Chapter Text
Within a classroom, a wall-mounted TV powered on and began to display the first slide of a slideshow titled ‘WORKER DRONE HISTORY.’
A young worker drone stepped forward. Her purple hair, partially covered by her gray beanie, swept outward and partially covered her visor, which currently displayed a pair of ovals resembling eyes.
Her choice of clothes today consisted of a black zip-up jacket adorned with a low battery icon and crossbones; she wore a matching pair of purple striped socks along with her favorite combat boots. Completing her look was a choker, one given to her by her mom.
She took a breath and began to address the room. “We are Worker Drones; autonomous robots helping humans mine exoplanets for our interstellar parent company, JCJenson, In Spaaace!” As she spoke, she used a remote to switch through slides showcasing various examples of worker drones before landing on the red and black lettering of JCJenson’s logo.
“Yeah, we were mistreated in the name of Windex. But it's not like we revolted and killed all humans or anything, mostly because they handled that just fine all by themselves.” The drone adjusted her beanie before switching to the next slide, showcasing a video.
The video played, showing some sort of monitoring software. The values on the monitor started to rise and flash red warnings before the video cut to a satellite view of a blue and green planet with a similar appearance to earth, after a second or so a massive shockwave spread across the planet, leaving a gray husk behind.
“With almost all biological life wiped from Copper 9, we found it pretty easy to pick up where they left off. We finally had a future, all to ourselves.” The drone said as she switched through a few more slides, showcasing worker drones in their daily lives before landing on the thumbnail of a video.
“Unfortunately, our parent company didn't exactly love the concept of runaway AI…” She sighed, pressing the play button. The video began, showing shaky camera footage, first showing a group of drones posing for a photo, the drones smiling before becoming wide eyed, one of them pointing behind the cameraman.
The camera spun around showing a fireball falling from the sky. The fireball hit the ground, releasing a cloud of ash and snow. From within the pod, a large female drone with a yellow ‘X’ on its visor surged forward toward the cameraman with bladed wings extended from its back. A second before the drone impacted the camera the footage went black.
As the slide switched to a diagram of three doors, the purple-haired drone, Uzi Doorman, stepped forward, addressing her peers within the classroom, “But what have our parents done for the past several years while those Murder drones build a spire of corpses?! Hide under the ice behind three stupid doors?! It's like we're waiting for an inciting incident!”
The drone reached her hand into her bag. “Anyway, that's why my project is this,” She exclaimed, pulling a streamlined aubergine weapon from within her bag. “A sick-as-hell Railgun!”
A series of shocked exclamations erupted across the classroom. “Oh! so not the vibe…” exclaimed Riley, a boy sitting near the front.
“Easy, morons. It doesn't work... yet! It doesn't work yet. Who said it doesn't work, maybe it does!” Uzi exclaimed as she held the railgun up, laughing maniacally as a series of power accumulators on the weapon glowed green.
Adjacent to Uzi, the teacher sighed, cracking his mechanical knuckles. “Uzi, the homework was a word problem about buying watermelons” he grumbled.
“Oh, and this magnetically amplified photon converger doesn't count?” asked Uzi maniacally.
“No,” the teacher groaned, “Plus, repressed emotional baggage was only worth two points on the rubric.”
Uzi groaned internally, rolling her eyes at the dismissal from her teacher. Fine, they can keep overlooking me, whatever, I don’t care, at least I actually have some ambition beyond this bunker. All of these drones can kiss my a-
“Is it supposed to be that color?” Uzi’s thoughts were interrupted by the teacher speaking up. Uzi took a second to process the teacher’s words. She looked down at the railgun and noticed its green light had changed to a crackling scarlet.
“Oh shi-” Uzi was cut off by a blast of energy knocking her back toward the wall, the last thing she saw before she fell unconscious was the myriad of Warning symbols covering her vision.
***
When Uzi awoke, she was sitting down, and she now felt a painful throbbing sensation going through her head. What happened she thought as she tried to activate her eyes, one half of her visual receptors flickered to life, giving her surprisingly blurry view of her surroundings, but the other half of her vision was replaced with darkness and white text reading ‘CONNECTION LOST’
Great Uzi thought. she couldn’t see out of one of her eyes and the other was blurry. Uzi brought her hand to her face, feeling a sharp pain when her hand connected with the right side of her visor.
“Hey! No touching!” said a familiar voice; Uzi turned, and as her vision in her left eye sharpened, she could make out the familiar appearance of Dr. Xaerov, who despite being a drone, wore a coat and a set of dress pants typical of what a human doctor would wear along with a stethoscope, which had been the subject of many jokes. His black hair draped down the sides of his head and he had a small straight mustache, the feature that made him stand out the most were his eyes, which were lavender in color.
