✧ took no time with the fall ✧
took no time with the fall
pg-13, hi suhyun + bobby. robot au. 1656w. ao3.
The house call is scheduled for four in the afternoon. Soohyun leaves school early, skips volleyball practice, and finds Hayi balanced on the stairwell railing, swinging her legs in perfect time with the ticking of her artificial heart.
"How do you feel?" Soohyun asks, toeing her shoes off.
Hayi tilts her head to the side and considers the question. "Slow," she says, big eyes blinking like window shutters. "Tired," she says, but she still leans forward to sniff appreciatively at the cup of fish cake in Soohyun's hands, so not everything is different.
They share the rest inside the apartment as they wait for the technician. Seven minutes past four, there's a loud rap on the door. Hayi's hands fall from Soohyun's hair. She taps the comb against the table instead, as Soohyun finishes chewing and swallowing and pulls the door open.
The boy shuffling in front of her looks far too young to be an AI technician. He slouches in the frame, like it's a little too much effort just to occupy space. The nametag on his muscle shirt reads BOBBY. When he smiles, eyes disappearing to make room for a row of charmingly uneven teeth, the reason for this visit escape Soohyun entirely.
"Hi," she says, suddenly conscious of the rumpled state of her school uniform and the flyaway pieces of hair Hayi had been fiddling with. Her fish cake breath. Wait-Hayi. That's why Bobby was here. Soohyun brings a hand to her mouth and steps aside to let him in.
Bobby moves into the apartment with a lazy grace, eyes zeroing in on Hayi, who perks up at the dining table when she sees him. "This must be the lady," he says, giving her a generous wink and taking her hand in his to draw her upright. Hayi barely reaches his chin. If Soohyun squints, she can actually see the AI blushing, which is new. She's so distracted by the flex of Bobby's biceps as he twirls Hayi around the living room that she almost doesn't register the next brisk question directed at her: "So what seems to be the problem?"
"Uh," says Soohyun. "She's been slow to start up and slow to react for about a week. I thought it might be the battery, so my brother arranged to have a technician come in." Hayi lets out a surprised laugh when Bobby dips her back in her chair. "Sorry-do you always dance with them?"
"Dancing uses almost every standard function this model has," he explains. He unhooks a fancy-looking device from his belt and plugs it into the port on the back of Hayi's neck, starts running a couple of routine diagnostics. "I think you may be right about the battery." He tosses her a quick grin. "You should consider going into AI mechanics, too."
Soohyun's heart flies into her throat. "Yeah," she says, voice cracking. "I'll think about it."
It takes an hour for Bobby to finish running all his tests, and another to replace Hayi's rechargeable battery system with a completely new one. Soohyun lays all her homework out on the dining room table but barely gets through any of it. She keeps stealing glances at Bobby, watching his fingers twist through Hayi's greased wires, the way his brow furrows when he focuses, the flick of his tongue over chapped lips. A bead of sweat as it trails from his hairline, past his temple, and into the neck of his shirt. At one point, Bobby coughs, and she leaps up to pour him a glass of water. The grateful smile he sends her buoys Soohyun through an entire physics problem.
He dances with Hayi again to test the battery. Her movements are decidedly crisper, feet leaping from step to step faster than Soohyun's ever seen. When Bobby twirls her again, that's definitely a flush on her face, synthetic skin tinting a soft pink.
They both watch as Bobby packs his toolkit up after a final set of diagnostics. "Call me any time you need anything," he says, giving her another easy grin, and hands her his contact information. It's not so much a business card as it is a name and number hastily scribbled on one of Soohyun's bright pink sticky notes, but she'll take it.
Soohyun keeps watching through the fisheye peephole as Bobby takes the stairs down two at a time. The minute he's disappeared from view, she whirls around. The expression on her face must match Hayi's, because the AI grins, leans forward with her chin propped on a fist, and asks, "What's the plan?"
✧
"This isn't really something you'd have to call me for," is the first thing out of Bobby's mouth the next Friday. He inspects the jagged remains of Hayi's hair, shorn short on the left side of her head, and gives the remaining tuft a quick ruffle. "There are cosmetic technicians who are much better at this kind of thing."
Soohyun sighs. "Hayi asked for you specifically," she tries, which turns out to be the right thing to say, because Bobby beams broadly and pulls out his toolkit.
