After a minute or two in the air, the two angel-girls dropped gently back to the ground. David could feel how Mark had enjoyed it, even though she was working hard to maintain her composure. For all the aloof attitude her "sister" had cultivated over the course of her life, there were five people who would always know exactly how she felt.
Mark walked over to the bench where she'd left the wine bottle and the remainder of the bread. She picked up the bottle and peered through the dark glass. "There's like two cups left in here," she said. "You want some?"
David frowned. "I...thought you were going to give it back?" she asked.
Mark shrugged. "To tell you the truth, I don't even remember where I got it from. And who returns a mostly-empty bottle? Besides, we already know it can't hurt you."
David hesitated for a moment, then sighed. "All right," she said. "But no more pretending to be divine just to get stuff, all right?"
Her twin sighed in annoyance. "Okay, okay. Here, find me my thermos cap." David rummaged through Mark's stuff that she'd brought along on community service, finding a thermos full of coffee, and removed the large outer cap.
She handed it over, and Mark poured it near to full and gave it back. Next her twin pulled out the remainder of the loaf and broke it in half. They paused briefly, then began to eat and drink.
It was something of an overpowering sensation, tasting the same things twice. David found it interesting that while she noticed more of the flavor and aroma of the wine, the sensation she got from Mark was more focused on the way it felt going down, and the kick the alcohol gave to it. Did their perceptions color the sensations they shared? Was that why Mark had mellowed out about the coffee on that first day of their change?
They sat in silence for a while, until David noticed that the emotions coming off Mark were increasingly glib and relaxed. She noticed a pleasant physical sensation, fully present in Mark and creeping in on her as well, and wondered if this wasn't an alcohol buzz. "I thought you said you didn't get drunk," she said.
Mark smiled lazily. "Hah, this isn't drunk," she said. "This is just all the nice stuff. I'm not impaired or anything. 'Course, that means that booze isn't going to make anything go away any more..."
David felt a sudden sadness as she heard this, and Mark turned to look at her as she picked it up. "Stop that," she said, annoyed. "You don't understand any of this."
David shook her head. "I-I'm not judging you or anything," she said. "You're right, I don't really understand. I just don't know what to think, is all."
Mark sighed. "Me neither."
David sat beside her "sister" and put an arm around her shoulder. Mark initially looked annoyed, but then her expression softened, and for the first time David could ever recall, she looked grateful.
Mikey sat at the lunch table, idly munching a piece of fried chicken. It was true that she didn't need to eat, but food still tasted good to her (well, as good as cafeteria food ever had, anyway,) and eating together was still an important part of bonding with people. And wasn't that why her parents wanted her to stay in school?
She looked around the table. Caitlin was there; unlike her, the statue-girl seemed to actually be hungry. Was this because she didn't have an internal power source like Mikey did? She pondered it for a moment, then moved on; so many things were working on different rules now, there was no telling how anybody's internals worked.
Bryan, on the other hand, seemed to run on more familiar rules. He was sipping large amounts of water and had chosen the sunniest table in the cafeteria for them, basking contentedly in the warm light. Mikey wondered how he got whatever nutrients plants needed; did he sleep in potting soil or something?
All three of them had noticed Sarah. The older girl had caused as much of a stir going to lunch as she had coming to class, and Caitlin and Bryan thought it was pretty cool that Mikey knew her. None of them were quite old enough yet to where a topless teenage girl was much more than an interesting sight.
"I dunno," Caitlin said, "I think it's kinda cool. Maybe I should try it..."
Mikey frowned. "Why would you?" she asked. "You've got hands, don't you?"
"Well, yeah," the marble maiden replied. "But it'd just be kinda neat, I think. Besides, there's lotsa statues with no clothes on! How would that be any different?"
The robot-girl shrugged. "I...dunno," she said. "I guess that's true. I still don't think clothes are such a big deal if you're not missing your hands, though."
Effie, meanwhile,was trying not to think of her experiment, as she played around with the editor she'd got from Amy. She wasn't having much success at the "not thinking of it" part, though. She was managing to avoid letting her notional hormones go wild again, but she couldn't stop thinking about the implications.
Was she really being so drastically changed by her new form that she didn't even like girls anymore? With this and with some of the other things she'd noticed...was her mind just a plaything of her new body? Did that have something to do with her form being interwoven in her code, so that her mind basically was her body, or was this something that afflicted other transformees?
Mikey certainly hadn't seemed very fazed by her new form, at least that Effie saw. Then again, it felt like Mikey was the sort of person who had never been too strongly defined by species or gender in the first place. Effie, on the other hand, had definitely been a heterosexual male in mind, but now...
Oh, why beat around the bush? She was attracted to guys. In a wild teenage hormonal sense, at the very least, and maybe on a deeper level as well. There, she'd said it, to herself. Now what was she going to do about it? If it was truly her body imposing this, she could fix it while she was changing her form, but she needed to really understand programming - and that could take years! Who knew what she'd be like by then!? But...what other options were open to her?
Jon arrived in the cafeteria after another stop by the bathroom to splash some cold water on her face. Karyn was in the pool room again, and Michael appeared to be out hunting. She could see Sarah sitting in the middle of the cafeteria; should she go sit with her? Or should she try getting to know some of her other classmates?
