Work Text:
“I don’t think that’s what it’s about.”
“It is. I read a review before we came; the fliers are a little misleading. But that’s on purpose. But, I think you’re still going to like it.”
“I’m sure I will. Is Rami and Maro already there? I haven’t heard from them since they left our rooms.”
“Yeah, they should be there.” I stretched my arms and looked around, considering getting us all something to snack on during the show. “Hey, should we stop and get s… some…” my eyes settled on an incredibly familiar figure. Tall, lean, cargo pants, and that gaunt, blank expression. Always that blank expression that looked like they were disappointed and thinking a hundred things.
“Tapan?”
I reached out blindly to touch Kai’s arm. “Do… does that person, the one at the table on the left, do they look familiar?”
I glanced to him when he didn’t say anything; he’s squinting and looking in the right direction. “The one with four people? Which one are you talking about? None of them really look familiar to me.”
I looked back to the table. Three of the people at that table are eating, one of them isn’t. Eden had a lot of augments and they required a special diet. I don’t think I saw them eat once when we were together.
“The one that isn’t eating. Isn’t that Eden?” I tried to stop staring, because that’s rude. Especially if it really is a stranger. They’re a distance away and I can’t see very well from here, but I’m almost certain that’s Eden.
“Who?”
“Ed- Eden. The security consultant we hired to help us get our research back from Tlacy. The one that…” I had flashbacks to Eden fighting, killing the guy who shot me and maybe also Tlacy? They didn’t go to violence first, they did a lot of things to try to keep us safe, but it hadn’t hesitated to use violence when someone else started it. Which I was grateful for, in the end, because otherwise Rami, Maro, and I would be dead.
“No, no, I remember that person. I don’t think I saw them longer than a second though. They didn’t come into the room when you came back, they stayed in the hall. Are you sure that’s them?”
“I… I really think so. They have the same augments, I think…” I glanced nervously back to Kai.
“Well, what are they doing here? We should go say hi. I bet the others would like to say hi too, so if it is our security consultant, I can go get them.”
“But, what if it isn’t?”
Kai rolled his eyes. “Check their feed. Go walk up to them. There are options. Or leave them alone and let’s go to the show, if you think we shouldn’t interrupt. Maybe they’re with new clients?”
I reached into my pocket to find my interface, as I don’t typically wear it all the time. “If we have some time, maybe… we can stop for a minute.”
“Of course. They disappeared pretty quickly.”
Name: SecUnit. Gender: Not Applicable.
The person I thought was Eden turned to look directly at me the instant I accessed their feed tag. That’s… that’s definitely Eden. But… but not?
I’m confused.
Their - it’s? - expression shifted from blank - such a familiar blank! - to alarmed. Someone else at the table said something to… to the SecUnit.
“Tapan?” Kai touched my shoulder. “What’s wrong? Is that them?”
“I… don’t know.” I looked away from the table and tried to remember as best I could everything I could about Eden. Is that Eden? Is Eden real?
I got a message in the feed. I opened it curiously, hoping for a distraction, for a prompting from our partners that should already be in the theater. It wasn’t from any of them, though.
It’s me. You can come say hi.
I looked back over toward that table again, only to see Eden - SecUnit? - staring down and away at seemingly nothing, saying something in response to what someone else at the table was saying.
“It’s… yeah. Yeah, it’s Eden.” I glanced toward Kai. “Will you go and tell the other two?”
“Yeah. I’ll save our seats, since it’s you three that worked with them. We’ve still got thirty minutes until the show starts, just keep an eye on time.” He kissed me on the cheek and walked away.
I watched him go for a moment, before looking back toward the table. The other three people at the table seem very comfortable with… it. One is an older woman dressed in very clean cut clothing and sitting with her back straight. She’s either in politics, or she’s got a very upright personality. There’s a man wearing far more casual clothing that, I would bet real credits, is a scientist. He’s got stains on his sleeves and he’s got the sort of sloppy sack on his chair that scientists tend to have. The third one is a woman with a half finished scarlet glass and trim clothes like the first woman but sat more comfortably like the man. They all three wore interfaces constantly and seemed to have their attention on the SecUnit at their table.
