TO lay naked on the bed, their body still giving off steam from the most wonderful bath they had ever taken in their entire life. The water had been perfectly hot for TO. The salts and powders they had chosen made the bathroom smell glorious, and the jets - which the training center didn’t have- worked to relax the strained muscles in TOs’ back. The speakers in the corners played a new musical, and TO found themselves so relaxed that they might have fallen asleep against DH in the tub. They nearly did, but when the musical was over the lack of sound pulled them from their deep state of relaxation and made it clear, it was time to get out.
The cool air against their flushed, steaming skin was just the most wonderful feeling, second only to the silky feel of the blanket under them and the excessively soft mattress. The only thing that could have made things better was if TO’s aching arm wasn’t bound up in a sling.
“Look.” DH said as they came over to TO. There had been a door alert on their communicator, so DH had gotten dressed and checked to see who it was. They had actually left the room since they had an alert for their own room as well. Now they returned with two glasses and two green tinted bottles. “Apparently they’re giving these out.” They put the bottles on a nearby table as they pulled off their black uniform.
“What is it?”
“Alcohol; specifically, it’s listed as sparkling wine.” They threw their top onto the foot of the bed and then passed the bottle to TO.
“15% alcohol, and no other chemical additives, hallucinogens, or stimulants. This won’t have much of an effect on us.”
“It won’t.” DH agreed as they took the bottle back. They pulled the cork out, creating a loud, startling pop as they did. DH nearly dropped the bottle, but held onto it. Once they poured up a glass, they sniffed at the contents and pulled back almost instantly as their nose wrinkled up. “That feels weird.” They said.
TO took the glass from DH and sniffed at it. The bubbles that rushed to the surface made their own nose wrinkle up, but it didn’t smell bad; it smelled a little like some fruits they had eaten with Avery and GiDi way back in the training center; on that day when they snuck all that food into the observation deck. They took the tiniest of sips. It was a chilled drink, and the contrast between the cool liquid they drank and how hot their body felt from the bath was lovely.
“How is it?” DH asked.
“Glorious.” TO said as they lay back against the pillows and took another, longer sip.
“... Do you think civilians normally live like this?” DH asked as they poured themself a glass.
“Well… this is apparently a special room that they give to certain kinds of people; politicians, celebrities, and I suppose us. The other rooms are probably smaller.”
“Do you think they have beds like this? Or drinks like this?”
“I suppose?” TO said. It made sense that they would; It was probably the same as in the training center where the only difference between a room a higher ranked synth had, and the bunks the trainees had, was simply a matter of size and privacy. They recalled C12’s old room, and though that was the only private room they had ever seen it didn’t look more comfortable than the bunk that TO had. “At worst, I imagine that they have bunks like we had at the training center, but they probably have the same food and drink, and their bed would probably still be soft like this one.”
DH sat next to TO on the bed, the mattresses sinking down as they did. “They get to live like this, and they can more or less do what they want…” they frowned as they took a sip of their drink, “No wonder civilians are so self-centered; They’re too comfortable, and they’re not really expected to be useful like we are.”
TO hummed as they stared at the bubbles in their glass; that didn’t seem right. It took them a moment to realize why, though.
“If that’s the case, then why the insurgency?” TO asked, though they were speaking aloud more than to DH.
“Because they want more?” DH offered, “I mean, we knew that people in the insurgency were awful, right? Civilians on their own are pretty bad but the insurgency is working against King Decon, which makes them even worse. We don’t know for sure whose part of it, but we can probably assume it’s former corrupt world leaders and deposed politicians who want to claw back their power.”
“Yeah.. I suppose.” TO said, but still… something didn’t feel right. They couldn’t place why, but there was just a part of this that made little sense.
The throbbing that still lingered in their arms, coupled with the effect of the painkillers that DH had given them, wouldn’t let them think about it right at the moment, so TO let their thoughts drift away from them. In the end, they guessed it didn’t matter. The insurgents were working against King Decon, and that’s all TO really had to care about.
======
The civilian security had turned the storage area of the insurgent transport into a workshop where TO, DH, and Avery could examine everything. DH had gone straight to the cockpit to check the information the ship had on its computers while Avery and DH were working to poke through the drones and see what they could find.
So far, it wasn’t good.
