Trigger Warning: Another narcissistic abuse flashback in this chapter.
CHAPTER FOUR
Overnight, all the Jarvises had been lifted like overgrown toddlers into their bays, and the workers had hung the aerial catwalk that would allow us access to their cockpits. I climbed the stairs and sat down on a white plastic crate someone had left up there, fingering my uniform jacket and gnawing my lip.
In front of the mech's round head, atop the catwalk's railing, was a circular dock. Curled up inside it was a robot—a cubish contraption with rounded speakers on its sides and a camera jutting like a third eye from its forehead. I stared at 343's dormant body for a long minute, my leg jiggling on the floor.
Slowly, I reached out and pressed one of the big, orange buttons on the dock. The eggshell-like plastic barrier around 343 slid back, and a yellow-orange light lit up beneath them. Their body let out a soft beep, then a whir as the eyeball-like camera pinned me to the spot with its gaze.
"Operator Miller," 343 said in a smooth, feminine voice. "I am to remain disabled until your tour on the Atlas begins. What is the matter?"
I turned my eyes toward the floor. They were right—technically, I was breaking protocol. While the Alberta Garrison had been used to Dr. Jarvis' creations, and let them roam the base at our sides as they pleased, this Garrison had taken a disdainful stance towards free-roaming AI.
Such a stance was technically understandable. Their own AI—Chip, if I remembered their name correctly—wasn't operational yet, and they'd never possessed any AI before, nevermind this many of them. Who knows what they might do?
They'd never seen an AI diagnose and care for a pilot in distress, or sit and talk with them, helping them work out whatever was bringing them down. They had no clue what they were missing.
"I need Dr. Jarvis to explain something to me," I said.
There was a hissing sound, and 343 lifted from their dock in a puff of air. Two arms, each with a small ring of different tools attached, folded from either side of the jet on the bottom of their metal body.
"I am only an AI fork of Dr. Jarvis' consciousness, Operator Miller." A horizontal plane of light shone from above their camera as they scanned me, and I frowned. "I cannot give you the answers you seek as she would—our paths have diverged."
I listened to 343's voice, blinking my dry eyes. There wasn't even a hint of sorrow in their voice. To others, the AIs' voice seemed almost human-like, but I could hear the roboticness it held. There was a slight hum of engine noise, as well as a slight choppiness between sounds, where their programming was pasting together bits of old recordings of Dr. Jarvis on the fly.
Everything about our AI partners was purposefully manufactured to make them feel friendly and familiar, but I could see the seams that made them up. I could tell they weren't as deep as they seemed. But, for some illogical reason, I ignored it—I kept coming back to talk to 343, as if they were really Dr. Jarvis.
"I know," I said, sighing. "But you can tell me something—that's better than nothing."
"I could tell you something too," a second voice said. "But you never deigned to ask me."
My eyes snapped to Dr. McKay, where she was standing next to the stairs. She walked over to 343 and I, pencil skirt stretching tight over legs sculpted by years upon years of stiletto heels.
How had she managed to get up the stairs in those, nevermind walk on the grated catwalk? Her feet were arched like half-moons, her toes wedged down in a 90-degree angle to her foot. Looking at them made me wince, and I wanted to clutch my own feet in sympathy.
"Dr. McKay," 343 said, bowing their head. The small jets on their corners hissed as they righted themselves. "It's good to see you."
"It's good to see you too, Unit 343," she said. "Now return to your dock and disengage."
I threw up my hands. Like a fool, 343 sank obediently into their dock, and within the span of a few seconds, the lights had gone off and nobody was home anymore.
"Hey!" I cried. "You can't just tell them to turn themselves off," I motioned to their motionless body with both hands. "They're a—they're smart enough to be a human being!"
Dr. McKay sat on a crate across from me, folding her long, bare legs at the knee.
"Yes," she said. "They are, which is why 343 knew a crafty young operator was using them to avoid face-to-face conversation with another person."
I leaned back on the crate, my lip curled.
"Crap."
That was the thing about AI—they knew what you actually needed, and they had no qualms about doing it, even if you kicked and screamed the entire way there. As a whole, they had no patience for the avoidance and denial that marked human behavior. All that mattered to them was whatever vulnerable nugget of pain you were trying your hardest to hide from them.
