(I'm no good at Gimp or Photoshop, you'll just have to imagine that Iris has thistle-colored eyes. Though I do now have an anime-ish avatar depicting Iris.)

"In Tandem Orbit, Chapter 3"
By = Sure-as-elle

Author's note: Paxum has a different school system than the United States. There is hardly any homework at all, because homework is counterproductive; the schools are low-stress, teachers work one-on-one with the students in their small classes to figure out how they learn and how to make learning the necessities of life interesting to learn, treating children as unique human beings with highly individual interests, learning styles, and patterns. Because the teachers are intimately aware of their children's progress, tests are rarely needed; when they are called for, tests are done in a disguised way to keep the child from knowing xe is being tested. It is more structured and focused than Montessori schools, but is still a far cry from the rigid, assembly-line "education" system of the US. Teachers on Paxum also get assistance from teacher's aides and from the school's AI.

* * *

Chapter Three: Sunday Surprises

On Sunday morning, I was awoken by my bladder a full ten minutes before my alarm was set to go off. I turned off the alarm and went about my day getting ready for work later at 10 AM. It was 9:30 already. But then I only eat cereal in the morning, and I live just a few blocks from where I work. I was ready in 20 minutes, and was still five minutes early.

I spent the first couple hours doing my job with my mind dwelling on the date the night before, and whenever we had lulls in the traffic, I told Aren all about it. As far as I know, Aren is a happily married bisexual teleiophile, but that didn't stop her wanting to know every detail about the date Iris and I had. She was stunned by my description of the pole dancing, and told me she was thinking about seeing it sometime, which made me happy to know I'd possibly converted someone else to the pole-dancing fandom. But of course the part she loved best was the part that I, too, had loved best; the dance after the concert. Aren actually had to stuff her fists into her mouth to keep from squealing, since she didn't want to disturb the patrons.

Not until shortly after noon did Iris show up, waving with a smile briefly before finding her way to the Dargon books by memory. I was busy checking another patron out, and so could only wave back. I was still busy checking patrons out when Iris got in line, a huge stack of books in her hands. When it was finally her turn to be checked out, I noted she'd grabbed the next four Dargon books in the series, as well as a 300 page book on how to build your own custom VC (VR computer), and three novels, one adventure and two romance (both romances were by authors I'd recommended to her).

"A little light reading?" I asked her jovially.

"Yes," she said, with a totally straight face.

As I checked her out, I started checking her out, and what I saw almost made me drop what I was holding. Today she was wearing a backless halter top, blue with bright yellow sunflowers all over it, and a short skirt of the same blue as the top. Her shoes were the same white buckled sandals that I'd seen so many times on her. I hadn't realized the night before that she'd been wearing tights for both our date and our pre-date, but today she had bare legs and feet under her sandals, and I sure noticed that, even though it was a little difficult to see her legs from that angle. Her skin was a nice honeyed amber color, and seeing it for the first time on her legs made me tingle pleasantly and feel warmer. It also put a small catch of emotion in my breath, and by the way Iris smirked up at me, I could just tell she'd noticed.

"Is it hot out there today?" I asked in lieu of a comment on her clothing.

With a knowing smirk on her face and in her tone, Iris responded, "Yeah, sure is. Hot in here, too, don't ya think?"

Aren chuckled and I did indeed feel very warm all of a sudden, with a mixture of embarrassment and lust.

"Um, well, cool," I said lamely. "Well here you go, Iris my Queen."

I slid the books over to Iris, and as she reached to grab them, her hand touched mine. Now I know what an accidental touch feels like, and this was not accidental. The way she touched my hand, and the length of time she did it, while no more than five seconds, made it obvious she was teasing me. I resisted the urge to either fan myself or reach forward and kiss her, as there were still a couple people in line behind her.

She took her books and put them in a bookbag, slung it over her shoulder, and made to leave, but instead asked, "When's your lunch break?"

"Don't have one today. We're only open til 2PM, so aside from a granola bar, no food until then."

"Oh, well, that's good too. I'll be over in the lounge, reading." She waved and left, and I waved back. Before she was out of sight, she blew me a kiss, and I naturally "caught" it and blew my own back.

