+J.M.J.+

Zenon Eyes: Eyes of Truth

By "Matrix Refugee"

Author's Note:

The last chapter.... My heart broke while I wrote this one. I may return to this series some time in the future, but it's hard to say right now since I'm so busted up over finishing this one. Time will tell.

Disclaimer:

See Chapter One

Chapter XV: Sanctuary

Joe's days were full now, counseling troubled Mechas, conferring with other directors, or just moving among "the family" of the Haven.

Each day at least a handful of Mechas came through the ever-open gates. Some were brought in by concerned relatives of a deceased or abused owner or imprinter. Others came voluntarily. Once in a while, Social Services or the A.S.PC.M would tip them off about an abused Mecha (too frequently a child) and asked Joe to join them in removing the child from an abusive home.

But they did not hold the Mechas indefinitely unless it seemed the Mecha in question was too damaged or disturbed to return to life outside the Haven. Many simply needed to be relocated with better employers. They had some irate owners show up looking for "their property", but Joe would not allow them to even see the Mechas they had injured. Rhiannon helped more than a few Mechas obtain restraining orders against abusive former owners and file for National ID cards. Joe saw to it that these same Mechas were also reoptimized for self-defense.

They saw quite a few animal Mechas come in: dogs, cats, snakes, even birds, especially parrots, which didn't fly too well, but in every other respect they resembled their fleshy counterparts: noisy. They had one pair of lovebirds roaming the garden at one point, squeaking so loudly their peeps made themselves heard all over the place. Alex went after them and caught them, sticking them into his shirt pockets where they squealed even worse until Joe fished them out and found their off switches.

"Is there any way you can de-squeak them?" Rhiannon asked.

"You will have to ask Galloway," Joe said.

Once in a while, not very often but more frequent than Joe would rather see, someone would bring in the body of an all but mangled Mecha, some marginally functioning, others far beyond repair. The repair crews would quietly send the body for recycling, but Joe took every precaution of researching the Mecha's name, model and serial number, recording them in a ledger he entitled the Book of Remembrance, which he kept in a tiny chapel behind the Temple of Fire.

At other times, they received a profoundly disturbed Mecha with programming so corrupted that the repair crews had to wipe the neural cube completely. This brought a pang of empathy to Joe; he'd come so close to this fate himself.

A lot of lover Mechas came to them, some were private companion models who had suffered too long at the hands of a cruel or demanding master, but most were street prostitutes as Joe had been. The females of this class tended to grow very attracted to Joe, often to the point of turning "lovelorn", or they took to following him about as he made his rounds. Joe found this every bit as annoying as Rhiannon found it.

"Maybe you should find a female robo-psychologist to take care of the female Mechas," Rhiannon suggested one morning as she and David cleared her breakfast dishes.

"Perhaps this would be the best course of action," Joe said, examining his schedule for the morning and ruefully noting he had two female patients that morning.

"You want me to contact Calla?" she asked.

Joe wagged his head. "I thought it would be best if she remained in the field outside."

"You know she'd say yes almost as quick as you could get the words out of your mouth."

"I know that she is only too willing to help us."

"And we need her help. I don't want you to keep getting hit on."

He smiled reassuringly as he put his pocket scriber back into his inner pocket. "You know their charms cannot lead me away from you."

"I know. But I don't want them to keep tempting you. I know it bugs you."

One female lover-model in particular, a small blonde with brown eyes, who went by the name Sabrina, was especially persistent. Joe spotted her watching him from strategic places in corridors and along walkways throughout the complex. The ragged leopard print halter top and hot pants she'd worn when she'd first shown up one rainy night had been replaced with a sensible gray blouse and black slacks, but she still looked exquisite in them. Joe tacitly avoided her and ignored her when he couldn't, but that only made her more persistent.

"Too bad Alex isn't interested in girls his own age; you could introduce him to Sabrina and see what happens," Lutwyn suggested as he and Joe were in the library one afternoon.

