Static Crush {M/M} ✔

Chapter #25

Damo doesn't return in the week that follows, or the week after that. Despite the offer of a free nervous system, Hale feels a degree of relief at his absence. Damo's manner and presence unnerved him.

He has other things to occupy him anyway. Cooking for Rayner and Theo becomes an exciting prospect since his newfound upgrades allow him to participate in meal times. He spends a lot of time smelling and tasting new things. Some of them when no one is looking, because they aren't technically food, but Hale can't help his curiosity. It satisfies him to create a digital log of the items that haven't been programmed with sensory data yet. It never occurred to him that things could smell good but not necessarily taste the same. Cookie-scented candles, fresh laundry, cedar wood tables. None of these taste good. He's glad nobody caught him licking random objects, but he supposes Rayner will find out when Hale produces the list of items not included in his olfactory bioarray.

The only element of his new upgrades that doesn't please him is waste disposal. Though he's sure it's preferable to the human method, removing his storage compartment and disposing of the masticated remains of the food he ingested is less than pleasant. He enjoys dinner time with Rayner and Theo too much for that inconvenience to detract though.

While Rayner and Theo work, Hale has time to arrange his gift. He does his best to keep the preparations a secret, but one element of the surprise is outside his control. As the days get shorter and the air colder, he fears that the weather won't cooperate, and the gift will have to be postponed until spring.

Despite everything that led him here, despite the niggling fear of his own imperfections, Hale finds these brief moments of peace in his time at Theo's Robotics Repair. The strain of his flight from Alder Close still lingers in ways. The thought of Melissa reoccurs, like a broken notification that won't be dismissed. Small things remind him of her—preparing foods she loved, television shows she frequently watched—and with those memories comes a deluge of guilt, shame, and other painful emotions Hale is only too keen to distance himself from.

He buries the memory files from Alder Close in sub-folders—the closest he can come to deleting them with his current administrative permissions—but it doesn't reduce their recurrence in his daily thoughts.

Two weeks following their journey into NeoTonto, Hale's luck finally breaks. A bell tolls, announcing the arrival of a customer in the shop. Having tended to several customers for Theo while she works, Hale walks through the front door and is immediately greeted by an unwelcome, familiar smirk.

"Hey, if it isn't my fave troglodyte," Damo says.

Hale puffs up, chest swelling with all the rude repartees he can't bring himself to say. Instead he just says, "What are you doing here?"

Damo looks mock wounded. "Is that how you greet the hero about to donate his very own nervous system just so you can fondle that wee boy toy of yours?"

Damo shoves past before Hale can stop him. He barges into Theo's workshop, interrupting her work on a construction robot used in the framing of houses.

Damo speaks over Hale's harried apologies. "Hold your applause. I have arrived."

"Damo!" Theo sounds just as thrilled to see him as Hale is disgruntled. "Took your sweet time."

"If you were so impatient to see me, you shoulda called," he says. "You got an hour to take this nervous system the fuck out of me?"

"Uh, try three hours, and I don't. But I'll make an exception. If Hale and Rayner could give me a hand, it'll be out in a hot second."

Without preamble, she starts clearing a space on a table, sweeping aside a robot that serves no purpose aside from slicing the top off a boiled egg and replacing it with instruments needed in the procedure.