Forums » Sci-Fi Roleplay » The Last Light

Robert corrected the terrified marine, stating, “not exactly, as we have the security bots, and maybe....the outside defences, but if not, then we will have inside defences, well, the ones that actually work will help, not to mention the armour, weapons, and home advantage, but, one thing I should mention, try not to get too close to the enemy, as they might have augmented limbs, so if they’re getting to close for comfort, don’t stick around to find out.” He then saluted back to the marine, and smiling, the respect was returned, saying “for the federation, for the Last Light.” his smile faded, as he granted their wish quickly, not wanting them to wait any longer, and sighs, knowing how some will die, as all gunfights do, “at least it’s an honourable death, right?” He pondered, he then slowly walked to towards the shooting range, as he called it, behind the troops.

It was the equivalent of midnight on the Last Light, when the hallways were all but abandoned and as lonesome as the tomb, when the knock came.

It was only a mild tap at first. But it was persistent. Like a single-syllable sound uttered, muffled, over and over. Like a distant alarm to slowly, arduously drag someone from the depths of sleep and back to the land of the living, where light hurt their eyes and people died. It grew louder. It didn’t stop. Somebody wanted in. But not enough to so much as try to open the door, it seemed. Must not have been all that important. But they were persistent. And eventually it would have to become clear that they weren’t going anywhere until that door was answered. Even if faced with overwhelming evidence that it would not be answered, the knocking would continue. Even if the battle to get that door answered had been lost from the start - the knocking would continue. Had this intruder upon Ike’s silent reflection no consideration at all for him?

Couldn’t they just let him wither away in peace?

Apparently not. Because the knocking didn’t stop. It wouldn’t stop. Probably not even if he actually opened the door, or so it might seem. But whoever was so callously bothering him - and at this hour, no less - was making the statement that it wasn’t really a choice.

Even if it took half the night

It wouldn’t stop until he returned to reality just enough to


Or

He could just tell them to

No ones awake, no one that could stop you

The void called to him, stronger and stronger each second, it wanted him, it needed him. He belonged there. Why was he continuing to resist it? Why did he only sit there and stare out at the vast empty expanse before him? He didn't know.

Was he waiting for someone?

No ones coming, they all wanted the war machine you were!

Was that true? Had the others been clued on what he really was? No they couldn't have ... but then again, how did he know that they weren't lying to him? Did they really just care about what was inside? No, that wasn't true! They cared about him, his creator cared about him, he had people there ... didn't he?

The ships so close, you can still do it.

Surely someone would come... Maybe she'd come...he could show them the void

Nobodies coming

He looked upwards, swinging his head slowly as motors unused to almost too long swung back into gear, the single act felt like each second his head would simply disconnect from his shoulders and roll away, for a moment he hoped it would. Dulled violet eyes blinked, most of the room was invisible to their sight, only two things pricked their way past receptors that had become practically blinded through misuse: The void, calling to him and the door, unlocked and so easy to open.

All he had to do was lurch over, press a button and be released, two short corridors and then ... then ... another door, a simple entry, he could be away, blasting off into the depths of space. He could be alone, he wouldn't need to be lied to, he didn't even need a personality, it would be him and the void.

Alone.

No one could stop you

Limbs aged and cracked with that rust endemic to Synthetics who didn't keep them powered, he swung out of his sitting position and immediately tumbled to the floor, legs failing to support his weight. It was a pitiful sight, the Synthetic, all his systems slowly dying, straining to keep themselves online for just that one more step, one more push until freedom. All he needed to do was get to that ship. They were past the allowed shutdown for cooling point and had accrued more problems than his self-healing functions could cope with, he couldn't heal, not without someone else. He was going to rust and shut down, but in that moment of realisation, he knew he had to do it blasting off to explore space.

He could pretend out there that he was cared for, that if nothing else, the void welcomed him. He would be happy in those few moments if only he could reach them.

A knock on the door.

Ignore it!

The knocking did not stop, it stayed, tapping away rhythmically on the solid metal block.

They'll leave soon!

Tap, tap, tap

Ask them to leave.

He shuffled closer, if someone was there, perhaps he could be healed, perhaps he could see her one more time...

DON'T OPEN THAT DOOR! THEY WILL NEVER LET YOU ESCAPE!

He pressed the button.

...

...

Riley would be confronted with an equally wretched sight as that which was plastered all over her face and body, although this was not in the way Ike carried himself, the way alone he did that, dead dull eyes, limbs that bowed like they could barely support his weight, the look of someone who'd given up. His skin too no longer looked like it should, instead of the previous, pinky flesh that had covered his body it was now grey with tiny blotches of mold and rust springing up in droves over each patch of exposed artificial flesh. He'd once looked so much larger than life, now if someone said he'd been built a hundred years ago, no one would have batted an eyelid.

It was her, standing there, as silent as the Synth who now stood opposite her, was she back to tell him once more that they were no longer friends, that he'd broken her trust too much to ever stand a chance of simply chatting to her again. He wanted to go back, to relive those few seconds of joy, of bliss in finding someone he could connect to, to understand and more than anything else, to have a friend.

She's afraid of you

He tried to deny it, to think of anything else, but no matter how quickly his mind ran, no matter how quickly it retreated to the void outside, that thought always found him. He'd done this to her, they'd been friends, Riley the fearless and Ike the wanderer, now so quickly it had come to this. Ike looked at her and once more became deathly afraid of himself, what he could and had done.

You could never hurt someone in the void

He lost control of his face, tears pouring out of his eyes in sudden and gushing torrents, tumbling along his face, bouncing off drying bits of rust and crashing to the hard metal floor below. The other thing he lost control of was his eyes themselves, as they sparkled in that way they always did when facing the person he'd come to view as his own little hero.

There was only one thing he could do now, only one thing he wanted to do, it was not the void, not the ship and not leaving, he was rusting now, what else did he have to loose?

"RILES!" He cried out, his voice filled, not with hate, not with fear, not with any emotion besides one, regret. He should have stayed by her side, he should not have let everything else overwhelm and consume him if this was his one chance he knew he had to make her understand how much she still meant to him.

He simply threw himself forward, arms outstretched to wrap around her and bring the smaller girl into a hug. There would be no recoiling, no fear this time. He simply wanted one last chance to be able to share a moment with her.

"I'm sorry, I'm so so sorry." Ugly tears ran down his face, even if she recoiled in time and avoided the attempt to sweep her into a hug, not that she couldn't have resisted it. His limbs were too weak now to force anyone to do anything. These tears were above all genuine, he knew that at least, if nothing else about him was true, he knew this statement to be fact.

"You're still my hero."

She hadn’t known what she’d been hoping for, not really. The fact that this was a lie didn’t make it false. Standing there, as if with her back pressed up to the pole and withering under the glare of the firing squad. Like some stray animal unsure of whether it was about to get fed or kicked, and preparing for the worst. That’s all Riley Miles was, really. A stray animal. For all she had accused Annag of being Kato’s pet, was Riley herself all that different?

Of course she was. Riley was the one who had fleas.

This was a mistake-

The cry of her name made Riley wince reflexively and take a half step back, already prepared to take the inevitable strike but unable to keep herself from one last-ditch attempt at stumbling back to safety. Avoiding an unwanted touch.

But her meager escape attempt was worthless, given her eyes being locked on the floor when Ike came lunging at her, grabbing her- the engineer let out a strangled, almost girlish yelp and immediately went to twist away, break free of his grip, throwing her hands ineffectually up between them - but having effectively thrown himself at her, the synth’s arms were already locked around her and pulling her in by the time she was able to consciously override the animal part of her brain. Had she bucked, twisted and struggled with the tenacity she had already proven capable of, or even half as much, she would have been able to break free with ease. But Riley was better than that. Better than instinct. She had to be.

Forcing herself not to pull away didn’t mean she wanted it, after all. She didn’t want anything. But she supposed she could take it. If she had to.

Nothing really mattered, not anymore, not now, not even the void. Not when he held her tightly in his arms. Sure he'd stumbled a few times, almost been knocked over by her last feeble attempt at a struggle, but really it didn't matter. They were back together, back in each other's arms, sharing that essential lifeblood of friendship with each other that they both so desperately craved.

The ship could have come crumbling down around him in those moments and he probably wouldn't have noticed, the stars could have reignited and he wouldn't have cared, no matter how much of his life was a lie, the most important thing to him was the girl huddling inside his arms. This time he would never let the same mistakes cloud their relationship, this time he was going to stay with her no matter what happened.

A soft gulping and more tears rolled down his face, uncontrollably splashing out along his cheeks and into Riley's hair. Yet in some way, these were not the same ugly, terrified tears of moments prior, they were tears of joy streaming down his face, an act he halted when he buried his face into her hair.

She forgave you-

He squeezed a little tighter, holding the girl closer to his chest, it felt too good to be true, yet she was really there, the same smell, the same messy red hair, the same stone eyes, really standing there, buried in his chest. It all seemed so strange, that someone who he'd hurt so badly before almost destroying himself could conjure up so many emotions, could be so comforting, yet here she was.

All the pain, all the fear, all the uncertainty, she'd fought her way past it in the same way he'd won his way through hers, Ike didn't know if he was truly a person anymore, but now he simply didn't care, it didn't matter when he was able to give this winner as many prises as he could give. Starting with his undying loyalty, there wasn't much else he could give, he didn't understand the demons that had been eating away at her from the inside, all the horrors she'd had to endure, but learning that could come later, until then he could be there for her, no matter when or why, he'd be there for her.

In a strange way, he craved, needed physical contact, this reaffirmation that despite all the made up parts of his brain, someone still saw him as a person.

In that moment, that realisation of some still glowing spark of inner humanity, it transformed into a raging flame, the only physical difference would be his eyes, which now sparkled with the intensity of a dying star, inflating to an enormous size with the strength of ten times that which it had previously been, not that anyone could see that bit, hidden as they were inside her hair.

She was the one who had when all other points of hope had flickered and died, been the one person who sat there and steadied him, had given him the message you are not alone!

Riley and Ike vs the world.

If it needed to come to that, he would have no hesitation in placing himself beside her, it was the only place he knew now that he belonged, to protect and to be protected by this little red-headed engineer.

The rust no longer mattered, the sheer effort taken previously for him to stand forgotten, this was all he cared about, that now, something which had seemed eternally broken inside of him was fixed. Someone now stood by his side or in his arms to face this dead galaxy with together. He felt her hands grasp onto his shirt and press up against him, in response he nuzzled himself closer as if to say. Here take as good a hold as you want, I'm not going anywhere, not without you.

When she'd first arrived on his door she'd given him the lie that she was here to fix something, now that lie had come about to be the truth in its own way.

She'd fixed him.

---

In the shooting range, the troops placed there would be staying up all night, practicing their shots with laser rifles, set with just low enough power to create burn marks on targets, but not high enough to melt through them like any real weapon of death. If one hit them in a real fight, it would be practically painless, a noble death, at least that's what the manufacturers said.

But as Robert would know, as did the man entering the room behind him, any deaths in battle like this tended to be slow and painful, the shot cauterising the wound so quickly that it was only during treatment and loss of vital organs that finally killed soldiers.

"Heya Rob..." The voice was low and distant, as if living in some far off land. Considering the speaker that was all too likely.

Kato blinked a slow heavy blink before turning away from the practicing would be soldiers towards his best friend. "How are they coming along? Do you think any of them will be ready? Properly ready for a fight I mean? How many do you think we'll loose?"

Robert scratched the back of his head, thinking long and hard about his answer, and said, “in a day and a half they’ll be ready, roughly, given how long it’s been since they’ve actually fired a,gun, how long practice will take, and how small of a time period, so we’ll have to rush it.” he was speaking with authority, like he was some hotshot general in the feds army, and considering everything, or at least trying to consider everything, and then continued after a pause in a hushed tone, not wanting the others to hear what he was to say next, “most we lose is 8, least would be 5 as these morts Have had more preparation’n all that.”

