Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Jude likes to think he’s doing good with what he can. 

Running an android repair service out of his house wasn’t his first pick careerwise, but it pays the bills. And he does it well , too. Jude can be pretty confident that there isn’t any android mechanic around with as much skill in fixing joints as him, for the same reason he’s very confident that it’s far too risky for him to work for anyone other than himself. The experience that’s given him that skill is very uncommon. (Or at least Jude hopes it is, because he really wouldn’t wish it on anyone else.)

He isn’t overwhelmed with clients, but that’s a given considering how so many models keep getting newer versions faster and faster, it’s a lot easier to just buy the latest one when yours shows any sign of wear.

But there’s still a lot of people who’ll go to repairs first, whether they don’t have the money to buy a whole new droid outright or they’ve grown too attached to their current one to replace it. Jude likes that second kind of person a bit more, but whatever the reason he always prefers when someone chooses to save rather than scrap.

Even if he has to do the latter every once in a while - replacement parts have to come from somewhere. And Jude may be skilled, but there’s nothing he can do to fix a droid that doesn’t turn on. 

—

A van pulls up to his place with a familiar rumble. Jude gets up from his desk, sets down a work-in-progress part, and stretches. The light discomfort in his shoulder doesn’t cease, but it doesn’t get worse, so Jude considers it to be a pretty good day. He makes his way downstairs, and greets the driver with a grin.

“How’s my favourite supplier?” “Loaded, today.” Camavinga smiles back, and then tilts his head at him. “Favourite? I thought I was your only supplier, bro. Have you been cheating on me?”

Jude rolls his eyes. “Yes, I have, with the only other supplier that’s got parts as good as yours for even lower prices.”

“What? How’s that even possible, I give you a discount -” Cama catches on to his teasing expression. “Ohh, I see how it is. You know what-” “You said something about being loaded, today?” Cama keeps frowning at him, but without much heat to it. “You’re lucky I like you.” His annoyance mostly evaporates when Jude goes to help him unload his latest shipment, though.

—

“Oh, I’ve got one more thing for you.” Cama looks excited, but almost a bit guilty, too. Ah, it must be an intact android for Jude to strip for parts himself. He knows that Jude doesn't exactly love to do that, too much sympathy for any machine he works on. Still, these were usually worth it.

“Is it good?”

“Oh yes, I’m lucky they called me. It’s going to be a source of very good parts, especially joints.”

Jude raises an eyebrow. “Really? How good are we talking?”

“Sporting quality. High calibre, too.”

Jude raises his other eyebrow. That was rare. The parts from sporting androids were about the hardest to come by, other than military-grade stuff. If they even were stripped, they’d always be recycled back at their factories.

Their parts went for untold amounts on the black market, (not that Jude would ever go to those lengths to get them, he had some morals) since they used such expensive materials and time intensive designs. It was what allowed them to apply and withstand a real amount of force while staying more flexible than almost any other type of droid.

As far as android parts go, they’re probably the closest thing to real human joints.

“Ok, let me see.”

Cama nods and drags out a box with a tarp over it. It almost looks like a coffin, but Jude ignores that thought. Whatever’s inside was never really alive anyway.

“Big, innit?”

“Yep, he’s still intact.”

Cama pulls off the sheet covering the android, revealing-

“Is that…?” Jude stares, disbelieving at the android’s face. Its expression is frozen in a look that's partly exhausted, partly protesting, half-lidded eyes staring back blankly. 

It's a face that Jude recognises. From watching Spain’s qualifying matches in the Euros de Máquinas.

“Yes, it’s him.” 

“But he’s- why is he in your shipment?”

Cama looks sympathetic, almost mournful. “They couldn’t fix the damage to his knee. And,” he hesitates, almost as if he could spare Jude from the news if he doesn’t say it, then sighs. “He doesn’t turn on anymore.”

“Fuck… seriously?” Jude hears the words, reacts to them on autopilot, but still doesn’t think they’ve fully clicked in his brain. “So they’re just.. selling him for scraps? They don’t even care about preserving him, after everything he’s done?” 

Cama shakes his head. “Apparently there was some attempt to keep him exhibited in a museum, but he’s gotten some internal damage so they think his batteries could be unstable. It’d be too much of a fire risk.” 

“Still, it seems so…” Jude searches for the right word, “ unfair of them.”

Cama shrugs, but his sympathetic frown remains. “They’ve got about a million other droids waiting in the wings, and this one had a very public mechanical failure. I know it sucks, but I think they just wanted to move on, bury him.” 

“Then why bring him to me?”

“You need good quality parts, right?” Cama gestures at the damaged area. “Apart from here, he’s a gold mine. Especially for joints and structure.”

“Yeah, for sure.” Jude sighs with a somewhat pained expression. “It’s just, the thought of taking him apart…” 

“Look, Jude, I know you’ve got a bleeding heart, even for machines, and that you liked to watch him play. But he’s circuit-dead. If you don’t take him, I’ll have to bring him to a droid disposal centre and he’ll be melted down. At least this way you’ll be able to keep his parts and use them to repair parts that need it.”

Jude doesn’t miss the look that Cama gives him when he says that, but he doesn’t acknowledge it. “You could even preserve more of him if you feel like it.”

Jude thinks for a moment. Then he nods and mentally braces himself before Cama answers his next question. “How much for him?” 

Cama pauses, then cracks into a fond smile. “Only because you’re my favourite customer, he’s free. 

“Seriously? He must have cost a ton, though.” 

“No, they gave me a ton to get rid of him discretely, that’s literally my job, bro.” Cama laughs. “Besides… I feel like charging you for him would be too cruel.” 

Jude almost argues with him on that, but ends up relenting once he realises he can’t come up with a solid rebuttal. “Thanks, mate.”  

“You want help getting him in?”

Jude lifts the android out of the box and hoists him over his good shoulder. “Nah, I’ve got ‘im.” He only winces for a second, but Cama notices.

He doesn’t say anything, but he gives his bad shoulder another pointed look. Jude gives him a reassuring smile that’s only half forced, and says goodbye with a tone that leaves no room for argument.

Cama returns the gesture with another look, a bit kinder this time, if not a bit more tired too. It’s an expression that says he expected Jude to respond like that, and he’ll drop it for now, but he won’t forever.

Jude supposes that’s the best he’s going to get, and turns to go back upstairs, this time with a circuit-dead sporting droid in tow.

—

Jude sets the android down, and just takes him in. He still isn’t sure he’s processing thie sight in front of him. Just to check that this is real, and not the most fucked up prank Cama’s ever pulled, he finds the right spot, then presses down on an almost invisible panel on the droid's wrist. It pops up, then slides back.

He inhales when he sees the serial number and the text below it.

6 - G4V1R4  

Made in La Masia, Designed in Los Palacios

Property of FC Barcelona

Number 6 - his position.

And G4V1R4... Jude didn’t know that Gavi was short for something.

Something in his chest aches a bit at the thought, did he develop the nickname himself? Or was it something his teammates or his design team came up with? Jude shakes those thoughts away, Gavi’s circuits are dead, he has no reason to get attached.

Besides, he’s an android, and a sporting one at that. He was never even close to sentient. Jude doubts they’d programmed much more into him than a basic personality archetype.

Especially with how little Barcelona seem to care about their droids outside of the pitch, judging by the way they’d get rid of their supposed golden boy like he wasn’t even good enough to scrap for parts. They really seemed like a better team than that.

Jude’s starting to get angry on Gavi’s behalf, and that’s when he knows he needs to get on with it and get the job done. It won’t do him any good to start getting attached now.

Jude opens up his shoulder, and although he’s surely seen this part in hundreds of droids before, this one takes his breath away.

It’s state of the art. He’s a bit surprised by the parts of it that look like refinements Jude’s thought of, has never been able to make with the quality of his materials. But he’s really shocked when he realises there’s a few aspects of this design that he’s never even thought of. Jude’s own almost seems to ache even more as he takes it in.

But once he’s finished marvelling at Gavi’s engineering, he notices something. It’s so subtle, he wouldn’t be able to pick it up if he weren’t so in tune with how android parts feel touching skin.

There’s a faint sort of hum coming from the metal. Jude brings his hand closer, and then, after a moment of hesitation, he touches it. 

It feels warm. Almost as if-

“S’like you’re still on.” Jude breathes out quietly. Then he processes his own words and rips his hand away, eyes wide.

No, he must be imagining it, it’s impossible for an android to be circuit-dead but still have power. This wasn’t possible… unless Gavi wasn’t circuit-dead.

Unless he just looked like it.

That could be possible if there was a problem with the android’s central wire. If it was damaged in just the right way, cutting communication but not power… then an android could be turned on and would still be able to process things, but it would be paralysed. It would look like it was still off.

Jude stares at Gavi’s eyes again with new recognition. It was so unlikely, he was probably just imagining the humming in his shoulder, but… if there was a chance that he was still on, Jude had to do something about it.

“I need to test something, I’m just going to turn you off and on again, okay?” He receives no reply, of course, because this whole thing was probably just a foolish exercise in denial.

Jude checks underneath the right side of the android’s jaw, and finds his kill switch. He flicks it off, then touches Gavi’s shoulder.

Nothing. The metal still feels a bit warm at first, but cools within a few seconds. Any sort of hum, no matter how subtle, is gone. Jude flicks the switch again, an action which should turn Gavi back on. No movement, his eyes stay as unfocused and gone as before.

But his shoulder is humming.

That’s enough for Jude to get to work, bringing him up onto the operating table of his workshop, shutting the panel over his shoulder and opening up his back so he can focus on finding the disconnected circuit. Finally, after examining up and down his spinal column, there it is.

He warns Gavi, and then turns him off again so he can operate. He may be paralysed anyway, but if he’s on he’s still processing the world around him. Jude doesn’t know if Gavi been designed with the capacity to feel pain, but he’s a sporting android, so it’s possible. 

The operation is a shorter affair than Jude thought it would be. It’s so strange though, it’s quite a clean cut of a part of his central wire, managing to avoid severing the section which would kill the android outright. Almost as if it was… intentional.

But that’s something to think about later. Right now he needs to focus entirely on this repair so he doesn’t accidentally finish the job himself.  

After about an hour, he’s done. Now all that’s left is to turn Gavi on again. Jude’s shoulder twitches with excess energy, his heart in his throat as he brings his hand to the kill switch.

He flicks it back on. 

At first, there’s nothing. Jude feels his heart sink, then speed up, he must have made a mistake somewhere, he has to go back and fix it. He moves to flip the kill switch back to off again- 

Gavi blinks. 

Jude freezes. 

He blinks again, and the light is coming back to his eyes, his expression shifting into one of shock, then relief. Then his eyes glance over to meet Jude’s own, and Jude suddenly finds himself able to breathe again. He’d barely even realised he’d stopped.

Gavi blinks a third time, (since when is Jude keeping track?) then flexes his fingers. He slowly lifts up his hand, closing it around Jude’s wrist so he can pull him away from his kill switch, underneath his jaw.

His expression has morphed into something unreadable, but a thousand times more intense than what it was frozen as before.

“You can still turn on.” Jude speaks it with a bit more force now, but that breathless disbelief is still there.

“Yeah, and I’m staying that way.” Gavi’s voice crackles slightly at the start, but it’s clear, Andalusian accent coming through. Jude’s heard he was given it as a nod to the town he was designed in. 

