Chapter Text
"Dammit Gurathin you're getting in the fucking bed." SecUnit is glaring at me (well, past me) like I deleted half of its Sanctuary Moon files. This is ridiculous.
"This is ridiculous," I announce, hands on hips. "Just because I yawned twice doesn't mean I'm tired!"
It sneers at me, an expression it probably got from Amena. "And now you sound like a toddler."
I do. I scowl and fold my arms (not helping with the impression, dammit), pointedly looking away from both it and the bedroom. I have absolutely no intention of going anywhere near my bed until I'm certain I can collapse directly into sleep. "I'm perfectly capable of finishing up this piece of code-"
"You'll find another bug three quarters of the way in and rabbit hole about it, and then you'll be at your workstation until dawn. Again. Absolutely not." It's right. I despise when it's right. I hope it can't tell that's been my plan for the evening.
"Why do you care, anyway? For that matter why are you here?" And when did it start watching fairy tales while it was gone? SecUnit scowls right back at me. For it to be here in my rooms within hours of Perihelion's arrival, well, it's weird. I'm the client it "doesn't like," and that usually means I don't get to see it when it gets back from its missions with Perihelion and its crew for a few days. Having it standing in my rooms this soon? ...oh. "Mensah told you."
"She did. So I'm here and your workstation stays off and you're getting. In. The fucking bed, Gurathin. Or I'm going to put you there." Nothing about its expression says this is a joke.
Nothing about its expression says it knows the way my pulse tried to leap when it threatened me. Small favors.
"Uh-huh." I give it my very best unimpressed face. "You're going to voluntarily touch a human because I'm a little tired."
"Client care protocol for a chronically exhausted client recommends initiating good sleep hygiene protocols, including turning off all screens a hour before sleep," it intones, as if it's reading from a medical module. "Best practices include spending that hour in wind down activities, such as stretching, listening to calming music, reading a book in warm light, meditation -"
"How am I supposed to read if I'm not supposed to have screens?" I shoot back.
It gives my general direction a withering look. "They make paper books on Preservation. I've seen them."
I gesture around my space. "Show me a book to read here."
It ignores me. "Given that you have also been showing signs of atrophying muscles and shortened ligaments, I suggest the stretching exercises."
I can feel my jaw wanting to clench, but consciously relax it. "My physical fitness isn't your concern, SecUnit."
"It is Dr Mensah's concern, and she asked me to intervene," it replies. A little too smoothly.
I squint towards its shoulder. "That's not what she said."
"She expressed concern about your health. I said I would check on you." It's looking almost smug.
"You've checked on me, you've lectured me, you can go now," I retort.
The smugness develops further into a full smirk. That last run must have be painfully dull if it's upgraded its "act like a human" code to include this level of purposeful facial expressions. I suddenly wonder if part of the reason it's doing this is to try them out on a new test subject. I can appreciate the commitment to the science, at least, even if it's frustrating me to no end. "I'm not leaving until you have begun your rest period, Dr Gurathin."
Never mind. It's being a sanctimonious jerk, that's all. I turn away from it.
"Sounds like you're going to have a boring night, then," I say, and turn my workspace back on.
Or try to. It doesn't respond to my gesture. I try again, scowling when it continues to not work. "SecUnit, did you lock me out?"
"Your non emergency feed access will be granted after a full rest period."
I wheel around, unable to keep the shock and anger off my face anymore. "That is unacceptable! You have no right to lock me out of my own feed!" I start prying at the feed from my augments, unwelcome panic rising, and get my mental fingers slapped for my pains.
"You need to sleep, Gurathin," it says, almost gently. "I wouldn't have been able to do that without you noticing if you were rested."
It can't be serious. I'm good -
pinpointing the access point reaching down the feed rage fear pain hellish joy got you you bastard
- but I know it's better. I've never known it to humor me, though. I don't know what to make of that.
Before I can follow that train of thought any further, SecUnit moves, in my personal space far more quickly than a human could move. I think I do a decent job of controlling my reaction, only freezing up for a split second, but for a moment it looks almost…
…sad?