Mackie always loved walking the halls when fresh cadets were aboard, given the mixed reactions that came with having someone who looked like her on a ship like this. The woman was liked by most of the regular crew, and most folks that didn’t like her just had no real opinion. And she annoyed some folks. Mackie somehow knew the names of every crew member aboard, and she usually knew all of the cadets’ names by the end of the first day. And so, with that arsenal of interpersonal relations under her belt, it was not uncommon to see her sauntering down the hallway with that lazy, hip-swaying gait of hers, fist-bumping, high-fiving and finger-gunning the crew, referring to them by first names or nicknames and often sort of ‘checking in’ - since she somehow managed to retain a lot of personal information from folks.

The cadets would see the crew respond to her - usually reciprocating, sometimes enthusiastically, sometimes not - sometimes sort of snubbing, not that it bothered her - and then she would get to watch them react to the others.

But it was interacting with the cadets themselves she found the most entertaining, since they usually just didn’t know what to do. She was so improbable that their inexperienced minds started drawing blanks, and making them act n all different, ad almost universally amusing ways. Her personal favorite was when one of the kids stood real uptight and gave a snappy salute, and belted out their name and rank like they had been taught in training. The look on their faces when she gave them a fist - or even something weird, like poking them gently on the forehead - and lazily introduced herself as the singular name she was known as - it was precious. She didn’t make fun of them for it. But it did make her giggle.

That was what she was doing along the fairly short route from the armoury to the firing range. And when she did arrive, poking her head in and letting the body follow, she saw Kato and Rob talking, and decided not to interrupt. Instead, she meandered over to one of the marines who was apparently a little bit behind on his practice than the others. For a moment, she stood behind him. Briefly stood on her toes to sort of look at him from the side, examining him and quite possibly making him a little uncomfortable. ”Yo bruh can Ilike, show you a trick?” And, politely waiting for the response, proceeded to lean in and start adjusting his limbs around, changing his posture, talking on in that lazy, SoCal pothead drawl as she did.

”This rifle isn’t, like, the best for your stature and whatever. Like you can totally still use it, but you gotta roll with the rifle, y’know? So like, sorta stand like this - press the stock up like that - there. Alright, give it a try.” And then, leaning back, Mackie watched him improve his accuracy by a considerable margin, complimented him on it. Not everybody aboard liked to admit that the paradox woman really knew what she was doing when it came to firearms. But there was no denying it. It was just that she didn’t spend a lot of time outside the armoury, so it was easy to assume that gunsmithing was the only of her unusual talents, rather than one among several.

The contrast between their gruff leader and the incongruous hippie was surreal, to say the least. She spent a few minutes just sort of helping people out - mostly adjusting stances or talking casually about aiming methods.

”When you aim down the sights - your like, field of vision or whatever gets like, super narrow, which can totally brutalize your aim - so like, pull your head back just a little…”

“These old LX-94s are dope, but like, you gotta’ be careful when you swap out the battery. If you like, suck it too dry, you’ll get this sorta’ residual funky-fresh @#$% all up in the focusing mod. So you should like, reload when you’re at like, one third charge.”

“Dude, bro, it’s all in the breathing. You gotta breathe. Like, really breeeeathe. Yeah, that’s better. Like that. Nah don’t try shootin’ yet.Try to make it so, like, you’re breathing that way all unconsciously or whatever. Then try it.”

Several of the rusty marines improved a little. A couple improved rather significantly. Several probably resented a little being shown how to shoot better by someone like Macks - but those were probably new guys. In general, she seemed to have helped boost the skill level a bit, and morale along with it.

When Kato and Rob had finished, she finished up what she was doing - which, this time, was leaning in close and noticing some imperfection n one marine’s rifle, and trading a better one out with him - and approached the two hulking men before heading out with the rifle over her shoulder. ”Yooo either of you seen that Annag girl?” She asked. It hadn’t taken Mackie to learn all the details about the stressful events occurring over the past day or so. ”Sec’s ARC-O-Matic is almost done, just like, calibrating the targeting interface which is a toootal drag and I got some time while I like, wait for the program to run and whatever. So figured I could, like take her measurements.” Which, everyone would know quite well, meant ’hang out, eat pizza, smoke a little and talk, if she could get them to’. ”Like, if you could send her over to Boomtown at some point that’d be dope.”

And then, catching Rob's eye with a meaningful, unusually solemn glare, she adjusted her joint and in the process pointed subtly at three of the marines, followed by a well disguised cutting 'nil' gesture. A discrete way of telling him that she had judged three of the marines as being unfit. Or, more to the point, 'Those three will die if you send them into this'.

Of course, there had been so little action in Mackie's time aboard the Light (How long had she been kicking around, anyway? It was like she'd always just been there, and nobody ever qustioned it. Oh well. Didn't matter.) that there was no concrete eidence of her intuition and judgement being correct. He'd just have to trust her.

ANd with that out of the way, Mackie flipped her totally gnarly dreads and sached out of the firing range, as lofty and aloof - yet paradoxically on-point - as always.

He listened and watched, mostly doing the latter. The silent giant of a being that spent so much of his time simply watching, eyes locked on monitors or those carrying out his commands, viewing the death counts tally up, each number, each figure showing more and more corpses piling up under his command. Each moment, each seconds bringing more and more faces, voices to chastise and fight him.

Why not blow them away? You have the power

Every battle, every war had left thousands, millions and so many times many, many billions dead. Many times those of his own side, the cadets he was watching here were simple more numbers, more figures on a scaling graph to tally your own dead to the enemies.

The ships' guns could vaporize them in seconds, the civilians are only dead weight

He could do it, he knew he could, it would be such a simple order, even to bring one of the ships many point defense beams around and onto the ship, it would only require such few calculations, such a casual press of a button. The ringworld would be saved, ten more figures for a chart, thirteen extra for his own side.

You wouldn't even have to use anyone else, you can fire.

Sacrificing lives for the nation he fought for, it was something he'd become very adept at, more so than most generals around him. It had become so simple, troop numbers so high, he was simply doing population levels a favor. At first, he'd got the simple nickname: The butcherer. That hadn't even begun to comprehend the dead he left behind him. In the end, his name alone had simply come to be synonymous with the apocalypse.

Spoken in hushed voices, whispers of a name which brought so much death, the extermination of so many worlds, the soldier who had single-handedly forced a rewrite the Accords of Sol in an attempt to bring the Union down. Going Katolai - a term applied to so many murderous warlords who used simple brute strength and total disregard of consequences to achieve their aims.

It would be such a simple task, who would notice more drops in the ocean?

His mouth moved to reply to the others but his eyes were never there, something was missing. "Annag? She'll be around, I'll go find her as soon as I'm done here." Limbs too seemed off, moving in oddly jerky movements, almost, but not quite as if a puppeteer was moving the bulky machine. "She'll be eager to get fitted up with some new limbs"

A jerk and the head twitched to look at the soldiers, so eager and willing, in most cases to be sent to a battle they were likely to die in. The numbers tallied up in his head. These were troops, the authorities would send him more, even that drone Sec. It was simply a machine, it could be replaced, they had more. They always had more. He could always set a trap, wait for landing and blow them all out the airlock. The civilians would be saved, his mission complete. Why bother using all of the cogs when you can only use a few to jam the entirety of the enemies machine?

If those three are going to die anyway why not use them?

Katolai blinked and gazed out at the people that surrounded him, figures on a chart waiting to be tallied. Lives that were to be fed to the machine to keep it going, keep it moving, Defending the ringworld at any cost imaginable. He'd wanted to stop, he'd seen so many, collected so many voices, but one more time, he could rebuild his reputation. Destroying the current and all future rebellions so long as he lived.

"Take those three and order them to stand down, I'll take their place on the frontlines. I've so much more experience with me with than anyone else here, make sure they all know to be positioned behind me if I give a signal leave the bay. Do you understand Robert?"

Kato looked around and sighed, this was a battle he'd hoped for so long to avoid and yet here it was, finding him once more. He guessed ten more voices would easily have room inside his head.

There's so much space for more

Robert shrugged and said. “alright, i’ll go do that.” He then walked away from Kato, towards the crew and called out the three out and asked them to come over to him, then told them what Kato wanted. “Kato decided that you three aren’t...Improving in a steadily manner, so your service won’t be necessary, you can go back to where ever you’re supposed to be. Now can you please put the laser rifles back?”

Time had ceased to exist. It was almost like falling asleep - dozing off on a summer’s afternoon, when every blink seemed to be a reawakening to reality. Every moment of conscious thought - rare and spaced out between gaps of blissful half-sleep - was a restart, reliving that first, euphoric moment of reclining in the sultry air and letting all troubles slide into the earth and sky.

Her hands gripped his shirt, clinging to it, clinging possessively to him - claiming him as her own. As much her cherished property as the metal tag hidden beneath her shirt, locked close to her heart and never permitted to wander. Never allowed to stray.

That was what made up life, after all. Clinging to what mattered as the torrential rains like pile-drivers crashed down, and the unforgiving current swept and screamed and roared and tore away anyone who couldn’t cling hard enough. Well Riley could cling hard enough. She had learned well. Too well. And she wasn’t going to make the same mistake again.

Ike was hers now. And there wasn’t anything he could do about it.

Save for breaking her heart. For going back on it all. For changing his mind, coming to his senses, realizing that he had only been caught up in his emotions, and of course the brat was an intolerable, untouchable little cretin, and how foolish he had been to get swept up in it again-

And as the voice in the back of Riley’s mind protested this pure and positive thing, Riley told it to @#$% off. Over and over. She wasn’t listening. Not now. It felt too good. Let the insecurities come later - when she was curled up alone in bed and running over every mistake, every minor error, every scenario with each ending worse than the next. Let the doubts come when there was nobody around to brush them away. Now was not the time. Now was the time to tell herself, over and over, that this time was going to be different. This time, everything was going to be okay-

The silence of Ike’s room, seeming impersonal and lonesome around them, was a tangible thing. It hung in the air, and clung to the ceiling and bored into their ears, abated only by that occasional small sound of humanity produced by one or the other. It hung until their breathing became the dominant sound - like the distant peep-toads on that sultry summer afternoon, a soundtrack that sank into the subconscious and became like the universe, but alive and reassuring and warm.

She nuzzled into him, redoubled her possessive grip on his shirt when it began to slack, ignoring the soreness in her fingers or the way the distressed flesh of her skinned knuckles cried out beneath the gauze. That didn’t matter. She didn’t matter. All that mattered was holding on as tight as she could, savoring this decadent moment the way she should have the first time. Lying to herself, telling herself it was okay to be this way, okay to do this. Convincing herself, if only temporarily, that this show of weakness might be something else.

At very least, she thought she could trust him not to go yapping about all of this foolishness to the others. Riley was convinced that Annag had already gone and spread the word all over the Last Light that the bitchy little engineer was actually weak and pitiful. She was convinced that everyone knew how the Mort had seen her - curled up, bloody, at rock-bottom and scratching nails to the bone as she tried in vain to hide under some filthy rock. But surely, after this display, Ike wouldn’t do such a thing. He wouldn’t spread stories of this moment of weakness...Would he?

Would he?

After all - the young man she had met when first boarding the Light had been quite different. Indeed, events had clearly shaped him - but could anyone ever change that much? What if, as a means of covering up his own moment of insecurity, he could out her -

No.

No no no.

Milo never would have done something like that. And while she needed to remember that Ike was no replacement - the similarities were there. The parallels. The memories, relived right - relieved as they should have been. She barely knew Ike. And in later years, looking back, Riley would marvel at the nature of teenage life - how so much could happen in so short a time. Her adult mind, then, would scarcely be capable of comprehending the intensity and certainty of these seventeen-year-old emotions. But that didn’t make them any less real. This was real. This was real-

”Y-you...y’bette’ not tell noone ‘bout’is, y’hear?”

