13. The Fisher
After sprinting for about five minutes while chatting lightly about the Standard Model, we arrived at the fisher's spot. Up close, she appeared much smaller than she had from a distance—her total height was probably no more than a meter. She was sitting, so I couldn't gauge her exact stature, but her proportions were well-balanced, like a human scaled down perfectly to a meter tall. There was something almost fairy-like about her presence. What stood out most was her incredibly long, deep-green hair—or perhaps pale blue was a better description. It was so abundant that it cascaded like flowing water, spilling over the edge of the crater and into the Scrap Nest below, almost as if it could serve as a net for her fishing.
"What do you want?" A cold voice cut through the air. It was the fisher. Without so much as glancing at us, she continued blowing neon-lit soap bubbles, puffing them out one by one while focusing intently on her fishing.
Kana spoke first, introducing us with a friendly tone. "Hi, nice to meet you. I'm Kana. Seiri Kana. And this is Denryū Neo—call him Neo. He's human."
"Huh."
I was taken aback. To hear that there was a human present and not even flinch—it was as if she'd heard a painfully dull joke and wanted nothing more than to distance herself from the teller. Her attitude wasn't quite contempt, but it was so utterly disinterested that I couldn't help but wonder if there was really a humanoid robot out there with such indifference toward humans.
Yet Kana, unfazed by the fisher's demeanor, pressed on with our purpose as if it were the most natural thing in the world. "We need a means of transportation for… reasons. We heard there are a lot of discarded lunar rovers around here, so we came to see if we could get our hands on one. How's the fishing going?"
"It's going fine…"
For the first time, the fisher turned her gaze toward us. Her eyes, the same pale blue as her hair, held a strange duality—mystical yet so ordinary they almost seemed tacky. The contradictory nature of her gaze stirred something inexplicable in me, and for about 0.5 seconds, I was so captivated that I forgot to listen to their conversation. Snapping back, I tuned in again.
"You're planning to ride that?" the fisher asked, pointing to the lunar rover she'd just reeled in with a flourish, her tone sharp as if scolding us for our audacity.
"Yup," Kana replied matter-of-factly.
The fisher's voice took on an exaggerated, almost theatrical edge, clashing slightly with her pale blue eyes. "No, no, no, no… Come on, that's obviously food. It's a fish! You're going to ride a fish?"
"Hmm…" Kana studied the lunar rover discarded beside the fisher, her gaze analytical. "My visual program can only see it as a vehicle. Right, Neo?"
"Yeah," I nodded, as if it were obvious. "Lunar rovers are vehicles, after all."
"No, no, no, no…" the fisher repeated. "That's just a preconception. We're not humans, you know—we're humanoid robots. To us, lunar rovers are fish. Food."
"But I'm human," I said firmly, lying through my teeth.
For the first time, the fisher looked genuinely startled. "Oh, right. You did say you're human. Well, I guess that makes sense then. Humans and I don't exactly see eye to eye. Anything goes with you lot."
"Thanks for understanding," Kana said politely before steering the conversation back to our goal. "So, if it's okay with you, would you consider selling us one of the rovers you've caught? One that still works?"
"Absolutely not."
The fisher shook her head adamantly. "You're planning to ride it, right? Taking something that's food for someone else and using it as a vehicle—that's nothing short of blasphemy to me. Were you raised to play with your food?"
"…"
Kana and I fell silent, at a loss for words. If our values didn't align, there was no chance of striking a deal.
Still, I held onto a sliver of hope and pulled out my handkerchief from my pocket. It was still soaked with mercury from wiping Kana's face back at her house, but I thought the mercury might actually enhance its appeal, making it look more striking. I held it out to the fisher. "How about this? It's pretty valuable."
"What's that, trash?"
Her blunt dismissal stung me on a quark-sized level, but being so minuscule, the wound healed instantly.
"Well, guess that's that," I said, turning to Kana. "Looks like we'll have to go into the Nest ourselves and find something."
"Yeah," Kana replied brightly. "That might actually be more fun. Getting a rover too easily would've been a bit anticlimactic."
"True."
We exchanged smiles, then turned to the fisher together. "Well, we're heading off then," I said.
"Heading off where?"
The fisher placed her fishing rod on the lunar rover she'd caught and turned to us. Pointing to the crater overflowing with rover wreckage, she said, "You're going in there?"
"Yup," I answered.
She let out a sigh before continuing. "Look, I don't particularly like you two, but since you say you're human, I feel obligated to warn you. Even I can't just stand by and let a human walk into a place that dangerous."
"…What do you mean?" Kana asked, her voice tinged with concern.
The fisher's tone grew heavier. "There's a terrifying monster in there. You might get eaten."
"What kind of monster?"
"I don't know the details. No humanoid robot who's seen it has come back alive. They all got eaten."
"Then how do you know there's a monster?" Kana pressed.
The fisher explained, "One robot managed to send a fleeting video of the monster just before it was devoured. Thanks to them, we have a single clip of that thing."
"Can we see it?" I asked.
The fisher shifted her hand, which had been pointing at the crater, toward me—or rather, toward the handkerchief still in my grip. "Give me that, and I'll show you."
"A deal now, huh?" I said with a wry smile. "No thanks. I'd trade for a lunar rover, though—how about it?"
"I told you, no way."
"Well, guess the deal's off then."
For about three seconds, the three of us stood in a long silence, each savoring the disconnect in our values. Then the conversation resumed. "Thanks for warning us about the monster," Kana said kindly.
The fisher picked up her rod again, blowing a flurry of neon-lit soap bubbles as she reverted to her cool, pale-blue demeanor. "Don't let the human die," she muttered.
She sent a cluster of neon bubbles our way. As they popped before our eyes, I felt a sensation like being charged with a kind of energy—not sweet like glucose, but rich and long-lasting, like something derived from ketones. It was, without a doubt, a good flavor.
"Thanks," I couldn't help but say. "I'll keep your warning in mind."
There was no reply. She seemed to have sunk back into her fishing trance. And so, with the pale-blue, faintly fairy-like fisher at our backs, Kana and I stepped into the crater.