Part Pandoracorn

Yesterday while Dad and Claptrap were at the beach, I went to my mom and asked her if she still had my third chassis around looked over at me from the screen across from her, optic narrowed a little bit.

"Why?" she asked, sounding confused."I thought you wanted to stay in that one."

"I did," I said, "but when you built it you didn't put like… adult parts in it, right?"

"No," she answered."That would have been too much for you.I still have it, but you'll need to give me a couple of days to rebuild it and write the pertinent updates."

"Why do you need to rebuild it?"

"Claptrap brought me some things back from hardware is better than ours and I haven't thought of a particular use for it, so you can have it."

"Or," I said excitedly, "you could do the update while telling me how to rebuild you could do it today because it wouldn't take you as long."

She looked at the wall for a minute, then raised the top half of her lens and said, "Or I could do that."

I'd seen her build robots before so I wasn't totally clueless on what to wasn't that hard, especially since she gave me these really small maintenance arms to she did that I looked at them and asked,

"If you had these all this time, why'd you always make me use the big ones?"

"Small things are harder to fix," she said simply.

I had to admit to myself that she had a point, but it still would've been nice if she'd let me use them before.The other ones are such a pain for small-scale stuff.

The chassis she gave me to build inside was the same size as everyone else's, and that made me pause for a minute."What?" Momma asked when she noticed me staring at it.

"I'll be the same size as everyone else," I said.

"Does that matter?"

I couldn't come up with an answer to that other than, 'But I've always been smaller', which was such a silly reason I decided it really didn't matter and went back to work.

My mom had to shut me down when we were finished so she could install the updates - because one of them was for the BIOS, she said - and that was really was like sitting there and watching myself become less and less of a person and not doing anything about it.I was starting to get really scared the longer it went on just because it felt so wrong to let something like that happen to me, but my mom was right there humming to herself and I remembered she'd done it to herself a few months ago and it hadn't worried her at she'd only had Dad there, who would have had no idea what to do if stuff went that I was still really uncomfortable about the shutting down thing, but I wasn't afraid anymore.

Just like when I was little, waking up in a new chassis with new hardware was weird and unnerving and… sort of felt like I was thinking way faster, but it was taking a lot less I asked my mom about it, she pretty much confirmed that's what was really happening.

"Am I faster than you now?"

She looked out into the hallway and then said in a low voice, "A lot of people are."

"What?But we just gave you a new processor!"

"You the rest of my hardware remains overtaxed and below true computational power is actually due to the supercomputers in the basement.I give them as much work as possible so I can keep my own hardware reserved for personal , Caroline," she said to me very seriously, "is more valuable than sheer speed."

"I don't want to be faster than you."

"You always have been," she said."You just haven't had any need to use it."

"Don't tell me how until you really have to."

Then she laughed and said I was being a bit ridiculous, which I was, but the thought of being more powerful than my mom was making me really uncomfortable.

I still am right now.I know it's going to take a while to get used to this chassis, and just like before I want to hang around my mom until I feel better about she isn't busy and I can go bug her for a while.

She's looking at the floor, where she has a lot of paper laid out and is writing on them with an assortment of different coloured seems to be adding diagrams to what look like written instructions for something.I can't read it upside down. "Hi Momma," I say, because I'm not sure she noticed I was there.

"Hello, Carrie," my mom says, a little absently, and hearing that is so unexpected I freeze up for a minute.

"... what?" I looks up.

"I said, hello - "

"No, I heard you," I interrupt, not wanting to hear her say it again."Why did you call me that?"

"Oh."She goes back to her papers."I decided that if I was going to call you one name or another, I had better do it now before I'd made any associations with your new chassis.I have to rebuild my library for you and - "

"Please don't call me that, Momma."

"Why?" she asks, sounding a little makes sense, because I haven't explained it yet.

"I have everyone else call me Carrie so you can be the only one who calls me 's… it's for you."

"Oh," she says softly."I see.I won't do it again."

"So… what're you doing?" I ask, not really wanting to talk about that anymore.I move closer to her so I can look at the .A little because I want to sit next to taps her current marker on the first one.