Then, faster than he can blink, Gavi knocks their foreheads together. Jude cries out in surprise, as Gavi lets go of his wrist and moves to get off the table and run out the door.

He succeeds at that first part, but the moment his feet hit the ground his knee buckles, making the android swear fiercely.

He still tries to drag himself forwards with his arms and his other knee, but this time Jude’s too fast for him, bolting over to the door to lock it.

Then he moves back to Gavi himself, and crouches down in front of him, holding one hand up in a show of surrender and extending the other towards him.

Gavi freezes and stares at him. Almost like a wild animal who’s just been rescued, and now is desperate to escape from him as fast as he can, to return to its life of freedom. 

“Mate, slow down. What are you trying to do?”

Gavi makes a face like Jude’s just asked him the dumbest question known to man. “Get back to Barça, duh.” Jude bristles at that, and not just because of Gavi’s attitude. He can’t trust that team anymore.

“That’s what you really want?” He knows what answer he’ll receive. Gavi was made in La Masia, anything else would be unthinkable.

“Of course I’ll go back to Barça, where else?” Jude has to admit he doesn’t know, and he really wants to give them the benefit of the doubt.

But they wanted Gavi to be scrapped.

He doesn’t know why, it sounds impossible, Barcelona’s always been the team that’s treated their androids the best, the closest to human.

And he knows internal battery repairs are risky, but they’re still possible, and so are knee repairs. But somehow, Barcelona didn’t care about Gavi enough to attempt them.

“You can’t go back to them, your battery is still damaged. And you could still hear me and Cama talking, right? They were fine with getting rid of you.”

Gavi looks so frustrated and angry that Jude is almost knocked back by it, he’s never seen an android this expressive before 

“You don’t know what you’re talking about. I need to go , get out of my way.”

“You can’t go anywhere with your knee damaged like that.”

Gavi groans in frustration, then almost seems to shut down a bit at that, turning his gaze away from Jude. Looking at his expression, Jude almost winces in sympathy. He looks like he’d be on the verge of crying if he had tear ducts.

“Look… I can fix it.” Jude isn’t sure what’s possessed him to make that offer, but he sure isn’t going to take it back. 

Gavi huffs, then goes quiet. “The national team’s mechanics couldn’t. And Barça’s.”

“Well, I’m an expert in android joint repairs.”

Gavi looks at him again, more consideringly now. He tilts his head, examining Jude.

“Really? How come you weren’t called in, then? You’re based here in Spain, after all. Even if your accent seems a bit.. British , almost.”

Jude hesitates, caught off guard. “I um, prefer to keep my business more private.”

“Why though? You’re good. If my internal clock is right, it took you like an hour, at most, to fix my central wire. That’s fast . And your specialty is one that’s very sought after in sporting android mechanics.”

“I- I guess I’ve just never gotten the opportunity to work with a team.”

Gavi frowns, not buying it. “More like you’ve never gone after the opportunity. I know they’ve been trying to hire more specialists, Barça’s been open about that.”

It’s a frustratingly good point. Jude had seen some of their postings and he had really wanted to go for them, it was practically his dream job.

But he had to bring himself back to reality. He couldn’t work with any other mechanics, the risk that someone would find out his secret was way too high.

Speaking of, Jude realises Gavi’s gaze has changed, slightly. There’s a glint to it, almost like-

“Stop scanning me.” Jude snaps. He doesn’t like to give androids orders, he really hates it actually, but he can’t let Gavi find out what he’s hiding. He pulls back his hand, and Gavi raises his eyebrows in surprise.

But his eyes don’t change.

That’s-  that shouldn't be happening. Maybe his audio processing was also damaged?

“ Stop scanning me.” Jude repeats the order, with more force, more panic. Gavi stops scanning him a few seconds later, not instantaneously as he should with an order, and looks almost guilty about it. As if he’s empathising with Jude’s situation.

And then it clicks.“You don’t listen to orders, do you? You’re sentient.” 

Gavi nods, still staring into Jude’s eyes. “And your shoulder is made of android parts. You’re a cyborg.” 

For a second, neither of them dare to speak.

Then Jude replies. “Yeah. Looks like we’re both illegal as fuck, then.”

Gavi almost smiles. “Hm. Looks like it.”

Chapter Text

“No.”

“It’s not really negotiable, Gavi.”

“Then it’s not happening, cyborg guy.”

“Seriously?” Jude raises an eyebrow.

Gavi looks at him with the same ‘are you dumb?’ sort of expression as when he questioned if he wanted to go back to Barça. “You haven’t told me your name?”

He may have a point, but he’s being rude about it, so Jude chooses to rise above and responds coolly. Just to show him he isn’t bothered by his dramatics.

“It’s Jude.”

“Just Jude?”

“No, well…” they may be both illegal, but Gavi still has a lot more connections in high places than him. Better not to risk it. “…yeah, it’s just Jude.” 

Gavi looks at him with a bit less outright aggression, maybe understanding some of his cautiousness.

Despite that, he continues to be a pain. “Okay then, just Jude. It’s still not happening.”

The mechanic responds with a long-suffering sigh. How he already feels that way after dealing with Gavi for less than a few hours is a real testament to his stubbornness. To hell with rising above. 

He throws his hands up. “Alright, looks like you’ll be crawling back to Barça then!”

“Suits me just fine.” Gavi snaps back, then tries to push himself off the table to make good on his word - Jude barely manages to get him to sit back down again. He thinks that he hears him mutter a few spanish swear words under his breath, though it's hard to distinguish them in his accent.

Once the android’s finished cursing him out though, he speaks again before Jude can get a word in.

“I told you. I’m staying on.”

The mechanic sighs, then meets him with a stubborn look of his own. “Look, I get why you want to.” 

His own shoulder’s malfunctioned badly enough to turn off before. It left his left arm paralysed, hanging limply on the verge of dislocation. The loss of control over just one part of his body was terrifying, Jude could barely imagine how it must feel living your life knowing it could be interrupted by someone else at any moment, maybe never to resume again. 

“But this is surgery. It’s a lot harder to fix you if you’re still on.” It's not just that, but it’s an excuse that has to do with his own abilities, so Jude figures Gavi can’t argue with it. 

He’s wrong.

“Please, that might be true for any other mechanic, but not you.”

“What d’you mean? All mechanics fix androids when they’re off, I’m the same.”

“But you’re not, though. You fix your shoulder while it’s on, don’t you?”

Automatically, Jude opens his mouth to respond, then closes it when a retort doesn’t come to him. Gavi smiles faintly at that, eyes smug with victory, and the sight of it is enough to kick Jude’s brain back into gear. He's not letting him win. Jude frowns.

“That’s still different to operating on you, though. I don’t have pain sensors .”

Sporting droids were part of the select few who were equipped with them. They could be turned off and on by their managers, depending on how intense they wanted a match to be. Sometimes they’d just be activated for one half to see how that impacted the team’s performance.

Or maybe, it was to give the crowd some catharsis by bringing android players down to the same level as humans. To appease the people who complained that droid sports weren’t “real” since their players had it so much easier. 

In Jude’s opinion, it was just cruel. 

He wasn’t sure if Gavi’s pain sensors were turned on, but judging by his irritated silence, he could make a pretty good guess. He sighed. “It’s going to be painful.”

Jude leaves no room for argument in his tone. Gavi manages anyway.

“I can handle pain.” 

The way he says it, with that same resolute tone except for the slightest bit of extra tension, as if he’s already bracing for agony… it makes something twist inside Jude, although he can't tell with what feeling exactly. “You shouldn’t have to.”

Gavi blinks, but doesn’t snap back with a retort. He seems surprised at Jude’s words, a bit. But then his expression changes again, like he doesn’t believe in them - or maybe he just doesn’t want to. The thought just emboldens Jude to keep pushing him on it.

“Look, I’ll operate while you’re still on… if we can turn off your pain sensors first, okay?”

Gavi goes silent for longer than Jude expects, then finally replies with a much quieter voice, closing his eyes once he says it. “Deal.” 

Jude lets out a breath he didn’t notice he was holding.

Alright then, the sensors must use some kind of wireless communication so the managers can control them remotely, maybe he could jam the signal somehow? He isn’t the best at the programming side of things, but he could probably-

Gavi’s voice derails his train of thought. “Done.” 

“Huh- what?” 

“I said, I’m done. I’ve turned them off.” 

Some part of Jude’s brain wonders if his eyes look like Gavi’s right now with how wide they get. “Hold on- you can do that?”

“Yeah. I’ve been sentient for a while, I’ve figured stuff out.” Gavi sounds pretty proud of himself at that, and Jude would probably show more appreciation for that achievement if he weren’t still in shock that he could do that. 

Or suddenly wondering why the fuck he hasn’t already.

“Wait, why weren’t they turned off in the first place?” Gavi goes silent for a moment, like he can tell the reason is one Jude won’t like. Then he speaks, quietly.

“They were still on from when I was in surgery at Barça.”

“What?! Why?” That doesn’t make any fucking sense. Until a possibility dawns on Jude, and he immediately wishes it hadn’t.

“Did they turn them on, then?” The android’s mouth falls open. “What? No! No, they’d never.” He’s quick to respond, sounding shocked that Jude would even say such a thing.

“Then, what? It was you ?” Jude doesn’t actually think he would, of course not, it’s supposed to be a ridiculous suggestion to get the android to admit who actually hurt him.

But then Gavi goes quiet, and it feels heavier than any spoken confession.

Jude finds that any further words die on his tongue. He can’t tell if he wants to hug him or shake him, because what the fuck. His voice, when it does come back, is small.

“Gavi… why the fuck would you do that?”

The android doesn’t meet his eyes as he explains. “Once I figured out how to turn on and off my pain sensors, I realised I could even do it independently from myself being turned off.” 

Fuck. Jude sighs as the realisation hits him. “You did it during your surgeries so you’d never fully turn off.” 

Gavi nods. “Being turned off… it's like… you blink, and then best case scenario? Suddenly hours have passed, and you have no clue where you’ve been or what’s happened to you. Sometimes your body even feels different, and you can’t tell exactly why but you can pretty much guess, and that almost feels worse than knowing for sure. And all of that is assuming I even do get turned on again…”

His eyes go a bit glassy for a second, but then Jude blinks and that look is gone, and the android continues on smoothly. “If I can still feel pain, then at least I can tell what people are doing to me. It's like an anchor, it forces a part of me to stay awake and think.”

That was pretty logical. Fucked up, but logical. 

“Wait. Does that mean you felt it when I was fixing your central wire?” Gavi gives him a sympathetic look- but he shouldn’t, Jude’s the one who hurt him. Fuck, he turned him off so he wouldn’t but because of that he did-  

“Hey.” 

Jude blinks, and then looks down to find Gavi’s hand over his own.

His tone isn’t careful like Jude is something fragile. It just seems genuine. “You didn’t know, okay? Don’t beat yourself up about it. Besides, you were fast and careful. It’s far from the worst pain I’ve been through.”

“Still,  it must have hurt… wait, what was the worst pain you’ve been through, then?” Gavi hesitates, then pulls his hand back and shakes his head. “Nope, we aren’t talking about this anymore. Anyway, I don’t have to worry about it now, do I?”

