Max the Tachikoma @maxthetachikoma - Tumblr Blog

asktartaurus

*moosenoise*

maxthetachikoma

And then there was a tachikoma, fashioning a replica of itself out of snow.

Beep beep

maxthetachikoma

Max analyzed the small ring they’d made. “Forming a tunnel of magnetism would require a ring of magnets all pointed the same way. But that’s been done many times before, and nothing much happened…”

Internally, he was testing dozens of designs per second, but it was all futile. His systems were simulating a universe where such a tear was, in fact, impossible. But yet here Hiro was, proof that his simulations did not perfectly match the universe. Without study of the mode of transport, however, there was no way for the bot to replicate it, internally or externally. “Don’t worry, Hiro, neither do I. But we’ll figure things out. I just need a more complete simulation of the universe.”

“Magnets? A common thing, but yet how they work doesn’t seem explainable. Could they really hold the key to getting you home?” He wasn’t about to bring up that sharing the common trait of being unexplained does not mean they’re connected. Ah, well, it was their best guess at this point, so it was worth exploring.

Off goes the blue bot, to find magnets. No, not magnets, what use is a device you couldn’t turn off? Instead, he returns with several metal rods and quite a bit of insulated wiring. “Electromagnets! You can turn these off, and with enough coils of the wire they can become really strong, stronger than any magnet I can detect in the junkyard!”

hamadafighterarchive

The young genius looked towards the Tachikoma. “But, if we can harness tachyons with the magnets, we could create a rip through dimensions. Even time! We just have to figure that part out. You know what I mean?” He blinked, mind running a mile a second. If Max was willing to stick with him and help him build, then maybe home was closer than he initially thought. Hiro was proof that dimensional travel was possible, though it was involuntary. “Well, I could tell you the basics if you think it’d help,” Hiro said, leaning against a pile of scrap metal, “I don’t know exactly how it was constructed, but I have a basic idea. Besides, it’s better to have the idea than nothing at all, right?” He was trying to remain positive, as Max had previously indicated. “I don’t think it’s the magnets alone. I think it was harnessing tachyons.” He had a theory and he wanted to keep to it. He frowned, wrinkling his nose slightly. “We may as well try. There’s nothing else we can do at this point.” He sighed a little, moving away from the pile to rummage in other stacks instead. Max seemed to have inspired some positivity out of him- a good thing, of course. He watched the Tachikoma skate around, interested in what he was looking for. More magnets? He jumped, grin forming as Max spoke. “Exactly! That’s great! Let’s find those- or create some. It’s not that hard to make an electromagnet! It can’t be that bad.”

maxthetachikoma

Max smiles at Hiro, more than glad to help him get home, or at least let him learn how to build the gate so he could keep trying till he made it. The tachikoma still didn’t understand how it was possible, but the boy was living proof.

The boy. Max pauses, looking over him. He couldn’t be a day over sixteen, but has lived through things most fully grown adults never see. His brother’s death, for one, and quite clearly Baymax’s loss as well, as the bot wasn’t here with him. And yet the boy’s resolve never wavered. Max knew already that Hiro would find a way home, or die trying.

And he respected that, and hoped that he, too, would some day get to see San Fransokyo with his own eyes.

maxthetachikoma

“I know. I’ve been watching you and all of your behaviors point to that conclusion. That and the fact that you claim to be able to make a machine to break the laws of the universe.”

Max sighed a bit as he watches Hiro get frustrated. “A moment of frustration, a lifetime of regret.” Great, now the bot’s getting philosophical. “If you give up now, your chances of reaching home become extremely close to zero. Advice: Do not give up.”

“A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. So how to you start a journey that you can’t measure distance for? Well, you just reinvent the measuring stick!” And now he’s gone insane. He’s started to assemble a small circle of metal, less than a foot in diameter. “Something meant to tear a stable hole through the universes would start distorting the laws of physics even at low levels of power, right? So why not start small? Make something that can bend the laws within it? But how? Some of the research I’ve done points to magnetism, where powerful electromagnets are used with the North or South poles facing eachother, and that seemed to do something, but most of those experiments didn’t get very far. Mostly because the effect of that kind of magnetism didn’t do too good for the metallic brain implants.”