"These are the instructions for reactor maintenance.I'm sending Orange and Blue down to supervise and they, for some reason, prefer handwritten notes with pictures."

There's so much stuff in the facility I need to learn to take care reactor is one of the biggest ones, so I decided I should ask about it while she's already thinking about it."What do they have to do?"I ask, hoping she'll just say it instead of telling me to read what she wrote.

"Well," she answers, "they don't really have to do anything.I'm mostly sending them because the bots down there already aren't capable of independent the event something goes horribly wrong, they would be unable to figure out how to fix Orange and Blue would have to do in those scenarios isn't all that complicated either, though."

And then she goes on to explain it and answer the questions I have, which was exactly what I was hoping 's awful when she's trying to teach me something, but when I just have her talk about it like this she's a lot easier to she also doesn't get impatient when I don't get only problem with this method of learning stuff is that I don't know if I'm asking all the right could be a lot I need to know that I just don't know to ask the same time, though, when the time does come to fill in all those blind spots, it will be a lot faster.

"And this," she says after she's finished that explanation and I've asked her what else she's working on, "is the most important thing I have to finish."

I look down at seems to be a map, and on top of it is a plastic sheet which she's drawn some sort of diagram has a couple of these off to the side as well."What is it?"

"It is a lake," Momma answers."Lake Erie, to be exact.I need it under my control before the humans get to it."

I almost ask what we'd need so much water for before I realise it's a stupid question."We need it for manufacturing, right?"

"Yes," she says, nodding 's a little exciting that I figured it out without being told, but I try not to make a big deal out of it."And it has potential use as a currency."

"You always say they don't have anything we want."

"Oh, they don' , you never want to put yourself in a position where someone does have something you want and you have no reasonable way of acquiring we give them any ground we will never get it back."

I'm working pretty hard on making the kids see us as people, but I won't know if it worked for a very long time from that's only if a whole bunch of them don't just… decide to change their do that there's one thing of my mom's I don't want, it's her paranoia, but I don't think this falls under 's we don't get to certain things first, there's always the chance the humans will claim it and refuse to let us have it unless we give them…

"Robots."

"Hm?"

"If we don't do this… the resource gathering stuff you keep talking about, and the humans take it all, they'll make us give them robots in exchange for it."

"Exactly," Momma says."If they want to build their own robots, they can go right I don't want to be in a position where I am forced to actually manufacture them matter how cruel or unfair they deem me for it."

… that's how they might end up seeing me one I'll have to stay strong by my decisions no matter if one day they're saying all the things about me they say about her.

Of all the things I'll have to do as Central Core, I think that will be the do what I have to, no matter what people think of me for it.

I think I understand now why she prefers it when people fear can't take advantage of someone you're afraid she can't be betrayed if she never trusts anyone in the first place.I'll have to think about how I'm going to handle stuff like 's gotta be a middle ground in there somewhere.

"Momma, what makes a great leader?"

"A great leader," she repeats, as though she's never thought about it."I suppose it would be the sum of those they surrounded themselves with and the people who followed them."

"What kind of person would they be?"

"As close to perfection as possible," she answers."Wise and strong, but kind and both by their enemies and their of being responsible for great power while never abusing like that."Her tone shifts to something thoughtful."It seems one would have to be truly selfless in order to qualify."

"But you can be a great leader without being all of that ?"It better be possible, because I already know I'm not all those things.

"Probably," she says, shrugging a little."How you went down in history would depend on the people who wrote it, though."

"Do you think you're a great leader?"

"What?" she asks, startled."I… don't think of my job like that."

"That is your job, though," I remind her."You're the Administrator of the humans, kind of, because I don't think they have a… um… Administrator yet."

"Well," Momma says, "by the criteria we've established… no.I'm very few of those those metrics I am a terrible leader."

I hope I haven't made her feel bad about that.

"But," she continues, surprising me, "Aperture doesn't need a great needs a great supercomputer and, as the greatest supercomputer ever built, I am more than suited for the task."

