Humble beginnings

Uzi grunted as she pried the panel open on the ship's leg, the seams had melted into each other on entry of Copper-9’s orbit, she didn’t even want to think about the internals right now.

She started pulling at melted wire when she heard the sound of footsteps in the snow. “Hey Uzi! I'm back” N’s voice was clear as a bell in the silence of the spire. “I found that rubber cement stuff you wanted, and a bunch of copper wire that was only a little bit chewed on!” 

Uzi grabbed a fistful of melted rubber and yanked at it. “Good job, N!” she shouted to him from the other side of the spire. “Just put it with the other stuff, and I'll sort it later” she heard N give a quick “you got it!” as he flew over to where they had been storing materials for the drop pod.

The tangle of wires came free after a few more minutes of yanking, Uzi knew they were not salvageable, so she didn’t care about being gentle with them.

She finally sat up from her spot near the leg, feeling her endoskeleton creaking from how cold it was as she did so, the balance stabilisers in her spine recalibrated themselves as she stood. So far It had been hours of tedious work for very little payoff, she hadn’t even started fixing the drop pod yet. This entire past two weeks were her just removing all the unusable parts, and at the rate it was going, ‘unusable parts’ was going to encompass 90% of the whole damn ship!

Uzi trudged her way over to the pile, where N was waiting with a still tied up V. She needed a break from working on the drop pod, but she didn't want to stop work entirely for the night. And sorting supplies was as good a distraction as any.

She sat herself down on a musty floor cushion N had scavenged from an old apartment building for her, in front of her were several piles of various materials, organised by type and quality. Copper wires, rubber tubing, power cores and batteries, various tapes and adhesives, magnets, electronics, and a whole auto shop’s worth of tools. 

Everything a drone like Uzi needed to fix the drop pod.

V piped up from where she was tied to the wheely chair. “Y’know, I don’t know what's dumber” she kicked her legs out and started spinning lazily. “N deciding to side with a bunch of toasters, or you, thinking you can actually make it to earth in that thing” she used one of her legs to point at the drop pod.

“V, don't say that” N turned to look at where Uzi was hunched on the floor. “I'm sure the pod will get us to earth just fine, right, Uzi?”

“Oh, no” Uzi replied casually as she checked the casing of a small power core for cracks.

V and N looked at each other before flicking their optics back to the worker. “What?” N couldn't hide his confusion, if they weren't using the pod to get to earth, then why bother fixing it in the first place?

Uzi snorted as she rummaged through the pile. “No, you goober, we're using the drop pod to get to one of the ships stuck in orbit around Copper-9 then we'll use THAT to get to earth” 

V giggled derisively from her chair.“You mean the ships that have been sitting in the caustic atmosphere for years, y’know, the ones that are more rust than actual metal?” V blew into the stupid bubble wand that was currently her hand. Sending a cascade of bubbles down into Uzi’s face.

Uzi waved the bubbles away with a huff. “Sure, if YOU mean the ships that are currently housing trillions of repair bugs and surrounded by enough space junk to repair an entire fleet, then yes, those ships” 

N blinked owlishly. “I'm not sure if I understand” 

Uzi groaned as she got up, grabbing a screwdriver as she went. “UGH, it’s literally the most simple plan ever just, look”. Uzi used the screwdriver to start drawing out her plan in the snow. 

“Step one: we fix the drop pod and get into orbit, that should be simple enough.” 

“Step two: we find a ship with repair bugs and an Alchemy Engine-and V before you bitch at me, I KNOW at least one of the ships has one, I checked the standard loadouts in a manual so BITE ME- and we activate them to begin repairing the ship.” 

“Step three: harvest resources and perform necessary upgrades while we wait for the ship to fix itself”

“Step four: fly the repaired ship to earth” 

“Step five: KILL ALL HUMANS!” 

“And last but not least, step six: RUB IT IN EVERYONE ELSE’S FACES! HA!”

N and V watched wordlessly as Uzi devolved into mad cackling, when she eventually calmed down, N used it as an opening to speak. “Upgrades?”

Uzi stood up and dusted the snow off her hoodie. “Huh?, oh, well, yeah” she started fiddling with the screwdriver again. “It’s not like you guys would stand much of a chance against the humans if you can’t even beat the sun”

N blinked at her, he had never thought of having upgrades before, JCJenson had made it clear to them that their ability to self repair made any upgrades obsolete. But to be fair, JCJenson also sent them to Copper-9 with no way to get back and zero ways to sustain themselves after they completed the mission, so he probably shouldn't use them as a baseline for this.

“Uzi…” he swallowed. “You would do that for us?” he hunched his shoulders in, trying to make himself seem smaller. She had already done so much for him and V, and now she was willing to fix them too? Even after he had killed all those drones, and almost killed her?

…didn’t she know that there was no way they would be able to pay her back for this? Even if he never laid hands on a worker again, he couldn’t think of anything that he would be able to offer that would mean as much to her as what she was offering meant to him.

Uzi looked back at him. “JCJ fucked you guys over just as much as us worker drones, if we’re allowed to fix all the stupid bullshit they did to us, then so are you” she said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world, like these upgrades were just standard practice and not a kind of freedom that N could only dream of before now.

She lightly smacked his shoulder, her arm laden with various materials, a smirk big and vicious on her face. “Now come help me with the pod, those busted panels aren't going to pry themselves off”

N felt his mouth curve up into a smile. “Sure thing buddy! You know I love doing anything”

End notes

Cover art by me.