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It’s like this:
Luka’s heart is a faulty machine. He counts seconds by the dismal diastole of a dusty instrument, the dull ache of blood preparing to pump through his chest; it is nothing new, nothing exemplary—it serves its purpose—he lives as a slave to it as much as he is to his father.
Still, there’s a little malleability in each; there is nothing that isn’t able to be manipulated, even middlingly.
Heperu will love him as long as he is quiet and perfect, but Heperu loves his wealth more, so there is some choice in Luka’s work—if he plays sweet enough, bares his belly to the right beast, then Luka can potentially knock something tedious out of his schedule if the right segyein with the right impatience lays down an offer.
It’s not nearly as easy to play with his pulse, the metronome mindlessly marching on at a sedated pace, an andante that spirals out of control the second that pain parts his perfect control over himself. But Luka has been getting better at dealing with it, understanding the human condition and failings of the body, in every conscious breath. If Luka can step away from himself, he can turn off the tedious terror that keeps him from taming the organ in his chest, like digging his fingers into the scruff of a feeble animal and forcing it to submit. The body is an object, his body specifically is a machine with missing parts—It’s easier to deal with when he’s not present.
Apathy courts him when he sings, and the distance that tails dissociation makes it easy to fine-tune faulty strings in his performance. It’s easier when he’s not human and just a pet.
It’s like this:
When she had gotten accepted into the garden, his father had cried. He held his favourite doll in his arms and had spat at the thought of Phan getting one over on him. He said Phan had cheated him, said Phan had never once accepted his invitations to one of Luka’s showcases, but that was simply because they knew they were raising a child that could destroy everything that Heperu had worked for—he thought that mendacious monster was just jealous but there were more tricks up their sleeves than initially thought. Luka wasn’t particularly concerned with that.
His father’s tears weren’t toxic to the human condition, at least, but they were always thick and oily—it settles in the crevasses of his father’s skin and builds into a fine froth when the flaps of Heperu’s neck starts rubbing together—it’s bad for the skin, it seeps into pores and will have his hair greasy for a week. There’s nothing to say when his father just wants something small to stay with him.
Eventually, his father says, petting Luka idly, “they sent theirs to the best; it’ll be a late admission, but nothing I can’t afford.”
The paperwork is done in the singular tick of a clock. It doesn’t matter to Luka either way, every fume of breath comes out more disinterested than the last.
It’s like this:
Hyuna is nothing like Luka.
It’s not love at first sight, but his heart squeezes and stagnates in systole when he hears her sing; his eyes follow her, the silk of her hair flowing behind her, glued onto the gaggle of pets that trip over themselves while getting close to her—Hyuna is the centre of an armistice, and every single one of their competitors turns docile and meek in the new kennel they’ve been placed in.
It’s not love at first sight, but Luka wonders what it would be like to speak to her.
She’s not unkind to him—she greets him during class and is the first one to cheer when he finishes a rehearsal; when he’s alone, she reaches out and asks if he would like to play with the group (but Luka is well aware of what people think of him, how lowly they perceive him outside of his performances—they’re all like the segyein, who care only for his face and the entertainment he provides), they have an amicable relationship as classmates. She’s not unkind to him, but he’s not close to her. Still, it doesn’t feel like enough. He wants to know if she knows him too, if she knew his life was curated around her owner—if she was a part of their petty rivalry too.
Hyunwoo is the key to knowing her, something that can pry open the barrier of entry without hassle; Hyunwoo brings something substantial to their interactions before he becomes a vestigial part of their time spent together, wires that have no place in the new mechanism of their relationship—Hyunwoo becomes obsolete after their first conversation, but he’s always next to her, always with her.
It’s like this:
Hyuna puts her fingers in places they’re not supposed to be, rests her fingers on top of the cables in his open chest and plucks cords like each vein makes a pleasant reverb—she touches him without pretence or shame—it’s addicting, letting her play him, hearing the backs of her nails resonate against the hollow of his chest.
She lays her wrist idly in him when he’s next to her, and the casual intimacy of it has his insides steaming—for a moment, he wonders if he’ll burn her like this.