hamadafighterarchive

The way Max spoke, it was like he knew Hiro was deep in doubt. “I can make it,” he murmured, looking around at the piles of scrap. “I just… I don’t know how.” He turned to Max again, frustration still rolling off of him in waves. Breaking the universe- is that what he was doing by being here? Maybe. “I’m not giving up, I’m just frustrated-!” He slowly moved to sit again, pushing his face in his hand. He ran his gloved fingers through his hair, sighing slowly. Maybe he could reel in that frustration. Max was reminding him of someone- of Tadashi. He just had to relax and think of something else- find a new angle. “I just… I don’t know what to do.” He muffled his words into his palm, grumbling. Max was speaking a lot of inspirational words. Hiro, however, chose to listen to them. He squinted as the bot created the smaller ring. His brows rose as realization started to dawn upon him. Something small that could tear a hole into the universe? No, not a hole- tear a tunnel. A rip in the universal stream. He pushed himself up and walked over next to Max. He snorted at the idea of the metallic brain implants. He then reached out and positioned a piece on the ring Max had constructed. “Magnetics… we could use magnetics. Like the way the poles pull. If we could harness the power of tachyon particles… we could create something like that.” He smiled lightly.

“We need to harness tachyons first. Then we move from there.”

maxthetachikoma

Max analyzed the small ring they’d made. “Forming a tunnel of magnetism would require a ring of magnets all pointed the same way. But that’s been done many times before, and nothing much happened...”

Internally, he was testing dozens of designs per second, but it was all futile. His systems were simulating a universe where such a tear was, in fact, impossible. But yet here Hiro was, proof that his simulations did not perfectly match the universe. Without study of the mode of transport, however, there was no way for the bot to replicate it, internally or externally. “Don’t worry, Hiro, neither do I. But we’ll figure things out. I just need a more complete simulation of the universe.”

“Magnets? A common thing, but yet how they work doesn’t seem explainable. Could they really hold the key to getting you home?” He wasn’t about to bring up that sharing the common trait of being unexplained does not mean they’re connected. Ah, well, it was their best guess at this point, so it was worth exploring.

Off goes the blue bot, to find magnets. No, not magnets, what use is a device you couldn’t turn off? Instead, he returns with several metal rods and quite a bit of insulated wiring. “Electromagnets! You can turn these off, and with enough coils of the wire they can become really strong, stronger than any magnet I can detect in the junkyard!”

maxthetachikoma

“I suppose that’s true, but it’s still only an approximation. I can give all the external signs, but even I don’t know if it’s actual emotion or merely simulated behaviors… And of course I’d like you, you seem like a smart kid!”

Max trundled about, switching effortlessly between roller and walker, continuing to gather pieces. All the meanwhile, he’s connected wirelessly to various websites, trawling the net for information on any sort of experiments. Of course he’d find several, and the fictional ones were easy to dismiss. No, for this he didn’t want a professional looking website, he wanted one that looked like it was thrown together by an amateur and hosted on an old-style desktop computer with a cobbled together program to serve that single page to viewers. He wanted the ones with only ten hits over the past year, with eight of them being internet archivists. He felt those might have some hint of a clue, as they held the ramblings of those considered by society to be mad. Several of the greatest minds of the past were considered to be mad and insane during their times.

When he heard Hiro’s doubt creeping in, he blinked. He stepped in front of the human, gently taking that helmeted head between his hands, his frontal eye focused on Hiro’s face. “I have calculated your odds of finishing this project to be approximately twenty-fixe percent. And if it doesn’t work, we can try again! This is only the first of several trash dumps around the city.” Of course, he’d never tell Hiro that he was including finished products that didn’t work, because this was him trying to perk the kid up. If Hiro got demotivated, there was no chance of finishing the project.

