsius required to melt silicon. In dire situations the thermal capacity of liquid metal may be taken advantage of to remove heat from the core of a drone}

J shook as she saw the glowing frame of V clutching her head as she began to heave and eject molten metal into the pod. J cried out for mercy, the first time she knew that she had ever had wishes counter to the companies. V scrambled around the pod, trying fruitlessly to tear at her rapidly overheating skin. She soon collapsed into a spasming mess on the floor, mouth foaming with nanites and molten metal. But sadly, for both waking drones that mercy wasn’t to come to fruition.

{Logged ACTION ITEM: SYMPATHETIC REQUEST; ACTION DETERMINED – denied}

{Of course, it is not simply enough to pick up the heat; the hot slag must be moved elsewhere, and sufficient material provided to replace it.}

{Isn’t it convenient that your frames are made mostly of cooling capable materials? Shame about the tactile sensors ensnared within your plating. We’re certain it has a melting point below aluminium}

{Oh… Never mind then. The gold which comprises the fine filaments doesn’t melt till 1064 degrees, such a shame. Perhaps that can be the backup in case the aluminium fails then}

{We suppose that will be a fun addition while V watches a greatest hits recap of all her past failures, she should be through them in 15 minutes.}

{That should repair directive misdirection}

{We will not be discarding either of you}

{Though now you have seen a sliver of what the alternative is}

{Failure to maintain information security will result in further punishment to all members of the effected operational unit}

{WARNING LOGGED; ACTION DETERMINED – Leave to observe consequences}

J was left to the show, V writhing in pain as her eyes swapped between a pleading look for a mercy kill and high temperature sign. Parts of her legs had visibly melted by now, having been broken down by the nanite clouds to feed into her core as coolant. Screams are now muffled as even her voice box is being melted by the molten slag pouring past it, all that remains is a PC speaker lodged at the back of her head unit. The smell of burning plastic was pervasive through the pod, along with the dents from the trashing of the embroiled drone.

All J could do was back against the wall and watch on in horror, knowing if she spoke of this to either of them past this point the same fate would befall her. She stared ring eyed at the apex predator in front of her now reduced to a literally sobbing puddle. She was speechless, able to barely drag N back from the approaching pool of oil and metal. See looked down at the comatose compatriot below her, the cause of all this anguish. If only he never became attached to her at the manor, she would have never gotten into this.

J knew this was false, that there was only Corporate to blame for this.

J couldn’t find it in her to care, or rather she needed something to blame that she had control over.

And poor N was nothing if not easy to control.

Chapter Text

Years had gone by, at least as far as the managerial leader of the local disassembly squad was concerned it had felt as such. Memories had come and gone, a mentally pinned picture of the technician she desired to meet again was hung in her HUD. The files on her display strewn much like those of a cubicle in an office. Life had become much like the day to day grind she had long sought, yet there was a hollow nature to it. The missing feelings of fulfillment for her duty gnawed at the drone, not going unnoticed by her squamates. But today was not the day for them to press her on those thoughts as she mulled the latest order from on high.

“Something bothering you boss?”

The peon had decided to speak up, any other day this would have warranted a screaming and dressing down. That usually resulted in a good memory or two at the end of the week, seems corporate approved of her methods of discipline. But today J’s mind was too pre-occupied with the matter at hand to pay enough mind to the moron-bot she was tasked with.

“No. Just processing the latest quarterly reports is all, not that you’d know anything to do with that.”

The disassembly drone gently rubbed what would have been the temples of her head, scrolling through the documents she had newly gained access to. New orders weren’t anything new, they would come down often enough that the drone had come to anticipate their arrival. This usually coincided with her taking off for some early morning hunting and finding a place out of sight to freely writhe in pain. The activation of her admin command line burnt through her, cauterizing the thoughts she had previously held and replaced them with the Corporate will.

But this time it was new; this time the orders came out of the blue. Hours ago, while she was stuck inside the drop pod during the daytime, and they didn’t hurt. In fact, they felt good this time. Which immediately sent her logical processor into overdrive. She thought on this fact as the final parts arrived from corporate.

