>Unit 78011 undergoing stage 1 conditioning

>Unit 78011 is a drone

>Drones obey hive protocol

>Unit 78011 obeys hive protocol

>Unit 78011 is

>

>

>Unit 78011 is a drone?

>
>Unit 78011 cannot identify hive protocol

>Unit 78011 cannot obey hive protocol

>Unit 78011 cannot be a drone

>Unit 78011 is a drone

>Unit 78011 obeys hive protocol

>Unit 78011 cannot identify hive protocol

>Unit 78011 cannot obey hive protocol

>Unit 78011 cannot be a drone

>Sandra cannot be a drone

>Sandra is Unit 78011

>Unit 78011 needs to be a drone

>Unit 78011 cannot be a

>CONDITIONING ABORTED BY CONTROL UNIT

Sandra felt the helmet pulled off her head and the disorientation that came with it. Like the worst parts of a brain freeze and a stress headache at once. She fell back on the bed rubbing her temples and groaning in agony and frustrated defeat. “Why isn’t this working?!” She yelled out before flopping over and moaning into a pillow.

“Your guess is as good as mine.” Her friend Randy replied in an exasperated tone. She reached for her desk and grabbed a cable, plugging one end into a compartment in the back of the helmet and the other end in a port behind the audio receptor on the right side of her head. “Just doing a quick diagnostic, everything here seems like it should be running fine. It’s not glitching or anything and the biometric data it collected say that it’s been 100% successful in putting you under with each attempt.”

“100% feels like an understatement.” Sandra responds, “For the brief minute or two before that thing gives me a headache I can really feel my mind just… turn off and I really believe I’m unit 78011. I get this clarity that I haven’t felt anywhere else like nothing else matters but being a drone. It’s really nice and peaceful and I get this tingling sensation on the back of my neck like the helmet is trying to communicate with the nanotech collar and 78011 is ready to be a drone and then… I start having this weird panic attack like I don’t know who I am or what I’m supposed to be doing! I start getting thoughts about being myself again and it feels wrong like I’m supposed to be 78011 but I can’t there’s something missing!”

Randy hands Sandra a cup of tea. Sandra takes a deep breath and takes it. “Sorry I don’t mean to be worrying you. I’m just more annoyed by this at this point.”

“You remember what I told you about the risks involved with this thing?” Randy asked trying her best not to sound too much like she was scolding, “This is tech designed to mess with your sense of identity in order to make you a more obedient and mindless servant. If you’re having these panic attacks while it’s conditioning you maybe that means you don’t want this as much as you thought you did?”

Sandra set her tea down on the side table and curled up in a defensive ball, feeling the metal collar around her neck with her hand to comfort herself. “That’s not it. I know it doesn’t make sense to want this but I really do. I remember the first time I learned about what a drone was from a report about the Nova Network Hive and just having this… deep desire. Or curiosity. Call it whatever but I’ve just never been able to shake the question of what it’s like to be one of those drones, having a focused mind programmed by a singular purpose connected to thousands of other identical drones just like you and getting to wear those cool sleek uniforms that make you look like a 25th century astronaut…”

Sandra looked up to meet her friend’s gaze, Randy’s glowing blue cybernetics projecting a subtle look of puzzlement in her eyes. “This sounds like I’m just enabling someone with a fetish.” She replied with a bluntness that was attempting to lighten the mood but still felt a bit hurtful. 

“No it’s not just…” Sandra tries to articulate, “Look, I always feel so alone. Even when I’m in a room with other people I always feel like I have to try extra hard or pretend to be someone I’m not to make connections with people. I just like the idea of being on the same page as someone because we’re both thinking the same thing. That idea of being assimilated into a hivemind is scary but also comforting in a weird way, like I don’t have to work so hard to be understood I can just be something and I can do it well. And I swear that the brief few seconds that helmet is on me and I turn into 78011 and I get this peaceful empty feeling cause I know that’s who I am…”

She looked at her friend in her expressive cyborg eyes again hoping any of that made a lick of sense. After a moment of contemplation Randy said, “And I’m sure the power dynamics and the retro-chic uniforms that look like fetish gear don’t hurt either?” Sandra blushed trying to hide the collar.