*

When 2 o'clock rolled around, Aren and I finished closing up. Iris was still in the lounge, so engrossed with the book about building VC's that she jerked with a startled cry when I said her name. Admittedly, I had stood there watching her for a few moments before speaking, because the moment I saw her sitting there, her book propped up on one knee, her right foot resting on the chair so her panties were visible, made such a great pose I just knew I had to draw her in it. So I admit I took a picture of her with my Omnus wrist device before I got her attention.

"Oh," she said, recovering quickly and blinking around at the dimmed lights, "the library's closing already?"

"Yes it is, my Queen. You've been sitting here reading for nearly two hours straight. A good book, I take it?"

"Oh yes, very," she said, getting up and following me to the door. "I knew a little of this stuff, but this goes into so much good detail, which is good, cause I wanna make my own system. The one downstairs is the family system."

"Wow. Between this, the building stuff in the toyroom, and the designs in the VC you told me about, you sound like you're on your way to being an engineer."

She beamed at me, and I locked the library door behind us. "Yeah, I've been wanting to be an engineer for a couple years now. But mainly cause I wanna invent stuff, too."

"You gonna go into nanoengineering as well?"

"Well yeah, I hope. All the best inventing comes from nanoengineering anymore."

"You hope?"

"Well yeah, I dunno yet how good I'll be at it. I've got a long way to go before I get to a point where I'll know if I can do it."

I patted her shoulder comfortingly, saying, "Oh, I'm sure you'll be great at it. After all, from what little I know of nanoengineering, it's all done in VR anyway. You model your inventions in VR, have the computer turn it into a template, the material is printed out, you test it to make sure it works right, and there you go. Hell, you probably have the know-how already to experiment with nanodesign at home. For all you know, you could become famous for inventing something at age 8 or 9. A lot of great inventions over the centuries have been made by kids. Hell, even back in the 21st century there were kids inventing things like a way to clean up the garbage and pollutants in Terra's oceans, or the girls that made an electrical generator powered by urine."

Iris made a disgusted face but hugged me and thanked me for the encouragement anyway. I had to stop so she wouldn't knock me over; luckily we were just on the sidewalk and not halfway across a street. Not that the Traffic Mesh would let any cars run us over, but accidents could still happen.

"Well with that in mind," Iris said excitedly as we continued on our way, "maybe I can do something in nanoengineering for the science fair."

"Science fair, eh? Looking that far forward already? Cool. Well that sounds like a lovely idea. You let me know when the science fair is, and remind me the day before, and I'll come see you in it." Then I was struck by a related thought, and continued, "That reminds me, when do you start school again?"

Iris faltered a little. "Two weeks from today. Two weeks from now, and I won't be able to come to the library as often!"

"Well I work from 10 AM to 4 PM on Tuesday through Thursday, from 1PM to 9PM on Fridays, and I have Saturdays and Mondays off. Though, I could always ask to trade Mondays and get the whole weekend off. Orrin has been asking for more hours lately, and I don't think he does anything on Sundays."

"Oh, so I could meet you at the library most days and we can go places from there."

"Sure thing. And then we have Saturday together as well. And Sunday, too, if I can convince Aren to change my schedule."

"Aren's in charge of your schedule? Well just tell her why you want the change, and I'm sure she'll be glad to change it."

"Yeah, I think so too."

Suddenly we were standing at my front door. I turned to Iris and asked, "Do you have the permission of your family to be here now?"

"Oh, I completely forgot!" Iris tapped some things on the panel of her own Omnus and was soon having a conversation with a little three-vee version of Matria. "Mama, the library is closed. They were really busy, so Rianna and I hardly got to talk at all. May I please have lunch and maybe even tea with Rianna?"
"What does Rianna say?"

Iris turned the three-vee projection on her Omnus so that Matria was facing me. "It's fine by me if it's fine by you, Matria."

Matria nodded and smiled. "You two have fun, then. See you later, Iris honey. Love you."

"Love you too, Mama," Iris said and tapped the panel to end the call.

