All Systems Red

Dr. Mensah is the leader of the PreservationAux research team. She is also the elected administrative director on the steering committee for the Preservation Alliance. Mensah’s age is unspecified though Murderbot guesses that she “wasn’t young” (19) because she is in charge. The only physical description Wells provides is that Mensah has dark brown skin and short light brown hair (19). When not working on a survey mission, Mensah lives “on a farm outside the capital city, with two marital partners, […] her sister and brother and their three marital partners, and a bunch of relatives and kids” (147). All the PreservationAux team members respect Mensah, and she creates an open, friendly, and professional group dynamic.

Mensah is a mentor figure to Murderbot because she teaches Murderbot that human interactions can be positive. Murderbot describes her as an “intrepid galactic explorer” (73) because she shows bravery and calm in crises and is an effective leader. Mensah does not look like the other intrepid explorers on the entertainment feed (73), signaling that some biases remain in this otherwise progressive interplanetary system.

Mensah values Murderbot as an individual and respects its opinions as a security expert. She understands that Murderbot is not a mindless machine that follows commands. In Chapter 6, when the group is panicking after DeltFall’s murder, she tells Murderbot: “You’re the only one here who won’t panic. The longer this situation goes on, the others . . . We have to stay together, use our heads” (108). Mensah knows Murderbot is uncomfortable talking about personal subjects, so she does not push its boundaries as some of the other team members do. At the same time, she requires Murderbot to sit with the crew and participate in their decision-making because that is best for the mission. She buys Murderbot’s contract because she knows that Murderbot is capable of much more than security detail, but she assumes Murderbot shares her values of education and productivity, which it does not. Mensah helps Murderbot realize that it can live on its own terms, and that leads Murderbot to seek its freedom.

Dr. Gurathin is a systems engineer in the PreservationAux group. He is the only member of the team who is an augmented human and, though the other team members are friendly toward him, he tends to keep to himself. Murderbot notes that he is the least talkative member of the team and has a “small, quiet smile” (29). As an augmented human, Gurathin has his own implanted interface and, like Murderbot, can access HubSystem data without using a touch interface. In Chapter 2, Murderbot can feel Gurathin “poking around” (28) in the data as the team searches for the missing map sections. He has an advantage over other team members when it comes to accessing data because he has an internal interface. Gurathin is a double for Murderbot because he is the only other team member who has inorganic components. When Ratthi talks about bot ownership as slavery, he says Murderbot “is no more a machine than Gurathin is” (54).

Gurathin is a foil to Murderbot—though he is not the novella’s main antagonist—because he challenges Murderbot’s right to autonomy.

In Chapter 5, Gurathin immobilizes Murderbot after analyzing its faulty systems. Gurathin believes Murderbot played a part in the sabotage and should not be trusted. While Gurathin is skeptical about Murderbot’s motives, he, like the other crew members, sees Murderbot as a person: “An angry, heavily armed person who has no reason to trust us” (96). As a secondary character, Gurathin does not have a growth arc. He does not reconcile with Murderbot or apologize to him: Toward the end of the story, Murderbot wonders if Gurathin advised Mensah not to buy it (146). Gurathin is a foil for Murderbot because by pointing out all the destructive things Murderbot could (but chooses not to) do with his hacked governor module, he highlights Murderbot’s humanity.

Dr. Ratthi is a biologist on the PreservationAux team. He is best friends with Arada and Overse and has an unrequited crush on Pin-Lee but doesn’t “act stupid about it” (30). Ratthi has “dramatic throwing-hands-in-the-air” reactions to frustrating situations, but he is a competent and reliable member of the team. At first, Ratthi is uncomfortable when Murderbot joins them in the hopper without its armor and looks away as Murderbot passes him to reach the copilot seat (39). However, in Chapter 4, Ratthi is the one who broaches the subject of Murderbot’s feelings. Ratthi is well-meaning and even volunteers to apologize to Murderbot for upsetting it, which Mensah advises against.

Ratthi cares deeply about the issue of bot slavery, calling the practice “disgusting” and “horrible” (54). Ratthi does not believe the company is using SecUnits to kill them and protests when Gurathin says Murderbot cannot be trusted. He tells Gurathin to “stop being mean” (96) to Murderbot so they can work together as a unit. Ratthi is the voice of activism in the novella and urges Murderbot to come to Preservation Alliance, where it can have full citizenship. Like Mensah, Ratthi has the privileged perspective of a human in a world where robots are second-class citizens and can therefore not fully understand Murderbot’s skepticism about the benefits of joining the Alliance.

