Disclaimer: I do not own 'The Zeta Project'. I do not own any of its characters. I deeply appreciate Robert Goodman as the creator of 'The Zeta Project' and all 'The Zeta Project' team. So it's just a fanfic.

As English isn't my native language, I want to thank Dragonmaster01 for her editing work on this chapter.

As in all of my stories, here Zee has a material covering over his synthoid's body. More details about this idea, you can find in Chapter Three of my fanfic "The Nettle's Shirt', book 1 of 'You Need Me".

Hide and Seek

by Iglika

Chapter Four

Zee's point of view

Pretending that I was looking at the brochure stand I saw with my peripheral vision how Ro rushed from the elevator in the lobby. I didn't move. I continued pretending that I was occupied with the brochures, still keeping a sharp eye on her.

Ro observed the lobby and then she suddenly began to yell at me.

„Okay, Zee, I'm the guilty one, but please don't try to act as if you don't know me! I'm so sorry for everything I told you! Please, forgive me! Please don't leave me this way! Please, don't do this to me! I'm really sorry for everything! Please forgive me! Please forgive me, Zee!"

I didn't know if I was glad that she managed to recognize me. Probably I wasn't sure in this the same way she wasn't completely sure that it was really me.

But… one way or another, something in me had a weird thrill that she was able to identify me no matter what kind of hologram I wore… although all this I didn't want to reveal myself yet. Not now.

Yes, I was insulted. I was really offended of the way she had treated me, of the way she had driven me out. But I loved her too much to leave her so easily.

I had turned to look at her with the blank expression of a person, who was not sure what was going on, while she kept yelling at me as if we were some just separated couple.

All the people in the lobby stared at us right now and I knew it was her goal – she wanted to provoke the security to come for her and that way she hoped to make me reveal myself. I wouldn't let her to enter in some troubles, would I? I would have no nerves to see her trapped and I would do something in order to rescue her.

Her plan was perfect, as she knew me so well. But obviously she didn't know me perfectly as she didn't foresee that I could have some plans of my own.

She kept yelling at me, all the guests kept watching at us and I noticed two guards, who were already approaching Ro.

Without changing my hologram and without glancing at Ro, I blocked their way and I said quietly enough for her to not hear me.

„Everything is okay, I'm Zee. She's my girlfriend, we had some fight, you know how it is. She's just too emotional, I'm so sorry for her behavior, but we don't want trouble. We were just leaving."

„Take your girlfriend and leave immediately or we'll call the police!" threatened one of the guards.

I made an idiotic servile smile, then nodded and ran back to Ro.

No matter how real my hands were, I knew she would recognize my touch even if I only held her arm, but I had no other choice. I took her by the elbow, being very careful to not allow her to grab and squeeze my wrist in order to check for a pulse. Well, even if she wouldn't recognize me by my touch, she would recognize the scent of the 'after shave' of my face. My creators had made me real enough by thinking about each detail on me, I only hoped that this scent of 'after shave' was something popular enough and I wasn't the only one on whose face smelled that way.

„Miss, come with me, please. The guards will call the police if we don't get out of here." I said with a voice, which I was sure I hadn't used during those years, since we were together.

„Zee! You are Zee! I know it's you!" She tried to twist in my hands, but I still didn't allow her to grab my wrist.

We were on the street already, but I kept holding her in order to take her as far from the hotel as possible.

„I'm flattered that a girl like you could date someone who looks like me, but I'm not your Zee."

„You are! It's you, Zee! I know it's you, it's useless to deny!"

„I'm really sorry but I'm not. And I don't want trouble with your Zee if he would suddenly appear and see us. I merely wanted to help you, okay?"

„No, it's not okay, it's not okay, Zee. I'm so sorry for what I said to you, I'm so sorry that I insulted you! I want you back! I want you back, Zee! Please forgive me! Please stop that masquerade!"

„I don't know what you're talking about."

„You perfectly know, Zee, please stop that!"

We were far enough from the hotel, so I stopped walking.

„Take care and…" I removed the real red bandana from my neck and I made her take it, trying to not pay attention to her totally aghast expression. „This little thing brought me luck so many times; I want you to have it. Good luck with your Zee." Saying that and using her confusion, I hurried up to dash behind the near corner.

By the time that she ran after me, I was already changed my hologram, so there was no way for her to recognize me among the passers-by.

„Ze-e-e!" I heard her yelling. „Ze-e-e…" I heard her whispering.

But I didn't answer.