I opened the door and Iris followed me in. "Oh, by the way, in the future please don't have your feet on the furniture of the library, okay sweetie?"

"Oh, yeah. Sorry bout that."

I hugged her. "It's okay. So anyway, what would you like for lunch? I think we should go out to eat, or order in. I don't want to make anything right now."

"Can we order delivery then? I just wanna stay here with you today."

She kicked her shoes off and plopped onto the couch. I went into my bedroom briefly to change into shorts and a t-shirt, then plopped down next to her, kicked my own shoes off, and we spent a few minutes deciding what to order. It took some time, but we finally decided on Chinese food. I ordered cashew chicken with curry and rice, and Iris ordered Kung Pao Shrimp, extra spicy, but with lo mein noodles.

While we waited for our food to arrive, Iris cuddled up to me and she and I talked about what she was reading. But we didn't get very far in the discussion before I started to notice she was fidgeting a lot and rubbing her back.

"Your back sore, my Queen?"

"Yes. I didn't have that backpack on long, but I musta had it on really wrong, cuz my back hurts."

"Well would you like me to massage it for you?"

"Yes, please." And with that, she flopped over face-down on the sofa.

"It would probably work better on the floor, the sofa has too much give."

"Great idea," she said, getting down onto her belly on the floor. I followed her, and as I knelt behind her, I took a few moments to admire her bare back and legs before I began to expertly massage away the knots in her back muscles.

"Mmmm... you're really good at this. How'd you get so good, Rianna?"

"I had a lot of spare time last year, so I took some massage therapy classes. It's good to have someone to practice on, after all this time."

"Well, ohhhh... this is so good I think I can get Mama, Papa, and Taanlen to volunteer for it, if you want."

"That might be cool. Still, you may enjoy getting a massage, but I really enjoy giving you one."

She attempted to giggle but it turned into an almost orgasmic shuddering moan. I must have done something that felt really good. No wonder some people talked about "erotic massage." I'd not touched anything except her back, and yet she was practically melting into the floor. I wondered if she would later make lame excuses to get me to give her another massage. Well, I thought, I'll just have to let her know she doesn't need an excuse. Seeing how much she's enjoying this makes me feel pretty awesome myself.

After a few minutes, Iris made a small sigh that sounded decisive, waved her right hand feebly, and said, "OK, that's 'nuff for now." Obedient to my Queen, I stopped and stood up with the unmoving help of the sofa arm. I looked down at Iris, and the way she was laying there on her belly, so relaxed, reminded me of a cat I used to have that would flop down, his legs every which way, limp as a rag doll. I know, because I used to pick him up when he was like that, and you'd think he was inanimate the way he didn't respond. I wondered if Iris would be the same way.

The house AI beeped at me with a message that the delivery guy was pulling up. I went to the door and got our food, thanked the man for his work, and set the food on the kitchen table. I went back into the living room and saw Iris was still laying there, sighing softly.

"Dinner is served, my Queen."

"Nggghhhh..."

I poked her gently on the thigh with a toe. "I'm not gonna feed you while you're on the floor, you'll have to sit up."

"So comfy..."

"The floor is comfy?"

"Oh. Right. Is there a word for 'not comfy, I just can't get the energy to get up'?"

"Hmm... is 'lazy' the word you're thinking of?"

She shook her head slightly. "No, that's not it."

"How about 'Iris has melted into the carpet and now I need to scrape her out like so much gum?'" I almost laughed at my own comment, but managed not to. Iris giggled, though. But said nothing and didn't move. I walked into the kitchen and grabbed a plastic spatula and took it back into the living room.

I put on my best melodramatic voice and said, "Oh my goodness, there is this big melted lump of Iris in the carpet, guess I'll have to scrape it out," got on my hands and knees again, and started to stick the spatula underneath her like I really was trying to scrape her out. Iris started laughing and wriggling about.

"No!" (more laughter) "I'm up, I'm up! Staaaap iiiiit!"

"Okay," I said, and immediately stopped. Iris sat up, leaning against the sofa for a moment, and looked up at me and sighed.

"Up!" she commanded, holding up her arms like a much smaller child. "Your Queen wishes you to carry her to the food."

