Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Mensah moves forward, something stuck in her throat. For some reason, she can tell.

It’s not here anymore.

SecUnit was dead.

Its eyes are open but there’s no life in them. She had walked away, embraced, rejoiced, and it had died staring at them.

Pin-Lee stands behind her, “Is it… Is it dead?”

She feels a little distant, “…I don’t know.”

Gurathin stares, discomfited. Its gaze is wide and blue, unseeing. Mensah runs a hand down her face, wincing as she’s reminded of the bruises and bumps she’d obtained. They had the cubicle. It wouldn’t be dead for long, it couldn’t be, “We- we should bring it back and see. We need to take it to its cubicle in the security ready room.”

Gurathin's face does something funny, “With what hopper?” He gestures to the wreckage above them, some flaming bits still falling down the craggy landscape around them, “We could all barely lift it last time. And now we're missing Ratthi and Arada.”

Pin-Lee's head shakes, “We drove one of GrayCris's land rovers here. We just need to get it… you know, in.”

Mensah nods, “Good idea.” She crouches down next to it, looking queasy as she swallows, reaching out shakily to its neck. She’s not sure if there’d even be a pulse. Do SecUnits have a pulse? Breathe air? It had said it didn’t have a heart, so what did it have? They had organic parts for sure, but lungs? It had said it didn’t have a stomach… She does remember seeing it breathe, though, chest rising and falling. She'd noted it curiously only a few days ago, when it had approached with Bharadwaj over its shoulder. That was the first time she’d really looked at it for longer than a few cursory minutes.

Of course, she’d never imagined this happening. Its skin was still warm to the touch and she hoped that was a good sign. Her next words are quieter as she closes its eyes with half trembling fingers, “We'll get it home. We have too.”

Moving the rover is, of course, an easy task. It’s getting SecUnit on there that is the difficult part.

It takes a few minutes of debating over little details like where to put the rover, how to pull SecUnit, and then actually going and doing those things. At the end of it, Mensah stands on the bed of the rover as she lowers the ramp, “Alright, all you have to do is pull.”

Pin-Lee's hands hook under SecUnit's shoulders, and Gurathin makes a face as he grabs its ankles, one twisted disconcertingly. They both grunt, pushing, pulling, and… absolutely nothing happens. Gurathin lets its ankles drop, panting, “Alright, well. That sucked.”

Pin-Lee grunts, “C'mon, we can do this- ugh!” The ensuing panic is not what either of them expected. But maybe they should have. Blood and vaguely brown fluid coats shaking fingers and Pin-Lee snaps, “Fuck! It’s- it’s… oh fuck…” Pin-Lee pulls its shoulders, up, turning it on its side.

Its back is a mangled mess of torn meat and cracked metal. Pin-Lee turns and retches. Mensah is expressionless and Gurathin looks gray, “O- okay, so what do we do now?”

Mensah carefully moves down the ramp, settling beside Pin-Lee. She looks where the lawyer had, lifting gently. She too looks away, hand over her mouth, eyes closed. She takes a deep breath, looking up at the sky before she looks back at it, “Get the blanket from the rover. I saw a kit in there.”

Pin-Lee nods, getting up on shaky legs, hurrying to the rover. Gurathin makes a face, “It’s still too heavy.”

Mensah cannot do anything but be firm, trying not to think about the pulverized mess of its back, “We are getting it back. We will bring it with us and see if we can revive it. We are not leaving it out here like- like equipment.”

Perhaps she’s too firm about it.

“That wasn’t what I was saying I- I meant…” Gurathin scowls, “I meant that-“ he curls inwards on himself, hunching, neck drawing in like a turtle.

Mensah stares at him, searching, before she draws in a breath and lets it out, asking, “What did you mean, Gura?”

Gurathin stares at SecUnit's limp body, “It’s going to rot out here until it runs out of battery power. It’s going to fail and die and- and-“ 

Mensah's brows furrow, for once not actually parsing his meaning.

He'd been looking for its angle, its trick, its underhanded goal this whole time. He’d finally gotten one. But he hadn’t expected it to be this. He can't speak, just staring helplessly at her, but at that point Pin-Lee returns, blanket in hand, and their minds are drawn to other things. Mensah points, “Lay that out.”