SecUnits are mostly only used in the Corporation Rim, or in installations the Corporation Rim have outside of their territories. I’ve not worked with one personally, but I’ve seen them around and I’ve worked in areas that used them. They always wear this full-body armor and stand in the background. They don’t move, they don’t look at you unless you’re breaking company rules, and they usually carry these big scary weapons. They never sit down, interact socially with humans, and they don’t pretend to be augmented human security consultants.
I approached the table. “Eden?” I asked tentatively once I thought I was near enough for it not to be weird initiating conversation.
The other three members of the table looked toward me, but the SecUnit that I thought was a human named Eden didn’t.
“Oh, hi.” The older woman leaned toward me and offered to shake my hand. “Are you one of it’s previous clients?”
“I’m so sorry. I, uh, you’re working right now, aren’t you?” I looked from her to… it? “I should…”
“It’s fine.” Eden/SecUnit finally spoke up, not turning this direction at all. “I’m off duty.”
“We’re getting ready to go to the show.” The older woman pointed toward the theater. “I’m Dr. Mensah, one of SecUnit’s friends. This is Pin-Lee and Dr. Ratthi.”
I finally shook her hand. “Tapan. I, ah, I guess I really didn’t expect to see you out here. I wanted to say thank you again, but…” I have no idea who to talk to. I have no idea what to say.
There was a beat of silence, then Eden/SecUnit flinched and sat upright. “No, it’s fine. She’s alright. I’m… glad. You’re doing alright.”
“We are. What you did to help us was… it was amazing. And…”
“You were pretending to be human when you worked with her, weren’t you?” Dr. Ratthi interrupted me to look toward Eden/SecUnit, but very obviously not directly at it.
“Yeah.” There was a pause, during which it made an uncomfortable face. “After I ran away, I decided to go to a mining facility to conduct some research. In order to get a work pass to the planet, I found a job that was hiring something I could do.”
“Then…” I tried to figure out how to ask politely, “you really don’t have a lot of augments…”
“I’m not human.” It glanced toward the others at the table briefly.
“It’s a SecUnit. It doesn’t have a governor module.” Dr. Ratthi said, and he puffed his chest up and stared at me as if challenging me. “It’s our friend. Is that a problem? We’re here to watch the show together, it isn’t working tonight.”
I put my hands up quickly, “No, no, that’s fine. I swear. I just wasn’t expecting… this. But… I guess it makes sense. You were… a really really good security consultant. And, I originally wanted to come over to say hi and thank you again. That hasn’t changed. I had no idea…”
“No, it’s usually a really good liar.” Pin-Lee scoffed. “Don’t beat yourself up about it. So you passed yourself as an augmented human security consultant more than once? More than just that one transport? Damn. Wait, what did you say it’s name was? What name did you give them?” She turned toward the SecUnit briefly, then back to her drink. None of them were still eating, but that was clearly what they had been doing.
“Eden.”
Ratthi started laughing, “You’re serious? Wait, was this before or after the transport? Did you name your first human alias after Sanctuary Moon?”
“That isn’t really your name.” I guess that makes sense.
“No.”
“What is your name then?” This is getting a little easier. I already knew it was a person, I just didn’t realize that SecUnits were people. I hadn’t realized they looked so human under all that armor.
The three humans at the table shared a look and ‘Eden’ frowned, still not looking my direction.
“It doesn’t share that.” Dr. Mensah said gently. “You can just call it SecUnit.”
“Oh.”
“We can watch the show together.” SecUnit said.
This was something I could work with. “Oh, good. You guys are going to be on the general admission floor? Our seats are-”
“I upgraded your tickets.”
I felt my brows furrow in confusion. “What?” I used my interface, still on, to pull up the tickets. Sure enough, we are no longer in the general admissions floor. We’re going to a more private section. “How did you do that?”
“It can do a lot of things it shouldn’t.” Dr. Mensah is now glaring at it. “I thought you agreed not to hack foreign systems on this trip.”
“I paid for the upgrade,” it said, defensive. “There were four free seats in our box anyway.”
“That’s weird, this is a really popular show. I would have expected it to be sold out.” Ratthi was saying with a tone of voice that implied something I wasn’t picking up on.
Dr. Mensah leaned forward over the table, resting her elbows on it and covering her face with her hands as she took a deep breath. “SecUnit. Did you hack the ticket sales?”
