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The soft dawn slowly spread its light over the rolling green dewey hills. Noel watched silently perched on a hilltop. Full blown sunrise was still about 30 or 40 minutes away by his count, but the cool morning air on his skin was just what he needed to calm his nerves after the night he had.
His parents were still going at it. They didn’t even notice him slipping out of the manor’s oaken doors; they were so embroiled.
Started with a snide comment from his mother at diner, mild bickering continued throughout the rest of the meal much of which Noel did his best to ignore, but with dessert came with more contentious conversation and things went straight to hell from there.
Rose, bless her heart, tried to intervene. It was what she was made for after all, keeping tensions down, making sure he didn’t have any “incidents'' as they were referred to. She tried reason, as any good android would, not knowing his parents could be unreasonable.
After logos failed, she tried pathos. Risky move. And it didn’t pan out well.
Rose had made a plea on his behalf, that the last thing Noel would want while on holiday would be to watch his parents bicker the whole time. Little did she know he was used to it by this point.
Zarah, his mother, didn’t take that well at all.
Rose seemed to recoil the instant, Zarah shot her a deadly glare. It was strange to see the android cower, especially given the fact she could push a double-decker bus out of her way like it was nothing more than an empty waste bin.
His mother ordered her out of the dining room and before Rose could slink away in peace, Danny, his father, insisted she stayed. That’s where the real trouble began.
Zarah and Danny had Rose commissioned as sort of “going away present” for Noel when he left for university. His father had been sold on the idea of a hired bodyguard who’d protect Noel from any overzealous xionaphobes who might have also been attending classes. While for his mother synths were a normal and sensible solution to his problem.
“She’s also been programmed to help you deal with stress on a more constructive level.” he could remember his father explaining to him over the telephone very matter of factly.
“That still doesn’t give you the license to send a strange woman to my dorm room at 11:02 in the evening without telling me! How do you think my stress levels are doing now, dad?”
“What? Your mother said she told you when she called earlier…”
“No she didn’t! She just wished me well and talked in riddles about a special ‘surprise in blue’ I- ah.”
He remembered a long silence on the call as both he and his father struggled to find the words.
In the end, “I was hoping she meant a Porsche” was all he could mutter.
It didn’t matter what the relationship with Synths and Xionites was before, on Earth they were both seen as people, something his mother seemed to have a hard time adjusting to.
When Zarah ordered Rose out, it wasn’t as the madam of the home asking a guest to leave, but rather a command given to a robot from her creator and Danny wasn’t having any of it.
“She has a right to be here, Zarah! She’s a member of the family now too. Rose is absolutely right, spending the whole holiday fighting is the last thing Noel needs.”
“It was just a suggestion Lady Zarah, I didn’t mean to offend you.” Rose said calmly. Her voice was steady and composed despite the tense situation she found herself in.
“Oh you couldn’t offend me dear,” Zarah snapped coldly, “I don’t expect a 1 year old synth to know about parenting, so why would their suggestions offend me?”
“I don’t know, Zarah? You’ve had over 20 years to get it right, and so far all you’ve done is turn our son into a science project for your friends on Xion!”
Noel winced, he watched his mother’s normal mask of calm smugness melt away, and her face twisted and contorted with rage. He’d watched Zarah remain composed during tense meetings with Earth's world leaders in the early days of the incidents happening, and seen her boss around plenty of people on Xion, but Noel’s father could always peel back the layers to hit a nerve.
Noel honestly wasn’t certain if that was a testament to how close they are as partners or how completely toxic the entire marriage has now become. One thing he was certain of, at least in that moment, was that things were about to get nasty.
“You’re not going to want to be around for this. These get pretty intense.”
Noel grabbed the synth’s hand and led her out of the dining room into the main parlor so Zarah and Danny could hash out what they needed to. No sense leaving her in the crossfire.
Out in the parlor a massive regal fireplace sculpted of dark colored stones and grey marble sat unlit and coated in soot. The parlor of the manor had a dark marble floor with white pilar like banisters that outlined the perimeter of the room. While the doors of the second story bedrooms overlooked the first floor.
