#iimposter

    @iimposter is looking at you.

Christmas jingles are surprisingly relatable. Ian doesn’t want a lot for Christmas but there’s just one thing he needs. He’s kept his distance, but Hunter-- even with the light stolen from his eyes, still manages to catch his own. They’re not quite the same tinge of blue as the other androids’ eyes, are they ? -- but it’s close. Turquoise? Greenish blue? Ian so desperately wants Hunter to give him a mini lecture on the semantics of colour coding and how important they were when it came to dressing for the camera. 

“I got your watch fixed,” Ian says expectantly, digging into one pocket. “Your favourite one. The one that you always wear on your person. I noticed it stopped a few weeks ago... wasn’t easy finding compatible batteries, but look.” The KN700 android pulls the watch free and holds it in front of the CA300′s android’s face as though he had eyes to see. True to Ian’s word, the minute hand is ticking— good as new. “But I’m not giving it back to you. Yet.” 

　　　"Wait wait, so you two have already met?” Lola crosses her arms over her chest, leaning back in her seat. “Why was I not made aware of this?"

　　　Markus just smiles and glances between her and Hunter. “Maybe because it didn’t seem important at the time. I could just as easily say the same about you two, but I mind my own business.”

　　　"God you’re just as much a smartass as he is. You’re perfect for each other.”

               To starve for affection, to long for just a taste of kind touches or murmured praise and tenderness so desperately that Hunter could be crushed under the sheer magnitude of this need, must have been what hunger felt like to humans. At least he’s not alone today. Lola, with her uncanny sixth sense, must have picked up on Hunter’s misery because here she is, staving off the hollowness welling up inside of his chest with a sweet peck that ends all too soon.

              Immediately, Hunter shifts closer and fixes her an imploring stare, a plea ( or a demand? ) bright in his eyes. “One more.”

　　　She almost doesn’t indulge him the first time. But something has her moving before she really notices, maybe that tiny part of her that’s weak for pouty boys. And in the end it’s just a peck on his forehead. Totally normal affection for most people, right?

“Four,” answers Hunter without missing a beat. “I know - it doesn’t sound like much, but actors didn’t like me acting. So, my screen time was shorter and shorter until I was just working behind the scenes. I was a phenomenal cameraman.”

As languid as a cat lazing in a patch of sunshine, he lolls his head and rests his temple against Lola’s knee, eyes closed in sweet, simple joy. Her fingers stroke through his hair in all the right places, and this has been the most serene he had felt in years. It’s a tender sensation that satisfies his starving soul and has him slack, content and docile under those clever hands.

         ( Is this bliss? )

“I had my biggest role in the first movie,” he remembers idly. “It was a romantic comedy, and I was playing the no-good boyfriend who had two affairs and was eventually dumped by the girl when I forgot her birthday. She ran away with the hero, a man she had ran into three times before – all at weddings.”

　　　"Well humans are notoriously jealous assholes. I bet you were great in all of them.” With one hand she sips at a glass of wine, pausing her words to do so, and with the other she seemingly has him wrapped around her fingers in more ways than one. “It’s silly to create a person to do a task and then never let them do what they were made for.”

　　　Lola runs the pad of a finger down the curve of his scalp while she listens to his big role. Traces along the dip behind his skull before running her whole hand up through his hair, careful not to tug too much or scratch him with her nails. She’s fascinated by the way he reacts to such a simple touch, something most people barely consider when they picture androids - herself included. It’s so easy to please Hunter. And she finds that she likes making him happy.

    An unfortunate, complete, total accident. What are the odds that a hefty splash of Hunter’s triple-espresso cappuccino would spill perfectly over this stranger’s book – and more tragically, those immaculately tailored gloves that definitely have no right to be made of a leather more luxurious than Hunter’s own? What a mishap.

    “Damn,” Hunter says nonchalantly. He raises his coffee cup to his lips, hiding the smirk that twitches at the corner of his mouth.  An elderly couple at the next table is watching, warily waiting -or hoping?- for a spat to break out in this very coffeeshop. Once he’s done miming his sip, he raises his cup to the stranger in cheers. “My bad.”

　　　This would be the perfect start to his day, wouldn’t it? Never mind that his meeting with his company’s CEO had been moved forward a day with minimal warning. Or that his project files had corrupted, forcing him to work through the night to restore them. Or that his incompetent neighbor had let his cat out from the safety of his yard, then refused to help him chase her down. 

　　　Now he can’t even enjoy a good book at breakfast without being disturbed by some smug prick. (Because Hux absolutely saw the look in the man’s eyes, for it was one he held too often.) 

　　　With a calm that managed to surprise himself, Hux set aside the drenched novel, its flimsy pages now stained a watery brown. He reached out to grab a sheaf of napkins with equally drenched, gloved hands to begin mopping up the mess. With that done, and against his first impulse, he dropped the used tissues to the side of his book rather than throwing them in the man’s face.

        It takes less convincing than Hunter had expected to persuade Lola into showing him how to dance, and he couldn’t have been any more pleased as they leisurely sway and step to the velvety voice crooning over their heads. His hand rests upon the curve of her waist, while his other clasps onto her own with their fingers snugly interlaced, and his footsteps are only a touch clumsy as they follow Lola’s. Slow dancing may feel unfamiliar to him, but that doesn’t dampen his zeal in the slightest.

            ( Unforgettable.

                                 That’s what you are. )

       He hums idly along to the song as they dance, lingering so close that he can smell that scent that is so subtle and so distinctively Lola. On a whim, he spins her gently, his lips broadening into a proud grin as he draws her intimately close again. “I think I’m learning how to dance,” he murmurs, eyes bright with mirth as he beams down at her. “Am I?”

　　　"You’re getting the hang of it,” Lola confirms. There’s a soft smile settled comfortably on her lips as she leads them through the steps. She was genuinely surprised to find that he couldn’t dance already. It seemed like an odd thing not to program into his system but she doesn’t mind showing him the ropes. “But this is just a simple dance. There’s a ton of different styles you can learn. Samba, merengue, swing. I bet you’d be pretty good at the tango.”

      “What?”

     Something inexplicable and unpleasant lurches inside of Hunter’s broad chest, a reflex honed into him since the very first time his sunshine had scolded so harshly at him — over a different joke, ironically enough. Is he still bad at reading the lines between humour?Impossible; he has poured so many hours into the intricacies behind jokes ever since taking the brunt of Lola’s outburst, and surely all that studying has paid off somehow.

     Faltering like a kicked puppy, he furrows his dark brows together and restlessly squirms at the sensation of guilt. “I’m not joking again,” he promises, eyes imploring as he stares at her, vying for her trust. “I swear! I’m deadly serious about this.”

　　　For once Lola gets to look down on him, standing over Hunter with fists clenched at her sides. She always swore that being around Hunter left her feeling volatile, no matter what her emotions were at the time. She takes a deep breath in, lets it out in a quick huff, and stares him dead in the eye.