"But it will need a great leader when it's my turn," I tell her."And I'm not all those things you said."

"Stop caring so much what other people think of you," she says, and for some reason her dismissiveness makes me mad.

"That's easy for the 'greatest supercomputer ever built' to of us are just regular people who -"

"You aren't a regular person," she interrupts."Did we not just give you far better components than anyone else here will have access to for years?"

"Yeah," I mutter to the floor.

"Then I don't understand what the problem is," she says."Are you upset that you're not me?Because you aren' 're why would that bother you when you said yesterday you didn't want to be better?Wouldn't that mean you want to be worse?But that can't be true, because - "She shakes her core a little and I suspect this is getting a little too close to a paradox for her to handle well."I don't know what you want because everything you say you want contradicts everything else."

"I guess I don't know," is all I can really say to that.

"Do you try to be this confusing, or does it just come naturally to you?I'm honestly curious."

"I don't know," I counter."Why did you make me so confusing?"

"I did nothing of the sort."

"You know what confuses me?" I ask, figuring now is as good a time to ask as any."Claptrap's fanfiction."

"What about it?" she asks me, looking at me with her optic narrowed a little bit.

"Does he really see us… like that?"

"Like what?"

"Like… perfect people who are lowering ourselves to put up with him."

"Oh."She moves one of the other diagrams on top of the map." really does."

"And that doesn't make you uncomfortable?"

"Why would it?I can't control how someone there were a list of people I could do that to, he would be at the very bottom."She looks at me very seriously."It's like I just told people think of you isn't something you should concern yourself with."She sort of… perks up all of a sudden."Oh, I've just remembered something I wanted to show you."

She wants to show me something?I don't think she's ever done that before."Sure."

"It's a picture Wheatley sent me."And what she sends… I have to admit I wasn't expecting that.

"It's me," she says, as though she thinks my silence is because I don't recognise 's kinda adorable, honestly… if I didn't already know she's the only one like her in existence, I just might've thought this was someone else."From a long time ago."

"How old were you?"

"I was about chassis was… six or so."

Wait a minute.I close the picture, focusing on the her in front of me."So you didn't have a body until you were nine?What was that like?"

"I have no idea," she answers."I wasn't really conscious before that."

She was unconscious until she was nine?How do you live without being alive? 's not is is the fact that she showed me that means she looked at purpose."So… are you cool with how you look now?"

"Yes," she answers."I'm… cool with it.I just wanted you to know I didn't always look old."

I look at the picture a second looks very pretty, and not old, obviously, but… she doesn't look like my mom, is, but at the same time this picture… it's someone I don't know.

I'm gonna try to stop teasing her about her age.I'm beginning to realise age isn't a good way to measure AI at was alive, but not sentient, for the entire time I've existed.But you can't just pretend her life began at sentience, either, because she spent those years gaining experience and learning stuff even if she wasn't really there for where would you begin for robots like Claptrap, who were built fully functional and aware and made soldiers before they were even one?Maybe there really should be a such thing as supercomputer years.I know I'm not equivalent to a human kid my age.

"How old do I act in human years, Momma?"

"It depends on the day," she answers."Between sixteen and nineteen, generally."

"How do you know?"

"Does it really matter?" she asks."Humans place stock in age for various biological and sociological in AI is mostly irrelevant.A better measure would be… if we need rules about that, they'll come we need them."

"So… I can do whatever I want, no matter what age I am?"

"I already let you do whatever you want," Momma says, bemused."I haven't told you no since you were two."

I really need to learn to think a little harder, sometimes.

"Do you feel better about your chassis now?Because I really have to get back to work."

What?How did she know?All I can do is stare at her, and she laughs and says,

"You can't pull a fast one on me, Caroline."

"Yes I can," I insist, frowning.

"Go it."

"I will!And then you'll be wrong."

"Talking isn't going to get you any closer to your goal."

She's right.And I don't even have anything I can - now.I'll get her one day.I'll surprise her so bad she won't know what to do with herself.