Tossing the spatula on the end table, I hunched over with one eye closed and responded in an Egor voice, "Yesh, mashter, ash you wish, mashter," and hauled her over my shoulder like a sack of potatoes, Egor-limping into the kitchen.

"ACK! Put me down, peasant! This is most undignified and unbecoming of a Queen!"

I set her down standing on the kitchen floor by the table and said in my finest butler voice, "Dinner is served, Your Highness."

Finally she sat down. I followed suit and soon we were dumping our Chinese food onto our plates and tucking in. I was only mildly surprised that Iris used chopsticks like a pro, even better than I did. We ate normally and without comment for a few minutes before I asked, "Want to try some cashew chicken?"
"Sure. We can trade."

I held out some cashew chicken for her on my chopsticks, and she snapped it up quickly. Then I tried some of her Kung Pao Shrimp the same way. Before long, this ended up with us feeding each other each other's own meals, so I was using my chopsticks to feed Kung Pao Shrimp to Iris, while she fed me my own cashew chicken. This was the cause of many snickers and giggles from the both of us, especially when we messed up and dropped lumps of food on the table. We scooted right next to each other to make it easier after one piece fell on the floor, and we were as close to cuddling as we could be in two separate chairs.

Then Iris upped the ante by snatching some of my chicken away from me at the last second. I was all prepared to be annoyed with her, especially when she put the piece in her own mouth, but then I noticed she was merely holding it with her mouth. I could see the giggle and the dare in her eyes, and knew what she wanted me to do. So I leaned forward and carefully extracted the chicken piece from her mouth with my own. We came very close to kissing, and possibly we technically did. She chuckled as I ate the piece.

I swallowed, and noticed Iris had some sauce on her lips. So in tune with the silly mood in the air, I leaned forward and licked the sauce off her lips. She wiped it off a little (I did lick her, after all) but was still smiling and grinning. Then she looked at her plate. "All gone," she said, disappointed. "Oh well, I can cuddle you now."

While I was still eating, Iris sat down in my lap and snuggled up to my chest. I ate the last of my meal, trying not to drop any food on her as I did, but she didn't move much even after I finished. I set Iris down on the chair while I cleared up. She got up as I did and said "Sofa please."

"No, you wash your hands first. Wouldn't hurt to wash your face, either."

She sighed as though she was being extremely put-out, but did as asked. Before long, we had both washed up and were sitting together on the sofa again, Iris snuggling against my chest again. We began to talk again, about all kinds of things, but the mood was calm and even a little quiet. She ran a hand along the dark brown skin of my arm, and I gently ran the fingers of one hand through her hair, softly against her cheek, and along the nape of her neck. My other hand was a little awkwardly positioned, but I still managed to run its fingers along her back with a soft touch. Occasionally it tickled her, and so took some adjustments to avoid doing that, but after a while I got into the rhythm of it.

I can't say how long it was before she shifted position a little, her head going higher up to my collarbone, because I was losing track of time again. I resumed my gentle caresses, and bowed my head a little to take in the scent of Iris's hair. It was devoid of artificial scents, and so her natural aroma – the warm, clean, earthy scent of childhood – was untainted by any other odors. I don't know if you know what I mean, exactly, but every child I have ever been around gives off the same kind of scent; it is clean, warm, and smells a little like soil, like the smell of the earth. Every child I've been around smells that way, though each child's scent is slightly different. Granted, I can count the number of young girlfriends in my life on one hand, but I used to babysit my younger siblings, and then neighborhood kids, and they all smelled that way. I've always loved that scent. I don't know if it's a scent all human children in the universe produce, but every child I've ever met did. And it is quite different from the much muskier scent adults produce. No matter how often people bathe, once the scent of the shampoo fades, or if they use unscented shampoo, a person's natural scent can be detected, and adults and children smell quite different.

If Iris knew I was smelling her hair on purpose, she gave no sign she knew or minded, so I continued. For how long, I don't know, but eventually Iris lifted her head and looked at me. I kissed her forehead, and she smiled.

"Yes?" I asked, sensing a question building.

"Can we lay down on the sofa instead of sitting up?"

