A Time Story

Chapter 3 (part B)

[Continued from Chapter 3- part A]

She did it! At last, Rylan found the girl-like-her! And to think not long ago she thought they'd never meet again! She was even better than Rylan imagined: so nice, so kind, so confident in a way Rylan wished to be. All she needed was her name and number and they'd be best friends forever! Now if only she could get her to stop talking.

"—and my class is on the 6th triple. It's the class I'm going to by the way. I made a lot of friends there. They taught me how everything works, even shorter names for cycles: hc, qc, tc, all that stuff. We always explore the hub after class. It's really big you know. I bet it stretches on forever. We've been to a bunch of places, trading center, social center, the simulation room. Weird how most of them have center in their name. It's kind of funny..."

The girl glanced at Rylan and seemingly read her mind, "Oh sorry. I've been talking a lot haven't I? So, what've you done so far?"

"Well... not much," said Rylan. "I made a friend in my class too."

"That's great, as long as you didn't spit on her."

"Hey, no fair," said Rylan offended. "I only did that with you cause I didn't have a voice."

"Relax, I'm kidding. Gotta learn how to lighten up a bit," she jabbed Rylan with her elbow.

"Ow," Rylan flinched. "What does 'lighten up' mean?"

"It means to, y'know, have fun. It's stuff friends do all the time."

"So does this mean, we're friends?" Rylan lit up.

"Course silly! Can't forget about you. Did you really wait for me to come out of my room back there? We have doorbells on the side you know."

"Oh," Rylan looked down, "must have missed them."

"Lighten up," she said jabbing Rylan harder, "You're probably just not aware of stuff around you yet. I only got better a twelfth-cycle ago. The helpbots should really tell you that you have them. Honestly, they're completely useless. So much for being helpful."

"Yeah," Rylan agreed, "The one that showed me my room didn't even tell me where the Trading Center was."

"You gotta go sometime! I just got a cool upgrade for my sphere. This is just the tip of the iceberg."

The girl transformed her sphere into a mini ballerina. Wind up music played as it spun around in her palm.

"Woooowww that's amazing," Rylan gazed with starry eyes.

"Me and my friends always find the best things," the girl bragged as her wristwatch reformed. "My one friend, Dynica, is 8-cycles-old. She knows all the ins and outs of the hub."

"My friend is much older than that!" said Rylan enthusiastically.

"Well why don't you come with us," she asked, "Oldcomers are always welcome in our book, new ones too."

"That's great!" Rylan celebrated. "I'll get out my tablet. I'm Rylan by the way. What's your name?"

"I'm Zoe."

"Zo, Zo," Rylan wanted to make sure she remembered that one. When asking for her serial number Zoe laughed when she saw Rylan's misspelling.

"There's an 'e' at the end silly. I'll help you out."

Zoe wrote down her information and gave it back to her. Rylan sent her a message and reversed roles by helping her with her own spelling. Replacing 'Rylin' with 'Rylan'. They both laughed at the coincidental misspelling.