"Crap, indeed," Dr. McKay said, her bright red lips curling into a plasticy white smile. "What's bothering you, Operator Miller?"
I looked away, feeling the skin around my eyes crease as I narrowed them. No way in hell was I going to tell her about Keith. Dr. McKay believed everything was fated—that she was meant to be Program Director after Dr. Jarvis, and that we were meant to be her pilots. Maybe it was, but believing that without proof was utter shite, and I didn't want her mucking up my head.
And, I most definitely didn't want her cheering me on from the sidelines, making my attempts look like something they weren't. There was no way someone like Keith's heart would lurch for someone like me. Not like mine had done for him the night before.
Besides—I didn't even know him! I'd only met him two days ago—admitting any interest in him would only make me look like some kind of insane stalker. I was already at risk of that because of my history; I didn't need to tempt fate.
"It's nothing," I said, moving to get up. I had to get out of here, away from Dr. McKay and her 'helpful' optimism. "I'll deal with it on my own."
"Ah-ah-ah," Dr. McKay admonished, putting a hand out to stop me.
I sank back down on the crate. A helpless, hopeless feeling washed over me, and I growled. How the hell was I going to get out of this? She was my boss. I couldn't just walk away from her—she'd ground me, or worse.
343, you traitor!
"I don't want to talk about it," I said, pointedly refusing to meet her eyes. "Can I just go?"
"You cannot," Dr. McKay said, her eyebrows tensing as she leaned closer. "What is it that's bothering you? Are the people here not being kind?"
I blinked twice. There was that thing where they grilled me in the cafeteria, but there was also Rizavi—and… Keith. Keith, who hadn't pointed out my awkward conversation starters, and hadn't laughed at me when I asked if there were lions in the Sonoran. Who hadn't bothered me when I was disemboweled and still stuffing my guts back into my body that morning.
"That's not it," I said.
"Are your accommodations not to your liking?"
My room was a room—there wasn't much more it had to be. It wasn't like I would be staying there forever. And, it had a bathroom of its own. Back at the Alberta Garrison, I'd shared mine with the person in the room next to me. Even though we'd rarely actually run into each other, I'd been annoyed with her in one way or another for the entire eight years I'd lived there.
"Ría," Dr. McKay said, and the hair on the back of my arms stood straight up at the sound of her using my first name. "Whatever it is, you need to deal with it and put it to rest. I cannot let you connect to Unit 343 if I'm not absolutely sure you're in a calm and collected state of mind."
What the hell could I say to get her off my back? Flipping back in my memory, I grasped for anything I could do for her—a favor, anything I could do to get out of this. My metaphorical hands grasped a glimmer of something, an off-hand comment from her that I'd somehow managed to remember.
"I am calm and collected," I said, standing up. "I'll show you. You wanted to do a demonstration—of the portal generators?"
Dr. McKay stared up at me, and I stared back. Directly into her eyes, even though it made my heart rise in my chest, wedging itself into my throat.
"I'll do it," I said, my voice steady. "I'll fight the arbiter for you."
The changeroom the Garrison had assigned for us was rectangular, with smaller, circular bays down one side and lockers with benches in the center. After Dr. McKay left, I stripped down to my skivvies and slid into a plasticy black inner suit. It hung loosely from my body, like skin I'd grown out of, but when I pressed the small orange button on its wrist, it vacuum-sealed to me—and to my crack—with a hiss.
"Shite," I whispered.
I wasn't looking forward to a bunch of gawking gawkers staring at me in just my inner suit, but since I'd offered to help with her demonstration, Dr. McKay had decided to go the extra mile. A hopefully non-existent crowd was going to watch me don the mechanical power armor that protected me in combat, then, there'd be a combat demonstration, during which I'd face the arbiter—a massive AI-powered mech that we Jarvis pilots fought during our combat simulations.
Where they were hiding the thing, or where they were going to put it, I had no clue. Probably out in the desert, where my weapons had no chance of blowing a hole in the side of the building or something equally destructive. Jarvises were, after all, classified as superweapons. It was part of the reason for the move in headquarters—we were too dangerous to let do our own thing, in what—to them—might as well be Nowheresville, Canada.
