update from sparkleup
This commit is contained in:
parent
ca3c59e360
commit
b5b0ef6ecc
|
|
@ -40,8 +40,54 @@
|
|||
<p>She titled her head at him.</p>
|
||||
<p>“”Extremely sentimental,” it says. Pretty sure that fits.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Hanne rolled her eyes, grinning. “Okay, yeah, that fits you to a tee.”</p>
|
||||
<!--more, probably-->
|
||||
|
||||
<p>They walked in silence for a few minutes. Reed tallied the occupants of the various restaurants along the way, making note of the busiest to check out on some less-busy night. Good date spots, perhaps.</p>
|
||||
<p>“What was it like when you uploaded?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“You mean phys-side?”</p>
|
||||
<p>Hanne nodded. “What was Earth like? What was your life like?”</p>
|
||||
<p>He shrugged. “Fine, I guess. The Western Fed was swinging conservative again, it was hot as hell all the time, most places were starting to subsidize uploading despite an already declining population. I guess that makes it sound terrible, and maybe it would have gotten worse, but I wasn’t around to see it. We were doing alright, so maybe I was kind of sheltered.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I hear you on the hot as hell part. We couldn’t afford moving south when it got too bad, so we moved up into the mountains. It helped a little bit, at least.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“When was that?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“2290 something. I don’t remember. I think I was five, at least.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Reed nodded. “I guess that’s what I mean by sheltered. We were already up in Newfoundland. Summers sucked, winters sucked, but it was alright between them.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Autumn or spring?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Huh?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Pick one, dummy,” she said, laughing.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Oh, autumn, for sure. Autumn bitch all the way.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“I knew it.”</p>
|
||||
<p>He rolled his eyes. “I’m nothing if not myself.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“So why’d you upload?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“You know that already.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Hanne shook her head. “You said to transition, sure, but didn’t you already do that back phys-side.”</p>
|
||||
<p>He stayed silent, picking apart his thoughts on the matter. “I– Marsh got sick of being trans. He wanted to just be a man, not a trans man.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“You’re a trans man, though.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Sure, but that’s not what he wanted at the time. He started to miss it by the time he forked.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Why?”</p>
|
||||
<p>He laughed. “So many questions tonight.”</p>
|
||||
<p>She grinned, shrugged.</p>
|
||||
<p>“Well, I think half of it was that there was just too much pressure at the time. Like I said, the WF was swinging conservative, so there was this push to assimilate, and I guess he internalized that pretty hard. He felt pushed to just be a man, and always felt that he fell short, despite all he did to try, but on Lagrange, he could do that right off the bat.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“So he went back to being trans–“</p>
|
||||
<p>Reed shook his head, cutting her off. “He’s still cis. I became the way he experienced that again.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Sorry, Reed.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“No, it’s okay,” he said, feeling a rush of warmth to his cheeks. “Didn’t mean to get too pushy. It’s still a little tender, I guess.”</p>
|
||||
<p>The shadow of her shoulders relaxed again in the dark of the night. “Even after so long?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Yeah. Like I said, he internalized it pretty hard, even as he tried to diversify later on. I headed back trans, Lily headed back feminine, and Cress sits in between.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“is that why you forked, too?”</p>
|
||||
<p>He laughed. “I forked for fun. Even if it’s still a tender spot, I think I’m still way more relaxed than he is. There may be a bit of that in Sedge, I guess. He’s still pretty happy being a guy. Rush is as ve is of his own choice, though.”</p>
|
||||
<p>Hanne looped her arm through his. “Well, I still like you as you are.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“What, trans?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“No, a huge nerd.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Of course.” He bumped his shoulder to hers. “Why’d you upload, then?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“The weather. The money. All the same stuff the government told us. Same as most people, I think. I internalized that as much as Marsh did the whole gender thing.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Was the WF still on its conservative swing?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“The Republic of Argentina wasn’t part of the Western Federation.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Oh, right. I guess I knew that.”</p>
|
||||
<p>She shrugged. “Sure. But either way, they were somewhere in the middle, maybe. There was this big push from the liberal side on the climate, and this big push on the conservative side on the financial side. They said they could cut costs on services if there were fewer of us. Dad was with them, mom was with the libs. It was one of the few things they could agree on. They said they’d miss me, but they weren’t exactly sad when I went the Ansible.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“‘Went the Ansible’? Is that what you called it?”</p>
|
||||
<p>“‘Uploading’ sounds so sterile,” she said, nodding. “‘Went the Ansible’ just made it sound like moving away from home.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Well, I’m glad you went the Ansible, then.”</p>
|
||||
<p>“Sap.”</p>
|
||||
<p>He laughed. “Got it in one.”</p>
|
||||
<hr />
|
||||
<p>Champagne tinted evenings fade, as they do, into brandy-colored nights. Amber nights and fireplaces for the hell of it, Reed and Hanne settling in for a little bit of warmth for that last hour, not quite decadence and a ways off from opulence, but still a plush couch and a fire and snifters slightly too full of liquor.</p>
|
||||
<p>They shared their warmth and they continued to talk, talking of the year past, of years past beyond that, and of however many they decided would lay ahead of them. A hundred? Two hundred? Five years? Reed argued passionately for five more years of life before he’d quit, then laughed, changed his mind, and said he’d never die. Hanne said she would live for precisely two hundred before quitting her instance and disappearing from Lagrange. She would fork at a century and never speak to that version of her again, that exact duplicate, and should that instance decide to live on past two centuries, so be it, but she’d decided her expiration.</p>
|
||||
<p>Reed scoffed. “What? And leave me behind?”</p>
|
||||
|
|
@ -212,7 +258,7 @@
|
|||
<p>Systime 246+41 00:17.</p>
|
||||
</article>
|
||||
<footer>
|
||||
<p>Page generated on 2023-01-18</p>
|
||||
<p>Page generated on 2023-01-23</p>
|
||||
</footer>
|
||||
</main>
|
||||
<script type="text/javascript">
|
||||
|
|
|
|||
Loading…
Reference in New Issue