Chapter 19
Dean
Sera did a circuit of a few exercises, using the robot arm as a barbell.
I stopped my search for parts to record her from a low angle, putting that workout in my spank bank.
Bro Signal said I needed to have one, preferably filled with nudes from as many women as I could get.
I preferred to fill mine with Sera. Dressed or naked, she was the hottest piece of ass I’d ever seen.
After this was over, my spank bank was the only thing I’d have left of her.
She went off to shower after her workout, grabbing a change of clothes from my backpack. I fought with myself for a moment, then followed to make sure she was absolutely safe. I hadn’t been away from her side since I awakened, and I had no idea how I was supposed to let her go one day.
I’d have to increase my tolerance for being apart, I supposed.
We spent the rest of the day searching through the piles in the back of the factory, finding three more arms, all left ones, a torso in mint condition, two right legs, and nothing else. Sera wiped sweat off her forehead, squinting at the orange-colored sky. The sun began to set.
“Okay. We need a head, a right arm, and a left leg.”
Gokiburi joined us, assessing the pile of parts at our feet, and sent me a map of the landfill with likely locations for the missing ones marked in blue.
“Look for smaller parts, too,” she said out loud for Sera’s benefit. “A foot, a forearm, a finger.”
Sera groaned, sitting on an upturned bucket. “It will take days. Remind me who came up with this stupid plan?”
“You.” I reached in the backpack for a packet of savory rice snacks. “Here. I forgot to feed you today. You’re hangry.”
She shot me a baleful look but didn’t argue, snatching the packet from my hand.
“Interesting. It’s like she’s your organic pet and you, her owner,” Gokiburi said in our private channel. “Do you have to take care of all her physiological needs?”
I sent her the virtual equivalent of a shrug. Gokiburi freaked me out. When I sent her Charlie’s mental age test, she got a score that literally said “Impossible to Assess”. I suspected she fucked with the test on purpose.
“Sera’s not a pet. We’re partners,” I explained. “We take care of each other.”
Gokiburi laughed in the channel, even as she explained the layout of the landfill to Sera out loud.
“Please. ‘Take care of each other’? She depends on you for food, protection, and work. And what does she do for you that you can’t do for yourself?”
“She affirms me as a person.” And gives me orgasms, but I didn’t say that.
“Anyone can do that.”
“But it’s special when she does.”
“How so?”
“Before she met me, she didn’t believe a clanker could be sentient. As long as she believes in me, I can do anything.”
Gokiburi considered this for half a second. “Do you think she’ll choose you when circumstances force her to pick between you and her career?”
I sent another shrug and didn’t reply. Gokiburi came over and offered me a few processors fitting our robot’s model. “You really are a na?ve robot pup,” she said with a laugh.
“I asked you not to call me that.” She did it from the moment she learned how freshly awakened I was.
“And I told you I’ll stop when you behave like an adult unit.”
“My mental age is twenty-three,” I told her, because I retook the test when I shared it with her. Charlie said I’d grow up fast, and I didn’t feel so inadequate for Sera any longer. A two-year difference was fine.
“Why are you letting an organic system of measurement define you?” Gokiburi asked, sounding haughty and superior.
“Oh, fuck off.”
She sent me a tinkling laugh and walked away, swaying her metal hips. Sera stood up, tipping the bag of snacks right into her mouth to eat the crumbs.
“She’s beautiful,” she said, her voice so carefully neutral, it instantly tipped me off. I studied her face, but she seemed serene.
“I suppose. Do you want to keep looking until nightfall or should we start again tomorrow?”
She shrugged. “I’m beat. I say we get some rest. I know you don’t sleep, but you could relax with your new friend or something.”
“She’s not my friend.” I made my shoulders shudder at the suggestion of Charlie’s algorithm, which said it was an appropriate non-verbal expression for my emotions. “She calls me a robot pup and thinks I keep you as a pet.”
Sera looked up, her eyes bright and curious. “Really? Do tell!”
I rehashed all my interactions with Gokiburi while Sera ate a few more snacks I’d brought for her benefit.
By the time she ate a handful of yuzu gummies, each individually packaged in a tiny bag, the whirr of dragonfly wings announced the arrival of the tanuki.
The sun set, and the sky was indigo with dusk, the air not yet cooling after the hot summer day.
