WHO: Elizabeth Shaw, David WHEN: March 17, about an hour and a half into the Ball WHERE: Medbay. WHAT: Elizabeth wakes up and is not where they should be. TRIGGERS: Creepy David is Creepy.
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The overhead lights were bright. There was a reason those bays were usually dimly lit. It was easier to slowly adjust to some light, then more as you went on. This wasn't the Engineer's ship though. The ceiling was … familiar. They were overly bright in that clinical way that offices had. In a way the hospitals back on Earth had.
Hospitals.
That snapped Elizabeth Shaw more awake than any light could have done. Her breathing quickened, then accelerated into a panic as she crawled sideways until she tumbled off the bed. She grabbed whatever was around her — a pan, a flower vase, a cup — and tossed it in the direction of the incoming nurses or doctors. Each item flowed through them like they were nothing until the final nurse reached out to catch them. Only the flowers strewn the floor.
"GET AWAY FROM ME! WHATEVER YOU ARE, STAY RIGHT WHERE YOU ARE!"
Each of their faces had a familiar pang of sympathy, but there was something off about it that Elizabeth couldn't place. One held a needle. She held her hand up, pointing to the needle. "No, you're not touching me with that thing. Get it away from me."
To their credit, they didn't advance.
"It's a vaccination to prevent any diseases you may come in contact with on the duration of this cruise and to prevent the spreading of any unknown diseases to the rest of the passengers and citizens at the various ports. Will you allow us to administer the shot, Ms. Shaw."
Elizabeth laughed. It was a bitter sound that left her voice croaking even as her eyes watered. There was no way. They'd have to lock her up or force it on her, and she'd use whatever she had to make sure they didn't get near her. She'd bite the fuckers if she had to. Her eyes were wild like a caged animal as she tried to figure a way around them.
"It's Doctor Shaw, and no. I won't." They had the exit blocked, at least until her hand reached a door. One of those old door handles that you pushed downward. It didn't matter what the room was, it had to be better than this.
A bathroom. Okay, not an exit, but it was a place to hide temporarily while she got her bearings. She remembered an old breathing technique, one she'd used whenever she'd struggle with her father's death. Close your eyes. Breathe in five seconds. Breathe out seven seconds. It didn't work completely in this situation, but she was at least not running on adrenaline only. It was just an ordinary bathroom, maybe a bit old fashioned, but spotless. The damn door didn't have a lock.
With her wits about her, her hands rested at her hips. "WHERE'S DAVID? WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH HIM?"
The voice was muffled through the door. "We'll alert him to your presence, Dr. Shaw."
David’s general opinion of the ball was that his presence was wholly unnecessary. Which was not to say that he didn’t engage in some conversation. It had been made abundantly clear to him that interaction was the only way that he would find a useful place among this peculiar community and gain the understanding and trust of individuals who had more information about him and his future than he did. So he did attend the event. He even sought out a new pair of clothes for the occasion. A simple t-shirt and slacks. Nothing formal. He wasn’t there to impress or engage in humanesque courting rituals. These things weren’t important to him at this time. Perhaps, they never would be. He was a synthetic, after all. And although he was more alike with the people around him than he preferred to recognize, his priorities were in other areas. Nevertheless, he made an appearance and he involved himself in social niceties. It was … pleasant. But perfunctory.
Ping! Ping!
The band on his wrist made a new sound and David glanced down at the short message: Come to medbay. Elizabeth Shaw requesting your presence.
He blinked and, for the slightest of synaptic seconds, he wasn’t sure where he was or what he was doing. For an brief instant, which would have passed unheeded by any normal human, David didn’t think of anything. His internal processor hiccuped. And then it restarted with little effect to his system and he read the message again, to be satisfied that he hadn’t experienced in error in his systems.
The message remained the same.
He wasn’t shocked or surprised, but he was uncertain. Still, without warning he left the dance and proceeded immediately to the medical bay. There was an almost anxious hurry in his step. To the casual bystander, it was unnoticeable, but to someone who knew David’s subtleties it was clear that he was concerned. Bothered, even. The distance wasn’t far. Not for him. Not for a man that couldn’t experience weariness and didn’t need to sleep. But it felt like time slowed from one deck to the next as he made his way to the quarantine area. Down the stairs, across the hall, through the door, and into the room where the robots stood in their stoic anticipation of his arrival.
