A/N: These next chapters will feature our favorite trio dealing with the consequences of their actions. BTW, break out the tissue box for this one.
'Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world
Like a Colossus, and we petty men
Walk under his huge legs and peep about
To find ourselves dishonorable graves.
Men at some time are masters of their fates:
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves, that we are underlings."
~Shakespeare, in Julius Caesar (Act I, Sc. II)'
I.
December 10th 1964, Late day…
Gordon wheeled Julianne McCoppin down the halls of the Supreme Courtroom with his mother spearheading the way; her suspicions about Trisha Evan's interference when she had dropped out of Rockwell eight months earlier had reached a head. The busty woman in red with golden jewelry marched down the hall towards the ladies room where someone had mentioned seeing a strange woman in woolen gray enter. Julie peered over a shoulder and Gordon met her eyes.
"Apples, why is your mama acting this way?"
The former football star scratched at his neck. "I reckon it's on account of Mama forgot to get her girdle this morning." He answered without fear that she would overhear, her enormously protruding rump bumped from side-to-side as they passed the closed, tall doors of the main courtroom. "Once Mama gets her mind made up, it's just best to go along with her Peaches."
"How many babies has she had?" She whispered up at him.
Gordon just bit his tongue.
As they passed a strong, authorial voice rose from the inside of the doors. "All right, with the exception of my passing out we will continue on with this case as though this never happened. What we have seen today…" the male voice trailed a bit. "I am not sure what to make of it. In light of recent events, we will now proceed with hearing Mr. Kent Mansley's testimony for the already confirmed murder of Annetta Hughes-McCoppin." And it was out. "You may proceed."
Gordon and Miss Rhinestien looked at each other in horror; Julianne knew but she didn't know how. The little girl looked up at them questioningly. "Murder means kill, right?" she asked in a quiet, pointblank voice. "Someone… did that to my mama?" The two were at a loss for words.
"Daddy!" Julianne yelled at the top of her little lungs, pushing her fragile, seven-year-old self up by the handle bars. "Daddy, don't let'em get you!" she wailed, for the first time emotional and worked up. Miss Rhinestien tried to settle her down. "No, Daddy's in trouble. Daaaaaddy!"
Gordon tried to get the squirming child to sit down. "Julie, Peach. You can't. This is a court."
"What do you have to say?" Came the frazzled voice of Dean McCoppin's lawyer; a time warp opening up inside the Supreme Court was more then a bit unusual. "Mr. Kent Arnold Mansley."
There was a long, debating silence.
"Your honor… I-I-." the man's voice was just as uncomprehending and unsure, and then there was a decision made. "Your honor," Kent Mansley somehow found a controlled tone. "I would like-." he paused. "I confirm all that the defense has said, Sergey Dimelo is guilty your honor."
He said this in front of the very people he had once betrayed; all fell silent at his admission.
"Please sit Mr. Rhinestien down while you are at it." The Supreme Court Justice finally spoke.
-_-_-
Seventy minutes later…
Julie watched the doors part and saw her disbelieving father walk out, the citizens of Rockwell all turned in his direction as he came up to his daughter, kneeled down to her level and placed his arms around her. A few people shut the doors as Dean pressed his teary-eyed daughter's heart-shaped face to his shirt, and for the first time in eight months they both began grieving.
"I'm sorry, baby." He whispered in her ear. "But your brother is fine." A small sob caught in his throat. "It's over for us." Dean picked out some of the gel from his dark hair, rubbing the back of Julie's own dark, curly hair. "We won, Julianne. We've won." The two embraced again.
"Hoggie is coming home?" She asked hopefully.
"That day will come." Her father told her. "Some day," he nodded with gratitude at a relieved- appearing Miss Rhinestien. "Thank you. Would you both like to join us at the local café now?"
"What 'bout the court case, Mr. McCoppin?" Gordon asked uncertainly.