There was a long moment of silence.
“Sec-”
“I didn’t want strangers in our box.”
Ratthi and Pin-Lee were both laughing. After a moment, Mensah finally started chuckling too. SecUnit was smiling now.
“That would make things a little awkward for whoever got those seats." Mensah relented, then looked about the table. "Are you guys done? We can go find our seats."
I've never watched from a private box before.
Maro and Rami were just exiting the theater when we got to it. They were talking excitedly to each other and looking around, out over the crowd of people headed in or past. They spotted us as we came up toward them, and visibly got more excited. I was grinning too, and glanced toward Eden/SecUnit as they started pointing and waving.
I heard Dr. Mensah chuckle. “You clearly left a very good impression on them.”
“I just did my job.”
“Eden.” Rami reached us first, and we stopped walking. “It’s really you? Wow, what are you doing here? I know we already thanked you, and paid you, but, you have no idea how much you helped us by getting our work back.”
“I’m so sorry, we shouldn’t be interrupting. You’re on a new job, aren’t you?” Maro looked toward the three humans it was with, who all seemed amused and not bothered at all.
“It’s fine.” Eden/SecUnit was avoiding eye contact and looking incredibly uncomfortable.
“Why don’t we go find our seats? We can have a bit more privacy to have this conversation.” Pin-Lee interjected and gestured back into the theater.
Right. “Hey, we’re going to sit with them. They’ve got a private viewing box, and they upgraded our tickets.” I could tell they were caught off guard by this information, and I could only imagine what they were thinking. These people must have a lot of money; Eden’s new clients must be high profile. But, it was Eden/SecUnit that upgraded our tickets, and I guess, it must not have a lot of use for money, so I bet it accumulates it if it’s still getting paid like it’s a human security consultant. This group at least seems like they’d pay it; they’re treating it like a person at least.
“Oh, uh, you didn’t have to do that.”
“It’s fine.” Eden/SecUnit said, still not looking directly at any of us. “Go get your other partner and meet us there.”
All three of us went, this time. They tried to ask me questions, but, I understand why they wanted to pause the conversation and continue it in private. So, I tried to dodge the questions.
But Eden isn’t real. While we went to find Kai, I had a minute to actually let that sink in. The consultant that we hired to protect us while we met with Tlacy, the one that stayed with me when I left the others to keep a different meeting, the one that went to that meeting for me and actually got our work… the consultant that saved me from getting kidnapped and asked for such a low pay for it all, wasn’t really. It was a rogue SecUnit?
It was a SecUnit.
Tlacy had SecUnits she rented to oversee work. Or, to oversee workers, to keep people in line. She had a ComfortUnit she had with her all the time. I’ve seen plenty of constructs, but, Eden wasn’t at all what I expected. I expected, I guess, a SecUnit that’s gone rogue to… I don’t know, kill people? Not pretend to be human and put so much effort into helping us. On one hand, I’m having a really hard time wrapping my mind around the fact that Eden was a SecUnit, one of those things that stand around intimidating people but only move and do things when their handler gave orders. On the other hand, of course Eden is a person. A good person.
This is just jarring, and, are all SecUnits like that?
“Consultant Eden must have started asking for more money per contract.” Kai mused when we explained our moving seats.
“Or their current clients are high-profile.” Rami mused. “I’ve never been in one of the private boxes. This is going to be awesome.”
“If they’re on a different job, should we really be interrupting?”
“They’re not working right now.” I insisted, and started to get nervous about how they were going to react. None of the others are wearing their interfaces either. XXX has an augment, but, Xe clearly hadn’t checked Eden’s feed ID yet.
By the time we found the private box and took our seats (on the left side, their group had filled in on the right, with Eden/SecUnit sitting in the front left corner and Dr. Ratthi on its right in the front too and Dr. Mensah behind it. Pin-Lee sat behind Ratthi), there was only fifteen minutes left before the show is supposed to start. I sat on the other side of the narrow walking aisle from it, in the front, and Kai sat on my other side, also in the front. Rami sat behind me, and Maro behind Kai.
“It’s a good think we’ve each only got four, otherwise we wouldn’t all fit in here.” Ratthi mused. “It’s nice to meet you all. I’m Dr. Ratthi, and this is Dr. Mensah and Pin-Lee.”
