Good Conversation

Arista found Marek sitting on one of the stone benches lining the Drowned Court's outer plaza, quiet and unhurried, watching Squishy drift lazily past the dome's curved wall with the same patient attention he usually reserved for a questionable alloy.

That alone was unusual enough to make her slow down.

Marek was rarely somewhere without an obvious reason. If he stood beside a furnace, he was waiting to see how a material reacted to heat. If he stared at a metal joint, he'd probably noticed stress, fatigue, or some flaw nobody else had caught yet. If he sat beside an unfinished project, there was usually a sample nearby, or a fracture surface, or a notebook explaining exactly which material choice had offended him.

Today there was nothing. No tools. No samples. No notebook.

Just Marek, a small paper bag in one hand, and Squishy moving slowly through the water beyond the glass.

"...Marek?"

He glanced over, entirely unsurprised. "Oh. It's you."

Arista looked around the plaza. "What are you doing here?"

"Sitting."

"I can see that."

"Then why did you ask?"

She ignored that. "Is something wrong with the dome?"

"No."

"The supports?"

"No."

"Glass?"

"No."

Arista narrowed her eyes. "Then why are you staring at Squishy?"

Marek returned his attention to the water. "I like this squid. He's a good conversation partner."

"...Squishy doesn't talk."

"I know. That's why I like him."

She stood there a moment, trying to decide whether he'd made a joke. His expression offered no useful evidence either way. Eventually she just sat beside him, and for several seconds neither of them said anything at all.

Marek reached into the paper bag, took out a peanut, then held the bag toward her.

"Peanut?"

"...Why?"

"People talk less with their mouth full."

She stared at him. He waited. She took a peanut.

"...You know that's incredibly rude, right?"

"I offered you food."

"You offered me food specifically to stop me talking."

"Yes."

"That's the rude part."

Marek ate another peanut. "Did it work?"

Arista opened her mouth, paused, then just frowned at him. He looked faintly satisfied.

She tried his version of conversation for a while. Squishy drifted past the glass, enormous tentacles trailing behind him, blue rings pulsing softly through the water. Marek watched him. Arista watched Marek watching him. A pair of workers crossed the plaza nearby carrying baskets between them, and the low background noise of the Drowned Court carried on without requiring either of them to contribute anything to it.

She lasted perhaps thirty seconds.

"...If you don't like me, why do you keep helping me?"

"I like your ideas," Marek said, glancing sideways at her.

"That's not the same thing."

"I didn't say it was."

She folded her arms. "So you don't like me."

"I don't dislike you."

"That is an impressively mediocre endorsement."

"If it helps, I'm not particularly fond of anyone in particular." He took another peanut. "Except my wife."

Her entire train of thought derailed. "...You?! You're married?"

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"Yes."

Arista stared at him as though he'd just revealed he had wings. "...How?!"

"I proposed. She said yes." He delivered it with the same tone he might use to explain why a bolt stayed attached to a plate. Simple cause, simple result.

Arista rubbed both hands over her face. "That's not what I meant."

"Then you should ask better questions."

"How long have you even been married?"

"Twenty-six years."

"Twenty-six?!"

"Yes."

"How did you meet her?"

"Work."

"And?"

"And eventually we had dinner."

"That's the whole story?"

"There were other dinners."

She waited for more. He ate another peanut instead.

"...You are terrible at storytelling."

"I wasn't telling a story. You asked how we met."

She gave up on that particular line of questioning before it killed her. "So why did you start playing Eternal Horizon?"

"Petrov asked."

"Of course he did."

"He asked several times."

"And that worked?"

"No. My wife agreed with him."

Her expression softened slightly. "She wanted you to play?"

"She thought it would be good for me."

"Good for you how?"

Marek hesitated long enough that she could almost see him deciding how much information the question technically required.

"She thought I should make more friends."

Arista's face immediately changed.

Marek noticed. "No."

"I didn't say anything."

"You made a face."

"What face?"

"The one people make before saying something sentimental."

"I was not going to say something sentimental."

"You were."

She pointed through the glass instead. "Fine. I'm saying nothing."

"Good." He reached for another peanut.

Squishy stopped moving.

Both of them noticed. The huge kraken had turned slightly, attention fixed on Marek's hand, one enormous eye tracking the peanut from bag to mouth. Marek moved the bag a little farther from the glass.

"You can't have these."

Arista looked between them. "...You feed the ancient sea god?"

"No. He prefers tuna."

She turned toward him slowly. "...What?"

"Tuna."

"How do you know that?"

