[Voice Test] Connor & Peter - Seasons Greetings

[st_abilitylost]

Of every face that Connor’s internal database failed to recognize since the beginning of his short stay, the only source of familiarity was found in the inanimate statues of Mr. and Mrs. Claus mounted in the lobby. He recognzied then as symbols of generosity and goodwill towards all humanity, but something about the way the sculptor chose to craft their features seemed...off.

He didn’t have any business lingering and passing judgements on the craftsmanship but there was no lieutenant to bark at him for “spacing out” and it all left him at, for lack of a better phrase, a loss.

Comments

[st_arkintern]

"No, no, I wasn't going to," Peter says quickly. Did people generally hurt androids? Peter doesn't know. Instead, he steps back, and back, and back again, and surveys the area. Then satisfied, he races forward, then launches himself up onto the ceiling where he easily sticks to the bright pink surface.

Peter turns to look down at Connor and smiles, then waves. "See?"

[st_abilitylost]

The moment Peter started in, Connor preconstructed each potential movement. A tackle? A feint? Some attack with a hidden weapon? In a split second, Connor had the option to dodge, retaliate, or keep still--and he opted to do the latter in a show of good faith. In the next moment, Connor felt it fortuitous he chose to observe, as the boy sprung up at the ceiling in an utterly unanticipated move, and his eyes caught every movement. Connor appeared as baffled as he ever would as he stared back up.

And then, just so he could be sure his visual processing units weren't malfunctioning, he self-scanned and then reconstructed the great leap on loop several times.

Connor cleared his throat. No malfunctions here. He ran the visual data through his usual process of analyzation. "Enhanced speed, strength, dexterity, shock resistance...potentially the ability to alter the inter-atomic interactions between yourself and external surfaces. Is that accurate?"

[st_arkintern]

"Yeah, that all sounds right," Peter says, still looking down at Connor. "I also use my web-shooters."

Peter demonstrates; he turns his hand knuckle face-forward and slings his fingers out. With a flick of the wrist, Peter sends a shot of web fluid at a wall. It stretches long against it in a classic spider's web shape.

[st_abilitylost]

Connor's head followed the initial shot, pausing each moment in time to calculate its trajectory, the way it reacted with air, and how it adhered to the wall to splay out into a distinctly arachnid pattern. However, merely seeing wasn't believing, especially when the mysterious substance was low enough to touch.

"Web-shooters." He repeated, approaching the curious formation on the wall. He rubbed his two forefingers over the hardening substance, ending up with some sticky white residue on the pads of his digits. Without thinking twice, he pressed it to his tongue like it was sugar.

[st_arkintern]

Peter's eyes widen and he drops to the ground without realizing it; his spidey-reflexes go off, same as they might if he were a cat who was suddenly dropped, and he lands cleanly on the ground.

"Don't -- don't eat that stuff," Peter says, scrambling to Connor's side. "It'll make you sick."

[st_abilitylost]

Connor focused as he processed the substance on his tongue. It acted much like the silk of a web building spider, but chemically it was distinct—more similar to nylon.

“I’m not eating it.” He rubbed his fingers together to encourage the polymers to degrade a bit quicker. “I’m analyzing it. This doesn’t come from your own biomass, correct?”

[st_arkintern]

Peter blinks, watching wordlessly as Connor pulls his fingers away and rubs them against one another. It takes a few long moments after Connor is done speaking for Peter to register that he was being asked a question.

"No," he says. "I made it. In science lab."

[st_abilitylost]

“I don’t have a reference pool for superheroes,” Connor began, continuing to rub the stubborn fluid between his digits, “But by most definitions, the tensile strength of your creation is formidable.”

[st_arkintern]

Peter smiles with pride.

"Yeah," he says. "Thank you. It took me a really long time to get the formula right. I still work on improving it here, too." With more limited resources than he had back at home. He'd been able to bring some stuff back from the OtherWorlds, but...

"Did you want to try my web-shooters out?"

[st_abilitylost]

Connor angled his head slightly to one side, looking between Peter’s face and the tool on his wrist. This human was considerably more generous with his time and resources than most. Human children were known to bond to their android caregivers and treat them as playmates, but generally teenagers were disillusioned.

