After his impassioned speech the rest of Intro to Robot Punching (Introduction to Mechanized Combat) course was a lot duller. Professor Ramos spent most of that time talking about the specifics of his curriculum. Which seemed to focus heavily on paying close attention to the safety requirements associated with piloting a mech.

Near the end of the class, he reminded the students that the syllabus would be on the class’s associated site along with the class’s assigned texts.

The associated texts were massive one to two thousand page files, that made Andrew glad that the Novem empire’s educational system had moved past the stupid ages of people paying for the required reading materials for classes that were already paid for.

Instead, choosing to simply provide the required text for the students, and letting the academies, the publishers, and the government educational budget committee sort things out amongst themselves.

The last two classes of the day were nowhere near as dramatic or memorable as the Intro to Robot Punching Course. Andrew’s seventh period class was an intermediary computer programming and cyber security course.

It was another class he could literally sleep through, and pass with flying colors, because he was an eidolon with an innate ability to manipulate the universe’s “true” or “t-data”, never mind manipulating the much simpler 1s and 0s of computer code.

Finally there was his eighth period of the day, which was apparently free study because the teacher for the actual class had been seriously injured during a personal duel and the school couldn’t afford to hire someone else. Andrew had no compunctions about skipping ‘that’ class mid-way through like most of his other classmates did.

As Andrew wandered through one of the academy’s to grassy plazas, he tried to retrace all the paths he’d taken on the map that was open in his view. Preparing for tomorrow so that he’d spend less time trying to find his way around the campus.

He heard the crisp, clean, and slightly posh voice of closest and perhaps only friend in the school and felt a familiar pair of arms pull him into a slightly unfamiliar bosom. Andrew wasn’t sure, but he suspected his attendant might have given herself a bump in size, while she was making a human form for herself.

“How was your day, Hoheit?” said Sophia.

“Good...I guess. Yours?” said Andrew. Feeling faintly uncomfortable because their close contact was drawing looks from passerby.

Andrew tried to pull away but Sophia just held him in place. Her feelings of bliss, enjoyment, and faint anxiety made him cease his struggling.

“Would you like to have the tour now?”

“Nah, I think I have the gist of where I need to go for my classes pretty locked down and all my classes for tomorrow follow roughly the same routes so I’m kind of golden.”

“Nh...A pity. I would have liked walking around the campus with you, hoheit.” said Sophia. Standing on tiptoe. Using her slight height advantage to rest her chin in the fluffy orange rat’s nest Andrew had instead of proper hair.

“That’s fine… Another day, maybe?” said Andrew.

“Can I take that as a promise?” said Sophia. Her breath tickling his scalp. Her calm, cool, voice vibrating against his back as she held him pressed against her ample chest.

“Probably not… I might forget. But we’ll probably end up walking together one of these days.” said Andrew.

“Fair enough. Shall we go home then?” said Sophia.

“Well, I kind of already got an apartment of my own set up so… It’s cool if you want to go do your own.” said Andrew. Not sure if he was teasing the woman, or if the part of his mind that still suspected that everything they'd been through together was just a very long sequence of misunderstandings on his part, was making him unnecessarily wary of making any sort of assumption about her intentions.

“Dear, hoheit. Dense protagonists are only popular in comic books and hackneyed, late night, television shows. I mean the home I prepared for us during the five months while I waited for you.”

Andrew sighed and then he chuckled.

“Alright, then...Lead the way.”

They took a cab to a nicer part of the city. Eblouir was a dazzling little urb but ironically it was the was a way that the upscale parts of the city left behind all the neon, solid-light constructs, and noise that really made the city feel its most beautiful. Making it feel like the rest of the city was a distant, glow in the dark, wonderland. Surrealistic and endlessly bright.

They didn’t say much during the ride through the city. They simply sat next to each other in the backseat of the self-driving car. Watching the city go by, while their fingers intertwined.

When they reached their destination, Andrew couldn’t help being a little impressed. The address they’d stopped up was a massive luxury condominium complex. A stately, rectangular chess piece, made of glass and enchanted chrome. Shiny and reflective like a mirror.

“Swanky...Which floor is your place on?” said Andrew. Whistling as he craned his head upwards to try and catch sight of the top of the skyscraper.

“What do you mean? The whole building is ours, hoheit…Though admittedly I’ve mostly restricted my own needs to the penthouse and the three suites directly below it.”

“R-, Really? That couldn’t have been cheap.” said Andrew. Shocked. Wondering for the first time exactly how much wealth his pale companion had gathered for herself.

“It was a pittance, hoheit… The original owners weren’t good people and I remembered your rules on what we could do with such individuals.” said Sophia.

“And by not good people, you mean...?” said Andrew. Trusting Sophia’s judgement but verifying just to be sure.

“Human traffickers. Selling war orphans. I disposed of them. Took all their non-liquid assets for my own…”

“Like the building?”

