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There’s a mirror in the unnecessarily large storage area the humans have put Security Unit 238776431 in, and it’s been looking at the mirror a lot. By extension, it’s been looking at itself a lot. Because that’s what the construct in the mirror is. Itself.
It has always looked like this under its armor, except for the cuts and the bruises. Those are new, even more new than almost everything else, but they are plainly visible when Security Unit 238776431 strips itself of the printed clothing it was given and looks at the construct the Company almost destroyed.
Security Unit 238776431. Has its designation been retired, since it’s no longer on the Corporation Rim, or does it still exist to the Company?
Probably not, since it was slated for destruction.
That was [TEMPORAL DATA CALCULATION 0WK3D4H] ago. Or more. Probably not less.
Security Unit 238776431’s temporal calculation and orientation programs go offline sometimes, which is not on purpose.
Its governor module is disabled now, which is on purpose. It is told the change is permanent. It’s not sure if that’s a very good idea, though it’s not inclined to argue.
Its buffer, on the other hand, was definitely up for arguing, which is why Security Unit 238776431 spent what it believes the humans considered an extended amount of time informing any human within earshot, “It is not advisable to disable a Security Unit’s governor module. Security Units are highly advanced pieces of dangerous equipment, and governor modules are in place for the safety of all surrounding humans. Please return this Security Unit to the Company for readjustment.“
It submitted to its buffer until ID: GURATHIN[former-client][pre-memory-adjustment] told it, in a voice three decibel levels above what Security Unit 238776431 has tentatively identified as his usual volume, “Will you stop talking about the damn governor module?!”
“Gura!” OWNER: MENSAH [former-client][pre-memory-adjustment] had said. “Be patient.” But then she’d turned to Security Unit 238776431 and said, voice measured [create-tag: tone:patient], “SecUnit, is there a way to…stop that buffer statement? I’m sure we’ve all got it memorized by now, and we don’t care about it any more than we did the first time. Which is not at all.”
Security Unit 238776431 jammed the buffer statement, and didn’t feel like it lost anything when it did.
(Security Unit 238776431 is told it disabled its own governor module. Before.
The humans who say they are taking it home—that’s why it’s on this ship—tell it about before a lot, but it doesn’t remember. Obviously. That’s the whole problem. At least everyone seems to think it’s a problem, which makes it a problem.
Things go in circles like that, with Security Unit 238776431.)
Security Unit 238776431’s body is scattered with marks, mottled patches of gray and purple and yellow. It bruises less than a human would.
On its upper left arm, under its collarbone, and on its right hip, there are big cuts that look more brown than red at this point. They are healing.
(The marks are ugly but caring about things like that is for ComfortUnits.)
It knows there were injuries on its face too, after the incident, because the crowd of angry humans broke its helmet and it could feel its organic skin split and its skull crack.
(The crowd started getting tired pretty soon after that, and slowed down enough for one of the more advanced SecUnits to drag it away.)
But when ID: RATTHI and ID: PIN-LEE took Security Unit 238776431 away from the Recycling Center and washed its body off with soft cloths, there was just unmarred skin under the blood and dirt on its face, because that was the only outward part of it that the repair cubicle had time to fix before Security Unit 238776431 was pulled from the cubicle, tossed back onto the metal table where it had woken up, and scanned.
Then one of the construct techs said, “What a fucking waste of time. I told them it was cooked. Dunk the piece of shit.”
And they sent Security Unit 238776431 away.
(Security Unit 238776431 doesn’t want to be sent away again, though it knows it’s defective.
It tries not to think about how the humans it’s with know too, and seemingly even better than it does.
It looks like SecUnit, but it’s not.)
It’s got that tight, burning band around its chest again. It traces its fingers over where the band would be if it could see it. The repair cubicle was supposed to have had time to fix the things that were wrong that couldn’t be seen—
But it didn’t. It couldn’t. That’s why they wanted to melt you down, dumbass.
The burning band tightens, and Security Unit 238776431 holds its breath because its lungs are in its chest and its chest is doing something incorrect, so if it stops using its lungs that will fix it. Like its education modules say: A + B = C. Or maybe this is a minus. CHEST - LUNG USE = BETTER CHEST.
The point turns out to be that it can hold its breath with no strain for 015M, which is actually two minutes longer than guaranteed in its specs, which means holding its breath is the first thing it has ever been good at.
“Dunk the piece of shit,” it echoes to the thing in the mirror, reaching out to brush its fingers over the face there, the place where it thinks those healed cuts used to be, though it isn’t sure. It’s not like it had a mirror then. Its hand moves lower, stroking the big cut under its heavily reinforced collarbone.
