Chapter Text
Humans wanted to interact with cyborgs, androids, and other mechanical beings ever since science fiction was invented. SecUnit knew this because it had consumed many a media from years gone by. At first it enjoyed the media. After it hacked it’s governor module, everything was new and exciting to it. Nowadays it rarely touched upon such media. It was tired of stories where the bot fell in love with humans, killing humans, or abused by humans. It will occasionally watch something if it had a secunit in it, otherwise it kept its distance.
So on the day when Rhatti blurted out, “Oh my fucking god, it’s Robocop” SecUnit had no idea what he was talking about.
ART and its humans had been tasked to transfer materials from an abandoned museum to its new resting home. They spent several hours moving boxes upon boxes of artwork, statues, and other such precious materials into ART. SecUnit helped, though it didn’t see the point of it all. Only less than half of the stuff they were getting would ever go out in display for the public to see. The rest would go back into storage, probably never to see the light of day again. What was the point of preserving history if no one learned from it?
It didn’t help half of the stuff was already rotting. The boxes the items were stored in were being eaten by bugs, sending many of ART’s crew into squealing yells whenever one fell apart in their hands. At one point SecUnit heard Mensah cry out in fright, and it came running, guns ready, only to find she’d been startled by a rat falling out of a statue and landing on her foot.
As the strongest individual, SecUnit was tasked with a lot of assignments. It was called to push, pull, grab, hold, shift, and anything else needed to keep giant, heavy items from falling on squishy humans.
Ratthi and Thiago were busy transporting some giant wooden box, the biggest of the bunch. They were pulling it along a rolling cart, going slow due to the immense weight. Corners of the box were already crumbled away, revealing parts of the glass display underneath. SecUnit was about to help them, and it took one step forward, but Pin-Lee gestured it to join her and Amena. Once it did, the two women pointed and laughed as they watched.
“Put your back into it!” Yelled Pin-Lee.
“Lock your knees!” Yelled Amena
The girls looked to SecUnit to throw out an insult, and the best it could do was, “You’re both slow!”
Ratthi groaned as he kept pushing the cart, straining under the weight. “I hate you all! Especially you, SecUnit! You could pull this thing with one arm if you wanted!”
“I could…” said SecUnit. “But I won’t.” That got a laugh out of Amena.
It got a notification from Iris. SecUnit, come to the Pre-Preservation Wing! I think there’s something in here that might interest you!
Thiago and Ratthi were now both trying to pull the cart from the same side. Neither of them had noticed the lock on the wheels were engaged. Amena and Pin-Lee were losing their shit.
SecUnit sent back, I don’t know, what I’m seeing here is pretty entertaining.
One of the artifacts here is an ancient secunit.
That did catch its attention. SecUnit knew briefly of its own history, though it has never seen the early generation secunits before. It probably looked terrible, like some sort of weird skeleton-flesh demon. The more SecUnit thought about it, the more it wanted to see. I’m coming.
SecUnit left the laughing women and the struggling men, and made its way to the Pre-Preservation Wing.
The lights were low in the wing. According to Mensah, this was done to keep light pollution from ruining the artifacts. (You know what else ruins artifacts? Leaving them behind to rot.) It was a bit eerie as SecUnit walked past pieces from hundreds of years ago. It wasn't exactly ancient history, but knowing so many humans came and went, leaving behind legacies beyond anyone could learn, felt unreal. It was too big of concept to understand.
It came around the corner to where Iris and Mensah was waiting. Iris gestured to the artifact. “Well? What do you think?”
SecUnit looked.
The ancient secunit was encased in a giant glass case, the body held up by wires. The glass was cracked and discolored, making it hard to see through the grime. At first SecUnit thought it was looking at a set of armor, until it saw a human face peeking out from underneath the helmet, leaving the mouth exposed. What a great way to tell your target to shoot me in the mouth! Secunit thought maybe this was done to give humans more comfort in knowing security bots had human faces under their helmets.
SecUnit thought it was ugly. It looked like a shitty suit of armor that someone put together in their living room. When SecUnit was in armor, it could still move quickly with relative ease. The bulkiness of the armor of this secunit would certainly slow movement. Whoever built it meant for it to withstand hits.
SecUnit did admit it looked strong. Perhaps it wasn’t as fast, but if one of those hands managed to wrap itself around SecUnit’s neck, it could crush it with relative ease. So it was built for strength and durability, but not speed. Still, how fast could’ve been?
“So this is an early secunit,” SecUnit said out loud. “What generation?”
“First generation,” said Iris. “If the description written here is correct, who we’re looking at is literally the first security unit in history.”
The first secunit in history. Such a shame the bot was stuck in some shitty museum and then will be transferred to some warehouse. “What’s its name?”
“Unfortunately half of the description has water damage. I can’t read it.”
So now this bot will spent the rest of its existence without a name. It turned to Mensah and said, “When I die, don’t put me in a museum.”
“Only if you promise to not put me in a museum as well,” Mensah said.
From around the corner, the group hear Ratthi coming down the hallway. He spoke on the feed, though it was unnecessary because they could hear his voice echoing easily.
“Okay, SecUnit, we give up. We need help with pulling that cart. The thing weighs a ton and Amena has been laughing so hard, she got the hiccups and-”
He turned the corner. He looked to SecUnit first, and then his eyes turned towards the ancient bot in glass. He did a double take and his mouth dropped. “Oh my fucking god, it’s Robocop.”
