MOAB

Chapter 50: Galene @ 1.9x nhs

Chapter 50: Galene @ 1.9x nhs

Galene couldn’t sleep. She puffed the pillows on the bed, but she still couldn’t get comfortable. She was enormous now.

Short girls go through the worst pregnancies.

Mel showed up, silent as always. “Need anything, Galene?”

“I’m having nightmares.”

The Muse propped up the pillows and motioned for her to lean back. She brushed her hair and started whispering a fairy tale. “Once upon a time there was a prince who ruled the land from a glass tower. He was a hard-working man and wanted to do well by his people, so he asked a witch for help with his studies. The witch brought her spellbook…”

Gal dozed off.

“Greg, I’m gonna ask you something weird. Why was your android Muse breathing deep in my ear last night, and more importantly, why was I enjoying it?”

Greg made breakfast for her, fatty toast which was her favourite. “It’s ASMR, Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response, basically a tingling, calming sensation when someone whispers to you or brushes your ears. Stuff like that. It was something that was defined in 2010, it’s not that old.”

“Not that old? I was born in 2010!”

Greg stopped moving and held his butter knife in the air. “Yes. Indeed. I guess it is rather old. Did I mention how every chat with you ends up making me feel old?”

“Wait till you see our boy riding a bike.”

Greg smiled wide. “I can’t wait.” He leaned in to kiss her.

She pulled away. “What are you doing? You broke up with me.”

“That’s crazy! Why would I break up with you? You’re so hot.”

Then she kissed him.

They worked, each on their own project. Greg had moved on from the augmented Olympics. The whole thing had been set in motion, and bigger teams had taken hold of the reigns. After Teucer officially applied to compete against able bodied athletes, the whole thing had snowballed. And there was Hermes Information Technology, right in the middle of it all, logo slapped on every surface imaginable.

Ten years from now, people wouldn’t even think twice about the new normal. But it had all started here, in this penthouse, as an idea. Just a firing of a few synapses, a couple of intellects rubbing together.

She rubbed her augmented knee. “If a guy with a bionic arm grabs your butt, is it inappropriate?” she wondered, staring out the window.

“Are you high?”

“High on endorphins. No really, humour me on this. You wouldn’t think it inappropriate if someone touched you with his insulin pump or his glasses or his walking cane, right?”

“Does he have sensory input from his fingertips?”

“What? Dunno, yeah sure, he does.”

“Then yes, it’s definitely inappropriate s****l harassment. A cyberlimb like a hand is considered a replacement of the missing hand. Even if it were an archaic prosthetic with no electronics, it’d still carry the same meaning. Touching someone with it should be the equivalent of touching with a fleshy hand as normal, with all the implications and social norms it carries.”

“Huh,” she mumbled, back in her thoughts.

“I’m so glad we’re having these conversations,” he said sarcastically.

She nodded but clearly her mind was elsewhere.