It’s an awkward operation. They grunt as they roll the heavy body over onto the blanket, and Mensah feels sick. Its back is a mess of lacerations from the rocks it had shielded her from, but it didn’t look like any of them were freshly bleeding. What had it said about sealing its own veins and arteries? That had to be a good sign, didn’t it? Its functions were still operating at some level.

Gurathin looks ill and Mensah waves him off as she folds the blanket over its broad back. Her breath comes in quick little bursts but she is not going to lose her composure in front of them, “We’ve got it, take a break Gura.”

Gurathin is definitely discomfited as he turns and walks away. Mensah folds the blanket over, trying to keep her eyes unfocused on the deep lacerations, its slack face and bloodied jaw, its limp hands and marred body. It was by all rights a dead thing. She and Pin-Lee secured the blanket so that it would be easier for transportation. It also served to cover the more gruesome bits. She thinks its leg and arm had been bent at an angle that her mind screamed was not right.

Gurathin returns by the time they’re ready to try and pull it back up the rover again. Gurathin takes its legs gingerly while Mensah takes the head and Pin-Lee braces the middle of the body. They pull, lifting, and Mensah strains. Her head aches.

It’s heavy, and Pin-Lee makes a grunt, panting, and then they’re over the bend of the ramp. Pin-Lee drops her part of their precious burden as Mensah and Gurathin strain, almost falling down as the lawyer runs to the wheel and hits the retract button for the ramp. It’s only a few more seconds and then the ramp lifts upwards, returning to its usual position as the lip on the back bed of the rover. It neatly rolls SecUnit in the back and Gurathin pants, sweaty, “What now?”

Mensah wipes her brow, grimacing at the blood that smears on her hands, “Now… now we take it back to the habitat.”

Luckily, with the rover, the time spent isn’t as much as it could’ve been. Gurathin spends his time fretting over her injury until she tells him it’s minor and MedSystem would have it well in hand long before anything might truly hurt her. SecUnit had seen to that.

Ratthi, Arada, and Bharadwaj are all waiting for them at the habitat, tense and quiet. Gurathin leaves pretty quickly from the rover, darting inside, hopefully to the security ready room to prep the cubicle for more severe injures when being horizontal was required. Arada and Ratthi are both eager to help with SecUnit, bombarding her and Pin-Lee with questions, “Are you alright?” “What happened?” “The beacon defintiely launched, but how did you- ”  before Mensah raises a hand, “Alright! We don’t know if it’s well, but we're hoping the cubicle will get it fixed. We just need to… get it inside.”

Ratthi rolls up his sleeves, “Well you’ve got me. Anything for Seccy.”

Arada rolls her eyes, but her smile seems fond, “Right. I’m sure it’ll be okay. We got it working after the combat module override anyway.”

But things… weren’t that simple. Getting it into the cubicle is the easy part, the six of them all staring uneasily or pacing respectively as the damaged SecUnit is stripped of its armor, only the torn suit skin remaining. Its arm and leg definitely don’t look good and Mensah is worried about a spinal injury and/or brain damage.

She tries not to gnaw on her knuckle as Gurathin stares, eyes lidded as he communicates with SecSystem. After a moment he withdraws, lips thin, “It can’t interface with the data systems. Some sort of SecSystem requirement.”

It’s Ratthi who speaks first, “What does that mean?”

Gurathin looks to Mensah and she knows instinctively what that means. It means they can’t fix it, “It… It can’t get a connection because it’s not registering the… the form inside it as a SecUnit. Because… well, usually even if it’s badly injured there’s an interface so it can register the life form as a SecUnit and begin its repair, but…” he swallows and Pin-Lee finishes, always quick on these things, “It can’t find a signal to connect too.”

Arada stares at the limp form in the cubicle, “W- what do you mean? What are you saying, it’s dead?” She fumbles, pointing at the small readouts on the outside of the now lowered cubicle, registering both heartbeat and breath, “It’s still alive!”

Gurathin is, as always, succinct, “It’s organic parts are alive, but that could be because of the battery. Its power cell hasn’t been damaged too badly and that’s what’s keeping its organic parts alive. That doesn’t mean important data centers or neural processors haven’t been damaged.”

Bharadwaj is too still, voice strained, “So it's brain dead.”

Pin-Lee shrugs, arms folded, “Maybe. There’s no way of really knowing. To know for sure, we’d have to have someone who could go inside, who could try and wake it up, you know? Form that sort of… connection…”

All eyes turn to Gurathin who stares, straightening when he realizes why, “It’s more complicated than that. It might not even work.”

