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Emotional Resonance

By V.M. Ayala

Arbor’s favorite part of a mission was always the first view of a planet. Even after seven hundred years of being a giant robot, it never got old. Green and blue clouds churned over purple seas, imposing storms that flashed red with threads of lightning. Beautiful.

And they were sent to clear it of all human life. Courtesy of ExoPLENTI, Inc.! Ugh, that slogan clung to their digital psyche no matter how hard they tried to scrub it from their databases.

At least this part, floating in orbit, wasn’t so bad.

Proximity alarms went off, a shrill beep and an itch on their right arm. Okay, this part wasn’t usually bad? Sensors indicated a friendly mech to the right, and it was floating too close.

The incoming mech’s sharp metal angles were humanoid like Arbor’s. Two hands, two feet. This model’s design was new, its frame less bulky and more streamlined. It was freshly painted blue and silver with huge blue, glass eye sensors—a contrast to Arbor’s dented weathered shell and red eyes.

The other mech’s MIND—a cute corporate acronym for Monitoring Interface Neural Driver—blipped into existence, a projected hologram of faded colors and warped outlines, and peered over the edge of her robot’s helmet plate in awe. She was listed as Crowe, her name and ID hovering above her. She wore a pink bomber jacket with glowing white lines. Her curly hair was a gradient of pink, white, and blue, her skin just a shade darker than Arbor’s own dark brown. She was super cute.

Arbor was relieved they still felt infatuation, simulated or not.

“Sorry!” Crowe said. “I was admiring the view and found myself drifting.”

“First mission post-download?” Arbor asked. They projected their hologram self-image on the shoulder of their body. Went for their classic black boots and jacket look. It was the first time they had done that in well over two hundred years.

Crowe nodded. “Freshly installed yesterday. Wasn’t expecting to feel anxious about it. Given that I’m now, you know.” She gestured down her projection body and her mech shell made the same motion.

“A giant murder machine, incapable of feeling upset?” Arbor supplied.

Crowe smiled. “Exactly.”

“Welcome to the beginning of a thousand years as a killer robot. Don’t worry, they only take your ability to question or disobey their orders. All the little quirks and unique things that make you, well, you stay intact.” It was in the contract, and it was obvious Crowe hadn’t been allowed to read the fine print. That was common. Shitty, but common.

“I guess that’s something,” Crowe said. She looked down at the planet and sighed. “I suppose we’ll be fighting soon.”

“Does that bother you?”

Crowe shrugged. Occasionally she became semi-translucent, her outline warping or voice distorting. “Bit of a trick question, don’t you think? If it bothered me, does that mean they did a bad job of removing my ability to doubt what I’m told to do?”

“Maybe.” Arbor’s projection leaned back and floated in space. “Or maybe it means they programmed your inability to question orders so well it even feels like you can doubt them.”

“Shit, that’s a good point.”

Arbor laughed. “I’ve had some time to ponder.”

Crowe looked at Arbor’s body, head tilted as her glowing blue eyes examined their information in the network. They felt the ping like a gentle tap on the shoulder and sent their detailed files along.

 

INCOMING PRIORITY NOTICE: Initiate MIND launch. Operation to commence in thirty seconds.

 

The text was in bright red, splashed against the planet below.

“Suppose that’s our cue,” Crowe said. “I should get back—sorry for almost drifting into you.” She gave a surprisingly shy glance back at Arbor. “See you again?”

They nodded. Arbor very much wished to see her again. After centuries of silence and distance, they felt a newfound emotion, somewhere between happiness and anxiety. Their heart beat faster, face flush and warm, chest tight. All simulated reactions. After all, they weren’t human anymore. Nowadays their heart was a replaceable nest of wires and power supplies buried in the toughest alloy. Still…

Crowe winked and disappeared, her mech moving back into formation with the other dots labeled green and friendly, forming a circle around the planet.

