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47 lines
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<title>ZK | Ioan Balan --- 2305</title>
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<h1>Zk | Ioan Balan --- 2305</h1>
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<p><span class="tag">writing</span> <span class="tag">novel</span> <span class="tag">chapter</span> <span class="tag">fiction</span> <span class="tag">scifi</span> <span class="tag">post-self</span> <span class="tag">qoheleth</span></p>
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<p>Ioan sat back and rubbed at eir eyes. Time had gone all funny with all this research.</p>
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<p>As with so many of eir previous projects, ey fell into a state of free-running sleep and distractedness. Ey would work for a few hours, suddenly get impossibly tired, nap for what felt like fifteen minutes, and wake up three hours later. Then ey'd work for twenty hours straight, neglecting to eat.</p>
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<p>Ey had researched it at one point and entertained the idea that it might be part of some larger sleep disorder, something grander, perhaps. Ey had put it off as just one of eir many neuroses.</p>
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<p><em>Less than healthy.</em></p>
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<p>There were never any complaints about the quality or quantity of work ey got done while free-running. Ey didn't slip up or stumble. Didn't make more mistakes than when ey stuck to a schedule. Made fewer, perhaps. And being methodical got one quite far as an historian and writer. Ey would write the same quality work at the beginning, middle, and end of eir waking periods.</p>
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<p>What it did not do, however, was endear oneself to one's housemates. Ioan#tracker quickly grew frustrated with eir forks, whether or not they used a cone of silence. Ey knew the feeling well. It was implicit that ey would, as a fork. It was a common enough problem when multiple Balan instances stayed in the same house while on projects, each on a separate project, a separate schedule. And ey was nothing if not a Balan.</p>
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<p>And here, ey'd been lucky enough to be invited by eir...client? Patron? Had been invited by Dear to stay at its place.</p>
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<p>So that's how ey found emself rubbing eir eyes in front of a simple, if painfully modern, desk in a studio apartment attached to eir...employer's? Friend's? Eir friend's equally modern house.</p>
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<p>The studio apartment really was a studio, too: someone --- perhaps Dear --- had used it for painting. Rightfully so. The exterior wall was floor to ceiling glass looking out over that sere prairie. The landscape, Dear's partner had explained, was the work of Dear's sib, Serene; Sustained and Sustaining, 'born' when their down-tree instance, Dear The Wheat And Rye Under The Stars had forked to explore its twinned interests of forming oneself and of forming one's surroundings in greater detail.</p>
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<p>Ioan's head spun whenever ey thought about the clade, but the longer ey spent around Dear, the more ey found emself liking it. Ey was curious to get to meet another Odist.</p>
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<p>If it weren't for the window, opaquable, the apartment would have felt like a cell. Simple cot. Desk. The kitchenette the one concession to freedom. The walls were whitewashed concrete. The floor that same pale hardwood. The fixtures all brushed steel. No doors to the rest of the house, nor anywhere but outside. No restroom. One was expected to either turn off elimination or do so outside.</p>
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<p><em>There's a cheap joke to be made there,</em> ey had thought when first moving in. <em>Dear lifting its leg against some tree. But I doubt its body ever had that functionality enabled.</em></p>
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<p>Ioan shook eir head and rubbed at eir eyes more vigorously. Ey was daydreaming --- eveningdreaming, actually --- and that made em wonder how long ey had been awake.</p>
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<p>"Probably some horrid number of hours," ey mumbled to the wall.</p>
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<p>A sensorium ping, a gentle impinging of Dear upon eir senses, half-sensed words, <em>"Does the wall reply often?"</em></p>
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<p>Ioan spun around. Dear was standing, prim, dapper as always, at the door through the glass, paws clasped before it.</p>
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<p>"You scared the hell out of me!" Ioan blurted.</p>
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<p>Dear's serene smile widened into a grin. <em>"Sorry, Ioan. I'll wait until after the wall responds, next time."</em></p>
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<p>"Jackass."</p>
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<p><em>"Foxass,"</em> Dear corrected, accenting that with an exaggerated swish. <em>"Have some news. Walk with me?"</em></p>
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<p>Ioan nodded and stood, "Glad to. I'm hitting a wall, here."</p>
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<p>The fennec adopted a look of concern. <em>"Don't hit your friends, Ioan."</em></p>
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<p>"Ha ha." Ioan rolled eir eyes. "Something's got you in a state today. Tonight. Whatever."</p>
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<p><em>"Tonight."</em> Dear's smile softened and it beckoned out toward the prairie. <em>"Come, let's walk. Storm scheduled in an hour, let's catch all of the nice smells."</em></p>
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<p>Page generated on 2020-04-11</p>
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