As usual, Rinzler’s at his favorite spot by his favorite window when Sam gets up in the morning. (Getting up in the morning—another thing he’s had to get used to in the short while since Encom became his responsibility. Luckily, morning comes with coffee. He always drinks two cups before noon, regardless of Alan’s worrying.) He enters the living room, mug already in hand, and joins Rinzler at the window.
“Morning,” he says.
Rinzler’s throat rattles with a low, purr-like growl.
“I slept well,” Sam says, sipping his coffee. “Thanks for asking.”
And not for the first time, Sam wishes Quorra would return from her morning routine just a little bit earlier. (The routine in question: Wake up with the sun. Jog for an hour. Eat breakfast at a local cafe. And “read a tree.” Whatever that means.) She knows how to deal with Rinzler a little better than he does. Something about sympathizing with another victim of Clu’s tyranny or whatever. Sam, meanwhile, finds it hard to see anyone besides the weirdly agile warrior who’d tried to kill them several times. And who also strikes a strange, twisted resemblance to Alan. And honestly, that’s probably the part that gets him the most—thinking about Alan doing a backflip and attempting several murders. Never fails to bring a grin to his face.
He gestures toward the window with his mug. “Anything interesting going on out there?” he asks.
Rinzler continues to contemplate the outdoors for a moment. And then he tugs a hand free from the blanket swaddled around him and points toward the nearest tree. “That blue jay is hogging all the birdseed,” he says, his voice like gravel.
Sam looks. Quorra had hung a birdfeeder up when spring started, and it’s still the most happening spot in the whole yard. Right now, there’s an entire flock of small black birds crowding the upper branches—a respectful distance from the jay monopolizing the feeder at the middle of the tree. He watches the jay splash several beakfuls of birdseed onto the ground, hop down to peck at some, and fly back up to chase off the black bird that had tried to take advantage of its absence and get a little food for itself.
Sam snorts. What a dick.
“You’d think a flock would be able to fuck up a single bird,” he says.
Rinzler hums. The sound vibrates in Sam’s skull. “Yes,” he says. “You’d think so.”
He makes it sound a lot like an accusation. Like a, “Yes… you’d think so,” sort of thing. Sam glances at him with a grin.
“Was that an insult?” he asks.
Rinzler’s scars stretch with the small smile that graces his lips. “Maybe.”
It’s also extremely Alan-esque. And it’s also a nice smile—at least until Sam remembers who, exactly, he’s standing next to. Did Rinzler smile like that when he shredded another program to voxels? Or was his face blank as his body moved, his hands wielding a disc that wasn’t his? (What does he see when he stares at his own reflection in the window, anyway? There’s always something in his eyes that Sam can’t quite access. And frankly, he doesn’t think he wants to.)
Sam brings his mug up. “You want any coffee?” he asks. “Perfect for bird-watching.”
Rinzler, finally, turns away from the window to glance at Sam’s offering. He grimaces at the liquid he sees inside. “I’m not drinking that,” he says.
“Not from my mug,” Sam exclaims with a grin. He takes a drink for emphasis. “I’ll get you your own.”
“I’m still not drinking any.”
“Booo.”
“I just got my… taste buds?” Rinzler says, and then, clearly satisfied with remembering the term, smiles shark-like at Sam. “I just got my taste buds, User. I’m not destroying them with that.”
No. Maybe that’s the smile that he’d worn on his hunts. Sam feels his body stiffen under the glare of Rinzler’s grin at the same time that he grins back. A strange mixture of reactions. But he supposes that Rinzler’s a strange mixture himself.
“That’s fair,” Sam hears himself say.
They turn back toward silence, the journey just as awkward as Sam had expected, and stare out at the bird feeder. The jay’s still at it, the little shit. Sam’s of half a mind to go out there and scare it off himself.
… But he also watched The Birds as a kid. No matter how much his rational brain yells, there’s always that small, completely normal fear that these fuckers will decide they’d rather eat him. Nope. He’s safer inside.
“You don’t have to drink it black, you know,” he says. He sees Rinzler glance at him from the corner of his eye. “The coffee. If you’re worried about your taste buds and everything. We have creamer and sugar, if you want.”
Rinzler scrunches up his nose. “That’s not the point,” he says, disgust written all over his face. “I don’t care how much you try to cover it up—it’s still coffee.”
“Damn.” Sam can’t hide a grin. “When fall rolls around, remind me to get you a PSL.”
Now Rinzler turns to look fully at him. “A… PSL?” he asks, visibly trying to unravel that.
Sam beams back, pausing to take another sip of his coffee. “A pumpkin spice latte!” he exclaims. “You’ll love it. Trust me. It’ll change your life.”
“… Hm. Fine,” Rinzler says. “Then I’m holding you to it… User.”
Well. It’s a start, he guesses. Nothing wrong with that, though he really wishes Rinzler would finally drop the whole “User” thing. At least there’s the promise of a pumpkin spice latte in… six months. If he can survive Clu’s gladiatorial games, then he can survive another half a year of a weird murder program who refuses to drink coffee.
Hopefully.
He checks the birdfeeder again. The jay’s gone, and now the black birds that had kept their distance swarm the little house-shaped thing. Justice served, in his opinion. He watches until he notices Quorra coming into view, the top of her head bobbing up and down over the fence, and turns away from the window. His mug’s somehow almost empty, anyway; he’s gonna need another cup. And, from personal experience—some food before he gets the jitters.
“Maybe Quorra brought leftovers,” he wonders aloud.
Rinzler looks at him. “Quorra never brings leftovers.”
“She might’ve this time!”
Rinzler shakes his head, almost pitiful, and wraps the blanket around himself again. “Go check, then,” he says, and then he’s back in the fantastic bird-eat-bird world that is the backyard.
Looks like the moment’s over, now. Whatever moment that could’ve been. That’s fine; Sam hears Quorra at the door. And she will have leftovers—he’s gonna manifest that into existence. He heads toward the front door, leaving Rinzler at his window.