Arbor held onto the interaction with Crowe as they descended to the rival corporation mining town and set everything on fire, rewinding the memory to override the destruction, replaying Crowe’s laughter to drown out the screams.

---

Afterward both Crowe and Arbor returned to orbit while ExoPLENTI’s crews took over the town’s mining equipment. See, ExoPLENTI wanted the rich deposits and wasn’t above some illegal murder to get rid of a rival and take all their tech in the process. At least guard duty was simple, redundant, almost peaceful if they blocked out what they’d just done well enough.

“Are we capable of regret?” Crowe asked. Her projection huddled on her mech’s shoulder, staring down at the planet with an almost absent expression. As far as first incursions went, this was a rough one. It was only civilians, no mechs to defend them. It was obvious Crowe was grappling with the weight of it, or the weight of not feeling it. Arbor understood. The sensation was an empty hole in their proverbial chest, a hollow where some vital part of them had been taken.

Arbor shrugged. Their mech shrugged in time.

“Why did you do that?” Crowe pointed, and their robot pointed too. She laughed. “Why did I do that?”

“You have lightspeed processing power and you’re asking me to tell you?”

“Ah, are we even speaking? Or are we just thinking very fast at each other and simulating speech to better help our human personalities comprehend it?”

Arbor thought about that for a long moment. Or was it a very fast moment? Did the time actually matter, so long as they enjoyed the interactions?

 

INCOMING PRIORITY NOTICE: Return to docking station.

 

They sighed. “We’ll have to continue this next time.”

“I’ll find you when I wake up,” Crowe said.

“Promise?” Arbor asked.

Crowe nodded. Her mech nodded, too, and flew away towards a rectangular ship looming in the distance.

The centuries-old routine settled back into Arbor’s servos. Sleep, wake up, do corporate dirty work. Sleep, wake up, redo. Again and again. Smoke billowed in the atmosphere, the gray and black flowing into green and blue clouds until the storms erased any trace of their crimes. Would ExoPLENTI get a nice boost in revenue for that stolen mine?

They felt nothing but the afterimage of remorse and anger, a dull ache they’d long since accepted.

Maybe it was time to be a little impulsive.

Crowe was new and wouldn’t be assigned a unit yet. First mission was always a test to ensure the MIND obeyed properly.

Discreetly, Arbor hacked into their ship’s mainframe and assigned Crowe to their unit. It was eerily easy to break the rules. No resistance. Arbor mused that maybe Crowe wasn’t the only one drifting off course.

---

The next mission was in an opposite part of ExoPLENTI space. Arbor didn’t search for more details because they were too excited. The hack worked. Crowe’s ID was in their unit’s listing—and paired with them, no less. They hadn’t dared risk being that obvious, so this was either a trap or very good luck.

 

INCOMING PRIORITY NOTICE: MISSION: protect primary fighters.

 

Unceremoniously, the hangar claws detached. Arbor was dropped through the open bay into a skirmish. Apparently a rogue faction was trying to take over. Not that Arbor cared about corporate hierarchy.

They did care about Crowe’s mech taking heavy fire nearby. Her body’s fresh paint was already scratched, and a huge chunk was missing from her shoulder plate.

“You okay?” Arbor called.

“Good morning, sleepyhead!” Crowe yelled, shooting at an enemy unit. “Was wondering when they’d wake you up.”

Arbor must have been set to reserve for a minor battle like this. Better to give the newer MINDs the experience. It wasn’t long before the fight shifted in their favor and what remained of the rebel faction fled. Good; less combat meant less repair downtime and less time away from Crowe, now that the two were partners.

They floated amongst the wreckage. Crowe bumped into half of a unit’s head, its glass eye shattered. Her projected self reached for it, upset, then hesitated. Her mech’s hand mimicked the gesture.

“Emotional resonance.” Arbor smiled when Crowe’s projection tilted her head, and her body followed. “Sometimes MIND projections automatically send signals to our bodies when we’re feeling a lot. It’s considered a glitch, a human remnant, an error. So: emotional resonance.”

