"For Parts or Repair"
1. "Total Worthless Junk" repairs
2. "Power-On Self Test" she awakens
3. "Perks of Needing Wall Power" she begins to learn things about matt and the world
4. ??? she learns sadness but also happies
5. ??? i think matt should promise to take care of her. she knows shes outdated hardware, the failures are becoming component-level


1. "Total Worthless Junk"
THRIFTER.COM, your #1 local online reselling platform!
Login: *******
Password: *********

Search in area code 60418

"LIQUIDATION SALE, 2751 ANDOVER LN., OLD NEWARK, IL ...
VINTAGE FILM EQUIPMENT, NEON SIGNS, TOOLS, $20/BAG, MAY 9-12, 9a-4p ... ALL DEALS ACCEPTED...
...UNIT IS TOTAL WORTHLESS JUNK. MISSING PARTS, NO RAM, POWER ADAPTER... CRACKED CASING, CRACKED OPTIC SCREENS, BROKEN USB PORT. WILL NOT TURN ON. FOR PARTS OR REPAIR ONLY. SOLD AS-IS. COMES WITH ALL PARTS SHOWN. NO RETURNS ACCEPTED."

A 2018 Crosstrek pulls into a busted asphalt lot. Dandelions grow from the cracks between faded parking lines and concrete stoppers.

A young man steps out, dressed right for the hot day. In huge letters at the front of the warehouse of a building: ANDOVER THEATER. "Now showing" - a movie released three years ago. There's tables set up, people ambling about, looking at dusty items.

With a crisp wad of cash, the young man approaches the person he knows is in charge. Hands the cash over; the old man counts all fifty dollars carefully. Leads the kid inside.

A few minutes later, with help from his brother, the kid hauls out a piano-sized cardboard box held together with duct tape and friction. Into the Crosstrek it goes. It's a fifteen-minute ride back to his apartment. Up the stairs they carry it, into the front living room.

The kid, glasses, messy caramel hair, fist-bumps his older brother, who flashes him a peace sign as he leaves. He drags the box into his bedroom, and turns on his desktop, goes to Thrifter, checks the listing, checks the parts he's got in the box for parity.

Too bad all the important components are missing.

UniSys 2000s units
UniSys P16 gen 3 slim spec
8gb DDR2 DIMM ram
UniSys P16 slim power adapter
UniSys p series slim replacement parts
UniSys p series slim replacement optics

He leans back in his office chair. A light breeze ruffles the trans flag hanging up behind his bed. He sighs.

A week later, there's a box at the door of unit 201, labeled to MATTHIAS DORSON. In it: everything he ordered when he got home from the sale.

And so it begins.

The process necessitates nitrile gloves. For being in the back closet of a movie theater for who-knows-how-long- yeah, not looking great. IPA, warm soapy water, elbow grease, it's not great but it's serviceable. It takes hours, disassembling the entire unit down to the board, compressed-air'ing out the PSU and the whole board, vaccuuming out the hollow parts of the chassis...

He stops midway through for chips and a seltzer water.

The entire cleaning process takes multiple sessions, multiple rounds. But it gets to the point that he stops feeling the need to use gloves and a mask. (Still kind of smells like popcorn butter.)

Another week passes. Friday: he gets back from his number-pushing job, showers, eats the Chinese takeout he ordered on the way home. And back to his project, into the night, heating up the disconnected board, removing the cracked USB port and the CMOS battery. No replacement on the port, but he turns on the fume extractor and resolders a new coin-cell.

And another week.

And another.

Nearly a month of troubleshooting and checking the board for shorts. A month of waiting for capacitors and resistors. A month of hot summer air only getting hotter. A month of tracking down schematics on two-decade-old websites.

A Thursday: staring at a schematic sheet for a different unit, he rubs his eyes, runs his hands down his face. A lobotomised extension cord trails down to the unit on the floor. He's put it back together enough to make it give him a couple POST codes, but accessing the BIOS is behind a supervisor password (of course it is).

He squints at a small, eight-pin chip on the sheet. Searches up another thread. Grabs a jewler's screwdriver and stares. No time to do it- work tomorrow.

The next day- with his brother's help- lots of "just stand there and hold it- don't move-" the supervisor password is good as gone. The unit sees the memory, sees the poor old spinning drive, fails a lot of things on the self-diagnostic.