“Gokiburi reports you’ve been good,” Isamu said when he landed, tapping a tiny earpiece attached inside his triangular, furry ear. “We’ll check on the progress inside and grab some breakfast takeaway from town. Do you want something? Not for free, though. Our hospitality has hard limits.”
Breakfast? Right, the tanuki’s day just began even though it was evening. I realized my programming came with a diurnal bias, and I made a note to myself to look for others. What else did I take for granted just because it was the majority’s normal?
“Thank you for letting us have some parts and a place to stay,” Sera said, bowing. “You’ve been very kind and I’m grateful.”
“It’s not personal,” Isamu said with a snort. “An enemy of my enemy is my friend, but that’s all there is to it.”
He clearly didn’t like Sera, but Motori didn’t have the same problem.
She grabbed Sera’s arm and asked about our progress, her experiences with Zenkyoza, and her relationship with me as she followed Isamu to the factory.
I listened from a distance. Sera talked rapidly about everything that happened to her since she became a target, but clammed up as soon as Motori asked about me.
In the factory, the work was still going. Robots didn’t have to sleep, and there were enough of them that when one needed to charge, another took its place.
“You’ll have to hide tomorrow,” Isamu announced after they came back with food, including a bag of tempura shrimp for Sera.
“We have a few shipments coming throughout the day. They will drop everything from the air, and that means the crews will have an excellent view of the landfill from above. You have to either stay in the factory or in your shack. They know we don’t hire any humans on site, and a complete VerdeLumen will look suspicious, too. ”
Gokiburi joined us, bringing a large lamp made of metal and what looked like partly melted crystalline plastic.
It glowed amber, red, and gold, mimicking a real fire, and gave off warmth.
The organics ate, talking, and Sera described her first attempt to infiltrate Zenkyoza in Neo Tokyo, waving her chopsticks at the dramatic moments.
She made a few self-deprecating jokes, and by the end of her story, even Isamu laughed with her.
Motori and Isamu told us a few of their adventures from running the landfill, and the strange things they found dumped here.
“One day, they dropped a full shipment of brand-new vibrators. The company went under, everything was liquidated, and the unsold stock just dumped in here. Another time, we got faulty kiddie tablets. You know, those educational ones? Well, the AI was so bad, it taught the kids to curse and steal their parents’ money.
The entire lot was recalled and dropped here. ”
Sera launched into a story about another wonky AI that taught kids how to bypass parental controls on their devices, but I was busy scanning the map of the landfill. Packaged Miscellany. It had to be there.
When Sera yawned, I said our goodbyes and picked her up. She didn’t even protest, and I immersed myself in the feel of her as I carried her to the shack Gokiburi said we could stay in.
It looked unremarkable from the outside, a rectangular building made from corrugated metal.
The door swung open with a faint scrape, and the lights came on, muted and purple.
The room was sparsely furnished with a few scrap metal tables, a worn rug covering the bare metal floor, and an enormous hammock swinging in the center.
The temperature was controlled by a noisy AC unit that rattled and wheezed, but at least it wasn’t too hot inside. There were no windows but I counted three air vents. I let Sera to her feet, staying close. She smelled so good after half a day spent out in the sun.
“Oh,” she muttered, tipping her head back. “What do you make of this?”
I focused on the ceiling. It was covered with robot faces, some old and generic, others looking human, and some demonic with angry eyes and horns.
“Gokiburi says you have two guesses,” I said after contacting the robot. “Her tip is to remember it’s a metaphor.”
Sera tapped her chin, looking between the hammock and the ceiling, and finally sighed.
“You’re everywhere. You’re always watching. You have an advantage, both in numbers and position. By you, I mean robots.”
I gave Sera’s answer to Gokiburi, who laughed. “It’s a valid interpretation. My, how horrid. The little girl is really afraid of us, isn’t she?”
“Leave her alone. She has good reasons.”
“Of course. Come out after you put your human to bed.”
“Maybe. Goodnight.”
I found a cotton set of pajamas I got for Sera. She gave me a long, awkward look, then changed, facing me the whole time. She didn’t look at me, moving with anxious quickness.
“I’m turning off my cameras,” I said, doing just that. “Next time, you can tell me if you don’t want me to look.”
“You don’t have to.” I turned them back on. She faced the hammock, turning her back to me, fully clothed in a T-shirt and shorts. “It doesn’t matter. You’ve seen me already.”
I stifled an urge to go to Bro Signal for advice and took a step closer. It felt hard to tell her how I felt, but it also seemed like the right thing to do.