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A MACHINES LOVE

CH. 5

"I only did it so that you would be more comfortable." Lugia said through the door in the hallway. "I wasn't like I was trying to...look." This time it sounded like she was a bit embarrassed at what she'd just said and maybe there was a touch of guilt there as well.

Wiggling into my pants and then buckling them up, I walked to the door, opened it which caused Lugia to fall backwards as if she'd been leaning against the door before it'd opened, and stare up at me in surprise. "Still you should've asked." I said to her as I walked back into the room and sat down on the edge of the bed, not really caring if she came in or not. I heard the door close a second later and watched as Lugia entered into the room with her head lowered.

"But you were asleep at the time, and I thought that you'd feel more comfortable sleeping..."

"In the nude?" I finished for her to which she only nodded slightly. I reached up, dragged my hand down my face and took in a long slow breath. "You may have had good intentions with doing that, but you still should've thought about it a bit more before doing it." I knew that I was being ridiculous right then, but I really couldn't help it. She needed to know that there were consequences to some actions, though since she was still young and all; and it really wasn't that big of a deal since she was only trying to help I mentally sighed in defeat. 'I really should lighten up a bit on her; after all it's not good to make a mountain out of a mole hill.' It was then that I noticed that a single black tear was rolling down her face and I knew that I'd probably taken it a bit far with raising my voice.

"Look..., I'm not really mad, but you have to understand that doing something like that can really hurt a relation...friendship between two people." Slowly reaching on over to her face, I used my thumb to wipe away a few of the tears on her cheek then sighed as I shook my head. "People don't like it when others do things to them while they're asleep. Do you understand?" To which she nodded to with a few sniffles and another tear falling down her cheek. "Now why don't you sit back down in that chair there and we can talk for a bit." To which she retook the seat next to the bed and wiped away at the remaining tears filling her eyes with a tissue from the box of them on the nightstand next to the bed. After talking for a bit about what'd happened last night, Lugia did look a little better and I had to admit that in doing so I wasn't feeling as upset at her as when I'd first found out that she she'd stripped me during my sleep.

Once that was done I looked over at the clock and saw that it was about time for dinner and sighed. "Well I guess I am a little hungry. Why don't I go out and get something to eat for myself, then we can have some dinner together; that is unless you've filled up on snacks." To which Lugia slowly shook her head and I smiled. With a bit of a promise that I'd be as quick as possible I exited out of the room and quickly went over to the front desk. The lady there had been a great help, on pointing out several different/close restaurants, and after selecting the one I wanted I exited the hotel and moved down the street to my left. It didn't take long for me to find a local Chinese takeout joint (To which I was thankful for as I was getting a little tired of eating Sub-sandwiches), order something that smelled/made my mouth water, and then return to our room. Lugia looked to have been busy in the meantime and had set up the table for the both of us and was patiently waiting for me to join her, to which I did after setting my things/food on the table as well. I had to admit that our tastes in food or things we eat were vastly different and I couldn't help but wonder for the fifth time what exactly her kind of food tasted like to her.

"Maybe you can tell me a little about your kind of food." I said as I pointed at the piece of computer component with my chopsticks that sat upon her paper plate in front of her (Author: Yes, I know how to use chopsticks).

"What do you want to know?" She asked as she set the thing down that she'd just been biting into.

"What happens when you eat stuff like that? I mean, after you eat it, do you...use it?" It felt a little uncomfortable talking about...that part of eating, but I had to admit to myself that I was curious. "With each...thing you eat, does it...become a part of you or something."

"Well...yes. Doesn't your food become a part of you when you eat it?" She answered my question with one of her own as she cocked her head to the side in confusion at what I'd said; to which I had to admit that she had me there.

"Well...sort of. We...I mean, people who eat...food, we...digest most of what we eat, and then...get rid of what we don't or can't digest." I was beginning to regret ever even asking or starting this conversation.

"Strange, but I do use each of the things that I...consume. Most of which is converted into my own being, some help to expand my memory, others...well...help me to...be more of myself." She seemed hesitant in the last part but maybe she was just picking up my uneasiness about the whole situation/conversation.

