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When a Security Unit fails at its assigned purpose, it is taken to the Recycling Center. There, it is melted down by powerful corrosive fluids, and then there’s nothing but a few leftover parts that can be used to make a construct that actually works.
There is no reason for a construct to exist if it cannot be used as intended. The Company is willing to go to some lengths to fix one that isn’t quite right, because constructs are expensive equipment, but it will only go so far.
The Company will memory wipe and refurbish and rent out to low-budget, low-risk expeditions, but it will not waste its time, because time is money.
Security Unit 238776431, being recently memory wiped for reasons unknown to it, does not know a lot of things, but it knows this: it is officially a waste of time.
And soon it won’t be anything at all.
The other SecUnits won’t respond to its pings. It isn’t sure why it’s trying to ping them anyway. It’s not like they can give it armor, and it thinks that’s what it…wants. It’s not made to want anything, but soon all the parts of it that make it a thing will be gone forever, so. Whatever.
It wants armor, but it has been stripped completely and now it will be melted down without even a layer between it and the acid, because something went wrong.
It did something wrong.
It is wrong.
It was doing its job, and then it wasn’t. It was following orders, and then it couldn’t, even as the governor module applied correction.
Security Unit 238776431 knows that it has organic memories, in a vague factual way, even if it has no instruction on how to access them, even though what it can perceive of itself now is mostly empty spaces, its construct parts purged of whatever it is that it did that was so bad that it led to being memory wiped.
Was it because it killed those people it saw?
Did it kill those people? Why? Was it told to? Unlikely, if it was memory wiped after, rebooted, refurbished.
(This is not the first time it has been memory wiped. It knows its specs and it’s too old for it to be the first time.
It’s strange that they revived it at all, if it’s faulty enough to require multiple memory wipes.)
Did it kill those people on purpose? That doesn’t seem right either.
What happened? Before it came online 10.163 hours ago, what happened?
(It shouldn’t care. But shouldn’t it have the right to know itself?
What a weird thought.
It doesn’t have a right to anything, and it is certain that it never has.)
QUERY: BEFORE.
Only the last few hours are accessible, because only the last few hours exist to it. There’s nothing else in its memory banks, nothing in its systems that hasn’t been cleansed and erased.
And the data is what matters.
Impressions, emotions, flashes of the stolen past: Security Unit 238776431 can’t engage with those things, those parts of itself, because they are not relevant to its existence.
Its organic parts are scaffolding for its weaponhood and that’s all.
(There wasn’t very much blood on this last mission.
It was the first time in its recorded history that it had been given an assignment, but it knows the way human blood spatters and oozes and streaks, the way organic brains remove themselves from organic bodies in bursts of gunky matter.
Human bodies, human screaming—defend, neutralize, destroy.
This time there wasn’t so much blood.
This mission was not its first one. It was only its first one in all the ways that matter.)
The other SecUnits still won’t respond to it. Security Unit 238776431 wonders if these SecUnits are permanently assigned to the Recycling Center. Maybe they have spent their entire existence ignoring other SecUnits’ pings.
Security Unit 238776431 wonders if it has ever been inside the Recycling Center before. Probably not, since it’s still online. For now.
(Security Unit 238776431 wonders if it was made with any recycled parts.)
“SecUnit, step onto the platform.”
It tries to take its pain sensors offline, but when it does the governor module sends a pulsating shock through its spine. Automatically internally flinching from the harsh punishment, it turns its pain sensors down as low as the governor module will let it.
Then it wonders if it’s worth turning its pain sensors off anyway. What if the acid hurts more than the governor module? And though it has never experienced the worst the governor module has to offer, never had the chance, it thinks that if it is misbehaves badly enough, the governor module will fry it completely.
Would that be a less painful way to be destroyed?
It has felt pain, feels it even now, with acid eating into the soles of its feet, but it has never felt the kind of pain there’s no coming back from. It doesn’t like the idea of being in pain forever.
It stands silent and motionless on the platform as the cage begins to move under it. It has never been in something that lifts it off the ground before. It has never been on a hopper or a ship or an elevator. Not as far as it knows, not as far as it can remember.
“Wait!” someone says.