Avery pulled the panel off the chief part of the one intact drone that security had found. TO leaned in and looked carefully at the soldering, at the way the wires were organized and arranged. They were careful to look at the different parts, to examine the designs and try to figure out where it came from.
“Anything?” Avery asked as they set down the panel.
“Yes.” TO muttered as they reached in and pushed aside a handful of immaculate-looking wires. “Look at this.”
Avery came over to TO’s side and looked into the drone.
“... the same person did not make this.” they said as they stared at the work. “This had to be the work of three... maybe four people.”
“Right.” TO said as they pointed to another clump of wires; this one more tangled and chaotic. “First; someone who takes this much care with their wires- “They pointed to the neater wires, “-Wouldn’t allow other wires to be so chaotic and tangled.” They pointed to a larger wire, setting their finger on a serial number, “And look at this; this is from an Arkanian language.” They pointed to another wire. “This is-“
“Wait.. that’s universal common, sure… but look at this.” Avery leaned in and pointed not to a wire, but to a motherboard, “Look at the code on this.”
TO frowned as they looked over it, their ears pinning back under their helmet “That’s synth.” They said, The particular way that their own written language worked and the distinct appearance of their lettering didn’t allow for any doubt.
“This is Synth wiring too.” Avery said as they traced their hands from the motherboard to a collection of neater wires, “About half the soldering is Synth too-“
“How can you tell that?” TO asked.
“I worked in Robotics for a while during training.” They said, “They’re very precise, and like to have everything perfect. I got to look at some civilian wiring as well. Honestly, if you compare it…” They shook their head, “Imagine that the way it’s wired, the way everything people work, is like a style of writing. If you look closely, you can notice the difference between the way certain people put these things together. Now.. synths? We’re precise and neat; we manage near mechanical perfection in our work. You can see that here, here, and here.’’ They pointed to different parts of the insides, “But civilians? It’s like the difference between reading something written by an adult and something written by a child. It’s clumsy and blunt. You can see that here almost everywhere else.”
“So it has civilian and synth tech merged-“
“Not only that…” Avery said, “I think a synth might have worked on this.”
“Well, if a synth made it-“
“Not not, not what I mean.” they said, pointing to some of the nicer wiring. “Look at this; This wiring leads from the Synth motherboard to this civilian component here. If they salvaged pieces of our tech to make this, then they must have done this wiring after the insurgents got their hands on this.”
“Right… but.” TO frowned as they looked at the wiring, “The wires are so neat, a synth must have done it.”
Avery nodded and sat down on a nearby crate. “Exactly; same as the bits of synth soldering on civilian tech.” They said, “Not only do they have information about us, but they also have a synth doing wiring for them.”
“It has to be under duress.” TO said as they shook their head, “The insurgency has to be torturing them.”
Avery frowned as they looked into the wires. “Maybe.” they said, “Do you think that the civilians really could figure out a way to break one of us? To break us to where we’d do mechanical work for them?”
“Unless they got information from someone that they questioned.” TO said as they looked over the machine. “Unless they could get them to cooperate.”
“... Or if they choose to cooperate.”
TO scoffed, “What synth would help the insurgents.” TO said, “Civilians, sure; they’re weak, and cave to manipulation easily; they’re selfish and short-sighted. Synths are different. They trained us to be different.”
“But there're synths that differ from normal synths. Like, you, me, DH-“
Like GiDi. Like C12.
“And you think that we’d turn on King Decon because we’re different?” TO asked, “Do you think I would?”
“Of course not.” Avery said, “But it’s something to keep in mind, isn’t it? It’s a possibility to think about.”
Synths helping the insurgency? No synth would do that. No synth would turn against King Decon-... Except TO already knew that they themself would, right? A shiver ran down their spine as they realized they had already said as much to DH; that if King Decon gave them direct orders to kill DH, that they wouldn’t do it.
That they’d turn against King Decon.
What if the Insurgency took DH? What if the insurgency had DH held captive, and said that the only way that they’d be safe is if TO did what they told them to. What would TO do then?
“No point in worrying about this too much until we get more information.” TO said as they started pulling pieces out, “Let’s look through the rest of this, and see if we can get more information; I won’t make any assumptions until I have the entire picture.”
“I don’t think you’ll find that until you find the leader of the insurgents.” Avery said, “If you find them.”