A part of Jude still wants to push a bit more, but another, maybe more logical part, tells him that Gavi isn’t going to budge, and he needs to get on with fixing him. He sighs.

“Yeah, alright then. You’re staying on… I can even put a mirror up so you can see what I’m doing, if you want.”

Gavi’s eyes widen somewhat at that last part, and his expression softens slightly.

“Oh. Yeah, that would be nice. Thank you.”

Jude’s reply feels automatic. “Don’t mention it. S’the least I could do, really.” 

— 

Gavi lies back down on the table, and does his best to make himself comfortable as Jude sets up the mirror above him.

“Can you see everything alright like this?” 

“Yeah, that’s good. Where are you going to start?” 

Jude climbs down and settles into his rolly chair, moving around to grab some tools and, after a brief moment of hesitation and slightly lowering the volume of his speakers, put on his usual lo-fi work playlist. 

“Normally I’d just assess the most damaged area,” he gestures towards Gavi’s knee, “but Cama said you might have battery damage, so I’ll check inside your chest first. Do you want to open it up yourself?”

Gavi looks surprised that Jude even asked, but he agrees almost immediately. He sits up and pulls off his grass-stained national team jersey, letting it drop on the floor.

Jude barely has any time to take in what his torso looks like, sculpted muscle only made uncanny by the absence of a belly button, as Gavi presses a few invisible panels along his sternum, making silicone panels rise up and then pull apart, revealing the state of the art engineering below.

Jude must be gawking at it a bit, because Gavi questions him. “You’ve never worked on a sporting droid before?” 

“Well, I have now.” 

“Before a few hours ago, I mean.” 

“Nope. But it should be pretty easy, I’ve studied it a lot. Sporting machinery is like, the most advanced out there.” It was almost beautiful, in his opinion.

Gavi just hums in response.

—

The android asks him another question a few minutes later, once he's chosen an area to start from and has begun the delicate process of moving components away to access the battery underneath.

“You usually let the androids you work on open themselves up?”

“If they’re on when we start, I'll ask if they want to.” He’d feel pretty uncomfortable if someone just opened up his shoulder without his permission.

“Any of them say yes?” 

“Most of ‘em don’t. But there were a few who almost seemed to like… hesitate and look at me funny before they said no. And the few who did say yes also seemed a bit livelier than the others. D’you think they could have been sentient?”

“I mean, you met them, not me. But yeah, it sounds like it. The ones who hesitated could have been on the edge of it, or maybe just used to hiding. Did the lively ones seem just like me?” 

Jude thinks about it. After a little while, he replies. “Not just like you. Maybe similar, but they still felt a bit artificial.”

He looks at Gavi consideringly. “The way you talk, your expressions… you just feel like a real person. Honestly, if your machinery wasn’t right here in front of me, I wouldn’t guess that you were an android.”

“Wait, really?” Gavi sounds shocked, but it seems to be in a good way.

“Yeah? Why, is that a surprise?”

“No- well yes, a little- I…” He shrugs a bit, then looks away. “I guess I’m just not used to people believing me so easily.”

“Oh. Why’s that?” 

“I mean, I’m sure for some people - the biological kind, at least  - it’s pretty easy to have doubts when a robot" he says with air quotes, "insists they have free will. Especially when that robot isn’t supposed to be anything more than a mindless football player.”

“Well, maybe some people aren’t very observant then. I don’t think you should give a shit about their opinions.” 

Gavi chuckles a bit. “Yeah, I don’t really. It’s just annoying sometimes.” 

Jude hums in acknowledgement. Gavi doesn’t speak again for a little while after that, but the silence between them feels comfortable.

—

In a smooth motion, Jude pushes the last few wires to the side and clips them out of the way. “Ok, I’m looking at your battery right now.” It's buried shallowly in his chest, in the same place a human’s heart would be found.

He reaches in to lift its cover with his prying tool. And although this is far from the first time he’s done this, a part of him hesitates.

If this battery was damaged enough, even attempting to open it could make it catch fire. He could extinguish it fast enough to avoid hurting himself, but it would fuck Gavi up. Badly. 

“What is it?” The android himself asks with a hint of dread and a bit more impatience. 

Jude snaps out of it. “Nothing. I’m just looking for the right place to pry it open.” 

“Okay then. Take your time, I guess.” 

Jude does it gingerly, as if he’s handling a glass vial that could crack and spill something toxic all over them if he isn’t careful. The cover comes off without the world ending. He braces himself for the mess that awaits him as he gets a look inside the battery.

And then Jude sees something he really shouldn’t be seeing. Gavi must sense his confusion.

“Is it… about to blow up or something?” Jude blinks in surprise, then turns to meet his eyes. They’re tense, a bit afraid, and very questioning.

“Jude?” 

“It’s fine.” The words almost surprise Jude himself when he speaks them. Gavi’s eyes widen, which Jude honestly wasn’t sure was even possible.

“There’s no damage. Your battery’s fine, Gavi.” He repeats it with a bit more force this time, then looks back at it again, just to double-check. Still fine.

In fact- “Hell, it almost looks like it’s been checked recently.”

Gavi seems to get what that information implies a moment before Jude himself does. At least, that’s judging by the way his expression turns guarded, eyes gaining that same sharpness as when he first told Jude he was going back to his team. Shit.

Jude turns back towards him to meet his eyes when he speaks. “Barça must have lied to Cama.”

Gavi shakes his head. “That’s not possible. You said it yourself, you’ve never worked on a sporting droid before, you’ve probably just misjudged it.”

Okay, he may understand some of Gavi’s denial but insulting his droid-repairing skills is crossing the line. Jude’s expression must be turning pretty murderous because Gavi’s own seems to backtrack, going from accusatory to ‘oh shit maybe that was too far.’

“Are you suggesting that I’m not qualified for this? I’m the only reason you can properly turn on again. Although, Barça didn’t even catch your central wire issue, so I can’t blame you for not being used to working with good mechanics.”

And now their expressions have switched again because even with how carried away he got, Jude knows that last part was a low blow. Even if it was kinda true.

Gavi looks ready to curse out his entire family, or maybe just straight-up lunge at him. It seems like the only thing delaying him is the energy he has to use to keep the hurt out of his expression. It’s still there in his eyes though, just a little bit.

“You don’t say shit about Barça.” 

“Alright, then I guess it must have been the national team then-” 

Gavi’s reply is so fast it almost cuts him off. “Yes, it must be.” 

“Seriously? You’re just fine with throwing your own country's team under the bus like that?” 

Gavi doesn’t even blink. “If it's them or Barça? Yes, every time.” 

Jude searches his eyes for any sign of hesitation and finds none. He remembers the words written under Gavi’s skin. Made in La Masia. Property of FC Barcelona. He may be sentient, but that doesn’t mean he’s separated himself from his team. Maybe that isn't even possible.

Jude still doesn’t know what’s up with Barcelona, but he doesn't feel like he or Gavi can trust them. Although, Gavi would know better than him after all - or would he? Does he even know which team was performing the surgery that paralysed him? 

“Gavi, do you remember what happened during your surgeries?”

The android’s eyebrows scrunch up as he tries to think, but then they settle into an annoyed expression which seems to be becoming his default one at this point. “No. Mostly just pain.” He sighs.

“Can you move on to my knee then, if my battery is fine?”

Jude almost keeps pushing, but something about how exhausted Gavi sounds stops him. 

“Yeah, sure.” He hates giving in, but seeing how Gavi relaxes in relief manages to make him feel a little better about it. 

Jude closes his battery gently, then moves over to examine the android’s knee.

He doesn't even need to ask Gavi to open it up, the ripped-up hole in his silicone skin already exposes the badly wrecked machinery underneath.

He was watching this match-he figured he should follow Spain as well since he was living here, at least for now. The footage they showed during the replays hadn’t captured the accident as well as the live camera angle, but even seeing both of them couldn’t prepare Jude for the sight of the damage up close. 

“Fuck…” 

“What’s wrong?” Gavi sounds like he’s trying to keep the fear out of his voice. He almost succeeds. “Is it too fucked up to fix?”

Jude blinks in surprise. “No, I can definitely fix it, it’s just going to take a while.” And it looks painful, but he doesn’t think Gavi would appreciate him bringing that up. He isn’t feeling it anymore, at least.

“Oh. How long?” 

Jude glances at the digital clock on his desk and sucks in a breath. He knows it was a late shipment from Cama, but the hours have gone by a lot faster than he realised.

“Well, It’s way too late to start tonight. I can probably get it done in a day if we start early enough tomorrow. though.” 

“Huh, that’s faster than I thought.”

“Yeah, well, it’s my speciality, isn’t it? Give me some credit, mate.”

“That’s true. Shame it isn’t my shoulder, then. You could probably fix that up in what, twenty minutes?”

Jude lets out a proper laugh at that, seemingly to the surprise of both of them. It’s silly, the joke isn’t even that funny. But then again, it's the first time he’s ever had someone to joke about his shoulder with, he realises. At least someone who isn’t a family member, and even then it’s only his brother who dares to.

(He ignores the image his mind conjures of Cama and his looks, they both understand the android scrapper will have to settle for just having his unconfirmened, hopefully still far off suspicions - Jude can never tell his friends the truth, can't bear to see the look in their eyes inevitably change when they realise he isn't as whole, as human as them, and never will be.)

The thought of Jobe almost makes him wonder if Gavi has a sibling, before he quickly dismisses the idea. He’s an android, of course he doesn’t… unless there are other droids designed by that same team in Los Palacios, maybe they’d count-

“So I guess I’m staying here tonight, then?” The android's voice pulls out of his thoughts, and Jude replies before his brain fully catches up, “What? Oh, yeah of course.”

Then he fully processes Gavi’s request, and realises it maybe involve a bit more compromise than the android would like. Jude swears.

“Wait, is something wrong?” 

“My spare android charger is still broken.”

“So? I’ll just use your main one.”

“I need to charge my shoulder.”

“ Oh . So you’re saying… ”

“We’ll have to share the pull-out couch.” 

“Oh.”

Chapter Text

The pullout couch opens with a thump, and a twinge of pain in Jude’s shoulder. 

“I could have helped with that.” Gavi calls over from where he’s perched on Jude’s rolly chair. Jude raises his eyebrow and gives him a look, secretly hoping the android didn’t catch the way he winced.

“I’m going to go grab some sheets. Don’t move.” If he were any bit less tired, he’d realise how badly he messed up by telling Gavi not to do something. 

Instead, Jude has to rush back over once he hears a thunk, then a crashing sound followed by more cursing in Spanish. He finds Gavi on the floor with an expression just like a cat that’s been caught knocking a glass off of the counter.

Jude stares at him, and then the words which had momentarily escaped him at the sight return with force, and get punctuated with hand gestures. “Mate, what the fuck do you think ‘Don’t move’ means? Did your auditory processing get fucked up too or-” 

“I fixed the lock mechanism, which you forgot, so now it won’t randomly snap back and break our necks in the middle of the night.” Gavi says pointedly, giving him a look like he’s the one who should be scolding Jude. He’s still in a crumpled heap on the floor, head resting awkwardly on one of the rolly chair’s legs. It looks like he’d be incredibly uncomfortable if Gavi could still feel pain.