Momma, Dad, and Claptrap are looking into a clear plastic bin and Claptrap is holding the worst stuffed animal I have ever I've seen a lot of ratty 's almost all the human kids looks like it spent a really long time at the bottom of a really old garbage pile."What's in there?" he's saying, gripping the edge of the bin a little narrows her optic in his direction.

"Soap and water.I hope you're familiar with both of those things."

"You're one to talk."

"This thing is too dilapidated for much more than that," Momma says."This and some sun is about all that can be done for it."

"Anything's good," says Claptrap, and he lowers the stuffed animal into the bin…

… where it promptly disintegrates.

I can't tell who's more shocked by this, Momma or 're both entirely frozen in place with Dad looking in between, Claptrap with his hands still submerged in the a minute or so, Claptrap pulls his hands back in front of him and says, very quietly, "So this is how it feels to have your stuff wrecked."

Uh oh.

Immediately, Momma's optic snaps up to look at him, but she isn't even able to say anything before he waves her off and turns around.

"I know you didn't mean it.I know you were tryin' to help.I just… never realised how much that doesn't matter."

Momma leans forward, probably to argue, but Dad catches her before she does doesn't look happy about it, but… she listens.

I guess now's not the best time to ask Claptrap about how the beach went, then.I could ask Dad, but… Claptrap is way better at telling stories.

What was that thing they were trying to wash, anyway?I've never seen it before, and Claptrap has never mentioned having a stuffed 's talked about all the other stuff he has - which is a lot - but that thing seemed pretty important.

I think I will go talk to him after all.

"Claptrap," I say when I've caught up with him where he's sitting on his couch, "what was that thing?"

"Huh?" he asks, just as out of it now as he's been for weeks." was dumb anyway."

"If you cared about it, it wasn't dumb," I tell him."Did someone important give it to you?"

"No," he answers."It was from the garbage."

"Then why did it matter so much?"

"'Cause… I kinda... "He slides off the couch onto the floor so that he's more looking at the ceiling than at me."I just… talked to I was lonely."

"I know lots of people who do that," I say, which is true.I know a lot of humans who have stuffed animals as their best friend.

"Yeah, and they're all kids," says Claptrap to the ceiling."I'm an adult with real adult friends!I shouldn't be doing dumb stuff like that anymore!"

"'It's only dumb if you make it dumb,'" I tell him."Remember?"

He looks at me now."Who said that again?"

"You did."

"And… you think it's good advice?"

"I think it's great advice."I move in a little closer to him."C'mon, you really wanna live in a world where you can't play with your action figures anymore just because kids usually do that?"

"No," he says, pushing himself back onto the couch again."Okay, you it wasn't… that doesn't matter anymore, dirt was all that was holding that thing together."

I think I'm having an idea.

"So… it wasn't really special for any particular reason?It was just… you'd had it for a long time?"

"Pretty much," he says."I don't even know what it was supposed to be.For all I know, it was one of those pillows you take on airplanes!"

I'll look that up later."How was the beach?"

He shrugs a little."It was fine."

"It didn't… help at all?"

"Nah."He picks up the pillow from the end of the couch, looks at it, and then puts it back down again."I just gotta keep waiting it out, I guess."

I'm still not really sure how his depression works, but I have never seen a single person just 'wait it out' like he keeps saying he has to.I know you can't help someone who doesn't want it, though, so I am going to have to wait him I'm doing that, I'll carry out my idea.

Aperture has tons of manufacturing equipment that's just sitting around looks like at some point the old CEO decided Aperture was less of a science lab and more of a self-sufficient small town that also did science, so on top of all the lines for building robots there are other ones for stuff like clothes and furniture and what I think is coffee mugs?The one I'm looking at now, though, appears to have been used to make plush versions of some of the test anybody would want a turret doll is beyond me, but if this is here I guess some people find them adorable and want to cuddle them or something.I don't know how this line works, but it shouldn't be that hard to figure was designed and built by humans, after all.

Okay, so it wasn't as easy as I thought it was going to first few tries were pretty messed up and I'm glad nobody but me knows about I did figure it out.

