“Hello, this is model KP984-N75, domestic relations. Please input your personal settings on my basic operational system.” 
Mrs. Kim Saejin looked carefully at the domestic android posted in the middle of the living room, among bubble wrap and a forgotten card box, his eyes blank, his face still.
“Woonie, how do I do this?”
“You should chose your settings on the available emotions this model can display. Just chose a number between 1 and 5, for the intensity said emotions can reach, where one is the lowest, and five is the highest. Unmark the gaps of the emotions you don’t want the android to experiment.”
The voice sounding from the small speaker over the table was soft, delicate, sounding careful, as if he was afraid of scaring her. She smiled to herself.
“I don’t think there is anything in here I don’t want him to experience, it’s all a part of being human.”
“You can always select the automatic regulation, he would react as a normal human would... based on his previous experience and his current mood.” said the voice on the small speaker over the table.
“Oh, that seems nice.” she smiled, pressing the small button with her slightly shaking finger.
“Thank you for your settings selection. Please select a voice tone and define our relationship status. Also select a name for this unit to call you by.” his voice cheerful and kind, but his eyes cold.
“I think I like this voice… Call me Granny, we are family.” the small smile on her face was far more warm than it should be for a woman talking to a robot, but he was no ordinary robot, he was her company and new friend.
“Hello, Granny. Please choose a name for this unit.” he blinked once, as he normally did every 47 seconds.
“Hm… What do you think, Woonie?”
“Do you want me to download a list of male names for you Mrs. Kim?”
“No, no, Woonie, thank you… Hm, I guess I’ll call him Hakyeon, what do you think Woonie?”
“I have no formed opinion on this matter, Mrs.Kim.”
“I like the name...Hm, Hakyeon it is.” she said as she typed slowly on the touch pad, carefully avoiding any misspelling with her shaking hands.
“Please, connect this unit to your house system for your personal safety.” 
“Woonie, how do I do this?” she asked, raising to her feet. The cat now rolling in the bubble wrap, the soft rustle of plastic the only sound aside from her small steps.
“Get the white cable on his neck and plug it in my control panel, right beside the television”
She stepped carefully, avoiding the cat, the bubble wrap, the card box, some of the wires, walking behind Hakyeon. Looking for the marking on his neck and the white cable.
“Oh, there it is.” she tiptoed, removing the security seal and pulling at the thin, white cable, connecting it to the control panel beside the tv, stumbling on a pillow that fell from the couch. 
“Are you ok, Mrs. Kim?” asked the voice, this time coming from the stereo on the table top.
“Yes, I’m fine, Wonnie.” she chuclked softly. “I’m just a bit clumsy, is all.”
She connected the cable, waiting carefully as the android’s eyes -Hakyeon’s eyes- glowed a faint blue hue as he downloaded the information and connected to the house system, Taekwoon.
“Hello, Taekwoon.” said Hakyeon, eyes softening, kind and warm, moving his hands and relaxing his posture, no longer stiff and robotic.
“Hello, Hakyeon.” said the voice from the stereo. “Welcome home.” 
“Thank you.”