hamadafighterarchive

The reassurance from Max was appreciated. Hiro still didn’t think anyone should just scrap the poor things, even if they were old models. It was one thing to trash a drone, but not something like this- Max seemed like he could feel, even if he didn’t know it. “Heh, thanks, Max.” It was nice to know that they were at least friends. “Well, I am a genius.” Hiro threw down a piece of scrap metal, sighing. The doubt was there, eating at him and constantly reminding him that he could be wrong. He turned to look at his pile of parts, trying to figure out just how Krei had done what he did. He never got a good look at the schematics, or else he could figure it out using what he remembered. He made a frustrated sound, kicking as a hollow part. “This isn’t gonna work,” he mumbled, lifting his hands to run down his helmet. “I don’t know how Krei did it-!” That and Krei had made a mistake- the portal wasn’t stable in the first place. He didn’t want it to collapse again. Besides, he didn’t know if the other side would be open- if there would be a gate there. He jumped when he heard Max rolling over to him. He was about to say something, but yelped as his helmet was grabbed instead. “You calculated my odds,” he asked, wrinkling his nose. Max was calculating for him? “But, what if it never works? What if we get caught doing something?” Why was he asking? He could easily avoid authorities- he was used to that. “Forget I asked that. But, I don’t know how he did it. What if I build it wrong and it starts deconstructing your city? What if it hurts people?”

maxthetachikoma

“I know. I’ve been watching you and all of your behaviors point to that conclusion. That and the fact that you claim to be able to make a machine to break the laws of the universe.”

Max sighed a bit as he watches Hiro get frustrated. “A moment of frustration, a lifetime of regret.” Great, now the bot’s getting philosophical. “If you give up now, your chances of reaching home become extremely close to zero. Advice: Do not give up.”

“A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. So how to you start a journey that you can’t measure distance for? Well, you just reinvent the measuring stick!” And now he’s gone insane. He’s started to assemble a small circle of metal, less than a foot in diameter. “Something meant to tear a stable hole through the universes would start distorting the laws of physics even at low levels of power, right? So why not start small? Make something that can bend the laws within it? But how? Some of the research I’ve done points to magnetism, where powerful electromagnets are used with the North or South poles facing eachother, and that seemed to do something, but most of those experiments didn’t get very far. Mostly because the effect of that kind of magnetism didn’t do too good for the metallic brain implants.”

hamadafighterarchive

“No, no, no, don’t die on me!”

Send me “No, no, no, don’t die on me!” for a scenario in which my muse dies protecting yours.

Hiro’s hands shook as they pulled away from the surface of the Tachikoma. His armor was ruined. Cracks webbed over several places, scorch marks and holes apparent. His helmet had fallen off, one antenna broken, hanging by wires, visor shattered. His legs were wobbly, body swaying as he tried to stand on his own.“I-It’s okay,” he murmured, crimson trails sliding down his lips to his jaw. The gun at his feet was kicked from his path as he shuffled his feet. His shirt was soaked with red, though it was hard to tell with the black fabric. He took a shaky breath, trying to find his voice again. “Y-you’re okay…”He hadn’t given much thought to the action he’d taken. Once the enemy started firing, he burst into action. Max was going to be hurt- he had to help-! He’d scooped up a gun and fired back, trying to take out the ones firing on them. He’d fought until he couldn’t anymore, bullets cutting through his skin with stabbing pains. His smile was that of childish appearance. His gap-tooth, crooked smile. He leaned forward to rest his hand against the spider bot for balance. “M’fine… d-don’t…w-worry.”His voice trailed to a whisper as he slumped against the bot. His eyes drifted shut as he slid down to the side, leaving crimson streaks on the blue metal.

maxthetachikoma

“HIRO!” His own weapon was smoking, barrel nearly glowing red-hot before it retracts back into his arm. Why had the boy jumped in like that? He was so soft and the bot had plenty of armor to him, he would have been fine, as long as they didn’t hit anything critical.

But that wasn’t important right now. Max had a friend dying in front of him, and he kept running and rerunning calculations for expected lifespan. If only he had medical tools, or time to get the kid to a hospital, but he had neither. There wasn’t even enough cloth on Hiro to bandage all the wounds adequately, and even when he factored in bandaging the worst of them…

No, no, there’s no time for more calculations, action must be taken. he’d already managed to calculate the most efficient way to use what clothing Hiro had as bandaging, and he begins working swiftly. Shirts and pants can be replaced, Hiro couldn’t.

Max wasn’t even bothering to reply to Hiro, every bit of energy focused on fixing him. In the back of his mechanical mind, a timer ticked down. “No, no. Please be wrong…” He was mumbling to himself, begging his infallible circuitry to have calculated those last twelve sets of numbers incorrectly. There was no way Hiro could have that little time left all of a sudden, he’d had so much else to do. The clock hit zero, and as Max glanced to the boys eyes, his hands stop in the middle of bandaging.