“I wouldn’t want to waste your fluid, Peter. It seems like it was quite an effort to create and accrue. But I appreciate your offer.” Connor finally replied after a moment’s consideration.

[st_arkintern]

"There's not a lot to do here," he says. "I mean, yeah, I got classes, but most of the time I'm just messing around with stuff like my web-fluid."

That and a suit design, though that had sort-of been tabled since Tony showed up.

"If you ever change your mind, let me know."

[st_abilitylost]

“They suit you better than they would suit me.” Connor smiled briefly, folding his hands in front of himself. “My place is to simply to assist where I’m needed.”

[st_arkintern]

Peter isn't quite sure that anyone who didn't know his secret identity would tell him as much, but he accepts the compliment all the same.

Still...

My place.

"What do you want to do, though?" Peter asks.

[st_abilitylost]

When humans asked loaded questions, it was easiest to play ignorant and continue on. They had a fondness for arguing, after all. But while Peter was being generous with his time, Connor elected to be straightforward as a courtesy.

"What I 'want' is to to progress with my mission. Unfortunately, at current it seems impossible."

[st_arkintern]

"Yeah," Peter says, agreeable, because who doesn't want to progress with their mission? It had taken him weeks to acknowledge and accept their situation fully and even longer to find new objectives that could be met here, in this place. "But now that you can't, what would you want to do?"

[st_abilitylost]

“Remain alert for the earliest possible opportunity to fulfill my goal.” He’d already run through the scenarios in his head and deemed vigilance as the best course of action. He could not contact CyberLife, nor Hank, and assistance was uncertain.

[st_arkintern]

Peter finds himself wishing that he had talked to Vision even once to know if any of this were normal. Movies and TV and books had such varied depictions of androids that it was hard for Peter to know what "normal" was for androids.

Then again, was there a normal for humans, either?

Peter quickly pushes the thought away and returns mentally to the conversation at hand.

"You can't do that and something else at the same time?"

[st_abilitylost]

“I can’t afford distractions, Peter.” Connor spoke as if he was patiently talking to a student in need of clarification. “I’m programmed with only one goal in mind. I can’t stray from it.”

[st_arkintern]

"Can't?" Peter repeats. "Are you physically unable to or are you not permitted to?"

[st_abilitylost]

Connor considered his words. Humans often projected emotions onto androids—that was by design, naturally. Why else would the android design resemble humans as closely as possible? The only time he argued with Hank over this very point was when it interfered with the efficacy of their investigation. That, and the most reliable method of communication with the man was by pushing back. With softer spoken types, that wasn’t necessary.

“It is possible for me to engage in activities that don’t directly interfere with my investigation. It is impossible for me to subvert my programming by acting against my directives.” He clarified.

[st_arkintern]

"Do you know Isaac Asmiov?" he asks. There's a pause there before Peter continues. "The Three Rules of Robotics?"

[st_abilitylost]

So they both had some historical figures in common, Connore noted. He nodded. "From his famous short story, 'Runaround.'"

Connor dipped his hand into his pocket, feeling the coin that sat within. He brought it out but kept from flicking it about, merely rubbing it between his fingers with traces of the fluid on them.

"'One - A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm. Two - A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law. Three - A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws.'" He recited, feeling the alloy warm beneath his touch.

"He added another near the end of his later novel, 'Foundation and Earth.' 'Zero - A robot may not injure humanity, or, by inaction, allow humanity to come to harm.'"

[st_arkintern]

"Yeah," Peter says, nodding. He should have known Connor would know exactly what he was talking about -- at least if they were from similar Earths, anyway. "Is that kind of what you follow?"

[st_abilitylost]

"It's more or less what we are programmed to obey. There are those of us who deviate, however. My mission is to track down those that do." Connor flicked his coin up into the air with a sharp jerk of his thumb.

[st_arkintern]

"Are you like Deckard from Blade Runner?" he asks. He's not sure if Blade Runner exists in Connor's reality, but if Asimov did, Philip K. Dick probably did, too.