What Was Then

“You forgot these,” teased Kōrō the next day during lunch, holding up her shoes tied by the laces.

“Thank you.” Himeko laughed, welcoming the reprieve from her own thoughts about what her cube self had said.

“Don’t mention it,” he said slyly, passing her shoes. She put them in her bag after dusting them off, and when she went to wear them, she found a curled-up slip with Kōrō’s phone number in it.

✦✦✦

Himeko didn’t speak to herself for the rest of the week. She got caught up with everything and everyone in her new life, from her intense coursework in university to a crash course on ballet choreography. She walked with Hengawa and Kōrō to and from the station every day, hung out with Hanami at lunch, went back and forth with Gakugi, and pestered Dr. Nakamura for a great deal of things he readily provided for her. It was remarkably uneventful even if her own thoughts were not, and she thought it would remain that way until Dr. Nakamura stopped her as she got home on Friday.

“Would you like to go to your old home this weekend?” he asked, voice soft as he sipped his amber drink from a squat glass cup. He was leaning against the wall of the narrow corridor out of the foyer.

Himeko stopped walking forward. Her bag slipped from her hands and landed on the floor with a thump. She stared at the scientist. “What?”

“You mentioned your old home and the old park before, and it’s your first weekend back. Neither of us our busy, so it might be a good chance to go see it if you still want to.”

“I think I want to, but I’m not sure if I should.” She clasped her hands together without thinking, looking down. “It isn’t my home to go back to. Not anymore.”

“But it was once, wasn't it?” asked Dr. Nakamura. Himeko heard him place his cup on the counter, startled as he put his hand on her shoulder. “It might be good to visit the people you left behind back then.”

She looked up at him, shrinking beneath his intense gaze, and sighed. Dr. Nakamura offered her a smile as he softened his expression. “If you don’t want to go, Himeko, then we don’t have to. It’s only an offer.”

“I’m not sure. Can I have some time to think about it?”

“Of course, although if we’re planning to go tomorrow, then I’ll need to know by tonight. Now,” said the scientist, letting her go and picking up his glass as he sat on the sofa. A hologram manifested in front of him, cutting the living room in half with how large it was and wobbling as Himeko passed through it to join him. “What do you want for dinner?”

✦✦✦

A cold spring wind tousled Himeko’s hair, making her shiver despite the jacket she wore, as she and Dr. Nakamura walked. It wrestled newborn green leaves from their tender branches and scattered them atop the myriads of wildflowers. Himeko shivered again, the cold seeping into her skin causing her to pull her jacket taut around herself before she looked at the scientist, gritting her words out. “I wish you hadn't given me the ability to feel temperature.”

Dr. Nakamura chuckled. “Sorry about that, but it does have a practical purpose.”

“I know, I know, but does that purpose outweigh me freezing? I don't think so.”

“Haha, if it's really too much we can temporarily disable that part of your haptic system.”

“You can do that? Really?”

“Yes, and I’ll show you, but you must promise me to turn it back on soon.”

Himeko nodded vigorously. “I will.”

Stopping, Dr. Nakamura turned around. “Remove your jacket, please. Since I wanted it to be easy for you to access without impeding your daily life or alienating you further, the master control button is located between your shoulder blades, or precisely at the top of your spine. Here, do you mind if I demonstrate?”

She shook her head, doing as he asked and turning her back towards him. Dr. Nakamura was quick as he pressed the button, and Himeko felt it ripple across her electric nerves. The skin of her right arm shifted into metal plating that opened at the grooves to reveal a board of small configuration buttons, none no bigger than a fingernail. Wires of pulsing liquid made up the majority of the space behind the buttons. When her nails skimmed their surface, tiny bands of light rolled across their surface.

“This is your configuration panel. I will explain what all of them do, should you want, but never, ever mess with them unless you know what you’re doing. Many of these buttons could render this body completely immobile at best and kill you at worst – and I don't know if I can bring you back from that. Do you understand, Himeko?”

“I do.” She whispered, still enraptured by each and every button. She knew her body was a modern marvel, a fine-tuned mix of machine and human, but it seemed to stray closer to human by design than machine if she didn’t observe her joints. This, however, was so obviously inorganic that she should’ve been uneasy and distraught, but her mind only whirled with excitement.

This was her body, she thought. And, in this moment, it was beautiful.

Dr. Nakamura’s hand hovered above a button whose surface was half red and half blue. “This is the button. Press it, and then close your arm. It’ll snap right back into place with no input from you. We went through rigorous testing to make it as simple as possible. Go ahead and press it.”