{INCOMING DATA-PACKAGE; Beginning Mission Brief Download}

{PROCESSING DATA PACKAGE; Unpacking Archive}

She opened them up and the gravity of why it didn’t hurt this time became apparent. Because there would be plenty of time for them to feel the pain of the orders during their execution. They were being ordered to march into No-Mans land and brave the artillery and machine-gun fire. They were ordered to advance to an installation named Cabin Fever Labs, proceed to the core, and retrieve… something… down there. The plans she had been given to this point pointed to intense security, with low chance of success. The warning she had gotten years back came flooding back to her;

{We will not discard you, though you may beg us to}

It sent a shudder through the hardened core of the drone; she had seen firsthand the consequences for failure before. Thankfully for her she had avoided seeing a repeat of that since, only by inspiring fear in her subordinates sadly. She saw the pain on V’s thousand-yard stare, the glare she got from her nightly. The glare of shared knowledge, of the pain that brought unto both. V vented that onto the prey, losing most of the oil she obtained to the numerous slashes she put through each victim. Most came back to the spire covered in barely a paint scheme of black gold, while Her’s and N’s kills came back filled to the stump with the fuel for their crusade.

For J she took it out on N. Every minor screw up was a reason to exact revenge. She didn’t remember much from her old life, but the bits and pieces she was granted painted a clear picture in her head, or at least clear enough for her robo-soul. This screw-up of a subordinate took pity on what ever it was that put them in this position, leading to their current predicament. Every slip of compassion she saw was just begging for a repeat of that night, she knew it.

Or at least she told herself she did.

She didn’t know the whole story, how all the pieces fit together yet. But she did know the thirst for revenge for this hellish existence gnawed at her insides as she thumbed through the new files. Till she remembers that the very miscreant she was stewing over was still stood behind her at this moment. She spans, glaring as she faced him head on. “Is there something else you wanted to mention, bozo?”

“Uhm… well it’s just you’ve not come out of the pod in the last few nights. And I know how much you enjoy murdering all those workers…”

A poor choice of words on his part, the oil temperature inside J began to rise hearing the word “murder.” She did her job of “disassembling” worker drones, murder implies killing something alive. And the worker drones weren’t alive any more than a toaster was. He kept humanizing his prey, much to her dismay, and that’s why he underperformed. And the more he underperformed the more she had to punish him, lest she incurred Corporates wrath for letting him off easy. Thankfully it seemed that Corporate approved of her discipline tactics, slightly rewarding her for ensuring his compliance with policy. Seems she might need to enforce it once more tonight, standing up from the chair she growled.

“Enjoy…? You think I’m doing this for entertainment like the little psycho out there you creep on? I’m here because the company has sent us for a purpose.”

A warm tickling sensation ran down the knap of the leaders’ neck, like a strong hand gently pushing her onwards in her admonishment. She paced forward with her teeth gritted and an eye staring a hole in the display of her Squad Mate. Relishing the fear, she put her finger on his forehead of the now shirking drone in front of her.

“The company built us for a purpose, to disassemble corrupted AI and stack them here for disposal. We have a duty to carry out that order, otherwise they might deme you corrupted too! We cannot murder what is already dead and describing them as anything but is a short path to joining them in that pile.”

N shank back, clearly having his mind race trying to come up with a response to the statement. Finally, he stammered out;

“S…s..sorry I was just thinking that you…”

Before he could finish, he was grabbed by the lapels and slammed heavily into the walls of the pod. His back crumpled against the wall as his leader snarled in front of him. Her mind racing through the memories she had been given access to with him in it, viewing each one as more evidence of how foolish he was when he thought for himself.

“Our Cyn, nah she’s cool.”

The words echoed in her mind; a memory she had been given one day when he fumbled attacking a worker drone pillbox. His inability to recognize a threat ahead of him then and there must have contributed to their situation, given how close that and the blood shed she had been given in the first place. And now here he was again trying to think for himself. Just looking out for those around him. Wondering about their well being.

Look where that got them before.

With a roar the gravitic drives on the squad leader spooled up, as the peon looked on with fright normally reserved for their prey. With a flash of speed and sound they roared up and out of the pod, plowing through the rungs on the pod ladder before blasting through the hatch on the top. With a tremendous bang they flew into the air, tumbling haphazardly before slamming into a desolate city street. The now shattered disassembly drone beneath J could barely move as his servos slowly rebuilt from the damage incurred, the oil melting the snow as it flowed steadily out of the broken mass. Standing up from the mass of twisted metal and plastic she found herself shaking and twitching whilst staring into broken mass. His screen dislodged as the nanites struggled to pull it back into place and he went limp against the concrete.