"Come on," it says, in that same oddly coaxing tone. "There's probably modules on stretching I can access if you don't have any of your own."
It takes me an embarrassing few seconds to catch up to what it's saying. "I don't need to stretch, SecUnit, I need to work."
slammed into wakefulness too late unfamiliar touch in my systems alerts screaming in my brain silenced seconds later
I run my hands over my face and through my hair, trying to scrub away any sense or appearance of tiredness. It doesn't understand. I can't sleep. I can't just get into bed and expect to get any kind of rest unless I'm completely exhausted. That's how I've been for the last few months. It's not great, but it's been working well enough.
Or so I thought, anyway. Seems like certain people have decided otherwise. I know it's irrational to feel hurt about it, but I do.
"Why are you so determined to not sleep?" SecUnit asks, sounding...not annoyed. Something else. I can't place my finger on its tone.
"…it's not that I don't want to," I finally mutter, crossing my arms around myself again. I refuse to back away even if it's closer than I want it to be. Behind me is the door to my bedroom, and I'm not giving up an inch in that direction. Maybe if I try to explain a little it'll leave me alone. "I told you, I can't."
It processes that for a moment. "You were sleeping fine before my last mission."
I scowl at its ear. "I specifically refused consent for you to monitor my bedroom."
"I don't have to," it says, sounding smug again. "I've monitored humans enough to know what a rested one looks like without having to watch them sleep."
I honestly can't tell if I find that disturbing or comforting, for me personally or on its behalf.
"You have all the hallmarks of sleep deprivation now, though," it adds, losing the smug edge to its voice. "Something changed."
"I don't think that's-" I begin.
"Absolutely my concern. A sleep deprived human is a human making mistakes and poor decisions. I'm not going to make my job any harder than it has to be, and you shouldn't either." One eyebrow twitches in a truly masterful expression of judgment. "Are you going to tell me or am I going to find out the hard way?"
Seriously, what has SecUnit been watching lately?
I sigh heavily and look away. I probably don't want to know if "the hard way" is real or another line from a stupid telenovela. Besides…it is a security concern. I had been planning to bring it up, just not like this; not in my room, not when I was already feeling on the defensive.
Not admitting to the emotional fallout I'd had from the attack.
"There was a breach in my personal security while you were gone," I said, as neutrally as I could. "An attempt was made to hack my augments and render me nonfunctional."
code crawling through my brain through the linked processor shutting down my vision my hearing causing the programs that regulate my autonomic nervous system to throw error code after error code as I fought to find the source of the attack and shut them down just as hard while my heart stuttered and my lungs felt like they were collapsing
"…somebody tried to kill you. Why wasn't I informed immediately upon arrival?"
I blink and look up. It sounds flat, affectless. All of the fun new act-like-a-human code got dropped while I was fighting back that panic attack. It's not-looking at me in a way that makes me feel like if my feed was up it would be trying to lean on me for, I don't know, intimidation or something. "Why would you be?"
"Because if someone attempts to murder one of my humans -"
"-or augmented humans," I chime in on its inevitable separation of me from the rest of its humans. It glares past me.
"-I need to know," it finishes.
"For somebody to tell you, other people would need to know." Oh, it did not like that. "I handled it. It's fine. I intended to tell you when you got back, since the operative cracked your wall, and that makes it your business, at least."
"By 'it's fine' you mean you successfully defended yourself," it says, not a question.
"Yes," I reply.
ripping through the shielding on the other side of the connection like it was so much paper going straight for the dispenser the attacker hadn't found in me because it wasn't there anymore triggering an immediate release of all the uppers into the bloodstream feeling the ratcheting heartrate like my own too fast too fast had to get out before
"Do you want me to look at your firewall code now?" it asks, not bothering to ask what a successful defense had entailed.
I'm so relieved I blurt out, "Yes please," before I can think better of it. Oh no.