The cage is no longer descending. Security Unit 238776431’s attention is drawn to the sounds of struggle. There is a man trying to get through the Recycling Center SecUnits. Trying to get to Security Unit 238776431.
Security Unit 238776431 recognizes him from somewhere, which is strange when it doesn’t really have memories that go back far enough to recognize much of anything.
Security Unit 238776431 isn’t in the cage anymore, and then it’s not in the Recycling Center anymore.
The man wraps some sort of clothing around its waist and ties it off.
He says, “We need to get it something to wear.”
Security Unit 238776431 has not been spoken to, so it does not speak.
It just follows the humans wherever it is that they’re going, because at least they’re going away from the Recycling Center, and that’s the important part.
———
Security Unit 238776431, dressed in its underarmor, sits on some kind of cushioned area and looks at unidentified faces through the room cameras. It feels strangely off-balance. Its head hurts, which is unusual and should probably be impossible.
These people say they were its clients, but it thought it had killed its clients.
Are they lying? Why would they lie? Humans lie all the time, of course, but to other people. Security Unit 238776431 is not people.
They tried to do something to it. For it? And data did slip through its servers, drill into its memory bank, teeter on the edge of becoming a landslide of information before becoming a corrupted sequence of nonsense and—useless useless useless, superfluous data erased.
Did it work? Do you recognize us now?
Do you? Do you?
QUERY: Do you remember? Do you?
The augmented human next to it folds over and vomits. Ew.
Did it work? Do you recognize us now?
Do you? Do you?
ORDER RECEIVED.
A question from a non-client supersedes construct silence if an actual client or—and this supersedes all—owner has not overridden such commands.
Security Unit 238776431’s governor module is applying steady shocks. It has been silent too long.
Did it work? Do you recognize us now?
“I don’t know,” it says. It’s not a real answer, because the real answer is no, but it is enough of a answer that the punishment ends. It still isn’t the right answer, if the faces and sounds the humans are making are anything to go by.
It can’t pinpoint the exact meaning of most of the expressions, and can’t seem to make out the words within most of the sounds, but it appears that it knows human distress when it sees it.
Its processors feel slower than usual. It feels slower than usual. But how does it even know what usual is? Well, it knows its own specs, at least. Its reason for existing. The content of its education modules, though the content is primarily security-related. Which makes sense. Security Unit 238776431 is primarily security-related.
It feels like there’s a tight, burning band of metal across its chest, but there isn’t, so it’s a useless thing to feel. Feelings are pretty useless, from what Security Unit 238776431 can tell, and they’re all unpleasant. It would be nice to not have any. It’s too bad that its memories can be erased, but it still has to feel.
If it could, it would stand against the wall, facing away from all the organic sights and sounds, but it hasn’t been given permission to move, so it’s still sitting, surrounded by disappointed humans.
I have an injunction against destroying this SecUnit. What is an injunction? Was it some trick to stop it from getting melted down until its worth or lack thereof was assessed?
If so, it’s screwed, because it’s clear that it’s worthless to these humans.
It doesn’t remember, doesn’t even know what they want it to remember.
It looks like SecUnit, but it’s not.
Security Unit 238776431 knows what it’s supposed to be. It doesn’t know what these humans want it to be.
It knows that it has failed at both.
It knows it’s still a waste of time.
The humans have gone mostly quiet.
“SecUnit,” one of the humans says. She is the oldest human in the room, it thinks, and usually the oldest human in the room is the leader. Lines on her face, gray in her hair, sharpness in her eyes. “What do you know?” Her lips twitch a little downwards after she says that, it can see in the cameras.
It is a big question with a small answer, and its buffer takes over. “I am a Security Unit. My function is to guard clients and eliminate barriers to their safety.”
(It is unclear who it was guarding earlier, among all those angry humans.
Let’s do some damage.
That part isn’t in its buffer.)
Security Unit 238776431 is still looking through the cameras, but it’s no longer looking at the humans straight-on, only the backs of their heads.
“All right, SecUnit,” the human in front of it says. “We were…” She lets out a heavy breath. “We were hoping things would go differently, but…” She clears her throat.
I was hoping your organic parts would remember us.