The man turned to him in reassurance. "Our part is over and done with, Gord. Thank God."
"I'd like some hot chocolate." Julie piped up in recovery, rubbing at her red-ringed blue eyes.
Dean flashed her down a wide, brilliant grin. "Daddy could go for some espresso himself."
"I suppose so." Miss Rhinestien sighed to herself. "I suppose so…" she let the Trisha thing go. If these people were so accepting of things, the least she could do was make this child happy.
The four walked out into a pink and red streaked sunset, the wintry chill of December stirred the trees that waned in the fading daylight but for Julianne, her father, Gordon and Gordon's mother, the weather had never felt warmer and the sense of renewed life never felt so grand.
-_-_-
Nighttime, December 10th 2201 in Iceland…
"… And so I am not sure of how many Alpha D.C. and Honolulu volunteers survived," A young Hawaiian nurse explained to the Giant as she treated an Omega D.C. child with a high fever. It did not matter to her where the child had come from, she would not discriminate her patients.
The Giant, however, was finding himself having trouble with this.
"They could all have lost their lives?" He asked disconcertingly.
She looked up at him with sympathy. "There are survivors, just not a confirmed account."
They were in the exact auditorium that the Giant and the others had left in the send-off, its scaling dome ceiling and massive size was the only place big enough to accommodate all these people in such short time. After letting blue-and-green jumpsuit garbed medical personal take a sleeping Hogarth and Taylor (he hadn't looked at them), the Giant had wandered the insides of the auditorium and tried staying out of the way as the medical personal ran about tirelessly.
Now he sat by as a small boy with copper-ish hair and purple jumpsuit shoulders poking out lie on a cot under a wall overhang, when the child's eyes moved his way they quickly filled up with dislike and resentment towards the Giant. The robot looked away from him, and noticed a few other children lying on their beds in light green jumpsuits. They meet his eyes and smiled.
At this, the Giant rose to his feet and looked out through a long row of window pane. He folded his arms on the top of the overhang as he gazed out in deep thought to the sheer blanket of flurry white he had spent six and a half years at. This was where he had worked so hard at honing control over his weapons; now all that had been wasted when he had used them to try and save the two people who meant so much to him. In doing so, the Giant betrayed himself.
But if he hadn't used his laser eyes, Hogarth might not be here or might have done something regretful. And then he had nearly used them to stop that man from gunning down Taylor also.
Hogarth --- he had nearly zapped the Giant with a gun to go back to the past. Taylor --- she had gone back on her word about staying where it was safe. The automaton turned to see the people running everywhere; they somehow looked so small to him now. How easy would it be just to use force to make things at peace? He had the size, weaponry, their trust --- the very absurd notion sent quivers down his ironed spine, and he remembered that it was his choice.
He had been the one to use his powers. His only reassurance was that he had had a very good reason for breaking his morality and that maybe Hogarth and Taylor would pull through. How could the Giant ever have thought such a thing? He gave a heavy sigh and moved away from the ceiling- parallel windows. Now he walked pass the privacy wall overhang when someone below caught his attention, the Giant kneeled down as a little girl in purple moved in circles.
She was an Omega D.C. kid. He braced himself for her to send him a look of hatred when the blonde-haired girl turned his way. "I fell out of bed, could you lead me back to it sir?" Her blue eyes were on him, but somehow she didn't seem to see him. "Hello? Aren't you going to talk?"
The Giant still felt tentative of her and waved a finger before her eyes; she gave a tired sigh at this and caught the Giant's big index finger. "Can you see that?" he asked her out of curiosity, forgetting for a moment the confusing distrust he had felt developing towards people. Now the Giant wondered how this child would react now that she knew who he was, and what he was. He felt a fleeting want to return to the glacier and his old way of life. The Giant had the option. Hogarth had had it too and hadn't gone home, and so had Taylor. He felt so very, very unsure.
