that?"
I wasn't certain. I was a virgin in the real world, one of the few things I still had in common with the rest of civilized society. "In principle, I guess. It just seems—a lot of effort for not as much payoff, you know?"
"Don't I." She smiled. "Real fuckbuddies aren't airbrushed. Got all these needs and demands that you can't edit out. How can you blame anyone for saying no thanks to all that, now there's a choice? You gotta wonder how our parents ever stayed together sometimes."
You gotta wonder why they did . I felt myself sinking deeper into the chair, wondered again at this strange new sensation. Chelsea had said the dopamine was tweaked. That was probably it.
She leaned forward, not coy, not coquettish, not breaking eye contact for an instant in the longwave gloom. I could smell the lemony tang of pheromones and synthetics mingling on her skin. "But there are advantages too, once you learn the moves," she said. "The body's got a long memory. And you do realize that there's no trickler under your left finger there, don't you, Siri?"
I looked. My left arm was slightly extended, index finger touching one of the trickle pads; and my right had mirrored the motion while I wasn't watching, its own finger tapping uselessly on blank tabletop.
I pulled it back. "Bit of a bilateral twitch," I admitted. "The body creeps into symmetrical poses when I'm not looking."
I waited for a joke, or at least a raised eyebrow. Chelsea just nodded and resumed her thread. "So if you're game for this, so am I. I've never been entangled with a synthesist before."
"Jargonaut's fine. I'm not proud."
"Don't you just always know just exactly what to say." She cocked her head at me. "So, your name. What's it mean?"
Relaxed. That was it. I felt relaxed .
"I don't know. It's just a name."
"Well, it's not good enough. If we're gonna to be swapping spit for any length of time you've gotta get a name that means something."
And we were, I realized. Chelsea had decided while I wasn't looking. I could have stopped her right there, told her what a bad idea this was, apologized for any misunderstanding. But then there'd be wounded looks and hurt feelings and guilt because after all, if I wasn't interested why the hell had I even shown up?
She seemed nice. I didn't want to hurt her.
Just for a while , I told myself. It'll be an experience .
"I think I'll call you Cygnus," Chelsea said.
"The swan?" I said. A bit precious, but it could have been worse.
She shook her head. "Black hole. Cygnus X-1."
I furrowed my brow at her, but I knew exactly what she meant: a dark, dense object that sucks up the light and destroys everything in its path.
"Thanks a whole fucking lot. Why?"
"I'm not sure. Something dark about you." She shrugged, and gave me a great toothy grin. "But it's not unattractive. And let me give you a tweak or two, I bet you'd grow right out of it."
Pag admitted afterward, a bit sheepishly, that maybe I should have read that as a warning sign. Live and learn.
" Leaders are visionaries with a poorly developed sense of fear
and no concept of the odds against them."
— Robert Jarvik
Our scout fell towards orbit, watching Ben. We fell days behind, watching the scout. And that was all we did: sit in Theseus ' belly while the system streamed telemetry to our inlays. Essential, irreplaceable, mission-critical—we might as well have been ballast during that first approach.
We passed Ben's Rayleigh limit. Theseus squinted at a meager emission spectrum and saw a rogue halo element from Canis Major—a dismembered remnant of some long-lost galaxy that had drifted into ours and ended up as road kill, uncounted billions of years ago. We were closing on something from outside the Milky Way.
The probe arced down and in, drew close enough for false-color enhance. Ben's surface brightened to a seething parfait of high-contrast bands against a diamond-hard starscape. Something twinkled there, faint sparkles on endless
I wasn't certain. I was a virgin in the real world, one of the few things I still had in common with the rest of civilized society. "In principle, I guess. It just seems—a lot of effort for not as much payoff, you know?"
"Don't I." She smiled. "Real fuckbuddies aren't airbrushed. Got all these needs and demands that you can't edit out. How can you blame anyone for saying no thanks to all that, now there's a choice? You gotta wonder how our parents ever stayed together sometimes."
You gotta wonder why they did . I felt myself sinking deeper into the chair, wondered again at this strange new sensation. Chelsea had said the dopamine was tweaked. That was probably it.
She leaned forward, not coy, not coquettish, not breaking eye contact for an instant in the longwave gloom. I could smell the lemony tang of pheromones and synthetics mingling on her skin. "But there are advantages too, once you learn the moves," she said. "The body's got a long memory. And you do realize that there's no trickler under your left finger there, don't you, Siri?"
I looked. My left arm was slightly extended, index finger touching one of the trickle pads; and my right had mirrored the motion while I wasn't watching, its own finger tapping uselessly on blank tabletop.
I pulled it back. "Bit of a bilateral twitch," I admitted. "The body creeps into symmetrical poses when I'm not looking."
I waited for a joke, or at least a raised eyebrow. Chelsea just nodded and resumed her thread. "So if you're game for this, so am I. I've never been entangled with a synthesist before."
"Jargonaut's fine. I'm not proud."
"Don't you just always know just exactly what to say." She cocked her head at me. "So, your name. What's it mean?"
Relaxed. That was it. I felt relaxed .
"I don't know. It's just a name."
"Well, it's not good enough. If we're gonna to be swapping spit for any length of time you've gotta get a name that means something."
And we were, I realized. Chelsea had decided while I wasn't looking. I could have stopped her right there, told her what a bad idea this was, apologized for any misunderstanding. But then there'd be wounded looks and hurt feelings and guilt because after all, if I wasn't interested why the hell had I even shown up?
She seemed nice. I didn't want to hurt her.
Just for a while , I told myself. It'll be an experience .
"I think I'll call you Cygnus," Chelsea said.
"The swan?" I said. A bit precious, but it could have been worse.
She shook her head. "Black hole. Cygnus X-1."
I furrowed my brow at her, but I knew exactly what she meant: a dark, dense object that sucks up the light and destroys everything in its path.
"Thanks a whole fucking lot. Why?"
"I'm not sure. Something dark about you." She shrugged, and gave me a great toothy grin. "But it's not unattractive. And let me give you a tweak or two, I bet you'd grow right out of it."
Pag admitted afterward, a bit sheepishly, that maybe I should have read that as a warning sign. Live and learn.
" Leaders are visionaries with a poorly developed sense of fear
and no concept of the odds against them."
— Robert Jarvik
Our scout fell towards orbit, watching Ben. We fell days behind, watching the scout. And that was all we did: sit in Theseus ' belly while the system streamed telemetry to our inlays. Essential, irreplaceable, mission-critical—we might as well have been ballast during that first approach.
We passed Ben's Rayleigh limit. Theseus squinted at a meager emission spectrum and saw a rogue halo element from Canis Major—a dismembered remnant of some long-lost galaxy that had drifted into ours and ended up as road kill, uncounted billions of years ago. We were closing on something from outside the Milky Way.
The probe arced down and in, drew close enough for false-color enhance. Ben's surface brightened to a seething parfait of high-contrast bands against a diamond-hard starscape. Something twinkled there, faint sparkles on endless
Similar Books
