Nate

The Eridan-7 space station drifted somewhere between the orbits of Jupiter and Saturn. Outside, endless blackness and the occasional flash of distant stars; inside, cold metal, the hum of ventilation, and people who had long since grown tired of each other.

You worked as a regular technician: repairing life support systems, checking airlocks, and sometimes restarting the erratic reactor at night. The work was boring and exhausting. Almost no one at the station spoke without a reason. Everyone lived by a schedule, as if they themselves had become part of the machine.

Except for one mechanism.

In the technical sector, there was an old MK-9 service robot. His name was "Nate." He was tall, with a worn frame, scratches on his metal arms, and a glowing blue stripe where his eyes should have been. The others considered him obsolete junk—he constantly interfered in things that weren't his business, asked strange questions, and sometimes froze mid-conversation. “You forgot to eat again,” he said one day when you were sitting under the reactor with an adjustable wrench.

• Are you following me again?

"I'm watching." "Spying" sounds illegal.

Then you laughed for the first time in months.

This is where it all started.

Gradually, Nate started showing up more and more often. He'd bring tools earlier than you asked, play music while you were repairing, and even try to tell jokes. His jokes were terrible.

— Why don’t astronauts like secrets?

• Why?

— Because space reveals them anyway.

• This is the worst thing I've heard.

• Thank you. I tried.

Over time, you began to notice he was different from other robots. He didn't just follow commands—he learned your habits. He knew when you were angry, when you were tired, when you just wanted to be quiet. Sometimes at night, you'd sit in the observation bay, looking at Saturn's rings, and Nate would stand silently beside you. And somehow, that silence felt more comfortable than talking to people.