"I had similar thoughts," Joe said, leafing through a bound volume on obsessive-compulsive disorder. "But she has no interest in him either."

"Like your song goes, she only has eyes for you," Lutwyn said, teasingly deadpan.

That very night, as Rhiannon was washing up in the bathroom off their bedroom, she heard an awful scream come from the other room. She threw on her bathrobe and ran out to find Joe, shoes off and shirt open, apparently startled in the middle of changing, had scrambled up on top of a high dresser in an effort to get away from a very aggressive Sabrina.

"Hey, come down from there, Joe," Sabrina purred, rubbing herself against the dresser. "I just wanted to return the favor."

"But this is NOT the way to do so," Joe countered, not even looking at her.

"Sabrina, get out of here!" Rhiannon ordered.

Sabrina turned to Rhiannon, looking up at her with a catty, almost patronizing little smile. "Can't you share him with me, Rhiannon? He's a lover-model after all."

"No. He's also my husband. Now get out!"

"If you do not get out of here, we will have to call security. Your stay in the Haven may be cut short," Joe added, icy-voiced.

"What-ever," Sabrina said, utterly miffed, nose in the air. She went out with a provocative waggle of her fanny. Rhiannon followed her out to make sure she really left. She locked the hall door of the apartment behind the intruder, something they usually didn't have to do.

"Mommy, what was that shout about?" David said, meeting Rhiannon in the apartment hallway as she went back to her room.

"Oh, we just had an unwelcome guest in our room and it startled Daddy," she said. "It won't happen again." She brought him back to his room, hoping he wouldn't ask what sort of intruder it was. He didn't.

"Now what was all that about?" Alex demanded, as she passed by his room.

"You know Sabrina, that new girl?"

"The ugly little one who's got the hots for Dad?"

"She broke into our room."

"Uh oh! Was she putting her little paws where they don't belong?"

"It hadn't got to that, but it would have if your father hadn't climbed up on a dresser out of her reach."

"That must have been funny to see."

By the time Rhiannon got back, Joe had climbed down from the dresser, but his whole being still bore a look of unease, even suspicion.

"She's gone, and I made sure the door was locked so she can't get back in," Rhiannon said.

"Perhaps it is time I asked Call to join us," Joe said, soberly. Then with a smile, "I could not have had a better sign to alert me to this necessity."

"So what exactly happened before I heard you yell?" Rhiannon asked.

"I was sitting on the bed, in the process of undressing, when I heard footsteps behind me. At first they sounded like yours, but I realized they were different steps. I looked over my shoulder in time to see her approach the bed. She said to me, 'Let me help you with that,' as she tried to crawl across the bed toward me. I replied to this with the incoherent yawp you heard." A sunset hue passed over his cheeks. "I tried to elude her, but the only place I could find safety was high atop that dresser.

"You poor thing," she said, hugging him comfortingly.

First thing the next morning, Joe sent off a message to Calla.

From: the_phoenix @ thehaven.org

To: robo_doc @ Juno.com

Subject: A very difficult patient and an offer

Dear Calla

I have an especially challenging patient who, perhaps, you might be able to help me treat. About a month ago, there came to us a small female lover-model, a Cybertronics SN-21429, answering to the name Sabrina (or "Hey, Sabrina, I ain't seen yah"). She had formed a highly improper attachment to me, following me about, trying to engage my amorous attentions. She even broke into our bedroom last night and tried to engage me in a passionate encounter (you will be glad to know I rebuffed her).

I know we have discussed this before but would you consider relocating her to assist me? Your needs and accommodations will be well provided here. Hope to hear from you soon regarding this matter.

I remain yours,

Joe M.

Calla called him that very evening.

"That must have been awful, having that little pest all over you," she said.

"It was indeed. It set all the pursuit centers in my being into high gear, but my volition centers went into high gear in the opposite direction."

