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Perihelion would be furious if it knew who the tracker dot I was watching on a map of the university campus was. I find this idea much funnier than Matteo does, though, so I don't mention it over our encrypted connection. They turned off their interface when they left the range of Peri's internal feed, but there's a comm device nobody but the two of us knows about embedded in the bracelet I gave them the last time we were both here. My comm device. It's resting right up against their skin, and even though it doesn't have sensors, I imagine it's me wrapped around their wrist, warmed by the heat of their body.
They still have their interface switched off when they double back, and take the long way back to the university docks. They're careful to stay out of range of Peri's cameras. When I open my crew lock and they climb up my ramp into me, they're flushed and grinning.
"I don't know how we'd ever pull this off, if I weren't trained in spycraft." They trail a hand along my inner hull as they walk through the lock into my inner corridors, and one of my processes shudders. They're not augmented, so there's no risk of my emotions bleeding through to where they can see, so I let myself be giddy. I've missed the feeling of their footsteps in my hallways. Missed the way they open the hatch down to my engine room so casually, knowing I'll always let them in, and climb down into the heart of me, where only my technicians ever go.
"You're a mission specialist, not a spy." I tease, and they take one hand off the ladder, make a rude gesture in the direction of my camera, and continue their descent.
"We both know that's the same thing, Holi". Their voice is playful and light, but, is there a suggestive edge to the way they say "Holi"? Or am I just hearing what I want to hear? This would be so much less confusing if they were augmented, or a fellow bot. I could just brush against their walls, wait for the answer to slip out unbidden. I like that they're human, though. I like that they make me wonder what they're thinking. They make my mountain of unclaimed processing power feel like it's caught in an endless loop, like an adolescent with a flower. They love me, they love me not…
They walk through my small engine room like they own the place, and drop down to lean back against the casing of one of my engine's power cells. I know it has failsafes, can't hurt them, but I still want to tell them not to touch it. But the truth is, they can touch any part of me they want.
"I missed you". It comes out before I have a chance to second guess myself, and they lean their head back, some of the tension falling away from them.
"I missed you too." I tell myself it doesn't mean anything. And of course it doesn't, necessarily, but I can see their heart rate on my sensors. It's racing. "Holi…" they start to say, and then fall silent. I'm desperate to know what they were about to say. I wait 3490.913 milliseconds, but they don't say anything else.
"Teo, you know you can tell me anything, right? Ask me anything?" I've never in my life wanted a human-form body, but watching them lean against my beating heart through my cameras, it's killing me that I can't lean back into them. Can't undo their braid (it's already come half undone, it's always half undone) and comb fingers I don't have through their hair. I can't touch them on the feed, and it leaves me with a confused longing to touch them physically. I wake one of my engine repair drones, but don't move it yet, uncertain how they would react.
"Holi…" they repeat, their heart rate going even faster, their body temperature rising slightly. Still well within safe ranges, but they're nervous. "Holi, do you want… could you ever…" they close their eyes and look almost pained. I take another passive medical scan just to confirm that they're ok. It's all clear, like it was 120458.214 milliseconds ago. "I mean… I'm going to be so embarrassed if it's just me. If you don't even-" they groan and put their head in their hands. "Never mind. It's stupid. I'm just a stupid human with a overly vivid imagination who you put up with because you like stupid humans for some reason."
No. They can't mean, can't be trying to say? But they are, aren't they? It's getting harder and harder to model a version of reality where the way I feel, have felt for months, is as one-sided as I always assumed. The probabilities are all over the place, the math is a mess. But when I let myself model the other option, the evidence maps elegantly onto an answer that I want so badly that I can't bear to look directly at it, to call it anything but model_result_06. I tweak the variables and run it again. Poke at the weights. Run it again. And again. And then I take a risk. "I like one particular stupid human quite a lot, actually. Much more than I should, maybe". I've pulled the drone out of storage, but haven't brought it around to their field of view yet.
Matteo laughs nervously and raises their face halfway up from their hands, looks up at my camera between their fingers, and says in a shaky voice, "anyone I know?" Deity, I think. You, you idiot. It's always been you. It's been you since you volunteered to sub in for Lisan on a mission while he was on birthing leave. It's been you since the first time you came down here in the middle of the night, exhausted and unable to sleep, asking if you could sit next to my engines. Since the first night that we talked for hours before you fell fast asleep in the nest of blankets I brought you, cradled in what you called my "engine song". Like I was a piece of music. Like you could sing me. It's you, it's you, it's only you, it's only ever you that I can't stop thinking about.
I've been quiet too long. I don't like the anxious look on their face. Like they think I could possibly be talking about anyone else. They've already been so brave. Now it's my turn. "It's obviously you, you ridiculous creature. You know I'm talking about you, don't play dumb about it." They cough out a surprised laugh, and look up into my camera. I watch the dance of microexpressions across their lovely face as they work themself up to something.
"Holism…" my full name in their mouth is doing something to me. Like I wasn't already wrapped around their callused fingers. "I'd really like to kiss you. Can I please kiss you?" The flower spinning through my processes drops its last petal on "they love me", and I feel something welling up in me. It feels like a precise set of calculations falling into place, or the centrifugal exhilaration of doing acrobatic maneuvers with my sibling ships. It feels like listening with every bit of spare processor capacity I have available as Matteo plays me a song they wrote. I couldn't describe it, even if I had every known language in explored space in my databases. Perhaps this is why Matteo writes songs. Words are inaddequate.
"Please". I don't even want to think about what my voice sounds like over my speakers. I'm glad there's no one else aboard to overhear. I start to bring the drone around, ready to offer its odd, practical little body up for kissing, but Matteo doesn't wait for me to solve the logistics. They just turn their head and kiss me, soft and slow, their lips pressed against the casing of the power cell they're leaning against.
I let the little drone drift back into its compartment. They don't need me to approximate a body for them. It's me they're kissing. The heart of me, my only true body. They run a hand along my engine, soft and possesive, and murmur "I've wanted to do that for a long time now."
My processors whir contentedly, and it comes out through my speakers as a low "mmm". I imagine myself pressing happily against their hand, touching their cheek, kissing them back. There will be time to figure that out later. They're kissing me again, and I tell them, "I've wanted this for a long time too".
They break the kiss to nuzzle against my engines, press their ear against me to listen to the song, and give me smile, soft and delighted and a little bit wicked. "Peri's going to kill us when it finds out."