MD Tangent Strings: The Christmas Incident V2

by OnyxScorpion

Basically a joke that I turned into an 8000 word character drama fic. V finds an old installation while looking for oil amid holiday preparations on Copper 9. She then discovers something else within, and well... if ya know 'Drunk Ragatha' from TADC episode 4, imagine that, but a traumatized murder bot with gun hands, and that's what our characters get to deal with.

[memo: Basically on Christmas Eve, the YouTube channel LukaszModeler made a now deleted community post that I thought was kinda funny, and I imagined a bit of context for it. After it got deleted, I kinda lost interest in this story after a few pages, but then I came back to it and decided it had potential if rewritten to be a character exploration, drama type fic.]

[obligatory note: Alcohol is bad for you, and this is in no way intended to encourage or glamorize drinking in any way, shape, or form. Stay off the stupid sauce.]

Murder Drones Tangent Strings : The Christmas Incident V2.0

Copper 9 was a pleasant 98.3 Kelvin as V flew beneath the pale glow of the gas giant, her bladed wings cutting through soft flakes of crystallized carcinogens that happened to resemble snow. The cold wind whipped at her hair, and as the chill sank through her body plates, it managed to take the edge off the building heat being cast off by the angry eldritch space crab in her chest. While she wasn't in any kind of danger, it had been long enough, and she'd been under enough stress that she'd developed an undeniable thirst.

Spotting one of the exoplanet's abandoned factories, she decided it was as good a place as any to land. Part of her also hoped she might come across some old worker corpses she could feed off of. The oil within would be stale, but the good stuff gets hard to come by when you start making friends with the things you used to kill for it.

A plume of ice and dirt was sent into the air as she hit the ground with meteoric force before retracting her bladed wings and stretching. Looking around, the place had an intense, haunted vibe to it, and shadows seemed to bleed from the building as it stood isolated amid a tundra of frozen poison. V couldn't help but laugh to herself a little as she imagined N seeing this place and being genuinely creeped out, apparently forgetting that he was one of the three most dangerous things currently on this planet. Still, V wasn't unaware of the peculiarity of the place, nor was she at all unfamiliar with horror movie tropes after Uzi insisted that they watch hundreds of hours of her pirated collection for Halloween.

Converting her hand to a submachine gun with a taclite, V lowered her smart visor, a ski goggle like gadget that enhanced her native optic feed and dissipated the bootloop flashes employed by the raptor-like sentinels that sometimes lingered in locations like this. Stepping inside however, the only threats that seemed to greet her were foreseeable boredom and android tetanus.

As she walked through the building, she found that the interior was some sort of vehicle finishing complex, the main area filled with cars waiting to have doors attached and receive a proper coat of paint. While it was a longshot, part of her wondered if she could convince the workers to get the place running again. Her speculations then devolved into fantasies of riding around in a makeshift convertible, kicking up toxic dirt and snow as she spun donuts outside the drone colony entrance and spending hours taking glamour shots on it with Lizzie.

V decided she would make it happen. If they wouldn't be persuaded, then she'd either threaten them with violence, or Lizzie would threaten them with docked grades, or whatever it was the workers cared about that she consistently had such control over. Then, near the back of the production floor, she found what she was looking for.

There were actually a considerable amount of containers, from metal drums, to plastic jugs holding numerous grades and varieties, and all factory sealed. None of it was quite what was in a worker drone, but as V cracked open one to taste it, it proved compatible enough. More so, it was actually fresh. Downing a few jugs, she felt the burning heat in her chest dissipate, and the encroaching stiffness abandon her limbs.

Feeling more herself again, N and the workers' perpetuance of the human holiday "Christmas" didn't seem as bothersome. Arbitrary and gross, sure, but she could deal with it. V was about to head back out when something caught her eye at the other end of the room. At first she thought they were more oil containers, but as she approached them, she saw they were labeled differently.

Curious, V picked up one of the smaller canisters and opened it. Immediately, she was hit by a biting, rank smell that was far more pungent than oil. After the initial shock of it passed however, there was something strangely tantalizing about the scent. Bracing herself, she took a sip, and her body shuddered before she coughed a few times as a tingling washed throughout her chest.

"Whoa..." She muttered in awe before glancing around and then eyeing the canister, initially with a look of uncertainty. The longer she stared at it however, the bolder and more adventurous she felt until finally, she took another sip.

Again, she coughed a few times, but this time was more prepared, and soon she felt the strange tingling again blooming through her chest, along with a warmth that was very unlike what she'd experienced when overheating. This was fuzzy, and made her feel strangely light. She wasn't near as hesitant about her third sip, and started to giggle as she let another cough or two.

An odd serenity washed through her senses as a slowness afflicted her thoughts. The sensation was utterly uncanny, but not inherently unpleasant. V suddenly felt very curious to tour the complex in its entirety, and set out to do so, but not before grabbing another canister of her newfound elixir.

"So what do you think? Did I go overboard?" Uzi asked as N rubbed a finger across his chin and analyzed the tree she'd decorated.

The artificial Christmas tree had been spray painted black, and adorned entirely with purple bulbs and plastic skulls, with a numerical zero placed atop it that cast a fluorescent glow throughout the room.

"Hmm..." N leaned in and studied the festive construct.

"Yeah..." Uzi blushed and rubbed at the back of her head. "I guess it is a bit inten-"

"Now it's perfect!" N announced after hanging a single statuette of a golden retriever from one of the branches.

