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  He couldn't help but wonder, with an odd mixture of excitement and trepidation, if he'd be sleeping in a strange bed tonight with a real woman in his arms.

  * * * * *

  Tycho spent most of the day until it was time to leave with Lady, exercising her vigorously so she'd be less energetic when it was time to board the ship for their visit to Callista's estate. He wanted to make a good impression, so he also spent extra time training her to make sure she was solid on all the commands.

  It helped distract him from his nervousness at this rash course he'd set himself on. He'd never considered himself the sort to seek out humans, and certainly not for borderline fetish intimate encounters. That wasn't why he wanted to visit Callista, of course, but as long as the possibility of, well, that remained then the prospect loomed intimidatingly before him.

  Finally Eva notified him that they should embark soon so they'd get there in plenty of time in case they encountered delays during travel. While Loran led Lady to the ship and got her comfortably settled in a traveling compartment Tycho undressed and stepped through a sonic cleansing field, then followed Eva to his bedroom to do some final grooming in preparation for the visit.

  “So rationally speaking, we're expected to make ourselves presentable for a face-to-face,” Tycho said as he stood in front of the bank of full length mirrors Eva had set up so he could get a good view of himself. “Would you say I should try even harder to look nice when I'm meeting someone in person?”

  The mirrors revealed a body that wasn't as sculpted and athletic as he might've liked, but he was reasonably proud of the shape he was in. Still, he bit his lip apprehensively as he looked himself over, wondering what Callista would think of him, while behind him Eva began laying out outfits to choose from on the bed.

  “Absolutely,” she agreed. “First impressions matter a great deal to humans. They essentially shape a person's opinion of someone moving forward, unless a trusted friend or family member at some later point offers a different perspective and changes their mind.”

  “Would you say I made a good impression with Callista?” Tycho asked, staring at his companion's reflection in the mirror.

  He saw her visibly hesitate. “Hard to say, when I'm not familiar with Miss Ensom's personality and preferences,” she hedged.

  Abandoning his self-inspection, he turned and gave his companion an impatient look. “But you're drawing from tens of thousands of years of companion experiences dealing with humans. Take a guess.”

  “I would say she found you . . . intriguing,” Eva said slowly. “I doubt she's encountered your, ah, new perspective on life and interpersonal relationships before. And she seems very fond of dogs, which will certainly help make her more kindly disposed towards you.”

  That was what he wanted to hear. He clapped his hands. “Okay, then let's make me look good. Give her a good impression of me.”

  His companion smiled widely, sharing his eagerness. “Might I suggest a look similar to Miss Ensom's adult companion Bruce?”

  Tycho froze, staring at her in horror. “You want me to make myself look like a companion?”

  “Like hers, specifically. After all, if she follows the trend of most humans Bruce will be customized to her exact preferences. Looking like that is almost guaranteed to ensure maximum attraction from her.”

  “And I'll look exactly like her companion,” he pointed out. “That's a bit weird, isn't it?”

  Eva hesitated. “Maybe. She might find the familiarity comforting.” She frowned. “Although given her profile it may be she's most drawn to novelty, so looking more . . . garish would serve you best.” At his blank look she clarified. “Some of the more flashy fashions, such as coloring your hair like she does. And you could sculpt your hairstyle into art, since she collects esoteric pieces. Then perhaps decorate your body with temporary ink, wear colorful, eye grabbing clothes, that sort of thing.”

  He liked that idea even less. “No. She agreed to a visit based on my appearance in the face-to-face, didn't she? Why don't we stick with that, but, you know . . .”

  “Optimize it?” his companion suggested.

  “Exactly.”

  “All right.” Eva grinned impishly and leaned forward to muss his hair. “There, you're all ready to go.”

  Tycho looked in the mirrors at his disheveled appearance. “Ha ha.”

  With a light laugh his companion gave him a quick shave and haircut, even though he'd had both from Loran the evening of his return from his excursion. Then she got to work arranging his hair and clothes to best suit his usual look.

