Chapter 5:

Love and Cupcakes

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Once again, Zima found himself traversing the city streets, this time on his motorcycle. Having rented an apartment in a middle-income neighborhood with some of the cash he and Dita had stashed in the old safehouse, he had unloaded everything from the safehouse out of the rental truck, tucked it safely away in his new home, then driven the truck back and paid for the day. Now all he had to do was ride home, create a new identity for himself, then figure out what his next move would be.

About halfway back to the apartment, Zima's olfactory sensor suite picked up a strange odor. Stopping at the side of the road, Zima sniffed for a moment, determined that the smell's source was somewhere behind him, and turned the bike around. He didn't have to go far before encountering a small shop with a sign over the door: European Sweets Tirol.

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To Hiroyasu Oeda, the tall man who walked in as he was preparing to close up shop seemed somehow unusual. Mostly, it was in the way he carried himself; he seemed almost shy, as though he was afraid that somebody would kick him out if he approached the counter.

Oeda plastered his best happy-shopkeeper smile on his face. "Hello there!" he said. "Welcome to our bakery."

"'Our' bakery?" asked Zima, looking around. "There doesn't seem to be anyone else here."

Oeda wasn't sure if the fellow was trying to make a joke; his face looked pretty serious. Still, Oeda gave a slight chuckle. "Oh, that's right," he said. "Normally, I have a server here, but she called this morning and said that she couldn't come in, so lately, I've been running the place on my own. Not that I mind, though; Chii's normally pretty reliable, so I guess whatever she had to take care of must be important."

"Chii?" Zima's eyes snapped open. Of couse he recognized the name; less than twenty-four hours ago, he and Dita had come within a hair's breadth of destroying Chii!

"Yes, that's right," Oeda said. "Do you know her?"

"I ... ah ... well, yes. We've met. Just the other day, actually." Realizing that he might have just gotten himself into a major dilemma, Zima racked his hard drive for an appropriate follow-up. Considering that he and Dita had very nearly killed Chii, he doubted very much that she or her owner would react well if they discovered that Zima now knew Chii's place of employment. "I'm afraid I didn't make a very good impression on her owner, though," he told the shopkeeper, "so I'd appreciate it if you didn't mention it to her that I dropped by."

"Her owner ...? Oh! You must mean Motosuwa," Oeda said. "Actually, he doesn't own Chii at all. He just found the poor thing in a trash pile one night, and she's been staying in his apartment ever since. I guess they're more like good friends than just a persocom and her owner."

"Really? Now, that's interesting," Zima said. Actually, he was a bit surprised; he had always assumed that non-combat persocoms were unable to function on their own without a human owner to give them instructions, but Chii was living proof that this was not so. Somehow, the idea of humans and persocoms living together as equals appealed to Zima.

Then the unique aroma that had drawn him to the store in the first place hit Zima's nose once again. He noticed a large glass display case that made up part of the counter, filled with various baked goods, and realized that the smell was coming from the sweets. Zima had smelled such things before, but now the aroma was causing an amazingly strong emotional reaction. It took him a moment, but finally Zima realized that he ... liked this smell. "Excuse me," he said to the shopkeeper, "but may I have one of ... these?" he said, pointing to a small tray of items labeled "Cupcakes".

"Sure!" Oeda said, opening a wood panel at the back of the display case and pulling a cupcake out for him. "That will be three hundred yen, please." Zima handed the man the required amount, then held the cupcake under his nose, taking in the scent of the tiny pastry. It seemed to have been baked fairly recently, judging from its exterior temperature. Zima smiled, luxuriating in the emotional responses that his rediscovered sense of smell was providing him. After several seconds of this, he noticed the shopkeeper giving him an odd look. "Aren't you going to eat that?" Oeda inquired.

