Chapter Text
The sounds of slaughter and laughter had slowly died out, the cold winds of Copper-9 carrying the long-dead screams of worker drones across the apocalyptic landscape as a lone disassembly drone stood in the midst of a massacre. Oil stained the ground as worker drone corpses were scattered about the clearing, limbs and scraps of internal systems littering the ground as the perpetrator of the slaughter wiped a trail of oil from her mouth. “And just like that, I am bored of this already,” V smiled with the same empty insanity she had always displayed in her violent outbursts, “barely put up a struggle, maybe the next batch of stragglers will keep things more interesting.” With one last look at her handiwork the disassembly drone unfurled her wings, shooting into the sky with little fanfare save for the sudden gust of wind disturbing the oil-stained snow, leaving behind another gruesome display of the fate of all worker drones that dared risk venturing out in the night.
Only a few minutes after the departure of the disassembly drone, from beneath the largest pile of former worker drones a stirring began, as a lone worker popped his head out. Oil caked the drones visor, a large, shallow gash across the side of his head barely leaking oil as he slowly pulled himself free of the morbid burial mound he had been trapped in, despite the horrific circumstances his eyes remained half-open as if perpetually tired or disinterested. As he pulled himself free of the corpse pile the drone took stock of his surroundings, mentally counting the corpses as he quickly established none of the wandering group he had slipped in with survived this attack, and with a cold indifference began picking over his former travel buddy’s corpses. It didn’t take long for the drone to find his own bag, its contents long ruined as he let out an artificial sigh, as he began picking up the limbs of his fallen kind in bunches, tucking them into his bag as oil further stained his tattered jacket. As he returned to the pile of corpses he had crawled from he spotted a backpack still tightly gripped by its former owner, his memory drives recalling vaguely who she had been, and it made him curious to her dedication to her cargo even in death.
It took a bit of effort to free the bag from its former owner, but once he had it loose and opened it, he realized why she seemed so familiar, as there nestled in a bundle of blankets was an inactive Untrained Neural Network. The worker drone remembered the couple he first talked to in this small group sat around a campfire talking about wanting to start a family once they reached the fabled bunker they all had been seeking out, how they were waiting to reach safety to put their code into the UNN. The worker drone carefully removed the delicate bundle from the bag, wrapping it up further to avoid accidentally giving it part of his own code before tucking it away into his own bag, quickly burying it beneath a bundle of arms and various keepsakes he had looted from other corpses.
After several more minutes of shamelessly looting his former travel companions the worker drone slinged his bag tightly over his shoulder, glancing up at the endless expanse of space and the ringed planet Copper-9 orbited, he quickly established his directions as he continued on the supposed path to the bunker. This group had supposedly traveled from the southern hemisphere of the planet seeking a safe place away from the dangers of the outside world, the drone sighing as he thought back on the countless colonies this group ignored in favor of this ‘fabled bunker’ they sought. He had only slipped into this group two days ago, but he could tell they were at best naive, at worst they were idiots, and now they were dead which he couldn’t really feel bad for as he had warned them. As he walked onward the drone found himself digging an arm from his bag, idly chewing on the severed limb as he glanced at the distant spire of corpses he was uncomfortably familiar with.
It was as he was observing the corpse spire he felt that same tickle in his programming, the one he always felt when a disassembly drone was close, his eyes remained relaxed as they darted around in panic. Realizing he was in the open, and the sudden shift of a shadow overhead the drone let out a sigh of defeat before throwing his arms out, just in time for three claws to impale his visor, a tall disassembly drone towering over the unfortunate worker. As the disassembly drone pulled his claws free a shadow descended down and impacted the ground with a dissatisfied growl, V storming over to her taller squad mate with a manic scowl. “That was my kill,” her voice was low as she kept her own claws drawn, “who do you think-” V never got the chance to finish her sentence as the taller disassembly drone quickly motioned to the corpse, a nervous look on his face, “Oh V, I was just getting them for you! I totally knew you were there, just uh, wanted to give you a break from hunting with some easy oil, yea.” N awkwardly gave V double finger guns as his visor displayed a pair of sunglasses, the female disassembly drone rolling her eyes as she knelt down next to the dead worker drone.