“Might not?” It’s the first time Mensah has spoken in a while. They all turn to her and she straightens, “We need to at least try. Let’s do it, try to connect, right now before more time passes.”

Gurathin's eyes narrow a little, face doing something funny, as if he’s upset. His voice is a little strained, “You know what we haven’t reached in a while? Consensus.”

Mensah vents a breath, lips straight and grim, “It saved me, Gura.” Gurathin’s lips thin and she corrects herself, “No, actually. It’s done that before. To all of us. You, Arada, Bharadwaj, me, Ratthi. But this time, it didn’t just save me. It died for me.” She looks at Gurathin, something wet in her eyes, spine straight as steel, “It died for me. For us. It didn’t have to, but it did. And so- so we will bring it with us. We will do everything and anything we can to see if we can revive it.”

The others nod, Ratthi's affirmative is quiet, “I agree.”

Pin-Lee adds, reaching out for his hand, “And me.”

Ratthi takes it, eyes wide, and Arada grabs Pin-Lee’s, “So do I.”

Bharadwaj connects Mensah to Arada as the older woman holds her other hand out to Gurathan, “We have reached a consensus. Do you?”

Gurathin stares, unsure, eyes flicking to her and the unconscious SecUnit in the cubicle. His voice is hoarse, “…So do I.” He takes her hand, gentle, fingers intertwining as he looks at his feet.

Ratthi makes a little noise and then gently curls his fingers around the edge of SecUnit's limp fingers, careful to not stay there for too long as if it could still tell them not to touch, “There. Now we’re all here.”

Chapter Text

Gurathin sits in the chair provided with furrowed brow, Mensah watching with folded arms, “Are you sure you’re up for this yet, Gura?”

Gurathin stares at his knees, “No, you were right, Ayda.” The rest of the members of PresAux sit in various positions sprawled around the room. None of them had wanted to miss the outcome of their SecUnit's fate, “It has proved… It has proved that there is more to it than its directives.” His gaze shies away from her and SecUnit, fixing on his knees, “I may not like it,” he is reminded of the words it had uttered to him what felt like so long ago now, “But it’s… a good… a good person.” The words are unfamiliar on his tongue but, they’re the right ones to say.

He’d known it already, after the beacon when he’d found Mensah alive despite what he’d thought when they’d pinged the hopper's location. He’d thought he’d killed her. But he hadn’t, and only because of SecUnit. He had been wrestling with what that meant… That it had been so selfless while he had been so selfish, but he’d resisted out of mere habit and old habits died hard.

He breathes in, out, and then plugs himself into it.

Mensah watches as his eyes go distant. His lips twist and his brows furrow, a little noise of what could be distress escaping his lips.

Ratthi leans forward, “You alright, Gugu?”

His fingers are digging into his pants legs, “It’s dark. And- and cold.” He inhales, “There’s nothing… there’s just nothing.” Mensah places a hand on his shoulder and he straightens, swallowing.

Her voice is soft, “Is that it?”

Gurathin stills, quiet. One minute passes, two… What seems an eternity but is in reality only five minutes later, he rasps, “W- wait. I think I-“ he’s in far too deep and he knows it. But he needed to at least try. Being in it’s head was odd, especially now that there wasn’t anything in it. It’s empty, like a bottomless pit, or like a hollowed out house with pictures on the walls that were faded just too much to make out anything discernible. It’s like digging through a corpse looking for parts to sell. He tries not to hyperventilate, until, he swears, he feels something ping quietly.

It’s not quite a ping, but it’s something, a sign of life. He moves closer, for lack of a better word, and he swears he hears dim voices, sees blurry shapes, hears something… he strains and strains… if he can just find a part of it and lock on then the cubicle could do its work…

He hears it, feels it, something- something strange. He’s looking at himself, at Mensah, Pin-Lee. The world is dark at the edges and the feed flickering weakly. They’re embracing… The world flickers, in and out, and he rasps, “ My clients are the best clients .”

“W- what?” It’s Mensah's voice, but he doesn’t register it, not clearly. He’s in too deep to know he’s spoken out loud.

What is it? It’s an echo, something strong that lingered here still. The figures of himself, Pin-Lee, and Mensah are turning towards him, with faces of grief and something he can’t- or doesn’t want- to name, “ My clients are the best clients. ” What is this? It must’ve been strong to linger this long after the lights had gone out. A last fading word, thought, emotion…?

