Someday, Someday Chapter Three

I haven't updated in nearly a YEAR, but I still love this idea anyway.

iii.

RK800-60 offers the cup of coffee he's gotten to Hank, who says, “He’s lying," right as he grabs it.

Beside him, Connor only shakes his head. He looks so human with his jacket off, sleeves rolled up, as if that helps him move any better. It’s probably a sensory thing. Connor’s been appreciating how the smallest things can make a difference on how things physically feel for him, lately. RK800-60 wishes he could be at that level of appreciating life already, but baby steps.

“Who is?” RK800-60 asks, leaning around the desk to steal a glance at Connor's monitor. Three files of  missing people are open. He's actually heard something about a spike of disappearances lately.  

“The RK900,” Connor says, but in a low voice. No one at the precinct knows about their new resident who they’ve tasked to look after Sumo. Connor had been against it, but Hank thought they might as well give the android something to do while they try to somehow form a game plan on the engineer problem.

Of course, before that option, Hamilton had volunteered to have the android over since she didn’t have classes for the holidays, but RK800-60 had shot that down quick. So house and dogsitting it was.

“He’s not very good at it, admittedly, but that’s probably because he’s new,” Hank says. He uncaps the lid on his coffee cup and takes a sip. “Or, you know, that’s because of the spotty memory.”

“I wasn’t able to run a diagnostics on his internal biocomponents, I can’t tell,” Connor says.  

“Either way, there’s a possibility he’s lying,” Hank says, “Why, I have no idea. I’m dreading the day he learns how to lie well, though, I remember you two catch on scary fast, and he looks like an upgrade.”

“He is,” RK800-60 says, flatly, because he’s trying to seem like he doesn’t care. He tries not to bristle indignantly as he remembers the nanotech.  

He fails. Connor sends him a pitying look, and he immediately beams out: He has nanotech repair.

We were going to, eventually, Connor beams back at him, Or, well, I think we would have been replaced or at least have our memories be uploaded to news models since I doubt a full solid body can integrate well with fluid nanotechnology.

You don’t understand. RK800-60 crosses his arms and shifts his weight back on one foot. Imagine the possibilities of manually-operated nanotech.

“Hello, flesh and blood here, I can’t hear whatever you two are having a silent argument about,” Hank says, even though there’s no heat behind it.

“Sorry, Hank,” Connor says, “RK is bitter about him having nanotechnology.”

Hank pauses sipping his coffee and raises an eyebrow at RK800-60, who gives Connor a dirty look at his betrayal.

“It’s fancy,” RK800-60 says, “And he doesn’t get as damaged as badly since he immediately just gets repaired the second he’s hit.”

“I’ve actually asked Markus to try and look into the files of the RK900,” Connor says, “See who worked on the project, and everything, and he’s still putting that together since Cyberlife does have a very strict NDA and very thorough with protecting the privacy of its greatest minds, but he was able to pull up the basics on the RK900 project itself – it’s an upgrade of the RK800 line, so obviously, it was made to be stronger, faster, and well, smarter.”

“What is it going to do, start predicting things despite nothing happening at the moment that it could conclude from?” Hank asks. “Roleplay Sherlock Holmes?”

“Don’t – don’t say that, ever again,” RK800-60 says.

“Cyberlife was working on something that would predict things,” Connor says. “But I don’t think so. I think it would have adapted faster. Learned things faster.”

“That would make it deviate faster,” Hank says, “Like, had it been completed and released.”

“Theoretically, that would be possible, given it would have adapted faster,” Connor says.  

“He’s probably already deviating if it’s got enough built into its head to like, have empathy,” Hank says, “He’s lying through his teeth, but he’s been awake for a few days, so I’ll give him like a week or two and I bet he’d be swindling people left and right given the proper environment.”

“We’re not taking the RK900 out to a bar,” Connor says.

Hank laughs. “It would have been funny, but I’m not that much of an ass.”

“Thank you.”

