Chapter Three -Conclusion
Far from Bevelle in the small city called Guadosalam, LeBlanc was supervising her servants as they packed her belongings for the move to the townhouse.
"No, Tavia, I shan't need all that formal wear. I'm going to be a nurse of sorts not a socialite." A private smile lighted her face at the thought of the one she intended as her patient. With a quick dancing turn, she escaped to her study and closed the door, leaving the remainder of the packing to the discretion of her household.
Still beaming to herself, she coiled up on the window seat and gave her mind over to the thoughts that bubbled in her as irrepressible as sparkling wine.
"I'm going to live with Nooj! After all these years, I'm actually going to live in the same house, on the same floor and -if I have anything to do with it – in the same room, the same bed." She hugged herself, "He's grounded and needs me and I'm going to be there."
She remembered the few times he had touched her. The pressure of the cold, unyielding black hand was as tangible on her flesh in memory as it had been in reality. Every man she had known intimately had treated her as if she would shatter at a touch. She supposed it was her fragile appearance– the white skin, gilt hair and narrow limbs. Actually, she assured herself, she was quite strong, able to hold her own in most situations. But Nooj...she loved to think or say his name... was different - he respected neither her position nor her apparent delicacy. She could still hear his scornful inflection when he had said "...inherited the Syndicate." In fact, she doubted that he respected anything much anymore. She breathed deeply and pulled at the threads of her memory skein. The feel of his lips was still fresh on hers. She loved his mouth, his tongue.... She tasted him in her mind and quivered at the immediate reaction of her body before she shook herself. It would take hours for her to dwell on his every feature. And tonight was coming.
LeBlanc was no fool nor was she a romantic. She was a woman of experience who had clawed her way into the business elite of Spira until she had genuinely earned the position left her by her parent. Managing the largest conglomerate on the continent was excellent preparation for the new challenge she was about to undertake. She did not underestimate the problem of healing the spirit of one so horribly broken, so dreadfully damaged as Nooj but she had decided, upon seeing him lying helpless and – yes - dead in the operating theatre, that he was the man she wanted as her life companion - and she was not one to shrink from the impossible. If it required her to submerge her strength and be led, to be subservient for a time – well, she could do that. She had an assortment of tools ready to her hand; she could tempt him with her body, with bits of carefully hoarded news from the opposing camp, with a refuge and the opportunity to regain his strength and skills. She tittered nervously at her thoughts. Here she was planning to train him like a house pet, luring him to her bidding by offering treats as a reward.
No, that wasn't the way. She didn't want a pet; she wanted a lover, a companion – she wanted the man she had lusted for before she knew him, the man she had come to respect and love as she had watched his stoic struggle with the pain and humiliations he faced on a daily basis as he tried to recover. LeBlanc buried her face in her hands and shuddered at the realization of what he must be constantly suffering now the world was so irrevocably changed for him. She was not repulsed in the least by his ghastly wounds and the prostheses that had preserved his life. They seemed to underline his uniqueness and make him even more desirable in her eyes but she could not ignore the fact that he was deeply depressed by his transformation. There had to be a way to reassure him, to show him it didn't matter to her.
Then, too, there was the information she had garnered from her agents on the Council. Kinoc was creating something he called the Crimson Squad, which he intended to use to increase his influence by cleaning out one of the most dangerous enemy nests of the War – the Den of Woe. That was the sort of gossip that would amuse a former Warrior, divert him from excessive brooding even if he couldn't think of being a part of it, of ever taking to the field again. They could make a game of calculating the chances of success. She sighed happily as she was briefly lost in a dream of comfortable domesticity and amiable arguments.
Still, the very first thing to do when she arrived at Bevelle was to assess his mood, his spirit and attune herself to his needs. That would be a new ploy for her; it had been years since she had been required to consider seriously anyone's needs save her own, not since she had secured her position in the world of commerce. She found herself wondering what she would see in his face when she was alone with him on that third floor she had so carefully prepared.
