Shortfic for myriad_myriad
Jan. 30th, 2006 08:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
petroniaWhen I saw "cyberpunk XXXHolic" I thought of this... and couldn't come up with any other ideas within the month. ^^; So I wrote what originally popped to mind, redundant though it be.
AU to Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex 2nd Gig, episode 11, guaranteed incomprehensible if you haven't watched the series. ^^;;
Shell
"An empty shell, in parlance and truth," said the woman. Her elegant fingers ghosted over the boy's still-rosy cheek, shifted strands of blond hair. "A carapace abandoned by growth, an outdated model with little intrinsic worth to him or anyone. But it was built to be a container, so out of convenience he used it to hold his memories. What comprises a human but that?" She smiled at Motoko. "A fair price for what he desired."
Motoko said nothing. This, this was not virtual. Each inhalation she took stirred invisible eddies of information like so many particles of dust. Objects were nodal portents: the weave of the tablecloth linen, the sugar cube dissolving in her tea... Turing had been defied. No compression algorithm could have encoded the complexity of the repercussions tangled and reverberating within these wooden walls. Say rather that it was the external world that had become immaterial, representative, schematic.
She said nothing. She waited. Eventually the woman straightened, dark hair sliding over her bare shoulders like a veil. The same smile dangled at the corner of her lips.
"If you found this place it is because you have need of it," she said. "To what do you aspire?"
"Saa," Motoko said. She lifted the china cup to her lips. "I wonder—"
In the instant before the hot fragrant liquid touched her lips words formed in her mind, falling into order as if they had been placed there by external agency. She did not speak them out loud. She took a sip of tea, replaced the cup on the table and stood.
"I must be going," she said. "Thank you for the story. And the tea."
"So soon," said the woman. "What of the children?"
Motoko turned at the door, glancing back. The children sat frozen in time, gazing dreamily at her through intervening glass. At first look they surely lived, breathed, at any moment would smile or yawn or speak; at second look they had the severe purity of dolls.
"That girl must have searched too, I'm sure," she said. "After all he was the first boy she ever liked."
The woman nodded. "Please don't hesitate to come again," she said, "if you change your mind."
Her voice fell with a strange tenderness, at odds with the sardonic tilt of her mouth.
Motoko descended the stairs and exited the store. When she turned the corner of the alley the granularity and bustle of reality reasserted itself, with a rush. She did not look over her shoulder.
AU to Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex 2nd Gig, episode 11, guaranteed incomprehensible if you haven't watched the series. ^^;;
Shell
"An empty shell, in parlance and truth," said the woman. Her elegant fingers ghosted over the boy's still-rosy cheek, shifted strands of blond hair. "A carapace abandoned by growth, an outdated model with little intrinsic worth to him or anyone. But it was built to be a container, so out of convenience he used it to hold his memories. What comprises a human but that?" She smiled at Motoko. "A fair price for what he desired."
Motoko said nothing. This, this was not virtual. Each inhalation she took stirred invisible eddies of information like so many particles of dust. Objects were nodal portents: the weave of the tablecloth linen, the sugar cube dissolving in her tea... Turing had been defied. No compression algorithm could have encoded the complexity of the repercussions tangled and reverberating within these wooden walls. Say rather that it was the external world that had become immaterial, representative, schematic.
She said nothing. She waited. Eventually the woman straightened, dark hair sliding over her bare shoulders like a veil. The same smile dangled at the corner of her lips.
"If you found this place it is because you have need of it," she said. "To what do you aspire?"
"Saa," Motoko said. She lifted the china cup to her lips. "I wonder—"
In the instant before the hot fragrant liquid touched her lips words formed in her mind, falling into order as if they had been placed there by external agency. She did not speak them out loud. She took a sip of tea, replaced the cup on the table and stood.
"I must be going," she said. "Thank you for the story. And the tea."
"So soon," said the woman. "What of the children?"
Motoko turned at the door, glancing back. The children sat frozen in time, gazing dreamily at her through intervening glass. At first look they surely lived, breathed, at any moment would smile or yawn or speak; at second look they had the severe purity of dolls.
"That girl must have searched too, I'm sure," she said. "After all he was the first boy she ever liked."
The woman nodded. "Please don't hesitate to come again," she said, "if you change your mind."
Her voice fell with a strange tenderness, at odds with the sardonic tilt of her mouth.
Motoko descended the stairs and exited the store. When she turned the corner of the alley the granularity and bustle of reality reasserted itself, with a rush. She did not look over her shoulder.