“Why would he be lying, though?” RK800-60 asks. “The only thing he can actually remember is my memories – still my bad – he has a limited storage unit and most of his previous memories were in his old ones– if he isn’t just forming a shaky story because of the awful recall, then why lie?”

“To get something else, maybe?” Hank asks, “Maybe he’s not really looking for his engineer to ensure he doesn’t shut down prematurely.”

“Why would he go after his engineer?” Connor asks. “Unless it’s something directed by Cyberlife, but...”

Connor trails off, and for a moment, he stares blankly at his desk. RK800-60 knows they share memories up until the Cyberlife Tower incident, but he doesn’t share this one, and he knows he doesn’t share this one because he has no idea what Connor could be thinking, only that he’s thankful he was spared this particular nightmare.

“Well, best we can do is get to the bottom of it, and probably actually find out who the team working on him was, or if his memory serves right, his somehow solo engineer,” Hank says, “Every time I remember that Elijah Kamski worked on the first android by himself in his college dorm probably surrounded by chip wrappers, takeout and coffee cups, I always have to balk at the amount of effort that takes, and at how much free time that guy probably had. Imagine an actual solo engineer working on nanotech.”

“There were machines to help create the biocomponents,” Connor points out.

“Like Iron Man,” RK800-60 says, helpfully. Hank snorts and laughs and Connor just sighs. “What?” RK800-60 says, gesturing with a hand to make the point that he’d done nothing wrong. “He inputs the design and the data and JARVIS 3d prints it for him or just assembles the parts together with all the necessary elements possible.”

“There’s a lot of things that have to explained regarding the source of the materials used and for it to just be generated and formed into a suit in a lab, RK, and I know you’re referencing the 2008 movie,” Connor says.

“Hey, hey, don’t shit on Marvel movies just because you’ve never seen one, especially not the first Iron Man movie,” Hank says. “The rest of the series is shit but I actually like Iron Man 1.”

“His suit isn’t even made of Iron,” Connor says, “And where does all the material come from – does he have it molten and stored in tubes? Where does he keep it? Does he have a 3d-printing system advanced enough to be able to generate elements and compounds of very specific properties?”

“It’s a superhero movie.”

“Logic is important.”

“You are a literal living miracle of technology and nobody knows how you happened, how on earth can you complain about a superhero movie having a few holes in its science?”  

Connor opens his mouth to argue back on that, but then RK800-60 stiffens visibly, and Connor catches it, turning to him,;RK800-60 quickly accepts the call that his system has identified is from Hamilton. He’s been understandably on guard for calls from them since it’s been less than a day that RK900 arrived, and he’s not about to start taking chances now.

He puts the call on loudspeak for the others’ sake.

“Yeah?” he asks.

“Hey, uh, RK?” Hamilton sounds a little unsure on the other line, and RK800-60 steels himself for bad news. “So, it’s like, five minutes before we usually walk the dogs, and - ”

RK800-60 does a quick check on his system clock. She’s correct.  

“ - I know sometimes you’re early, or a little late if you have to run an errand and get stuck in traffic, and I figured it was the former today, but uh...”  

Oh no.

Connor winces.  

“RK900 is here? He’s with Sumo, though, and Sumo’s on his leash. I’m just about to get Molly ready,” she says, “Did you guys assign him to...oh, okay, he says he wasn’t, but that Sumo was pawing at his leash, so he put it on him, and then Sumo turned towards the door so he put it together that it’s probably because he’s used and trained to a scheduled walk. I’m guessing me calling you is confirming it.”

“I am so sorry,” RK800-60 says, “I got held up at the precinct talking.”

“Oh, no, no, it’s fine, actually. I’m just terrified of your uh, new acquaintance.”

“Should you be telling it that out loud?” Hank asks.

“He says he appreciates the honesty. Or prefers it.”

Hank mouths, That sounds like a threat, at Connor. RK800-60 agrees.  

“Anyway, it is time for the dogs to be walked, so do I just...go with him?”