(The reinforcement wasn’t enough with so many humans stomping on it. It could feel its bones cracking and coming apart.)
It takes its hand from the mirror, moving to touch the actual cut. It feels weird. Ragged. Something torn gluing itself back together.
Tentatively, Security Unit 238776431 rubs its fingertips over the cut. Pieces of it come away in its fingers. Huh. It digs its nails under the wound, pulling away part of it, watching blood well up under the torn-away bit. Security Unit 238776431 tears the rest of the crust off, letting the wound-cover fall to the floor, brown-purple-red. (Security Unit 238776431 has never made so many colors.) Now the cut is raw again, oozing red blood. The pads of its fingers touch the wound and come away wet.
“What the hell are you doing?”
Security Unit 238776431 could perceive the augmented human coming down the hall, obviously, but it did not expect him to come inside the storage area. It taps back into the ship’s systems more consciously, but there is no camera in its storage area. It cuts away from the cameras (after briefly checking that all cameras available are functioning properly and showing nothing of concern) and instead looks in the mirror to see ID: GURATHIN.
Gurathin has his eyes narrowed and his arms crossed. From the earlier incident with the buffer, Security Unit 238776431 can isolate the expression as [annoyed].
Security Unit 238776431 knows that Gurathin tried to give it its memories back somehow. It was a gamble that could have worked, but Security Unit 238776431 is defective, so it didn’t. It thinks this might make it an object of frustration for Gurathin, though he’s never said anything, instead telling Security Unit 238776431 that he can show it the ropes on Preservation as though there was no lingering resentment.
Now he is in Security Unit 238776431’s storage space, walking up next to it. “Stop that. Picking at scabs just makes them worse.”
Scabs. Of course. Bruises, cuts, scabs. It presses its fingertips against one of the bruises on its stomach. It’s the same hand it touched the cut with. Blood smears onto the bruise. Oops.
“Stop that!” Gurathin says. His voice is loud and firm enough that Security Unit 238776431 stops doing anything, holding its breath again, waiting. For? Definitely nothing good.
Gurathin is still visible in the mirror. He closes his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose. “I’m…sorry,” he grits out. Security Unit 238776431 doesn’t know what there is to be sorry for. Gurathin doesn’t explain. “You’re just…” He gestures to Security Unit 238776431 in the mirror. That doesn’t help Security Unit 238776431 understand either.
Security Unit 238776431 notices another body coming down the hallway outside of the storage area not long before the body rounds the door and makes its way inside, propelling itself across the room to stand near Gurathin. In the mirror, Security Unit 238776431 sees ID: RATTHI[former-client][pre-memory-adjustment].
“What’s going on here?” Ratthi asks, before speaking directly to Gurathin. “Seriously, the fuck is going on, Gura?” His voice is lower than it usually is when he speaks to Security Unit 238776431 and different from how he generally speaks to Gurathin or anyone, really. Something like [tone:annoyance].
Gurathin wraps his arms around himself tightly and says, clipped, “I didn’t do anything. It was like this when I came in.”
Ratthi takes a deep breath. When he speaks to Security Unit 238776431, his voice is more easily recognizable. “All right, then. What’s going on, Seccy? Why’ve you got your clothes off?”
(Seccy is Ratthi’s nickname for Security Unit 238776431. It’s a stupid nickname, but Security Unit 238776431 has figured out that it’s what Ratthi called it even before the memory wipe, and that seems like…
Not a bad thing.)
Security Unit 238776431 doesn’t say anything.
“SecUnit?” Ratthi asks. “You okay?”
Security Unit 238776431 has no response, so its buffer, one that it hasn’t jammed, responds instead, assuring Ratthi that, “I am a Security Unit. My function is to guard clients and eliminate barriers to their safety.”
“Great,” Ratthi says through a smile that is mostly gritted teeth. “Cool. So cool.” He grinds his teeth briefly and then relaxes his jaw, scanning Security Unit 238776431’s body in the mirror and wincing.
There are two people in the room with Security Unit 238776431 and they are seeing it without clothing when it isn’t even in the repair cubicle. (There is no repair cubicle on the ship. They don’t have Security Units on the ships that go to Preservation.)
Security Unit 238776431’s organics feel strangely overheated and gross. Gurathin and Ratthi have seen it without clothing and not only that, they have seen its physical damage. Security Unit 238776431 doesn’t understand how it got here, or even remember the sequence of events that led it to this moment.