But there's a teal light behind the broken optics. 

Matt looks at his work, laying on its side on the floor.

She'll move soon. She's just got to rest from her service.

2. "Power-On Self Test"
UNISYS BIOS V.5.663.10
PRESS F10 TO ENTER SETUP. UNIT WILL CONTINUE BOOT IN 10...9...8...7...6...5...4...3...2...1...

A chime plays through the external speakers. Her chassis is open and the board is exposed; he's got his bottle of water far away on his desk. And she'll know not to move far when the chassis is open, anyway.

"UNISYS" shows in bright letters on the VGA-connected monitor. And she thinks for a while. A long while. Her hard drive whirrs and clicks (it isn't happy).

UNISYS 7

He sees the desktop interface open out of the corner of his eye. Why they didn't completely remove the drive- beyond him. But this was the heart of the Andover Theater's point-of-sale system... where all their cashier systems talked to each other and to the banks. Now, of course, any exposure to a network would leave her debilitated and needing a BIOS flash...

2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
2025

Right, they had to rebuild betwen '12 and '16. Nestled in each year are folders for each month, then in each month, each week, and in each week, files of adverts and previews and trailers for each and every movie they were showing at the time.

...The trailer for Super Dreamland Crisis: The Movie isn't as cool as Matt remembers it being when he was a kid. (Bad CGI. Worse acting. Great watch.)

Matt pokes around on the desktop, deleting the old financial files, old point-of-sale records. It's fun enough until he remebers the true goal of the boot test.

Settings
Handoff Mode (Remote Mode)
Handoff Mode allows paired unit to run in standby using KFP Protocols.
Please enter supervisor password to enable Handoff Mode.

It was on a sticky note in the box. ...Financial docs must have not been very important to the old guy.

Handoff Mode enabled. To disable Handoff Mode, completely power off paired unit and disconnect from AC power. Then, follow the instructions on this screen.

Matt waits patiently. Drives whirr. Servos whine. She blinks and he can audibly hear the springs and gears complain. Loud. But it's weird- he can't keep a straight face. A nearly thirty-year-old piece of hardware is live and alive. All because of him.

The pride, he figures, would come off as a patronizing smile were she able to see.

Her fans spin on, rivaling his modern gaming setup. (Good thing he dusted out the air intakes on the shoulders.) She turns her neck.

"What's your name?"

And that can't possibly be her actual voice. These units don't even have voiceboxes, anyway, just external speakers for audio playback. That sounded like a little girl, anyway...

"Matt," he takes a sip of his water a little awkwardly. "I fixed you."

She pauses as her drive spins. "You, fixed, me?" That sounded spliced, almost.

"Yeah. ...Well, me and my brother."

In fact, it's like she has to think between each sentence. "Where am I?" A frightened young woman.

"My apartment. Old Newark, right by the movie theater."

"Why." An annoyed, gruff man.

Matt purses his lips. How to break the news?

"...They shut down. And they were going to." He shrugs, gestures with his water. "Throw you out."

"So you, saved, me."

"Yeah. ...I collect old tech."

"I am not old," an offended older woman.

"...You are."

"What year is it?" a young man, maybe from The Time Traveller's Husband.

"2025,"

And she thinks a while, longer than it would take to mix a sentence.

"Why,"

"Why, what?"

"You, saved, me. ...Why?"

Matt looks away from her, then back at her open chassis, broken optics, cracked plastic casing.

"Just what I do." He shrugs, takes a sip of water. Warm summer breeze filters in through the curtains. It's unclear if she's thinking in preparation or rumination.

"...I can't see." Another annoyed one.

"I know," Matt nods. "Replacements are hard to come by."

3. Perks of Needing Wall Power
"Just be careful," he turns away from his e-mail to oversee her standing up. "You're very expensive."

He's put together her chassis enough to make having open drinks around her not a life-threatening hazard. The month of repairs took extra long due to Caleb's disassembly of the motors, greasing of the bearings, whatever he did to get the rust off.

This, Matt realises, is the first time she's moved in... it has to be at least ten years.

"How's it feel?"

She moves her new optics around ("optics," they're vase-fillers from grandma Dorson's house), steadies herself on his dresser. Just takes a second to drink in the environment of a single guy living alone. Between pride flags, posters line the walls, some corners escaping from the adhesive putty.