He's wearing something a little more formal this time, a simple button-down dress shirt and baggy black slacks. "How did this happen, anyway?" Bobby asks, and when he steps closer to her Soohyun can smell something sharp and woody in his cologne.
"UH," she says, stepping away so that the table's between them.
Hayi saves her by cutting in. "I had something cooking on the stove," she says, "and I got distracted. Hair caught on fire. Thank goodness Soohyun was around to dump a bucket of water over my head."
If Bobby notices there aren't any burn marks in Hayi's hair, he doesn't say anything. "We'll have to transplant new strands," he says, sitting Hayi down in a chair and tilting her head forward. "Honestly, with enough practice, you could probably do this yourself." A note of delight enters his voice. "Soohyun-ah, come here. Take a look at this."
Soohyun's never actually seen the inside of Hayi's head before. It's certainly interesting enough to distract her from Bobby's cologne, all lit up like a Christmas tree, a thousand tiny wires running out in different directions, meshed around the center of Hayi's processing system. An entire chrysalis of activity nested in Hayi's pretty head.
"That's beautiful," she says. She tracks a crackle of blue light down a thin, transparent wire until it vanishes into Hayi's spine. When she reaches out to touch it, Hayi giggles.
"Isn't it?" Bobby agrees, and gets to work on the hair.
✧
"I'm beginning to think you're doing this on purpose," Bobby says, when he comes by the third time that month. Somehow Hayi's foot has managed to get itself twisted the wrong way around.
Soohyun gives him an innocent look. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"Hmm," Bobby says. If he cared enough to notice, he'd see that there isn't actually a sign of forced trauma, that all the wires have been meticulously reattached, as if done by a careful, balanced hand, but he doesn't push it. Doesn't seem mad, or frustrated, even with a wrench in his hand. Hayi raises her eyebrows as Bobby bends his head over her foot, and Soohyun flashes her a thumbs up.
✧
At the beginning of October, Chanhyuk comes home from work brandishing an official bill from YGAI. "Why do we have five-hundred thousand won in maintenance bills this month? Is Hayi okay?"
Soohyun raises her hands and puts on her best placating smile. "Oppa, I can explain."
Hayi trundles out of the bathroom with two delicate wires sticking out of each ear, and Chanhyuk boggles at her for a moment. Before any of them can say anything, someone's knocking on the door. Talk about crappy timing. Chanhyuk glances between them one more time before opening the front door of the apartment. Recognition dawns on his face. "Bobby?"
"Hey, hyung," Bobby says, hefting his bag. "I'm here to see Hayi?"
"Wait," Soohyun says, suddenly suspicious. "You know my brother?"
"Sure," Bobby says, nonplussed.
"He's dating one of my college friends," Chanhyuk says. "You remember Jinhwan, right?"
"Yeah, I do," Soohyun says faintly, blood roaring through her ears. Small, cute, high voiced Jinhwan-oppa, who had, the last time he'd come over, mentioned something about a relationship.
"I told him Hayi was malfunctioning in September and he recommended Bobby. Hanbin said he was the best AI technician he knew, no bias." Chanhyuk sighs and drops his bag on the table. "Sorry she's been bothering you during work hours," he continues, rubbing his forehead.
"Hasn't been a bother," Bobby says, grinning. That stupid grin. "Your little sister is very cute." The horrible flush of embarrassment creeps up Soohyun's neck. She feels like her face is about to burn off.
"Why don't you stay for dinner?" she can hear Chanhyuk saying, as if from very far off. Only Hayi's hand at her elbow manages to steady her enough to sit down at the dining table.
✧
Soohyun turns in early after eating, the food like ash in her mouth. In her room, she wraps a thick blanket around herself, like a toga. She can hear Bobby and Chanhyuk discussing something in the living room and has to resist the urge to slam the door for dramatic effect. She crumples the pink sticky note with Bobby's number on it instead, tosses it in the wastebasket.
"Does this mean you're giving up?" Hayi asks, swinging her legs on the edge of her bed, wires tucked safely back inside her head.
"Of course not," Soohyun says, propping her hands on her hips. She focuses on the wavy swoop of Hayi's hair as she bends forward to regard her. "It's time to plan our revenge."