There was a knock at the door—three quick raps, one after the other.
"Are you ready, Operator Miller?" Dr. McKay asked through the door.
"Yes," I said, reluctantly squaring my shoulders.
The door swung open, and in strode Dr. McKay, followed by a group of men and women, some of whom I recognized. The woman with glinting glasses from the cafeteria had lost the white lab coat, but she was still instantly recognizable on account of her huge, round lenses. The cook—tall and wide—followed behind her, for some reason I couldn't fathom. Why was a cook attending a combat demonstration?
As more and more people filed into the room, I inhaled deep through my nose, trying to calm the wobbly anxiety that was slowly seeping into me. Rizavi and her friends entered, chatting and laughing, but when they saw me, they quieted. The people kept coming, lining up silently against the wall, and then against the lockers on the other side of the walkway.
Fuck me, I thought. All of these people had now essentially—metaphorically—seen me naked, as a vacuum-sealed inner suit left next to nothing to the imagination. They could probably see how deep my belly button was, even from this far away. But then again, I should've known better than to think a Jarvis Program demonstration wouldn't draw a crowd.
The flow of people slowed to a trickle, and I thought it was over—but then, a fuzzy-eared Galra in a Blades uniform walked in, ducking to get his hulking body through the door frame. Another shorter Galra—from the width of her hips, a woman—followed, and finally, as if I wasn't already scarred for life, in walked Keith.
C'mon, was my luck really that bad? My face flared red-hot, not entirely from embarrassment, but from frustration, too. However, Keith's eyes stayed respectfully—stiffly—on my face, and he made no expression whatsoever other than a brief tightening of his brow as, no doubt, he wondered what he'd just walked into.
I curled my toes against the floor, wanting to look down but unwilling to let my confident professional facade crack under the weight of his gaze. Everyone was watching—I needed to play this cool. I needed to keep my shoulders squared, my chest puffed, and my eyes off the floor, otherwise I was going to deflate like an untied balloon.
"Today," Dr. McKay started.
Her voice was loud, steady—the voice of a skilled presenter—and when everyone turned to look at her, I exhaled in relief.
"We'll be doing a demonstration," She continued, tucking her file folder against her side. "Of both the Jarvis Mark IV power armor and the portal technology we've integrated into the Jarvis Units. This is Ría Miller—" All eyes turned back to me, and I barely managed to restrain myself from flinching and ducking my head.
"—one of our finest pilots—" Did she think compliments would make up for this? I pressed my lips together to keep from frowning. "—and the Operator of Jarvis 343. She will be donning the Mark IV power armor for us, and will demonstrate the portal technology in combat against the Arbiter."
The woman with the glasses raised her hand, and Dr. McKay motioned for her to speak.
"Pi—" She started, then paused. "Katie Holt, from the Science Department. Does this Arbiter—" She wrinkled her freckled nose. "—utilize the same technology as the Jarvises themselves?"
"Ah, Professor Holt's daughter," Dr. McKay smiled her plasticy smile. "Thank you for attending. Yes, the Arbiter is functionally identical to the Jarvises, with the exception of lacking a means for a human to pilot it." Katie Holt—where had I heard that name before? Of course everyone had heard of the Holts, but she'd done something important, too, hadn't she? I shifted my weight and pushed the questions away, trying to focus on the discussion.
"Hunk," The cook said, having raised his hand while I was distracted. "Your suits use the same tech as the Jarvises, right?"
Dr. McKay smiled wider, pleased.
"Yes. Dr. Jarvis studied human anatomy in detail during her time as a physician, and used her knowledge to develop systems that resemble the human body—both for the Jarvis Units and their operator's armor." Her smile slipped somewhat at her mention of Dr. Jarvis—her mentor's—name. As she finished her sentence, I saw panic seep into her brown eyes as she rushed to force it back onto her face.
"It hurts like a motherfucker when it pinches you, though," I found myself saying, filling the gap. "And there's nothing you can do about it, either—it's like breaking a toe."
