#ladidatt

[tunastime]

For the spotify wraped... a 25??

so I swear I got this ask last year but I can't for the life of me find it anywhere, so maybe I never posted it? I'll link it if I can find it, but this song specifically falls into the fixing tango portion of my SEN playlist for docsuma! (EDIT: I FOUND IT)

so here's that, but from etho's pov instead of xisuma's! which is what the original fic. apparently obfuscated from my view. was in. regardless, enjoy! (738 words)

The first time Etho meets Tango is when he’s under his hands. Not physically, since Etho was no mechanical engineer and certainly had never claimed to be. He was good at smaller mechanics, because Bdubs, in their few years of knowing each other, because they’d both been hired at the same time here, luckily, and there was something so charming about him when he’d met him the first time on the Crescent, had taught him. But other than that, his entire background on the Relation was systems analysis and software programming, and not even in a language he particularly understood. Tango—the android, dormant, almost as if it were sleeping—was programmed in a language he understood, though it had been so heavily modified by the android itself, and Doc and the Admiral, apparently, that it was like learning a whole new one. He skims the code in front of him with his heart beating away in the base of his throat.

This is the second most terrifying moment of his life. Second only to the time the lab space he’d been using, snuggled up close to the outermost chamber of the sealed ship’s core to assist in making warp drive adjustments, had exploded on impact when the Relation crashed into its sister ship. That was also the first time he’d seen any of the people in this room with him, currently, besides the android dormant beside him, turned on its—his—side so Etho was able to access the cerebral port at the base of his neck. He can still feel the slightly cold impression of Admiral Void’s hands on his shoulders. 

He’s turned to leave Doc’s main lab space, now, standing with him at the base of the stairs, arms folded. The Chief Medical Officer—Cleo, he’s been told—had also left a few minutes prior, concern written deep into their expression. Now it’s just him, and the body to his immediate left. Tango. That was kind of a nice name for an android. Kind of rolled off the tongue. And clearly the Admiral, and Doc, and the CMO, had liked him a fair bit, because Etho had never seen the Admiral so firm in his convictions or statements. It was like he’d shifted to being a whole different, almost younger version of himself, fresh out of the academy. He wasn’t old by any means—Etho was almost certain he was older than him by at least a year, but the spark in his eye when he’d told him: I just need something, if anything changes, you ping me in the feed, Lieutenant, was something foreign to him. Even as he spoke to Doc in low, hushed whispers, his tone seemed to carry that spark. Etho rolls his shoulders. 

Tango has a variety of patches on his grey jumpsuit, too. Over his shoulder is the brightly colored HASA meatball, his name is embroidered in chunky, HASA font on the front with LT stitched in front. He had the dark red stripe of engineering down the side of his arm and the seam of the jumpsuit. They liked him enough to treat him like another member of the crew, which was different than Etho had ever encountered. The sparse connections he had ever had with bots were either low-sentience bots, like in the Relation’s or Crescent’s medical suite, the haulers he’d seen on the Prometheus, or any of the drones he’d come in contact with. He’d never been face to face with sentience and artificial intelligence like a self-writing android, or construct, or anything in between. It was interesting, and it was kind of nice. Tango looked human, aside from the slightly shiny, plasticine and silicon skin, now underlain with visible electric lines. He had bright blond hair and a soft face and the Admiral and Doc clearly referred to him as Tango and buddy and friend, so the admiration was clear.

It was that admiration that was scaring Etho, too. Because if he fucked this up he could call his job done for, easily. He breathes out a shaky sigh as he spreads out the crash logs between his display monitors. Doc comes to stand at his elbow after a moment, brow furrowed.

“Don’t be so stressed,” he says a touch playfully. “It’s only your rank on the line.”

Etho barks out a strained laugh. When he looks behind him, the Admiral is gone. He swallows.

He really, really hopes Doc is joking.