Prompt: A girl has strange tattoos. Tell the story why. 

Andromeda knew she was unclean.

She knew it by the gray, coarse fabric that scraped at her skin every moment she moved, the heavy-soled work boots that gave her blisters when her peers were donned in heels. She knew it by the way people looked at her, the slightest sneer curling their lips, when they closed down web pages to block her, to shield the sight of her from their cybernetic vision. She could see the web pages, of course, even when nobody else could.

But most of all were the permanent scars that had been left behind, the snaking pattern of polygons creeping up her arms, snarled around her wrists, spiraling up to a finish at her shoulders. The ink would forever stay under her skin, a physical sign of her blemish to the face of humanity, one that everyone could see.

She had been told she was different for so long she had started to believe it.  Where the rest of the world's hair was a dusky brown, highlighted and tinted in waves to be ever more glamorous or stylish, hers was a limp, loose blonde. Her sister, Cassiopeia, who was allowed to go to school, once told her about genetics and recessive genes, but Andromeda could read her expression. Cass was no fool, and she knew there was more to Andromeda than a long-lost recessive gene and blonde hair.

By hacking the net Andromeda knew that there were approximately ten thousand unclean in the city of Ketch alone, but she had only seen one other before. The rest hid themselves in lowly jobs, sleeves rolled down to hide the interlocking shapes that laced up their arms, hair tucked under caps and eyes downcast. Andromeda had resolved as a child that she never wanted to be like them. She held her head high, gaze burning into the eyes of others, enduring the small torments of her lowly status, until they beat her back down to subservience.

But there was one who would never be conquered, and Andromeda knew it.

She had discovered the strange gift that pegged her as unclean one night when she was five years old, eyes wide open as she traced the shapes on her arms, then went downstairs to ask her father to turn off the light. He tugged on his beard and shook his head, but was kind enough to show her that there were no lights on. Andromeda returned to bed, only to come down moments later to insist that there was a light blazing downstairs. The only light she could find, though, was one of her father's net pages strung up before his vision. Two small words at the top of the tab caught her eye: private page. She shouldn't be able to see it, and yet the page shone before her like a tiny supernova.

As a child she dove into the net with vigor. Because the unclean couldn't go to school, for fear of cheating and the like, she taught herself from home, when father went to work and mother went to school to teach. Even though mother was a teacher herself she always refused to tutor Andromeda, although she practically fell over herself to help Cass with the most insignificant homework.

Andromeda liked to think she loved Cass, but at times a vein of envy would run through her and her hands would tremble until the house's power fizzled and all the net pages crashed. Cass was everything Andromeda wasn't -- beautiful, outspoken, and powerful where Andromeda was meek and lowly. Mother and father adored her, fawning over her every step, their perfect daughter with her perfect looks and perfect grades. 

Their eyes would fall on their other daughter, though, the one they hid away, burying her existence so soundly that they seemed to be burying her in a grave. Andromeda, stay inside. Andromeda, we're having guests over, go to your room and be quiet.

She liked to think she loved mother and father, too, but it was much harder to pretend.

Despite all of their fretting and overbearing protection, they couldn't keep Andromeda in the house while they were away. She loved the city, extending her consciousness over the city, feeling each pulse of the beating heart of the net. Lush rewards dangled before her eyes -- codes to bank accounts, credit cards, secret information only her eyes could peruse, but she shoved them away, preferring to simply observe the beauty of the tech.

She would sit on park benches for hours, watching as men and women strolled by, with perfectly normal brown hair and an impervious business professional aura, but Andromeda could see past that. She could search browser histories and messages, read the pages that flitted before their eyes, blurring the contact lenses that projected them over their vision. She could read each and every name of the people boarding the pneumatic, and the ones in a bigger rush hurrying to the magnetic levitation tracks. Even their agendas were open for her to read, so she could see what in particular they were late for. 

That was why the world hated the unclean. She could see the hate in the citizens of Ketch's eyes as they passed her on the park bench, the way some of them pulled up blank tabs or tightened their technological defenses against her. Most of these shields were shoddy and she could break through them easily, but she chose not to. If they would hate her, fine. But she wouldn't give them reason to hate her any more.

And so she ducked her head low, avoiding their burning gaze, their gritted teeth, the way their fists would clench when they glanced at her golden hair. Mothers would steer their brunette children away, some even going so far as to cover the kids' eyes. Each action was like a wound, and soon Andromeda was hunched with the load of it. The hate forced her to buckle under the weight, and she couldn't bear it any longer. Soon she had no more fight than the other unclean, always ducking out of sight, hiding from view.

But there was one glaring exception, one with a proud expression on his features, Andromeda's strength to keep going.

The first time she had seen him was in the park. Most of the people were lounging around, reading or watching movies, never straying from their blankets or benches, eyes glazed as the action played across their retinas. She had been wandering through the winding paths that stretched the park's expanse, partially because they were beautiful, but more so that  no one ever came down the paths. They were her safe haven. 

They she saw him, sitting with ramrod-straight posture on one of the benches. The first thing she noticed about him was his flaxen blond hair, long to his shoulders and topped with a battered newsboy cap that might have been green many years ago, but had faded to the ugly color of a bruise. His clothes were stiff and drab like hers, the mandatory gray of the unclean, but it was his face that shocked her the most.

He was handsome, of course, extraordinarily so, with elfin looks and prominent cheekbones that made him look ethereal, but the feature that took her breath away was his smile -- a wide, content smile free of the pain of the world. In one moment the weight lifted from her shoulder and she took an involuntary step forward, because if this boy could survive, so could she.

Every so often, when Cass was busy with homework and mother and father were otherwise occupied her feet would trace the usual path to the park, where she would sneak peeks at the boy, always smiling, always watching the world go by. His appearance changed little, except one time when he sported a brilliant black eye, but it only made him look more intriguing still. Of course, it was foolish to watch him from afar, she knew that, and she wasn't so naive to say that she was in love. Most of all she desired to talk to the boy, to ask how he could stand it, how he could stand the torment of his own fellows.

He was always a short distance away, but her feet were glued to the ground, firmly placed on the grass with her own body betraying her.

The closest they had ever had to contact was when she slowly extended her consciousness to him, skirting past the net feeds and blaring radio dramas that cluttered the air, a fleeting touch past his own mind, which burned unlike any screen could, a ray of hope so bright it stole her breath from her lungs.

Sometimes Andromeda wondered if her own mind looked like that too, so bright and powerful.

How could she return to her home afterwards? The TV screen was glaringly bright compared to the steady glow of the boy's aura, even when her father pulled up the shows on private tabs. Cass chatted with her friends over message and the text scrawled past Andromeda's vision, even when she pressed her eyelids together tightly, and the static tone of mother on the call trumpeted in her ears. The boy was so different, so natural, and she needed to feel that touch again. 

She would never approach him, just let her mind run circles around his, basking in the warmth and glow of his consciousness that no one else had. No one else glowed at all but this one boy, this one who the world said was flawed, was different, was special. No one looked past his blond hair to his handsome features, to his beaming smile, because he was unclean and that was what mattered. Andromeda couldn't hate them for it -- instead she felt sorry that the world couldn't feel his aura, his strength.

Maybe one day she would speak to him. Maybe he would impart some sagelike wisdom on her, a way to shoulder the burden of the world, but for now she was satisfied to lean on his strength. When father was cruel and everyone else was crueler, she could trust on the courage of the boy in the park to guide her, to give her what she needed to keep going. And maybe, just maybe, she would talk to him, but that was a decision for a later date. For now, she was satisfied simply to watch and learn.