Himeko obliged. The effect was instantaneous. A void enveloped her body. Her hands scrapped her skin, and she shuddered. Without the sensation of temperature, touch was unfathomable and alien, like she had lost a core piece of what defined a living organism. She hated it, and with a flick of her finger, all of the bitter cold of spring rushed back over her. The panel closed with a soft pop.

“You don’t want to do it after all?” asked Dr. Nakamura as they started walking again.

“Nope,” Himeko said, popping the ‘p.’ “I think I’m happier this way.”

✦✦✦

A lonely, dreary serenity clung to the Zaiyabōto house. Most of its once impressive grounds, only afforded because of Himeko’s position, had been stripped away in the last century to make room for the ever-encroaching developments of New Urania. Even the house’s fence, front yard, and ornamental pond her brother had loved so much didn't exist anymore. The tombstones the two of them had made for their parents were gone, too, and Himeko wasn't sure how she felt about that, even if there were never any bodies to be disturbed beneath them.

“Are you ready, Himeko?” Dr. Nakamura asked. “You don't have to if you’re having second thoughts.”

“I think I need to.” She replied, trudging ahead.

Her footsteps echoed as she opened the door, dropping a handful of coins in the automated system of entry, and she looked around.

It was just like she remembered, though now instead of just being a home, a few cameras had been placed at various angles and hologram infographics were poised to launch into their information the second one strayed too close to their exhibit. They detailed everything about her life, until piece by piece Himeko felt exposed.

It was like any house in New Urania. It wasn't special. Yet…

“There’s no one else here,” Himeko noted.

“Forgive my presupposition,” said Dr. Nakamura, lingering at the door. “I arranged it with the Madam Nahaku. I figured you may want to be alone.”

“I…don’t know.”

The first place she stopped was her own bedroom. Her once-beloved items were glued and tacked into place, framing in panels upon panels about her interests. There wasn't a speck of dust out of place, nor any stray clothes or hastily hidden toys from her childhood sticking out from the cracks and crevices like they once did. A photograph of herself and her brother still sat on the nightstand, and melancholy flooded her thoughts as she recalled the last time that she'd held that photo, the morning that she and the cube had melded into one.

Himeko looked at it. Back then, she and her older brother had the same nose and rosy, idealistic cheeks. Their hair swooped the same way, they were the same height, and that hollow sadness in their eyes was shared between them. They were children of war, left haggard and afraid with the responsibility to prevent another in a city full of children and adults like them, and Himeko had left him alone.

They were both that and scientists, but he was the only one who had ever been anything more.

Leaving the room, she drifted through the rest of the house. She didn’t stop for longer than a few minutes in most rooms, only giving them enough time to lightly reminisce, yet found herself in front of where she knew her brother’s room was. A holographic electronic lock hovered over it, red and imposing, and ‘fell’ to the side once Himeko entered the master password. Strange that it too, like the building that housed it, hadn’t changed once in all the time since she’d last left it.

Himeko couldn’t bring herself to enter. How much had changed since she passed? How much would it hurt to see the life lived without her? How much had her brother’s life grown when she wasn’t around? Her heart felt hollow as she pushed the door open.

It was as simple as it had always been. Clean linen and neatly kept trinkets brought about a feeling that this was only temporary, that its owner would soon be back, that over one hundred years hadn’t passed since it was last used. On the nightstand were two rings next to a photo. Himeko picked it up.

It was her brother and a woman with curly brown hair next to him. Three young adults surrounded them, and they all looked so…happy. Himeko put the photo down, choking out a sob as she sank onto the bed, and covered her face with her hands to catch the tears that followed.

✦✦✦

A tall young woman stood on the hill of Zaiyabōto Park, facing the house at its foot. Her hair, a fiery orange flame that descended her back, whipped around her in the breeze. She wore a heavy black coat, and her tangerine eyes caught the glint of the sun. With one arm across her chest to hold her elbow, she held her chin, tapping her tan, manicured fingers against her cheek in controlled excitement. This would be her first real look at her.

The scientist and the android girl left together after a while, and she examined her nails as she watched them.

“The Takamagahara Protocol, ‘bringing heaven to earth.’ Necessary for our future, and the thing granting the Madam and by extension you two so much power,” she said, a mocking edge to her voice. “Do you really think that means the two of you are from the consequences, Kōji Nakamura?”