A wave of restrained laughter swept through the room, and in the time it took to reach her, Dr. McKay had wedged her ever-present model smile back into place. She laughed alongside them, her eyes crinkling in a perfect imitation of genuine amusement.
"You—" She said, smacking me with her folder. "—our little comedian."
I rolled my lips, rocking awkwardly on my feet—I'd let the 'little' go. For now, at least.
As I looked away, my eyes caught on Keith's over the top someone's shoulder. One of his brows was arched, like he didn't get the joke. I snatched my gaze away. Focus, Rí.
"Any other questions?" Dr. McKay asked, hardly waiting a beat before she said, "No? Let's get started, then. Operator Miller, you can begin to don your power armor, now."
"Yes, m'am," I said, and turned towards the bay to my left.
Inside it, the power armor sat. Its feet were on the ground, but it was peeled apart, its muscles and skin fileted to open a vaguely human-shaped cavity inside it. Careful not to bump anything I wasn't supposed to, I stepped into the legs of the suit, placing my feet on the insoles in the bottom. They were soft, like the ones people put in their shoes—in complete contrast to the cold hardness of the suit's body against my legs and thighs.
Inhaling, I held my breath and straightened my arms in a well-practiced T-pose. Then, I stomped my feet. The power armor whirred to life, several round discs around the inside spinning and blinking as they calculated the distance between themselves and me.
"Engaging Mark IV armor," A canned female voice said from the speakers inside the suit.
All at once, it came alive in a blur of motion and a din of mechanical scraping and clicking. It yawned wider, then folded closed around me, engulfing me. Mechanical closures clicked shut all across my body, and I flinched as the joints of its internal skeleton engaged with a loud clack, stiffening and lifting my body weight off my feet.
I gasped. The sensation never failed to make me dizzy. It was a queer sort of weighlessness, like suddenly going from standing to being held up by clouds.
"And that," Dr. McKay said beside me. "Is how one dons a Jarvis Mark IV power suit."
Stepping down out of the bay, I looked down at the silent crowd of people. They peered up at me, some with their mouths open, others with just their eyes widened. Rizavi's face was blissful, her hands balled up underneath her chin in excitement. One of her friends was staring at her, her nose wrinkled in what looked like disgust.
Without turning, I snuck another glance at Keith. He was swallowed whole by my shadow, his hands hanging limply at his sides. He stared up at me with wide eyes, his brow furrowed, and his lips moved from where he'd pressed them into a thin, taut line.
"Woah," he whispered.
I hid my smile behind the suit's neckguard and looked away.
Sweat coated my cheeks and forehead as I climbed the dusty platform. After I'd demonstrated how to don my suit, we'd piled into two cargo trucks which had driven us out into the desert. There was no shade out there, and aside from a temporary observation platform and the two mechs dwarfing it, there was nothing to see, either. Aside from a few cacti, it was completely and utterly barren. "I'm disengaging the failsafes."
Dr. McKay's statement through the coms ended in a squeal, and I winced, covering my ears. Between the wind—stronger this high up—and her announcements, my fingers were zinging and it was getting hard to breathe. But, inside the circular cockpit, it was quiet. Almost eerily so, despite the whirring and thudding of the entrance closing behind me. It was as if Jarvis 343 was shielding me from the chaos of the outside world.
"Hello, Operator Miller," 343 said.
The Jarvis' dash flared to life in orange lights. Frowning, I swung my leg over the seat. It sat atop a pivoting mechanical arm in the center of the cockpit, resembling a wingless hoverbike. I pressed a button to mute my microphone, frowning.
"You told on me," I accused.
"Human interaction will alleviate your suffering, Operator Miller," 343 informed me for what might've been the twelve billionth time. Their eye whirred to look at me from their dock in the dash. "If you avoid it, your anxiety is likely to only worsen. I cannot conspire to what isn't in your best interests."
"I know that. It's just—"
"Are you ready to connect?" Dr. McKay asked over the coms, interrupting me.
"Yes," I said, before hitting mute again.
It was better if those watching didn't hear what would happen next.