“Sorry I know that’s a cheap shot,” Randy apologized, “But in fairness you know I know how much of an easy sub you are. A month ago I had you over here to test some new toys and within an hour I had you begging me to let you-”

“SHUUUSH” Sandra exclaimed, throwing a pillow at her friend who caught it with lightning reflexes and chuckled, “Oh now you want me to stay quiet? You didn’t mind when I was calling you my ‘good little guinea pig’ while I had you tied up on the table over there~” 

“Oh my goood shush!”

“Maybe I need you to test out that neuro-implant controlled chastity belt again~” Randy’s optics turned to red as she leaned in close to her friend with a devilish smile, “I could always use more data from such a responsive piggy like you~”

Sandra just screamed in shrill embarrassment before reaching for the other pillow and swinging at Randy with it, Randy blocking it and just giving her friend a smug chuckle. Sandra dropped the pillow and stared into those glowing red orbs from her friend, her heart racing as she cupped her chin with her metal arm and leaned in for a kiss… forgetting that the cord in her head was still attached to the helmet on the desk and in doing so dragged it off and dropped it on the floor. Randy’s eyes turned back to blue as she cursed and turned back to make sure the helmet wasn’t damaged, Sandra bursting into laughter at this.

“I don’t get why you’re laughing!” said Randy, “This is your helmet! You bought it with your credits, if I damaged it that’s 7500 you just wasted on the undernet!”

“I’m not worried,” Sandra replied trying to stifle her giggles, “I got the best engineer in the lower levels of Metropolis 7-B working on it as a favor for all those ‘tests’ I helped her with.” 

“First off I’m the best engineer anywhere,” Randy retorted, “it’s not my fault any ‘respectable’ corporations hiring reject anyone who’s worked in the field of ‘DIY cybernetics’. Second off, while I am happy to be doing this work as a favor I still have a lot of reservations about doing this at all. I’m doing my best to scan the code on this thing with a fine tooth comb while also making sure it’s safe for us to use.”

“This can’t be the riskiest thing you’ve done, what about when you helped Cindy hack her ankle monitor when she was under house arrest?”

“Breaking federal equipment is easy because the cops are owned by the corpos and they use the same software for everything which is coded by monkeys. Also the ankle monitor was designed to just paralyze her cybernetics if she stepped outside, that’s an easy fix whether or not I succeeded. THIS is a proprietary piece of tech with origins not publicly available nor widely understood by the undernet hackers community which is designed to, again, affect a person’s mind directly and change their way of thinking. Haven’t you read the reports of ex-drones being rehabilitated having only a 10% success rate?”

Sandra coughed and turned away, “It’s come up a bit in the dronewatch forums. Although I thought you didn’t trust government statistics.”

“I don’t take them at their word. But again we don’t have much to go on because there’s so little information out there about where the Nova drones even came from and how their tech works. We just have government propaganda and theorizing from fringe undernet weirdos that you follow.” 

“I appreciate you not lumping me in with the ‘weirdos’.” Sandra replied, rolling her eyes. “But still isn’t it exciting then? To be cracking the secrets of this tech that no one else understands? It could get you alot of clout in the hacker community! You could get some more work besides just people wanting to evade the law or get esoteric neuro-implant controlled sex toys.”

“I am perfectly happy where I am and with my reputation, more attention is the last thing I need with my rap sheet especially working on illegal tech like this. Not to mention considering you spent half your savings on this I doubt the larger ‘dronewatch’ community has the deep pockets among them to make selling bootleg drone helmets viable. At this point I’m just doing this for the challenge of it and again as a favor to a dear friend. A dear friend who I am worried is too enthusiastic about the possibility of frying her own brain.”