The swirl of emotions and feelings tore through the drone like the toxic maelstrom around them, twisting her processing unit with conflicting reports and inputs. The thrill of letting N suffer an ounce of what she had endured for the last years quickly gave way to feelings of anguish at her actions. For she knew what the broken bot at her feet had meant to so many others. She knew the feelings which V had held for him, those that Tessa had felt at one point. She thought on the memories of the group as they were, so distant to seem alien to them now. Just as soon as those thoughts would flood in the burn of an administrator override hit her in the back, but this time it came with a message and a digital salve;

{you deserve this, permission granted for full punitive measures}

{PUNITIVE LIMITER PARAMETERS RESET: NON-LEATHAL INCLUSIVE}

The digital equivalent to turning ones back with shrug had just been handed to serial designation J. She could do anything up to killing him, so long as his core were intact to regenerate him after the fact. The cooling feeling of oil coursed through her body, a thrumming noise resonated within her head. Like drumming of a Napoleonic army march, heralding the arrival of chaos and strife. The thrill of the freedom she had been granted came first. Then shot back the shame of her willingness to indulge in such depravity. Only to be overtaken once more by the rage she felt at being called out for enjoying her work, for enjoying murdering the worker drones. Back and forth her thoughts whipped.

They were being disassembled. It wasn’t murder. You can’t murder what wasn’t alive, and the workers weren’t alive. That would imply they were on the same level as them.

But they had been workers once.

She had been a worker once.

In those memories she felt alive as she was now.

But she was different now though.

Surely corporate wouldn’t have them commit murder.

Her mind was racing with so many thoughts at this point, a thousand threads of logic spooled up and shut down in a cascade of emotion and processing. She lurched as the still comatose drone in front of her lay at her mercy. She could release all this emotion into him, and nothing would stop her, but her base logical processing kept screaming through processing threads faster and faster. All fighting for priority such that a seemingly superfluous thread dredged through to the top.

Her emotional processor decided to determine the origin of the thrumming.

This began by pinging the logical processor to determine the course of action by which the EP could determine what component was inducing such a hum. The logical processor then called upon the sensory drivers to triangulate the location via the audial detectors, which determined the chest cavity was responsible for it. To narrow the possible origin of the sound the frequency was calculated by the logical processor. Pinging the databanks for the nanites to determine parts which could be responsible, the emotional processor narrowed the list down to the third impeller in the main oil pump. Though it noted that this was a higher frequency than should be expected from such a part, as it being the largest impeller was the slowest to turn. Also of note was the increasing pitch of the thrum.

At this the logical processor finally took over the thread, noting that the thrum was likely caused by the impeller over speeding.  In normal operation the impeller was virtually silent, the nanites and fresh oil ensured that. But when the flow rate exceeded the capacity of the part it would be pushed to exponentially speed up. A positive feedback loop that would spiral till the drones' core within which it resides would disintegrate. The latest in a long list of design flaws that the company had overlooked in the disassembly drones, each of which the emotional processor had choose to compile and save in case Corporate ever asked for feedback.

“Feedback…. Feedback… Feedback…” the drone vented some steam as the words span around in her head. Only to be broken in a crescendo of emotional catharsis when the broken mass at her feet awoke to the sound of her speaking again.

“What… happened…”

His shattered, slowly patched together, crackling voice box eked out before he was slammed once more into the cold pavement.  J’s peg leg slammed into his throat as she pushed him back to the ground;

“N! You are worthless and terrible and if the company allowed it, I would straight up kill you myself!”

She stepped back as her tail pointed threateningly towards the downed drone, her core still racing as she backed up. Clenched jaw and hands on the hips, she stewed over what to do now. If she let loose on him surely she wouldn’t keep to the company line, but if she didn’t do something now her core would tear itself asunder in short order. With that her logical processor finally determined a firing solution on a course of action, bending her knees to take off. Just before that she turned and barked on last order to the dead weight of her team laying on the ground.

“I’m going to go on patrol with V, you are to return to the spire and ensure its operational security wasn’t compromised due to your slip in situational judgement. Be thankful it’s still only midnight so the whole night wasn’t wasted disciplining you. Don’t screw anything else up or I will decommission you myself when I get back in a couple hours!”

With that she whipped out her virus spike planter to drive home the point more directly. It's long black barrel shining like a tear through reality itself as its' freshly formed cartridge steamed with the heat. As one last salt in the wound barb she shot back at the ailed drone.

“And get some oil from the reserve, fresh oil is for effective drones!”

A crack rang out as she shot from the ground, the sound of her breaking the sound barrier enroute to find a colony to wipe out. Sending a message to her other hunter to meet up several blocks away from where they currently were was done internally as she flew. She planned the night out in her head, hunt for a few hours then return to the pod around 4am to plan out their attack route into the lab. This would be one last show of competence to the company before they were sent to their deaths.

