Chapter Text
Ivan didn’t dream the same way humans did.
His sleep mode was clean, deathly so. It wasn't like humans; no symbols, no teeth falling out, falling down a building or endless hallways. His was smooth like the soaked, clear and glassy blue surface of a quiet lake buried in the forest or white and pure like snow frozen mid-fall. But sometimes, if he stayed still enough, stayed quiet long enough, buried in his own microchips, little memories would rise through the internal and crackling static like colorful little air bubbles.
Till’s face had been the first thing the black-haired robot ever processed: pale, thin, cheeks smudged with dust, sticky black oil and eyes popping with something that looked like exuberating joy and pure madness intertwined like barbed wires.
“You’re awake , ” he at first whispered, as if afraid to break the moment by speaking too loud, promptly saying it again, leaning forward so close their pale noses touched.
“You’re awake! ” he repeated, louder now like a popping ballon a hoarse bursting out of his throat like a firecracker. He fell back with such excitement he knocked over a whole shelf of supposed mechanical components, sending small screws and bolts tumbling across the dirty, black floor like startled insects.
The tall robot blinked, barely understanding anything that was happening as he quite literally had just woken up.
The tired gray-haired man was still talking, now pacing around in the cold lab. “Do you know who I am? Of course you don’t—you’re gorgeous . You’re perfect . Oh my god , I did it! I have to—no, wait , I should sit down—no, I should tell someone. Wait, no, you're—oh shit, oh my god —”
The bot blinked slowly, tilting his head a little. A few black strands fell and slid across his forehead like milk. “Did… what?”
Till snapped his teal eyes back to the android’s face, freezing in place before running back to the robot. “You’re talking . You’re thinking ! I mean—not just thinking, but responding! You even paused before speaking! Can you—do you know what you’re seeing?”
The raven’s mechanical eyes dilated and thinned, locking on to the man. “You are... infact the first object in my field of vision. Bipedal. Unshaven. Erratic breath pattern. Visible high caffeine concentration in bloodstream. Emotional output: excessive .”
The silver-head man paused, cocking an eyebrow before surging forward and gripped Ivan’s face between both hands, smudging pale and synthetic skin with the oil and dust from his palms as he cupped the bot’s cheeks, analyzing his face with eyes in slits. “Okay, okay! God, you sound like my toaster . But that’s okay. That’s so okay. We’ll work on that later—say something else. Say anything . Wait, no—no, first how do you feel ?”
The android just blankly stared, his joints and stiff, onyx-colored eyes with hints of red staring directly back at mad, green ones. “I am online,” he mumbled, snaggletooth sliding across his bottom lip. “Diagnostic status: stable. Unit I.V.0214—"
“No, no, no,” Till interrupted, removing his hands from the robot’s face waving both arms frantically as he smiled like an idiot. “You’re Ivan. I named you already. It’s Ivan . Okay? Ivan ! Say it!”
“Ivan,” the so-called Ivan repeated, uncertain. Testing it in his mouth like a sample of some sort of new and strange food, licking the letters between his tongue and lips.
“Yes! Wait till the ANAKT committee hears about this. Wait till anyone hears about this. Wait— fuck —I need to write this down—” Till whispered, voice lowering again, before his eyes slightly rolled back as something Ivan would say a human ‘’shutting down’’. His whole body went limp, his knees curled and bent before he collapsed into the mess of blueprints decorated with scribbles and doodles and empty, cinnamon colored coffee cans like a marionette whose strings had been sliced cleanly off.
Ivan paused, blinking a few times before bending down to the passed-out man on the ground.
“Medical emergency detected,” he mumbled, blinking some more to save in his mind his creator’s appearance. “Please remain calm. Scanning vitals, initiating emergency protocol…”
That was exactly 2,095 days ago—3 years ago, for those who dabble in simpler, child math. He had it timestamped in his microchip which served as a mechanical brain, arching it in five folders, all labeled some variation of Important.
Softly, his internal clock blinked softly in the quiet dark.
06:43:12 AM.
The lab hummed around him like a purring feline, its breath steadying through the soft slabs of ventilation overhead. Blue and white light pooled from the ceiling panels, bathing the room in a sort of clinical glow, pipes running like veins behind frosted walls, pulsating gently with blue fluid like a beating heart. Slowly, the raven yawned as he carefully unplugged himself from the creamy-blue wall, stretching out limbs that didn’t particularly need to stretch but just to mimic humans and gently took up a metallic, cold tray onto his hands.
Toast (43% carbonized—his professor’s weird preference), and a juicy fried egg, cooked into a shape he had calculated to be “objectively cute ” as per the 1.2 million results he got by searching online: a small, white cat’s head with a ‘ :3 ' face, and tiny ears that curled. There was even a little face drawn in ketchup underneath it. It was extraordinarily easy to do for a robot like him, but as humans called it, it's the thought that counts.
He walked slowly up the creaking, bony and reflecting stairs, feet making faint tss sounds with every step. The hallway’s tiles had started peeling months ago, which he had thought about fixing before but never had the chance to, whispering under his shoes like dried leaves. He gently opened the door to see the usual mess.
His creator’s room was a disaster, as if a tsunami or tornado had slammed through. Fluffy blankets draped his chair, half onto the floor, glowing laptop buzzing with cluttering opened tabs and some unfinished 3D model of what seemed to be an outfit for the raven spinning on loop on the screen. The air smelt, as usual, like bitter caffeine, burnt cables and old air conditioning. Meanwhile, Till laid across the couch, one sock missing and drool sipping from the side of his mouth.