"Ah," she breathed as she unwound from the cushions. "At least, I don't have long to wait to see what'll happen. I'll be there this evening and I'll know everything then. I hope he won't resent me for being so open with him, telling him what I feel. If he really doesn't want me, I'll leave him alone ... if I can. No, I can't even bear to think of that. He has to at least desire me, even if he doesn't love me yet. He will; he has to. I know he wanted me day before yesterday in his room. I could tell, in spite of what he said.... This is so different for me; already I know that it won't be the same because I've never felt this way before, this need, this hunger, ... I truly believe I love him."
She thought about the life-sized statue in her bedroom, placed so that she could easily see it from her pillow. It had been commissioned from a sculptor who had made his name working from images captured on spheres and portrayed Nooj as he had been before Mount Gagazet – at his zenith and whole. She supposed she would eventually have it updated but that seemed more than a little silly now when she was going to have the living man warm and accessible. "It's like a fairy tale when the magic godmother brings the stone image to life." She giggled giddily at the thought. "Maybe someday he'll like to meet his idealized self."
Humming happily, she gathered up a few books to add to her luggage.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
This had probably been a mistake, all day alone up here, nothing to do but dwell on his deficiencies. The tall man at the window stared morosely out at the busy streets three floors below. Limping carefully over to the large chair pulled up to the view he sat down heavily and manually lifted his left foot to the hassock placed conveniently near.
It had been a very long day, so far. He had wakened earlier than he intended, bedeviled by the nightmares which seemed destined to inhabit his dreams since that night in the hospital. He kept seeing his father's face and hearing his father's curse as he relived the battle that had killed the older man and left his son with the obligation of leadership and a cognomen which was a burden in itself. "Undying"! Indeed! It was harder than it might seem to carry such a name, to continue such a legacy. Added to the harrowing images that haunted him waking and sleeping was the suspicion that had lately taken root in his mind. Nooj found himself wondering if he had left his father's side that fatal day for a reason more sinister than the one to which he had clung during the intervening years. Had he purposely abandoned Biyonne to his death? Had his resentment finally reached the point at which he had deliberately acted to end his father's life? He had told himself that he had run to kill the Mages who were turning the battle against the forces of Spira; that explanation had been unhesitatingly accepted by the Crusaders, who had been there, and all the others who had heard the tale. Nowhere had there been a whisper of scandal. Not until now – when the whisper was his own in his own mind and conscience. Now, when there was no possibility of proving his motives – good or ill – he was beleaguered by doubts. He had finally made the admission that he had hated his father; had that hatred led to the actions that had doomed the man? He didn't know but feared it was likely. Pasir might have been able to absolve him back when it had just happened but now it was too late, too many years had passed and both he and the Elder had grown too old for easy answers. While he had been active in the field, he had been able to keep such thoughts as these at bay – it was only his enforced leisure that permitted them to rise to the surface like the bloated corpses of forgotten enemies.
Nooj tossed his head back impatiently, the lock of hair beside his face whipping against the chair. He was restless and yearned to pace the room, to stride with long steps, burning his excess energy. But it was so difficult to get to his feet again and pacing, striding were impossibilities at least until he had mastered the use of the machina leg that now hobbled him. He shifted his position impatiently – nothing was going as he had expected. When he threw himself before the body of the Summoner and saw the blow coming toward him from the great Unknowable, Sin, he had expected death; in that blazing instant when he saw the impact of the blow, his arm gone, his chest exploded, he knew he was dead. And then the damnable Al Bhed surgeon engineers with their new toys to test... a heart better than original equipment, a lung that was larger and more efficient than the old and the limbs... the abominable limbs that weighed on and dragged at him every conscious moment. In addition there was the pain - that unrelenting pain that echoed and augmented the agony he had experienced in the second before his death when the tortured nerves had shrieked as they were torn apart and he had heard his own dying scream. The loathing he had felt from the beginning flared in him again and he cursed the name and family of every surgeon who had touched him. Fairness, he grimly reminded himself, must also visit Spira's rulers with blame for his current state. They had agreed to let him be used as an experiment because they, too, wanted something from him. LeBlanc had told him that they wanted his fame and charisma to inoculate them from the accusations that they had run the War badly. According to her information (she was well positioned in the government and knew many of their secrets – more, probably, than they realized), he was not to return to the War but was to serve as a sort of icon of victory to be carted around for inspirational purposes. They wanted to make him into a flag, a banner to distract attention from their failures. Be damned to them; he would die in with a sword in his hands like his father before him. A career as a symbol was no life for a Warrior; it was shameful, unthinkable.
