A few hours later, Daemon and Cynthia came out of the mall together. The latter had a smile on her face, while the former was showing a more relaxed expression. As for whether he was indeed feeling lighter, only he would know the truth.
"Are you going back to your hotel? I will give you a lift."
He shook his head at Cynthia:
"I will be running some errands first."
"Oh."
She could feel that proposing to accompany him would not be the best idea, so she changed the subject:
"Why are you still staying at the hotel? I can help you find a place if you want. Or you can come stay at my place for now. You saved my life, that is the least I can do."
"Don't worry about me. I will move out after some time."
"Alright. Don't hesitate to reach out if you need help. I will try my best."
Daemon looked at the hand touching his arm, and replied in a less flat voice:
"Alright. Now go, you might catch a cold with the evening wind."
"Then I will be going."
"Drive carefully."
"And you, remember to call me."
She didn't wait for his answer this time. She hurried to her car, and after waving at him, she drove away.
Daemon remained in place for a while, looking at the direction the car disappeared in. Then turning around, he started walking away.
The next day, he went to the rented apartment once again.
He first changed his clothes for sports ones. He went to the transformed bedroom and used the contraption he put in place to let out a good amount of sweat.
After a warm shower to relax, he took out the scans he made at the hospital. With a notebook he bought the previous day, he started making a draft. He drew a human shape, and with the scan as a guide, started marking dots and making annotations.
Only the sound of pencil rubbing against the paper remained in the silence. That, along with his mumblings:
"With the scans, even if I forgot some of my ideas, I can reproduce them… Here, the electric current can start here to simulate this muscle… and here too. But I need here as an exit to not have it choose a path on its own. I should also take the nerves response into account to not make the responses of the body become chaotic. This muscle group is not big, so the intensity should be reduced. And here, I need to ensure the isolation…"
Alone with his thoughts and his notebook, he didn't have anything to feel trouble about. No heartache over lost love, no grief over comrades' death, and no disappointment or disheartenment over something he had been part of getting tainted.
That was how he spent the rest of his day. And the next one too. All the way until he was satisfied with the reproduced draft. Then, the notebook along with the hospital documents were not what he kept himself busy with anymore the following days after taking a shower to conclude his workouts.
Instead, the electronic parts he had bought before became what he turned to. He started putting them together, connecting wires and fixating them on one of the bodysuits he had bought.
When he had been transforming the bedroom previously, he had not made any plan because it was simple enough. And he could use the constant need for adjustment to make the time he could keep himself busy longer.
But he was now making something he had been thinking about for a moment already, and it required precision. So he made the preparations he found necessary to prevent mistakes.
Looking at his notebook full of calculations along with his notes, no one would take him for an army veteran. He looked like a scientist instead.
As he transformed the bodysuit, it became full of electrodes. Its appearance was almost like a motion sensor suit, but with more dots.
He exhaled and looked out of the window. The sky was dark. Taking his phone, he saw that it was still early, but the date showed that it had been about two weeks since he had been to the mall with Cynthia.
During that time, she did contact him. After complaining about him never calling her, she did ask him out to eat. They had gone to different restaurants, and could have done more activities together, but he had declined.
He shook those thoughts away and placed his phone down. He would have liked to continue working, but it was better to go back and rest.
He started putting everything into order when his phone rang. A look at the screen showed that it was the only one with her number saved inside calling.
"Yes?"
"Hi, Daemon. Are you busy?"
"You can say that."
"Then I will try to make it short. Can you have dinner at my place in two days?"
"Any special reason why?"
"Not really. Only my father wanting to meet the one who saved his daughter. He would have liked to do that earlier, but I told him not to bother you since you just came out of the hospital. Now I cannot hold him back anymore."
Cynthia, listening to the silence that answered her, spoke again in a pleading tone:
"Pretty please. Can you do it for me? I know you don't want to be bothered lately, but just one dinner. After that, I will make sure he does not bother you."
Daemon still kept his silence, so Cynthia inhaled on the other side, and took out her last move. In a cute voice, she pleaded:
"Can you do that for me? As a favor. After that, you can ask me anything you want in return. How about…"
It was becoming too much in the end, and Daemon couldn't continue being silent. He suppressed a twitch of the corner of his mouth and spoke:
"Alright, enough. I will come."
"Hooray. Thank you. Don't worry, the reward is not an empty promise."
"No need for reward. I will come, but now I need to hang up. I must continue what I have been doing."
"Ah, my bad. I will stop bothering you. See you later."
"Bye."