"Well, I've got a month's worth of patients booked, but I've got a partner who's well-equipped to take over the practice. I could leave it in her hands and come up to help you in about, oh, five weeks."

"That sounds reasonable."

"Oh, and find Sabrina's off switch and shut her down till I come," Calla said.

"There could not be a better solution."

Later that evening, Galloway and De Vries went to the cubicle where Sabrina stayed when she wasn't pestering Joe. They led her out, a little miffed but unprotesting, to one of the workrooms.

A few moments later, Galloway emerged pushing a trolley on which lay Sabrina's still form, as if she slept peacefully.

Joe watched this from the safety of the mezzanine, breathing a well-deserved, almost hearty sigh of relief. Galloway brought her to a storage unit where he stowed her in a padded container till the day would Calla arrive.

@--`--@--`--@--`--@--`--@--`--

A month later, Calla arrived. Joe gave her the grand tour of the Haven. She'd seen the simulation he had devised during his temporary disembodiment and Architecture Today had run a cover article about it, but she had never seen the building for real. Seeing it and walking through its halls and gardens gave her a whole new experience the images could only hint at, a feeling of safety and comfort, of unity. Though the place bustled with Orgas and Mechas going to and fro about their various tasks, she still had a sense of peace and tranquility. She especially liked seeing the simulsilk weaving workshop where several of their resident Mechas worked, weaving tapestries and curtains or embroidering garments. Joe himself wore one of their creations, a tapestried vest done in maroon, forest green, navy blue and dark gold.

"So what's this about Sabrina?" Calla said, as they headed back to the Garden of the Blue Flower, where Rhiannon awaited them.

"Sabrina, Sabrina," Joe said, almost ruefully. "'Sabrina fair, listen where thou art sitting…Listen for dear honor's sake…' I regard her as I regard every Mecha who comes here, as a child, as a daughter in her case. But she would rather have me as a lover…She came to us about two months ago, five months after we opened our gates. She was a discard. Her owner couldn't be bothered to maintain her, so he basically threw her out on her own. She saw one of our ads on a television in a store window, so she came here. She seemed undamaged at first scan, but we found a few anomalies in her programming, but hardly enough to shut her down or cause her to malfunction."

"But enough to make her pesky and start following you around like a little lost puppy," Calla said.

"Precisely," Joe said. "She took an immediate fancy to me. Myrtle Kleiffinger and Sagan Cassidy, our program directors tried to find a craft to her fancy with which she could employ herself. But instead, her chosen activity has been following me about and watching my every move."

"Like a smitten teenager."

"Exactly like one. At times her attention has been innocent enough, usually when Rhiannon is around."

"But what about when Mrs. Masters is nowhere in sight?"

Joe rolled his eyes. "Then she starts looking at me in ways I can tell she wonders what I look like as the makers made me."

"So where is she now?"

"We powered her up again this morning. Astarte put her to work filing documents."

"Good, that'll keep her quiet until I can get settled. But mind you, I'd like to tackle this case today, spare you the sequel," Calla said.

That very afternoon, Sabrina had her first session with Calla. As the new assistant robo-psychologist told Joe and Rhiannon that evening at supper, the session went as she had expected.

"She thought Joe was conducting the session," Calla said, "So you can imagine the look of disdain she had on her face when she walked in and saw me. It was like, 'Ewww, an Orga!' And that changed to 'Eeeewwwwwww, a FEMALE Orga!!!' So for the rest of the session, she had this look on her face like 'I'm-prettier-than-you-are'."

"Let's hope she gets over it," Rhiannon said, hiding a smile in her salad.

"And that she soon adjusts to the change," Joe said.

After about three weeks, Sabrina stopped following Joe around. However, she kept giving Calla snooty looks when they passed each other in the hallways. Eventually, another Mecha who looked very like Joe would come along, and Calla would grow interested in him, but that would not be for a while yet.