"I am blind." The little girl said patiently, she wrapped her purple-sleeved arms around his iron finger and pulled herself up to her feet. The Giant saw that something round lie under her bed, glowing a gentle yellow. "Could you please guide me to my bed?" she requested of him again.
He brought his shutters together with compassion towards her plight, and escorted the girl back to her bedside. The girl crawled over and under the heavy covers before she poked her head out, blowing hair wisps out of her face. "All right?" The Giant asked. She shut her eyes.
It didn't look like she would respond anymore, but as he stood up he felt a hand on his finger.
"You're nice for a droid." A small smile fell across the child's face as did her blonde bangs.
"Thank you." The unnamed girl did not know and would never know how much he meant this.
The Giant looked down at his knees and pushed up on them to reach his full height, feeling a renewed sense of faith and hope. He noticed that people were thinning out as they got others to assigned rooms, and saw that the assistant droids were migrating in one general direction.
"They are going to receive re-fueling if you are interested." A middle-aged man in dark blue mentioned to him as he went from bed-to-bed with a floating cart stacked with trays of food for the children. "It's a bit of a walk." The Giant's stomach gave a famished growling at this. "I'll keep that in mind, thanks." He said to the tray passer guy and headed off without hesitation.
I hope they have old solar crafts, those are my favorite.
_-_-_
Taylor stared down at the uneaten tofu sandwich in her hand, she had drank the hot tea but moved the unappetizingly breaded, meat-flavored gunk around absently from where she was braced to the catwalk's siding on the outside of the teleported medical facilities; it was where she had spent her second night in the future back when the Giant had stood up to Trant's first Motorix and had accidentally self-imploded himself. How very naïve and young she had been.
The young woman tucked some of her blade-cut bangs back self-consciously as she heard the sound of footsteps approaching, Taylor dropped the sandwich carelessly and tugged up on her old bell bottoms as she turned to see an unsure-looking Inx approach her. "Hello." He greeted.
"How's it going?" She answered in slight irritation, turning away as a blush crept over her doll-like face. Taylor made sure they were tight over her tie-die suit stomach before turning to face him. "I'm not sure what it is you could possibly want, what with your conspiring against me…"
"Excuse me?"
She folded her arms as she ticked off her points. "Giving your job up, trying to coax me to go to the past when I wasn't ready. Inx, my friends had to save me after you deserted me." His slitting brown eyes grew incredulous. "Then you just show up at the end like some big hero."
"I did it all for you." Inx defended himself quickly. "Unlike that Hogarth-."
"He protected me, Inx." She cut him off. "All he's ever done was to make sure I was safe."
"He uses foul language, dresses slovenly…"
Taylor gripped at her elbows, crinkling her little upturned nose. "Hogarth's been through a lot and I haven't seen him in months, Inx. He's probably been through more then everyone has."
Why couldn't he just leave her alone? She felt bad enough as it were.
"I seriously doubt it, Taylor." The Korean man said with outright annoyance. "And no, I am not jealous of him." His tone of voice said otherwise. "You should have gone back." He then turned sincere, holding his hands out to her. "I would have adjusted to your life back in 1964. I would have done-" he crossed his arms and looked down at his feet. "What it took to win you to me."
"They said I'll miss my period next week." Taylor said simply and looked away.
Inx dropped his arms to his sides and looked up at her. "What?"
"They found it out after they ran a quick health scan on me." She toyed with a white ring on her pinky finger. "When they asked me if they could find out who the father was, I said no."
"Hogarth." He voiced his suspicions.
"I thought it was the only way to save him." Taylor stifled a sob and placed her face into her hands, she felt Inx rest a hand on her shoulder. "I know we only knew each other a short time before, but then I felt reconnected after seeing Hogarth again." she sank into Inx's solacing arms. They stood together for a long with the fine snow particles swirling around their bodies, two people from two other times of different ethnics and backgrounds stood pressed together.
