Max was a little surprised at how at-ease she felt. Despite the awkwardness in the restaurant, Hiro had been pretty pleasant company, and it hadn't felt like he was just trying to hit her up - and given that he evidently didn't know she used to be a guy, it couldn't just be written off as him being too weirded out by that to try. It was a relief for her - she had worried that he was going to...to ask her out or something, but it hadn't been like that...they just got to hang out. He'd even brought his little sister - he wouldn't have done that if he were trying to ask her on a date, would he?
No. She still wasn't sure if and when she should tell him that she used to be a guy (which would be more awkward? She wasn't sure,) but things hadn't been anything like what she was afraid of. And she felt relieved and relaxed in that knowledge. But she did feel bad about what had happened...
"I'm sorry they treated you like that," she said, trying to keep pace with the cyborg's steady strides.
He shrugged. "...can't be helped, I guess," he said. "I guess they figure I'm unsafe because I look scary." He didn't mention that maybe they weren't entirely unjustified - he had, after all, let Julian use him for his own purposes for way too long - but he didn't think that bringing that up was likely to make a good impression on the cat-girl.
Max frowned. "Do you really think you're that scary?" she asked. She never had gotten an answer on how he felt about this, they'd gotten interrupted before he could say...
"I dunno," Hiro shrugged. "I mean, look at me. I'm not even that fond of it myself, I can see why they feel that way about it."
"It's...it's not that bad!" Max protested. She stopped there; she wasn't actually sure how she felt about it herself and had no idea how she'd support the argument if he asked for a reason, it just seemed like a shame for him to be so down on it. Admittedly, she had mixed feelings about her own change, but she didn't think it was understandable for people to act like she was a freak just because she'd been changed into...into this...
Hiro shrugged noncommittally, but she could just see a hint of a smile. "Thanks," he said.
Hawkins pulled up the car about a block down from the house they were headed to. It wasn't that he was too worried about standing out - it was a nondescript black sedan, but not the kind of late-'70s land yacht that got the general public thinking "Men in Black" - but Cecilia had requested that they not go up to the house in person right off.
"Well, here we are," he said. "Something you're waiting for, before we go talk to the person we came to see?"
Cecilia chuckled. "Easy, Nate," she said. "I want to see if I can get ahold of her first. If she's a minor, I don't want her parents to think that the cops are paying a visit, if it turns out that she doesn't know anything after all." She focused on the local wireless traffic - the good thing about having multiple antennae was, she could triangulate a signal and figure out which networks belonged to which houses...
The masked man shrugged and settled back in his seat to wait. It was sure getting dark early, he mused. But then, the year was drawing on, so it wasn't really a surprise. He supposed it was a blessing for the unchanged, having longer hours in which they could be safe...they'd even passed a busload of unchanged students on their way to school on the way here. He wondered how Jenny and Riley were getting along...they must have gotten there by now...
It had been a pretty quiet afternoon for Mikey. No school on a Saturday, Jon and Karyn were off somewhere hanging out with each other, Becca was holed up in her room (well, it had used to be the guest room, but it was pretty much her room, now,) as was Zoe, and none of her friends had come over. Even her digital fairies had gone off into the wilds of the Internet to do something or other. That wasn't necessarily bad, she liked a little peace and quiet now and again, but for some reason it did feel a little preternaturally quiet to her. Probably it was just the shorter days getting to her - or did that only affect biological creatures? She wasn't sure.
At any rate, she was interrupted by a blip of network traffic - a short message broadcast to all nodes on her family's wireless network. She was a little confused at first - wasn't she the only AI on the network? And none of the computers in the house should be broadcasting messages like that - not unless they'd come down with something. But she checked the contents all the same, careful to keep it in an area of memory where it couldn't be executed.
Looking for an M. Madison. Would like to talk with you about your story on Emergence.
Mikey gasped - someone had managed to track her to her home from information she'd had on the Internet? That was a little frightening...but if they just wanted to talk...
Hi, she responded. You mean the time difference thing? I don't know that much about it, I just wanted to see if anybody else noticed it.
Gotcha, came the response. But even so, even if you weren't the first person to notice it, you were at least the first one to notice it clearly enough that you thought it was worth making a post about. Was there something that clued you in?
Mikey bit her lip - what had clued her in was that peculiar feeling of Becca having shared her secret before, when it'd actually only happened just recently...that wasn't exactly something she could go around telling random strangers. Maybe if she left out the details...but even then it was a story that indicated more than just some kind of slippage of the internal clocks of a bunch of robot-changed... How was it that what seemed like only unusually strong deja vu could coincide so neatly with a case of missing time in her internal systems? But not that neatly, only sixteen seconds were "missing," not nearly enough for what she felt must have happened to have happened...what was going on here? Suddenly she wanted to be the one asking the questions, but she doubted this stranger knew more than her...
