update from sparkleup
This commit is contained in:
parent
911e64fa71
commit
866c331170
|
|
@ -54,6 +54,27 @@
|
|||
<p>He nodded, working on a careful extraction from his role as pillow, replacing his lap with another pillow from the bed as he slid from beneath her. He stretched his arms up over his head, winced at a quiet pop from his neck, and then shifted to lay down beside her instead, arm draped over her front. Cress followed suit, laying down beside Tule and hugging around them both.</p>
|
||||
<p>I chose to remain sitting for a while, idle gaze settling on the triad beside me, while I thought of the ways in which Dry Grass talked about In The Wind. I tried mapping that onto my own clade. Thinking of Lily like a sister, of Cress like a sibling, felt right in a way that I didn’t expect. While it was difficult to think of Tule as in any way younger than me, despite being my second degree up-tree instance, but perhaps that was due to his lingering similarities to me. After all, Sedge had forked him off shortly after I had forked into her. It was part of the package deal: Sedge went back to exploring femininity while Tule returned to cis-masculinity. Both of them remained siblings, perhaps because I was their progenitor.</p>
|
||||
<p>But Marsh? Were they a parent? Were they also a sibling? Some great-grandparent, perhaps? Or were they simply my root instance? All fit to greater or lesser extent.</p>
|
||||
<p>Finally, the thought ran its course and, left with a curiously numb and empty mind, I slid down to join the other three in laying on the bed, though I kept what I hoped was a polite distance, laying on my back and staring up at the ceiling.</p>
|
||||
<p>The polite distance lasted for less than a minute before Dry Grass rolled onto her side and draped an arm across my middle. <em>“If this is uncomfortable, do let me know, Reed,”</em> she sent in a sensorium message as both Tule and Cress scooted closer to her. <em>“Otherwise, I am going to try and sleep.”</em></p>
|
||||
<p>Tense, I nodded. <em>“It’s…different. Not bad, just going to take some getting used to.”</em></p>
|
||||
<p><em>“Should your boundaries change, then, let me know and I will adapt with them.”</em></p>
|
||||
<p>I nodded once more, patting the back of her hand where it rested on my side.</p>
|
||||
<p><em>“Ooooh, Reeeeed,”</em> came the barest hint of a message from Cress, and I peeked an eye open to see it peering over Dry Grass’s shoulder, grinning.</p>
|
||||
<p>I smirked and rolled my eyes. <em>“Shush, you.”</em></p>
|
||||
<p>Tule messaged a few seconds later, including Cress in the message, <em>“You good, Reed?”</em></p>
|
||||
<p><em>“Yeah, just taking a bit of getting used to.”</em></p>
|
||||
<p><em>“I can imagine,”</em> he replied. <em>“I caught myself feeling a little sorry for dumping this on you, earlier today. Trying to keep in mind that it’s your fault, not mine.”</em></p>
|
||||
<p>I did my best to keep my laughter to myself. Dry Grass’s breathing had grown steadily slower and I didn’t want to wake her if she was drifting off. <em>“Uh huh. All my fault. Nothing to do with freaking out about the entirety of Lagrange going down.”</em></p>
|
||||
<p><em>“I guess I’ll allow it.”</em></p>
|
||||
<p><em>“Is there any more news on that?”</em> Cress asked.</p>
|
||||
<p><em>“I mean, there’s plenty,”</em> I sent. <em>“Almost too much. All these changes they added to the System are beyond me. Like, they made the Ansible and AVEC more robust, which I guess is good, though we don’t use those any. ACLs are whatever, I guess. Not something we have to worry about. Splitting the hardware of the System, though? That sounds wild. Ditto adding cross-tree merging, which the other Odists and Jonas freaked out about.”</em></p>
|
||||
<p><em>“Cross-tree merging? Like you and I merging?”</em></p>
|
||||
<p><em>“I guess so. Answers Will Not Help and Jonas got pretty mad about the whole thing, actually, saying it changed clades into ‘gestalts’ or something. I guess I can see it, too. We still fork like a tree, branching out and everything, but if we can merge from one branch to another instead of just down, then the metaphor falls apart.”</em></p>
|
||||
<p>Tule chimed in with a scoff. <em>“What about that would make them angry? It just sounds like a minor improvement and a change in terminology.”</em></p>
|
||||
<p><em>“Hell if I know. They’re old and weird.”</em></p>
|
||||
<p>Cress buried its face against Tule’s shoulder to muffle a giggle. <em>“God, if they’re weirder than Dry Grass, they’d have to be.”</em> It sighed, added, <em>“But I guess that cross-tree merging sounds interesting. I can’t imagine what a mess the combination of all six of us would look like.”</em></p>
|
||||
<p>I stiffened, restraining the urge to sit up straight. <em>“Like Marsh, maybe?”</em></p>
|
||||
<p>There was silence from both of my cocladists, though I could hear that their breathing had picked up in turn. <em>“Well, now</em> there’s <em>an idea,”</em> Tule said at last.</p>
|
||||
</article>
|
||||
<footer>
|
||||
<p>Page generated on 2023-12-20</p>
|
||||
|
|
|
|||
Loading…
Reference in New Issue