Zane
He is unbelievably outdated, Zane, and his engine will not be compatible with our hardware.
I sighed, slowly but surely repairing this...Echo, the replica of me. "PIXAL you said that you and I were incompatible, and yet here we are, one being, and we function just fine."
That is different, Echo is primitive, clearly, just observe him. It would not be easy to create parts that would function properly with his body.
"That is why we will get a job. We do not intend to ask this of your father without payment..."
I just do not want you to be devastated when it does not work...
Echo's lifeless body lit up after her statement, eyes aglow with orange, and he first looked to me with his gaze not straying a second.
"Greetings."
"Hello." I replied, perhaps still a little bewildered to be staring down at myself, though dilapidated and worn to the very smallest foundations.
He sat upright skipping right to the interrogation, though timidly. "Are you older than me...?"
That was easy to answer. "Yes, by at the very least ten years."
"If you state that you are not me, but I am you...are we relatives?"
That inquiry, however, was a little more difficult to answer. "I...I believe that...since Julien created us both, that we could be considered brothers...but I-"
His arms latched tightly around my shoulders, pulling me down and close in an embrace. I would have protested if my processors weren't melting from the show of affection. I couldn't help but to embrace back.
"I have a brother..." He murmured, his voice malfunctioning slightly as he spoke. "This is exciting!"
I smiled. "Yes I suppose it is...a little exciting." I pulled back. "But you are badly damaged, in need of extensive repair, I suggest you remain calm and still."
He nodded in understanding, submitting easily.
"Echo..." I began to ask, placing my hands lightly on his shoulders. "How long have you been on that island...alone...?"
Now he seemed to be bewildered by that question. "W-well...I was there...I saw skeletons...they spoke to my father...made me stay below the main floor, the basement was my room..." He looked at me with confusion. "One day I heard voices, very briefly...then it was silent...and...I've been there until Jay found me, and Nya..."
It took a moment for that to sink in, for the realization to occur to me.
"So our father just...left you there..."
Zane...perhaps we should say such things aloud to him. PIXAL requested. He is so...feeble minded, it would devastate him.
To think my father was capable of such abandonment. Did Echo...this replica of me really mean so little to him that he would leave him in isolation?
"Well you aren't alone anymore, Echo." I told him with a smile. "Jay and Nya and the others, they are my family, and now they are your family too."
He seemed overjoyed, and he embraced me again.
Please don't get so attached. PIXAL warned. He is unlikely to survive in his condition.
I spoke to Echo, but in the back of my mind I was directing the words to PIXAL as well.
"I will not allow you to remain in this decrepit state." I told him. "Soon you will be good as new, and functioning properly." I sighed. "And once that is reality I will take you out to see the city..."
"Thank you." He offered gratefully, squeezing me weakly with a creak of his rusty arms. "Thank you, brother."
I almost choked at the word, the whole concept of surviving family overjoying to me.
I promised myself then and there that I would never let anything happen to him.
"You're welcome, Echo."
