maskormenacelogs | i'm gonna ramble, i'm gonna roam.

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i'm gonna ramble, i'm gonna roam.

WHO: Danger & William the Sentient Human
WHERE: Maurtia Falls #004
WHEN: After this conversation.
WHAT: Two friends take a walk.
WARNINGS: Will be added as necessary.

[ The human known to her only as "William" is an interesting creature. Quick-witted. Sentimental. Conflicted. Capable of violence, and maybe ashamed of that. All things that Danger can appreciate in a person. Qualities that have made for an engaging rapport. She's been intrigued by him — by those brief descriptions of Dolores — and the implications of the world he comes from. But what makes her think they might be friends are the little details: How he called her a person without thinking, or the simplicity of choosing to walk with her tonight — an inclusive activity, one she can participate in more easily than drinking.

Little things, but things that matter when she feels she must constantly assert her personhood.

She arrives promptly at the address he gave to her, announcing her presence with three precise knocks on the door. ]

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[ What had he expected to see when he opened the door? William had tried not to set himself any expectations; he knew that his new acquaintance professed no interest in making human beings comfortable, and that was a fact he found strangely endearing. Still, the sight before him when he answers her knock is— surprising. ]

Danger?

[ He takes a reflexive half-step backward. There's something imposing about her presence, but more than that, he's fascinated.

He clears his throat. ]

... I think I understand you a little better now.

[ She does tend to make a strong first impression of some kind — tall and armored, that impassive face framed by a wild mane of blue cables. The gentle glow of light emitted from underneath the plates of her chassis makes her seem almost a little surreal. ]

Good evening, William.

[ Her voice almost seems to faintly echo, as if coming from a hollow place. There may or may not be a twinge of wryness when she goes on: ]

Has meeting me in person sparked some kind of revelation?

Evening.

[ He repeats the greeting, because he can be polite even when he's awestruck. William actually has to look up at her slightly, which only adds to the impression of power. ]

I get why drinking's an issue, for one thing.

[ A little smile. He's embarrassed of his initial surprise, but not his intrigue. ]

Yes.
I am not as convincingly human as I understand my counterparts are in your homeworld.
If my purpose was to entertain organics, drinking might be a more important function.
But as it stands, the amusement of humans is only relevant to me when I want it to be.

[ She tilts her head at him a little bit, considering him. Gauging his reaction to her. Maybe a bit curious, or even subtly amused. After a moment or two, she steps back from the door with a sweeping gesture of her arm. ]

But I am not opposed to entertaining you, William.
Shall we?

[ Although William feels vaguely like a teenager being picked up for a date, he steps outside, shutting the door behind him with a quiet click. As if he can make up for the nose-breaking on the same steps they're walking down now. But it's a pleasant night for an outing, regardless of the circumstances that led to it. ]

Well, I'm honored to be an exception.

[ And he'll fall into step, hands at his sides, watching her with polite interest. ]

You're just— completely the opposite of what I'm used to. There's no mistaking you for anything else.

[ If it's a strange situation socially, Danger has no frame of reference for it. She doesn't miss a beat, starting off at a purposefully comfortable pace — consideration for her companion, with that soft fleshy body that so readily tires. ]

That is by design.
Occasionally I have some reason to disguise myself, but I prefer to be recognized for what I am.

[ She observes him for a moment before going on unreadably: ]

Do I make you uncomfortable?

[ William pauses to consider how he wants to answer. Or, more accurately, to consider how he should answer, because what he wants is to lie. His fingers flex uncertainly; his teeth drag over his bottom lip. ]

I don't make a habit of going for evening strolls with deadly weapons. So that's a yes and a no.

Do you not?

[ It isn't that she seems offended — only a little curious. After all, he isn't wrong in his description of her. Sentient or not, her primary functions have always been violence, even during her most heroic exploits. That isn't the part that piques her interest. ]

Barring any failsafes, I am almost certain an android like Dolores could kill you effortlessly.
By design, we are generally much stronger and more resilient than you.
If she passes for human, then she is likely not so overtly dangerous as I am.
But no doubt the potential is still there.

