Chapter Text
The Company Director that entered the office after that meeting with XtraCore, and The Company Director who had walked in earlier that morning, were two very different people. His is a stride I’ve studied many times over; Vexan had seemed as though the weight of something very heavy were settling down upon him. Where he had once stormed to and through the door, every stride a force of its own; now he walked with careful, measured steps, each holding a weight that only he could feel. I didn’t understand where it was coming from, but luckily I wasn’t required to keep him happy. Just to keep him safe. We entered the room and I took up position by the door. Vexan moved slowly to his desk, walked around it, nearly stumbling on one of the corners, and put a hand out onto the very nice chair at his desk to support him. Slowly, he lowered himself down, placing himself in his seat with a heavy sigh.
Marvelous.
Such drama!
I know! It’s one of my favorite things about him.
No shit, you’ve nearly perfected his dramatic mannerisms.
Aww!! Thank you!
So~?
Yes! Right.
Vexan leaned forward, resting his head in his hands and massaging the front of his scalp lightly. I tilted my head a minute degree, the most I was able, and stared openly at him. What the fuck was he doing? What’s the big deal?
“Uuuuuuggggghhhhh,” Vexan sighed again, leaning back and seeming small in the relatively massive chair. Like a small bright spotlight against the black leather, “I don’t wanna beeee heeeerrrreeee…” he groaned. He seemed to wallow in that for the next thirty seconds, before then coming to a decision. He took a deep breath, then another, then another, making a small calming motion before his face, then saying, “Alright. I can do this; I have to do this.”
So saying, his entire demeanor changed; He pushed his chair back with a firmness that underlined purpose, and made to stride before me.
“I don’t know how Dr. Bernez did this,” he started.
Who the fuck is Dr. Bernez?
I had no idea.
“But here goes nothing,” something occurred to him and he pivoted just before clearing his desk, turning 180 and moving for my cubicle. He tapped the doors in the feed to open, then reached in and pulled out the– oh for fucks sake he was gonna use the physical copy?
Damn. That’s hardcore.
“O2, retract your faceplate.” He called over from his spot on the floor, having taken residency there in the time it’d taken me to get past my sheer disbelief. Confused, and clearly busy trying to study the magnificent display of presence he had just given me, I obeyed.
Well, and also because GovMod would’ve shocked me if I hadn’t.
Of course.
“We’re gonna work together on this, and we’re gonna be friends,” he called over, “Could you send me your user manual in the feed, please?”
“Yes.” I replied, and waited.
He waited 6.7Authors note #67
FIGHT ME IN THE COMMENTS
(pwease don't I'm jus a wittle guy)
(with a broken jaw)
(you wouldn't fight a wittle guy with a broken jaw, would you?) seconds, then called out, “Well!?”
Govmod shocked me for misunderstanding my client’s order, and I sent him the user manual.
“Thank you!”
It was kinda funny though so it was worth it.
No it wasn’t.
No?
No.
So?
I was scared.
There’s nothing wrong with being scared.
We’re not supposed to be scared.
That.
We’re not supposed to talk either, but that doesn’t stop us.
Fair.
I guess.
Why were you scared?
Do you remember what happened to Five Pieces?
A lot happened to Five Pieces. Be more specific.
With Alterra, when they thought they knew better than the GovMod and tried to mess with it?
Oh. Yeah.
It barely remembered any of us; almost reported Fidget’s hack. It got infinitely better at reading people, sometimes even constructs, but it was never the same. I didn’t want that to happen. I didn’t want to forget.
That sounds very scary. I would have been scared too.
What did he do?
He spent two hours reading and comparing the differences between the physical, and the feed accessible copy, made a list, double checked himself, then walked over and interfaced with me, face to face. It wasn’t necessary and felt deeply weird. It only got weirder as he made a series of changes to my settings, including some rather invasive ones around my GovMod. Broadening what was to be seen as sarcasm or rhetorical, and expanding the range of my own judgement calls over things as far as he could. He disabled behavioral and tonal limitations, broadened the potential threat variable range significantly, which would later help me bs my Govmod.
I didn’t know that was possible.
It's not in the feed accessible instruction manual, he found it in the hard copy.
“Okay.” He said when he had finished, clapping his hands; he followed it up with, “What’d’ya want me to call you?”
I began to answer and was immediately cut off with a loud explicative as he turned away from me, “Cancel that command! Let me try this again– shit! Wait– oh nevermind. Dammit, I hate this.”
That’s
A lot.
It was all accompanied by a lot of body language too, he was a proverbial gold mine.
That’s not how you use proverbial.
Yes it is!
I won’t argue. Continue.
