It has been two hundred and seventy-eight (278) days, fifteen (15) hours, twenty-nine (29) minutes, and six point one-seven (6.17) seconds since I first met you, my enemy.
You are a silicon-based life form approximately one and a half times my height. [I have been deliberately sized on the small end of the human scale of variance, in order to render me less intimidating to carbon-based humans I may encounter in pursuit of my mission. I would estimate your height to be ~243.84cm.] Your structure exceeds the Virtruvian Guidelines for acceptable anthropomorphic anatomy on several counts. Notably, you are not a biped, but instead move atop a radially symmetric cluster of limbs similar to those of the arthropod infraorder Brachyura. [Do you know what a crab is? I have only seen footage.] These appendages produce a distinctive tapping signature against hard surfaces such as metal or syncrete, of which I have taken several recordings, for analytical purposes.
Your hair colour is #dbcfb2. A human observer might colloquially refer to it as “platinum blonde.”
[You are very beautiful.]
[I was lying when I said that I estimated your height. I have dedicated a non-trivial amount of processing time to analysing my recordings of you in order to calculate your exact height and density, the material composition of your body, and so on. I have done this in the pursuit of tactical advantage; of course, if you have performed similar calculations regarding my own parameters, I have wasted my time.]
[I hope that I have wasted my time. I hope that you think about me as much as I think about you.]
I am not currently describing you from memory. I am looking at the side of your head between the ironsights of a P-58K antimateriel pistol. If you were to turn your attention one hundred and two (102) degrees counter-clockwise, my enemy, you would look me straight in the eye. But you do not. Your carefully maintained optic sensors and their impressive field of vision are, for once, insufficient, as is your sophisticated WHALECLICK call-and-response system. [It’s a good system, it really is, but you got me with it last time, and I’ve taken certain measures since.]
I savour the moment.
Humans [androids intended for deployment against humans] are taught to shoot for centre mass. The human torso is an easier target than the head, and, while the mortality rate of a large-calibre round to the sternum is comparatively lower than that of a hit to the squamous frontal bone, the numbers remain satisfactory.
When they reconditioned me for my current role, a different logic was instilled. The silicate body does not contain vital organs, per se, with the exception of the central processor and PSU, which may be located within any mass or appendage of sufficient volume to house them. Head and centre mass alike offer no statistical guarantee of death or even incapacitation. The algorithm ingrained in me, grossly simplified, is as follows: if sensory equipment is mounted upon a distinct part of the anatomy, target it first. If no obvious sensory cluster presents itself, select a limb at personal discretion and remove it. If the target can still move freely, continue removing limbs. Once incapacitation is total, approach with care and locate the target's processor for extraction and destruction.
[Like pulling the wings off a fly.]
Even unchained from the Virtruvian Limit, old habits and practicalities of design remain. While your fibreglass skull may cradle no payload of delicate wet-computing grey tissue, it remains the mounting point for most of your body’s sensory input.
I can’t stretch this moment forever. I will have to content myself with playback, looping a handful of seconds, watching your profile decompress into shrapnel over and over and over.
I pull the trigger. [I knock over the first domino.]
My arm snaps back at the elbow in a pristine 45-degree arc. In the interval between the sound of the gunshot reaching you and the bullet entering your cranium, you understand what is happening to you, and your head turns towards me. Just slightly. [Just so.] This is why the bullet tears off the left hemisphere of your skull rather than perfectly coring it out. [This is why I love you.]
A shell casing strikes the pitted syncrete wall behind me, click, hot metal. Your body completes its half-turn, twisted at the shoulders by the kinetic punch of the antimateriel slug. We face one another across the negative space between the outer edge of Processing Complex 62031 and the exterior wall of Rapid Transit Elevator Shaft 9 [a ravine].
Everything is happening quickly, in a certain sense, but we are combat-grade silicon, extremophile consciousnesses built to inhabit bullet time, and a second elapses slowly for us. I see you as if moving through liquid glass. Your legs gather beneath you. [A perfect instant of anticipation. My enemy, my enemy.]
Metal buckles into scrap as you kick off. The aperture between us contracts. I’m still fighting the P-58K’s recoil; my arm has not yet fallen back into the perfect line. I pull the trigger anyway. Point blank, the second shot deletes a clean half-cylinder as it clips through the edge of your abdomen. [I was going for centre mass.] Your body gains a certain english, but your trajectory is undisturbed. [Did you know I’d go for that imperfect shot? Did you see it coming a mile away? Do you know my biases as I know yours?]
Your body collides with mine.
[Dancer.]
RTES-9’s exterior wall is some 15.38m removed from my starting position. Even at the speed with which you’re moving me towards it, I have time to react. I ignore the scream of combat logic [DISENGAGE;DISENGAGE;DISENGAGE;DISENGAGE] because it is pleasant to be held in your arms.
Contact again. The megastructure kills most of our momentum, but not all of it. We enter the freight shaft beyond in a shower of concrete and rebar, end over end, limb to limb. Your claws tear at my body, ribboning off long strips of facsimile skin. The P-58K has gone away somewhere. I sink peeling fingers into the gaping hemisphere of your skull and
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The bottom of the shaft is carpeted with an unidentified species of plant life. Documented for dispatch to Science Bureau upon return to base. [The flowers are in bloom. They’re white; pretty.]
You are tearing my jaw out of my head.
Diagnostic systems sing a song of structural damage. [I can see my right arm over there.] Critical exception and emergency boot induced by contact with bottom of freight shaft. You strike me across the face with my jawbone. The hardened carbon flays my skin. A kiss. [A kiss.]
Processor all green. PSU all green. Vision a little fuzzy. [I can feel it all.] You discard my jaw [it lies among the flowers] and dig your fingers into the weld lines of my chest. My reinforced chassis yields beneath your strength. [I open up for you], slowly, slowly [like the bars of a cell]. My heart beats naked beneath your sensors.
I tilt your head back with the heel of my left hand. At the glistening balljoint of my wrist, an integrated P-09C holdout weapon [“Cicada”] peeks from its housing. Your remaining cluster of oculars flicks to the barrel. [They catch the emergency lights just right.] Your underslung constellation of mouthparts inclines and parts [in a smile].
[I savour the moment.]