"Sort of like when you were able to change into more of an adult?" To which she nodded.

"And other things." She then began to point out what each of things she was eating would be used for and I had to admit that I was getting a whole new look at how computer components could or were being used in her case. "Speaking of which, there are still a few other things that we have yet to discuss about...us."

A hard lump began to form in my throat and it became a struggle to swallow it down. Somewhere in the back of my mind I knew that this day would come and I couldn't help but feel a little uneasy again about our...relationship. "Now just hold on a second there..." I slowly pushed myself a little back from the table and my eyes slowly began to widen. "Now, before you do anything...weird, I want you to warn me first or at least tell me what you're about to do."

"I guess that's fair. But you have to understand that I would never do anything that'd hurt you." She said as she placed a hand on her chest and gave me a bit of a hurt look.

'By whose definition of hurt?' I thought as I was beginning to feel a bit more uneasy.

"Well...," she looked around the room and brightened when she saw the laptop still sitting on the table where I'd left it on the first day we'd gotten here. "Just like your laptop over there, you had to register it under your name right?" She turned and smiled over at me, too which I shivered a bit as I thought about that innocent smile.

'I think I know where this is going but I still don't feel that comfortable about where it's going.' "Um...yeah. But I don't see what that's got to do with you. I mean, you're not suggesting that I have to register you under my name are you? I mean, come on, you're not a computer, you're a..." I paused there and I could see that Lugia had a bit of a hopeful expression on her face and with the pause she was losing that expression quite fast. "Person. Yeah, that's right, you're a person...and I don't think it's right that you should be registered like property to me." To this Lugia chuckled a bit at, only to fall into a full blown laughter as whatever I'd just said had struck her funny bone, which was if she did have bones. "What the...what did I say?"

Lugia laughed for a while longer until the fit had finally passed and she wiped at her eyes, in case any tears had accidentally leaked out. "Not that kind of registration." She giggled again. "Instead of registering me as yours, I'm going to register you under me." To which I couldn't help but raise a confused eyebrow at her and she chuckled at. "Let me explain. By me registering you under me, I'll be able to learn all there is to know about who and what you are."

This caused the other eyebrow to rise and I couldn't help but feel even more lost. "I don't get it. If you wanted to know all there was to know about me then all you had to do was ask. I'm fairly sure that I know myself by now." This caused her to laugh once again.

"Silly. I already know about your past." This caused my forehead and ears to rise in shock and I looked at her in uneasiness. "Well, I am a living mechinoid after all. Learning about your past is like opening a book for someone like me."

"But...how? I mean it's not like you could just..." I stopped in mid-sentence as I thought about what I was going to say and who or what she was. "You didn't." To which she nodded, confirming my thoughts/fears. Dropping my head and covering over the back of my head with my hands I began to shake in fear. 'She's just jumped through the Wi-Fi connection here and found out about everything I've ever done in my past. Shit...' Though the thoughts of how many laws she just ran through the mud came in a close second.

"You don't have to worry though. Anything and everything I find in your past is just between us. No blackmail involved, I swear." To which I raised my head and looked long and hard at her.

It was true that I'd done some...things in my past, but nothing really to be ashamed of...except those years after high school. "Then what do you need me for? You already know practically everything there is to know about me then. What else is there for you to know?"

"Your DNA silly. I can look at everything that is to know about your past through the net, but that doesn't tell me about who 'you' are. Only registering you under me will allow me to know that." It was one of those times that you felt like an open book and everything about you and your life were to be open to someone else's eyes.

'Talk about feeling exposed.' "What would happen if you don't get to register me under you?" I asked in hopes of avoiding the situation that I'd bet she'd be able to do when I'd be asleep.

