Chapter Twenty-Three – Hikikomori with a Shotgun

“It’s strange, isn’t it? How as the world grows, and people get stuck in their own little bubbles apart from others, how communicating effectively just becomes even more important?”

–CEO of Talktech, during a 2039 interview

***

“So, uh,” I started. “Did Deus Ex tell you about what I was doing?” I asked.

Shy slowly and carefully shook her head.

“Right. Well. She wants me to check up on all the local samurai, make sure they’re alright. I guess… give them my number, in case something comes up. You know, if you need help or something.”

“Okay,” Shy said.

She stared, and I stared right back.

Truth was, I’d dealt with something similar before. There was a kid in the orphanage a few years back. Actually got adopted at some point. I think his name was Br4nd0n? Numbers and all. Poor shit had some of those parents before he ended up in the orphanage. Didn’t speak a word. There was a mute kid back then too, but he could sign up a storm and used her phone to ‘talk’ a fair bit. Mute was mute, The Br4nd0n was just cripplingly shy.

It took a long time to figure out how to work with him. I think there were tricks to handle it, but I couldn’t for the life of me remember any of them.

Didn’t help that mute kids got adopted a lot more often than more obvious cripples. I guess wanna-be parents would rather have a kid that can’t talk back instead of a kid missing an arm or a leg.

“So, uh, is there anything you need help with?” I asked.

Shy shook her head slightly. “No,” she said.

Well shit, a whole syllable, I was getting somewhere. “Okay then,” I said. “I’ll have Myalis, my AI, send you my contact info. If something comes up, don’t be… don’t hesitate to give me a call, or send me a text. If it’s urgent, I’m sure Myalis will nag me to get to it.”

“Okay,” she said.

“Cool cool,” I said.

The silence stretched. The only good thing was that I could tell this pained Shy as much as it pained me. She was working her jaw and looked like she was resisting the urge to cringe into herself. “D-do…”

“Yeah?” I asked.

Shy looked away from me, and her throat moved strangely for a moment before she nodded.

“Are you thirty?”

“Thirty?” I asked.

“Thirsty,” she repeated.

Then there was a voice, speaking up from… pretty much nowhere and everywhere all at once, but not in a super loud way. I recognized it almost right away. Latyns, I think his name was? “Greetings, Vanguard Stray Cat. Lady shy wishes to enquire about your hunger and thirst, as a matter of polite hospitality.”

“Oh. Uh, no, I’m good. My girlfriend has been taking cooking classes at that university right off the island lately. She’d been getting pretty good at cooking. Hey, maybe I can invite you over one of these days?”

She nodded.

“Do you cook?” I asked. Maybe I could foist the social responsibility of dealing with Shy onto Lucy… she wouldn’t mind too much, would she?

Then again, someone as extroverted as Lucy might well blow Shy’s little introvert mind right off her shoulders.

I was expecting Laytns to answer, but Shy suddenly shook her head, took a deep breath, and spoke herself. “Ah, no? I order a lot,” Shy said. “Do… you want a tour? Of my apartment? If I go to your place, it’s only fair.”

“Yeah, sure,” I said. Did I really want a tour of her place? No. Did I want the awkwardness to end? Yes. Would I feel guilty if I just fucked off back home and hugged and praised Lucy for being so awesome? A little bit.

Shy nodded, and seemed happy, and that little twinkle in her eyes twisted the guilt in my gut. Then she pointed down, towards my feet.

I looked at the floor, then back up. “What?” I asked.

“Shoes,” she said.

“Actually, these are boots,” I said.

Shy shook her head. “Wearing shoes in someone’s house… um… no, it’s okay.”

I didn’t sigh. I wanted to, but I had the impression that if I gave off the vibes that I wasn’t appreciating her efforts, Shy would clamp right up, and then every visit to her would be more awkward than the last.

“Give me a minute,” I said.

I was left standing in half my power armour, since the legs and boots part was kind of one thing. Then I said ‘fuck it’ and took off the rest too. It was probably safe inside a samurai’s place, right?