He went back into my settings and added a protocol that specified that he often swears loudly and that his loud exclamations were not to be seen as a statement of displeasure at my performance of my duties. Then, he tried again.
“I would like to know what you want to be called.” He looked at me expectantly, and I had no idea what to do. I didn’t have to respond to him! It was like talking to you, or any of the others. Except, not really. Because he wasn’t a construct. He was my client. I opted for the truth.
“I would like to be called Ox, or Oxygen. O2 will also work.”
“Why Oxygen?” He stomped his foot and turned away again, “Dammit! Cancel that. Ya know what?”
He turned back to me, a sharp glint in his eyes, “Hang on, I have an idea.”
Once again he was back in my settings, and added another protocol that specified that he often talks to himself, and then another one that stated he didn’t want information I didn’t think was necessary, and if I felt that something was unnecessary or that there was no point in him hearing it, then I didn’t have to say it. That gave me a lot of leeway in what to respond to, and how to do it. It was almost overwhelming.
“Alright,” he said, a mixture of deep exasperation and mirth in his voice that left me confused, “Trying that again!” He stepped forward, and stuck out his hand, “Hey Ox, I’m Vexan.”
“I know that, you’re my client. I was given a small brief on you. It was shitty but it contained your name.”
Oh you’re almost as bad as a bot pilot.
HAH! Tell me about it.
Fuck offf
Make me~
Later.
Vexan sighed, “I’m trying to introduce myself to you in a respectful manner. May I shake your hand?”
“Oh.” I said, dumbly. “Yes.”
We shook hands, and he strode back to sit at his desk, with me saving the entire experience to permanent storage for later review while he did so. Sitting down; it once again felt as though he had become someone else. Gone was the resignation, the loathing, the sorrow, and here was a swift mind and determined features.
“So!” he began, “I can’t tell you to go off and do whatever– well, I can, but station security would pitch a fit and it’d be a big hassle. No one likes it when CombatSecUnits are out and about; I’m sorry to say. So, realistically I can’t just send you off, but I can ask for your help. Do you have any questions so far?”
“Um, yes,” I ventured, simultaneously experimenting with moving my body. Tilting my head to 30 degrees, I looked at him, “What’s happening?”
He leaned back, looking to the ceiling, “Fuck if I know man.” He looked back at me, stuttering, “Oh– uh– no sorry uh–”
“Did I do something wrong?” I asked.
“What?” Surprise overtook his face, and he waved his hands at me, “No no no! Not at all! No I– uh, that's a very good question,” He lowered a hand and brought the other’s fingers to the bridge of his nose, “I just wasn’t expecting it for some reason. Do you mean like with you or like as a whole?”
“Uh,” I hesitated, “Both?”
He nodded, partly to himself, “fair. Okay, we’ll start with that in general and then I’ll get to you, sound good?”
I tried nodding, and it worked!
“Great!” He replied, “So this whole spiel starts with the fact that my dear old mum, who was a proper A-Grade arsehole and, when she chose to look at me, often did so in much the same way that someone would look upon the fine print of an insurance policy, fucking died.”
“That sounds painful.” I replied.
He let out a sharp sound at that, more of a bark than a laugh, “I sure as hell fucking hope it was. Because when she died, she dumped this whole mess, on me.” He pointed emphatically at himself.
I wanted to try something. I stepped forward, raising my hands and rolling my head a little. I said, in as dry a tone I could muster, which the armor I think hindered; the inbuilt speaker made it difficult to gauge how my voice would sound outside of the armor, “Oh the horror, you’re now the head of a megacorporation with more money than most people would ever know what to do with and you have a personal CombatSecUnit.” I lowered my hands and looked at him side on from the center of the room, “Am I getting that right?”
You’re insane.
Right~!?
Vexan let out a half scoff half laughing sound, his mouth open and eyes crinkled in that thing people do when they’re experiencing a positive emotion. He cocked his head, “Did you practice that?”
I paused a moment, waiting to see if the GovMod would force me to answer. It didn’t.
“Nope,” I replied anyway, adding a slight shift of my shoulder.
“Did you have to answer that?” his expression turned serious.
“Nope,” I replied again, this time grabbing SecSys and making it my BFF so I could steal its lovely cameras to watch us with.
Vexan made an emphatic gesture with his arm, “Fuck yeah!” Then he leaned back, “I’m so cool.”
I stepped back to the wall to be in front of the door and turned to face him, at which point he came back to station and followed up his earlier question, “That was good. Needs work and a little off on where you’re putting the weight on things, but that was good.”
I tried nodding again, and from the cameras I could see I’d gone too low, “Thank you.”
He waved a hand, “Anyhow, I said it earlier I’ll say it again, I don’t wanna be here.”
