Selected Assistant

by Robin Roseau

  “He found you fascinating but didn’t want to let on.”

  “I know,” she said. “I don’t know how to break through that.”

  “I’m the wrong person to ask.” I smiled. “You could use a little psychology.”

  “Oh?”

  “Ask him what you should do. Tell him sometimes you encounter teenagers who seem interested, but are standoffish. Ask him what he thinks you should do. I bet you can do it so he doesn’t realize you mean him.”

  She snuffled again. “You know, I might just do that.”

  “It will get him talking, and I bet you can do it so he feels important, like his opinion matters.”

  “And he might have insight.”

  “Or he might be a dork,” I said. “But at least you will have tried. You can’t do more than try, and if he misses what might be his only opportunity, he can spend the rest of his life kicking himself over it.”

  “That’s not what I want.”

  “I know. Take them somewhere else. Is there somewhere else you can go?”

  “Yes, there is,” she said. “And they’re accustomed to serving us. That’s a good idea.”

  We finished breakfast and then I asked, “Did you need to get back?”

  “I’m not in a hurry.”

  “Walk a little more, then I can shower and take a ride to the center.”

  “While you’re showering, I’ll wait here and let people talk to me. Come back when you’re ready go.”

  I smiled. We stood, and then she wrapped tentacles around me for our walk.

  It was nice.

  * * * *

  “Hey,” Felicia said as I walked into the robotics lab.

  “Did we figure anything out?”

  “Not yet. You recorded the shutdown, but nothing makes any sense. Maybe you can make sense of something.”

  I sat down beside her, and we spent the next two hours going over everything I’d manage to collect. Lunch arrived for us, and as we ate, I turned to her. “We’re going to have to do it again.”

  “I know,” she replied.

  “I wonder if we can do it on automatics.”

  “We’ll try with that. I’ve already talked to Bay about it. He wants us to try to find a method that doesn’t involve sand.”

  I laughed. “It wouldn’t have been that bad, but how long did it stay in front of the fans?”

  “All night. Workers found it out there when they arrived in the morning.”

  “Hell,” I muttered.

  “Taisha, I’m so sorry. I was working here with you in that bed, and I didn’t realize it.”

  “I’m not blaming anyone,” I said. “Okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “Did you ask Bay about water?”

  “He said it’s fully waterproof.”

  “We could try simple wind,” I suggested. “As a start. Maybe with flashing lights or something, and noise. Anything to provide an overload of sensory input.”

  “Muriel doesn’t describe that kind of overload.”

  “It might take a spike,” I said. “We could try loud noises timed with a jolt.”

  We brainstormed ideas with the simple goal of providing a combined sensory and balance input overload. And then Jasmine appeared. “Someone needs a little exercise and a nap, and someone else could use a break, too. Who wants to go for a swim in the pool here?”

  “Me!” I said, waving my hand in the air. “Pick me!”

  “Goof,” Felicia muttered.

  Hobble

  I’ll have to come back to the day job later. For now…

  We had our swim, and then Jasmine sent me home to nap. I was ready to protest, but I effectively passed out for two hours, not waking until Felicia brushed my face. “Hey.”

  “You have a date with some Hobbles,” she said. “I’m to see if you are cancelling.”

  “No. Wow. I really slept.”

  “You’ll be back to normal in a few more days,” she replied.

  “Help me pick something?”

  * * * *

  And so, I cleaned up and dressed. When I emerged, May and Cinder were sitting with Felicia. Everyone stood as I walked into the room. “Hello, Taisha,” Cinder said.

  “I hope I didn’t keep you waiting.”

  “You look very lovely,” May said.

  I crossed the room and offered her a cheek kiss, and then Cinder. Then I turned to Felicia. “You have a date as well.”

  “I’m meeting mine at the restaurant,” she said. “I’ll walk with you.” I collected a small clutch, and then we headed for the door.

  We walked two and two, May with me and Cinder with Felicia. We talked about easy things. At the restaurant, we encountered Cape and Bight, the Martian couple. Greetings were exchanged, and then Felicia left with them. May, Cinder, and I would be staying here. I would find out later that Cape and Bight brought Felicia to the same restaurant that Jasmine took the family to.

  But I decided to focus on the Hobbles.

  I should describe them. From what I knew, they were typical Hobbles in appearance. They were of similar height, taller than I was, but within the range of high standard for a human woman, maybe around five-foot-eight or so. I think Cinder was slightly taller, but they would have to stand back-to-back for me to be sure. Their skin color was pale with just the slightest hint of blue. Neither of them carried a single marking, no freckles or other variation. And they were, well, pudgy. I don’t know what better word to use. Not fat, and the few Hobbles I’d met so far seemed to fall within a tight norm.

  They had no facial hair. Their eyes were big with yellow irises, and the iris filled more of their eyes than a human. And while they didn’t have facial markings, they had facial features. There were no eyebrows, but there were ridges over their eyes and across their foreheads. They didn’t look bony but instead appeared soft, and they were quite expressive. The ridges weren’t substitutes for eyebrows, not exactly. There was one over each eye in an arc, and so that resembled an eyebrow, but there were more, like a wrinkled forehead, and in this way, they were markedly different.

