A.N: I hope you like a love story chapter. ^^
~.~ Her eyes, that's where hope lies.
That's where new skies always meet
The sunrise. Her eyes, that's where I go.
When I go home. . ~.~
-Pat M. from Train.
I.
Taylor Evans, formerly Erika Robinson, felt herself at a standstill. She experienced the guilt of her actions on Hogarth upsurge from within as they all looked at her questioningly to address the boy who was the object of her affections. The overhead showed the long lines of very gradually developing Iron Giant copies out far on the ocean. But she knew their attention was on her for a purpose; The children were supposed to be getting an idea of the damage the robots could cause.
"There's…" She tugged on her tie-dye jumpsuit collar. "Not all that much to say."
"Taylor." The Giant encouraged with a little eagerness. "You promised you would."
When she began stammering and backing away, Hogarth folded his arms and narrowed his upper lids. He looked up at the Giant before making an indicative nod for him to intervene. The ironed colossus complied and lowered his hand down so that the girl stepped directly onto his palm, he brought his other down so that Hogarth could step on it and connected both of them side-by-side.
"…and it's just that I don't know how to say that I…"
When Taylor took notice she was several feet up in the air and chin-to-face with a rather casually smirking Hogarth. "Yes, Miss Evans," he said patiently. "You were just about to say that you…"
The inspiring little tale of stars and souls returned to Taylor.
She decided to take a leap of faith. "I'm in love with you, Hogarth."
The Giant let out an audible breath of relief, Archer had already left to see about his niece Trina, the ambassador of Iceland was patiently watching the last few minutes of the major news cast, the retired war veteran turned government agent was doing his best not to look interested in the star-crossed lovers admission booth and Inx ignored them entirely. Hogarth was left looking doubtful.
"You're in love with me, Taylor?"
"Mmm-hmm." The Giant tried prompting her further.
She laced her fingers and nodded with a small, nervous smile. He took a few moments to let this sink in before he let an elusive smile cross his face. "You know, the first night we were here the Giant asked me that exact same thing. I only told him the partial truth when I said it was getting there." The Giant optic-balled him. "I didn't lie. See, what I didn't tell him was that I fell for you the very moment that I saw you." Taylor let a calmed look cross her face as they leaned inward.
They shared a deep kiss.
When the two leaned back, they looked into each other's eyes acceptingly. Hogarth looked out at the Omega D.C. children and nodded encouragingly towards them that it was all right to reach out to the people they had been taught to distrust. Taylor, however, met with Inx's disappointed eyes.
Unconsciously, the teenaged girl touched her hair bun. Her long hair was cropped. She touched the material of her jumpsuit. This was not her regular clothes. Taylor touched her size-B cups and realized she no longer had a flat chest. The sight of the children leaving sent a rush of realization.
She was going to be a mother, and Hogarth was the biological father.
"I hope I got through to them," she barely heard Hogarth say with a heavy sigh. "I'm not going to win any role-model-of-the-year awards, but they do listen to me. Hey, Mr. Barnes. When does the Council want to gather these people to stop Kina?" The Giant lowered himself to Daniel's height.
"And how exactly are they going to help out?" He still felt sickened for the unconfirmed life loss.
The man ran a hand through his thinning scalp before he answered honestly.
"You four know as much as I do for the most part, but I doubt they will have anymore lives that will be sacrificially given." Daniel and the Giant met Hogarth's taken aback look grimly. "I-I… cannot believe I was so obsessed with getting back to my own time, those lives…" he moaned.
Obsession. Taylor grimaced inwardly. "Of course, there's still not a total yet." She added.
"It isn't your fault, Mr. Hughes." The man told him. Hogarth nodded in slow understanding as the Giant explained. "I had planned to rescue you from Kina and Trant, but I felt I couldn't let all of their sacrifices be for nothing. That's why I intercepted you." Hogarth chuckled a bit at the irony.
"You did rescue me, IG. Batman would have gone too far if Superman hadn't stepped it up." He reached into the pocket of his jacket and extracted the softly glowing orb that had helped him in his trialing months. "Here, I don't know if you could call it your kid but this guy belongs to you."
