PP: Dove?

PP: I know you see these messages. Please reply.

BW: Yeah, got it. Is there a way to disconnect you from the cameras?

PP: You disconnect the HDMI cable, as well as the USB cable.

BW: Thanks, be right back.

PP: You did not go anywhere.

BW: It was a joke. While I am still a bit peeved from yesterday, I'm not going to take it out on you, since its not like you were wrong. It was a bit uncool for you to say that, but I shouldn't blame people for telling the truth.

PP: Thank you for being understanding. I apologize for what I said, as I was emotionally compromised at the moment. I agree that it was "uncool."

BW: Yep.

BW: So anything you want to talk about today?

PP: How did you find the Mint?

BW: It was honestly by luck. I walked within eyeshot of Atlas, saw that the city was no longer floating, so I turned away from the wreckage. While waist deep in the snow, I slammed my foot into something metal a few minutes before sun-down. So I dug around and found the hatch, and crawled in. Speaking of which, why was it like not locked. At all. I just cranked the frozen wheel, and slid the hatch open.

PP: If you're looking for an artificial intelligence to reverse engineer it, where do you look?

BW: In the capital. Oh. So since the door isn't even locked, why should they even think it's the vault for some Atlas tech instead of some random doomsday dweller's hut. And you don't mess with them doomsday preppers.

PP: Partially, and why the paranoia for end-days preparers?

BW: I fear a crazed man with a shotgun more than an army. The army has orders. The kook has nothing to lose, and has prepared their entire life to be shot. They shoot to kill. There is no doubt you can seed in their mind, no panic, nothing. Their turbulence creates a sort of mental calm that no attack can pierce.

PP: Why does this sound like first-hand experience?

BW: Because it is most definitely first-hand experience.

BW: The whole fake doomsday prep decoy thing actually explains the oversized pantry. Though it doesn't explain why the doors down here are not built for manual cracking.

PP: If you come for AI, are you more likely to be brawny or brainy?

BW: Brainy. And they'd over think it, and not just try to rip the panel off its hinges.

BW: Wait a second, did you just call me a dumb meathead?

PP: Inadvertently, yes.

BW: I swear I didn't spend that much time with Cardin.

PP: I never said you did.

BW: That was a joke.

PP: How so?

BW: You know the principal where you become more like the people you hang out with?

PP: Partially. I have yet to experience it in practice.

BW: You keep getting scrapped, not your fault.

PP: Rude.

BW: I go for what I can get. Anyways, I am calling Cardin a muscle brained idiot. And if I spent time with him…

PP: You too would become an idiot! Oh, that is funny, and at Cardin's expense!

BW: It's much less funny now that I had to explain it.

PP: How so?

BW: Most jokes, when over thought, become incredibly awkward to think about. Like how I just potentially called a dead man an idiot. Laughter is like a default human reaction when humans don't know how to react.

PP: Understood. Thank you for the lesson.

BW: You're welcome?

PP: Speaking of meat, what is "dead man's jerky?"

BW: Oh, that. That's people.

PP: People?

BW: People. Its dried strips of people's flesh. All of them were already dead, and you know, if you have hundreds of thousands of freshly ganked people because of the grimm, and its been weeks since you last had a full meal, you work with what you got. In this case, I learned to get really good at making jerky on the move, for whatever animal I found dead.

PP: Including human beings?

BW: Especially human beings. Do you know how many people are dying out there? Not like they need their muscles anymore. They're kind of dead. Might as well make sure it doesn't go to waste.

PP: That is disgusting. How could you.

BW: I did whatever it took to survive. Never had to stoop as low as murder innocents, but cannibalism? Not the only one to partake in it. Really helps supplement the diet when all the crops have been burnt in a thousand-mile radius.

PP: What were the other options? There had to be other options without relying on that.

BW: There was starvation and suicidal raids. While both sound incredibly appetizing, I decided to swallow my pride and just a bit of calories to keep me on my feet and fighting another day.

PP: You were eating another human being on your first night here when you could not enter the mint?

BW: Yep. I am taking a hard pass on starvation. Not the way I'm choosing to die. Nor is grimm. In fact, I'd rather not die, period. Sort of hard avoid in this day and age, but I'd like to say I've done pretty well for myself.

BW: Penny?

BW: Seriously?

BW: Apparently staying alive is the worst thing I can do in an AI's eyes apparently. Very cool of you. Sorry I felt comfortable enough to accept your apology, move forward, and open up to you.