"Sure thing, my Queen." I scooted my top half sideways a little, which helped me to slump down against the pillows at the end of the sofa. We were now laying down, though also sitting up at an angle, which was good because if we were completely horizontal I might have gotten vertigo.

"That's better," she said, and scooted up until her face was over mine. Slowly, gently, she leaned closer and began to kiss my cheeks, my chin, my forehead, even my eyes and nose. I couldn't help but chuckle a little, because it tickled somewhat.

I was closing my eyes when the kisses stopped. Opening my eyes to see why she'd stopped, I saw Iris's gorgeous thistle-colored eyes staring into mine. It was like she was trying to memorize my retinal pattern, her gaze was so intense. I made a funny face at her to disguise my slight discomfort, and she seemed to snap out of a trance. Many emotions flashed through her eyes very rapidly, too rapidly for me to process at first, but then I saw the light of coming to a decision in her eyes, and without any more warning than that, she kissed me right on the lips.

This was no simple peck on the lips, either. Her cute little nostrils were flaring to get her more oxygen, for she was determined to kiss me properly. It was kinda wet, but pleasantly so. I had just started to take a more active role in the kiss when it got wetter. She was using her tongue, trying to get me to open my lips. A little surprised but pleased, I did, and soon our tongues began to explore each other as a certain something between my legs got even more excited than it had been up to that point.
It was bliss. Her scent filling my nose, the taste of her lips and tongue in my mouth, her small warm weight on my body, her legs brushing my own, strands of her hair falling around us and brushing against my ears and cheeks and neck, my hands on her exposed back and shoulders, and now she was running her own hands through my many braids, but less gently, as though she were considering holding me down by my hair at some point. She and I were the only things in the universe in that moment, even more singularly than we'd been the night before.

She surfaced for air briefly, then kissed me again. It was my turn to melt, and as I did, I barely noticed her cautiously pulling me against the sofa by my hair. It didn't hurt, it turned me on even more! Iris paused briefly mid-kiss, probably in response to my stiffness down below, for she giggled a bit into my mouth before resuming. And oh, that little minx, she scooted her body slightly away from it as she giggled, which was as good as a command from my Queen that I was to get no relief from her; she wasn't ready for that, if she ever would be, and in that moment I knew I didn't mind one bit. Quite the opposite! I didn't want relief in that moment.

After a while, Iris pulled her mouth away from mine and began kissing and sucking on my neck. I briefly wondered if I would get a hickey, before thought was driven from my mind. From there, she moved on to just under my ear, and then she was sucking my earlobe, which is one of my biggest turn-ons. My girl-cock was almost painful from all the excitement, and I wondered if I could get an orgasm just from snogging.

Iris moved on to the other ear, and I lifted my fingers up so I wouldn't risk digging my fingernails into her back. When she stopped, I felt like crying, but I was soon rewarded with more glorious tongue wrestling.

And then, mid kiss, as my girl-cock throbbed its most painfully with need, Iris pulled away from the kiss with an evil smirk on her face and sniggered at me. I really did cry then, just a little, realizing that she knew full well how much I wanted relief, and was denying it to me. She sat up at the other end of the sofa, wiping her face dry, still trying very hard not to laugh. She smirked at me, the little vixen, and said, "If you want relief, you can go into your bedroom and give it to yourself it if you want. I'll wait."

I practically ran to the bedroom and shut the door in an almost-slam on my way into bed to rub out my sexual tension and frustration. While I did so, I could hear Iris cackling like a madwoman in the other room. Maybe she hadn't set out to wind me up so, but I knew that when she saw the opportunity, she had taken it. I was dating a child with a very evil sense of humor, it seemed.

*

After I had taken care of my little problem, I went back to the living room to find Iris clutching a stitch in her side, but no longer laughing. Her face fell a little bit when she saw mine, and she asked sheepishly, "You're not cross with me, are you?"

"A little. But, well... there's no denying I enjoyed that immensely. I didn't know I would, to be honest, but I do. So if it happens again, I won't mind."