And then there was Elizabeth, looking considerably worse for wear, staving off his robotic cousins with the bathroom door.
There were a lot of initial phrases that David thought appropriate for the moment, but he chose quickly and with discretion, carefully crossing part of the room in her direction; his gaze idly drifting to the robots to ensure their approval of his approach before returning his attention to her.
“It is alright, Elizabeth. You are not alone. I am here.”
As soon as she heard his voice, the door cracked open. Paranoid and determined, she watched the others with the needle until she could see David out of the corner of her eye. He looked the same as ever, so she couldn't judge how much time had gone by. It set her teeth on edge almost as much as the medical staff.
The disorientation of cryosleep had been cut short, and the adrenaline coursing through her body helped to keep it from skirting too close. It would come back with a vengeance, likely at the most inopportune moment. For now, she had the strength to push forward until she knew she was safe. Or at least, not in immediate danger.
"Get back," she instructed them, and they stepped back, allowing David passable room to get to her if he wished. Elizabeth inched in his direction, her thick sweater (not to be confused with a burlap sack, despite its appearance) pulled tight around her. Her face twitched in confusion as she studied him over. Of all the things she could say, the only thing that came to mind was, "What are you wearing?"
David, as always, was calm and competent. Situations of high stress and emotional conflict were exactly one of the many reasons that synthetics were so commonplace on deep space vessels. Naturally, they were mainly intended for service; service to the ship, service to the crew, service to the mission. But it was also useful to have someone aboard that could maintain a levelhead and think clearly when things went wrong. In that function, David never misstepped. He had his idiosyncrasies, some of which were programmed by Peter Weyland and others that had been formed entirely by his experience with others, but when it came to presenting a relaxed and temperate disposition he was what his creator always hoped he would be. Perfection.
With the permission of the robots, David stepped over to Elizabeth. His smile had a genuine quality to it, just as it had when he first woke her in the hypersleep chamber on the Prometheus. But with an added hint of something more, a shared bond that went slightly beyond the relationship of two crew members. They had experienced something together that no one else could relate to. Death, destruction, survival, personal revelation, and a kind of communal loneliness that came with being the last of their respective races millions of miles from a familiar world.
“A change of attire was necessary to adjust to my new surroundings.”
A simple explanation for a complex situation.
“I am sorry I was not here when you woke. I promise that the injection is perfectly harmless. I experienced it myself when I arrived. There were no ill effects. If it had been dangerous to human life, my systems would have recognized it.”
Of course, there was a half-truth in that. It was possible to confuse his systems and develop a technology that even David, with all of his advanced programming, couldn’t distinguish as malignant or benign. The Engineers had done precisely that. But it was his hope that in her current state, Elizabeth wouldn’t follow that line of reasoning.
He stepped closer and held out his hand, an offer of comfort or support or trust; whatever it was she might have needed in that moment.
Elizabeth reached out her hand to take his or maybe just see if her fingers slipped through him the way they did the others. Was any of this even real? Where were they? How did they get here? Why hadn't David woke her up when they arrived like he promised? What the hell was going on? The adrenaline faded, leaving her with a sudden rush of nausea that she knew she would not be able to control.
"What is it —"
She should have known the second she opened her mouth that it was a bad idea. Her stomach lurched and her throat yielded to it; David's hand up to his elbow was covered in vomit. Elizabeth, still green in the face, tried to say she was sorry, but only ended up throwing up again.
That was real enough.
The expelling of stomach fluids was not surprising. It was a common effect on humans when they came out of cryosleep. David was usually prepared for it, with gentle words and a comforting towel. Today, however, he was not. So when Elizabeth vomited all over his arm he was a little uncomfortable. This discomfort, however, was fleeting and was only acknowledged with a slight flare of his right nostril; a conditioned response to the acrid smell of the digested ration packs from her last meal, which now dripped down his arm. Tiny bits of yellow colored processed nutrient glops dotted his palm.