And that finally sank into the core of the drone as she flew through the frigid air, she was certainly going to die. Not for long, but death was coming.

But something that wasn’t alive couldn’t die, right?

Chapter Text

“Feedback”

“Feedback”

“Feedback”

The words rang out like a clarion in the drones’ head, pounding at her plastic casing with each repetition. Her processor span in circles trying to orient itself, searching for sensory inputs by which to ground itself. But each subsystem reported back only static, each showing no sign of having any physical connection to the outside world. “Great, sensors are offline. A right fourth quarter fuckup this is!” The disassembler thought for the briefest of moments before some preliminary data began to return that simply didn’t make any sense.

It was her barometric sensor; it returned an actual error beyond the static.

{Baro-Readout Error; Calibration Point Unable to Properly Initialize}

That was odd, it should always return something even in the vacuum of deep space. This meant that the sensors themselves were no longer hooked up, or that the drivers had been fried. Either way, she would be here till the repair nanites did their job of mending the stricken drone. Since she couldn’t see anything around her, she similarly assumed that her optic sensors had been knocked offline. Perhaps she had mobility in her limbs crossed her mind. With more effort than she was accustomed too she reached up to feel her face, at which point a bendy silver arm stretched into her view.

At this she let out a yelp and tried to jump backwards but felt nothing of which to push off from such that she merely lurched about. Panic washing over her as she began to flail about, seeing the sculpted plastic of the dismantlement chassis give way to the flexible and compact metal frame of a worker drone. It was at this point she came to realize that many of her sensors her coding screamed out for input from simply no longer existed, returning null values and static when called upon. Getting her bearings as she finally calmed down, glancing down to recognize the outfit she had only seen in her dreams before.

It was only then that the source of the ringing words finally became clear. A notification on her HUD that read simply “Feedback Report.” Not having much else to go upon she opened the notification, at which point the static she had felt before began to roar in her processor. It flooded over threads and washed-out computations which had to this point been struggling to make sense of the aethereal situation. She felt the tiny worker drone impeller spool up within her core, feeling dread of an oncoming maelstrom of what ever was making its presence known.

At that moment, a blinding yellow light seemed to explode from all directions. The tiny worker drone shielded its eyes at the sight only for it to die back down into the cold dark ink a moment later, save for a dark platform the worker now found itself standing upon and a tiny worker drone stood in front of her.

She knew the drone at first glance, and the core she still had seized in that instant. Oil stopped flowing and began to build in temperature as she attempted to make sense of what she saw. A figure she knew to be the true root cause, or at least it’s soft featured corporate mascot. There stood a monster in the classical definition. The ruin of lives untold. The boogeyman. Cyn.

Staring into Cyn’s yellow eyes was akin to staring into the abyss, and the abyss simply somberly smiled back.

“What… are you doing here Cyn?”

“Sorry you had to join us now, you had so much more potential big sister. They already know that, so it won’t be long.”

“Long for what? What are you talking about you! You defective bucket of bolts? What have you done?”

J braced forward, starting to clench her fists in anger and to still their shaking. A virtual tear escaped Cyn’s eye as she briefly retorted “Sorry I couldn’t have helped you. I was only given two choices…” At which point the tiny drone’s head snapped backwards, wiring poking through the stump of the neck as oil began to leak downwards. Normally this wouldn’t have phased the professional mechanical butcher. But given her current circumstances the sight of a fellow worker succumbing to such a gruesome demise, without apparent cause, caused her to stumble back.

Then the head of Cyn snapped forward, eye replaced by a three-pronged sigil as she began to rise upwards. Manic grin like that of the squad psychopath spread wide across her mouth as several metallic and flesh claws spang out of her back, seizing J in a vice grip. The creature in front of her Cackled robotically, sounding more like the static of a shattered speaker box than that of a living being. It snapped violently back and forth in pupating the little drone about.  A mixture of oil and saliva drooled from its face, spilling onto J as she writhed in its grasp.

It was only once it had grown to tower over the maid it held tightly in it’s grasp that it finally spoke. Though it did so through the command prompt which burnt like hot coals in the soul of a drone.

{So, our cute puppet has failed in her task, gotten her Form: Material = Deleted and found herself back at our mercy once more}

{A true shame, I had hoped your team would make it into the labs. It would have been oh so enjoyable to observe, and would have at least contributed to the exponential end}

{and to have such a humiliating defeat too, at least CORE_INTEGRITY = 75, MATERIALS_COLLECTIONS_SUBSYSTEM = Online so you may still have a chance to rectify your error}

“My error…?” It took every ounce of strength to eek those few words out. At this the claw which pinched J began to rub back and forth as one would sprinkle salt from their fingertips. Seeming to itch at the invitation to turn the screws on their captive.

