Meditation

"Not admiring yourself again, are you?"

There was a smile, or perhaps a sneer, behind Shadbolt's words. Scuffling noises on the other side of the door told him she was hurriedly getting her mask on. She burst out of the bathroom, nearly bumping into him. He handed her two capsules and she swallowed them dry.

She paused in the doorway and blew him a kiss, her mockery invisible behind her prosthesis. He listened to her clattering down the stairs.

In Shadbolt's mind, he could hear her sobbing. At first, when he had found her desperate and lonely and made her desperate, lonely and dependent on him, he had enjoyed hearing her sorrow. It was a demonstration of the hold he had over her.

But now he found it uncomfortable. They worked well as a team, even if they were unequal partners. Her despair was absolute; she was entombed in her own misery and locked in a pattern of behaviour that kept her thus. If her chains were chemical and hypnotic, Shadbolt's shackles were only of his own making, purely psychological. He was so convinced there was no turning back that he bent reality to his own perception. They shared this characteristic, this flaw, and as he had grown to understand her he had found empathy where once there was contempt. And now, God help him, affection. He thought of the pale mask.

Where was the hope for them?

Shadbolt's CICI paged him. He connected and his snooper applet monitoring Dove's CICI told him she had sent a message. He read the text in silence.

I should discipline her, he thought, but knew he wouldn't. She can't break free any more than I can. We are indeed very much alike.

There was a glimmer of doubt, of course. But to Shadbolt, that also meant hope.

Ben Wright, 28/10/00

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