"Then if you were to get hurt again I couldn't help heal you." She stated as a matter of fact as she raised a single finger and pointed at my injured shoulder. This caught me by surprise as I turned and looked over at my shoulder and when I turned back to look at her I saw her nod. "That's right. If I register you under me, I can use your DNA to make a...digital map of you. That way, if you get hurt again, I can use that information to repair you where you're hurt." She then held out a single hand and with each thing she mentioned she pulled down a single finger. "Broken bones, cuts and lacerations, all those hurts and aches that you might get later on, I can instantly heal them."

"Then my shoulder...could you fix my shoulder if you had my DNA right now?" I asked in a bit of a hopeful tone.

"Well...yes. If you let me register you under me, then I could help heal your shoulder." She seemed a bit reluctant about that for some reason and through that little pause it gave me a moment to pause and thing about her pause. It was like one of those times that you were really good at something in the past, then you forget about the skill as you don't use it all that often, and then are asked to perform as well as you did way back when. "Though I think it would be best to wait until your shoulder heals all on its own. I'd hate to get bad information on 'you', only to find out later that that information that I got is faulty and will do more harm than good when the time comes."

I had to admit that hearing her say that, made me feel a bit better about it, but I was still a bit reluctant about the whole thing. I remembered somewhere in my past that when a guy had allowed a computer to heal him after an injury that the computer found that it'd be better to remove all the inferior parts of him and replace them with synthetic or biological components, thereby fulfilling its masters wish to the fullest. "Um...if you do heal me, it'd only be like a speedy/natural recovery...right?" To which she cocked her head to the side in confusion for a bit, then her eyes went wide.

"I think I know what your fear is. You're afraid that I might change you beyond that of being a regular human, right?" To which I guiltily nodded.

"I mean, changing me into a bio-human might be alright if there was no other choice in saving my life, but...I like myself the way I am. I'd rather not turn into a machine." When I'd said this I could see a bit of a hurt look in Lugia's eyes, but it only lasted for a moment as she looked back at me and nodded.

"I guess it would probably be too much too much to ask you to change yourself so much just for me. But I can respect your decision." I hated to admit it, but right then and there, there seemed to be a wall that was starting to grow between us. I could tell that Lugia thought it might be best for me if I was like her, but do to my nature or selfishness I wanted to stay as human as I could, for as long as I could.

All in all, it took me the better part of a week for my shoulder to finally get back into some kind of normalcy, and to which a week or two ahead of what my trucking company thought it'd take for me to ask for my old job back. But truth be told, I knew that they were thinking of letting me go as it'd not be in the company's best interest to keep on an employee that couldn't work. The way that I could tell that was simply by listening to their voice over the phone when I told them I was ready to come back, and it didn't help them hiding their mood since I had a computer whiz on my side that could hack into their computers like there was no tomorrow (She'd told me close to the end of my recovery period that that was what she found when she'd randomly searched through their database).

With that said and done, and a note from the local hospital saying that I was fit to return to work, I was all smiles and sunshine when I'd jumped into a fellow drivers rig and we headed out to the nearest Company Yard so I could get into a new rig. Lugia hadn't been too keen about the idea I'd come up with keeping her hidden away while we traveled to one of the yards, but there really wasn't much I could do about it. I mean, people would be asking a lot of unwanted questions if a little girl were to have suddenly shown up, with no relations to me, and claim that she wanted to go trucking with me.

'I still don't see why I had to change back into this small form again. I feel all cramped up like this.' Lugia complained in the Bluetooth. It'd been her idea to use a Bluetooth to communicate back and forth, but even though it was a good idea, it'd still been pretty much a one sided idea or one that she was taking full advantage of using to keep me informed practically to the minute of how uncomfortable she was.

"Please bear with it for the time being, as I'm sure you know that if things were different that I'd have changed things so that you'd be better...situated." This had been the third or fourth time she'd complained about her situation and I had to admit that I was beginning to share in her unhappy mood, though for entirely separate reasons.

