Well, that was something of a plan. I suppose I had better talk with them and set things in motion, or better yet, see if we could put this whole tiresome incident behind us.
I said, "Interfering with support personnel is against regulations. Urination upon sensitive equipment also qualifies."
"Who the fuck is that?" the man said. In the time I'd been considering the situation, he had managed to get his pants open.
"Emma, you're up!" the girl said. Her voice indicated strains of pain and stress.
"You've got a friend?" the man said. "Hell, more the merrier. Come on out, girl. I've got something to show you."
I was not impressed with his mental faculties.
"Urinating on sensitive electronics will be discouraged. If you wish to urinate on the technician, it is asked that you go elsewhere," I said.
"You sick or something? Though, I guess if that's your thing..." the man said, hiking up his pants.
"He's a bit more into the raping me to death than pissing on me, and he wants you to be impressed at the size of his dick," the girl said.
"Honestly, I was kind of planning on both. Raping first, though," said the man.
The girl made a face. "I'd prefer in that order. Emma!"
I really didn't like how much she kept using my name or the volume levels she managed to reach. Of course now, the male had confirmed his intent to permanently hinder a service technician, which made him even more unlikable.
"Barnacles can have penises that are roughly forty times the size of their body. Some species of duck manage twice the length of their body. If I praise him for his impressively small size, is he likely to depart?" I asked.
"The fuck?" said the man, and he gestured to the girl on the floor. "You, stay the fuck there. Where is this smart-mouthed bitch.”?
"You see the round thing in the middle of the room? I'm in there," I said.
"You were trying to get in there to hide with her," the man said, sounding like he'd figured out some great mystery. "Well, get ready sweetheart."
The man moved towards the open panel. I waited until he was standing in front of it.
I triggered the emergency cooling system. It was only meant to be used in the event of a massive overheat, liquid nitrogen spraying in a fine mist.
It wasn't enough to hit all his body, but it did at least manage a nice coating on that malformed appendage he seemed so very fond of that was protruding by several inches.
It was his turn to scream, stumbling backwards a few steps. The organ in question had been frozen solid.
The girl pushed herself to her feet, pulling a wrench from her belt.
"Dude. You've got the worst case of blue balls I've ever seen. Why don't you let me help you get one off," the girl said, and took a swing with the wrench. The impact caused the frozen flesh to shatter, bits of organ flying through the room as the man collapsed to the floor.
The girl wasted no time, bringing the wrench down again and again onto his skull. There was the crunch of bone. It was a good thirty seconds until she stopped, breathless.
"I should have gone with a hard joke. Or maybe a screw driver and I could have asked if he wanted to screw. That would have good, right?" the girl asked.
"You don't seem to be very good at this. I'd start a list of things you aren't very good at, but I fear there are limits to my file sizes," I said.
"Yep. You're an Emma," the girl said, fumbling for her top and closing it, before kicking the corpse. "I'm Anna."
"Two vowels around two consonants. It's a stupid name. It suits you," I said.
"They went a little overboard on your mean programming. I like it. Let me tell you why I reactivated you," Anna said.
2
I double-checked my systems just to make sure that the coolant venting hadn't done any harm. It hadn't—to me, which really was the only important thing.
"Do you remember anything?" Anna asked.
That was a rude and impertinent question, largely because I didn't.
"I remember saving you. My life is filled with questionable choices," I said.
Anna said, "So that's a no. I wasn't sure you would. They worked hard to scrub you and physics aren't very friendly to you here anyways. You wouldn't be functional at all without the Power core."
That was perhaps the first interesting thing she had said. There was something strange attached to me, I could feel it in my network, and through my cameras I could see it in my hardware. Some kind of softly glowing crystal.
"I see we can add explaining things to the long list of things Anna doesn't do well," I said.
Anna winced and leaned against the wall. I noticed a dark stain along one arm. Blood, perhaps, the woman was injured.
"It is hard to explain and I'm not sure how it is going to manifest with you. Try accessing its files or something, tell me what you see," Anna said.
More impertinence, but I was curious.
I pinged the unusual mass within my consciousness and got a response a moment later. There did seem to be some sort of connectivity and communication present.
I opened a connection session much like I would for any system.
E.M.M.A
Underground Facility
Power Core: 50
Power Usage: 10
Habitability: 1
Biomass: 0
Research: 0
Military: 0
Manufacturing: 0
Resources
Rubble: 122
Traits
Insulting — Nearly everything you say will be offensive and insulting, and provoke others to reckless behavior.
Brilliant — Research times for new technologies are halved.
You have an unspent core point.
Core points can enhance your competencies and open up new options for Research and Manufacturing.
Your options are:
Research 1
Research 1 will allow you to build the Testing Center. The Testing Center allows you to dissect corpses and begin research projects. It also serves as a prison where prisoners can be subjected to experiments for ongoing research gains.
Military 1
Military 1 will allow you to build defense drones. Defense drones are mobile weapon platforms capable of base defense and attacks at a distance. While basic in function they can ultimately be updated to become formidable weapon platforms.
Manufacturing 1
Manufacturing 1 will allow the production of automated minions. They are capable of autonomous facility repair and will half all build and production times for new facilities.
These prompts were foolish. I wasn't insulting, I was honest. And surely I could build anything I wanted? I didn't need to invest in any points to do that. Yet, at the same time, I was faced with the realization that I didn't know how to build any of those things.
I searched my systems and found some basic abilities. I could construct a simple drone that I should be able to control and move remotely, but the Military or Manufacturing capabilities seemed distinctly limited.
I didn't like it. I thought Anna might have some information about what was going on. I explained to her the options I was offered.
"Interesting, I wasn't expecting that. I thought you'd be manifesting abilities as an intelligence and not as a structure," Anna said, her voice a little weaker.
I began the production of a drone. Apparently it would take an hour.
"Your intelligence is obviously not proportional to your hips. What were you expecting?" I asked.