Page 12 of Cozy Prisons (Human Pets of Talin: Origins #4)

Nataly

Waking up nauseated wasn’t unusual for Nataly.

Neither was waking up with a headache. She could tell the lights were on in the domicile so she didn’t open her eyes right away.

Once she started moving, the discomfort would get worse.

A medication wafer, followed up with a hot cup of strong tea, would do wonders.

Unfortunately, she couldn’t simply summon those items with the power of her mind.

She was going to have to get up and fetch them herself.

When she could feel her pulse behind her eyes, she gave up on remaining in bed.

Sitting up, she was surprised to find that the covers were tidily spread over the top of her.

That wasn’t like her. By the time she woke up feeling like this, she’d usually tossed all her bedding around so nothing remained on the bed but her.

One time she managed to toss herself off the bed! At least all the pillows already on the floor had made for a soft landing.

Pulling her covers off, she wasn’t surprised to find that she was still wearing her clothes, minus her shoes.

Daxus must’ve taken off her shoes and tucked her in before he left. She needed to do something to thank him.

Swinging her legs over the end of the bed, she sat there for a moment and let the throbbing in her head ease a little.

“Would you like some tea?”

Unprepared for someone else to be in her domicile, Nataly screeched and jumped to her feet. Habit had her grabbing the closest item as a weapon even before her brain registered the familiar figure of Daxus.

“Are you going to defend yourself with that pillow?” he asked with an amused rumble.

She looked down at the “weapon” she grabbed, then lobbed it at Daxus’s head. “You scared me!”

He snatched the pillow out of the air before it could impact his face and tossed it back onto the bed.

“I didn’t mean to startle you,” he said. “But I applaud your reflexes. I bet you're used to sleeping with some kind of weapon close at hand. If I were an attacker, you would have presented a formidable defense.”

He clearly admired her reflexes instead of being surprised they existed. She shouldn’t be shocked by his comments considering their conversation about size vs. weakness.

“I was going to say that’s a surprising thing for a Talin to say,” she murmured, “But I guess not from you.”

“No, not me,” he agreed. “I’m well aware that, given the right circumstances, you could be just as fierce as any Talin.”

As much as she enjoyed his compliments, her head felt like it was going to explode. “I need tea and a painkiller wafer before we do any more talking.”

He jumped into action. “Please sit. I’ll fetch you what you need!”

She grinned at his eagerness, then stumbled to her work desk and slumped down in the chair. She wished Talin furniture had backs, but it made sense that they designed things around keeping their backplates from pressing against anything.

Resting her elbows on the table, she rubbed her temple with one hand and tapped the inset display with the other to get the day's vital stats.

It was morning!

She’d slept most of yesterday and all night. How was that possible? She never slept that well.

A wafer appeared between her face and the desk. She snatched it and popped it in her mouth, ignoring the way it tasted. She knew from experience that the strange flavor would go away soon and her head would feel much better right after that.

“Thanks,” she said, looking over to where Daxus was crouched next to her.

Daxus reached for an empty vial she’d left on her desk yesterday at the same time she lobbed it into a corner full of bits and pieces she meant to take to the reclamater machine. “Oh, sorry.”

Daxus sounded a rumble of amusement. “Can I assume that pile is refuse?”

Thanks to the medication, the headache was already fading. She gave him a rueful smile. “Yeah, I’m lazy. I haven’t been good at keeping my place clean.”

“It’s perfectly clean,” he argued.

She raised both eyebrows at him. “You can’t mean that. There's no floor space, only paths around piles of junk.”

“It’s clean but not tidy,” he explained.

She huffed out a laugh and sat up straight and turned in her seat so she wasn’t twisting her neck to look at him. “I don’t think there’s a difference."

“There is,” he insisted. “This place isn’t dirty or unsanitary, it’s simply full of items.”

“I like that description," she said, looking around again. “It makes me sound a lot less pathetic."

“You are in no way pathetic,” he said, emphasizing his words with a rattle of affirmation. “You’re dedicated and busy. All you need are some shelves and bins, and then you could be clean and tidy. I can help with that.”

As much as she liked the idea of him staying with her all day, she shook her head. “I thought you were assigned to set up the land-based array?”

“That is one of my duties,” he agreed. “But I can’t start until they finish clearing and grading the spot where it’s going to be installed. That’s Utharium’s duty. I have a few rotations until my work begins."

