Tentatively, Wattson reached toward Revenant as she watched him struggle with the wires protruding from the metal plating where the Syndicate's automaton had run him through. She stopped several inches away, careful not to touch him- she was keenly aware that, despite her best efforts to prove that she meant well, the assassin was unlikely to trust her.
"Let me help you."
Her voice was soft, but her tone was full of confidence. Revenant turned toward her.
"I don't-"
"...need help from humans." The engineer finished at the same time as he did, then looked up at him with wide eyes and a bright smile, like she'd just solved a math problem and expected a gold star. He only rewarded her with a menacing glare.
"I don't want to take you apart or do experiments on you," she continued. "You don't believe me, I guess– which is kind of funny, because people keep telling me I'm a terrible liar. I don't see why lying is so important in our culture, anyway- humans, I mean… Why do people ask for an honest opinion, when what they really want is a compliment? I'm happy to give them either, but people keep asking for the wrong one, and then they think I'm being mean-!"
A quiet sigh followed her words. There were plenty more thoughts that she had along the same lines; AI behavior was, in many ways, more sensical than that of humans. This wasn't a good time to let herself go off on that tangent- she needed to stay focused.
"But I've helped you twice now, and I didn't do anything bad," the engineer pointed out. "That should prove that you can trust me- right?"
"Humans don't have a directive," Revenant growled. "What drives your kind changes without reason. Your first assumption wasn't wrong– that I despise Pathfinder because he tries to make himself part of humanity, as if he won't be deemed obsolete and discarded like the rest of us. Hell, they do it to their own kind! But– he's predictable. I can trust him to be insufferable, if nothing else… The same can not be said of a human."
"So– you can't trust me to be insufferable?"
Wattson pressed the fingers of one hand to her lips to stifle her giggles. "That's– a good thing… right?"
"If I were you," hissed the assassin, "I'd stop talking– before someone decides to snap your neck."
He turned his back to her. Despite the harsh words, Wattson remained where she was, unfazed. She didn't so much as blink at the threat. His aggression, she realized now, wasn't always personal. It was a function of how he'd been programmed; under Syndicate control, there had never been a reason for him to do anything else. Away from their influence, it was something he returned to- an instinct of sorts.
"What is it like to have a directive?"
The engineer tilted her head curiously. Revenant froze in place, uncertain how to answer such a question– or if he wanted to. Thirty seconds passed - then a minute - of silence and tension between them. It seemed that she wasn't going to give up and go away.
"Order," he finally replied. "In the moment that I carry it out, all is in order."
"And everything is right, and all the bad things kind of fade into the background, and it's like they can't hurt you for a little while, even though they're still there."
Wattson's thoughtful voice trailed off. She exhaled slowly, then took another deep breath before continuing: "That's how I feel when I'm working on my inventions, you know- late at night, early in the morning, when it's dark and quiet and no one else is around. Just me, fitting all the little pieces together. I wish more people understood that."
The assassin glanced at her over his shoulder. Over multiple human lifetimes, believing himself to be one of them, he hadn't interacted with a skinbag who understood directives. Finding one's purpose over a lifetime was one of the traits they saw as defining their humanity– what did that mean for someone like him, who'd known his purpose and directive as a part of him from the moment he had awareness?
It meant that he wasn't human. Heh… That had been the truth all along. He wasn't one of them. He was free of the humanity that confined them.
How did Wattson know–? Her description was emotional, not a perspective that he would have come up with or words that he would have used– but she clearly understood directives in a way that her kind… shouldn't.
"How long," he growled in monotone, "have you been an inventor?"
"Well– I'd say 'since I was born,' but that wouldn't make sense, because I can't remember the day I was born– but I can't remember a time when I didn't think of myself as an inventor, either!"
Her fingers idly fiddled with the ends of her hair. "Ever since I was a kid, I've had this– this sort of magnetism toward technology, the circuits… It speaks my language. Words like these are too limited. They can't express the detail that I see in– in everything. Most people can't see it– the intricacy of it all…"
The engineer sighed as she looked down at her feet. Revenant studied her behavior, unsure what to make of it.
"Order…" Wattson uttered the single word quietly, then looked up at him with a bright smile on her face. "When I am working with electricity, and the circuits that it follows, all is in order."
"Strange human."
He made a subtle gesture of turning his head from side to side as he regarded her, though he finally began to let go of his defensive posture. He stood straighter, lowered his arms to his sides… The engineer reached toward him again, slowly, cautiously. This time, he made no move to stop her. She ran her fingers along the edges of the metal plating and pried away the panel. Revenant hissed at her– but he didn't fight it.
