#i try to condense it but hmmmmmmm

[aka-indulgence]

So I wanna get back to writing but I’m not yet ready to tackle the big stuff or asks just yet and i was recommended to write a oneshot/short thing so.... yet again, conversations with @llamagoddessofficial​ brought an idea to life and I’ve been kinda obsessed with it <u<

----

Space.

Vast, hauntingly beautiful...

lonely.

Even though you’re far from alone on this station- there was a huge crew of humans aboard with you- being on a station always left you with this feeling of... isolation.

You were on lone station, far from the planet whence it was launched, circling the star from a distance. There was no obvious motivation for why you were in one right now- living in space has become commodity, just another way of living. But to say you and the crew were living in space “just because” wasn’t quite the correct answer either... a lot of the people onboard were researches, and you were simply a mechanic on the ship.

You’re distracted a little from looking out the window, at the stars, when you hear a little clank from the outside.

You can’t quite see what’s directly out the station from where you are, so you took a few steps further from the edges of the window and lean a bit into it. You can see a metallic leg, blue sparks from a torch... S4-N5 was out there, his eight legs firmly gripping onto the outside of the station while he was making some kind of superficial repair. As he did, he seemed to notice you, as his “skull” turned to the side, his artificial eyes with “lights” as pupils fixating on you. There was a glare so you couldn’t see him completely... he must’ve caught you in his sensors. You give him a little smile and a wave before he turned away from you to focus on the station.

Yes, humans weren’t the only crew members... there were also robots on this ship. They assisted in managing most of the ship to make sure nothing was falling apart, in order, and generally making the humans; lives much more comfortable, doing things that were deemed too risky for humans to do. They were categorized by intelligence, conveniently titled in three levels, at least on this ship. There were the I-1s, which... to be honest doesn’t seem to be “real” intelligence. They just remember what kind of coffee you like, for example, catering to your tastes, delivering things to your room, the roombas and toasters, those guys. I-2s has a more managing role, controlling the locks, the doors, gases, air, and all the calculating needed to keep the station stable. They have an AI, but they were mostly fixed to their programming.

Then there were the I-3s.... like S4-N5.

Much more intelligent than the other two, they’re mostly mobile, can react to things they didn’t originally have in their programming, do tasks, solves puzzles and problems... advanced learning AIs. Affectionately called “big three” by most people since they’ve become... slightly more common than before, they’re one of the most intelligent AIs created. S4-N5 (who you called “Sans” for short that everyone else picked up- “Es Four En Five” was quite a mouthful to say) was a mobile, mechanic robot. He was made to fix the major fixes in or out the ship, with eight legs to provide grip while he was outside to stop him from floating away, and two arms for all the fixing. He had tools stored in pretty much every part of him, including his legs- another reason why he had so many, er... limbs.

He had a head and upper body that looked strikingly similar to a human’s skeleton- despite having thick “bones” and a very rounded skull. Black “sockets” with lights serving as eyes... and a permanent, wide grin on his face. You’re not even sure why it’s there- but then again why did his upper body part have to look like a skeleton? Maybe it was just a design choice to make him less spider-y but... yeah he still looks like a robotic, spider skeleton.

What did S4-N5 stand for again? “Station something something”-?

“Hey how’s it hanging? you’ve been staring out for a while there. What, trying to tan your face?”

Your lips drop into a lopsided grin at the voice, feeling annoyed before you even see his face.

“Hi... Robert...” you turn around, straining your smile, “Yeah, I was just, thinking...”

“Oh yeah? What about?” You took a few steps back when Robert stepped uncomfortably close to you, leaning back on the window. You know the glass is made to endure but you start to play with your fingers looking at him.

“Oh just... hey, do you remember what ‘S4-N5′ stands for?”

“Ugh... the robot bug thing?” Robert’s “charming” smile turned into a frown at the mention, “Why do you wanna know?”

“I was just wondering because I saw him, I- nevermind...” guy probably has no idea...

“Those things don’t matter anyways, they’re probably just a bunch of numbers and codes to track which model and version of the robot is..” Robert made a pout with his mouth, looking like he wanted nothing more than to steer the conversation away from Sans.

“Hey do you wanna know what me and the boys did earlier?”

... Riiight back to him.

