Zev waited, arms behind his back. Maybe this person could help him. They sounded female, perhaps in their twenties. Maybe she would let him join her on her ship. Or if hers was too badly damaged, her bioprint could unlock the Daedalus's cockpit, and they could pilot it away. He had a strange yearning inside him to see…Alexi Shokov. To see his creator. The man he had called "father".
"And it became Human, in most ways that mattered." // OxO // OPEN
With a yank on the handle, the door opened and she glanced into the ruined cockpit. She scowled and glanced over at the boy inside, her knife held non threateningly against her side, though she wouldn’t hesitate to use it. “This your ship?” She asked, jabbing her chin towards the other ship. Thesa smoothly made her way to where the front controls would be and cursed. The whole thing was twisted and dented.
Zev hesitated. "Sort of." He replied. It is not mine, but…it isn't anyone else's, either. "I assume that this one is yours?" He asked. "I have not seen it's kind before." He wondered if she would notice that his own ship was thirty years old. That if she listened, she could hear the engines struggling sometimes. That a lot of the lights no longer worked, or flickered a lot.
“It is. Hand built and one of a kind,” She said, crouching down and opening a half bent open panel to see if there was anything worth salvaging inside. “Dammit.” She cursed, pulling out a mess of wires and trying to untangle them. Thesa set her knife next to her, ready to defend herself if needed while she tried to find a small red wire in the mess.
Zev stepped forward, looking over the controls. "My ship's controls should still be in working order." He said. "We could tow your ship behind it." He looked at her. He couldn't get into the cockpit of his ship. If she could just…open it for him. That was all he needed. Her bioprint, to open the doors.
Waving a hand dismissively, she continued to untangle the wires. “I’ll be fine, might just have to borrow some spare parts. And it might take a while, but I’ll manage without making you tow my ship.” Her brows furrowed and she looked back behind the panel when she didn’t find the wire. That was the one wire she needed to pilot the ship.
Zev nodded. "Oh." What now? "I have a favor to ask of you, then." He said. He was still waiting for her to realize what he was, though he found himself not wanting to say it outright. It was nice, being treated as a human. As an equal. "It wouldn't take very long."
She tipped back on her feet and looked over at him, studying him and deciding he was around her age, “What do you need?” Her hand drifted to her knife and she slipped it into a sheath on her leg over her very oil stained cargo pants of sort. He didn’t seem hostile and she didn’t have any gut feeling against him, so she figured he wasn’t going to lead her into a trap. Still she was slightly wary though.
"I…have been drifting out here for thirty years." Zev admitted. "Because the cockpit of my ship needs a human bioprint to be opened." He looked at her levelly, waiting for the realization that he wasn't human. The automatic recoil as she realized that she hadn't been able to tell the difference. Then suspicion, as she asked who he was and why he didn't look like a normal Android.
“Aren’t you a huma….” She trailed off her sentence and looked closer at him, head tipping to the side in confusion, “You're not, are you? You don’t look like a robot or android, and I’m fairly certain you’re not an alien.” Thesa stood up and took a few steps closer to him, looking for any sign that he wasn’t what she though he was. “What are you then?” It was probably rude to look for any sign of non humanness on him, but she didn’t care at all. The thought of him just fixing the holes around the ship popped into her mind and she sighed, shaking her head at her stupidity for not realizing he hadn’t needed a suit or anything, “You are a robot. But how? All the other models are very easy to tell they’re not human.”
Zev looked down. "My name is Zev." He replied. "Shokov model Z." He glanced over at her. Waiting for the exclamation of "Shokov never made a model Z!" He wasn't sure he should have told him about that, but… this might be his only chance to leave. To get somewhere other than drifting in space for the rest of eternity.
“Nice joke,” She rolled her eyes as she responded, “Shokov never made a model Z. Almost got me there, but I’m not an idiot.” Thesa shook her head and went back over to her ruined controls so she could get back to work, “My name is Thesa, I’m guessing you weren’t lying about your name being Zev.”
Zev sighed. "I really can't open the door…" He trailed off, and extended his left hand. He dug the fingers of his right hand into the small, invisible seam line, and peeled back the skin to expose the wiring and metal beneath. He winced slightly. He still felt pain, despite being an android. If necessary, he would take off his shirt and show her the mark on his chest.
When she looked back at him and saw him peeling back his skin on the palm of his hand, she gasped. She stood up and walked back over with a confused and look that said she though he was insane until she saw the wires. “I guess Shokov did make another model,” She mumbled to herself, looking up at him and jabbing a thumb towards his ship, “How long did you say you were trapped here? And why in the world haven’t I seen more androids in the model Z?”