“I like it when you’re close to me,” he says, “more than I thought I would.”
“It’s relaxing,” she says, fixing the chord progression into something resembling a folia—the signature turns sweet, “it’s fun to be with you.”
He could tell, she indulges him more than the other kids, when he’s on standby she pads up to him, when he’s at rest she waits for him to recharge by her side.
“I’m not as energetic as the other kids,” he mutters.
“I could tell,” she says lightly, “but I like you no matter what.”
Luka is led by his father just as he's led by his heart, so when it races for her, it means something.
Luka has never had anything before, and when he grabs her wrist and pulls her deeper into him, granting her access to everything he has to offer, she laughs. He’ll give himself to her in his entirety, he’ll have her in return.
Her knuckles brush the back of his heart, and a thrill shocks its way through his system. “You’re so cute.”
When Luka sings, there’s amativeness anchoring his voice, filling out sounds in a way that he’s never knew he was capable of—it resounds bright and clear; Heperu keens with each praise.
It becomes easier to imagine he’s singing for her, when he knows that his voice makes her breath catch in the same way.
It’s easier for the segyein to personify him when he plays as a person.
It’s like this:
Luka is beautiful; it’s an undeniable fact. Hyuna is beautiful. This, too, is undeniable. But unlike other kids, Hyuna doesn’t work. She moves through her life quietly, and her vivacity is confined only to the tiny toy house garden that they’re locked away in instead of being printed across galaxies.
As much as the other kids love her, sometimes they look sorry for her—her owner never puts their fingerprint on her monthly reports, her owner doesn’t have a sponsor lined up for her yet, her owner never sends her gifts—but all of these are trifling matters; in fact, Luka wonders what it would be like to be faced with this consideration, to be trusted to study without being watched.
(“I don’t know,” Hyuna had said absently, eyes boring into her returned mail, her records showing no evidence of being touched, “I think it would be nice to have an owner that thinks of me—thinks of Hyunwoo—just a little bit.”)
When his clothes are stripped from him in one of the more risqué exhibitions, he’s incapable of putting her in his place. He can’t imagine her bare body being laid out in front of a crowd, he can’t imagine her body being a spectacle—he can’t imagine Hyuna being toyed with by anyone.
Still, Luka is lucky, because the only thing that happens are pictures. Sometimes, if certain segyeins rent a private display from Heperu, he’ll watch someone touch themselves while looking at him. If the price is right, they’ll be able to use the empty husk of one of his siblings. Still, Luka himself, is mostly clean.
Hyuna is unseen and untouched in her entirety, as far as he knows her body is only known to her veterinarian, but sometimes the thought comes unbidden when he looks at her—sometimes he wonders what’s under the flash of her clothes, wonders what it would be like if he got to see all of the parts that were kept hidden like a secret.
But maybe that’s the point of it all—Luka carries the title of the most beautiful pet in several universes, but Hyuna is a treasure, kept away in a chest to keep from being mired. She’s pristine, unweathered, and in proper working condition. Eventually, she’ll be unveiled and considered all the more valuable for being untouched—the authenticity of her eventual fumbling in the industry would be charming despite her immeasurable competence elsewhere. It’s common, Luka thinks, for segyein to want to put a naive child in their place; it’s natural to want to chart unseen territory. Some segyein don’t need an aperitif—what’s the point of whetting an appetite?—It’s as smart a marketing tactic as any other.
It’s odd though, because it’s only natural due to the progression of their paths, this is what humanity is made for, but the thought of Hyuna on display is almost disgusting.
It’s like this:
Many insects on earth are extinct, so it’s not uncommon to come across words that are unfamiliar during lyrical studies of the past—Hyunwoo is unusually interested in insects, artificial anthophiles are less interesting to him than the few native-born beetles and butterflies kept in circulation for their patterns—if anything, he’s unusually reliable at remembering the names of plants and insects, considering he lacks in every other aspect.
Luka remembers him talking about the way figs were grown on Earth, once, when others were quick to steal her from him; wasps, crawling under the dark rind and infesting the pink insides of a plant that would fall barren if it couldn’t withstand the violation of being used, adapting to take it as that was the best option for its continued survival.