There's suddenly pressure on my firewalls, and if my systems hadn't done the handshake of an affiliated system immediately I would have panicked. SecUnit flows into my security processes, riffling through them the way a sleight-of-hand artist does their cards. In its wake are various tweaks and smoothed-down code, systems interlocking again in a way I hadn't been able to fully manage.
(I used to deal with augment cracking regularly, having to fix my own firewalls shouldn't make me start hyperventilating and dropping code like a glitching amateur. SecUnit seeing this level of disrepair is embarrassing on an entirely new level, and I can feel myself flush with shame.)
{That should help}, it comments, feed voice devoid of metadata. It pulls back out and falls back a step, regarding the wall behind me.
It takes me several moments to get myself back under control. "Thank you, SecUnit," I say, voice steady.
"It's my job," it replies, and I can't tell if it's being ironic or sincere.
"I still get to thank you," I retort.
"Will you go to sleep now?" it asks, still in SecUnit neutral. That alone tells me how bothered it is by what happened. It must be seriously pissed off that somebody got past its code successfully while it wasn't here to deal with it. SecUnit tends to take security failures as a personal insult. The fact that I had the audacity to deal with it, but not clean up the mess afterward? Yeah, one more reason for me to be on its least favorite list.
I sigh again and rub my hand over my face. "Okay, SecUnit, I'll try." I won't make any promises beyond that. Promises are too easily broken if you make them too rigid.
I let it herd me towards my bedroom, and it stands in the doorway as I go into my bathroom to change and do my nightly routine. It's still there when I come out, and I roll my eyes. "What, are you going to tuck me in?" I ask, heavy sarcasm in my tone.
"Do I have to?" it quips back. I ignore the little pang in my chest with the ease of long habit and turn away, pulling back the covers and climbing into my bed as if I wasn't being watched by a giant overbearing surveillance system. The increase in my heart rate and breathing as I attempt to settle in to sleep are less easy to ignore.
It's fine. I'm fine. I'm safe. SecUnit just fixed (and probably upgraded) my firewalls. It is literally looming in the doorway to my bedroom.
That last thought surprises me by helping. Huh. Not something I'd expect to be a comfort, considering I usually hate my privacy being violated, especially when I'm trying to sleep. I feel ridiculous. Do I actually need a personal guard to sleep now, like a child with a favorite blanket?
It moves to turn away after I gesture my lights off. Immediately I feel my heart seize a little. It stops and turns back.
"Dr Gurathin?"
"…yes, SecUnit?" I manage to sound calm, maybe even sleepy.
"You aren't afraid of the dark, are you?" There's a hint of amusement in the otherwise neutral voice.
"I am NOT. AFRAID. Of the DARK, SecUnit," I growl, glad the darkness is hiding my face.
"Your heartrate elevated when the lights went out," it points out. Right, it can monitor my biometrics at a distance. I hate this.
"It's fine, SecUnit. I'm a grown person that can sleep by myself." I am going to crawl out of my skin with humiliation if it doesn't leave. I am going to lie awake and stare at the ceiling and analyze what SecUnit did to my firewalls until I feel safe enough to sleep if it does.
"You have a surprisingly nice display surface for somebody who mostly reads scientific journals," it comments. What? "Would you mind if I used it while you slept? I have some new media to catch up on."
Normally I would in fact mind very much. Right now, though, the thought of SecUnit in the other room if anything happened is embarrassingly soothing. "Uh…go ahead, just keep the sound down."
"I can keep the sound on my internal system," it replies, and parks itself on my couch. The screen flickers on and I'm abruptly reminded that while keeping my bedroom door open feels safer, it also means the light from the screen will keep me up…unless I disable my visual augments. I have a moment of panic again, and then snort at myself. If SecUnit is in the living area, I don't need to worry about having immediate sight. I turn my visual augments off with a very slight pang, and instead turn up my auditory augments just a little, to reassure myself that it's really still there.
I fall asleep to the very soft sound of SecUnit humming the theme song of some overblown romantic drama under its breath. My last conscious thought is wondering if it's doing that for me.