"...The Beast at Pike Mountain," and this clip must have been from a trailer, it's in that cadence. "In theaters July 4th."

"Local fave." He nods sagely. If there's one thing that brings Old Newark together more than being the only red town in a blue state, it's the yearly showing of Pike Mountain.

She moves to examine the faded poster more closely-

"Hey, hey, hold on," and she holds on. Matt spins in his office chair, looking for an extension cord- found. "You gotta take a quick nap, I didn't think you'd want to walk around."

"We should go over there," hey, it's main character Wendy. "Check it out."

"I know you want to look at it, but you're going to strain the cord, and then you're going to be unplugged, and then your hard drive's going to be very mad at me."

"...Alright." her sister Cindy (first dead). "I'll, sleep, first."

The addition of the extension cord takes five seconds. It's her boot and handoff that takes longer. But the first thing she does is beeline for the poster and just... stare.

"You a fan?"

"Huge fan," and there's, like, crowd chatter in the back of that clip. Must be from a promotional trailer. "I love, Wendy."

"She's cool. I like the scene where she cuts that guy's head off with the chainsaw."

"You had it coming," that's the line!

"Yeaaaah, you had it coming."

"'Wendy, your hair's all over the place.' 'I know, mom. But it's trendy!'" she pauses, constructing something. "Always, liked, Wendy."

"Yeah?"

She just lifts a yellowed plastic finger and points to the visage of Wendy on the poster. Specifically, her rat's-nest of a 1980's hairstyle, black locks framing her "bloodstained" face. It takes a second, but Matt connects the dots. The "slim" models are "slim" because they were built with a more feminine frame (because of course). So the P16's just been a "she" because that's what the manuals tend to refer to them as. But this seals the deal, not from a manufacturing standpoint, but from a personal one.

It's not that she was made a girl, it's that she wants to be one. Which, he guesses, means she wants to cut off a serial killer's head with a chainsaw.

A few days later and Matt finds her purposefully ruffling up the wig in his bathroom (all he has to do is follow the daisy-chain of extension cords down the hallway).

"Looking good. ...Now all you have to do is hike up Pike Mountain at midnight."

"Cindy, I'm telling you, there's got to be a demon up there. That's what all the people in the occult club say."

"And they were right. ...Hey, stupid question. I forgot to ask if you have a name. I've just been calling you the P16 to my friends."

"Just Wendy's fine, don't wear it out. Or, Unit P16."

"Cool."

"And you're, Matt."

"Yeah, don't wear it out."

She scans the bathroom for a second, her eyes passing over the T vials and injection supplies. "What's that?"

"Oh, that's my T..." she probably has no concept of that. At all. And if she does it's informed by distasteful films from ten years ago.

"Tee," golfing movie, maybe.

"T, for testosterone. -You know how you wanted to look like Wendy? That's kind of how it was. But not Wendy. A guy. I-" this is just really going off the rails. "-I'm transgender."

"Okay," Wendy again. "I wanted, to be- like- Wendy. And you, wanted, to be, a dude."

"...Sure!"

"...Rad." She sets down the vial, nods. "Hey, show me around the place."

He gives a quick tour (not much to see). She seems to admire his video game collection and the alcohol in the fridge. He makes a quick dinner of packaged ramen and reheated chicken.

"You've got mail."

"Yeah. Mostly junk."

"Dinner?"

"Oh, this? Uh-huh."

"Do you, have, a job?"

"Unfortunately." He sifts through the mail and picks up a letter from the pension fund at the company. "I push numbers."

"How do you, push, numbers?"

"I'm an accountant. It's so fucking boring."

"So, you, leave, every day."

"Yeah, they don't let me work from home."

"You, leave, every day."

"...Yeah." She wouldn't have known that; nine hours for him is a couple seconds for her. Or maybe it isn't. But it might be by the way she's talking.

"...I don't have any friends," from a heartbreaking scene. "I don't, like, sleeping."

"Sorry." He fishes in his bowl of ramen pensively. "...I can't take you with me. But you could always e-mail me. -You know what e-mails are."

"I can send e-mails with the click of a button." an excited man in an advert. "It's so convenient, I don't know how I lived with paper mail."

