“If you’d like,” She replied, not even looking over at him as she pulled out stacks of the food packets and held them tightly in her arms, “In not in charge of you, you can do whatever you want.” These were the good food packets, the ones that lasted decades before they went bad. She wasn’t going to let any of them go to waste either, either using them to trade or to just eat herself and not have to worry about getting more food.
"And it became Human, in most ways that mattered." // OxO // OPEN
He nodded. "Alright." He said. He frowned slightly. "I'll help you carry these." He grabbed some more packets, tucking some in the pockets of his admittedly rather threadbare clothes, and holding the rest in his arms. He hadn't been able to get new clothes the entire time he'd been in the Daedalus, and while he had been as gentle as possible on them…they were still showing the signs of age and use.
Thesa glanced over at him and nodded, realizing just how many trips she would have to take to carry everything. “You said this is enough to feed eleven people for a whole year? Three meals a day?” In her head she was doing the math, and if she had done it right, there were over twelve thousand packs of food in this little space. That was more food than she had ever had in one spot at any time in her life.
"No. Twelve people for eleven months." He replied. "There were ten in the crew, plus Alexi, and they packed for one extra person just in case." He replied. "And yes, three meals a day. The Daedalus was designed to not have to restock very often, which is why its engines and such laster so long." He explained. He knew this ship. Had read the manual multiple times, just for something to do.
“Still….that’s over 12,000 packets of food,” She replied in amazement, “How long was the Daedalus in space before it crashed here or whatever?” Thesa piled a few more packets into her arms and looked around, “Wow…this place is a gold mine.” It amazed her that so much food could exist at the same time in the same place.
"I told you already." He said patiently. "A month." He grabbed as many as he could hold, looking over at her with those strange blue eyes. Unlike most androids, his eyes almost seemed to have…some sort of life in them. Some spark of sentience, of knowing.
Thesa looked over at him and nodded, looking at and into his curious blue eyes. She was almost tempted to ask again if he was sure he wasn’t human, his eyes reminded her of no other Android eyes, both in the color and in the almost…life in them. She cleared her throat and looked away, heading back on top her ship with the load of food. Leading Zev, they brought it back to the small table by the data port and dumping them out to look and check all of them to see if they were still good and if she even wanted them, “Alright. I’ll go through these ones before I go get more, you can go do whatever you want Zev.”
Zev nodded, and set the ones he had grabbed down. "I am going to check for a message from Alexi." He replied, and plugged into the dataport. His eyes got that almost glazed look in them, that happened when he was paying more attention to something inside than something outside.
She paid him no attention as he plugged in, going through the food packets. There weren’t many that were expired, and the ones that were missed by a few years at he least. The expired ones she set on the floor, all the other ones she stacked neatly and walked out of the room with to put away in her storage section of the ship. Thesa then went back and got some more, repeating the process while Zev did his thing.
After a bit, Zev unplugged from the dataport, a small smile on his face as he went over the instructions in his mind. He didn't seem to even realize he was smiling, which was odd. Usually when he smiled, it was to mimic human behavior, but now it was just…from some reaction in his circuits that he was having a hard time configuring.
“Good news I’m guessing?” She asked, looking over at him. She was on her second batch of the packets, sorting through them and deciding which ones to keep. Stabby had been mysteriously absent while she worked, which surprised her. Normally her little robot buddy was around anywhere she went.
Zev looked up, the smile disappearing. "Yes. He replied. He says that he would like to know your flight schedule, so that he can arrange to meet up with us as soon as possible." He said, standing up.
Thesa was silent for a moment before she answered, “Well, we probably won’t get this thing fixed for at least another week, and after that I planed on heading to Horath. I need to get another customer and make some more money. These repairs are gonna be spendy when I get back and actually fix it.” She went back to her sorting and went quiet, guessing that someone as rich as Shokov would live on the richest planet around, maybe she could drop Zev off there, she doubted the billionaire or his android would want to go to the one place in the galaxy that was ruleless and wild.
Zev nodded. "I'll tell him. Thank you." He said, looking at Thesa. If he did get taken to Horath with her, he could take care of himself. He knew that. However, it might be difficult finding a good Repairman Android there, considering it was a den of thieves and smugglers, and worse.
“No problem. If he prefers, I can drop you off on a different planet before I go to Horath.” She finished with the pile of food and went to put the good stuff away before grabbing another handful and coming back. Going to a planet like Horath probably wasn’t smart for a one of a kind android, or a billionaire that could easily be taken ransom, Thesa wouldn’t judge, she personally wouldn’t even go to the planet if it wasn’t the only neutral space that wasn’t involved directly in the war and the only place that was relatively cheap these days.
Zev nodded, and hooked himself back up to the dataport, sending the information to Alexi, the unplugging. He looked at Thesa, studying her for a moment. She was the first female human he had met that was the same age he was built to look like, he realized. He straightened. "Shall I continue working on the ship?" He questioned, looking at her.