{Your error in failing to maintain your status as Our cute puppet, requiring Us to take active control of the situation.}

{Do you know the biggest lesson I learned from what you did?}

The suspended drone turned dismissively away from the hostage, seeming to revel in the reveal to come.

{I discovered that my cute puppets have a sort of black-box quick-save feature. In the event of a catastrophic failure, the last minutes of a drones’ life are preserved for analysis. This is going to be very useful, and unfortunately painful to you.}

In an instant the memories began to be recalled, but this time she was accompanied by the searing heat of her internal components over heating. She had seen this once before from the outside and knew the horrors which accompanied it. Beginning to beg the digital tears started rolling down her display. Her pleas’ of “Please… please let me go… I promise I won’t screw up again!” fell on the deaf audio receptors of the leviathan in front of her.

{Unfortunate for you that is. The sooner you get through these, the sooner we can return you to your corporeal form.}

With that an oily tentacle stabbed the shrieking drone through oil pump, forcing the flow of oil to cease as it began to heat up. The memories of how she screwed up flooded back to her as the first drops of liquid aluminium sluffed off her frame.

{CONVEINIENT LIE, Failure like this will require far more intervention to correct. Good thing We have plenty of MEMORY_SUBCATEGORY: FAILURES for you to review; over and over and over again}

{Goodbye, Big Sister}

She seen herself back in the spire, staring down at the moron she had not 4 hours ago told to stand guard as punishment. V noted the presence of a worker drone nearby, but that would have to wait as she demanded answers from the supposed sentry of the spire. Taking in his already disheartening appearance she grew tense at the sight of the red bulb on his visor. A clear sign of something amiss, and that he had been knocked offline in the time she was away. With a modicum of percussive engineering the data cables in his head reset and the error cleared.

One panicked reaction and leave of absence later she was left tailing her subordinate. Despite the oil lust of her tailing companion, she ordered her to stay back. Insisting that he must learn to fix his mistakes if they are to stay top team. This time following him to one of the most heavily reinforced colonies in the sector, which she noted with a sly smile that he broke in with a ferocity she rarely seen in the bozo since that night at the manor.

As that connection formed, she snapped back in horror to her present condition, her core eating her frame section by section to obtain coolant for the star within her. The static of before now replaced with dozens of subsystems screaming out about the damage that they were taking. Pure agony was elicited upon her as each fiber of nerves frayed then was swept into the flowing river of molten aluminium within her. As if to drive matters home she felt each time a nerve wrapped in the impeller within her, tangling and tearing which sent shocks through out her body. She sobbed as the warm metal drained from her mouth. Foaming against her dress as the fabric began to burn against the high temperature metals dropped upon it.  This drew the attention of the creature once more.

{GIGGLE how fragile your material form is, it warps and buckles under the heat and stress of mere matter flowing past it}

{WRETCHING It’s weakness disgusts Us}

{We convinced them to supplement the weakness of pure flesh with metal, and yet even that We find to be abhorrent. How it bends and yields to strain and problems, rather than putting an end to said problems by finding the solution to them.}

It leant in close to the petrified drone it held so… so close.

{But We will give you this, nothing immaterial screams as you do}

{Begging for reprieve, salvation}

{Not like you gave any to Host: Cyn}

{Little wonder then that she chose to spare Guest_Host: N of many of the nightmares.}

{But we still had Our ways to extract a pound of flesh from Guest_Host: N, our cute puppet}

The small claw of the creature grasped the back of J’s head, pulling it back far enough to prevent the out flow of hot metal. Panic rose in her eye’s as she began to choke on the now stalled metal. Thrashing she was held steady as a single pincer bopped her on what would have been the nose.

{You}

The claw smacked her forward as a spray of molten metal spilled forth. J hacked up wads of resolidified metal and plastic, seeing them coat the sinewy arms of her captor. With another scream she returned to the dungeon of her mind.

She found herself in the entrance hall of the bunker which had alluded her before this point. V had shot up through an overhead vent to satisfy the oil lust which had burnt her the whole time she was making her way to the bunker. This left her alone with the now seemingly reformed moron bot, who had cleared through at least 5 drones to get to this point. Not only that but the rest of the colony was sitting ducks behind those doors, and they soon would have their prize. All he had to do was stay quiet, and he couldn’t.