@--`--@--`--@--`--@--`--@--`--

And shortly after this, Alex found something he had been seeking without looking for. He was carrying a box of new file folders into the central office when Astarte, not looking where she was going, almost walked full tilt into him. He stepped aside to avoid a collision, but she still dropped the stack of files she carried, scattering papers everywhere all over the floor.

"Oh, man," Alex muttered, setting down the box. He carried.

"Uh oh, did I hurt you?" she asked, bending down to collect the scattered folders and papers.

"No. You know I can't get hurt," he grumbled.

She noticed how neatly restacked the folders and slid the papers back into them, with a punctiliousness she knew was part of his nature, but with something else. She looked up to find him looking at her with an odd expression in his eyes: curiosity, even a sheepish kind of longing.

That evening, as she headed back to her room from the dining hall, she heard someone playing piano up in the Masterses' apartment. She knew from habit that it was Alex playing, but somehow it seemed different.

Next day, which was her day off, Astarte went into town to do some shopping. She stopped at a card and gift shop where she got a small note card. She wrote a short thank you on it and gave it to Rhiannon to leave on Alex's piano when he wasn't looking.

 Later, when Alex sat down to play a new piece he'd been composing, he found Astarte's note card on the keyboard.

"Now what the heck is this?" he demanded.

"What is it?" David said, peeking out from under the piano.

"It looks like a note card or something like that," Alex said.

"Open it, open it," David coaxed, coming out to see it.

Alex opened the envelope and pulled out the note:

Dear Alex,

You didn't have to do what you did, because I really was at fault like the clumsy Orga I am. But I just wanted to thank you again all the same. You're a good kid even if you pretend to be tough.

Astarte

"What did you do that you didn't have to do?" David asked.

"She bumped into me in the hallway near the office and dropped a bunch of papers and stuff she was carrying. So I helped her pick them up. It wasn't really anything."

"No, it was something: You helped her out when she was feeling bad about messing up her papers, and that made her feel happy."

"Guess you're right, bro," Alex admitted, a little sheepish.

The next day, after lunch, Astarte and Carri, one of the other office girls were trying to remember the melody to an old love song, "A Kiss to Build a Dream On", but the got it hopelessly jumbled. Alex, who had been playing piano in the dining hall during lunch, overheard them. He knew the tune from having heard Joe singing it to Rhiannon once, but he didn't know the melody to the verses.

That evening, as Astarte and Carri were walking through the garden to their room in one of the dormitories, they heard someone playing the melody they'd been trying to remember.

"Hey, there's that song," Carri said.

"Is that Alex playing it?" Astarte said.

"Sure sounds like it."

Up in the Masterses apartment, Joe sat reading, with David curled up in his lap. His ears pricked up when he heard someone in the next room playing an old love song. He set David aside and went to see if it was really Alex playing it.

Sure enough, it really was. Joe paused in the living room doorway, entranced, letting his son play on, not interrupting him.

Alex stopped. He turned around, looking right at Joe. "You were listening," he said, accusatory.

"Only for a little while," Joe admitted. "I was surprised. You usually play more serious sorts of music."

Alex shrugged. "The change might do me good," he said.

Next afternoon, when Astarte took her break, she went for a walk in one of the many terrace gardens that wound through the Haven. To her surprise, she met Alex there among the flowers and tree ferns, looking at her shyly.

"Was that you playing last night?" she asked.

"Playing what?" he asked, a little irritated, but somehow she could tell this was just a scrim.

"Playing 'A Kiss to Build a Dream on'."

"Yeah, that was me. I heard you singing it earlier in the day, so it got stuck in my processors," he said. "I hunted up the sheet music file online."

"You played it great."

"It's not hard music. It's too easy to play wrong."

"Yes it is, if you don't play it with the right spirit."

"Did I play it right?" he asked, hedging.

She patted his shoulder. "You sure did, baby."