"You are right," He finally said, pulling back and cupping her chin. "I do not know of how you feel towards him, but I will respect it." Taylor smiled slightly, thankful that he saw it her way. "Sorry I put on such an act." She glanced down at her purity ring and began to remove it. "I guess I won't need this anymore." Inx caught her wrist. "No, you will. If it turns out that the Council brushes up on 1960th history, it may do you good to keep your symbol of innocence."
"What if they find out, Inx?" She asked seriously, fear casting over her like a dark shadow.
The man sighed. "Well, it would mark a third offense." He met her eyes truthfully. "Your first was from when we first met and your second was entirely my fault, I… I should not have done what I did Taylor." Inx stepped away from her in shame. "They will judge me tomorrow also."
Taylor took a breath and placed a hand on his shoulder now. "Inx," she pulled him around to face her and climbed up on his feet to match his height. "We'll face this together tomorrow, whatever happens." They slowly leaned in to one another, and closed their lips in together.
In a matter of seconds Inx pulled back.
"Well?" He asked with a breathy, hopeful smile as they stood under cloudy and misty night.
"Good," Taylor said and added coyly before ruffling his hair. "But… not like Hogarth and mine."
"You wish to see him in the morning?"
"Yes," She said before hugging herself. "Burr. Chilly. Let's go in for right now."
"And for now you would like to know where your friend the Giant is?" Inx asked, lifting a brow.
Taylor gave him a light jab in the ribs as they went. "It's like you know me or something."
They laughed at her predictability. "It still intrigues me that this droid displays humanity."
"Well, it still intrigues me that some people act more like droids then humans." She countered and lingered back a moment. Lord, please be with my loved ones. Taylor rubbed her stomach.
-_-_-
"She is beautiful." Gold said in a gentle voice. The gild-plated droid had teleported them back to a still-standing building in Washington D.C. with a teleporter she had swiped from Kina's cousin Trina. Now cradled in Kina's paste-white arms was a baby girl of light skin, little hazel –green eyes and a tuft of reddish-brown hair. "Yes," the eighteen-year-old replied. "Abba is."
"The infant appears as your mother did."
Kina closed her eyes at this mention.
Gold had done all she could for the woman, after delivering Kina and (biologically) Hogarth's child the robot had provided her former human master with nutrient pellets left behind after the Omega D.C. take over, a bath and a change of clothes. They were both in an empty room down a medical wing of the scientist facilities. Kina looked up at the attentive droid thankfully.
"And after all I have done to you," she looked down at the suckling infant in her lanky limbs, saying in a sorrowful, sniffling way. "To think… how I treated you 35, 000." The droid stroked Kina's shoulder once with her thumb-severed hand. "In truth, I feel I can trust no one else."
Gold nodded her gilded head once, casting a loving look with reflective green eyes down at the two. "You are safe now, Kina." She turned away to retrieve a fresh diaper. "And Abba as well."
Rosie the robot had a run for her bolts.
"It is such a shame I cannot trust anyone but you." Kina sat the child on the pillow and stood up to reach around behind her back. "My father would never accept me back, Trant is gone, my followers have been accepted back to the Alpha side and all I have left are you two girls."
"I am sorry for that, Kina." The droid said as she busily searched for an expandable diaper in the turned over mess of medical supplies. "Now I know I placed them somewhere." Gold had resided here after Hogarth had convinced her of her choice in life. "Where do you suppose…"
"And Hogarth spurned my affections." Kina said spitefully; the baby made an upset moan.
"Found one."
"That is why I choose you, Gold."
As the droid turned around, Kina advanced toward her with a wicked, wild grin. She backed away from the crazed person held up a glowing green tubular object. "I designed this just in case things didn't work out, it will take your ability to transmute to the highest level possible."
"No, Kina…" Gold rose her hands up and stepped back. "I refuse this. What of your child?"