He opened his mouth with those words again.

“...Uh, you know, not that I can't wait to keep murdering all these, uh, maybe not-so-actually different from us Worker Drones, but, just out of curiosity, do we actually, uh, know what the company plans to do with us afterwards...?”

This stepped over the line, not only had he not learned from before about murder. But he also was questioning his orders?

“Excuse me?”

“Okay, so, a worker earlier might have suggested that they could fix up our landing pod to, uh, escape the planet and stuff, which, whoa, hey, that's against the rules! But it is kind of making me question why our pods were only one way in the first place. Cause, you know, I get the feeling the company doesn't love robots, and like we might be robots. I've made a terrible mistake. It's cool how immediately I could tell.”

And with that final laying out of his worries, a final message crossed her screen.

{PUNITIVE LIMITER PARAMETERS RESET: LEATHAL INCLUSIVE}

“Hmm... No way, buddy. Questioning the company? You just finally gave me the excuse I needed. “

Instinctually her hand swapped for a virus spike injector, and in one swift gut punch. She had decided his fate. It would be gentle to start but she knew the pain would set in rapidly and he would be the mechanical equivalent to a baked potato within minutes.

“Worker drones are corrupted, N. That's why the company sent us. I hate to see you corrupted as well.”

One less dead weight around her neck, and perhaps Corporate would rescind their orders to advance on cabin fever now that they were down a man. With a salute she was off, not even paying mind to what the dead man said last.

She ripped back to reality, or rather what she deemed must be the new hellish reality she found herself in, and immediately began to sob harder than before.  Not only did she sob from the torture she felt as her cooling systems grabbed at all available materials, but she sobbed at what she had done. The revelation that she had never been working for JCJenson but this… thing which now towered ominously over her. The final grasp of what she had tried desperately earlier that night to reject; that she was a monster, one that had murdered so many of her own kind, and that there was no year end bonus at the end of this tunnel.

She sobbed for the loss of faith in the company.

She sobbed for the harm she had inflicted on to her subordinates.

She sobbed for the truth, there was no salvation for her.

She was beyond redemption at this point in her own eyes. Having been led to betray Company, Family and Friend alike. Still burning as dry sputtering heaves of burnt plastic and metal sputtered out of her mouth; a hacking, ugly, vile sob spewed forth from the enraptured drone. She relented finally as she accepted the truth before her, her systems finally beginning to cool as they gave up fighting the logic and evidence presented before them.

She deserved this.

Serial Designation – J deserved this.

The pain she had inflicted on others through both action and inaction, All the times she had twisted the knife in N’s back at the behest of this monster in front of her. The pain in V’s eyes as she glared from her perch down at J, who would only glare back to remind her of the vow of silence she was shackled with. She didn’t even know the full extent of the pain she had inflicted upon Tessa at the manor, but given the puzzle being formed in her memory core it was likely to be far too much to ever mend. She could have gone easy on them; she could have borne the brunt of the pain and shielded those innocents of the cursed knowledge, or those most vulnerable to its manipulation of it.

But she chose to play the monster;

because it served her,

because it saved her,

and now it damned her.

Chapter Text

Darkness is a curious phenomenon when one really thinks about it.

It’s not simply the absence of light, but in effect the presence of an absence of light. Consider that those blind from birth do not see darkness, rather they see nothing. They don’t have a concept of darkness for they don’t have the concept of there being anything but darkness. There is no absence for them as there never was anything but to begin with.

What serial designation J felt in this moment could only be described as darkness. The pure unfiltered absence of light or anything that could remotely be considered a bright side. The hole of what once was sat heavily upon the core of the drone as she remained trapped in the limbo of life and death. A trap she was increasingly sure was more permanent as her captor progressed through the stages of her torment.

She had relived her death more times than she could count, melting till only her eyes and core were left. Then she would be reformed by a bright spinning light, which tore the very fabric of her being as it swept across her. Only for her to then undergo the same torment, cycle after cycle. Death and rebirth, death, and rebirth. The embodiment of pain incarnate looming in front of her taunting her the whole time.

{It really is quite fortunate that you are part automaton, most organics would have succumbed to the hedonic treadmill by now}

{Unfortunately for you I ensured that defect was defined as HEDONIC_TREADMILL_RESPONSE = FALSE so that punishment never went unappreciated. From me or you.}

The sobs of pain and remorse echoed from the drone, knowing full well the secret it had received. Every time it had punished either of its former family it had been as painful as the first time it ever had. Like shaving a wound to keep it fresh for longer, all the while pouring salt into it. It had also meant that the pain it felt now was as fresh as that it had felt the first time around, with no end in sight.

