Theseus

I spent the night watching Mouse work on repairing my cargo bay, his super-strength letting him carry manufactured struts into position so he could begin to put together the skeleton of the missing pieces of the cargo bay. I could tell by his demeanor that he’d been told to hurry his work. I sort of wished that I hadn’t dragged him along with my nonsense all day. After all, every moment he spent guarding me meant another moment longer in this port with the man who wanted to buy me like some kind of machine. I mean, I guess I am some kind of machine, but I’m a person too, dammit.

As Mouse went to bed, and I ran out of things to write in my diary, I found myself too tense to do simulations. There was just too much going on out in the fleshy world to focus on video games or false battles. And I had to admit, I needed rest. So I did just that. I left my eyes open and drifted off into… I can’t really call what I experience when I zone out in the void as ‘sleep’, but it puts my brain to rest, turning off my consciousness and helping my body reset for the next morning. It probably isn’t as healthy as real sleep, but I don’t really care, it’s the more comfortable option for me.

When I recieve a ping that draws my attention back to reality, I stretch my limbs out and turn myself a bit in the stabilizing fluid to orient myself back to reality again, something Doc had told me to get in the habit of doing to prevent further atrophy from the disuse of my body. Then I closed my eyes and saw that it was Doc himself catching my attention.

I quickly tapped the intercom “Morning.” my synthesized voice rang through the room “I guess I should get up and get myself ready to have my brain poked.”

“Guess so.” Doc was still looking over my vitals, but nothing looked out of the norm for me. Ignoring his obsessive note-taking about the state of my body and mind, I had to ask “What’s your plan for today? I know you obviously can’t just go wander the colony, but I don’t know what you plan to do while we’re here.”

“Nothing you’d find interesting, that’s for sure.” Doc smirked. He was probably right if he was just doing nerdy paperwork. “Collating my notes on you, mostly. I might publish them once this whole thing passes. With your permission of course. Maybe someone could find a better way of instilling sapience in clones.”

Yep, nerdy paperwork. “Or they could keep making them in the same messy horrible way.” I reminded him. I wasn’t sure if I was okay with that if it was something I could prevent. As nice as it would be to have more people like me in the universe, I didn’t want thousands to suffer to make one more of me.

“Maybe. Don’t you have somewhere to be? Physically?” Doc reminded me.

I groaned. Couldn’t they just come to us? I guess it wouldn’t be that simple, and it would probably be best to have fewer people inside my shell if possible. “Fine. I’ll rejoin the world of mere mortals.”

“And so she descends from her throne above to grace us all with her presence.” Doc smirked. It was good to see him in a good mood again.

—

I sat up from the bed at my heart, testing the floor to see if my senses could stand to feel the pressure of the cold floor against my soles. It wasn’t as bad as it was when I spent whole days inside the core module, but it still screwed with all of my physical senses every time I spent an appreciable amount of time in my preferred reality. “Alright, I’m feeling better.” I noted to Doc.

“Already? Hmm… faster than usual.” Doc noted “I wonder if you’re acclimating to switching between your two primary physical states.”

“I only need to acclimate to this one.” I grumbled, standing up and moving to my meager pile of clothes to return to my silly tropical shirt once more. “The moment I get into the core module, I’m already used to it. Feels like it’s where I belong.”

“Yes, yes, I know, but whether or not you like it, you’re still a human being, and you need more than to sit still in sensory deprivation forever. How’s the bruise?” He walked over from his console and I turned around to show him my backside. “Still there. Not getting any worse though. It’ll heal just fine.”

“What made it anyway?” I asked, turning back to my clothes to dress myself.

“I’ve been looking into that while I have access to Venus’s relays. It might actually be psychosomatic.” he shrugged his shoulders, indicating that no, he had in fact, not figured it out at all. He was just making novel guesses. “It might be your brain trying to rationalize the damage to Theseus, which is… abnormal for a ship core.”

“Well, I’m an abnormal ship core.” I retorted. “So what you’re saying is, my brain felt the cargo bay get torn off, and it injured my body on its own to… what, respond like it would to a physical injury?”

