The wind in his face would always be a welcome feeling, no matter what day it was, but he was sure to grip the little bouquet of flowers in his grip for fear they would blow out into air and to the ground below. A lovely cascade of flower petals and a very grumpy android would make for quite the sight, he figured, so he held them tight as he sped over rooftops, dipped between buildings, sighing as the warm morning light brushed against his...skin?
Well, not really skin, but a sort of vinyl/silicon replication using tightly wound superficial polymers-
Oh, uh, never-mind. Skin felt easier on the tongue, and much more clean and easy when he explained it to civilians when they asked; it was always a bit awkward and uncanny when they went to touch his cool surface...plastic, and remarked how real he felt. He used to tell people that it was made for that purpose, Tenma would often tell him as he went at length about his creation and the marvel of genius it was to have a skin like substance that was both durable but efficient and no-porous, but when people would back away, remarking at its unsettling nature, he sort of just...thanked them and moved on.
Heck, he couldn't really blame them as someone like his would be a little...disconcerting.
So it didn't bother him as much...or he tried not to let it.
His eyes phased blue, scanning the immediate vicinity, searching high rises that seemed to claw at the sky from the floating ground below, picking at each individual area code and district that she had told him to look for, though he found it was just a bit easier identify things this way. Imagine how long it would have taken him to do this, how many wrong turns he would have taken had he done it at ground level? Of course, he'd had his fair share of frightened pedestrians, spooked cats, and down-right scared grandparents when they saw a flying child...robot...thing float near their windows, but were quickly reassured, as it was "The Protector", "The Android", or even for the more astute, "Blue Core".
This didn't upset him, but he did like his name, though.
He made sure to tell them that he was Astro, you know? They'd wave their hands, and go tell whoever they lived with that they'd seen his, the human-like robot, the one that flies, something along those lines, and they bring back their equally impressed, equally awestruck person, and they'd snap pictures, which he also didn't mind.
Nope. He didn't mind it a bit.
It had only been, what, maybe a week after the whole Peacemaker thing.
He didn't expect for it to go away so soon, that is, the excitement and shock and everything.
People needed time to get used to things, and thankfully for him, he was built with an automatic adjustment feature to take in information and process it to reason the best solution to problems, but that didn't necessarily mean that it didn't get a little weird having it brought up so much.
But he could deal with that much.
They liked him, and that was enough.
But in the times that he didn't, well, pop his head down below, he was having a fairly easy time picking out her address from the others, and with a start, he pointed his attention up, up, up, up to some of the highest apartment and penthouses that MetroCity could boast, and, from what he could see, was in the Innovation District, one of the most renowned in the city.
"So that's where her parents live? This is really cool!" He exclaimed as he slowed down a bit, setting his boosters to low burn to take in the view. Bustling city-scapes blurred past, swathes of people, robots, and the like presenting their many inventions in Intuition Square, and from the information that his scanner provided him, it was typically very populated, with approximately over one hundred down below, laughing and enjoying each other's company.
There were also children, playing and bumbling about with so much energy that even their robotic attendees had trouble keeping up with them, but they managed well enough. They would snatch up them up and play with them some more, until the kids tired themselves, and their parents tended to the attentions of their interested patrons, presenting their work to those that wished to see it.
It was amazing.
From self-cleansing automatons to the beginnings of autonomous nanobots, Astro could recall from his memories, well, Toby's memories, the many trips that he and Bill had taken there, the ice creams that had as they ventured and gazed at the maelstrom of inventions that whirred overhead.
The joy that they felt...joy that wasn't...his.
He shook it away, choosing instead to focus on the task ahead.
His internal clock told him it was nearly 14:21, just four minutes before their assigned, agreed upon time. He turned his head, and banked up, scaling the side of the buildings as the addressed in his sweeping sight, picking from one to the other.
'417 Redline Suite, Nanite tower, Intuition Square, Suite Number 220, Level AS-Tier 002; come on, come on, where is it...,' His processor whirred as he took in one address, then another, and another, still.
Suite Number 210, 212, 214, on and on until one took his attention, spotting her address, and he could read their heat signatures inside, bleeding heat from inside, a single robotic servant, five bodies, three children, two larger, likely adults, residual temperature average 97.4 degrees Fahrenheit-
Astro shook his head again, clearing his precision sight as he chastised himself.
'I really need to stop doing that!' He banked around to the nearest balcony, one that found would be the most efficient way to get in, directly to her room, Cora's room. Peering inside, he could see her getting ready, brushing her, now, completely black hair, her neon pink highlights completely gone and replaced with matching raven shades that shimmered blue and purple in the light. His heightened hearing picked up on her voice, she, herself, humming a jaunty tune that he could recognize, a familiar, popular tune that had appeared on the radio frequency 99.2-
'Cut that out, me! Geez, could I be more ROBOBTIC?! This is definitely not helping my case.' Landing with a gentle thud on the balcony, he knocked on the window, tapping with a stern, steady finger until she turned her attention to it, and he giggled at her expression, mostly shock, with some inclusions of mild surprise, amusement, though there were also hints of apprehension, if her darting eyes were any indication as she stood up from her vanity to greet him.