But that’s hardly just a Robert thing... everyone on the ship doesn’t really like talking about Sans. They seem to barely want to do ANYTHING with Sans. He has a reputation for being the creepiest robot on the ship, almost entirely silent, walking around with his eight legs like a giant spider, with that upper “skeletal” body with the grin that now that you’re thinking about it again may be so he’d look friendlier... instead doing the opposite.

You tune out of him for a while as he regales you with something stupid he did on the ship that has you wondering how he even got assigned to this station when you perk your head at the sound of the air-lock door hissing open, the sounds of metal clinking against metal.

“-and ah fuck, speak of the devil. You talk about him and there he is.”

You turn around and see Sans as the doors close behind him in all his glory. Standing almost at twice your height, a shiny, metallic spider. His legs resembled knives, sharp with pointed joints, dividing a leg into three parts. His plated “abdomen”, equipped with machinery, energy storage, and a compartment for supplies suspended above the legs, holding up his torso.

You knew those legs are for mobility, grip, and tools, while the abdomen served to keep all of his body parts in check... but even you had to admit his likeness to spiders could be a bit unnerving.

“Ugh, look at that thing...” Robert whispered to you, as if Sans would take offense to whatever he was about to say, “he’s so fucking creepy, c’mon, why don’t we go somewhere else?”

He looked like he was about to take you by the arm before you jerked away from him.

“Why? He’s just doing his thing, he’s not made to hurt us, just relax!” you hiss at him. You knew Sans could be pretty creepy to some people, but he’s just being childish right now.

“Are we looking at the same thing? I- look, now it’s staring at us,”

You took a glance behind and sure enough, Sans was facing you, with only his head turned to you. You saw how his “pupils” focused, fixating on the nearby humans.

Is it just you or did his eyes look.. more intense than usual..?

“Do you see that? It looks like it’d fucking kill you in your sleep, don’t go out the ship with it (Y/n), it’d probably snip your tether, sadistic fuck.”

“What is wrong with you? He’s just doing his job can you just leave him alone?” You knew Sans was an AI but... it just felt wrong to be talking about him that way in front of him.

“What, because he’ll listen to me?” Robert scoffed, before his definite scowl turned into something less confident. “... actually yeah I don’t like that, so come on let’s go get some food or something.”

“You can go ahead and do that, I...” think of something think of something, “... need to go to the supply room for a moment. I think I’ve got something to fix and I’d rather finish it now rather than later.”

You walk on ahead without letting Robert reply, hearing his slightly distressed sounds of frustration.

“I- ok fine, I’ll be in the cafeteria.”

You hold your sigh until you get into the supply room, for once wishing you had a task to do as you look at your E-Pad.

One lose pipe at Section 8... least priority... what’s is it I need...

You don’t really have to do it, it’s hardly a human-specific maintenance job, but you didn’t want to just be hanging around outside while you wait for Robert to clear out of the cafeteria, because you’re starting to feel peckish.

Your mind goes a bit blank, staring at some spare pipes in front of you. You pick them up with no real intention in your mind, your mind just throwing around the word ‘pipe’ in your head and your hand just grabbed the nearest thing related. It was mostly quiet in the room, aside from the sound of air flowing out of the ventilation system and providing white noise in the background. You completely lose track of what you’re doing, just killing time in the most useless ways possible when...

Clink. Clink.

You hear... Sans’ legs clanking around outside. Something about the sound makes you go still, gripping tighter onto a pipe that just so happened to be in your hand. It was slow, deliberate movements... your heart rate quickened. Something about that quiet noise, sounding so loud when the room was so quiet felt you with this primal dread. You could hear your heart beating in your ears.

He was approaching the door...

Why were those legs so chillingly horrifying to you sometimes?

... No no, it’s ok he’s just... walking by...

The clanging stopped right outside the door while you bore holes into the pipe with your stare. keenly aware of Sans’ movements.

...

The hissing of the sealed doors opening almost makes you jump out of your skin, goosebumps suddenly breaking everywhere all over your skin as you make the mental note that: Sans opened the door.

As he steps inside, those quiet, tapping noises... you shake off your discomfort, ignoring the uncomfortable chill climbing up your spine the closer he sounds.

You said it yourself earlier. He’s harmless, he’s just doing his job... probably needs to take something. You’re in the supply room, remember? He may be a robot but treating him like he’s a monster just didn’t sit right with you when his sole purpose is to keep the ship intact.