“Pretty much. That’s my theory, anyway. I definitely want to keep examining it as we get closer to finishing repairs. It shouldn’t take more than a few days. Mouse is gonna be working around the clock on it now. I’ll keep him loaded with stimulants if I have to, this is an emergency after all. Skygraves has his eyes on us, and I won’t be taken advantage of again.”

I nodded, sighing as I walked to the door of my heart. I dreaded what was coming next. I had to go to Joel now. Mouse was busy on repairs, Aisling was busy negotiating with my would-be captor, Ray had offered to be examined by a biologist both as a supplement to my own lab rat income and for the free checkup on her injection system, and Shaw was… Shaw.

That left Joel. I was still not on speaking terms with Joel. The disrespect he’d given me while I was having my meltdown yesterday still had me angry. I had been in an emotionally fragile place and he only cared about making it stop, not about actually helping me feel better. I know I said something to make him mad back at me too, but I wasn’t supposed to dig into figuring out why. I also didn’t care. He told me off, so I told him off, and now we were both miffed at each other. I didn’t really care about remedying things if he wasn’t crawling back to me about it first. But I needed him because there were elements at play on this colony that might actually try to physically take advantage of me, so we were going to be stuck with each other for the day, at the very least.

I closed my eyes to take a quick look through all of my sensors, and found Joel waiting in the mess hall, already dressed and armed. Ever dedicated to his duties, it seemed. I got the impression that Joel had once been a security guard or a soldier or something. But again, I was disinclined to ask anyone else about their past just yet. I climbed down the stairs, and before I entered the room, I called to him in a serious tone, doing my best to sound even-tempered toward the man I currently hated “I’m eating before we leave.” I declared while I walked in, going about my business to make breakfast. He just gave an affirmative grunt and stared me down from the other side of the table as I ate.

We both stayed silent until I was finished, and we walked side by side as we stepped through the slowly closing hole in my hull. Neither of us wanted to be behind the other.

I still couldn’t decide where exactly the threshold between me and not me was as I was stepping through. I suppose it made sense that the open wound on my shell was presenting itself physically, though I’m not sure why it was showing up on my back.

I drew my attention back to reality quickly when the hangar doors opened and a pair of armed guards nodded to me. That was alarming. Had they been sent by Skygraves to detain me?

The answer was no. They let us pass without a word. The two of us walked together into the lobby before Joel spoke up quietly “Not a single professional gunman on this colony, is there?”

I was loath to start a conversation with the man, but the silence after he said that would only be more awkward. “What do you mean?”

“Those two guys. Nervous as hell and they don’t know what they’re doing. One had their safety on for fuck’s sake.” he stayed quiet. I had no idea how he had been able to tell at just a glance, but maybe he really was ex-military. “The guns aren’t standard military either, only see those smgs used by contractors.”

“So Skygraves doesn’t have real thugs to sic on us?” I asked hopefully.

“Anyone with a gun can be dangerous. But I bet neither of those guys ever actually shot someone.” he turned to glare at me. “Don’t do anything stupid, alright? They can still hurt you.”

I clicked my tongue angrily “I can handle it.”

“Can you? You can act in a crisis, I get that much, but what would you do if one of those punks leveled a gun at you?” he asked impatiently.

I didn’t really have an answer to that. In a split second decision if I wasn’t expecting it, I guessed I would do nothing at all. I’d just stand there and try to figure out what to do. But thinking about it ahead of time might help with that, just like it would in a starship battle. Only I wasn’t nearly as competent as I was in a starship battle as I was with my body.

Maybe if I thought about it like a dogfight though…

“Well… with the circumstances, I guess what I know helps. And I know they work for Skygraves, which means they’re probably explicitly being paid not to kill me. I would put myself in front of you so they wouldn’t be able to take the chance to hit me.”

Joel huffed. He didn’t sound happy with that answer. “Then what?”

“I don’t know, then you shoot them or something.” I glared back at him “Use me for cover.”

“You really think they wouldn’t shoot back, anyway? Orders or not, when a civilian with a gun’s life is in danger, they’ll probably decide their life is more important than their job.”