"Yeah, and I check my e-mail every five seconds for my job. So if you get lonely, just e-mail me. I'm usually back by four or five."

"Okay." she nods, "squints" at the letter from the pension fund. "Thanks, Matt, door-son."

"No prob."

He has to swat her hand away from helping with dishes ("you'll short your eye out, kid" which she appreciated). Back from his nighttime routine, she's poking at his modern gaming setup and stickerbombed laptop.

"You're kinda cousins with this one," he pats his older work laptop as he sits down. "Same manufacturer."

She squints at the array of ports on the back of his desktop and tilts her head.

"What are, all these?"

"What do you mean, what are all these?" He rolls his office chair to her side, looks with her. "Options."

"U-S-B super speed... audio, out... display, port. ...What's, their, name?"

"Who, the desktop? -They don't have a name. ...You're the only machine with a name."

"I'll ask, them, tomorrow."

"Tell me what they say." He purses his lips. "Did you have friends back at the theater?"

"No."

"No friends? No... cash registers? Modems?"

"...One, friend. Maintenance. IT guy. His name was, Maurice."

Matt spins idly in his chair, considers the thought. "How often did he come around?"

"Not very."

"So what I'm hearing is that I'm your best friend."

Wendy nods. Kind of cheating to ask that to someone who's never really had a friend before.

"Your friends-?"

"I have a few. Caleb, my brother, you haven't met him but he helped with the repair. And there's Nadia, Mike, Jake, Yukina..."

She blinks a few times. "Good people?"

"Yeah. I know better than to be friends with assholes."

"Good. To have, friends." She nods. "...Do you have, more, machines?"

"Oh, to be friends with? Uhh..." He opens a drawer in his desk and rummages, pulls out a couple handheld consoles and a few old cellphones. Another drawer and he pulls out a netbook from an era just past Wendy's. Chargers come in spaghetti bundles after them. "All of these. Plug 'em in tomorrow, see if they're nice."

"All machines, are nice. ...It's people that cause problems." Is that the villain from 10,000 Robots From Hell?

Matt frowns. "I know. Tell me about it. ...I mean, I try not to cause problems. But the maintenance people who left you in a corner sure did." And he immediately purses his lips. "Sorry! Sorry."

"It's true." She sits on his bed, swings her legs. "...They don't, want me back, do they?"

"No, they're demolishing the building after they sell all their inventory."

She nods, her wavy hair bobbing. "...I'm safe."

"Uh-huh. No dusty corners for you. Lots of friends. A whole apartment."

"But you, push, numbers."

"I know. They keep saying they'll have us work from home, but they said that for the past two years and it's never happened. ...And I couldn't take you to work, anyway. Maybe I can get one of those inverter battery packs and take you out for a day..." He opens his phone and immediately begins searching (and she's staring).

"...Is that a date?" And that's from a rom-com. "I've, never, been on one."

"It doesn't have to be a date. ...We can just hang out."

If she could emote she'd furrow her brows. "Do you like girls, Matt?"

"I guess,"

"Do you like, dudes, Matt?"

He shrugs. "Sure."

"Do you like, the new, Unisys P16 Slim Series serial number 16374-051699?"

"...We can find out. You're cool. ...And I wouldn't have fixed you if I thought you were worthless junk." She nods, and lays back on his bed. "Sleepy?"

"No. Are you sleepy?"

"Yeah. I should get to bed soon." He squints at the clock on his phone, yawns, turns it off. "Do you wanna take a nap or stay up?"

"I'll take first watch," Wendy again. "Of course I'm armed. Lissa said I'd need these. ...Yeah, pure silver. Perfect for ghouls and demons."

"You really like Pike Mountain." Matt stands, stretches, sets his phone down to charge wirelessly at his bedside. "It's a good one. ...Scoot." Wendy shuffles over, lets Matt lay down. "...Can you turn the lamp off? Please." He makes puppy-dog eyes.

"Sure. ...Can I sit, back, down?"

"Yeah. Just don't roll over on me."

"Never. ...Glasses."

"What? Oh, yeah, I was about to..." he takes them off, and she snatches them. "Hey."

"Dirty."

"I know. ...Put 'em back on the stand when you're done cleaning them. Please."

"Yes." She nods, shuffles in a desk drawer for a microfiber.

"Night, Wendy."