You mess around with the pipes some more, trying to make it look like you’re busy gathering supplies, or something. He’s probably come to get supplies himself, he always resupplies the spares in his abdomen for future fixes before going to neutral mode.

You hear his movement doesn’t stop, every step he makes sounds like a whole second, and he keeps coming closer and closer and closer... until he’s directly behind you.

You sweat a little, the proximity making you a bit nervous, feeling like you’re being scrutinized.

He’s completely silent, and the silence stretches on longer than you’d think... what’s he doing? His shadow fell over you, unmoving, stationary. After a while you couldn’t stand it and turned around to see what he was doing-

Squeaking a little when you saw he had bent down so he was at your eye level, finding yourself face to face with him.

“O-oh hey Sans!” You greeted him cheerfully, though your heart threatened to leap out of your chest just a second earlier.

“Hello, Crew-Member 55.” He tilted his head to the side a bit, like he was confused by your reaction.

“I’m... sorry, you surprised me, I didn’t think you’d be that close. Did you... need anything?”

You’re so close to him that you could hear his eyes as his pupils widened and narrowed, focusing on you, see all his individual “teeth” of his, looking like a big, wide cheshire grin.

“... tool set complete.” He says, one of his automated responses. “It seems that you need something, 55. Do you require assistance?”

You looked at the pipe still clutched into your hand and drop it back into the latch. “I... yeah, actually. There’s a... a loose pipe in section 8, can you help me get the tools I need?”

“...” Sans tilted his body back, and you could hear again the whirring in his eyes as he focuses.

“... no tools required.” he finally says, surprising you a bit. “I can manage it for you, 55. You do not need to fix it.”

“Huh?” You checked your E-pad, and sure enough, the task was labelled as “taken by S4-N5”.

“Oh.. thanks Sans, you didn’t have to do that.” you smile at him, and... was it just you or did his grin widen a bit?

“I’ll uh... leave you to that then...” you slip out from the end of the room he had you cornered in- not going to lie, being trapped by a giant metallic spider didn’t seem very comfortable to you. His head faced you the entire time, his head turning 180 degrees. You almost rushed outside a bit to escape his gaze, but then you stop right at the door.

“Oh Sans, can I ask you a question?”

He’s silent. You take it as a ‘yes’.

“I... haha, sorry I forgot... what does S4-N5 stand for?”

“Station 4, Neurocognitive 5.” He responds as soon as you’re done speaking. “Station 4 refers to the station I am assigned: a star revolving station. Neurocognitive refers to my AI: Cognitive. I don’t have real neurons, however I am named so because I simulate one. Was that clear and concise, 55?”

You stagger a bit, for some reason you had.. human expectations for him? You didn’t think he’d reply you with such a detailed explanation of his name.

... you smile at him.

“Yes it was. Thanks, Sans, I appreciate it.”

“A pleasure, 55. Have a pleasant day.”

Of course, his response was robotic but... he is a robot. And... maybe you’re anthropomorphizing him a little but it sounds like he had emotion saying it.

You come out with a little spring in your step. Guess you’ll just check the cafeteria... if Robert’s there you can just go to your crew room and wait him out there. At least you didn’t have anything to do today.

You hear the sound of Sans shuffling around the supply room, probably getting what he needed to make the maintenance before he shuts the door. You hear him stepping away from you to Section 8. You hear another door open, his metallic legs coming to a halt.

“Oh hey whoah- hey!” You hear Robert’s voice, startled, staggering back to the door. You hear Sans skitter back as well, much faster than you heard him walking earlier.

“Please step away.” His voice, suddenly much colder and robotic sounded. “Please step away.”

You turn around and see Robert grasping the toilet door (guess he hadn’t immediately went to get food), trying to make as much space as he can from Sans, while Sans was pressing himself to the other side of the corridor, his eyes... much sharper than you saw them before. They looked almost.. hostile(?).

“Man I’m trying- move!”

“Please be at least 1.5 meters, or 4 feet away. Please be at least 1.5 meters, or 4 feet away.”

Everything becomes static again as you focus on what Sans is saying.

Please be at least 1.5 meters, or 4 feet away.

"This is a safety precaution. Please step away.”

...

You were much, much closer to Sans when he had you trapped in the supply room.

[markantonys]

Now that you've read all the books, what are you most looking forward to them adapting in the show? And also impressions of everyone's character arcs and how they might adapt them to screen?

