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[victormakesart]

If you find yourself in a secluded corner of the Nexus, past the rhinestone statue of a... no one quite knows what that is, but it's blobby in shape. And perhaps not a statue at all. If you find yourself there, you might stumble upon a child's birthday party.

The birthday cake is pretty standard. It says: Happy 2nd Birthday Anya and Athena!

That's where the standardness ceases. Little Anya is dressed as Amelia Earhart, but she keeps taking off her hat, messy blonde hair static clinging up. Athena is dressed up as a toaster, keeping with the history theme, because that's in the history of mechanical doodads and Athena is a robot. It made sense to her papas.

Victor, for her part, is dressed up as Abe Lincoln, complete with a fake beard and a stovepipe hat. That is to say: she's being ridiculous, like usual. Anya is trying to tear the beard off, and Victor is leaning back out of reach of her tiny hands, laughing.

Comments

[chiron-survivor.livejournal.com]

It's a bit of a surprise, Victor's reluctance. So don't, she thinks, then immediately feels guilty. Victor is a good, loving parent. The evidence is right in front of her. Her son won't decide one day that he hates all of humanity. She hopes. "Do you feel like... if anything goes wrong, you'll blame yourself, since you built him?"

She looks over at Athena again. Just a cute little kid, doing cute little kid things. "I don't think you have to worry, Victor... if your son is anything like you, he'll be amazing."

[victormakesart.livejournal.com]

"I'm afraid that my programming might not be good enough. What if I activate him and he feels bad? What if all of my studies on the soul gain superficial results and... and he feels like an outsider, or he acts the right way without anything backing it? And what if he doesn't like me. I've done all of these simulations, but I can't know until he's in his body. It's a leap of faith. It's not like I've been programming all my life; just for about three years. And I've had a lot of help, but I'm so scared to fail, and that my failure will hurt the boy." So her worries aren't attached to what Jude might do, but how he might feel. Her concern is for him, not others, which is sweet, in a way. She has full faith that he'll be a good boy.

She looks over at her daughters, too. A small, shy smile, unsure of herself.

[chiron-survivor.livejournal.com]

Adia wonders to herself, briefly, if the cylons worried about these sorts of things when they created their human-looking models. If they cared about having a soul or how they'd feel with false memories. The fact that Victor cares so much is encouraging, but Adia can spot worried over-thinking as she does it often enough herself. "If any of those things happen, it won't be because you failed your programming. He's going to be who he is. But I'm pretty sure he's going to love you, and feel loved."

[victormakesart.livejournal.com]

"I worry," she says, softly, "that I might not be as smart as I think that I am." She depends so much on her own cleverness. But today's a good day, a happy day, pretty much the best day, and she shouldn't be acting like a broodyface. All the same, she looks like a massive weight has lifted from her. The tense little muscles in her face since she started talking about Jude have smoothed out again. She feels better about the whole situation. "He'll be a good boy. Happy."

[chiron-survivor.livejournal.com]

Adia hopes that something she said helped. "If I could, I'd take on your worrying for you. I've gotten very good at it." She grins and looks back over at the two birthday girls. "Do you think I could have a slice of cake? I haven't had birthday cake since... my birthday, I guess. A while ago."

((Bedtime for me! Also, I finally moved Adia forward in her canon's timeline. I'm deciding when to post to DM. That community has become very quiet lately. It makes me a sad panda because I don't know where else to RP.))

[victormakesart.livejournal.com]

"I think things'll be okay," she says, and the oomph is there behind her words. "I'm not gonna worry. If I have to tweak his programming, I'll figure it out as I go. I've made parts of him imperfect on purpose, so I shouldn't be freaking out about this."

She smiles this wide, toothy smile, heads over to the cake. She is taking very good alien painkillers, so there's only a bit of a wobble to her steps. "Oh totally! Have two!" She leans in, confidingly, "The girls shouldn't be having too much sugar anyway."

((Goodnight, rest well! Make sure to poke me when your post is up! I don't really check the site anymore, but I'd love to reply and play and catch up. And, I know. I mostly play journal to journal now. You could do that, maybe, too?))

[chiron-survivor.livejournal.com]

"How will he grow?" She asks Victor as they walk back over to the cake. "Will you build him a new body?" How will Athena grow, for that matter? She laughs softly at Victor's words. "Not unless you want them bouncing off the walls all night."

((I will let you know! I am happy to play journal to journal and maybe I'll throw up a post there as well in case other folks don't check DM anymore as well.))

[victormakesart.livejournal.com]

"There are certain spots on his frame that can be expanded when the time comes. At his waist, his shoulders, his neck, arms, legs, chest, stuff like that. And his holo'll fill in the rest." Athena, on the other hand, without her holo, looks almost like a ball, with orbiting littler spheres, gathering information. She's almost all holo, but solid, warm to the touch (Victor came up the idea to make a shifting holo for her).

((That would be fully awesome. ♥!))

[chiron-survivor.livejournal.com]

"Oh, that makes sense." The expansion of his frame, that is. "Holo as in hologram? Won't that leave, um, gaps?" She pokes at the air. "Like, you could touch him in spots and just have your fingers pass through?"

[victormakesart.livejournal.com]

"Yeah, you got it." Victor gets gleeful at the question, shifting from side to side a little, she can hardly contain herself. "That's actually something I came up with for Athena when she was still in production! There's this shifting matter underneath, like muscle and skin, with sensors for heat and sensation. It can even simulate the rush of a pulse. But I can't get texture and detail and good color with that matter, hence the holo."

[chiron-survivor.livejournal.com]

"Oh." She looks over at Athena, then away guiltily. She wasn't just thinking of giving the girl a little poke in the side, nope. "That's really impressive. Does that mean she could change her appearance if she wanted to?"