He sighed.
His facial recognition software was impeccable, but seriously, if he wanted to be perceived as at least a little normal, people didn't analyze the smallest variations in people's expressions, no matter how subtle up to 99.9888% accuracy.
Another feature of his programming, but he'd like to think that it was mostly practiced, something he did on his own.
Something that showed...showed his humanity.
But he couldn't deny its accuracy as she popped her head out, her expression incredulous, much to the confusion of the android.
If he was correct, she should be mostly elated with factors of surprise and some confusion.
This was not the anticipated response.
No matter.
Surely there was an explanation.
"Hey, Cora! You told me to be here by 14:25! And it's...there! Just a bit over two minutes early. I hope you don't mind too much." He exclaimed cheerfully, gently pecking her cheek, but he looked at the flowers with a hint of remembrance before holding them out a bit, smiling softly at her. There were tulips, sunflowers, and orchids; a light assortment that flashed brilliant colors in the light. Cora blushed at the motion, holding her cheek to her hand before opening the door completely, taking the flowers in-hand and smelling them deeply, then she jumped, as if recalling something important.
She quickly pulled him into the room, closing the glass door to the balcony softly before turning back to him, her flowers still in her hands. Astro realized with a start that this was the first time that he'd actually entered someone else's room, well, here and the orphanage, but he meant someone's personal room. He watched Cora for a moment as she scrambled to clean up a few of the items, but in the midst of it, he looked about, spotting various plushies, stickers, and just explosions of pink, pink, pink!
Pink walls, pink bed, heck, even pink slippers.
He never took her for the type, but then again, they had only really known each other for, what, a week at the most?
They were still learning each other, so it wasn't that hard to believe that there were things that he didn't know about her.
He gave her an amused look as he picked up one of the stuffed animals, this time in the shape of a duck, squishing it softly before she hurried to snatch it from her hands, her face a furious shade of red before she threw it onto her bed, brushing strands of hair from her face that had been tossed into her face in the movement.
Cute.
Feeling the room was sufficiently tidied up, she stopped, though, by his metrics, it looked pretty much the same, except slightly different, what, with her items sitting a bit straighter on her shelves, but her clothes basket was spilling onto the ground.
He considered fixing that, but she probably wouldn't like him pointing it out.
Taking a chance, he sat on a small stool near a large easel, blank but with paint canisters about, as if she were preparing to paint.
Astro went to ask her about it, but before he could, in a hushed voice her whispered-yelled at him, her face no longer a blooming poppy red, but instead, showed signs of annoyance, even fear, both emotions he didn't think that he'd ever seen on her face.
Now he was even more confused, but also a bit intrigued.
"Astro! I thought I told you to-," He giggled a bit, grinning widely as he bubbled with the answer to the question that he thought she'd ask.
"I know, I know! 'Go to the door. Don't fly to the window, Astro.''" He mimicked her voice through his replicator, his words sounding identical to her own, then reverting to his own, he didn't notice the huff of annoyance that pushed past her pursed lips.
No, he wasn't done quite yet.
"But then thought, wouldn't that be a little boring? Besides, I couldn't really find a good reason why I wouldn't want to do it this way. Can you? Maybe I'm thinking hard enough, but I went through four hundred and thirty two different scenarios, but none where the variable of going the window made an appreciable difference." Cora sighed, putting her hand on the bridge of her nose before she smiled softly, seeing the flowers upon one her her dressers.
Padding across the floor, she pulled the knob of her bedroom door, peaking out. Astro did, too, though unintentionally.
His x-ray vision activated in the same breath, and he could see a few different heat signatures, and his hearing let him hear their voices.
Wait, was that...
"Widget and Sludge?! They're here, too?!" His rocket boosters activated in the same breath (well, not breath for him; it didn't exactly need to breathe), and he was behind Cora in a second, turning off his boosters as soon as he got close to her, not wanting to burn her, but excited nonetheless, though he relented when he felt her place her warm hands on his shoulders, pushing him back from the crack.
He huffed a bit.
What was she so afraid of?
Couldn't he go see her folks?
Of course, he'd come to see Cora in her big, new, cool house, but also, he thought it would be really nice to meet her parents, too.
Not just because he really just wanted to get to know them, but Dad -Tenma, Astro corrected himself quickly- was really picky about where he got to go and for how long he got to leave, so it wasn't very often that he got the chance to leave out on his own, and for this long as it was.
He wasn't upset at him, of course.
Things had been going really well this last week or so. He was just nervous about losing him again, that's all.
Nothing weird about that. Nope, not at all.
So to say that he wanted to make the most of the four hours, thirty-seven minutes, and twenty-one seconds he had was an understatement.
"Something wrong, Cora? Aren't we going to-," This time, it was Cora that stopped him mid-sentence, holding her hand up before he could finish.
