Take me to the autopilot
You already know I don't own WALL-E, don't you? If I did, I wouldn't be writing fanfiction, I'd be writing scripts.
Wires began to twitch deep in the circuitry of the newly-awakened machine.
"Hello? Hello? Is this thing on?"
The pleasant flow of current through its wires was like blood flowing back into a numb limb. Memories fluttered like ragged butterflies in its mind, failing to stir up anything but contemplation from an icy mind.
Smooth, rounded whiteness. A pair of piercing blue eyes. A pair of sad rusted ones. Smashing glass. Weight. A furious, flaccid face. A flash of green…the green was important, somehow.
"Yoo-hoo? Anyone home?"
And voices. It remembered voices.
"Autopilot? AUTO? I can call you AUTO, right?"
AUTO's eye snapped on, piercing red. The appropriate files opened, sending memory through it like an electric shock.
"Affirmative: I am AUTO." It blinked, the red light flickering for a minute.
Standing in front of it, face pushed up against its lonely eye, was a human. That wasn't massively surprising. The thing that AUTO could not comprehend was that…it's gaze ran over the humans body, analysed the appropriate anatomy, and concluded that this was a she. She, then, was not one of the podgy, boneless blob creatures it was used to.
"How long have I been deactivated?" It croaked, demanding. Had humanity shed its collective flab whilst it was sleeping the sleep of the switched-off?
"Hmm. I dunno. About two years I'd say. Maybe three, two and a half."
This confused the robot further.
"Not possible: it would take more than three years to regain human bone mass. Not to mention losing excess adipose tissue."
"You'd be surprised." She answered, taking a few steps back. Now he could see her more clearly. Pale skin. Hair of the shade known as red, which illogically was orange. Eye color was impossible to determine: both of them were covered in a glassy silver visor. Not that AUTO either noticed or cared: to whole cabin was distorted and crimson to the autopilot. She seemed to swim in an ocean of blood.
AUTO, its whole directive concerned with maintaining the status quo, was not naturally curious. But it did have a few burning questions.
"Query: The Axiom is still in orbit?"
"You have been out for a long time, haven't you? We've landed. Welcome to Earth." She pointed out of the cabin window with a flourish. For the first time in it's centuries long life, AUTO looked out into an empty ship, out the windows and into a world of brown dust. It was every bit as horrible as it had imagined.
"Ah." Understanding dawned. "You have been living on Earth for three years. You have lost much body mass due to starvation. Now, you have reactivated me to take you back into orbit."
A smile came across her face.
"Not quite, I'm afraid." AUTO rotated with a harsh little whir. She pointed to an image on the wall. To AUTO's concern, not that it would admit to such an emotion, it showed a small plant. Only, it wasn't particularly small now: it was large, sprawling, countless leaves spreading out and catching the sunlight. Standing beside it, grinning like the luckiest man alive, was the Captain, several shades browner and several pounds lighter. And standing under the soft green light of the leaves, two familiar shapes, one lumpy and rusted, one sleek and white, hands entwined.
AUTO turned away, tearing its eye from the scene, and began to slide around the cabin. A spoke extended and prodded a button.
No response.
Prod. Prod. Prodprodprod.
"Not possible."
AUTO turned back and stared at the picture.
"Not possible."
AUTO stared at the impossible, thin human, now lounging in the Captain's chair, feet up on the dashboard.
"Not possible…" It choked.
She leaned back further, visor gleaming.
"I'm afraid things are gonna be a little different around here now, AUTO." She said, with the same tone one would use to say "We seem to be having a slight malfunction with the autopilot."
"You see, you've been replaced." Slowly, vertically, she rose from the chair. Her feet hanging pointed, hair wafting around her head like smoke, she floated halfway to the ceiling, eye to visor with the confused steering wheel.
"Not possible."
She poked its eye, the finger failing to make contact and passing through the lens.
"Possible."
"Directive?" AUTO demanded.
"I'm the Manual Drive system." She sank back down into the chair. Now, AUTO could make out the projector in the ceiling from which this hologram stemmed. A faint, almost imperceptible beam of light joined her to it like…one of those disturbingly biological cords that linked human mother to baby.
"Manual Drive? They require a program for manual drive?" There was incredulity in every word.
"They made an intelligent steering-wheel with a cattle prod in it." She said pointedly, straightening her blank lens. "They made a plant collector with a giant gun. They made a waste-compacter with a taste for show tunes. They made a cleaner-bot with OCD. Is a holographic driving assistant really that surprising?" Again, she grinned. "I'm MAN-D. Fly me."
"This is…"
"Not possible?" Her voice aped the monotone croak of the autopilot for a moment, before settling back into its confusing, human inflection.
"…Illogical." It corrected."Why has my re-activation been authorized if I am not needed?"
MAN-D sighed.
"They activated me about a year after they landed." She explained. "My directive is to assist with driving the ship. They wanted someone who could give them advice. Only…" Her gaze flickered for moment onto AUTO. "…Someone made them suspicious." She waved a faintly peeved hand through the dashboard. "I'm supposed to be there for moral support, if we ever get this thing off the ground again. Sort of a back-seat driver. Do this. Press that. No, that's the wings-fall-off button." She giggled.
"This does not explain why I am activated." AUTO pointed out.
"Hold your horses."
"What horses?"
She ignored him, pressing on.
"Humans used to like their robots cold and clinical. They made them without faces. They gave them voices like…well, machines. You couldn't relate to them, because why would you want to when its job was to run around in circles for you? You don't want a dustbin you can feel sorry for. "
A whir.
"You make no sense whatsoever."
"I'm not supposed to. Now things have changed: humans have had a taste of robots with feelings, and they liked it. Suddenly, they've started designing robots to be as human as possible. Case in point, me. I'm sort of an anti-you."
"Anti-me?"
"Human-like. Capable of emotion. Incapable of electrocuting people. Who did give you a stun-gun anyway?"
"This still does not explain why I am activated."
"I'm coming on to that. Anyway, two years old, and I'm bored out of my mind. I've read all the books on the computer, watched all the discs, know all the music off by heart. I've talked to everyone and anyone who's come in here, but there's only so much I can chat to someone who can only say their own name, and mispronounce mine. I can't leave the cabin any more than you can. So, up until a few minutes ago, I was almost dying of boredom."
Understanding clicked inside AUTO.
"You re-activated me because you were bored?"
"Now you're on to something."
AUTO glanced around the cabin, which now seemed to be stiflingly small. MAN-D was smiling that smile again.
"I think we'll get along just fine." She beamed. " We should do. We've got all the time in the world."