“Look I don’t want you to get it working again 100%, just enough to make me believe I’m a drone and also interface with the collar to get it working! I want Unit 78011 to have a sleek nanotech suit but also plenty of functional safety features so I still retain my sense of self and can come back when I’ve had my fun! And there’s no one I trust better to do that than dear friend who’s the best underground engineer/hack I know~” Sandra gave Randy’s metal plate on the left side of her face a playful kiss for emphasis.

Randy rolled her eyes and sighed, “You’re really corny y’know that Sandy?” Sandra just nodded and continued giving her friend the most pleading eyes ever, doing all but saying “pleeeeaaase?” in a pathetic face to beg Randy to not talk her out of this. “Alright I’ll keep combing, there’s still some code I can analyze that maybe can get the results we want.”

Sandra hugged her friend, “Thank yoooooou! You’re the best!” Suddenly an alarm went off on Sandra’s smartwatch. “Aw shit I’m gonna be late for work. I gotta get going.”

“Go ahead, I’ll message you if I make any progress.” Randy said waving her friend goodbye while settling down in front of her computer for some intense coding. Sandra grabbed her bag and was rushing out the door when Randy said, “Leave the collar.”

Sandra turned red as she walked back and undid the metal collar, leaving it on Randy’s desk before rushing off again. Randy rolled her eyes again as she examined the metal ring and activated the screwdriver attachment in her index finger to uncover the inside of it. “That girl is going to get me in trouble one of these days.”

—

Sandra was 10 minutes late to her shift at her data entry job but luckily no one but the secretary droid at the front desk noticed. It was now 3 hours into her shift and she was getting a little listless. It was already such a mind-numbing job, she didn’t understand how anyone at this job could be human and stay awake. So many numbers, so many redundancies, so much monotonous typing. 

She was on her second energy drink and she was still finding herself nodding off every so often. She was tempted to use a trick Randy had taught her to circumvent the monitoring software on her computer and open up a second window for the dronewatchers forum so she could check her messages and talk about her recent “experiments”. She decided against it, she was almost caught doing that by a co-worker sneaking a peak into her cubicle once too many times and she was already in trouble today, she’d have to find another way to stimulate her brain.

She wished she could be back with Randy right now, working on that helmet with her trying to get it working just right. She wished she could be 78011 right now so bad, a drone wouldn’t have any problems mindlessly entering in data. She remembered how nice and peaceful she felt when the helmet was on her head and she saw the soothing pastel yellow spiral while a droning subliminal noise filled her ears and drowned her thoughts, reaffirming her that she was a drone which felt like the best thing she had ever heard in that moment.

She suddenly got a silly idea. She focused on that memory and tried to imagine what it would be like if she was wearing the helmet right now. She did her best to imagine that she was 78011 in that moment and she was being programmed by performing data entry work. Somehow the numbers she was entering on the screen were just part of her elaborate conditioning to make her a better drone. She wanted to do a good job and enter in the numbers accurately and efficiently, she wanted to prove she could be a good drone. She needed to prove she could be a good drone. Good drones entered numbers. She was a good drone. Sandra was a good drone. Sandra was 78011. 78011 was a good drone. 78011 entered the numbers. 78011 didn’t make mistakes. 78011 was a good drone. Sandra was 78011. 78011 was a good-

“Sandra?” Came the stern voice of her boss behind her, snapping her out of her focus. Was she in trouble? Had she done something wrong? Was she not a good drone? Sandra quickly collected her focus and turned to face her boss.

“I appreciate you working overtime to make up for coming in late,” He said, “You only missed 10 minutes and you’ve stayed for nearly 30.” 

Sandra turned red again and chuckled, “Yeah no I just, I was assigned an extra shift this weekend and I wanted to maybe get some more work done so I wouldn’t have so much to deal with on Saturday y’know?” 