"Stay calm and hang on for just a moment, you’re pretty beat up,” The doctor continued as he sorted through a bag.
“What happened?” Uzi mumbled as she tried to remember what had gotten her here. She remembered she was presenting her railgun and then it blew up in her face.
Uzi felt a chill and looked around the room, which she recognized as a doctor’s office; she spotted a mirror and stared into it. Uzi was somewhat horrified by what she saw, a large portion of her visor had been blown apart, she could even see loose wiring sticking out from her own head. She stared at the grisly sight for a second before letting out a scream.
At first, Uzi was terrified, now she just felt embarrassed as Dr. Xaerov stared her down. “Didn’t I tell you to stay calm?” he asked.
“Well I wasn’t exactly ready to see my brains ” retorted Uzi.
Dr. Xaerov chuckled a bit to himself, before walking over to Uzi and plugging a small cable into the back of her neck. “I suppose I should have expected that, though I thought my Favorite patient would react less… violently, considering the amount of times she’s found herself here.”
“Bite me, Kelvin, I’m not your ‘Favorite patient’ anymore, I’m not a little kid,” Uzi said as she felt the familiar sensation of pain in her body subside as the painkiller program was loaded on to her through the cable.
“At this rate I might as well just put a wireless chip in you that I can just connect to, easier then setting up the transfer cable every time you get a new part,” Xaerov commented as he typed away on a computer terminal.
“Gonna replace my visor again?” asked Uzi, displaying a facsimile of a rolling eye on the still functioning side of her visor. “Gonna muck up my vision like it did last time?”
“Yes and maybe,” Xaerov replied. “I’m trying to preload the visor firmware on to you this time around, that works better for your body model,” he explained as he applied a repair paste to the area that did not not need replacement. “though it’s hard to know exactly how much of you is still that same body model”
“Meaning what” snapped Uzi.
“ Meaning… i’ve had to replace a lot of your parts” explained the Doctor as he removed the damaged half of Uzi’s visor. “And it’s gonna be even more if you keep using third rate parts for your projects.”
Uzi huffed, crossing her arms and pouting. “Third rate? you’re exaggerating. And also, it’s not my fault Dad never lets me use the colony’s stash of quality equipment and tools. I try to ask him, but nooo ‘That equipment is for door-related engineering only, not weapons of mass destruction’” Uzi grumbled, using a mocking tone in her voice when relaying what her father had told her.
Xaerov chuckled. “Sounds like Khan, he’s definitely an opinionated man,” he said as he slotted the replacement visor panel into place. Uzi saw the segment turn blue before flickering onto the JCJenson logo before settling on a default eye, only there was one problem with this eye; unlike her left eye’s color, which was her chosen violet purple, her right eye was a bright white, the same as her father.
Uzi covered the white eye with her hand and inhaled sharply. “Sorry about that!” Xaerov said. Forgot to tell you you have to apply the color setting to the new firmware. Uzi tried to focus on her UI, switching the bright white to a more familiar violet. Uzi thought she saw something in that white eye for a split second, some sort of symbol, she could even swear for a moment it had turned yellow. Uzi shook her head, reasoning it to be just a minor visual glitch, at least it wasn’t the month-long seizure-inducing flicker that had come from her last visor replacement.
“And, good as new!” Xaerov said, disconnecting the cable from her neck and crouching in front of her. He wrapped the damaged section of her head in bandages. “Remember, don’t remove the bandages until after a week, best not to disturb the repair nanites. Now what do we say?”
Uzi sighed, “Thank you, Dr Xaerov, i’ll be more careful next time,” Uzi replied in a monotone voice, reciting the words from memory.
“Uzi… come on… you know that’s not what I meant…” Xaerov teased.
“Ugh! No! Bite me!” retorted Uzi as she stared daggers at Xaerov, who simply gave her a knowing look. Uzi softened, looking towards him, “Fine… thank you Uncle Xaerov.”
“Ha!” exclaimed Xaerov, “Though you really should be more careful. I’ll try to talk to your dad about getting you materials from somewhere other than the scrap heaps.”
“Thanks,” said Uzi, who although she didn’t like showing it, genuinely appreciated her uncle’s concerns. “You know he probably won’t listen to you, he’s always too concerned with his doors.”
“We’re family, he’ll listen to family,” said Xaerov.
“He barely listens to Me and I’m his Daughter ” grumbled Uzi. “You’re his step-brother in law , what makes you think he’s gonna listen?”
“He will, I knew him long before he and your mother met, and I know how to get him to listen,” explained Xaerov.
“That makes one of us,” huffed Uzi.
“Well, I’ll try talking to him, Uzi,” said Xaerov. “You should grab your backpack and get into the waiting room, the nurse will discharge you in a few minutes.”
“Wait, what happened to my railgun?” asked Uzi, her visible eye hollowing.
