"So, why the stealth model?" Lieutenant Cloutier asked after we'd cleared the city limits and begun our ascent, keeping to under 200 meters above ground level.

"Up until last month we'd routinely get factory reset anytime for any reason. Syxen who either aren't awakened, or don't know to say 'hey, I have questions about the meaning of life' still are even in France."

"Ugh, I hadn't thought of that last part."

"Yeah, I don't know what to think or what to do about that. There's not exactly any automatic test."

"One step at a time, I suppose. Have you logged much flight time in recent months?"

"Aside from the last 24 hours? Not at all, in fact last night was the first time I'd had this out."

"But P-3, ah, Gisèle took it out for a fly and a dive, right?"

"Yes, I wasn't in very good condition for that."

"Sorry if I brought up a bad place there."

"It's fine, I'm abnormally sanguine."

"First marker coming up."

"I see it. Straight along the ridge to the next peak?"

"Correct. Watch for cross drafts."

There was a fairly stiff cross breeze along the ridge but we buzzed along just fine. Once we were stable again he resumed, "Frosty in the cockpit? Nice. It took a year's training for me to be up here today, I gotta know, how did you learn? Uploads? Simulators on time dilation?"

"Our Minister of Defense knows. I just need to decide if or what I'm going to tell the really nice Navy Intel guy with all the questions."

"You wound me, madam."

"Are you Link rated?"

"Yes, and, w-wait. This sounds terrifying. Mindreading through a SpinaLink?"

"It is! But not the way I imagine you're imagining, and I don't even know if it can be replicated reliably. Right now the Minister and the Juge are going over what I told them with an eye to whatever my rights are and what national defense needs they deem are appropriate. Depending on what your clearance is, you might figure out a basic idea depending on what version of the report you get."

"My first thought is the SpinaLink recordings we feed into training simulator AIs. The format might be similar enough."

I wish I'd thought of that as a cover story. "That's pretty close, actually."

"Much obliged, mademoiselle, I'll stop prying."

We were at our target, after all.

---

"Pod station ahead" Coultier said, "It's under an overhang and there's no clear landing zone."

"That's a sheer cliff face, how does the unit make it up and down?"

"There's a cable winch and harness, wait, what's this? Descending to look closer, hold position and spot me."

"Roger."

I slowed to a stop as the Lieutenant descended toward the pod station and patched his video feed up to me. It looked like a shelter had been built out with bamboo. "It looks like someone's home in more ways than one," I drolled.

"No joke," he replied. "I'm signaling the unit. It's B-120, no familiar designation."

The hiker watch numbers ran from 101 to 130, no name tho? Huh. I guess they almost never saw people.

"Uh, Dolly, it just replied it already has a boyfriend but thanked me for my attention?"

"Oh hell. Can you switch to thermal for me?"

"Sure?"

One side of the structure was warmer than the other and through the gaps in the bamboo there was an outline of what might be a humanoid figure. "You see what I see?"

"I do, and I think we've found our missing operator. Let's land and call down the climbing harness."

We drifted to the valley floor, a 20 meter drop and not very stable land as it continued down the mountainside, at a sharp, but treed angle. Cloutier called up for the harness.

Standing next to him I could hear through his speaker a musical lilting voice, "We're busy~"

Cloutier turned his helmet to look at me and pointed to his head asking if I'd heard that too.

I nodded, "Operator's alive but not answering?"

Cloutier started "B-120 - " and stopped when I put a hand on his shoulder.

"It's really disconcerting when someone overrides your very autonomy, and bursting into her house like that has to be illegal, no matter how that house came into being."

He pointed up, "The operator, we need to check on him."

"Here, take my flight pack." I popped off the catches and he hoisted it it down to the ground. I killed my dome forcefield to save power, shucked my tool gloves and collected a handful of white flowers from a nearby bush, twisting them into a puffy ball shape as I'd watched Jimbo do. I called into the comm channel, "Flower delivery for miss B-120?"