  After that there was nothing more to do but head out to his starship for departure, Eva following behind carrying luggage with anything he might have need of, including changes of clothes, swimming suits, cold weather gear, and of course emergency supplies. She also brought a few of his favorite snacks, probably more to soothe his nervousness than in case he got hungry.

  The first thing Tycho did when he boarded the ship was visit Lady in her traveling compartment, making sure she was comfortable and the safety measures were in place in case something went wrong on the flight. He spent a few minutes soothing his faithful friend so she'd be more comfortable in the unfamiliar space, scratching between her ears and beneath her chin.

  “Probably best to nap if you can while we travel,” he told her, his voice prompting an enthusiastic tail wag. “Visiting the first new human you've ever met, and the second I've ever met, should be an exciting event.”

  Satisfied his dog was as prepared as possible to travel to another galaxy, he closed the compartment and joined Eva just outside the cockpit.

  “Welcome aboard,” Pilot said sarcastically as they entered together. “I suppose since you're in a hurry traveling to visit someone we can dispense with the piloting lessons for this trip?”

  Tycho grinned. “Maybe on the way back. Wouldn't want to disappoint you.”

  “Well space is generally considered to be a much safer place for a completely unskilled pilot to fly, it being a vast empty expanse with a statistically negligible number of obstacles and all. Unless you were careless enough to fly into a planetoid, that is, which to be frank I wouldn't put past you.”

  His grin widened. “I don't know, I was kind of thinking you'd let me calculate a rift jump.”

  He was just tweaking the ship's computer, of course. Spacial rift jumps required such complex mathematics that the human mind was barely able to comprehend them, even with the help of computers. Which was why rifts with pinpoint destinations hadn't even been possible until after AI was developed to properly calculate them.

  Sure enough Pilot nearly blew a gasket at the idea, then sulked hilariously when he realized Tycho was making fun of him.

  “You're the worst, you know that?” the AI muttered. “You're really just the worst.” He lowered his voice to nearly inaudible levels and continued to grumble. “A human making a rift jump. You'd put us smack dab inside the event horizon of a supermassive black hole.”

  “Isn't that a statistical near impossibility?” Tycho asked innocently.

  “You'd somehow manage it.”

  Once they were underway Eva coaxed him into his stateroom and settled him onto a couch, his favorite one since it had a good view out the banks of large windows along the wall with the emergency exit hatch.

  She settled down behind him with her hands on his shoulders, murmuring at how tense he was. “Nervous about this visit?” she asked as she began kneading his muscles.

  Tycho didn't answer, watching out the windows as the atmosphere of Helios 4 thinned and darkened and gave way to the cold void of space. Over the emergency hatch a second barrier lowered with eerie silence, to provide an airlock for the exit now that they were in vacuum. Tycho watched it seal, realizing he'd never used the airlock before.

  Eva wasn't wrong about him being nervous. Although he didn't want to show it, even if only to her. To distract himself he looked back out the windows at the brilliant vista of stars, nebula, galaxies, a
nd other visible phenomena that filled the universe. It was nothing he hadn't seen before, although he appreciated the beauty of it.

  The windows had built-in magnifiers for interesting phenomena, which was why what would've otherwise probably been a fairly mundane expanse of stars showed so many breathtaking visuals. During his years of space exploration Tycho had loved admiring the splendor of the view out those windows, but now he kind of wished he could see the stars as they really were, without embellishment for his benefit.

  “Deactivate window magnification,” he said.

  “So you can stare out at nothing?” Pilot asked sarcastically. “How about I just close the shutters entirely?” Tycho stared at the windows impatiently until the ship's AI huffed in irritation. “Fine. Enjoy the “view.”

  As he'd expected the vista became a lot less spectacular without magnification. Just an endless expanse of stars of all colors and luminosities. Although he did see the dusty streaks of the Norvis galaxy's two arms like wounds across the blackness, and the faint haze of a distant nebula in another area.