Well, she would be here shortly and would possibly have fresher news about the intentions of that unholy crew. Suddenly, he realized that it was nearly evening and LeBlanc would be arriving at any moment. He pushed up from the deep chair with some difficulty and called for his Hypello attendants.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Some little time later Nooj stepped from the hydro-shower that the Al Bhed had designed for him, the one that would clean his human skin and not damage the machina implanted in his body. He had avoided mirrors since his experience in the hospital when repugnance with his non-living parts had so disgusted him that he had dropped his self-discipline and made an absolute fool of himself. He compelled himself to remember that night frequently so as to be protected against its repetition. Now, in a similar spirit, he forced himself to look into the mirror before him. He thought he looked older; there were new lines in his face but then he had always looked older than he was. Even as a boy, he had seemed mature beyond his years. Perhaps it was his eyes. By the time he was a man, he had seen more than he should have – his father's death, too many campaigns costing too many lives. He had seen too many fiends, too many Llyobs fall to his blade or explode from his projectiles. Now new lines were dug across his face - he had seen his own death. Still, strength was obvious in his form, the remaining muscles well defined again. He looked with distaste at the places where the machina joined his flesh and thought he should be grateful that there were no scars of any moment – the Al Bhed had managed to do their suturing in such a way that it was mostly covered by the synthetic skin marrying the mechanical to the human. The left shoulder was molded from a flexible material, which blended nearly invisibly at the base of his neck while the arm itself was formed of vaguely anatomically correct modules. The hand, being the most complicated of the modules was also the most machine-like but it was concealed by the glove that mimicked the shape of his other hand. The leg, he glared at the leg. Since a portion of his left thigh had remained intact, the attachment had not been as difficult as at the shoulder. A closely fitted articulated ceramic and metal sheath clasped the stump and tapered up to just below his waist serving as both support and armor. Barely discernible rivet-like rods held the sheath to the remaining bone underneath. The upper leg was a cylindrical unit with a sort of bare-bone knee inserted into the base and was connected by recessed cables to the pseudo-calf and foot. They had shaped those parts to look as much as possible like real limbs, but like the arm, with indifferent success. The colors, which had so dismayed him on his first critical look, had lost their blatant newness and were beginning to dull into a more acceptable appearance or perhaps he was growing accustomed to them. He looked as dispassionately as possible and still saw a discordant mixture of tissue and machine, repugnant to his eyes.
"What will she see when she looks at me?" Nooj wondered with apprehension. "Am I a man to her; am I Nooj or merely the half-human lover she seeks out for the novelty?" He was not unaware of her adventures; in her blatantly open manner, she had made sure of that.
He stood there trying to force himself to believe that it was not too bad, not too grotesque. Grotesque, that was the word that always came to him these days when he thought about his body - this freakish combination of nature and mechanics. How could a woman lie with this? He raised his cane and brought it down on the mirror, shattering the glass with a resounding crash. Instantly the Hypello were there, picking up the bits, clearing the floor.
"Do you want to dreth now, Mathter" Their lisping voices enraged him but he held his temper knowing that they were what they were as he had become what he was. Instead, he moved to the wardrobe and looked though his choices, all too conscious of the irony of their selection by LeBlanc. Not the uniform, its tight fit made it too difficult to manage without the help of the Hypello, not a dressing gown, that kind of undress would convey just the wrong message. A cassock ... he drew out the loose garment that would cover him from the open lacing across his chest to his feet, a robe of a deep wine color with a gold cincture knotted at the waist. That was right, formal and dignified and easy to don and doff. It was meant to be worn over a long straight tunic but he had always preferred to have his chest bare if possible and so rejected the undergarment - no sense making things more complicated than they had to be. He would be able to judge her mood when he saw her and the cassock would not commit him to any action until he was certain. With a sort of despairing self-mockery, he realized that he could not tolerate much more pity and humiliation. Although rationally, he had few doubts about the direction the evening would take, he was still reluctant to place his fragile ego at risk. In spite of her declarations of devotion, he was guarded and did not discount the idea that she was setting him up as a mark. If he offered and she rejected him, he felt he would fold up into himself like an armadillo and never emerge.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
The buzzer sounded and the Hypello pressed the respond key.