"Okay, good. Cause I was just enjoying kissing you, and then I saw your girl-cock making a little tent down there, and I knew you were, uh, getting excited, so even though I'm not ready for sex, and dunno when or if I will be, well... no harm in a little teasing, right?"

I sat down on the sofa next to her. "Ah, but when you stopped and told me to finish myself off, you enjoyed that, I could tell."

She rolled her eyes at me. "Well duh!" We both giggled at that.

I yawned. "Okay, would it be too much to ask to just cuddle again? No more kissy stuff, just cuddles?"
"A Queen's duty is to her subjects," Iris replied haughtily, and snuggled up to my chest again. Before long, we were back to that quiet mood we'd been in earlier, me stroking her hair, face, and back while she stroked my arm again, talking quietly now and then about not much. At some point, we drifted off to sleep.

*

My Omnus woke us both up after who knew how long, and groggily I answered it. Matria's slightly concerned face popped up and almost immediately relaxed into a smile. "Ah, so that's the explanation; you two lovebirds fell asleep. Is that a sofa?"

"Yeah. What time is it?"

"It's almost 6," Matria informed us.

"Oh crap. Tea!"

"Yeah, we were waiting on Iris. Is she coming home, or will she be dining with you again?"

"I dunno. Let me ask Her Highness. Iris?"

Iris was barely awake. "Home? Food? I dunno." She looked at me questioningly.

"Well, maybe you should, Iris. My food is kinda... well, I'm not as good a cook as your family is, and that's when I put forth the effort."

The look on Iris's face plainly said she'd barely even registered my words as being words at all, much less made any sense out of them.

Matria chuckled "Well that decides it, you need to come home and Mama will get you woken up with food and drink."

Iris must have woken up a little more, because she asked, "Mama, can Rianna come over for tea, too?"

Matria smiled warmly and said, "If she wants to, yes."

Well of course I did. I told Matria I'd love to join them, and soon I was changing into something comfortable but suitable to be seen wearing out in public. In this case, it was a simple one-piece dress. Getting out of my shorts and t-shirt was more work than getting into the dress was.

Tea with Iris's family was again simple, cold, and delicious, given the heat of the day and how it was lingering. Iris did indeed wake up a lot, though I think she may have still been a little on the tired side. Our discussion mostly involved Iris giving a slightly censored account of the day's events. Matria seemed to pick up on this partial dishonesty, and prodded for the truth. Iris rolled her eyes at her Mama and said, "Don't worry, Mama," she said a little pompously as she buttered a piece of bread. "We didn't have sex. I'm not ready for that yet. But if and when I ever am, it will be safe sex."

Matria nodded, seeing the truth in it. "Good, that's good."

"And even though we've only been officially dating a couple days now, I trust Rianna. She's shown me she considers my feelings, stops when she's told to, doesn't do stuff she shouldn't without my permission, and is very thoughtful and practical, as well as being fun to talk with. A Queen could not ask for a better subject."

Everyone chuckled as I felt my face warm up, and I suddenly became very interested in my potato salad. By the time I looked up again, the conversation had moved on.

"So," Taanlen said, considering me from the table's far opposite corner, "I never caught your surname, Rianna."

"Oh. My name is Rianna Goode."

"And a fitting name it is, too," commented Iris, folding another piece of buttered bread in half before biting into it.

"Hey, that reminds me, I never caught Iris's surname either."

"Our family's surname," Derris said, "is Zahane."

"Interesting name."

"Thanks. And in case you were wondering, no, I don't know what it means, if anything."

I shrugged. "A lot of surnames are that way."

After that, the rest of the Zahane family had Iris and I tell them all about our date from the night before. They were almost as good an audience as Aren had been earlier, and I could tell by the words they exchanged with each other that a family trip was in the works, probably to the next city over, where the Mocksville Children's Dance Troupe would be playing next.

When dinner was over, Iris took me back down to the toyroom. I kinda wanted to play with the Autonotinies again, but Iris took me over to the VC to show me some of her designs. Having never seen any of her work before, but knowing her intelligence, I knew to expect above-average work, but looking at the work coming up on the three-vee display nearly floored me. She started off the exhibit with a design for Mesh-linked swarmbots the size of ladybugs that could do precision work with scores of tiny little tools that, even with the computer's built-in tools, must have taken weeks to design. The little robots were extremely versatile and could be linked to an AI so they could easily be made to switch specialties.