Making a squeaking noise that sounded like some kind of small animal, Uzi hopped in place before nearly tackling N as she leapt into a hug, basically ragdolling as the two spun. "This is gonna be awesome!" she exclaimed upon being released to pace the room, wildly gesturing as she spoke. "Like normally, it's just me and Dad at Christmas, and he's like cool and all... ya know, in a 'dad' way, but now I got you and Mom, and just... Aaaaaah!" she elated before jumping onto her bed and rolling amid her blankets as she trembled with excitement.

"Glad I can be a part of it!" N said, stepping over and sitting beside Uzi as she glanced up at him with her glowing gradient eyes looking like a sunset over a violet beach. "I don't think I've had a Christmas since Tessa..." He trailed off and glanced aside, suddenly finding himself a little lost amid ambient thoughts.

Sitting upright, Uzi scooted next to him as N's expression fell. "I uh..." Uzi started to speak, but couldn't find words for what she wanted to say. "She seemed... cool. And I could tell you guys were close."

N smiled, a somber wistfulness filling his voice. "She was. Her parents were real jerks, and things were definitely tense sometimes, but she did her best to make things at the mansion comfortable for us. And J..." He trailed off, considering a few additional things that had partially come back since Uzi had dislodged some of the memories Cyn had tried to destroy. "J was a bit different back then too. Still pretty harsh, but she was vigilant and attentive when it came to Tessa's parents. She made sure they never... well... rarely caught us by surprise."

"J actually being helpful?" Uzi muttered, initially going for a sarcastic comment before seeing a lingering bit of distance in N's amber gaze. "Well, I guess a lot did happen."

N then seemed to shake it off entirely. "Yeah, but it's all 'dumb ancient history', as you'd say." He then got up and took her hand as she stood from the bed. "Come on, I think-"

"Gotcha!" Nori shouted as the door to Uzi's room shot open, and she burst in, pointing an accusatory finger at them as she summoned a solver glyph with her other hand. Finding nothing nefarious occurring between them as N and Uzi blankly stared back at her however, she dismissed her Solver and slumped. "Well, damn..."

"Mom!" Uzi shouted indignantly. "What'd I tell you about going all sitcom parent and busting in randomly!"

"You're literally dating one of the things that killed me. I think I'm entitled to some suspicious shenanigans." Nori then sighed. "Even if you did kinda save the world and stuff." Pointing again, she added "I'm still your mother! This is still your Dad and I's house!"

"Ugh, bite me..." Uzi muttered.

"Uh-uh missy, YOU bite ME!" Nori corrected. "That was my thing first." She then grumbled. "Even if your sass makes me really proud in a weird way..." Crossing her arms, Nori slumped slightly. "I don't guess anyone ever took up being a family counseling bot, did they?"

Uzi and N both shrugged. Nori was about to add something when a rumble shook the room, and alarms started sounding throughout the colony. Turning to rush towards the square, the trio found themselves directed by Worker Defense Force officers to make their way towards the main entrance. Apparently something had impacted near the main gate, and scanners were picking up two Disassembly Drone signatures outside.

Behind the outer door, an effective firing line was formed. Uzi and Nori readying their Solvers, N equipping his machine guns, and Thad rushing up with Uzi's railgun as Lizzy took up arms next to him, wielding the collective arsenal of her cell phone and a disinterested expression.

Emerging from his office, Khan looked over the assembled force with a skeptical expression before offering "Ya know, we COULD do something different this time and let the marvelous security door provide marvelous security."

His suggestion received an eye roll from Uzi before Nori responded. "Maybe next time Stud Muffin. We already ran out here, and everyone's riled up on holiday jitters."

With a shrug, Khan pressed his remote, and the door shot open in an instant, letting in a flurry of icy carcinogens as two figures were illuminated by the entryway's lights.

Both were immediately familiar, one being J, who still had a far less than favorable reputation among the colony. The other was V, who was hanging onto J with her arm slung over her neck. Meanwhile, J gave the defensive line a look of pure annoyance.

"One chance! What'd you do to her!" Uzi commanded.

J only slumped. "'Do to her?' She came to me cackling like an idiot and carrying around a skeleton she wouldn't stop rambling to! I just wanted to make sure she got back to this dingy toaster pit in one piece."

Exchanging a suspicious glance with Uzi, N approached with Lizzy, and the two of them took one of V's arms over their shoulders as she stumbled off of J.

"Hai Eynn! Hai Lisseyy!" V said with a giggle. As the two escorted V away from J, Uzi questioned again.

"So what happened to her?" She looked at J, now more confused than suspicious.

"Do I really have to explain with THAT pointed at me?" J pointed to the railgun Thad still had aimed at her.

"You tried to help Cyn eat the planet and kill us all, what do you think?" Uzi asked.

"Fine, I'm leaving." J sighed. "Enjoy the drunk murder bot."

"Wait!" Uzi interjected. "I might have another idea."

J only narrowed her eyes in response.

"I should've just left her..." J grumbled as she sat in a chair in front of the main entrance, not technically restrained, but having a magnet stuck to her head.

"Hey, you wanted us to stop pointing the sick-as-hell railgun at you, and we did." Uzi stated. "So what happened?"

J had been working on repairing the ship ever since Cyn's defeat, knowing well that she wouldn't be welcome, and figuring anywhere was better than an icy rock inhabited solely by a bunch of idiots who hated her. As she welded and fitted her latest scrounging of parts into place however, she heard an all too familiar voice echo through the ruins of the human city. The laugh, with its maniacal euphoria and almost song-like quality was unmistakably V's.