"Goodnight, Matt, door-son. Don't let the bedbugs bite." A taunt from Wendy.

"'Course not." He pulls up his covers, makes himself into something of a burrito, with Wendy's spinning drive as white noise to sleep.

She does, of course, return his glasses. And braves the sink to refill his water bottle. Because, she figures: what did Melissa do in act three of Pike Mountain? Return the favor.

4. ?
The inverter bank, placed unconspicuously in an old backpack, is a smashing success.

The weekends shift from indoors to outdoors. Matt clears room in his Crosstrek for Wendy after buying era-appropriate clothing for her ("would Wendy from Pike Mountain have worn it" being the deciding factor). She seems to enjoy the breeze in her air intakes.

The main street of Old Newark is populated on a Saturday in July. People walk their dogs, push strollers, take light jogs. Matt and Wendy sidestep around the caution-tape surrounding the lot of the former theater.

It's a pile of bricks and concrete.

Matt sips his iced coffee (if there's one thing she's learned, it's that he always has a drink). "Can't imagine you miss that place."

"No," Wendy shakes her head. "...Lots of people."

"Yeah, usually. It's nice out today, too. ...Hot."

"I hate hot weather. Screws up my eyeliner." Of course, Wendy, with the goth makeup.

"I'm just built for the indoors. I could never be a construction worker." He gestures down the road to a public utility worker flipping a sign from SLOW to STOP.

"Which is why you, push, numbers."

"Uh-huh. And why I fix old electronics."

Speaking of electronics: Uncle Dave's Resale, open nine AM to five PM every day but Sunday. Wendy looks up and around to the set of bells on the door; observes the local happenings on posters in the windows. Even she can enjoy the air-conditioning inside.

"Hey, Matt,"

"Hi, Aleisha," Matt leans down, squints at a set of vintage maps that would probably disintegrate were they not stored in a glass case. "How's Mooch?"

Wendy turns to Aleisha, tilts her head. "Who is, mooch?"

"Fine. Old and stinky. ...Who's your friend?" Aleisha puts a bookmark in her comic and slides it across the glass display case, tucks a cornrowed braid behind her ear.

"She's from the theater. Early 2000's slim."

"Cool. Hard work?"

"A little. Had some funny stuff with the hardware I had to fix. But she's cool."

"Who is, mooch?" Wendy asks again, to Aleisha, this time. Her conversation partner slaps around a water bottle idly.

"My cat. Here- you seen a cat before?" She whips out her phone, right there on the lock-screen is a heterochromiac white cat with a clipped ear. "She's 12."

"Rad." That's a clip she tends to use a lot. "...Where are your, electronics?"

"Oh, down thataway." Aleisha gestures vaguely to the labyrinth of a shop. "Past all the antique guns, down the stairs... but Matt's cleared the section out, not sure what you'll find."

"Not all of it," Matt calls from behind a towering shelf, looking at old muscle car magazines for Caleb. "Just the cool stuff."

"I'm looking," Wendy's battery supply clunks against her back as she descends the stairs, passes even more antique guns and bullets, passes porcelain figurines of ducks and children, passes old neon signs for beer and car brands.

It's conspicuous on account of the spaghetti-mess of cables. Mice, keyboards, lamps, wireless speakers, and docks for old MP3 players. Matt really did take all of the cool stuff already...

"...So I was, like, fuck that. So he's on my shit-list now."

"Yeah, Caleb's ex-girlfriend was like that too. You guys know how to pick them."

"I know. ...What happened to you and Hannah?"

"Bullied me,"

"For real?"

"For real. And I'm not looking for anyone right now, anyway."

"Why not? Come on, get on a dating app or something. People love small guys."

"...What?"

"I'm telling you, there's gotta be someone out there for you. You bring it up every time you come in."

"I do not."

"Okay- maybe not every time. But you just seem really lonely. Like you need a person. You know? How Brett and Anna are."

"...I have company."

"What, dusty computers?" And she immediately makes a sour face. "That was really rude. I'm sorry; you know I don't mean it like that. ...I just mean you should try to make some friends."

"I did make one." And it's a little indignant. "She's wandering around in the electronics section right now."

"...I forgot some of those things can think."

"Yeah, the owner of the theater did, too, when they put her in some dusty maintenance room."

Aleisha rests her chin on a hand. "So you saved her from the scrapyard."

