Work Text:
When I was being reasonable about the Amena situation, which was not often, and certainly not now, tricked as I had been into attending this celebratory sendoff for her—okay, I’d been invited, whatever—I told myself that I wasn’t her parent. Mensah and Farai and Tano were, and if they thought it was a good idea to let Amena attend university on Mihira and join ART’s crew as a junior research apprentice, then they knew what was best for their daughter.
(I don’t actually believe this. Humans never know what’s good for them.)
“Ooh!” Amena squealed with such high-pitched delight that I had to turn down my hearing when she opened her next gift and pulled an intricately woven sweater, obviously hand-knit with great care, from the box. “Thanks, Mom.” She gave Farai a big hug, her face alight with happiness
Well, at least one of us was pleased with the situation. Who was I even kidding? Her parents were beaming with pride, her aunts and uncles too, while the younger kids looked on with envy so obvious even a Murderbot couldn’t miss it. Clearly, I was the only one who thought this whole plan was a disaster waiting to happen.
Amena turned her attention to the next gift. “From you?” She directed an uncertain glance in my direction.
Yeah, it was from me. I’ve only consumed upwards of 20,000 hours of media. I knew what humans did at celebratory events like this. They gave their juvenile humans presents to take with them as they set off into the unknown dangers of the galaxy where absolutely anything could happen to them.
Amena tore through the wrapping, opened the case, and stared at the contents with some confusion. “Are these—"
Mensah peered over her shoulder. “Drones.” Her tone was neutral, but I knew her well enough by now to understand when she was amused.
Amena fixed a sharp look on me, which those 20,000-plus hours of media led me to believe was a complaint about privacy and over-protectiveness and blah-blah-blah.
“They’ll stay inert unless you activate them,” I told her.
Technically, this was true. ART had helped me with the design, which was only right, since the whole Amena situation was its fault to begin with. The drones were compact in size, but had the fire power of an energy weapon. ART had encoded them to respond to any signs that Amena was in danger and had incorporated the same long-range communications technology it had given me. If Amena were in trouble, anywhere, ever, the drones would spring into action to defend her, and I’d be able to control them, no matter how far away I might be.
I hoped Amena appreciated what I’d gone through to make this happen. ART was never so insufferable as when it got to show off its huge processing power and its understanding of humans.
“The key is to encode drone activation to correlate with specific biochemical stress markers rather than more general signs like increased heart rate or respiration,” it had belabored the point in its typical know-it-all fashion while we worked. “Otherwise, sexual arousal could trigger—"
Yeah, I’d shut that conversation right down. I never wanted to think about humans doing human things, and definitely not Amena, who was like my—my favorite human’s daughter.
“Thanks, Third Mom,” Amena said, smiling, and launched herself at me.
I allowed this one-time breach of my strict no-hugging policy because it was a celebratory event, not because I had any parental feelings for this adolescent human. I want that noted for the record.
There was one last present to open, which turned out to be something of a mystery, since no one had any idea who it was from.
Amena removed the wrapping paper and found a card. “It’s from ART.”
Because of course it was. If there was one thing ART had no clue about, it was how to mind its own business.
Amena finished opening the package and pulled out a crew uniform with the colors and insignia of the Pansystem University of Mihira and New Tideland. “Oh, wow,” she murmured, clearly excited about it.
I froze, feeling very much the opposite. The uniform made what was about to happen all too real, and thanks very much for that, ART. Fortunately, I’m a SecUnit, so I didn’t storm right out of there in a human-like snit. According to my internal chronometer, I waited a whole three minutes and twenty-six seconds.
Mensah tracked me down out on the terrace, where I was absolutely not sulking.
“I know you don’t like the idea of Amena joining the University’s crew aboard the research vessel,” she began.
“You know what happened before. She could have gotten killed!”
“Yes,” Mensah said, more calmly than I could understand. “But she didn’t. Instead, she found a sense of purpose. On Preservation, we’re mostly shielded from knowledge of the Corporate Rim and its abuses. Amena isn’t any more. She believes in the University’s mission. She wants to help free other worlds from corporate enslavement. It’s her calling.”
“ART is the whole reason Amena knows about any of that! You don’t understand what it’s capable of. It would burn down the entire galaxy if that’s what it took to—"
“Protect its crew?” Mensah said, with a gentle smile.
Which now included Amena. Okay, she had me there.
Mensah continued, “As a parent, there’s nothing you want more than to protect your children. At the same time, you have to give them the freedom they need to fully become themselves. Sometimes, love means setting aside your own comfort in favor of supporting your children in the path they choose in life.”
With child-rearing philosophy like that, I really wondered how humans had survived this long.
She patted me on the arm. “But I must admit, it’s a lot easier to let her go knowing that you’ll be there with her and that you’d also burn down the galaxy to keep her safe.” She headed back toward the house, turning to add, with a smile, “Third Mom.”
I didn’t splutter, because SecUnits don’t do that sort of thing. I also didn’t manage to hotly deny what she’d said before she disappeared back inside. Fine. Whatever. Maybe I have a few teeny tiny parental feelings toward her offspring. Maybe I have a calling too, and it’s keeping the humans I care about from getting themselves killed doing the dumb stuff that humans love to do.
That was something I could think about later. Preferably after I’d watched another 20,0000 hours of media to soothe myself.