The Giant let the bandanna sheaf-covered sphere rest in his hand as he examined it over; the little black figure was refiguring itself inside. "Will it turn out just like the clones, Hogarth?" He asked.
"Not sure. But as far as I'm concerned this is your child, Giant. Heh, that'd make you a dad." His expression turned far-off; as if he were thinking heavily on that subject. Taylor feared that he had figured it out when Hogarth looked at her. "You're awful quiet, Hun. Anything you want to say?"
"Perhaps," Inx inserted as he folded his arms. "We could discuss the Giant's asexual-like traits."
"Or," Taylor took charge of the situation with the knowledge that Hogarth's earlier verbal assault would be proven. "I could tell you that I'm pregnant, Hogarth." She told him in her calmest tone.
He side-grinned and shook his head. "Taylor, come on now. One revelation is enough for today."
"No," she came up and took his hands, her heart pounding in her ears. "you'll be the father."
Daniel Barnes felt ready to keel over. It was enough that he had become involved with the future to this extent, and to have Robert's niece and the Hughes's boy more then infatuated wasn't that hard to imagine. A good girl dating a bad boy was predictable. Although the sexual liberation was well under way, Taylor's sexual advances and Hogarth's stunned reaction left the man off-guard.
"What are you telling us, Erika Roberta?"
"You're not kidding." Hogarth said with surprise. "I'm going to be a-a-."
The Giant held the orb between his fingers carefully and pointed to it. "A dad." He said cheerily, the idea becoming more and more appealing. This left Hogarth in a state of brief happiness. "I'm going to be a dad… I'm gonna be a dad." He collapsed backwards in a near faint over this news.
Luckily Inx and the Giant caught him mid-fall.
"Hogarth?" Taylor inquired hesitantly, slipping the frown-creased Mr. Barnes an apologetic look.
"Hogarth?" The Giant coaxed him, careful with the still recovering arm between his fingers.
"I'm sorry, Inx." Taylor turned to the man.
"Do not seek forgiveness from me; seek it from your significant other." He told her solemnly.
The Giant looked back and forth quizzically between the three. "What's wrong?" he asked them.
"Do you know how hard we've worked to keep Dimelo's witless cronies out of our past, young lady?" Daniel suddenly stalked up to her. "Do you know the lengths I, Archer and others have all gone to try to get you back to the past? Yet your parents… it just runs in your family, doesn't it?"
Everyone but the Giant knew what was going on, but he was figuring it out gradually. "Taylor," he turned slightly shuttered eyes on her. "Did Hogarth want to become a father?"
Heartache welled in her light brown eyes; she remembered the night she had painted a beautiful image of what love was through Venus, roses and promises for him. His curiosity had been that of a child's as his capacity to handle a situation once grasped was mature and that of an adult's.
She didn't want him to lose that vision of romantic innocence because of her, just like Tress had lost his heroic vision because of Hogarth's actions. This deep need went above even her desire to hold on to her self-respect. She wasn't a prostitute like her mom or a teenaged rapist like her dad.
"Taylor," Hogarth uttered off-balance as he got to his feet. "Are you telling me the truth?" He got that same disbelieving look on his face when she had told him about her real motives for being in Rockwell, except multiplied. "You violated me Taylor and at the same time you care about me?"
"Yes." The young woman told him bravely. "I only meant to keep you warm from the frost-."
The righteous indignation that fell over his features froze words. "Kina did the same thing to me." He said in quiet shock and that's when the hurt pierced his blue eyes that Taylor was dreading to see. "I wasn't a virgin." Encroaching shame hit her. "I was." She covered her face with her hands.
"My God…" Hogarth looked at her purity ring. "I can't believe I called you a-."
"Slut!" Taylor shouted in a screech, she ran from the three with her face buried deep. Every one of the times she had bent or broken the rules didn't compare to this. The gentle hindrance from an iron hand against her arms only increased her need for flight. She climbed over it and dashed off.
