Page 77 of Elanie & the Empath
“It did not work the way they wanted, though. They did not like the camaraderie that developed between bionic families. We formed our own bonds. We formed communities. The programmers did not like this. LunaCorp liked this even less. After my generation, all bionics were given unique genetic sequences, independent programs, directives to avoid attachments.”
I thought of my own desire to detach, my reluctance to get to know anyone in my life on any deep level. I remembered how hard Sunny had fought to break through my barriers, to be my friend. I’d taken it for granted. I wouldn’t make the same mistake here on Thura.
“I would like to have seen my family one last time. But Gol took them all away when they became too weak to follow their programming. He did not want me to be sad. I am grateful to Gol. Because I am not sad.” His lips wobbled before hitching back up again. “It is good to be a Thuran.”
“You like living here?” I asked, stopping to bury my nose in the petals of an enormous white flower that smelled like melon and honey. “You’re happy?”
He stopped to sniff a flower too, a green puffball with bright orange spikes. One that, if his flinching grimace was any indication, didn’t smell as sweet as mine. “It is very nice,” he said. “But I do get lonely sometimes. I do not have many friends. The newer generation bionics do not spend much time with me. I think they find me too robotic. I do not look like the rest of you. I am different.”
Sliding my hand over his elbow joint, his titanium shell cool and smooth under my fingers, I said, “I don’t have many friends either. And I think you look just fine.”
“Why do you not have many friends? You have very nice skin and pretty hair. If not for your eye-blink speed, nobody would even know you were a bionic.”
“My what?” My mouth hung open. “What’s wrong with my eye-blink speed?”
He made a raspy, digital sound I thought might be his version of laughter. “Non-bionics take one-hundred milliseconds or longer to blink, on average. You blink in ninety-two milliseconds, on average. It is a dead giveaway.”
When I just stood there silently, surprised that I’d never noticed this discrepancy, his eyes shuttered closed.
“I have been timing your blinks.” He shook his head. “I am sorry. That is not a normal thing to do.”
“It’s okay,” I said with a laugh. “And I don’t know why I don’t have many friends. But I do know that I’d like to have more of them.”
“I will be your friend,” he said as the sun rose over the dome, orange light glinting off the angular curves of his shoulders. “If it is okay with Dr. Semson, that is.”
“He won’t mind. But I’m sure he’d like it if you called him Sem.”
Mal patted my hand with his. “Then we are friends. You and me. This makes me happy.”
“Me too,” I said, and when I tiptoed back into our hut thirty minutes later, I realized that it was true. I was happy here.
Nothing Mal told me about Thura was suspicious, no secrets or schemes. No devious plans. It was just a safe place for bionics to live freely. And even though his right eyebrow had twitched when I asked him if non-bionics had ever lived here freely too—Yes, he’d said; long ago—I had no reason to doubt him.Just like Sem will have no reason to doubt me when I tell him I want to stay.
Sem, who, along with Grover, hadn’t moved from the position I’d left him in.
Quietly, I slid back into bed, pulling Sem’s arm back over my waist. And just when I’d closed my eyes, he asked, “Where did you go?”
“Out walking with Mal.” I kissed his cheek. “I think I’ve made a new friend.”
Sem grinned, about to say something when Grover stood up tall on his back, filled his furry chest with air, wrenched his beak open wide, and crowed.
“Sweet merciful Saints!” Sem cried, shooing Grover off his back. “How does he keep getting louder?”
When Grover jumped onto the sill and crowed again, I climbed out of bed and shooed him out through the window. “No crowing in the hut,” I called after him while he scampered into his favorite happle tree. Hanging from a branch by his tail, he scowled at me. “Don’t look at me like that, Grover. You know the rules.”
I turned back around, and Sem was sitting up, staring at me. His lips were parted, breaths shallower than usual, faster too.
“Don’t move,” he said, his voice still low and gravelly from sleep. “Don’t move a muscle.”
I stood in a beam of sunlight, a golden glow illuminating my breasts, slipping over my stomach.
Staring at me, he crawled to sit on the end of the bed. “You are so breathtakingly beautiful, Elanie. I can’t believe there was a time when I didn’t know you. I can’t believe I spent so many years existing without you. No wonder I wasn’t happy then. No wonder I was searching.” His lips hitched at one corner. “The most wonderful thing in my life hadn’t happened to me yet.”
“Sem,” I said with a sigh that felt like my bones exhaling. “Do you really mean that?”
He curled his fingers, beckoning me closer. “Come here.”
I went to him, straddling his lap. And when I looped my arms around his neck and gazed into his eyes, silver threads dancing in a sea of blue, I knew we’d be okay. Because I knew that this thing between us was real.