"Astro, how do you think they're going to react knowing that you broke into my window unannounced from my balcony, uninvited, then coming from my room no less, without letting them know you're here?" The young girl asked him as she eyed him skeptically, and Astro couldn't deny the logic there.
If he recalled correctly, people didn't take too kindly to having intruders (which by it's most literal definition, he was) entering their home unannounced, and as she aptly put it, uninvited. He couldn't really argue with her with that.
"Fair enough. You...you did tell them that I was coming, right? They know?" Cora looked...uncertain, factors of fear, a bit of hesitation as well.
Strange, that wasn't what he was expecting to see, either.
Was she okay?
She fiddled with her hands for a bit before sighing.
"Uh...no. They...may not know yet?" Her voice lifted at the end, smiling nervously at the android as he processed what she'd said, and he gave pause as he frowned, the first time he'd down that, but wasn't sure what to say to that.
Wasn't she supposed to?
'That doesn't make sense. Surely she'd want them to know that I was coming. Maybe it was just a mistake.' He looked to her as she continued to speak on.
The last thing he wanted to do was not give her enough time to explain her actions.
That would be rude.
Besides, she probably had a really good reason for not doing so.
"I didn't really tell them, but that's only because I wanted to them to be surprised by, well, you! You're THE Astro. Imagine how surprised they'll be when they see you for the first time and everything!" Seemed reasonable enough.
What reason would she have to lie?
His frown faded, and an understanding smile grew on his features, smoothly, cleanly, as the logical fallacy was cleared from his mind.
All of that made sense.
"Oh, that seems reasonable. So...what should I do now?" Scratching his cool, plastic hair, he tilted his head.
"You're going to do this the old fashioned, person way; from the entrance!" Leading him gently by the hand, he relished in her warmth; grabbing the bouquet, she leaned a bit over the railing to point at a large entry way, manned by several robotic lifeforms dressed in uniforms, painted finely and neatly over their pristine metal bodies. They greeted guests one-by-one, even the ones that didn't acknowledge them, walking right past them.
They didn't seem too bothered by it, though Astro didn't think it was very nice to ignore them, but that thought seemed to leave him just as quickly when he realized just how tall this building was, and the length of time that it would take him to return to their suite, if just entering from the main lobby, the first elevator, and up all 220 floors, that would take him roughly eight minutes with minimal traffic.
Eight minutes longer than what would have taken him to fly.
"Do I really have to? That takes so long and I'm already here so...," Looking at her hopefully, he deflated at her expression.
She wasn't going to budge, was she?
He raised his hand to argue before she began to gently nudge him, hugging him close before letting him go.
"Look, if you...if you want my parents to be more...open to you, you're going to have to act more...more..." She paused, appearing more hesitant than she had before. His sensors could see her heart racing, if only with slight levels of elevation, but he could likely predict what it was that she was going to say, and he caught it with a small smile, holding her hands as he backed further to the railing, preparing to leave.
"More human?" He asked, sensing her heart rate increase a bit more.
She was flustered.
"No, no, no! That's not, I didn't-," She started, but Astro finished with a little chuckle, hopping up onto the railing and looking back at her, then to the city below. Down there, he could see so many, walking warm bodies...then he looked down at his own cold one, remarking the lack of body temperature except for the heat that was generated from the core within him, churning like a small sun.
Churning, churning, churning...but it didn't beat.
Not like hers.
"It's okay. I...I know that I have to, I just forgot that for a second there. Weird, right? That I could forget something so...obvious? Sorry about that." Smiling at her, she fiddled with her hands, but her heart-rate was still elevated, though it seemed to be slowing down, bit by bit.
His critical response system told him that was a good sign, but she still looked upset.
He wondered if he could fix that.
Inside, a voice called from behind her bedroom door, and taking to it, his blue eyes giving off an eerie, soft glow, even in the bright, afternoon sun, he scanned it, noticing a smaller heat signature, rapping softly at the door as he gazed through and saw the outline of a younger woman, likely in her...late twenties...early...thirties.
But...there was another heat signature, lying inside of her.
It's small heart beating softly, so...small.
It was a baby, she was pregnant.
She was smiling, heart-rate relaxed.
That must be Cora's mother.
"Cora? You okay in there, sweetie? We're going to start the board-game soon, so if you wanted to join, you might want to come here. Widget and Sludge are jumping all over the place waiting for you!" She called out until he heard her leave the door, rushing away, he presumed, to tend to the sound of Widget and Sludge running about excitedly.
He could hear her scolding them lightly and they calmed down a bit, though he could still hear then romping about, playing though much more carefully now.
His smile fell a bit.
"Oh, sorry, Astro. I have to-," His smile returned and he chuckled.
"You don't need to apologize. I haven't arrived yet." He winked, going to push off of the balcony when she placed the flowers back in his hands, and in that same moment, he was falling through air, turning on his boosters just before hitting the ground.
Eyes around him focused on him, some excited, some apprehensive, but they were all focused on him and him alone.
The spectacle.
The android.
But for Cora...he would try his best to be human.