Kina sent the baby an examining look as Abba's round, red face crinkled from a wet diaper; she turned back to the droid. "What of it? I was going to use Hogarth's copied 7000 orb to combine the child's DNA for the first of my cyborg fleets, but now that you have returned…"
"Kina." The droid drew back frightfully. "No, you can turn things around. I have! Your father would forgive you if you would only try and if not you still have me. Kina, no---no---no.. NO!"
Gold quickly pulled out the one-way teleportation device that would send a person back and forth, she dodged Kina's crazed attack and thrust the device to land beside the wailing baby. Her relief was brief as the infant on the pillow was teleported to the one place she'd be safe. A brilliant, terrifying emerald light came out of the room as the biological mergence commenced. No one's love, kindness or compassion had been enough to save Kina from her worst enemy.
-_-_-_-
The Giant walked up to a line of robots not unlike children waiting for a cafeteria meal, he tapped at his metal mandible and tried to offer them a friendly wave. An orange-colored one looked up at him with yellow eye beams at this gesture, blinked twice and pointed to the back.
"Hi there." He tried to make conversation with his own kind. "So… I need to go to the end?"
"That is the mandatory obligation Droid 7000."
"Actually, you can just call me Giant."
"Not negotiable," The blank-faced robot told him in automation. "My indicators detect you are one of the earliest forms of droids built for asteroid defense. You are Production Number: 7000."
"I'll get back to you on that." He said politely and moved back behind the long, long line of much smaller and brightly-colored droids. It had been worth a try. The Giant was relieved to observe a gradual increase in the line; he took inching steps while the newer droids took steps two at a time.
Finally they arrived at a single door, the droids didn't seem bothered as the huge grey Retro-robot curiously peered down inside to see a man in a dark blue jumpsuit sticking a white hose into a red droid's hip like a long metal snout into the gas gage of a car. The process took all of ten seconds before he hollered "Next!" in a grouchy, tired voice. The orange droid from before came forward and the man stuck the end of the hose this time to the gas gage located in the droid's rumpus area.
The Giant's white pupils dilated a little at seeing this, he stood up and glanced back at the studded column that served as his rumpus area. Somehow the idea of tube feeding and feeding anywhere other then in his mouth was not good. As the droid left, he bent down and peered inside the door.
"You wouldn't happen to have any regular metal, would you?"
The overweight, black-bearded man gave him a once over. "This is smelted metal from the broke train tracks outside," he spat sideways. "it is either go get some of that or settle for this stuff, pal."
With his belly crying, the Giant took the offered hose and placed it into his mouth resignedly. He had eaten all types of metal before of all different shapes and sizes, but this was the first he had ever drank metal. The iron '50-foot-tall robot sat down, hose dangling out of his mouth like one huge strand of spaghetti. "How long will it take?" he asked the metal liquid provider guy, sighing.
"Don't get too comfy; just because you're a famous droid don't mean you get special treatment."
"All right, all right…" The Giant replied, trying not to sound testy. My stars, I only asked…
Three and a half hours later…
The man gaped as the last of his liquefied metal contents were drained; he glared at the apologetic looking Giant. "Sorry. But you see, I need to have a lot of metal to eat and if you need me to go-."
"Right, right. No one owns you. Well, first thing tomorrow I want you back out here to go gather some more metal out there. If you eat like garbage truck, you're going to work like one too palsy." The man himself looked like the guy riding on a garbage truck. "I'll be here." The Giant said to him eagerly, the idea of eating real metal was circuit-watering. He then stood up and went on his way.
-_-_-_-
Taylor stepped out into the auditorium with an open mind, tomorrow she would deal with the fact that she had left Honolulu for here without permission. The girl noticed children lying in cots and felt surge of sadness for them. She was about to search out for the Giant when two little children who were (surprisingly) in tie-dye jumpsuits came rushing up to her with computerized screens.
"You are Taylor, right?"
"Yes."
The child's face lit up and she grinned. "Taylor Evans, the past girl who stopped the Omegas?"
