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A few weeks now, living with the rebels. It has been odd.
She has met all of them now. She spends the most time with Milo and Zack- they spend time with her in her room, show her around, help her out. Not just out of the goodness of their hearts- she heard their boss tell them they have to stay with her when she is outside of her room. Just in case.
They say that they’re her teammates, now, and her friends. But internally, she can’t help but see them as her handlers.
If Milo and Zack are like Savannah and Brick in role (not personality, definitely not), then Candace is like Verliezer. She is the leader, she is in charge. She is loud, bossy. Fiercely protective of her brothers, and of her team of rebels.
Her brothers are the people she has spent the second highest amount of time around. Phineas and Ferb seem to be completely geniuses, in every sense of the word. And that includes mechanically. So they have been checking her metal limbs, repairing parts. They don’t seem revolted by it, they seem almost intrigued. Excited.
She hasn’t spent as much time around the others, but they all seem weirdly kind. In a mind boggling, disorientating way. They can be somewhat awkward around her, sure, but the rebels seem determined to not treat her like a weapon, like Verliezer’s weapon.
She sometimes has to remind herself of that. That she is their weapon, not Verliezer’s.
She took off her jacket with the V-Tech logo emblazoned proudly on it and dumped it in the corner of her room. It disappeared the next day. But the V shape of her ear is still clear, obvious to everyone.
She sees a few examples of Milo’s condition already. She can’t help but wonder how the kid can be alive- he is constantly dodging falling objects (and walls), running from wild animals, and a myriad of other things. She would never be stupid enough to underestimate him- she has fought him enough times to see his very real skill. But living with him just makes it clearer how great he is.
One day, she is walking with Milo and Zack. She can’t help but fall behind them slightly, lower her head. It feels wrong to act like equals to them. They fall back to walk at her side, meet her eyes even if it means lowering their own heads. Sometimes she can’t understand the way they act at all.
A panicked warning yell makes all of their heads snap up. This corridor has another branching off of it. And a huge wave of water is rushing towards the trio, a wave that is filled with rubble and broken equipment.
Zack is out of the way, but Milo isn’t quite yet. It isn’t even a thought, just an instinct. She shoves him out of the way mere seconds before she is caught by the wave.
It hits her like a truck, slamming her against the wall. Her arms fly out as her breath is knocked out of her. And it is replaced only by water, which floods into her throat and her lungs. She fights against the force of the water, but she can feel her limbs getting weaker. Her eye is flickering.
Oh, you stupid cyborg. Her own head spits at her. Water is her one weakness. She’s fine out in the rain, but being submerged? That doesn’t end well, her metal parts break. She can’t control her limbs now, they flail helplessly. And she can’t see out of her robotic eye.
She sinks like a stone, her useless metal arms pulling her down. Her human eye flickers shut, weariness falling over her.
Arms grab her, yanking her out of the water. She sprawls on the hard floor of the corridor, coughing water out of her lungs, shaking and convulsing. She bends over with the force of her coughs, but she can’t even bring her arms to her mouth to cover it.
Hands touch her, help her into a more comfortable position. Pat her back, help her to cough up the water. She limply allows them to, so disoriented. She is leant against the wall, and someone is checking her throat, her breathing. And then they are yelling for help, something about… broken?
“Melissa?” Milo’s voice breaks through the daze.
Panic hits Melissa, as hard as the wave. “Sorry…” She manages. The effort leads to another fit of body wracking, pathetic coughs. Her head burns with humiliation and fear. The rebels have never seen her so weakened, so helpless. Do they regret taking her, now?
“What? Don’t apologise.” Milo’s voice is so, so soft. She is urged both to lean closer to it, and to lean away. To protect herself from something so foreign. “Can we carry you? Phineas says that you need to get to the workshop right away.”
Asking for permission, when she could never refuse him. When she doesn’t have the right to refuse anything. She nods anyway, and soon finds herself being lifted. Being carried away, by hands that are gentle, not rough.
Even her human eye is darkening now. She tries to fight the darkness, but she can’t. Like the water, it is too strong.
———
When she wakes up, she is lying on a table in the workshop. That sends panic surging through her, it feels far too familiar.
But she isn’t restrained, and she feels… fine. When she tries, she can move all of her limbs. But she still can’t see out of her robotic eye. She hates that, that feeling of disorientation. Of vulnerability.
“Melissa? You’re awake!” Milo sounds so relieved. She turns to look at him, blinking her human eye. “And can you move? Phineas and Ferb said that your arms and leg and foot would would be ok.”
