Simple Machines

CHAPTER ONE -3

Besides, it was a genuinely crowd-pleasing moment. Xander turned to the audience and took the reception. A rapturous round of applause, once again.

Around half an hour later, the crowd had made their way to the launch party, a grand affair that was held at the other side of the building. Twenty-five floors up, it offered a fantastic view of the London cityscape.

No expense had been spared for the stockholders and interested parties. The showcase on behalf of Manning Inc. was designed to kill.

Flutes of champagne were being carried around on silver trays by immaculately-dressed waiters. Caviar of all descriptions lined the food decks.

The ballroom itself was decked out in silver and dark purple. The lighting was dim enough to provide an intimate mood. The futuristic chill-out instrumental music piping through the speakers completed the ambiance.

A massive rectangular fish tank around six feet high took center stage in the room. It completed the futuristic tone of the evening. A zillion fish of all shapes and sizes squiggled around, racing one another across the bedrocks and weeds.

The real tone-setter in the room took place a few feet from the fish tank. Three MAVIS droids stood in a line, talking to the guests. They were the real showpiece and everyone wanted to immerse themselves with them.

A woman in her fifties - evidently a seasoned stockholder of the company - spotted someone. A man, not much younger than her, try to cop a feel of the first MAVIS droid. She patted his hand away and accused him of inappropriate touching.

The woman suppressed her smirk. "Well, well. Seems he’s gone straight in at the deep end."

The second MAVIS droid turned to the woman and sighed. "We don’t work that way."

"Do you not?" The elderly woman asked as she sipped her champagne.

"No, we react how you would expect any human being to react," MAVIS explained, "For example, if you were to suddenly slip your hand around my waist, I would probably tell you to sod off."

The woman spat out her mouthful of drink on MAVIS. She hadn’t meant to, but she wasn’t expecting that kind of a reaction.

"My word, I’m so sorry," the woman said, peering over MAVIS’s shoulder. "I haven’t damaged you, have I?"

"Nah, you’re fine," MAVIS quipped, taking a handkerchief out of her jeans pocket. She proceeded to pat herself down. "Do you usually spit expensive beverages on people you hardly know?"

"No, no," the woman said, holding her chest in embarrassment, "I’m so sorry, Mavis."

"Maybe I can return the favor later this evening?" The droid said, handing her damp tissue to a passing waiter. "Could you take this for me, please?"

"Oh, uh, sure," he said, placing it on the metal tray.

The incident had temporarily diverted Xander’s attention from two men he was talking to. One of them was Benjamin Herlihy, Xander’s best friend since high school. He wasn’t an especially attractive man. Male pattern baldness had set in. The subtle wattle under his chin didn’t exactly add to his visual aesthetic.

"She’s a feisty one, isn’t she?" Xander giggled at the old woman and MAVIS.

"Yeah," Ben said. "Anyway, you were saying?"

"Where was I?" Xander thought and took another swig of champagne. He gulped it down and shook his head, feeling slightly tipsy.

"When are we gonna get to see one of them naked?" Ben asked. He, too, had a bit much to drink.

"Oh, well, that’s the million dollar question, isn’t it?"

"You’ve slept with her already, haven’t you?" The other man asked.

This was Scott, one of the main shareholders in the company. In his fifties, he exuded the kind of corporate menace you’d expect from a man who knew what he was doing. On the flip side, however, he knew a decent story was forthcoming. He didn’t let Xander, nor his inebriation, flounder at all.

Xander blinked and regained his composure. "I’m afraid I can neither confirm nor deny—"

"—Oh, get real. You have slept with one of them. Haven’t you?"

Xander giggled and held up his hands. "I plead the fifth."

Scott smiled and gave him a sly wink. "You can’t plead the fifth, here."

"Ah, screw it." Xander grabbed Ben’s arm and pulled him away from Scott. "Excuse me. Ben, can I have a quick word with you?"

"Sorry, chaps," Ben swallowed, drunkenly, and handed Scott his half-finished drink. "He’s gonna tell me where the bodies are buried. Ha."

Xander pulled him toward the rest room. "I got something to tell you."

"What is it?" Ben asked, somewhat confused.

Xander looked around. Hundreds of party attendees were chatting together and having a jolly good time. They paused occasionally to look at the androids in all their glory.

"Not out here," Xander headed for the toilets, "Follow me."

Thirty-Eight Seconds Later

Xander sat on the toilet seat in the farthest cubicle from the door. He looked forlorn and pensive. Ben leaned against the cubicle wall, reeling from the news.

"Divorce?"