"Mm-hm." He nods. "The listing online said she was junk. 'For parts or repair only.'"

"I guess she's for companionship, too."

"Some are. This one, I don't think so."

"Oh?" Aleisha squints. "Are you-?"

"Matt," Wendy calls from the ether of the resale shop. "I have, found something."

"Make your assumptions or forever hold your peace," and off he goes to the electronics section.

"What's up?" He comes to her side, brushes a hand on her casing. "Oh, sick find. I was looking at that last time but I couldn't justify it..."

Wendy keeps her eyes locked on a desktop computer tower from her era. Slim black casing, USB and PS/2 ports, a small optical drive, original stickers with a note "HARD DRIVE REMOVED" on the front.

"Can I have, it?"

"What're you gonna do with it?"

"Be, friends."

"...Sure. Just for you I can swing it."

"Yay," she grabs the unit off of the shelf, cradles it in her arms. "Yippee."

Aleisha gives a steep discount just for the hell of it- and ushers Matt out, first, with his magazines for Caleb. She keeps Wendy behind on purpose.

"Hey, you got a name?"

"Just Wendy's fine, don't wear it out."

"You..." she purses her lips, thinking of a good way to phrase her point. "Be nice to him. Okay? A lot of his exes were really mean."

"I get it." A line from Wendy upon receiving instructions for the anti-demon silver cross.

"...We went to school together, he's always been quiet like that." She drums her fingers on the countertop, thinking of anything else to say. "Yeah. Just... be cool. Okay?"

"Pinky promise." Another Wendy quote (shortly before Cindy gets axe-murdered).

The two of them pinky-promise, and Aleisha sends her off.

"What was that about?" Matt finishes the last of his drink, tosses it in a nearby garbage can as they head back to his Crosstrek.

"Nothing much." She readjusts her grip on the desktop. "Aleisha, and I, made a promise."

"What kind?"

"To be cool."

"Didn't know that requires a promise."

"Correction: to be, a special kind, of cool."

"...I see." He nods. "You made a friend."

"Two friends." She pats the casing of the computer tower; holds it in her lap the whole drive home.

The afternoon is calm, slow. They return; Matt unpacks his goodies on the dining room table, stretches- and Wendy's gone down the hall.

"What're you doing? -Hey, you're gonna electrocute yourself!" And he follows her into the hall bath where she's kneeling, a hand on the tub handle.

"I am starting, the shower."

"...Why?"

"Because, you have to shower."

"Wow, tell me how you really feel. -You're right, though, I feel gross. You're lucky, you don't sweat or anything."

"I am not, water-cooled."

"Well, I am. And the T makes me sweat gallons, I swear..." She blinks. Almost stares. Thinking? "...What?"

"...You're pretty." She turns the handle, lets the water run on hot.

"Who, me? Oh, pssshhh..." He waves his hand dismissively.

"You're pretty." She insists, turns toward him, looks up. "...Always wondered. How big's your hard drive, handsome?" And THAT'S from a porno. New Andover showed those?

"Ay, yo," he laughs nervously, averts himself. "Maybe after while, Wend, I'm disgusting right now."

"I know," she nods. "I said, I was wondering."

"Well." He contemplates. "Not big. ...Easily turned on, though."

"I know."

"You know?"

"When I talked to, your, machines. They told me, your preferences."

They what? "Huh?"

"Do not, fault me, for your lack, of a, password."

"...Fair. Alright- let's talk about this when I'm done. 'Kay?"

"Okay. ...Sorry." She stands up, beelines for the door.

"Hey, no, it's fine. It's not your fault I didn't put a password on my old phones. ...And we would have talked about it sometime, anyway."

She pauses at the entrance to his bedroom. "...Sex?"

"Or, other stuff. Yeah." He shrugs. "All the partners I've had kind of sucked. But you're cool."

"I'm, cool. ...We're partners?"

"Do you wanna be?"

"...After, you, shower. Let's chat."

"Uh-huh. Hey, remember to plug the battery in."

She nods. Matt closes the door and buries his face in his hands.

He finds her spinning idly in his office chair when he goes to grab clothes (could have done that beforehand but chose not to). Dries, dresses, comes back and plops down on his bed face-up. ...It's been an awkward thirty minutes.

He sighs. Her drive spins.

