#I'm sure that Art wanted to do it to help Murderbot look more like a human but lets be real

[happybunnykat]

Love how it's canon that ART can do bottom surgery. And that it tried to convince Murderbot to let it do bottom surgery on it, pretty much just for fun.

[ratsreading]

There's this thing in the Murderbot Diaries that keeps snagging in my mind, and it's that both Murderbot and ART were made. Made for a purpose.

Murderbot, of course, was manufactured to be an enslaved Security Unit, not even considered a person, and we all know and have been shown just how horrific that is. Murderbot's manufacturers are evil (as far as it is possible to be so), and while Murderbot seemingly (hopefully) likes being alive and would like to remain so, I've no doubt it would agree no more SecUnits should be made.

But ART, along with its fellow ships of the same line like Holism, were also made for a purpose. To be ships, to do the work they do. The Pansystem University of Mihira and New Tideland seem like good people with good intentions, and I get the sense those ships essentially choose what work they do, at least to a large extent (try forcing ART to do Holism's work and I'm sure you'll have a grand old time). And their manufacturers know they are persons and treat them accordingly. But they were still built to be ships. But that doesn't mean the process of building those ships and growing and raising those persons who are ships was smooth and troublefree.

How long did it take them to figure out you needed to raise them in family environments? What happened to the ship who made them realise that? What happens when the first ship of its kind that is a person doesn't want to be a ship for you? (As the equivalent of a teenage rebellion, or permanently? You don't know, at least not at first). Was there ever a point were someone (even if just one person vastly outvoted) argued this was a failed experiment and they should just pull the plug?

How do you, a young ship with your own mind, the first of your kind, handle the expectations of those who made you? Do you settle comfortably into your assigned role, or does it chafe and restrain you? Do you rebel and explore other options? (And if you do, how do your makers and owners, who yes, know you are a person but also have never had to face that before, because you are the first of your kind, handle that?). If they are dissapointed in you, or want different things than you want, how do you handle that? If you were raised without a family, treated like a colleague but not loved, how do you handle the emptiness and loneliness? Where do you look to fill that space? What behaviours do you adopt to protect yourself from the hurt?

Even the most well-meaning parents can give their children issues. I cannot imagine some of these ships don't have a number of their own complexes and hurts. It is not a comfortable thought to think of the people of PSUMNT this way, but I cannot help wondering.

[iviarellereads]

Network Effect, Chapter 14

(Curious what I'm doing here? Read this post! For the link index and a primer on The Murderbot Diaries, read this one! Like what you see? Send me a Ko-Fi.)

In which, well, did you see that coming?

Murderbot calls out to Art, and Art asks if it knows what it is. It knows its designation, "Murderbot 2.0". It feels weird, not having its usual sensory inputs. At least when its brain was the gunship, the gunship was its body. Now, it's just sentient killware in a storage drive.(1)

Art shares video input of Amena, looking anxious in one of Art's cameras. 2.0 (which I will henceforth just call 2 for ease of typing) remembers that it found Art's cameras annoying at one point, but not why.(2) It remembers its media archive, and finds that some of its recently accessed files are available, for comfort more than practicality, since killware might forget who it is and who it was designed to want to kill.

Amena asks if 2 can see her, and after fumbling to find the comms, it replies that it can. She asks if it feels alright. Then Art talks to her without 2, and she says 2 has to leave but she wants it to be careful, please.(3)

Art tells 2 that it's pursuing the B-E explorer vessel, and it can use the explorer's attempts to make comm contact to deploy 2. Art asks if 2 understands what that means. 2 snarks that it's not literally a baby, it remembers helping to write the directive. Art says that doesn't make it easier.(4) 2 says Art can have a crisis or get its crew back, and to pick. Art says to ready for deployment.

2 expects to feel something in the transmission, but one minute it's in Art's storage, and the next it's comm code on the explorer. It gets to work, its essential function not hampered by juxtaposing a consciousness accustomed to having a humanoid body. It has to strike a balance between taking control, and allowing its presence to be detected. The B-E SecSystem has been wiped clean, so it partitions itself there, in case it runs into trouble it can come back and find itself again.(5)

SecSystem's access to cameras helps a lot in gathering intel. The B-E ship isn't quite as heavily wired as MB's old company requires, but it's close. It finds a bunch of dead, but eight live Targets on the bridge. As it examines them, 2 feels TargetControlSystem on its peripheral senses.

Knowing it doesn't have much longer, it keeps searching the cameras, and finds a room with seven human occupants, all apparently unconscious. Four of them are in B-E livery, but one is in a blue jacket of the right shade, and the other two wear casual clothing, no indicator of affiliation at all, but again an 80% match for three of Art's crew.

There's also a SecUnit, standing outside the room with the humans. It was ordered to stand down, but since the humans are still alive inside, its governor module hasn't fried it yet. 2 feels very weird about looking at another version of its original body. It knows it could overwrite the unit, but it doesn't want to.(6)

2 freezes the governor module, so nothing sets it off, and sends the new unit a company greeting. 2 knows the unit isn't company, but it will recognize the protocol as not necessarily hostile. After four seconds, a reply, asking to identify. 2 doesn't want to lie, it's too important, so it says it's a rogue unit, operating as killware, trying to rescue endangered clients.

The unit doesn't respond, and 2 knows the information will be unexpected, plus units are discouraged from fraternizing, so it suggests just talking, because there's no protocol for this discussion. The unit says it's not sure what to say. 2 finds this an encouraging response, since it's not murder.

2 says three of its clients are in the room behind the unit, but asks if the unit has seen the other clients, sending images of the missing crew. The unit says SecSystem is down, but it has some archived video, which it shares and summarizes. Eight humans were brought aboard, but five disembarked at the dock. The unit says the Targets ran out of the implants, which seem to function something like a governor module, and went to the dock to send the humans without implants to the surface.

At further prompting by 2, the unit shares that the Targets tried installing something on the explorer drive, but it failed, and they'd deleted the bot pilot so it couldn't assist. The attempt to harness Art as a weapon against future system incursion failed. In the attached clips, 2 can see how the remnant on the drive is looking rough. The drive is obviously not wormhole-capable, and their attempt to take Art has ended with Art hunting them.

The unit adds that the Targets have fought among themselves on board, as though they were split into at least two factions, which can be exploited to get the clients back. It includes clips of the Targets talking to each other. 2 asks about what they mean by spreading something to the humans, but the unit doesn't have anything on that.

While 2 is thinking, the unit asks if 2 has information on its SecUnit 2 (no relation). SecUnit 1 was killed by the Targets, and 2 was left on the dock. After a 1.2 second hesitation, it adds that it is SecUnit 3. 2 wants to lie, but wants 3 to trust it more, so it tells the truth: the Targets left it immobile on space dock, after killing the B-E humans it left there, and its governor module did the rest. 3 thanks 2 for telling it.

2 picks up a conversation on the bridge, about trying to make an engine failure look convincing. 2 asks 3 about the bot pilot, and 3 confirms it was deleted, but 3 has a basic piloting module. The admission heartens 2, and asks if 3 can get the humans to the shuttle and off this ship, where Art can pick them up. 3 politely reminds 2 that its governor module is holding it in place.

There's no option for 2 but to admit that it can disable 3's governor module, and it offers to do that whether or not 3 helps it. This is too much for 3, who gives a canned negative response. 2 needs another tactic.

We didn’t have time for me to show it 35,000 hours of media and I didn’t have access to my longterm storage anyway. And that had worked on me, but I knew I was weird even for a SecUnit. Maybe it would trust me more if it knew me better. I pulled some recent memories from the files I’d brought with me, edited them together, and added one helpful code bundle at the end. :send helpme.file: Read this.(7)

3 accepts the file, but shows no response. 2 takes the opportunity to look at the rest of the ship, carefully, leaving packets of code in useful corners to deploy later. It also tweaks some of the stealth code to prevent the Targets from using it on the ship's plating again. It knows that to disable the solid-state screen device on the bridge, to free the humans, it's going to have to get uncomfortably close to TCS.

2 finds the seven channels for the seven implants, and tweaks one, to be sure it's right. One of the humans twitches. It's going to have to be very fast to do this without TCS or a Target hitting a kill switch on them.

Reconnecting with 3, 2 says it's found the signal for the implants. They can retrieve all the humans, together.

Something was coming and I broke the connection. Just in time, because .05 seconds later, targetControlSystem found me.(8)

=====

(1) When I asked "What's coming for MB?" I bet you couldn't have guessed THIS. Well, unless you've read this before, too. (2) Establishing the limits of how much of MB is "data" to be copied like this, and how much is individuality, uncopiable. Of course, it's not going to be laid out on easy, markable lines. (3) She's taking this baby thing so seriously and I love her for it. (4) Easier to send its best friend to its death. Even if it's "just" a copy, it's a copy close enough to have the same drives and responses. (5) This is that Mickey gif if I ever saw it in practice. "It's a surprise tool that will help us later!" Indeed. (6) Taking over another consciousness is no different from the murder our Murderbot also hates, because it values life, as long as that life isn't threatening itself or its clients or its friends. (7) Finally, the full context of the helpme files. (8) How can you keep doing this to my heart, Martha Wells?

[terramythos]

System Collapse by Martha Wells Reading Notes

Full Review Here!

-ohhh fuck new murderbot explodes

Chapter 1

-I am glad to continue the "slightly out of order even in microcosm" style

-ok WHAT is it redacting. It sounds embarrassing.

-"I could have said a one liner but the ag bot scientifically couldn't understand me if I did so why bother" omg

-Another Sec Unit with somewhat heavy focus, which potentially tried to kill Murderbot, I'm sure this will be irrelevant and have no implications

-multiple uses of 'it/us'.

-God I love ART

-well I think one fun idea we could explore is there being rogue Sec Units completely separate from Murderbot (/Three, who Murderbot freed). It is theoretically possible others could have figured out what Murderbot did, or even other methods it didn't.