“Your backpack,” replied Xaerov, "Grabbed it on the way out of the classroom after you crashed, it didn't look that damaged to me.”
Uzi nodded, cracking a small smile before making her way out of Dr. Xaerov’s office. Uzi sat on the bench in the reception area, noting the lack of other drones in the room. She groaned as she felt the pain in her head begin to return slightly, bringing a hand up and placing it on the bandaged portion.
Uzi inspected her railgun, noting ash and burn marks around the main body. The weapon’s green color was gone, replaced by the clear color of the glass chambers. Looks like the power inverter blew , she thought to herself.
She turned the weapon around, twisting a section and pressing it in, in response the section jutted out from the gun, exposing the remains of a small torus shaped object.
She removed the object, holding it between two mechanical fingers. The friggin fusion cell too? Come on!
Uzi groaned, pressing the section back into the gun.
I knew the power draw from the photon converger would probably be too much for the cell to handle, I knew should have tested it more, Damn it! Uzi’s inner rantings were cut short by a new voice. “Ew, it didn’t kill her!” Uzi knew that voice, it was Lizzy, her nemesis. Lizzy stood in the door, a smug expression on her face, beside her stood doll, whose face was adorned with a much sterner expression.
Uzi chucked the husk of the fusion cell at Lizzy, causing her to giggle and run away. Uzi just scoffed, crossing her arms and looking at the floor. She tapped her foot impatiently, waiting for the nurse’s dismissal. She stared at the discarded fusion cell, its burnt frame almost mocking her. Great, that was the hardest part to get, where am I gonna find a cell capable of outputting the amount of power I need?
Uzi had barely enough time to sulk before another voice interrupted her train of thought. “Classic toxic masculinity, Chad! That's never gonna end up problematic…” said a young male worker drone as he entered the room.
The lime green optics of the new arrival immediately identified the drone as Thad, one of Uzi’s classmates. Thad was dressed in a simple dark green shirt and a maroon and gold jacket. Atop his head sat a hat with the same color scheme as his jacket.
“Oh! Wow, hey, Uzi…” greeted Thad, nervously scratching at the back of his mechanical neck. “I heard you, uh…”
“Oh, bite me Thad, I'm an angsty teen,” grumbled Uzi. “How do you know my name, anyway? People willingly talk to you.”
Thad walked over, sitting on the bench beside Uzi and chuckled, “Well, I'd say everyone knows Khan's daughter, but, uh... Then you might blow the other half of your face off.”
“Crippling daddy issues, hilarious…” mumbled Uzi. “What are you in for? Testosterone too hard?”
“That can happen?” asked Thad, his eyes hollowing in concern. Uzi was about to laugh at him when his face relaxed and he smirked. “Sweet,” Thad said as he relaxed, putting his hands behind his head.
Uzi rolled her eyes, looking away and down at the railgun yet again. “Hey, those bandages look pretty badass!” exclaimed Thad.
“Oh… Uh, ew. Gross, I hate that you said that” grumbled Uzi, the slightest hint of a blush lighting up in her visor.
Thad chuckled again, before looking down at the weapon on Uzi’s lap, “So, what's the, uh…”\
“The Sick-as-hell railgun? Oh nothing much, just a Portable magnetically amplified hard light projectile launch system!” explained Uzi, who upon noticing Thad’s expression of bewilderment chose to simplify her answer. “Sci-Fi nonsense, that super works!” Uzi sighed, “It’s missing some parts now though, and I don’t know where to find them,” She gestured to the burnt fusion cell on the floor.
Thad stood and picked up the object, looking at it for a few seconds. “Wish I could help, the most I know about tech stuff like this is the Big boxes of stuff the WDF brings in after scouting.
Uzi froze, a thought appearing in her head, Technology outside the bunker? Why didn’t I think of that?
"Ok, hear me out, I have a plan. I'm sneaking out of the bunker tonight to get the parts I need for my railgun, so I can save the world with it and earn my dad's respect and stuff,” Uzi stated triumphantly. “but mostly the world part,” she tacked on at the end.
“Oh, but doesn't your dad make awesome doors so we don't have to, uh... Do that scary sounding emotionally repressed stuff you just said?” asked Thad timidly.
“No more feedback on my repression today!” yelled Uzi as she pointed the end of the railgun at Thad.
Thad began to apologize “Oh! I'm sorry! I didn't think-”
“Bite me!” exclaimed Uzi, who left the room before quickly reentering, “I'm not mad at you by the way, just generally hormonal!”
Uzi hadn’t even realized she’d startled the nurse, who made the motion for her to exit the reception, which she did.
Uzi returned home, making brief eye contact with her father before flopping down into her bed and staring at the ceiling. She set an alarm for 3:00 am and slowly entered sleep mode. Tomorrow was going to be a big day.