Letters to an Android

by Wendy Rathbone

  Dear Liyan:

  Your amazing descriptions!

  I do not need haiku from you if you keep writing me in this way!

  What a breathtaking planet, a miraculous tour. I think the goddess in the lake stands out for me even more than the thunderlights. But I can hear them…or maybe I am hearing the rumbles of the spaceport here…and I can see the crane-hat of a lady rising from a mystic lake forever and ever.

  How fortunate I am to hear of the far-off alien world firsthand. A world where inhabitants lived as shortly as ten thousand years ago, only to vanish mysteriously into the night.

  I have my hotel and my green skies, a constant image to wake to. But then I have your waves.

  And I have my haiku which are like split-second dreams. Perhaps in those split-seconds I actually can travel faster than the speed of light to form my words based on either what I see, or maybe even what I dream. Or what you see and dream and then communicate.

  a flooded statue

  eyes downcast

  a goddess rising

  I would love to stand on the orange-cliff shores and observe so I could write more and more lines of the true experience. For now I will have to imagine it all, but thanks to your helpful waves it is easier.

  I await word on your lieutenant’s test results. Anxiously.

  Your friend,

  Cobalt

  *

  Dear Cobalt:

  I’m half-drunk writing this. Yes, we were celebrating, me, Lark, Tiri, Sekina and a few others.

  I passed the lieutenant’s test. I did very well. The captain himself ordered me to his office where he officially upgraded my rank. I have a pin and everything.

  Lark is technically still my boss but I was asked to work on the bridge four hours a day. It’s up front. Where discussions that affect the entire ship transpire, and the big decisions are made. You’d think it a breeze running a passenger and cargo liner. But it’s complicated and there are a lot of protocols to follow. It’s still called “paperwork” though there’s no paper involved. I will now add to my nav duties, doing quick updates and answer any questions, write reports on daily and long-term nav calculation programs that the computer runs.

  Right now my words to you face me on my wave-screen and they’re spinning.

  My eyes are aching. I don’t remember how much I really drank. I’m usually a person who measures and counts such things as glasses, if not bottles of alcohol. Not tonight. I really didn’t pay much attention. Euphoria is like being displaced from reality…and the body.

  Now I just need to tuck myself in and try to sleep. Although with my vision turning round and round I don’t know if I will fall asleep easily.

  Or maybe I’ll just pass out.

  I’m happy.

  And I miss you.

  Thank you for the goddess poem. More of that please.

  Your friend (and new lieutenant),

  Liyan

  *

  Dear Liyan:

  Congratulations are due. But I speak the truth when I say I had no doubts you would pass your tests and be promoted.

  Working in new areas of the starliner will be very exciting. I can imagine the thrill you most certainly feel. Your passion for this work shows. I know you aspire to have your own ship one day.

  I have no doubts this will happen for you.

  You are diving into your life full-force, now. You have made a home in a place of space. That is truly amazing.

  You have good friends who support you, always an important step in moving forward in life.

  I remember the boy in the bar asking for a glass of ice water, stars in his eyes, how exuberantly he embraced the idea of a conversation with me that ended in a promise he kept: to write me of his adventures wherever he went.

  I admit I was unsure if I really would hear from you.

  After we did connect, I was not sure how long the correspondence would last.

  Now I can’t imagine my life without it.

  Everything you go through is important to me.

  Again, congratulations.

  Your friend,

  Cobalt

  *

  Dear Cobalt:

  Thank you for that last letter.

  Your support means everything to me.

  My first day on the bridge, we passed within a respectable distance to a black sun. It is not black even though it is called that. It is a whirlpool of light.

  And I thought about how you said the stars were in my eyes.

  Truly, they are.

  I don’t miss the disks at the landing field, or the green-tinged fake moon of the port that is your indentured home.

  But I do miss you.

  I want to make a promise right now, no matter what, that I will always write to you on the wave. My life is full. Yes, I have friends and distractions. But when I am off-duty and go to my room and my personal screen there, I feel like I come home to you. You have been there for me for three years.

  It means so much.

  I am still coming down from the excitement of my promotion. Perhaps I will be for days. The boy you first met at Rory’s is still inside me, but tonight my thoughts stream high over the stars, over the very universe itself, and I am something ‘other’.

  Your friend,

  Liyan

  Part Four

  11. Third Meeting

  He waited by the gate, the android with the blue-washed hair and a black silk coat with tails.

  He watched the effervescent play of jungle-hued light from exhaust-swept, stale skies. The color today was belligerent.

  The shuttles lined up in the coiled tunnel. The force-field ate green flame.

  The diskships dotted the left side of the incoming coil, the triangleships flared to the right. Rockets rumbled, going right up through the middle.

  The flight landing programs, intricate and precise, never allowed for collisions. But it often seemed the ships passed right through each other, taking up space and time for one where there were two.

  Cobalt had written many haiku trying to describe this mirage. He felt he’d failed with every line.

  Today he watched with only one thought. Which was Liyan’s shuttle?

  The flight was late.

  People came and left. All strangers.

  Finally a triangle landed. A flock of people emerged. One all in white.