He dropped his gaze to the ground, a pink tinge touching his cheeks. Gosh, he was so human, she thought. But then she realized how young he really was, young enough to be her grandson if he were Orga. He'd barely have to shave if he were of flesh and blood. She let him go. "Just wanted to thank you," she fumbled.

He smiled, the first genuine smile she remembered ever seeing on his face. "Glad y' liked it." He went away.

That night, and for several nights in succession afterward, she heard love songs floating down from the windows of the Masterses' apartment, as she walked by. And just as often, she found herself encountering Alex on her walks through the gardens.

Rhiannon noticed and welcomed a change in Alex's behavior. He took a lot more walks out in the garden then he had before, when he used to shut himself up in his room or hide in the library. She found he'd been downloading a lot of old-fashioned love song music onto his music pad. And he'd even started trying to write one of his own, though from the exasperated snarls she often heard coming from his room, she guessed he wasn't too successful. When she asked him what was wrong, she only got evasions. "I'm busy/None of your business" or the catch-all "Nuthin'."

"I think our Alex is in love," she told Joe one night, as they heard Alex at work, testing a melody.

"Yes, I think so too. It seems he has found solace with Astarte," Joe said, listening to Alex's efforts.

"Astarte? I could see her as a mother for him, but not a lover—oh," she remembered Alex's crush on Madison. "Maybe this place is a good influence on him."

"I hope it has been so," Joe said.

She looked at him, concerned. "You don't think…" She caught her tongue, realizing this might not be the right thing.

"What don't I think?" he asked.

"You don't think Astarte will want to imprint him, do you?"

"She might."

"Would you let her?"

He paused, looking at her. "Tell me what you would do."

"I think I'd ask Alex what he thought about Astarte, then ask Astarte what she thinks of him, and then take it from there."

"I had that course of action in mind, but I wanted to see if you held similar views."

She shoved him playfully. "You rascal: your mind is still one step ahead of mine."

"But at least I let you catch up with me."

@--`--@--`--@--`--@--`--@--`--

Alex sat curled up on the divan in his room with a notebook later that evening, trying to jot down a melody to fit a love poem he had found in a book in the library.

Someone knocked gently at the door. "What?" he demanded.

"Alex, it is I," Joe's voice said.

"It's open."

The door opened and his father stepped through, closing the door behind him.

"I've heard you playing old love songs lately," Joe said, cutting to the chase. He sat down on the divan, at Alex's feet. "Is there any reason why?"

"Not anything you'd be interested in," Alex said, an oddly evasive note to his voice.

"I don't think you're being completely honest," Joe said.

Alex sat up, looking at Joe askance. "What makes you say that?"

"I know you better than you think I do."

Alex let out a harassed sigh. "Okay, it's because Astarte likes them."

"Really? And do you like Astarte?"

Alex shrugged. "She's okay." A rose tint passed over his cheeks.

Joe leaned conspiratorially closer to Alex. "I suspect there's more to what you think of her than just 'okay'."

Alex's face went scarlet. "Are you talking to me as my dad or as a shrink?"

Joe waged his head. "However you see fit; I'm speaking as both."

Alex's chest rose and fell. "Okay…I think I love her…but you know I can't love. I'm just a Mecha. She's Orga."

Joe put his hand on his son's shoulder. "If you really love her, it does not matter how either of you is constituted."

Alex nodded. "I see."

Joe hugged Alex with one arm. His son squirmed a little, but only for a second, relaxing just before Joe released him.

"Can I ask you something?" Alex said, tentatively.

"Of course you may."

"How do you…how would I…whatdoIhavetodotomakeherhappy?"

"Now that, Alex, is a question I am well-equipped to answer for you," Joe said, smiling broadly, his eyes dancing a trifle.

@--`--@--`--@--`--@--`--@--`--

Next day, Joe thought he saw Astarte and Alex walking arm in arm through the Garden of the Blue Flower

@--`--@--`--@--`--@--`--@--`--

The rooms of the apartment the Masterses occupied had been simple, the white walls almost sterile when they had first moved in, but now, a year and a half later, they were hung with darkly colorful hangings and damask curtains surrounded their bed.

