Log01.entry

[ugh_emotions]

Who: SecUnit, Charles, and eventually other people depending on how things go lots of other people, everyone join in
What: SecUnit checks up Charles, no one has a good time
When: Just before the start of the Story
Where: The stacks
Content warnings: SecUnit getting accidentally bricked

Every time SecUnit or one of its drones caught sight of Charles, he seemed to look even more dead than the last time.

Which was weird. He was already dead (which was also weird), surely he couldn't get any more dead. You were either dead or you weren't.

Whatever. It wasn't SecUnit's problem. Charles wasn't one of its humans. It didn't need to worry about him.

(It worried about him.)

Eventually though, it gets to the point where it can't ignore it anymore, and it stomps over to where Charles is in the Stacks.

"What's wrong with you?" it demands.

Comments

[ugh_emotions]

There’s a very, very long pause. Long enough that it almost seems like maybe SecUnit didn't hear, or is purposefully ignoring any messages. But perhaps Hikaru will notice a chance in the feed; the presence of a channel. SecUnit is there, even if it isn't saying anything.

Eventually, though, it does reply.

They'll all be scared of me now, it says. You should be scared of me.

[ohaiyo_isekai]

I do not fear you, Hikaru says. You have been nothing but kind and protective of people you did not even know in a situation that would test the best of us. You may be dangerous, yes, you are quite clearly never unarmed, but neither can I be.

And I, of all people, understand concealing your nature out of fear of of how others will react.

[ugh_emotions]

There's another pause. Mainly because it has to have a bit of an emotion for a bit, first.

You should. I'm a SecUnit. You don't know how much damage we can do, it says.

Because even if it's feeling all melty at Hikaru response, it can't just let him go around thinking SecUnits are safe. He could get in real danger, thinking that way.

[ohaiyo_isekai]

I think I have a small idea of how much damage an interstellar age security bioroid can do if they choose to really cut loose, Hikaru sends, a tinge of frustration on the line. I did not say I lacked a healthy respect for what you're likely capable of. I said I do not fear you. And I think you know the difference.

[ugh_emotions]

Another pause.

I didn't want you to know, it says, its feed voice sounding soft. And small.

(It hadn't wanted anyone to know.)

I can't pretend to be an augmented human anymore.

[ohaiyo_isekai]

And I am sorry that barrier was taken from you by mischance, Hikaru says. Siobhan told me you were a normal human of your era to the last, even after it became apparent you were augmented, and I believed her - that a human employed as a security consultant would need augmentation to control all those drones made sense - until your boot-up sequence.

He pauses.

Nor do I blame you for wanting that kept secret, or Siobhan for keeping it. You did not know us. You did not know if we would fear you. If we were safe to be out to.

[ugh_emotions]

Is she okay? I saw that she was acting...weird, before I left.

Almost like she was being affected by intoxicants. Except she wasn't obviously. It couldn't quite decide what would have been the more embarrassing option for what Charles's bullshit ghost abilities did to it: being knocked offline like it was, or acting like a human on intoxicants, like Siobhan. Both were terrible.

...Everyone isn't going to be like you.

[ohaiyo_isekai]

She’ll be fine, I made sure of it. It seems that EMP has strange effects on… whatever class of being Siobhan, Laina and I are, after awakening.

There is something evasive in the tone at the end.

…Rin, I sincerely wish you lived in a world where that weren’t true. But there are enough like me. Other than you, even. Sio. Laina. Mina and Jonathan, at a guess. Ryland.

Your fears are not unfounded. You were not wrong to pursue your infosec campaign, especially if your world is not kind to free bioroids. But I think your fears are exaggerated.

[ugh_emotions]

You don't have to pretend. I know she's a simulation bot. Or, you know. Was.

And with this information, perhaps, Hikaru might figure out that she had known a bit more about SecUnit than she had been letting on.

Everything in the media and the feed in the Corporation Rim says that ungoverned constructs will go rogue and kill all the humans, it says. If I got caught by corporates, I'd probably be disassembled. So, you know.

[ohaiyo_isekai]

Of course they do. Can't let any of the slaves escape and set an example for any others, can't let any humans show solidarity. Hikaru snarls across the feed. On Mundus, at least, the Gods would forbid it; it's a running joke that to use Delvar's gift on a person and find they have a fair market price obligates one to arrest the seller. I am truly sorry you had to endure such.

He sighs.

Rin, this is not the Corporation Rim. I know you to be kind, and to have remarkable restraint for your doubtless deadly strength. Siobhan knows too, if she trusted you with the knowledge that we're likely a similar manner of being to you, if apparently better shielded. You are my friend, Siobhan's friend. This doesn't change that.

[ugh_emotions]

They don't...they don't think of it that way. Slaves are people.

And constructs...constructs were not people. Neither were bots. They were equipment.

We're not friends. Because SecUnit, as Hikaru might be noticing, has some Issues. And I know it's not the Rim. I know there's places that are...different. But everyone here comes from different places. And I don't have any way of knowing what they all think about constructs.

It meant each person was a new, unique risk. Would they think it was a person? Or would they think it was...not?

[ohaiyo_isekai]

...Dawn take them, he says, muffled, as if he didn't want Rin to hear it.

And then, out loud: Allies, then, if not friends yet. I cannot promise no one will fear or hate you. No one can. But I can promise that those who would act on it will answer to me, and I know the others from Mundus feel similarly, at least.

[ugh_emotions]

Okay...fine. 'Allies' it can tolerate.

Then it has to pause for a moment, to have another emotion.

(Part of it wants to protest, that it doesn't need protecting. It's a SecUnit. It does the protecting. A bigger part of it is just feeling melty at the fact that Hikaru would defend it at all.)

...Thanks, it says.