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  Emmett walked the abandoned streets with his head down. He was heading back to the lab with planks of wood under his arm.

  Most of the apartments had been ransacked or trashed, but he’d found one room that held what he was looking for. A guest bedroom in a tucked away apartment. The walls were covered with half wood paneling. Most of them were gouged or broken, but Emmett had found five that were pristine and four more that would be good enough for woodburning. Hopefully she could join them together and make a regular sized canvas.

  There was poetry in that—tearing down something old to make something new.

  A few minutes later, Emmett arrived at the secret dumpster entrance to the lab. He clutched the boards nervously and used his whip to pull open the dumpster facade. Nanites manipulated the blast door lock and then Emmett slipped inside and down the stairs.

  He went all the way to the small dormitory. It wasn’t very big to start, and TINA had used excess nanites to divide up the rooms into living quarters for the team. By the time everything was partitioned, each room was barely big enough for a bed—which meant Athena had the smallest room, and Lock’s was roughly the same size as Emmett and Clara’s combined room.

  Emmett was going to poke his head into Lock and Athena’s rooms to see if they were there, but he sensed where they were through his connection to TINA. They were both in the demiplane—Lock sparring with nanite training dummies, and Athena working on expanding the demiplane itself. Emmett walked over to his and Clara’s room.

  The door was a glorified partition made out of nanites. It just didn’t sound the same knocking on the door, so he knocked on the doorframe.

  Clara replied, “Hey… You can come in. “

  Emmett pushed through the nanite partition. There hadn’t been enough furniture to go around, so TINA recycled the little bit there was. That, along with extra raw material, had given her enough to make furniture for everyone out of nanites. There was a small cot, just big enough for the two of them side by side, along with two small end tables for personal items.

  Clara was hunched over on the bed with a nanite blanket wrapped around her shoulders. She was doodling on one of her metal spheres.

  “TINA told me you were back…” Clara looked up and trailed off. A smile crept across her face. “Are those…?”

  “For you? Yeah. I finally found—”

  Clara leapt up and wrapped her arms around him. The sphere and the boards clattered to the floor. Emmett hugged her back.

  “These were the best ones I could find,” Emmett said sheepishly.

  “They’re perfect. Thank you.”

  Clara stooped and gathered the boards up. Emmett recounted where he’d found them, but it seemed like Clara was only half-listening. Then she picked a board and sat on the edge of the bed with it across her lap.

  Emmett asked, “You’re not going to join the boards together and make a canvas?”

  “No. I’ll draw something that will fit the canvas. We have to work with what we have.”

  Clara concentrated for a moment as she rubbed her fingertips together. She was channeling heat into them—a process that she concentrated even more on since she’d started using her new thinsuit attachments.

  “Grab a canvas,” Clara said.

  Emmett held up his hands. “Oh no. They’re for you—”

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  “And I want you one. Come on.” Clara patted the bed beside her. “TINA told me about the new mod you made.”

  Emmett sighed. “TINA’s just giving away all my secrets.”

  He grabbed a plank and sat beside her on the bed. Then Emmett pulled the woodburning mod out of his pocket. He finished the design a few days ago and had been carrying it around ever since.

  Of course, the point was to eventually use it, but now that the moment had arrived, a pit had formed in his stomach.

  Emmett stared at the piece of wood. His eyes followed the grains as his fingers connected to the woodburning mod. It looked like a stylus, though the internals were more complicated. The woodburning mod felt far heavier in his hand than it should have.

  He’d enjoyed art in high school, but he wasn’t good—not by art class standards and definitely not compared to Clara. Sure, he’d drawn schematics during engineering classes, but that didn’t feel like art. Just like designing his prosthetics didn’t feel like art, either. He’d done all that out of necessity—he wasn’t an artist.

  Clara stared at him expectantly. “Go on.”

  Emmett shrugged. “I don’t know what to draw.”

  “Just draw whatever comes to mind. Starting is the hardest part.”

  Emmett stared blankly at the canvas.

  Just draw whatever comes to mind…

  Maybe he could draw Belport. His prosthetics should have an easy enough time with straight lines, and he had an almost-photographic memory of the city. It was probably a good idea to start with something on the easier side.

  Emmett held the board horizontally and started at the far left side. He imagined the Belport skyline, like he was standing on the rooftops and looking out across the city. Buildings rose like a mountain range, the glass peaks of downtown almost rising off of the canvas.

  Everything was just an outline at first, and his prosthetic arm had an easy time with the lines. Before becoming a cyborg, he couldn’t have drawn a straight line to save his life. Now, his lines looked like they’d been drawn by software or ruler.

  He added details—windows, brick facades, the outline of signs, and glints off of windows. The details, too, were easier than they should’ve been. Emmett could see the buildings so clearly in his mind that he was practically copying a photograph.

  Emmett swept slowly across the canvas, adding the outline of buildings to the middle as he was putting details on the left side. On one faraway building, he drew two small stick figures—one running across the rooftop, the other flying. By the time he finished the skeletal skyline in the middle of the canvas, he knew what else to add.

  There, in the middle of the canvas, in the middle of the city, Emmett added himself and Clara. They were sitting on the edge of a building, overlooking the skyline, just like the viewer. Even with his newfound steadiness, the stylus was too thick to add many details aside from the outline of them holding hands.

  As Emmett finished the details on their small silhouettes, he knew exactly how to finish the canvas.

  On the right side, the city skyline faded. Instead, Emmett drew side profiles of both of their faces, like they were a few extra seconds away from a kiss. The longer Emmett drew, the more confident he felt. He still felt like he was cheating—TINA had 3D models of their faces for him to work from, and his prosthetic arm didn’t miss a stroke.

  Drawing Clara felt like falling in love with her all over again. He got to see her eyes, her nose, and her cheeks with a rekindled appreciation.

  Drawing himself… was weird. Emmett had never attempted a self-portrait before, but it came just as easily as Clara’s portrait had. He wasn’t sure if that made it more or less awkward. Emmett forced himself to put enough detail into his own face instead of just breezing through it. Even if he didn’t appreciate his own features, Clara probably would. He wasn’t making this for himself, after all. It was for Clara.

  Besides, she’d put him up to it. She should be the one to keep it.

  The right side of the canvas didn’t include their whole heads—just from their noses to the beginning of their ears. If he could’ve planned it from the beginning, he would’ve left more room for their faces. But he had to work with what he had.

  Finally, Emmett finished. He let the canvas rest on his thighs and killed the power to his stylus.

  Then he turned to Clara. He’d been so preoccupied with his own piece that he was excited to see what she’d made.

  Except she hadn’t made anything.

  Clara sat beside him, the blank canvas still sitting across her lap. She’d picked her sphere back up and was doodling on its surface. Except now that Emmett was done, a smile crept across her face.

  “What did… Have you been watching me the whole time?”

  “Yeah,” Clara replied, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

  Emmett’s face felt warm. He stared back at his canvas and focused on his breathing.

  Clara leaned over and kissed him on the cheek.

  It felt like the dam of emotion in Emmett broke. He took a deep breath to steady himself.

  Finally, he asked, “Is it good enough to hang it on the fridge?”

  Clara’s smile couldn’t possibly have gotten any wider. She brushed the canvas aside and pounced on him.

  ~ ~ ~