My one true love in fiction is probably Characters Running Face First Into The Consequences Of Their Actions (And Getting Back Up), so I couldn't resist.
Yeah, that's kind of what I thought too! Murderbot comes off as early in the govmod-hack era, and clearly has no idea what it's doing. The only reason it's working out is that Gurathin is a miserable, desperately lonely husk of a man.
The contrast between Murderbot being so proud of itself for getting in A+ in Taking Care Of A Human Who Isn't Scared Of It and Gurathin's idle musings on how he's being partly motivated by the threat of blackmail? Crunchy! Possibly devastating if it comes up in the future!
There I was writing part one like "what a nice consequence-free little fantasy!!" It's never a consequence-free little fantasy.
They're hurtling towards the point where any blackmail would simply be mutually assured destruction. At that point, we'll see if they continue to throw themselves down the road to their worst fears, or if they decide to be kind to each other.
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IreneVitale on Chapter 2 Fri 27 Feb 2026 03:47AM UTC
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lawfulchaotic (cerebel) on Chapter 2 Fri 27 Feb 2026 02:54PM UTC
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