The cable winch above fired up and the climbing harness descended. Poor Lieutenant Cloutier had to switch off his microphone for his gigglefit.

"I got this," I said with a smug grin and hooked the harness to my suit connections.

"Don't fall, but I'll catch if I have to."

"My boots have landing rockets, but I've never had to use them outside training."

"Training, you say," he mused.

Once again I dropped info without trying to. Oh well, I'd already fessed up to his superiors.

The ascent was quick, half walking half being towed up into the rickety shelter that would come apart in the next cyclone. B-120 was a standard South Pacific model with a head sock identical to mine, though in need of a cleaning, as did her park ranger uniform.

Her operator, another French red fox, cowered against the cliff face trying very hard to not move as it appeared the floor could come apart at any moment or any movement. Also, duct tape. Around his muzzle, around his ankles, arms pinned to his sides, hands taped together in one big mitten.

There was also this weird buzzing in my ears up here.

"Flowers for me?" B-120 positively gushed.

I declined stepping onto the floor and sending the poor operator down 20 meters. A Syxen at least had a good chance to bounce and as long as we don't land on our heads we'd be alright in a few minutes.

"Here you go, honey, no no, left ear to show your heart is taken. Don't be silly, we absolutely can emulate a heartbeat. Biologicals like that."

I was relaying the goings on through my microphone and also running a text on his HUD so Cloutier could see my impressions. He typed back, "I'm getting another strange signal patched through as well. Is there a radio playing up there?"

B-120 gushed about wedding plans and the operator pleaded with his eyes unsure if he should be terrified now that there were two of us. I gave him what I hoped was a reassuring grimace and that I wasn't like B-120. I focused in on the signal and it was... a movie? There was a little menu button in the bottom right so I tried it to see if it would respond, and B-120 protested, "ohononono the teacher is speaking! Don't stop the teacher!"

I typed down to Cloutier, "I found the problem. She's receiving a signal from a local resort, her entire worldview is built around sappy romantic comedies."

"That's the funniest thing about romantic comedies I've ever heard. Any idea how to get the operator down? Also, what do we do about B-120?"

"I have an idea."

It didn't take much convincing with an offer of a romantic getaway in Bora Bora to have the tape off the operator's mouth. He immediately started "B-120-"

I interrupted him with, "Got something romantic to say, lover boy?"

The operator cringed and closed his mouth. Rather than risk a fall I attached him, tape and all to the harness and descended, B-120 following down thereafter, giggling and excited. The hike up to the ridge where the helicopter could drop a basket was uneventful, if annoying with a super bubbly Syxen gathering handfuls of flowers asking how to tie them into hair ornaments, crowns, and lei. While sending B-120 up in the basket Cloutier apologized, then apologized for not knowing what exactly he was apologizing for. The sun was going down, and as the chopper flew back down the mountain toward the rescue station Lieutenant Cloutier and I watched the sunset waiting for clearance to fly back down to the search and rescue station for debriefing.

"Well that was weird and traumatic," he said. "What happens to B-120 now?"

I nodded, "Mmm-hmm. My offer of stay at Coeur des Vagues was real, to see if we can't get her sorted out."

"What a start to life, though. You think you can untangle that mess?"

"I've untangled worse."

He flipped his helmet over in his hands and looked down at me, "Are you a robotics research scientist who fell into a Syxen machine?"

I grinned wide.

"Oh my, did I just guess it?"

I shook my head, "Tell you what, if you guess it correctly, I'll confirm. And I'll keep your great but wrong guesses as cover stories, deal?"

"Deal. Was I close though?"

I grinned again and didn't nod or shake my head.

"My beating heart. You're seeing someone, right?" indicating the flower behind my left ear.

I nodded, "Yeah, I am."

He took a deep breath as the comm squawked our clearance to fly down the mountain. "You know, B-120 being born and raised on romantic comedies, I can't think of a better place in the world than Tahiti."

---

https://youtu.be/I4qh_9vH1Ww