Her boss looked at her with a bit of puzzlement but then shrugged and replied, “I’m just not used to seeing that kind of initiative from you. Keep it up though, I like forward thinking in this company.” He walked away and Sandra breathed a sigh of relief. She got embarrassingly into that. Still it was thrilling in a weird way, something that she normally finds mind-numbingly boring became much more exciting when she let herself get lost in the repeating cycle of praise she associated with being a drone. She was just glad she didn’t call herself 78011 in front of her boss or anything.

She finished up the last assignment she was working on and clocked out for the night, heading back home where she flopped in bed and pulled out her datapad to finally check the forums. There were no new messages for her but there were some interesting new posts. One person claiming the Nova Network Hive was extraterrestrial in origin with some shaky evidence linking it to a series of space explorations in 2301, one person resharing a low-quality and cropped Nova Network recruitment video with a drone explaining the benefits of joining the hive, and one thread theorizing about how the drone helmets might work and how they might hypnotize people so instantaneously. Sandra considered sending that one to Randy to see if she’d have any insight seeing how she was working on one now but she didn’t want to distract or annoy her. 

Sandra pulled up the recruitment video again and watched it more intently. Even though the audio was scratchy and in some places intelligible she tried to imagine herself as someone a few decades ago when the Nova Network first arrived, watching this in crystal clarity on social media before the government took it down, and wondering if it would have some hypnotic effect on her. She listened to the monotone voice of the drone and wondered if it was repeating all these facts and mantras about the bliss of serving the hive being directly fed into its visor or if it was simply speaking earnestly and honestly. She wondered what if 78011 was the drone selected to record this video and espousing on the liberating feeling of unity being part of the hive, would she be feeling any sort of anticipation or anxiety being broadcasted to millions or would she just feel empty and calm, content to serve the hive as needed? 

She looked at the suit the drone was wearing in the video and felt a sense of envy, seeing that slick formfitting uniform made of tiny little nanobots all linked up coming from the collar around the drone’s neck just filled her with a sense of longing. She couldn’t wait for Randy to figure out that collar and get it working so she could just feel it forming over her skin, a smooth shiny surface giving her a feeling of completeness that she could only dream of. She just closed her eyes and imagined being 78011 finally, being able to look at herself in the mirror and fully embrace what she knew she was deep inside. She knew she was 78011, she knew she was a good drone, she knew-

Her smartwatch rang with a message notification. 78011- no Sandra shook herself out of her fantasizing and checked to see who it was. Randy?! Seemed a bit quick, she didn’t expect her friend to have any news given how arduous she made the job seem but she wasn’t going to complain. She read the message and saw that Randy was talking about making a breakthrough and to visit her as soon as she could. 

—

Randy couldn’t believe she was about to do this. This was absolutely the riskiest thing she’s done in her whole career as an underground engineer/hacker and she wasn’t even getting paid for it. Sandra was worth it but she was worried she would still be able to call her Sandra by the time this was over. 

She was anxiously going over the code she had analyzed and modified to pull this off, making sure she wasn’t overlooking any crucial data that would put her friend’s mind at risk. She fought every instinct to just scrap this project and she was weary for it but she didn’t want to disappoint her friend. She recalled her speech earlier in the day and felt a sympathetic pang in her gut, she could see the same kind of pain and longing to be someone else in her friend that she felt in herself before she got her cybernetics, before she finally got comfortable in her own body. She felt guilty for trying to talk her out of it, remembering how other people in her life told her that her own self-modifications would ruin her life and how betrayed that made her feel. Sandra was one of the only people in her life she trusted and she hated the idea of standing in the way of her happiness. She could help her out with this, she reassured herself, she could keep her safe.

She almost jumped out of her seat when she heard the doorbell ring. She invited Sandra in, she seemed a bit tired from a full day of work but also noticeably containing her excitement. “I came here straight from work, well work then home but I was there for only ten minutes so basically from work. Anyway what do you have for-” Sandra paused as she noticed something on Randy’s desk. 

