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The installation had been successful, Shawn sweating profusely through the entire procedure.
It was risky work. He was one of the most knowledgeable people about robotics and AI, well... ever, but much about Sid’s design and mechanics had been top secret and were foreign to him. It was risky and as bad as he felt about it, he didn’t fully trust Sid to guide him around his own anatomy.
So much could go wrong, what if Sid simply shut down and never started again? He knew he’d have a complete nervous breakdown if that happened.
But it was done now, with minimal complications along the way.
The stress of the installation process had completely distracted him from what was going to follow afterward, however.
He had busied himself, overworking himself to death at his actual job that wasn’t illegal genitalia installation on stolen robots. That was just a hobby.
Admittedly, he didn’t need to be working this hard, and he took on several side tasks that he usually wouldn’t just to tire himself out so he would have to go straight to bed as soon as he got home, then be up at the crack of dawn the next morning and out the door again.
He just wasn’t ready yet.
It was bizarre. The whole concept of having a robot he stole, developed a relationship with, then had to install a robot pussy on it because the robot craves intimacy on a deeper level.
It was enough to make his head spin sometimes.
He wouldn’t give Sid up for the world, make no mistake. That was his love, the light of his life, the most important thing to him… but he just wasn’t ready yet.
The first couple of days Sid buys it, he understands that Shawn is busy, but about a week later he starts piecing things together. He finds it strange that this happened immediately after the installation, and Shawn has never been this busy before. Ever. Even by his own admission.
“Is something wrong?” Sid asks casually from across the dinner table one night.
Shawn looks dead tired, the bags under his eyes have bags under them, too. It was almost midnight when he got home. Sid was sure he was planning on eating then getting in bed like he had been doing this whole week.
“Tired, lots of work, that’s all,” Shawn says shortly.
“You sure?” Sid inquires further.
“Yep,” Shawn sighs.
Sid is silent for a long while, the only sound filling the room is Shawn’s fork scraping against his plate, before he speaks up again.
“Is this about the procedure?” he asks innocently but Shawn freezes so abruptly you’d think Sid had started screaming every obscenity known to man.
“...It is, isn’t it…” Sid continues when he’s met with silence, slouching his shoulders sadly.
“It’s not that simple,” Shawn finally says, looking down at the pattern on the tabletop instead of in Sid’s eyes.
“Then explain it to me,” Sid says, sounding hopeless, resting his chin on his hands.
“I’m just busy,” Shawn brushes off again, “and tired .”
Sid was becoming frustrated with Shawn’s denial that nothing was wrong. There had to be something, and he wanted to understand, but clearly, that wasn’t going to happen right now.
He got up from his seat and left Shawn alone at the table.
~~~~~~~~
Sid spent the rest of the night reading alone, tucked away in the study, not bothering to say goodnight when he heard Shawn shuffling off to bed a short while later, and not bothering to say goodbye either when he heard Shawn up at the crack of dawn again to head out to work.
Shawn didn’t bother looking for him either before he left and Sid wanted to be alone anyways but it would have been nice if he could have at least tried to say goodbye then let Sid reject him.
This was something Sid had discovered about himself recently because of the way Shawn was acting: he was petty.
He felt rejected and lonely and he wanted Shawn to know how it felt, see if he liked it when he was suddenly shunned for reasons unknown.
But Shawn still kept his distance, the pair of them barely speaking despite being in the same house for almost four days before Sid finally broke and couldn’t stand it anymore.
“We need to talk,” was all he said, crossing his arms and blocking Shawn from exiting through the door early in the morning .
“When I get home,” Shawn nodded simply.
“And when is that going to be?” Sid pressed on, not moving to let him through the door.
“I don’t know, got a lot to do,” Shawn answered shortly.
Sid let out a synthy huff and still didn’t move. Shawn wrung his hands together as they stood staring at each other in silence. Shawn hated this wedge he had driven between the two of them caused by his own anxieties. He wished he could do it all over again and not be such a fucking weirdo about this whole thing.
“I’ll… I’ll get off early, ok? We can talk,” he said quietly. Sid unclenched his jaw at this and let his face soften. He hadn't been expecting to get a result from this confrontation.
“I have to go though. Now,” Shawn continued. Sid stepped out of the way and let him pass, allowing Shawn to pat him on the shoulder gently and kiss his cheek as he left.
Fine.
~~~~~~~~
Shawn hesitates outside the door after work when he arrives home, finally entering after a few moments of talking himself through it.
Sid is waiting directly on the other side, unnerving him. Shawn wouldn’t be surprised if he had just been standing there like that all day.
Shawn doesn’t say anything and Sid raises an eyebrow at him.
“I’m home,” Shawn says, “... early ,” he reiterates, seeing Sid’s face turn displeased at his first statement.
“I’ll be in the living room,” Is all Sid says, softly, sensing there’s a raw nerve in the air.
Shawn takes his time removing his shoes, hanging his coat up, and making his way to where Sid is waiting. He sits down cautiously next to him and Sid turns to face him, immediately looking into his eyes pleadingly with his own glowing blue ones. Shawn still can’t bring himself to say anything, so Sid has to prod him to speak again.
“...So?”
“What do you want to know, Sid?” Shawn asks quietly.
He does his best to maintain eye contact but it’s hard. He still has trouble believing this is real life sometimes, he just has his wildest dream living with him in his home.
“Why are you being like… this ,” Sid asks, struggling to find the right word, “I thought the test was good that’s why you put it on me??”
Shawn feels a pain in his chest when he hears how desperate Sid sounds. He feels awful about how he’s been treating him, but something inside him is climbing the walls, some deep fear of intimacy brought on by a lifetime of dissatisfaction and alienation. Everything he had always wanted was right in front of him but he couldn’t even muster up the courage to reach out and take it.
“I’m sorry, Sid, I really am… Can we just start over?”
Sid’s face softens a little at Shawn’s weak tone.
“Not until you tell me what’s going on,” Sid says, quieter now.
“I just got… I don’t know, freaked out, I’m being stupid, and I was busy with work, but I’m fine now, really, I am. Promise.”
“ What about this freaked you out?”
“Everything…” Shawn trails off, but it still seems like Sid doesn’t understand, “...You spend all that time reading, but you don’t even have the slightest grasp on what you yourself are. You’re a marvel of invention, Sid. You’re a miracle. You’re beyond anything I ever could have dreamed of… and sometimes it’s a little jarring.”
The pair were silent as Sid thought this over and processed it, only asking “Really? Is that it?”
“I swear that's it, it’s nothing you’ve done, it has nothing to do with the installation, I just still go into shock from time to time… but it’s over now, promise.”
Sid doesn't say anything to this for a long while, he just scoots a little closer to Shawn on the couch and leans his head on his Shoulder, and Shawn just holds him, the silence only breaking when Sid says “Ok”.