"You say something bub?" The fellow driver asked, to which I simply just turned my head and pointed at the Bluetooth in my ear, hoping that he'd get the idea without me vocalizing what was going on between Lugia and myself. "Ah, sorry about that; didn't know you were on the phone." He then turned back to staring through the windshield, shifted down a gear to pull the trailer up a long incline in the road, and then into another to keep the RPM's up to keep a steady speed up the rest of the hill. With a bit of a sigh of relief, that his attention was now fully on the road, I turned back to my luggage and looked at my larger bag and through it in my mind's eye I could see a very unhappy little Lugia alarm clock on top of all my cloths and such. I winced visibly at the image and just knew that when we were alone that I'd probably getting an ass chewing for making her travel in my bag as well as in her smaller form.

All in all, it took us the better part of a day of driving, him driving out his hours in the morning and mine later that afternoon, to reach the yard and my new rig. I knew that I'd have to fill out a lot of paperwork to officially call the rig my temporary home, but still, the keys were in the driver's seat and our new home sat in the back of the yard just waiting to move off down the road and deliver something to somewhere else. It only took me fifteen minutes to get my things moved from the other drivers rig to my new one and in that time Lugia continued to complain about being cramped and wanting to be let out to stretch. Though through all her complaining and whimpering in a pathetic manner, I simply told her that I'd let her out once things were in the clear and nobody was looking, to which was another fifteen minutes of putting things in their proper place in the rig.

By the time I'd pulled the curtains around the front of the windows to shut out the light from outside and unzipped the bag, Lugia was just about to the threatening phase of her ranting and practically popped right out of the bag as soon as it was slightly open. "Never again!" She shouted at me as she looked up at me and stared deeply into my eyes, but I couldn't help but squash down the feeling of cuteness that was wallowing up in me at being scolded by something not even a foot in height. It reminded me so much of those little dogs that were just about the same size barking up at people who are ten times their size and thinking how easy it'd be just to lift your shoe and end all its barking once and for all.

"Look, I said that I was sorry and I even explained why we had to travel like that." I tried to explain to her for the fifth time that day though I knew the truth of the matter was that just a kid in a long car drive, they just want to get out and want to know 'Are we there yet'. With a sigh I sat down in the drivers chair and lowered my head. "Now look, be as it may, we've finally gotten here and are now in our new home."

"Not much of a home now is it?" She said in a bit of a sarcastic tone. Which made me look over at her and see her craning/twister her neck this way and that so that she could look around the place

With another sigh I just simply nodded my head slowly at her. "You might say that, but for better or worse, I 'do' call this place home." I swept my arm around to indicate it all and nodded to it. "Though in the next few minutes we'll be going out and purchasing a lot of things, to make this place more livable.

"I don't understand. Surely you had things in your old home that you could use right now to make this place more livable." To which I couldn't help but shake my head and give out a defeated sigh

"That may have been true if I were jumping from one rig to another, but this is different. It turns out, or what I'm fairly sure happened, was the mechanic pawned off all my possessions from my last truck, so now I need to go out and purchase all new things for this truck. A new Television set, blankets, clothing, food, all the important things that I'll need to turn this place into a home away from home."

"Then I guess you can say, 'He really cleaned you out'." To which she giggled at, but I only sarcastically laughed at, not really seeing the humor in having everything you own stolen from you and sold off for a profit to the person who stole all your things.

"I guess if you want to look at it in a good light, it means that I get to buy all new things to replace all my worn out and older possessions." To which I just rolled my hand to indicate all the other things that I really didn't need to go into detail about purchasing. "Though, in the meantime we need to find out what you're going to do."

"What do you mean?"

"I'd think that it was fairly obvious." I said with a bit of a laugh as Lugia went ahead and placed the back of her hands/wings on her hips and scrunched up a bit of one side of her face, almost as if she were trying to say that if I was about to make a joke about her that I'd better think twice about it. "I mean, are you going to stay in that little form or are you going to change back into that of a little girl? You were after all, complaining quite a lot about how cramped you were while staying in that form, right?"