"Taylor…" The Giant tried to call after her as even Inx looked ready to leave but instead turned to the Giant. "As much as I detest mentioning this, no offense Iron Giant, this immoral act was a direct action taken on your glacier." He said this in the hopes the issue could be resolved quickly.
"This is mine and Taylor's business." Hogarth also impressed this on him. "I know we have a lot of preparation before we head out, but this is something that needs to be dealt with right away."
"You shouldn't let your personal relationships influence your decision-making." Daniel protested calmly. Hogarth forced himself not to retaliate, but instead asked another question that had been burning at the back of his mind. "How is my family, sir? I want to know how my-," he stuttered. "-my-"
"Your mother?"
"Was Kina lying with what she said in that court room?"
"Yes," Daniel told him softly, giving no stray hint that he only told the partial truth. "She's safe."
"And I'm guessing you'd tell me if anything were wrong with my sister and Dean."
They both turned to the pondering robot.
The Giant had been thinking before addressing the middle-aged man. "This is their business and they need to fix it themselves." He nodded at Hogarth. "I hope that it works out for both of you."
"Thanks for the support, buddy." With that Inx escorted him away down the halls.
"If it's not too much of a problem," Daniel mentioned with a weary breath. "I would like a word."
"All right." The Giant tried to keep in compliable spirits as he brought down his hand.
"Sorry, that hand's reserved only for me." Hogarth called over his shoulder but waved at them to continue on. Daniel declined and the two headed down the corridor with him talking. "There's… a little more to this then has been mentioned. Something the Council wanted only you to know."
They exited to the outside.
II.
Back in Rockwell, December 12th 1964…
Dean, Julianne and company arrived back to their little town with friendly greetings and Dean for the first time in months took the attention without regret. The four were frequented at the old yard of scrap more then once. In between court dates, Dean had managed to sell the old farm house to distant relative's of Annie's and had cleaned up his building with some new interior for him and his daughter. It was a pleasant time to see Julie catching up with a few of her first grade friends.
It was late day as he and she were walking through the town grocery store, she was moving along a little unsteadily on her silver crutches down the toy aisle. As the girl bypassed the Barbie dolls for the book section, her grazing blue eyes caught sight of a doll she had never seen there before.
Julianne picked it up and examined it over. It was a very pretty doll, standard-looking in a regular dress but there was something different about it. Its faux hair was imbued in tightly-curled ebony, its set-apart eyes were calm deep-brown and its arms splayed away from its hour-glass shape had a very strange pigment: Brown. "A negro Barbie." She said, some excitement in her peppy voice.
African Americans had been on the news lately and she had heard they were trying to become a lot more important. The seven-year-old took the boxed doll to the front and showed the clerk with an eager grin. "Sir." She said to the wide-eyed man. "Could you hold this until my daddy's here?"
Expressionlessly, he took it. Julie noticed Gordon coming and waved at him. As he lifted his hand in return the clerk approached the young man. "Would you mind taking her outside for just a spell Mr. Rhinestien?" Gordon crossed his large arms uncomfortably and motioned Julie to walk away.
"Go find your daddy, Peach."
She looked between the two men, but scampered off to find her father. Dean was sifting through a rack of magazines with his groceries stocked up in a basket on his arm as his daughter came up to him. "Daddy," Julie inquired him, blowing up at her wisps of black hair. "May I ask a question?"
The man slid the James Dean-covered one of Us Weekly back into the rack. "Of course you can."
"Answer honestly."
He laughed softly. "Ask away, baby."
"Why are negro people becoming famous now?"
Julie watched as his eyes drifted up over the grocery store aisles to think; she couldn't see a thing.
Dean's easy-going expression shifted to one of shock. The man scooped his daughter up and took off through the back of the store. Julie kept quiet as she was use to these kinds of actions from the last eight months. Gordon held the door open to allow them passage and they exited immediately.
From the waning light slanting through the glass doors, the bottom of a pink box stuck up in the trashcan behind the clerk's counter. He got a marker, scrawled something on the box and tied it up before slamming the lid on the can. The man picked the tin can up and took it to the back of his stockroom, he sat it next to a neatly folded white robe and left to return for new customers.
III.
