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Cassian shtly She still wore her yukata, for she had no one to impress

Show me

Ceno’s hand shook as she pressed a pearly button in the boardrooht a red curtain too dramatic, but the effect we had chosen turned out to be hardly less so A gentle, silver light brightened slowly in an alcove hidden by a trick of angles and the sunset, co on like daybreak

And I stepped out

We thought it would be funny Ceno had e of the robots from old films and fra, grasping e and lit fro every tihts, a mouth that could blink off and on, pupils points of cool blue My torso curved prettily, etched in swirling das perched on tripod-toes Ceno had laughed and laughed—this was a panto, a cartoon froe

“Mother, meet Elefsis Elefsis, this is my mother Her name is Cassian”

I extended one polished steel arm and said, as we had practiced, “Hello, Cassian I hope that I please you”

Cassian Uoya-Agostino did not becoreen tuba to answer me She looked me over carefully as if the robot was my real body

“Is it a toy? An NPC, like your nanny or Saru’s princess? How do you know it’s different? How do you know it has anything to do with the house or your necklace?”

“It just does,” said Ceno She had expected her mother to be overjoyed, to understand i us all copies of the house? To see if you could … wake it up? Teach it to … be?”

“In a simplified sense, yes, Ceno, but you were never ned to be permanently installed into your skull” Cassian softened a little, the shape of her htly “I wouldn’t do that to you You’re hter, not hardware”

Ceno grinned and started talking quickly She couldn’t be a grown-up in a suit this long; it took too y when she was so excited “But I am! And it’s okay I ra And I run so fast We both do You can be mad if you want, because I sort of stole your experih I didn’t ot pregnant by one of the village boys—I’ but you’d still love ht? But really, if you think about it, that’s what happened I got pregnant by the house and we made … I don’t even knohat it is I call it Elefsis because at first it was just the house prograer It’s not alive, but it’s not not alive It’s just … big It’s so big”

Cassian glanced sharply at ?” she snapped

Ceno followed her gaze “Oh … it doesn’t like us talking about it like it isn’t here It likes to be involved”

I had realized the robot body was a h I could not then say why I made myself small, and human, a little boy with dirt s in the corner with er, standing in the corner of the house that waspunished