~+~ 

Months pass, and the living room is quiet aside from the soft hum of Taekwoon's cooler, right in the corner of the room, turning on every twenty minutes or so. The faint glow of his hologram standing in the middle of the room as Hakyeon walks around, tidying things up and humming to himself.
“What time is it now, Taekwoon?” he ask, he knows it’s late, but how late is the main point, he must recharge his battery in time to make breakfast for Granny.
“Four in the morning, Hakyeon.” comes the answer, but even though Taekwoon's mouth is clearly moving around each word, the sound comes from the other side of the room, from one of the small speakers scattered around the house.
“Thank you.”
He smiles and places the last pillow on the creamy couch on the living room, sitting down briefly, looking around to find any faults in his work.
As always, he finds none.
He looks up, to see Taekwoon shimmering form glowing weakly in the dark room, his frame tall and broad, wearing the clothes Granny chose for him days prior, on his personal customization interface. She keeps changing his outfit, changing his hair, keeps telling him he looks nice and handsome, but Taekwoon does not understand the concept entirely, only quietly thanks her and says nothing else.
In fact, Taekwoon rarely speaks, mostly only says anything when he is spoken to, when he is called... And Hakyeon calls him a lot, says he feels less lonely with Taekwoon there to talk to him, or hear him speak, as it usually happens. Taekwoon does not blink, only stares, his expression soft, sometimes making small comments or asking him to exemplify certain things, things he cannot understand.
He always says that he never actually left the room, and that he is not actually there at all, that his holographic form was designed for the humans, so they won’t feel weird, like they are talking to themselves. Humans feel more at ease when they can look at the person whom they are talking to, and his number one purpose is to make humans comfortable.
Hakyeon usually says he is doing a good job, then, and that he is thankful for the company while he cleans.
“You are the one who requested my hologram to keep you company while you clean, Hakyeon.”
“Yes, sometimes I forget you are in all the small cameras around this place...” Hakyeon states, looking around, fingers scraping over the cloth of his pants, thinking.
“Do you want me to maintain a reminder of that in your personal database? I can set it to go off every week, if it will help you.” Is the answer Taekwoon offers, seriously offering help, trying to be of any use.
Hakyeon chuckles lightly, feeling his inner circuits spinning and turning, to simulate a muscular contraction.
It always surprises him how he always feels on the edge of real and fake.
He always sees his own reactions as real, even if his humanity is not.
It never bothered him to know that he is not an actual human, he feels like one, it’s good enough.
“It’s not necessary Taekwoon, thank you.” and he smiles for good measure, because Taekwoon is always like this.
“You are welcome.” he says, voice soft, ringing near the couch. “Your battery is running low, you should go recharge.”
And he should, so up, to the hallway... He looks over his shoulder, but Taekwoon is no longer there, but at the same time, he is, and he is never actually alone at all.
It’s comforting in a way that it shouldn't be.
Inside his room, the room given to him by Mrs. Kim... Granny, as he corrects himself, there is a bed, too big for a man that does not sleep, for a man that is no man in the first place. But he feels the mattress dip under him, and he is grateful for this little moments where he can pretend he is an actual human.
He sighs softly, air that he does not need, but even so his chest rises and falls, because he is a domestic android and humans feel more at ease if they can forget that.
Hakyeon looks like any other human would, and the reason why he does not regret in the least not being one, is because he feels like he belongs, feels loved and accepted, and it’s fine.
It really is.
He is grateful for what he has, and he has so much.
So he smiles, plugs the thin white cable from behind his neck on the control panel beside his bedpost, and lays down, setting his timer to go off the sleep mode in four more hours, and closes his eyes.
“Good night, Taekwoon.”
“Good night.” says the soft voice from coming from the small speaker on the nightstand. “Sleep well.”
His systems all shut off with the faint green glow of Taekwoon’s sensors scanning the cat as it skips down the hallway.