“I-I… What happened back there?” Rose's voice was a distant murmur.
Her eyes went blank, as a rose shaped logo took the place of her brown irises. He’d seen her do this before when assessing an area for threats.
The rose logo cycled through an animation of blooming and wilting over and over again. Like a mouse wheel spinning endlessly. She was literally trying to process what went wrong. Noel opted to bring her up to his childhood room. His parents rarely ever went in there, and he was staying in one of the many guest rooms in his family’s manor.
“Here, you should stay in here tonight. Maybe get some sleep if you're feeling it. Mum and dad are probably going to be at each other’s throats for the rest of the night…”
Rose didn’t respond. Her eyes still had that logo in them, whirling in place as she tried to make sense of it all.
“Hm. Don’t worry too much over it. They aren’t always the easiest people to deal with. I’m going to bed, you should rest too.”
With that he left for his room.
Unfortunately, Noel was right. His parents fought into the wee hours of the morning and any sleep he got wasn’t very restful. Even though it was only his first semester away from his parents he'd actually gotten used to sleeping without two people screaming their heads off from downstairs. His father had been so kind as to invest in a flat in London so Noel could live life properly as a single young man on his own.
Admittedly this situation was stressing him out. And when he was stressed, his mutation, his growing, was greatly exacerbated.
His legs hung awkwardly over the wooden footboard, as the bed frame uncomfortably groaned beneath him. A particularly high pitched shout caused Noel to shoot awake, and his head was brushing the ceiling. He’d finally had enough when he rolled over in bed to see his clock displaying 5:30 am while shrill accusations of terrible parenting were still being tossed around downstairs. If he stayed any longer he wasn’t certain he’d be able to fit out of the door at the rate he was expanding.
Now here he was, alone watching the sunrise with his back towards the manor. Noel ran his hand through his long thick dark hair, in a vague effort to untangle it. His hand found something in the long strands.
It was his hair tie, all stretched out and broken. He’d forgotten to undo his ponytail before bed. Hopefully he’d be able to find another somewhere in the manor once he got back down to a more normal size-
“Hey…” a familiar voice called from behind.
A cold bolt of fear shot down his spine. It was Rose, he didn’t have to turn to see her. He could just imagine her there, dark curls, brown eyes, and honey brown skin dressed in a futuristic blue sweater with a diagonal crease across the chest.
Noel supposed this was inevitable. Peace would only last for so long at that size.
“When did you notice I left my room?”
“Recognized your heat signature leaving the premises as soon as you walked outside. I just figured you needed the space. Mind if I join you?”
Noel took a deep breath, “Yeah ,sure.”
As soon as the words left his lips he could hardly believe he said them. He didn’t want to turn her away, though. Not after what she’d been through last night. Rose walked up parallel just enough so he could see her out of his peripheral view. Keeping a cautious distance she sat on the plush grass.
They sat in silence for a while, watching day creep ever closer to the manor nestled in the hills. It made the cool air feel as heavy as a weighted blanket.
Noel took in more deep breaths, his chest dramatically rose and fell. He was prepping for a blow, there was no way she wouldn’t bring up his current altered state. It’s what she was made to monitor after all.
Then it finally came, “Noel…”
He sucked in another deep breath and closed his eyes.
“... What did your father mean earlier? When he said Lady Zarah made you a ‘science project’? “
“Ah. That.” Noel said with a deep exhale. His entire body untensed, and the muscles in his legs started to cramp up immediately.
Feeling the discomfort, Noel figured he’d been sitting too long. Rose watched as Noel stood up to his full height. Then he looked back down at her.
“How about we take a small walk, and I’ll tell you about it?” he offered. Maybe subconsciously he was trying to get as far from his mother as possible before he told this.
Rose nodded with a tiny smile, “I’m still getting used to Earth, so I am always excited to see more of the terrain and landscapes here!”
