Ty walked back into the MCR, where Lisa was once again busy transfering the replacement manuals to the bookcases. He resumed helping her with that.
"How'd it go," she asked him.
"Great," replied Ty. "Cock is happy to be back where he belongs."
"That was very kind of you," Lisa said. "You could more easily just have gotten rid of him."
Ty was shocked. "I'd have thought that you, of all people, would understand why I couldn't do that."
"You're not thinking clearly," Lisa told him. "You're confusing me," and she pointed at her own, short and somewhat oddly-proportioned body, "and her," pointing at the main monitor, showing the sleeping Lisa. "You may see me as looking like her, and it's confusing that you refer to me by her name, but remember that I am not a person, nor is Cock, nor B27. You're seeing an anthropomorphic abstraction generated in your own mind to try to explain the inner workings of hers."
"Well, that may be," Ty countered, "but you, B27, and Cock all have acted enough like persons, that I think it would be wrong for me to treat you any other way."
"No wonder Lisa loves you so much," she said. "Thank you for saving her."
"And thank you for helping with that," Ty said.
"I literally couldn't do otherwise," she said.
"Nevertheless," Ty said, "I am grateful."
They continued transfering manuals for many hours. Lisa, or whatever she was, occasionally stopped briefly to check the control panels, but seemed tireless. At some point she suggested that he take a break and get some more sleep. "No thank you," he said. "I just want to help you get this finished as quickly as possible. After that, I'll be able to sleep easily."
At long last, the final manual was transferred. "Is there anything else that needs to be done?" Ty asked, "Anything that I can help with?"
"No thank you," she said. "That's everything. No, wait, there is just one small thing." She walked to the doorway Ty had created, and Ty followed. They looked into the abandoned MCR of what had been Mini-Me, an incomplete person Ty had created for the sole purpose of repairing Lisa's mind. "Just remove this doorway."
Ty felt a bit sad, doing that, but she was right. Mini-Me had never really lived, but had fulfilled her purpose. Ty removed the doorway, and also erased the last vestiges of Mini-Me's mind from existence. "I'm going to keep the block of wood, that I transformed Mini-Me's physical body into, as a..." He choked up a bit. "As a memorial to her brief, sacrificial existence. At least she never felt any pain."
She hugged him for a moment, then stepped back. "I hope you won't be offended, Ty, and will take this in the spirit in which it is intended. I sincerely hope to never see you again, except..." She pointed to the monitor on the main console. "On there."
"As you wish," Ty said. He briefly bowed to her, then disappeared. On the monitor, she saw his body appear next to Lisa's on her bed.