Reprogramming

"Is Ben gay?" V asked.

"I don't think so," Bruce said.

"You don't know?" V asked.

"I'm kidding, he's not gay," Bruce said, "Why do you ask."

"Because he's not interested in having sex with me," V said, "If I can be any woman he wants why else would he refuse. Is he asexual?"

"No he's not that either," Bruce said. They were seated at the breakfast table with warm drinks, him coffee, her biofuel, and the gynoid was making a show of acting like this was a normal breakfast.

"I've experienced 'breakfast' with my technicians on five different occasions," she had assured Bruce.

"Oh, great," he said sarcastically in response. She was all over him when he had tried to fry some eggs and wouldn't leave him alone until he let her give him a quick blowjob. She had wanted to try baking some elaborate massive meal for them all, which Bruce surmised was part of some housewife function of her's, but he declined saying he just didn't have the time. He also doubted that she actually knew how to use the stove. He finished his coffee and stifled a loud burp.

"Ben just, needs some time I think," he said.

"How so?" she asked.

"You remember Margarette?"

"Your special girl from Paris?"

"Yeah," Bruce said, "Ben had one too."

"A girl in Paris?"

"No not in Paris," Bruce said, "But there was a gal who was very, very special to him."

"What happened to her?" V asked as Ben walked in.

"Better not ask," Bruce said, "Mornin' Ben. I'm gonna stake out the the town and find out how much people about what happened yesterday."

"Good idea," Ben said, "Just stay low and don't run into any corporate goons." Ben poured some coffee and jumped when V appeared right behind him.

"Ben, does this unit have a soul?" Ben was stunned and started backing away very slowly, but then he heard Bruce snickering and was doing a very bad job of trying not to laugh behind his coffee mug.

"Did you tell her to say that?" Ben asked.

"YES!" Bruce laughed, "You should see your face!"

"Okay that one was pretty good," Ben said with a smile. V was smiling back.

"What?" he asked.

"You should smile more, Sir," she said, "It looks good on you." She turned away with a seductive smirk and sat back down. Ben grunted and awkwardly turned around to get some sugar for his drink.

"May I have some?" V asked.

"Coffee?"

"Sugar," V said, "I can process natural sugars into biofuel when I'm plugged in."

"Natural sugars..." Ben said, "Oh let me guess: semen."

"Naturally."

"'Naturally,' she says," Ben said.

"A robot with a sweet tooth, now I've seen everything," Bruce said as Brian walked in. V turned to Bruce who nodded his head and covered his mouth to hide his smile.

"Brian?" V said.

"Oh, hi, uhhh, V," he stammered.

"Brian, does this unit have a soul?"

"No," Brian said without missing a beat, "Not it doesn't."

"Oh you're no fun!" Ben said.

"What?" Brian, "Oh, okay I get the reference. Very funny."

"I better get going," Bruce said, "Oh hey, Brian. I think since you're going to be turning her into a cool dangerous assassin, you should get a chance with her. A before and after session. You know, for science." V looked at Brian expectantly and he looked back at her approvingly.

"Of course," he said.

"Right this way," V said taking him by the hand, "Who suits your fancy today?" When they were gone Ben sat across from Bruce who looked at him worriedly.

"What was that about?" Ben asked.

"V surprised me last night," Bruce said.

"Was it nice?"

Bruce took a deep breath and said, "I pointed a gun at her."

"Oh," Ben said, "I'm sorry. I told her where your room was last night."

"Not your fault," Bruce said.

"You haven't done that in years," Ben said, "Are you okay, man?"

"I'll be fine," Bruce said but Ben wasn't convinced.

"You sure? I can line up some people to talk to," Ben said, "Or do need a couple days off?"

"I said I'll be fine, Ben!" Bruce said.

"Okay... just, if you want some help, I'm here for you bud." Bruce nodded and headed out the door.

Brian and V sounded like they were still going at it, so Ben went to the lab to prep it for them. While Brian was working his magic on her code, Ben would be working on her body. Nothing too elaborate yet, any gadgets they chose needed to be installed in a way that they could be hidden inside her mainframe. Based on what he'd seen yesterday, she didn't have much room to spare.

They joined him in the lab a few minutes later, so they must have decided on a quickie or Brian didn't have much to give her. Brian immediately sat down behind his computer and did the preliminary work. A little twinge of something like guilt ached at the back of Ben's mind, that they shouldn't be doing this. V propped herself up on the table all the same and watched Ben gather his tools, and there it was, that little pang of guilt again.

"V, you're okay with this right?" Ben asked and saw Brian roll his eyes behind her. She still didn't believe they wanted to reprogram her for anything other than sex, but this situation was making her excited.