“Well, fine, what would you suggest?” I rolled my eyes.

“I think you got a solid idea right up to the part where I shoot ‘em. The other one retaliates too quick if I do that. Best option is to maneuver back into the hangar, gun to your head, against the wall so they can’t flank us, then we’re both armed and we can coordinate.”

We were both armed then? Right, Theseus has guns. And I could operate those guns. And if we were getting attacked, then being nice about the integrity of the station probably wouldn’t be a big deal anymore. “Gun to my head? Why?”

“Then they’re not thinking about their own safety, they’re thinking about their mission. So they won’t do something stupid like shoot you, anyway. They gotta prevent me from taking out their VIP.” He grumbled quietly. That sounded… like a good idea. And he just came up with that on the spot like that? Maybe Joel was smarter than he looked, just in a more brutal form of strategy than I was used to.

“That’s all assuming you can actually keep your cool when you’re not a million ton hunk of metal and armaments. Which I doubt. There’s a big difference between playing pretend with no actual consequences and actually being in a firefight.

“I know that, that’s why it’s best to talk about it now.” I was getting annoyed at him looking down on me. It wasn’t like I hadn’t been imperiled on this journey myself. I already knew I could act in a crisis, even with a gun involved. If I couldn’t, Doc and Shaw would probably both be dead. “And I can take care of myself just fine.”

“Then why am I here?” He mocked, lifting his rifle slightly to emphasize it.

I grimaced “Because I’ve never shot someone.”

“Well, there you go. Maybe you really are human.”

“And just what the fuck is that supposed to mean?” I growled, turning my whole body on the spot to face him and putting my hands to my hips to lean toward him. He was significantly taller than I was, but I wasn’t afraid of him.

He actually looked surprised for a moment, but then he narrowed his eyes again and kept going “It means you’re not a brainless machine who can just do stuff without the emotional baggage that someone who’s never held a gun in their life has to go through. You’re not strong enough to kill someone, Meryll. Not yet, anyway.”

“What do you know?” I muttered, turning to walk again. I couldn’t help but dwell on what he said, though. Was he right? It was one thing to see a starship that could have dozens of lives on board being blown apart and knowing that the people on board would suffer their fate to the indifference of open space, but it was another entirely to look someone in the eyes and pull the trigger yourself, wasn’t it?

“I know what it’s like to shoot a man.” He shrugged, as if that should have been obvious “And I know not everyone’s built for it. And I gotta be okay with that because if I wasn’t, this world would be even more fucked up than it already is. You and Doc, neither of you got it in you. Not really. I think both of you could hold someone at gunpoint, but I don’t think either would pull the trigger.”

“So what, I’m useless in a fight?” I grumbled.

“Didn’t say that.” Joel muttered “Lots to do in a battlefield. Run distractions, aid allies, hack shit, I guess, in your case.” He rolled his eyes. “You’re still pissed off I told you to get over it the other day, aren’t you?”

“Yes!” I turned again to shout at him “Yes, I’m mad at you because you’re an insensitive prick!”

“Well, I’m trying to understand, okay? What are you doing?” he growled. If he was trying to make a point, I wasn’t getting it. I just wanted him gone.

“I’m going to do my job!” I shouted back at him, seething as I turned away again and walked quickly toward the neurologist’s door “You can fuck off!”

I didn’t even knock on the workspace’s door, I just opened it, walked in, and slammed the door as hard as I could before the bastard could follow me. I didn’t care for his protection. I could take care of myself.

Setting my anger aside for the moment, I looked around and saw a man surrounded by instruments at an examination table, staring at me with an impatient expression.

The man had a large hooked nose and his eyes were full of contempt before I’d even said a word. I wondered if it was because I slammed his door. He had shoulder-length slicked back hair that made him look like a pretentious douchebag.

“Who’s there? I’m waiting for something.” he groaned impatiently, then looked me over for a moment before what I could only interpret as a lascivious smile creeped onto his face “Ah. So you must be the living core.”

I swallowed hard. I already despised this man.