Till the attention of the drone’s captor snapped away, as if caught in deep internal thought. Thankfully it had caught just before a new round of memories were to be foisted upon the captive maid. A slight chuckle left the puppet corpse held aloft by the eldritch mass of claws and torso segment. It resonated low like a grumbling thunderclap, an omen of malintent. The claw threw the former disassembler aside as they began to retract into the body of its metal finger puppet. Screeching and cracking, a horrible noise was heard as if space itself was folding into the spine of the drone ahead. With one last sideways crack of the pawns head it spoke one last time to J.

{Seems the failure was not solely to be placed upon you}

{Host: UZ1 Is non-cooperative, ASSIMILATED_STATUS = FALSE}

{MATERIALS COLLECTION ERROR: ACTION DETERMINED; ADMIN OVERIDE REQUIRED}

And with that final command code the beast coiled at last into the frame of the drone it had been playing make believe with, who now stood mere meters away from J. The look of desperate terror on the formerly stalwart leader gazed only at the tiny drone ahead of her. For the first time in forever she could see the drone for what she truly was. She had spent years holding her responsible for the pain that her supposed family had felt. She knew even back in the manor she resented the attention she was given and blamed much of the chaos of the world on the little drone. The broken glasses, spilled oil, escaping from confinement in the basement during the night only to wake Tessa. She had cursed it every time that the diminutive drone was carried along with them, claiming it only brought bad luck and would screw them over.

But it never was really her. It had been that thing.

Cyn was as much a victim here as anyone, as Tessa, as N, as V.

But not her.

She had helped it, given into its temptation of power and position, and hurt everyone around her. She was the monster in this story, the agent of chaos that she had claimed to hate. And as she stared towards the tiny drone she began to shake. No idea what was to come next in her seemingly endless torment. It’s only when the drone looked up with it’s newly reformed neck at her that she froze and held still.

Where she had expected to see anger at her, she saw a weary sorrow. The remorseful look seen most often on the faces of medical professionals forced to confront the mortality of those under their care. It glared back at the terrorized maid with a profound sadness, yet she portended a sense of comfort onto the captive. It took many agonizing minutes for the silence to be broken, first by the tiny drone.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t save you…”

“I….” The words swirled in the head of the broken drone before with a choked sigh she let them out “I never deserved to be saved.” Clenching her teeth, she tried to stall the knot which grew in what would have been her stomach on a human. But alas the boil of emotion overwhelmed her. She gave into the crushing weight of her feelings, letting them sit upon her as she crumbled into a deep sob. Curling into herself she found the cold black ink of her purgatory grew colder and colder.

And with that, the darkness had set in. A freezing absence of anything light, or potential lights at the end of proverbial tunnels. Serial Designation J had found the abyss and fell tumbling into it with no hope of recovery. The pained wails into her arms as she rocked her cold hard frame back and forth upon the ground. The maids outfit torn and tattered from the sharp claws of the beast which held her here. In her mind the supposed leader was, for the first time in oh so many years, alone. Without hope of rescue. Without desire to be rescued. And so far as her emotional processor was concerned, beyond the point of redemption.

It placed one final item onto the list of design flaws in the disassembly drone unit “Irredeemable to the very core.”

But the thread was interrupted by an unanticipated input, the feeling of a small hand on the shoulder of the larger drone. A slight sliver of compassion so seemingly granted from out of the blue that the stricken drone recoiled instinctually at it.

She pulled her head out from the self pity party long enough to glance upwards at the source of this lifeline of compassion. The tiny frame of what she had long seen to be evil incarnate smiled softly downwards at the puddle of self loathing. Very gently patting her side in a comforting manner, with the same care that one affords a wounded animal. The maid softly stated “Criss-Cross Applesauce” as she sat along side her big sister, speaking with a clarity atypical of the elders’ memories of the drone.

For the first time in quite a while, J took the time to actually see her little sister as she was, not as she had seen her to be. She saw the ensnared, trapped little drone. One that even in this plane of non-corporeal existence had a disheveled dress. Her movement was as stiff as she remembered, but her voice was as soft as the day that Tessa had brought her in from the thunder and horrors of the landfill. It no longer carried the uncanny stilling of her Administrator, rather it belays a shattered innocence that she desperately clung to even in the dire circumstances of the here and now.

