No Longer in Spaaaaaaace [Open]

[darkxwolf17]

Who: Uzi and YOU!
What: A January catchall, settling in, brooding. Regular teen things.
When: Throughout January.
Where: Milton and surrounding area.

Content Warnings: Emeto in the second prompt.

[A: a lack of doors]
[To say that Uzi decided 'quickly' that she'd rather not stay in the community hall would be underestimating her processors. She was out of there as soon as she could stop talking to everyone.

Problem is, there's nowhere else to go. She can't exactly hitchhike back to Copper 9 from... wherever the hell this new frozen hellscape was. Wherever it was, it had humans, and Uzi didn't much feel like being near those.

Which leads to you. Either a fresh newcomer looking for a place to settle, or an experienced survivor of Milton, searching for more to scavenge. There's still plenty of abandoned cabins in town, surely with loot waiting within, or a nice, warm place to rest.

Well, you step up to the door, and open it to a dark interior, lit only by the purple glow of two pixelated eyes staring back at you.]

Hey! Find someplace else to brood!

[B: Scrap meat]
[Disassembly drones were a particular breed. With their violent tendencies and thirst for fresh oil. Eventually, that's what gets Uzi out of wherever she's decided to hole up.

Out on the crumbling, cracked roads leading to and from Milton, there were cars. Abandoned for whatever reason everything else was, there were large metal corpses dotting the snow-covered landscape.

Uzi knew enough about humans to start checking here. Popping open the hood and rooting through the confusing inner workings of retro human technology. Ugh. She could hack her way into a couple murder drone heads, but you'd think any of that would help dismantling a car engine? Nah. Maybe if her dad cared a little more about anything other than doors.

She missed him, didn't she? god. She did-- Oh, jackpot. No time to think about it anymore.

There's still oil here. It smells old, not like home, and yet... She hopes nobody is around to see her almost crawling into the engine compartment to get a taste. Just a little. Just enough to sate the feeling.

But it's no better than it smells. Her robotic insides churn. Soon enough, she's crawling out to land in the snow and - bleaugh - exhume about a mouthful of steaming motor oil into the white snow.

She coughs, spits, and notices that she's no longer alone.]

...Don't... don't do that.

[C: Wildcard]
[The option where we put anything that doesn't fit into the other prompts. Feel free to plot something out with me and do it here.]

Comments

B

[desperate_times_right]

[Chloe had wanted to go back out to check out the cars ever since that first day that she’d talked to Louis about them, but it's taken her this long to get outfitted enough to actually do it.

It wouldn’t have surprised her to see other people out here scavenging, but it does surprise her to see a kid leaping away from a vehicle into the snow, hacking and spitting oil.]

No shit, kid. What was that?

[darkxwolf17]

It's...

[Hold on. She has to spit up another gob.]

Nothing. It's, uh... totally normal.

[Another cough, she wipes what's left of the mess on her lips with the back of her hand. Eye optics flickering for a second.]

I'm fine.

[desperate_times_right]

Yeah, you look like you're doing great. Is this some new thing kids are doing?

[darkxwolf17]

Ugh, not unless they're weird, robot vampires?

[desperate_times_right]

[Okay, sure. Put a pin in that for a second.]

Does it have to be in a car? You could probably get oil from a gas station that hasn't been coagulating inside frozen tubes for ages.

[darkxwolf17]

It...

[Tearing, screaming. Fresh oil against the snow. The searing pain of her arm being sliced off and being unable to do anything about it.]

Not just from a car, no. Honestly, the gas station was probably a better idea.

[desperate_times_right]

You wanna head back? I was here to see if I’d be able to get any of these guys running and I think you answered that. We could go check out the gas station.

B

[thefifthchild]

[Robin's face is as impassive as ever as he watches the robot girl retch the oil into the snow. It's hard to tell how long he's been there. Maybe the whole time. She has a tendency to stand out, with the bright illuminated eyes and the purple paint.

She's starving. At a glance... the desperation, the way she'd crawled into the engine, it reminded him of the addicts you'd see desperate for a fix, begging around the shadier parts of Gotham - the streets that the police and city officials left alone in the hopes they'd kill each-other instead of putting the parts of the city that were deemed worthy of protection.

He makes a mental note that this girl is a possible drug addict.]

Wasn't planning on it. [Pause.] You require oil for fuel, I suppose?

[darkxwolf17]

[She's not starving... but she hungers. In as much as worker drones can hunger. Their eating habits were a facsimile of human culture. A bit of gas or a battery every now and then went a long way.