"Her ladythhip is on the way up."
Nooj drew a deep breath; he felt as though he had been running but that was clearly an illusion since his breathing was as mechanically regulated as his heartbeat. He struggled to his feet and, hearing the sound of the lift, moved to stand with his back toward the door to his room. He would appear to be just entering the common room when she came in, he thought, taking a firmer grip on the loathed cane. If only...
The door from the lift opened and LeBlanc stood framed in the entrance. She was wearing her usual style of garment, all ribbons and flowing softness, the front deeply cut exposing much of her breasts. The short loose curls clustered about her head glowed like a nimbus against the darkness of the corridor as she swept in with her usual air of delighted anticipation and directed the maid trailing her toward the third door in the room before turning to the dark man watching her.
"Are the accommodations as you wished, love? Have you seen the entire house?" Without pausing for his answer she glided toward him, her narrow white hands held out in greeting.
They stood, not touching, the tension building between them. This was nothing like the other times they had been alone together. A globe of stillness enclosed them in a private space beyond the reality of the room and its contents. Nooj felt overwhelmed by the closeness of her, by the aura of electricity she seemed to project. He thought that if he dared to touch her actual sparks would fly about the room, consuming the parts of his body Sin had left intact. Gradually, time resumed and he could move and breathe again. Then, she stretched up toward him, her face glowing and he saw a wildness, a glitter in her eyes and bent to meet her lips.
Now it was LeBlanc whose breath came with shallow quickness – almost panting. She pressed against him and inhaled with a little hiss. He lifted his head and, his arm around her waist, drew her into his bedroom. The abandoned cane fell to the floor as the door closed with a decisive click.
Far from Bevelle in the small city called Guadosalam, LeBlanc was supervising her servants as they packed her belongings for the move to the townhouse.
"No, Tavia, I shan't need all that formal wear. I'm going to be a nurse of sorts not a socialite." A private smile lighted her face at the thought of the one she intended as her patient. With a quick dancing turn, she escaped to her study and closed the door, leaving the remainder of the packing to the discretion of her household.
Still beaming to herself, she coiled up on the window seat and gave her mind over to the thoughts that bubbled in her as irrepressible as sparkling wine.
"I'm going to live with Nooj! After all these years, I'm actually going to live in the same house, on the same floor and -if I have anything to do with it – in the same room, the same bed." She hugged herself, "He's grounded and needs me and I'm going to be there."
She remembered the few times he had touched her. The pressure of the cold, unyielding black hand was as tangible on her flesh in memory as it had been in reality. Every man she had known intimately had treated her as if she would shatter at a touch. She supposed it was her fragile appearance– the white skin, gilt hair and narrow limbs. Actually, she assured herself, she was quite strong, able to hold her own in most situations. But Nooj...she loved to think or say his name... was different - he respected neither her position nor her apparent delicacy. She could still hear his scornful inflection when he had said "...inherited the Syndicate." In fact, she doubted that he respected anything much anymore. She breathed deeply and pulled at the threads of her memory skein. The feel of his lips was still fresh on hers. She loved his mouth, his tongue.... She tasted him in her mind and quivered at the immediate reaction of her body before she shook herself. It would take hours for her to dwell on his every feature. And tonight was coming.
LeBlanc was no fool nor was she a romantic. She was a woman of experience who had clawed her way into the business elite of Spira until she had genuinely earned the position left her by her parent. Managing the largest conglomerate on the continent was excellent preparation for the new challenge she was about to undertake. She did not underestimate the problem of healing the spirit of one so horribly broken, so dreadfully damaged as Nooj but she had decided, upon seeing him lying helpless and – yes - dead in the operating theatre, that he was the man she wanted as her life companion - and she was not one to shrink from the impossible. If it required her to submerge her strength and be led, to be subservient for a time – well, she could do that. She had an assortment of tools ready to her hand; she could tempt him with her body, with bits of carefully hoarded news from the opposing camp, with a refuge and the opportunity to regain his strength and skills. She tittered nervously at her thoughts. Here she was planning to train him like a house pet, luring him to her bidding by offering treats as a reward.