"I… guess…"
"May we have your autograph?"
Taylor smiled sweetly at them and took the offered pen. "How could I say 'no' to you two?" she signed her name on both in very careful cursive. "Here, Taylor E.R. Roberta Evans." It felt a bit wrong for her not to include her old initials Erika Robinson now that her identity was discovered.
"I can't read this." The young girl protested slightly. "Is this how you write in the past?"
"Yes," She explained. "It's called English."
They both looked at each other excitedly. This must have been what Marsha Brady felt like with all those young girl fans. Taylor thought and rolled her eyes a bit at the idea of being famous. She then spotted the Giant further along the wall some ways away, and ushered the girls to run along.
"Let us go find Mom, Charna."
"By the way…" The other girl turned to her before leaving with her friend. "My name is Lika, as in when I want to grow up I want to be like-a you." She laughed forcedly at her own joke. Taylor smiled kindly and waved them good-bye, but when she tried to direct one over at the Giant who had now taken notice he merely looked away. "Hi, Mr. Giant." Charna called over to him in glee.
He waved at them patiently.
Taylor took a bracing sigh and approached him. "Hi yourself." She greeted, folding her arms.
The Giant's upper shutters fell a little as he turned to appraise her briefly. "Are you all right?"
"I've been better…" she admitted before turning concerned on him. "How about you?"
He gave an indifferent "hmm" before looking away, not even trying to keep in normal spirits.
"Giant?" Taylor asked a little more seriously, catching on that something was definitely amiss.
When he turned his white gaze back on her it was brimming with discontentment. "You didn't keep your promise." The Giant said in reference to her leaving Honolulu after she had told him, along with the officials who had funded the mission that she would wait for the Giant to return with Hogarth. Obviously, that plan had gone completely awry. He looked down at his kneecaps.
"Giant, if you'd let me explain…"
No response.
Taylor bullied up then. "Giant, my word! Sometimes you can be so frustrating!" she declared in annoyance, making him shutter his eyes closed. "You expect everyone to do exactly what they say every single time, but what you have got to learn is no one can be perfect. Not even you."
They attracted looks possibly as no one had ever heard anyone talk to the usually peaceful though intimidating robot this way, as most looked to him as some sort of celebrity for his past history or just steered clear of him altogether. To hear and see someone talk to him this way was strange.
But of course, most people weren't friends with the droid population.
"I mean," Taylor ignored them as she tightened her arms to her chest. "There is such a thing as being too trusting…" she saw his shutters open when she said this and softened her tone. "Giant, will you please look at me?" He gave her one final glance before averting his eyes sideways now.
Not to be denied, the petite girl rolled back her shoulders and marched under his twenty-foot-tall, arching legs. The Giant opened his eyes completely when he saw her on the other side, giving the grey robot an insistent look. He stubbornly went back to his regular position and closed the gap in between his legs with a clank so that she couldn't pass under them. Taylor pursued her small lips and climbed over his square-toed foot in order to stand between them --- They had to talk this out.
The Giant lowered his upper shutters as she stood in between his towering legs. "Maybe you're right… maybe I am too trusting." He told her with quiet acceptance in his baritone voice; Taylor brought her blonde brows together and looked downwards. The Giant rose to his full height and began to walk away without one single backward glance at her. A wave of great loss hit Taylor.
"So that's it then." She said after him with an emotion-thick, indignant voice. "Just like that and we're not friends anymore…" when she said this he froze in his tracks and turned around to face her. "No," The Giant argued gently. "That's not it." She didn't face him when he said this to her.
"That's how you make it seem." Taylor choked back a wad of tears that threatened.
"Taylor," he placed a hand to his chest, explaining to the girl. "What if I had lost you?"
She turned to look upwards as the gigantic iron robot approached her. "If anything had happened to you, I don't know what I would have done." He went down on one knee and encircled the girl with two of his fingers before thumbing her chin up, that's when Taylor saw what she meant to him. She laid her cheek to his dark grey thumb tip and cupped it with her hand as tears surfaced.