HMMMMMMM in general what i'm looking forward to most is seeing how the major advantages that the show has over the books continue to improve the story: a) the endpoint is already known, so the pieces can be set up better and series-long arcs can be treated with consistency, b) greater emphasis on and understanding of interpersonal relationships and the emotional weight thereof, c) the elimination of dated attitudes like gender essentialism and "being gay is just a phase in college" stuff, and updating the world to feel truly inclusive and diverse (which rj DID intend, he just missed the mark on some things since it was the 90s lmao)

now for character arcs!

rand: so excited to see this onscreen! no question about it, i am ready to get hurt again! i remember you and i have discussed before the difficulties of adapting this in a visual medium since so much of rand's arc and struggles are internal, so i'm really looking forward to seeing how they will pull this off. most importantly, i can't wait to thirst over josha as Darth Rand jkjfg

egwene: i think her arc is probably my favorite character arc of the books, and in some scenes in s1 (especially with the whitecloaks) madeleine madden showed that she will totally nail late series egwene's stone cold badassery, so i absolutely cannot wait to see her arc! it is so powerful and empowering and i think it will translate beautifully and easily to a visual medium.

mat: i really like the show's changes to his backstory and think that will help ground his character a lot and make his insecurities and fears more tangible - just in the first season it's helped show the contrast between the mat that most people see (including mat himself) and the real mat. i am.........not a fan of mat or his arc after winter's heart and believe he was character assassinated by rj way before sanderson entered the picture and found his endgame super depressing, so i'm very nervous to see how the show will handle tuon and mat/tuon, but cautiously optimistic because i love a lot of the tropes they're built on and just found the execution terrible (since getting them together required forcing mat to behave extremely ooc and basically become a terrible person who no longer cares about slavery - i have hope that the show will find a way to do this more organically and maybe, you know, make tuon have to get better instead of mat have to get worse lmao)

perrin: i didn't care for perrin in the books but i found him so sweet and lovable in the show, so they've already made a big improvement! same thing as with rand where so much of his arc is internal. i think that the whole laila thing was a good move (i can see how it might feel like fridging, but i personally didn't feel that way or mind it) because it anchors perrin's internal struggle with violence in a way that is MUCH more understandable and emotionally compelling to the audience than in the books where he felt bad that he killed whitecloaks who were trying to hurt him and egwene. and the changes to the way of the leaf and his conversation with ila were also wonderful additions to make pacifism seem like an actually viable alternative, which the books never managed.

nynaeve: i absolutely adored her arc in the first half of the series, but was disappointed that she kinda faded away in the second half and was largely reduced to being rand's saidar battery, so i'm hoping the show will give her more to do in the second half (condensing the slog will help a lot with the many characters who feel like they're not really doing much in the second half of the series). nynaeve was the first character who jumped out as my favorite the first time i watched the first 3 episodes and i've seen lots of other show-only people list her as a favorite, which goes to show that they've already done an A+ job with her in s1!

and finally, some specific things that i'm excited to see the show tackle:

ELAYNE!!!!!!!!!!!! my wife, my idol, my reason for being!!!! i'm dying to see her next season!!!!!

i'm also so excited to see aviendha!!!!! and the aiel in general

rand's relationships. the seeds of a wonderful polycule are there, the execution was just bad in the books lmao and given rafe's comments and the use of alanna's polycule as a forerunner to rand's, i think we will be in for a treat here and get a bona fide representation of healthy polyamory! i'm also 99.999999999% confident that elayne and aviendha (at the very least, maybe also min) will date each other as well as rand, and as a bi woman whose favorite character is elayne, if/when i get canon bi elayne, i WILL cry and that is a promise jdkfjg

the wondergirls' dynamic and the wondergirls + mat dynamic (especially mat and elayne!)

gawyn and gawyn/egwene! i don't care what anyone says, i love him and i love the ship! and that leaked gawyn audition script has got me super intrigued and excited for where they might take him. i think he and galad were sorely underused and absent for the majority of the books, so hopefully the show will do more with them.

that script also showed that the trakand sibling relationships will be important and acknowledged that moiraine is their aunt, so i'm thinking we might get some of these family dynamics fleshed out more, which i'm always all about!

tel'aran'rhiod, because that's something that was always somewhat difficult for me to visualize while reading. a number of other magical things fall into this category as well (notably the cleansing of saidin and rand's final confrontation with the dark one).

