Network Effect (The Murderbot Diaries, #5)

by Martha Wells

“If I thought he was going to hurt you, I’d be disposing of his body. I don’t fuck around, either.” She stopped and stared up at me.

(Yeah, I assumed it was about me, but humans assume everything is about them, too. It’s not an uncommon problem, okay?)

And then I sort of blackmailed her.

(None of which I got to use during the one actual attack on the facility, but though it was tempting, “advance planning sucks” seems to be the wrong lesson to take from that whole incident.)

“This transport. What did you do to the bot pilot?” ART was so much more than a bot pilot but I didn’t have a word for what it was.

“We deleted it, of course.”

“Angry, then afraid, then dead. Is that the right order?”

I knew what its opinion was worth.

“There’s something you’re not telling me and it’s scaring me! I’m not a fucking hero like my second mom or a genius like everybody else in my family, I’m just ordinary, and you’re all I’ve got!” I wasn’t expecting that. It was so far from what I thought she had meant, and she was so upset, that the truth inadvertently came out. “My friend is dead!”

Got you, you piece of

(Actually, ART would have laughed at the part where it sent back a code bundle that would have eaten my face.)

ART had stopped pinging me but I knew it was listening. It’s like having a malign impersonal intelligence that is incapable of minding its own business reading over your shoulder.

I told her, “It’s an anagram. It stands for Asshole Research Transport.” Amena blinked. “That’s not an anagram.”

I should have known this was going to turn into an interrogation.

Tell her you care about her. Use those words, don’t tell her you’ll eviscerate anything that tries to hurt her.

So yeah, I’d lied to her.

(If I got angry at myself for being angry I would be angry constantly and I wouldn’t have time to think about anything else.) (Wait, I think I am angry constantly. That might explain a lot.)

Amena repeated the question, adding to me, “Rentals” is a creepy way to talk about people. Yes, Amena, no shit, I know that.

(Normal = neutral expression concealing existential despair and brain-crushing boredom.)

ART, who I couldn’t block because it’s a monster,

I stood there accusingly, not looking at her. She tried to hold it in and managed it for almost six seconds, then burst out, “ART should know how you really feel about it! And this is serious, it’s like—you and ART are making a baby just so you can send it off to get killed or deleted or—or whatever might happen.”

I am actually alone in my head, and that’s where 90 plus percent of my problems are.

She just looked more certain. “You’re Peri’s SecUnit.” Oh, ART’s humans had a cute pet name for it. I saved that to permanent archive immediately.

(Confession time: that moment, when the humans or augmented humans realize you’re really here to help them. I don’t hate that moment.)

CodeBundle.FuckThisToo

Which was not what I needed right now, cut off from the feed and ART’s cameras and my drones. I said, “ART, I thought you told them about me.” ART said, I told them I had met a rogue SecUnit. I didn’t imply that you were every SecUnit ever mentioned in the newsfeeds