No, that wasn't the way. She didn't want a pet; she wanted a lover, a companion – she wanted the man she had lusted for before she knew him, the man she had come to respect and love as she had watched his stoic struggle with the pain and humiliations he faced on a daily basis as he tried to recover. LeBlanc buried her face in her hands and shuddered at the realization of what he must be constantly suffering now the world was so irrevocably changed for him. She was not repulsed in the least by his ghastly wounds and the prostheses that had preserved his life. They seemed to underline his uniqueness and make him even more desirable in her eyes but she could not ignore the fact that he was deeply depressed by his transformation. There had to be a way to reassure him, to show him it didn't matter to her.
Then, too, there was the information she had garnered from her agents on the Council. Kinoc was creating something he called the Crimson Squad, which he intended to use to increase his influence by cleaning out one of the most dangerous enemy nests of the War – the Den of Woe. That was the sort of gossip that would amuse a former Warrior, divert him from excessive brooding even if he couldn't think of being a part of it, of ever taking to the field again. They could make a game of calculating the chances of success. She sighed happily as she was briefly lost in a dream of comfortable domesticity and amiable arguments.
Still, the very first thing to do when she arrived at Bevelle was to assess his mood, his spirit and attune herself to his needs. That would be a new ploy for her; it had been years since she had been required to consider seriously anyone's needs save her own, not since she had secured her position in the world of commerce. She found herself wondering what she would see in his face when she was alone with him on that third floor she had so carefully prepared.
"Ah," she breathed as she unwound from the cushions. "At least, I don't have long to wait to see what'll happen. I'll be there this evening and I'll know everything then. I hope he won't resent me for being so open with him, telling him what I feel. If he really doesn't want me, I'll leave him alone ... if I can. No, I can't even bear to think of that. He has to at least desire me, even if he doesn't love me yet. He will; he has to. I know he wanted me day before yesterday in his room. I could tell, in spite of what he said.... This is so different for me; already I know that it won't be the same because I've never felt this way before, this need, this hunger, ... I truly believe I love him."
She thought about the life-sized statue in her bedroom, placed so that she could easily see it from her pillow. It had been commissioned from a sculptor who had made his name working from images captured on spheres and portrayed Nooj as he had been before Mount Gagazet – at his zenith and whole. She supposed she would eventually have it updated but that seemed more than a little silly now when she was going to have the living man warm and accessible. "It's like a fairy tale when the magic godmother brings the stone image to life." She giggled giddily at the thought. "Maybe someday he'll like to meet his idealized self."
Humming happily, she gathered up a few books to add to her luggage.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
This had probably been a mistake, all day alone up here, nothing to do but dwell on his deficiencies. The tall man at the window stared morosely out at the busy streets three floors below. Limping carefully over to the large chair pulled up to the view he sat down heavily and manually lifted his left foot to the hassock placed conveniently near.
It had been a very long day, so far. He had wakened earlier than he intended, bedeviled by the nightmares which seemed destined to inhabit his dreams since that night in the hospital. He kept seeing his father's face and hearing his father's curse as he relived the battle that had killed the older man and left his son with the obligation of leadership and a cognomen which was a burden in itself. "Undying"! Indeed! It was harder than it might seem to carry such a name, to continue such a legacy. Added to the harrowing images that haunted him waking and sleeping was the suspicion that had lately taken root in his mind. Nooj found himself wondering if he had left his father's side that fatal day for a reason more sinister than the one to which he had clung during the intervening years. Had he purposely abandoned Biyonne to his death? Had his resentment finally reached the point at which he had deliberately acted to end his father's life? He had told himself that he had run to kill the Mages who were turning the battle against the forces of Spira; that explanation had been unhesitatingly accepted by the Crusaders, who had been there, and all the others who had heard the tale. Nowhere had there been a whisper of scandal. Not until now – when the whisper was his own in his own mind and conscience. Now, when there was no possibility of proving his motives – good or ill – he was beleaguered by doubts. He had finally made the admission that he had hated his father; had that hatred led to the actions that had doomed the man? He didn't know but feared it was likely. Pasir might have been able to absolve him back when it had just happened but now it was too late, too many years had passed and both he and the Elder had grown too old for easy answers. While he had been active in the field, he had been able to keep such thoughts as these at bay – it was only his enforced leisure that permitted them to rise to the surface like the bloated corpses of forgotten enemies.
