DoomPet

Chapter 72

"Are you ready?" Elena tapped on Samuel's door, dancing her fingers over the handle.

A few hours had passed since he had helped both the Slayer and Crüe. The robot was not ready. His olfactory nerves wouldn't be usable for assembly for what looked to be another day or two. He honestly wanted to cancel, but felt too guilty now that Elena was at his door. "Oh yes, I'll be out in a second."

He sprayed some of the cologne she liked on himself and made sure he had no blood on his arms. He looked rather nice, but still felt like shit. He poked his head out of the door and smiled, "I regret to inform you, but I wasn't able to get my nose to work yet tonight."

"Oh that's fine, I told you we can work on that sometime together. For now, let's go enjoy the beautiful flowers." After quickly looking both ways, she reached out and pulled him close to her.

He savored her warm touch for a moment. It also helped him calm the panic he felt about not being able to smell.

"Our cover is that we are checking on the seed vault inside the greenhouse, well... It's more of a conservatory."

"Sounds interesting." He gently tapped her lower back, his hands lingering before they pulled away and walked side by side down the hallway.

It actually took a decent walk through the city to get to their destination, and the closer they got the more nervous Samuel felt. As the conservatory came into sight, he felt a lump form in his mechanical throat. He began talking to try and stave off his worry, "I'm surprised it survived the invasion."

"Oh it didn't, but the basement was intact with all the seed samples and root bulbs so we were able to rebuild." Her scarred face looked up at him. "We're lucky we still have all the flowers, and bees too!" They opened the door and were hit with the warm humidity of the large greenhouse, the glass panes reflecting the last bit of the sunset down into the plants.

An ARC member with a flower symbol emblazoned on a green apron smiled at them, "Oh hello, Elena are you here for the seed vault?"

She gave them a quick flash of a smile, "Oh I was just going to give Dr. Samuel Hayden a full tour of the gardens and vault if that's not an issue."

They nodded and went back to watering some plants by the door, "Enjoy!"

Both of them walked off into the large sprawling forest of the conservatory.

They would bend down together to look at tiny little stalks of red flowers, admiring their little shiny petals. Samuel picked her up so she could look up at beautiful orange flowers with thick stamens and tiny little green vines all around them.

There was a little stream that ran through part of the building, soaking the plants near it. As they walked down and farther into the building, the plants began to get smaller and smaller. Whole rooms would be filled with pots of tiny new sprouts or pots that haven't even sprouted yet.

They rested on a bench in one of the themed rooms full of cacti. Nibbling on some gummy bears Elena had brought. Samuel had to take careful minute bites as to not clog up his mouth slit and be forced to reveal under his face plate.

"Could you imagine falling into these cactuses?" She shuddered at the thought, "That was always my fear whenever I was little, and I didn't even live somewhere with cactuses." She mused and popped a gummy snack into her mouth.

Samuel stared at the sharp plants for a moment before he could formulate a response, "I suppose now I'd do more damage to the cacti then they would do to me..." He wondered why today of all days he was reminded of his body's inferiority every other minute.