Dancing In The Street

"...so I told her, you know what? I'm done. And I just... left. That was it. Bought a one-way ticket to Earth. Started a new life. And, you know what? It was easy. I never realized how easy it'd be to leave them behind until I did. It's not like they cared, either. I still look through their socials sometimes. They got a new singer in, what, a week? And now they're bigger than ever. It is what it is. Now I spend my days looking after these two nincompoops. Oh, yeah, Stella, did you tell them about the shop?"

Stella hadn't told them about the shop because Shigure's temper flared if someone farted in Saturn and because to shut Isla up was a futile endeavor. Once he'd walked into Mrs. Aoyama's home and greeted the concerned denizens with cat ears, he'd performed a hostile takeover. The scattered conversations had all come to an end. Now, there was only Isla. "No," she replied.

"Right! So, folks, this is the thing: see those lovebirds over there? One is a former underground boxer and the other one a veteran from the Last War."

Shigure drew in a breath. He wasn't the only one.

"Shocking, right? That's the thing about people—we only ever see the surface. Alas, these two lovebirds weren't able to escape prosecution... persecution... back on Earth. No matter where they went, who they became, they were never able to escape their past. That's why our rehabilitation program chose this neighborhood to finally grant them the happiness they deserve. Why? Because you, too, know what it's like to be ostracized! 'Cat ears? Seriously?' Yes, seriously. What's wrong with appreciating feline aesthetics? Why can't the world understand? Trust me, when I first found out about a neighborhood built exclusively for catg—feline type cyborg appreciators, I was stoked. I could not believe such a paradise existed. If I wasn't busy saving lives, I would've moved here. In any case, that's the story of these two. Broken, yet whole. They refuse to shatter. I'm sure you guys are the same."

Silence.

If Shigure wasn't sitting down already, he would've probably shattered. That's all he did. Shatter. If somebody farted in Proxima Centauri he collapsed into a mass of subatomic particles. As of now, he covered his face with both hands. Stella sat next to him. More than embarrassed, she was impressed at the sheer amount of tomfoolery that could leave Isla's mouth.

Mrs. Aoyama stood near the kitchen-living room divider. She did and said nothing. No one did or said anything.

So this was why Shigure had advised against revealing Stella's true nature...

...he should've advised Isla, too.

But Isla was his boss, kind of. (Stella still didn't know what Isla supervised, really.)

He should've known better. Then again, for someone who claimed to have run from his past—who'd assumed a new identity, even—, Isla sure liked talking about it.

Irina, who had been urinating, emerged from the small hallway leading to the bathroom. "What's wrong?" She asked. "Why's everyone silent?"

Shigure responded, "Because our social worker is extremely invasive." He no longer had his hands on his face. Where were they? His pockets, of course. The sniper stare was back, and it aimed straight at Isla. Oh no. "That's right, I did underground boxing for some time. I paid the fine years ago. It's no big deal. Stella was found in the sea by a co-worker, got repaired, then got forced into a program run by rich assholes who want to feel better about themselves."

Isla chihuahua-stared back. "It's working, isn't it?"

Shigure nudged his chin at Stella. "Is it?"

Stella had not been programmed to feel nervous. For an autonomous machine meant to fight in the front lines, such a response was, if anything, undesirable. Doubt? Fear? None of that. What was freer than to live unburdened by emotions? To live with, fight, and overcome them? To accept them? 

She was an expert liar by now. "Yes."

The slow head shake was even worse than The Stare. Meanwhile, Isla clapped once. Loudly. It startled three out of thirteen citizens, Irina, Asaba, and Mrs. Aoyama not included. "Ha! There you go. So, as I was saying, these two are looking for a new beginning. For those who haven't noticed, there's a relatively high amount of boxes stacked outside. Can anyone guess what they're for? Anyone?"

Silence.

There was a spy drone.

Stella watched it; it floated fifteen meters away from her current position.

Someone other than Isla—Asaba—finally spoke up. "They have like... food, right?"

"Correct! They're ingredients. Stella here is an excellent cook, so in order to get acquainted with the locals, she decided to bake everyone a pie. And I mean everyone. Who here enjoys peach pie?"

Asaba raised his hand, but no one else did, so then he lowered it.

"C'mon, don't be shy!"

Stella vaporized the drone. She was quaint about it, though; she fired a laser from the tip of her index finger. It whizzed right by Isla, a hanging decoration, the door, then the target to be eliminated. If not for the pssst, it might've gone by unnoticed. Now they were looking back at her.

All of a sudden, it made sense.

If she were to put herself in their shoes, went to a tea party to have a good time, then found herself hostage by a Jovian motor mouth, only to realize the party had two criminals, one of which could vaporize the snow globe on a whim, she'd probably be... afraid? And angry, maybe. "I'm sorry," she said. "There was a fly." She hadn't seen a single animal on the moon yet. "No. My bad. Dust particle. I must've confused it for one."

Great. Amazing! Dope. 

"I am not bad," she said. "Truly. I try to be good."

But this clearly fell on deaf ears which, honestly, applied to everything and everyone. Stella stood up. "Stella," Shigure warned, but she ignored him.

"Good day," she told the concerned denizens before she left.

It was a mistake and she knew it, but... so?

Stella vaporized the ingredients in front of her lawn. She'd deal with the ones on Tsukiko's house later, once the snow globe fell asleep, so she could clean the ashes. It was wasteful, but so was everything and everyone else. She didn't know how to lock the door without unnecessarily automated everything was, so she barricaded it with the fridge. 

Shigure called for her as he knocked. She turned her audio settings off after that. Moved all the furniture out of her room. Lay on its center. Watched the ceiling.

"What now?"

She couldn't hear herself talk, but she knew she had. The thing mimicking a brain transmitted the necessary instructions to the thing mimicking a mouth, and her voice receptors, which led to sound waves traveling through an artificial atmosphere that had probably been... what, transported? Entire tanks of oxygen, nitrogen and other gases, traveling from Earth...

"I don't like this world, Robert."

People living for centuries without aging. Humans getting cosmetic surgery to resemble animals. Growing crops on the moon.

"Everyone is too bad and crazy. I don't understand."

Nor did she want to understand.

"What will I do tomorrow?"

Or the day after tomorrow? A week from now? A century?

"What do I do?"

Objective: open a coffee shop.

"No."

Target: neighbors.

Conflict: herself.

Resolution: to stop.

"No."

Stella moved very, very careful, or her bun would fall apart.

Maybe she could find Robert's tomb and sit beside it for a century. If she was 'free', and if they prioritized her happiness, then what stopped her from doing so? 

All she had to do was find it.

But that might require connecting to the network...

Or reading through books...

She could also change her objective to baking pies and brewing coffee in a vacuum—literally. Upon preparing a big enough amount, she could toss them out. And if that wasn't allowed (so much for freedom or happiness) then she could dig holes on her lawn to bury the food there. Once she ran out of space, she'd dig deeper holes, deeper and deeper, until she reached the core of the moon, where she could throw pies and coffee forever, since they'd melt, and the matter requires to create these was insignificant compared to a ball thousands of kilometers across.

She could do all of that and have 'meaning'.

But did she want to?

"No. Yes."

Sentience was a curse. 

After a while, to exist was torture, so Stella went for a walk. Problem was, Shigure waited at the front stairs of her house. Stella didn't even think of using her infrared sensor until it was too late. Before he could speak, she shut the door, then barricaded it.

She used herself this time. Stella stared at the fridge for a meaningless amount of time. She leaned against the door, just like Shigure, at the other side. Neither of them spoke.