I merely noticed the route she took and I followed her.

o O o

Ro's point of view

Squeezing the red bandana in my hand I stood on the street. How I allowed him to mislead me that way! A real red bandana! What a proof that it was a real human! If it wasn't Zee, he wouldn't have any need to prove me anything. A real red bandana! Just great! That confirmed the fact only that he really liked that kind of bandana, as he had bought it. Why he didn't tell me about that? Probably because he wanted to spare himself from my sarcastic remarks that if he would dare to wear it, I would pretend that I don't know him. Or at least I had said something like this when he had made that ridiculous cowboy clothing with the hologram red bandana.

So now what? I lost him. Again. That red bandana wasn't a mistake he made; it wasn't a signal that it was him. It was his way to make me to lose track of him; it was his way for revenge.

I had no right to be insulted. I deserved all this.

So now what? Where to go in this snowy winter night?

I couldn't go back to the hotel. Then where to go? Probably he would follow me. But how to make him to forgive me? How to make him to come back to me? How to make him to be my Zee again?

'Good luck with your Zee.' What was that? Sarcasm? Or some code? What he wanted to tell me with this? Was he so sure that we were thinking alike enough already and I would be a real mind-reader?

Where to go? In some new hotel? On the bus station? On the train station? Or rent a car? The trains were giving him malfunctions of his hologram; I didn't want him to be caught. So I made my way to the bus station.

When I arrived, I entered the waiting room and sat on a bench.

You are somewhere nearby, aren't you, Zee? Please, don't leave me… I can't live without you… and you wouldn't survive without me… you are somewhere nearby, aren't you, Zee?

I looked around… all those people… he is someone of them, isn't he? He just was waiting…

…Someone approached my bench and stopped just before me. It was some police officer, but before I raised my head to look at him, he said, „You have to come with me, Miss."

This warm and deep, soft voice…

Zee?

Zeeeee!

He was a police officer now, I… I couldn't throw on his neck… they weren't too many people around us now, but… I couldn't throw on some police officer's neck… as soon as I… I probably looked like some criminal as I was so shocked… it doesn't matter how I looked like… nothing on earth was important now except Zee, who stood just before me…

It was him… it was his face… his navy blue eyes… he looked at me… with so much sorrow…

Zee held my hand, holomorphing handcuffs, I stood up to follow him… he held my hand… without glancing at me as like a real police officer, who has nothing to do with some criminal girl…

No. It was just a memory. Nobody came to me now. Nobody approached the bench saying, „You have to come with me, Miss" like the last time when we were separated, before our meeting with Casey, when we had tried, once more, to run from Bennet…

Zee wouldn't come this time. He wouldn't reveal himself so easily. We had never fought before. Ever. And it wouldn't have happened if it wasn't for me. It was all my fault.

I bit my lips. I had to invent something. I had to.

Probably if I ran to catch the bus, which was about to leave, I would see what hologram he used now, because he would be the only one, aside of me, who would run to catch the bus in the last moment.

I did exactly that, but… there was just a mother with a little kid, obviously some foreigner, who climbed onto the bus after me. Zee couldn't be that woman, the kid was quite real.

But I was sure he was in the bus. Probably he had guessed what I would do, he had checked which bus is about to leave and he had come here before me.

Well, so be it. I'll make him to forgive me, sooner or later. At least he followed me. I just knew it. I was sure in it. He was here.

He was here.

I was sure of this.

o O o

A tall, black haired young man with dark grey pants, lilac T-shirt and a long violet-blue coat began to carefully and noiselessly, with the fast, flexible moves of a prowling panther, sneak close to the wall, which surrounded the hotel's garden. Then with the same skillful moves he began to climb up the outside wall of the hotel. He jumped quietly on the balcony of one room and he stood unmovable next to the window. The blinds were closed, but it seemed that he was able to hear even the slighter sound in the room. The winter wind waved his hair and his unbuttoned coat, but he didn't pay attention to the cold as if it wasn't able to affect him. The young man didn't look like a thief. He looked like some guard, like some guardian angel, who wanted to be sure that the person in the room was safety and well.

When the light in the room died, a green-white light flashed around him, he became a part of the wall and he remained immovable on the balcony in the slight light of the new morning. He remained there for hours.

When finally, in the late afternoon, there were sounds in the room, which meant that the person inside was awake, the black haired man climbed down the balcony the same way he had come. Then he sneaked beside the wall of the garden. Then, becoming a hotel employee, he entered the hotel.

When he stopped in front the door of the same room on whose balcony he had spent hours, the green-white light around him flashed again. He knocked on the door. After minute a blonde girl opened the door and… she managed to say one word only.

„You?"

to be continued…

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