Page 56 of Light Leech

“Can someone please kill me?”

“At least he’s forming coherent sentences,” Naoma said, struggling to hide her disgust.

“You’re right!” Boyband said, kneeling down to pet David, whose sweaty meat coated Boyband’s hands with each stroke. “Why?”

Denji stood, arms akimbo, looking rather proud of his creation after Boyband’s admiration for the animatronic meat. “I’ve been uploading your parents’ data since you left. I told you I was close before, but I think I’ve got just about everything now.”

David’s eye centered on Boyband.

Boyband smiled. “He’s looking at me! How are you doing, bud?”

“I am suffering. Are you not merciful enough to end my existence?”

Boyband chuckled. “Zeg, you’re funny.”

Naoma whispered to me. “He knows that thing isn’t joking, right?”

I looked at her, tried to take it seriously to respect that odd little organism, but neither of us could help but laugh. “I hope so.”

“Why are we laughing?” She couldn’t suppress a grin.

Because maybe we Imps feel the same way and this is some sick irony. That thought ended the humor for me. I shrugged, kept the smile for her, and focused back on Boyband.

“Can I leave?” Akna asked, looking anywhere but at David.

“This might be important.” Abbas patted her on the back, his disgust apparent as he looked at David.

“Try him out,” Denji said.

“What do you mean?” Boyband asked.

“He’s got your parents’ research uploaded to his mind, ask him anything you want.”

“Wait,” Ralia asked, covering David from her view with an outstretched hand. “Why did you have to upload their data into that crawling meat pillar? You could have just given it to me.”

“Look, I don’t know you all yet–”

Boyband interrupted Denji. “Yeah you do, we’re right here.”

“I mean… we just met. I’m sure you’re a good person, Ralia, but I can’t just toss all of this data–most of which is Luxist research–to someone I hardly know. Not only that, but I can’t be sure that your internal storage is secure. You even said one of your mods is down, which entails that your security is not infallible.”

“So you trust a meat pillar.”

“Yes. David is mine. I created him and therefore trust is automatic.”

“You’re trusting a meat pillar over me?”

He held his hand out. “I started creating him before I knew you were going to come and settle here–which I must add, I don’t mind. It gets lonely around here when all the others want to do is meditate, but maybe that’s my problem. Again, Ralia, it doesn’t mean I won’t trust you. I think I can, but that isn’t the only reason I uploaded everything to David. I didn’t even trust myself. David is his own entity. No neurospace, no neuronet access. While you can access him to extract files, it’s all done with light lines. David is a safe storage and if he falls into the wrong hands, I doubt they’ll think anything of him.”

“How can you be sure?” I asked.

“Please, bowl-cut boy, end my life.”

Denji smiled and pointed at him. “Would you want to steal that? I love him, but he’s not the most attractive spoil to take.”

“I gotcha, I gotcha,” Ralia said.

“Why did we have to bring him back again?” Akna asked.