Satsuki

  It always seemed so over-rated, somehow, that thing they call love. I had never felt the need to embrace it. For me, it had always been enough to be alone with my thoughts, and with the computers, my friends. 

  Now? I still think it's over-rated. And I'm still alone with my thoughts, but now I have Beast. I'm alone, waiting..


Beast

  


Satsuki and Beast

  She paused, from polishing out a scratch on Beast's gleaming surface. Sounds were coming from the other room. "Beast, show me the feed from surveillance camera 03," She ordered, snapping on her glasses.

  A screen on the other side of the room lit up, showing a two people entering the room. A familiar couple, Yuuto and Kanoe. Satsuki relaxed. It was only them.

  Words flashed on the screen. "Discontinue feed?" Beast enquired, green print flashing on a black screen. Satsuki nodded, absently, returning to her work. But as her eyes left the screen, she saw an image of Yuuto, smiling..

  Her mind turned back to a conversation that she had had with her fellow dragon, a few days ago.

~
  "That Dragon of Heaven was ready to cry when she couldn't answer your question."

  She had turned to him, impassively. "And why can't we kill humans?"

  He had smiled, a little wistfully. "Because someone will feel hurt." Then he had turned around, walking towards the door.

  "But, Yuuto-san, in order to feel hurt, you need to be able to feel in the first place. And if you can't feel emotions, you'll never be hurt. So I can't see that it matters at all."

  He paused, then resumed walking. "Satsuki-san," He had asked. "Does Beast have a dictionary? Access to online databases?"

  "Of course."

  "Look up the meaning of love."

  And then he had gone.

~

  She had been too busy the past few days, to actually implement his suggestion. Busy with her work, destroying and undermining kekkai. But she had time enough to spare, at least for now. And the question irked her. What /was/ love, anyway?

  "Beast."

  The main screen, which she had painstakingly assembled herself, lit up immediately. 

  "Initiate search program." She said, feeling uncertain. "Topic: Love Find.. tabulate results and present conclusion."

  

  She watched Beast work, with an odd mixture of pride and fondness. Beast was her creation, and the only thing in this world which mattered to her. And she was the only thing which mattered to it. It was her pride and joy. Within moments, it had finished. Text scrolled slowly down the screen.

  

  

  She shook her head, impassively, scanning quickly through columns of summarised data. There wasn't much of interest to her. "Beast, list references to love, from camera archives."

  

  

  

  Satsuki snorted, softly to herself. "Love." She said. The very word felt alien on her tongue. "What's love, anyway?"

  
  "I know what's love." Her voice was a whisper that echoed in the empty room, seeming a thousand times louder that it usually did. Beast was strangely silent. "It's something I can never have, right? It's something I can never feel, never touch, because no one will ever love me."

  She reached out a hand to touch Beast's gleaming exterior. "But you love me, don't you, Beast?" Wires snaked around, encircling her hands gently, almost like a kiss. That was Beast's answer, and it had answered the only way it knew how. After all, hadn't she designed it that way?

  

  The main screen of Beast flashed, and for a moment the type hesitated, as if the computer were not certain about what to present. It hesitated, and then type scrolled on the screen, impersonal green on black.

  

  Satsuki stared at the screen, face impassive. It wasn't like Beast to express emotions. Feelings, of any sort. Could a machine feel, even when humans couldn't? There was a lump in her throat. What kind of person was she, who couldn't even feel? Beast loved her. She had made it to.

  More type flashed onto the screen.

  

  

  The lump in her throat grew larger. Had Beast grown beyond her, then? Learning more than she had put into its design. Learning, understanding what she had failed at. Learning to love.

  Satsuki didn't answer the question. She was still waiting for answers. The text on the screen continued to repeat itself.  She waved a hand at the computer screen, irritated. "Does it matter?" She snapped. 

    Source: geocities.com/euphyi