Every Me Loves Every You

cass moves from his apartment into an onsite dorm in the runup to launch, and balthazar starts spending more and more time there

he’s supposed to be in the lab at nights recharging & shit so when he gets back after his first overnight stay at cass’ the devs r just like

“where the hell have you been???”

“sorry, guess i just forgot,” says balthazar entirely insincerely

“literally HOW did you forget?? you’re a computer you don’t even have a brain to forget WITH”

“sorry, guess i just forgot,” says balthazar, already out the door again

balthazar’s base design and hardware is probably standard issue but his outer appearance and supplemental hardware are unique & new cause they’ve never used an android as a system’s ai before

cass is not pleased at first to hear he won’t actually be the only person on board, since that’s why he took the job, but when they meet before launch, balthazar is just so lowkey congenial and makes him laugh and knows how to scritch a cat’s chin just right

and thinking it over cass decides it IS less disconcerting for the ship’s built-in ai to have a face he can talk to