She had caught them out of the corner of her eyes, and the smile she had given him had rattled everything at once.
A bolt had fallen, skittered loose when a gear caught in his brain, it ricocheted through different parts of him and an augment forth resounded against his ribs. When it had landed, the impact sounded oddly fleshy. He ignores it, and over the devil’s tritone and the slap of wet meat, Luka had wondered, not for the first time, what it would be like to have tender brown skin under his hands, breaking the hull open and getting his hands slick—just for him, not an audience.
“Hey,” Hyunwoo had said, after a moment of unease, “why are you looking at my sister like that?”
It’s like this:
Perhaps it wasn’t love at first sight, but love had reshaped his insides nonetheless, and if Luka had loved her any more, he wondered if his heart would break—diastole—like metal expanding when her touch makes him overheat—systole—annealing too quickly when her attention falters.
He decides that she likes him, that he likes her in return. When he kisses her, it’s clumsy as the calcium of the teeth collides with tin, and after, Luka thinks he has nothing to lose when he unscrews the bolts on his chest and decides to show her how he has melded to her, wants her to listen to the warped shimmer of his heart beating in her hands, each tattoo chiming bright on the diatonic.
She recoils. Luka doesn’t understand what he’s looking at.
He stares down at his hands, feels the pulse of muscle between his palms, the wet pulp of his being staining his hands and marring Hyuna’s clothes with new meat—it’s so ugly, it’s such a vulnerable, miserable thing that he’s forcing into her hands—it trembles between them like a frightened animal, and for a moment he doesn’t recognize himself, doesn’t know what to do with it as his filth drips onto her face. Since when could Luka bleed like this?
“Give me yours too,” he asks, almost pleadingly, quiet from his position above her, “Hyuna, I’ll give it to you.”
Hyuna doesn’t want it. She doesn’t like it, even though she said she’d like him no matter what. Hyuna’s heart stays her own.
“You lied to me,” he accuses childishly, and for a moment he doesn’t remember the obstacle in his way, the pitiful solder that had spliced them together in the first place—the one who’s been trying to turn her against him recently, “you led me on.”
His heart remains human regardless.
It’s like this:
Despite everything, he doesn’t want to let it go—Hyuna herself just needs to be rearranged, and Luka is sure, with just a bit more dismantling, he can find enough room inside her, but there never seems to be enough room. It’s impossible to deal with man the same way as a machine, and all the viscera blocks his sight. There is never enough room for him, every time he touches her, every time he pries her open, the spaces in her chest that he wants are occupied by Hyunwoo—they are fixtures in her body even as he pries open pink flesh and fastens steel in whatever gaps are left.
Seventeen years after his production and three years after a faulty first kiss, Heperu decides to replace and tidy the unsightly parts of him.
His lower ribs are confiscated to make his shell thinner, he gets new teeth to slot into place, and body hair is lasered off—he is everything but castrated, despite Heperu’s disdain for the thing between his legs, disliking the familiarity of that part of the body—and passively Luka watches as they work around bloody bits of his body, watching the modifications through a layer of sedation.
Luka’s heart is taken out before Hyuna could accept it—and he had wondered, just a bit, if that would change anything. It doesn’t; it’s still the same ship, no matter how many things are updated and replaced.
Luka’s original heart still beats for her, it was politely laid on the side and within reach after the procedure, given the gift of storing his childhood in a little box. The mundane metronome ticks in her signature from the corner of his eye, but it’s surprising that his replacement syncs up to the rest of him so well—reinforced, iron-plated, but it beats in a familiar pattern, bloody under a cold shell.
Hyuna still conducts his existence, and he wonders if she always would, no matter how much time passes, as long as he’s still alive—it must be written into his programming at this point, it must be written into his very concept of his being. Loving Hyuna is integral to being ‘Luka’, and it will probably stay that way no matter how old he gets or what changes.
He doesn’t lose anything that matters, it’s a relief. The warmth she had given him will always be his—Luka’s feelings, his horrid humanity, will always be theirs and theirs alone.