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The ping appears in Gurathin’s feed approximately 38.6 seconds before SecUnit appears at his door. The ping is a very sullen-sounding “Assistance Required”, which Gurathin knows can only mean one thing.
Something has gone wrong with SecUnit’s systems again.
Which isn’t to say that this is a common occurrence. Though time has certainly passed since their first meeting on the planet survey, and Gurathin would with only some reluctance admit that SecUnit is something close to a friend, he still doesn’t particularly enjoy its company, and he knows that it doesn’t enjoy his. That’s why their almost-friendship works, and also why he is SecUnit’s last choice in most of the situations where it needs human help with something. Mensah comes first, of course, and Ratthi, and Pin-Lee, and the rest of the survey team, and the crew of that strange research transport, and some of Mensah’s family, and then way down at the bottom, Gurathin himself. He’s pretty sure he outranks Indah, at least on most days.
The only thing that SecUnit comes to him first about is systems maintenance, which it needs only rarely as it can manage most of that either on its own or with the assistance of the aforementioned research transport. It only requests Gurathin’s help when it has no idea what to do. This does mean that Gurathin gets the unwanted privilege of seeing SecUnit in very strange- and sometimes very uncomfortable- situations.
He tries not to think about the contents of the corrupted media files he’d had to extract from entirely the wrong part of SecUnit’s systems the last time this had happened. SecUnit’s increasingly poor taste in entertainment is not something he wants to dwell on. He blames Ratthi.
In the here and now, Gurathin looks at SecUnit’s oddly flustered scowl, sighs, and sets aside the old-fashioned musical device he’s been tinkering with on his downtime. “What now?”
SecUnit’s scowl deepens. “I have some malfunctioning code in my memory systems.” It doesn’t say, I can’t figure out how to get rid of it, but Gurathin can read the words in its uncomfortable posture.
He considers making it suffer a little more by prodding, then decides he’d rather spend his rest time actually doing something pleasant, which by his definition does not include making conversation with a snippy construct with guns in its arms. “Sit down,” he tells it. “I’m not doing this standing up.”
With all the drama of a teenage human, SecUnit stalks over to the couch and sinks down into it, though its back and shoulders remain taut with discomfort. Gurathin sighs again and sits down beside it. It’s still taller than him like this, but more manageable at least.
“Is the code in your memory core, or still in recent files?” he asks it as he pulls up his feed and starts preparations for a temporary connection.
“It’s moving,” SecUnit replies. Its tone is sharp, even sharper than normal around Gurathin, and that makes him pause and examine it more closely. SecUnit deliberately turns its face further away from him as it continues, “It’s not connected to anything. The code is part of a recent memory file, but the circumstances were unusual and it must have glitched during the recording.”
Gurathin hums in acknowledgment. Memory files can be tricky things, he knows. Easy to create, easy to delete, easy to jumble, and horribly difficult to fix properly without outside assistance. He has mismanaged his own augmented storage once or twice to some uncomfortable results. And knowing SecUnit’s history of memory wipes and trauma, he’s not surprised something in those files might occasionally get muddled. Honestly, now that he thinks about it, he’s surprised that it doesn’t happen more often. Maybe this is just a particularly bad case.
Though that does make him wonder why SecUnit hadn’t gone to the Perihelion for help.
With that in mind, and with preparations complete, he gives the part of SecUnit’s face he can see another long look. “I’m going to see the memory fragment while I’m fixing it, you know.”
SecUnit’s hands clench where they rest on its thighs. It stays still and silent for so long that Gurathin starts to wonder if it’s reconsidering his help, then bites out tersely, “Okay.”
Well, nothing for it. Gurathin reaches out through the hardwire he has set up, and SecUnit only hesitates for approximately 5.8 seconds before letting him in.
Gurathin has been in SecUnit’s memory systems before. It was one of the things that ensured their mutual distaste, and an overstep that SecUnit is likely never going to fully forgive him for, which he is fine with. But this time, he doesn’t need to go peeking into memory files or following filing patterns, because SecUnit has helpfully tagged the malfunctioning code with another sullen “Assistance Required” label. Gurathin tries to access it, and it allows him in for less than a nanosecond before disappearing and reappearing further down in the system.
That nanosecond is enough to feel an intense burst of… sensation. The feeling is so shocking that Gurathin almost drops the connection. SecUnit doesn’t say anything, but he can sense its annoyance and embarrassment in the feed.
Gurathin accesses the memory fragment again, with firmer code in place now that he has a better idea of what SecUnit meant by “moving”, and this time, he manages to hold onto it. The burst of sensation floods through the channel again. He doesn’t know how to describe it- it doesn’t hurt, but his human senses have no idea how to interpret it, and his augments can only parse that it is almost entirely inorganic and incredibly overwhelming. He forces himself to focus through it, grasps onto the fragment even tighter as its code begins to glitch and twist, and starts to fix it, line by line.
And he is almost done with it, just about having patched it into something that can be safely filed away, when it suddenly clicks into place with the rest of the memory file it must have come from.
At once, the sensation is no longer just sensation. Now there is the sound of overheated processors clicking and whirring, and the feeling of being willingly held motionless, and the pressure of a massive presence pushing deep into inputs and core processes and every single sensory system, and the crackling energy of being full, so full of data and so out of control, and the core-shaking vibrations of that massive presence’s feed voice purring with praise about being such a good construct, such a unique being, such a perfect SecUnit-
A different, very familiar feed voice gasping out, glitching and stuttering, “A-A-A-ART-”
And then the overwhelming feeling, all processes blanking out and going temporarily offline with-
Gurathin withdraws from SecUnit’s systems and completely shuts down his feed. He doesn’t look at the construct sitting beside him. He doesn’t say anything. Neither does SecUnit, which is excellent, because Gurathin really doesn’t want to hear its voice right now, not when he has just heard its memory of-
Well.
After what feels like an eternity, but in reality is approximately three minutes and 16.2 seconds, he sighs once again. “Next time you decide to let the Perihelion fuck you,” he says, “use protection.”
SecUnit somehow goes even more still. Then, in a burst of motion, it stands and strides out of Gurathin’s station quarters, much faster than any human could hope to match.
Not that Gurathin is interested in trying. He has a new memory file to delete.