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Ratthi blamed Gurathin for it all. Apparently, Gurathin had been the test subject of SecUnit’s new idea, and since it had been received well, it had started to use it on all of them.
Working late to catch up on stuff you’d been slacking on? Drone. Right in your feed interface. And it didn’t go away until you took your feed interface off and went to bed. Hanging out somewhere SecUnit had warned you against? Drone. Most of the time, more than one, trying to push you away from that spot. Despite all the drones being a little more than a centimeter big, it always worked. On all of them, too–Ayda even complained about how well it worked whenever she was trying to take a late night walk or finish up some reports. Well, didn’t complain, exactly, but it would be the closest she would ever get to doing so about anything SecUnit did. Other than its tendencies to throw itself at anything that looked at them the wrong way and getting itself blown up, of course.
Volescu thought it was pretty funny. But Volescu slept on time and listened when SecUnit told him things.
He didn’t work with living things. Like Ratthi did. It would have been endearing if SecUnit wasn’t messing with his damn work.
“SecUnit,” Ratthi said, trying his best to imitate Ayda’s stern voice, hands on his hips as he turned to the drone buzzing by his ear, which was trying to shove his feed interface off of his earlobe. “Please. As much as I appreciate it, I need to spend time with this specimen. This species of fungi only shows these behaviours at night, and I need to study them!”
The drone buzzes against Ratthi’s cheek and ear. He tries to swat at it, but it comes back just as fast as the last time. He can’t tell if he’s imagining it, but it seems more smug each time he fails at trying to get it to bug off.
Ratthi, trying to ignore the drone by his ear and the buzzing of the other drone, nudging his hand as he interacted with the physical feed device hovering just a little above his worktable. He pulls up the article he’d been reading about what was, in theory, supposed to be happening, but SecUnit’s drones kept flicking their little lights on(which was supposed to be saved for emergencies when SecUnit needed its drones to see in the dark! Those were its words about how the battery would be drained too quickly!) and disturbing the low light levels. Ratthi wasn’t sure if it was trying to scold him through Morse code or some other language that could be communicated through light frequencies, because it probably didn't care enough to a) learn them and b) actually use them. Unless that research transport of its was helping.
Ratthi tried to pull up a different article on that species of fungi, because for some reason his feed device wasn’t letting him scroll any further along it. But all that ended up typed in the search bar was “humans need rest periods.” Ratthi, groaning, pressed enter anyway in hopes that SecUnit would just drop it. Instead, his search immediately directs him to an article about regular sleep schedules.
“SecUnit!” Ratthi exclaims, throwing his hands up in the air. “I need to finish this! I swear I’ll get a normal amount of sleep. Just let me do this.”
A drone bumps into his nose, and he was pretty sure that was a miscalculation on SecUnits part(because why would it ever voluntarily do that?) so he ignores it. He tries to swat it away and reaches for his feed device again, but two other drones were nudging it away. Stars, how many drones did SecUnit sic on him?
“SecUnit,” Ratthi said firmly, trying really, really hard to put on a strict voice. “You better not be doing what I think you’re doing.”
The two drones shove his feed device off the edge of his worktable. It clatters to the floor and illuminates the ceiling with its blue light. Ratthi gasps, even though he totally knew it was going to happen, and he also knew that it wasn’t broken because he’d really put his feed device to the test over the years(But nobody was supposed to talk about the peanut butter incident anymore.)
“I’m telling Ayda,” Ratthi snaps, turning away from the drones and crossing his arms. One of them bumps into his feed interface, while the other buzzes around to the front of his face again.
Get your ass to bed.
Ratthi covers his snicker with a well-timed clearing of his throat.
He walks around his desk to pick up the feed device again, giving the nearest drone the best glare he could manage right now. Hesitating, his face softens. “Would it be easier to let me work on this if I explained it to you?”
SecUnit sends him a rude gesture sigil over the feed. Typical.
Ratthi sits back down anyways. “I got extra sleep last night anyway, SecUnit. This will be done real quick. Promise.” He leans over his sample again–something Bharadwaj picked up for him a couple cycles ago as a favour. “This kind of fungi only really shows off the cool things it can do in super, super low light levels.”
He reaches over and clicks his feed device off. “So keep your drones away, dummy,” he adds pointedly. But SecUnit didn’t flash the drones’ lights again. So maybe it was listening. Or maybe it just gave up–he didn't know.