There was a click, and a metal bar with a row of jacks descended from the cockpit's ceiling behind me. The points of the jacks hummed, and watching them out of the corner of my eye, I felt my body tense. I sucked in a deep breath, forcing my muscles to slacken. The jacks found their hilts in my suit, and I closed my eyes. My hands were shaking with anticipation. Electricity shot through me with every click I heard.
"Standby," 343's voice said loudly over the coms. The cockpit thudded, and my vision went completely white as the windshield switched on. "Initiating connection in…"
My legs bunched to run, but I inhaled sharply and pressed the panic back down. My memories were my cross to bear, and I knew every bump, every crack along it's worn surface. Living through it hadn't killed me, and reliving it wasn't going to kill me either.
"3, 2.."
343's next words came deafeningly loud, as if they were coming from both in and outside of my head.
"Initiating connection process!"
All at once, my entire body surged white-hot. The world tore away in a blur, leaving only a lukewarm, featureless space behind. As I sat in the resulting void, waiting for what came next, I felt fingers that weren't there trail across my skin like a cold omen. I flinched.
More sensations came—much bigger hands gripped mine, and fingers closed hard around my arms before slipping through me and disappearing. My eyelids twitched. I had no clue when these phantom sensations had happened—they were memories, but ones without words or visuals. Events that'd happened before my brain was developed enough to fully record what'd happened.
My eyes were still closed, but even so, I saw a hazy image start to form. It was blurred almost beyond recognition until suddenly, all of a sudden, I found myself sitting in a white-walled classroom. Cork boards and cheery posters of happy, smiling children coated the walls. Sunlight streamed through windows, scattering into colored flecks when it hit the metal legs of the desks that were lined up from wall-to-wall.
My leg bounced beneath my own desk, my hands raised as I gestured. My heart raced as I described the music I was trying to write to the boy sitting ahead of me. Excitement filled my chest as I enthused, heedless of the flat stare he was giving me.
"And then—" I heard myself say, voice dreamy in my ears. "—the guitar fades, and the violins start—"
"Nobody cares," he snapped abruptly, interrupting me.
My heartbeat stopped dead. I could feel my hands shaking as I shrunk back, my eyes wide in shock.
"All you ever do is talk," he said. "Can't you see no one cares? Everyone hates you."
You let me talk. You didn't say anything—you—and then…
In an instant, the scene shifted in a blur of motion and sound. When it settled, I was crying—sobbing—my heart wedged in my throat. My chest was too tight—I couldn't breathe.
"You deserved it," My father said, looming over me as I sat curled in the corner of my closet, where I'd run when I'd started getting upset. He held out his hands to me, but I shrank away and started to cry harder. "If you hadn't—"
Liar, my adult voice snarled, overlapping his. It was deep, angry, like I was speaking with my back bent and my teeth gritted. If they'd just said something, I would've stopped. My heart was a black hole, warping me with its pull as it squeezed harder, compressing the memory into a glinting shard of hatred. I felt my inner suit stretch as my lungs expanded, my lips peeling back over my teeth in a snarl.
"I hate you."
I didn't know whether I was talking to him, to those kids, or to myself. My body was stone-steady, without even a little bit of a tremble, and I wiped my sweat damp forehead with the back of my hand. In the vision, it stayed balled up against my chest.
This wasn't real—it'd happened, but it wasn't happening now. Yes, he'd let me down—but it wasn't my fault. I had Autism; I couldn't have possibly known I was boring those kids, and they couldn't possibly known how to deal with someone who couldn't read their social cues.
It hadn't been my fault.
Thank you, I thought to the memory, my words falling awkwardly into the shrinking gap between me and 343. Letting go of it, I watched it shred and tear away from my fingers. For your strength.
I opened my eyes. The arbiter's deep crimson irises stared at me, though I knew it was only staring into the distance. It had the same tell-tale catatonic gaze as an unmanned Jarvis unit—human-like, but completely and utterly lifeless. But then, it sprung to life.
In a blur of movement, it rushed forward. I only had enough time to get my hands up before it's blade came down, sending out a spray of sparks as I deflected it. Nope, nope, nope, nope. Was it faster that it'd been the last time? No fair!