Marek nodded toward the water. Squishy had already begun swimming away.

"...Where's he going?"

"Probably tuna."

"Probably?"

He ate another peanut and didn't elaborate.

A short while later, Squishy returned, two tentacles carrying an enormous tuna between them. Arista stared. Marek nodded once, as if that settled the matter.

Squishy settled outside the dome, roughly opposite their bench, and began eating.

Arista's amusement lasted about three seconds.

There was no delicacy involved, no careful bites, no graceful tearing. Several tentacles converged on the fish at once, bending and pulling it apart with enthusiastic efficiency while Squishy's rings pulsed bright blue with obvious contentment. The whole process had the table manners of an industrial accident.

Arista slowly lowered the peanut she'd been about to eat. "...Oh."

Marek took another of his own. A particularly unpleasant portion of tuna disappeared somewhere between two tentacles, and Arista looked away.

Marek kept watching.

"...That doesn't bother you?"

"No."

"You can actually watch that?"

"Yes."

Another unpleasant chunk disappeared between Squishy's tentacles. Arista winced. Marek reached into the bag again.

"Good conversation."

She looked at him in disbelief. "You're both eating."

"Correct."

"That isn't conversation."

"Neither of us is interrupting the other."

Arista decided not to argue with a man who had apparently discovered his ideal social interaction in a thirty-meter kraken eating raw tuna beside him.

By the time she looked back, Squishy had finished and drifted off again, leaving remarkably little evidence the fish had ever existed.

"...Does he always do that?"

"I've seen him do it before."

"So you two have lunch together."

"No."

"Marek."

"He eats tuna. I eat peanuts. Those are separate activities occurring near each other."

"That's lunch."

He considered this. "No."

Arista sighed.

A few minutes later Squishy returned once more, this time without food, one tentacle curled carefully around something small enough that Arista couldn't identify it at first. He moved closer to the glass and slowly turned the object between two suckers until a metallic surface caught the light, an old piece of polished brass, worn smooth by water and age. Maybe part of a fitting. Maybe part of something else entirely. Whatever it had originally been, Squishy had apparently decided it qualified as treasure.

Marek leaned forward slightly. "That one's new."

"...You know his collection?"

"I know I haven't seen that one."

Squishy rotated the object again, and Marek just watched, patient. Arista's expression shifted slowly as something occurred to her, an ornate golden trident, gifted generations ago, because friends deserved something shiny. That had been Squishy's reasoning back then, simple and sincere enough to survive everything else his people had forgotten about him.

Now he was pressed close to the dome, carefully showing Marek one of the things he'd chosen to keep.

"...He's showing you his valuables."

"Apparently," Marek said, glancing at her.

"You know what that means, right?"

"No."

"Of course you don't."

Squishy shifted the brass piece once more. Marek nodded toward it. "Nice."

The rings along Squishy's body brightened.

Arista looked between them, and Marek noticed. "What?"

"Nothing."

"You made another face."

"I'm thinking."

"That usually causes problems."

She ignored him. "So your wife wanted you to make friends."

"Apparently."

"Petrov gets you into Eternal Horizon."

"Yes."

"You end up helping me build half the ridiculous things I've come up with."

"Not half."

"That is not the point."

"It was inaccurate."

She pointed at Squishy. "And now you're spending your free time sitting next to an ancient sea god, eating peanuts while he eats tuna and shows you his treasure collection."

Marek looked through the glass, where Squishy was still holding up the brass object.

"That appears to be what I'm doing."

Something in Arista's expression softened. "Aaah, that's actually kind of cute."

"No."

"It is."

"No."

She grinned at him. "I can be your friend too!"

Marek looked at her, then turned back toward the glass without hesitation.

"No thank you. I already found one."

Arista followed his gaze. Squishy floated there, enormous and peaceful, blue rings glowing softly as he went on displaying his shiny piece of scrap to an audience of exactly one interested materials specialist.

Her mouth fell open. "...You picked Squishy over me."

"Yes."

"You didn't even hesitate."

"I considered it."

"For about three seconds!"

"It didn't require longer."

She stared at him, offended mostly because she couldn't decide whether he was joking.

Marek reached into the bag. "Peanut?"

"No."

"More for me."

Arista folded her arms and looked through the glass. Squishy's rings pulsed brightly.

"...Don't look so pleased with yourself."

"I don't think he understands you," Marek said, eating another peanut.

"Perfect. You two really are made for each other."

He considered that, then settled back against the bench.

"Good conversation."

This time, Arista managed almost a full minute before speaking again.