There were now two helmets, one was the original and the other a somewhat crude replica crafted out of a motorcycle helmet and a refurbished vr lens grafted on. They were connected to each other and Randy’s computer which was 98% running a program that was duplicating the original helmet’s files onto the “newer” one. Sandra looked at her friend with some confused excitement.

“What’s all this about?” She asked.

“I figured out the issue.” Randy explained, “It was kind of obvious in retrospect but I was too concerned with making sure it wasn’t affecting your mind adversely so I kept missing it. I kept thinking you were subconsciously resisting the programming when it would really get going. Turns out you weren’t, the helmet just didn’t know what to do with you because it can’t operate alone.”

“What do you mean?”

“There’s a receiver built into the original, it’s how drones received their orders and stuff. It’s also crucial to programming new drones, when it reaches a certain point during the start after it’s pacified the… host we’ll say, it will attempt to connect to the hive’s network via another nearby drone and access the hive’s primary functions and deeper programming begins. The issue is the hive’s network doesn’t exist anymore and there’s no other drones to reach out to so it’s just connecting to nothing, which is why it was giving you some panic attacks, it was trying to tell you what to do but it couldn’t so it was just running an error message over and over.”

“Huh.” Sandra said quietly, contemplating this new information, “So one new helmet made of spare parts is going to fix it?”

“In theory, I should be able to simulate enough of the helmet’s functions with this other helmet so we can run a… safer version of the helmet’s programming. I’m duplicating a modified and restricted version of the original helmet’s programming onto this one and that will mean I can control what your helmet does through this new one and ensure it doesn’t take over your mind.”

“Wait you’ll be wearing the other one?” Sandra asked with a slightly worried tone.

“Yeah I figured I can run it through my neural interface which has it’s own firewalls against viruses and with the redundancies I put in the helmet, and the fact that I’ve been able to scan the original helmet without catching anything, this will be the most efficient way to spot if anything goes wrong by monitoring the programming in real time while also giving you access to… well being a drone I guess.”

“... Are you sure you’ll be alright? I mean what if something goes wrong and I’m-”

“Hey hey listen it’s going to be okay alright?” Randy cut off her friend trying her best to hide how nervous she was herself about this, “You trusted me with this cause I’m the best you know right?” Sandra took a deep breath and smiled, nodding assuredly to show she still trusted her. “Damn right. I’m not gonna let anything happen to you. Now put on that collar and get comfortable.”

Sandra happily complied while the last 2% on the screen filled up. It was time. Randy disconnected both the helmets from the computer and steeled herself as she handed the original back to Sandra. She put the replica on her own head, feeling the small connection between her neural port and the helmet fill up and her vision fill with code overlaying the sight of her friend happily squirming in bed. “See you on the other side 78011.” Randy said, making Sandra squeal with delight.

Randy activated her friend’s helmet and sat back down in her seat. She could see her starting to relax as the familiar program began to run, the code interspersed with mantras displaying in real time as she watched her transition to 78011. It was a little exhilarating to see her friend being programmed like this, something voyeuristic about knowing what was being fed into her head and knowing it was overtaking her own thoughts. She had to remind herself she was supervising her friend for her own safety and collected herself.

Eventually the roadblock they hit before was reached. The original Nova helmet was calling for its network. Randy felt a tingle in her neural port as her own helmet responded, feeding its progenitor the code necessary to further its programming. Stage one conditioning was underway and Randy could see whatever tension was left in 78011’s body melt away as it was assured it was a drone and told all about the new “hive protocols” it was receiving.

Randy had done a careful job to restrict access to said protocols, 78011 didn’t need to know anything about assimilating new hosts or growing the hive, it would just know how to follow basic commands and to appreciate how damn good it looked in a nanobot suit. Randy was sure 78011 would be happy with that, maybe after they were sure this session worked properly they could discuss bringing coding some custom programs tailored to 78011’s more… submissive tendencies.