Nooj tossed his head back impatiently, the lock of hair beside his face whipping against the chair. He was restless and yearned to pace the room, to stride with long steps, burning his excess energy. But it was so difficult to get to his feet again and pacing, striding were impossibilities at least until he had mastered the use of the machina leg that now hobbled him. He shifted his position impatiently – nothing was going as he had expected. When he threw himself before the body of the Summoner and saw the blow coming toward him from the great Unknowable, Sin, he had expected death; in that blazing instant when he saw the impact of the blow, his arm gone, his chest exploded, he knew he was dead. And then the damnable Al Bhed surgeon engineers with their new toys to test... a heart better than original equipment, a lung that was larger and more efficient than the old and the limbs... the abominable limbs that weighed on and dragged at him every conscious moment. In addition there was the pain - that unrelenting pain that echoed and augmented the agony he had experienced in the second before his death when the tortured nerves had shrieked as they were torn apart and he had heard his own dying scream. The loathing he had felt from the beginning flared in him again and he cursed the name and family of every surgeon who had touched him. Fairness, he grimly reminded himself, must also visit Spira's rulers with blame for his current state. They had agreed to let him be used as an experiment because they, too, wanted something from him. LeBlanc had told him that they wanted his fame and charisma to inoculate them from the accusations that they had run the War badly. According to her information (she was well positioned in the government and knew many of their secrets – more, probably, than they realized), he was not to return to the War but was to serve as a sort of icon of victory to be carted around for inspirational purposes. They wanted to make him into a flag, a banner to distract attention from their failures. Be damned to them; he would die in with a sword in his hands like his father before him. A career as a symbol was no life for a Warrior; it was shameful, unthinkable.
Well, she would be here shortly and would possibly have fresher news about the intentions of that unholy crew. Suddenly, he realized that it was nearly evening and LeBlanc would be arriving at any moment. He pushed up from the deep chair with some difficulty and called for his Hypello attendants.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Some little time later Nooj stepped from the hydro-shower that the Al Bhed had designed for him, the one that would clean his human skin and not damage the machina implanted in his body. He had avoided mirrors since his experience in the hospital when repugnance with his non-living parts had so disgusted him that he had dropped his self-discipline and made an absolute fool of himself. He compelled himself to remember that night frequently so as to be protected against its repetition. Now, in a similar spirit, he forced himself to look into the mirror before him. He thought he looked older; there were new lines in his face but then he had always looked older than he was. Even as a boy, he had seemed mature beyond his years. Perhaps it was his eyes. By the time he was a man, he had seen more than he should have – his father's death, too many campaigns costing too many lives. He had seen too many fiends, too many Llyobs fall to his blade or explode from his projectiles. Now new lines were dug across his face - he had seen his own death. Still, strength was obvious in his form, the remaining muscles well defined again. He looked with distaste at the places where the machina joined his flesh and thought he should be grateful that there were no scars of any moment – the Al Bhed had managed to do their suturing in such a way that it was mostly covered by the synthetic skin marrying the mechanical to the human. The left shoulder was molded from a flexible material, which blended nearly invisibly at the base of his neck while the arm itself was formed of vaguely anatomically correct modules. The hand, being the most complicated of the modules was also the most machine-like but it was concealed by the glove that mimicked the shape of his other hand. The leg, he glared at the leg. Since a portion of his left thigh had remained intact, the attachment had not been as difficult as at the shoulder. A closely fitted articulated ceramic and metal sheath clasped the stump and tapered up to just below his waist serving as both support and armor. Barely discernible rivet-like rods held the sheath to the remaining bone underneath. The upper leg was a cylindrical unit with a sort of bare-bone knee inserted into the base and was connected by recessed cables to the pseudo-calf and foot. They had shaped those parts to look as much as possible like real limbs, but like the arm, with indifferent success. The colors, which had so dismayed him on his first critical look, had lost their blatant newness and were beginning to dull into a more acceptable appearance or perhaps he was growing accustomed to them. He looked as dispassionately as possible and still saw a discordant mixture of tissue and machine, repugnant to his eyes.