She desperately wanted to say something to the loveable idiot who was still awkwardly waiting for her to lash out at him, but she couldn’t help but appreciate his intentions, even if they were totally fabricated. She instead elected to accept his offering, yanking the backpack off the drone as she inspected the kill, more interested in why this drone seemed so familiar, while N was content poking around the bag. At first he had hoped to find something fun, or a gift for V since she was just a bit upset he stole her kill, but his attitude changed once he opened the stolen bag. ‘Wow that is a lot of worker drone arms, maybe I can make an arm bouquet for V?’ N thought to himself as he dug deeper into the morbid cargo. It took a bit of effort, but he spotted something bundled up at the bottom of the bag, carefully removing the blanket to uncover the Untrained Neural Network.
“Hey uh V, what is this thing?” N’s question drew V from her pondering on the corpses unnerving familiarity as she glanced at her squad mate and froze. At once the sight of her loveable, idiotic squad mate holding an Untrained Neural Network pushed several memories from before they deployed on this mission to the front of her mind. Images of the same drone cradling human infants, the gentle and caring nature that had comforted her so many times, but most significantly what came to mind was a briefing after their upgrade to disassembly drones by a human technician.
“We know with how long it has taken for any decision to be made on what to do about the rogue Copper-9 situation the worker drones have had plenty of time to create more drones,” the human had been lecturing for hours at this point, and V was only half paying attention as they still rambled on, “through the use of Untrained Neural Networks, or UNNs, a standard worker drone could be programmed in a matter of hours, however we know from satellite spying and hacking into old security systems remotely the workers have found a new way to ‘reproduce’ so to speak.” The slide changed to display a pair of worker drones, oddly enough wearing human clothes, which V found comedic, holding between them a single Untrained Neural Network, with non-standard eye color.
“It seems when two worker drones combine their base code in a UNN it creates a brand-new non-standard code that, while taking much longer to develop, is unique and independent.” The human technician flicked through several more slides, displaying worker drones with a litany of variations, V could see out of the corner of her eye J was practically seething, which only made the psychotic disassembly drone smirk at her squad leader's pointless rage. “Now we did some testing with a few loyal worker drones we have here, and also discovered something strangely unique. I personally think it is a glitch or bug, but it seems like two drones who share code through an UNN also develop,” the slides changed to show a worker drone holding a wrench defensively against the photographer, their partner cradling the UNN in a comforting motion, “for lack of a better word, paternal instincts, as well as a strong bond with their partner…it is almost sweet if it wasn’t actively threatening the company.” V rolled her eyes as she realized this briefing wouldn’t contain any combat information and decided to enter sleep mode, assuming J would have it covered.
V had never been so glad she stayed awake for most of that briefing as she witnessed N with the Untrained Neural Network, and even more so when she noticed the thing hadn’t been activated at all yet. A plan was quickly forming in V’s head, a chance to reconnect with her distant squad mate with a reasonable excuse, she could play off the affection and caring nature of the UNN triggering paternal instincts, and maybe even recapture the old love she had come to miss in the years since their squad deployed to copper-9. N, for his part, was more curious about the strange little device in his hands, turning it over a few times as he ran a delicate hand along the side before he felt a sudden surge, it lasted a second before he pulled his hand away to shake the pain off. Where his hand had been was now a yellow handprint, and a small loading bar appeared on the Untrained Neural Networks display, N’s eyes going wide in surprise and shock. V grinned as she watched this unfold, realizing his curiosity made this even easier, standing up as she began to slowly stroll over to the confused disassembly drone. ‘Just take it from him, imprint your own code, and then get back to the loving care he will shower you in like he used to,’ V thought to herself, completely forgetting the worker drone corpse she had been so concerned with, which would prove to be a mistake to neglect. With N busy still shaking the phantom pain on his hand and V’s attention on the UNN neither of them noticed the electrical glitching on the corpse, neither of them noticed the drone getting back to his feet, and both were oblivious to when his visor began knitting itself back together.