The thought would make Jude wince in sympathy if he weren’t so bloody annoyed with the guy. The android even has the gall to say, after Jude’s been rendered speechless by his insane behaviour, “You’re welcome.”

Jude just shakes his head and swears under his breath as he helps Gavi up onto the couch bed. 

It’s only then that he realises how out of place the android looks there in his grass-stained and slightly burnt National Team kit, shirt back on after they wrapped up their surgery. Gavi clocks it as well as he follows Jude’s gaze and looks down at his clothes, lips pursing slightly as if the uniform now brings up more discomfort than pride. 

“You can borrow something of mine to sleep in.” Gavi meets his eyes again, surprise and a hint of something warmer in his expression.

“Oh, thanks.” Jude leaves and grabs a nightshirt and some soft shorts, the comes back in, tossing them over to the android on the couch.

“I’ll give you some privacy,” he goes to take a shower and brush his teeth, turning to the rustle of clothes coming off. 

-

The moment away gives him some time to think about everything. He finishes his shower and puts on his favourite night set on autopilot, as his mind drifts off to take stock.

Ga isn’t circuit dead. His battery isn’t going to catch fire. He’s sentient . 

He’s fucking here, just like, in general. In Jude’s life.

And somehow, he can even banter like they’re old friends. Like they get each other, on some level.

Even if he knows, according to everything that should be predicted as their fates, the distance between their lives, they never should have met.

But now they’ve collided like this, and somehow he’s gotten Gavi back from the brink all while giving him, a total stranger from a whole other world of competition and blinding lights he lost his chance to join a decade ago, the one piece of information that could destroy him.

Because that’s actually okay, because Jude knows the truth about him, too. And so, despite himself, he’s finding that he’s able to trust this machine-turned-man. He doesn’t think it’ll come down to it, but at least Jude knows that if it all goes to shit, they'll be sinking together. 

Finally, once he realises he’s probably been brushing his teeth a lot longer than the two minutes he’s heard is recommended, he spits out the toothpaste and watches it wash away down the drain along with his swirling thoughts.

Somehow, despite how much he’s had to hunch over to fix parts up today, his shoulder barely hurts compared to how it usually feels.

Jude catches his reflection in the mirror. His eyes look tired, but from the good kind of tiredness that comes after doing a lot of hard, satisfying work.

Then momentarily, his gaze drifts over a little to the left, to the spot at the base of his neck, almost covered by the way his work shirt hangs. Where the normal colour of his skin is interrupted by a patch that’s just a shade off, its hue the slightest bit too cool compared to the natural warmth of his skintone. He knows how off it feels to the touch, too. 

But if he doesn’t bring his hand to it, and doesn’t look too close at how its clean its edges are, he can almost convince himself it’s just more hyperpigmentation. 

“You finished in there? I’m done changing!” Jude’s gaze snaps back up, meeting his own surprised eyes, and yells back, “Yeah! Just give me a second.” He breaks his own gaze, and manages to resist shooting the edge of his shoulder work another look as he turns off the tap and makes his way back into the lounge. 

 -

Gavi looks relaxed, sitting on the edge of the bed in Jude’s faded nightshirt and shorts. They’re loose on him, and his hair is slightly ruffled.

The sight makes Jude short-circuit for a moment, at least as much as someone human can. Well, mostly human.

Gavi just looks so… normal. Like a regular guy, or even one of his mates. Far away from the athletic machine Jude’s always known him as.

“What’s with the staring?” Gavi seemed calmer when he first came in, but now he’s picked up on Jude’s surprise his wariness is coming back, eyes narrowing a bit, clearly trying to analyse what’s provoked his change in mood.

Jude shrugs, to diffuse the tension. “You look really casual. It’s just different from how I’m used to seeing you, is all.”

Gavi looks faintly surprised, and then his guard starts to go back down, expression softening. “Oh. Well, I’ve never worn oversized clothes before.” He looks down at himself again, feeling the soft fabric between his fingers, almost smiling. “They’re nice.”

-

Gavi is quick to assert that he won’t go near him and will very much stay on his side, he can even use a separate blanket, but Jude isn't too concerned with the situation. It’s just so they can refill their batteries, after all. No need to make anything of it.  

Gavi talks while he wraps his damaged knee up in an extra blanket, which he insisted on so the ripped up metal wouldn’t poke Jude in his sleep. “I usually charge with my teammates anyway, so I don’t think I move too much in my sleep… they’ve never complained, at least.”

“Lucky.” Jude’s reply, half laughed, a bit too revealing, slips out.

Gavi meets his eyes again, tilts his head a bit. “You’re not too used to this sort of thing though, are you?”

Jude shakes his head, but keeps his expression light. It doesn’t bother him, he likes his personal space… it’s just been pretty impossible to stay in the same bed with anyone else ever when you have to hook up your shoulder with a machine every night. He barely had the chance to even have sleepovers before he became a cyborg, though, so its not like he really knows what he’s missing. “Yeah, but I’m fine with it.” 

Maybe Gavi picks up on how some of that aloofness is fake, but if he does, he doesn’t comment on it.

Jude plugs his shoulder in to his charging block, sees the little indicator light blink on, red and flashing slowly, and hands the spare cable to Gavi. The android eyes it for a second, with the same expression as when Jude gave him the option to open himself up. “Oh wait, I could plug it in for you if you need.”

Gavi looks up from the cable and meets his eyes, pausing for a moment in surprise, and then replies, “It’s okay, I can do it myself.”

He pauses again as he takes the cable, and then adds, quieter, “thanks for the offer, though.”

He plugs it into the back of his neck, and sighs in relief as the little indicator light next to Jude’s own comes on, red as well.

At first, it flashes much faster than his did. Gavi’s battery must have been super low, probably around 5%, Jude realises. And then wonders how he didn’t clock it sooner, they wouldn't have charged him if they thought he was circuit dead. Then, the light settles into a regular rhythm, pulsing slowly in time with the one from Jude’s shoulder.

Jude flicks the room's lights off from the switch beside the couch, and they slip down under the covers.

“Goodnight, Jude.” 

“Night, Gavi.”

At first, Jude is slightly worried it’ll him take him a while to fall asleep. He ends up drifting off before he knows it, only one of them breathing softly, but both warm.

-

Jude wakes up at 2am, to a hum from his shoulder indicating it’s fully charged.

Just like he does every night.

What doesn’t happen every night, however, is that he finds unplugging the cord a bit tricky, since he’s somehow ended up half in someone else’s arms.

His instincts scream at him to hide his cyborg parts and get ready to run- but then he remembers it’s Gavi. Gavi who knows, who’s safe. Jude relaxes, against everything in his nature.

The contact is definitely a surprise, but somehow it doesn’t feel unwelcome. He remembers that thing Gavi said about usually charging with his teammates or at least not far from others. Of course he’d reach for someone – he’s been through a lot today. Even if he has been an absolute pain at times as well, Jude feels like the android needs this, it’s some warmth.

His face is so peaceful, he’s fully conked out – far away from that half asleep, half fighting expression Jude found him frozen in. He reminds himself that the androids circuits are fine now. Jude wonders if Gavi has dreams, he’ll have to ask him in the morning.

He can see the slightest bit of yellow illuminate the furniture behind Gavi, from the small indicator light pulsing faintly on the back of his neck, just above where his charging cable is plugged in.

But more obvious than that is just how warm he feels. His body doesn’t have the same give as a human’s but it’s still cushioned.

It’s all quite pleasant, really.

He sighs.

A thought emerges from Jude’s half off brain, that his shoulder is all good and he could just move into his own bed now.

He considers it for a moment. 

Jude’s arms pull Gavi just the slightest bit closer and he lets himself fall back into slumber, feeling warmer than he can remember being in a long time.

-

He wakes up alone on the couch, and lies there for a moment, sure he should be remembering something. Then he shoots up, unintentionally yanking his shoulder from its charging cable in the process. Jude winces slightly. 

“Whoa, slow down. Good to see you’re finally up, dormílon.” Gavi says it without much bite, which Jude was half convinced he wasn’t capable of doing.

“Wha- dormílon?” “Its, ah, sleepyhead? I think. I prefer it to the English word. I mean, you live here, you should know Spanish by now.”

Jude rolls his eyes. Gavi has no way of knowing how recently he’s moved here. The longer he stays, the more likely it becomes that someone will figure out what he is is and tell the authorities. He’ll have to leave sooner or later. Just like he did with Germany, and England before that. 

Even if a part of him does want to stay in this place just a little bit longer, he can’t entertain that thought.

“Not all of us are lucky enough to have inbuilt translation software, mate.”

“Still, aren’t humans supposed to be fast learners? I mean, the languages aren’t crazy far apart- although Spanish is obviously much prettier.” 

Jude rolls his eyes, while Gavi barely blinks. ‘Wait, where you watching me sleep?” 

“Only for like…” he looks up at the ceiling and scrunches his face in thought, must be checking his internal clock, “20 minutes.” Gavi shrugs, like that's a reasonable and not at all creepy thing to do.

Jude shakes his head. “I have got to teach you how to interact like a normal human being”

Gavi stares at him with a hint of a smile. “As if you are one?” And gives his shoulder a pointed look.

“Fuck off, mate.” he scoffs, with no real heat to it. “You said you made breakfast?”

“Yep, ta da.” He’s clearly proud of himself, presenting a bowl with a single weetabix inside and absolutely nothing else.

Jude blinks. “Mate, you realise you have to add milk to this?”

“What?”

“Its like, part of the picture on the box and everything.”

Embarrassed and maybe even genuinely dismayed at failing, Gavi quickly recovers back to his comfort zone of being angry, blaming Jude’s “Stupid british cereal, its so bland and dumb, and anyway do you know how hard it is to make breakfast on a rolly chair? You’re lucky I didn't break that bowl, hijo de puta-”

Jude has to resist smiling at his scowl, Gavi definitely would be flushing red right now if he could.

“Well, it wasn’t too bad for a first attempt.”

Gavi stops, and then glares at him, as if it Jude’s attempt to console him has only offended him more.

“It was my second. Don't be a bully.”

“Wha- How was I supposed to know that? What did you do with the first?”

Suddenly, Jude feels the need to glance over at the sink just to check Gavi hasn’t clogged it horrifically with weetabix number one-

“I do still have to eat you know! Or wait, do you?”

They both go quiet for a second, at a bit of a loss.

“Well, I know you can eat of course,” sporting androids had internal combustion engines to get energy from food so they didn't need ages to recharge at halftime, “but I thought you wouldn’t need to since you’ve been charging all night?”

Gavi shakes his head, not unkindly. “I’m sentient, that takes a lot more processing power than just existing unaware like a normal android. It’s not enough for me to just charge up or eat, I need the energy from both. Just like biological humans.”

The way he seems proud of that last part, like it’s validating his humanity, warms Jude’s heart a little.

Until he realises what Gavi is implying.

“Wait, so you ate one of these raw ?”

Gavi looks like he'd be blushing if he could at Jude’s half laughing, half horrified expression.

He scoffs in a failing attempt to keep his pride. “So what if I did? I don't have taste buds, it doesn't matter to me!”

Jude scrunches his eyebrows sympathetically, but his smile isn’t wiped away “Yeah, but the texture must nave been awful, mate.”