Melissa nods slowly. She turns her head to look, and can’t stop her eyebrow from raising when something small and white falls out of the join. “Rice?”
“Hey, it works!” Phineas is as cheerful as ever. “Oh, but your eye isn’t repairable. We’re gonna have to replace it.”
She nods. She doesn’t know where to look, what to do. She feels totally out of place, out of shape. Verliezer made her into different person than she was before, changed things other than her arms and legs and face. She doesn’t know how to act in this environment, when he isn’t around.
“Why would you do that?” Milo sounds unusually serious. She has very rarely heard him sound so serious.
It makes her flinch, which she tries to suppress. “I’m sorry.” She says automatically, not even sure what she is apologising for. She tries to think about what it could be. Probably, he’s angry that she was so weak. So helpless. Verliezer always hated it, that she had such an easily exploitable weakness. Was furious when he found out, punished her cruelly.
She can’t ask what has upset him, she should know. Should understand. “I shouldn’t have done it. I’m sorry, si- Milo.” Calling him by his first name is something she has to train herself to do, and when she is frightened she falls back to a reflex. It’ll upset him more if she slips up.
Milo looks down at her, brown eyes filled with the pity that makes her squirm. “I don’t think you understand what I mean.”
“I’m sor-“
“Don’t- you don’t need to apologise.” Milo stops her. She flinches, flinches roughly. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have interrupted. But you don’t need to apologise. I just, I don’t understand why you let yourself be caught in the water to save me. You must’ve known that your metal parts could break when you’re submerged.”
Melissa hesitates. “It’s what I’m supposed to do.”
“No, it’s not.” Milo says immediately. “You need to look after yourself. I mean, your eye’s broken. That wouldn’t have happened if it had been me. I would be completely fine already.”
Melissa looks away. It seems like an obvious equation to her. The safety over a cyborg comes under the safety of a human. But he is seeing the sums differently. Adding it up in a way that must be wrong, except she shouldn’t question him. Shouldn’t go against him.
She nods.
Milo looks unconvinced. Still worried. But he smiles. “I’ve been dealing with Murphy’s Law for nearly 13 years, I don’t need you to throw yourself into the firing line for me.” His tone is back to light and friendly. “How’s the eye? It must feel weird.”
“I can’t feel anything in my mechanical parts.” She reaches out with her metal hand to touch it anyway.
“Hey, don’t touch! We’ve already unscrewed the front part.” Phineas calls. Melissa yanks her hand away as if burned.
“Yes, si- Phineas.” She lies still, arms by her side. They work on her eye, with loud tools. She tries to keep her face blank. Although it doesn’t hurt, she has always found being worked on somewhat uncomfortable. Especially her eye.
Phineas explains everything that he does. She has noticed this about him- she thinks that he might be trying to make her feel more comfortable. She doesn’t understand why he wants that, when she will be still no matter what. But it does work, she does feel more comfortable.
Ferb is quieter. She has only heard him speak a couple of times. But he is steady, and skilful. And careful.
She likes both of them. She likes all of these rebels- she just doesn’t understand why they act the way that they act. Why they seem to see something different from what she does, from what everyone does.
“Done!” Phineas sounds triumphant. Sure enough, her eye flickers to life. She suppresses her sigh of relief to have regained her full vision. “How’s it working?”
“Good, it’s good.” She says. It works exactly like it did before, showing her various statistics, showing her the position of everyone in the room. “That was fast.”
“It was quite easy.” Phineas shrugs casually. “Oh, and we made it waterproof. That was easy too, I don’t know why they didn’t do it before.”
Melissa looks away. That doesn’t make any sense. Her easily exploitable weakness was fixable? Verliezer would have been so pleased to know that. Unless, of course…
“We can do the rest of your limbs another time.” Phineas says. “And we were thinking, maybe we could teach you how to do basic repairs on yourself? So you aren’t helpless no one’s available. I can’t believe that they didn’t already teach you that, it’s like first aid but for cyborgs.”
Melissa stares. She tries to guess his motivation… irritation at having to deal with her minor issues? Yeah, that makes sense. He doesn’t seem irritated, but she is proof that people don’t always act how they feel. “That sounds good, thank you.”
“We’ll do that tomorrow. You should probably rest, you did almost drown and all.” Phineas suggests. “See you later!”
He waves enthusiastically as he leaves. Ferb also waves. She awkwardly waves her hand too.