Treat her gently

"Skibidi?" skibidi'd Shenfield, dropping the electric clippers onto Bod's lap.

Bod awakened from their low-power doze. Bod was a camera-unit with a serial ending in 808, and enough of the paint had worn off the number on their yellowed head-casing that it looked passably like 'Bod', if you didn't look too carefully. So much so that Shenfield seemed to think that was the cam's name. Bod hadn't been bothered to correct them.

Bod had no vocalisers, but in their head they called the skibidi 'Shenfield.' Bod had first found them sheltering from rain under an unfolded paper map that had happened to be centred on the little town of Shenfield.

Bod unbuttoned their garments enough to expose their charging port, and plugged the electric clippers into it. (It was a good thing Bod's solar charging panels still worked, otherwise they would have fallen into stillness ages ago for lack of an Alliance grid to recharge from.) Shenfield was already laying their head in Bod's lap. Bod wasn't sure if Shenfield had once been a human man or a human woman. The humans could tell the difference between themselves, but it had always seemed all rather arbitrary to Bod. Shenfield was probably old, though, judging by their wrinkled countenance - hence why their faction had given up on them, as Bod's had given up on them.

Shenfield grunted in satisfaction as Bod tidied up their hair, keeping it out of the skibidi's eyes and ears. (What a bother it must be for humans and skibs, Bod thought, to be always extruding strands that needed periodic cutting.)

As Bod worked with the electric trimmers, Legsy scuttled out of Shenfield's bowl and scurried up Bod, where it half-heartedly attempt to latch its tongue-like parasitic appendage onto the cam. Bod let it. They were from such an old wave of cams that Legsy lacked the requisite parts to manipulate them. But it was in Legsy's nature and training to try anyway.

There wasn't anything particularly remarkable about the skibidi parasite, so 'Legsy' it was. Even if Bod had had vocalisers, it was unlikely the parasite would have come when called anyway.

Legsy got bored with trying to control Bod, and climbed back down to chomp at Bod's hands, its small teeth biting the leather-like material of Bod's gloves.

"Skibidiii," admonished Shenfield. 'Let the cam work' seemed to be the implication.

Legsy jumped off Bod's lap and went to chase some leaves on the breeze.

Bod turned off the clippers, and cocked their head at Shenfield, silently asking if the skib wanted any more hair cut off.

┄

Bod had been wandering alongside a cemetery when it started to rain. They were an older model without the advanced waterproofing, so Bod had sought shelter in one of the stony and mossy-roofed octagonal gazebos that had once provided visitors a space for quiet contemplation.

That was where they had found Shenfield and Legsy, huddling under the remains of a paper map. Bod and Shenfield had braced themselves for a stand-off... until both had seemed to sense that the other was too tired and worn down to fight. (Legsy was spoiling for a rumble, but had backed down at Shenfield's admonishing hiss.) Bod had sat down and opened out their coat to allow the two skibs to shelter under it for a bit of warmth. After the rain, Shenfield had emerged from Bod's coat and studied the cam's head thoughtfully.

"Bod," Shenfield had 'read' out the fragmented numbers from the cam's casing. "Dop dop yes."

Bod didn't know if any of Shenfield's vocalisations had been an attempt to convey their own name. It wasn't as though Bod could have called them by it anyway.

After that, Shenfield had wandered the cemetery, Legsy riding on their cistern. Bod had followed. Shenfield read out the names on some of the gravestones. Had they been members of the skibidi's family back when they were a human? Bod had no way of knowing.

┄

Shenfield shook their head no to Bod's silent question with the clippers. They were happy now that their hair was out of their eyes. Bod unplugged the electric trimmer and set it down on the ground for now, before sitting back in the reclining garden chair where they sat to charge in the sun. Shenfield returned their head to Bod's lap, hoping for scritches. Bod gave them some, rubbing a thumb against the freshly-buzzed hair above Shenfield's ear, while Bod's scratched lens regarded the seagulls whirling above.

"Skib skibidi," murmured Shenfield sleepily. Bod withdrew their hand and let the old skib snooze in peace.

So silent was the world. Bod's shelter, where Shenfield had followed them home long ago, was a shed in a warehouse district. Before the war, there would have been the constant sounds of footfall, workers' raised voices, reversing vehicles' warning klaxons, idling diesel engines, and air traffic overhead. Now, it was just the gulls, and the occasional scurrying mammal.

On cue, Legsy rolled past like a tumbleweed, a dead rat encased in the parasite's clutching legspan.

Bod reached for the book they'd been reading. Their fingers brushed their Alliance-issued tablet, itself an old model. Bod felt a pang of guilt at the sight of their tablet, as always.

Their faction would have called Bod a deserter, but to Bod it felt more as though the faction had abandoned them.

Bod could have used their tablet to contact the Camera Faction at any time, where they'd be welcomed back - and forcibly upgraded and made battle-ready. It would be nice to be shiny and new again... But not at that cost that Bod would inevitably pay.

The housing and interface of their main memory chips was damaged. Theirs was an old model even before the war. Bod could still access the memories within, for now, but any attempt to repair or upgrade them would irreversibly delete Bod's pre-war memories.

Bod couldn't bear to let those memories fade away - their memories of them. Of the humans they'd known and loved, before their species had been transformed into rapacious and unreasonable toilet-creatures. This way... it felt to Bod that they were keeping a fragment of humanity still alive inside themself.

Bod wondered if it was much the same for Shenfield. They weren't running with the Skibidi faction any more, for whatever reason. It seemed to Bod that the small and plain toilets were used only as first wave attackers before being quickly surpassed by the bigger toilets bristling with weaponry and sometimes even stolen techfolk frames. The ordinary toilets seemed to not have a place any more. Perhaps Shenfield had been deemed useless and left to fend for themself, or maybe, like Bod, the only way to earn their place was to submit to upgrades. Was there something Shenfield would lose by doing that? It wasn't as though Bod could ask.

Perhaps, Bod mused, Shenfield thought of themself as more human than the newer and more powerful toilets, and they were putting off upgrading so as to avoid losing their humanity, just as Bod was putting off upgrading and losing their memories of dear departed humans.

Legsy apparently tired of playing and hunting, and scurried back home. Bod, already drifting into power save mode, watched half-awake as Legsy climbed up and settled in Bod's lap, nestled against Shenfield.

At least, for now, they had each other. Possibly the only other person in the world who knew how the other felt.