"Searching is an appropriate word, I suppose." Hannibal nodded. The desire inside of him was strong. Not something that anybody would see unless he wanted them to. But there was something about the woman who sat in the tree, he wanted to share with her. She had said her name was Red, but she'd said it in such a way as to make him believe that her name was actually something else. "Are you still Red? Or have you changed your mind on that?"
The nakedness of the females didn't evoke any reaction in him either way. Not pleasure nor revulsion. Perhaps he found it a little absurd that they should be so publicly revealing themselves, but in the end they were just bodies.
It was, maybe, a little fun to be here watching them. For them to be so unknowing that somebody such as himself was nearby. Making plans for one or more of them. They would look over and see nothing more than a boy standing under a tree and a woman in it. They had seen much stranger things in their time, he was sure of it.
"I have no doubt that they can." He glanced up, briefly. "They may not have the absolute free will that you and I have, but for the most part, they are left to their own devices. Allowed to live as they wish. Occasionally given instruction. But if what I have seen is any great matter, they are not puppets. Not always. Their actions speak of those who are doing what they wish. None of it is artificial. If the City itself were controlling them now, their movements wouldn't be quite so fluid, I don't think. Their decisions would be more along the lines of what it thinks we would like to see. The turning of this game from something playful to an actual competition based on the showing of flesh speaks to actual human nature."
Not that he believed they were actually human. Not like he was. Perhaps their basic genetic code would match his, were he to take a look. But he believed that he would see mutations. Things that the City inserted because it didn't know the science. Things that should have made the people walking monstrosities, but didn't because that's not what the City wanted.