((I've put up a post on Adia's LJ. I decided to eschew D_M for now.))

[victormakesart.livejournal.com]

"She can. And she does. A lot. She shifts ages sometimes, hair color. I made that impossible for Jude. He can make cosmetic changes, but not on a whim; he has to work torward it and program it in manually."

((I'll check it out! Is it okay if Vic happens to be in the Nexus at the time? I'm not sure if she could trace text back.))

[chiron-survivor.livejournal.com]

"I'm glad you changed it for your son. I don't know why, but I don't think kids should be able to do that. Call me old-fashioned." She grins a little.

((Whatever works for you. :) I'll probably be going to bed soon but I'll tag back when I can.))

[victormakesart.livejournal.com]

"Oh, I agree. Athena was mostly Billy's work, and I like the way she changes around, for her. But I don't think it would be good for Jude. I want Jude to feel his own limitations and learn to make beauty within them." She smiles back at her, warmly.

((Awesome, thanks! Rest well when you do! :) ))

[chiron-survivor.livejournal.com]

Victor's words trigger a thought in the back of Adia's mind. A line of questioning she has long since forgotten gets a little tug. Her gaze drifts as she pokes at her subconscious, trying to bring that thought back into focus. Something about cylons and why they took human forms, forms that couldn't change...

But then the two girls start giggling over something, and Adia's attention turns to them. She smiles softly. "Are you ready for three kids? How are your husbands, by the way?"

[victormakesart.livejournal.com]

"That was part of what I was worried about," Victor admits, face tilted toward her girls. "But then I realized that... I'd have a million kids if I could. That I love people, and children, and the work I do with them is... energizing as much as it is exhausting. Even when I'm dead on my feet, I feel... proud, and I love my girls fit to bursting. And my husbands are doing awesome. Tonight James is going out with Jonny for some boy time, Cole issss... right there," she says, craning her neck to see, then pointing to the back of a man in a crazy white wig. "He went as Einstein. How're things going by you?"

[chiron-survivor.livejournal.com]

"A million!" Adia laughs, but in admiration, not to make fun. "I think I'd be worn out with just one. But I'll bet you have room in your heart for a million."

She peers in the direction Victor points. She doesn't know who Einstein is, but the hair reminds her of Doc Brown, which is oddly in the right ballpark. "Not bad, I... guess I have a boyfriend now." She feels dorky for admitting it, but she likes that she is finally building a life with someone else, when a year ago she didn't think she'd ever move on.

((So many RP threads! I should hit the hay, but I'll tag back more when I can!))

[victormakesart.livejournal.com]

"I get kinda worn out myself," she admits. "Physically, I mean." She worries about how much longer she'll be able to pick up her girls, for example, with the joint pain she's in. They're getting big, fast.

"Oh my gosh," she chirps, hands fluttering up into the air, sounding, for once, like a bit of a girly-girl. "Who is he? Tell me all about him!" This is all made somewhat ridiculous by the dark suit and the stovepipe hat.

((No rush! Rest well! :) ))

[chiron-survivor.livejournal.com]

"I'm not surprised. But you do have two husbands to help you out. Or is that just twice the work?" Polyamorous marriages weren't unheard of on some of the colonies, but Adia did not have any personal experience with them.

She laughs, surprised by Victor's reaction. "His name's Will. He's a chemist and works at the water treatment facility. We met at a science function -- the fleet tries to keep ingenuity going, y'know, get all the eggheads together to keep things fresh. Anyway, we have some things in common, and... well, I wasn't exactly looking for a boyfriend, but he was interested in me from the beginning. He's really passionate about workers' rights. Passionate in general, really."

[victormakesart.livejournal.com]

"Definitely not twice the work. James has another partner, too, so there's not really any pressure on me, and I have a lot of other people to help me out with the girls. I'm much luckier than most other parents, I know." She practically has a village, and her children are going to be so loved.

"That's so exciting! Aren't the brilliant ones so much fun? Is he really cute and stuff?"

[chiron-survivor.livejournal.com]

Certainly luckier than the parents Adia knows, but she doesn't dwell on that. A birthday party is a happy occasion. "Well, I'm glad you have help. They look like a handful -- but in a good way." What toddler isn't a handful, though?

Adia laughs again, blushing a little at the questions. "He is pretty smart," she says shyly, "And I think he's pretty cute. He kind of looks like -- oh, never mind, that won't help, you won't know who I'm referring to."

[victormakesart.livejournal.com]

"Ha! They totally are! They're gonna grow up to be little wild savages," she says, with the greatest amount of relish. She looks forward to them being crazy little kids, capable but impulsive teenagers, and adults who can dollop up a big blob of bonkers with their happy, well-adjusted lives.

"Hee! That's okay. Describe him anyway. I bet he's so adorable."

[chiron-survivor.livejournal.com]

Adia looks up, bashful but amused all the same. "Okay, okay. Um, he sort of looks like this actor I used to fancy. He's tall and blond and... I don't know, just really there/i>, you know? He never hides how he's feeling."

[victormakesart.livejournal.com]

"I love people like that. Totally present, totally honest. They kinda hold you accountable, you know? Won't let you get away with the silly dishonesties other folks let you get away with. And tall and blond is pretty cute." Take her choice in husbands for example. Though Cole isn't tall-tall, more like taller-than-Vic tall, he is blond. And James is definitely blond and tall.

[chiron-survivor.livejournal.com]

"I just like that I know what he's thinking. I guess it does keep me honest, too. I'm not into mind games." She considers Victor's costume. "He'd make a good President Lincoln, maybe. Well, minus the beard."