  Cinder had the two arcs over each eye, but then two long ridges, one that might be like a unibrow, beginning above the outside edge of one eye and heading all the way across to the other eye, with two upward points very near the center. The top arch was much longer, the tips coming down to the top of each cheek, just in front of her ears. It framed her entire face.

  May was quite different. She had a single ridge similar to Cinder’s second, but at the outside edges, it seemed to explode into a starburst, or perhaps like crow’s feet, but above the eyes. One line curled backwards, pointing upwards towards the center of her forehead. The others curved down, for five in total.

  May’s face was bare below that, looking much like the lower half of a human face. Cinder’s was not. Where May had the starburst thing going on near her eyes, Cinder had something similar beginning just outside her mouth, and in reverse, with one line running along her jawline, and the others radiating up towards her eyes.

  They had hair, which they both wore long. I’ll come back to that. Like their skin, their hair was pale, not quite white, and with a hint of color. Cinder’s was very slightly red, and May’s edged towards violet.

  I wouldn’t have called any of this pretty, or physically attractive. None of the Hobbles would be called pretty by a human, I didn’t think. But their faces were expressive and interesting. Yes, their faces were interesting, and quite animated. I found that intriguing.

  For clothing, they wore shimmering material that covered much of their bodies. May’s was a sort of robe while Cinder’s resembled a loose pantsuit. Tonight, they both wore silver, but I’d see other colors, always shimmering.

  * * * *

  We sat, a comfortable table inside the restaurant, slightly separated from the other tables to give us just a little more privacy.

  “We must ask,” May said, as soon as we were seated. “Are you recovered?”

  “You gave everyone a
fright,” Cinder added.

  “The doctor wants to see me on Monday,” I said. “Jasmine is being very careful with me, and I’m still napping a lot. But I feel better, and I’m going to be fine. Thank you for coming to see me while I was ill.”

  “You should know that Aventurine was going to come instead of us.”

  “Why didn’t she?”

  “Jasmine Brighteyes wasn’t going to let her in a bed with you while you were recovering.”

  I laughed, long and hard, to the point I was wiping tears from my eyes. I finally wiped my eyes and drank a little water to collect myself. “I would have enjoyed her company, but I understand. Tonight, I’m glad to be here with the two of you.”

  We ordered meals. There wouldn’t be sharing tonight. They ordered from the Hobble menu, which was simply a setting on the menu tablet, ordered by number with the human server. But then we looked at each other for a minute. Finally, I said, “I am insanely curious about everything.”

  “We are also curious,” May said. “But we have met more humans than you have met Hobbles. Where would you like to start?”

  “The basics,” I said. “First, you are sisters. You have the same mother and father.”

  “Correct,” Cinder replied.

  “You are of similar heights, and your face colors are identical, at least to my eyes. Your hair is slightly different, and your facial…” I gestured. “These are quite different.”

  “Ah,” Cinder said. “So, you wish to know the basics of Hobbles.”

  “Yes.”

  “All right. There are a few basic things. First, from a societal perspective, of the species in human space, we believe Hobble society most closely mirrors western human society.”

  “We are less likely to have male friends than a human female might,” May added. “We are entirely egalitarian in professional settings, but few female Hobbles will declare a male as a friend. An associate, a colleague, this is nothing to us. But our friends away from work are all female.”

  “It is actually a little uncomfortable for us if we have a work social event, and the males are present,” May added.

  “How about couples?”

  “Then it is couples, an attached male with his mate,” she replied. “It is not a sexual thing, or a fear of cheating. And it’s entirely societal. There is no biology involved, only the norms of society.”

  “I guess I have some friends that are like that,” I said. “Guys are for dating, not for friendships.” I made a face.

  “What is this expression?” Cinder asked, gesturing to my face.

  “We would say, ‘she made a face’. Different facial expressions can carry different connotations of distaste. Horror, disapproval, disgust. Unless exaggerated, you can’t always tell the difference. That was general distaste at the idea of dating a male. But we were going to talk about Hobbles for a while.”

  “Of course,” May said. “There are, of course, distinct social differences between us, and, say, the average American. We tend to form binary partnerships, typically male and female, but we form single-sex partnerships somewhat more often than humans, and there is no social stigma, and never has been, going back throughout our written history, anyway. There can also be other combinations, but they are rare. There is no stigma, but there may be attention.”

  “That doesn’t cover everything,” Cinder added. “A relationship such as ours is common, two sisters or two brothers sharing a household. If May were to bring home a mate, I could make a new home, but it would not be remarkable if I stayed. I would probably move out if I also wished to bring home a mate, however. But until then, May’s mate would treat me like a sister, and I would refer to him as my brother.”

  “That’s sweet, actually.”

  “It makes for a good household, as long as everyone gets along. But when there is three, there can be strife, and then I would leave,” she explained. “That can happen if the two of them make decisions while excluding me, or if my new brother formed too close a relationship with me.”