The two of them had been standing there for so long that the words - small and stammering as they were, wracked with uncertainty and fear - would seem very far away. It seemed like she hadn’t spoken in decades. The dream wasn’t quite over yet. And, the girl would find, it wasn’t going to end for some time still.

The words, though, may not have seemed quite right for the occasion. Clearly this moment was important to both of them. So then why was she ashamed of it? Why was she ashamed of him? Did she really want him to keep their friendship a secret? Or was it only this moment that she felt the need to conceal and hide away from the others? Would he understand? There were too many uncertainties, even now-

The words were like a minute island in a great, vast sea of time - for it was yet another incomprehensible, uncountable period of silent embrace before she spoke again - never moving from her position, keeping buried in his shoulder, clinging to his shirt. Again, the words were muffled by her absolute unwillingness to pull away, even for an instant - though the tone was different now. Her breathing had settled down. No more hiccup sounds or allergy-sniffles. Just breathing, and the eternity of peace that came with it.

”You look like @#$%.” She said at last, and with a simple, almost casual finality that suggested the moment was over now, and she was going to return to her usual abrasive, intolerable, bitchy little self. Oh joy.

Again, silence passed over them. The silence of thought, this time. Of gears turning. Of the detective, going over the events of the past few seconds in order to uncover the critical detail they had missed.

Then, again - but with the higher tone which suggested that common progression of dawning understanding ”Y-you look like @#$%.” Indeed, she was starting to sound nervous.

When Riley pulled away from Ike’s embrace, it was sudden - but not absolute. She lurched back suddenly, eyes wide, gaze and voice alike tinged with a fringe of panic as - while still keeping in his arms, with her own tucked between them - the girl glanced over the decaying body of her only friend with multiplying horror.

”W-what-” She stammered, still not pulling away completely, but with a concern, dread and fear in her steely eyes that was almost heartbreaking -

And then the girl would proceed to switch rapidly between several emotions in a matter of seconds as she tried to readjust and come to terms with the sudden change of circumstance she was only now perceiving.

First, it was the look of baffled, unbelieving, uncomprehending dread which would not have looked out of place in the eyes of a soldier watching the bombers cresting over the horizon. ”W-wha’th’@#$%?!” It was like waking up from a bad dream which bordered on a nightmare, lurching out of the sleep and half-moaning in blind, semi-conscious panic into the empty room.

Riley glanced wildly over Ike then, pulling away just a little - just enough to look over him with terrible haste. The buzzing energy which he had dissipated over time returned with a vengeance and became her as an aspect. Twisting, Riley yanked partially out of Ike’s embrace, grabbed one arm and looked at it closely with dreadful focus. ”Y-you’re all-...w-what-?!”

Then, within an instant, she was whirling back on him and grabbing onto his shirt again - any trace of weakness (Save for that most noble of weaknesses, ’concern for someone of great personal importance’) gone and eyes once more composed of glimmering steel. ”Who th’@#$% did this-”

It was clear as she looked up at him, steely eyes sharp and glinting in the light of his bunk room, that the girl was ready to leap off and go maul someone with a wrench at a word. It was a similar certainty to that which she had about her upon leaping onto Annag, except with a blazing fury that had been too smothered by fear to shine through that first time.

But it didn’t last long - because even as she was demanding to know who had done this to him, Riley was recalling something she had read while Ike was recovering from their first ordeal - something about these very symptoms being akin to those of extreme oxygen or blood deprivation in a human. The equivalent of cutting off circulation completely, with the only real difference being that a synthetic could take a lot more than a mere mortal. She was recalling something about an internal shutdown feature that most synthetic humans possessed, allowing them to essentially cut off the oxygen to their own parts and shut themselves down in a manner not unlike simple stagnant death.

The blazing steel glinted then, seemed in an instant to hone to a furious razor edge and lunge at Ike, as if a shard of diamond-steel halting at the last instant before piercing his throat. ”Did you do this!”

It was not a question.

Riley was furious. She snarled, and throttled him by the collar of his shirt in two, sharp lurches. ”Did you do this t’y’self! You @#$%in’ idiot!”

Though even in her anger - anger which was clearly and undeniably aimed directly at him - her hot steel eyes glistened. The faint redness beneath them hinted at their previous moment, which was somehow gone a thousand years away - and yet simultaneously still lingering. Lingering because, even as she raged at him, Riley kept close. Kept pressed up against him as she throttled him and growled ”You absolute @#$%ing dumb@#$ moron don’t you ever @#$%in’ do’at again-!!” With a voice that hinted, just at the edge, of a hysterical sort of dread - a betrayal that could be forgiven, but a betrayal nonetheless. Not that it was her focus. Not that she even knew.

Having scolded him with the same anger and incredulity as if he had just leaped off a cliff for no apparent reason, Riley shifted again - this time lunging closer to him, twisting, and coming about his side and back up under his shoulder. It had not taken conscious thought to return to the same position she had supported him with when calling for the medic the first time. It was as if she could sense the weakness in his legs - and hadn’t she already told herself? She was not-

Once she was sure that Ike was propped up against her, leaning his weight on her, and not about to topple over, Riley glanced frantically about the room for the comms panel and allowed an edge of panicky fear to taint her throaty voice, stammering ”A-alright, I-I’ll get Danesh - @#$% you’re such an idiot- where the @#$%’s that comm- I, I, uh, I…”

But that was the thing about admitting to yourself that you cared about someone. It made it harder to react in moments of crisis. She was probably looking right at the blasted communicator and not seeing it - oh yes, some hero she was.

Kato nodded in thanks to Robert, before sighing as another thought struck him, "Rob ... if I don't make it back from this, I'm appointing you as my successor, I just wanted to say that before anything else happened." He paused turning away before looking back at his friend. "That's if you want to stay out of the fight, if not I'd be honoured to fight side by side with you in battle. It's been too long since we've done that."

While waiting for a response he grabbed one of the leaving marines and quietly whispered to her. "Go find the new girl up on Deck three, she'll be practicing fist fights in her cabin alone, tell her Macks needs her and direct her if she doesn't know exactly where to go.

---

For Ike these few moments of bliss had seemingly been snatched from a nightmare, one from which he had thought there was no escape and yet seemingly here it was, the light at the end of the tunnel, the small redhead who now nuzzled into his shoulder. He clung to her with the ferocity of someone who believed that any second this moment of bliss could be torn from him, a drowning sailor clinging to the last few planks of driftwood to keep themselves afloat.

In the same moment that she mentally claimed him as her own, he made the choice that he was hers, the only one he could really trust, his best friend. In a world where he couldn't even trust his own self, his own memories, he had to cling to something, some stable rock, that rock it turned out was Riley.

This time he wasn't going to much up, this time he was gonna stay with her, his little savior as much as possible after all a friend was all that he needed to keep going. It was funny really, he thought, a few minutes ago, he'd been prepared to allow himself to rust away and now he could think of nothing worse than doing so. Now he had to fight to stay alive, for if he faltered in that resolve for a second he might not see her again.

As the gentle quiet of the room stole over the pair he allowed himself a quick glance down at her and suddenly a realization stole across his mind, that he was amazed he'd never noticed before.

She's actually really cute.

How could he have not noticed it before? He'd always looked up to this small ball of outwards resentment and hostility as a hero since their first encounter, but this was the first time he'd noticed this. That it had sparked another set of emotions within his synthetic skull, ones that he'd never felt before.

Almost beyond his own control the small pinkish tint that had been present in his cheeks the two of them had huddled close in a tight embrace began to deepen, spreading like an infection across his face, something with no cure. Yet strangely the sensation which came with it, for a series of sensations he'd never felt before felt so calming, so pleasant to spread throughout his body that he simply didn't care. Here in this moment, feeling sudden emotions that had never wormed their way through his brain before he was happy.

Even then however his natural curiosity set in, the questioning part of him, the part that always sought out exploration and discovery. He wanted, no needed to find the reason behind these emotions, if only so that he could recreate them.

What were these emotions? That was the first question, the big one that he needed the answer to, that he felt was simple, it was a sense of euphoria, of wonderful calm and presence of mind - yet there was something else ... something he couldn't understand. What had triggered it? That question took longer to answer, but when it came he knew that this was the answer without the shadow of a doubt, it was the girl now clinging to him, somehow Riles had brought on these new feelings just by standing there, clinging to him.

Answering those it seemed, however simply brought more questions to his mind, the main one which bounced around his head almost as fast as his heart was now becoming spoke the same line again and again. Why now? Why after seemingly so much time with this runt was he feeling this now?

Was this part of what came with friendship? A deep longing to be with the other person, to share in their life?

All at once his train of thought was derailed with the strength of a massive amount of TNT being detonated within the tracks. The small event that created such a ripple was the sound of her voice, had it always sounded so good to hear that?

"Of course I won't tell anyone about this, I promise!" The words came out before he even realised that he'd spoken them, but there they were, he'd agreed so easily to her demand and yet it felt such a wonderful thing to do, to grant her even the smallest hints of peace of mind. He didn't mind this being their little secret.

The sudden silence that followed in the wake of the words brought more pondering with it, more questions that seemed never to have any answers. That was until his frantic search through the hidden passages of his memory unearthed a memory, a small imprinted message from early days following his creation.

"Ike, you're special, just like the rest of your siblings. You're the pinnacle of humanities engineering, our most marvelous creations. For you lot, we've broken many of the old rules about personality for you lot, remember when you feel something new, don't be scared, embrace it.

A broken rule! This must be one of them! The idea came to him in a flash and without hesitation, he delved further into his memories, the lessons he gained as Synth in the capital, all the rules for Synthetic personalities. Then he found it and without the shadow of a doubt he knew what feelings had suddenly wormed his way into his heart.

It would have been perfect if she hadn't noticed his condition, although he had to admit, in those moments he'd forgotten too, so wrapped up in this new feeling that he'd hardly noticed the rusting flecks on his skin. The blush grew even redder and deeper as embarrassment crept in and mingled with the already blazing cheeks and he turned his head away to hide the shame, as well as other more personal emotions.

He felt her move in his arms, pull his arm close and inspect it and yet he didn't speak, not until the end of her tirade. He couldn't bring himself to admit to her that the thought of not being with his hero was destroying him, it would cut too deep, nor could he bring himself to lie to her either. Instead, he opted for the third option: to stand there mutely taking the harsh but rightful reprimands for actions so stupid he didn't even want to begin thinking of the place he'd been in when he'd decided it was a wise course of action.

Slowly he looked back at her and it would be clear in his eyes that he regretted his previous course of action, though if the feeling was seen by Riley in her heightened state of emotions was something that he couldn't see. Repeated after it was a word Ike had become so regretfully accustomed to saying over the last few days. "I'm ... sorry. I ... promise that I will never do it again, I won't ever leave your side!"

He hadn't expected her to slip under his arm and begin to support his weight, yet when she did, he hardly protested it at all, instead, he took it as his turn to rest his head into her shoulder, nuzzling it in close and relaxing in her comforting presence. Yet even then he still had the presence of mind to stumble slightly to the left, an action that he put as much strength into to still seem fake but would hopefully stumble her to the left slightly and place her infront of the Comms panel. In a small way he hoped she'd feel the benefit of being able to act the hero and spot it first without him having to direct her.

Regardless of all the discomfort, he was in, the fact that recently she'd been almost throttling him, he didn't care. He wanted to help her as much as possible. All because of one small fact.

Ike was in love.

Riley blinked.

Focus!

She needed to focus. This didn’t have to be a crisis. Riley blinked again. Her friend was dying. He was withering away and crumbling into dust and it was up to her to fix it. And she needed to do it right now.

But, of course, she was freezing up. Her mind was a blank, eyes wide and glancing about, looking right through the comms panel even as she numbly recalled that it was the thing she was looking for. It had always been this way. The moment of truth came - the moment of action - and Riley Miles always locked up, because for all her bragging and boasting she was really just-

Ike stumbled, lurched to one side. Riley’s heart skipped a beat and she tensed, thinking he was going down and insisting to herself that she wouldn’t let that happen - but he didn’t go down, and by what could surely have been no more than sheer coincidence, there was the comms panel, right there, right within reach. That was a relief.