“That’s its name?” Iris asked, but she was ignored as Ratthi went right up to the glass display, staring up at the “Robocop” with wide eyes.
“Is this really him?” Ratthi asked. He read over the water-damaged description, then went back to staring. He pumped his arms in the air in jubilation. “It is him! I can’t believe-! This is incredible, I never thought I would ever see him in person!”
SecUnit didn’t know why, but it bristled at Ratthi’s enthusiasm. There was no need to get this excited over what was basically a dead body, especially one that was outdated by hundreds of years. Irritation must’ve shown on its face because Mensah suddenly stepped forward and said, “Ratthi, calm down. Why has this got you so excited?”
“It’s Robocop!” Ratthi said, as if that explained everything. “I’ve been reading comics about him since I was a kid! I sent you guys links to the documentary, The Detroit Files, a while back, didn’t any of you see it…?”
Mensah gave a half-hearted guilty shrug. Iris shook her head. SecUnit said, “It’s on my queue.” (Though it sat so far down, years would past before SecUnit would ever get to it.)
Ratthi groaned, some of the wind knocked out of his sails. “You guys don’t understand, this is Robocop, technically the first secunit!”
“We know. We read the description.”
“No wonder this museum crashed, they only did half-assed job. That description is missing a lot of important info. Like did you know this is not a bot? This is a human being.”
SecUnit snapped its head back to the body. It took a second hard look, staring at the exposed mouth. “So this is an augmented human?”
“Kinda? His name was Alex Murphy, and he was killed in the line of duty. Because he legally dead, he wasn’t given human rights anymore, and then he was turned into… well this. The only thing left human was his brain. That portion of his mouth you see there? Artificial.”
Iris winced, her whole body shaking. “That sounds horrific! Why would they do that?”
“Capitalism,” Ratthi said, and this time that did explain everything. “They did this because they believed a human body in a bot’s brain could work better in security. In many ways, Robocop paved the path for a lot of secunit regulations. Everything you are, SecUnit, is all thanks to him.”
SecUnit felt its artificial insides turn. Just like food and sex, it treated religion as only a human thing and did not give it more attention than a passing acknowledgment. It’ll respect the way Ratthi prayed at sunset, how Mensah and Amena bowed their heads during meals, but it personally thought it was needless business. SecUnit will never be religious, but to stand there and find out that its origin story was all thanks to a guy named Alex kinda pissed it off.
Mensah asked, “What happened to him?.”
“You see, this is where the history gets a bit iffy,” Ratthi said. “During that time the politics and economic strife of the area hit a fever pitch, so the fight for Robocop’s basic human rights got put on the backburner. A lot of documents got destroyed, and what happened afterwards is lost to history. The fact Robocop is here, still intact after all this time, boggles my mind.” Ratthi continued to stare up at the glass in awe, one hand over his heart. “It’s like a childhood dream come true.”
“I think your childhood dream is tipping,” Iris suddenly said.
“Huh?” Ratthi said.
In that moment after years of neglect, the glass case finally gave way. A small chunk of glass clipped off, and like a snowball falling down a mountain, an avalanche of glass quickly followed. SecUnit rushed forward and grabbed Ratthi, hauling him out of the way, just in time as the top portion of the display came crashing down. The wires holding up Robocop snapped, and he dropped forward like a broken marionette.
“Is everyone okay?” Mensah asked.
“No!” Ratthi said. SecUnit was confused because it got him out of the way and it didn’t see any obvious wound. Ratthi pulled his arm back from SecUnit’s grip and said, “Robocop!”
Oh. The fucking fake-secunit.
Ratthi stepped over the broken glass and went to the slumped body of Robocop. Only the top half of the display exploded, leaving Robocop sprawled out. He looked ridiculous.
“This is not the way a hero should be honored,” said Ratthi. “We need to find a more respectful way to transport him.”
One of Robocop’s fingers twitched suddenly.
SecUnit thought the fake-secunit was built for strength, not speed. That was proven wrong when it suddenly shot forward, grabbing Ratthi by the throat. Ratthi gave a little ‘eep!’ noise as he was dragged forward. Robocop rose up, his mouth twisted in rage, and said with a deep gravely voice, “Who… are… you?”
SecUnit didn’t care if Robocop was the first secunit. It didn’t care that he was miraculously still alive after hundreds of years. Right now he had his hand around the throat of its human and SecUnit was going to shoot his fucking head off.
Well, he would, except Ratthi said through the feed, SecUnit, don’t shoot! He’s just confused!
SecUnit said back, Are you FUCKING KIDDING ME?
“Alex Murphy!” Ratthi gasped. Saying Robocop’s name seemed to trigger something because he twitched. His grip around Ratthi’s throat didn’t lessen though. “You’re safe! You don’t need to be afraid!"
"Who... are... you?"
"I'm Ratthi! I'm a friend!"
“Are… you… OCP?” Robocop asked.
“No!”
“Where… is… Officer… Lewis?”
That time Ratthi hesitated. He swallowed (hard to do with a hand still gripped around his neck) and said, “I’m sorry, I… I don’t know… but I promise you I will help you find her.” He glanced over to the others. “We’ll ... help you find her!”
The fuck I will, SecUnit thought.
Robocop’s expression slowly softened. His grip suddenly loosened and he pulled back. Ratthi gasped, his hand coming up to his neck, rubbing it. He was coughing but he was smiling. “That’s right… we’re all friends here.”
Robocop bowed his head. “I… don’t…. remember… what happened… to me.”
“That’s alright. We’re here to help. I promise.”