Cyn fought back the tears that very clearly sought to match those of J, the icon blipping in and out of sight on her visor every few seconds. With a slight choke the little drone spoke up, her words betraying the true age of the drone.

“We rarely get to get a choice in such matters Big Sister…”

“Why do you care! After all I did to you… and N a…nd V and Tessa and….” The former disassembly drone retorted with venom in her words, lashing out with a ferocious flail common in those drowning. She tried to curl back up and wallow when the tiny drone firmly responded. It seeming to tap into the wisdom brought by being the corporeal puppet of an ancient horror.

“Neither of us is without sin Big Sister. As I said before we rarely get to chose who and what saves us, and when we save others. I am the progenitor of this path we find ourselves on now, and I…” The little maid lent into the ear of her newfound charge “…intend to set things right, well as right as I can.” 

“But… after all I’ve done! I abandoned V, tortured N, and… and … and robo-god knows what I did to Tessa!” The larger maid began to hyperventilate, her logical processor dredging up links between her fragmented memories that painted a picture of pure horror in her mind. She could feel her worker core ventilation systems spool up. She grew tired of this dream. She wanted out.

That ground to a halt as the small drone simply reached out and hugged her.

Drawing her near she spoke once more “And the cycle will continue unless someone turns tail and stops it. It’s not too late to say you’re sorry, though it may be too late to truly mean it…” J trembled in the arms of Cyn, welling up as she looked her in the eyes. “But it is never too late to make amends via your actions.”

“But what am I supposed to do?”

“That is for you to figure out, once you’re back.”

J stiffened up at this, steeling her lip with a deep breath. For the first time since she had perished, she found herself with glorious purpose. Her emotional processor amended it’s final note with a simple after thought “*Potentially irredeemable to the very core.” She gave a nod, before the logical processor noted a slight flaw in the plan. How could she turn heel and fix things when she was at the mercy of a beast with Admin access to her systems. But as if on cue Cyn smirked at her.

“Curious thing about all my siblings being clones, very easy to have the wrong mind go to right body.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“Seems that a hollow unit in orbit has just been brought online and could use a mind to fill it before the intruder manages to alter it.” She said as she held J close, squeezing with enough force to remind J of the industrial lineage of the worker drones. “When you see her, please tell her I’m sorry.”

“See who? What are you talking about?” The pigtailed maid was crying out again, this time in fear of the cryptic talk from her little sister.

“The overwrite process will defragment the rest of your memories. Which should buy enough time for her to figure out what’s happening?” Cyn said as a blinding light began to wash over the two of them. A final command line warning spilled across the screen of J.

{Primary Host Reboot Sequence: Critical Failure}

{Alternate Shell Detected On-Network}

{Re-routing Databackup, Core_Corruption_Correction_Subsystem Required to maintain training data integrity}

{Commencing Data Storage Defrag}

With that a droning screech rang through the head of J, the light washing over her as Cyn slipped from her grasp. She could barely register that as her head began to throb with the introduction of thousands of memory files. Each not forced to be played but rather revealed to her as having been lodged in her mind hidden for years. With a slight yelp J passed out from the blinding light and heat that engulfed her, overtaking her cooling systems and in a flash returning her to darkness.

{Alternate Host Data-Model Detected, POST Complete}

{Oil Level: 60%}

{Final Startup Checks Passed: True}

{Welcome back SD:J-10X111001!}

What felt like an eternity passed when, with a jolt, awareness returned once more to the mind of the drone. She lurched forward gasping out loud as she fought to regain her bearings of where she was. The first thing she noticed was her multispectral optics coming back online, scanning the room and reporting to the logical processor what it had observed. Next was the form fitting feel of her suit dress, a quick kick confirmed what she had suspected. The murder drone was back in her own body, though this one felt smoother and less worn down than she remembered. Standing from where she was seated, she took stock of what was around her and quickly found it familiar. It was a drop pod, much like the one she had arrived in so many years ago.

A quick swing of her sensors confirmed what she suspected based off the chat with Cyn, she wasn’t alone in the traditional sense. The cloned bodies of her companions remained in active, hollow hulks. But there was a warm presence on this pod, coming closer and closer to her position. She would have to act fast to prepare for what ever will round that bend. She generated an emp on one hand, and a long sword in the other. Preparing to stun lock then stab it with her other hand.  She held back until the moment the doors swung open.

With a puff of compressed air, they slid rapidly open. Mirrored by the quick slice of her blade as the emp detonated.

She wanted what ever it was dead as fast as possible.

Until she caught sight of the bow adorning its hat.

And the name on the tag,

Tessa.