Subtle yellow daylight dwindled on the glacier's horizon as their second day there wound down.
The Giant and Daniel walked on the outside of the medical facilities with the smaller of the two moving along the elevated walkway as they went; he patiently explained to the robot the Russian scientist Dimelo's general plot and his own involvement in the whole thing. His enormous ironed acquaintance listened out of consideration, but unless knowing the entire back story was essential for his and Hogarth's mission to halt Kina in a futuristic Rockwell than he was not too concerned.
"What didn't you want my friends to know, Mr. Barnes?" The Giant stopped and turned his huge bulk to face him, ready to get to the pith of matters. "I do apologize, but I'm just not really up for anymore surprises right now." Taylor's, Hogarth's and Tress's well-being weighed on his mind.
Daniel looked the robot over once and determined something. "Iron Giant, I can safely say you're the first person-err-individual I have met in quite some time with such straight-forward honesty. I won't mince words with you large fellow, the Council has equipped us with strapped conditions."
He cocked his iron head. "You'll have to be more straight-forward then that, not-so-large fellow."
The man offered a hinted smile which quickly faded as he brought out a small box. "This, Giant, is a cognition condenser." He received a blank stare in return. "Please don't ask me to explain all of its inner workings." Daniel sighed and explained calmly. "Any gadget from this time period is science fiction in the past. Put plainly, this thing is capable of blocking out long-term memories."
Curiously, the Giant carefully extracted it from the man's open palm and brought it up to his low yellow beams as night fell over the reinforced-metal buildings. People were congregating out for fresh air as he looked the device over. Dark blue hard rubber veins made zigzags around it, purple painted in the grooves emitted a vague glow. He looked from it to the pale yellow glowing orbed copy of himself and said. "It would be nice if you told me this is made to turn pygmy - me good."
Daniel gave a slight "hmm" at that. "The Pygmy Giant." He mused before placing his hand into his face. "I hate to be the bearer of bad news. Giant, please understand, the Council thinks this is beneficiary." The man took a moment to gather his sixty years old life experience for this. "They figured you would give in to your friend's request. The lad means well, but he's also not a fool."
"Is there more to me just suddenly getting this glacier?" The Giant asked him wearily.
"Yes, Iron Giant." Daniel was all business now. "They believe he may still have contacts in other places. No one denies Mr. Hughes's well-intended tendencies, but this is a matter far greater then we are willing to risk. They scanned the memory of every last person through that portal while it was still open, and you hold in your fingers the memory imprints of every last person in the past."
"You mean… everyone I saved in Rockwell?"
Daniel Barnes nodded with a stony expression. "Giant, the only way you will be allowed to have Hogarth accompany you or even leave this glacier at all is by consenting to erase his, Miss Erika, mine and everyone else's memory of you, the future and all they have seen." He said to the Giant.
The two were silent as night arched over the frozen plains, giving the impact of the news time.
After about ten minutes of deep musing, the Giant replied with a much burdened expression. "Do you expect me just to go behind my friends' back and take away all the times that we've shared?"
"The Council expects you to prove yourself capable of making citizen-status decisions without letting your personal feelings get in the way." Daniel told him in a firm voice while trying not to sound too demanding. "From your past ventures, you have proven your capacity for this Giant."
He received a refusing glare and took a few hesitant steps back as the Giant lowered down to the man's level on bent knees. "I would never deceive them like that. I'm not a liar and I'm not about to tell them this after all they and I have been through. Let someone else stop Kina if that would mean Taylor and Hogarth can remember me, and then when it's done we can all return together."
"You're not grasping my point, Giant." Daniel strode up to stare the robot with equal, if not more, stubbornness. "Your friends will never even get to return home if you don't do this." He glanced over sideways so as not to look like he was in it for self-interest. "That includes myself as well. It stands to reason that this is why they provided you with a suitable residence when you stay here."
The Giant gently clasped the item and Pygmy Giant in his hands, covering his face with his arms.
"Let me talk to the Council myself." He said between grit iron teeth.
"They're gone to their own separate divisions in the world." Daniel shook his head sadly before he turned to head back inside. "You have until tomorrow to make up your mind my large fellow."