His chest hurts, aches. Everything does. It’s just pain, pain, and there’s something there inside of him that’s warm, despite it all, so warm, and he doesn’t realize there are tears on his cheeks, words thick with emotion, “ My clients are the best clients.”

And then he feels the creeping fingers of the cubicle's signal, latching onto that echo. It’s harsh, harsh enough that he remembers who and why he is.

Gurathin knocks back out of SecUnit, gasping and trembling. Mensah is before him, her hand in his. The rest of them crowd around her, “Are you alright? Gurathin?”

He looks over, the rest of them following his gaze, Bharadwaj sucking in her breath as the cubicle begins to do its work, needle starting to regrow flesh and restore its body. Ratthi throws his hands in the air, yelling excitedly, “You did it! Yes, Gugu, we knew you had it in you!”

Arada hushes him, “Shh, we don’t know that yet.”

Gurathin is still trembling, “N- no, no, I think- I think we did it. It’s- it’s locked on.”

Mensah's brows furrow, “But are you alright? It’s been a half hour, and you look sick. You started… started saying things that didn’t make sense.”

Gurathin shakes his head. Half an hour had been longer than he’d thought, “No, I just… It can be confusing, especially in such unusual circumstances. No, I found- I found an echo. I think, as best as I can describe it. It was just… a fading…” he waves a hand, looking away from them, “It’s last fading thought, is the best… the best term, I- I think, before it… that was…. That was its last thought.”

Arada turns and walks away. Pin-Lee curses and runs after her with a soft, “Babe, wait-“

Ratthi sits down with a thump, quiet, Bharadwaj placing an hand on Ratthi's back, comforting. Mensah pats Gurathin's shoulder, “Thank you, Gurathin. We're all glad you did that.”

He can still feel it. As if it’s there. His chest hurts, and he feels as if his- its leg was on fire. Breathing was hard, his head ached, he felt shattered. Gurathin rasps, “M- my clients…” It had looked at Mensah, Pin-Lee, and- and himself and the warmth had beat in his chest, “Are the best clients.”

He breaks down with a soft whining noise, not really a sob, but something similar to a wounded animal nonetheless. Mensah pulls him into a half embrace, his head buried in her hip, arms winding around her thighs as he clung to her, gasping for air.

Mensah runs her hand through his hair, “I'm sorry, Gura.”

“N- no-“ he makes a wet noise, trying to get it together, “No, I’m fine, it’s just- it’s the residual- the residual- it’s feelings, just, too close, we got too close-“ we? Oh, he and it- “It was sad to go, and- and too much. It was too much.”

Mensah, asks, curious, “You could feel it?”

He doesn’t noticed the tremor in her voice. 

“Memory. Just memory. An echo. An echo of- of-“ he chokes, “ Love , I guess. I don’t know, I-“

“It’s alright.” She looks at the broken body in the cubicle, “It’s alright, Gura, you don’t have to explain.”

SecUnit's flesh is being slowly stitched up, exposed insides pushed back within, sewn over. Except, she didn’t think, that they would be able to put it all back inside now that so much had been spilled out, raw and real and exposed to the humans it had seemed so wildly uncomfortable about.

Chapter Text

“How long has it been?”

Ratthi startles, looking up from his otamatone where he’d been playing it carefully, “Arada!” He sits up, “Er, well, total? Fifty-two hours give or take, and four since bed but I’ve only been here for the last two.” He shrugs, “I don’t know, couldn’t sleep. I felt like it could use some company.”

The cubicle is still working on repairing flesh and metal. The deep lacerations on its back were more easily visible now as it laid there, the blood that had marred it gone. Its arm and leg had been straightened and more of those quick needle-like machines worked there, “By playing it music?”

Ratthi shrugs, “Well, it really likes the serials. I thought maybe it might like music too.” He presses carefully as a note squeaked out, “Not sure I know the Sanctuary Moon soundtrack, but I’ve trying to learn by ear.” He hums, halting, clumsy.

It doesn’t sound quite like it, but his earnestness makes up for his mangling of the tune. 

Arada sits down next to him, watching him move and then looking back at their SecUnit, “Do you think it’ll wake up?”