Astonished, I checked the backstage data, which records the design process, which is useful data for many reasons. The reason I checked it then was to see how many tools she had used to make it, and my astonishment grew; she had used minimal tools. So unless she had spent hours in autistic hyper-focus – and to be honest, I had no idea if she was on the autism spectrum or not – it would have taken her months to design this. I checked the timer; the design had taken a month and a half to complete.

"Wow. So little tool usage."

She shrugged and blushed. "Well, most of the built-in tools were getting in the way. But if you look at this bit, you'll see I downloaded a few bonus tools. And then this one over here, I actually designed that tool myself."

"You made a custom design tool? Iris, that alone... if you can get that tool authenticated, that alone is enough to get you a lot of notice in the design world. Granted, it's the Mesh-design world as opposed to engineering per se, but still..." an impossible thought struck me then. "Iris, this... this isn't your first creation, is it?"

She snorted. "Oh God no. Most of my early stuff is pretty cruddy. No, I don't wanna show you any of that crud. Just the stuff I really like."

"Well just let me say WOW. This is the most intricate swarmbot design I think I've ever seen. I know I'm only an interested reader of stuff like this, and nowhere near an expert, but still... if this design is viable, if it works like intended... hon, I don't think you'd need to experiment with nanodesign to win the science fair, with this design. I mean, if you still want to do that, by all means do, but... I think this alone would floor most judges. The size and intricacy of those tools, I can't even begin to imagine the practical uses of this swarmbot, but I'd bet anything there's scores, if not hundreds, for people to figure out. Iris?"

Iris was hiding her face in her hands. "Iris honey, what's wrong?"

"Nothing," she said, her voice muffled.

I gently pried her hand apart, and she let me. Her face was red as a tomato, and her eyes were watering; my lavish, if deserved, praise of her abilities had deeply embarrassed her.

"Oh Iris," I said, holding her close to me. "I didn't mean to embarrass you. But I meant every word. It's incredible. And you say there are others?"

She nodded weakly, not speaking at first. Then, as if it hurt to speak, she whispered, "this isn't even my best work..."

I revised my opinion of Iris then. I wasn't in love with a merely intelligent girl. I was in love with a child prodigy. If this girl didn't grow up to have her name in the annals of science and technology for the next 1000 years or more, it would be a truly damned shame.

*

Once I managed to comfort her out of her embarrassment, I decided that one jaw-dropping design at a time was enough for the both of us, and we went over to the Autonotinies after she put the file away. Iris was slightly subdued at first, but before long I managed to get her to forget all about her earlier embarrassment and really get into the game. As it was, we again were in the middle of a highly interesting scenario when Matria informed us it was Iris's bedtime. While Iris grudgingly trudged upstairs, I gave Matria a significant look. Matria nodded, and – knowing what Iris was going to want – we both followed her up to her bedroom.

As soon as Iris was in bed, Matria took me to the dining room and asked quietly, "What is it?"
"Don't be alarmed, because it's nothing bad. It's just... there's something I think you, Derris, and Taanlen need to see, on the VC downstairs. It's absolutely amazing, and the implications... I don't think you'll even believe me if I say it without you seeing the thing."

Matria nodded, and left the room. A few minutes later, I was escorting a bewildered Derris, Taanlen, and Matria downstairs, and pulling up the swarmbot design. It took some explaining of the meaning of the backstage data, everything Iris had told me, and everything I had told Iris, before it began to dawn on them what I was inferring.

"Wait," Taanlen choked out at last, "wait, so... are you saying... are you saying that our little Iris is... a genius or something?"

"More than that. I think you'll find, if you get some of her designs properly authenticated by a trusted, accredited authentication service, that Iris is, in fact, a child prodigy." They just gaped at me, unable to speak. I might have laughed if I wasn't feeling pretty much the way they looked.
I have to wonder if they had as difficult a time getting to sleep that night as I did.

(to be continued)