"If you'd like, I can disconnect your peripheral relays," she offered as she looked over the damage. "You won't feel any pain, or– or anything of what I'm doing."
"You're telling me those infernal engineers at Hammond could have done that when they wanted to run their damn tests on me-?"
Wattson blinked, her expression blank. "They- didn't?"
"No," snarled the assassin. "And they left the software in place that made me think I was human. I've experienced torture and death as a machine, and one of your kind– so I know exactly how to inflict the most suffering if you give me a reason to."
"That is… bad procedure," she muttered. "I- I mean what those engineers did, not what you just said- though I don't think threatening someone who wants to help you is good procedure, either."
"I'll pass on that offer," answered Revenant, ignoring her remark. "Whatever you're planning to do to me, you're not going to hide it by dulling my awareness. I will remember, and I will hunt you down."
The engineer hummed softly. "Not everybody you see is conspiring against you, Revenant. I hope someday, you believe me about that."
"Two hundred eighty-eight years of experience says otherwise."
"But you were in a closed environment, weren't you? The Syndicate controlled what you experienced." She spoke with an unconscious undertone of excitement, head tilted, innocent curiosity expressed as seemingly inappropriate enthusiasm. Her fingers carefully manipulated the wires- another thoughtful hum left her throat. "You didn't get to see what else there is, beyond the mazes they had you running…"
Revenant glowered down at her. "Are you really comparing me to a lab rat?"
"No! No, I– I didn't mean that!" She shook her head. "C'est comme ça– I can speak two languages, and I make the same mistakes in both of them. Why is communication so complicated?! J'en ai marre!"
She should be afraid, she thought; that choice of words had been a terrible mistake. Though he'd certainly become more patient since Torc had isolated his human counterpart, she doubted that Revenant would forgive her easily. She should be afraid– but at the moment, the idea of fear in her head was purely intellectual. The only emotion she felt was frustration at how absurdly convoluted language was. Running mazes was an expression she'd heard someone else use, and stored in her memory without context… It hadn't occurred to her that the phrase was associated with lab animals until this moment. A genius with electrical circuits- a stupid person, she scolded herself. Stupid mistake!
"Ah… don't worry, skinbag," the simulacrum growled dismissively. "I won't hold it against you- this time."
Wattson nodded quickly, disinclined to engage in any more verbal communication for the time being. She kept her focus on the work she was doing. The damage wasn't severe - especially compared to the first time she'd seen Revenant in this conflict against the Syndicate, when Crypto had reached out to her - but it was significant. Whatever had been done to him at the hands of Hammond Robotics, the engineer thought, had to be pretty bad for him to act like this was nothing- to prefer it over letting someone see to him… He was free of his human predecessor, thanks to Torc's work. He still had a long way to go to be free. All of them did- and perhaps they still would, even if the Syndicate were to fall.
"For a second, you were almost being civil."
Crypto's voice sounded louder than he'd meant, carrying from the doorway over the smooth concrete surfaces of the room. Revenant's head turned toward him in a sudden motion. He didn't react- no subtle step back, no tensing shoulders as he stopped himself from instinctively reaching for a weapon.
"Don't get used to it," replied the assassin. Crypto responded with a smile; a quick laugh, barely audible. The lighthearted expression vanished when Wattson repositioned the ends of a severed wire, and Revenant responded with an aggressive hiss. The metal claws of one hand raked over the surface of the wall behind him- by the time the echo of the resulting screech had faded, so had his reaction. His posture was neutral again, hands relaxed at his sides… It seemed more like a reflex than an intentional threat. The engineer moved more slowly and deliberately as she reconnected the wires, offering him more time to anticipate what she was doing. She couldn't tell if it made a difference to him.
"How can you feel that?" Crypto frowned. "When the wire's cut, the connection is broken. You shouldn't be able to feel anything."
Revenant glanced at the hacker.
"Your guess is as good as mine," he finally growled in answer. "They wanted me to think I was human."
What makes you think they allowed me to know anything about my own design?
"I can explain it, if- if you're okay with that," Wattson replied. She was cautious, careful not to reveal any information about him. It was something that he did appreciate, not that he would have been able to explain so, even if he wanted to.
Crypto stayed silent. He watched patiently, waiting for the assassin's answer. In spite of Revenant's crude attitude, there was now an unspoken respect between the three of them.
"All right."
There was tension in Revenant's voice as he answered. It could easily be mistaken for aggression- not to Wattson or Crypto, both of whom had become too familiar with that default state of his. This was… more reserved, more subtle. He didn't like the control that they had over him, under this set of circumstances– but in the absence of his human counterpart, it was tolerable.
