OPEN |

[aurable]

CHARACTERS: Drift and YOU
LOCATION: Simulation Room + Closed Starters
DATE: Mid-Late September, Post Wish Full
CONTENT: Drift finds a familiar simulation program
WARNINGS: possible discussions of terminal illness and substance abuse TBD MA! the robots are fucking again!

A FRIENDLY REMINDER

[ Drift had not stuck around for what passed for a debriefing, leaving before Dengar had even gotten a word in edgewise. The situation was Yzak had been an unfortunate advantage to slipping under the radar. For two days, it was decidedly easy for someone nine feet tall and made of metal to fade into the background. Then, he started popping up in sudden bursts. Once or twice, at some odd hour, he would poke his head into the infirmary or go knocking on a seemingly random door only to say nothing and walk away without saying much — a melancholic jumpscare, where instead of "boo" the monster merely shakes his head and leaves.

Later into his self-imposed and unexplained isolation, things had taken a turn almost into normalcy when a group text went out:

Driving lessons at 0900 in the Sim Room
Sword and closed-quarters practice at 1300 in the Training Room
By appointment with thirty minutes advance notice at the latest

Absolutely nothing. Drift had reconnected with the rest of the crew in so many words and with as much affection as a timed reminder for a phone app. At the very least, notifications and replies look as though they're being read now. ]

A CITY WITH NO PEOPLE

[ The doors of the simulation room open with a whisper of hydraulics sliding open like a soft, unintrusive announcement. Bursting into view with quiet brilliance is an endless horizon with a view from the peaks of an alien world. You enter onto the balcony of a polished white steel building with a view falling down into the perfectly recreated, dizzying heights of a sprawling city. Above is a night sky streaked with a nebula's pale, milky spill and thousands of stars painted around and through its cascade. Flicking lights shine like fireflies on the roads coiling up and around the buildings that grow ever higher towards a massive focal point — a spire that, even at night, illuminates everything surrounding it. All of it was a facade of life, the illusion only broken up by the vacuous silence where the sounds of the rush of traffic or even the stray snatch of conversation or laughter carried up by the wind should have been.

Drift stands at the edge as an almost unobtrusive silhouette against the skyline. He could have easily been mistaken for a statue if one of his finials hadn't slightly flicked in the direction where he heard someone sidle up beside him. Eyes that glowed a cold and pale blue against the dark color of his face stared out over the balcony. Even without pupils, it was clear he hadn't offered so much as a glance in the direction of whoever decided to join him. ]

It's something else, isn't it? [ A neutral response to an otherwise incredible view. Drift hadn't moved an inch, and his tone of voice was quiet, almost like someone who had just woken up from a very long nap and was only speaking on reflex. ] This simulation was made by...[ Imperceptible movement — a slight bow of his head. ] by someone else. The capital city wouldn't have been my first choice, and it's not how I remember it.

See that? [ Drift pointed to the tower, voice perking up slightly but still holding the stupor of a lecturer who had repeated himself once too often to care. ] The Primal Basilica, or at least I think it is. Xrisora reminded me a little of this place, thought I'd see how deep the mirage went. [ Drift nodded as if confirming something to himself ] They did a pretty thorough job.

Quiet, though. [ Finally, he turns his head two degrees to catch you in his peripheral. ] I can leave if you need the room.

Comments

[choicely]

She reminds me of someone. [ That same, similar age beyond her years that exists in Ciri, the fearless approach that comes from being in possession of real power and knowing her capabilities. She'd only had the briefest conversation with Eleven and she could see that, in addition to a level of bluntness that Yennefer herself could only ever possess respect for.

She doesn't flinch when his hand slides over her; what proves more telling is how her spine curves into the contact, a brief run of tension that soothes out, and her head resettles against his shoulder, the crown of her hair nudged to the angle of his jaw as she remains looking outward upon a world that exists unknowing of its ultimate fate. ]

So why revisit it now?

[aurable]

Who? [ Drift asked without thinking of it, seeing her eyes briefly wander towards some middle distance. As though the topic stirred up a memory. The simple question seemed harmless despite Yennefer offering little about herself that hadn't been inadvertent slips between the sheets at off hours.

They settle against each other once more until her body heat seeps into his ambient state. Drift didn't register the cold from the steady breeze as much as he did the stolen warmth bleeding into him. It was...comfortable to register something solid from her weight to the slight tickle of her hair against his face. ]

Ratchet created the simulation. [ Drift confessed, wistful. ] I wanted to — [ He looked back at the horizon, winking without millions of lights from fabricated windows like little ghosts ] understand, I suppose. Why someone might mourn this place in a way I couldn't.

[choicely]

A girl. A powerful one. I'd been preparing to train her myself just before coming here. [ It's easy to think of Ciri, in spite of the complications surrounding her origins and everything that had come afterward; it's surprisingly simple to dwell on her now considering that she's tied to Yennefer's greatest regret, given that the girl had been quicker to forgive her than even Geralt had.

She's making no effort to move or even so much as shift carefully once she's established a comfortable position leaned against him, but when he speaks her head tips back along his shoulder so she can observe him in profile, study him as he glances out over the view before them both. ]

Does it make you feel closer to him even now that he's gone?

[aurable]

[ The arm around her shoulder squeezed at an infinitesimal degree before he let go. ] You've probably come a long way to do that.

[ Projecting? Maybe, but he knew the pattern, not the circumstance: You're told you're brilliant while stuck in the mud all your life, and you have a basic framework for overcoming that. Even if it means shaking hands with the devil.

Drift looks out onto the old Cybertron horizon and how it glistens, ]

No, [ He answers honestly, ] I was one of the ones who burned this city to the ground and — [ Drift looks out, the darks of his catching the reflection of destruction long behind them in the way his pupils dilated, ] and sometimes I miss knowing I helped start the flames.

[choicely]

It's not really anything I ever pictured myself doing, no.

[ Beyond the fact that she'd never considered herself well-suited for tutelage, for guiding someone else — whether because she felt lacking in patience or some other quality that Tissaia always seemed to be in infinite possession of — there was the notion that such things never appeared meant for her to get to have.

Only now, she's here, and Ciri is elsewhere, and there's no other purpose she has to be useful to anyone save the retrieval of these orbs, which is a bitter irony in and of itself.

She peers to him then, her expression remaining mostly unchanged apart from a slight shift of her eyes, curiosity more than anything else. ] It merited destruction that significant?