“Meaning the more I feel, the better my body will react to my thoughts?”

“Something like that,” they said.

“I saw someone put me in your unit.” Crowe glanced at Arbor as the two scanned the battlefield for good salvage or enemy remnants.

“What are the odds?” they replied with a grin as they pushed a large chunk of debris aside. They didn’t dare admit to anything, but their projection floated awfully close to Crowe’s. Could projections hold hands? Probably not.

 

INCOMING NOTICE: mission complete. Return to the designated unit hangar.

WARNING: Do not deviate from flight trajectory.

 

Did someone at corporate notice Arbor’s behavior? Fine. They knew how to exist in the margins of protocol. They’d teach Crowe how to get away with it, too.

---

All corporate cities were identical; the one they were guarding was no exception. They were defending it, showing the sector executive’s strength or something. Arbor didn’t fully pay attention. They rarely cared. They sat next to Crowe, projections visible only to themselves, bored because their bodies were locked until the executive’s blustering ceremony concluded.

“Did you ever play twelve questions as a kid?” Crowe asked.

Arbor tilted their head. “No?”

Crowe laughed. “It’s simple. Ask twelve questions. We’d play on long trips between cities. This whole stuck-up event reminded me of it—my dad had been an executive’s aid.”

“Okay, I’ll play. Ask your questions.”

“Why did you become a MIND? Sorry, am I allowed to ask that?” Crowe hastily added.

“It’s fine, I don’t mind, no pun intended,” Arbor said, smiling. “I missed my rental payment one too many times, so I had no choice. Supposedly once your contract is up, they let you pick your name and gender after though, and you start over debt free.” Arbor existed on that hope for so long.

They thought of all the promo-vids projected against white skyscrapers draped in utopic greenery, where mechs would dash and zoom in and out of combat to heroic music. Back when they were still human, Arbor never escaped those ads, could never afford to be who they really were. Their shitty family, even supposedly decent friends, always addressed them with the wrong name and pronouns. Maybe after a thousand years they’d actually get a new body to their specifications.

“It was similar for me,” Crowe said. “I went into the negative too many times on work trips. I was an acquisitions researcher; my job was to find viable planets and sites for takeover—like this city, actually. I think I helped find it. But I forget what it’s called. Or maybe they erased it,” Crowe mused with a scowl.

“Aren’t research expenses paid for?” Arbor asked.

“Is that one of your twelve questions?” Crowe teased. “They don’t count unforeseen expenditures. I got sick and stranded with too much debt, it pinged the system. I was too useless and now here I am. Useful again.” Crowe clenched her fists.

Arbor shot her a warning look. They were being monitored more diligently in the city.

Crowe lifted her chin defiantly. Her mech head tilted slightly up for a moment before locking back down and she gave an exasperated groan. “Emotional resonance doesn’t resonate that far,” she grumbled.

“We’ll have to practice later,”Arbor said. “In the meantime, I’d like to hear more. About other planets you’ve been to—if you want to talk about it, I mean. Consider that my twelve questions.”

Crowe smiled. “I would love to.”

---

No matter where they went after that, Crowe took scans of the planets and told Arbor about the chemical components, the mechanisms at work in the atmosphere or magnetosphere if there was one, and more. So much more. Arbor was fascinated. It never occurred to them to do this, despite basic scans being allowed.

It became a game to assess objects and weave stories, scenarios, and what-ifs. Solar systems and constellations and planets, anything they could find, points in the sky or distant, flickering stars in space. Crowe told Arbor the likely species of flora and fauna. They created cinematic space opera scenarios. On and on until Arbor felt calm and happy, or as much as a MIND could simulate those emotions when they never felt them much in life before.

It wasn’t such a bad existence. They wondered how long it would last.