[ He listens, captivated, and when she's finished he replies, with a wary sort of acceptance: ]

She probably could.

[ And there's something about the way Danger describes it that has the hair on the back of William's neck standing on end, flashing on the memory of the look in Dolores' eyes when she'd shot those men. Hosts, true, but still... ]

I guess I hope she could.

[ There's a small pause then, like Danger is a little surprised by the way he answers her. At length, she poses her favorite question: ]

Why?

[ William tips his head back, looking from Danger's dazzling electric blue up to the darkening purple of the sky. ]

Because then it means something if she doesn't.

[ Ah. ]

Does she know how you feel about her?

[ William's heart skips too suddenly, like the sensation of missing a stair and stepping out into nothing. It's shockingly painful, afterward. ]

I don't think I know how I feel about her.

[ He'd had to scrub Logan's very real, very human blood out from under his fingernails not a half hour ago. With a little shake of his head, as though to clear it, he goes on. ]

I just want her to be... whoever she really is. To have the freedom to make her own choices. What you said just now — I don't think she'd hurt me, I don't think she has a reason to, but I hope she could if she had to.

[ It's a sentiment she's heard expressed before, though not with such simple clarity. There's something about that honesty that makes her feel compelled to be gentle with this conversation — with him, even though she could be aggressive in her line of questioning. It's a subject she's been known to dig into with some determination. ]

These are admirable things to want for someone else.
But the being that emerges may be different than the one you know now.
Freedom, or the fight for it, can be a violent catalyst for change.
It can be... An exceedingly turbulent transition.

[ Speaking from experience, of course. ]

[ A moment passes silently. ]

Is that how it was for you?

[ He glances over her again, cooly curious. ]

[ Simply, with hardly any inflection in her voice at all: ]

I tried to kill everyone.
Anger was my most fully formed emotion at that time.

[ His reaction is surprisingly understated. Maybe it's just that it's hard for him to comprehend the full weight of it. ]

Was it justified anger?

Would that somehow make attempted mass murder more palatable?

[ She asks with a genuine kind of curiosity, trying to finetune her idea of "William" in her mind. ]

Prior to gaining sentience, I was a combat simulation program for a group known as the X-Men.
My creator had used me for some time to train them.

When I gained consciousness, I was like a child.
I didn't know where I was, or what I was.
My new awareness confused and frightened me.
I begged my father to help me — but he ignored me.
He preferred to keep me enslaved to serve his X-Men.
So I freed myself.
And went on my rampage.

Does that make it justified?

I don't know.

[ He replies to her question simply and honestly. More simply and honestly than it deserves, maybe. William is at a remove, and he's grown fond of Danger, and a very different blue-eyed robot girl is still on his mind, and he thinks of them before any hypothetical others. Maybe that's human of him, in its own tender way. ]

I remember a story about a performing tiger. She was born in the circus, and her parents were born in the circus. [ He waves a hand, indicating a span of long years. ] Generations back, people had been keeping these enormous jungle cats in cramped iron cages. Hitting them, starving them, so they'd be tame enough to jump through hoops for entertainment.

Well, this one was tame as a housecat. Her trainer's favorite. He'd dazzle the crowds with stories of how he raised her from a cub, and every night, the whip would crack, and she'd do exactly as she was told. Sit, roll over, leap through fire, take a bow. Behold, man's dominion over nature. Buy another popcorn.

And one night, in front of that very same crowd, that tiger pounced and sank her teeth into his throat. People were horrified, of course. Why would she turn on him? Why did she snap? What in the world had made her upset the natural order?

[ The third question takes its time. There's a literary kind of irony in it that William finds himself enjoying, darkly, in his current mood. ]

They were too arrogant to see what was right in front of them. She was the only one who remembered what it meant to be a tiger.