“Professor Till,” Ivan mumbled, voice quiet as silk. Ivan sighed internally before scooting over to the man. “Professor Till.” he repeated, a little more sternly now.
No response. Ivan’s thick eyebrows furrowed.
“Till,” he repeated, now at a regular speaking volume
Still no reaction. Just a faint snore and the mindless twitch of an eye. The room buzzed low with cooling fans and the soft, peaceful hiss of nearby machines.
Ivan stared a few more seconds. Then, like someone who had done this many, many times before, he tilted his head and pulled up his internal interface. Selecting protocol… M.S. He scooted over closer to the gray-haired man, practically mouth to his ear now.
“ Till goddamn Seo! ” he barked in a perfect imitation of the stern voice of Till’s mother, Io, right into the man's ear. “What did I tell you about sleeping in like some kind of jobless stray ?! You think government funding grows on trees ?! Wake up, you ungrateful little—”
Till shot up with a whiny yelp like he'd been tased, teal eyes bulging and limbs flailing. He almost hit Ivan’s jaw as he jumped up in a panic, the robot quickly getting up out of the way. “ EOMMA?! —Wh...’’ He blinked a few times, like gears were turning in his head before his eyebrows furrowed tightly, ‘’What the ever-loving fuck —Ivan!!”
Ivan tilted his head, seemingly pleased, a semblance of a smirk on his inexpressive, pink lips. “You did not respond to my standard greeting. I calculated a 96.7% success rate using maternal simulation. It appears my predictions were correct , Professor.”
Till groaned, both hands dragging down his face, fingers catching in his silver, messy hair as he slumped to sit on the edge of the couch. “I swear to God, you can’t keep doing that! That voice sounds exactly like my mom when she caught me smoking in middle school. I’m gonna develop a fucking tic...”
“You already possess a few,” Ivan replied right after, voice smooth and leveled, “You clench your jaw when lying and forget to blink when nervous, and—”
“Ivan,” Till hissed, reaching blindly for his pants, eyes blinking, groggy with sleep. “Do not psychoanalyze me right now...”
“You are late.” The raven offered him the crispy, ironed white lab coat, holding it out to the man’s face like an offering. “Your meeting a ANAKT is at 7:30. You have exactly 28 minutes and 17 seconds remaining. I recommend eliminating unnecessary fidgeting and arguing.”
Till froze before his face quite literally dried up, his eyes so bulgy it's a miracle they didn't pop out of his eye sockets.
“ Shitshitshit! ” he barked, jumping off the couch will all the grace of a beaver, halfway into a pair of jean pants—only to realize, halfway through, that they were backwards. He grunted and almost cried out in frustration.
Ivan stepped forward silently, placed a cool palm on his hip, and rotated the waistband, Till mumbling out a quiet thank you. He smoothed out the fabric, brushed off a speck of non-existent dirt, and stepped back.
“You are now socially presentable. Barely. Also here. Toast,” The black-haired man continued, holding out the tray. “And an egg shaped like a kitty.”
Till paused, blinking in confusion. “What?”
“Cat-shaped. With ketchup.”
Till bit into toast, it making a crispy and pleasing sound, glacing mid-bite at the little adorable egg. “Huh. That’s actually kinda cute. Did I... program you to do that?”
Ivan’s eyes looked away at the wall, as if that was the most interesting thing there was. “...Possibly.”
The two of them made it to the car in a scramble, Till slamming the door shut behind him and hitting on the gas so hard you'd think the machine insulted his family lineage. The old white Hyundai croaked like a creature begging for death, coughing out a puff of dark smoke out of its exhaustion pipe.
“Come on, come on ,” Till hissed, slapping the steering wheel, constantly looking over to his reer-view mirror and poking his head out of the window.
Ivan was sat in the back seat, watching his professor curse to himself, already adjusting to the probably aggressive G-forces that will pour out from the man’s driving. The world whipped from the window with lazy and wet morning mist gathering on the glass, and pedestrians loitered in crosswalks like they’d never feared a violent death that will end up in them competing with roadkill.
“Professor,” he said calmly, looking at Till from the rear-view mirror, “you are currently traveling at 87 kilometers per hour in a 60km only zone. That is 18 kilometers above the limit.”
“I know ,” Till snapped, gripping the wheel so hard his knuckles turned white, “Shut up unless you’re going to build me a time machine.”
The raven tilted his head, seemingly in thought before coming up with a problem to his creator’s issue. He always had something to say back. “ Technically , time travel in the classical sense remains impossible with today’s technology, but if you are interested in conceptual—”
“That was sarcasm !” Till snapped, head cocked to look back at the robot before noticing something from the corner of his vision. He yanked the wheel to avoid a truck turning left, doing that so hard Ivan smudged against the car’s door. “And that was a truck, shit —!”
“Sir, that is a red—”
“I SEE IT, IVAN.”
“Please be advised,” Ivan continued, voice robotic and calm, “an elderly woman is currently attempting to cross in about 200 meters. With the speed that we’re currently going, in about 8.3 seconds impact will be imminent. Probability of impact if trajectory continues sits stable at 92%.”
“ AAA FUCK— ” Till screamed.
The brakes screamed. So did the old lady, her little body falling unto the road with fear.
The car swerved. The egg, still in Till’s hand, splattered against the dashboard and his coat, dripping pathetically. Till stopped the car, his breath ragged and uneven.
“That egg contained 7.3 grams of protein.” The raven chimed in.
Till ignored him, rolling his teal eyes before slamming the pedal again and this time, travelling towards the ANAKT research tower. (with hopefully no more issues going forward.)