“We’ve got to try.” His reply is fast, making her head turn back to his. He still watches his instrument, “We owe it that much, after everything.” His usual smile was gone, “It died for Mensah, for us. Twice, actually, if you count DeltFall and the combat override module. But even after, we just… We just doubted it. Or, I doubted it, was afraid of it. Didn’t trust it. We have to try to save it.”

“Ratthi…” she licks her lips, hesitant, “You're not at fault. And after Leebeebee… How could we have…?” She sighs, looking at the body in the cubicle, “Mensah's worried. Saving it might not be possible. It’s been… way too long. Way longer than it should for repair. It might not be able to fix it.”

Ratthi presses the instrument again, entirely genuine and sincere despite his lack of concentration, “It will.” He seems to be thinking, before he plays another note, “It’s Seccy. It’ll make it. Even if it takes a year in that cubicle, we’ll see it done.”

Arada leans back in her seat, “I wish I had your confidence.”

Ratthi shot her a smile, “It's Pin-Lee’s. I just borrowed it.”

“Where is Pin-Lee? I’ve been looking, I woke up and…”

Ratthi tilts his head to where the lawyer lays on the bench against the wall, “Knocked out cold, finally. Pin-Lee has been more anxious than I am. We monitored SecUnit for a bit and then… you know. I felt it would be more comfortable to sleep there than the chair.”

Arada had looked over and she smiles, small, “Thanks.”

“No problemo.” He plays another note, humming softly, trying to think.

His voice is quiet, thready as he sings softly, trying to pin it down, “There's a place beyond the wormhole…” Arada hums softly with him, the melody almost pretty, “A place that only lovers know…”

It’s just their voices echoing in the security ready room, and the noise of the system trying to repair their SecUnit.

Chapter Text

Gurathin pokes his head in the room. He doesn’t know when they’d started up with their midnight vigils, he’d tried not to think pessimistically of them as death watches, but he’d caught all the others here at various times. Everyone except him. Now, Pin-Lee and Arada are on the couch, dead asleep. Ratthi is next to them, head back on the couch, snoring softly, his otamatone in his lap.

Were they all waiting for it to die? Its flesh wouldn’t rot, even if it was dead. Its battery seemed to be doing just fine. It would just be… empty.

That thought is somehow more horrifying than anything else.

Gurathin sits down on one of the empty chairs. It’s cold and he shuffles, folding his arms. SecUnit is eerily still and he swallows, nervous. He hadn’t recovered from his wild embarrassment after he’d started sobbing in Ayda's arms. More stunning interference from their local SecUnit. Except, he still recalls it’s horrible memory, a disconcerting array of strange sensations and thoughts.

He didn’t like that he had this now, like he was… was carrying it.

He didn’t like it and it didn’t like him.

It was an uncomfortable squirmy feeling. Especially as he played it back. There was no audio, but he felt like he could feel its voice, error messages clustering together like a barrage. It’s annoying, even for him. Worse are the messages he'd felt that had come in from the rest of its body, blaring and frantic. The pain was faded from that dim memory and yet all too real. His spine is- its spine was - fractured, the metal cracked and the leg broken in half.

He can’t stop thinking of it like they’re his own injures he’s suffered, instead of SecUnit's. It had been as if his arm was shattered and shrapnel was all up and down his flesh, embedded in his skin. Worse, is, sometimes it still feels like it was happening now. He’d wake up and think that the back of his head was a mess of gravel and rock, two of his metal ribs cracked and piercing what served for lungs and abdomen. Gurathin can’t help but reach up now and press his fingers to the back of his head, where he finds only neat hair and no wounds.

It feels all too real.

It feels like that now.

And he can’t stop thinking of that quiet thought, the pain and the warmth and the sadness mixing all into one before catastrophic failure had killed that system. That’s right, killed it. It had known it was dying. Secunit had known. Their actions were futile right now, weren’t they? They couldn’t bring it back. He could just feel it. They were putting bandaids on a corpse, a corpse of the person he’d- he’d- Gurathin doesn’t realize he’s fisted his fingers into his shirt, breathing heavily, until Bharadwaj's hand is on his shoulder, “Gura, it’s alright.”

He looks up at her, blinking away a thin film of pathetic tears. He feels exposed, just as SecUnit had been exposed. But, unlike SecUnit, he had Bharadwaj who had always understood him a little more than most. His voice cracks, “I shouldn’t have this memory in my head.”

She pats his shoulder, quiet, “You’ve been in its head before.”