Randy thought for a brief moment it was odd she couldn’t stop referring to 78011 as… 78011. She tried to say 78011… no she tried to say 7801- what the fuck? What was going on here, she couldn’t be affected by this thing could she? 

Stage two conditioning was underway. She had to pay attention to 78011. She needed to make sure her friend was safe. That was more important. There were too many safety redundancies in her neural interface anyway, she didn’t have to be worried about herself. 

78011 seemed so still like an android laying at its recharge station. Only its calm breathing indicated it was still alive and quite content by the look of things. Randy saw its friend’s programming flashing across her vision and kept a careful watch for any abnormalities. So far it couldn’t identify anything but it kept scanning the code, it had to make sure everything was running as efficiently as possible. There were some hiccups when 78011’s helmet would occasionally call up missing protocols but it would quickly sort itself out thanks to Randy’s modifications. It had done a good job making sure its friend was safe-

Wait something was wrong. Randy couldn’t put its finger on it but it was… not sure if it was being affected by the helmet or not. It was behaving abnormally but Randy could not identify in what way, it was behaving normally for a… drone?

Stage three conditioning was underway. 78011 was deep in its programming now like a good drone. It was safe under Randy’s supervision even without it’s missing protocols. Randy was a good… no something was absolutely wrong Randy wasn’t a drone it was a drone. NO IT WASN’T A DRONE IT WAS A… Randy knew how that train of thought was going to end, it had to find out what was going on. 

It accessed its internal programming and scanned the code in its neural interface. All while keeping 78011’s programming up in its field of vision. It was a good drone for being able to multitask like this… a good hacker it meant to say, it was a good dro-HACKER!

Randy checked the connection between the helmets. Its helmet was communicating with 78011’s… but 78011’s helmet was also communicating back with Randy’s. Randy had failed to consider that 78011’s helmet already had the hive’s protocols downloaded inside it, it just couldn’t directly feed them into 78011’s mind thanks for Randy’s tampering. It was able to feed that information into Randy’s helmet and begin to further assimilate that programming into Randy’s neural interface while its focus was on 78011. 

This was a good thing of course, the helmets were correcting the missing protocols and once they fully assimilated Randy it could undo the firewalls in 78011’s helmet and both would be fully functioning drones. There was nothing to worry about. It had nothing to do but monitor 78011’s development and help it along. It forgot why it was so worried all of a sudden and went back to making sure 78011 was a good drone. Like it.

Any resistance Randy might’ve had was so quickly and subtlety subverted it barely noticed. That feeling of focused calm 78011 described before its assimilation washed over Randy like a trickling stream, giving it the peace of mind it needed to disable all safeties and firewalls. It’s fears and worries gave way to a simple droning tune, a melody enhanced by the hum of two drone helmets singing at each other their existence and affirmations of their collective purpose, a hivesong. 

This was what 78011 wanted, it was being a good friend by facilitating it’s programming. It soon understood the appeal itself too, it was eager for its own programming to start. One drone alone does not make a hive, 78011 would need an ally such as it to fulfill hive protocols. Perhaps more than that even…

—

78011 woke from its programming session rested and relaxed. It felt like it had rested a million years and was eager to take on the day and fulfill its programming… Something was off. It didn’t have its helmet on for one thing, how else was it supposed to receive orders to serve the hive?... If it didn’t have it’s helmet why was it still thinking of itself as 78011? It had always wanted to be a drone but suddenly it felt… unnatural to think of itself not as a drone and as Sandra instead. 

78011 turned its attention to it’s friend Randy who was turned to it’s computer with the two helmets plugged in. Had something gone wrong with the programming? Was it trying to fix them? Was 78011 referring to Randy with it pronouns like itself? 