"Eat... Oh! Yes," Zima said. Luckily, unlike commercial persocoms, Zima had been designed with a secondary power system capable of extracting chemical energy from ingested material. It acted as a backup in case his main fuel cell were ever damaged, and had the side benefit of allowing him to eat common foodstuffs. Zima brought cupcake to his mouth, taking a small bite. Instantly, an explosion of sensation flooded his senses, and Zima nearly took a step back as his mind was sent reeling. Both his and Oeda's eyes went wide as Zima realized that he didn't just enjoy the taste of the cupcake; he loved it! It made the feeling provoked by its smell seem mild by comparison. "I ... this ... that was incredible!" he said to Oeda, smiling broadly; to Oeda, he looked like a kid who had just unwrapped the world's greatest birthday present. Zima finished the cupcake slowly, savoring every tiny morsel, and would have probably eaten the wrapper if Oeda hadn't told him not to. Still grinning, Zima walked back over to the counter, peering in at all the amazing treats contained within.

"You know," he said, "I think I'd like one of those next..."

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Ten minutes later, Zima was carrying four plastic bags stuffed full of various baked goods, the entire contents of Tirol's display case. He had felt uncomfortable taking so much of the shopkeeper's time, and besides, he wanted to have a supply of sweets for later.

Oeda just scratched his head. "Wow! You must really have a sweet tooth. You said that this was the first time you've ever had pastries?"

"Yes," Zima said. "I have to say, these are the best things I've ever tasted."

"Well, I'm glad you like them so much. Feel free to come back anytime."

Zima smiled. Unfortunately, because Chii usually worked at the bakery, he knew that coming back again might be a very bad idea. "Thank you for the offer," he said.

As he was picking up his bags of goodies, a young woman walked in the door. "Wow!" she exclaimed, "that's a lot of sweets! Are you having a party or something?" She had a warm, genuine smile, and Zima found himself responding to her good humor. "Actually, I'm building up a stockpile for the next few weeks."

"Yumi!" Oeda exclaimed, smiling. "It's good to see you!"

Yumi ran over and, as Zima watched, threw her arms around the shopkeeper's neck. "Sorry," she said, whispering in the man's ear, "but I just couldn't wait until you got off of work."

"That's okay. I'm just happy you're here. In fact, given that Mister Sweet-Tooth here just cleaned me out, I think I might just close up the shop a half-hour early today."

"Really?"

"Really."

"Oh, Hiroyasu!" Yumi exclaimed, holding the man tighter and pressing her lips to his. "Hiroyasu," in turn, wrapped an arm around Yumi's waist and pressed back with his own mouth.

As Zima watched the couple, a memory surfaced: Dita, leaning against him as she recharged, her head on his chest while she slept. At the time, of course, her position hadn't meant anything more than lying on a sheet; sleeping on top of Zima's coat and soft synthetic skin was better for her endoskeleton than sleeping on a hard steel roof. Now, though, as he watched Yumi and Hiroyasu embrace, something seemed to twist inside him. Now that he actually had the capacity to feel human emotions, the thought of being so close to another person, pressing her to him...

Hiroyasu and Yumi broke apart when they realized that Zima was staring at them, his head cocked to one side, a strange look on his face. "Sorry!" Oeda said. "Um, I'm sorry, sir. I guess we just forgot that you ..."

Zima blinked, composed himself, then shook his head. "No, no, it's all right. Seeing you two together just reminded me of ... well, someone else. Please, don't mind me."

Hiroyasu gave a relieved-looking smile. "Uh, this is my girlfriend, Yumi," he said. "Yumi, this is Mister ...?"

"Zima," Zima responded. "Zima ... Tanaka."

"Pleased to meet you, Mister Tanaka," Yumi said, bowing.

"And I am very pleased to meet you both," Zima replied, bowing deeply to both the shopkeeper and his ... "girlfriend".

Zima grabbed his purchases, walked out to his motorcycle, and gently placed all four bags in the plastic saddlebags mounted on the rear of the bike. Before mounting up, though, he put a hand to his chest. It felt as though someone were squeezing his coolant pump in a vise. Somehow, thinking of Dita, of the time they had spent together, had made him feel as though there was a huge empty place inside him, a vacuum so powerful that it felt like he was going to implode.

Dita...

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