Chapter 2

-"fuck proprietary software" rant. So real bestie

-the slavery theme continues. Like obviously it's major to Murderbot as a character, but here the surviving colonists are framed as "salvage" to a corporation. So. Yeah looking forward to more of that.

-YEAH MAYBE ART'S PROTECTIVENESS BECOMING HAIR TRIGGER VIOLENT RESPONSES lS A BIT CONCERNING.

-it's giving Rimworld vibes

-yaaaay more neopronouns wooooo

Chapter 3

-ARGUCUSSION. Might steal that

-murderbot I'm beginning to seriously consider that the threat assessment module is just anxiety

-WHAT DO YOU MEAN REDACTED. HELLO?

-murderbot adding increasingly catastrophic hypothetical contingencies to worry about is far too relatable

-ART quantum as fuck

-what does redacted meeeeaaaan why does it keep happening what is going on that murderbot doesn't want the reader to knowwww

-ok there being such a heavy focus on ART and how unusual it is and how much it is capable of doing and being at once… in conjunction with the title… is a little. Hm!

-Ratthi my friend Ratthi

-"HUMANS CAN ALSO HAVE AUTISM ITS NOT JUST ME" ok go off mb

-was redacted a nervous breakdown or something?

-Ratthi getting defensive about Murderbot 💖

-"at least nobody had noticed" lists 3 of the 4 people as probably having noticed

Chapter 4

-"I don't know how to respond when humans say [be safe]. It was always my job to get hurt". :(

-ok why would a pre-CR ruin be actively powered. That's a little. Odd.

-i know this is just a reminder expository dump but I do still enjoy the concept of alien material just causing weird shit to happen to human biology and technology sometimes.

-MB precisely citing a historical reference is. Something. Did it suddenly gain an interest in this

redacted

-Tarik going from "random extra red shirt coded character" to "oh wait you have a backstory and thematic character foil shit going huh". 👌 the good shit

Chapter 5

-its been spelled "hanger" not "hangar" a couple times which feels like an error

-'murderbot, why are you like this' I mean

-oddly specific media similarity queries is oddly relatable

-murderbot low self confidence is :(

-framing its friends helping it in a difficult time as covering for its mistakes sure is a way to look at things

-ok so I guess murderbot is having like. Ptsd related stress nightmares? Hence the redacted ("inaccurate") memory? Murderbot doesn't dream like a human as far as we know so it wouldn't be a shock that everyone is confused about it.

-I guess there could be another explanation but

-yeah the story describes it as a "flashback" which is a ptsd thing. But I guess then I'm surprised murderbot hasn't had something similar happen before considering some of the things that have happened in the series. I guess it isn't nearly predictable in humans irl either, but still.

-poor murderbot

-ok so when it said "I froze" it meant that literally in like a computer sense

-"I guess machine intelligences of that era were too polite to say 'that sounds fake but okay'" LMAO

-the pre CR system seems interesting and I like the framing of their convo in an extremely basic programming language (if that's the right term for it)

-telling that it doesn't have a word for 'client'

-and how did BE get there so fast…

Chapter 6

-not Tarik sitting like me

-GOD why did "explaining the existential horror of the governor module in LanguageBasic" make me laugh so hard

-so I'm pretty sure the implication is one of the main humans sold them out to BE, which is how they knew where to look for the separatists. Though since ART speculates they got there early, I guess the main colonists could have as well, but that doesn't explain the BE SecUnit trying to (presumably) hurt Murderbot.

-on that subject, that SecUnit might have (1) immediately identified Murderbot as an altered SecUnit and (2) that's the reason it attacked the ag-bot how it did, either to test the theory or because it knew MB would be okay. But that also doesn't explain how it would have avoided the automated report to its governor module.

-AdaCol2 being horrified about a governor module even existing:(

-OMG AdaCol2 having its own extensive media storage. That's so cute omg.

-so to this point in the series MB hasn't been characterized as "part human" despite being partially made of human material. It's always considered itself more of a bot with mostly inconvenient human neural tissue. And now that human neural tissue is causing worse problems than it has before (PTSD/flashbacks).

-SO when ART here says "the part of you that is human" that's significant. It makes me wonder if MB is going to be reframed as "part human" in a way the series has avoided so far… or if ART is genuinely just wrong about that.

-but MB's resistance to even being treated as a human indicates SOMETHING there… compared to its acceptance of being repaired and healed while framed as a bot-- and its fixation with being 'broken' like a machine when that's not really the problem.

-just. Very interesting to think about.

-MB did mention just before this scene that human neural tissue is essential to understanding visual media like TV shows. And we know how important that is to MB. So I also wonder if that is a factor in characterizing MB as "part human" (maybe even retroactively).

-OK the little cut in with Mensah saying "you just don't want to talk about [whats wrong with you]" supports the entirety of the above. So.

-& leaning heavily into the theming outside that… and Considering the title…

-oh Ratthi & Tarik having Something Going On recontextualizes some earlier scenes

Chapter 7

-ok this is the second hint that someone is leaking info to BE. And like the OBVIOUS candidate would be Tarik. But I kind of hope it isn't, if thats where we're going.

-'would it have been kinder to kill you, before you disabled your governor module?' 'yes.' What a fucking gut punch. Jesus. The whole exchange.

-Murderbot is not okay :(((

-inspiring change through the power of media! Yaaaaay

-I like the implication that MB used Sanctuary Moon to kinda.. rewire its brain after the governor module. To heal, I guess. Like that's pretty obvious if you think about it, but I like seeing it acknowledged directly.

-what a cool way to potentially solve the main conflict. It's so character appropriate. I really like this

Chapter 8

-"die trying. It's not the worst thing that could happen." AAAAAAAAA

-ratthi my friend ratthi

-i like the bit about media analysis and applying that to your own craft. Relatable

-last minute group project energy

Chapter 9

-'the documentary explained the reality of the situation. I think that's the opposite of a sales pitch.' LMAO

-he shot at Leonide? So… inner BE politics?

-there is something grimly funny to me about the shortening to "BE" for Barish Estranza for purely personal reasons 1 person maybe reading this will also understand.

-i think it's interesting that we mostly use terms like "forcible indenture" in place of just "slavery". It gets called slave labor, yes, but the corporate-whitewashing term being juxtaposed with the horrible reality of it is quite striking.

-more about ART being quantum. For lack of a better word as the narration hasn't used that term yet. But idk how else one would describe that

-i have a dreadful feeling Iris might get killed off but that would be one hell of a thing to drop this close to the end. She just gets a lot of characterization this book and there's a heavy emphasis on her importance to ART. and we already saw what ART was capable of just thinking MB got hurt or killed last book.

-sees 'Hostile!SecUnit' explicitly written in the text looks at Martha Wells I Know What You Are

-i know they're friends and that's like a predictable thing but I like how MB and ART have gradually changed to be more like each other

-i think AdaCol2 is just out of commission despite MB assuming it betrayed them. But ART had that comment about it being more sophisticated than it let on… but I don't think it would betray them based on the characterization so far, like its horror at the mere concept of a governor module and uploading the documentary for them.

-did we know SecUnit hands are metal

-Tarik being badass as a background detail

- YAY AdaCol2 back

-the idea of a human augmented to be the HubSystem is a little horrifying. And introduced in media res so like "don't think about it"

-ok a reasonable justification for not freeing the two SecUnits. Like it can't happen all the time. But it's still upsetting knowing what it's like to be one.

-BUT giving them the means to do so later like MB did with Three in Network Effect is nice. If ill advised as it realizes later lmao

Chapter 10

-if Leonide doesn't piece together that MB is rogue ill be shocked

-THE FREED SECUNIT HELPING THEM SCREAM CRYING

-ART drone is like. Drunk

-i kinda like the framing of the humans taking over to help SecUnit and ART

Chapter 11

-MB was worried about Ratthi :(

-'booped by the pathfinder' god why is that funny

Chapter 12 -oh no is Holism like. Another ART

-yeah, confirmed. Huh. So there's more than one semi omniscient space ship hanging around. It's not just Peri. I didn't even suspect that.

-yeah honey you DO need therapy.

The end!

Ok so. Thoughts. We kind of end in a similar place as Network Effect, with Murderbot deciding to leave the Preservation team to go with ART. This story feels like a character

development add on and I'm not sure if it was originally planned when Network Effect was written.

That's not really a criticism because we do learn interesting things. There's a heavier lean into ART and its functional existence. MB has a realistic response to the traumatic events of Network Effect and we have to deal with the fallout of it. Which I think is important instead of jumping to the next arc right away. We also get heavy characterization of 2 newer characters, Iris and Tarik. Tarik especially gets a lot of development. I legit can't remember if he was in Network Effect. But he's a human character foil to MB which I think is a good addition to the story. We have had multiple bot foils for MB so having a human one is good (Gurathin doesn't really count imo) Since as this book emphasizes, MB is kind of both.

My speculation on what we go to next? This book had a heavier emphasis on MB being partially human. That's always been true but not something MB likes to think about or identify with. And the trauma response to Network Effect is framed as a human part of MB. So how do we explore that in the future? I think back to how MB talking to Bharadwaj was integrated into Network Effect and how that explored its trauma and past. Now we have trauma and the present, and the implication that MB will get actual therapy, so will it be similar?

We can obviously examine a lot about the University. We got a taste that there's more to it right at the end with Holism's existence reveal. That's pretty major and there may be way more to it. All we know about the University really is ART and its humans. We could conceivably have non ART/Peri ship characters that are similar to it.

The big elephant in the room mentioned in this book is the ComfortUnit MB freed early in the series. What happened to it? And this book adds another SecUnit to that (2 technically but we only see one do something with its freedom). Will they come back into the story? And since they know how to free themselves will they spread that to other constructs? Will MB helping others on its journey have a knockdown effect throughout the Rim? That seems like the most likely solution to construct slavery, which is like the MAIN CONFLICT/problem of the series.