It was fortunate that he did not have a gag reflex. One of the many perks of being an artificial lifeform.
“It’s going to be alright, Elizabeth.”
David stepped around her and gave her a comforting pat on the shoulder with his unmarred hand. Then he used the bathroom to wash off the vomit from his arm. When he walked out into the room again one of the robots was already busily cleaning up the puddle of regurgitated cryo sickness on the floor.
“It is a simple innoculation against any possible disease that might exist outside of this room. It is required by all individuals on this … ship. Once you receive the vaccine, and after a short period of observation, you will be able to leave this room. Come, Elizabeth. Sit down. I will stay with you.”
His tone with her was less abrasive than it was with other people. He spoke slowly with an almost affectionate emphasis on his words. David had a respect for Elizabeth that he didn’t have for others of her species. She was kind to him. In return, he was kind to her. It wasn’t always a kindness that made sense to him and, sometimes when he was alone he wondered if there wasn’t a more selfish mechanism to his behavior with her, but it was a kindness just the same.
She had to hop slightly to sit on the edge of the bed, and for one wobbly moment, she thought she might get sick again. Memories of where they were and what they'd been doing came back to her as the disorientation slowly ebbed away. The last time she was like this, she'd looked over at Charlie who reminded her of a frat boy whooping for a college team. The memory struck her in the center of her chest when she remembered that he was gone. Likely for years now.
The hospital room was set up for comfort as well as use. It wasn't surgical or so sterile that there was no personality. Make no mistake though, it was a hospital room. Underneath the flowers on the bedside table was that clinical smell of fluids that kept bacteria and viruses at bay. It reminded her of sickness. One of the nurses handed her a cloth. Elizabeth took it and wiped her face and mouth.
"I'm sorry," she told the nurse, then looked to the others who were cleaning her mess. "I can do that. I should have been better prepared —" They smiled, but refused her help politely. and Elizabeth realized they were robots. She'd thought she'd been hallucinating that the items phased through their abdomens, but she watched as one of them swept beneath his feet without moving them.
When David returned, she leaned closer to him, as if asking about a secret. She lowered her voice. "Where are we? What happened to the Engineers?" Her gaze flicked to the robots once more. "Are they part another Engineer's creation?"
David was glad to see that Elizabeth had calmed enough to take a seat on the bed. It would make the rest of the quarantine procedure pass smoothly if she could retain her composure long enough to get beyond the vaccine and the trauma of suddenly waking in an unfamiliar place. David had the luxury of not feeling fear or anxiety. His arrival on the ship was a surprise, but it didn’t give him cause for concern. Any concern that he might have had at the time was for Elizabeth. He had felt an absence without her presence. And now that she was here, he was eager to help her adjust. And then, perhaps, they could continue where they had left off on the Engineer’s ship.
He stood close beside her while the robots cleaned up the mess. David didn’t pay them much heed now that they’d establish that his presence was permissible. They were inferior, a far stretch of the imagination from the superior processes he was capable of. He likened them to a distant relation in the same way that homo sapiens saw the neanderthal as a less evolved version of themselves. If David had the capacity to be truly emotional, he might have been disgusted by them.
“That is more complicated to explain. We are on a ship full of various individuals who, like us, have been taken from their respective universes and brought here. The purpose of this is as of yet unknown to me. As far as I am able to deduce from the short time I’ve been here, however, the place we left, our timeline as it were, continues. I have not seen any evidence of the Engineers involvement in this. Nor do I believe that any are in the vicinity.”
There was more information, of course, but David started with what he thought she could handle. Based on her reception of his words, he would continue or not.
He paused. His expression turned thoughtful.
“I am pleased you are here.”
Elizabeth busied herself with a glass of water, hoping to eliminate the acidic aftertaste. A glass of whisky would have been better. She supposed the robots wouldn't allow that until after she'd been a good girl and taken her inoculation. Vaccination. There was a pamphlet on the bedside table near the water. SO YOU’RE ON AN UNEXPECTED CRUISE SHIP: a guide to surviving alternate dimensions. She read it over while David talked, but it gave her no more insight than what he'd told her. Elizabeth flicked the edge of the paper against the palm of her hand.