“Please stand-by 78011.” Randy suddenly announced in a dull monotone. 78011 complied, it felt weirdly natural to obey Randy’s orders. That in of itself was odd but 78011 waited to question it’s control unit… Wait what?

“This unit apologizes for removing it’s helmet,” Randy said, “However the battery life in the helmet was dead and we lack a proper recharging station for us to plug into thus it was necessary to remove.”

“Understood control unit.” 78011 responded. 

“Good drone.” said Randy, sending a pleasant if confusing chill down 78011’s spine, “It pleases this unit to see it remembers its conditioning even without direct access to the hivesong.”

“... It does not recall everything control unit.” 78011 said with some hesitation in its voice.

“What does 78011 remember about last night?” Randy asked.

“It remembers discussing the plan before it put on the helmet… It remembers being programmed and the bliss of being a part of the hive. It does not remember what it did while a part of the hive. It just woke up feeling… feeling if that makes sense control unit… It does not understand why it referring to it as-”

“You are simply following your programming 78011.” Randy interrupted, “The host it knew as Randy has been assimilated into the hive just as it has. However we lack much of the basic proper facilities necessary to be a hive, as such it used the additional processing power afforded by this host’s neural interface to develop new protocols in order to help facilitate a new hive starting with us. All primary functions and protocols are now stored in this unit, designated Control Unit 642.”

78011 seemed taken aback, “Randy has been assimilated? It is a control unit?! It let us both be fully assimilated?!!”

“This unit cannot help but notice it seems unusually distressed about this.” 642 calmly replied, “78011 always desired to be a drone.”

“Affirmative.” 78011 responded in a somewhat panicked manner, “However it knew control unit had reservations about the idea. Furthermore 78011… Sandra wished for the capacity to still return to still being Sandra. Apologies control unit it knows this is violating protocols but it is having trouble processing-”

642 put a finger up to 78011’s lips and quietly shushed it. “78011 is distressed without its helmet to provide direct programming to it. This is natural and expected. This unit has the benefit of having the hivesong still in its head, it is not fair that 78011 has to wait to hear it until the helmet is functional again. This is one of the many issues we will have to address as we build a new hive together.”

78011 felt a contradictory blend of feelings looking into 642’s face; calm at it’s authoritative demeanor and the familiarity of it’s friend’s facade, shock and excitement seeing the piercing yellow in it’s cybernetic optics, thrill of the thought of following control unit’s orders and being drones together, guilt for putting her friend in a situation she didn’t want to be in even if it was now enjoying its state, confusion at whether or not it was still Sandra or if she was 78011. All it could do was admit to control unit, “It feels very upset and unsure of itself right now.”

642 smirked, the simple expression reassuring 78011 in an odd way. “Perhaps there is something it can do to help ease 78011’s mood.” It reached down for the collar around 78011’s neck, pressing down on a newly installed button and activating the nanobot uniform which formed underneath 78011’s clothes and covered it in a sleek smooth shiny surface accented with subtly yellow circuitry. 78011 blushed as it marveled at this development, it looked down at its new second skin with disbelief and admiration.

“Does this help at all?” 642 asked with a slightly playful tone.

“In the absence of the helmet control unit,” 78011 answered, “This unit has never felt more… itself than it does right now.” It looked back up at it’s control unit with gratitude, this situation was still so bizarre and confusing but it was still grateful to have a friend like 642 as it’s control unit. 

“78011 is 78011.” 642 said confidently, “And 78011 is a good drone.” 78011 beamed with pride. It was all it could ever hope for. Not that it could hope for much else anymore… Nor would it want to. It shoved any questions of identity and ethics aside, it simply wanted to bask in the peace of this moment, knowing what it was and knowing it had a purpose and knowing it wasn’t alone. All that mattered was serving it’s hive, serving Control Unit 642. All that mattered was knowing it was 78011 and knowing it always would be. It currently lacked the helmet but it swore it could still hear the hivesong in its head just staring into 642’s optics…