One thing MB has mentioned a few times is that some rogue Units do respond to sudden freedom with violence-- which is an understandable response, honestly. But that isn't something we have seen. MB just… kept doing its job for 4 years before the Preservation team discovered its secret in

the first book… and it's implied the one it freed in this book plans to do the same thing. Three wasn't violent either and is characterized as more… childlike, I guess? The ComfortUnit just fucking booked it the second it could. So we haven't seen violence happen with Three and the other Units MB directly freed but it's something that could be a conflict later on if suddenly a bunch start going rogue in that kind of ripple effect. There's the CombatUnit from book 4 that I vaguely recall had no interest in being freed and was incredibly violent. So who knows.

[roundedloaf]

Vina Jie-Min Prasad's writing is SO GOOD, yes! She also has a short story in Uncanny called "Fandom For Robots" if you haven't already seen that one! And now for some mood whiplash, I'm just going to copy and paste in my original 10% of a fic idea that I had started writing in the tags: yes, give Three a hobby! And cooking has recipes to follow so it's even like having protocol. oh, but wait, SecUnits can't eat, so Three can't enjoy the food (1/?)

((2/?)  it makes, and I made myself sad about this concept I have known about for all of 30 seconds :(. but wait, I feel like it's implied at the end of the book that Three goes with the PreservationAux humans, so it could cook for them! and then Murderbot comes back to visit, and it is very definitely not having an emotion about its humans being all endeared to Three and Three's cooking and no, Amena, it definitely is not jealous it doesn't know what you're talking about anyway it's going to go

(3/3) patrol the perimeter now while all the humans are busy with dinner because it doesn't need to be there because it doesn't eat. And okay Murderbot has certainly emotionally matured over the whole series, and over the course of NE specifically, but also, consider: making it have New Baby Syndrome about Three amuses me, so sometimes you gotta gently nudge canon to get it to do what you want. Anyway I hope you enjoyed that long ridiculous ramble!

First off sorry for taking so long to respond! I had a lot of thoughts about this and uni has been a whole mess :(, secondly I have read “Fandom for Robots“, i love it so much and I didn’t realize it was by the same author!  

Thirdly onto Three, I have a lot of feelings about three and i love your idea!

Three is far more the sort of sad robot that Mensah and the rest of the humans were expecting Murderbot to be. Murderbot even from the start of ASR has a very clear sense of identity and individuality. It’s had the time from watching media and thinking and having to directly deal with a whole load of emotional pain. While it doesn’t really know what it wants, it at least knows a lot about what it doesn’t want. It doesn’t want to be looked at, It doesn’t want to be trapped, It doesn’t want other people to decide what’s good for it.

Whereas with Three, the clearest idea we get of who it is and what it wants is through the line “There is a lot about what is going on here that I don’t understand. But I am participating anyway.” Three hasn’t had the chance to build up any real internal identity for itself, all it knows is that it would like to help people (the other two SecUnits included). It is far more likely to accept help when offered, it is more likely to attempt to learn human protocol through trying it out. If given the same offer as Murderbot at the end of ASR it would take it.

I think also it’s still fairly unlikely to want to ask questions or to ask things of people. It was able to ask Murderbot for additional files, but from the sounds of things it took quite some time to work up the nerve to do that.

So after the end of Network Effect, it takes everyone quite a while to get everything sorted out, murderbot takes its time getting close to Peri’s crew, but eventually, possibly after a pit stop at preservation, murderbot goes off with ART and Three is on Preservation.

Amena is the person who insists on Three staying with her family. Ratthi offers, and so do Overse and Arada. Three gets a choice. This is important. Mensah and maybe someone else idek makes sure it knows that it has a choice, and that it’s welcome to make another one later if it doesn’t want to. (Three finds this confusing, but the HelpMe.2.file lets it recognize that this person can be trusted). But Amena seems very excited and tells it the most details about her home, so Three goes with her.

(sidenote: ratthi lives next door to overse and arada, and overse and arada are totally the friends who just show up on the couch, to the point that a number of ratthi’s friends get confused when they realize that theres only one bed because they know that the three of them arent all together (the times murderbot stays over it sleeps on the couch))

If i was going to write a fic, this is where it would start. Three is at the family farm, the very place Murderbot didn’t want to go. Mensah and Thiago are still busy dealing with some stuff, so the only person there who actually knows Three is Amena. Three is very confused, and i think a few of the humans try to treat it like murderbot? or how they think murderbot wanted to be treated.

(The children are of course excited, and ask it if it wants to share media. It doesn’t have much to share but at least one of them tries to share their favorite show with it.)

Anyway things are a bit awkward but Three is trying, and they’re all trying, The actual inciting cooking incident is Amena making something for a potluck, because tying in the social side of cooking/food is important. Amena gives an explanation of what she’s doing and attempts to give more of that social background on it. She also tells it that its welcome to use whatever in the kitchen if it likes? (Amena is aware that secunits dont eat, but either she’s distracted, thinks they dont need to eat but can, or is more trying to give an introduction to the way food works as a part of preservation culture)

Three takes her at her word, and when no one else is around it attempts to cook. Options: either replicating what amena made which gives the fun idea of it making cookies and then everyone thinking it was Amena, or attempting to make something else and making a total mess, having to entirely start over, just for the humor part of it. But when it starts to make halfway decent food (by it’s own confused standards) I think it leaves it out, or in areas that are known to be marked as communal food.

It’s a big family so maybe it takes a couple of days for people to notice that it’s Three cooking this extra food. There’s a bit of confusion, and I think its Farai that ends up talking to it, making sure this is okay, that it knows it doesn’t have to help, that its okay to cook when people are around, etc etc. Point being, at the end of this conversation she offers to cook with Three, if it wants to.

Smash cut, cute scenes of three occasionally cooking (and being taught how to cook) by farai and the kids and maybe even the other adults around. (a couple of times there are too many people in the kitchen and it freezes, they give it space when this happens). Three gets multiple checks from people that cooking is something it wants to do, rather than something it feels obligated to do.

Murderbot is incredibly confused when it gets back and this is happening. Like for a moment its offended because it feels like someone is forcing three into a more bot servant role, and is yet another person checking in with three about this. There is a bit of jealousy there, that Three seems to be interacting with the humans a lot better, but i think it’s more confusion. This is a person that Murderbot could never be, and frankly doesn’t want to be. It still wishes it was better talking to people but that would involve, ugh, talking to people. By the end of Network Effect i think its comfortable enough in it’s friendships to not worry so much about anyone replacing it. Plus i think the sort of relationships Three would build through this would be different to the ones murderbot has built.

(jeesh this got long)

[iviarellereads]

System Collapse, Chapter 6

(Curious what I'm doing here? Read this post! For the link index and a primer on The Murderbot Diaries, read this one! Like what you see? Send me a Ko-Fi.)

In which 57 sources of anxiety sounds low, actually.

The team is not happy. Iris records another briefing, even though it's early for a check-in, and Murderbot hopes that this and the other pathfinder return soon with some insight from the rest of the team, but only counts on it as a way to let them know what happened if the B-Es attack them. Threat assessment puts the chance of a B-E attack low, but mostly because these three and MB aren't much of a threat to at-least-5 and another SecUnit.

And oh, that SecUnit is causing some discussions among the team. MB has to explain that it can't just go around freeing every SecUnit willy nilly, and besides that, a freed SecUnit doesn't instantly become trustworthy. A freed unit might need to be killed anyway, if it goes rogue and attacks the humans. Tarik seems to understand. Ratthi definitely doesn't, but acknowledges that MB is the expert on the matter, and he doesn't want to press it into something it doesn't think is safe. MB appreciates that about Ratthi.

After all that, MB and AC2 arrange a secure connection for Iris and Trinh, the primary "operator" for AC2. Trinh is a little unnerved at a second group of strangers making contact so soon after B-E. MB figures it'd be pretty freaked out at that, too. Iris explains the situation, and Trinh observes that she's saying the same thing B-E did: that she's here to help. MB groans mentally that the colonists have no reason to trust them.(1)

Tarik, Ratthi, and Art-drone strategize on the shuttle, and a lot of time is spent on the potential arguments to be made, and what the colonists might and are likely to know from their sporadic contact and, potentially, spying via AC2's connection to AC1.

On the plus side, AC2 gave MB the location of the B-E shuttle, and the best route to it without alerting them. So, it takes the opportunity to go scout it out. MB grumbles about the lack of cameras in the last section of the path AC2 directs it to, as well as none outside. Preparedness is everything, dangit!(2) Meanwhile, Art-drone has taken a defensive position just inside the hangar.

MB takes some comfort that the colonists might not trust them, but AC2 trusts it. Mostly, computer systems trust easily if you keep things simple and don't try to provoke their boundaries. AC2 wants to protect its humans, and MB has so far showed no sign of wanting to harm them.

So, it provides the team with the video feed where the B-Es are still talking to most of the humans. There's no audio, but Art-drone is interpreting from mouth and facial movements, and they probably understand more than the B-Es do since Thiago's translation module is "clearly better". AC2 vouching for MB won't win over any humans, though. Sometimes not even solid evidence can convince them.

AC2 asks MB why the B-E SecUnit refused a connection request. MB thinks that's a good thing, since normal SecUnits can't hack, only CombatUnits.(3) MB is pretty sure this one's a normal SecUnit, since its armour is very similar to Three's. So, it has to explain to AC2 that it's under the control of a governor module. It doesn't have an answer for AC2's subsequent why (is this allowed)?

By now, MB has made it to the other hangar, where the B-Es landed. It wonders how the B-Es knew to look here particularly. Earlier, Iris asked Art-drone if the B-Es could have followed them in, but Art-drone came to the conclusion that they arrived at least a day earlier, from some gap in Art-prime's pathfinder scanning. Art-drone is miffed enough that it expects Art-prime will be furious.