  It had its own beauty, simpler and less attention grabbing. Like looking at the night sky from his solarium, but without atmosphere obscuring the view. Was this the first time he'd ever looked out the windows without magnification?

  Would the view be even better if he was on the other side of the transparent barriers?

  “You know, in all my space tourism I've never actually gotten into a suit and gone outside a ship, station, or habitat,” he said. “Seen space firsthand, you might say.”

  “Probably a good thing,” Eva replied, digging her fingers a bit deeper into his muscles to try to relieve the tension this impending visit was causing in his shoulders. “Space can be dangerous, and even the best suits don't offer total protection.”

  Tycho idly pressed his fingers to the window above the couch. He felt like the glass should be cold to the touch with the vacuum of space on the other side, but it was actually a comfortable temperature. He was surprised that in all his time in this ship he'd never so much as checked that before now. “Eva, what would happen to me if I threw myself out the airlock?”

  His companion froze, leaning around him so she could stare at his face with wide green eyes. “Exposure to vacuum is potentially fatal. Don't even consider it.”

  He met her gaze. “What would happen?”

  With a soft sigh Eva scooted around to sit in front of him on the couch so she could lean back with her head on his stomach. “If you were holding your breath your lungs would almost certainly explode. Air would also be expelled from your bowels. You would also suffer from decompression sickness as the gases absorbed in your bloodstream came out of solution and formed bubbles, which would then try to escape and cause you to swell up to potentially twice your size, an experience you'd find incredibly painful.”

  “I can imagine,” Tycho murmured.

  His companion continued firmly. “You'd also face the fact that any liquid exposed to vacuum, such as saliva or tears, would instantly boil. Another severe risk is that any skin exposed to direct sunlight would be hit by dangerous levels of radiation. Although you wouldn't have much time to worry about radiation poisoning, since in vacuum you'd lose consciousness within fifteen or so seconds due to lack of oxygen, then be dead due to asphyxiation after a minute or so.”

  “Sounds pleasant.” Tycho stared down at her, thoughtfully teasing her strawberry tresses. “Could you patch me up if you got to me in time?”

  His companion abruptly sat up and turned to face him, looking alarmed. “My love, I'm very concerned with your recent masochistic behavior. It speaks to potentially serious issues.”

  He fought down his annoyance. “I'm not interested in hurting myself, Eva.” She simply stared at him doubtfully, and with a sigh he looked away from her piercing green eyes, once more staring out into the cold emptiness of space. It seemed like an apt metaphor for his life. “You don't understand. It's like ever since I was born I've been living in a sensory deprivation bubble. You, and Diana, and Loran, and Maurice and Charelin back when I was with my mother, you've all kept me from any danger, any risk.”

  Eva mulled that over. When she replied she sounded genuinely befuddled. “Isn't it good to be spared from detrimental experiences?”

  Tycho chuckled bitterly. “Who decides what's detrimental? Maybe I never learned caution because I never stubbed my toe as a child. Maybe I never learned to truly grieve the things that made me sad because you and Diana and Loran were always there to distract me from them.”

  There was another long pause from her. “Would you, um, like me to engage you in philosophical discussion? You've never really shown an interest in interacting in that manner before.”

  “No, Eva, I want you to listen.” He turned away from the window and leaned forward to stare down at her intently. “How can I appreciate pleasure if I've never felt pain? Where's the contrast that keeps the endless parade of amusements and pleasures my life offers me from feeling empty and hollow? And what joys and simple contentments have you kept me from experiencing thinking it would be the best thing for me?”

  Eva stared at him. “I-I don't really understand what you want from me here.”

  Tycho briefly closed his eyes and looked away from her. “No, you don't. So why is it you think you know what will make me happy?”

  “Because I have access to a repository of knowledge from all companions ever created and purposed to serving humans. That's tens of thousands of years of experience with the behavior of trillions of humans, all with the most intimate and complete exposure possible.”

