A/N: Did I say I was going to write Pilot's POV this chapter? That didn't happen, sorry. Have some Cancer instead.

For the rest of the time, they acted as though "Friendship Bonding Time" was actually hours of card games that made little impact on the bond of their friendship. It wasn't as though it was a big secret or anything, though. There was nothing to feel ashamed about, two consenting adults having a bit of fun in this forsaken world. Unfortunately, Zee Captain had the maturity of a 5-year-old, while Engie had fewer social graces than the murderous AI he invented, so Snippy was glad that neither of them seemed to know. On the downside, this meant that there wasn't anyone he could talk to about his conflicted feelings toward the whole situation.

"LEt uS prOVide hIM witH nEW oRgaNS. HoW AbouT soMe gENetaLIA?" suggested the Biomatrix that dogged his existence and kept him technically sort-of alive. "IT cOUld fAciLitaTE PRoCreAtIOn."

"Bwah?!"

"YoUR RELatiONShIP wiTh thE sEMi-OrGANiC iS uNsaTIsfyINg dUE to laCk oF poSsiBILitY of SExuAL conGResS. WE CAn pRovIDe tHe reQUisITe oRgANs aT yOUr rEquESt. BetTeR reTuRNs on iNVestMEnt iF pRoGEny rESult."

There were so many things wrong with the little unsolicited speech from his scarf that he could only manage a flat "NO."

"FiNE. JuST tRyiNG tO heLP."

"Just trying to acquire more biomass in the form of my hypothetical children, you mean?" he snarked.

"IT wILL eVEntUaLLY cOMe tO pASs," purred the Biomatrix sedately.

He wasn't sure why the thought of it was so unsettling. His... children. Haha. No. Just, no. That was never going to happen, except that he had glimpsed the future through the eyes of one of his descendants, so, yes. Children. Eventually. It made him wonder how many other survivors were still out there, and about the possibility of rebuilding the human race... but if the world remained this fucked up, any speculation was useless. This was no place to raise a child. This world was barely able to sustain the few humans left on it. And for all Zee Captain's talk about bringing Spring back...

No, it was pointless. Some things were not worth thinking about. Some things were too dangerous to think about, too close to the edge of madness to risk brushing up against. So long as he didn't think too much about it, he could hope. And if he could have hope, then there was a tomorrow.

Semi-organic, the scarf had said. "Do you know which parts of him are organic?" he asked, changing tracks as smoothly as a changing gears in a manual car with a broken clutch.

"It wiLL nOt hELp yOU. EsseNTiAL coMpoNEnTs aRe miSsInG."

"No, you're still not adding organs to him."

"HE wOuLD bE a dURAbLe veSseL fOr..."

"No."

The Biomatrix seemed to sigh. "...wE haD hOPeD tO heLP wITh yoUR veXATioN so YOu woULd bE mORE rESpoNSIve tO oUR eXcELLent oFfeRS. AS yOU wILL nOt bE hELpeD bY aNy aNSwer we CAn gIVe, wE hAve deCIdeD to reFUSe to aNSweR yOUr qUEry. ThE mISsiNg esSENtiAL cOMponEnTS aRe fROm hIs bRAin. MisSINg oR daMAGeD, oTHeRWIse nOT foUNd. Rest iS irRELevaNT."

"Wait, what do you mean by that?!"

He spent the next minute or so trying to figure out if it was possible to strangle a scarf before a loud crash drew his attention away from his problems. Life was always full of distractions when living with a bunch of psycho children, after all.