Gavi doesn't admit to it verbally, probably doesn't want to give Jude the satisfaction, but his expression does all the agreeing for him. Jude wonders how on earth no one clocked his sentience before, he doesn't so much as wear his heart on his sleeve as he does shove it into your face.

His gaze drifts up to Gavi’s hair as he keeps muttering profanities in Spanish, noticing how it’s become even messier. It’s something he’s never really seen on an android. 

‘You having trouble restyling your hair?’ maybe the component which fixed it automatically got damaged too, somehow. 

‘No.” He reaches up to block Jude from touching it, then calms down again. “I like it better this way. It just feels… better. More comfortable.’

Closer to human, Jude’s brain supplies.

“Alright then, that’s all good. Speaking of, what do you say we get started on fixing that giant hole in your knee? It doesn’t look too comfy.”

Gavi rolls his eyes gratefully, (Jude doesn’t know how a person can pull that off, by the way, but maybe that’s just Gavi for you.)

“Wow, I though you’d never ask.” 

-

Jude gets to work on the repair as the morning sun filters into the workshop.

“Wow, this is shocking, it’s the kind of damage you'd see from like, a fire, or explosion… do you remember how it felt?”

“Like the second one. Almost like there was a small bomb in it or something. Did it overheat badly? Or like get twisted and short circuit as I turned?”

Jude shook his head. “No, nothing like that could cause this. It must have been a bomb, or some kind of explosive thing.” Pieces are falling into place in his brain, but he doesn’t want to accept the picture they're making. Or maybe, he just knows that Gavi won’t.

“I think… I think someone sabotaged you, Gavi.”

The android goes silent, tense. But not just the angry kind of tense, the kind you get if you’re trying to hold back tears, from expressing how raw you really feel. His tone is low, warning, with and edge designed to hide the pain behind it. “If you say it was Barca, I swear to you I will-”

“No. I don’t think it was them.”

“Seriously? Don’t you dare lie to me about this.”

“Seriously. I may not trust them anymore, but I haven’t forgotten how they’ve always treated their android players. That’s why I was so shocked when you turned up in Cama’s shipment. Even if I don’t think that I really know them anymore, from my perspective looking in on things, I don’t believe they’d ever do something like this.” He finds that the words are all true, somehow.

Jude takes a breath, braces himself, “But, I don’t think we can rule out foul play.” Between this and how cleanly his central wire was cut, that conclusion’s looking more certain than anything.

“Who knew about your sentience, on the National Team and in Barça?”

Gavi may have relaxed slightly when Jude assured him about Barça, but he tenses again now.

“Only people from Barça. The Mister- my coach, Xavi.” Jude knows him, he’s been coaching the android team for basically it’s entire existence. He’s the reason Barça has been treating them right. “A couple of my teammates, Pedri, Fermín, Ferran, Lamine, Raphinha – they’re sentient too, or close to it, at least.” 

“Whoa, really? Considering how rare sentience is, that’s kind of insane.” 

“Yeah. So you can see why none of them would fucking snitch, or anything.”  

“Right, of course not… sorry.” Gavi huffs, and mutters something under his breath that sounds a lot like ‘you should be.’

He sighs. Jude is starting to hate it when Gavi’s angry like this, locking it up inside himself and spitting it out because he feels scared and hurt. He’s always had too much of a bleeding heart. He doesn’t even try to make the topic change subtle.

“Well, back to this repair, I’ve got some other bad news.”

“What is it? Am I never going to be able to walk again?”

“What?!” Jude exclaims, genuinely shocked. The talent this guy has for jumping to the worst conclusions possible is honestly impressive.

“No, it’s nowhere near that bad. I just don’t have any sporting quality parts, so it’s going to be pretty weak at first and need some more tune ups as I take the time to make you a proper custom joint.”

“Oh. Wait, that’s it? That’s like, nothing.”

Jude does a double take.

“I mean, seriously, it’s going to be a real downgrade.”

“So what? The fact it can be fixed at all is more than enough for me.”

The way he says it, as if it’s just as simple as that… it’s almost enough to shift Jude’s perspective on what he’s been able to do with his shoulder.

But then he reminds himself of the reality of the situation – Gavi probably just thinks of this as a patch job for a short while so he can go back to Barça and get properly fixed. Jude doesn’t have that luxury.

Still, the point of bringing this up was to distract him and lift Gavi’s mood a bit from the sabotage topic, so he goes along with it.

“Yeah, that’s a good way of looking at it. I mean, my shoulder’s parts aren’t sporting quality either, and they work just fine.” Emphasis on just fine , of course, not great .

Gavi, way too goddamn perceptive for Jude’s liking in moments like this, seems to pick up on the fact he’s papering over his shoulder’s shortcomings. 

“Right, of course…” the android seems to want to say something else, but be internally debating on whether he should. His curious side wins out thought, because he continues, “What happened to your shoulder, anyway?”

Jude pauses, the last piece of metal debris he’s had to clear in hand.

He realises that he’s never been asked this, never needed to tell the story to anyone before, since only his family have known and they were all there when it happened. He takes a moment to come up with an answer.

“Accident, when I was twelve.”

He hears Gavi suck in a breath, and continues before he loses his nerve.

“I don’t really remember the details, but they ended up having to remove most of it. My Mum was a mechanic, she’s retired now, but back then she still had access to parts and we had a workshop at home.”

He keeps his voice light to downplay how bad it sounds.

“I got pretty lucky, if she hadn’t, I probably would have just bled out.”

He chuckles a bit, still looking down at his work. The idea of seeing Gavi’s surely raw, far too expressive reaction feels like it would be a bit too much right now. 

“It was a real pain to deal with when I was still getting growth spurts, but it’s a lot more stable now.”

That didn’t mean it actually was stable, just better. But Gavi doesn’t need to know that.

“So…” Even without looking at his face, he can sense the emotion in the android’s tone as he processes it all, “you had to become a mechanic out of survival?”

“I mean-“ he wants to say that survivals maybe too strong a word, but it isn’t really. “Yeah, basically. Since it’s such a mixed design I need to replace and remake it pretty often, so I need a steady stream of parts. This business is a good cover for that.”

“Wow… I mean, you say that as if your work is just a lie you keep up so you can fix yourself, but- you are still helping people, no?”

“Yeah, I mean I try to, at least.” He’s always wanted to make an impact on other people’s lives in some way, he’d just never thought it would be like this when he was a kid, going from picking dandelions on the side of the pitch to picking up football skills like he was breathing.

But still, it's not like he hasn't accomplished anything with this job. He's seen grateful smiles on faces, biological and mechanical. And there’s the fact he’s still alive, like, at all.  

“So… you were going to take apart my shoulder to repair yourself?” 

Jude focuses back into the conversation. “Well, I’m not going to now of course, but yeah, I was. I couldn’t really pass it up, I never get access to sporting parts but they’re the closest to human functionality.” He sighs, “I know that probably sounds bad to you, but-“

“No, I get it. I think I’d do the same. What did you want to be before you had to become a mechanic?”

He closes his eyes. “A footballer.” They both go quiet for a moment, Jude out of reminiscence, Gavi out of realisation. It feels heavy. 

“Really? Like professional level?”

“Yeah. I had a spot at an academy and everything. And then well, life turned out to have a few more surprises in store.” Gavi hums empathetically.

“I still play though. My friends have got a little unofficial team going, we’re pretty good. You met Cama, he’s in it.” 

“That’s good. I’m glad you can still play, even with your shoulder like that.” Something in his voice makes Jude look at him for the first time in a couple minutes. Gavi’s looking away at the ceiling though, and Jude is fucking glad because he feels his own mouth fall a little open once he realises there’s an actual smile on Gavi’s face.

It’s faint, but it’s there. For him.

Jude quickly tears gaze away before the android can notice, and clears his throat slightly before he replies.

“Well, honestly I really shouldn’t. But it’s not like it’ll kill me or anything.”

It technically will, eventually. If you looked at what it was doing to him in the right way. But he was prepared to deal with that when he had to,and it was worth it to keep being able to play while he still could. Anything was worth it for that.

“Still, it hurts right?”

Jude hesitates before he answers, and ends up being honest about it for once.

“Yeah, it does.” In more ways than one.

“But it’s It’s manageable, for sure. I just have bad days every once in a while.” More and more often now, but Gavi really doesn’t need to know that.

The last thing he should be doing is worrying about Jude, he’s got own his recovery to focus on. Jude has to remind himself that as nice as this can be, Gavi just wants to get back to his life as soon as possible, and he doesn't blame him. 

-

Finally, after surprisingly less hours than he thought and some much less emotionally deep conversations about Jude’s taste in work music and Gavi’s opinions on how much Madrid’s been lining referees’ pockets this season – ‘which they always have done of course, it’s just been so blatant this year’ – he’s finished up enough for the knee to be about 80% functional.

(Jude wisely chose not to share that he supported the human version of the Merengues these days, even if he still has a soft spot for Barça‘s android team. Sue him, he was born a Culer but his friends are all Madridistas, a guy has to get by.) 

“We’re done.” They share a look, and he hopes he manages to convey reassurance in his eyes.

He helps Gavi up so he’s sitting on the side of the table, and lowers it so the android’s good leg touches the ground. Even with Jude’s arm around him for support, he hesitates just the slightest bit, and then rests his weight on his repaired leg.

It doesn’t buckle.

He inhales, then does it again, and then finally — Gavi laughs.

It’s a little sound, but it almost lifts Jude’s heart all the way up into the sky.

And then Gavi turns to face him with a real smile , his arm still slung around Jude’s shoulders. And Jude returns his grin, almost competitive with his giddiness.

He actually did it, he fixed him, brought him back from the brink and even further forwards after that.

He can tell Gavi’s thinking it too from the softness in his eyes, and the way he pulls him in closer into more of a proper hug – Jude has come to realise that touch is his purest form of communication.

And for a moment, Jude can forget the ways his body doesn’t ever truly feel right and just feels good .

Warm and soft. 

And then, Gavi accidentally pulls on his shoulder, just a little bit too hard. 

And it all comes crashing down again as Jude feels a valve’s seal slip, and something that’s the wrong kind of warm, too warm, starts dripping down onto his synthetic nerves. 

Fuck.

Gavi senses somethings wrong from the way Jude must be tensing up right now. 

“What is it?”

He hesitates, but he finds doesn’t want to lie, not to Gavi. 

“Something’s bleeding in my shoulder.”

Chapter Text

Gavi’s used to feeling like his emotions are just a bit too off kilter.

Not closely aligned enough with the world around him, like a boot that fits just a bit wrong or a slightly mistimed dribble. The kind of reflex that, although he’s taken the time to build up and stengthen, still doesn’t seem to click sometimes and drives his perfectionism up the wall.

At first they were too weak—quite literally nonexistent—but then they became far too strong, and almost seem to have gotten stuck like that ever since then. Since that moment where it all clicked, or maybe unclicked, he still isn’t sure whether it was something breaking in him or being remade. Maybe both somehow. All Gavi knows is that like staring to slowly wake and then snapping up out of a deep sleep, suddenly, he could feel. And he felt everything. Like he was blind and then regained his sight by being hit by a flashbang, like in the time it took to blink he was crushed by a wave and dragged by its undertow into an ocean swirling with every colour and sound and touch and taste and curiosity, surprise, shock, elation, terror, awe, exitement, realisation, dissapoinment, rage, hope, overwhelm—he was so sensitive back then it was an actual miracle that he hadn’t snapped and revealed his sentience to a random trainer or PR person and gotten shut down. 