"Matt,"

"Uh-huh,"

"What do you mean, when you, say, partners?"

"I mean..." he thinks a moment. "Well, it's when you're in a partnership. You... take care of stuff together, do stuff together, relax together. Help each other out. Sometimes it's romantic, sometimes it's not."

Wendy nods. "...Based on what your friends told me. You get along better, with machines, than people. And, Aleisha, said..." she blinks, thinking. "People have, mistreated you."

"Sometimes." He sighs. "What'd she say, I need a person instead of dusty computers?"

"You have, your brother. And Nadia. Mike. Jake. Yukina. ...And me." She plops down onto the bed, moves aside a stuffed animal and scoots next to him. "Is that, forward?"

"No," he averts his eyes, nervous. "...I like you. Even if you were just for parts or repair."

"Hm," she hums. "...Does romance, include, sex?"

"Huh? Uh... it can, but it doesn't have to. Most of my partners, it just felt forced. 'Cause, you know, that's what couples do. Or something."

"...Well, I like you, too. Even if you do, like, dusty computers."

"Pff," he smiles. "What was it about my devices telling you my preferences?"

"The net-book, had a video, of someone. Copulating. With, a desktop computer unit."

"...Yeah." He covers his face.

"Don't be, embarrassed. ...You're warm."

"I know,"

"Are you nervous? We don't have to, have sex, right now."

"No, I know, I just..." He peeks at her through gaps in his fingers. "I'm worried."

"Why?"

"You... might have an idea about me that's not right. -And you weren't installed with. Anything,"

"I can tell you, which data input ports, are most, sensitive. ...Do you mean to say, we cannot, enjoy, each other?"

"N- no, not at all, I just... don't want you to be unhappy."

"I wish the same,"

"...How about this. We'll figure it out." Matt sits up, sighs. "...You are pretty."

"I know. All, Unisys P16 Slim Series models are designed with an aesthetically pleasing form factor."

Matt purses his lips. Wendy stares.

"...Let's kiss?" She holds out her hand- "Uh..." -Grabs onto his, shuffles herself around.

"My, A/C input port." At the base of her spine is the twist-lock plug and cord right at her power supply.

"Uh. Mm..." he hums, then, awkwardly, carefully, kisses the plug end of the power supply. "Yes, no?"

"Yes," and she almost sighs. "...And, you?"

"Ah..." he thinks. "Hug?"

"Hmm," they embrace, lean back on his bed, her face buried in his neck. He wraps his legs around her back, careful to not tangle her power cord or accidentally press any buttons.

"You're heavy,"

"I know."

"...Did you use my cologne?"

"Maybe, I did."

"You're silly. ...And very sexy."

"I know. ...You are, engaging."

"Engaging? Conversationalloooohhh. ...What do you want me to do, not... not get hard? -And I thought you only had sensors on the hands and legs and face areas."

"I am a, unique model."

"...Where were you before the theater?"

"A, corporate office. ...They, liked me."

"Sorry,"

"Don't be. What can I say; I have a thing for the nerdy types." That's from some coming-of-age movie, he's heard it before.

"Hmmm." He sighs. "...I'm gonna fall asleep like this."

"At your leisure," and eventually, he does.

(She eventually moves off of him; tucks him in. It's his gentle breathing that lulls her into standby mode.)

5. ?
#TODO
time has passed. they have done sex and stuff. they share another intimate moment, maybe he talks about upgrading her to an ssd, they promise to take care of each other.

Summer melts into fall in its usual Midwestern way. Matt swaps his polo shirts for New Andover High School crewnecks that are still a size too large; and then fall becomes winter, and he becomes grateful for Wendy's poor power consumption- newer styles of autonomous computers run less hot.

The heat dissipation only becomes an issue when she's on top. Not of his desk, of course- and becoming especially useful when the furnace serving his floor of the apartment breaks.

(In December. While he's already sick.)

"...Staring at me doesn't do anything," he turns away from trying to obtain a copy of a schematic, tea steeping away on his desk.

"I know." She blinks. "I am, making sure."

"Of?"

"I am, making sure, nothing bad, happens to you."

"...I'm not dying-" he sneezes like a bunny. "Just ill."

"Hmm." She is ostensibly unconvinced. "How do I, fix, you?"