"I'm sorry; I didn't mean to make you cry." The Giant apologized softly.
"No, don't be." Taylor wiped at her hazel eyes. "I never meant to hurt you Giant." He titled his Astrodome-shaped head slightly. "Then why?" She gathered herself and explained, taking a deep breath. "Because I was afraid I'd never get to go home, I was just trying to get you to see that…"
The Giant gave a thoughtful "hmm" before sitting back down against the wall.
"So," Taylor slid her fingers in her bell bottom pockets and moved her shoe about. "Forgive me?"
He gave her a calmed look and lowered his left hand so she could climb onto the top of it, Taylor smiled and sat down with her legs brought up facing him as he folded both his arms onto his big knees. "Only if you can forgive me for expecting too much." She frowned and shook her heard.
"You didn't, I should've been good on my word."
"I just wanted to understand why." The Giant told her. Taylor sent him a warm look. "Let's not stay angry with each other, okay?" He nodded at that and held out two of his fingers before her. "Team?" She nodded back at him and placed her hand on them as he touched it with his thumb.
"Team." Taylor confirmed, she looked down at the grey-tipped thumb and placed her other hand on it. "And there's no 'I' in team, right?" The girl asked with a pointed smile. "No, even if it is in Iron Giant." He replied, but gave her an equally mindful look. "What about in Erika Robinson?"
"Not even then."
The Giant gave her a playfully challenging look before using the thumb from the hand she was sitting on to cover hers. "You've ran out of hands." He informed the girl with a deep chuckle. She furled her legs up and over her head, then placed them daintily on his thumb top in a pretzel pose.
"Ah, my pupil. But now you know defeat by da feet." Taylor joked in a wise Chinese guy accent.
"How come you never told me you could do that?" The Giant asked curiously.
She returned to sitting normally. "I'd have blown my cover. Besides, you and Hogarth-." That's when they hit a fork in the road; the Giant squinted his shutters and looked away. "What do you think?" Taylor asked him concernedly. He met her eyes. "I don't know what to think about him."
With a preparatory breath, she walked across his octangularly-cylinderic arm. "I didn't see what happened with you both at the portal, Giant. But he's still our friend, yours especially, and he's going to need us now more then ever." He nodded. "I'll always watch over him, friend or not."
"Do you want to tell me what happened when you and Hogarth met again?"
The Giant heaved a heavy sigh. "You wouldn't want to know, Taylor." His eyes suddenly widened and he peered down over his leg to a small purple jumpsuit-wearing boy hugging onto his ankle.
Taylor and he exchanged puzzled looks before the Giant transported her to his left shoulder, and placed his fingers gently on the child's back. Light blonde-haired Tress looked up at him now, an elated-looking smile on his face. "Tress!" The Giant exclaimed in surprise at seeing the boy after all time. He hadn't seen the kid since the very first night the trio had traveled there to the future.
"Oh, right. Hogarth mentioned you." Taylor said with interest.
"Hogarth told me you both were dead." Tress said in a small voice, this left the robot and her off-guard. "It's… probably just a misunderstanding." She mentioned to the disbelieving Giant. He let it go and turned back to his pint-sized acquaintance. "Where's Ven at, Tress? Did he come also?"
"I can't find him… Giant, could I say with you for a while?" A quick survey around showed that the lights in the huge auditorium were going out, and children were tucking away for the night's rest.
"Mmm-hmm." He finally nodded.
Compassion extended between him and Taylor at the child's need, and the Giant brought the two together in a cupping bowl in his hands. Taylor tried to embrace the child but he kept his distance.
"My brother says that Hogarth said that real men don't hug." Taylor and the Giant exchanged a bit of a concerned look. "Giant," he sank into the teenager's arms when she wasn't looking, and peered over at the iron-clad automaton with mist-filmed brown eyes. "Are you still a superhero?"