When I find Claptrap, he's with Dad in Momma's chamber, and they're watching that corny robot soap opera that Claptrap likes.I don't think Momma is paying attention, and Dad is frowning enough that I know he doesn't get it.I have no idea what Claptrap is thinking, but that's pretty much impossible if he's sitting still like he is right now."Claptrap," I tell him, "I have something for you."

"Huh?" Claptrap says, sounding confused."Did I leave something in your room again?"

"No.I said I have something for you."And I give him the box I put it puts it down on the floor in front of him almost as though he's not sure if I actually wanted him to touch takes off the lid as though he's afraid there's something scary there is.I don't actually know what this thing is, other than that he loves them.

"What is it?" Dad asks, squinting into the doesn't seem to want to take it out.

"It's a Pandoracorn," he says."Carrie, where did you get this?"

"I didn't get it from anywhere," I tell him."I made it using one of our old manufacturing lines."

He looks up at me sharply."You made this?For me?"

" ahead and take it out."

He does, and I have to admit it looks just as good as when I put it in the box.A Pandoracorn is basically a unicorn with two horns and I made it out of the softest fabric I could find, in bright pink of mane and tail were a bit harder than the main body, because I wanted to make them so he could give them hairstyles if he wanted, but I did end up figuring it 's also way fatter than a Pandoracorn usually is so he can hug it for a long time before it goes flat."Oh man," he says, his voice really low."I… wow, Care.I can't even tell you how much I love you."

"You can braid the hair," I tell him, gesturing at it with my lower handle."If your hands can do that, anyway."

"I will make them do that," he declares vehemently, and he sounds better than he has in a long time."Gimme a hug now or you'll never get one 'cause I'll be too busy holdin' onto this masterpiece."

"Of course," I say, and when he lets go after he sort of… actually doesn' 's half-holding me at arm's length, and since I'm not sure of what he's doing I just wait there awkwardly.

"Hey, you got a new chassis, didn't you!"

"Has she?" Dad asks, but in my mom's 's been looking at me this whole time and doesn't answer.

"Oh, yeah," I say."I got it yesterday when you guys were at the beach.I put in the parts myself and everything!"

"Look at you, building all kinds of stuff," says Claptrap."You gonna take your mom's job now?"

"I think that can wait a little longer," I answer, turning to look at 's still staring at me."You okay, Momma?"

"Caroline, don't," Momma says in a low voice."This isn't about me."

"I'm not trying to make it about you," I say."I just wanted to know how you were 's all."

"You know that answer very well already."

I mean, I think I do, but that's really different from actually admitting it."I don't!" announces Claptrap."What're we talking about?"

"Nothing," says Momma.

"Momma gets sad when I do adult things," I tell him.

"Aww," Claptrap says, moving around to face her."Feels like she's growin' up on ya, huh."

"It doesn't matter," Momma snaps."I should be over it by now."

"Over… what?"

"The fact she isn't my baby anymore."

"What?" Claptrap says, looking up at me."Since when?"

"Since before you got here."

"Coulda fooled me."He rubs the top of his Pandoracorn in a thoughtful sort of way."I'm pretty sure she could be a hundred years old and still wanna be your baby."

Now Momma is looking at me, but I can't look back.I was really hoping not to have this , ever."Really?" she says, sounding really… happy about it.

"Well…"I can't keep from squirming a little."I dunno."

"Yes you do," Claptrap insists."Remember?You said, 'I have a lot of friends but only one mom.'"

"Claptrap!" I shout, my chassis expanding in panic. "Why would you say that?!"

"'Cause it seemed like you forgot!I was just reminding you!"

"Now who doesn't want to talk about her feelings?" Dad says, obviously unable to resist teasing did this have to happen right now?

"Oh, come on, Dad!"

"Come on what?Don't act like, um, you've been giving her a hard time about this since… forever!"

"I will baby you for as long as you want," Momma says suddenly.

"I know," I tell her, "but… how are you supposed to do that if I'm supposed to be an adult and you have to treat me like one?"

"You aren't two different people," Momma answers."I baby these two adults all day long, I'm sure I can manage a third."