Hayi's red lips part in a smile. She leans forward, reaches out to lace their fingers together, and asks, "What's your plan?"
pg-13, hi suhyun + bobby. robot au. 1656w. ao3.
The house call is scheduled for four in the afternoon. Soohyun leaves school early, skips volleyball practice, and finds Hayi balanced on the stairwell railing, swinging her legs in perfect time with the ticking of her artificial heart.
"How do you feel?" Soohyun asks, toeing her shoes off.
Hayi tilts her head to the side and considers the question. "Slow," she says, big eyes blinking like window shutters. "Tired," she says, but she still leans forward to sniff appreciatively at the cup of fish cake in Soohyun's hands, so not everything is different.
They share the rest inside the apartment as they wait for the technician. Seven minutes past four, there's a loud rap on the door. Hayi's hands fall from Soohyun's hair. She taps the comb against the table instead, as Soohyun finishes chewing and swallowing and pulls the door open.
The boy shuffling in front of her looks far too young to be an AI technician. He slouches in the frame, like it's a little too much effort just to occupy space. The nametag on his muscle shirt reads BOBBY. When he smiles, eyes disappearing to make room for a row of charmingly uneven teeth, the reason for this visit escape Soohyun entirely.
"Hi," she says, suddenly conscious of the rumpled state of her school uniform and the flyaway pieces of hair Hayi had been fiddling with. Her fish cake breath. Wait-Hayi. That's why Bobby was here. Soohyun brings a hand to her mouth and steps aside to let him in.
Bobby moves into the apartment with a lazy grace, eyes zeroing in on Hayi, who perks up at the dining table when she sees him. "This must be the lady," he says, giving her a generous wink and taking her hand in his to draw her upright. Hayi barely reaches his chin. If Soohyun squints, she can actually see the AI blushing, which is new. She's so distracted by the flex of Bobby's biceps as he twirls Hayi around the living room that she almost doesn't register the next brisk question directed at her: "So what seems to be the problem?"
"Uh," says Soohyun. "She's been slow to start up and slow to react for about a week. I thought it might be the battery, so my brother arranged to have a technician come in." Hayi lets out a surprised laugh when Bobby dips her back in her chair. "Sorry-do you always dance with them?"
"Dancing uses almost every standard function this model has," he explains. He unhooks a fancy-looking device from his belt and plugs it into the port on the back of Hayi's neck, starts running a couple of routine diagnostics. "I think you may be right about the battery." He tosses her a quick grin. "You should consider going into AI mechanics, too."
Soohyun's heart flies into her throat. "Yeah," she says, voice cracking. "I'll think about it."
It takes an hour for Bobby to finish running all his tests, and another to replace Hayi's rechargeable battery system with a completely new one. Soohyun lays all her homework out on the dining room table but barely gets through any of it. She keeps stealing glances at Bobby, watching his fingers twist through Hayi's greased wires, the way his brow furrows when he focuses, the flick of his tongue over chapped lips. A bead of sweat as it trails from his hairline, past his temple, and into the neck of his shirt. At one point, Bobby coughs, and she leaps up to pour him a glass of water. The grateful smile he sends her buoys Soohyun through an entire physics problem.
He dances with Hayi again to test the battery. Her movements are decidedly crisper, feet leaping from step to step faster than Soohyun's ever seen. When Bobby twirls her again, that's definitely a flush on her face, synthetic skin tinting a soft pink.
They both watch as Bobby packs his toolkit up after a final set of diagnostics. "Call me any time you need anything," he says, giving her another easy grin, and hands her his contact information. It's not so much a business card as it is a name and number hastily scribbled on one of Soohyun's bright pink sticky notes, but she'll take it.
Soohyun keeps watching through the fisheye peephole as Bobby takes the stairs down two at a time. The minute he's disappeared from view, she whirls around. The expression on her face must match Hayi's, because the AI grins, leans forward with her chin propped on a fist, and asks, "What's the plan?"
✧
"This isn't really something you'd have to call me for," is the first thing out of Bobby's mouth the next Friday. He inspects the jagged remains of Hayi's hair, shorn short on the left side of her head, and gives the remaining tuft a quick ruffle. "There are cosmetic technicians who are much better at this kind of thing."
Soohyun sighs. "Hayi asked for you specifically," she tries, which turns out to be the right thing to say, because Bobby beams broadly and pulls out his toolkit.