...and anyway, what could she tell them? If she was going to share what she could, she'd have to be careful so as not to let on about Becca...
Ricky glanced around the library, but the girl in the strange clothes seemed to have left. Why had nobody else noticed? She wasn't hanging back, and in an outfit like that, as colorful and unusual as it was...it seemed odd that nobody else would have noticed her, or even heard her speak to him. And...and she herself seemed surprised that he could see her...was she some kind of changed, that was normally invisible? The possibility was kind of tantalizing...but what if she'd just made herself invisible again to mess with him? He thought again of that crazy angel-chick - were they in league?
Nervously, he finished his reading and left the library, wondering if any other surprises were in store for him. The halls were pretty quiet at the moment, which was a bit of a relief - he'd be able to see anything coming a ways off. He made his way over towards his next class, keeping his head down and trying not to be noticed.
"You shouldn't say things you don't mean, you know."
He nearly jumped out of his skin. Looking around, he spotted the speaker - a girl around his age, lanky and bespectacled, heavily freckled, with unkempt short blonde hair. She was fairly flat-chested for her age, so it wasn't too difficult for him to look like he wasn't staring - besides, he was still rattled from the surprise.
"Wh-what are you talking about?" he asked.
"What you were saying to Jeff," she said. "That's not how you think of the changed at all." There was a strange sort of intensity in her eyes; he almost got the feeling that she was looking into him. But that probably had more to do with the fact that - that she knew!
"Wh-who t-t-told you!?" he hissed, trying to keep from yelping it aloud. Did...did she really know? Had Julian told people? Had she seen him looking at...at this newest picture?
She laughed. It wasn't exactly a merry laugh, but it wasn't cold or dismissive. It felt like she couldn't believe he was surprised. "I saw the look in your eyes when he was talking about the mermaid," she said. "It was written all over your face, to anybody who understands what to look for."
He blushed. "I...look, it's not that I..." Dammit, he couldn't think of a decent counter-argument...I'm not really weird! he wanted to say, but every way he could think of to say it would only reinforce that he was...
"Relax," she said. "I won't tell. But you're not going to get anywhere pretending to be an asshole like Jeff, and you know you don't mean it. Lots of people don't mind the changed. Some of us...even have a more active interest in them." She leaned in closer to him, her voice a conspiratorial whisper. "You're not as alone as you think you are," she said.
Ricky's blush only intensified. Did...did she mean...that she...? Or...no, that was too out-there. Maybe she just meant... "Are...are you thinking of...of going into the Sun?" he asked.
She laughed. "Oh no. My mom would kill me. I don't think she has anything against the changed, but she doesn't want me just abandoning my humanity for the sake of it, or something. Besides...my interest is more in others than in being changed myself. I'm Anne, by the way."
His mind boggled. "R-R-Ricky," he said. Did she really mean that she had the kind of interest he did in the changed? It sounded like that was what she was saying...maybe not to the same extent, but still, the idea that there were other people like him out there, even just this gawky nerd-girl...he briefly wondered if maybe he should share his picture with her, as a sort of show of friendship, but maybe that wouldn't go over well...dammit, he was no good with this kind of stuff...and anyway, if Razor had taken that without the mermaid knowing, maybe she would have a problem with that, like the crazy angel-chick...other people made this all so complicated! He just wanted to enjoy this kind of exotic beauty, was that so wrong!?
But he realized he was losing his train of thought, and he didn't want to look like some kind of drooling moron in front of the only other person he knew who shared some measure of his interest in the changed. He tried to focus on looking her in the eye - but that was kind of awkward, because of that piercing gaze she had... "Are you?" she asked. It felt like she was searching him...
"N-no!" he said. "I..." His first instinct was to deny everything, to pretend that he had never even had thoughts of that kind, that he was completely normal...but then, he didn't have to do that with this girl, did he? But it was true... "I...don't wanna risk it," he said. "There's a whole lotta stuff that could happen, and only some of it that I think I might like..."
Anne nodded. "S'pose so," she said. "Still...even a lot of people with weird or awkward changes seem to be doing all right. You might have better odds than you think."
"Do...do you talk with them?" he asked. "They...will they talk about it?"
"Of course!" she said. "They're people too, they can still talk!" Then she frowned slightly. "But not if you get too nosy or...personal," she said. "You gotta respect them like anybody else."
Ricky wasn't sure how he felt about that - it wasn't as though he'd expected them to even want to talk to him to begin with, but when the possibility had been raised, the thought of all the things they could tell him, about what the experience was really like...but no, that would be...too personal, he guessed. Too weird. Only they would ever really know what it was like to be changed...
Anne glanced down, then eyed him intently. "Hey," she said. "What's up with your hand?"