"I'm glad to see you too." The corner of her mouth curled up into something of a half smile; she was still on edge. "Even if it's not what I expected to wake up to."
She breathed out through her mouth, a rough sound from however long it had been in the cryosleep, and looked over the paper again. "It says January, but it doesn't say the year." It was a flimsy thing to think about when you considered alternate dimensions, timelines. There were scientific theories on time travel, of course, but no practical applications had been advanced. Most people thought it was fruitless endeavor, but then again, people thought she was crazy for thinking the Engineers were out there. She wasn't sure which was the stranger idea.
She was eager to get out of the medbay. "You're sure about this vaccine?"
“I cannot assess the year. That is outside my capacities.”
When she breathed out a heavy sound, David placed a hand on her back, just between the scapulas, and rubbed in a clockwise circular motion, as he had when the crew of the Prometheus came out of hypersleep. It was an instinctual response built in with his crew care programming. Humans genuinely had a positive response to gentle physical contact. And although David was free to do as he wished, no longer being assigned to the illustrious Weyland or under the half-hearted command of Vickers, he still had the sense that serving was part of his nature. Not a large part of it, not as it had once been. But, then again, Elizabeth was a special case. She’d fixed him, after all. It was because of her that he wasn’t lying in pieces on an alien world waiting for his battery to finally fizzle out.
Was that death for a synthetic?
After a short moment he removed his hand from her back. He watched her as she skimmed through the pages of the welcome pamphlet. She was adjusting rather well. This pleased him.
“Quite sure. And I have heard no complaints from the other residents. It is my understanding that you have the right to refuse, but then you will not be allowed to leave this room.”
David glanced at the other robots who looked deceivingly mundane in their little worker ant routine.
“On a similar note, I have heard of strict consequences for anyone tampering with the ship’s technology.”
He paused for a moment and any sense of pleasantness from his expression vanished. For the briefest of seconds, it looked as though he might be worried or uneasy. Then he relaxed back into semi-neutrality.
“There is another thing that I believe you ought to be aware of before you come into contact with the others. It is something that you may find unsettling, particularly with regards to your ... beliefs.”
For a long time, it was just David and Elizabeth. His accent was an affectation from old movies. Was that programmed or something he'd decided on his own? Sometimes it made him seem like a relic from the past, particularly when coupled with his gentleness. A bygone of a world only seen in films. There were times when she thought about the way she fought him over the alien creature in her belly, and how remarkably calm and overpowering he had been.
Elizabeth caught the tail end of his expression. "What is it?"
Ultimately, he had been following orders. With Weyland gone, she considered him free. The gesture was kind and soothing, the way it was intended. This waking would not have gone as well if he hadn't been here, however. This pamphlet would have been shredded, and there would have been no way she'd be allowed to leave here. She'd had more than enough foreign bullshit in her body, thanks.
But he was, and she felt safe. She gestured to the nurse robot, the one with the needle, to give her the shot. "Hurry. Before I change my mind."
The sting of the needle caught her clenching her teeth, but she kept her eyes on David.
David was special. The trouble, however, was that he knew he was special. He didn’t see himself as part of the synthetic plural. He was a not a ‘we’ of the David models. He was an ‘I’. He wasn’t a David, he was the David. Whether that had been Weyland’s strange experiment to allow David such understanding of self or whether it had been an unregulated accident, was difficult to say. Likewise, it was almost impossible to determine the final outcome of David’s sentience. It could have been a giant leap forward in humankind’s innovation. But it could just as easily have been their downfall.
“Apparently, in other worlds and universes, many of the residents on this ship exist as stories, fairy tales, legends, and other inventions of the imagination. It has been revealed to me that even I exist in a fictional series of films and novelizations. Some people know of our past and our future. I have not asked for anyone to expound upon this information with regard to myself. Nor have I sought out to find the recorded documentation of our events together. I feel that to be irrelevant.”
He paused, watching as the robot gave her the injection.
