Page 48 of Elanie & the Empath
“Macey Valentine,” I explained. “You asked me to sing her song at karaoke. Why?”
“Because she’s my favorite singer.”
“Really?” I wouldn’t have pegged her as a lover of Old Earth pop music. Delphinian synthwave maybe. Or Tranquisian classical, listening in her pod late at night while floating her fingers through the air. “That’s surprising.”
Wood snapped, releasing a flurry of embers, and she asked, “What do you know about her?”
“Not much. She was a big pop star in the twenty-third century, right? Just before Old Earth’s biosphere collapsed?”
Elanie sat up straighter. “She was more than just a pop star.”
“Sorry,” I said at the snap in her voice. “Tell me about her.”
She settled back into a comfortable position. “I didn’t even know who she was until I watched her episode ofBehind the Starsa few years ago with Sunny and the twins. But she was a genius. She was immensely talented and often misunderstood. She was also a prisoner for most of her life. Her career, her finances, her choices were controlled by others. By her parents and her agent, even by the courts when she was placed in a conservatorship. But she spent years fighting for her freedom, and she never gave up.”
“Did she win?”
“Eventually,” she said. “And she spent the rest of her life fighting for the freedom of others in the same position. Her story was inspiring to me. But it was also terrible, in a way.” Even though it was warm in the cave, she shuddered. “She had done nothing wrong, and the people around her stole her freedom anyway. They made her work, made her sing, made her tour until she was sick. They treated her like she owed them something just for existing. Like they owned her.” She stared into the fire. “I’m not supposed to think this, but nobody should be owned by anyone else. Beings should not be property.”
Not even bionicswas the part she didn’t need to say. Was this how she felt? Purchased? Owned? Like she was serving out a life sentence to LunaCorp that she’d done nothing to deserve? If so, she wasn’t wrong.
I hated how sad she looked. I hated that I didn’t know what to say to make her feel better. I wanted to reach through the flames and take her hand, let her know that I understood. But I didn’t understand. Not really.
“I don’t know if you’re aware of this,” I said. “But there are virtually no bionics on my planet.”
“Yes, I know.” She rolled her eyes. “Portisans hate bionics.”
“What?” I said, shocked. “We do not hate bionics.”
“Of course you do. It’s well-known that Portisans can’t stand us. I could tell at our first visit that you didn’t like me.”
“Saints,Elanie.” My heart sank, landing somewhere near my stomach. “I have never not liked you.”I liked you too much, I thought. More than I should have. Probably more than I should now.
“Do you mean that?” she asked, a brow rising.
“Of course I do.”
She crossed her arms over her chest. “Then youreallyneed to work on your bedside manner.”
When I burst into laughter, she grinned at me. It was transcendent, her flushed cheeks, the way her hand covered her mouth even though there was nowhere to hide in this cave.
“The truth,” I said, “is that Portisans are intimidated by bionics.”
She frowned. “You can’t be serious.”
“It’s true. I’m used to knowing what the beings around me are thinking and feeling. When I first met you, it wasjust…silence. And for a Portisan, emotional silence is uncomfortable.”
Like they did when she was upset, her shoulders inched toward her ears. “So being with me is uncomfortable for you?”
“Only at first,” I said quickly. “And that was my fault, not yours. I didn’t know if I could be a good doctor without empathy. I was worried I wouldn’t be able to help you. I’m still not sure that I did. The thing is, though, because I didn’t grow up around bionics, I don’t know much about you. I mean, I know what the Vnet has to say. But only about 50 percent of that information is accurate—even after the Vox Accords.”
“Fifty-two point six,” she corrected while wiggling her toes in the fire’s warmth.
I was happy to see they were already healed.
“With my empathy,” I said, “I know, at least emotionally, certain things about other species. I know that Argosians struggle with self-worth since they equate their success with the size of their crops. I know that Delphinians don’t entirely trust reality after their planet passed through that rogue temporal eddy five hundred years ago. I know that New Earthers are still addicted to conflict even after it nearly destroyed their planet. But I don’t know what it’s like to be a bionic. I don’t know what it’s like to beyou.”
“I didn’t know that about Delphinians.” She played with the ends of her hair. “But that explains why bionics designed with Delphinian DNA have coincidence amplifiers installed in their temporal lobes. I always figured it was so they’d be willing to believe in magic.”