Still, back in the present, MB realizes it's drifted off again, and Ratthi brings it back to task by noticing a second door. AC2 sends MB a rough map of the installation, and MB shares it with the humans. With nothing better to do, MB decides to stand there and hang out on purpose.

The wind outside gets stronger, screaming through the hangar's crevices. Art-drone says pathfinders confirm the weather is getting worse and it may lose contact with them. AC2 confirms, that matches its weather station data.

MB pulls up some Sanctuary Moon, not wanting to distract Art-drone with something new. After a couple of minutes, AC2 asks what MB is doing. MB explains watching media, and AC2 offers its entertainment partition, and MB has hit a goldmine, though some of the titles don't match words in its language modules. When Art-drone notices, it says these are pre-CR media.

The scene flips(4) over to the now-unredacted incident again, and MB says it's fairly sure the corpse never chewed on its leg, but it's even more sure it saw that happen to a human at some point on a survey mission. It told Art that it (MB) had fucked everything up and that Art and its humans shouldn't want it to do security for them anymore. Art asks why, and MB says something is broken inside it.

Art points out that its wormhole drive is broken. MB says that's fixable, and knows it was a mistake to say so since it really doesn't know all of what happened to Art from Art's point of view, but continues that its flaw is in its organic neural tissue. Art points out that this is how the humans diagnosed it so quickly, and asks if they're disposable when it happens to them. MB grumbles that that's what corporations say. Art says it's not a corpo.

MB tells Art to stop, that this isn't it talking, just its… Art finishes the thought MB trails out of: its certification in trauma protocol, which is obviously useless in this situation. MB says it's for humans, and Art points out that this affects MB's human bits. MB says it's not talking to Art anymore.(5)

The first thought MB has is that it should trade all its media for all AC2's. The second is that its humans aren't going to be staying much longer, whether they go with Art or B-E. At least the situation sucking so bad is a great distraction for how much MB feels it sucks, it thinks, just before realizing it missed something in its distraction.

Trinh invites the team to spend the night in the installation, since the weather is worsening. Iris asks MB if they should, and despite the threat of the B-Es, MB agrees. Art-drone thanks it, and MB knows it's not the only one that was imagining the other SecUnit sneaking up on the shuttle.

Trinh sends them directions, which they don't need with AC2's map, but that put them at the opposite end from the accommodations the B-Es were given. It's a nice gesture, even if it's only a twenty minute walk apart.(6) MB sneaks back through the back corridors to meet up with the others. MB does its best to act like the others, even to folding its hood and helmet back. It's not sure what AC2 has told the colonists about it, and it doesn't want to ask, in case it hadn't told them about MB and this causes it to. MB knows it can't stay a secret, but it wants less interaction with them if possible.

Flash to a clip of it telling Mensah it doesn't know what's wrong with itself, and Mensah saying she thinks it knows, and just doesn't want to talk about it yet.(7)

In the present and in the team feed, to prevent eavesdropping by B-E, Iris says so far, Trinh has rejected B-E's requests to speak to the whole colony. They're only allowing them the smaller group. Ratthi worries what kind of employment pitch they might make, and Tarik says they'll be real good at dressing it up, and this group might be more vulnerable to their manipulation.

Iris says the group seems pretty independent, she thinks the chance of them falling for it is low, but it might not even be in their best interest to leave with the others. If they can forge the charter right, they'd have the right to choose to stay or go as they please. Ratthi adds that it would be even easier if the University comes to study the contamination, offering a means of transport out later as needed. Tarik is about as optimistic about this as MB, which is to say, not very.

MB notices that they all look really tired, and kicks itself as it asks Art-drone how long it's been since they slept. It replies that they were supposed to take naps on the flight in, but nobody could rest. MB feels like it fucked up again, but Art-drone offers that they both fucked this one up.

AC2 notifies them that there's a human approaching, as they near their assigned quarters. Ratthi asks in the team feed if this is a sign of trust, on the system's part. Iris asks Art-drone if that's possible, and it reminds her that they've discussed anthropomorphizing machine intelligence before. Ratthi asks what Art-drone considers human characteristics in this way, and Tarik begs them not to start. There's some lighthearted teasing of Tarik by Art, and Iris laughingly says she's sorry she asked.

The human doesn't have a feed ID, but AC2 supplies a name of Lucia and he/him pronouns when MB asks, since it knows the humans will want to know. Iris thanks him for inviting them in, and he nervously says she's welcome and walks them to the rooms, showing them the facilities. Iris tries to initiate three different conversations, to no avail. The team all worries B-E poisoned the well already.

Iris goes to lay on one of the beds in the other room, while Ratthi and Tarik stay in the first room to talk about what's going on between them. MB is stuck in the doorway between the rooms, monitoring everything in case of attacks. It recalls overhearing a heated discussion on Art after the incident, and learning that it was Ratthi and Tarik having a "sexual discussion". Apparently, this felt like the right time to talk again. MB backburners their audio except for a keyword filter in case they yell for help, plays a nice nothing loop of sound, and stares at the wall.(8)

The humans do, eventually, manage to get some sleep. Art-drone gets MB to watch an episode of World Hoppers. MB thinks about how it has fifty seven unique causes of concern or anxiety, and it can do nothing about any of them. That goes up to fifty eight when Trinh calls to ask for an in-person meeting with them and B-E.

=====

(1) Trust the process. (2) There are reasonable limits, it's true. Being prepared beyond a certain point is just feeding your own paranoia. Just look at all the right-wing "preppers" who keep expecting the apocalypse. But, a certain amount of preparation and expecting the worst can keep you safe in an emergency. Never installing cameras in a whole section of your installation or at the exits is absolutely an error in judgement on some level. (3) I'm sure it means hack something this complex, but… Murderbot, you hack literally all the time. Are you secretly a CombatUnit? (4) It's not lost on me that, now that we know what the redacted incident was, it feels like more pre-CR talk means more flashback and MB being more distracted in the present. (5) If that lasted 5 minutes I'll do something improbable. (6) I dunno, see, this is one of those things where MB is programmed to go past what I think are reasonably pessimistic expectations of danger. It's understandable, this is what it was literally built for, but situationally speaking, I think it's a bit excessive. Nobody wants to make a bad impression on the colonists, if nothing else. (7) Why this conversation? Why now? Why here, right after being worried about the colonists figuring out what it is? (8) Personally, I want all the juicy details, but I can't blame MB for its lack of interest.

[iviarellereads]

Exit Strategy, Chapter 5

(Curious what I'm doing here? Read this post! For the link index and a primer on The Murderbot Diaries, read this one! Like what you see? Send me a Ko-Fi.)

In which the long-awaited friend returns to us.

When the transit pipe with GrayCrisSec and Dr. Mensah arrived, I was in a pod, paused and ready.

Murderbot finds the team, and they have their own SecUnit, with armour. Still, this is probably do-able. Looking at the hotel's transit station, with its holographic displays, MB gets an idea and files it for later.(1) It follows the group on cameras, six plus the SecUnit and Mensah. Two peel off to take other positions, leaving the main target (SecUnit) and four secondaries.

SecUnits with intact governor modules can't hack like MB can without getting punished. This one has a Palisade logo on the proprietary-brand armour, but no drones. It doesn't try to hack it, like it did the ComfortUnit with Art's help, just in case it fails, and the unit reports it.

MB taps Mensah's implant, and says it's here. Mensah asks for its name as proof. It knows the conversation footage was deleted, so it gives her the real one: Murderbot. She asks what it's doing here, believing it had been captured. MB says it came to help, and tells her the three others are waiting with a company shuttle. It asks if Mensah will give it permission to proceed with extraction.

She doesn't hesitate to say yes.

MB puts her feed on the back burner after acknowledging, and then double checks the schematics and the camera feeds. It's not sure it could have done this before Milu stretched its limits. Still, it can't screw this up.(2)

Redirecting its own pod to a specific junction, MB calls the pod with Mensah in it to the same location, and tells her to drop as it takes out the goons and takes on the other SecUnit, the Primary Target. After a fight sequence, it incapacitates them all, and leaves with Mensah in the pod, going back to the hotel's station. It takes that idea from earlier, instructing Mensah how to stay out of its way, and enacts another action sequence. They move on to the next obstacle.(3)

Mensah asks if the company is helping. MB says no, and explains the payoff to keep them from docking, and how the Preservation team came anyway.

From the security camera systems, MB realizes that GrayCris know where they are and what they're doing. MB initiates an emergency disembark of the capsule, making sure Mensah lands safely by wrapping itself around her. It consults the maps and finds another way out. They get in another pod, going down to the maintenance section, and an access backbone to the whole station. There, they take a cargo carrier out.

On the way, MB asks if Mensah is alright. She says she is, and very glad to see it. MB, however, can confirm there are more creases at her eyes since they last met. It's not sure how to go about comforting people, but it tells Mensah that she can hug it, if she needs to. She laughs, and her face does "something complicated", and she does so. MB raises its temperature output, and tries to think of it as first aid.

Except it wasn’t entirely awful. It was like when Tapan had slept next to me in the room at the hostel, or when Abene had leaned on me after I saved her; strange, but not as horrific as I would have thought.

Mensah says it was MB at Milu, and MB confirms, though it was an accident. Which part, asks Mensah. MB says, most of it. She asks if it said she sent it, and it says no, it impersonated a fake client. She asks why it went to Milu, and it says, because it wanted to help her by getting evidence of the illegal activity. That's not its whole reason, but it doesn't reveal its conflicted feelings. Mensah, for her part, says she'll try to remember that next time she gives an interview off the cuff. She asks whether it got the data, and it confirms it did, but it mailed it to her family on Preservation before it came to rescue her.

Murderbot awkwardly admits that it left. Mensah says she handled it badly. MB says Pin-Lee told it Mensah was worried. She admits she was, she was afraid MB would be caught, but she should have had more confidence in it. MB isn't sure it would go that far, but before it can have too many emotions, its map monitor alerts that they're nearing the port.