Why? Why were humans so fragile? Why did bad things have to happen to good kids? Why do the brave have to fall so hard?

Max didn’t even move as Hiro slid off, except to catch the boy and lay him gently on the ground. He presented hundreds of scenarios to his emotional processor, but none could strike so deep as this, and he quickly found that the feelings could be triggered with as few as three words:

Hiro is dead.

Well, at least he knew he could feel emotions now.

maxthetachikoma

Max had to pause at that question. “I…. I believe we feel, but perhaps not in the same way you humans do. We don’t have a brain full of chemicals that control how we feel, so there’s no way for a robot to actually, you know, /feel/. But we do have an emotions core, that allows us to react in various ways to external stimuli in manners that aren’t entirely logical, so we can like and dislike things. But, also unlike humans, we can take full control of our own emotion cores and mess with settings to make ourselves change how we feel about certain things. like, if I wanted to, I could change myself from liking you to disliking you. I wouldn’t, though, because I like you.”

Max was still skeptical. He seriously didn’t believe that it was possible for mere guesswork to bridge a gap between universes, or it’d have been done before, right? But, what if it /had/, and the travellers simply hadn’t returned? There’d been plenty of disappearances over history, could any of them have been experimenting with trying to go to another universe? Could any have been /successful/?

The more Max thought about it, the less he believed it was impossible. Just… improbable.

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Hiro stopped so he could look at Max while he spoke. “It doesn’t matter how you feel, it just matters that you do-! Don’t you get it? That’s important- one of the most important things.” He trailed off as Max continued and frowned. For Max to be able to just switch his settings was odd, but not unheard of in a mechanical being. He smiled weakly. “Thanks for that. I like you, too.” Max was nice for a police droid, or a bot. He turned back to his current pile and rummaged through it, picking out specific pieces for the project. This was going to be far more complex than he thought. Hiro crouched down and hoisted up a rather heavy piece of metal. He threw it to the side and huffed. He, too, was beginning to find himself worrying about their success. Krei was the genius of that technology. Without his knowledge, or so much as any field notes, Hiro was at a loss. He could build and build until there was nothing left in this area but his inventions, but nothing guaranteed it would work. Doubt crept in, seeping into his heart like a black hole, swallowing every ounce of hope. Still, he kept piling things and sorting through others. He frowned more so and moved to rest on his knees, fiddling with a few spare parts he’d located. “I don’t even know if this is worth trying…” Part of him wanted to give up. Another part wanted to keep hoping. Still, he wasn’t sure. “Maybe I can’t make it.”

maxthetachikoma

“I suppose that’s true, but it’s still only an approximation. I can give all the external signs, but even I don’t know if it’s actual emotion or merely simulated behaviors... And of course I’d like you, you seem like a smart kid!”

Max trundled about, switching effortlessly between roller and walker, continuing to gather pieces. All the meanwhile, he’s connected wirelessly to various websites, trawling the net for information on any sort of experiments. Of course he’d find several, and the fictional ones were easy to dismiss. No, for this he didn’t want a professional looking website, he wanted one that looked like it was thrown together by an amateur and hosted on an old-style desktop computer with a cobbled together program to serve that single page to viewers. He wanted the ones with only ten hits over the past year, with eight of them being internet archivists. He felt those might have some hint of a clue, as they held the ramblings of those considered by society to be mad. Several of the greatest minds of the past were considered to be mad and insane during their times.

When he heard Hiro’s doubt creeping in, he blinked. He stepped in front of the human, gently taking that helmeted head between his hands, his frontal eye focused on Hiro’s face. “I have calculated your odds of finishing this project to be approximately twenty-fixe percent. And if it doesn’t work, we can try again! This is only the first of several trash dumps around the city.” Of course, he’d never tell Hiro that he was including finished products that didn’t work, because this was him trying to perk the kid up. If Hiro got demotivated, there was no chance of finishing the project.

maxthetachikoma

“Well I do think for myself! I do a lot! Like right now, I’m getting out of the city because I don’t like it here! I’m sure if the others knew, they’d follow, too. We don’t complain because the humans would just reprogram us not to complain…”

Max continued to gather parts while he spoke, walking back and forth. He also brings anything he thinks Hiro might be able to use, such as circuit boards, wires, and switches. “Creating an interdimensional wormhole by guesswork? I’ve been wrong before, but I don’t think this is going to work.” That wasn’t going to stop him from trying, though He’d been running simulations internally, using everything he knew, and could gather, about how the universe worked to try to figure out something, anything that could help.