Gurathin looks down, fists clenching in his crew uniform, “This is different. This is different, now I-“ now he saw it as a person? He didn’t think he’d been wrong before, to be suspicious of it. It was a rogue SecUnit! Such things were not meant to be trifled with. Considering their delicate circumstances, it was reasonable to have hounded it so much. It was understandable to reach his hand into its wires and metal and yank out any and all ill-intentioned plans.

He hadn’t been wrong. It was all of those things. Understandable, reasonable…

But… it hadn’t been right either.

He hadn’t been right because it had always been on their side. He hadn't been right because it had proved, over and over, to be willing to protect them. He hadn't been right because it was… it was a person. And he’d crawled into its head and pulled thoughts and memories out that he had no right too. Gurathin was an augmented human, he’d had it done to him before. And it- it was awful, terrible… evil.

He whispers, quiet, “I’ve invaded it in a very deep and personal way that neither of us would like.”

Bharadwaj is quiet and thoughtful for a moment before she says, as if it’s simple, “Then find a way to apologize to it.”

Gurathin looks at his knees, eyes stinging, “But- but I don’t know how. Is there even anything I could say? That I could do that’ll- that'll properly convey…?”

Bharadwaj has more confidence in him than he does, “You’ll think of something.” Her smile is fond, despite everything he’s done, “You’re good at that.”

Chapter Text

Mensah walks into the security ready room at five am, unable to try and manage her fitful sleep. To her surprise, the rest of PresAux is already there. Pin-Lee, Ratthi, and Arada are asleep on and around the room's bench, and it looked like Gurathin and Bharadwaj had started working on… something before they’d fallen asleep on their chairs. Gurathin is slumped and snoring softly against Bharadwaj’s shoulder in a manner she finds all too touching. Mensah steps closer, something in her chest twisting as she realizes that they’d been working on something to give SecUnit more storage space for downloads.

She’d known they’d reach consensus eventually.

She turns, moving over to peer into the cubicle at SecUnit. It was still and silent but far less bloody. That was good. Or bad, depending on how you took it. She crouched down, watching its chest rise and fall. She lets out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. She’d woken up, unable to breathe during the night a few times already. But… for the first time in nearly three days, she feels as if she can breathe again.

Had it been that when SecUnit stopped breathing, she had too?

It’s a silly thought.

She stares at it, the face still slack and devoid of expression. Did it even need to breathe? Was this some random process for their comfort, set forth by the return of its automatic functions? She thinks about what it would do if she asked and she finds that she misses its uncomfortable grimaces and wide terrified eyes, gaze always shying away from hers, “I know I haven’t said it yet. And I’m sorry for that SecUnit.” She clears her throat, “Thank you for saving us. Thank you for saving me.” It doesn’t move, but it wouldn’t have moved if it had been awake. It probably would’ve stared just over her head and to the left awkwardly, with wide alarmed eyes and a turned downward mouth, “We're alive thanks to you and we are grateful.”

She folds her fingers together, sitting down beside the rim of the cubicle, “If there’s anything you’d ever need, we’d be happy to provide it, at any time. If there’s anything we can do… Well, you need only ask. I think we're all friends, now. If you’d like us to be. I know we can be a bit naive or make you feel uncomfortable with our silly human insistence on making eye contact,” she laughs a little, the sound wet, “But, I count you as an ally. Someone I can trust. A good friend.“

She looks at her feet, distant, “You focus on getting better, if you can. We'll take care of everything else. You just… you just breathe,” her eyes are hot and her voice is hoarse but her breath is sure and steady in her lungs, “Breathe in that crystal light.”

Its chest rises and falls, in tandem with hers.

She stays there until she falls asleep with the rest of her team, head leaning on the cubicle, their SecUnit breathing with them.

The thing about hub system is, that it was still recording. Everything up to my arrival in the rover all the way to pick up was downloading as soon as I woke up. I didn’t get to see it for a while obviously but when I did, I was curious.

Watching over the footage is enough to make me want to go and stand in the corner of the ship I'd hitched a ride on. However, I was already doing that so I just stood there and stared at the wall harder, trying to ignore the weird itching in my eyes. It’s embarrassing, humiliating. It’s sappy and soft and it makes my performance reliability drop a whole level as I stare at the slate gray wall panels.

But I feel weird and warm, my insides doing funny flip flops that I didn’t appreciate.

Those were my stupid humans.

My clients.