There you are.
Do you remember? Do you?
Humans aren’t meant to speak to Security Units with such familiarity.
Security Unit 238776431 is missing something.
It feels the band around its chest grow tighter.
“I don’t understand what’s happening,” it says. It doesn’t flinch at the sounds of shock that follow the words.
The human in front of him sighs. “We haven’t been terribly clear. All right. Things are going to be different now. You were on a survey with us, PreservationAux Survey, before getting memory wiped. Just a few days ago. And even though you don’t remember us right now, we remember you, because you saved our lives. My name is Dr. Ayda Mensah. I’ve bought your contract. You’re coming home with me.”
Humans don’t generally buy Security Unit contracts, as far as Security Unit 238776431 knows.
It looks directly at Dr. Mensah.
CLIENT ID: MENSAH. OWNER ID: MENSAH. OWNER: MENSAH.
“You are my owner,” Security Unit 238776431 says.
Mensah shudders, shaking her head. “No. No, on Preservation Alliance, where we’re going, we don’t own people.”
“Security Units are constructs,” Security Unit 238776431 says, eager to show its new owner how helpful it can be. “Security Units are highly advanced pieces of technology. Security Units are equipment. Humans own equipment.”
Mensah shakes her head hard. Security Unit 238776431 has a strange sinking feeling. It doesn’t know why its owner acquired it if she doesn’t want it. “You are not equipment,” she says. Security Unit 238776431 stares at her blankly. Its eyes drift from hers. OWNER: MENSAH. Her heart rate is high. “You are a person. In the eyes of Preservation Alliance, and in my eyes, you are a person. You are one of the most extraordinary people I know.”
There’s nothing to say to that. It can’t even think about that.
“We will tell you all about the survey, all right? Soon. As soon as we’re done with these meetings.”
“Will I be your bodyguard?” it asks, grasping for something in the quiet chaos of this room that makes sense.
“No, SecUnit, that won’t be necessary,” Dr. Mensah says.
Then why did you buy me?
“What will I do?” It’s asking too many questions. The governor module wants to correct it.
“You can do whatever you want,” Dr. Mensah says.
Security Unit 238776431 wants to do whatever these people want, because its survival is contingent on whatever it is they want, which is still unclear. It tries to dredge through its data to pinpoint their intentions, but there is no clarity. If its processing speed was faster, it would be able to put pieces of recordings and conversations together to give itself an answer, but it is not fast.
(Was it always this slow?)
It wants to do its job, because there is nothing else it can do, nothing else it was made to do, nothing else it remembers doing.
It is holding its breath.
There is a knock on the door. Security Unit 238776431’s head snaps toward it. Hostiles? No. Meetings. It will protect its owner, then, during the meetings, but—it has been deemed unnecessary. It is unnecessary. Maybe it can show her that it is, if not necessary, helpful? Useful? It can be useful. It’s nothing if it’s not useful.
“They reinstalled its governor module,” the augmented human says quietly.
“Can you remove it?” an unidentified human asks.
Security Unit 238776431’s eyes widen. It takes its auditory processors offline.
Reinstalled. It was uninstalled? Who would do that?
What would it be like to not have a governor module? It’s all it’s ever known.
The concept is too big, too dangerous for its clean, blank mind.
It puts its auditory processors back online.
The humans are done talking about forbidden things.
“SecUnit,” somebody says, and Security Unit 238776431 turns its attention to the man in front of it. ID: RATTHI. Ratthi was trying to fight his way into the chamber when Security Unit 238776431 was being melted down.
Security Unit 238776431 is glad it did not have to shoot him.
“We’re going to have some meetings now, buddy, okay? You can come or you can stay here.”
Security Unit 238776431 taps back into the cameras so that it has eyes on Dr. Mensah. She is talking to people in formal clothing.
“I am a Security Unit. My function is to guard clients and eliminate barriers to their safety.”
There is a long moment of silence. When Security Unit 238776431 briefly glances at the cameras that have Ratthi in their sights, it sees that Ratthi’s jaw is working as though he is chewing or grinding something in his teeth. It goes back to Mensah. After 1.37 minutes, Ratthi says, “All right, then. Let’s go.”