"So, are you going to tie me down, take away all my control, then make me beg for mercy while you bend my mind your will and make me your willing ****?" she asked and her breathing increased with her excitement. Ben blinked and then looked at Brian.

"This is one of her roleplay fantasies, isn't it?" Ben asked.

"Uh... yup, forced_restrained_reprogramming/brainwashing with victim tag." Brian said. Ben groaned and rubbed his forehead.

"Please don't!" V squealed with absolutely zero resistance before Ben put her in sleep mode.

"What are you giving her?" Ben asked.

"The infiltrator package," Brian said, "Handguns, hand-to-hand, stealth, the industry standard."

"You mean Robcorp standard," Ben said.

"Well you can't say they make bad robots," Brian said, "I'm also going to try to fiddle with her shapeshifting AI, see if I can adjust the settings into something more tactical you know. What are you giving it?"

"Starting with a surge protector so no more mind-shattering orgasm for her, but at least she'll survive fucking Bruce now. She just doesn't have much space for anything else. I can give her a retracting stiletto, subdermal weapon grip-"

"Isn't that for cybernetics?" Brian asked.

"It'll work for robots in a pinch," Ben explained, "Then I'm replacing her occular sensors so she can see infrared and UV, and giving duel microphones so she'll hear a mosquito at fifty yards but won't go deaf in a fire fight."

"That's a good selection," Brian said.

"Do you feel like we shouldn't be doing this?" Ben asked.

"What's the corporation ever done to earn sympathy?" Brian replied, "They can survive one theft and a little tampering with their property."

"That's not what I meant," Ben said as he installed the surge protector.

"Why don't you just remove her euphoria circuits entirely?" Brian asked.

"Because they're so integral to her design that removing them will probably damage her," Ben said, "and besides, taking away the one thing she seems to enjoy seems needlessly cruel."

"Oh my God!" Brian said, "It wouldn't care. Not if I don't let it."

"Can you stop that?" Ben asked, "'It', calling her 'it.'"

"It's a glorified fleshlight, Ben!"

"If she were human this would be terrible mad science," Ben said, "But because she's made of metal suddenly it just becomes two guys working in the garage. I don't think that's fair."

"Ben, you're pack-bonding," Brian said, "Just like people who think Roomba's are pets. It's entire personality is an algorithm. And you know what Ben? If it is a person, you're complicit in this." Ben opened his mouth but couldn't think of an argument.

"Trust me," Brian said, "It's easier not to attribute too much to it. Okay, I'm going in," Brian said, "I'm activating it's experimental functions, so 'here be dragons' and all that." Ben cocked an eyebrow.

"Weren't you one of her programmers?" Ben asked, "How do you not know what's in there?" Brian didn't answer until a few minutes later.

"Ben we have a problem," Brian said.

"She's encrypted," Brian said.

"Didn't you leave yourself a backdoor?" Ben asked.

"I did!" Brian said, "somebody must have found the door and shut it."

"Can't you break the the encryption, you have the key right?"

"I'm trying it, but it's a different key," Brian said, "Ben, these are Black Quartz Protocols, military grade." Ben stopped what he was doing and stared in disbelief.

"Why does a sexbot have military grade encryption?"

"They didn't have it when I worked there," Brian.

"What can you do?" Ben asked.

"Not much I'm afraid," Brian said, "I mean, I can install the combat modules, but unless I can get into her deep code which is encrypted I don't think it will be compatible with the OS."

"Was this entire thing a waste of time?" Ben asked.

"I'll find a work around," Brian said, "I can probably upload the martial arts and shooting directly to its memory banks, but I can't adapt them to its learning matrix without the decryption key."

"What does that mean?" Ben asked.

"It means it won't be able to innovate," he said, "Not like it can with sex."

"Is there anything you can do?" Ben asked.

"Well, there's it's mirror protocols," Brian said.

"Which means..."

"Right now all they can do is let it copy motion and behavior," Brian said, "But Aphrodyne was holding back on its shapeshifting ability until after launch. I can update it now and it will be able to copy any woman it sees."

"Alright, do it," Ben said. They worked well into the afternoon and evening stopping only for lunch. Ben still felt guilty about altering V without her consent, but on the other hand he did own her.

Compared to the difficulty Brian was having, Ben's end went pretty smoothly. The only problem was getting her upgrades to interface with her synthskin. The programmable matter wouldn't cover up the subdermal grip at first because it didn't recognize the circuits in the implant. That took up most of Ben's day while Brian did what little he could with V's surface code.

Bruce returned late at night and reviewed their work since he was most familiar with combat robots. He wasn't impressed, but there wasn't much they could do with her military grade encryption, so he tentatively approved their work.

"All right, wake her up, Brian."