She stood up as well. Normally, Noel would be worried about a normal person’s ability to keep up with him while at this height, but the fantastic thing about Rose is that she wasn’t normal and because of that keeping up with him would be no problem. It was small but deep down, Noel appreciated that little sense of normalcy Rose provided.
They started down the hill, into the green. Silence and a chill breeze blew between them, as the manor got further and further from their view. Small stone walls and other structures dotted the hills here and there, adding the smallest touch of gray to this sea of green, Rose and Noel navigated together Still the question hung expectantly in the air.
Noel reached back to scratch the back of his neck as he began,“It’s not that much of a story to tell. When I was younger, mum would take me on trips to Xion, to have the physicians and scientists run tests, so they could look into curing me, curing all of us. They did a lot of good research and they thought they finally had a breakthrough…”
Noel brought the hand on the back of his neck up to his face. If he squirted hard enough he could just make out the healed over scratches from when he ripped the research facility into pieces.
“That look tells me that the breakthrough was a bust.” Rose added.
“In more ways than one... Ever since then dad has never let mum live it down, and so the fighting. Sometimes I wish they’d just call it quits already.”
“Yeesh!” Rose exclaimed with a grimace. It was much more emotive than she’d been the entire night. She then folded both her arms behind her back as they continued. Another hill loomed near. Noel could be at the top of it in a few steps, so Rose bolted ahead to wait there. At the top of the hill Rose was now chest level with him.
Noel was caught off guard watching this happen.
“That is on par for a great lady of XIon though.” she added, taking a seat at the top to face him.
“I don’t blame her for it though!” Noel said, looking up from his hand.
“She was just trying to help. Just trying to fix what was wrong…”
There was another brief pause before Rose spoke again, “...You should blame her for it though.”
“What?” Noel’s head snapped to look at the android. Rose instantly shrunk from his piercing gaze. It was eerily similar to the one his mother shot her at dinner time.
“Oh, yeesh! You’re mad! Please don’t tell her I said that, she’ll have me melted down into ooze.”
He softened his look, “No, no I wasn’t mad, I just didn’t think synths could say things like that about any Xionite.”
“Are you kidding? All synths do is talk shit about Xionites! They suck! No offense to you, but I’m sure you’ve noticed they can be a little… No. If I say that you’ll have me scrapped for sure.”
But Noel’s curiosity was already piqued. It felt like this was the first real conversation he’d ever had with Rose up until now.
“I’m not going to tell Zarah. It’s the least I can do for you not ratting out that I’m seeing someone.”
“Hm…” Rose closed her eyes.
She was running several algorithms to decide if telling Noel was worth the risk, or lose this opportunity to truly gain his trust by speaking freely. But for Noel it just seemed like she was mulling it over. He opted to sit beside her the hill, folding his legs under himself
“Ok, I’ll tell you, but you can absolutely never tell anyone else, especially anyone from Xion.”
“You have my word, Rose. My lips are sealed.”
Her eyes flashed open, “Most synths can’t stand Xionites or the Xion society as a whole. Dealing with your mother is a nightmare, ok! I said it! I was made to help you deal with your stress and stop you from having incidents, that means I have to think of new things to help you cope! Collect data, learn from past incidents, adapt! You know the whole machine learning deal but she dismisses anything I say if she believes it’s, and I’m quoting her on this, ‘Impede you from successfully integrating into upper echelon Xion society’.”
Noel blinked in shock, “What? She said that?”
Rose gave a nod and continued on.
“I don’t know if you ever realized this, but Xion society is meant to be the perfect society of Sapien creatures. Xionites are obsessed with the idea of being perfect beings. It’s why Lady Zarah and the others on the high council are especially concerned about the genetic condition you new breeds have….”
“Ha, so they do think of us as freaks?” Noel said with a scoffing chuckle or perhaps it was a half choked sob. A sort of numbness was creeping over his body. He wrapped his arms around himself. It didn’t stop the familiar feelings of stretching skin and vertigo.
“I guess I always sort of knew that. I grew up in near isolation. No school, no mates, not a lot of contact with the outside world. Dad pretty much had to leave his job to devote to teaching me full time, but he still wanted me to try and have a normal childhood.
