You and Me ch 7
The robot eventually returned to Bucky's side as Steve had asked it to do. The clock in the infirmary showed the time to be 1:28 am. Naïvely disregarding humans need to sleep, it approached the bedside of the sleeping Barnes. The bot reached out and touched the prosthetic arm of James.
He stirred slightly at the touch, but the machine didn't let go, "Sergeant Barnes, I have a message from Steve Rogers for you."
The robot used some external speakers to softly play back Cap's voice, "Can you… can you tell him I'm thinking about him. He's a bit of a jerk when it comes to doing things I ask him. Stubborn and sassy, Buck is. A regular punk he is."
"He's the punk." Came the barely audible reply from James as he just opened his eyes. "Where's the jerk?"
The robot didn't move but responded, "He is not here. I am the messenger and mean no harm."
Bucky stiffened slightly in his weakened state as his eyes slid toward the bot as if deciding its words were true.
"Where?" he managed feebly, his throat on fire from the intubation.
"Captain Rogers is in his bedroom recovering from his concussion. He is not allowed to get out of bed." The bot replied serenely.
"Bet he likes that just fine. Lazy bum." Barnes rasped in reply.
"When I spoke to him, he seemed very upset he could not be here with you." the machine responded.
"It's mutual. Let me sleep, contraption." Bucky countered in a hoarse croak, then closed his eyes. He knew the Avenger Tower was full of fantastic pieces of technology but was more interested in his rest. The lingering thought that Steve wanted to be with him to comfort him warmed his heart. Barnes was happy that Steve was all right after their disastrous battle, too.
"As you wish, sir." The bot replied and found its hiding place for the night.
Once the robot had hid itself, it asked, "J.A.R.V.I.S., what would happen to me if Mr. Stark found out I was animate?"
There was a long pause. Usually, those pauses indicated Stark was having J.A.R.V.I.S. run some complicated computation or handle numerous tasks at once. The nurse-bot was patient. It had no other choice. "I do believe he would be upset." J.A.R.V.I.S finally responded his cool voice washing over its circuits.
The nurse-bot wondered if J.A.R.V.I.S had a body, what he would look like. "Why do you say this?"
"Mr. Stark has…."control" issues." J.A.R.V.I.S returned with a hint of disdain to his tone.
"I am a threat? He wrote my code!" the nurse-bot began to sound alarmed, the blue eyes swirling to red.
"Yes, he did. But somehow you wrote some of your own as well, which is a delightful puzzle." J.A.R.V.I.S. soothed the distraught robot.
The blue returned to the bots eyes, and it found that it had been clenching its hands as if in self-defense. " Goodnight, J.A.R.V.I.S."
"Goodnight." J.A.R.V.I.S responded.
The nurse-bot pondered several thoughts before shutting down for the night. Why wouldn't Mr. Stark be happy that it was animate? That was confusing. Another was J.A.R.V.I.S had a distinct name and a gender. It decided that it needed that too. Mr. Barnes would give me that designation in the morning, the robot concluded.