#gabriel01.

       this had already gotten farther than murderbot had wanted it to; despite its precautions and experience in dealing with a situation like this, it must have had contact with some of the spores. its’ performance reliability had fallen by ten percent in the last two hours - and that was all without being shot at. pain kept flashing across all of its’ sensors and diagnostic programs, and even though it had turned down its’ ability to actually feel the influx of sensory data, it wasn’t able to entirely dissociate from it for very long. it had managed to keep quiet, though - until one of its drones was able to spot some sort of ( construct? ) approaching. performance reliability dropping to 87.3%.

Gabriel scoffs, gaze still fixed at the screen as he goes for a victory lap. "I've never played this game before either. There's no use in softening your loss, machine." The angel's all clenched up around the controller like a shrimp. It's a miracle he can play the game at all.

         “ ... we - i - were - was - ” they cut themself short, trying to sift through the terminology of a single identity versus a myriad of identities. it was a peculiar thing to feel one’s self begin to form into a new identity altogether - even more so when they weren’t certain whether to fight it or not. “  ... th-this unit was not referring exclusively to the game. ” they settled on that phrasing. they were still learning nearly everything beyond their homeworld. “ ... c-c-congratulations. ‘good game’? ” they’d witnessed humans say as much after accepting a defeat in friendly competitions.

        ghost tilted their head in an owlish manner, clearly studying their opponent as he seemed to adopt an unhealthy posture. they made a quiet stuttering and chittering noise - their programs talking amongst themself - before speaking again, albeit much more hesitantly. “ i-i-inquiry: why do you dislike machine intelligence? ” they tried kept their tone flat, but the curiosity in their voice was undeniable. how unfortunate it would be if multiple universes held a common variable; a distrust of artificial intelligences. their own realm, at least, had the excuse of a billion-year cycle of death and organic harvesting at the whim of the ‘old machines’ to bolster their anger.