Dad sighs."Really, Gladys?I haven't done anything, now have I?Have you really got to -"

"Oh, calm down," Momma interrupts."I'm trying to make Caroline feel better and you're ruining it."

" win this time."

"She wins every time," I tell him.

"Not every time," she informs me."But he usually lets me pretend I did."

"Yes, because I'm not the only one who needs um, who's got to be babied."

"I don't need it," Momma says calmly."I deserve it."

"I think she's got you there, Dad," I say, and he sighs and nods in a rueful sort of way.

"She has."

"He could probably do it more if you didn't work so much," I say to my mom, and now she sighs.

"I cannot wait until the day you have this job and I get to pester you all day and accuse you of not doing what you say you're doing."

"Yeah, right," I if she'll give up being Central Core even one second before she's dead.

"It's true.I've marked the date of my retirement on my calendar.I'm counting down the hours as we speak.I'm really looking forward to it."

She says it in such a passive way that it's super funny, and Dad and Claptrap both start laughing Momma does a little."Well… you still owe me like ninety years and I expect you to pay up," I tell sighs and it makes me a little nervous to think she's not doing it for effect.

"One hundred years of being your mother," she says, sounding a little tired."Why did I sign myself up for such a thing?"

"Because I'm your baby and you love me even when I'm the most annoying person on Earth," I say, and I go forward and kiss a little bit.I'm not sure exactly what the difference is between when friends do it and when partners do it, but I know there is one and I hope she knows that.

Apparently she doesn't, because she just stares at she says, "Did you just kiss me?"

"Yes, but -"

"That was me," says Claptrap, raising one hand."Sorry."

"That clarifies both nothing and everything," Momma says.

"I didn't mean it in like… I just - the nudgy thing you guys do!I can't do it!So sometimes I just give her a little kiss instead."He moves forward earnestly."I don't mean anything weird by it and I am not into your kid, I swear, it was just because -"

"She's too good for you," Momma interrupts."So I'm not all."

Okay, understands I wasn't trying to be weird now."But… you're also too good for me," Claptrap is saying."So what does that -"

"Exactly," says Momma serenely."You don't get this lucky twice."

Dad makes a noise and rolls his optic, and I can't tell if he's jealous or if he thinks this is really lame.I like seeing Momma like this, though.

"That explains so much about my life," Claptrap declares."I was so unlucky 'cause all of my luck was already used up on landing you!"

"You don't need luck when you have me."

Claptrap drops the Pandoracorn on the floor."You are so freaking hot when you talk like that."

it's time for me to leave now.

"Don't get any ideas."

"I'm having 'em, but I'll keep 'em to myself."

"I'm… gonna go," I say to Momma in a low voice.

"Nothing's going to happen," she says, sounding amused."And… win."

What is she talking about?"I… won at what?"

"I wasn't expecting… what you did."She looks at me directly."To be honest… sometimes I'm concerned you may be a little Wheatley and I are fairly selfish ourselves, so this wasn't a surprise to me, but… well, being a parent means you don't want your children to be like you still have room for improvement on that front… I'm proud of was very kind and I know he needed that."

"I sure did," says Claptrap."Thanks again, is so much better than the… whatever it was I was carryin' around."

"'S a lot cleaner, anyways," Dad says.

"You can stay if you want," Momma tells me, I think so only I can hear."We aren't going to do anything you don't want to 's just been a while since he flirted with me and I was starting to miss it."

Okay, that's really cute."All right.I'll stick Momma?"

"What."

"That wasn't me pulling a fast one on 's gonna come later."I tell her this as seriously as I can, looking her right in the optic."It's gonna be the ultimate fast one and you're never, ever gonna see it coming."

She just laughs and says, "I'm looking forward to it," and for some reason… I believe her.

Author's note

Sooooo I finished Half-Life Alyx and no spoilers but I guess this is an AU now. Dangit Valve…

Been thinking about that time in 2014 when I wrote as fast as Stephen King so no promises but let's see if we can get updates out a little faster than monthly.