Locating it had the positive effect of returning her focus and presence of mind enough to better perceive her surroundings. Ike was sort of leaning into her, nosing into her neck - but that was to be expected. He was weak. Just trying to stay on his feet. Obviously. She also - belatedly - registered what he’d said and in response, gruffly muttered a perfectly insensitive ”Quit bein’ dramatic.” All this nonsense about ‘never leaving her side’ - it was ridiculous, he was delirious, and she needed to get that medic-bot here right now-

Reaching out with the arm that wasn’t supporting the half-limp Ike over her shoulders, Riley stabbed the key that initiated an emergency contact with the medic. Half a second later, on the other side of the Last Light, the rusty robot flailed to life from where he had been packed up and rumbling softly as his passive monitors watched over the medical bay.

The response was almost instantaneous - Despite herself, Riley was again momentarily stunned as the tinny, Farsi-accented voice came over the speaker.

”Ooooohhhhhyeshellooo please to be stating nature of emergency thankyou!”

Again, Riley blinked, drawing a blank. She glanced to Ike, with those wide, intense eyes like steel rods, then back to the comm. It seemed to her to take a very long time, though it all could have been measured in seconds. When she did reply, it was with the first thing she could think to say; ”Man down! Evac-Red-Three Now!”

It sounded straight off the front lines - which was funny, since Riley had never actually seen the front lines. It didn’t seem to be the manner of speaking one might expect out of a seventeen year old - but then, Riles MIles had already proven herself to be some kind of weird case.

Weirder still, since while the meaning of ’Evac-Red-Three’ could be surmised with relative ease, it was by no means any standard among Federal operations. The code itself was meaningless. Given the many similarities between their own internal operations, Annag might have known it to mean, more specifically, that a high-ranking officer or strategist was in immediate, mortal danger. The best and fastest response team would be sent - and if it was later determined that the code was used improperly, the consequences would be severe indeed.

”An’ keep it quiet!” She added as an afterthought. There was no need to go humiliating him either, if she could prevent it.

Back in the medbay, the old robot spun up and immediately began clomping down the hallways, yowling something in Farsi as he rebounded clumsily off a wall, skidded around a corner, and activated his wailing siren for half a second - just long enough to scare the everloving @#$% out of some hapless cadet he was passing on the way - before remembering that he had been asked to keep at least relatively quiet.

With that out of the way, Riley heaved a sigh. It wasn’t over yet, but all she had to do was wait for help to arrive now.

RIley blinked again. Then she shuffled back, maneuvering both of them to flop down - with some care - onto the edge of the bed. Another sigh - and that silence seemed once again to settle over them.

She didn’t push him off, keeping his arm slung over her shoulders just in case she needed to get him back up with haste. It was only logical.

”...You’s a @#$%in’ idiot, y’know’at?” She grumbled grumpily after a moment, taking the silence as another chance to reprimand him - but with more placid dejectedness than rage this time. She glanced his way, but mostly watched the floor.


Time then seemed to slow down. It was the dramatic juxtaposition of urgency and relief, of wanting very much to get going while there was nowhere to go. Yet strangely, there was an air of relative peace to this. Like the gaps between bombings, hiding in lantern-lit bunkers and chatting until the next run came to deafen the ear and tremble the earth.

”B’you’ll be okay’like.” Riley added after a moment, a distinct note of softness rounding the edges of her otherwise gruff tone. To anyone else, that minor reassurance would have sounded impersonal, even disinterested - and anyone else would have been right - but this time it was different. This time it was not only quite personal indeed, but doubling as a simultaneous question and self-assurance. She needed to hear it, ideally for him to agree. She needed to know that he wasn’t going to be ripped away from her at the last second, just when she was starting to think that everything was going to be okay.

”You’ll be fine.” She reiterated lowly, just a little nervously, that buzzing anxiety which flitted about within her showing through in glints and shimmers.

Riley was just opening her mouth to say something else when the sound of heavy, metallic footsteps came into range down the hall - the galumphing of the Last Light’s talented, if quirky medic. His approach was a relief in itself, though Riley had to note with approval that he had, in fact, not engaged his wailing siren.

Luckily for the two of them, the sight and sound of the rusty old junker galloping about with great urgency was nothing new - as this was how old Danesh responded to every call, no matter how trivial. And everyone knew that his word-association programming was haywire, so it was not uncommon to hear him spouting nonsense as if it were very important. As such, the bot did not attract much attention as he approached, and by the time he was stumbling and skidding to a halt outside of Ike’s room, the one or two people who had been mildly interested in what he was doing got bored and wandered off.

”Rrrrreeeeeeeeescue operations is arrival yes yes, sssyyyyynthetic humanoid undergoing ssstrrressfull unpleasantness yes yes thank you!” He announced, tinny voice crackling through the speaker mounted on his body while the long, knobbly limbs guided him through the doorway like some kind of weird, giant spider. Riley was not quite as taken aback as she had been the first time, though the sight of the old thing working was still an overwhelming thing, and the hand that was clenching Ike’s forearm in order to keep him slung over her shoulder as they sat tightened it’s grip.

More than that, it was the animalistic instinct not to let anyone take what was hers - but as she had told herself a thousand times, she was better than instinct and would not succumb to it over logic.

”Oy Danesh.” Riley greeted with a slight nod, blinking and looking a bit dazed. The two of them had actually gotten acquainted in the short periods between Ike’s first operation, her stealing the doctor’s chair, and so on. ”Yyyyyyeeeeshello what problem solving mathematical equations equilateral planetside- ide- ide- problem is what thank you?” The robot bounced in place, the rumbling of his motor within the ostrich-sized body and the occasional hiss of ancient hydraulics making him sound not like an old diesel truck, albeit a small one. The gaping green eyes with their cracked and dusty lenses swung toward her, then toward him, hanging heavily on the snake-like neck.

The girl was about to answer when Danesh’s diagnostic programming kicked in. Raising one hand, he waggled the tentacle-like fingers, saying ”Ooohnevermindingnow. Veeeeeeeery rustymuch please, not gourd cucumber salad, injecting nanobiotic sssssssssssssssoup for good health yes now hold still-”

Riley was no stranger to rusty old robots who weren’t quite right in the head. The Compound had been full of them, lumbering about and yapping on - usually meaningless nonsense and nothing actually constituting a meaningful interaction. Her memories of the old Compound autodoc came to mind - and as old Danesh leaned in, producing from some rear compartment some kind of aperture which resembled a syringe, Riley subtly pressed just a little into Ike - who was already, of course, pressing into her. Her grip, became somehow firmer as the bot leaned in like a gruesome witch over a cauldron and poked Ike on the nape of his neck, instantly draining the blue-green liquid and providing his auto-repair systems with enough of a primer to, if not restart, at least cease to decay.

With his internal sensors detecting a successful injection, Danesh waggled his jellyfish fingers again, still bouncing slightly like some manic cartoon, then reached behind a second time to produce the same stretcher that Ike had ridden in not so long prior.

”Cadet is noooo good for walking running leaping flapping and please to be riding upon sedan stretch waggle thank-” He said, again holding the stretcher in arms that looked much too thin to support any significant weight, and prompting Riley with a chance to help maneuver Ike onto it for the second time.

Once he was securely lain upon it, Danesh’s siren let out one WHOOP before silencing, not kept-up enough to halt the program before it could start, but still cognizant enough to remember Riley’s request and silence it right away.

And as the bouncy robot took off out the door and down the hall, Riley was hot on his heels.

Robert turned around, relatively quickly and sternly said “hey don’t go talking that way, You’re gonna be fine,if you die, it’s gonna be to more than a little firefight.” He then started to turn away, but turned back and said with shrug, “ I’ll fight, it’ll be the most action the Last Light’ll get, and i agree, another good fight with you has been long overdue.”

Kato grinned, it was always enjoyable hearing how much faith could be placed in someone who he considered didn't really deserve it, he'd done too much killing from tens of thousands of miles away to ever have truly been in any danger and yet here he was in sudden close combat firefight.

"I'm glad you think so Rob, It'll be nice to fight side by side with you once more. Let's show these bast@#$% that attempting to invade this ship is a mistake!"

Just fire on them!

He ignored the voice, it was small now, he had a plan, he had people who would fight alongside him, he was no longer alone. This fight he'd win for the sake of every human who still clung to existance down on that metalic structure.

---

For a moment, a small moment Ike thought he was going to have to be the one to reach out and grab the comms panel, in the process doing more damage than he ever wanted to do to her self-confidence and esteem. In that moment he was prepared to do so, knowing as well as she did that the internal damage to him was too great to simply not do so out of a concern for Riles' self-esteem, but a part of him held back, he wanted her to succeed, for the little engineer he loved to get what she wanted.

So when she reached forward herself and grabbed it his heart almost skipped a beat in joy. She'd done it! He could feel her relax too from his position nuzzled into her shoulder, the muscles relaxing slightly from the tenseness of moments before.

In all truth he really shouldn't have needed to be nuzzling so closely and warmly into her shoulder, his limbs still easily had enough strength in them to keep supporting his own weight for a while longer, yet it felt so comforting to be pressed up against her that he didn't want to leave at all. He just wanted to stay as close as he could to her for as long as he was able.

He was so happy that even when she told him to stop being dramatic in that dismissive, abrasive way she was accustomed to using that he simply smiled, keeping the grin hidden from sight, by nuzzling closer. "Sure thing..." He whispered, loud enough for her to hear, "I'll just stick with ya."

For a long time afterward he simply allowed himself to lapse into silence, content to wait for medical treatment, safe in the knowledge that he was in the arms of someone he could count on. Someone he trusted, far more than he could ever trust himself. To the rusting synth this wasn't an awkward silence or even a particularly anxious one, it was merely more time that he was getting to spend in the arms of Riles, a thought that immediately reignited the blaze which raged across his face, colouring it far more brightly in contrast to the paleness of the skin around it.

Although with the intense feeling of comfort and joy came the second one, a small niggling doubt of anxiety, one which whispered softly in his ear. What if she's disgusted by the idea that you love her? It was a silly thought, but it still clung there, gently prodding the Synth with doubt.

In an attempt he burrowed his face even further into her neck, attempting to hide the entirety of the blush in her skin. Something made drastically harder when she maneuvered him onto the bed, there all he could do was grin sheepishly at his savior, the small sparkles in the violet eyes that never seemed to leave when she was around. Still he clung to her as best as was possible.

A smile that slightly faded at her next words, but returned all the stronger moments later, "I'm your idiot." The words were barely audible, he doubted she'd even hear them, but still it simply felt right to say them. "I understand Riles. I won't do it again."

The look on her face gave him a few moments discomfort, even with the warming feeling from being so close to her seeping into him. The knowledge that he'd caused her even the slightest hints of discomfort was a painful one and as he watched her attempt to reassure herself he felt the need to speak out, say something to help in her fight against anxiety.

"I'm a Synth, I can take things like this, I'll be okay, don't worry!" All he needed now was for the medic-bot to arrive and his predictions would become fact. While it was a serious problem, one that had gone way beyond his own capacity for auto-repair, it was a simple solution providing he was given the right medicine, just enough to overdrive his auto-repair systems long enough to reverse the current rusting.

So engrossed was he in watching and monitoring Riley that Ike practically didn't even notice Danesh until he was practically outside the door and felt the grip around his arm tighten, in response to which he wiggled closer to her as he physically could. In much the same way and for the reasons that Riley had tightened her grin, his was tightened out of the similarly animalistic desire not to be separated from his protector.

Unlike Riles who had more time to get used to the quirks that seemed endemic to the bots of the Last Light, of whom their medic was no exception, Ike was still quite severely taken aback by the sights and sounds that surrounded Danesh as it went about its work. In repsone he sat there, practially frozen into position, mouth slightly agape, just watching the two. A look of mild shock that transformed into something more similar to horror when it got a proper glimpse at the syringe that had just been produced by the machine. With sudden harshness he slammed his eyes shut and pressed further into the comforting touch of the one person he could trust.