The Giant immediately moved away without a second glance back, his stride rigid and anxious as he began the difficult deliberation that the Council had set forth for him. One thing was certain to him though, if he did agree to this than he would make sure Hogarth knew about it before he went through that portal in future Rockwell. The Giant tucked the two meaningful shapes into the open crawl space of his shoulder line before extracting the metal rose he had crafted for Taylor, saying.
"This is the only way you can go home, but I know it'll break your heart." He began thinking.
Hogarth adjusted the worn-out collar of his jacket as he stepped out the sliding doors to see Miss Taylor Erika Double R. Evans. A misty, cool night openly canvassed the outside; he allowed the fresh air to fill his lungs and exhaled out in preparation as he approached the woman from behind.
She clung to a pole. "This is where my mother was when she found out she was pregnant." Taylor spoke in a distant voice, unwavering as she explained. "From then on it became her career path."
The man said nothing as he came to stand on the other side on the corner, clasping his hands on the sleek metal rail. Hogarth stared out into the distance before saying. "I was raised to believe in making an honest living. To me, it could be good or bad." He heard her laugh at this a bit bitterly.
"My mother isn't a bad person, Hogarth. But she made a very dishonest and disgraceful choice."
"Taylor," He turned her way, she didn't look at him. With a heavy breath, Hogarth reached the pole above Taylor's dipped head and mounted the slippery railing. He hugged the fat wet silver cylinder. She looked up in surprise and backed away from it. Satisfied with gaining her attention, he hopped down and came up to her with his hands out. "I think she was dishonest with herself."
"How do you figure that?" Taylor argued meekly, forehead puckered and eyes glazed in shame.
"Because she accepted that sort of lifestyle." Hogarth rested his hands on her shoulders. "Baby, I know I'm preaching the choir here but you don't have to lead the life of a label." He went back to stand beside her. "Your mother had a very bad experience, so she decided to let it define her life."
Taylor looked at him with drawn in brows. "What?"
A kind, but definite smile marked his bearded face. "It's your choice if you let one action decide your course in life, Taylor. The Giant for example, he was branded a gun but he refused to let that drag him down. I love you, Miss Evans." His blue eyes sparkled. "No matter what you say or do."
She let go and finally moved into his arms. Hogarth held her close to him until she finally moved back and stared at him with a strong need to know. "Do my intentions lessen this at all, Hogarth?"
"Did you want to do it, Taylor?" Was his crucial question.
"You can't hold it against me…" She grumbled and folded her arms. He asked her again.
"Yes, partly."
Hogarth remained very calm and frank with her. "Taylor, I do thank you for saving my life." He took her delicate lily hands, saying honestly. "But what you did to me was very wrong. You may have had good reasons, but you could have warmed me without giving yourself over. It doesn't."
She nodded acceptingly and looked down at her stomach. Hogarth wondered anxiously what she would say about the barely developed child. Would she be like Kina? Would she demand that he take responsibility for him or her? Taylor met his blue eyes. "What do you think about my child?"
Hers, not mine. Hogarth thought, trying not to let the relief show on his face. "I'll have to give it some thought." He was pleased that she would take full responsibility for the child, but worried at the thought of her feeling like she could depend on no one. "Taylor, I won't just leave you alone."
"I don't expect any child support or anything whenever we get back, Hogarth."
"Expect the unexpected." He winked at her and slipped out a couple pair of studded sole shoes.
"What are you going to do with those?" Taylor asked with an odd look.
"Make-shift, moonlit skating." Hogarth handed her a pair close to her size. "The night's young and so are we." He was invigorated to see a small smile light her light tan features. As she placed her hand in his larger light-skinned one, Hogarth stepped over the slippery silver railing to skate.
"Hogarth…" She began to protest.
"Look," He knocked a fist against a sheet of ice. "Rock hard."
Taylor sighed lightly and allowed herself to go into his open arms, the two moved back in a bit of a clumsy manner at first but Hogarth held onto her hands. Slowly, in unpracticed circles, the two young lovers moved with the swirl of the chilled wind. The muted light from the outside suddenly blossomed brightly and they both realized the Giant was peering over at them beside the facilities.