The Giant brought his shutters together. "I try to be…" he answered in quiet, bass voice.
"Tress, even heroes aren't perfect." Taylor tried to reason, her tone gently maternal. "What about Superman?" The child tried to argue quickly, slipping a torn, water-stained first issue from out of his jumpsuit, at seeing the comic book the Giant's mouth became slightly agape. Taylor laughed a bit at the boy's innocent sense of justice. "Love, Superman couldn't even keep after Louis Lane."
The Giant did not laugh, but repeated with empathy. "Even heroes aren't perfect, Tress."
He looked down at the old comic book, the one that had been a defining moment centuries ago, as Tress laid his cheek against Taylor's small bosoms. The Giant watched him closely, the way his sun-blonde hair swept over his fore head and how his light freckles showed out in speckles on the bridge of his little nose, of how Tress clutched the altruistic fictional hero to himself like a shield.
And then the Giant remembered. "You're not like Atomo, you're a good guy… like Superman!"
He lifted his large iron face to gaze up at the clear black night through the window panels, with stars settling on the faintest mist of cloud as it encompassed it's billions of silver specters in the eternal ebony firmament. The Giant said up at the sky in sweet, sad reminiscence. "Hogarth…"
What the young man really needed from him was his friendship and his protection. A hero.
-_-_-_-
"Should we remove that orb from beside him?" A medical personal asked as they evaluated the disheveled patient lying unconscious inside a dry-cool bed. The idea was that they could reverse the setting and instead of getting him wet, soak away the start of frostbite by layering him with a coat of warm vapors. "No," Another person answered indifferently. "The process will take a few moments and the metal sphere would not tarnish either way." He and the other one left the room.
Hogarth could feel the stinging on his arm where the knife wound ran up it, but a heat generating around him made him feel that he was safe. However, his mind was muddled by confusion and in a state of shock. His friends… they were alive. His mother… could she be? Did Hogarth almost do what he think he had to Kina? He felt the familiar roundness of the Giant's orb at his fingers.
It penetrated the inside with a blooming radiance of yellow, a small shadowy figure with two eyes and thin pointy legs suddenly stood up. The creature looked around in confusion as it stumbled to find it's bearings like a newborn calf. A set of green digits and data appeared on the orb's exterior where Hogarth touched it. "DNA signature for activation: Denied. Not Kina's." Came a womanly automated voice. The creature tried to lunge at the inside, but stumbled back and shook it's head.
"Mmm-mmm-mmm."
"No Atomo… I Superman!" Was the only voice that reached his ears. Hogarth smiled in memory at hearing the familiar voice in his head. "Giant." He whispered in his sleep and gave the orb an affectionate graze. The creature turned yellow optics his way and began to crawl over to where his hand rested on the outside. "Access denied." The automated voice said without awareness of the fact that the person touching the in labor orb was on cloud nine, its occupant came up closer.
Hogarth's thumb somehow gained access into the ball as a metal hole slid open, the little creature inside reached out and touched the tip of his nail. As the thumb went to absently stroke the top of it's tiny yellow eyes, it clutched around his rough knuckle before gazing up at him in recognition.
"Ho-garth!" The creature squeaked in a happy, girl-sounding voice. It was still underdeveloped, but climbed onto his thumb to wrap itself on him while rotating it's lit eyes closed. "Ho-garth…"
"DNA signature invalid." The automated voice again repeated. "Not Kina's."
Hogarth and the napping creature didn't take notice. "Giant." He repeated his name once more. They slept soundly inside the dry-cool bath, Hogarth with his thumb inside the orb like a bowler and the little creature hugging itself to it. The Milky Way outside twinkled with newborn starlets.
To be continued….
I cannot disclose her name as of yet… oh all right. I'll let you know, see if you can unscramble it and put it in the correct order. y m g P y e T h n I r o. Learn more in the next chapter.
LP