One Nation Under Surveillance

The little girl stared at the shiny apple that was presented to her. She hesitated. She glanced from the apple to him, back to the apple, and back to him one last time. She wasn’t sure whether this was a cruel game or not. It would not be the first time someone had taunted her with food. However, when she felt safe enough to do so, she snatched the apple from him and bit into it. She held it close to her face– a clear sign that she was used to her food being taken away from her, or at least that she was afraid it might be.

She looked up at Cythros as she munched on her apple with a tilted head. She couldn’t figure out why he was being so nice. She wasn’t really used to men being nice to her. Hesitantly, she reached out to touch his arm. A connection with him. It was a soft touch– tentative. As if testing out whether she was safe or not.

The lid of a garbage can fell in the alleyway, spooking the child. She jumped and drew closer. She looked back over her shoulder several times. It was clear she was scared… of something,  or someone.

He didn’t move, but cast a glance downward as her fingers brushed his arm - his only arm. This little girl couldn’t be judging him the way everyone else did, like a performing monkey in a circus, thinking about all the things he shouldn’t be capable of or how he would do them one-handed... right? Children this age were usually more open-minded than adults.

At the sudden noise, Cythros looked in the direction that Kveta kept turning towards. He picked up his grocery bag and stood.

“I don’t see anything over there. What are you looking for?”

Honey golden eyes met his when he said those few words and she nodded. He hadn’t answered her questions. However, he was there. He was standing in their home. And, the fact that he had come back to her at all meant more to her than he could ever know. No one ever came back to a girl like her. The rest could be figured out later. For now she hurled herself at him, wrapping him up in a tight, yet careful, hug.

“I’s missed yew too,” she whispered into his neck. “I’s was scared I ain never gunna ge'ta see yew again…” She kissed his neck and then pulled back to look into his eyes. Hers were watery. She kissed his lips gently.

Securitron had made him more machine than man, it seemed. Yet he was still her man. He still retained the most vital parts of him that made him… well, him. He had his heart– so big and beautiful. He had his mind. And now she could boast she had the only cyborg boyfriend in town. Kveta led him to the couch and sat down on his lap, adjusting to how he felt now.

“Don’ yews ever go scarrin’ me like t'at again!” Her voice was angry for a moment before it turned into another sob and she kissed him again. She’d finally found home and it’d almost been torn from her.

He returned the embrace, slowly, tentatively, like he was afraid that Kveta’s form would shatter under his touch. The cybernetic arms seemed to respond with the same precision and gentle touch as his human ones, but what if there was a glitch in the code? What if the software that interfaced the machine components with his brain was hacked?

Would he hurt her?

Securitron developed weapons. He had no doubt that the cybernetic parts they’d attached to his body served a less peaceful purpose than simply keeping him alive.

Cythros obediently followed her to the couch. His arms wrapped loosely around her body as she leaned into him - a soft electrical whirr as he moved them - and he kissed the top of her head.

The child, startled, retreated a few paces when the man knelt dowm before her. Here he could see her skin was dirty, her hair tangled and matted. Her clothes hung from her tiny little frame. It was clear that she’d been neglected for awhile. Anxiously she fiddled with the material of her shirt as she gazed up at him. She didn’t feel like talking. She shook her head.

Who was supposed to be looking after her?? Kveta turned and looked over her shoulder again. Her mommy was. But her mommy was sleeping again. She had the pointy stick in her arm. Without speaking, she pulled her thumb from her mouth long enough to mime the way her mommy stuck herself.

That certainly got a raised eyebrow from Cythros. A needle in one’s vein when the lack of direction in civilian life became unbearable - he’d known others from the Service to go that route.

He got down on one knee, set his grocery bag on the ground in front of him, and pulled out an apple, which he held out to the little girl.

Kveta hadn’t been expecting him home. Securitron was different than a regular hospital. They had told her to go home– Cythros would be home when he was healed from surgery. She had asked what that meant. She had demanded to see him. Yet, none of it mattered. She’d been sent home empty-handed.

Home hadn’t felt like home without him there, though. It was too quiet– too lonely. Kveta had a hard time sleeping without him there to hold her through the night. Every fiber of her being missed him.

However, as she stood in front of him now, she wasn’t quite sure what to think. One part of her wanted to run right into his arms and curl up. Another part wanted to ask him ‘how dare he?!’ for putting her through that. Slowly Kveta made her way across the room, sitting down on the bed beside him. Her small fingers tracing along the cold metal of his arm. Half machine half person.

Regardless of what he thought, she wasnt afraid. Her brows remained furled, though.

“Wha’ did t'ey do ta yew?” She asked softly, lifting her honey colored gaze to meet his. “Is yew… okay??”

He tensed slightly as Kveta approached him; as her eyes explored his new cybernetic form and her fingers brushed over his mechanical arm. He held his breath and waited for her reaction.

Metal and fiberglass covering the lower two thirds of Cythros’s abdomen, his pelvis and legs now entirely machine. His left arm had been replaced at the shoulder by the shiny black material, and the flesh portion of his right ended just below the elbow. Here and there, a wire or cable connected various pieces together - some reached the human parts of his body and disappeared under his skin.

Where his body remained organic, he saw that most of his skin was heavily scarred. Wide areas of scarring covered his chest, giving it a taut, slightly sunken appearance.

He finally remembered to let out his breath as she spoke, and tilted his head to better look at her. He wasn’t sure how to answer either question-- a lot of what Securitron had done to him was scientific technobabble that he couldn’t hope to fully understand, and while he was by no means okay, he also wasn’t in any physical pain. He wasn’t dead.

“I’m glad I get to see you again,” Cythros said after a long period of silence. “I’ve missed you.”

It didn’t feel... real, though? It was present, but wrong-- inhuman.

He forced himself to look away. Instead of focusing on his own - was it his own anymore? - body, his eyes wandered around the room. The apartment had an odd chill to it, a feeling that no one had been here in quite some time. How long had Cythros been in the hospital? He found it hard to remember... Telling time was difficult in such a place.

Soft, light footsteps let him know that Kveta was coming to check on him. He turned his head and gave her a sad look. Without thinking, his hand moved to his chest, fingertips brushing over the line where his human skin met the machine that he had become. “I-- I’m sorry... I don’t know what else to say.”

“I understand if-- you’re afraid of me... or if you want nothing to do with me anymore...”

He turned toward the sound of his superior officer’s voice, reflexively reaching out to catch the object that had been thrown in his direction. The Black Guard held his hand out in front of him and looked at it in surprise– generally, officers under CLU were not about lifting regulations on resources for those who were assigned to difficult missions. Soldiers either had the ability to handle themselves in the field… or they were imperfect.

Cythros glanced at the Commander with a smile and a nod.