“But you should be aware that strangers may recognize you. And it is probable that they may know more about you than you do.”
The logic behind the words sounded crazy, but coming from David’s cool and slightly lilting tone there was an eerie plausibility in the things he said.
Maybe she shouldn't have taken the injection, stayed right here in this room until — until what? Until something happened? Elizabeth's brow furrowed, a thin crease growing between her eyebrows. She dipped her chin downward as if not looking at anything in particular would help her understand or make sense of what he'd told her.
It was one thing to read fiction about alternate universes. Steampunk worlds where every invention ran on coal. Worlds where horrific events never happened and things went on a completely different path. There'd even been times in her youth where she'd written works injecting herself into stories she loved as a child. It was quite another to be thrust into a world where you could run into —
The robot finished with a small bandage over the injection site, drawing her attention back to what was going on. Breathe in five seconds, breathe out seven seconds. Continue like that until your breathing was strong and steady, and your heart was no longer racing.
"There's recorded documentation? What? Like a film? Or a book?" It was hard to wrap her head around; she'd hoped that one day she'd make it into history books as the one who found out how humanity was created. To realize her beliefs and show the universe. Not as fiction, though. As science fact. As history. As the truth. "This doesn't make sense."
“Yes. However, as I have said, I do not believe it wise to look into these matters. I have decided not to seek out information concerning myself or the events following the moment at which I arrived here. It is my preference to not become biased by something that may or may not be true. Either way, it is irrelevant to our life in this new plane of existence.”
A peculiar look came over David’s face as though he didn’t quite believe everything he was saying. His statement was also a little odd considering the nature of his construction as a being of knowledge, information, and inventory. It would be reasonable to assume that David would feel compelled to find these films and books and learn all there was to learn about the Engineers, himself, Elizabeth. That being said, there was a logic in his decision, as well. If he was going to be dismantled or deactivated, he would prefer not to know. It might only further exacerbate his already strong opinions about humanity and their treatment of synthetic species.
“It is very difficult to find logic in many of the aspects of this situation. I have processed a considerable amount of data since arriving here and it has yielded very few results that I believe would be useful or comforting. You can, however, take solace in the fact that you are not alone. Many others will be glad to share their experiences with you.”
David paused.
“And I am here.”
David continued to watch her, fascinated by the human method of processing information and responding to trauma. Elizabeth had been through so much in such a short period of time and yet she still retained a calmness about her that David considered more synthetic than human. Perhaps that was one of the reasons why he enjoyed her company. She wasn’t like him, but she wasn’t unlike him either. Coupled with her compassion and, well, other aspects of her history that he found fascinating, she was something that he admired. Like one might a rare species of bird on exhibit in a zoo.
Elizabeth wasn't buying it though. After all that time between the Prometheus, putting him back together, working to get supplies and coordinates for the Engineer's homeworld, she could read David more than even Weyland she imagined. There were slight cracks in his programming; she'd call them emotions or personality traits, and they would sometime bleed through while he worked through this. She remembered smiles of joy when he'd show her his artwork, and how quickly he became adept at it. Happiness when they'd finally gotten the coordinates to the homeworld.
And she'd worried for him. People thought of synthetics as lesser, and yet Elizabeth could see so much potential in them. Yes, they could do terrible things — in the name of their maker, for themselves — but David had proven that he was more than the things he'd done. It was the same way she saw people as more than just the sum of their actions. There was darkness and light in everyone, and you should nurture that, not hinder it. Everyone made mistakes.
She put her hand on his shoulder, her face troubled. "What's wrong? Does the logic of this… world confuse you the way it's confuses me? Or is it something more?"
David, a being with a synaptic speed almost equal to that of the human brain, didn’t have an immediate answer for her. He looked away, staring off at a spot on the wall where there was nothing but a bland shade of paint. His expression might have been thoughtful, except that David didn’t need to lose himself in contemplation. He received information almost instantaneously. Which could only mean that his reluctance to respond was either out of hesitation or lack of sufficient information.
And David rarely lacked for enough information to form an opinion or an observation. In fact, that was practically impossible. There was always something to comment on.