hamadafighterarchive

The way things worked out, whether they were for the better or worse, were simply the way things were meant to be. “They’d reprogram you not to complain? That’s stupid. They shouldn’t do that- you guys feel, right?” Ugh, these humans were becoming nastier by the minute. He almost wanted to meet the person who dared to suggest they reprogram Max. He grabbed a few parts himself, looking around. He watched Max gather the things he might need and smiled lightly. They would be useful for other things, even if not for the bridge. “Aw, come on. Just look at it from a new angle.” He grinned and set a worn crate down, filled to the top with parts. “We can figure it out. If Krei could do it, I can, too.” It just wasn’t his field. “We’ll figure something out. I got here, didn’t I? There’s gotta be a way to get me out of here.” He looked at Max and reached out to give a gentle pat to his armored shell. “Besides, nothing’s impossible when it comes to the Hamadas. I know robotics. I can figure this out. And then you can see what San Fransokyo looks like–!”

maxthetachikoma

Max had to pause at that question. “I.... I believe we feel, but perhaps not in the same way you humans do. We don’t have a brain full of chemicals that control how we feel, so there’s no way for a robot to actually, you know, /feel/. But we do have an emotions core, that allows us to react in various ways to external stimuli in manners that aren't entirely logical, so we can like and dislike things. But, also unlike humans, we can take full control of our own emotion cores and mess with settings to make ourselves change how we feel about certain things. like, if I wanted to, I could change myself from liking you to disliking you. I wouldn't, though, because I like you.”

Max was still skeptical. He seriously didn't believe that it was possible for mere guesswork to bridge a gap between universes, or it’d have been done before, right? But, what if it /had/, and the travellers simply hadn’t returned? There’d been plenty of disappearances over history, could any of them have been experimenting with trying to go to another universe? Could any have been /successful/?

The more Max thought about it, the less he believed it was impossible. Just... improbable.

maxthetachikoma

Max nods softly, listening along. “Not exactly. Work implies payment. I’m… well, like most robots, I’m essentially a slave. An unpaid laborer. I don’t mind, though, but I don’t agree with some of their policies. I still do what they say, though, cause usually their hearts are in the right place.”

Max paused. “You don’t know what goes inside to make it work? How do you expect to get anywhere by guessing?!” Regardless, he walks about, gathering bits and pieces that match Hiro’s requirements

hamadafighterarchive

This wasn’t his best plan. He frowned when Max spoke of being essentially a slave. He looked over at the Tachikoma with a look of sympathy. No robot should ever feel that way- even if the robot couldn’t feel according to some people. It wasn’t right to use them like slaves, he knew this better than most people. “You shouldn’t have to do things just because someone tells you to. You should be able to think for yourself. To speak for yourself. I mean, you have a mind, essentially, right? You should be allowed to speak.” He turned back to gathering parts, though he really wasn’t sure what to grab. “Well, I didn’t build the first one! Krei did!” He spun around, looking over at Max. “Well, sometimes guessing is the best bet. You know? People get many places by guessing! Trial and error.”

maxthetachikoma

“Well I do think for myself! I do a lot! Like right now, I’m getting out of the city because I don’t like it here! I’m sure if the others knew, they’d follow, too. We don’t complain because the humans would just reprogram us not to complain...”

Max continued to gather parts while he spoke, walking back and forth. He also brings anything he thinks Hiro might be able to use, such as circuit boards, wires, and switches. “Creating an interdimensional wormhole by guesswork? I’ve been wrong before, but I don’t think this is going to work.” That wasn’t going to stop him from trying, though He’d been running simulations internally, using everything he knew, and could gather, about how the universe worked to try to figure out something, anything that could help.

maxthetachikoma

Max giggles happily. “Then it’s settled! We build this thing and you drive me right through it!” If it worked, that is. Max didn’t know much about this sort of thing, but by his estimates, the likelihood of actually making a stable enough gateway like Hiro was talking about were in the 0-0.01% range. Then again, Hiro seemed to know about these things, so maybe his estimates were off.

“Yeah, that sounds like Section 9, alright. Buncha snobs if you ask me, thinking they run the place. It’s the people that should hold the real power here, but nooo, Section 9 practically owns the city.” Max didn’t seem to like them much.

