She turned her head as soon as Iona appeared suddenly into the field. She lifted her head up to her and smiled. She gestured to the seat ahead of her and Iona obediently sat down and picked up her tea cup.
"What's Gunzō up too?" Kongō asked as she took her own tea. It touched her lips but the artificialness of it wasn't hot as it should be. She touched her lips with her fingertips remembering her first human sensation. It had been the burn. Her second was.. Iona's touch.. It was still weird to her, after all that time she spent with Maya, she had never touched her. Now she knew why of course but still..
Iona looked up at her. "Gunzō is showing Takao around his city." She continued to sip at the tea then seemed to do some processing of it, and then chose to pick up some sugar cubes to add to it.
Kongō peered curiously at her. Adding additional fake senses to already fake stimuli.. The thought reminded her of Maya complaining of the sugar making the tea too sweet and Kongō looked down feeling waves of sadness burden her. She sat her tea cup down. Kongō refused to feel the grief and instead replaced it with anger. Under the table Kongō's fists tightened. She should have realized Maya was nothing more than an AI without a core. How could she have been so stupid? Had she already, even then been blinded by human emotion? By.. Love?..
Kongō looked up to notice Iona was staring at her.
"What's wrong?" Iona asked.
Kongō looked away. "Nothing.."
Iona nodded quietly then looked over at the piano that sat quietly to the side of them. "What's that?" Iona pointed.
Kongō grief suddenly doubled. She had kept it after Maya was absorbed. It was a way to remember her by.. A memento.. A human illogical flaw she had picked up. She looked down. "It's a piano."
Iona tilted her head. "Piano?" She repeated then looked it up in her data base learning what it was for. She stood up and wandered over to it. Peering down cautiously at it she reached out to touch a key, then stopped and looked to Kongō instead. "Do you know how to play, Kongō?"
"Yes.." Kongō replied. She had taught Maya... She remembered asking Maya if she remembered how she learned, when Maya started to fail. She remembered hoping all that time together would have meant something... Only to have her heart and mind broken..
"Can you teach me?" Iona asked and Kongō looked to her startled.
"Sure.." Kongō activated her operating system but Iona shook her head.
"What are you doing, Kongō?.." Iona asked.
"Sending you the download update on how to play."
"No.. I want you to teach me Kongō."
Kongō looked down unsure how she could actually teach someone again after Maya, but the look on Iona's face as she looked up at her proved differently. "Okay.." Kongō stood up and went to the piano and sat beside her.
As Kongō taught her notes and how to spread her fingers properly she took in the new stimulation of sound as the keys played beautiful sounds around them in the pretty field of flowers. The visual and auditory sensations seemed to over lap and over whelmed her. As she smiled at Iona in explanation, she knew someday they would have to do this in the real world sometime.. When they would be eventually allowed on the mainland and it's own wonders.
She knew she would always feel a void in her core, but for right now in this artificial world of their own making, she could swear she could feel the vibrations of the keys and the beating of her cores heart filling it just a little.