Ike wouldn't feel anything as the shot went into his skin, for the second it did so, his sytems began to act on the substance, causing a chain reaction which shut down all outside functions while his body got to work. Similar in many ways to falling unconcious for a short period of time. He'd awake a short time, around half an hour later.

---

Annag had been stood in her room, futily punching a bag she'd found and tied to the ceiling with massive difficulty. The temporary arms she'd been given were practically stick thin, not good for any real activity, when she'd been approached by another crew member. Whereupon she was informed that he had to go the armoury where someone named Mackie was waiting for her. The sentance had been simple and in many respects, crude, not in the way it was put together, but more in the delivery, there was an undeniable layer of hostility hiding behind the words that no matter how hard she wanted to deny it, was there.

She wasn't one of them, she may have been accepted by Kato, but that didn't mean she was part of the group.

There wasn't much of a debate in her mind to go or not, the feeble attempts of her arms to do any damage to the bag had been frustrating her more and more, she was so used to being able to blow away everything in her path, to find some weakness that to be unable to do anything depressed her. More than that it was a reminder of how helpless she now truly was, surrounded by people who could destroy her in an instant.

Slowly she exited her room, waiting for it to close with the reassuring click of it locking behind her, a little quirk she'd picked up from earlier days, always to keep the door locked, for you never knew what people could steal from you inside. Not that was anything to steal, but still, she felt better knowing only she could get back in. Doing her best to be stealthy she slunk along towards the armory, she knew the way easily, having studied it meticulously for the original mission she'd been sent to the ship for.

Only when outside did she pause for thought, was this really the right move? Was this just simply making her a pet of the military, fitted with cybernetics to create the most high-tech warrior? Were they no better than those she'd come from?

When the door was opened, the sight that would greet the eyes of Mackie was that of a nineteen-year-old teen with increadible amounts of scaring and a burn that covered most of her face. Her chest was covered in extremely well-defined muscles, far more than most of her age would normally have, although the arms attached to her body, didn't even come close to matching them, they were tiny and spindly, only good for menial tasks, although to any seasoned eye for working with mechanics one detail would catch her eye, that currently, the metal attachments implanted into the girls body had been suffering the strain of arms way too heavy for the girls body, designed clearly for someone much bigger. "Wat do ya want me for?"

It was something beyond deja vu. Not merely the feeling that it had all happened before, but the knowledge that it had. The experience. It was dreamlike - the sort of dream that filled the dreamer with dread while not quite becoming a nightmare.

The recovery ward was still dark, with only the dim glow of inset sconces and the beam from the door illuminating the place, allowing anyone with adjusted eyes to see well enough. The sounds of air filtration and distant machinery created a pleasing, comforting white noise. It was the same bed, in the farthest, left-hand corner of the long room.

And, of course, Riles was there.

But there were differences, too. Just enough to remind the participants that it was, in fact, a new scene - and not some reliving of memories or half-waking dream. The chair was closer, pulled right up against the side of the bed rather than up against the wall. And so Riles was closer.

She hadn’t been here as long as the first time. Boots and coat still on, the girl slouched in the chair, leaning heavily up against the armrest closest to the bed, sitting somehow diagonally in the thing. The scent of cheap coffee was in the air. There was a glow from her diacomm, illuminating her profile in soft hues of pale blue - but rather than intently, if sleepily reading, this time the kid was clearly putting all her effort into merely staying awake - and it was a losing battle. She was clearly just reading the same sentence over and over, and nodding off for several seconds at a time in the process. Or just staring at one word for an indeterminate time, not processing so much as a letter. One white, styrofoam cup sat empty on the table behind her, and one, almost empty, sat loosely in one hand, all but forgotten. Had it been full, it would have been tilted at a dangerous angle.

But through sheer force of will, she had remained awake. The clock upon the wall read [02:11]. There were fresh bandages on her hands, as well as wrapped around her forehead. She blinked rapidly, stared glazed through half-lidded eyes, then abruptly, slightly nodded her head and blinked again - rinse and repeat.

Again, it would take for Ike to move or make some sound to get her attention - otherwise he could have just watched her indefinitely.

Once alerted, Riley snapped to something vaguely approaching cognizance and looked toward him. Seeing him awake, something seemed to slide off the girl’s shoulders as she settled down just a bit - and even in the dim lighting, the shimmer of relief could be seen in those rainy-day eyes. This time, there was even the ghost of a lopsided grin just barely tugging at one corner of her lips. It was relief if ever Ike had seen it. Not intensely so - he had been in much less danger this time - but the sort of gentle relief that came with the keystone of reassurance. The satisfaction of having known all along, and knowing there had been no reason to worry in the first place.

”Oy.” Riley greeted - trying to sound apathetic even while that nearly invisible grin tugged at her lip. Then, putting up a hand she added with some gentle urgency ”Don’ge’ up. Doc’s got’ye some nanobots in’ere. T’make sure’e get th’job done right’like.”

Then, eyes lingering on him just long enough to satisfy her that he wasn’t going to do anything stupid, Riley returned her eyes to the screen - but didn’t continue reading. Didn’t even bother to pretend like she was still reading. Looking at the screen was still easier than looking at a person, after all.

Ike was definitely looking better now. His normal color had not quite returned, and some of the imperfections in his skin still remained for the time being - but he no longer looked on the verge of death.

After a moment, glancing almost furtively back toward him and appearing to weigh her options for a brief moment, Riley reached out as nonchalantly as possible and brushed a small patch of oxide off Ike’s arm, creating a little brown puff as it dissipated. As to be expected, she was just a little too rough for comfort, and she retracted her hand with awkward haste, almost as if she were still learning how to use it. ”Says’ye should be all set’like by mornin’.” She added gruffly, averting her eyes again to an arbitrarily chosen spot on the dimly illuminated wall.

Perhaps it was to be expected that Riley would return to her usual, emotionally distant self. Discouraging, maybe. But as awkward and distant as she was acting, there was no hiding that initial glint of relief…

At least, so long as one was really looking for it.

---

It was far from the sort of sight one would expect an armoury to be - the pristinely kept weapons on the walls contrasting with the thin film of faint smoke that hovered about the ceiling and the herbal scent that permeated the air. A counter with grated bars broken only by one central window and a door off to the side which hung lazily open. Somewhere, a stereo was playing what could only be described as ’Jefferson Airplane Meets Pink Floyd’ at a comfortably low volume. There was also the distinct, savoury scent of marinara and mozzarella. The only reason Annag would know she hadn’t spoken to an empty room was the pair of standard-issue black combat boots propped up on the counter.

Hearing the newcomer, Last Light’s paradoxical gunsmith took her feet off the desk and poked her head up over it. The mop of blonde dreads, the lightly freckled face and blue-green eyes that peered inquisitively over dark, thin sunglasses and the herbal smoke dangling loosely from her lips did not provide the standard image one might expect of a head armourer.

It took only a moment for the curious look in the young woman’s eyes to light up into recognition and delight - something else which was likely quite unexpected - and while it could be argued that the expression was faked, that did not seem likely.

”Oh hey~ You must be the new girl with the robo-arms. Annag, right?” She said, her voice husky but absolutely friendly. She was one of very few to actually bother learning the kid’s name, even accompanying it with a neighborly wave and bright, if slightly lopsided grin that might have been sly looking if not for her otherwise open face.

Without preamble, the woman beckoned with a hand for the teen to approach, gesturing toward the door. ”Com’ere, check this out.” Her enthusiasm was calm, but seemingly quite genuine - as if she was excited to show something to the new girl that they would both appreciate. If the she hesitated, the gunsmith would beckon more emphatically as if stalling was silly and unnecessary.

She sat in a chair too low to be seen from over the high counter if slouching as she had been moments before. It was situated next to one of many different benches, most of which were occupied by weapons of various makes and models. She continued beckoning until the girl was next to her, then turned back to focus on the thing mounted in brackets atop the bench. As if she wasn’t wearing a ridiculous tie-dyed hoodie bearing the word FONK and looking generally as if she absolutely did not belong there at all.

The thing looked like some kind of wrist-cuff, but complicated and with moving parts. Several wires hung from the underside.

”I like, totally don’t know what to call this thing. Like it’s soooorta like a tiny crossbow, but like...not really?” The woman went on, sounding about as ditzy and out-of-it as they come. ”It shoots these, like, little dart things, watch-” Carefully picking up two of the wires hanging from the thing’s underbelly, she pricked them together and almost silently something just bigger than a sewing needle shot out from one end, its impact on the far wall visible only by the tiny spark it made before bouncing harmlessly off. ”The velocity is like, kinda’ lame, but it’s totally enough to like poke through body armor. And like, those needles? I bet I could totally get them to have all sorts of like crazy cool effects and whatever.”

She was talking to the girl as if they had been friends for years. Or, at very least, as if they had just met at some party where everyone was friends by default.

”I figured you could like, help me name it? Like if you have any ideas-” Then, as if remembering something, she spun back toward the teen, holding one fist up in the traditional greeting of her people while the other jutted a thumb out toward a box of still steaming mushroom and pepper pizza. ”Oh, I’m Mackie by the way. It’s like, totally rad to meet you. Help yourself to the pizza it’s super good and I got beer and soda in the mini-fridge over there too.”

It was as if she hadn’t heard about any of what went down earlier. As if she had no idea that Annag was essentially an enemy agent who was being allowed to stay aboard as some kind of pseudo-prisoner-trial-crewmember.

What was this weird chick’s deal, anyway?

When Ike first blearily blinked open his eyes, he gave the ceiling a long hard stare, the feeling that the last day had simply not happened, that all the events between the first time he'd awoken there and now were simply erased, a chance to start afresh. It all felt so similar and yet worlds apart from the time he'd been brought there after the attempted kidnapping, now there was no pain aching through his limbs, no dull stabbing feeling from his leg, simply a sense of calm, that this time everything was sorted out, both mentally and physically.

He was even in the same bed.

The realisation struck him right across the face like someone had forcibly taken the two periods and sown them together, weaving one scene into the next and the sensation made him feel suddenly nauseous. What if this all had been a dream? Some fabrication of the discovery, loss, and reconnection with a new friend, his only friend, that she was still as abrasive and standoffish with him as their first meeting? It would also mean he wasn't a lie - a price he wasn't willing to pay for such a gain.

With excruciating difficulty, he forced his eyes to slowly trawl around the room, each movement bringing with it another wave of nausea, enough to make the task a very slow and very difficult one. Each object he made a mental note of, checking it against memories of days gone by for any sign of a difference, the window still stood there as a giant portal into a black and infinite void. The bed looked the same too, nothing seemed changed at a-

She was sitting closer.

Without a shadow of a doubt, Ike knew now that this indeed was a new situation, a second time he'd been sent to the infirmary in just as many days. Yet the knowledge didn't come with the sinking feeling of dissapointment that it would have created for the Ike who had sat there the first time, that Ike was no longer there. This time it simply brought a feeling of giddiness and elation with it, Riley was still here and they were still friends, the little redhead he loved was still beside him.

It took him a while before he actually moved enough to attract the attention of Riley, content to sit there for a while simply enjoying her presence and studying her. Seeing each detail of her face be highlighted in the soft glow of the diacomm, only this time he could now see them in a new light, the one created and built up by his own happiness in her company. It was amazing he decided, just how determined she could be to sit by his side and wait for him to wake up, an internal dedication to something he really needed to understand and learn. Only when he properly tried and failed to nudge himself upwards would he create enough movement to alert the practially sleeping engineer.

He was looking straight at her and as such was in an easy viewing position to catch the shimmer of relief which played over her eyes, mirroring in some way the simmer that placed itself center into his own. None of her elation and minor happiness went unnoticed by the Synth who was feeling much the same emotions well up within himself, although they showed more plainly across his face, a grin far wider than the small twinge of the lips displayed by Riley plastered all over his own face, he was safe, so was she and they were now both there for each other.