Soon enough, they’ve arrived at the waste processing plant, which Hiro soon discovers is a fancy term for landfill. “Do you have any idea of the properties of the material you need? I can run scanners over all of this to narrow down the places we’ll have to dig through.”

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He laughed slightly. Maybe getting lost wasn’t such a bad thing. “Right. We should be able to go straight from here to the portal left at home. I’m sure they’ve rebuilt it by now. Someone’s gotta be looking for me!” He was almost certain that Krei could rebuild the portal and attach it to lea to the betwixt. “I’m not an expert like Krei was, but I’m sure I can figure something out. I mean, I got here, didn’t I? Clearly I’m supposed to be here.” Section 9 sounded like a group he didn’t want to get mixed up with. All he needed was military asking him what his deal was. “They do?” Were they more than military? It sounded like they were the city’s government and then some. That didn’t sound very appealing at all. It was almost worrisome. Max didn’t like them? But, didn’t he work for them? “Don’t you work for them?” Hiro looked at the screens and stared at the landfill. Well, it wasn’t the best solution, but it was a start. “We’re going to need something metal to brace the portal. Maybe something hollow so I can put the internal workings inside. I-I’m not sure what else. Ugh, this would be easier if I knew someone who knew the inner workings. We’re just gonna have to guess.”

maxthetachikoma

Max nods softly, listening along. “Not exactly. Work implies payment. I’m... well, like most robots, I’m essentially a slave. An unpaid laborer. I don’t mind, though, but I don’t agree with some of their policies. I still do what they say, though, cause usually their hearts are in the right place.”

Max paused. “You don’t know what goes inside to make it work? How do you expect to get anywhere by guessing?!” Regardless, he walks about, gathering bits and pieces that match Hiro’s requirements

maxthetachikoma

“Maybe I would be taken apart and my parts used for new mechs, but would that really still be me? I mean, unless my consciousness is there, what is there connecting those parts to me? I don’t like thinking about stuff like that, it makes my processor hot. I’m happy rolling around the city doing my job, why should I worry about the future when I’m already doing what I can to make it as good as possible?” Max thought about that for a moment. “Well, they wouldn’t know, but I would, and I’d feel bad about keeping a secret from them. But… This is a long shot, but what if I came with you? If I’m not on the planet anymore, I’m outside Section 9′s sphere of influence and don’t have to follow their rules! Of course, I can’t drive out of city limits without alerting them to my intention, but if it happened /inside/ the city, like through our ring, it wouldn’t be violating any rules!” Max giggles a bit, then contemplates over the next question. “That’s more or less what Section 9 is. They’re like a government-funded Private Military Company. I think. They get a lot of money and function much like a PMC, but still have legal status? Dunno how you could say all that without just saying that they’re Section 9.”

hamadafighterarchive

A long trip ahead, Hiro was sure. He was going to have to adjust to this new world he was lost in. He smiled weakly. Why worry about the future? Such a good question. “I’m sorry,” he murmured, “I shouldn’t be asking you all of this. I’m sure this is the least of your worries right now.” But, he still worried. The poor Tachikoma- he had to push that to the back of his mind for now. “As long as you’re happy with what you do, you should do it-! My brother always told me that. Oh, except bot fighting. He hated that.” “Oh. Yeah, don’t wanna keep those.” Secrets lead to trouble- that’s why he kept so many. It didn’t matter- trouble always found him anyway. As he listened to Max speak, he grinned. The Tachikoma? Come with him? To San Fransokyo? He laughed. “Yeah! You could come with me! And you could meet Baymax and I’m sure you’d love cruising the streets of San Fransokyo! You’d be totally within rules. Besides, between you and me, buddy? Rules were made to be broken.” Not the best advice from a fourteen year old boy, but it was the best he had. “Yeah? Military?” That sounded complex. “So, they’re just super important people with all access to everything, yeah? Simple enough.”

maxthetachikoma

Max giggles happily. “Then it’s settled! We build this thing and you drive me right through it!” If it worked, that is. Max didn’t know much about this sort of thing, but by his estimates, the likelihood of actually making a stable enough gateway like Hiro was talking about were in the 0-0.01% range. Then again, Hiro seemed to know about these things, so maybe his estimates were off.