Flying to perch on the side of a building near where she heard the sound, J watched as V stumbled from an impact crater and struggled to retract one of her wings that she'd damaged by crashing into the ground. V then staggered through the snow, murmuring inaudible nonsense, occasionally punctuated by some one off phrase with zero context.

"But they couldn't be eggshell, no, always STARK!" V spat with a venom to her words. "Then that..." She mumbled something J couldn't quite make out, but which sounded utterly profane. "And if ya ask me, her fan WAS stupid! I'd a... If I could..." V converted her arm to a machine gun and fired aimlessly into the surroundings before cackling. She then collapsed into the snow and curled into a fetal position, falling quiet before soft sobs started to echo through the empty streets.

Confusion overwhelming her, J leaped from the building and swooped down to land next to V. She apparently didn't notice her approach, as she was still huddled in a small crater of snow, softly whimpering as J reached out to her.

"V?" J asked, and immediately V scrambled to her feet.

Shouting several half audible profanities, V fired a wild spray into the surroundings. "Narc! Get-! I'll-! Your head... or something!" V growled in a slur.

J ducked slightly as rounds whizzed over her head before cautiously approaching. "V, are you... okay?"

"I said GET AWAY!" V shouted, hand swapping to a sword and nearly cleaving J in two.

As she jumped back, J watched as V stood hunched and panting as she glared at her. J's guard had been relatively lowered, and she knew that if V were normally wanting to land a hit like that, she would have. As J looked at her former companion, or at least cooperative however, there was clearly something wrong with her. Her gaze was intense, but spacey, and she seemed to be struggling to keep her balance as she took a fighting stance.

"V, I'm... not gonna hurt you." J said unsteadily. "You and N, and that purple thing won, okay? I get it. You're mad at me, and have every right to hate me, but right now, I just want to know if you're okay."

"That 'purple thing' is Uzi." V corrected as she staggered. "She likes nightcore, but she's not that bad." V sighed and visibly slumped a bit. "I can see why N likes her."

J took that answer as a 'no'. "Right, Uzi, now I remember. How could I forget? Not like she shot me in the head or anything..."

V snickered. "First time someone catches ya off guard, and it's an edgy kid on a frozen backwater world." Stumbling, V added "Never thought I'd see it."

"Yeah..." J sighed. "But what about you? What led to..." J pointed to V's slumped, tilting posture. "this?"

Again, V laughed, nearly falling to the ground. "Oh that's... man... that's a something." she didn't explain. "I- I got someone you oughta meet though! I found... I found a buddy!"

Hobbling directly past J towards her impact crater, V faceplanted into the snow before pushing herself back up and rummaging around for something. "Ta-daaa!" V cheered as she ripped a skeleton from within a snowbank. "Meet Mishter Boones!" she commanded before nearly doubling over and laughing. "He's my new best bud! I'd say he's a ride or die kinda man, but..." Now she did double over laughing as she rattled the suit clad human remains. "I guess all that's left is ride!"

J was only getting more confused by the second. Clearly V wasn't right in the head, she'd probably be attacking her right now if she was, but then what had happened to her? Part of J wanted to write all of this off as 'not her problem'. V and herself had been on opposite ends of a war more or less, and were still functional enemies. Now that Cyn was gone however, some introspective part of J had started to awaken, and that part of her was, as much as she couldn't believe it, worried about V.

"That's great V." J said uncertainly. "Do you wanna... go tell N and Uzi about Mr. Bones? I'm sure they'd just... LOVE to meet him."

V's head rolled, her gaze staring absently into the stars above as she slowly formulated a response. "They'd just... Mr Bones... he's... he's shy, ya know?" V said, bashfully turning away slightly. "I don't think they'd get him."

"But it's N." J pointed out. "If anyone can get it, it's him, right?"

V thought for a moment, then another, then another, and finally admitted, "Fiiiine, I guess you're right. I just... he and Uzi..." V dropped her skeleton and sat in the snow, quietly pouting.

Not wanting to give her a chance to start crying again, J interjected, "Well, I can take you back to them, and they'll make sure you're... not dying... or anything."

"And then I tried to fly her here, while she attempted to fly literally every other direction, including through the planet." J explained, glaring at V as she hung off of N and batted at Lizzy's ponytail like it was a cat toy.

"So then you don't know what happened to her." Uzi concluded.

J slumped in the chair and rubbed a hand across her face. "I mean, I can guess she drank or ate something that had some depressant effect on her neural systems, but I'm not exactly a 'Doctor Drone'."

Annoyedly pointing to the magnet on her head, J glanced between N and Uzi, the latter rolling her eyes muttering. "Fine."

Popping the makeshift sedative and restraining device from her head, J sighed. "I don't guess you have a doctor or scientist anywhere in this cobble of semi-sentient archetypes do you?"

"Why do you care?" Uzi asked. "You sure weren't worried about her well being before."

"I don't know if you've noticed, but not a lot happens out there in the frozen ghost city." J pointed out. "Even I get bored after a while, and I didn't HAVE to bring her back here."

J and Uzi glared at each other, the both of them looking increasingly ready to fight the other until Lizzy interjected. "Well like... there is one person who'd know about robo drugs."

Teacher Drone (who will be referred to as 'Teach') was reclined in his chair, with his feet resting on his desk as he stared at the ceiling and played a game of virtual pingpong on his viewscreen. As he leaned forward to blindly reach for the flask on the corner of his desk, a knock on the door thundered through the room.

Closing his game, he stood and grumbled. "School's out for the holidays. What do you want?"

"We have a problem." a muffled voice said from the other side.