"What will she see when she looks at me?" Nooj wondered with apprehension. "Am I a man to her; am I Nooj or merely the half-human lover she seeks out for the novelty?" He was not unaware of her adventures; in her blatantly open manner, she had made sure of that.
He stood there trying to force himself to believe that it was not too bad, not too grotesque. Grotesque, that was the word that always came to him these days when he thought about his body - this freakish combination of nature and mechanics. How could a woman lie with this? He raised his cane and brought it down on the mirror, shattering the glass with a resounding crash. Instantly the Hypello were there, picking up the bits, clearing the floor.
"Do you want to dreth now, Mathter" Their lisping voices enraged him but he held his temper knowing that they were what they were as he had become what he was. Instead, he moved to the wardrobe and looked though his choices, all too conscious of the irony of their selection by LeBlanc. Not the uniform, its tight fit made it too difficult to manage without the help of the Hypello, not a dressing gown, that kind of undress would convey just the wrong message. A cassock ... he drew out the loose garment that would cover him from the open lacing across his chest to his feet, a robe of a deep wine color with a gold cincture knotted at the waist. That was right, formal and dignified and easy to don and doff. It was meant to be worn over a long straight tunic but he had always preferred to have his chest bare if possible and so rejected the undergarment - no sense making things more complicated than they had to be. He would be able to judge her mood when he saw her and the cassock would not commit him to any action until he was certain. With a sort of despairing self-mockery, he realized that he could not tolerate much more pity and humiliation. Although rationally, he had few doubts about the direction the evening would take, he was still reluctant to place his fragile ego at risk. In spite of her declarations of devotion, he was guarded and did not discount the idea that she was setting him up as a mark. If he offered and she rejected him, he felt he would fold up into himself like an armadillo and never emerge.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
The buzzer sounded and the Hypello pressed the respond key.
"Her ladythhip is on the way up."
Nooj drew a deep breath; he felt as though he had been running but that was clearly an illusion since his breathing was as mechanically regulated as his heartbeat. He struggled to his feet and, hearing the sound of the lift, moved to stand with his back toward the door to his room. He would appear to be just entering the common room when she came in, he thought, taking a firmer grip on the loathed cane. If only...
The door from the lift opened and LeBlanc stood framed in the entrance. She was wearing her usual style of garment, all ribbons and flowing softness, the front deeply cut exposing much of her breasts. The short loose curls clustered about her head glowed like a nimbus against the darkness of the corridor as she swept in with her usual air of delighted anticipation and directed the maid trailing her toward the third door in the room before turning to the dark man watching her.
"Are the accommodations as you wished, love? Have you seen the entire house?" Without pausing for his answer she glided toward him, her narrow white hands held out in greeting.
They stood, not touching, the tension building between them. This was nothing like the other times they had been alone together. A globe of stillness enclosed them in a private space beyond the reality of the room and its contents. Nooj felt overwhelmed by the closeness of her, by the aura of electricity she seemed to project. He thought that if he dared to touch her actual sparks would fly about the room, consuming the parts of his body Sin had left intact. Gradually, time resumed and he could move and breathe again. Then, she stretched up toward him, her face glowing and he saw a wildness, a glitter in her eyes and bent to meet her lips.
Now it was LeBlanc whose breath came with shallow quickness – almost panting. She pressed against him and inhaled with a little hiss. He lifted his head and, his arm around her waist, drew her into his bedroom. The abandoned cane fell to the floor as the door closed with a decisive click.