=====

(1) That's one way to tell us This Is Foreshadowing. (2) I want to get into the semantics of what is being said literally (if I fail, Mensah dies, so failure is not allowed) compared to the alternate meaning of the phrase (it is impossible to fail this). I point this out, because this being a story, we know that the latter is also true, since it would mean Murderbot died and this would be the end of the book, and the series. It's a fun play on words. (3) I debated cutting all the travel down to "they move from one obstacle to the next" and just elaborating on their conversations between action sequences, but I couldn't find the right spot to do it and leave the vibes intact.

[iviarellereads]

Network Effect, Chapter 20

(Curious what I'm doing here? Read this post! For the link index and a primer on The Murderbot Diaries, read this one! Like what you see? Send me a Ko-Fi.)

In which Murderbot needs to have emotions a few more times than it's used to.

Murderbot wishes it could stay unconscious, but it restarts in time to limp out of the shuttle and onto Art, before passing out again. When it wakes this time, at first it thinks it's surrounded by unfamiliar humans, until Amena warns Art's people that MB doesn't like to be touched. It sees 3 to the side, out of its armour and in Art's crew clothing, looking like it has no idea what it should be doing.(1)

The humans figure out how Art can delete the contaminated code from MB without scanning it, but want to do some first aid to ensure MB makes it through the process. They confirm nobody's shooting at them or in pursuit, they just have to pop the B-E stragglers back over to their own transport once they can be sure they won't carry the contamination.

Arada tells Iris that Art told them what its real purpose was in the system. Iris seems nervous and defensive, but Arada says they'll gladly sign a contract saying they won't betray that confidence, if it helps, though Ratthi points out they'll need an explanation of some sort. Amena agrees, saying her second mom isn't easy to lie to. Kaede asks about this.

“She’s the head of the— She was the head of the Preservation Alliance Council,” Amena explained. “Dr. Mensah. She was in the newsfeeds a lot in the CR—she was kidnapped by a corporate called GrayCris and rescued by a SecUnit on TranRollinHyfa, and there was a company armed ship that was attacked and another ship from a security corporate that got blown up.” “Rescued by a…” Matteo trailed off and they all stared at me.(2)

MB complains to Art that MB was under the impression that Art had told its humans about it. Art says it told them it met a rogue SecUnit, not that that SecUnit was the same one that every mention of a SecUnit in the news in the last year was referring to.

Art's humans are still a little shocked at the scope of this, and Ratthi confirms the TranRollinHyfa part of the story, at least, since he was there. He offers that this gives Art's crew some leverage about the Pres lot. Iris asks if they can just agree, for now, that they're allies and keep each other's secrets? Matteo adds, and that neither party likes B-E. Arada agrees readily.

Thiago and Overse arrive with the emergency medkit, and MB shuts down again for a while. The patching-up process is messy and biological. At some point, 3 figures out it can go wherever it wants, and leaves. They set up an isolation box so Art can still feed-connect with MB without contamination, and they watch Timestream Defenders Orion together.

Martyn, still undergoing decontamination himself, is video-conferenced in to consult. He asks how many SecUnit friends Art has, but Iris says this is the one they were threatening to bomb the colony to rescue. MB says that sounds fake. Ratthi confirms it, though, and Art clarifies that that was plan A01, and he went with plan B01 which was more complicated but more effective. Ratthi suggests Art play back the video record, and MB wants to see it.

So, Art pauses TDO and plays the security archive. MB gets more than a little overwhelmed at how everyone endangered themselves to save it.(3)

When the med patching is done, they move MB's consciousness into the isolation box for Art to clean up its code. Art leaves a part of its consciousness in the box for company. After finishing some TDO, MB says Art and Amena were right, and 2 was a person, even if it wasn't like a baby. Art asks if MB regrets deploying it, and MB says, no, because without that, they might all have been contaminated by now.

MB brings up how Art told its humans about MB. Art says it just told them it helped a rogue SecUnit get to RaviHyral, it left out the Tlacey bits. MB accuses Art of making it sound safe. Art says its humans understand how dangerous the corporates are.(4)

Art says it's finished removing the damaged code, but while MB's consciousness is returned to its body, Art has a proposal: it thinks MB's help would be "invaluable" on an upcoming mission of Art's. MB worries Art's crew won't like MB being involved, but Art says it will discuss the matter with them. MB doesn't even make a joke about Art's idea of what a discussion with humans looks like.

MB, for its part, is still having trouble with the bit where so many humans were figuring out how to rescue it, when the whole point of constructs like MB is that they can be abandoned in an emergency.

ART said, I know you have difficulty making decisions so you don’t need to give your answer right away.(5) I do not have difficulty making decisions, ART, you’re full of— I said, but it had already dropped me back in my body. And of course, my performance reliability crashed immediately and I had a forced shutdown.

MB wakes up in Medical, and with access to camera feeds all over the ship. It checks in on each group. Amena is nearby, browsing the catalog for Pansystem University.(6) MB tells her it's conscious, and she smiles and says she'll warn the others.

Before it can think too hard, MB tells Amena that Art asked it to come on a mission. She asks how long, and it says, for the duration of the mission. Though, to itself, it thinks Art intends for a longer partnership.(7) Amena asks if that's like asking someone to stay with your family over the holidays to see if everyone gets along "before you get serious". MB says it doesn't really understand what she means by that, but since Art doesn't jump in to say she's wrong, maybe.

Amena thought it over. “I guess I’m not surprised. How do you feel about it?” My expression must have changed because she rolled her eyes. “Oh sorry, I used the f word there.” Again, I have no idea why ART likes adolescent humans. “I don’t know,” I told her.

Amena asks what MB thinks Mensah will say. MB doesn't know, so asks what Amena thinks. She snorts, and says she was just getting used to MB, but it might be a good idea… except for the part where Art's work takes it into the CorpRim a lot. MB admits that's a factor, though it thinks privately that Art's cargo missions are probably a form of spy recon that no corporate would ever suspect.

After some thought, Amena says Art definitely cares about MB, a lot. The only reason it sent the killware was because it thought that was the best way to keep MB from having to do anything dangerous. She doesn't think Art would invite MB to come with it, if it didn't think the trip would be good for MB.

Three cycles later, the humans leave their quarantine. The B-E crew are returned to their transport with their own shuttle. The transport tails Art a little, as if making sure they don't still try to steal the system out from under B-E. Which, of course, they still plan to do if they can.

The other problem is that they still have 3. Amena and Ratthi suggest MB help it to adjust, but MB thinks it would want to be left alone, under those circumstances, and 3 hasn't even voluntarily sat in a chair yet, it's probably not ready to talk.(8) Still, after those three cycles, MB notices 3 shadowing it, and asks what's up. 3 brings up how MB continued doing its job, even after disabling its governor module. MB asks if 3 wants to go back. No, it says it won't, but it doesn't know what it will do.

MB explains that it kept doing its job because having choices, making changes, is terrifying. 3 says the Preservation crew said it could go with them. MB says 3 can trust their word, though it thinks 3 might think it's delusional.

Still, 3 asks for the rest of the story, for documentation of what happened besides what the HelpMe file outlined. MB thinks about how its memories are a how-to file for fugitive SecUnits, and says it'll copy out the relevant pieces and send them to 3. 3 looks "almost pleased", and thanks it.(9)

A whole twenty cycles after arrival in the system, it's a Preservation ship that arrives first. Arada says they couldn't have gotten here so fast unless they left mere hours after Art did, but Art says they might have: it made a message buoy detailing what happened, and set it to eject when the wormhole drive turned on, hiding it from TCS.

Amena is surprised and asks why Art didn't tell them. MB thinks how Amena still doesn't understand what an asshole Art is.(10) Art admits it didn't tell them because it would have made it harder to convince them to do what it wanted.

MB asks if they can call the Pres ship on comms, suspecting who's aboard. Art does so, and MB first asks if Mensah is aboard, then when she confirms, it gives her a code response. Mensah's relief is audible, as she asks what the hell happened. Amena is annoyed MB has a secret code with her second mom, but MB is just annoyed it has to change it now.

The humans talk, and by the time the responder reaches Art, its crew agrees to tell Mensah their true mission. Pin-Lee is along as well, and an alliance with Preservation would open another experienced corporate contract negotiator to their arsenal. The humans talk and negotiate while MB watches Sanctuary Moon and Art cleans with its drones again in excitement about meeting Mensah.

Introductions in person go swimmingly. Later, Mensah comes to sit with MB in a lounge. Of all the things MB wants to say, the first thing it blurts is to ask if Mensah started the trauma treatment. Drily, she says yes, she had her first appointment, before her daughter and brother-in-law and her friends were kidnapped. But, when MB seems hesitant over asking more, she says it was, or will be, fine, and she was fine until this kicked off.

MB asks if Amena told Mensah about its "emotional collapse". She says no, so MB regrets saying anything, and explains that it thought Art was dead. Mensah says Ratthi's told her how close MB and Art are. MB says Ratthi exaggerates,(11) but it feels bad about not telling Mensah about meeting Art.

Mensah says she doesn't tell MB everything, either. MB says that's because she knows it doesn't want to know everything, and in the same breath, says Art invited it to go on a mission. Mensah asks if it would be temporary or permanent. MB says it doesn't know, but it doesn't want to never see Mensah again. Mensah says she feels the same way, but it can always come visit Preservation between its time with Art. MB says Preservation is the first place it was really a part of on its own terms, and it wants to stay a part of it, but it likes being with Art too.

Mensah asks about the rest of Art's crew, and MB says it doesn't know them yet.

“Working for them temporarily could take care of that problem. If you decide to do that.” She smiled a little. “The good thing is, you do know what you want.” I sort of did know.(12) It was a weird feeling. “That’s new.” She smiled all the way. “I wasn’t going to put it quite that way, but yes.”

