/.||. Feast .||.\
So this is where it all went.
.
He's taken the initiative with North's request and returned to New Jericho ahead of schedule to assist in any way possible. At the moment not much needs to be done. The more difficult tasks will come later in the month when shipments arrive and more homeless deviants show up at the docks.
For now she has him assigned to resource management. He is tasked with confirming counts on supplies, particularly thirium and spare biocomponents. A simple job. Simon and Josh have been assigned more difficult and likely more important tasks while Markus is off discussing politics. It's an easy and mindless job but he finds it worthwhile. It's something a machine can handle between idle periods.
He had expected much of New Jericho's stock to be whatever survived Jericho's explosion; the sturdy crates stolen from Cyberlife Warehouses and fished out from the wreckage after the revolution.
Instead he is rather surprised to find packets of thirium and various limbs and biocomponents lying scattered about a storage room with no crates in sight. There is no possible way these survived the explosion so they must have been acquired after the revolution. But they would still be in containers if taken from warehouses and repair shops. The only reason for them to be on their own like this is if they were taken straight from the production line…
Ah.
He'd discovered after rebooting and attempting to repair himself that Cyberlife Tower had been scavenged during the week he was thought dead.
Here were the stolen goods.
And possibly an RK800 processor.
.
Completely ignoring North's instructions he starts to rifle through the miscellaneous parts in search of the one that would solve all his problems.
Unfortunately North chooses that moment to check on him. "You having trouble counting or do you need to work on your stealing skills?" she asks, her tone not unlike Amanda's when she pretended to not be upset with Connor.
He stops and turns around to face her, gently placing a thirium pump regulator back onto the table behind him and giving her a cheeky grin. "Oh no you caught me. Now I can't report your thievery to Cyberlife like a good little spy."
She scowls. "Knock it off and answer me. I thought I could trust you."
His fake smile fades. "These were taken from Cyberlife Tower. I thought I might find something to repair myself."
She quirks a brow at him and walks closer, examining the parts on the table behind him. "I thought Jonah already did that?"
He turns to face the table as well and gestures to the various biocomponents. "Do you see an RK800 processor? Without that all he could do was patch me up enough to prevent shutdown."
"I don't even know what that looks like." She turns to face him, expression faltering somewhere just before pity he doesn't want. "I'm guessing you didn't find one?"
He looks her way and says tersely, "If I did we wouldn't be having this conversation."
"Well sorry for caring!" she shouts, clearly frustrated with him.
He sighs and steps back from both North and the table. "I apologize too. It's my problem, not yours."
The way she frowns, shakes her head, and follows after him implies she's not sorry for caring, that she does want to help, but doesn't seem to know how. For once he watches her confidence waver, a lost look in her eyes much like what he sees in the mirror. "I would help if I could."
"Because you consider me a friend?" The concept still bewilders him.
"And it's Christmas season. That's when you're supposed to help people the most. At least we've got this for everyone who needs it." A gesture to the tables of parts and thirium packets.
"For the strays that come begging?"
She gives him a cross look. "For anyone who needs help the humans won't provide. We're a safe haven. Always will be."
He glances back at the tables, scanning and identifying the myriad of parts. Limbs from nearly every android model, biocomponents that aren't model-specific, plenty that are, enough wiring to cover an entire table, and enough thirium packets to fill the quarter of the room they're piled in.
"A feast for the poor this holiday season." he comments drily. It's a rather fitting comparison actually. His research indicates that humans often have feasts for holidays, enough to name some of their religious ones after the term.
Being as androids, barring the YK500 models, cannot eat it's a decent equivalent. A feast for androids is the massive amount of thirium that will be given out to those in need.
She chuckles at his comparison. "I guess. Now either get back to work or go home."
"Bossy much?"
"No 'feast' for your poor ass if you don't get back to work." she gives him a playful shove as she says this, then heads for the door but stops short. "If you find your part you can have it."
"So Christmas is only about generosity if I work for it?"
She picks up a stray thirium packet and tosses it at his head with perfect aim, grins, then leaves.
He catches the packet when it falls into his hands. Hmm.
.
THIRIUM LEVELS
87%
.
He'll last a while longer.
But while he's here he might as well partake.
It's not Christmas yet but he'll take his portion of the Christmas feast early.
.
THIRIUM LEVELS
100%
.
Now back to work.
.
Author's Note: This prompt was a pain in the ass given I'm working with androids. I eventually settled on the idea that a feast is not just a lot of food, but can also mean a lot of something good. I hope that idea came across well enough...