I gritted my teeth and rammed it with my shoulder, sending it recoiling. My fist slammed into its chest with a shriek of grinding metal, and it stepped back, ducking beneath my follow-up swing. It's knee came up, and I felt my ponytail brush my cheek as I dodged it's attempt to knee me, taking the opportunity to step back to a safe distance.
It didn't work—the moment the arbiter had righted itself, it surged forward. It was inside my arm's breadth yet again. I let out a surprised yelp as I felt it's fist impact my torso, and ducking to the side, I held up both hands to guard against any additional attacks as I used my jets to put more distance between the two of us. It kicked up a massive cloud of dust, and the arbiter froze.
Fuck. Whether I won against the arbiter was a toss-up, even on a good day. But, in her haste to put on a show, Dr. McKay had turned up the difficulty—or maybe, just the aggression. The moment the dust cleared and it's sensors could find us, the arbiter charged. I sidestepped it's attack, and it slid to a stop behind me. I had to end this, and fast—or Dr. McKay's demonstration was going to wind up being a demonstration of how much I sucked at mech-to-mech combat.
"343," I said. Their eye whirred as it focused on me. "Get ready to take over."
They let out a displeased beep.
"Operator Miller," They admonished. "Engaging the arbiter without your Jarvis Unit is ill-advised."
I severed our connection, batting away the connector arms. The arbiter came at us again, but 343 seamlessly took over the controls, deflecting its attack.
"Big whoop, Three," I said. "If she wanted me to fight fair, she shouldn't of cheated."
"Operator Miller," 343 warned again, this time through the cockpit's speakers.
"No time," I said, hitting the eject button below the dash.
Air whistled past my ears, quieting as my suit's helmet automatically deployed. It's face shield clipped my nose as it slid down and slotted into the helmet's chinguard. Below, Jarvis 343 pivoted out from beneath me. The arbiter's head turned, tracking my movement through the air as 343 jetted to safety.
"Yeah," I said, voice tinny inside my helmet as I flew towards the giant AI-manned mech. "Eyes on me, you potato-brained chunk of shite."
It's sword thrust toward me, maybe hoping to skewer me, but I was expecting it. The jets on my suit hissed as I twisted, dodging it's tip. The magnets on my feet adhered to the metal as it slid past, kicking up sparks and leaving red licks along its length.
"Whatcha gonna do now?" I panted, vaulting over the metal plating that guarded it's wrist before sprinting up it's arm. "Not so tough when your target is ⅒th your size, now, huh?"
The arbiter was silent, it's red eye tracking me. They were completely emotionless, without even a hint of frustration, which made them look even scarier. It'd forgotten about 343—which I'd wanted—but it wasn't going to sit there and let me wreck it. Leaping over the swell of it's bicep, I caught motion out of the corner of my eye—it's hand was gliding towards me, it's palm the size of a minivan.
Gritting my teeth, I engaged my jetpack. As its hand collided with its arm, my body shot forward through the gap. I soared into the air above it's head, grinning. I had it exactly where I wanted it.
"343," I called out. "Ready the Teludav, and prepare for a SKIF missile strike."
"Acknowledged," 343 replied.
There was a blue flash in the distance, and I was momentarily blinded as the portal generator in 343's chest lit up. Everyone on the platform covered their eyes. The arbiter turned, it's arm outstretched after me, and I marked it right between the eyes with my heads-up display.
"Now!"
Behind me, the sky tore open with a bang. Missiles swarmed through the portal and shot past me, exploding against the arbiter's face one after th other with an explosion that rumbled through the hills. I shot down over it's shoulder, the wind whistling in my armor as I plummeted towards the ground.
I landed feet-first, my legs and arms outstretched like a cat. I was far outside the arbiter's shadow, and I rolled to a stop on the balls of my feet just as the debris hit. Bits of metal plating rained down behind me, and I was swallowed whole by a thick floodbank of dust.
Breathing hard, I brushed a smear of dust from my visor. A message popped up on my heads up display telling me the air quality was poor, but I minimized it.
"Good job, Operator Miller," Dr. McKay said over the coms. She sounded breathless, and there was a tightness to her voice, but behind it, I could hear the others cheering. "We'll talk about your methods later."
Shite on a stick, I thought.
I rose to my feet, a smile stretched wide across my face.