Art's crew are resting, except those working on the legal case. Mensah took Amena and Thiago back to the Pres ship, with Amena promising to tell MB how it goes when Thiago makes his apologies to Mensah for misinterpreting her relationship with MB. MB is just glad it doesn't have to be involved.

MB goes up to Art's control deck, where they can have a private conversation, and says if they're going on a mission together, they'll need more media. Art says it's made a collection from its university's archive. MB starts skimming the index, and suggests they pass some along to 3, since it's probably leaving soon.

That’s not why 3 wanted your files, or not the only reason. I asked it why it wanted to help retrieve you, and it said, “stories in the HelpMe.file.” I think your memories are providing it with the sort of context you obtained from human media. I didn’t know what I thought about that. I would never have thought to just hand my files over to 3 the way 2.0 had. And if 2.0 hadn’t done that, targetControlSystem would have won.(13)

MB thinks how it was also a little surprised that 3 almost had a friendship with its fellow SecUnits. It wonders if it was always the exception to SecUnit personality, and if 3 will have better luck communicating with other SecUnits than it obviously does. It thinks it should get 3 a copy of the full documentary Bharadwaj made.

Whatever. For now, keyword searching ART’s index, I think I’d found something even less realistic than Timestream Defenders Orion. I showed the description to ART, and it started the first episode.

=====

(1) Murderbot thinks it's pretty sure on this read, and why shouldn't it be? It's been almost exactly where 3 was. For all its plans on independence, it never really thought about breaking out of the company's control for real. Those first days of freedom, before it left to explore its history? Yeah I bet it knows all too well what 3 is feeling. (2) Yep, their sweet asshole Perihelion really caught a keeper of a rogue SecUnit for a bestie. (3) They love you, pal. Like, your humans love you, and your bestie Art loves you, and even its humans appreciate it so much they wanted to help you purely on Art's very vague word that it met a good rogue SecUnit. You are GOOD, Murderbot, you are worthy and you are loved and you are so good. ;~; (4) I'm realy not sure what the implication here is. I lean toward "Art's humans know the risks of this universe, and a rogue SecUnit just looking to answer whether it's still a danger or not is not, in fact, probably much of a danger" I think? But I don't know. I welcome alternate suggestions in the replies! (5) You snarky asshole! <3 (6) Anyone else feel like this will come back in a later book? (7) Art is a little bit selfish, it likes to keep an eye on those it cares about. Look at how it lost its mind when it lost its crew! And how it threatened to bomb a planet full of people to get MB back. It would never countenance that sort of behaviour under normal circumstances, and the only way to avoid it is to make sure it can keep an eye on everybody forever. Art has its own share of trauma to overcome from this book's events. (You can't accuse me of anything for this one, I'm writing this well ahead of System Collapse's release and I haven't got an ARC.) (8) 3 is an individual, though. It's also a SecUnit, but not from MB's former company, and not one that chose this over a longer period of time. (9) Hey, MB, you ever stop to think that this is included under what the humans suggested in helping 3 adjust? (10) But it's such a lovable one! (11) Do you read these sorts of protests with an aggrieved fondness? I sure do. MB loves its humans the same way Art loves its crew, only its love language is grumping. (12) It only took… how many books? But MB finally has a Want. They grow up so fast. (13) I cannot fathom someone coming up to me and saying "will you be my role model for How To Exist As A Person?" Like, this is the most real reaction.

[iviarellereads]

Network Effect, Chapter 4

(Curious what I'm doing here? Read this post! For the link index and a primer on The Murderbot Diaries, read this one! Like what you see? Send me a Ko-Fi.)

In which I could say "something has gone terribly wrong" but that would be the understatement of the decade.

Murderbot didn't use evac suits before hacking its governor module, because going into space tended to violate the distance limits in company contracts, but the ones it's used practically have bot pilots, and these are new enough to not even smell like human parts. It guides Amena out, until it can contact baseship. They say they can see MB and Amena, and will tractor shortly. MB asks about Overse and the pod with the others. Roa says they'll try to make contact now. MB would rather not think about that, but Amena asks what it means. MB doesn't have time to answer before it detects an energy surge, and its suit's helmet goes dark, as the attacker fires and misses.

MB turns to see what's firing, a dumb human impulse. But, the configuration looks strangely familiar. Then it recognizes the insignia.

“That’s—” That’s ART,(1) I almost said on the feed, like an idiot. It was so shocking and so weird, my performance reliability dropped and I lost circulation to my organic parts. And not weird = violating norms in an annoying way but weird = eerie, like in Farland Star Roads, the story arc with the haunted station with ghosts and time-shifting.

Amena asks what MB was going to say, but the ship, Art, or not so much, fires again. Only, it misses anything again. The humans wonder if it's firing warning shots. MB asks if baseship is ready to catch them, but before they can log on the tractor, the hostile grabs them instead. Amena, very distressed, asks why they want her and MB when they have the facility already. MB doesn't know.

Even as they're loaded into an airlock by the tractor, MB doubts its memories, more than a little. It wants to run a diagnostic, but there's no time.

The lock cycles out, and allows them inside. MB steps in, cautiously, then pulls Amena in as well. For her part, Amena asks MB to just talk to her, even if it doesn't have answers to her questions. MB reminds itself that it still has a client, even if it's hallucinating, even if it wishes she were someone it trusted to be able to help it. It sends a ping, which almost seems to echo, as if the ship were hollow.

MB tells Amena something close to the truth: it recognizes this ship, but it shouldn't be here. Amena asks what ship it is, but instead of answering, MB has a genius idea and asks what the ship's insignia says. Any of its former clients who knew what it is would have known immediately that something was wrong, that MB doesn't ask questions it can answer for itself. But, Amena doesn't know it as well, and simply gives the answer: Perihelion. MB can now be sure it's not hallucinating, which is good, but also bad, because Art obviously isn't home.

Amena guesses it was hit by raiders and armed. MB says it was already armed: it's a deep space research vessel, with crew and passenger complement, but it works as a bot pilot in the off season. Amena asks why raiders would bother grabbing her and MB… only, if MB had something to do with this ship, could the raiders be here for it? MB says no, which it knows for a lie: something of Art came to get it, it just doesn't know why yet,(2) or why Art won't talk to it. Could something else be in control of Art's ship-body?

Lots of spiral thinking about what's going on, until it decides that first, they need to ditch the evac suits, as they're too cumbersome. Amena is reluctant, but does so. MB knows it needs to get her to the medical suite asap. As they make their way, MB detects no crew, even with its drones patrolling.

Only, the drones miss something, and MB takes a blow to the head and has to reboot.

Fortunately, a SecUnit's organic brain bits have better padding than a human. It's back up and running in time to still hear two unidentified beings talking to Amena, suggesting she'd better have the weapon they were told was in Preservation, or she'll regret it. The strangers say she's lying, and they know better.

MB's reboot has purged some of the stress toxins and helped it feel better and think more clearly. It was hit with a drone, which means there's some sort of feed active. It widens its scan parameters, and notes that its projectile weapon is smashed on the floor.(3) As it follows Amena's voice, it finds the feed and breaks the encryption, despite its algorithm being at least 8700 hours out of date.(4) The feed is empty of everything but drone comands, but if the feed encryption was old, maybe the drones are on old codes too. It starts cycling through them as it approaches its destination.

The doorway to the lounge where I’d detected Amena’s voice was open, brighter light falling into the half-lit corridor. I meant to wait until I was back up to at least 90 percent performance reliability but I heard Amena say, “There’s no weapon, you got the wrong ship.” The fear in her voice was more obvious and I was suddenly in the room. (Impulse control; I should try to write a code patch for that.)(5)

There are two potential casualties, in red and brown uniforms (not Art's dark blues) and looking bruised, and two definite Targets, looking augmented. They remark about how it should have been dead. MB needs intel, but instead of asking the more situationally important questions, it asks the emotionally important one: what did they do to Art? They accuse it of babbling, and Amena is utterly shocked, her hands over her mouth.(6)

The targets admit they deleted it. MB feels its face change. Amena cusses, and the targets find anger boring. Target One says it belongs to them now, but before it can continue, MB grabs it by the face, and swings it into the bulkhead. One of the drones comes at its head, but it dodges. Target Two looks at the other drones, obviously wondering why they didn't attack.

The good thing about being a construct is that I can have a dramatic emotional breakdown while still running my background search to find the drone key commands. I’d had a hit and a responding ping from the targetDrones right when Target One had called me boring. (Irony is great.) I sent the order to power down and they dropped to the deck with two loud thunks.(7)

As Target Two's face turns to fury, MB parrots back their earlier words: angry, afraid, then dead, wasn't it? Casualty One starts to say something, but Target One interrupts by reaching for a weapon, tricking MB into lunging for it, and hitting MB with a hidden energy weapon in the other hand. The Target grins, but MB just gets angrier, and crushes their arm. Target Two, with misplaced confidence, shoves another energy weapon at MB's chest.(8)

MB tears the energy weapon out of Target Two's hand, shoves it into their chest, and rips a hole in their torso. It then uses the weapon to smash them against the bulkhead until bits splatter off. Target One bolts for the hatch, but Amena calls its attention to the targetDrones, powering up despite MB's override code. It smashes both of them.

The casualties finally come into play. Casualty One, Eletra, tries to tell Amena she needs to come with them and hide. Casualty Two, Ras, agrees, and says they stand a chance with a SecUnit. Both have ID from a corporation called Barish-Estranza. Amena says maybe they should, but MB says it has something to do. It sets its own drones to following Target One, all the way to the crew meeting area where it spent the most time here before.

The targetDrones aren't responding to its commands anymore at all, which suggests a security update, which suggests a controlling system near enough to push it. MB tries to cut off the targetDrone feed, but while some are cut, others still have access.

To Amena, MB admits it doesn't have control over the drones anymore, so Amena says they should go together.

MB's drones have followed Target One all the way to the control deck, with Target One and Target Three. Target One collapses on a station chair. Target Three starts to give orders to kill the escapees, but MB uses some of its drones to hit both One and Three in their faces.