Xander wiped his eyes on his sleeve cuff. “Yeah.”

"When?"

"This morning."

Ben shook his head and let out a sigh. "b***h. I knew it."

"Eight years of marriage and - bam - out of the blue, she lays this on me. Hang on, what do you mean you knew it?"

"No. No, I didn’t mean I knew knew," Ben protested, "It’s just that I kinda suspected something might have been up, you know—"

"—Like what?"

"Like, I dunno." Ben felt on-the-spot, as it were. He changed tack immediately, remembering where he was. "You mean you went through the presentation anyway?"

"Yeah, of course."

"Wow, it didn’t show."

Xander grabbed his knees and looked up at Ben. Tears flew down his cheek. His eyes were bloodshot. Drunk, angry and freshly dumped. "Really?

Ben looked back at his messy-faced friend staring back at him. "Well, not right now, no. You look like a little crying b***h right now. But on stage, no-one would have guessed. You kept it hidden well."

Xander thumped the side wall, causing Ben to spring forward. "Ah, never mind. Who cares, anyway?"

Ben allowed Xander to stand up straight and pat himself down. “You obviously do.” He unravelled a length of toilet paper from the holder and offered it to his friend.

"Thanks," Xander said, taking the tissue and wiping his face with it. "How do I look?"

"A bit red in the eyes, but you’ll be okay."

"Good." Xander dropped the tissue into the toilet bowl and hit the flush. "Thanks, man."

"Look, there must be a reason why Charlotte said that," Ben offered. "You just need to give her time. It could have been an overreaction."

"An overreaction? What are you, twelve years old?" Xander pushed his way out of the cubicle. "You don’t say you want a divorce when you don’t mean it, just to get back at someone you’re mad at."

Ben followed after Xander as he marched through the gents toilet door. "No, I didn’t mean it like that."

"Maybe she’ll tell me, maybe she won’t." Xander shoved through the door and surveyed the crowd of attendees all enjoying themselves. The vast expense of the engagement troubled him. "She’ll have to tell my solicitor, though."

Ben caught up with Xander and patted him on the back. "Look at them, man. They f*****g loved you tonight. This is great."

"Yeah," Xander finally smiled, "We did okay, didn’t we?"

"It was all you, mate." Ben released Xander’s shoulder. "I don’t work for you, remember? I am but a mere, lowly office hound."

"Ah, you know what I mean." Xander chuckled and knocked Ben’s shoulder. "Thanks for coming tonight, man. It means a lot to me."

"Hey, anytime." Ben moved toward a waiter carrying champagne. "I’m gonna get a drink, you want another?"

"Sure," Xander said over his shoulder. His attention seemed to wane as he caught a glimpse of a woman across the room. "Uh, just… whatever…"

Xander didn’t bother finishing his sentence.

From where he stood, the woman seemed rather small at the other side of the room. Her frame stood out - more so than that of the MAVIS droids.

She reached the buffet table and held out her champagne glass as she took a china plater from the table’s dock.

Xander bumped into Scott as he moved forward, fixated on the woman. The streaks of blue and purple in her hair were difficult to ignore.

"Xander!" Scott complained, stepping back and narrowly avoiding spilling his drink down his trousers. "Watch yourself."

Xander snapped out of his trance and looked at Scott. "Oh, I’m sorry."

"Be more careful next—"

"—Who’s that, over there?" Xander pointed at the woman, thirty-feet away and helping herself to the caviar.

"Who?"

"Her. With the funny hair."

Scott squinted and tilted his head. "Dunno. Why?"

"No reason."

Just as Xander took a step forward, the woman turned around and made eye contact with him. It stopped Xander in his tracks.

Xander felt his heart clambering to escape his ribcage. She may have been thirty feet away, but Stevie Wonder could have told you that this woman was a f*****g angel.

Sure, she had blue and purple streaks in her hair, but it only rounded off her perfect and fragile face. A pristine blue skirt hugging her amazing hips. She smiled at him and tucked her head to the side.

"M-My God," Xander gulped and clutched his chest. He put one foot in front of the other, which took him closer to the woman - and right alongside the fish tank.

Xander never tore his gaze away from her as he moved closer.

The glass from the fish tank entered his vision. The image of the larger ones warbled through the thickness of the glass.

Ben reached Scott with two glasses of champagne. "Where did Xander go?"

"He’s over there, look," Scott pointed at the fish tank. Xander paced alongside the glass, looking at the woman at the buffet. It looked really, really silly. "What an idiot."

Scott looked at the spare drink in Ben’s hand.

"Is that for me?

"Uh, I suppose so." He handed Scott the drink.