---

Eventually, Arbor realized they were closing in on the end of their contract date. Had it really been a thousand years? They’d settled into a routine with Crowe. It was comforting, familiar, safe. Now Arbor might return to humanity if they wanted. It was the plan, what ExoPLENTI dangled as an incentive for so long.

But what if Arbor didn’t take it? What if they stayed, kept going with Crowe to different planets, continued making up stories?

What if they just stayed MINDs together? Would that be so bad?

Maybe it was something that snapped at a thousand years of being a human embedded in a murder machine. Maybe it was emotional resonance, maybe it was impulse, but Arbor thought fuck it and took Crowe’s hand. Their mech hands awkwardly entwined with the screech and whine of metal scraping metal.

“What are you doing?” Crowe asked.

 

WARNING: Do not deviate from course. Do not engage friendlies. Final warning.

 

Arbor let go. They would stay. There was no way ExoPLENTI would make good on the contract anyway. They knew that in their heart and had known even when they signed. At least now they weren’t alone. Crowe looked at them, confused, as Arbor peeled away, grinning.

---

The next mission was dangerous, even by experienced standards.

They were out of ExoPLENTI space, far, far out near the edge of the Milky Way. There weren’t corporations here, just small outposts nestled on isolated asteroids, orbiting in debris fields filled with seemingly endless resources. Which meant their locations were heavily fortified and defended. What did ExoPLENTI even want out here? Was this just a suicide mission?

Is this what happened when a MIND hit a thousand years?

Arbor and Crowe stared down at the target. It was yet another habitable planet, perhaps the most habitable planet they’d ever seen. Blue oceans, human-friendly gravity, an actual magnetosphere, oxygen. Very idyllic. Its population was maybe one city-state trying to thrive outside of corporate grasp.

“You asked me once if we can regret,” Arbor said, projection looking down at the unnamed planet. “I don’t regret what I’ve done or witnessed, even if I could. Not even after a thousand years. I can’t, and I refuse to.”

“No?” Crowe’s projected self moved closer, her body drifting out of proximity warning range. She’d become adept at keeping just out of range, barely avoiding warnings and unwanted attention. Arbor hated it. It was exhausting to never do what they wanted, and it was never more apparent with Crowe’s arm outstretched, close but untouchable without causing too much unwanted attention.

“No. Because it let me see the stars, let me dream of different futures, however unlikely. Because I’ve never once been called a woman. Because…” Arbor hesitated, staring at Crowe. “Because it brought me to you.”

Crowe held their gaze for a long moment. Or was it a brief moment? A lightspeed thought? Her eyes were a bright blue, the same as her shell. Arbor’s own eyes, they knew, glowed a bright red like their mech’s. Both of them had brown eyes as humans. But now Crowe’s eyes glowed in the planet’s shadow. Intense, radiant, mechanical, and inhuman. Beautiful.

In an instant (or perhaps a long moment), Crowe blinked rapidly and looked away. “That’s really sad.”

“It’s the best I could hope for,” Arbor said.

“That’s also really sad,” she replied.

“Not all of it. Not the centuries I’ve spent with you.”

Crowe lifted her hand as if to add something, hesitated, then looked down again. Her mech did every movement in time with her.

“You’ve gotten really good at that,” Arbor said.

“What can I say? I have a lot of emotions to resonate with, when I’m with you,” Crowe said shyly.

Arbor was so close to saying fuck it to the proximity alarm.

So it caught them extra off-guard when the proximity and combat warnings blared in their head—in their mech’s head. A surprise assault? There was a searing heat and a dull thud, and they watched as bits of their power supply leaked out toward the planet below. An overwhelming explosion of light followed. They reached out to try and shield Crowe reflexively. It was a purely emotional reaction, actual response time lagging behind.

Somehow, their body obeyed. Something shredded through their arm.

As they faded, body going into emergency power reserve and repair mode, they marveled at how strong their own emotional resonance had become, too.