The rest of the PreservationAux team consists of Drs. Volescu, Bharadwaj, Pin-Lee, Arada, and Overse. They are scientists who play tertiary roles in the novella, and as such are not distinguished by many identifying traits. Their actions help the plot unfold, and their most important narrative function is in creating the social dynamic that Murderbot must navigate on the mission.

Dr. Volescu is one of the biologists Murderbot saves from the creature attack in Chapter 1. During the rescue, Murderbot learns that Volescu is in a four-way marriage and has seven children. He “admired Mensah to the point where he might have a crush on her” (30) though these feelings never become relevant in the plot. Volescu voices support for Murderbot throughout the story, and he becomes confrontational with Gurathin for questioning Murderbot’s trustworthiness.

Dr. Bharadwaj is the other biologist Murderbot saves in Chapter 1. She is badly injured and recuperates in the medical until the beginning of Chapter 4. Bharadwaj has a personal history with Pin-Lee with whom she flirts “in an old comfortable way that suggested it had been going on for a long time” (30). She supports Murderbot when Gurathin challenges its motives because she has firsthand experience of being saved by Murderbot when Murderbot was operating without its governor unit.

Dr. Pin-Lee is a jack-of-all-trades whose official job title is not specified. She is a “gifted amateur at systems interpretation” (31) and has experience in habitat and shelter construction. She helps Gurathin troubleshoot their lost satellite connection to HubSystem and helps Overse surgically remove the implanted combat module from Murderbot after the SecUnit attack. Pin-Lee is “exasperated a lot, and tossed things around when the others weren’t there,” and like Volescu, she admires and has a crush on Mensah (30). Pin-Lee is assertive and does not let her emotional reactions affect her duties. At the company station, she protects Murderbot from the company officials and reporters like a “tough yet compassionate solicitor coming to rescue us from unfair prosecution” (142). Murderbot does not form a strong personal connection with Pin-Lee, but from this description, it is clear that Murderbot admires her.

Dr. Arada is a biology specialist and is in a relationship with Dr. Overse. She is caring, and her interactions with the team members express her compassionate nature. She is sensitive to Murderbot’s feelings and is the only team member who initiates physical contact with it. She takes Murderbot’s hand after it is injured at DeltFall and pats it on the shoulder to welcome it to the group after Mensah buys Murderbot’s contract. In Chapter 6, she silences Gurathin when he continues to question Murderbot’s trustworthiness: “You need to give it time. It’s never interacted with humans as an openly free agent before now. This is a learning experience for all of us” (107). Along with Mensah, Arada leads the group in having consideration for Murderbot’s boundaries.

Dr. Overse is a scientist and certified field medic. She is in a relationship with Arada and like Arada, she is sensitive to Murderbot’s social discomfort. In Chapter 4, she tries to stop Ratthi from discussing bot slavery, saying that Murderbot is aware of the unfairness of the situation (54). When the team is assessing the risk of going to the DeltFall habitat, Overse raises the question: “If it turns out the DeltFall group did need help, and we didn’t go, how would we feel?” (57). Like Arada, Overse is a voice of compassion in the novella.

DeltFall Group is the other scientific team on the planet. Like PreservationAux, they are on a survey mission from their company to determine if the planet has valuable natural resources. DeltFall is located on a continent on the opposite side of the planet. They have communicated with PreservationAux but have never met them in person. DeltFall’s members are never named: their function in the narrative is to provide PreservationAux with a potential solution to its immediate problem of obtaining a complete information package for the planet. The grisly scene PreservationAux finds at DeltFall’s habitat is an example of the damage rogue SecUnits can do to their crew. Having that knowledge raises the stakes for the Preservation team members when they realize Murderbot has an implanted combat module.

DeltFall is a character double for PreservationAux because its fate could have easily befallen PreservationAux. In Chapter 3, Murderbot remarks that DeltFall probably thought it was safe at its habitat “right before they got eaten or torn to pieces or whatever” (60). DeltFall’s demise turns PreservationAux’s routine survey mission into a deadly adventure. The novella’s dramatic tension comes from the fact that the Preservation group is not equipped to handle the situation: “These weren’t intrepid galactic explorers. They were people who had been doing a job and suddenly found themselves in a terrible situation” (93). DeltFall is in a similar situation, except that their SecUnits have no way to stop HubSystem from downloading and activating the combat modules. The fate of DeltFall’s SecUnits highlights how fortunate PreservationAux is to have Murderbot and provides a glimpse into what happened in Murderbot’s past.