"Hey!" It sounded silly, almost absurd to be greeting each other with such casual language and yet, that was all Ike's mind could think to say in response, so much else was rushing through it that any sense of a coherant reply was lost, so deep in pondering everything that had happened and what even he should do now to act upon his realisation.

Stop it Ike! Get a grip on yourself!

Realising she had spoken again, he quickly shook his head to clear it, putting out his reply slowly if steadily, deliberately annunciating each word to make sure his mind didn't wander. "Sure thing Riles, I'll stay down, you don't need to worry about me doing anything as stupid as that again!" Not now that I have you

For a few moments afterward, he allowed himself to return to the buzz of emotions and confusion brought on by all the sudden and practically overwhelming new batch of emotions. He would have remained there indeffinately, stewing on how best to approach the subject to her when he felt a touch on his arm, the characteristic roughness cluing him in immediately on who the fingers belonged to, not that there was much of a list to guess from. Snapping back he allowed himself to display the same grin as before once more, although this time it was accompanied by a slight reddish tinging of the cheeks.

Yet when he looked again he realised something else, Riley was looking incredibly sleepy, she wasn't even reading or pretending to do so, her diacomm anymore and in his muddled brain an idea came to him which he felt would be beneficial for the two of them.

"Hey Riles ... you're shattered ... you really should go to bed," A slight pause, a soft silence in which the only noise was the Synth grabbing onto the side of the bed for confidence. "Perhaps you should lie down here, get some rest with me and recover together?"

---

Annag hadn't really known what she had been expecting, be it an extremely massive and buff soldier sharpening weapons or a more pencil pushing type meticulously documenting the details of the different type of weapons stored along masses of racks. At least the guns being polished matched her expectations, not that anything else did.

What she most certainly hadn't been expecting was the woman who now sat up infront of her, the dreads, the smoke, the music, none of it was right, she'd been expecting something ... bigger, something that could match up to her expecations of the ship. This was the ship after all that she'd spent the last year of her life preparing to assault, that she'd lost everything in order to reach, this was after all the place she'd personally been picked to take, the person she'd been picked to fight.

In a strange way she felt like she'd been cheated, that the woman standing in front of her had in some way taken all of that away and thrown it back in her face, something she knew was stupid, but just couldn't help scrubbing that idea from her mind. "How can someone like you be an armourer to the last warship of humanity? How are you able to sit there blowing smoke all -" She'd have said more if the woman she was now pointing an accusatory finger at hadn't sliced away her next words with her own sentences.

The sound and sudden pause for breath allowed the fighter's brain to catch up with its eyes and ears and process what they had actually been seeing and eyes that a few seconds before had been drawn into angry slits widened in surprise. This strange woman actually seemed to be pleased to see the Mortugan, something which she hadn't even gotten from Kato, who mostly gave her sad understanding or almost parental concern. This person had even bothered to learn her name, although that idea held less weight as it was something that could have been simply looked up moments before her arrival.

Without realising it, she took a few steps backward, almost as if out of every possible interaction this was the most intimidating that she could possibly have been faced with, which in many ways it was. She knew how to fight, to confront those who attempted to face her down or intimidate her, not those actively trying to be friendly. "Ehhhh - hhh" She stammered, mouth agape before regaining even a semblance of composure. "Yeah .... yeah, that's me."

None of it was really happening, was it? Was this some sort of prank played by the crew, lets all laugh at the stranger who attempted to attack us by putting her in a strange situation? These questions and more raced through the teens head, yet it still continued to happen, this strange surreal experience. Gingerly and very slowly she began to tiptoe forwards, almost as if mesmerised by the single beckoning finger drawing her in. "Wha .... what do ya wanna show me?"

As the Mortugan inched closer she'd look less and less like a combatant and more like a simple lost teen, completely out of her depth in a strange environment, which is precisely what she truly was. She'd spent so long fighting day in, day out for survival that the hints of niceities were strange, as such someone trying full on to be friendly, while also being the calmest yet paradoxical sight Annag had witnessed was practically something she had no clue how to deal with.

The sight of the weapon helped steady her nerves somewhat, it was at least something from the girls' world, something which someone could use to fight with, even if it didn't seem to be her style at all.

When Mackie fired it, something strange happened, Annag actually lept backwards, not out of fear, but more of the reflexes of someone who's senses had been totally overwhelmed in such a small space of time and was merely reacting to a new threat. If something could be described as fast as lightening it would be the speed with which her eyes darted back and forth from the crossbow-like thing to the bolt now lying on the floor. "I ... ehhhh..." She stuttered before locking her gaze properly on the otherworldly person infront of her, "You want me? Me? To help you name this? Don't you realise who I am!"

It was all too strange, just strange that she had to speak out, say something to try and grasp onto any sense of what was going on with both hands and not let go, a tricky thing for her considering during a wild flail of an arm her left arm detached.

"What the frack is going on?" The look on her face was now very distinctly of a wild-eyed beast cornered by a massive predator. A mild sense of attempted friendship was something she'd barely been coping with, the latest additions had completely blown her mind, it was almost unreasonable for someone to be this friendly, especially to someone like her. "What are you trying to do? Why are you being so friendly to me? What do you want?"

She didn't really know what she was asking, she just wanted some grasp of the situation, to pause for a second and understand just what was going on.

Riley blinked, and turned to give Ike a blank, uncomprehending look. And for a long moment, it might have seemed to the young synth that she was judging him. Was she appalled by his suggestion? Revolted by the idea?

’You want me to do what??’

‘Don’t be creepy. I’m leaving.’

‘What? No, ew.’

There were any number of harsh, negative things that she could be thinking. Was she merely trying to word them right? Say it in the most sensitive - or insensitive - way she could manage?

Was she really staring for a long time, or was it merely the slow manner in which time seemed to move in the state they both were in?

Riley blinked again.

”I’m a’ready ‘ere ye’nut.” She said finally (though really it had only been a couple of seconds), letting a very slight, but soft lopsided grin accompany the equally mild tone. For all intents and purposes, she had apparently just not quite understood the question.

”I’ll nod off in a few’like. Pleny’a free beds, oy.” She added, squirming a little, though not uncomfortably. Indeed, the idea that he might have been suggesting sharing a bed had simply not occurred to her. He was only suggesting she go to sleep soon, and stay with him - which meant not leaving the recovery ward. Naturally.

As if to punctuate this, Riley flicked off the rugged little handheld device and let the semi-darkness take over them, allowing their eyes to better adjust.

There was a long silence then. It seemed the subject was not up to debate - but only because the idea that there was anything to debate at all was too foreign as to go entirely unseen.

After a bit, Riley shifted again, slipping her boots off and pulling her legs up into the chair and laying most of her weight on one armrest - the girl had a talent for getting reasonably comfortable in otherwise uncomfortable places - and rested her head on an arm propped up atop it. More silence. Obviously she intended to conk out right there.

When her voice came again, it was hushed and sleepy sounding, eyes staring blearily, but contentedly off into a pool of shadow on the opposite wall. ”Oy. Ike. You got like...like a job on this boat?” She asked - and was that a note of hesitation? Why? Admittedly it could have been taken as something of an insult, but it seemed unlikely that she was even aware of that - or would care even if she was.

”Turns out I’m actually the Light’s Head Engineer. Only one’like.” It sounded like preamble. Was she trying to say something? There was a note about it which did not suggest idle conversation, but a topic to be broached with sensitivity.

”’Cause like, I was thinkin’...That, uh…” It was obviously much easier for Riles to allow that warble of something approaching downright bashfulness into her voice as long as it was dark, and she didn’t have to look directly at anyone, and with the added confidence that they might even be sleepy enough not to really hear it anyway.

”I could...sorta’ use some ‘elp’like down’ere n’th’Engineering Deck. I-if ye’want I mean.” Then, getting flustered she added, stammering ”I-I mean I don’t need ‘elp, like, need, b-but I could use it, like, like I wouldn’t mind-” And, realizing that she was digging herself into just the sort of hole she really hated to be in, Riley shut her trap and didn’t say anything else - past perhaps a small sound of affirmation that merely bordered on actual speech.

During the night that followed, Ike would be partly or wholly awakened by the faint tickling of coarse, bristly hair on his face. He would see that the chair had moved. Or, rather, it had been turned to face him - and he actually did have company. The little redhead, legs curled up on the seat, had her arms folded on the side of the bed and her head resting atop them, complete with a slightly unflattering expression on her face and snoring so lightly and faintly that it sounded rather like a soft purring. Well, at least she wasn’t drooling.

In the morning, he would awaken to the subtle scent of curry, and to see that the chair had been turned back, though it was still flush with the bed. And of course, she was still there - this time sitting cross-legged with some kind of sandwich held in both hands, munching away unhurriedly. Seeing him awake, she’d take another, larger bite, a thick mouthful keeping the little grin well hidden, - and give him a little wave, before nodding toward where a plate containing a second sandwich and a drink.

---

Mackie watched the kid grow rapidly more and more distressed with a mostly blank, but slightly perplexed expression. She blinked, looking herself just a little bit startled by Annag’s reaction - but in such a manner as to convey that she was simply not sure why the girl was reacting as she was, rather than being actually unnerved by the hostility itself.

”Yeah. You’re the new girl with the robo-arms. Annag.” She said, taking the question much too literally and answering it with a sort of deadpan confusion. As if Annag must have forgotten their interaction from several seconds before, and was slightly surprised - but not judgemental - about it.

The fistbump was, of course, not reciprocated - so she just retracted her hand, not appearing to be offended in the least.

Mackie blinked again, watching the puny mechanical arm soar across the armory and clatter inoffensively to the floor. She stared at it blankly for a second, then looked back at Annag - then back at the arm, then back at Annag. ”Want me to grab tha-” She began, but was interrupted by a barrage of wild-eyed demands. Again, the woman blinked - not offended, but still a little bit befuddled.

A wild-eyed stare, emerald eyes sharp and hard as their gemstone namesake, versus a blankly, openly perplexed pair of blue-green eyes that peered owlishly over useless sunglasses. The silence following the questions seemed to drag on for eternity - it was a predator, corning and staring down its prey - except that the predator had no idea what the prey was freaking out about. It was a tad unnatural, from that perspective.

Then the young woman’s mostly blank look transformed into a bright, culpable smile that bordered on downright embarrassment. She even gave one breathy little laugh. ”Eheh~ You got me. Actually I wanted to see you about taking measurements for your new arms.” She said, flicking her head slightly in a half-nod to move one of the thick, blonde locks from out of her face - conspicuously leaving both her arms and hands where they could be clearly seen, while maintaining her casual, laid-back posture. ”I just thought that, like, since I was planning on integrating this thing into them you’d wanna’ like, name it…” As if she had completely forgotten - or never even noticed - Annag’s cornered-animal act, Mackie momentarily looked thoughtful and confused, glancing toward the wall where, close to the ceiling, several outdated and eclectic antique firearms were mounted in such a fashion as never to be used. ”I don’t name any of my weapons so like, I don’t even know where I got that idea…”

And with a cool, complacent shrug and abrupt return to a cheerful smile, she decided to put it behind her and drop it completely. ”Oh well...Anyway, there’s like, no rush or anything. ” She said conversationally, still as if only vaguely aware of the teen’s existential crisis, taking to swinging her chair back and forth just a little in a lazy, idle motion. ”I can’t actually, like do anything with the measurements and whatever. I mean like, I caaaan? But that’s sorta’ Jack and Robyn’s specialty so I’m waiting on them aaaand I, like, dunno’ when they’re gonna’ show up.”

With a light scuff sound, Mackie used the heel of a boot to spin the chair around, just once. ”You don’t actually have to like, stay here if you don’t want to. But,” Coming back around on the spin, the young gunsmith stopped, eyes meeting the teen’s in something that was warmer than her usual, cool look. There was something earnest and almost a little bit sheepish about that look, and the soft smile that went with it. ”I’d be totally stoked to have some company or whatever. If you feel like sticking around. You can go if you want.”