"I didn't give homework over the holiday." He responded. "If you have a problem, it's not mine."

"Ugh..." the voice groaned. "Dad, can you...?"

The door suddenly opened, revealing the Doormans, all three of the murder bots, one of which was hanging onto one of the others with a spaced out look, and Lizzy. Looking them over, Teach sighed and looked at Khan. "Is this one of your 'mandatory security meeting' things?"

"We just need your... expertise on a certain matter." Khan explained.

After some explaining, no shortage of eye rolls, and some minor coercion, Teach agreed to look at V. The only other people allowed in the room however were Khan and Nori, leaving everyone else to wait in the hall.

"Wait... Didn't we have a nurse at one point?" Thad asked, looking between Lizzy and Uzi.

Lizzy didn't bother looking up from her phone, and Uzi shrugged. "Never appeared on screen I guess."

"Makes sense."

Glancing at N, Uzi saw him staring at the floor as they sat on old plastic chairs that somehow still felt uncomfortably hard to metal alloy bodies. He was clearly troubled, and as Uzi started to ask if he was okay, gently wrapping her fingers through his, J spat a single syllable remark from where she leaned against the wall opposite them.

"Ew."

Uzi glared, ready to scrap again before N asked a question. "J, do you remember anything... from before?"

J's eyes narrowed. "Like?"

"Well..." N nervously rubbed at the back of his head. "Like Tes-"

"Don't even!" J snapped. "That was another life, and an entirely different 'us', in case that detail slipped your memory."

"But you do remember." N insisted.

"What does it matter?" J scolded as she glanced aside. "She's gone. Earth is gone." J stood and marched halfway over. "We killed planets N! You and V just happened to get yanked out by..." she gestured to Uzi, who seemed ready to pounce on her. "And ya know what? Good for you! That's just great for both of you! But I never got out. And maybe it was because I didn't want to, or didn't think I could, or maybe it was because Cyn was still worming around in parts of my head. I don't know! And really, I don't care!"

N dejectedly shrank a bit, and this seemed to cross a line with Uzi. "Okay, what the hell is your problem?!" she demanded. "I mean, V says you were kind of a jerk to her too, but literally all he's done is try to be supportive and help people, and all I've ever heard of you doing is berating, abusing, and literally walking all over him!"

Her outburst stunned both J and N, meanwhile Thad looked around uncomfortably, and Lizzy was leaned over and recording the whole thing. When J recovered, she seemed to double down with her disdain.

"I'm sorry, but did you happen to miss the part where we were being used as fodder by some psychotic AI death god?" J asked. "And did N ever fill you in on exactly what we were living with before that?" Her voice shook slightly. "Even before any of this, we lived a hair's width away from being tossed out to die and rot in a swamp. The price of ANY mistake could've been death, and then Cyn comes along, and death isn't even an option anymore!"

J leaned in to get in Uzi's face, and seemed to actually intimidate her somewhat. "So yeah, I'm mean. I'm an absolute bitch! But do you know how often I was the only thing between them and either dying, or something so much worse?"

Uzi fell quiet, not entirely sure how to respond until she remembered. "Then why'd you try to kill him back when you three broke in?"

J backed away and sighed. "Cyn would've just sent another. The virus is relatively painless, and let's just say I wasn't betting on... well... you." She then glanced aside and added "Not saying I wasn't also ready for a break from his buffoonery, but he's died before, and the most that's ever seemed to change is maybe a week of lost memory."

"So I-" Cyn started to interject, possessing Uzi's tail.

Shrieking, J's hand snapped to its claw form and she swiped the head from the swaying appendage. As it rolled across the floor, and the burning yellow eyes of the strange, snake-like head fell dark, a new one grew to continue its query.

"So I take it... I'm not getting a 'Best Boss' mug... this year?" Cyn asked, eyeing J, who looked at her with an expression of horror.

"Why-? Wha-? How?" J stammered, glancing between the tail and Uzi.

"I ate her soul or something. Now she lives in my butt." Uzi seemed to deflate slightly as she explained. "I don't think she's dangerous. My mom says she's a 'subjugated remnant entity' or something. Apparently it's to do with the collective size of an assimilated thing compared to the thing absorbing it." She sighed. "I don't know. It's stupid, Cyn's annoying, and I'm kinda tired of the sci-fi nonsense at this point."

"Don't be... so glum... Uzi." Cyn said. "Now you'll... always have someone... to talk to."

"Yippie..." Uzi groaned, rolling her eyes.

As J continued to stare, totally perplexed at Uzi's tail, the door to the classroom opened. Teach walked out first and indifferently gazed across the scene happening outside, meanwhile Nori and Khan supported V on either side.

"Yeah, your friend's drunk." He remarked. "Not sure why you needed me to tell you that, but that is my diagnosis."

"So she's gonna be okay?" N stood and visibly brightened.

"Judging by her..." Teach was interrupted by V managing to slip off of Nori and Khan to faceplant on the floor. He spared it only a brief glance before continuing. "She's probably going to hate herself in eight to ten hours, but she'll live."

"Okay, but like how?" Uzi asked. "I didn't know this was even a thing that could happen."

Teach rubbed at his eye screen in annoyance. "I'm not about to literally instruct my students and a bunch of murder bots how to get drunk. Maybe if you'd paid attention in robo-biology, you'd understand how compounds diffuse through our self-repair systems."

"Ugh, bite me." Uzi groaned, then remembered. "Hey J, you said you wanted to know too, so like... threaten him or whatever."