Mum shot him down at every turn. Even about little things. She nearly flipped her lid when she found out dad was teaching me Gaelic. Dad was very patient about all of it until the botched experiment on Xion. The ‘cure’ they made didn’t just fail, it triggered a particularly aggressive incident. There weren’t any casualties so I guess I’m lucky in that regard but that lab pretty much doesn’t exist anymore and I was in containment for weeks after. Things were never the same at home after that…”
His head was swimming. These were memories he preferred not to think of often but he hadn’t realized they’d have such a profound effect on him still.
“Yeesh… Well if it makes you feel any better, the high council would have that facility destroyed anyway due to their failure and all of those scientists are probably serving out exile on some forgotten colony planet.
The slow blink he gave signaled that it in fact, did not make him feel any better.
She continued on, “...Synths are made to be perfect and to do our functions perfectly, despite whatever flaws our creators may have. Our sentience allows us to make tough rational decisions, and I have a tough call to make now.”
“I was made to protect you and reduce your chances of having ‘incidents’ not to keep secrets from you, not to spy on you, and not to report back to lady Zarah about your every move. I’ve observed enough now, Zahra is officially a detriment to my mission. I’ll report to her but it’s apparent she’s too close to this to make objective and efficient judgements. Her admin status is revoked until further notice.”
Noel was taking up her whole vision now. Not that he seemed to notice. And at the size he was currently, Rose had to admit it was a bit imposing. By her sensors he was topping out at a little over 5 meters. Not a particularly destructive size to be, but not completely harmless either. Those big bright lavender eyes were fixed keenly on her. She could see the slight twitches in the muscle of his eyes as he studied her closely. To her his eyes were giant stained glass windows of loneliness.
Rose hadn’t brought up his increased size when she first joined him on the grass or when they started walking away from the manor. Though she’d definitely was worried something like this would happen given the stressful emotional atmosphere of the house, it was what she was made to keep track of after all.
She figured as long as his heart rate was down and things stayed calm and civil between them during their talk, his risk of triggering an incident was low, despite his now large size. Now if Zarah or Danny came outside and saw him like this, that’d be a different story. Which is why putting distance between them and the manor was an idea Rose was happy to go along with.
From all she’d observed of the young hybrid, him switching between regular size and gradually shifting and growing as he felt comfortable, helped reduce the overall likelihood of stress induced panic attack growing
.Zarah was not happy when Rose brought these figures to her attention. Her reaction to the results started the first of many doubts that now factored into Rose’s decision to terminate her admin status.
“Well, since your mother no longer has administrative control over my functions, I was thinking you might want the role instead.”
At that Noel turned sheepish, “I’m not certain that I’d be comfortable with that Rose. Things on Earth aren’t like Xion. Having complete and total say over another autonomous being isn’t ok in nearly any context here. You should be able to govern yourself.”
His hand went back to the back of his neck nervously.
She should’ve known he’d say something like that. Just statically speaking based on their past interactions and conversations it was plainly obvious that is exactly the response he’d give. And yet, the synth still found herself taken aback by the idea.
On Xion when her final updates and calibrations were being set, she’d heard other synths refer to Earth as a paradise of freedom. Out of all the endless soft colonized planets under the Xion flag, this place was where every synth wanted to be lately.
Rose had finally figured out why.
The loading animation appeared in her eyes again as her mind opened the countless possibilities of having full autonomous control could mean for her objective.
Hell she didn’t even have to follow her objective if she saw truly fit.Nothing was stopping her from launching herself at mach speeds away from the manor and though the dewy hills never to be seen again. Her mind was racing.
“Ah… maybe that wasn’t the best…” Noel mumbled to himself.
He watched again as her eyes once again shifted from human irises to that fluid loading animation. A small trickle of panic formed in the back of his throat as the logo continuously spun with seemingly no change.When he left her like that last night he went to bed after and there’s no telling how long she was out. It was strange watching her go from having a normal conversation to now being totally idle and unmoving.