  He just huffed at that, and Eva's expression softened. She took his hand and kissed it, then pressed it to her cheek. “I know how to understand you. How to read you. From the moment I met you I've been customizing myself to your wants and needs. To give you everything, even what you don't even know you want.”

  Tycho pulled his hand back, looking at those perfect features. Uncannily perfect, it seemed to him now, even though Eva had customized her appearance to have enough flaws to make him comfortable with her. “What if I'm an outlier to your “experience” that companions have never encountered before?”

  She smiled warmly and ran her hand up his arm in a frequently utilized gesture that could either be soothing or inviting, depending on his mood. “You aren't, my love.” When he just stared at her she reluctantly pulled her hand back, tone becoming ruefully accepting. “Can I at least take away from this conversation the fact that you don't plan to throw yourself out the airlock?”

  He chuckled, feeling an unexpected lift to his spirits. “Of course I don't. But I would like to hear more about exposure to vacuum. If I can't experience it I still want to know enough to imagine it. And it would be nice to know if you actually could put me back together if it ever did happen, just for peace of mind.”

  Eva nodded doubtfully. “Seems a bit morbid, but if it matters that much then-”

  Tycho abruptly hunched in his seat with a strangled whimper, accidentally shoving his companion off him as he folded up around himself.

  His mind was crumpling in on itself, his body feeling completely unfamiliar, as if he was an alien consciousness that had just inhabited it and had no idea how it worked. Colors bled across his vision, many of which weren't visible to the human eye. Eva's voice distorted so her words sped up and slowed down randomly, and went from high pitched to low in an eyeblink. Somewhere distant he heard Lady howling, although it took long seconds to recognize the sound.

  Then reality slammed back into place, leaving him curled up around himself shuddering. Eva was there in an instant to spray an anti-nausea solution into his mouth, and before his gut could even begin roiling it settled down to queasy discomfort, then calmed entirely.

  “Fair warning, we just went through a rift,” Pilot mentioned with almost vicious glee.

  Tycho cursed the AI through gritted teeth as he forced himself back upright in his seat. This was exactly why he hated rifts, especiall
y the bigger ones. But when Eva moved to help him he waved her away. “Lady,” he growled.

  His companion nodded and hurried out of the stateroom, turning towards the back of the ship and the dog's traveling compartment. He could still hear Lady whimpering with helpless confusion back there; he'd been hoping her mind was simple enough that she wouldn't be able to process their brief stint outside spacetime, but apparently he was wrong.

  Eva's voice came over the stateroom's display since she couldn't be there with him in person. “Don't worry, my love. Extensive tests have been done with ferrying all varieties of animals through rifts. It's not harmful for them, merely briefly uncomfortable like it is for humans.”

  “I know,” he growled. “Check her closely anyway.”

  She continued as if he hadn't spoken. “Animals are ferried around all the time without any problems. After all, how else would we get them to newly terraformed planets?”

  Tycho was well aware of all that, but he still felt guilty thinking of the distress in his faithful friend's howl. He glared at the display, his usual focal point when talking to Pilot. “You're supposed to give warning before we go into a rift.”

  “Sorry, slipped my mind,” the AI said glibly.

  “I'm going to download your consciousness into a chew toy and give you to my dog.”

  “Very inventive. Although even that would be a step up from taking backseat while you fly.” Tycho glared at the display, and Pilot's voice became thick with false sympathy. “Oh boo hoo, widdle Tychy wikey can't stand the mental displacement of being outside his comfortable spacetime.”

  He gave up the argument with another irritated growl, stumbling over to his bed on shaky legs and sprawling across it. Honestly, he had no idea why he hadn't purged Pilot's personality years ago. The stupid AI was just asking for it.

  Rift travel always took it out of him even though it only lasted moments, and he usually ended up napping afterwards. Which was nice in a way, because going through a jump while asleep usually had no more effect than a moment of bizarre dreams that usually blended in with the rest.