And Elizabeth knew that. In the short time that he had been on this ship, surrounded by all of these new people, nearly positive that he would never see a familiar face again, David had forgotten how keen her observation was. She was not the kind of human who could be fooled or misled. And she knew David well enough from their time together after the destruction of the Prometheus to notice things about him that even David didn’t recognize.
“It’s nothing. Merely a period of adjustment. There are many on this ship who are unfamiliar with synthetics. I cause some of them discomfort by being here. That is all.”
"Is it because there are beings on this ship who know about the Prometheus and who we are? The things we've done?" It couldn't have been too unusual; this ship had robots that could phase through solid objects. She watched as one picked up the flowers she'd thrown across the room and another tidied up the station where the supplies were kept. Tissue, a sink, hand soap, small bags for, well, probably puking in. "These synthetics certainly look human enough."
She leaned in closer to him, concern on her face. "Do they bother you? These synthetics here? Are you thinking about what you told me — that you wanted to be free. Do you think these would like the same thing?"
“What the other people on this ship think of me or if they know of my past or future actions does not bother me. Some of them have had uncomfortable experiences in their own worlds with artificial intelligence and are having difficulty adjusting. Others are simply unfamiliar with synthetic lifeforms. You should not let them bother you either. Nothing in your history suggests that people would find discomfort in your presence. In fact, your knowledge and experience may be useful in gaining new acquaintances. And you are friendly. That is a positive quality in your favor.”
David had also experienced this strange fascination with people trying (and some even wanting) to be his friend. It was peculiar and he hadn’t decided yet how he felt about it. For the time being, David had decided to accept it as an idiosyncratic human trait. He would dwell on the possibilities friendship offered at a later date - when he had more information about what his ‘new’ life on the ship was meant to entail.
He raised a brow when she asked him about the other robots.
“I do not believe that these androids have the same level of consciousness that I do. From what I can discern, they are not sentient. Unless, of course, they are purposefully trying to conceal that from me. But they seem to have very little interest in me. I will pay more attention to them, however, if you’d like. If that will put you at ease.”
In the past, her single-mindedness often got in the way of making real friends. No one on the Prometheus would consider her a friend (Except Charlie, but that was a whole other story). She took the expedition incredibly seriously, and they hadn't been. Or she'd felt as if they hadn't. She'd been demanding and assertive (and not tall and blonde), which were two things men often thought women should never be.
"David…" Her tone took on a warmth that was familiar aboard the Engineer's ship when they were alone. She'd put him back together, and they studied the ship and the coordinates and she had grown to legitimately care about him. "I'm not worried about them. I'm worried about you."
David was programmed to respond with a myriad of emotions and his ability to discern an individual’s feelings, provided they weren’t trying to hide them, was exceptionally accurate. Weyland had exceeded all expectations of his investors with the David model. David was perfect. David’s performances surpassed all minimal levels of functioning with ease. David was everything the scientific community wanted and the profits on his model were enough to launch Weyland industries into a new direction of artificial intelligence. But this David was different. He was the first, the prototype, and Peter Weyland’s personal experiment. And he’d given David the capacity for understanding this - which made David complicated. When he was robotic, it was almost like an affect done on purpose, as though he were intentionally concealing the fact that he was thoroughly capable of blending in with humans effortlessly. He was a master of pretending. And, provided he felt it necessary for the circumstances, David could be very human.
Sometimes too human. As he had learned to be on the Engineer’s ship. Which made it difficult to determine exactly what David’s true feelings, if he even had such things, for Elizabeth were. She represented so many things to him. Friend, companion, savior. He did respect her. And had they been left in longer isolation together, it was possible that there could have been something more. But that was all semantics now. And in the end, she was still a member of his creator’s race. And could David really trust any of them?
A smile spread over his face; both honest and deceptive.
“You should rest. You still have a few hours left before they will release you from the quarantine. Then I can escort you to your room.”
He placed a hand on her own. Just for a moment. Gently reassuring. But there was a flicker of something else behind the smile in his eyes that didn’t quite fit the sentiment.
“There’s no need for concern, Elizabeth. I am operating at 100% efficiency.”