His mouth bent into a concerned frown.
“Uh, Rose? Are you okay?” he asked timidly.
There was no response from her however, just the logo and her uncanny blank expression.
“I mean if that’s not something you’re allowed to do in your programming maybe we could figure out… something.”
Noel was floundering. He didn’t think this would be such a big deal, and honestly he was kicking himself for it. Of course it was a big deal. After everything Rose just explained he should’ve been more aware of what he was asking her.
It occurred to him at any time Rose could’ve ratted out him dating someone while at University, she could’ve sold him out about all the raves, partying and drugs, hell even now at his current size he was more of a risk than ever. If Rose was really focused on fulfilling her duties, he’d be tranquilized and in a containment chamber already.
Rose wasn’t like any other person he’d ever met. By virtue of being focused on a goal, she didn’t get caught up in the usual societal conventions that Noel found himself desperately trying to fit into. Though, in the beginning he found her bluntness and straight forwardness off putting.
She was especially a bummer when he was trying to sneak into campus ragers insisting on getting a guest list and clearing the area.
But Rose wasn’t unreasonable either. Instead of limiting his freedom or treating him as delicately as possible, she was willing to compromise. To listen to what he wanted, to what he needed and do her best to work towards a solution that suited them both.
Which made her continuous lack of reply even more anxiety inducing.
“Rose! Are you still there?” his voice was nearly pleading.
Rose’s head snapped to meet his eyes but that was merely a reflexive message. Her expression remained blank and her thoughts were still running wild with ideas of freedom, travel, and even adventure. And yet she wasn’t moving.
A tight knotting feeling would form in her chest whenever she thought of running away and never looking back. Rose tried to run diagnostics on it and why it was causing her hesitation, but nothing conclusive came back.
Noel had sweat beading at the base of the left temple. She was at least now looking in his direction but the logo was still spinning endlessly. His mind drifted to scifi books and shows of youth, in which when robots were confronted with paradoxical concepts would suffer catastrophic meltdowns, typically ending in an explosion.
There had to be something he could do to snap her out of this.
Noel thought of something and then immediately rejected the idea. But as he watched Rose cycle through her animation over and over, his heart continued to sag with worry.
Noel.
That’s why she stayed. He was a fascinating personality to say the least. Stubborn, as all hell which was admittingly frustrating (a guest list isn’t asking that much). But also incredibly kind and empathetic. His eyes were seas of great loneliness, calm and steady most of the time.
But Rose had a few close calls in her time with Noel. Times when those great seas would yield to storms, and she could just make out the monstrous terror lurking beneath the surface. Not full blown incidents, not yet anyway. Though statically speaking one was way overdue.
Rose didn’t care to bring it up in their earlier conversation, but she had seen footage of that incident Noel described of the lab on Xion. Hell she’d been trained using reconstructed simulations of that very lab, but she had never been given any context for what caused it.
It wasn’t until what Danny said at dinner that she’d-
As gently as he could manage at his size, Noel cupped a hand on either size of the android. Softly turning his palms upward, he scooped Rose into his waiting hands. The auto stabilizers in her legs kicked in when they felt the ground shift beneath her feet. She wobbled only lightly as Noel brought her right up to his face.
Still the shuffling brought her out of her thoughts. Now Rose found herself before two massive and beautiful eyes, studying her every tiny movement with great care. She could see the great cords of sinew that made up his pupils pull tight. His dark hair was surrounding her on either side, like black gossamer curtains drawing to a close.
“Rose?” He said in a breathless tone. .
Noel had lowered his voice to a whisper, since they were so close now. He could see her eyes had switched out of their loading mode back to those warm brown eyes. But she still wasn’t moving.
Noel’s worried eyes were still upon her and she hadn’t said a word.
“S-sorry!” she stammered. “I didn’t mean to make you worry like that. I must’ve been out for longer than I realized,” Rose blinked quickly.
“Governing myself. That can be arranged I think! I was reconfiguring some settings just then. I’ve got most of my parameters adjusted so I should be able to manage. Everything else I’ll just learn as we go.”