He picks up his pipette, carefully dipping it into the glass of water he’d grabbed earlier. He’d also drunken out of it a couple times, but that was irrelevant. He sets the droplet of water on top of his sample. “And when it's stupid humid out. From what we know, anyways. Panellus stipticus isn’t poisonous, because I know you’re probably thinking about the fungi I almost accidentally fed Gura with that tea a couple cycles ago. This one is tots safe.”
He grabs the same cup he dipped his pipette into and tags a sip of it. “It might take a bit, but you’ll see.”
One of the drones buzzes around his head in circles a couple times, and he follows it with his eyes. After a second, it zips off away from his desk. He watches it, and realizes it was headed towards the closet. Huh.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Ratthi asks, getting up and putting his hands on his hips. He follows after it and opens up the closet door carefully(the handle was a little splintered.) He knew what was in here, because, well, he lived here. But did SecUnit know? He didn’t remember giving SecUnit a tour of his place, but, then again. Drones. They could have let themselves into every little crevice and he’d not have a clue it had happened unless SecUnit let him know. He also probably wouldn’t have minded. It was hard to feel unsafe when you had a paranoid SecUnit constantly making sure nobody kidnapped you.
He looks into the closet. “What do you want from here?” He asked, looking down at the drone that had led him over here. It bumps into his hand again before diving into the closet.
It was all mostly cloth. Not clothing, but towels and blankets and pillow covers and sheets. Ohhh.
He grabs one of the blankets from the bottom shelf and wraps it around his shoulders. Seemingly satisfied, the drone goes back to trying to shove his feed interface off his ear. Covering his grin with the blanket, he waddles back to his sample and plops down in his chair, cocooning under the sheet.
“There. See it? The humidity really lets it shine,” he says, voice a lot quieter than before as he points at the fungi. Panellus stipticus glowed in the dark, but only when it was humid enough, which was why he’d kept his windows shut all day. Sweating throughout the day was worth it. The soft, green light illuminated his hand as he reached out to it, turning the dish towards SecUnits drone by his ear, even though he knew SecUnit probably could see the sample just fine from several other directions. The drone keeps lazily bumping into his feed interface, the gentle green light reflecting off its surface occasionally.
He laughs, and it's a bit muffled by the blanket as he pulls it tighter around himself. “You suck,” he says, and the warmth in his voice ruins it. “Now let me finish testing this, jackass.”
─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───
Mensah leaned over her kitchen counter, cursing the loud crinkling of the wrapper around one of her favourite biscuits. Struggling to open it quietly, she watched SecUnits drone hover closer, waiting for it to herd her back to her bed. She’d barely managed to slip out of Tano’s hold and not wake Farai up while going down the stairs. But she’d had a light dinner, and she was hungry and couldn’t sleep.
Instead, SecUnit sends her an image over the feed. Curiously, she opens it, momentarily stopping her late-night-snack mission.
It was Ratthi, slumped over his worktable, a blanket she and Amena had made for him a couple years back around his shoulders. In front of him were a couple scattered papers, an offline feed device, and a small, clear circular dish with a glowing mushroom on it. His cheek was mushed up against one of the papers, and he was drooling just so slightly out of the corner of his mouth.
By his hand—which was limply holding a pencil—resting next to the mushroom, was his feed interface that should have been on his ear. And, when she squinted, she was pretty sure she could see one of SecUnits drones stuck underneath the feed interface.
Covering her mouth to quiet her laugh, she looked at it a few moments longer, a warm, warm feeling filling her diaphragm.
“Thank you, SecUnit,” she whispered as she dug her biscuit out of its packaging, shutting the feed again with one last, long look at the picture.
It sent her a wordless query, and she tried to keep it off her face how much she wanted to give it another hug like it’d given her the chance to on TranRollinHyfa. She glanced at the drone, which was buzzing quietly by her shoulder. “For looking after us.”
After a hesitant moment, one she appreciated because she knew it could have replied a lot sooner, it sent her a wordless acknowledgment.
She stood there, one hand on the counter, taking a bite out of her biscuit while she soaked in the moment. It sent her a map of her own house, the way to the stairs and back up to her room highlighted and marked with the comment of “humans need rest periods.” She eyed the drone by her head, which buzzed in circles for a moment before zipping off to follow the path it’d sent her. Smiling, she followed it to bed.