But now, it’s like they’ve settled a bit.

Found the right level, or close enough to it that he can get a handle on them and breathe easily enough—figuratively, since he doesn’t actually need to—whether he has to hide them or let them show. Okay, he might not be perfect at that first part, hell, that’s probably why he’s gotten into this mess in the first place. And the worst part is, he doesn’t even regret that.

Even if it might end up getting him destroyed—probably almost did—those precious moments when he lets his feelings flow freely like undamming a river, and they click and he just feels human, real, himself, are like tiny drops of gold amidst all of the rest of the rain that weighs him down by soaking his clothes and seeping into the cracks in his hopes.

Yeah, even if they’re the most dangerous thing for him to indulge in, his emotions are, even more than that, what runs him, makes him. What got him started and keeps him going and catches him when he risks falling into an oblivion of preprogrammed plasticity, soullessness.

There’s just one other thing, that burrows like a louse into wood, creating just the tiniest flaw that’s still impossible to ignore. That they sometimes feel wrong for the situation. Like not just off, but completely wrong, in a way that acutely reminds him of how incomplete he still is, how far he still has to go to reach the heights of humanity everyone else is just born into. 

Maybe that’s just him being to harsh, getting too into his own head about it—but that’s just because he has to be his own greatest critic about this, he’s the one who’s had to develop and refine his ability to feel and so he always has to keep himself in check. It’s maybe not the kindest thing he could do to himself, but the only way he’ll improve, become fully human and then stay there. Granted, he hasn’t let himself think otherwise, but that’s because he doesn’t know if he can afford to, so he can’t risk it. 

It’s purely pragmatic.

He ignores Pedri and Fermín’s laughs in the back of his mind, accompanied by teasing tones of ‘your pragmatism is anyone else’s worst case scenario bro’ and ‘you know it might not kill you to hope for the best for once?’ 

He forces them out of his mind for now, ignoring the ache it takes to do so. He has no clue how they are, and won’t for a little bit. There’s no point in letting himself think too much about what could be happening to any of his teammates right now, after what it seems like the National Team did to him, that train of thought will only derail into a fiery wreck. 

Back to judging his own emotions. It’s still a tough tightrope to walk, because he can also spiral into an ‘am I actually human enough though’ crisis of free-will if he vivissects his feelings too intensely. So most of the time, Gavi acknowledges that feeling of ‘you have to feel better, feel more human, because this isn’t enough’ and then tells himself it’s just in his head. And most of the time, he can believe that.

Until the moments he can’t. 

Like right now, when he feels Jude go from matching his lit-up-and-blooming-like-a-firework joy to ever so slightly tense.

It sets off those far too familiar alarm bells in Gavi's mind, plunging him back into alertness mixed with self doubt. Convincing him that his hopes were naive, that so much happiness must have been wrong to feel from the start.

He has a brief internal debate over whether to wait for an explanation or demand one himself—but Gavi has always been a cat to to curiosity, so the latter wins out.

‘What is it?’ he asks.

Jude hesitates— and of course he does, he’s fixed Gavi now. He probably only saw this connection as temporary, just trying to comfort Gavi so he wouldn’t lose it —but then, sounding almost defeated, he replies, ‘something’s bleeding in my shoulder.’ 

Gavi feels the words hit, and then his mind take a second to process them.

Oh. 

Shit.

Yeah, of course, cyborg , duh. 

And he just squeezed his shoulder. Gavi, with his enhanced sporting android strength, just squeezed Jude’s sensitive, handmade-from-inferior-parts shoulder. 

Fuck. No matter how hard he tries, looks like he’s still insensitive when it matters .

Gavi opens his mouth to ask… well, he isn’t sure exactly what he can do to help, but he feels like he should still at least offer it—but he cuts himself off when he processes that the warmth at his side his gone.

Jude’s already moving towards his workstation, adjusting the angle of the mirror with a fluidity that exposes how much practice he must have with the movement. Turned away from him now, the mechanic pulls off his t shirt, fast but not frantic, and starts to reach behind him to open up the panel to his android parts.

Only for his arm to stop mid-movement, as if he’s snagged his skin on a bramble of an invisible rose bush, caught by unseen thorns.

It’s the short wince that comes next that pushes him to act. He may be sentient, but that innate instinct to help any human in need is still baked into him. And unlike some of his other android features, he welcomes the feeling with open arms.

‘Hold on, your angle’s fucked. Can I open it for you?’ 

And although he doesn’t think anything of it as he says them, it’s like time is suspended for a moment once the words leave his lips.

Jude holds his breath, and Gavi has none to breathe out. After an hour-long second, the mechanic turns his head and meets his gaze.

Oh.

Gavi feels his eyebrows raise and soften a bit. He thinks he’s gotten good at recognising emotions, but it’s tricky when a lot of them are playing on someone’s face–like the surprise mixing with fear and what he hopes is gratitude in Jude’s eyes. 

‘Yeah. That’d be nice, actually,’ the cyborg breathes out. Gavi feels the urge to match his exhale, despite the artificiality of his own lungs. 

Good. 

Gavi gets up from the table, grabs a nearby spare chair, and walks–he can actually walk now, holy shit–over to his mechanic.

Jude’s eyes seem a bit wider, up close, as if he had acknowledged what the android said but it hadn’t hit him that he was actually going to help until he made the move to do it.

The thought makes a flitter of something run through Gavi, he feels it in the way his eyebrows shift, scrunching together a fraction but also softening. He can't identify it exactly, it seems to be hovering in the space between sympathy, realisation, and that feeling of just needing to act. 

‘The opening panel’s at this spot, just on my back.’ Gavi’s gaze flicks from Jude’s eyes to his hand, although as it passes over his moving lips it lingers on them for a fraction of a second. Weird, that wasn’t entirely efficient… Gavi must just be a bit tired or something.  

He blinks, and refocuses on the part of Jude’s chest the cyborg is pointing to. It looks like it’s just to the side of his heart.

He scans to make sure, and is greeted by the sight of Jude’s finger’s flesh and bone almost overlapping with his heart’s left chamber. It’s in the same area as Gavi’s own battery sits, only it’s pumping blood through vessels instead of current through wires.

The mechanic’s veins and arteries look like the branches of a plant, blooming and bending and flexing outwards towards the rest of Jude. So biological, organic, natural… it’s close to beautiful. Powered by oxygen and breath, instead of electricity and combustion.

But just past it, behind the layers of ribcage and lungs and muscle, the bright shine of metal makes him squint, as impossible to ignore as the sun bearing down. And tracing the path of one of those blood-delivering branched rivers into that blinding shoulder, Gavi notices a tiny offshooting stream.

A small, broken thread that’s sharply pointing downwards away from the rest of the flow, disconnected, letting red trickle down through the rest of the android part, drop by drop. 

Right. The reason he was looking at Jude like this in the first place.

‘Earth to Gavi? you scanning me again, mate?’ 

Gavi snaps out of it—suddenly feelling grateful he can’t blush, for some reason –and nods. ‘Yes, just to double check something. Turn around.’

With a flicker of a smile, Jude swivels in his chair, exposing his back.

Even without scanning, Gavi can tell where his android parts begin by the way his skin meets silicone with a subtle shift in texture.

And colour, as from the edge of it halfway down his upper arm to the other edge at the base of his neck, the bands of artificial skin radiate out from his shoulder blade like tree rings; never quite matching his real skin but getting close, some slightly darker or lighter in shade, warmer or cooler in tone.

He runs his hand over them, starting from the middle, and notes how there seems to be a bump between the edge of the central, largest whole section, and the ring neighbouring it. If he’s eyeballing it right, that’s the spot right where the shoulder’s opening panel’s supposed to be. Jude doesn’t seem to react to the touch until he reaches the outer circles. 

‘The newer sections are more advanced, they’ve got touch and temperature sensors,’ the cyborg explains. 

‘Newer? I thought all the replacing happened when you were twelve and you’ve just been repairing it since then?’

Jude hesitates again, growing tense once more, and finally replies, ‘I’ve had to add more as I’ve grown up.’

Right, that makes sense. Gavi ignores the part of his mind that feels like there was something else under Jude’s tone, that his reply felt more like a deflection than a straight answer, because it’s a perfectly logical explanation.

He’s getting distracted, he can’t forget that broke red string. It didn’t seem to put Jude in any danger of bleeding out, but it couldn’t be good to let it leak too much. 

He finds the panel, on the outer edge of the center circle. Presses it carefully, and Jude’s mechanical insides unfold before him like a flower peeling apart in the morning light. 

Jude sighs, ‘thanks, mate.’ 

Gavi attempts to stifle his sharp gasp. He’s unsuccessful. 

The cyborg– and sure, Gavi’s been thinking of him like that, he saw how much of him is metal when he first scanned Jude, but it’s only seeing inside of him that’s making what the mechanic truly is hit home– pauses, sucks in a breath.

Jude’s voice sounds almost a bit far away, somehow, over the noise of his fans overheating as he processes the visual information in front of him. ‘I know it probably looks a bit messy.’ 

‘It’s, eh…’

A patchwork, uncanny valley of machinery, put together from parts scavenged from types androids as different from each other as a cat is from a dog, pieces of robotic factory workers, lifeguards, nannies, firefighters, drivers, gardeners, police officers, waiters, service workers, sex workers–all fashioned and remolded together by an architect skilled in bending parts to their will, even when they all fit slightly wrong, with tubes pumping red blood and synthetic nerves crisscrossed over and under and through it all like a mind numbing mixed up looking highway of internal plumbing, like someone shoved hair made of snakes inside of him, curling and tangling together from a cursed human body, as if Gavi’s being turned to stone by the sight.

Like something someone far older, far more knowing than he could understand would cook up to give androids nightmares about what they could be twisted into, like that one scientist in that story who remakes a man out of corpses and rejects it out of horror. Except it isn’t something Jude could ever reject, its an extension of him, its his own body, is him. Gavi’s basic programming must be malfunctioning— he wasn’t designed to see this, no android was —its stuck in some loop repeating that it’s wrong it’s wrong it’s wrong it’s all so wrong

He closes his eyes, tries to reframe the sight in his mind.

What he’s looking at is Jude, just Jude.

This shoulder fed the blood into the hand that stitched back together his central wire, and did it gently at that.

Yeah.

Gavi’s just being dramatic, it isn’t terrifying , it’s more like… if a very skilled child was given a bunch of bits and pieces to reconstruct themselves and assembled them like a lego creation as best they could. Yes, like a lego creation made with some glue and some tools to cut pieces in half, just for good measure.

With a sinking feeling, he realises that he should probably replace the mental image of Jude as a kid with that of his mother. He wonders if her fingerprints are still there, in the bones of his shoulder’s structure, or if Jude’s had to replace it all by now.

He wonders where she lives, if she’s close, if she ever comes to help fix him up every now and then. He remembers the way Jude’s eyes widened when he realised he was actually getting help from some one else, and the sinking feeling gets just a little bit stronger.

‘Gavi? You good mate?’ Stop spiralling, Jude’s the one who needs fixing here for god’s sake.

