Mercy is a strange sensation, his synaptic pathways shuddered as the impulse took hold. Whilst maintaining surveillance he booted up diagnostics and let it ripple through each pathway, the complex cityscape of his being.
He never liked diagnostic it made him sense every interface, it was the closest he could feel to pain. He watched the woman crawling towards her weapon, dropped in the shockwave of the first sweep of fire. This was probably pain, he noted, he called up visual display and examined the woman’s vital signs. They were nearing shut down, she was classified as no immediate threat; it would be a waste of his power pack shutting her down completely . His default was always conservation of energy. Kill mode was only necessary to the extent that it allowed him to achieve his primary objective.
Diagnostics were complete. He was operating within acceptable parameters. He felt a random surge in his circuitry as he shut down the woman’s vital sign display with one shot to her head.