  Cobalt’s heart leapt.

  The hat he refused to wear hung from his belt. His hair shone, straight and thick, brown-green in the beaten tarmac light. He walked light on his feet and tall, not heavy as some passengers did after a long spaceflight. Among the group, he alone glowed. Or so it seemed to Cobalt’s eyes.

  This time Liyan did not approach looking lost, or grasp his hands, or hesitate. He simply moved upon him and took him, without a word, into a tight embrace. He did not let go until many seconds passed, confirming to Cobalt that the hug was authentic, a hungry connection, perhaps beyond mere ‘heartfelt’.

  Liyan smelled of intensity, electrical and sweet. His aura bristled warm and red.

  When he finally stepped back, despite the confidence of his approach, Liyan stuttered. “I missed…I missed…I missed you!”

  Cobalt laughed in a deep breath of release. He had no words.

  “I like that you are laughing at me. It’s okay,” Liyan said, and his grin was a man’s grin now, not a boy’s. At 25, his features had sharpened, but his eyes were still round and young. His body was slender but hard, thicker in the shoulders and chest. He’d gained weight. All muscle.

  The lieutenant first class of C&C Starlines met his eyes with confidence and said, “Where are you taking me to dinner this time?”

  Cobalt replied, his own happiness no doubt showing far too much teeth, “The Riviera.”

  “Never been. I’m starved.” Liyan clasped his shoulder as they turned for the exit that led into the port’s small town.

  “A lackluster meal aga
in on your shuttle flight?”

  “Most definitely.”

  It was as if they had never been parted since the last time Liyan had visited. Their ease with one another continued. A tremor of anxiety had haunted Cobalt for a few days as he wondered if they would meet more as strangers this time, both older, their time apart measuring in years. But their waves had only strengthened their bond. They both knew it. His worry had been only the result, perhaps, of caring too much.

  Everything about him, even his thoughts, warmed in Liyan’s presence. Liyan brought out powerful feelings in him, hope being one of the strongest. In a formerly bleak existence with no freedom, no rights, his future took on a different hue because Liyan was in it. Just one wave made his days better, lighter. Work was bearable simply because he had a friend.

  They could’ve taken a taxi to the restaurant. But Liyan said, “I want to walk. I see lots of planetfalls, but it’s never enough. When I am planetside or at a port, I always prefer to walk.”

  “Is the gravity all that different?”

  “No. And yes. It feels different. And the ship is large but still confined. And surrounded by space. That’s on the mind. I ignore it as much as possible.”

  Liyan had written little more about his fear in the past two years, but Cobalt never forgot his secret. He did not speak to his friends of his hollow, lost feelings. Navigation grounded him, he had said. Gave him target points of reference, headings, direction.

  “I love the confinement of the ship. I love calling it home,” he had written. That was all he needed to keep him going.

  Now they walked at a brisk pace under the cankering afternoon sky of the old asteroid port. The force-field flashed occasional white lines overhead reminding them they were protected, safe. The toxins at the very edges of the field were what made the port sky green. The air they breathed was, in truth, filtered, considered clean enough by health-net standards.

  “I don’t miss this place,” Liyan said with a smirk.

  Cobalt said, “I hope not.”

  “But you, Cobalt, I will come here to see you any time I am close by.”

  “I know.”

  “I hope you know that. I come to see you. Only you.”

  A faint blush heated the skin at his face. “I am not a goddess with a crane hat rising from a lake.”

  Liyan laughed. “Well, I suppose not, but if I could see you more often, I would.”

  They spoke of easy things at first, the shuttle flight, health, their jobs. Then Liyan said, “I will make commander in six months.”

  That conversation lasted longer and carried on as they arrived at the restaurant.

  “You sound confident.” Cobalt knew he had been studying hard again.

  “Oh, I have plenty of anxieties over it. Just like anyone. Maybe more so. When I feel them I make myself study harder, work overtime. Or I wave you.”

  “I hope my waves in return help.”

  “They do.”

  They were seated by a window overlooking lines of large, square buildings, white-lit from within. The station’s hydroponics farms. They lit up the avenues they lined, squares of light that arrowed to a point in the distance until vision dropped off. The buildings shimmered blue around the edges giving them a tri-dimensional phantom shadow.

  Cobalt’s eye was not drawn to them, though. He could not take his gaze away from his friend. Not for a second. He meant to savor all the moments they had while spending this short weekend together. He wanted to memorize every curve and indent of Liyan’s face, his lips, every eyelash, every reflection in his eye. His gaze traced down to his chin, neck, adam’s apple, the edge of his chest, the broad shoulders still in the uniform of C&C with the little Pegasus logo on the cuff, just below the lieutenant’s stripes. He studied the hands, long, and not so blunt as many men’s hands were, the knuckles thick but well-formed, the flesh of his palms softly pale against the tea-hue of his skin-tone. The wrists were lightly veined in raised blue, a delicate tracery that hinted at both strength and masculine vulnerability. There lay life pulsing so close to the surface, a mortal power contained by the thinnest of veils, mere skin to hold it all at bay.

