Chapter 361: Aylin Wanted His Hands and Trusted His Flippers

The Earth form waited for a preferred home presentation.

Jiang left all three options untouched.

Conti confirmed that the field was administrative rather than protective. The sealed drive would keep its24:00 preservation whether Jiang selected HUMAN, PENGUIN, or NO DEFAULT. Future notices might arrive with a less convenient layout. Nothing more.

"We can leave it blank," Conti said.

"Please do," Jiang replied.

Conti closed the observation route and carried the question away from them. Hessa moved to the far side of the slate to begin repairs. Neither invented work nearby.

Jiang settled onto the dry recovery mat. Pressure62 needed ordinary time to return60. Cold24/47 would not recover with it.

Aylin remained beyond the expired test line.

"You heard easier as better," she said.

"The field said home. You answered human."

"I said it would be easier for Earth contact."

"You said that while looking at the word home."

She lowered herself to the floor, leaving more than an arm’s length between them. The distance was not punishment. Current touch permission remained0, and neither of them had asked to change it.

"Then ask what I meant," Aylin said.

Jiang almost told her that he had. He had not. He had told her what he heard and waited for her to defend herself.

"What did you mean?"

Aylin looked toward the closed Earth plate. "Your human face makes their records easier to use. Your voice fits what they knew. You can answer a written form without Conti translating one foot, one beak, and one tail into a procedural objection."

"You meant convenience, then," Jiang said.

"Convenience is real. It is not sacred."

Pressure dropped to61 percent.

Jiang watched the number rather than her. "Do you want that form more?"

"For what purpose do you mean?"

"That sounds like an answer prepared for a tribunal."

"It sounds like the question is hiding five questions."

He disliked that because she was right.

Outside the route room, a penguin called for a worker and received an answer from someone Jiang could not see. The migration continued while its most complicated bird argued about hands.

"Do you want to talk to me in Human Form?" he asked.

"Yes, I want that," she said.

"Do you want me to stay that way?"

"No, I do not," she said.

"Do you desire me more that way?"

Aylin did not hide behind the Earth plate this time. "I desire different things."

The answer found the part of him that wanted honesty and the part that wanted a ranking. They did not agree on what to do with it.

She continued before he could turn the discomfort into accusation.

"I want your hands on me when we both ask for that. I want to kiss a mouth shaped for it. I want your face close enough to read without guessing what a beak can show. Those wants are mine. The system did not put them there."

Jiang’s tail pressed harder against the mat.

"And this body?" he asked.

"This is the body I know best."

"That was not the question."

"It is part of my answer. I know when your left foot hurts before you admit it. I know how your oilcoat changes after bad water. I know the difference between Quiet Brood turning you and you choosing to follow. When I wake under threat, this is the shape I search for."

She glanced at his flippers.

"I trust those more than I trust the hands you have used for less than an hour in front of me. I am attracted to you now. I also do not know what adult intimacy with this anatomy should mean, and I will not pretend curiosity is permission."

Jiang finally looked at her.

There was no polished answer waiting in her expression. She wanted him and had limits. Both facts survived being spoken together.

"I thought you were waiting," he said.

"What did you think I awaited?"

"For the joke to end. For the system to give me enough points to become a man again."

"You refused that reward yesterday."

"I know what I refused. I did not know what you lost when I refused it."

Aylin rested both hands on her own knees. "I lost permanence I never possessed."

"You still lost the easier path."

"Yes. I am allowed to notice that."

The correction carried no cruelty. Jiang still felt it.

Pressure reached60 after00:06. Abyss Pressure became available. He remained on the mat because recovery had ended and the conversation had not.

"I am proud of this body," he said. "Not every minute."

Aylin waited without interrupting him.

"I hate being lifted without being asked. I hate rooms designed so every useful surface starts above my head. I hate that people see an emperor penguin and decide I am harmless, adorable, or available to touch. I hate walking backward under serious equipment while everyone tries not to laugh."

"I failed at the last one."

"You failed with admirable restraint."

"A royal education has some value."

He let the humor pass without using it as an exit.

"I miss hands," Jiang said. "I miss height. I like having a face you can read. I want the things you described. I also like that my feet can hold a current no human ankle would survive. I like my dive, my keel, my oilcoat, and being built for pressure instead of merely enduring it."

"Those are not opposing confessions."

"The selector thinks they are. Sometimes I do too."

Aylin looked at the blank administrative field through the closed plate. "Home is the wrong word for a body."

"Bodies can be homes."

"Then yours has two rooms and no landlord."

Jiang gave her a long look. "That was dangerously close to sounding wise."

"I will ruin it if you give me time."

"Please ruin it for me."

She considered the request. "Your penguin body is not a room I wait in until the man arrives. Your Human Form is not a guest I refuse to desire because the system might misuse that desire. Neither body belongs to me. Neither one gets to cancel what you chose in the other."

That was closer to what he needed, though need did not make it proof.

"And I will not punish you for wanting easier," Jiang said. "I may ask whether easier is worth its price."

"You should ask every time."

They submitted NO DEFAULT to the Earth form together without touching the same control. Jiang tapped the penguin-height plate first. Aylin confirmed only that the field reflected his current answer, not that she shared authority over it.

[PREFERRED HOME PRESENTATION]

[No default1]

[Future forms available2]

[Contact convenience reduced1]

[Original/primary form0]

[Relationship authority0]

[Current touch0]

No skill appeared. Stabilization review remained1/3. Soul Anchorage remained unacquired, and EP stayed0.

Food stood2:22. Pressure60, Cold24/47, and mobility12 remained current.

The primary-form selector withdrew.

For three seconds, Jiang thought the system had accepted their answer.

Then a new offer opened with Aylin’s name inside the price.

[DUAL STABILIZATION]

[Shared living anchor:Aylin]

[Automatic return direction:Aylin]

[Relationship persistence required1]

[Unpaid damage transfer:undisclosed]

Aylin read the offer and kept both hands on her own knees.

"There," she said. "I ruined the wise part."