Hmm.

He was on the second floor of the apartment when Craig heard it. She must have been on the fifth, sixth floor? Still, her screams hurt his ears.

"Son of a bitch," he sighed.

Derek huddled in the hallway, hands over his ears. When her wails seemed to be dying down, he poked his head around the corner. Linda was staring at the ceiling and catching her breath. She looked up at him impassively.

"You... really gave me the works." she said between gasps. Derek winced. "Too much?"

"Yes," she replied tonelessly. "Definitely."

He rushed to her side. What had he done? As if she heard his thoughts, she explained. "I think you might have hormone bombed me." She glanced around the room. "It's really weird. It's different than I thought."

"Wait a minute, 'hormone bombed'?" Derek asked incredulously.

"The medical name is long and boring," she said without affect. "It happens sometimes with TBIs and occasionally ECT. It's a huge risk for people like me. If someone experiences too much positive sensation at once, their brain fires all the pleasure pathways."

"What?" he stared at her. "Linda, why aren't you shutting down? What are you saying?"

She stared at the fan. She hadn't made eye contact yet. "After that, there's an interim period that can last days or even years. Think of it like a long hangovers. Some people get very emotionally unregulated, some people go into a coma. You're lucky that I appear to be experiencing one of the easiest variations."

"Years?" Derek whispered. His eyes had lost focus.

"Yes," she said. "Complete emotional blackout. I don't have them, I can't see them, I have a hard time even thinking in emotional terms. As in, I'm just now starting to realize that you might be upset."

He stared at her silently for a second, eyes wide. "Ah, well, it's really hard to interpret silences. I suppose that means you're still upset. You understand, I can read your body language and even hear what you tell me. I just can't make sense of words like 'upset', 'happy', 'sad'. I have to remember which ones are good and bad. I see that you're-"

"What the fuck?" he cried. She flinched slightly. "What the fuck? Linda, oh my God, what the fuck?"

"I see I was right that you're upset. I'm sorry about that." She sat up, the sheets falling off of her sweat-soaked chest. She stared at the wall for a moment, then looked him in the eye. "After the interim phase, we enter the final phase. This is a profound connection to the source of our... pleasure."

"You just now thought to make eye contact..." he said softly. He stared into her eyes and saw only calculation.

"However this pans out, Derek, I'm yours now. Even during this interim period, I am linked to you." She offered a small, patently phony smile. "I do what you need for you. I'm going to be whatever you want or need. Many of us end up sex slaves, but we're also represented by at least a few senators. The hormone-bombed, the servants."

He sputtered. "'Servants'? This doesn't sound like neuroscience. I think we need to talk to your handlers."

She stared. Her mouth was gradually relaxing back into slack neutrality. "Of course. They'll need to know about this. At the very least, we won't be renewing our contract. Now that I'm yours, you'll probably want to take some classes. A lot of the new ones do."

"Classes?"

Was his hearing bad? He seemed to be overwhelmed. That made sense, but she couldn't figure out why he kept repeating her words. "Yes. Let me think for a second. Ok, I already told you about the interim phase and the bond. Think of it like this: the event causes my brain to go haywire and try to rewire itself for an indeterminate amount of time. Whatever's wrong - often some sort of emotional dysregulation - the resolution always ends in attachment to the source."

"Me."

"Correct. It often is driven by whatever was the deficit in interim. In this case, since I've lost all emotions and ability to empathize, I suspect I will feel all positive emotions toward you at once. I'll be in love to the point that it's literally classifiable as brain damage. I hope you like me, because at some point in the future I'm going to really like you."

"Christ," he said. She raised an eyebrow. "Are you religious?"

He looked at her differently, then sighed. "Oh, no. That's just a saying. I'm very, very overwhelmed."

"Many people find my condition unnerving. Which brings me to another point about the interim period. Based on stories like mine I've heard, it's very likely that I will be able to experience a few sorts of pleasure or pain in my otherwise gray, bland existence. Since it's largely tied to non-neurological systems, sexual pleasure can often register with us."