The Fem-Bot climbed out of the hover cab with a delicate grace. Her chrome, plastic and rubber working together in perfectly tuned harmony. With a wave to the Fem-Bot the Jonny Cab scooted back into the quickly moving traffic hunting for its next fare.

Eyes and sensors followed the Fem-Bot as she smoothly walked down the busy sidewalk.  Flesh and metal both appreciated the artistry that went into her design. Long highly polished legs that ended in built in wedge heels, check. An aesthetically pleasing chest to waist to hip ratio, check.  Seams that were in just the right pattern on her arms, check. A face that was at least a 224 on the Smith-Reinhold attractiveness scale, check. She paid no attention to the looks as she walked to her goal.

But before she walked to her destination the Fem-Bot looked at her reflection and adjusted the ultra form fitting purple polymer long sleeve mini dress that she was wearing for maximum appeal. She then brushed her black hair tendrils into a light wave, straightened her shoulders and entered into the offices of Trexos Entertainment.

----------- 3 Hours Earlier --------------

“So what are you thinking Chassis? Any ideas?”

“Nothing super feasible. We need access to Dimples or we need access to your hardware. One of the two. And I imagine either one would be really difficult. Because if he is anything like I have heard he is probably furious.”

“He was spitting mad in his creepy delightful way before we tried to do the hit. And after we started the op I don’t think he got much happier.”

Chassis laughed a bit. “I don’t imagine he got happier. What was he upset about, did you manage to catch it?”

“Cred flow. Apparently a deal fell through and he took a pretty sizable loss on the kilo-cred front.”

“That might be usable. He needs cred, maybe we can offer him some to get him to hand over your hardware.”

“Maybe, but that will be pricey. And how will we get access to him?”

“Well he is a businessman. We just need to make an appointment.”

Redd looked a tad dumbfounded. “What?”

“We go in, we talk and we leave hopefully with what we want. Well not both of us. I imagine he is still pretty mad at you. So I go in solo and take care of it.”

“What makes you think you can just talk to him?”

“I am a parts dealer, negotiation is kinda what I do on a day to day basis. And besides I have my negotiator skill maxed out and Scrounger gets a massive bonus to it.” The Nu-Bot chuckled. “With the right hardware I’ll be damn hard to beat.”

“I haven’t heard of any modules that give that much of a negotiation bonus. What exactly are you talking about?”

“I have something special in the vault. Why don’t you call your client and get your pay for the job while I start getting everything ready.”

The Fem-Bot nodded and got the absent look that one gets while making a remote communication in game.

Chassis broadcast a specialized code and called out loud “CeCe, please save progress on arm 3386-C and make sure that the vault is ready for me to access it in a few minutes after Redd finishes her call.”

A high pitch voice replied seemingly out of nowhere.

“Will do boss. Is there anything else?”

“Ummm, yeah. Prepare for a backup file upload. This might go sideways. And if it does I might be down for a while, so you should fire up your shop bot. I might be a while. You can roll around and take care of the place for me while I’m out.”

“Sounds good boss. I will get on it right away.”

“Thanks CeCe.”

At about that point Radiation Redd finished her call.

“All taken care of. The client is transferring the kilo-creds to my and Vo’s account and is pretty satisfied by our attempt. He didn’t think we would even be able to get that close and cause that much chaos. I guess that’s a good thing.” She sighed.

Chassis swapped the dismantling attachment for a more usable humanoid hand and gestured to Redd.

“Follow me back. CeCe fired it up so I can take you to the vault.”

“Who’s CeCe?”

“CeCe, introduce yourself.”

A small light blue and chrome bipedal bot with a yellow sensor band instead of eyes stepped out of a side room and gave a little wave.

“Hello. I am CeCe. I am an autonomous MI that works for Chassis. I help out around the shop when Chassis needs to be offline and am a general assistant. I hope to one day take a more prominent role in the day to day operations of the shop.”

“CeCe, I’ve said it before you don’t have to give the full intro every time you meet somebody new. Just say the first part.”

“Thank you boss I will endeavor to follow your instructions in the future.”

Radiation Redd seemed a tad shocked.

“You have a MI, a Machine Intelligence, working for you?”

“Technically CeCe is a Micro MI. Not a full MI. She is developing a full personality. I was asked to help out by Mother Brain. And she has come a long way since we started. Isn’t that right CeCe?”

The small bot nodded. “Yep. That’s right boss. I’m getting better all the time. Soon I’ll get my third upgrade and be able to help you out even more!”

“But that doesn’t explain how you got the job and a home back up station.”

“It was a quest, that led into a quest, which led into a mission, which led to a task and back into another mission. Trust me the details are not worth it. And I’d rather not explain, we really don’t have time. We need to get Vo back.”

Chassis, Radiation Redd and CeCe walked into the back of the store, past racks and bins of parts, through a thick metal door and down a flight of nicely maintained stairs. They came into a large room lined with what looked like industrial cryo stasis modules and a set of mad scientist equipment.

“Chassis what is all this?”

“This is the Vault” The Nu-Bot made an overly dramatic arm motion encompassing the whole room. “This is where I keep specialized hardware sets and meat suits that someone might pay big kilo for. And it is where I do my backups.”

“This room is amazing!” Redd looked around peering into the clear windows set inside each of the dozen or so stasis modules.  “I’m super impressed. Who knew you had something like this down here.”

