Mister Disney princess

Eve felt much better physically now, thanks to the bed to recuperate on. With nothing jarring her wound, nanites were quick in repairing damages. The current estimate for it to heal was only two weeks. The pain that weighted down on Eve's mood diminished drastically, but she had a new frustration on her mind. Lately, she was making a pain limiter for her core, but it wasn't going as well as she'd like. Eve's code kept numbing not just pain, but all her sensations to the point where she wasn't able to move; and she needed to work carefully in order to not paralyse herself forever by accident.

With all that, Eve pursed her lips and narrowed her unsympathetic green eyes at Ellin and Xia. "Don't tell me you can't even bear some verbal abuse anymore. Don't bother me with things like that."

Under her icy gaze, Ellin and Xia could only retreat like beaten dogs and let Eve return to DreamscapeEdit.

⠀

It took her the rest of the day and most of the night, but eventually, Eve ended up triumphant. The sub-program she created this time carefully lowered the intensity of pain signals, turning them into only slight discomfort, while not touching any other nervous receptors. With the health reports stating that her current state was stable, Eve decided it was time for her to go out and look at Victor's tyranny for herself.

Like that, instead of eating in her bed, Eve dressed herself with Xia's help (even if Eve didn't feel pain, it didn't mean that she could pull at the wound) and walked outside of the room to join others at breakfast. By that time, plates with food were already put on a table in the living room. Ellin was pouring everyone porridge, and Victor was putting up utensils on a table. In his presence, even Ellin the chatterbox didn't dare to talk too much.

When Eve sat down, she saw that each plate and each spoon were arranged so evenly that it looked like they were copied and pasted. She looked around. The living room was akin to the bedroom in terms of furnishings and cleanliness—it sparkled. Everything in there that could've been sorted, was. Then Eve looked at Victor, who was picking at his porridge in silence.

She wondered if he had an obsessive-compulsive disorder.

As if reading her thoughts, Victor threw a sharp glance at her, and Eve lowered her eyes. His presence indeed was very domineering. It wasn't even because of his level—it was all in his frown and the darkness in his eyes. Even Eve, who wasn't new to pressure, had an instinctive urge to obey before she could think it over.

"Is it alright for you to get up, Eve? Are you feeling well?" Ellin asked. "I think you are still too pale."

"I'm well enough. In another week I will probably be able to move without problems." Eve straightened and met Victor's eyes. "I hope it won't be a problem for us to stay here until then, Mister Kraust."

Victor didn't look away. His brown eyes pierced into Eve's green ones. That stare made her feel as if her skull was made from glass, and her brain was open like a book for Victor to examine—it made shivers go up her spine. The feeling didn't disappear when Victor broke the eye contact by shaking his head. "It won't, Doctor Ziffer."

The rest of the breakfast went relatively quiet. When the dishes were cleaned and put away, Ellin and Xia hurried to excuse themselves away from Victor's unreadable gaze. Now that he and Eve were left alone, the questions about him buzzed in her head again. She wondered what would be polite enough to ask and how to start a dialogue. Small talk was never Eve's forte, and Victor looked like someone who didn't want to be spoken with.

Eve picked at her nails for a while. On the opposite side of the table, Victor waited for her with patience. Finally, she opened her mouth. "Mister Kraust, as a host, you should return to sleep in your bed."

Victor responded without a delay. "As a host, I decide what I should and should not." He threw at Eve a look with half-closed eyes. "Don't bother with small talk. I can see that we both are people who prefer to talk business."

Eve steeled herself and raised her head. It was the only way for her to keep some dignity. "Alright. I was wondering if you had a degree in a technical speciality, Mister Kraust."

He shook his head. "No. My degree was in economics; I studied computer sciences independently, because it was connected to the business I was working in."

Eve slightly deflated in disappointment. 'Well, I guess that a small fish is better than an empty dish.'

"Have you lived on your own for a long time? Did this house belong to you before the apocalypse?" she said aloud.

"I want to ask you a question first, Doctor Ziffer. How a scientist of your calibre ended up here, instead of working in a lab in order to neutralise the zombie nanites?"

Eve grit her teeth. The question made the frustrations and stresses of the last weeks' surface all over again. Her fists clenched. 'Because it was just my luck that the first people I found after getting out of coma were bandits who only care for the kind of science that makes them guns!'

"Actually, that is just what I look for—a lab. If you can point me and my companions towards one, I'd be very grateful."

"It's not a simple thing to find nowadays. A good nano-research lab requires a lot of electricity to run, and not every place has enough resourced to spare for something like that. And amongst those, most wouldn't bother. People tried to deconstruct zombie nanites in the past, but all attempts failed."

Despite herself, Eve felt her chest swelling with pride that she tried hard to not show on the outside. Instead, she concentrated on the topic of labs. She raised her chin resolutely. "Then I will need to make my own. Build a whole base around it, if necessary."

Victor nodded; his face warmed, if almost imperceptibly. "I will try to remember if there are any places where you might find what you look for, Doctor Eve. Now excuse me."

He stood from the table and walked outside. Bound by her curiosity and restlessness, Eve followed. She watched Victor bring out four baskets and place them on the ground. Then he stood and looked into the forest. Eve felt his presence becoming more pronounced and knew that whatever his superpower was, in this moment Victor was using it to the fullest. She waited with bated breath, and as if following her, the chirping of birds stilled.

For several minutes, nothing happened. The silence stretched and stretched until a single crow flew out from the woods. It held a branch with several bright red berries on it. Under Eve's incredulous eyes, the crow threw it into one of the baskets and flew away. But it was only a beginning.

Soon, other animals appeared one by one. Birds of all kinds, rats and squirrels, several dogs, a fox, even snakes and lizards. Several of them had level one or two presences. All brought something edible with them—a patch of grass, some berries, acorns, mushrooms, wild apples and eggs. After leaving their tribute in one of the baskets, most of the animals left, except for a single grey rabbit.

When Victor's presence calmed down away, Eve could only look speechlessly at the "forest's treasures" lying down before his feet. One basket was filled with all sorts of weeds, another one had some fruits, berries and mushrooms inside, the third one had several multicoloured eggs in it, and the last one was empty. Eve glanced at the rabbit who sat nearby without any fear. 'Is it for eating as well?'

Victor crouched near the baskets and sifted their contents. He kept murmuring under his nose as he examined what the animals brought to him. Some things he put back, some he threw into the fourth basket. After a single look at the unmistakable red mushroom with white spots on it, Eve understood that the fourth basket was for inedible things.

'Even after everything, something still grows and brings fruit out there. And there are so many animals,' she thought. 'Maybe… Maybe the way my nanites were released was for the best. At least now Earth has a chance to heal.'

As Eve looked at the wilted forest, she didn't see how Victor stilled in his movements, nor did she notice the glance he threw at her before returning to the sorting. When Eve's eyes returned to him, he was working as if nothing happened again. Soon enough, Eve grew tired from keeping herself upright so soon after losing half a litre of her blood and returned inside. She still had a lot of things to work on in her DreamscapeEdit.