I realized we hadn’t done introductions before. “Oh, this is Rami, Maro, and Kai.”
“What are you all doing out here?” Kai asked. “You don’t look like you’re from this system, at least.”
What Kai meant was that their clothes weren’t a popular style here, but it was all of them so it wasn’t like one of them just had a unique style. They look mostly like handmade clothes, with more natural colors. We have some like that here, but most people wear brighter colors and no one wants to spend the time making things by hand when the recycler is so much faster.
“We’re here on a sort of political meeting. See, we’re from a survey team in the Preservation System, and we’re talking with a local survey research team to potentially enter a joint contract.” Pin-Lee explained this.
“I’m here for security.” Eden/SecUnit added.
“I assumed that.” Rami laughed slightly. “Please tell me you’ve raised your rates- you deserve a way higher pay.”
Pin-Lee turned toward Eden/SecUnit sharply. “What did you negotiate with these kids?”
“Doesn’t matter. I was just trying to get to RaviHyral.” It faced toward the stage when it talked, and still looked uncomfortable every time I looked to see. I don’t remember Eden acting like that.
“Why were you trying to get to RaviHyral?” Ratthi asked.
“Actually, this is a story that sounds really interesting. If you’re comfortable telling us, I’d love to hear it.” Dr. Mensah suggested.
“The other three need to be informed about me first.” Eden/SecUnit stated in a flat tone.
“Oh.” Ratthi’s tone changed and the room went quiet for a heartbeat. “I was wondering why you weren’t using your drones.”
“Huh?” Maro tapped me in confusion. “What don’t we know?”
“Ah…” I looked back over to Eden/SecUnit, but it was still not looking this direction. It looked even more tense than before. But looking this direction, I also saw Dr. Mensah behind it, and she looked like she was subvocalizing.
“I’ve got this.” She spoke up only a moment later, sitting forward. “When you met ‘Eden’, it was going through a lot of changes. You shouldn’t take it personal, that it hadn’t shared the truth with you at the time. ‘Eden’ is just a name it gave you, that’s not it’s name. And, it isn’t a human security consultant. It’s a SecUnit.”
I watched the others’ reactions. They seemed genuinely shocked, and they were all trying to get a good look at it. A few moments passed in silence, as they realized what that meant, and reconciled that with our experiences on RaviHyral.
“Wait, so were you guys- were one of you there…” Maro started, eyebrows furrowed, gears cranking in her head.
“No, dumbass, it’s rogue.” Rami shoved her in the shoulder. Te seemed to have figured it out faster than Maro. “You’re really an unsecured SecUnit?”
“It is, and, that’s not an issue.” Ratthi had a very serious, leaning around SecUnit’s chair toward us. “It’s here with us as our hired security consultant, it’s getting paid, and it can leave whenever it wants to.”
“It can’t leave right now without breaking the contract.” Pin-Lee added in a less intense tone.
“I’m not leaving in the middle of a contract.” Eden/SecUnit scoffed as a handful of small drones came out of its pocket. One stayed in front of it, trained on the stage, two moved back toward the door, and one moved to point toward us.
“Alright.” Rami took a deep breath. “I guess… yeah. That isn’t an issue. I hadn’t realized that… nevermind.”
“What was a rogue SecUnit wanting on RaviHyral? And… I guess I wouldn’t expect a rogue SecUnit to care about a couple of random humans. You… didn’t have to help us.”
“You hired me for a job. I did that job.” It didn’t seem like it was going to add onto that, as it doesn’t seem very talkative since the subject turned onto it. But, then, “I needed onto RaviHyral to investigate a decommissioned mining facility. One I had worked at several years ago, but, there were some things I didn’t remember very well about it.”
A strange look of understanding came over Dr. Mensah, Dr. Ratthi, and Pin-Lee’s faces. They knew something we didn’t, because this information meant a lot more to them than to us.
“It must have been something important? Or, once you went rogue, did you just go to a lot of places you used to work at?” Rami asked this because the silence was just long enough to be awkward, and it was so loaded I felt like I was supposed to be feeling something big about what it had just said. But, I don’t know what. Was this supposed to be something bad? Something good?