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

While Radiation Redd wandered around the room CeCe and Chassis got to work. After fiddling with a few switches and dials Chassis settled into a chair next to a gleaming blue console. Its eye lenses dimmed for a minute or two then resumed their glowing.

“Back up successful Boss. Shall I send it out?”

“Please CeCe. Thank you. After that please get ready for a personality module transfer. I’m going to swap hardware to something that will work better this situation.”

“Affirmative Boss.”

The cobbled together Nu-Bot walked over to a specific stasis module and tapped in a code. With a pneumatic hiss the front split open and its contents were exposed to the room. An elegant chrome and plastic Fem-Bot.

“Wow, that is a high end set of hardware.” Redd remarked as she came up behind Chassis and looked into the open module.  “She looks factory fresh.”

“She is to both. She is last year’s executive model; I got her in trade last year and haven’t found a buyer for her. Not many people need something like her for a secretary or for sales. And if they do they will probably get something brand new and have Mother Brain generate a basic personality for her. Very few players want to play being a personal assistant when they can shoot stuff and make explosions.”

Digital laughter. “Too true. Too true.”

Redd looked the shell over. Elegant seams at the major joints. Polished chrome and white plastic. Softly segmented black hair tendrils what had little LEDs on the ends. Not a blemish or imperfection could be seen anywhere on the smooth lines that the Fem-Bot was composed of.

“The designers went out of there way on making her look amazing. I am more than slightly jealous. I though my hardware was high end. This just looks classy and elegant. Could you Combat mod her?”

“I did a full scan after I got ahold of her. I could but not very well. She would be limited to infiltration only. There is not much I could do to make her tougher and able to have her take a few hits without ruining the lines. I can incorporate some of her features into another set of hardware. But to do anything with doing will be painfully expensive. I’m afraid that Plutonia here is a non-combat model only.”

“You named her?”

Chassis had the grace to look a bit embarrassed.

“Plutonia is a registered alias. I haven’t actually used it yet. And I thought that it would be a good name to use on her.”

“Suuuure Chassis. I’ll believe you.” Redd smirked.

“Boss I’m ready to assist you now.”

“Thanks CeCe. I’ll get in position.”

Chassis walked over to a nearby bench, sat and powered down.

CeCe tapped a button on the stasis module causing the Fem-Bot inside to spin on her axis so that her back was to CeCe and Redd. With a little fiddling a back panel opened up between her shoulder blades exposing an empty slot.

CeCe walked over to Chassis inert body and did the same. But instead of the open slot there was a shimmery blue board in the slot about the size of a deck of playing cards. With delicate motions CeCe removed the board.  She held it out in front of Redd. Showing all the thin wafers of micro circuitry.

“Is that what a personality module looks like?” Radiation Redd asked.

“That is correct. See the flickering red and yellow lights?”

Redd nodded.

“That means the board is healthy and active. Green and red mean the board is damaged and is in standby mode, it will self-repair if placed in a working body. White lights means the board is heavily damaged and should be repaired by a Techno-path or a skilled cyberneticist before being installed. No lights mean it is dead. And the best that can happen is that it can be scanned for any memory retrieval. This is what usually happens to players when they need to be reset at the upload bank. The brightness of the blue glow indicates the level of active memories and experience that could be lost in the transfer.”

“That is so cool to know. Thank you CeCe.”

The tiny bot smiled. “I am happy to share knowledge. Now I must install the boss so she can get started on her mission for you.”

With that the helper-bot slotted the blue glowing board into the open slot in the Fem-Bots back with a light click and closed the panel.  With a tap of a familiar button the bot spun so that she was facing forward again.

A minute passed as the two watched the silent Fem-Bot that Chassis would become shortly. Slowly at first but then faster the blue irises of her eyes lit up and the glowing of the hair LEDs grew until they reached full brightness.

Chassis pivoted her head around and examined her hands for a few moments before giving a slight tug on her feet and stepping off the platform out of the stasis module. She tottered around for a few steps before she gained her balance and spoke with a surprisingly melodic voice.

“The hip actuators are interesting. Lots of wiggle in there. But the posture and balance compensation is pretty amazing.” She paused. “And my voice is intense. I haven’t heard it before. Wow. It certainly fits the look though.”

Redd laughed. “Look at you. You aren’t a Fem-Bot for a whole minute and you are already vain.”

Chassis smirked, seemed surprised that she was able to, and then smirked again. “Well when you bought it flaunt it.”

Redd and Chassis both shared a laugh.

A few minutes later the Plutonia alias was registered to the hardware that Chassis was wearing and she was all dressed in her matte purple rubberized polymer mini dress.

“Ok I’m heading out to get your bod back. Wish me luck”

“Good luck Chass.. Err I mean Plutonia. And thank you again.”

The new Fem-Bot smiled and gave a wave as she stepped out the front door of the store.

------------- Now -----------------

Plutonia clicked though the open lobby across the marble floor toward the receptionists desk. She walked forward ignoring the others in the lobby with a slight smile on her face as if she owned the place and everyone else was beneath her notice.

“Hello there I would like to schedule an appointment with Mr. Butterscotch.”

“I’m sorry Mr. Butterscotch is a very busy sophont. I doubt he would have time to see you miss…”

“Plutonia. Please call him just to check.” Plutonia asked with a charming smile.

The receptionist wavered a moment. “Oh I guess it won’t hurt to ask. And what would you be meeting about?”

“Please let him know it is about the leak in his basement.” Plutonia said with a smile.