The reconstituter dinged. Daxus stood up with a happy rumble. “That’s your tea. Let me fetch it.”

He leaped gracefully over a pile of items and landed on the other side right next to the reconstituter.

She thought of all the times she’d stubbed a toe on random edges of bots. “I wish I could do that.”

“Once I'm done, you won’t need to,” he said as he made his way back to her with one of the thick-walled, stone cups the Talins liked.

After she accepted it, he went back to the food preparation area and started putting together a tray of food.

It looked like it was only enough for her.

That wasn’t surprising, Talins only ate one meal a day.

For a species that didn’t eat often, they were obsessed with humans getting at least three meals a day, if not more.

It made her think that Talins had a tendency toward a food fetish they lived out through the humans around them!

The door display chimed, making both of them look to the front of the domicile. Before she could call out, the familiar voice of Rami spoke through the display.

“If you’re not awake, just groan,” Rami said cheerfully. “We’ll go away and come back later.”

“No, Mama!” Ula said with a little whiny wail. “I’ve been waiting foreeeeveer! I need to show her now!”

“Ula,” Illea said with a clear warning.

“Zaza, this is important,” Ula said. “Mama doesn’t understand but Nataly will!”

Nataly winced, remembering that she promised to see Ula’s new programmed trick the other night. She’d completely forgotten.

She called for the door to open. Ula ran in, followed closely by a bot with a small body on top of long legs. They were usually used to do land-based surveys, but this one didn’t have the range-finding assembly on the top of its round body or the extra appendages for taking soil samples.

Nataly had put it together for Ula not long after they arrived. There were no other kids her age, so the bot was her best friend right now. She’d named the bot Iffy because Nataly had casually told Illea that the bot’s charge holder had an “iffy lifespan” and to bring it back if it failed.

“Watch, watch,” Ula shouted. Nataly was grateful the medication had already taken effect, otherwise Ula’s high-pitched voice might’ve sent her headache into the stratosphere.

“I’m watching!” Nataly assured, turning in her seat and focusing her attention on the bot. “What have you programmed Iffy to do?”

“Iffy, perform program trick three,” Ula ordered.

At the same time, Rami shouted, “No! Not inside.”

Rami was too late. The bot bent all three legs and then jumped high enough to put a dent in the ceiling. The impact changed the bot's landing area and it came down right on top of where Nataly was sitting.

Used to new programming going wrong, Nataly was ready for the bot to misbehave in some way. The moment she realized it was going to jump, she dropped out of her chair, grabbed Ula, and rolled under the desk.

Nothing hit her or the desk or chair except a spray of building material.

She peeked out from under her improvised shelter to see Daxus standing on the far side of the worktop holding the bot with one hand and trying to catch the bot's flailing legs with the other. “Bot, stop operations. Bot, cease functions. Bot, shutdown.”

The machine wasn’t responding to any of Daxus’s commands. Those words would’ve worked with a normal unit. When she’d set up the base programming for the bot, she’d given Ula the ability to specify verbal orders. That meant Daxus didn’t know how to shut it down.

“Iffy, off,” Nataly ordered. The legs all went stiff and straight with the ends bent at a ninety-degree angle.

It was ready to be set down and left until ordered to reanimate.

Daxus didn’t let go; instead, he walked to the front door and set the bot outside as if he expected it to come back online and start jumping around again.

Nataly and Ula crawled out from under the desk at the same time Illea and Rami rushed over.

Illea, Rami, and Ula all spoke at once.

“I’m so sorry!” Illea said.

“I never thought she’d give the command inside,” Rami said. “She’s not allowed to do any program testing inside the domicile at home. It never occurred to me that she wouldn’t carry that over to other people's domiciles.”

“Are you angry at me?” Ula asked, tears gathering in her eyes. “I know better, but I wasn’t thinking. I wanted to show you so bad because it took me forever to get Iffy to land without falling over.”

Nataly held up both hands to silence the little family. Once everyone stopped talking, she looked at Illea. “Accidents happen.”

She shifted her gaze to Rami. “No one can predict what their brilliant children will do.”

She smiled wildly when she dropped her gaze to the anxious Ula. “I’ve done silly things because I couldn’t wait to test something. The important thing is that we learn from our mistakes and don’t do them again.”