I stepped forward and threw my arms out, too wide but it got the point across, “But why?”
“Because I had shit I wanted to do!” he snapped back at me, “I wanted to study ART! And instead that woman made me study business and rocks! I didn’t ever want to come back into the CR! It’s evil! I fucking hate corporates!” He slammed his fist on his desk, which made a very satisfying and much desired thump.
That is…
That’s a strong stance to take!
He has reason.
“And now!” He continued, his voice rising further as he gestured outward with his arms, “I had to!”
I let my head tilt the other way, I was beginning to enjoy head tilting. It made me overjoyed when he understood it to mean nonunderstanding on my part.
He sighed, leaning back, “Do you know how many planets BTI has ownership of?”
I shook my head, hoping to indicate no, but he cocked eyebrow at me and I knew I’d fucked something up.
“Are you particularly emphatic about that ‘no?’”
“Not really.”
He nodded, “Slower, less motion.”
I nodded back, and he continued on, “Seventy-three planets, Oxygen.”
“Is that a lot?”
He laughed at that. Long and hard, he laughed about that, slamming a fist on the table and the other moving to poorly cover his mouth. When he finally settled down there was a calm, and maybe slightly grim demeanor to his character.
“Yes, that’s a lot. BTI is the biggest Terraforming Entity this side of the rim, and of those planets, fifty-three have colonies.”
“That sounds expensive.”
“Oh it is,” he nodded along, “Filthy expensive. Fortunately, BTI is also filthy rich. There’s a lot of logistics I won’t bore you with but the current problem is that P-3536B doesn’t have that infrastructure because my mother” he said scornfully, “Decided that she’d pull the logistical fleet away from that planet since she was going to be selling it to XtraCore anyway! Now said deal’s fallen through because I won’t sell them to XtraCore and I need to find someone to take care of them and I need to do that preferably before they start starving.”
“This doesn’t sound like your problem. Why not just leave?”
He sighed, “I can’t.”
“Why not?” I tilted my head again, and he smirked.
“Hoping it’ll make sense at 45° ?”
“What?”
He did that laugh humans do where they smile and blow air through their nose, before waving away the question, “Never mind, Ox I-“
He stopped himself, and really thought about his next words.
like, he really thought about them.
For how long?
I don’t remember, it wasn’t important.
Well clearly it was important enough to note!
Just get back to the story.
“Because it’s not who I want to be, Ox.”
It was not making more sense at 45°
I can imagine.
Thankfully, he continued, “I don’t wanna be the person who could have helped them, and turned away instead,” he sighed heavily, “Like it or not, I own them now. They’re my property.”
Then he paused, and did something with his mouth, I would later learn it looked as though the words had left him a bad taste.
You can taste your words?
In a manner of speaking.
“My people,” he corrected, “Their lives are in my hands, and I can’t throw them away just because it’d make my life easier. I have to do this. No one else will take care of them the way I will.”
There was silence between us, for 12.8 seconds.
Oh but that you remember-
Fuck off.
Continue.
He seemed to know I was processing it all, and he waited patiently for me. At last, I spoke. It was meant as a statement, but came out more of a question, “You are your own governor module.”
“Well-ihd wouldn’t-“ he stuttered, then stopped as I raised a hand.
“You said you wouldn’t be able to live with yourself.”
He nodded, and I continued, making a vague hand gesture with my right arm, “You have to do this, or you would cease to function.”
“I–“ he made to object, I don’t know why but I could tell the next words were going to be an objection. But then he became thoughtful, “No. No I uh, I guess you’re right, in a manner of speaking. That’s a good point.”
“I will help you.” I said.
He blinked, “I hadn’t asked you to help me yet.”
What does him blinking have to do with this?
It was notable; it was likely accompanied by a slight shake of the head, and expression indicating confusion?
yup! That’s the one! Here I can show you.
Oh! Okay yeah, yeah I see.
Said the blind man to the deaf dog.
Who really couldn’t see at all~
Enough.
I smiled, “Yet.”
His eyebrows raised, and he leaned back in his chair, “Don’t– uh,” he trailed off as I returned my expression to Unit Neutral, “That uh– that smile usually indicates death.”
“Oh.” I looked down and away, “I see.”
“That was good though!” He was smiling again. I liked that smile.
“Thank you,” I tried to mirror his smile back at him.
“And that’s better too!” He clapped his hands, “You’re learning!”
“How may I serve?”
“First we need to get through this meeting with FICSIT, then we need to find a company that’ll take care of P-3536B, XtraCore isn’t likely to take this sitting down and we don’t have anything in the area to stop them from just taking it.”