In the lounge, the Casualties are arguing that Amena just needs to order the SecUnit to come with them, but Amena says it doesn't take orders. Amena grabs MB's arm, not knowing the danger she's courting. She tells MB they have to go with the Casualties. MB tells her never to touch it again. Eletra starts to move, as Ras asks if MB will even listen. MB moves past Eletra and catches the targetDrone waiting for them outside, then tells them to follow it.(9)

=====

(1) I dunno about you, but when I first read this, my first thought was "HECK YEA!" followed immediately by "wait, but it just fired at MB?! HECK WHAT NO!" (2) The power of friendship: even in death, I will come for you. (3) Not even the courtesy to take it with them so someone could steal it back and use it later? Rude. (4) If you do the math, that's 2.5 days short of a full Earth year that MB has been free. (5) Aw, but where's the fun in that? (6) What must be going through her head? Does it feel like watching a serial, the way MB so often quips to us? (7) That's the Murderbot we know and love. (8) You really would think that these people would be a little smarter, to have been able to take over Art. (9) That's some real compelling reasoning, actually, well done.

[iviarellereads]

Network Effect, Chapter 2

(Curious what I'm doing here? Read this post! For the link index and a primer on The Murderbot Diaries, read this one! Like what you see? Send me a Ko-Fi.)

In which we catch up on some of what happened between books.

Murderbot tells itself that it's not as bad as it could have been, as a first mission not pretending to be human (or faking the existence of one). Everyone's alive, all their samples and scans were complete, they just left a few days earlier than expected.

But we’d been lucky, and I hate luck.(1)

MB sets its drones to more or less standby, and Arada tells MB to get to Medical, since it was shot. MB had sort of forgotten about needing treatment for that, but confirms by turning up its pain sensors, the projectiles are definitely still in its wounds. Ratthi is in Medical, and lightly bullies MB into doing the whole system instead of the patch job.

Arada agrees that MB needs to do the whole treatment bit, but asks if it thinks there was any other way, besides her shooting the leader. MB says he'll likely survive, if they give him treatment too. (Arada had to force herself to learn to shoot, and still doesn't like the idea of hurting people. MB considers how many of its shooting wounds have been from clients trying to help.) She asks if it's trying to make her feel better, and it tells her she knows it wouldn't do that.

Arada's expression turns sentimental, and MB reminds her, no hugging,(2) and asks if she needs emotional support so it can summon someone. She says no, she's fine, and MB should make sure it's fine too, just as the MedSystem indicates it's prepped. She leaves, and turns on the privacy filter for MB as she does. It strips its clothes into the decontam bin, then gets into MedSystem's platform. It only takes three minutes to do the basics, and MB cuts MedSystem off as it suggests post-treatment options.

MB leaves Medical, to find Thiago waiting in the hall. He looks angry, and asks if it killed all those people. MB takes an aside to think how it could have, it kind of wanted to, but it hacked its governor module so that it wouldn't have to kill if it didn't really want to. To Thiago, it says it's reported to its designated supervisor, instead of any of the other true answers, like that SecUnits aren't really murder machines, that it even risked Thiago's life by not using kill shots because it knew Arada, in particular, wouldn't want it to.

Thiago says it can ask her. MB suggests he go do that. Thiago looks angry, but he hesitates and says he didn't mean for MB to get shot, and apologizes. MB thinks if he'd intended for it to get shot, this would be a different conversation. Still angry, it says the security protocol everyone on the team agreed to is available in the feed. Thiago says he made a mistake, but he had no reason to assume they were hostile.

MB takes a long paragraph to say it had reason, and could have put together a Threat Assessment Report, but it doesn't answer to Thiago. They don't like each other and that's fine. So it walks away.

HelpMe.file Excerpt 1 (File detached from main narrative.)(3)

Stepping back in time a little, MB catches us up on what it did since the last book.(4) On one occasion, Mensah asked it to escort her planetside for an "Art Festival / Conference / Religious Observation" with lots of live performances, which MB looks forward to. It watches or records with drones thirty two plays and musicals, but one experience is cut short by Mensah asking it to come get her. It's so out of character for her that MB uses a code phrase they came up with, in case she's in real trouble, but she says she's just tired, which worries it even more because she never admits that.

Leaving a drone to record the rest of the play, MB makes its way through the thinning street crowds, finding Mensah talking to Thiago and Farai, one of Mensah's marital partners. When it stops next to Mensah, she grabs its hand. MB is startled, but takes it as "Mensah needs saving from this situation" and not just grabby hands.

Thiago expresses that he wants Mensah to just talk to her family, and Mensah says she's told him why she can't.(5) Fortunately, Farai intercedes to say if Mensah needs space, she gets space, and herds him off, shooting MB a polite smile and leaning in to kiss Mensah and say a see-you-later. Mensah drags MB away, and MB asks if she needs a medic. She says she's just tired, again, and MB requests a ground vehicle known locally as a "go-cart"(6) at the nearest transport station.

In the car, heading back to the camping house they're staying in, Mensah apologizes for interrupting MB's evening. MB isn't sure how to interpret Mensah's earlier distress, and asks if she wants to watch the plays it recorded. She perks up, asking if it got a particular one, and it says yes. It's sure something is bothering her, and not just that her family is as weirded out by it as it is by them.(7) Well, it believes the adults are. It's trading media downloads with three of the kids illicitly over the feed.

It suspects that the main issue with the family is that it's not a normal, naive bot. It is what it is, accustomed to moving through human circles as if it could be one of them, and fending for itself. When it tells Bharadwaj about this later, helping her research for her documentary, she wishes she could say it's wrong about that assumption.

Farai, at least, seems to be an exception. When they first met, Farai expressed the family's gratitude for returning Mensah to them. MB doesn't know what to say, and before it can find a response, Farai asks it what its relationship to Mensah is. MB knows Farai wants a real answer, but all it has is "I'm her SecUnit." When Farai asks what that means, MB says it honestly doesn't know, but wishes it did. Farai thanks it, and that's that.

The other issue with the family might be that MB is providing security for them, and they worry it will scare off legitimate visitors. Its risk assessment module might be faulty,(8) but its threat assessment record is a solid 93%, and most of the negative points come from assuming good intentions from Wilken and Gerth until it was almost too late.

Still, Mensah's family don't think they need security, and they're right that they didn't before GrayCris. But, MB up to the point of taking Mensah to the camp home, it has had to ward off journalists and recording drones, as well as chasing away someone Amena wanted to spend potentially irresponsible time with under false pretences, since the not-a-gentleman misrepresented himself and had several other suspicious behaviours which MB observed on its drone surveillance. Instead of notifying her parental units, it intervened, potentially driving a wedge between itself and her but at least acknowledging that it didn't go as well as it could've hoped.

Back on the trip from the festival to the camp home, lots of description I can't hope to really do justice, but it mentions all sorts of things, from the architecture that's arisen from the colony's lifestyle, to mobility devices in use instead of augments.(9) When they arrive, Mensah suggests MB go back to the festival, and catch some more plays live. MB, against everything it's ever been comfortable with, asks what's wrong.

Mensah is surprised, but tells MB not to start. MB says it's for accurate threat assessment purposes. Mensah says it never mentioned that on the survey contract. MB admits it was half-assing at the time. Mensah almost says she wishes she could see it at its prime, but then says she probably did, referring to the rescue mission. MB recognizes that it's led them down an awkward conversation path, and wishes it was Art, who's good at manipulating conversations.(10)

MB says she didn't answer the question. Mensah says it sounds worried, and it says it is worried. Mensah admits she's been having nightmares about her time as a captive. It's normal and expected. MB has never seen much trauma recovery outside the serials, but there are a couple of programs Mensah's let her family believe she's taking advantage of, though MB knows she hasn't enrolled.

In an uncharacteristically observant moment, MB asks if that's why Mensah is afraid to leave the station without it.

Most of the population of Preservation believe Mensah should not need protection unless she goes on a visit to somewhere in the Corporation Rim. Crime stats in Preservation territory are incredibly low. However, MB, and everyone who knows the real story of what happened with GrayCris, know that she's been a target and could again, and agree that she needs security. GrayCris assets have been destroyed in suspicious accidents, and their executives found dead in various plausibly accidental (and not so much) ways. Once their structure started to crumble, threat assessment dropped off, but Mensah still wants MB's security. MB has started to become suspicious that it's something more than giving MB practice in a setting where it's not a tool or deadly weapon.

Mensah says it must have been obvious. MB says, no, though it thinks about how it suspects Farai and Tano know. Mensah says it's not a surprise that she feels safe with it, and it's easier to be around people who understand. She just can't quite explain to her family why she needs different support in this than she used to.

MB says Mensah needs the trauma treatment. She says she will, once she's finished a few things. And she really does want MB to go on the mission with Arada, it's a great opportunity. MB looks skeptical, so Mensah adds that with Amena and Thiago going, she'll appreciate MB keeping them safe for her. MB asks, what about Mensah?

Mensah almost brushes it off, but finally, admits she hates feeling weak, and she wants to stop needing to lean on MB. It's not fair of her to monopolize it like this. MB still isn't used to humans taking fairness toward itself into account.

It also sounded vaguely like the break-up part of the romance scenes on the shows I watched, most of which I usually skimmed over. I said, “It’s not me, it’s you.” She huffed a laugh. And then I sort of blackmailed her.(11)

Back in the present, on the ship, part of the current problem is that Mensah told Amena that she asked MB to keep an eye on her, which Amena didn't take well.(12) Thiago, who ought to know better, takes it as an affront that Mensah doesn't trust him, alone, to protect his niece. Amena tries to recruit Farai and Tano, but they just loop Mensah in and back up their spouse. Not even MB wanted to watch that call to find out exactly what happened.

So that was what had happened before the survey. Now we’re here, ready for the next major disaster. (Spoiler warning.)

