I took a long and leisurely sip of my tea. Perhaps it was odd to describe a giant’s ear canal as relaxing, but it really did feel quite cozy to me. Maybe it was simply being away from the intelligence base and its constant deadlines that had set my heart at ease.
The world outside was faced with an unprecedented crisis—the AI that formed the very foundation of contemporary society had gone rogue and left humanity in the lurch. The century and a half of luxury we’d been provided through the toil of an unquestioning AI network had ended, and there was no telling what might come next. But right now, none of that mattered to me and Coeus. We were completely set apart, detached from it all. Here, no one could criticize us. No one could tell us what to do. We were officially off duty—enjoying a well-earned vacation together.
“But y’know…”
As I sat there in our little secret hideaway, I reflected on the nature of our now three-month relationship. I had known Coeus even prior to his “birth”—watched firsthand as his personality was molded from vapor and been intimately involved in the process of shaping and refining it into the person he was today. These counseling sessions had been intensely formative for both of us, creating a level of intimacy only rivaled by the relationship between a mother and child.
Yet at the same time, he and I had for the most part only engaged in “heavy” discussions about big, abstract concepts thus far. The open, heart-to-heart conversations necessary in a therapeutic setting for the purposes of establishing mutual understanding, offering counsel, and making diagnoses. Our relationship had been purely professional in that regard, so perhaps we weren’t actually that close at all. We had yet to establish the casual rapport of two friends who might take some time from our deepest hobbies to go on vacation together.
“I think we both deserve this, don’t you? I mean, heck—this is your first day off ever,” I said, making a deliberate effort to use more candid and relatable language than I had in the past. I’d never been very good at breaking the ice—finding the right balance between emotional distance and coming on too strong was tough. Even when I thought I was doing a good job of it, my friends would often tell me later that I’d been socially awkward. “But I think you’re going to like it, Coeus. Everyone needs a little ‘me time’ now and then.”
I looked for a place to set my mug down, but finding none, I set it carefully on the ear canal’s soft floor.
“Me, I love to kick back and recharge my mental batteries by curling up with a good psychology textbook or doing a little photography. Going out and finding new things to take pictures of is always a ton of fun,” I said, making camera gestures with my hands even though I knew he couldn’t see the interior of his own ear. “When you’re using film, though, having a good light source is key. All it takes is a little change in the weather to totally screw up your shot, if you don’t adjust accordingly.”
Digital cameras automatically select exposure settings, but traditional film called for individual decision-making, and you needed to be pretty precise in order to capture the image you wanted. Otherwise, you could end up with a photo like the one of me and Coeus, where the subject was poorly exposed and indiscernible.
“Oh, god, that reminds me,” I said, with a laugh. “A while back, I was trying to take a photo indoors, but I wanted it to come out a little darker than usual, right? So I adjusted the exposure settings accordingly—but then Titan sensed that, and adjusted the room lighting to cancel it out, because it didn’t realize what I was trying to do. So I changed my settings back, and Titan did too, so I had to change them again—and we went on fighting each other like this for a solid minute, probably. Kind of like when you and another person are walking in opposite directions down the same sidewalk, but you both keep trying to go the same way to go around each other, so it just becomes this hilarious unintended standoff.”
Eventually, I’d had to tell Titan to just leave the lights alone so I could take the picture the way I wanted. Such hiccups were also possible with conventional cameras, but they generally left less room for error compared to analog technology. The average person wasn’t all that concerned about experimenting with exposure and saturation and contrast—they just wanted to take pretty pictures. And they were more than happy to let Titan decide what the prettiest settings for each particular photo might be.
“We should take a photo together again,” I said. “An outdoor one this time.”
Just picturing it in my head was enough to make me laugh again. In his current physical form, getting a good picture of Coeus shouldn’t really be a problem—but how in the world I would ever fit all of him in frame was another question entirely.
“Yeah, I think a little trip would be kind of fun, actually… We should do that sometime.”
I let my imagination run wild. Obviously, there were no hotels on the planet with rooms large enough, so we’d definitely be sleeping outdoors. I’d have to learn to like camping.
I continued chatting Coeus’s ear off for a while, then slipped back into the tent at a little after nine o’clock and crawled into my sleeping bag. Me, a young woman drifting off to sleep in the ear of a friendly giant—it sounded like the premise of a fairy tale. Despite my age, I couldn’t help but smile.