  Like the force-field of a port o’ call or the bulkhead of a ship, bodies were also merely containers protecting living cells from the battle-cold indifference of the void. What lay within was the mystery, the indefinable soul.

  Liyan seemed to be observing him with the same fervor. He noted the man’s eyes moved over him again and again, taking him in. They basked in each other’s presence. It was a phenomenon of sublime pleasure.

  They ordered steaks and wine.

  Spoke of star-faring and navigation.

  Philosophy and haiku.

  They could not have been a better match.

  “How are Lark and Tiri?” Cobalt asked. “And Sekina?”

  “Loyal friends. Efficient co-workers,” came the answer. “I wish you could meet them some day.”

  Cobalt bowed his head.

  Liyan seemed to sense a rift and added quickly, “Lark teases me because we’re going to be taking the commander test at the same time. He’s not really competitive but he keeps saying to anyone who’ll listen to him that his ‘baby’ is showing him up. Tiri will take the lieutenant’s exam this year. Sekina is still well ahead on the path to getting command of her own ship. She’s tired of the luxury liners, though. She’s looking at exploration.”

  “That’s all more toward military lines, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah. But they let qualified civilians in on the more science-oriented tours, including as ship captains. Between shifts, we all hit the online classes pretty hard. Sekina just got a Masters in Space Environment.”

  Cobalt tried to recall what that might be. He had a lot of downloaded knowledge, but not necessarily space-oriented. “What exactly is that?”

  “She studies rocks. Asteroids. Meteors. Comets. Including the geology of planets sometimes, but it’s more geared toward rock. Space rock. There is a branch of it that studies light, too, more physics than geology oriented. She’s pretty smart about all of it. If I ever need homework help, she’s the one I ask. Oh, and you didn’t ask, but I’ll tell you that her hair has peach stripes in it this month, and she’s cut it so that it feathers all around her neck and shoulders.”

  “Last time you told me she was back to blue.”

  “It matched her eyes.” Liyan took a sip of wine.

  “Is she still single?”

  “Single and driven to stay that way.”

  “Like you?”

  Liyan’s eyes drifted as he kept his glass raised, took another drink. “No.” He spoke softly.

  Cobalt caught his breath.

  Liyan’s hesitation showed in the lowering of his lashes, the withdrawing of his lower lip, the unsteady light flowing through the wine glass and making silvery shadows on his face.

  Cobalt wanted to clear his throat. He wasn’t sure if he’d caused discomfort or more depth of thought. In himself, it seemed a cool edge radiated through him almost defining itself as pain. He waited for Liyan to elaborate.

  Liyan ended up emptying the entire wine glass while not answering.

  Finally, Cobalt said, “Someone?” He kept his voice neutral.

  Liyan shook his head, then said, “I don’t know.”

  “Ah, a consideration, though.”

  “Yes.” He took a deep breath and glanced out the window at the square lights of the hydroponics. “How many times…I forget…that Tiri and Lark have invited me…well, you know. I never knew how to write it. Sometimes I was overwhelmed or embarrassed, maybe? I’m not all that wild. So far. I’ve joked with them about it and stayed close with them everywhere except the bedroom. The teasing has lasted years.” He smiled sheepishly, glancing back to Cobalt. “I might break one day. So there you have it. Not as dedicated as Sekina, only too shy and stupid to follow that side of my heart. Yet.”

  “You are ready when you are ready.”r />
  “I don’t think so. Sometimes there are times when a person has to jump in, just so they can change the fear, or ultimately know it.”

  “Fear?”

  “Of course. If nothing else, the third wheel syndrome. I don’t want to be a toy.” As he finished his sentence his eyes got wide. “Shit. I didn’t mean it like that. Sorry Cobalt. This is why I’ve had trouble writing about it. I can’t find the right words.”

  “No offense taken. I understand perfectly well what you’re saying.”

  “Yeah, how could you not? But I meant, well, that’s why I’m…um…maybe hard to get.”

  “Or maybe you don’t like the games certain humans play.”

  “That’s it exactly. I never have fit in that way even as a kid. Maybe I’m more cerebral or something.”

  “No. Cerebral is a cold word. You’re not cold. I would say you’re sensitive. That’s all.”

  Liyan blinked at him, mouth parting. “Wow. Thanks.”

  Cobalt reached for the wine bottle and poured more.

  Liyan said, “What about you?”

  “Me?”

  “You know. Someone else…”

  “You’re really my only friend.” But his thoughts drifted to one other person. Someone who had been kind to him once or twice. But if they paid, it didn’t count, right? He could never say that aloud to Liyan, though. Something stopped the words in his throat, or kept his hands from writing on the screen about anything extracurricular he did with the personal space of his body regarding Pel’s requirements of him for financial gains.

  “Surely you must have offers.” Liyan seemed to blush as he made the statement.

  Cobalt said, “Why?”

  “You’re…handsome.”

  “People don’t know what to do with androids. Even if they had designs, where would it lead beyond a one night stand?”

  “Maybe that’s all some people want.”

  “I was talking about me. Where would it lead for me?”

  Again, Liyan started to apologize.