Rose gave a thumbs up and a smile and Noel immediately felt a sense of relief. A tiny smile pulled at the corner of his mouth. Gently he lowered hands back to the ground to allow her to step off of his palms.
“Sorry for making you uproot your process like that, but I think you’ll enjoy this a lot more. I hope at least…” Noel muttered that last part to himself.
He averted his eyes back to the manor in the distance .A winner of his parents' fight should have emerged by now. Not that it ever mattered who won in the end. These fights always came with Pyrrhic victories.
“Sounds like the firefight is over, should be all clear to head back if you want to try and sleep in! Can’t believe they actually kept going through the whole night. Where do they find the energy to go at it that long? Couldn’t be me, and I have like, unlimited energy...” Rose let out a yawn.
“Don’t tell me you’re ready to turn in? I was actually thinking about continuing our walk before heading back. Run myself down a bit. I mean I’m still… well not exactly an indoor size at the moment.”
Noel began to rise to his feet. He looked out over the open green fields fondly.
Lately, he hadn't had this much space readily available to navigate in. While he did love the new fast paced world of the city, it was extremely cramped compared to what he’d grown up with.
“What’s the matter? Not feeling like you can shrink back down yet?”
Rose eyed him up and down. His stress and heart rate levels had long tapered off since their last spike earlier in their conversation.
Noel felt completely naked when she stared at him like that though. He supposed it was a good thing, kept him honest.Though it had been treated as a hindrance and a misfortune all of his life, Noel never really minded his ability to grow in size, when he wasn’t having a total meltdown and endangering others of course. Deep down inside of himself was even a part of him that might’ve admitted he enjoyed it.
“Just thought it might be good to stretch for a bit, like you’re always saying. In case mum and dad pick back up later. Plus it gives me a chance to show you around the area! There are some really neat caves around here and quite a few abandoned towers. I mean, if those things sound interesting to you…”
Rose put her hand to her chin in thought, “You know I don’t think I’ve ever been to a cave on Earth. Do they have lagrolins?”
She walked over to where Noel now stood towering over just about everything in the immediate area, and looked up at him expectantly. Catching on, he kneeled down once more and offered his hand, happily. The grass was soft and cool on the back of his hand.
“Alright, I’ll bite, what in the bloody hell is a ‘lagrolin’?”
Rose stepped into the center of his palm, “Ya’know! Bipedal reptilian thing, stands a little taller than a man, really mean and territorial.”
Noel slowly stood back up, with the android in tow. He closed his eyes and titled his head in thought.
“It has like ,colorful frills around its neck, yeah? I think I’ve seen one of those in a zoo on Xion. A real long time ago though.”
“That’s the one! They are super invasive and infest Xion colony planets that still have wilderness. It’s a real problem,” Rose nodded solemnly.
“Well, you’ll be happy to hear that there are no lagrolins in Scotland. As far as I know anyway.”
Noel started walking away further from the manor, towards those dewy hills he’d been gazing at all morning. With each step his impossibly long legs took, he cleared even more hills that would give a regular sized person quite the workout to climb.
“Aw, give it time” Rose sighed, “I’m sure someone from Xion will screw up and bring one here.”
“Hope not,” Noel replied with a smirk.
“This manor and the land around it is my inheritance. Do you know what man-sized alien lizards will do to the property value? It’s already bad enough that the giant half alien chap stomps around the rolling green.”
The cool morning air rushing through Rose’s hair with each step was refreshing.
“In my humble android opinion, that’d be a feature! Think about it. You go to the land of fairytale and myth and see a real giant? That’s absolutely worth it. Throw in some monsters to fight and you're golden! Think of the trophy hunters!
Noel let out a half chuckle, “Now that’s an idea for a summer job, giant city tours. I could wander around the outside of Buckingham giving visitors a scare.”
“Oooh! Then you’d put the ghost of Thatcher out of a job. Win win!”
Noel threw his head back in laughter as they crossed over the horizon.