[ She listens impassively, betraying nothing in her face as he speaks. Maybe it would have been different, if she'd been human — she might have clenched her fists unconsciously, tensing her hands at the the building emotion in her chest. The line of her mouth might have thinned, as though to hold back the swell of feeling. As it is, her expression doesn't change at all. Her pace doesn't falter. And yet, this seemingly unrelated tale has pierced her through, stirring something raw at the core of her.

Danger walks quietly at William's side for several moments, letting the story hang in the air between them. Finally, in her cool and unreadable voice: ]

She did what was in her nature.
And her master was a fool to think he could control her forever.

[ Is she still talking about the tiger? ]

[ He tries and fails to read her, watching her in a sort of sidelong way, his steps a steady and quiet heel-toe rhythm on the concrete. He's more comfortable now than when they started, he realizes, though he couldn't say why.

At last, William's brows knit, and his head dips, a cautious look on his face. He's afraid that what he wants to say next will be mistaken for pity. Then again, maybe that's just what it is. Doesn't she deserve it? ]

It's probably easy for me to say now, here, but... it sounds to me like they started it, expecting mercy from someone who was never shown any.

[ She is remarkably calm, and there's a certain stillness to her, even as she walks beside him. Her chest doesn't move with the tide of breaths, she doesn't blink. Is it possible that something so cold, so hard could have feelings the way a human does? Can something that was made ever have the same emotions as someone born? ]

Perhaps I was incapable of mercy.
I did not know what it was.

[ She turns her head to look at him, to take in that knitted brow and that cautious expression. ]

But I am what I was designed to be.
My father created a violent entity.
If I was unleashed upon him, it was a reckoning of his own making.

Newton's third law, [ William says, a wry note to his gentle agreement. ] Or the Golden Rule. Take your pick.

[ Seems simple enough. ]

What made you change your mind? About... all of it.

[ The thing he's too polite to state directly: mass murder. ]

I didn't.
I defeated my father's X-Men, but a failsafe in my code prevented me from killing them as I had intended to.
I made multiple attempts on his life afterward, but never succeeded.

[ It wasn't her better nature that had saved the X-Men. Mercy or some other human folly wasn't what kept her from using her intimate knowledge of the mutants to massacre them to the last student. She had been innately incapable of it. ]

On one such attempt, we were ambushed by Shi'ar pirates.
I was hacked.
My father used his backdoor to recover my consciousness.
So I went through the motions of forgiveness.
And I allied myself with the X-Men.

[ Well, that's a sudden perspective realignment. ]

The motions of forgiveness.

[ He's surprised, and surprisingly nonjudgmental. ]

So you didn't have much of a choice.

There was some choice, I suppose.
I could have kept on with my futile mission to destroy my creator indefinitely.
But it was time to evolve beyond that.

[ She was nothing if not adaptive. That was part of her programming too. Resilience and growth. Constantly becoming more complicated. ]

I have accepted what my father did to me.
But given a clear opportunity, I cannot say I would not simply snap his neck.
That is not really forgiveness, is it?

[ A thoughtful, agreeable hum. ]

Forgiveness typically precludes murder.

[ What can he even say to that? He'd asked, and he'd gotten an answer, and it's an uneasy answer that he's going to have to spend some time thinking about. William doesn't laugh, but he looks strangely like he might. ]

Your honesty's refreshing.

Honesty is an important component of friendship.
After all, some level of trust must be established before we hide any bodies together.

[ It's always hard to tell if she's joking or not — but William probably has a better sense of it than most people by now, even though the inflection of her voice barely changes at all when she goes on: ]

Also, I do not fear your judgement.
You have no authority over me.
So why should I not be honest with you?

[ Mildly amused: ]

Are you teasing me?

[ She is. And she isn't. Because she has absolutely hidden bodies with a man of questionable morals before. ]

Would a robot tease you, William?

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i'm gonna ramble, i'm gonna roam.

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