But a Murder Drone. They needed it, lest they overheat and collapse. The cold temperatures here kept that in check, but if she ever really needed it...

She looks up upon hearing Robin's voice. Geeze, and here she thought she was being stealthy. She hadn't even heard his approach. Then again, she couldn't focus on much besties her body's violent reaction to these earth resources.]

S... something like that. [She shifts into a seated position, squinting.] How... long have you been standing there?

[thefifthchild]

[It's about the answer he expected. It's hardly like as a combative teenager with trust issues he's had no experiences with his fellow combative teenagers with trust issues.

He hums. Flexing his fingers through his gloves to keep his blood circulation going. He needs his fingers. The cold could easily kill, or worse, make him vulnerable to attack. There's only so much harsh conditioning and organ replacement that can overcome that natural biological weakness.]

Two and a half minutes, give or take. [There's a beat of silence before he continues.] There's a gas station towards the edge of town, you know.

[darkxwolf17]

Yeesh. You were counting? Kiiinda creepy, kid. Just sayin'.

[Uzi moves to stand up proper. She brushes off some of the snow clinging to her hoodie. She's hardly dressed for these elements, but she's never had to care about that before. Worker drones were built for exoplanet mining, and sure, they died a lot. But they got the job done. They didn't even revolt!]

Uuugh, I was going to check out the gas station. I just... wanted to check out the cars first, okay? Your retro human technology is weird and interesting!

[thefifthchild]

[He looks at the car. Then at the robot.]

I said give or take. I just happen to have some basic awareness of the passage of time. [Dumbass toaster... He doesn't predict this girl will be much use as is, but as an interloper she is still his responsibility (he's decided).] You should be more aware of your surroundings if you hope to survive in this wasteland.

But I suppose if you were already headed there, I don't need to point you in the right direction. [Instead he moves closer to examine the broken down car, scanning it for parts amidst all it's decrepit rust. Hmm.]

A

[bigbaddy]

[ .. huh.

Bigby does at least stay standing outside the cabin, rather than entering when there's clearly someone in there, but he doesn't leave right away. Maybe it's the eyes he finds himself staring at right now. They look so.. strange. Those are definitely not human eyes in the darkness. And considering Bigby's true nature, he definitely is interested in the non-human inhabitants of this place.

It's worth enough to risk a - gasp!! - social situation. ]

Do you even have any light in there?

[ Not because he's looking for it, mind you. He's more just wondering why the other is.. sitting there in the darkness..

Is this that 'brooding' thing?? Is that hip with the kids nowadays? ]

[darkxwolf17]

[Definitely not human. Maybe Bigby would be reminded of the harsh neon lights of New York, it's... not like that. But it's close. Pixelated display screens were the common feature of all drones - less money spent on advanced mechanical eyes.

The circular eyes flicker - a blink - and eyebrows form to create a dismissive look.]

Wh- Okay, no. But that doesn't matter. I just had to get away from... all of that, for a while.

[bigbaddy]

The people?

[ Are the people 'all of that', Uzi. Because Bigby would actually understand that one. There's a reason he never spends all that much time out there in the Community Center himself, spending time around that many other people is just.. awful.. A special form of torture, surely..

At least Bigby is only one (1) person, rather than people, so maybe that's still kind of an upgrade. Though he's kind of wondering something, especially as he's still staring at those odd eyes. ]

.. did anyone say something bad to you?

[ Look, if anyone knows how weird people can get about non-humans sometimes.. It's Bigby over here. Not that you'd be able to tell, since he currently looks perfectly human himself. ]

A

[solitarysoul]

[Levi still regularly checks buildings he thinks haven't been claimed on patrols. No telling what he might have overlooked all the other times he's checked or what's wandered in since then. So he plans to check this one but freezes when he sees her eyes. He starts to go for the rifle on his back but stops when she talks.]

Um...sorry?

[darkxwolf17]

[In hindsight, she should've found some way to label this place as her own. But what was the point of trying to hide away and brood if everyone knew where you were? Dumb. that's dumb.]

Yeah, I bet you're sorry.

[She's grumbling. It's not fully directed at Levi.]

Ugh, just don't mention it, Human. To like, anyone, okay?

[solitarysoul]

Levi. My name is Levi.

["Human" really doesn't narrow it down here. He is not even sure if she's human or not.]

Uh, so...you want me to leave you alone but not tell anyone you're here? Someone else will just come in later.