-+-

Taekwoon’s hologram is crouching down in the front yard, looking ahead like he does when he is updating his personal database. The cat walks through him, his hologram flickers, but he is still looking ahead, standing still.
So still.
Granny clearly asked him to use his physical form as much as possible, so he did. She seemed pleased to see him all the time, so he thought that he was doing good. Even now, as he sat down, floating millimeters above the wooden floor, she came and quietly sat on the chair right beside him, smiling warmly like she always does.
“What is it, Woonie?”
“Nothing Mrs. Kim.” he says, moving his head, looking down, at the cat sprawled on Mrs. Kim garden, rolling among some bushes.
“Are you thinking?”
“As a part of a collective mind, interconnected database, and a fragment of the program of well care and protection of human life, I do think a lot, Mrs. Kim.”
She laughs, and he concludes that she is pleased, so it’s fine, even if he does not understand the reason.
“How are you feeling today, Mrs. Kim?”
“I’m fine Woonie. Later I’ll go out with Hakyeon to buy some things, want something?” she asks good-naturedly, smiling at his hologram sitting on the floor beside her chair, even if she already knows his answer.
“No” he says, after briefly checking working systems. “I do not require any physical maintenance at the moment Mrs. Kim, thank you.” he elaborates a bit more, knowing very well that she prefers long sentences.
“Ok.” she says, smiling.
She pets his head, even though her hand easily goes through his glowing form. As a response he looks at her, image flickering, because he knows she likes when he looks at her while they talk, even if his eyes are not actually there, but in the cameras behind him, and that hologram was merely a representation made to leave her comfortable with his absence of a physical presence.
“My holographic manifestation is not tangible, Mrs. Kim.”
And she smiles again, her eyes crinkle. She finds him a good boy, even though he is no boy, and he does not understand why she smiles so much around him, but she is pleased and no one is hurt, so it was fine like this. Even if he didn't do anything to cause such a reaction from her.
Hakyeon’s head peaks out of the front door.
“There you are, Granny. I made some muffins, and the tea is ready.”
She gets up shakely, grunting softly as her knees tremble a bit, her back hurts - she is starting to get old, she thinks - she smiles fondly at Hakyeon at the door, warm and kind.
Always warm, always kind.
“You are so good to me, Hakyeonnie. You do too much.” she says and gets inside, complimenting the sweet smell of baked muffins coming from the kitchen as she goes, patting his arm on her way there.
“Not at all. It’s the least I can do.” he looks at Taekwoon still staring ahead, quiet, his eyes soft as he looks at the flowers Mrs. Kim cultivates. “Come inside too, Taekwoon.”
He smiles and Taekwoon turns his head to look at him, as he would do to her. “I’m already inside, Hakyeon.” He says because it’s the true, and Hakyeon should know that.. is the cat playing with the cables again? That would be bad. The last time it happened they had a blackout that went on for two entire hours until mainetaince came.
Hakyeon sighs and closes the door, he turns on his heels to see Taekwoon standing right beside the couch, watching the cat rub it’s face on one of his movement sensors.
The cables will be fine, apparently.
“I’ll never get used to you appearing out of nowhere like this…”
“You requested my holographic form to stay inside the house, I am only doing as you required.” He says, and looks at Hakyeon with genuine confusion on his calm face.
“I know, I know…I’m not complaining.”
Hours later Hakyeon stands beside Mrs. Kim at the door, looking at Taekwoon inside the house with the corner of his eyes as he watches the cat, hands on his knees, standing still once again.
"Don't you want to come, Taekwoon?" Hakyeon is smiling when Taekwoon looks at him, his hologram flickers, bleeding white light over the round pillows scattered over the couch.
"I cannot leave the house dependencies, Hakyeon. My personal connection does not reach far out the front door."
Hakyeon seemed a lot more saddened than he should while Taekwoon himself sat impassively with his blank expression and his eyes cast somewhere between Hakyeon and Mrs. Kim.
"Oh..."
Mrs. Kim smiles sympathetically, patting Hakyeon's arm.
"Are you ok, Hakyeonnie?"
"I'm fine, Granny." He smiles and she closes the front door, saying goodbye, telling Taekwoon she would be back soon. Taekwoon shimmering hologram vanishes in the now dark room, and the cat, now on the couch, curls against a pillow, purrs alone to a technically empty house.
"Doesn't he get lonely?" Hakyeon asks as they walk down the street, stepping on the lights blinking over the solar roadways. The rails of the monorail buzzes slightly with electricity, the weather is fine.
"I've thought about that before, but he does not mind, I suppose. As far as I know, he runs his secondary updates when I go out, or something like that. It’s the only time he uses that much words." She chuckles, fixing her name band with her address, house number, ID pass, and basic personal information on her wrist.
Hakyeon has a barcode, so he doesn't need a name band.
"Yeah... but isn't he curious about the outside?"
"Since he is connected to those other computers and I don't know what else, he is not actually locked in, right?"
"Hm..." He says, eyes cast down.
"Don't worry, Hakyeonnie, let's get you some new clothes. I have some extra money, we can get you some new sweaters. It's getting colder."
"You don't have to, really."
"No, no. My children are all too far away, so let me spend my money on you, Hakyeonnie. We are family after all."
Hakyeon sighs and smiles, it was unavoidable, she already decided even the type is sweater they would buy.

A/N: Crossposted from AO3 :)