J glanced aside with a half-lidded look of annoyance. "I actually have a pretty good idea of how it works, I'm more just wondering what EXACTLY she drank and where she found it."

"Why? You want some for yourself?" Uzi snarked.

"Maybe I do. What of it?" J spat.

Pushing herself up, V shambled into the hall and over to J, a look of childish excitement on her face. "J! J! Oh my god! I jus remembered! Yur gonna thing this is HILARIOUS!" She nearly fell onto J, who reluctantly caught V and let her hang onto her shoulders. "Cyn... you'll never guess what happened to Cyn." V nearly fell over laughing.

"I saw..." J sighed. "It's weird, but I guess her being gone completely was too much to ask for."

"She's stuck in Uzi's butt!" V cried before stumbling off of J to fall onto the floor, cackling like a hyena. "Freakin planet eating space demon, and now it's..." She made a biting gesture with one of her hands before sitting up and pointing at Uzi's tail. "Get wrecked!"

"I'd say... you're the one... currently wrecked." Cyn flatly retorted.

V responded with a one fingered gesture, popular among humanity.

"Well..." J started in a dull tone. "I'd say it's been fun if I cared enough to lie, but I have a wasteland I have to get back to freezing in."

"Wait wait wait!" V said, getting uncertainly back to her feet. "Be-before you go and like... we go back to like..." She made several chopping and punching motions with her hands. "I gotta tell... I gotta show... I gotta tell ya. The drones they got like a... like Chrighmath and stuff. You member... Chrismiss... right?"

"I remember, yeah..." J briefly took on a somber look similar to N's earlier.

"I gotta show ya! It's cute!" V put her arm around J and poorly whispered. "Well, it's like... kinda scuff... but like cute scuff."

"That sounds great, but I don't think the Worker Drones would really want me just hanging around like that." J said, clearly looking to escape this situation without making another scene.

"Nah, you're with me, and they're cool with me. It be alright." V assured. "That be aight, won't it Ussi?"

J looked at her, slightly shaking her head and expression pleading for her to say 'no' and put an end to this.

"Totally." Uzi grinned fiendishly. "Ya know what V, just this once, I'll even vouch for her too."

"Awe... so sweet... You're so sweet Usi." V leaned into J, nearly throwing her off balance. "I bet if like... I ate you... you'd taste like a grape, ya know?" V then glanced between everyone with a confused expression. "Wait... does anyone know what a grape actually tastes like?"

"Well..." N somewhat nervously took the lead. "If we're doing a tour, I guess I'll lead the way!"

As the trio of death robots, followed by Thad and a plainly concerned Nori and Khan made their way towards the main colony, Uzi and Lizzie lagged slightly behind.

"So like, you're getting all of this, right?" Uzi leaned in and asked.

"Oh you know it loser." Lizzie grinned, keeping her phone camera trained on the group ahead of them.

Much of the colony was a webwork of underground halls and tunnels that connected numerous side rooms that had been fashioned into houses, offices, classrooms, shops, and other fairly standard facilities. Depending on the wing, more or less of these rooms would be fully repurposed and active, but really only about a third of the total facility was in use by the roughly one thousand drones currently living there. The colony's rear half was effectively a ghost town, and as such, was omitted from the tour.

Oppositely, the colony town center was surprisingly lively with the coming holiday, many of the residents coming out to shop and attend festivities at the more visually striking establishments set up there. Said spectacle was entirely relative however, as the establishments had all been fashioned by adorning and modifying the massive freight containers that were left over from when the colony had been one of Copper 9's major cargo relays.

The drones had done their best to make it into a functional town center however. Some of the containers had windows cut into the side, which didn't require any kind of glass due to being in an enclosed cargo storage area, and many had adopted a sort of urban nightlife aesthetic, having glowing signs and flashing lights affixed to the sides of the boxy metal containers. These luminous displays advertised everything from shops, to robo-dine-ins serving cuisines of electronic components, to a variety of recreational facilities, such as arcades, clubs, and even a few courts that could be set up for a variety of games and activities.

"This is..." J glanced around in slight amazement as V balanced against her. "a lot more than I expected to be here."

"Well we dint hav much time to hang out or nuthin." V said. "Is like... we WANTED to, but then like we only had the eight essimodes, so now it's just some fedshannon or whatever."

"Was I supposed to understand any of that?" J asked, looking incredulously at V as she stared back at her with an utterly thoughtless expression.

"And if we continue this way..." N chimed. "We'll arrive at the town square, where the workers have set up an amazing holiday display to get everyone in the Christmas spirit!"

As they stepped into a semi-cleared section near the storage area's middle, they were greeted by an almost overwhelming show of multicolored lights. Strings were strewn across every container so densely that they looked almost woven over the metal bodies, and obstructed several of the open air windows as they rained from the sides of three and four container tall structures.

Several screens had also been hung, showing looped animations of reindeer prancing through the night sky, scenes of drone families sitting around fireplaces and trees, and one distinct scene of very human looking elves making toys in a sweatshop as a robotic Santa watched authoritatively.

At the center, a massive artificial tree stood. Appearing to have been constructed from machine parts and piping, its visage of Earth vegetation was provided by a dense coverage of LED lights that slowly faded between green, red, blue, and gold, all while equally luminous ornaments would shine in complementary hues to whatever primary color was currently present.

J's jaw hung slightly open as she took it in. The sight was frankly garish with the density of artificial lights, and between these glowing displays, there were exposed sections of gray steel floor, as well as a few patches of uncooperative lights, but as V had said, it was scuffed in a cute kinda way.