For a few agonising seconds Ike feared the worst, that his suggestion, meant in the best of humour and intentions had been taken as something creepy, something to be disgusted by. Again the idea that he may have driven a rift between them powered into his brain, the sights of the previous few hours still burned into his mind, the tensed body, that primal fear of being broken.

Yet like a curtain being drawn back to let the light flood in, the feeling was washed away into that dark corner of his mind, not to trouble the Synth, there was no way she would really think that of him right?

right?

He knew that just a few words could easily break what little mental stability he clung to, like walls of paper on cracked foundations, all it needed was a few good tugs or one strong shot at the core and everything would crumble. It was a strange thing to do, base your entire mental stability on someone else, but when you couldn't trust yourself, what else could you do?

Something resembling a giggle slipped out of his mouth upon hearing her first words, it was a strange noise, partly as it was comprised of two entirely different halves, the sort of laugh one would share with a close friend after a good joke and the relief of another few days of survival.

"But you're in that chair, are you really going to just try and nod off there?" It was a mostly rhetorical question, for just looking at her at that moment he knew the answer before she'd even need to speak it, of course, she was. This was Riley after all, she was the sort of person to sleep anywhere.

What he hadn't expected to happen so soon, or at least without a bit of warning first was her suddenly flicking away the device that had been the room's main source of light. Prompting a small yelp from the mouth of the Synth, something which caused him no end of embarrassment upon the realisation that he'd done it.

Afterward, as the silence settled in, he began to get more comfortable with the arrangement, the bed and the atmosphere surrounding the sleepy pair.

It was a warm sort of atmosphere, the sort that sprang up not because those involved didn't want to speak to each other, but more the sort that created itself when both felt a connection and simply didn't feel the need to speak to communicate.

"A ... job?" Ike was stunned and for a moment it looked like he could have been insulted by the question, not that it could really be seen in the low light. In fact, he was more bewildered than anything, now that he'd actually come to think of it, he didn't actually have a job -

You have THAT job...

Not any real job that he could think of, Kato hadn't gotten around to assigning him something to do, even up here it looked like he was the pampered capitol Synth. "I ... uhhh, don't think I've been given one, what with everything else going on."

It was a poor lie, but it was all he had.

"You're the head engineer!" There was a clear sense of excitement in his voice, an overwhelming wave of adoration directed her way. In almost every part of that sentence he'd latched onto the implications he'd wanted to, ignoring the thoughts which directed him to the part saying that she was the only engineer, not the ones saying she was the head engineer. "That's amazing Riles!"

Whatever she was about to say next, she had the Synth's entire enraptured attention when she said it, not only was she his best, only friend, but she was also the head engineer of humanities last warship! Even during the pauses he wouldn't move or attempt to interrupt, it was clear she wasn't finished and he wanted to listen to everything she had to say, it sounded important and he wasn't going to miss a second of it.

"Help you?" Was that joy in his voice? "I would like nothing more than to help you, Riles! I've always fancied myself as somewhat good with machines so this should be fun! Not that you need my help, I know you're already good enough for that, but I'd love to lend it to you!"

It didn't matter that she didn't speak afterward, the idea of actually being able to spend as much time as possible beside her made his heart glow, so much so that if it was able to light up it could have flooded the entire solar system with the brightness of a dwarf star. All he needed to do now was close his eyes as quickly as possible to zoom towards that moment when they could be alone, sharing jokes and basking in each others company. With such a wonderful time awaiting them, who was he to slow it down?

As the strands of hair stroked his cheek in the same course, if friendly way that Riley was so apt to do when touching him, it was all he could do to contain himself from bursting forth and wrapping his arms around her in a hug. While to many, the look on her face coupled with the noises she made might have sounded unflattering, but to him, he'd never seen anything cuter in his life.

Ike wasn't sure what had been the trigger to wake him up, whether it was the smell of curry or the general sound of movement, either way, he was up and about. Slowly and in a manner most would consider curious he raised himself to a sitting position, stretching out his arms lazily, followed quite closely by the hands being brought around to rub any remaining sleep from his eyes. Unlike the Riley, sitting there cross-legged, he made no attempt to hide the beam that spread around his face at the sight of his best friend.

"Heya Riles!" It had become almost second nature for him to call her that now, just in the same way that his eyes sparkled each second he was around her. Not that he could really help his next set of actions, it started with an arm being reached forward to boop her nose, like he'd done the first time they'd ended up in the hospital. "Gotcha!"

He followed it up by responding to her wave with a little wave in return and an even bigger grin, one that seemed impossible to get any bigger, yet it clearly did when he spotted the sandwich prepared for him. "Thank you! You're the best Riles!" The words seemed to dash from his mouth in a hurried escape attempt, they were all that made it before the food was powering the other way. To see it, one would think he'd never eaten before.

---

Just what did this woman want? What was her game?

Annag didn't understand it one bit, the simple niceties, the friendly exchange of words that seemed so natural to the woman and yet so totally alien to the teen. It was almost the obliviousness with which she seemed to carry on that agitated Annag the most, the simple fact that it seemed like this whole situation was so ... normal to the other, that nothing really out of the ordinary had happened.

"Tell me why you're being so nice to me!" It came out more like an order than she'd intended it to, yet the sentiment was still there, she wanted, needed to understand what was going on, just why this strange paradox was there, talking to her as if she wasn't some trial crewmember.

Kato had accepted her, she knew that, but she'd understood the sad logic through which he'd spared her. There it had been two simple choices, keep living aboard this ship, starting with the removal of her arms, or to be sent to federal prisons and executed. She was a fighter, clawing at each scrap of life, each tiny string holding her body to such a concept, to pull herself along, scraping along every surface if nessicary, dying wasn't an option. However, this was not any concept she'd trained herself for in any minute of her existence.

The new arms! It was such a simple thing, but the mere hint of the concept was something she could cling to, a semblance of reality in the swirling, eddying mad pool that this room had become.

"...Well ... here I am, you can take the measurements!" It wasn't meant to be rude, or at least not to the same degree it could have been received as simply a challenge as to why it had not been the first priority when she'd arrived. "Why can't you use my old arms? What sort of trap are you trying to lure me into ..." She'd have continued if the next set of words hadn't completely blown her away. "Intergrate those into my new arms?" There really was no other way she could have put that, it was such an utterly mad idea that it hadn't even entered into her head that the demonstration was for her benefit. This woman was totally mad beyond any reasonable sense of belief.

"The ... the naming part isn't what I object to! This .... this" There were a few wild sweeping gestures made to encompass everything within the room, Mackie in particular as if pointing at it somehow made it make any more sense.

It didn't

"You mean there's more of you coming!?" The choice of simple leaving looked even more appealing now, just ditching all the madness and returning for her arms then running as fast as she could in the opposite direction to this land of upside down expectations and humans behaving as if they lost more than a few of their screws holding sanity together. Yet that was the thing with Annag, even when faced with an unknowable threat, she wouldn't run from it, not on their terms at least, if she was to leave it would only be after she'd gotten the answered she wanted, not before.

"Look ... I don't know why you're doing this, or what purpose you think it serves, I don't have any more information to give! I've already told Kato everything I can, so whatever it is, just tell me this! Why are you trying so hard to be nice to me? What are you trying to get out of me?" In those few seconds, she'd come cloest to showing the root of so much of the surprise and confusion which surrounded Annag: The wild look of someone to whom a nice tone meant nothing but the bitter lies of anyone trying to extract information, if at all. This kindness was not something she'd ever experianced in her life.

It was the little things that always made life worth living. Overused and trite it may be, but there was a truth in the sentiment that dwelt bone-deep in the souls of human beings since the dawn of intelligence. Denying it could not make it false - even the little things that went unseen, or only partially realized. The bubbly little sound Ike made, and the way Riley raised one brow in response. The way she insisted quietly ”Nah’ain’t gonna sleep’n’th’chair, I’ll ge’an empty bed y’dope.” and was unable to make it not sound like a fib. The way she blushed hotly and hid her face at his admiration, muttering little blustry negations about how it wasn’t really like that and not exactly the ‘head’ engineer she didn’t mean it like that, proving her total inability to functionally take a compliment. The way she mumbled some half-formed thought about being too dramatic when he did agree to come help her, again looking away to hide what she knew was a glimmer of admiration and heartfelt appreciation in her eyes.

The way, in the morning, he grinned at her, beaming, with a light about him that shined bright enough to give her nose a faintly pinkish hue and look more intently at her food. The unfamiliar little ‘pricking’ feeling she got deep inside whenever he used that silly little nickname - an emotion she had never experienced before - and one that, while it was not actually altogether pleasant, she wouldn’t have wished away for the ringworld.

Ike poked her nose again, too quick for her to stop it - and like before, she immediately swatted his hand away after the fact with a sound belding a scoff and a laugh. It was followed up by a hasty and rather long sip of her drink which did little to hide the resulting blush - but only someone like Ike would have been able to catch the way she glared up at him through her hair, as well as the helpless grin she was trying so hard to keep hidden. The confusing reaction when something @#$%ed her off yet she couldn’t possibly get angry over it even if she wanted to. The similarly resulting profanity went unspoken, but it didn’t need to be voiced to be perceived.

”A’ight, a’ight cool it ye’weirdo.”She said placatingly, but softly. It was odd indeed for her to use such mild terms for him, especially given her affinity for casual use of excessive profanity. It almost made words like ’weirdo’ and ’nut’ sound like terms of endearment, if only relatively speaking.

Contrasting Ike’s enthusiastically devouring his food, Riley took her time with her own - mostly since it was so much easier to talk to someone when she didn’t have to look at, or focus on them. By normal human standards, the food was delicious but incredibly spicy - some kind of meaty something in a mysterious, but equally tasty curry-scented paste that was not pepper spray, but could have served as such in a pinch - though clearly Riles was quite immune to the intensity.

”I been ‘earin’bout some kinda’ attack incomin’.” Riley said conversationally, past a mouthful. As if it were nothing at all to be surprised or exceptionally concerned over. Almost as if it were to be expected. After all, the threat of attack was a constantly looming thing back home. ”Terrorists r’somethin’, prolly’ m-” Letting out a little cough as she stopped herself from saying ‘Morts’, it might have been a simple clearing of the throat. Or maybe it was because, if she could help it, she didn’t want Ike to know any more than he had to about the Mads and the Morts. ”More’a them like ‘at @#$% Annag.” She said instead. She didn’t have to have any involvement in this. She didn’t have to be a M’Draani here. It was a sickening thing that she was still trying to come to terms with, and still couldn’t decide if she wanted it or not. But she did know that she’d rather her only friend not find out too much about it, if she could help it.

”S’I wanna’ check out th’Light’s defensive systems an’@#$% once we get th’ RCFs, cytos an’ liners sit’ated’like.” Riley went on, starting to spout engineering jargon that she assumed Ike would understand - and while he most assuredly did, there was a discrepancy between their individual experience in that RIley had spent her whole life working on severely outdated technology and mechanics that were much more in line with the ancient Last Light than with anything even resembling modern systems. There was also the matter of Riley having spent so much of that time working more or less alone or within very small groups that much of what she said relating to machinery might have been in a personal jargon that would need downright deciphering to understand.

Though the fact she was so quick to fall into that old mode of speech meant that she did have a great deal of faith in Ike’s own abilities, and rightly so.

Too, it was easier to jump straight into it, as if they had been working partners for a long time rather than just having made the agreement to work together in a half-dream from another life. She proceeded that way for several moments, listing off some of the things they would need to do that day between, and through mouthfuls. When she was finished Riley subtly double-checked that her hand bandages - supple and new - were still securely wrapped, then hopped energetically to her feet, shrugged on her overlarge coat and nodded sidelong toward the door. ”Righ’then. Le’s ‘ave at it.” She said, and one could almost perceive a hint of chipper giddiness in that husky voice - minute, ghost-of-a-grin not withstanding...And the enthusiastic sparkle in her steely eyes, which looked at her friend with just a glimmer of subtle, nearly imperceptible admiration.

