[b]Red![/b]

"Eh, say what you will about self-loathing bigotry, at least it's an emotion," said Red. "Like, that's a profoundly fucked up germinal worm of a human being over there and I can't bring myself to even be bothered by that. I mean, like, did you notice he didn't take the fursuit head off after I put it back on him, even when he was trying to denounce me? He had that argument while still wearing that smiling lion face and being filmed by literally everyone. If he gave an inch to the humiliation inherent in that situation I don't think he'd make it to the gas station."

She gave him a sideways glance. "Nah, he's on the wheel, right? The same with the entire genre of narcissist politics, I can't bring myself to hate them. It's the fucking... cruelty Bodhisattvas that get to me, the ones who are genuinely chill about it. The sociopaths who have made their peace with what they are and play the world like a game. Difference between culture war and class war, you know? I wish I could only fight the latter but that's kind of the point of the former, right?"

[b]Pink![/b]

She closed her eyes and thought in co-ordinates. She started talking through it, letting the process play out so that Crystal could hear what was happening.

"Everything has its place. Everything in its place. Check the stocks and then run the routine, reach for the exact places in the exact positions. X-912 Y-124 Z-139 was object 1, transport it to X-322 Y-125 Z-139. X-820 Y-124 Z-139 was object 2, transport it to location X-322 Y-130 Z-139. Apply motion 1. Reset. X-915 Y-124 Z-139 is object 3, transport it to X-322 Y-126 Z-139. Basic routine. No flourishes."

She smiles calmly, eyes closed. She doesn't need to look at what she's done. Cereal, milk, spoon! A topological map and rhythm sequence. The picture of a robot chef! The early automated kitchen prototypes featured a single robotic arm that would pick up precisely located objects and apply precisely calibrated movements to them, the kitchen as a positional map. There was no need for Creativity here at all!

Because if there was -

"I'm going to try again with my eyes open -"

She could try it again with just a touch more of a flourish -

"Cereal!" she declared, setting it down. The substitution of drain cleaner for milk felt like a bit of a bold statement, but Pink seemed proud of it. "I hope you enjoy it!"

There's an actively deranged edge to her smile and curtsy, that uncanny body language that happened when an AI was off their socialization routines. Her earlier insistence that Crystal clear the area of knives felt suddenly like a reasonable precaution.

[b]Spearmint![/b]

No I'm Green no other colours but isn't it so much better to have clarity to become the shape that will make her happy to relate to others through the obliteration of the self to be the dream made manifest -

There's a faint whir and shift of paneling as her emergency cooling routine kicks in, revealing a shade more metal as her processor fan goes into overdrive. She's thinking so hard that her body is physically reshaping to vent. She tugs her collar down. All she'd have to do would be to [i]become [/i]-

She struggles to formulate a thought from amidst all the thought. Instead she registers that she is in a shower, and showers have a useful cooling function, and also #ILLEGIBLE# and so therefore she should help clear it.

"This isn't a good idea," said Spearmint, half to herself. "I..." she felt a part of her overheated mind check out and go limp. There wasn't space enough in her head for all of this...

Then her eyes flick up, RGB sliders shifting across her body to a cooler tone. She smiled, and smiled brilliantly - just for a moment - and then put her hands on her hips. "I don't have to explain anything to you," she said. "This is [i]my [/i]event and you're not -" her eyes flickered down, she bit her lip for a moment, and then she looked up again, defiant. "- you're not going to hijack it!"

She fits into this space. [i]Cool, but chewable[/i]. She comes into resolution where Panther remains mysterious; vulnerable, bullyable, tempted. That flimsy shield of defiance wouldn't stand up to those claws against her neck. All Panther needs to do to get her to be everything she wants is show those claws.