"You shambling cans really put this much effort into a human holiday?" J asked, looking at Uzi, who kind of shrugged.

"I mean, people get bored." Uzi sullenly remarked, seeming slightly put off at the vomit of luminous colors around her. "Plus, this place was a bit of a hub back when we were expanding into the city. And like..." She glanced slightly towards N. "Gifts are fun I guess."

Looking back at the constructed tree, J found herself amid some sliver of a memory that had been trying to come back for weeks now. The context wasn't clear, and there was a dreamlike haze over it, but she could practically see the scene in front of her.

She was in one of the dens of the Eliot manor, and could hear V and N chatting somewhere else with Cyn, who at the time, had just been kind of a clumsy troublemaker with no sign of inherent malice. J herself had been sitting on an ornate velvet sofa as a fire crackled in the corner and a tree glowed in front of her, lined with ornaments and golden lights, all of which had been set up by the drone staff as an automatic function with no input from either of the senior Eliots.

Beside her, a girl with raven hair and warm brown skin laid, absently staring at the tree. J looked down at her as her head rested on the arm of the couch opposite herself.

"They won't be back until after New Years." Tessa said indifferently.

J's eyes fell downwards, not sure how to respond, but feeling a slight relief.

"Don't guess it matters." Tessa somberly noted.

J was still a little unsure of how to console her until an idea struck. "Ya know..." she began. "if we're going by royal law, them being gone means that the next in the lineage is currently in charge."

This got a single laugh out of Tessa. "Then it's my official decree that we bare arms against the tyranny of the old monarchs and the empire of man." She joked.

"As you command, Lady Eliot." J said with a playful salute. "What message shall we relay to the kingdom?"

Tessa thought for a moment, smiling slightly. "To pretend that their leader was witty enough to think of something cool."

"Got it. I'll plagiarize something from Sparta, and execute anyone who notices." J grinned.

"And that's why you're my general." Tessa laughed before sitting up. "I guess it is for the better." Her smile faded slightly. "At least now we can just goof off and not have to worry about covering anything up for a bit."

"Maybe don't let the others hear that, or there might not be manor left for them to come back to." J teased.

Tessa buried her face in one of her hands, smiling. "Don't tempt me. I might let it slip just to spite them."

"Inadvisable, but not unreasonable." J noted.

"Then it's settled. First thing we're doing is a merry game of blowtorch tag." Tessa declared.

"Well, at least I won't have to worry about you 'catching cold'." J teased and went to nudge her, only remembering about Tessa's arm the moment before her metallic elbow made contact. To her dismay, Tessa noticed.

"You don't gotta worry about it." she assured. "I've managed to keep Cyn out of sight lately, and there haven't been any events for me to botch this past month."

J wasn't sure how to feel. On one hand, it came as a relief that Tessa hadn't been locked up or hurt, but it also brought back the incessant, disturbing reality that even Tessa wasn't above her parents' wrath. Again, she found herself running the numbers on if she could pull off getting her out of there, but knowing the kind of power that came with the level of money the Eliots had, and what she knew about the chaos of street life, it seemed like any attempt might just end up doing more harm than good.

"I'm just glad I have you guys here." Tessa said, pulling J out of her thoughts.

J was briefly taken by the way the lights of the tree and fire reflected in Tessa's eyes. She had always found something mystifying about human eyes, and the way they cast no light, but seemed so able to capture it, and Tessa's were no exception. She tried to think of something either witty or nice to say, but found herself in the rare position of being at a loss for words.

Tessa only laughed softly and pulled J in a bit before resting her arm over her shoulders. "You know you guys really are my everything."

J found herself with a storm of things she wanted to say, but couldn't quite bring herself to. Finally, she softly uttered "Just glad I can help." as pale blush lines lit across her face.

"Yo J!" Uzi shouted as she snapped her fingers in front of J's blank, transfixed gaze.

"I love you." J absently muttered before blinking and snapping back to.

"Wait what?!" Uzi recoiled and glanced around. "Did I... miss a plot arc or something?"

"Oh can it toaster oven!" J snapped.

"Look, I'm just saying," Uzi motioned to V, who was still leaning on J. "we already got one death machine with their head in another dimension, so maybe hold off on whatever it is you're doing."

J rolled her eyes and looked to N. "So is there anything else you have to show me, or can we wrap this up?"

N considered a moment. "Well, there are one or two things, but if you're in a hurry, we can-"

He was interrupted by V, laughing with a newfound energy that caused J to try and shrug off her grip. "Juh! Jayyy!" she sang. "You dun goofed."

"What in the world are you-?" J looked around for the cause of V's sudden commotion, and realized all too late what she was standing under.

The significance of the glossy fake leaves and red polymer berries of the ornament hanging from an overhead line of Christmas lights didn't click immediately. By the time it did, V had already clutched her hands around J's shoulders. Before she could protest, their robotic lips met in a prolonged exchange as J froze in utter shock, and V held her in an impassioned kiss.

From somewhere, a camera flashed as the immediate group stared, looking almost as mortified as J. When her wits returned, J pulled V's head away from her own before holding her steady, and at distance, by her shoulders. For a moment, they simply stared at one another, J still looking stunned, and V seeming utterly satisfied as she gave a thumbs up and swayed with sepia blush marks on her cheeks.

The stillness was only broken when J coughed. "Gasoline." She said in a grunt. "She drank gasoline."

"Okay, V..." N started as he stepped over and pulled V away from J, letting her lean against himself. "Maybe we call it at unsolicited displays of affection."