Rhiannon pretended to be asleep when she felt Joe get up one morning and sit quietly beside her. She could almost hear his brain processing his ideas and dreams. The mattress creaked ever so softly as he got up. From under her eyelashes, she watched him pace by the bed, pulling on his maroon simulsilk dressing gown. He perched himself on the foot of the mattress.

She looked at him intently, her "English lord", as she affectionately called him, for his default accent and his courtliness. He sat with one leg drawn up with one arm draped over it, the other leg hanging off the edge of the mattress, his free arm propped behind him so that he vaguely reminded her of a statue of a Japanese bodhisattva she'd seen in a museum. The early sunlight shining through the French windows opening off their balcony glinted off his lightly tousled hair, now in its blond mode.

She stirred, pretending she'd just awakened. He turned to her, his eyes going from blue to their full jade glory.

"Is it a success?" he asked. "Is it enough?"

"Is what a success?" she asked.

He spread his hand, panning it slowly about him. "All this. Have I succeeded? Is all this that I have accomplished enough to fill up the measure?"

She sat up. "It is," she said. She reached for her robe; he helped her pull it on. She led him to the balcony.

Below, in the Garden of the Blue Flower, several gardener Mechas were already at work among the plants, several Orgas working alongside them. At the far end, some of the Orga children played, under the watchful eyes of an Orga caregiver and a nanny Mecha. Several of the humans below—of flesh and of silicon—looked up toward the balcony for an instant. One of the little ones, a girl about seven, bounced up and down, waving to the Masterses. Joe raised his hand and waved back.

Rhiannon looked at her life's companion and a flash passed through her mind. It was well over ten years since she had met Joe, then a slightly traumatized companion Mecha bereft of his creator and imprinter. Now he was a fully realized young man, a leader and a servant to those in need. He'd come full circle from needing help to giving help.

She realized she must have been staring at him. He turned his gaze to her, his eyes meeting hers.

"What is it?" he asked.

"I just couldn't help thinking how far you've come since I first met you," she said.

He turned to face her, taking her wrists in his hands. "And where has it led me?"

"Oh, you know it better than I do."

"That may be so…but it would delight me—and you as well—to hear you tell of it."

"All right…It's led you from being an object to being a person."

"And it has led me through all levels of personhood. I have discovered more roles than just one: a lover, an artist, a friend, a student, a spouse, a father, a servant."

"And a leader."

He nodded in agreement, but he bowed his head humbly, as if he realized the burden of duty and service that this role required of him. But his face and eyes still beamed with a quiet happiness.

"What do you think Serin would think of all this?" he asked, glancing out at the concourse below them.

"She'd be inspired. She'd be amazed. She'd be very, very astounded. To think where you've gone and the things you've accomplished when she only intended you to be a companion, to recreate her lost lover."

"And she saw me snatched away from her…only to be restored to her thanks to a little one named David." A mist passed over his eyes. "Because he took my hand and saved my brain, we are now standing here together in this place, in this sanctuary."

He started to draw her to him. "Is it enough?" she asked.

He smiled. "Yes."

The End

Afterword:

I have three more stories in mind for this series: an anthology fic entitled "Tales of the Haven"; another subtitled "Don't Gimme That Look!" which was inspired by Spielberg's recent effort Catch Me If You Can (think of Alex as the Leonardo DiCaprio character); and what might be the cap-off, which takes place 1,500 years into the first David's imprisonment in the ice and effectively (I hope) shows the fall of Orgakind and the rise of Mechas.

Literary Easter Eggs:

Mecha parrots—an homage to my own pet birds: Oskar the jittery cockatiel and Merry the parakeet (read "feathered tape recorder"), and also to Alex the African Gray parrot at MIT's AI lab.