  “I think I understand.”

  “What else?” May asked. “Let’s see. We are known for our architecture.”

  “That’s related to our planet,” Cinder said. “We should come back to it.”

  “It is our primary artistic expression,” May added. “We also have music, but it isn’t as varied as human music. Professionally, we are generalists. Compared to other species, even humans, we don’t stand out in any field outside architecture. But we’re evenly reliable.”

  “That places us in contrast to Catseye,” Cinder said. “They are very, very good administrators. They can juggle disparate priorities and details far better than most species. But they are average engineers and nearly entirely without art.”

  “They are capable of quite clever thinking,” May added. “But if there were a room of people discussing ideas, the most interesting ideas would come from other species. Oh, the Catseye identify a good idea at least as quickly as anyone, but they are most powerful when partnered with another species.”

  “Such as humans,” Cinder said. “And they are probably better than most species at identifying the talents and potential in others.”

  “This conversation started when she pointed out the differences in our facial features,” May said.

  “Ah. That means she needs to know about our planet.”

  “Yes,” May said. “We took a very different evolutionary path from humans. Humans diverged from your origins millions of years ago.”

  “We didn’t,” Cinder said. “And that is due to our planet. Our sun is hotter than Sol, and our orbit somewhat further. Our planet is smaller than Earth, about the size of Venus.”

  “Your gravity is heavy for us, but we have grown accustomed,” May explained.

  “Our axial tilt is only four degrees,” Cinder continued.

  “Earth’s is 23 degrees,” I pointed out.

  “Yes. And Earth is a water planet with land masses. Our home world is a land planet with bodies of water. We have large inland seas and three oceans, but they are smaller than your oceans.”

  “We have two temperate bands where most life is found. The portion nearest our equator, for about twelve degrees on either side, is dry and inhospitable. And there is distinct divergence of evolution between north and south, as there has historically been very little mixing.”

  “That doesn’t include aquatic species,” Cinder inserted.

  “Hobbles are a northern species,” May said. “Our origins can be traced to a single area about the size and shape of California, although tilted to an angle. And it is within our written history that we left that range.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Yes,” she said. “We were bounded on the south by the inhospitable band, and to our northwest and east by very tall mountain ranges.”

  “There was a massive earthquake,” Cinder explained. “It opened the mountains to our west, and in the centuries following, we began to spread further.”

  “It wasn’t until we developed flight that we ventured throughout the entire planet.”

  “Wow. Okay.”

  “And that means we have no ethnic variation,” Cinder declared.

  “How long ago was this?”

  “Nine thousand years.”

  “You’ve had flight for nine thousand years?”

  “Yes,” she said. “About. Space flight was another five hundred, but it took us another six thousand years before we sent probes outside our solar system, and another three hundred before our first interstellar probes.”

  “Humans burn hot,” May added. “We think too hot.”

  “We’re eating up our planet’s resources. In this way, we’re opposite.”

  “In this way, but otherwise our societies aren’t that different. We are less populous, and our cities are much smaller.” She gestured to her face. “These are like your fingerprints.”

  We talked. We ate. “Walk with me.”

  We took a walk on the beach, and then
I pulled us to a bench, sitting between both of them. We stared out at the water for a while until May said, “It’s so beautiful here.”

  “The station must be home for you.”

  “It is,” Cinder said. “I look forward to the day we can live on Earth.”

  “Why wait? There’s land here.”

  “It’s not our decision.”

  “Maybe someday it will be.” I paused, and then I said, “Take me home with you.”

  They didn’t question. They had quarters at the center, and I followed them in. I looked around for a minute, both of them watching me.

  “You started to tell me about architecture and your planet.”

  “Ah,” said May. “We have a lower gravity and less extreme weather. And so, we are able to build differently. That matters less with modern materials, but in the past, it was critical.”

  “I see.” I turned and crossed the room. They were both watching me. I came to a stop before them both. “I’m not staying long, not tonight.” But I took their hands and led them to the sofa. They sat, and I knelt between them. I turned to May. I lifted my hand, and she said nothing, so I brushed her face a minute, following the creases. Then I switched and did the same with Cinder. “I’d say ‘yes’ if either of you ask me out again, but maybe just one at a time, if you want more touch than this.”

  Then I slipped from the sofa. “Thank you. I had a lovely time. Please don’t make this our last time together.”

  And then I walked from the room. And nearly screamed. Jasmine was waiting. My hand over my heart, I stepped to her. “You have their room bugged?”

  “No,” she replied. “I’ll walk you to the garage.” She slipped tentacles around me. We walked slowly. “Is everything all right?”

  “Yes,” I said. “Neither of them is going to ask me out, is she?”

  “Probably not. Regrets?”

  “No. I’d remain friends, if they’d like that. Make sure they know.”

  “I will.”

  I said little until we reached a jumper waiting for me. I turned to Jasmine. “That was a strange date. I don’t really understand.”

  “They’re good people, but Hobbles are slow to do anything. They didn’t come here to meet humans, much less meet one special human. It will be six months before they wonder if they lost an opportunity.”