verin!!

the box. enough said!

rand and mat's rhuidean trip. rand giving mat cpr is like the #1 book scene where i'm like "this must be included exactly as is or i'll riot" lmao (well, not EXACTLY as is because a) book!rand's cpr was wack, and b) they didn't even HUG after mat almost DIED, which was a crime! they have to hug at that moment in the show!)

egwene's battle against the seanchan in TGS. also egwene at the last battle, especially her reaction to gawyn's death and subsequent power blast. i will cry! powerful character unleashing a power blast when a loved one dies is one of my favorite tropes!

hoping for more AOL flashbacks like the 1x08 cold open to flesh out lews therin and the forsaken more than the books did. the forsaken in general i'm excited for! when i rewatch s1 i will definitely be pausing to analyze those statues and see if i can guess which ones they're including haha

i'm not exactly EXCITED for tuon since i despise her in the books lmao but she had great character potential that was wasted, so i'm curious to see what the show will do with her. i think it'd be really neat if they introduced her much earlier on in the story, possibly even showing her life in seanchan (they could really lean on the Tragic Backstory/Fucked Up Family angle to give the audience a reason to sympathize with her), so then the audience already knows and is invested (or at least interested) in her by the time she crosses paths with mat. and they absolutely HAVE to do something with the fact that she can channel, that was so wasted in the books that it might as well not have even been a thing.

the seanchan in general and the sul'dam channeling secret was one of my biggest frustrations with the books (ever since book 2 we were promised that the fact that sul'dam can channel would shake the empire to its foundations, but that never happened, and also when you introduce an antagonistic empire that enslaves people, i just ASSUME that they will be defeated or forced to change their ways and the slaves will be freed by the end) so i'm hoping the show will resolve all that in a more satisfying way.

speaking of my biggest frustrations, the show had better reunite the full ef5 properly by the end!!!! and have less character separation in general. which i think it will do, since it really committed to the ef5 dynamic and the importance of relationships in general in s1.

i'm sure there are many more things i could add to this list, but these are the ones off the top of my head!

[majorxmaggiexboy]

i had typed up a whole thing but it wouldn’t let me post so i’ll just paraphrase/condense to:

It’s dumb  that they went to all that trouble to get Mary and Anna in the same place and then used that time to have Mary continue to call Anna an adulteress while Anna was doing nothing but sticking up for Mary’s concerns, listening to Mary’s ideas, and generally trying her best to look out for Mary for absolutely no reward

it’s weird that in the Already Done scene Ben has the line “It’ll be my men, no, my FRIENDS who pay the price” after an entire season of him arguing with Anna every time he speaks to her and completely dismissing Caleb’s struggles. it’d be one thing if we’d actually been shown Ben wrestling with his duty to the Cause vs. to the Ring but alas we get none of that and also there’s minimal build-up to him exploding at Washington anyway like i’d get it if they’d kept up momentum from Wash’s aggravation with Ben over that letter from Arnold but that situation is resolved almost immediately and then not brought up again so Ben’s passionate speech just kinda comes out of nowhere and doesn’t feel entirely earned, enjoyable as it is.

literallly tho Ben spends three seasons leaning on Caleb and then in s4 can’t return the favor and it’s not even acknowledged in the writing like. Anna brings it up one time in a way that doesn’t agree with what we actually see happening (he’s not been “treating Caleb as a broken man” he’s been ignoring that there’s anything wrong with him and expecting him to function as normal but i digress) and it’s. never developed. Ben shouts at Caleb. Caleb goes and does the thing. End of the series and they’re all chums as normal like nothing happened.

on that note i do kind of feel like the “and ye shall receive” conversation should have come from Ben. I like Mary and i like her interactions with Caleb and it makes sense that she would do this for Abe, it’s just strange that she winds up being the emotional anchor to reel Caleb back from the brink when the two of them have barely interacted and have no established emotional connection. meanwhile Ben and Caleb have the entire series’ worth of connection established, and Caleb has been Ben’s emotional anchor numerous times throughout the show, and now the one time you’d think it’d be the reverse and Ben would step up for Caleb...that Doesn’t Happen? idk fam seems shady to me

anyway i feel like TURN s4 (and s3 to a slightly lesser extent) had a lot of Plot Arcs but not a lot of Character Arcs and im a little hmmmmmmm :/ about that. weakened the ending for sure.