"What?" He sniffles, squints at a paywall for the circuit board layout.

"...I can't take, you apart, and replace, your components. So... how do I, fix, you?"

"You just have to wait." He shrugs. "If you could replace my components, Wednesday would have been a different story. ...Not funny?"

"Funny," she nods. "All I can do, is, wait?"

"I mean." he purses his lips, spins around in his office chair as the schematic downloads. "You could make me something."

"A gift."

"Food."

"Preparation of food, often requires, water."

"No, not all the time. And you're careful, I trust you." He sips his tea. "Could you make me soup?"

"How,"

"The instructions are on the label. You'll figure it out." And they just look at each other. "I like you."

"I like you, too." She nods, pads into the kitchen. "In, which receptacle?"

"You know where the bowls are."

"Nadia, likes her soup, in mugs."

"That's Nadia, not me."

Matt was right- she figures it out, doesn't hurt herself, carefully brings it back into his room, and sets it on the table to the side of his desk.

"Thank you," he smiles, looks up as she sort of hovers over him. "...Hug?"

"Hug." And they embrace. "Do you feel better?"

"Not yet."

"...How about now?"

"Hmm." He smiles into the hard plastic of her neck. "A little."

She deposits him back into his chair, and sits on a shop stool acquired from a friend's dad. A light breeze dusts snow off of the rooftop of the apartment building, off of his Crosstrek. Wendy and his desktop hum in the silence of the unit.

"Thank you." She pipes up as he's watching a video about re-balling a CPU.

He pauses- turns around. "For what?"

And she really thinks before replying. "For fixing, me."

She likes to thank him for it on occassion. But this time seems particularly sincere.

"Yeah," he nods. "I'm glad we met."

"Me, too. ...But."

"But?"

"I'm not like you."

The mood gets somber. "What do you mean?"

"When you are, sick, you wait. When, I'm sick, I break."

He furrows his brows, sets down his mug and scoots closer. "Wendy. What's wrong?"

"Nothing,"

"Yes, something's wrong. ...Is it 'cause your drive's clicking?"

"Ask not for whom the bell tolls. It tolls for thee."

"Wendy, I was going to have to upgrade your drive anyway. ...There's legacy versions of UniSys OS online. And you use SATA, anyway. Your motherboard supports a few terabytes of storage. And worst case scenario, we get you an external drive."

She just blinks. "I'm, sad."

That's entirely new.

"...Why?" He tilts his head, grasps one of her hands.

"I am, failing hardware."

"N- what?"

"I am, past, the end-of-life support. My drive, clicks. Capacitors, will, leak." She pauses. "I'm. Fragile."

"Ohh," he chides, tuts. "Wendy, all I do is fix old hardware. So I upgrade your drive. I re-cap your board. ...There's vaccuum-tube computers that people've gotten to run. I don't care if you're fragile, or if I have to upgrade something. ...I'll get it done."

"I am, costly, and require maintenance."

"...Are you trying to justify going back to some dusty closet?"

"I like you. ...A, human being, does not require, replacing capacitors."

"Come here, Wend," and he sort of tugs on her arms, pulls her close. "I don't care. If I did- I wouldn't have fixed you in the first place..." and he tilts his head, looks her right in the optics that he had to replace. "You're very important to me. Okay? ...Do you not think you're worth fixing?"

"I am, being pragmatic."

"No such thing as pragmatism in this house. ...The Snyder-Troxel is from 1992. I spent two weeks troubleshooting it just to get it to read a drive. Come on, Wend. You know how I am with this stuff..." He links his fingers behind her neck. "I'll fix you as much as I have to. Because I like you. And there's nothing you can do about it."

"Hmm," she hums. "Nothing?"

"Nope, not anything at all."

"Nothing."

"...You're encouraging me," he half-laughs. "Do you want to do something about it?"

"I can."

"Hmph," he smiles, shakes his head; runs a hand softly against her casing. "...Wend, I know a lot of P-series got parted out. But you know I'm not going to do that."

"I am, not, for parts. I am, for repair."

"...Nope,"

"Nope?"

And he's all smiles as he tugs her close, flush, sighs into her. "N-ope. You're not for parts or repair."

"...What am I for?"

In an elapsing moment everything seems rectified; love can be labor and labor can be love. Parts, repair, or:

"Me."

~ FIN ~