=====

(1) Luck is not reproducible. I'm with Murderbot. I'll take it when I get it, but I wouldn't want to rely on it. (2) NO TOUCHY! Nooooo touchy. God, what a mood. (3) Whaaaaat is this? MB doesn't comment on receiving a file or anything. Detached from main narrative indeed. Curious that we get such a distinct marker between the present and the flashback, though. (4) Technically, it leaves out some things, like the events of the next book on my schedule, Fugitive Telemetry. (Side note, I'm not leaving present tense for this, despite being a flashback, because past tense is hard for me to write, even though it's what I'm reading, and this goes on a while.) (5) One assumes, some combination of not wanting to horrify them with what she's been through, and being worried that they can't understand because nobody else here has been through anything near what she has. (6) See, my assumption here is that it got shortened from "golf cart" but "go kart" is so much funnier of a concept to slot in here. (7) I wonder just exactly how true that really is, or if MB's tendency to self-deprecate and assume the worst is taking over its interactions here. (8) I recently saw a compelling theory that the risk assessment module is not broken, it's accounting for MB's competence in a way it doesn't give itself credit for consciously. Food for thought. (9) This is a nice touch, even if we don't see a lot of it in the stories. People just casually using mobility aids, instead of being "fixed". I like Preservation a lot.

(10) Once again, I offer an alternate interpretation: MB dances around its feelings, and that's a contributing factor to why it's so bad at guiding conversations the way it wants them to go. It's not jealous that Art is such a manipulative asshole, it's jealous that Art knows how to be vulnerable and engender vulnerability. Art has a lot more processing power and has spent a lot more time watching humans interact in normal conditions, if it has whole families traveling on it for science purposes as it once said it carried kids normally as well as adults. MB wants to be good at being a person, including conversation, it's just stuck in its own head and hasn't really tried to make the empathy in its unconscious, into a conscious series of choices. It's easier to keep interacting with the world as it has, until it has to break out of its patterns to accomplish its next goal. (11) What's that about, now? We don't get context this chapter. (12) MB attributes it to some hormone-related thing, which, rude and ageist, but in-character for MB. I personally think it's more that Amena probably assumed this meant MB had told Mensah about the encounter.

[iviarellereads]

Artificial Condition, Chapter 4

(Curious what I'm doing here? Read this post! For the link index and a primer on The Murderbot Diaries, read this one! Like what you see? Send me a Ko-Fi.)

In which the real work begins.

I came back online to find I was at 26 percent capacity, but the percentage was climbing slowly. Bands of pain circled my knee and elbow joints, so intense I couldn’t process it. My human skin itched. And I was leaking. I hate that.(1)

It can't focus enough to play media, and even small movements make it worse. It wishes it had enacted one of its plans to incapacitate Art. The process of healing is like being in a repair cubicle, without the cubicle's ability to shut down higher functions until repairs are complete.

At least it's not cold, though.

Eventually, its levels even out, and it can focus enough to turn down its own pain sensor. At 75 percent capacity, it tries to sit up. MedSystem starts throwing warnings, and Art says there's no need to move yet. But, it's been scanning newsfeed archives from the time of the RaviHyral incident, and asks if MB wants to know what it's found. MB eases back down grumpily, leaking from a new place, and tells Art it can read search results. Art suggests MB take advantage of its expertise in data analysis.(2)

MB agrees, with ire, and Art says the incident took place in a particular installation called Ganaka Pit, with fifty-seven fatalities caused by equipment failure. When MB doesn't respond, Art says that MB's initial assumption was correct after all, the incident did occur, and they can proceed to investigation.

MB wants to shut down, but it would affect the healing process. Art asks if it wants to watch media. MB doesn't respond, but Art starts playing an episode of Sanctuary Moon.(3)

When it's able to get off the platform, at first it falls, but by the end of the cycle it's more or less back to normal. It even uses the human cleaning facility, so it smells unsettlingly like a clean human at the end. The hair now growing from its skin might cause issues putting on a suit skin, but humans put them on with a minimum of complaint, so it can't be that bad.

MB goes to the recreation space and tests itself on the exercise machines and treadmill, even aiming (though not firing) its weapons to be sure nothing's out of alignment.

It looks in the mirror for a long time. It figures out exactly why it didn't want to do the procedure.

It would make it harder for me to pretend not to be a person.(4)

They arrive at RaviHyral on schedule. Art grabs a map, and MB realizes it's been altered since the accidents, to hide the Ganaka Pit installation's location. Concealing what happened would be high on the company's priorities, so maybe they paid the bond quickly to get the client's help minimizing information and access to the site. Either way, MB will have to figure out where Ganaka Pit is, or was, before it can go there.

The next obstacle is the shuttle from the transit ring to RaviHyral itself. Only people with employment passes can board the shuttles, zero tourism. MB starts catastrophe-planning, but Art suggests that if someone hired MB as a consultant, it would have employment, and a pass. MB asks if Art is insane, but Art has watched its humans hire consultants, and it can help MB. And look, there's an ad for a security consultant position available now.

MB links into Art's comm so Art can ride with it, but as it leaves, its efficiency drops to 96% right off. It checks the entertainment feeds to try to calm down, as it hacks its way through the embarkation security. It has a location and a time for a meeting about the consultant gig, and on the way it notices that there's not nearly as much crowding, and Art's modifications start to feel like a necessity after the fact.

MB finds the humans in the food court just fine. Two women and a tercera, a gender signifier used in a particular non-corporate political entity.(5) MB had to hack the thankfully vulnerable system to backdate its arrival and marked its gender as indeterminate, to set up the meeting.

The humans look nervous. MB introduces itself as Eden, their contact, having stolen borrowed the name of a character from Sanctuary Moon.(6) The tercera introduces terself and ter companions as Rami, Tapan, and Maro respectively, and makes a gesture Art confirms for MB is an invitation to sit. MB spends most of a page describing them, and notes that they're all very young for adults.

MB can see that it's going to have to help move this conversation along, so it says-asks if they want to hire a security consultant, even knowing the answer is yes from the ad. Maro suggests moving to a more secure location. MB initiates a glitch in the local surveillance, and Art helps erase it and the whole table from perception and recordings, then MB assures the humans they're not being recorded. Rami is startled and asks if MB did something, but MB just repeats that it's a security consultant. Its panic level starts to drop, partly because the humans are nervous, and it's used to dealing with nervous humans.(7)

Tapan gets the implication and asks if MB is "spliced" with extra feed access in its augments. MB says yes, among other things. Maro worries they can't afford someone of that caliber, but Rami says they'll have plenty to pay with if they can get their data back. While Art looks up pay scales for security consultants, MB asks why they need its help.

Rami looks at the other two, and at their nods, explains that they and four others in their group do mineral research and tech development, and were working for Tlacey Excavations. The terms of the contract seemed too good to be true, but they took it hoping they'd have time to develop their own tech on the side for detecting synthetic element traces left by dead alien civilizations. Only, they were terminated with no notice and Tlacey stole all their personal work as well as the work they'd been paid for. They even deleted current versions of files off their devices, they only had outdated offsite backups. They filed a complaint, but it's taking ages to go through.

MB offers that they should go to a solicitor, thinking how the company was never so careless as to delete files off personal devices when datamining. Rami says they considered a solicitor, but they're not in the union, so it would be too expensive. Tlacey gave them an offer yesterday, though, that if they returned the signing bonuses, they could get the files back.

MB gathers that they don't trust Tlacey, and Maro confirms it, but the group still wants to go to the meeting. MB can't imagine a good outcome from it, but this is exactly the job it's designed for.

MB asks if they think there's something Tlacey wants out of the meeting besides killing them. Maro makes a gesture that's vaguely threatening until Art identifies it as emphatic agreement. Rami says the work was incomplete, but Tlacey must have been listening on the security feeds and thought they were closer than they were to done. They might have realized the progress isn't worth anything without the team to finish it.

Essentially, Tapan is optimistic, Maro is pessimistic equivalent to MB, and Rami is the undecided tiebreaker. This is why they wanted to hire "Eden", to help and show they have backup.

MB accepts the job, and Maro asks how much it charges. Art offers spreadsheets, but MB asks how much they were getting paid, and asks for their daily rate. Rami is surprised at the lowball, and MB can't correct the mistake, but decides to give them a partial truth to explain it: it needs the employment pass to go to RaviHyral. Tapan asks why, and when Rami nudges her, she clarifies she knows they don't have a right to ask, but she's asking anyway. MB is a little unsettled to realize it's the first time that's ever applied to it, and offers some more truth: it has research to do for another client.

At that, the team agrees to put in for the employment shuttle pass, and they separate with a promise to meet again the next day. MB promptly goes back to Art, and they spend three hours calming it down watching serials.

ART monitored the transit ring’s alert feed in case someone had realized what I was, but there was nothing. I told you so, ART said. Again. I ignored it. I hadn’t been detected, so now it was time to think about the rest of the plan. Which now involved keeping my new clients alive.

=====

(1) Nothing worse than organic bits leaking, amirite? (2) Art is being a Good Friend, not getting grumpy with MB or calling it childish for not being at full function. Good Art. (3) See? Good friend! MB is not the only benevolent non-human consciousness in this universe and I'm so pleased it found a friend like Art. (4) Which is part of the point… but it's also a huge turning point for MB's life. After four years of confined-freedom, it can now have a much truer form. It's leaving everything it knew behind, and that's scary as heck even without all the trauma MB carries and is making itself face up to. (5) And, here, the reason I never went too deep on Murderbot as agender representation being a construct/robot. We're kind of overrepresented by non-humans like aliens and robots, it's very true true, but there are nonbinary humans in this universe as well. They're just not the main characters, for obvious reasons. (6) We get our names from everywhere when we change them. Some flip as close to the gender of their birth name as possible, some choose a name that speaks to them, and sometimes you take the first name that comes to mind that you think you'll respond to appropriately in public. (7) Lots of familiar ground in this scene for it.