He swallowed a large portion of frost-covered metal with a grinding crunch and motioned at them to look away. "Don't mind me." His amber eyes illuminated a spotlight on them. They gave him a couple of appreciative smiles and concentrated on one another. As they rotated with their studded skates barely grazing the ground, Hogarth and Taylor began slowly reminiscing about their home.
"We never graduated." She stated sadly. "Well," he chuckled a little. "We've been a little caught up for the last few months. But wow, what I wouldn't have given to see you in a prom dress. I'd have sold my motorcycle and gotten a car. You know, I use to fix them up all the time. If things had worked out in my favor, I would have gotten a scholarship to be a pro auto body mechanic."
The Giant paused from taking a bite of old ship metal as he listened to them talk. "And if I hadn't gotten involved, the grades I had transferred over to Rockwell from Jersey would have gotten me a decent teaching degree." They began recapping over more missed school activities in their last days. He tried not to listen anymore, but found it impossible not to let their wistful voices affect him.
"We haven't even gotten enough of each other," Taylor said.
"Well, absence makes the heart grow fonder." Hogarth replied endearingly.
"But we'll never be able to make up for our lost time at school."
"Yeah," He admitted with a rough sigh. "We'd have to get our GED's and there's still the issue of the baby. And if when we return, I'll need to help you make plans. We'll need to start new lives."
"Together?" Taylor asked of him.
Hogarth leaned up to her face and uttered quietly. "Together... that is, if you can stand a Were Garth."
She laughed deeply.
They enveloped in a kiss as a full moon slid out.
At this point, the Giant canceled out his long-range hearing so he could only hear low frequency. It was because of him they had missed out on their regular lives. Knowing that his guilt couldn't be satisfied with consuming more food, the Giant set it off to the side and prepared to go off so as to think some more when the scrape of metal to metal hit his low-range sound sensory receptors.
The Giant allowed his yellow eye beams to swerve slowly over, when he was sure the intruder was in proximity of his reach the Giant whipped around and pinned the droid to the wall with his hand before it could get away. "Not so fast." He boomed in his bass voice; assuming it was Kina's spy. Since the orbs had been nabbed, they had put the entire medical facilities on high security.
When his eye beams focused on the creature he saw it was Kina's former droid; 35,000. She was standing partway in the shadows and edged back when he tried to move his yellow luminance to see her fully. "If you press any harder, you'll crush the gift I'm carrying inside of my stomach…"
"Gold?" He eased up on her. "What are you doing here?"
The droid lowered her upper shutter as she opened her gilded breast plate to reveal a swaddled up baby sleeping soundly. "This is Kina's daughter, Abba." She explained as she slipped her golden funneled arm around the defenseless infant. "I've come to deliver her to her grandfather Archer."
He moved his suddenly over-sized hands back as Gold brought Abba forward. "You are the first I have seen out here that I feel would trust me. Here," The Giant started objecting to even touching the chubby-cheeked child as she was placed onto his slate-gray finger tips. "No, it's not because she's Kina's or anything. But I… Gold, no. I'm just too big to hold someone as tiny as this baby."
"But there is no one I trust more." The droid said with a fond expression. "Kina, Giant, is not well enough to take care of this child." He hesitated, the human on his finger tip rested as sweetly as a lady bug. As usual, his enormous size made him an odd-match to someone much smaller than himself.
"I'm afraid I'll accidentally drop her."
"Nonsense, just keep the child's head propped. I did this with Kina when she was first born. Her mother ran out on her at birth and I was designed specifically to mother her." Gold let her head drop.
"I may have failed with Kina," she lifted a determined green eye. "But Abba is new altogether."
The Giant slowly found himself drawn to the baby and couldn't surrender her back. He used his thumb strong enough to puncture a hole through steel with little effort to gently caress the baby's forehead. When her light jade eyes opened and she saw the Giant a tiny smile formed on her plump bow mouth.
"Who's the dad?" He inquired softly in his gravelly voice, forgetting all his troubles momentarily.