Both disassembly drones were blissfully unaware of the resurrection, at least until V felt herself being shoved face first into the snow, and N startled into tossing the UNN as a hand pushed him back. The worker drone snatched his bag from N and swept up the flying, half-programmed droneling with a blanket and took off running at full speed, leaving both V and N dazed, and extremely confused.
One Second, V was still face down in the snow, her mind running with a thousand thoughts a minute as she tried to process what just happened.
Two Seconds, a sense of longing filled the psychotic drones' core, realizing how close to returning to the love she had so long desired and missed, and now it was gone.
Three Seconds, she started to get up, on her hands and knees as she glanced at N, who was hovering over her in concern. He was totally focused on her, but she couldn’t even acknowledge it or she’d expose her secret.
Four Seconds, V felt a rage building in her core, she finally realized where she saw that worker drone before, her slaughter earlier that night, meaning this was a cockroach that she’d failed to crush, and it had come back to bite her in the metallic ass.
Five Seconds, and that is when V finally came to her senses, and the worker drones head start ended, as the disassembly drone barred her claws and unfurled her wings in a display of pure rage, causing N to step back in fear, she was mad, and he knew it.
Like a bullet fired from a gun V was off, her sudden departure sending a shockwave out as she flew with purpose, and she intended to make that little worker pay, how he even survived getting his head impaled didn’t matter, she’d make sure there wasn’t enough of him left to even be concerned with. Despite her speed V found herself still far behind the worker drone, who despite only fleeing on foot had managed a mind-numbing distance between himself and the murderous pair in the few seconds it took her to recover. Once she finally had him in sight she also spotted something that made her core sink; the massive doors to the colony that had been a thorn in her squads' side since they landed almost fifteen years prior. As the worker was quickly approaching the doors V felt a surge of emotions, first fear the drone would escape, then sadness of losing the Untrained Neural Network, before a sense of sadistic pride as she realized they wouldn’t dare open those doors in such a dangerous situation.
The worker drone seemed to also realize this fact as he kept charging headfirst towards the sealed door, tucking the UNN into his bag as he placed a hand on his chin and the other on top of his head. V was confused about what the worker drone was doing, as she was only a few dozen meters from her target, and he was a few meters from the sealed door. Then he reached the door, and without breaking stride his hands snapped, his own neck making a horrific crack as a small spurt of oil shot out, and his entire body seemed to glitch with reality, V watching in confused horror as the glitched form of the worker drone seemed to simply run through the solid door. Unfortunately for V her momentum compounded with the confusion she felt, as she was not so lucky to defy physics and felt the full force of slamming her face into the solid door, cracks snaking across her visor as she dropped onto the snowy ground, digital tears flowing on her fractured screen.
N hadn’t been far behind V, having also witnessed the worker drone defiling physics from a safer distance, as his wings tucked away and he crouched over his crush in her pained crying. He gently pulled her to her feet, wincing a bit at the sight of her visor, awkwardly licking his thumb as he rubbed the nanite saliva over the damage, watching as her visor began knitting itself back together. Both stood there for a few moments, V trying her best to hide the emotional outburst she’d experienced while N was even more gentle and caring than normal for his clearly distraught crush and squad mate. After several minutes both turned to stare at the door to the bunker, neither sure what to say as V let out a sniffle before slashing at the door with a single clawed hand, N only offering her a sad smile.
Then, N felt it, he could feel it in his core, like his very programming itself was screaming at him, and he stared at the door, his eyes hollowed out and he placed a single hand against the surface of the door, V giving him a concerned look at his sudden change in attitude. N wasn’t entirely sure what he was feeling, but deep down he knew exactly what it was: A desire to protect, protect his own code, and a newly shared code.