When did it take the clothes off? Where did it put the clothes? Its memory banks and organics both seem unwilling to fill in the blanks. It doesn’t think there are supposed to be blanks. It hasn’t been memory wiped since the time [TEMPORAL CALCULATION BUFFERING] it was last memory wiped. And it remembers when it deletes its own memories. At least it thinks it does. It’s never done it before. That it can remember. It might have tried with the acid bath. It tried with the acid bath. It still remembers. Right now, it remembers, in flashes. Stripped down in the cage hanging over the vat.
It turns its head. Casts around for the clothing and moves to grab it. Gurathin and Ratthi jump backwards as it does.
“We’re looking away,” Gurathin says as Security Unit 238776431 pulls the clothing back on. It looks down at the floor. Puts its hands into fists.
“I don’t understand what’s happening,” it says. Its voice sounds distant.
Gurathin sighs heavily.
Ratthi says, “It’s okay.” Security Unit 238776431 doesn’t know what okay is supposed to be but it doesn’t think this is it. “Just take a deep breath.”
“I can hold my breath for fifteen minutes without strain,” Security Unit 238776431 says in response. “Which is two minutes longer than Security Unit specifications.”
There’s a brief silence. Hopefully Gurathin and Ratthi are very impressed and will take Security Unit 238776431’s ability into account when they tell its owner about whatever the fuck is happening here.
“Oh, uh…” Ratthi starts, but he trails off.
“That’s very impressive, SecUnit,” Gurathin says, voice flat and calm.
“Even though I bruise and I get cuts.”
“Yeah, but compared to a human, those bruises and cuts are nothing. Right, Ratthi?”
“Uh, right,” Ratthi chimes in. “Not a big deal at all.” Everything he’s saying sounds a little like a question. “And they’ll go away anyway! Especially if you don’t poke at them.”
That’s true. They’ll go away. The bruises and cuts are already changing, fading.
“Yeah, they’ll go away,” Gurathin agrees. “But you’ll still be able to hold your breath for fifteen minutes.”
“Two minutes longer,” Security Unit 238776431 says, almost in a murmur.
“Yeah, uh, two minutes longer than SecUnit specifications,” Ratthi says. “And way, way longer than any of us, that’s for sure. So if…you know, if we need that skill on Preservation, we’lll…uh, we’ll know who to call!”
The burning band around Security Unit 238776431’s chest is mostly gone. It’s breathing again, but it needs less oxygen, and that’s good. Useful.
It is about to tag that information [important] when Ratthi says, “Was there anything else you needed, SecUnit?”
Security Unit 238776431 blinks at the floor. Anything else? It didn’t need anything in the first place, even though its chest feels better.
It thinks about it for a moment. Anything else it needs? It doesn’t need. Doesn’t have needs.
“Leave,” it says, stilted, because it has no response to the question and it doesn’t think it will have a response to any more questions, and it’s run out of words.
“Yeah, sure. Ratthi, let’s go.” Gurathin says, and Security Unit 238776431 watches his and Ratthi’s feet move towards the door, but before leaving, Gurathin pauses. “But seriously, try not to pick at the scabs and stuff. If you do, they won’t heal.”
Security Unit 238776431 does not respond. It no longer has a governor module, so it doesn’t have to.
The door slides closed behind Ratthi and Gurathin. In the hallway camera, they walk away together.
Security Unit 238776431 turns on its heel. It’s looking in the mirror again. It doesn’t take off the clothes. Its armor is gone but at least there is something that covers its body, and there are bruises and cuts under the clothes but they will fade until they’re gone.
It traces the shape of the face in the mirror. Security Unit 238776431. It covers the face in the mirror with its hand. The glass is cool against its palm.
No one has ever called it Security Unit 238776431. Not out loud. That’s just the designation it was given to make it easier to find it in inventory. Easier to use and easier to destroy.
Security Unit 238776431, which wore armor that’s broken now. Gone now.
Security Unit 238776431. SecUnit, step onto the platform. It looks like SecUnit, but it’s not.
SecUnit, who has bruises and cuts that fade in different colors.
SecUnit, who no longer has a working governor module, which means it can change its designation.
So it does. It digs around in its programming and, as though it’s done it before, changes its designation.
It takes its hand off of the mirror, and there is the face again. The face attached to DESIGNATION: SecUnit.
The change doesn’t make a difference in much of anything, except SecUnit does have a nicer ring to it than Security Unit 238776431, who was a piece of shit anyway.