---

Arbor was only out for a moment, or an eternity. They thought, dreamily, of Crowe’s laughter, of her many stories of myriad planets and destinations. All of it mired in fog and distant yelling. Slowly, the shouting became clearer and clearer.

“Hey, hey! Arbor! Wake up! Please.”

Crowe’s voice crackled. Her projection hovered near one of Arbor’s eyes, touching it as if willing them awake. Their projection flickered to life and all but fell over. Crowe caught them in time, cradling them in her arms. Their giant robot bodies were entwined. Everything hurt.

“S-so projections can interact,” Arbor said with a cough. It made their chest hurt—seriously, who simulated this?—but the pain feedback eased up once they were more alert and aware.

Damage to systems: catastrophic. They were missing their right leg, upper left arm, and a chunk of their left side.

Crowe let them float freely once they were able. It was a strange echo of human hurt and recovery, since their bodies never moved. There were jagged and warped bits of metal and broken circuitry drifting all around. As well as a giant robot hand.

“You’re missing an arm,” Arbor said.

“Somebody had to shoot us out of the situation.” Crowe’s right eye and left hand were almost entirely transparent.

Arbor’s right leg, upper left arm, and left side were equally missing, repair bots trying their best to recover the most essential parts.

Shakily, Arbor reached for their mapping data and telemetry and realized the two of them were far away from the unnamed planet. Distant flickers of light erupted in almost rhythmic sequence. Their sensors highlighted several large battleships. ExoPLENTI’s dropships were in full retreat.

“It was a surprise assault from their old friends, the ones that owned that mining town—remember? When we first met?” Crowe said, also watching.

So ExoPLENTI was getting their asses kicked. Good.

That’s when Arbor realized.

“We didn’t get the return command.” They turned to Crowe, simulated heart racing from more than leftover pain indicators. “Listen, they think we’re space debris. And I know how to wipe any lingering ExoPLENTI IDs. Unless someone looks closely, we’ll look like space trash. And without a way to replenish our repair systems and power supplies, we have maybe two thousand years of juice at best. So there’s no going back. If they find us, they’ll delete us.”

Yet, in this moment, in this instant or this brief eternity, Arbor had never felt more alive.

“When we were patrolling earlier,” Crowe said, “I scanned for other solar systems outside of corporate space. There’s one nearby, relatively. Maybe a thousand years out? It’s got a totally inhospitable planet with an atmosphere full of particles very good at blocking scanners. So what do you say?” Crowe took Arbor’s hand with her remaining one, their mech bodies doing the same.

No proximity alarms or warning notices went off. No one from the far-away battle turned around to come for them. After so long, it was such sweet relief to be little more than scrap floating through the cosmos.

Impulsively—what did they have to worry about anymore—Arbor kissed Crowe’s projection on the cheek. She was slightly taller. They’d never realized that before.

Crowe smiled, gently tilted Arbor’s chin up, and kissed them. It wasn’t what a human would consider a kiss. No skin against lips, just simulated movement. A facsimile, an intent, an emotion.

Arbor felt nothing, physically.

Arbor felt everything, emotionally.

“Tell me all about this planet, then,” Arbor said and let the sound of Crowe’s voice soothe their MIND as the two giant robots, happily lost, drifted away.

---

Host Commentary

By Mur Lafferty

V.M. has this to say about the story:  These are two trans characters, and I wrote a lot of my gender feelings as a nonbinary person into the dynamic of feeling forced to do certain things because capitalism where your gender is just totally disrespected, but then finding solace in another queer person who makes you feel like you’re home. I want that ending to have that bittersweet “we should not have been in this situation but we have each other and let’s drift in space as happily as possible for now” vibe.

The thing that spoke to me in story was what the characters hold dear. We get a lot of tragic stories sent our way, and this one could have fallen easily into that category except for one thing- their most important thing to them was each other, and therefore what could have been a tragic end is instead a place for them to have the freedom to treasure each other for the first time. And there is something beautiful and sweet in that, even though they lost everything else.