“Nh. Yes.”

“And the orphans?” said Andrew.

“Those who were unsold were freed, and those who’d been sent to less than savory places were reacquired. All of the children were sent to a reputable academy. I set up a trust made up of the assets of their sellers and the assets of their buyers. The trust will pay for their needs, and be divided amongst them, when they reach their legal majority. ” said Sophia.

Andrew smiled. It was just as he’d expected. While slavery wasn’t quite illegal in the empire, the sale of innocent children, war orphans no less, was an offense that would warrant execution if the authorities found out about it. Thus Sophia’s actions were fine as far as Andrew was concerned.

Those who were dead had all deserved death. Those who were alive would seal their own mouths for fear of bringing the wrath of the law onto their own necks. Assuming Sophia had been as exacting and clean as she usually was, no trouble would come from Sophia’s actions. Making her acquisition of the property flawlessly executed.

With their vast powers and their ambiguous natures, it was quite easy for beings like them to step into the realm of chaotic evil. Despite having been human not too long ago, Andrew found that his attachment to his fellow man was much, much, ‘much’ more distant than he’d like.

While he wasn’t going to overcorrect by trying to make himself into a saint, he still tried to avoid becoming a full on devil. Thus he and Sophia set rules of conduct for themselves. Acting based on courtesy, reasonability, personal scruples, and fairness. Trying to do their best to avoid drawing the ire and attention of the angels, spirits, and the so-called gods.

One of these rules was a rule that involved only doing unprovoked harm to those who did evil onto others. Preying on the innocent was the path of a fiend, but if monsters ate other monsters than that was just nature.

Thinking about it now, Andrew realized he could probably do a little more to help his own fortunes. He was an eidolon an apex predator. Yes, he was trying to stay low key, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t stealthily go out and snag a “bite” or two for himself.

“Hoheit?” said Sophia.

“Yes?” said Andrew.

“You said you like it, right? You like the home I’ve acquired for us?”

“Yes. Yes, I did.” said Andrew.

“So I’ve done good? My performance is satisfactory?” said Sophia.

“Of course. Excellent as always.” said Andrew.

“Then reward me.” said Sophia. Her eyes glowing with golden light. Her voice husky and low.

Andrew paused. Hesitating for a moment before leaning forward and kissing the woman. Increasing his height a little more than he’d planned for, because he’d be damned if he had to stand on tippy-toe to reach her lips.

His mouth pressed against hers and he ended up wincing as their teeth clacked against each other. Realizing he’d used too much force, Andrew pulled back and tried again. Softer this time. His tongue flicked out, and she opened her mouth to invite it. Her own tongue waiting to greet it.

Once they started, they started in earnest. Losing themselves in the experience. They made out in the mostly empty condominium lobby. They made out during the elevator ride up to the penthouse on the top floor. They only sort of stopped when it came time to enter the penthouse itself.

Sophia pressed Andrew against the front door, and hurriedly but efficiently used her key to unlock it. Andrew reversed their positions, whisking Sophia off her feet. Kicking the door closed and using his data reading to find the nearest bedroom.

*************************************************************************************************************

Several hours later they both lay on a guest room bed, exhausted, contented, and covered in sweat. Their white and navy blue uniforms crumpled and abandoned on the ground.

“Sex as a human is…. Different.” said Sophia. Sounding sleepy. A tired smile spreading across her face.

“Different bad? Or Different good?....Or?”

“Not bad… Just different. I used be less...Just a doll. Then I was more, you made me more, gradually turning me into a person and then an eidolon, even before ‘you’ became an eidolon...Now I’m both less and more...because the mortal races are just ‘quirky’ that way.” said Sophia.

“Ah… But that doesn’t answer the question. Was it different bad, or different good, or what?” said Andrew.

Sophia giggled and nestled into his side, pulling Andrew’s arm around her, as she gave him a peck on the lips.

“Silly. It’s just different. Nothing more. Nothing less.”

“Nh...Alright then.” said Andrew.

Andrew drifted off to sleep, feeling at peace with the world. He wasn’t sure if his relationship with his pale companion was a complicated one or a simple one. They were a lot of things to each other. Some of them complimentary, some of them contradictory.

Their romantic relationship was oddly the most understandable part of their relationship, for Andrew. Born from the simple alchemy of time, plus attraction, plus affection.

The indeterminate period that they’d spent with no one but each other to talk to, had ended up bringing them to a place that was somewhere between well-worn marriage, and the awkward courtship of two people who were definitely more than friends but weren't sure how far to take things.

An amused Andrew sleepily considered how his peers might respond if they knew he was here. Then he paled and made a mental note to hasten his plans to carve a slightly prominent place for himself in society.

Sophia might not have cared a whit for whether he was a tiger or a pussy-cat but Andrew that the human world was a lot more complicated than that.