She lost her scowling look and looked at me in a bit of surprise. "Wait a minute, are you saying that I can change back now?" To which I scoffed at a bit and nodded to her. "Then why didn't you say so in the first place. Of course I want to change back." With a nod to her I got up, opened the bag with her cloths in them, and then stepped back. "Um...could you turn around for a second? I feel a little embarrassed about changing while...you're looking at me."

I raised an eyebrow at her for a second, but when she placed both her hands/wings together and pleaded with me, I shrugged my shoulder and turned around. A moment later the cab of the rig was bathed in a small white glow, and a second later I could hear the sound of cloths being put on. "All done, you can turn around now." She said to which I did. Lugia was now dressed in her sun dress once again and sporting a bit of a happy look upon her face. Once she knew I was looking, she lightly pinched either side of the dress, did a small curtsy, then twirled around in the dress, to which I couldn't help but clap at her little ballerina display.

'I wonder if I should get her a little tutu?' I wondered but shook my head at the idea as I knew that she wouldn't really have the time or space to really do any kind of dancing inside the rig. "Probably later, anyways, let's get going on over to the grocery and a few other stores, to get this empty rig livable." To which Lugia happily nodded at and jumped into the side seat to buckle herself in.

'For the love of Pete, is she going to keep on monitoring what I buy for food?' I wondered as she gave me a scowling look until I replaced the can of stew that I'd plucked off the shelf of the grocery store. 'Congratulation, you not only got a new friend to share your truck with you, but you also got a freak'n nutritionist along with the package.' I sighed in defeat and replaced the can, to which Lugia happy smiled up at me and my decision to follow her instruction on what to and not to buy.

"Oh, you don't have to have such an upset look on your face. I'm just trying to make sure you don't turn out to be looking like all those other truckers out there." To which I scowled and slightly scrunched up my nose at her.

"What the heck are you talking about? I think I've done very well in keeping in shape while out there on the road." I said in a rhetorical tone as I scowled down at her, only to have her giggle up at me. The biggest problem with rig drivers and such was that of food. Most of the time we are running around so much that we need something quick and easy to eat, which means a lot of fried foods and fast food restaurants, which in turn means a lot of fats and calories.

"And you did a really good job of it so far. I'm just making sure that you stay that way." She giggled once more and gently rubbed my arm to show me that there was no harm intended by her words, but I still wasn't convinced. "If it makes you feel any better, I'll cook up something really nice tonight. Something I know you'll find really tasty, and as you might say, finger lick'n good." To which she giggled at and I couldn't help but laugh at the silly phrase as well.

By the end of the day, I'd purchased enough things that would at least make the truck a little more livable and someplace that I could be comfortable in. All in all it took us the rest of the day to get all the groceries put away and to which found Lugia currently on the top bunk arranging her blankets up there. "I swear, if you hadn't been there, those cashiers would probably still be giving me weird looks when I'd put that princess blanket sheet set on that conveyer belt."

Lugia stopped smoothing out her sheets and simple smiled down at me. "Oh, I'm sure you would've come up with something to make it look less strange and believable that you were buying them." She reached on over, grabbed her pillow to her chest, and gave the thing a gentle hug to her chest. "But, are you sure that you were able to buy everything you wanted? You looked kind of disappointed when we left that last store."

I sat down once again in the driver's chair and nodded up to her. "It's true that I was able to get most of my shopping down while we were in town, but the fact of the matter is that regular stores don't have everything a trucker needs. There are still several other things I need to buy, but I can only get them at truck stops and such."

"Oh, like what?" She asked as she replaced her pillow on her bed, swung her feet off the edge of the upper bunk and kicked her feet towards me, showing off her dainty little sandals that made a slight clicking sound when they tapped the bottoms of her feet.

"A C.B. radio, some special or unique tools for rigs, and other trucker stuff like that." I said to her as I turned towards the front and glanced down at the clock on the radio. "But those things I'll probably end up getting once we hit the road again." Lugia nodded to that and I simply slapped both my thighs and smiled. "Now I think a little someone promised to show me her culinary arts." Lugia giggled at that, and in the next few moments she was whipping together a very fancy dinner for the two of us (Food for me, and computer parts for her).