There’s a few excited barks in the background. At the very least, the animals don’t seem to be alarmed, which RK800-60 is taking as a good sign. Animals can usually tell who’s to be trusted or not, although it might just be because RK900 is a new face they haven’t really gotten to know yet.  

“I’ll meet you halfway,” RK800-60 says. “Park?”

“Sounds good,” Hamilton says. “See you there?”

“Very promptly,” RK800-60 says. The call ends from the other side, and he winces and puts his face his in hands so harshly he’s practically slapping himself. He groans loudly. “I messed up again. I can’t believe I got distracted and forgot the time.”

“At least it’s just walking the dog,” Connor says, “At least he actually took the initiative to walk the dog.”

“Yeah, that’s...a bit of a good sign,” Hank says. “You better hurry, though. We’ll get home as soon as we can too.”

“Yeah, catch you guys later,” RK800-60 says, before sprinting out of the precinct, weaving through desks and employees until he’s finally out of the building.  

He’s honestly just hoping nothing happens before he gets to the park.

-

Nothing happens before he gets to the park.

In fact, when he gets there, Hamilton is sitting on a bench eating ice cream while the RK900 is throwing a frisbee around with the most serious expression while the dogs take off running to chase it. He stands stiffly, much like a statue, waiting for them to retrieve it, and when one of them returns with the frisbee,  he just does it all over again.

The RK900 barely gives RK800-60  a glance when he arrives, so he runs straight for the bench.

"I am so sorry," he says. Hamilton's got that familiar wide-eyed deer look on her face that she usually gets when she's terrified but trying not to show it. Guess she's still terrified of the RK900 despite the fact that they'd actually had a small conversation last night, even if it was just introducing themselves to each other.

"It's okay," she says, "It's fine, he's - well, he hasn't killed anyone yet, despite looking permanently murderous."

RK800-60 laughs and turns to where the RK900 is. They're within earshot, but he doesn't seem to be bothered by the comment. Preferring honesty indeed. That counts as a sign of deviancy, right?

"Did you, uh." Hamilton motions her ice cream cone towards the RK900. "Figure out why he's here and all that?"

"He's looking for someone."

"Oh. Who?"

"His engineer," RK800-60 says.  

"Oh." Hamilton glances at the other android before turning back to RK800-60. "Does he have something that needs to be fixed?"

"'We're not sure, we haven't done a diagnostic test," RK800-60 says. "Actually, we could just let him run it himself."

"Are you brave enough to?"

"Thank you for that, that's very reassuring, very indicative of which side you're on," RK800-60 says, pretending to be offended. His friend laughs. "Maybe later, we'll ask him later." He pauses. "He's looking for his engineer in case he kicks it."

The RK900 throws him a sharp glance.

Hamilton shifts uncomfortably in her seat. "Can't you guys just make the equipment or something? Buy it? Uh, I don't know, contact Jericho Tower about it?"

"I guess we can," RK800-60 says. "Yeah, push comes to shove, we can. I think they have the plans for him, everything cleaned out should have been given to them." And they already called Markus anyway, who's going to ask for them to bring the RK900 in for registration soon - at least after the Tower is finally ready - so they might as well just ask about the plans and the possibility of manufacturing parts for the RK900 in case of emergency.

The RK900 should know this, though, shouldn't he? As much as RK800-60 hates thinking about how the android is essentially a replacement prototype of him and Connor, he is, in fact, faster, stronger and smarter. Whatever has crossed his mind will have crossed the RK900's, sooner or later, so if his concern truly was a lack of parts and the lack of a safety net should things go awry, then he should be aware that it can easily be remedied by the existence of several other volunteer engineers and Jericho's in-progress government.  

RK800-60 stares at him, aware that the RK900 knows he's being stared at, and ignoring him anyway. He tries to bat away the small spark of irritation that crops up from that and instead sends a message to Connor.

I think we should ask Jericho if they've found anything else regarding the RK900.

A minute later, Connor responds:

Actually, Markus just sent us something interesting.

They found nothing related to the RK900 in the tower archives.