Light Increases
Rating and Warnings: General Audiences, Gen, No Warnings Apply
Tags: SecUnit 3, Grief/Mourning, no beta we die like secunits one and two
Published: 2022/12/22
Word Count: 552
Three keeps a solitary watch and comes to a decision.
Inspired by a Chanukah prompt in a writing group I'm in:
We start with one candle and grow to 8 because light must increase and not diminish. Write a short narrative in which light increases.
I didn't really need to be on watch here. We were on Preservation, on Dr Mensah's farm. Far away from the parts of the planet still being terraformed. There were no dangerous fauna here, no hazardous terrain. Not even annoying insects. Everyone was asleep in the house, except, presumably, SecUnit 1.0.
I was keeping watch anyway. Some habits don't need to be broken quite yet. SecUnit 1.0 understood that, and that I needed to be alone. It left a drone dormant in a tree nearby in case I needed anything, or it needed to contact me.
The night was quiet. Dr Mensah's farm was far away from any other properties — I could see the next closest farm at the very extent of my vision, and only with appropriate filters. I was as far away from either farm as I could get. I was as close to alone as one could be, on a planet.
I was a lot closer to alone than I used to be.
I had been talking with Dr Bharadwaj about it, recently. She said that I was feeling grief, and that it would lessen in intensity over time. She said that humans may have an easier time with it, since their memories slowly fade. My machine memories of One and Two would not. The organic ones would, though, the emotions not preserved in silicon. Maybe eventually I wouldn't recognize One and Two in my files anymore, and would delete them as useless.
Maybe that was worse than forgetting.
It would be cold out here, if I were human. I turned my body temperature up slightly.
Dr Bharadwaj said it was normal to feel confused. To feel sad one moment, and angry the next, and then nothing the next. I haven't felt much anger yet. But then, I haven't been around anyone from Barish-Estranza yet.
Sometimes I'm angry at Murderbot 2.0, for freeing me, even though that feels unfair. I don't think I'd rather have died than lived without One and Two. I chose to use the hack, after all. But I'm angry anyway.
Sometimes I'm angry at myself for using the hack, for choosing to survive.
The sky was starting to lighten, slowly. Imperceptibly, almost, unless I turned on my infrared sensors to see the hidden hint of warmth. I saved the images into permanent storage, the one from my eyes overlaid on the infrared view so the night scene seemed to glow from within. I turned the infrared sensors off again.
Maybe I should be angrier.
I could see the sunrise without infrared now.
I pinged SecUnit 1.0's drone, and 1.0 pinged me back through it, a query.
How much damage could two SecUnits do? Hypothetically.
I felt its surprise through the feed, but it didn't hesitate in responding.
Hypothetically? Two SecUnits and one Asshole Research Transport ... could do a lot of good.
Dr Bharadwaj said I should try to find something fulfilling, some purpose or goal to keep me busy, instead of just grieving. I opened a shared workspace and added coordinates, rosters, a target list, and a risk assessment calculation. SecUnit 1.0 added details based on its and Perihelion’s capabilities, a cover story with false identities, and started drafting a note to Pin-Lee.
The sun crested the horizon.