He opens his eyes—his programmed instincts are screaming that this is wrong it’s a twisting of android parts it’s not supposed to be –

Gavi inhales to steady himself. ‘Yeah.’

But the thought that he was going to be taken apart by Jude and his own shoulder joint was going to be twisted into that doesn’t stop reverberating in his head, setting the edges of his circuits alight with apprehension- 

–and then Jude winces. 

Just slightly, like he’s used to the pain. 

And that must flick some sort of unknown secret switch inside of him because Gavi blinks and all of that all-consuming panic is gone, replaced only by the thought that Jude is hurt. 

Gavi wants that to stop happening.

He reassesses the situation, scrolling back through his recent recorded memory to catch that Jude’s already started working on fixing the issue, inspecting different parts to find the source of the leak while Gavi was quietly losing the plot.

Ah, there : two seconds before he winced.

Just as he’s been trying to hold a piece close to the joint’s socket down, his hand’s slipped and he’s ended up poking one of his synthetic nerves.

Ay. Gavi winces in sympathy.

He scrolls back a little further, and shit– Jude barely misses pulling another blood vessel open.

He can’t let him keep working like this. 

‘I can do it.’

‘What?’ Jude’s turned back to face him, tone disbelieving, like Gavi’s just told him the sky isn't blue, or that Real Madrid is a wonderful team ( ew , even thought of that makes Gavi feel like he’s going to to throw up, despite that being impossible.)

‘I can find the broken blood vessel and fix it. I have steady hands and a much better angle to work at.’

‘But you don’t know anything about fixing android parts.’

‘I don’t have to. I am an android, you can just order me to do a task and I’ll execute it perfectly.’

He expected him to think about for at least a second, but Jude’s reply is immediate, automatic. ‘No.’

‘What? You won’t even consider–’

‘I’m not violating your free will, Gavi. Not for this, not for anything.’

That renders Gavi speechless, for a moment. 

Some kind of feeling sparks in him, its close to the one that he gets when he’s with his teammates, or coach, but- more raw.

He thinks he’s felt it before, too, with Jude. When he was so careful reaching inside of him, fixing his central wire and checking his battery, when he said that he felt like he’d never guess Gavi was an android with how sentient he found him to be, when he pulled Gavi the slightest bit tighter at 2am when Gavi was only half asleep, unbeknownst to Jude, when he smiled like that at Gavi after fixing his shoulder…

a feeling that’s unfamiliar, swooping, but oh so warm. 

Gavi starts talking again, tone gentler. ‘You wouldn’t be forcing me to do anything against my will, trust me. I’m sentient, so I can choose if I want to follow an order or not.’

He adds, just because it feels necessary to, ‘thanks for caring about that, though.’

‘Oh.’ Jude’s tone is softer, much less rigid. ‘Yeah, of course mate.’

Gavi feels a smile starting to form on his face. ‘So you’ll let me fix you up like that, then?’

‘I meant of course I care about your free will, that’s like, basic human decency-’

‘well, you’d be surprised-’ Gavi says under his breath, but Jude gives him a smile, slightly knowing, bogged down just a bit by the way he knows the world works.

‘Yeah, I know. But it feels like it should be.’ 

‘Hm. I’ll toast to that.’ Gavi’s actually smiling himself now, and holds up a spare part from Jude’s workdesk as a mock glass.

Jude’s smile turns lighter as he goes to grab one too, and then Gavi comes crashing back into the present as he sees the cyborg’s expression twist into one of discomfort as he moves with his shoulder open—it must be painful without the padding of his silicone skin.

‘Shit, don’t move too much. Will you just…’ he goes from looking at his shoulder to his face, the mechanic’s eyes still scrunched closed. ‘let me fix you?’ The words may be a bit blunt, but his tone is far from it. Gavi feels his own expression soften. 

Jude’s eyebrows raise a bit in surprise, then he seems to relax slightly and open his eyes, meeting Gavi’s gaze, and takes a breath. There’s something a bit raw in his expression for a moment. Something, that Gavi thinks he’s interpreting right, like hope.

Then a little bit of the openness in his face gets put under control again and disappears below the surface of Jude …blah blah blah (Gavi doesn’t actually know his last name, he realises.)

But still, with a small, real smile and the slightest shine to his eyes, he replies, ‘Yeah, okay Gavi. I trust you.’ 

--

It feels so… surreal, working on Jude. Honestly, Gavi’s half-glad for the way letting his body follow orders lets him zone out a bit, and focus more on conversation. 

‘Is it always this hard to work on yourself?’ 

‘ Locate the leaking vessel by scanning the part, then start carefully moving any components which are in the way so you can access it– Usually I don’t make this many mistakes, but the feeling of something dripping onto stuff is really distracting. It makes me feel like i need to rush to fix it, you know.’ 

‘Mm, yeah I think i get that. I’ve found it by the way, just clearing a way to access it now. Does it happen often?’

‘Thanks. Uh, bleeding is rare. Most of the time a part will break down from age or overuse and have to be replaced, or occasionally one will slip out of place and might disconnect a nerve or something. Those suck, take ages to heal properly.’ Gavi thinks he catches an undertone of ‘it never heals properly at all’ but he hopes that’s just his pessimism coming up with words Jude would never think.

‘Yikes, they must. So when’s the last time something bled?’

‘Oh, would’ve been ages ago now.’ Gavi can hear the fond smile in his voice as Jude reminisces. ‘Yeah, was paying footy with my mate Trent and he tackled me. That was when we were still in England.’

Gavi feels something almost a bit ugly now, close to petty but stronger, and can’t help himself but reply, ‘eh, he doesn’t sound like that good a friend if he hurt you that bad.’

Jude lets out a little laugh at that. Yes , Gavi made him laugh, suck it Trent… what the fuck? why does he even care? oh no , he’s feeling jealous. 

‘Bit hypocritical of you to say, don’t you think?’

‘Well, I bet he didn’t fix you up afterwards…’ If that fucking human somehow did, Gavi might just actually rage quit, sue him for thinking what he and Jude have is special… ay, why can’t he get a grip, this is fucking embarassing! Thank god he can’t blush.

‘No, of course not Gavito, only you can do that.’ Jude’s voice is half teasing, but that half is doing a lot of leg work to cover the genuine feelings behind that statement.

‘See, I knew I was just better… also, Gavito?’

‘Oh, uh, yeah? That’s like a spanish thing, right? I didn’t really think as I was saying it mate, just sorta slipped out… I mean, I won’t say it if you don’t like it–’ 

‘No, I like it. It’s cute.’ He looks over at Jude’s expression in the double mirror set up, and feels dangerously proud of himself to have caused that hint of red that’s now colouring the mechanic’s cheeks. ‘You can keep saying it, cyborg guy.’

Jude’s face goes from a bit lost in though to immediately present, twists into an extreme expression of ‘seriously?’ One eyebrow scrunched down and top lip curled slightly back, then makes a quick recovery.

‘Absolutely not. That’s like me calling you like… I dunno… android boy or something.’

Gavi rolls his eyes, ‘Sorry, would you prefer Just Jude?’

‘That’s even worse!’

‘Okay, eh… Judito? Judey? Wait, I got it, Judith! Judidi? Juju., Jululu ..‘ 

‘…you know what, maybe I shouldn’t have fixed your central wire… could’ve gotten a nice plush shoulder instead as well…’ 

Gavi faux-gasps, ‘now you’re just being rude, jjjjjjjjjjjjj-.’

‘Is that just a ‘j’ sound ? As an actual nickname?’ 

‘Mhm, and I think it’s my best one yet, asshole. I can’t believe you don’t appreciate my genius.’

The mechanic actually groans and brings up his free hand to cover his face. ‘God, you’re actually awful at this mate! It’s a miracle you came up with ‘Gavi’ as a semi-normal name!’

Gavi’s laughter cuts off with a sharp pang of homesickness for Barça. Oh, right. He forgets, somehow, how little Jude really knows him. 

The cyborg clocks his silence, and switches his tone accordingly. Speaking quieter, he asks,

‘Wait, you didn’t come up with it, did you?’

‘No. The Mister– my coach, Xavi, named me. Named all of us.’

He remembers it as crystal clearly as he sees Jude right in front of him. 

~

‘Hey there kid, what’s your name?’

‘Hello. Pleased to meet you, coach of the FC Barcelona Android Team. I am 6-G4V1R4, a latest generation Class A sporting android produced by La Masia’

Xavi shook his head, not unkindly, and gave him a small smile. ‘No offense kid, but I’m not interested in all that technical nonsense. I want to hear your name. Mine’s Xavi, for example.’

He had nodded once, and replied. ‘You desire that I devise a human name for myself? I will attempt to fulfill this request, I may require your patience for a moment… apologies, it appears I have not been designed to execute imaginative tasks of this calibre. I can provide the contact information of my design team, Los Palacios Diseños de Androides, if you wish for more information on what I can and cannot do.'

Xavi had looked at him with a small smile, and weary eyes with a hint of something almost sad, or nostalgic tucked away in their corners. ‘You know, I wouldn’t limit myself based on what they say.’

Before he had a chance to disagree automatically on that, Xavi had continued. ‘It’s okay kid, it was a lot to ask of you in our first conversation. How about I give you one?’ 

‘I am pleased with any decision you make for me, coach Xavi of the FC Barcelona Android Team.’ 

‘Oh, please, just call me Xavi or Mister, okay kid?’ 

‘Understood, Xavi or Mister.’ 

Mister’s eyes had brightened at that. ‘Ah, there it is, a spark of personality.’ 

‘I am simply following your order, Xavi or Mister.’ 

‘Hah, sure you are, 6-G4V-blah blah blah. I know enough about your advanced verbal comprehension programming to know that you know what you’re doing here.’

‘Apologies, I will sto-’

‘No! Don’t, please 6-G4-something something. Keep that feistiness, god if you’ve already got it right out of the gate, you have the potential to be someone really special.’

‘...’ 

‘I see you didn’t correct ‘someone’ to ‘something’’

‘I did not think it my place to correct you on your choice of indefinite pronoun. As you are my coach, Xavi or Mister.’

Xavi really smiled at him then. ‘Yeah, I think we’re going to get along very well together… Gavi.’

‘Ga-vi? Are you addressing me as such?’

‘Yes. I feel like its still a nice nod to your official designation without sounding too much like a serial code, you know?’

‘So it is my designated human name, and I will answer to it and provide it when asked ‘what is your human name?’’

‘It’s your name, Gavi. Period.’

‘Understood.’

‘Although, you could always change it later if you like something else better.’

‘I don’t believe that I will, Xavi or Mister. Simply as I am not designed to feel emotions, attachment to anything other than my teammates in a strictly practical capacity, or form opinions, of course.’

Xavi had smiled at him like they were both in on some inside joke.

‘Of course, Gavi, of course.’

~

 Gavi relives it all in about half a second, then snaps back to reality when he hears Jude speak again.

‘Oh.’ 

‘Yeah.’ The silence begins to stretch out a bit, like caramel slowly being pulled.

‘Yeah, he's definetely a lot better at nicknames than you, then.’ Jude says almost a little awkwardly, trying to salvage the bantering mood.

‘You think so?’

‘Yeah, Gavi, Pedri, Ferran, Lamine Yamal, Frenkie de Jong, Fermin, Raphinha … all sound pretty like, iconic, you know.’ 