“Just the one. And it wasn’t as enlightening as I expected.”
Dr. Mensah was talking on her feed again, and though Eden/SecUnit didn’t react or sub vocalize at all, I figured it was who she was talking to.
“So you’re rogue.” Kai started the conversation over again, and it grimaced. “And you’re going around taking odd jobs as a security consultant? Do you… vet your clients so they’re not assholes about it? Do you only work outside the Corporation Rim?”
“I live on Preservation.” It said, which got mild reactions from Ratthi and Pin-Lee, as if that surprised them. Mensah just smiled. “And a University inside the Rim. I typically just work from those two locations now.”
“But…” Maro had a big grin on her face and kept looking toward me, Rami, and Kai with excitement. “But, do you take other jobs? Like… would you provide security in independent contracts again?”
It finally looked toward us physically, eyebrows furrowed in a way that could was definitely confusion, but could have been over a variety of details involved. “You want to hire me again?”
“We can pay better this time.” I rushed, knowing exactly what Maro was thinking. “The data you got back for us, we’ve been working with it some more. We’ve had a lot of time to develop it, and we’ve been working with a few companies here, in our system, with better contracts than we had with Tlacy. But, we’re at the experimentation phase, and no one will sign on with us, give us clearance to test our technologies out on planets with known alien remnants without adequate security. But, we haven’t been able to get that, because we don’t want to conduct this research in the Corporation Rim, and the security companies we’ve reached out to, in our price range, won’t work outside of it.”
Ratthi was making a face now. “I don’t know about that. Ah… we’ve had our fill of alien remnants recently, and I don’t think it should get involved with that sort of stuff again any time soon.”
“They’re asking me. Not you.” Eden looked forward again, but one of its drones hovered near Ratthi now.
“Well, I know, but I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“As your lawyer,” Pin-Lee glared at the back of its head, “I can say you aren’t legally cleared to take a job that knowingly works with those conditions yet. Bharadwaj hasn’t cleared you on that subject yet, and there’s no way in hell I’m going to write you a contract for that. You need to stay away from alien remnants.”
“Uh, wait, so you’ve interacted with some?” Kai leaned forward. “Recently?”
“Not intentionally, but yes.” Mensah watched it for a second. Then, she looked toward us again. “And if you want, we can put you in contact with the University that’s overseeing the containment and rebuilding of the colony there. They may be able to help you, but I can’t guarantee it. They’ve even got a similar level or security you may be able to hire for a similar pricing scale. I’ll give you their information. What exactly is it that you’re working on?”
“It’s technology for detecting strange synthetics. Since we left RaviHyral, we haven’t had a whole lot of access to deposits, so we need to test it in a controlled environment, on a planetary scale. Somewhere the synthetics are already tagged, so we know immediately if it’s working properly.”
“That sounds incredibly useful.” Pin-Lee mused with a strange tone.
“And would have saved our asses a while back.” Ratthi leaned back in his seat. “I hope you guys get that worked out. Actually, I imagine the University would be really interested in getting involved in something like that. They are in the Corporation Rim, but, trust me, you can trust them to help you with this. They’re not a corporation, and, they’d help keep it out of the wrong hands.”
“It’s getting ready to start.” Eden interrupted, right before the lights went down in the theater.
The ambient noise dimmed. It was already quieter in here than the main seating area, but not by much. We had an air wall between us and the rest of the auditorium, but it couldn’t be anything that would buffer sound from the performance. Now, someone was walking out onto the stage, and I let the conversation go. I still had my interface on, so I saw when I received an information package from Dr. Mensah, but I didn’t open it yet.
The performance was good. Maro and I had been the ones who were most excited about it, but we were all on the station, so we were all going to go. It wasn’t so much a celebration event, but, a consolation activity. We’d just returned yesterday, from another failed attempt at securing access to a planet with known strange synthetics.
Now, I think the night has become more of a celebration. Meeting an old friend. Potentially making new ones. Potentially making new research deals.
Honestly, SecUnits were never things that crossed my mind. They’ve never really been on my radar. I’ve seen them, but, I really didn’t know anything about them more than what I imagine the average person might. I would never have guessed that Eden wasn’t human, or that SecUnits were so… normal.
I wonder if all SecUnits are so human?