---

---

The weird gunsmith didn’t look even slightly offended at being essentially ordered by a cadet to explain herself. In fact, the young woman so much as skip a beat as their unorthodox ‘conversation’ proceeded. Mackie just burst into a sudden fit of incredulous giggling and saying through it ”Because I’m not a @#$%.” In the exact tone of voice used when someone is being absolutely, hilariously wrong about something. Still, it seemed impossible for even this to come off as mean-spirited.

Once she had managed to banish the bubbly laughter, Mackie was able to continue unhindered. ”I’m not the expert here, but even I can tell that, like, you had like two years tops before those old arms would tooootally whomp your spine. Like you’re obviously strong enough to handle ‘em, but you can’t like, exercise your spine. Be pretty dope if you could, though.”

When the topic switched back to the matter of integrating the little dart-gun into Annag’s new arms, Mackie’s eyes lit up with enthusiasm and her voice mirrored it, speaking fast as if to get all the thoughts out before she forgot them. ”Yeaaah, I figured like it’s got a really short effective range it’d like still essentially be a melee weapon, and we could use nanotech to give the darts like, stunning effects and whatever, and Robyn can toootally hook it up to be thought-activated, it’d be siick-”

But her fervent enthusing was cut short when the girl, with her one remaining, sickly arm, gestured to the room as a whole as if trying to comprehend the meaning of existence. Mackie stopped, blinked, then with one brow raised in an expression of absolute, utter confusion she asked softly ”The...Armoury…? Like, what’s wrong with the armoury?”

But Annag didn’t seem to want to bother with that question, and had instead gone over to looking horrified at the notion of more people coming. ”Well, not more of like, me. That’s be a total bad trip. Nah, Hawk and Honey Badger. They’re our exo-suit pilots, and they specialize in cyber-prosthetics like yours. You’ll have to see them either way if you want your new arms set up.” Then, shaking her head a little and letting out one little chuckle ”Don’t worry, you’ll totally like them more than me. It’s cool.” She didn’t seem to be making it a passive aggressive statement, either. Merely acknowledging that she was under the distinct impression that Annag wasn’t fond of her.

And then, it was apparent that girl intended to end their little conversation. Mackie did not interrupt her as she insisted she had nothing to give, then demanded (almost pleaded, Macks thought) to know why this was all happening.

Mackie responded by letting a moment of silence linger, then rolled her head back and partially raised one hand to begin counting off on the fingers. She spoke almost as if she were getting not quite irritated, but perhaps a little bit bored.

This girl was in a bad place. She was losing her grip, spiraling out of control. At least, that was how Macks saw it. She wasn't so much of a burnout that she couldn't recognize when someone needed to be grounded and brought back to reality. She was also aware that her aloof, flighty demeanor was only worsening the issue. She would have to be more direct. Continuing to be her usual self was only going to send the kid packing even faster. Maybe Annag had not poked her head out from isolation on her own free will, but she had done so nonetheless. A furious torrent of unfamiliarity was only going to make her want to take cover deeper and longer.

”Okay One, I am not trying hard to be nice to you. I’m just being nice, and you happen to be in the room.” Mackie began. It was probably the most aggressive thing the hippie chick had ever said - which wasn’t saying much. The words were vaguely clipped, but only because she clearly intended to make her point without interruptions. ”Two, we’ve already got backup plans for if you’ve lied, or not given us the whole story. We don’t need any more information from you.” Her exaggerated, valley-girl accent was still there, though the language was conspicuously lacking in ‘likes’ and ‘totallys’. At that point, Mackie shifted for the first time, planting boots on the floor and leaning heavily forward on her knees to look up at the girl over the glasses and through the spilled locks. There was something familiar in those aquamarine orbs. ”And three...”

Flicking three fingers from one limp hand, Mackie raised a brow, a subtly mischievous glint in her aquamarine eyes. She grinned widely, maybe knowingly, and said in a sly, but still somehow totally perplexed voice ”Are you like, scared of me or something? Because you are tooooootally acting like, super weird-” Holding a hand up as if to tell herself to stop, Mackie shook her head to clear it and allowed the grin to, paradoxically, brighten wanly. A small, inoffensive sigh sign preempted her words.

”Annag, I'm just gonna’, like, tell you this right off the bat, ‘k? Things up here, on the Last Light?” She gestured vaguely to the ship around her with a lazy, circular motion of one hand. "Things here don't work like they did where you come from. Neither do people. Everything is different up here and most of the rules you know don't apply anymore.” There was a sober note in her throaty voice that made her seem all the more earnest. Somehow, her usually somewhat silly accent didn't detract from this, even still present as it was. ”You're gonna have to adapt and learn the new rules of life. And that's not easy…Trust me. I know. And it’s almost impossible to do it alone.”

Standing then, Mackie seemed a little sore. She loped lazily over to where the sad little arm had clattered and, ripping over on one leg, she reached down and plucked it up easily in one hand. ”You're a tough kid Annag, I can see that just looking at you. Aaaaannd I can also see that you totally don't wanna’ be here right now.” the grin which accompanied the observation as she began back toward Annag with lanky arm in hand, suggested that she still wasn't offended by any of it. She was quite aware that there was nothing she could do or say to make the kid actually feel comfortable in this place, at this moment. She just wasn't the right type of person for that - wasn’t the person this troubled girl needed.

”So like, you can go. I'll send J and R up to your room when they get here, it's fine. I just want you to know that, like, for what it’s worth - my door’s always open. Okay? I mean it.”

Saying that and with a warm, classically reassuring grin on her face that probably would have put almost anyone else at relative ease, Mackie held the arm out for Annag to take - making sure not to get too close as she did.

And then, once Annag had taken the severed arm with her functioning one, Macks spun on a heel, took a deep, indulgent drag off her smoke, and sauntered back to her chair. She flopped into it, spun once, then bent over the desk and went back to work, tinkering with the little dart shooter as if Annag wasn't there at all...But still watching the girl though there was no way for her to know it.

Annag didn't get many things about the conversation, although to call it that would be doing a gross disservice to conversations everywhere, even the ones held by two people who really didn't get on and were merely passing the time of day with pleasantries before they could escape, this was more random accusations with more limb loss involved. Yet what she did understand was when she felt that someone had challenged her, she felt that right then.

"Ach! I get my limbs taken from me, limbs that have served me well throughout my life, by a group of random hermit soldiers living up on a rotting carcass and now I'm told that they were slowly destroying me! They've seen me through some real tough scrapes ya know!"

She'd have continued, in fact, she was very much in the process of formulating another sentence mentally to continue with when she realised that the next part of Mackie's reply had in fact been a compliment. This, of course, pushed her right back into the deep end, she'd known where she'd been with a challenge, that could be fought, overcome, defeated. A compliment, however, now those were more tricky, hid intentions and were entirely the opposite of something which could be responded to with a swift punch, which had Annag been able to process the full concepts this situation entailed she'd have considered it a shame, punching something was really all she was good at.

Weapons as a subject, on the other hand, was something the little warrior was more familiar with, not by much, after all, she'd maintained a strict policy down in the pits that if someone was handling a weapon other than one whose only purpose in life was that of a rudimentary club then it usually wasn't her and that was someone else's problem. Still, that hadn't stopped her from taking an interest in new and interesting weapons, a passing interest mind you, none that any guard would need to take notice of, just a curious look over the new stuff ya know?

"So ... you're planning on installing a dart ... bolt gun into my arm ..." It wasn't that she couldn't believe she'd just heard that, her ears had most definitely listened to the noises enter them, which when placed together indeed created that sentence, she couldn't deny that, it was the actually grasping why it had been said she was struggling with. "Stun darts that I can control with my mind, like zap, surprise, they're down? How would something like that even begin to work? Aren't you worried that I'd fire it by accident into someones back?"

Again, her wild gesticulations had not gone unnoticed and the armourer sent another question her way that gave her food for thought, whats wrong with the armoury?

Annag most definitely thought she'd have an easier time working at that question from the opposite angle, whats right with the armoury? Now that, she felt was a much shorter list. Not that any of this could be put into words, that list would take too long, in fact, if she'd even have tried to begin to list it, they'd only be a tenth of the way through the list by the time the entire black hole had stopped spinning and the last protons had faded into nothingness.

In the end, she had to settle with a few strangles noises and a dissatisfactory, "What isn't?"

The joke, for that at least what it must have been, somewhere in the primordial soup of its creation, Annag mused, was not a very good one. Jokes she felt should be there to make someone laugh, ease tension or simply to diffuse the situation, the way someone diffused a bomb they're quite sure is unarmed, but not certain, full of nervous giggles and relief after its all over.

This however she decided was more of a torture method than anything else, for it conjured up in her mind the image of even more Mackies strolling casually into the room to unroot her even more with all the completely idiotic and really totally unbelievable friendliness.

She'd voiced her misgivings and that was putting it extremely lightly, before in a panicky, baffled tone and was very much considering the option of repeating them in a louder, more shouty tone when out from the hippies mouth came a string of more somber sentences she'd never even begun to consider could come from someone like her.

To give her the credit she probably, if you thought about it hard enough then blurred out half of her past, then the other half could be justified in having deserved, Annag listened throughout the whole speech, taking in every word of it too. The only problem, which was, of course, a simple small issue was that she couldn't really bring herself to believe much of it, that's not to say her subconscious brain, the underused part which actually looked at how people behaved and interacted didn't believe her, that part had weighed up all the factors and decided on balance that Mackie wasn't lying to her.

The problem only really began to get a tiny bit bigger when you realised that, that part of her brain had never controlled Annag, her strings were being pulled by the more feral side, the side that bit and fought and pummeled their way through every problem, the side that assessed just how many punches someone or thing would take before going down, but most importantly the part that simply didn't believe in people just being nice. That simply wasn't human nature, human nature was to lock kids up in cages, force them to fight each other to advance their own cause then claim it was all for the childrens good and future.

Yet in all of that, both parts of her brain could agree on something, "I AIN'T AFRAID OF YOU!" It came out harsher than she intended it to, although when someone's accused, for both parts agreed that is entirely what Mackie had done, of being afraid of a scrawny armourer that seemed to spend more time getting high than even training with weapons, the harshness of one's tone isn't exactly at the forefront of considerations when preparing a response. "You're the weird one here with this speech all about niceness!"

Mackie's summary had been bang on the nail too, she really wasn't the sort that Annag needed to help adjust herself to this new situation, sure the fact that someone, anyone treated or even began the process of mildly considering maybe her a human being helped matters, only if she submitted the right paperwork that is. Yet someone simply being "nice" to her was still too alien of a concept. Reina hadn't been nice, she'd been a supportive rival, Kato wasn't nice, he was understanding in the way that only someone who'd seen the depths that humanity could sink to, mostly by going through all of them himself, then inventing a few more just to sink even lower could.

What would have helped matters was if she knew what sort of person would be the best for her, which naturally she didn't, she couldn't even begin to comprehend the idea of needing someone else, let alone find someone who could push her in the right direction.

She'd take the arm, what else could you do when someone who you think is a walking lunatic hand you your severed mechanical arm back with the nonchalant calmness of someone to whom this is an everyday Tuesday afternoon occurrence?

Actually leaving the room like she'd intended? Now that was a different matter entirely.

She didn't want to be there, she knew that, what she also knew is that she didn't want to not be there. There was nowhere else on the ship for her to go. What really could she do with her one limb that looked so skinny it would probably have to be given a participation prize just to make it feel better if it went into a size competition with a couple of twigs and half a length of string.

So she crouched down in a corner and waited, any company would be more grounding than the one she currently had, so was the logic she'd adopted. If not and they turned out to be as barmy as Mackie, then she'd simply have then install the arms then leg it as far away from this upside down land of armories and not look back.