She shrugged, “Sure, if that’s what you want to do, I won’t tell you what to not do or what to do.” Her eyes flicked over to him and she quickly focused back on her work before she got lost in his blue eyes. The more they both worked on the ship the faster they would get back to civilization, but Thesa didn’t want to leave any food behind. Right now it was her priority, not the ship.
He frowned slightly. "Why not? I am an Android; I am designed to follow orders. Were I any other Android, you would have to tell me what to do, or I wouldn't do anything." He said, cocking an eyebrow slightly.
“You know when you talked about not being able to control any of your actions or what was done with you? I’m trying to give you a little of that freedom before you go back to Alexi and who knows what happens with you.” Her voice didn’t really have an angry tone to it, or an informative voice or anything really. She just sounded like she was trying not to say anything to brash or angry. “Also, if you were any other Android, yes, I would give you orders. But as cliche as it sounds, there’s something different about you. Something you have that I haven’t seen in any other Android. A spark of something inside of you that makes you seem human.”
He listened. "I see." He raised an eyebrow. "Whatever you think you see, it is just programming. I am programmed to act as much like a human as possible, but I am not one. I do not have emotions like you, nor a soul." That was something that had been debated among religious circles for a while. Did androids have souls? It was decided that no, they didn't, as they were created by man.
Thesa rolled her eyes, “That doesn’t mean anything, your face can show a whole range of emotions, you’ve gotta have felt an emotion at least once. Happiness? Sadness? Anger? Any of the basics that even animals can feel?” She shook her head and leaned against the wall, “Maybe all in seeing is faulty wiring or something, but it still not going to make you do anything.” Talking with him made her think. Really think about everything she knew and thought she knew. It was crazy,, and as much as she liked it, it also could get frustrating when she just wanted to prove a point or say something simple that didn’t need to make her think.
"Just because my face is capable of showing emotions does not mean that I have them. As for feeling them… I don't know what it would feel like in the first place." He said. "All Androids are capable of mimicry. The Foxtrot and Tango models do it all the time. It's in their programming." The Foxtrot and Tango models were, for lack of a better word, the sex models. Foxtrot was female, and Tango was male.
“That’s cuz they’re used for that stuff exclusively, yours is different. You know when you smiled after getting a reply from Alexi? You’re saying you didn’t feel a…buzz of excitement?” She refused to believe he didn’t feel emotions, even if he could prove that he didn’t, she refused to believe. It would be a terribly bland world to live in without emotion. She tried to imagine it and couldn’t, emotion was too big of a part in her life.
"I.." Zev hesitated, raising an eyebrow. "That is a good question." He said, looking at her. "However, that could be from the fact that I have not had repairs nor updates in 30 years." He shrugged slightly. The dreams. You have dreamed, Zev. He blinked, looking at Thesa.
She shrugged as well, looking around at the room, “Keep giving me excuses, it won’t change what I think. You feel at least some kind of emotion, I’m sure of it.” Eventually she walked out of the room and back to his ship, scooping up the last giant armful of food packets and bringing them back to sort through. Thesa dumped them on the table and set to work, very softly humming to herself.
"I am an Android. It is not in my programming to feel emotions." Zev countered. "I do not have the capacity for it. I have spent much of my life observing humans and trying to quantify their emotions, and categorize them. I could tell you the exact amounts of Saratonin in each bit of happiness you feel, but i cannot feel happiness myself. I can tell you how, exactly, the fight or flight instinct works in humans, but I myself do not have a fight or flight instinct."
“And I don’t have the capacity to keep arguing with you,” She replied, not looking away from her work, “You’ve gotta have felt something, sometime. Even if you don’t believe it. Alexi wasn’t the type to create a new android that was one of a kind and just make it like every other one ever made.” With the final stack sorted out, she put the good ones away and walked back into the room before. She looked around and eventually took up a spot on the edge of her bed.
"Yes, and I'm not like every other type. I have the ability to form my own thoughts and opinions, and am the closest thing to an individual that an Android can come. I have all the knowledge of the others combined." Zev replied. "That is how I am different. But you must have a soul to be human, and it has already been decided that androids are soulless. You must have emotions to be human, and I do not have them. I am an Android like any other. The only difference is that I do not require direct orders to continue working."
“I’m not saying you’re human, you’re an android, but that doesn’t mean you can’t feel emotions.” She laid back on her bed and sighed, putting a hand behind her head to prop herself up, “I’m saying you’re somewhere between human and Android. You look crazy humanlike from looks to decision making and the argument over emotions, but you have the internals of an android, the thoughts of an android, the straightforward, non human way of thinking.”
Zev nodded. "I don't feel emotions. As I stated, emotions are a human thing, not an Android thing. It is impossible to program something to have emotions." He said. "As you said, i act and think like an Android. Just because you wish and think I have emotions, does not mean that i have them."