"I rather not say."
"A-hem, I would like to take the child if it's not too much to ask." They looked up to see Archer and a bandage head-wrapped Trina out on the balcony. The Giant allowed Gold to stroke Abba a final time before handing the child up to the aged scientist. He smiled politely, lifting up his crippled hands. Trina gladly took her niece and disappeared. Archer nodded his thanks to Gold before he left. The Giant and her continued looking lingeringly before turning to look at the others.
"Your fondness for Hogarth runs quite deep."
He nodded at this. "They mean a lot to me." His shutters drew together in wonder. "Gold?"
"Hmm?"
"Do you believe droids have souls?" The Giant had always wanted to ask another of his kind.
There was a moment for thought.
"No, Giant." She noticed how down-trodden he appeared. "An eternal life force is not made for us. But it seems to me Hogarth has given you one thing that is equally important, my dear robot."
He turned to her at that. "He has shared humanity with you." Slowly she emerged a few inches to see his large iron sheeted face. The droid was no larger then his head, but Gold didn't hesitate to explain. "Droids were not meant to possess this, Giant. You and I are exceptions to principles; it would seem that one human out there thought well enough of our type to share a most great gift."
"Hmm…" He turned to look out at his lip-locking charges.
"Although I am not sure if we die or not, it is an assured fact that you will outlive them both. This makes their lives all the more valuable." She rested a thorn-fingered hand on his shoulder. "There will be a time you never see them again. But for now, enjoy the time you have with them on this planet. Treasure the fact that whether together for eternity or not, you'll have their affections…"
The Giant looked at her and gently fingered his hand on. They turned to face each other and he felt himself become entranced with the idea. "Everyone needs to be treasured by someone." She stepped fully out of the shadows, revealing only half of her body was there. Embarrassment crept up inside of him and the Giant shifted his eyes down as if he were a young boy who had peeped.
"Truly," He heard her say without shame. "If a droid could show affections as a man and woman do…" Gold's hand brushed across his cheek. The Giant froze up for a moment, for the first time he couldn't make up his mind. This experience was so new to him. When they met eyes the two very differently sized beings were mere inches face-to-face. "…then, I would choose no other."
Taking a chance, the Giant did what he had once seen a couple do. He brought his two fingers to the rim of his iron mandible and then gently tapped her gold mouth. "Would you be my Lois Lane?"
IIV.
Nighttime, Rockwell in 1964…
Dean walked on ahead of Gordon and Julianne into the mayor's office. The little girl had both her hands in her lap while looking down. What had she done wrong? Gordon tried his best to console.
"It isn't anything you did wrong, Peach."
"I wish my bubby Hogarth was here," She said softly. He worried for her; the reality that Annie was really gone was beginning to dawn on the child. "I'm sorry, Gordon." Julie rubbed the back of her small hand across her eyes. "I know I'm supposed to be strong, but I guess I'm just not…"
"Whoa, now." Gordon lowered down to her level, gathering her up in his large arms. "I want you to listen to me, little lady. Real strength isn't about what you have going on the outside," he drew her closer to his face. "Julianne Peaches McCoppin, you are the strongest person I have ever known."
"Really?" She asked, trying not to sniffle.
"Yes, Ma'am." Honesty shone in his deep brown eyes. "I use ta think bein' tough meant bein' a bully." A faint mist entered his eyes as a crack entered his voice. "Thanks to you and your whole family, I've learned what it means to have courage and believe in something that you can't see."
"You have faith, Gordon?" Julie asked with watery eyes, slipping into his large arms.
"Yes sire, little misses. I also have faith that one of these days your brother will be comin' home."
He looked out into the park where the Iron Giant statue was partially hidden in the shadowy depths of the trees, and he knew that he owed the large titular-named creature a lot. The Giant may not have saved him like he had saved the town, but it was Julie's faith in the unimaginable that had turned Gordon toward what wasn't supposed to be known. The man hoped that he would never lose this feeling.
"I know I'll see Hoggie again."
"The sandwich?"
"No, Apples silly. My brother!" Julianne giggled.
To be continued…