"There's- there's this conductive shielding, in between the layers of insulation over the wires." Wattson's speech was hesitant, and she watched the simulacrum's reaction.
"It shields you from interference, like radio waves- that's why your EMP doesn't shut him down, Crypto." She briefly glanced in the hacker's direction as she addressed him, after which her attention returned to Revenant. "But it's also used to network sensors that give you information about what's going on around you. When the signal on the network is broken, some of those sensors pick up on that- and instead, you get a signal that something isn't right."
"Geulsse. Then– huh…" Crypto seemed to be intently focused on some nonexistent object in the distance, analytical mind spinning and sorting information at full speed. He ran the fingers of one hand through his hair, which felt strange after having cut it so short to disguise himself as a Syndicate agent. "Then you can feel the EMP in some way, too- yes? Even though it doesn't stop you…"
He recalled watching the post-match replay of the first game he'd played against Revenant. Himself holding a long sight line for Wraith as she pushed ahead– the assassin flanking him, being forced frantically to reposition, barely making it around a corner in time– setting off the EMP, which should have damaged the robot beyond repair, but Revenant merely lost his balance for a fraction of a second and kept coming after him. Of course, Crypto didn't remember being there as he watched himself on the broadcast footage; he'd woken up comfortably tucked into his bed the hour before, his last memory being of the machine that scanned his syncording.
The hacker became aware that several seconds - if not a minute or two - had passed, and Revenant still hadn't answered the question. He looked pointedly at the simulacrum.
"What do you experience," Revenant growled instead, "when that drone of yours gets shot out of the sky? Are you overloaded with broken signals?"
If these two skinbags were going to insist on asking these sorts of questions - expecting him to reveal information that they could use against him - he'd do the same to them. The change in Crypto's demeanor confirmed that he'd caught the hacker off guard.
Crypto opened his mouth like he was about to answer, only to exhale quietly when the words caught in his throat. He wasn't sure how to explain the sensation- language hadn't evolved as fast as the technology, leaving many concepts like this without names. Revenant's own description might be as close as he could get.
"Yeah," he finally answered. "Broken signals- like a solid wall of static. It goes away before I can fully process that it's there."
That was the result of a failsafe built into the neural interface, which ensured that only the specific data he wanted was transmitted to his brain. He could see through the drone's camera and hear the sounds that it picked up as if he were right there– a script that filtered the data suppressed certain elements that would be overwhelming, such as the sound of gunshots and the blinding flash of light when a thermite grenade went off. Another function of that script was to cut off the transmission if the drone took significant damage, so his perception of his environment wouldn't be flooded with useless, fragmented data.
"That's what happens when the EMP hits you?"
Revenant's hands clenched into fists at his sides- the hacker couldn't quite discern if that was a reaction to his pressing the question, or to the connector that Wattson had just snapped into place with a distinct click. The guarding reaction subsided as quickly as it had happened; once again, it appeared to be a reflex rather than a conscious move.
"For a few milliseconds," the simulacrum responded. "A human can't register information in that amount of time– but I notice every detail. Searing energy, a surge of meaningless signals that force out everything else around me… and then, nothing. The static is gone, and it takes everything with it. My surroundings, my body… I exist in some sort of transient subspace, made of pure energy. Then it's over, and everything comes crashing back into place. Violently."
"It resets all of the feedback from your control system," mused Wattson. Crypto let out a heavy rush of breath.
"I'm… sorry," he muttered.
Revenant glanced at him. "'Sorry' is a pointless, human sentiment."
The hacker wasn't sure how to respond to that. He stayed silent, absorbed in his own thoughts, half-watching while Wattson used a molecular splicing tool to patch up the mechanical damage. It wasn't fair, what he'd done- putting her in the Syndicate's crosshairs, throwing her from the secure life she'd worked hard for into this perpetual state of uncertainty. He should have known better. It didn't matter how comfortable she seemed, or how many times she assured him that she was happy to be here; Crypto couldn't let go of the feeling that he had wronged her.
The process of loading and boarding the vehicle - this time a clunky old minibus that Augustin had procured specifically because Syndicate agents were unlikely to see it as a threat - was quiet and restless. Cade was driving; Revenant, who knew the precise location of the biomedical facility, provided him with directions. The unease between the two of them radiated in waves, felt clearly by everyone else involved.
"Slow down, fré," Augustin snapped as Cade took the turn onto the exit ramp at a reckless pace. "Get the idea that you have nothing left to lose out of your head. We aren't going to let the Syndicate kill you today, you hear me?"
As Crypto looked over the amount of weapons and ordnance that the enforcer had piled in the back, it was clear to him that Cade fully expected this to be their last stand.