Her only response was to stare dreamily at N and giggle. "Hey Eyennn! Guess what yur standin underr..." She started to lean in when Uzi threw her hand over V's mouth and pushed her back.

"Uh-uh, nope." Uzi asserted. "I don't care what kinda backstory you guys have, he's my boyfriend!"

V looked at Uzi, or maybe at some point beyond her and muttered something that the only decipherable words of were "you" and "circus".

"Ugh, bite me." Uzi groaned, only for V to lean off of N, widely open her mouth and attempt to stumble onto and literally bite her as she backed away.

As N managed to restrain V, she merely chomped at the air and giggled before falling back to be swept up and carried by N.

"So do you think you can manage raging wine-mom there while I take J out?" Uzi annoyedly asked with her arms crossed.

"Oh yeah!" N assured. "I think she's starting to wind down, and if nothing else I can keep a hold on her."

As he started back towards the wing their rooms were on, V's final observed act of shenaniganry was to reach up and tap a finger against N's faceplate, cheerfully announcing "Boop!" as it made contact.

The group mostly diffused after that, Lizzy accompanying N to hopefully help get V settled into bed and possibly capture a bit more embarrassing footage of her intoxicated state. Meanwhile Khan went off to answer a service call on one of the doors near the square that had started audibly grinding, which seemed to mortify him as much, if not more than when he first laid eyes on N mid-murder spree. This just left Nori and Thad to accompany Uzi as she led J back to the colony's main gate.

Their intent was added security, though J seemed more than compliant with the instruction to leave before she could be swept up into any more happenings, and possibly start searching for wherever V had found the gasoline. As they neared the front however, J's pace slowed, and she glanced towards Nori and Thad with a hesitant expression.

"Would you two mind if I talked to Uzi for a second?" She asked, not quite seeming her usual self.

"Why?" Nori glared suspiciously.

"Just a private counsel on something." J assured. "You don't even need to leave, just hang back a minute... If you would?"

Uzi and Nori exchanged a glance, Nori raising a virtual eyebrow and Uzi just shrugging. "Fine." Nori growled. "But try anything funny, and you're dead before you so much as pop a claw out."

"Understood ma'am." J gave her a courteous nod before stepping a few meters ahead with Uzi.

"So what's this about? You gonna tell me how you're sorry for helping Cyn try to eat the planet and reveal that deep down you love V and N despite trying multiple times to them?" Uzi asked skeptically.

"Not quite." J rolled her eyes. "And just to be clear, I think N's little 'nice guy', always happy attitude is endlessly grating, V barely has any sense of volume control, and you..." J scowled. "If I started to list off my grievances with you, it would be a dissertation exceeding the length of 'The Journey to the West' by a minimum of three... make that four fold."

"So you wanted me alone to insult me one last time." Uzi concluded. "Great, you can leave now."

"Despite that however..." J added, seeming to soften slightly. "Maybe you could rack it up to Stockholm syndrome, but after everything those two have been through, I'm... happy you managed to get them out and stop Cyn. Hopefully this place can be a new start for them, and I know that if you keep having their back, they will have yours, so just..." J shook her head and sighed. "watch out for them, okay?"

Uzi eyed J, still suspicious, but relenting slightly. "Yeah, well, thanks for not letting that girl's psycho parents kill them or anything."

"Tessa." J said somberly. "Her name was Tessa."

Slightly thrown off by the sudden sincerity and even hurt in J's tone, Uzi was driven to ask "Cyn... killed her, right? That's where she got the whole..."

"Yeah." J sounded utterly hollow. "I still can't remember when, or where, or how, but when that monster wanted to make a new body, she figured she'd use the one person we all cared about as her mask."

Hesitantly, Uzi asked "From what N's described, you two were close. Like, closer than Tessa was with him or V. Is that... ya know... true?"

J let a somber, wistful laugh. "I was the first one she brought back. Although after those two showed up, it kind of seemed like N was her favorite. I guess maybe I resented that. I just became the watchdog against her parents and tried to make sure everyone stayed in line for their own safety." She looked back to Uzi with a tired expression. "I guess that version of me didn't get cloned."

"So what happens now?" Uzi asked. "I mean, are you just going to hang around in the wastelands until you short out or overheat or something?"

"Accuse me of plagiarism if ya want, but I've been trying to fix one of the ships." J explained. "There should be enough parts left over for your little can collection here to get another working eventually, but for now I'm planning on leaving." She then shrugged. "Afterall, I do hear Bermuda is nice this time of year."

"Well, not to interfere with your plan of getting away from us, but I'm pretty sure-"

"It's a figure of speech." J interjected. "I don't actually know specifically where I'm going to go, but I figure I'll see what's left of the other exoplanets and work from there."

"Well, as long as it doesn't involve killing any of us or blowing up the planet again, good luck I guess." Uzi remarked before pulling out the electronic access key and reaching to tap it against the door control.

An instant before it made contact, Teach approached, looking slightly more tired and annoyed than usual. As he glanced between J and Uzi, he spoke in a sullen monotone. "So do you think either of you can get my flask back from your crazy murder friend?"

"There wasn't... gasoline in your flask, was there?" Uzi asked with a look of terror.

"No..." Teach sighed and rolled his eyes. "I haven't drank gasoline in years."

Uzi let a sigh of relief before he continued. "It's a little weak for me these days. Pretty sure what I had in there was a blend of rocket fuel, lithium, and... cinnamon." He actually seemed to smile a bit as he added. "A little holiday blend, you could say."