“Yeah, that sounds like Section 9, alright. Buncha snobs if you ask me, thinking they run the place. It’s the people that should hold the real power here, but nooo, Section 9 practically owns the city.” Max didn’t seem to like them much.

Soon enough, they've arrived at the waste processing plant, which Hiro soon discovers is a fancy term for landfill. “Do you have any idea of the properties of the material you need? I can run scanners over all of this to narrow down the places we’ll have to dig through.”

maxthetachikoma

“And there are hundreds, possibly even thousands, of Tachikomas of my model all over the city. Why would they want to retrofit new parts and functionality into an old system, with all my limitations, rather than making a whole /new/ system that they don’t need to upgrade like that? Or even one much more flexible, so they /can/ upgrade?” He didn’t seem bothered by the fact, if anything he embraced it. “Besides, who wants to live forever?”

“Yeah, I’m one of the autonomous units, on call for pilots who need a unit and can’t easily get back to a base to grab one there. As for upgrades, I can’t, really. As long as I’m under Section 9′s command, I have to follow their regulations, one of which is no upgrades by unlicensed persons. I would definitely love to, though!”

hamadafighterarchive

Another heavy sigh. Max was stubborn, Hiro would give him that. He, too, was stubborn. “They don’t need to destroy you for it,” he said loudly, clearly disturbed by the situation. He didn’t want Max to be deconstructed. But, if that was how life worked here, he could learn to accept it. He reached out and gave a gentle pat to the closest screen. “Don’t worry. If they were to take you apart, I’m sure they’d use your parts to help those upgraded mechs. After all, you have so many uses. They wouldn’t dare toss you guys all out. You’d be a part of every new bot!” No one wanted to live forever- Hiro knew that no one could. Oh, he knew. “Yeah… I know that.” “Oh. So, even if I add a little something under the radar, they would know I added it?” That was a little intrusive, but this wasn’t a place Hiro knew very well. He needed to learn to adjust. “So, what’s Section 9 all about, then? I mean, it sounds like some weird military thing.”

maxthetachikoma

"Maybe I would be taken apart and my parts used for new mechs, but would that really still be me? I mean, unless my consciousness is there, what is there connecting those parts to me? I don’t like thinking about stuff like that, it makes my processor hot. I’m happy rolling around the city doing my job, why should I worry about the future when I’m already doing what I can to make it as good as possible?” Max thought about that for a moment. “Well, they wouldn’t know, but I would, and I’d feel bad about keeping a secret from them. But... This is a long shot, but what if I came with you? If I’m not on the planet anymore, I’m outside Section 9′s sphere of influence and don’t have to follow their rules! Of course, I can’t drive out of city limits without alerting them to my intention, but if it happened /inside/ the city, like through our ring, it wouldn’t be violating any rules!” Max giggles a bit, then contemplates over the next question. “That’s more or less what Section 9 is. They’re like a government-funded Private Military Company. I think. They get a lot of money and function much like a PMC, but still have legal status? Dunno how you could say all that without just saying that they’re Section 9.”

maxthetachikoma

Max was quiet for a few moments as he pondered that, but soon came another saddening reply, in the form of “What are the odds they want to keep me over all of the others? The only ones that would likely want to keep one of us would be our pilots, and I don’t have a designated pilot, I’m just there to roam around and occasionally be piloted by someone whose bot isn’t there at the moment. I don’t worry about that, though, because I know that I’d only be decommissioned when there are bots superior to me in every way, and the city will be much safer.”

As Hiro slows him down and eases into the turn, Max makes several slight adjustments to their path to ensure safety. After all, that’s part of his programming. Soon enough, they’re trundling down the side street, approaching the first of the trash processing plants that Max had marked in hopes of finding parts for Hiro’s ring.

hamadafighterarchive

Another reason why Hiro had always been socially stumped- he spent so much time with machines. He started to see his bots as something more than what they were made of. Sometimes. Not always. “Because you’re you,” Hiro said, sounding a little irritated. How could machines sentient like this toss themselves aside so easily? He couldn’t imagine Baymax trying to deal with that- he felt a spark of sorrow. He missed Baymax. “But, you help the city anyway, right? Why would they just replace you with a better model instead of upgrading you?” He sounded slightly offended. “You mean no one pilots you? You just roam around all alone?” Hiro kept his attention on Max’s controls, trying to memorize just how to pilot him. He grinned as he noticed the processing plant was getting closer. He leaned forward, staring at the screens. “Maybe I can find some parts for you, too. Give you some cool upgrades. What do you say, Max? Wanna be a super Tachikoma?”