Xander reached the end of the fish tank and stepped out from behind it.

The woman who’d caught his attention now had a mouthful of food. She placed a small cracker topped with beluga caviar into her mouth.

Her teeth bit into it as slowly, and salaciously, as possible..

Xander stood up straight. A fiery thunderbolt of confidence pummeled his body. He puffed out his chest and stared at the mysterious woman as she ate. "Hmmm."

He saw a few of the other male attendees ogle at the unexpected vision of beauty - at least, those who weren’t fixated on the MAVIS droids.

"Okay." Xander exhaled. "Let’s do this."

Xander stepped forward just as the woman began to chew. Suddenly, she stepped back and coughed, spitting the caviar out and into her hand.

"Ugh. That’s digustin’."

She spat the last chunks of food from her mouth and wiped off her hand on a paper towel. "Ugh, yuck. Gross."

Xander approached her with the kind of confidence Indian men display when asking for nudes from strange women on social media.

"Not liking the caviar, eh?" he giggled as he approached her.

She pushed a finger into her mouth and scraped the fishy remnants from out of her cheek and gums. "Ugh, that’s nasty. How can you lot eat this s**t?"

Xander burst out laughing at the woman’s displeasure. He thought she was joking. She most definitely was not joking.

"Do you have any normal food, here?"

"Normal food?" Xander blinked and acted all innocent. "That Beluga caviar. Very expensive."

She wiped her hand clean on the napkin and threw it to the table. It wasn’t until she turned around and looked that he knew what was happening.

Straight away, Xander was in love. There was no doubt about it.

The woman was mesmerizing. Xander had spent years trying to create perfection with MAVIS. The work was unfastened in a flash. A perfect female template stood right next to him.

Where to start? Her face? Beyond love. Cheeks with the perfect bounce. Lips that stood out just enough, begging to be kissed. Fast forward, quite likely lips that could kiss your child’s face.

Crystal blue eyes you will lose yourself in. We’re not talking the kind of lost where you fall in love, necessarily. Rather, one you could just lose yourself in. s****l? Sure. But this was beyond s*x.

Her neck, shoulders, chest - the entire package. It was hard to know where to end let alone begin.

Xander damn near pissed himself as his body switched off and his mind took over. A thousand scenarios of this woman doing a variety of things - surprisingly, not very many of which were dirty - socked him across the face.

In reality, the thunderbolt probably lasted about seven seconds, which isn’t very long. To Xander, it lasted about a week. In just one survey of her entire body, he felt he’d been to heaven and back.

"I, uh—"

"—I know who you are," she giggled and held out her recently-wiped hand. "I love your work."

Xander looked at her hand. Instead of taking it and shaking it, or holding it up to his lips and kissing it, he imagined the following:

1: His flaccid p***s laying around the index and middle finger, and thumb.

2: His semi-erect p***s gripped between said fingers.

3: His fully-erect p***s clasped by all four fingers and thumb, culminating in a m**********g motion.

4: All fingers in his mouth, one-by-one, sucking off a variety of liquids, including (but not limited to):

- His own semen

- Her ejaculate

- Peanut Butter (unless she had an allergy to nuts, in which case a jam substitution might suffice.)

- His/her saliva. Probably both.

5: Two or three fingers, at the most, pressing into her v****a.

Xander tried to shake the image of her m**********g herself to orgasm. It was near-impossible. He had to be struck across the face to snap him out of his sexually-charged mire.

He playfully tapped himself on the cheek and play-acted, rather pathetically, the scenario of him waking up.

The woman laughed at the action. It caught her by surprise. Xander squeezed his eyelids shut and hoped the woman was just a mirage.

And there he was, standing in front of her like a complete hat stand, and still not shaking her damn hand!

Then, a curious thing started to happen. He continued to imagine her hand in other situations:

6: Caressing his naked body. In particular, his shoulders, from behind, after a hard day’s work.

7: The fingertips stroking his face as he slept, and she watched on.

8: A ring sliding on the fourth finger of the other hand.

9: The hand cradling the back of a baby’s head.

There wasn’t a tenth scenario. Xander had temporarily forgotten how to count to ten by this time. The woman was having such an enormous effect on him. He could barely remember why he was at the party.

"Well, seeing as you ain’t gonna shake my hand, I’ll do it for you." She grabbed his right hand and plonked it into hers. She shook it as hard as she could.

He blinked and squeezed her hand, following her salutation. "Oh. Uh… I’m Xander Manning. Sorry, I just —"

"—All right, Xander," she said with a smile. "My name is Chloe Armstrong."