"That's... who hurt you?" J asked in disbelief as Uzi's eyes went hollow.

"So uh... J..." Uzi turned to face her, nervously rubbing at the back of her head. "So what do ya say, in exchange for helping us with her, we kinda put a stall on the whole 'hating you' thing until after the holidays?"

"Does this include my own room?" J asked skeptically.

"What?! No! Bite-" Uzi was interrupted as an explosion rumbled from deeper within the colony, and alarms sounded in the distance. "We'll work something out."

Epilogue

The flask was eventually returned, though not before being completely drained by V the moment N had turned his back. The resultant effect on V was a much higher energy form of intoxication than what she'd consumed previously. The initial strategy of having everyone who was capable fly after her in the airspace above the town center and attempt to restrain her proved to only further excite the now absolutely rampant death machine however.

What seemed to actually work, much to everyone's surprise, was when J simply tried commanding V the way one would a small child or disobedient pet. This alone seemed capable of penetrating her haze to get her to recognize how destructive and obnoxious she was being. Once she was talked into submitting, they stuck several magnets to her head as she was again carried back to her room. She was then monitored in shifts in case she woke up, though remained unconscious for about a full day, and proceeded to be crippled by pain and sickness for another.

While far from happy to be the main one charged with monitoring and tending the drunk, then violently hungover V, J held up her end of the deal with a steadfast, even militant resolve. The arrangement between J and Uzi was then generally accepted after many workers witnessed J aiding the others as they corralled V, who earned herself a bit of ire from much of the community.

J never left her room much after V was sorted. Per her request, it was in one of the largely unpopulated wings of the colony, where she could be left with her thoughts, but be somewhere protected from the elements that didn't feel totally isolated. The times anyone checked on her, which was usually N, they'd find her laying on her bed, offering brief, minimal responses as she stared at the ceiling with a bored look in her eye. To most, it seemed to be all she did, and all she was interested in doing.

Eventually, V visited, dead set on confronting J about what had been said during their duel as Uzi and N had been battling Cyn. J barely reacted however. Even as V tore into her over the betrayal, even as she berated J in every way imaginable, J let her. Only when V finally demanded that J fight her did she get any kind of substantial response.

"Later." J said absently.

"What?" V demanded, looking ready to tear her apart where she stood. "What do you mean 'later'?"

"I mean..." J sighed. "I don't blame you for hating me. I don't even blame you for wanting to kill me, and if you're dead set on dueling me to the death or whatever, then fine. But let's do it later."

"Not really like you to stall, J." V glared. "Not unless you're hiding something."

"No." J replied with a shrug. "It really isn't, but that's basically what I'm doing. Just delaying everything because... why the hell not at this point? What difference does it really make anymore? In fact..." She turned her back to V and closed her eyes. "One shot, or swing, or whatever ya want. Go ahead."

"What?" V asked, looking around the room in search of some kind of trap.

"You heard me." J said, eyes still closed. "I'll fight back against anything after, but you can either get an easy first hit, or get in one of whatever you think will make you feel better."

"Yeah right, this is some kind of trick." V asserted.

"Whatever." J shook her head and sounded slightly annoyed. "Are ya gonna do it or not?"

Converting her hand into a submachine gun, V took aim at the back of J's head. As she studied her silver hair through the weapon's sights however, something looked off. Up until now, she'd been too caught up in her own anger to notice, and probably anyone else wouldn't have, but J had a kind of messiness about her. She wasn't visibly unkempt by any means, but the entire time V had known her, J had been an unyielding perfectionist about her appearance. Now however, her pigtails and clothes were fine, but lacked the kind of meticulous, literally 'no hair out of place' finish J usually insisted upon.

"What's with you all of a sudden?" V asked, lowering, but not retracting her weapon.

"Technically," J said as she turned to face her. "I've told ya once before. Go ask Mr. Bones if ya don't remember."

"Who?" V asked, looking utterly befuddled.

"I'm still not one to repeat myself." J explained. "So are we done here?" She then motioned towards the door.

After staring her down for a minute, expression shifting between malice, confusion, suspicion, and then a brief flicker of concern, V left.

Again alone, J sat on her bed and went back through the memories again. While less than literal playbacks, actually being similar to human memories in how they were imprinted into her neural matrices, she thought through them over and over until it almost felt like rerunning some kind of simulation. Over time, she'd filled in blanks, either with things she'd actually managed to recall, or just whatever seemed right in her mind.

She knew it wasn't her though. In every sense, literal and metaphorical, it was a different J. She then resented that other version of herself. It was weak, and sentimental, and attached, and seemed all together childish compared to what she had become. Why then did she miss it? Why did she wish she could be that version of herself again?

Sitting in the corner of her room, leaning against the wall as she coiled into a ball, she stared into her own mind to see the memory once more.

"I'm just glad I have you guys here." Tessa softly as the golden flames and lights glistened in her eyes, her face a slightly somber, but utterly genuine smile.

Resting her head against the wall, J muttered to the silence. "I'm sorry Boss."

[memo 2: I really enjoyed this as a chance to write some characters from the show that aren't really going to be featured in my main project, Murder Drones: Splinter Strains. It's also kind of a way for me to give a snapshot of what I personally think life and dynamics on Copper 9 could be like after the show's conclusion. Some ideas, like the Drone Colony being much larger and more intricate than you might think from the snippets we see of it in the show also come from a sort of 'personal lore expansion' that's kind of stewing in the back of my mind, and might become something sort of like a tabletop RPG sourcebook if the stories incorporating bits of it get enough attention.]