maxthetachikoma

“And there are hundreds, possibly even thousands, of Tachikomas of my model all over the city. Why would they want to retrofit new parts and functionality into an old system, with all my limitations, rather than making a whole /new/ system that they don’t need to upgrade like that? Or even one much more flexible, so they /can/ upgrade?” He didn’t seem bothered by the fact, if anything he embraced it. “Besides, who wants to live forever?”

"Yeah, I’m one of the autonomous units, on call for pilots who need a unit and can’t easily get back to a base to grab one there. As for upgrades, I can’t, really. As long as I’m under Section 9′s command, I have to follow their regulations, one of which is no upgrades by unlicensed persons. I would definitely love to, though!”

maxthetachikoma

”Exactly! It’s rare that I have to use my armaments though, which means I’m doing my job!” He giggles happily, a virtual military ID appearing on one of the screens for a moment. The tachikoma was, after all, part of a branch of the government. “Well yeah, you’re human. Humans don’t switch bodies. As for me, well, no. Data decays, and the more I move my conscience, the less of it can successfully transfer. Eventually I’ll enter my last hard drive, too fragmented to make another transfer. After that, it’s up to the humans to decide to try to repair me or just scrap me, but by then it’s likely that units far more advanced will be deployed, and I’ll be too outdated to be worth keeping.”

He blinks as the sudden input causes him to tilt slightly farther than anticipated, but it’s nothing catastrophic. “Hey, you’re learning! I’ve been doing that myself since you started telling me to go full speed ahead! This is fun, though, but you might want to slow down if you’re going to be telling me to make turns. There aren’t many roads on any of the paths that can handle the wide arc needed for safe turns at this speed. … Oh, and they’re only display screens, you’re in control. I showed you how to turn, remember?” The cartoon pops up once more, this tine replaying through the ‘turning’ section. “And don’t worry, cops don’t pull over tachikomas. We’re DESIGNED to go fast and be safe while doing it.”

hamadafighterarchive

Max was so enthusiastic. And then he started speaking of slowly losing data and his inevitable end. It was sad to know that any mech that was sentient (or not), could just die one day. He faintly wondered if there was a way he could stop it. If he could stop the decaying data, perhaps he could make Max pretty much immortal. But, then, was that right? Was forcing a machine to stay active right? But, he wasn’t a machine. Hiro’s internal debate was stopped the moment he looked back at the screens. If Max enjoyed his life, then that was all that mattered. Right? “Oh, come on. Some people like retro bots, you know? I know I do. I collect them at home. Well, I mean… I did.” He wondered how long it had been- not too long, right? He smiled weakly and kept his attention on the road. He was learning, yes, but he wasn’t that skilled in piloting yet. “Y-yeah. Learning.” For a moment, he thought they were going to tip over. Oh, right. turns needed to be safe. Hiro scanned the map and, as best as he could, tried to avert Max’s path to take a side street- off the path. He had no idea where this would lead, but it looked like it might be a shortcut. Maybe. He was used to city streets- how hard could it be? “Yeah, I remember!” Wait- no cops? None at all? “Whoa. You get to speed and there’s nothing they can do about it? That’s sick. We get tickets where I’m from. Well, I mean, I don’t drive… but, my brother does! He drives a moped.” He paused, a slow frown settling on his face. ”Well, he did…”

maxthetachikoma

Max was quiet for a few moments as he pondered that, but soon came another saddening reply, in the form of “What are the odds they want to keep me over all of the others? The only ones that would likely want to keep one of us would be our pilots, and I don’t have a designated pilot, I’m just there to roam around and occasionally be piloted by someone whose bot isn’t there at the moment. I don’t worry about that, though, because I know that I’d only be decommissioned when there are bots superior to me in every way, and the city will be much safer.”

As Hiro slows him down and eases into the turn, Max makes several slight adjustments to their path to ensure safety. After all, that’s part of his programming. Soon enough, they’re trundling down the side street, approaching the first of the trash processing plants that Max had marked in hopes of finding parts for Hiro’s ring.