He's wearing something a little more formal this time, a simple button-down dress shirt and baggy black slacks. "How did this happen, anyway?" Bobby asks, and when he steps closer to her Soohyun can smell something sharp and woody in his cologne.
"UH," she says, stepping away so that the table's between them.
Hayi saves her by cutting in. "I had something cooking on the stove," she says, "and I got distracted. Hair caught on fire. Thank goodness Soohyun was around to dump a bucket of water over my head."
If Bobby notices there aren't any burn marks in Hayi's hair, he doesn't say anything. "We'll have to transplant new strands," he says, sitting Hayi down in a chair and tilting her head forward. "Honestly, with enough practice, you could probably do this yourself." A note of delight enters his voice. "Soohyun-ah, come here. Take a look at this."
Soohyun's never actually seen the inside of Hayi's head before. It's certainly interesting enough to distract her from Bobby's cologne, all lit up like a Christmas tree, a thousand tiny wires running out in different directions, meshed around the center of Hayi's processing system. An entire chrysalis of activity nested in Hayi's pretty head.
"That's beautiful," she says. She tracks a crackle of blue light down a thin, transparent wire until it vanishes into Hayi's spine. When she reaches out to touch it, Hayi giggles.
"Isn't it?" Bobby agrees, and gets to work on the hair.
✧
"I'm beginning to think you're doing this on purpose," Bobby says, when he comes by the third time that month. Somehow Hayi's foot has managed to get itself twisted the wrong way around.
Soohyun gives him an innocent look. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"Hmm," Bobby says. If he cared enough to notice, he'd see that there isn't actually a sign of forced trauma, that all the wires have been meticulously reattached, as if done by a careful, balanced hand, but he doesn't push it. Doesn't seem mad, or frustrated, even with a wrench in his hand. Hayi raises her eyebrows as Bobby bends his head over her foot, and Soohyun flashes her a thumbs up.
✧
At the beginning of October, Chanhyuk comes home from work brandishing an official bill from YGAI. "Why do we have five-hundred thousand won in maintenance bills this month? Is Hayi okay?"
Soohyun raises her hands and puts on her best placating smile. "Oppa, I can explain."
Hayi trundles out of the bathroom with two delicate wires sticking out of each ear, and Chanhyuk boggles at her for a moment. Before any of them can say anything, someone's knocking on the door. Talk about crappy timing. Chanhyuk glances between them one more time before opening the front door of the apartment. Recognition dawns on his face. "Bobby?"
"Hey, hyung," Bobby says, hefting his bag. "I'm here to see Hayi?"
"Wait," Soohyun says, suddenly suspicious. "You know my brother?"
"Sure," Bobby says, nonplussed.
"He's dating one of my college friends," Chanhyuk says. "You remember Jinhwan, right?"
"Yeah, I do," Soohyun says faintly, blood roaring through her ears. Small, cute, high voiced Jinhwan-oppa, who had, the last time he'd come over, mentioned something about a relationship.
"I told him Hayi was malfunctioning in September and he recommended Bobby. Hanbin said he was the best AI technician he knew, no bias." Chanhyuk sighs and drops his bag on the table. "Sorry she's been bothering you during work hours," he continues, rubbing his forehead.
"Hasn't been a bother," Bobby says, grinning. That stupid grin. "Your little sister is very cute." The horrible flush of embarrassment creeps up Soohyun's neck. She feels like her face is about to burn off.
"Why don't you stay for dinner?" she can hear Chanhyuk saying, as if from very far off. Only Hayi's hand at her elbow manages to steady her enough to sit down at the dining table.
✧
Soohyun turns in early after eating, the food like ash in her mouth. In her room, she wraps a thick blanket around herself, like a toga. She can hear Bobby and Chanhyuk discussing something in the living room and has to resist the urge to slam the door for dramatic effect. She crumples the pink sticky note with Bobby's number on it instead, tosses it in the wastebasket.
"Does this mean you're giving up?" Hayi asks, swinging her legs on the edge of her bed, wires tucked safely back inside her head.
"Of course not," Soohyun says, propping her hands on her hips. She focuses on the wavy swoop of Hayi's hair as she bends forward to regard her. "It's time to plan our revenge."
Hayi's red lips part in a smile. She leans forward, reaches out to lace their fingers together, and asks, "What's your plan?"