“H-here,” Shy said as she placed something down ahead of me. Slippers.

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Little black slippers, with cat ears, and tiny tongues sticking out the front.

“Thanks.”

I slid them on without protest. “So, you have a pretty big space down here?” I asked.

“Yes,” Shy said. “I, ah… Latyns?”

“Lady Shy rents out a large portion of this floor. And some of the floor above. She has expanded her home to make more room for herself within this building.”

I nodded along, and when Shy darted out of the entrance hall I followed her.

The house was pretty tightly packed. Past the big open space of the entrance was a narrow corridor with a low ceiling. My augs picked up on the fact that there were several guns tucked into the walls, likely turrets of some sort, so the space wasn’t unprotected.

Then we walked into a living room slash kitchen. It was one of those open floor-plan spaces, I supposed. The centre of the room was taken up by an island next to a small kitchen, and then there was a living room… of sorts.

Maybe display room was more appropriate? There wasn’t any seating anywhere, except for a small table in the kitchen with a single seat next to it.

The far end of the room had several mannequins on plinths. They were dressed like Shy had been when I first saw her. All-black bodysuits with ponchos and long coats and… and one of them was very skintight, with a boob-window?

I decided not to comment. There were racks behind the gear, with guns and equipment fixed to them. “That’s cool,” I said.

“Thank you,” Shy said. “Um… just my equipment. For Samurai work. Over there is my bedroom. Please… don’t?”

I glanced at the door she was pointing to and nodded. Fair enough.

“Washroom,” she said, pointing to a door that was left open and which led to… a pretty ordinary modern washroom. “And that’s my office,” she said, finally pointing to what might have been the largest room in the house.

“What’s that on the walls?” I asked.

I squinted. It looked like the entire far wall, which rose up to take up two floors, was covered in cubicles filled with… were those anime figurines? Of Samurai? Wow, that was a lot of flesh-tone plastic.

There was a clunk and a whooshing sound, and the wall folded into itself and closed up. In its place was a plain wall, with a few perfectly inoffensive posters for like, anime movies and some samurai merchandise.

“That’s my office,” Shy said. “I… spend most of my time here.”

Shy had a hell of a mesh-runner set up against one wall. It was floor-to-ceiling screens and a curved wall, the higher ones mounted on racks that pointed downwards and towards a sort of… throne thing.

The seat was all padded cushions and digital ports and water cooling pipes. I bet the average mesh-runner would sell their mom for a month with that seat.

“Nice setup,” I said. “You do a lot of like… hacking and shit?” I asked.

Shy blinked. “I… pirate a lot of shows,” she said. “And… have a lot of friends that I talk to.”

“Really?” I asked. Maybe I should have toned the incredulity down a bit.

“On… IRC,” she said.

“You don’t get out much, do you?” I asked as nicely as I could.

Shy crossed her arms and didn’t meet my gaze. “I’m getting better about it,” she said. “When I saw your call to action… I left the house. And I often do clean-up, for incursions. Usually at night, when it’s quiet, and in places that aren’t guarded as well.”

“Right, you’ve got some stealth stuff going on too,” I said. “That’s… pretty cool, I guess. Doing good by moonlight, helping people without being too obvious about it.”

“Thanks,” Shy said.

I eyed Shy. She was kind of cute, in a lanky, dorky way, and… I was not going to adopt her like picking up a stray out of an alley. She was a grown woman who had her shit together. She had an apartment and a job, and her own weird little hobbies. She didn’t need me.

That didn’t mean that I couldn’t be less of a bitch than usual and extend a bit of a hand. “Hey, are you busy… on most afternoons this week?” I asked.

“No?” she said, uncertain.

“Cool! So, uh, I need to head out and meet all the other locals. Gros Baton, Tankette, Princess and Knight. You know, the bunch that were around for the Big Gun project. They’re all about our age, give or take a couple of decades. Anyway, they are all newer samurai. Maybe you wanna come along? They’re cool people.”

“Oh. I… would like that.”

Deus Ex owed me a fucking ‘best babysitter’ medal once this was done.

***

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