Chapter 7

It was late when Eva and I walked back to our cabin, chatting about string theory on the way. I really missed our late-night chats and was happy that things were back to the way they were before we got interrupted earlier. We got in, and Eva sat on my bed, but rather than reaching for her pad to show me the research she had mentioned before, she went quiet. I looked at her concerned.

“What happened?”

She looked away and sighed.

“I guess… I am just tired. It was a long day.”

“I can give you a massage,” I said softly, putting my hands on her shoulders.

She didn’t object, but her body felt tense under my touch.

“Relax, I am familiar enough with your anatomy to do it”, I reassured her.

She chuckled at my words, and her body slowly relaxed. She sighed and let her head drop to her chest as I sat behind her and slowly rubbed her neck. It was so nice to be able to do something else for her than working on an algorithm that would shorten the time required for the recalibration of the scanners, I thought as my hands glided down her back.

“If you lie down, I can give you more.”

She tensed again and said quietly, “I… I am almost falling asleep, another time… ok?”

She got up and went to her bed, leaving me startled by her reaction. Had I forgotten to include something important in my analysis before I decided to take this course of action? My systems reached full capacity and told me that I hadn’t accounted for the effects of the sudden relaxation on Eva’s physiology. So her behaviour was absolutely normal, I told myself, feeling relieved as I lay down.

Eva stirred in her bed and said quietly, “Thank you, Rea”, before turning off the light.

I booted my systems early the next morning and left our cabin while Eva was still sleeping. I always tried to give her some privacy when she woke up. She really didn’t like to interact with anyone before she’d had her coffee, and my systems didn’t need as much rest as the human brain, so leaving early was a habit that we had established soon after we came to the station.

Even if it was so early, my systems worked at full capacity. I worked through my shift, part of my processing power delegated to figuring out what Sven had wanted from me. He had asked me yesterday if I could help him with something after work as a payment for the drawing he’d done for me, but he never said what it was, claiming it was a secret. The delegated processing didn’t affect my work, but it left me feeling restless. Analysing the data from the scanners was more monotonous than difficult, unless, of course, I found what we were looking for in the endless stream of data. In that case, I would need my full capacity to ensure we didn’t have false positives and started to celebrate prematurely, as we had done last time. I remembered how disappointed Eva had been back then, and I wanted to ensure it would not happen again. I never liked not knowing something, especially when it concerned myself, and right now I had more unpredictability than I could handle.

I couldn’t figure out what Sven wanted, but my systems were predicting with 95% accuracy that whatever it was, it would not affect me negatively in any way. So maybe it wasn’t so bad that he hadn’t told me, I thought. At least I didn't have any processing power left to try to solve Eva’s anomalous behaviour yet again. That would leave me unsettled and confused, as it always did, while Sven’s mystery was more of an academic nature, which probably would not have any impact on reality.

Eva left for the gym earlier than usual, but I attributed this change to her erratic workload and didn’t pay much attention to it. Maybe she would be tired in the evening, and I could give her another massage, I thought. There was an 87% chance that she would need it again. I should definitely do some research so I could perform it properly before I tried it again. My understanding of the human anatomy was basic, but I could spend my lunch break studying it deeper.

I smiled and brought my focus back to the stream of data displayed on my holo screen, still remembering how soft her skin had felt under my hands and how nice it felt to be able to do something for her.