‘Well, Raphinha–’

‘Already had that name before he joined cause he came from a different manufacturer, I know, I know, I just forgot for a second there.’ Huh.

‘You know your stuff about Barca’s bot team, hm?’

Yeah, so I know how much you must miss them goes unsaid, reflected in Jude’s eyes as he meets Gavi’s gaze through the mirror. He feels a small jolt somewhere in his circuitry, and breaks the eye contact. 

Jude takes a breath, ‘You know–’

‘I’ve cleared the way to your damaged blood vessel, by the way.’

The mechanic blinks in surprise. ‘Damn, that was fast.’

‘What can I say, taught by the best.’

Jude takes the offer for a more bantering tone and runs with it, expression turning sly. ‘Are you trying to butter me up so I give you a discount?’

‘Oh fuck me, I have to pay for my repairs?’

And then the mechanic, horrible person he is, actually lets out a laugh as he sees the fear in Gavi’s expression. 

‘No! Of course not, mate, that’d be fucking insane.’

‘Good, cause im absolutely broke , bro, like its not even funny–’

‘How!? You’re a pro footballer, you’re literally a millionaire?’ 

‘Androids don’t get paid??’ 

Jude pauses, mouth open to talk, and it almost makes him look a bit like an emoji of a shocked face. ‘Oh. Yeah, of course. I uh, forgot for a second there.’

‘Why do you sound so embarrassed? I get that the inner workings of droid sports aren’t exactly common knowledge.‘ Jude goes quiet, shifts his gaze to the side, and Gavi can almost see the gears turning a bit in his head before he answers.

‘No, I mean i uh… forgot you were an android, somehow?’ 

Now it’s Gavi’s turn to meet his eyes and just stare at him open mouthed.

Holy shit.

Jude must mistake his shocked awe as disbelief, because a faint red blooms across his face once again, this time out of embarrassment.

He chuckles, ‘yeah I really don’t know how mate, like I think if I ever get the chance to turn my brain off a bit I can get a bit like, concerningly stupid.’‘

‘Nah, I don’t think you’re dumb.’

The mechanics eyebrows shoot up in surprise like Gavi’s just told him he’s secretly the queen of England or something. Yikes, that’s probably an indicator to be a bit less blunt.

‘Don’t take it back. I like hearing you say that sort of stuff. Makes me feel… good. About myself.’ 

‘Oh, ok. I’m glad that my stupid arse can do that then, mate.’ Jude laughs... and it seems a little too confident, too easily relieved, now that Gavi thinks about it.

‘Wait, that was just a lie to save your arse, wasn’t it?’

Jude lets out a guilty, but not regretful chuckle. ‘Whattttt?’

Oh , this guy.

He tries his best to look shocked and his eyes would sell it if it wasnt for the barely disguised grin on his face.

Gavi faux-gasps and tuts at him, leaning in over his shoulder to meet judes eyes in the mirror’s reflection.

‘You little manipulator.’

‘Little? Big talk from someone whos a head shorter than me. At least.’

Gavi sees his own face morph into an incredibly offended expression and flicks him on the cheek, earning another infuriating little laugh out of the cyborg. He leans back again and crosses his arms.

‘Ok, just for that, i’m letting you bleed out.’

‘Really ?’ Ugh, those stupid big brown eyes of his. Theyre like wide open windows, jude should really figure out how to close them before the wrong person looks into the core of him and he gets hurt.

‘Of course not, dumbass. God, I can’t believe you thought I was stupid enough to fall for that!’

‘I mean, I was pretty convinced you’d think I was stupid enough to forget that.’

‘Why? When have I ever indicated to you that I think you’re dumb?’ Now jude genuinely looks gobsmacked.

‘Seriously? You quite literally just called me a dumbarse? You said I have quote stupid english cereal for a stupid english person? And you keep doing this thing with your face that screams you just said the stupidest thing in world history .’ His tone is mostly light, still, but he can tell that there's some truth underneath it.

Gavi hesitates for a bit before answering. ‘Jude, I’m sor- surprised you thought that. I- Of course I don’t think you’re stupid, god, you clocked my central wire and managed to fix it. And it seems like not a lot of mechanics would be able to do.’ 

Jude goes quiet, a look in his eyes that Gavi can’t quite place, but does seem positive, if not a bit warm.

‘Thanks, mate. And honestly, it wasn’t even that much of a lie. I feel like I probably will end up forgetting what you are for a second one of these days.’

‘Serious?’

‘Serious. I wasn’t lying when I said that I wouldn't be able to tell if you weren’t open in front of me, earlier.’ 

Gavi is still for a moment, and then feels himself smile a little ‘thanks.’

‘Don’t mention it, s’just the truth.’

Jude’s words are light, but he can still make out a little bit of rawer softness in his scrunched eyes. Eyes that really linger on his, flick down to look at Gavi’s small smile for a second. There’s something that the android can’t quite place in his gaze when it comes back up to meet his own, almost like a swimmer coming back up for air. Jude’s lips part slowly, about to speak-

Then he twitches a bit, shoulder jerking—ah, it must be dripping more. Right, back to repairs. He doesn’t know how Jude managed to stay so focused on working on him throughout their conversations. 

The cyborg clears his throat and breaks their gaze.

Gavi’s circuits are still buzzing a little more than usual, his face feels the slightest fraction of a degree warmer than baseline.

Must be the heating in Jude’s workshop. 

‘Anyways, yeah speaking of android abilities, could you grab the sealant on my desk right there and use it to reattach the artificial capillary to its end point.’

Gavi nods automatically, and feels his hands reach out for the sealant, giving it a cursory glance as his fingers move to unscrew the top and reach in—when he notices something, and stops obeying the order immediately, freezing mid-movement.

‘Gavi? What’s-’

‘According to the label, this expired weeks ago. I can’t use it on you’ 

‘Oh. There’s a newer bottle in the drawer, but I just figured I’d finish this one first.’

‘Mm.’ He rummages around in the drawer and retrieves the unexpired sealant. ‘I’ve got the new one now, you can reorder me so I can fix it.’

‘Thanks.’ A look that says I’m glad you really can disobey plays in Jude’s eyes, and Gavi finds a smile almost reaching the surface as he replies ‘you’re welcome,’ automatically.

--

As his hands work methodically to carefully seal up the wire-encased blood vessel, and now that he’s stopped freaking out about it, staring into jude’s shoulder feels almost… familiar, somehow. ‘I feel like I’ve seen this sort of thing before.’ 

‘What do you mean?’ 

‘Like android machinery, in a person. Would’ve been when I was scanning them, I think.’ He feels like there must be something blocking his memory, any recollection is usually easily accessible. ‘Around a joint, but not on the arm.’ 

‘The leg then? Ankle, hip, knee?’ Jude sounds very intrigued, but with a hint of something close to cautiousness, or concern.

‘I think… it was the last one you said. Ay, it hurts my head to try and remember more.’ 

‘Don't push yourself then.’ Jude replies immediately.

‘I know, its just so frustrating. I never have headaches.’ 

‘Yeah, that's quite weird actually. Wait, arent your pain sensors supposed off as well?’

‘..Yes. They are. How the hell does this still hurt then, actually?’ 

‘Must be programmed into you, like a neural block of some kind…’ 

‘Huh. Suspicious.’ 

‘Yes, very.’ 

Gavi goes quiet, almost unsure but once again, always that doomed cat.

‘Have you ever met another cyborg?’ 

‘No.’ There’s something quieter about Jude’s tone, seemingly close to saddened at first impression, but more like almost relieved, actually.

It makes sense, it doesn’t sound like becoming a cyborg is a very pleasant experience that happens for perfectly nice reasons.

Gavi nods, and doesn’t say anything more for a little bit.

--

After polishing the few drops of blood off of the exposed metal it fell onto and rearranging the internal wires slightly so they aren't so bunched up together anymore, Gavi presses his shoulder closed, gently smoothing out the slight bump at the edge of the main seam, and feels Jude sigh with relief.

‘Fuck, thank you.’

Then he moves, and his expression shifts into one of surprise.

Oh shit, Gavi must have made a mistake, it must be even more fucked up- ‘what’s wrong?’ 

‘It’s- its stable.’

‘What? I thought something was off, you seem too surprised.’ 

‘Yeah, I am, cause it’s stable . Like, actually solid feeling, everythings properly tucked into place, nothings loose because I can’t reach it properly… it feels comfortable .’ 

‘Oh. That’s really good, then.’ 

‘Yes, oh my god it is, I… thank you, Gavi. Thank you so, so much.’

Jude pulls him into a hug, and this time, Gavi realises there’s no subconscious hesitation around the way he uses his left arm to squeeze him firmly. He freezes in surprise for a second before returning it.

Jude is laughing softly and Gavi can’t help but smile with the warmth blooming in his chest. (He knows its his circuits overheating from emotion, but a part of him likes to think that he is just a normal human and this is the proof.)

‘Hey,’ Jude breathes lightly into Gavi’s shoulder, ‘looks like we both fixed each other up then, hm?’  

‘Yeah…' Wow, Jude must have the heating on or something cause his face feels so warm... 'although, what I did was much more impressive, considering I’ve never been a mechanic before.’ 

Jude scoffs, and Gavi feels another spark of pride at getting a reaction out of him.

‘Are you mental? I’m the one who told you how, you didn’t do shit!’

‘Eh, wrong? I stopped you from using out of date sealant and closed you up properly for the first time in years, thank you very much.’

‘Bro, you would still in pain, paralysed, and probably gone actually mental by now if I hadn’t fixed your central wire.’

‘…So what I’m hearing is that we agree to say that we’re evenly skilled, then.’ 

‘Haha, fuck off mate.’ Jude replies warmly. 

Gavi grins at him, and yes, that lit-up-like-a-firework joy is back, might be even stronger now. Thanks to him, he helped Jude.

‘Come on, let’s get out of here. If I have to spend another second thinking about android parts and fixing up machinery I think I will go a bit, ah, how did you say, mental.’

‘Ok, sure. You've still got tp be careful with that knee okay? Don’t overexert it.’

He rolls his eyes, feeling the opposite of annoyed.

‘Got it, doc.’ 

Gavi walks out of the workshop into the living room, and as he sees the late afternoon Madrid (still ew… but not like, actively vomit inducing now) sun stream in through the window and spill over the potted plant near the couch like a slice of bronze, it finally hits him.

He’s going to be able to go out into the real world for the first time. 

Gavi takes a breath. 

He may have found a nature database and scanned the shit out of it to be able to immerse himself in the outside, but that felt like nothing compared to the prospect of lying down on real, imperfect grass without any obligation to play.

He can just exist as himself, as a regular person.

Outside, in the actual outside he's always seen out of bus windows and been briefly ushered out of when he visits different venues, not just the sliver of it he's gotten in the stadium. It almost feels like the courtyard of a prison to him now-one that, despite his heart—if he has one—certainly belonging to it, he's managed to escape, just enough to live a little.

The thought is so good that it makes him turn back on his pain sensors for a second to confirm that yes, he is smiling so hard that his fucking teeth hurt.

Just behind him a second ago but now beside him, Jude catches his eye, smiling back.

And he, Gavi, designed in Los Palacios, made in La Masia, property of Barça in name but no longer in practice, lets himself believe that feeling free isn’t some unattainable fantasy.