"Thirty years. You haven't seen others because I am the only one." Zev replied, looking at her. He winced slightly as he put his skin back together. "I was…not meant to become a mass produced model." He wondered vaguely if she would notice that he spoke and behaved more human than a normal android.
“One more question. Why do you sound and look so….humanlike?” She watched as he put the skin back together and was amazed when the seam disappeared. It was enough to make her wonder if this was all a dream as she walked back to her destroyed controls and crouched down to start working again. Her hazel eyes flicked around for any sign of a red wire, not that it was much help in the quite dark and shaded underside of the controls.
"I was designed this way. To be one of a kind." He said, watching her. "Is there anything I can help with?" He wanted to help, in any way he could. His programming gave him the ability to do virtually anything.
Thesa shrugged, “Do you know how to rewire controls? I can try to bend the panels into roughly the right shape again, then I just have to rewire and hope there aren’t any problems with the engines or signals going to anything.” Her mind was already busy with what needed to be done and she only glanced at him once as she started digging around inside the controls.
He stepped over, and crouched down to examine the wiring. "Let me see." He examined it critically. "I can fix it. You need a new wire. I know where to get one." He straightened. "Come." He walked out of her ship, heading into the Daedalus.
He didn’t leave her much room to choose to follow or not, and honestly, she admired it. She stood up and followed after him, onto his ship and to wherever he led. Leaving the safety of her ship, she glanced back at it one more time before shaking her head and deciding the only way to get it back into working condition was to trust Zev.
Zev led her through the halls of the ship. The life support was running, though he didn't need it. He led her to the mechanical section, and started looking for the right wires. He had used some of the parts to repair himself over the years, and a lot of them to repair areas of the ship. He started looking through the wires, which he had neatly organized.
“Dang, you organize well,” She said softly, running her hand over the carefully organized wires and other electrical parts, “And even though these parts are all really old, we should be able to get something to work until I can replace them with newer parts.” Thesa started looking for the right wires as well, though she was very careful not to mess his system up.
"Is the war still going on?" Zev asked, glancing at her for a moment before returning to looking for the correct wire. "I…haven't had any news or contact with anyone else for the past thirty years." He picked up a wire, examining it carefully, then putting it back, and kept looking.
She nodded. “The war hasn’t stopped, and has no sign of stopping. Both sides are still going hard, though they’re running low on supplies and everything else.” There wasn’t any sign of the exact wire she needed, but she found a few she could twist together and make a makeshift wire that could hold together until she fixed it. She took the wires she could use and shrugged, “I don’t really pay much attention to the war. It helps fuel my business and that’s all I care about it.”
Zev nodded. "You will end this war, or make it last forever. When people find out about you…they'll want you. You are the perfect weapon, Zev." His creators words came back to him. "I see." He said. "I thought maybe it would have stopped by now…" He trailed off, and picked up a wire. "This should work." He handed it to her.
“Nope. The idiots that run the planets are exactly that. Idiots that show no sign of letting the others win. They almost remind me of spoiled toddlers in that way.” She said, taking the wire and nodding in thanks as she put the other ones back. “Do you happen to have any other wires by chance I could borrow just in case? Anything for the controls that might need to be fixed.” Thesa looked over to Zev and studied him again, still amazed to believe he wasn’t a human but an android.
Zev nodded, and pulled out a few more, handing them to her. "I…have a favor to ask again." He said. "Could you either unlock the cockpit, or take me with you? Otherwise…I'm stuck here for who knows how much longer." He said, looking at her. His face was expressionless, as was typical of androids. A human would have looked nervous, maybe bit their lip or fidgeted, but he just stood there, looking at her.
She shrugged and nodded, “Sure, I can do both even. As long as you help get my baby back up and running you’re free to come along as long as you want.” With the extra wires in her hand. She motioned for him to lead the way, “One more condition too, you gotta just stop staring at me. It’s the one thing that gives away your non humanness.”
Zev frowned slightly. "Okay. Why is that a bad thing?" He had asked a similar question, once. To his creator. Alexi. He had gotten the answer of: "Because you look so human. If you don't tell people what you are, they won't figure it out. Unless you do that stare of yours. That one that gives it away so easy." "And is it a bad thing that I am not human?"
"It's just creepy, and makes me feel weird," She admitted, shifting on her feet and playing with the wires. Thesa shook her head at his next question, "No, it's not a bad thing at all, just when you look so humanlike and act so humanlike, it's hard to remember you're not one." She eventually just stuffed the wires into her pocket, knowing she would mess with them as long as she could otherwise.