Heady sweet scents hit him before anything else.They lapped against his skin with playful newness before giving way to the spicy and intense waves of something deeper, something richer.
“That smell—” Elodie took a deep breath, her lids closing slightly as her chest filled.Her long lashes dusted her cheeks.“What is it?”
Black velvet drapes hung in front of them.Aiden brushed his hand across the soft edges as he found the opening.“Welcome to Wonderland.”
XXXI
Elodie’s fingers tingled as she brushed past the curtains.She’d never seen anything so beautiful.A rainbow brought to life and stretched before her in rows and rows of flourishing flowers and heavy buds—not in planters, but growing from the dirt floor of the warehouse.The thick and foreign notes greeted her and pulled her between the rows of blossoming color.Her vision spotted as she took deep inhale after deep inhale, trying to store the luscious scents within herchest.
The space had stolen her words, her thoughts, her worries.Trees blossomed pink and white and yellow along the sides of the warehouse.Their grace and beauty formed a protective, nurturing wall that surrounded the oasis.Jade-coloredvines and tall,greenish-yellowstalks stretched toward the warm and gentle lights glowing above.The artificial sun and the smallvine-coveredshed sprouting from the middle of the space were the only obvious signs of human interference.
This is nature.Realnature.
“It exists,” Elodie saidaloud.
“It does.”Aiden was behind her twirling his fingers between the leaves of a plant she’d never seen before, his rich pine scent in harmony with the complex and candied perfumes of the nearby blossoms.
She delicately brushed her fingers over a soft puff ofpowder-
blueblooms.“How?”
“Eos,” he saidmatter-of-factly.
Elodie thought about that for a moment as she sank her nose into the sweet center of a bloom so orange it looked ablaze.“This,” she swept her arm over a group of flowers that waved gently in her breeze.“This is what Eosdoes?”
“One of its many functions.”Aiden wandered deeper into themulti-coloredrows.“The Key likes to take things, natural things, and distort them.Turn them into something else.”Elodie followed as he explained.“Like corn.”He paused near the tallyellow-tippedstalks.“The corporation took this plant in its pure, natural form,”—he grazed one of the stalk’s pregnant pods—“and changed it.”
Elodie tilted her chin.“Or did the Key make it better?They made just one of those plants able to feed one hundred people.”She shrugged.“That’s progress.”
“That’s perversion.”
Her arms snapped up to cross over her chest.She’d never heard anyone talk that way about the corporation that had saved their species from extinction.They owed their lives to the Key.And their continued health.The Key was the only thing between humanity and another pandemic.Didn’t Aiden understand that?Didn’t Eos?
He broke off one of the pods and brought it to her.He peeled back the green covering and brushed away the shiny hairs, letting them fall to the dirt.White-and-yellow buds thewashed-outcolor of acloud-coveredsun nestled inside.
It was familiar and nice, but in the way VR was familiar and nice—close enough to what she already knew to make her comfortable, but not exactly right.Elodie shook her head.This wasn’t the corn she knew.Corn was bright, vibrant, electric, sunflower yellow.She wrinkled her nose.“What’s wrong with it?”
Aiden brushed away a few more hairs and examined it.“Nothing.This is how nature intended.That’s what I’m trying to tell you.This is what it looks like when we’re hands off.”His thumb grazed the swollen kernels.“Want to try it?”
Before she had the chance to answer, Aiden dashed into theplant-coveredshed.He reemerged with two slightly burnt corncobs.He handed her one before peeling the charred husk away from his.The kernels squirted as he took his first bite.“Real corn is so much better than that genetically modified stuff.”He jabbed his cob in her direction.“Try it.”
Elodie shucked the rough papery husk.Golden hairs clung to her fingers and she shook the cob and her hand free from the soft strands.After a few attempts, she gave up and brought the warm cob to her lips.She loved corncobs, but had never seen one like this, fresh from the stalk, still trailing silk.If she hadn’t watched Aiden, she wouldn’t have known what to do with the green covering.
Again, Elodie’s thoughts flashed to Vi and herno-nonsensebravery.Elodie could be that brave.Aiden already thought so.
She bit down.Flavor washed over her taste buds, and she couldn’t help but close her eyes as she took another bite.It was so much more than what she’d tasted before.Those flavors had been enhanced, but the true taste of corn was better than the saccharine sweetness of what she was used to.It was dynamic and juicy and sweet and pure and utterly delicious.
She opened hereyes.
Aiden’s gaze lifted from her mouth.How long had he been watching her mow through the corncob?
“It’s good.”His words were thick and sweet.“Isn’t it?”
She swallowed and brushed the back of her hand over her mouth.“It’s amazing.”She was breathless despite standing still.
“You still have a little...”His hand split the air between them, hovering inches from herlips.
It was happening again.That feeling that rocketed to the surface from deep within her core.It radiated out, seeped into her legs, and turned them to quaking bags of mush.Elodie licked her aching lips as her breath locked itself within her chest.Dizziness swirled her thoughts and her heart clamored within herchest.
