Night 71: Main Hallway, 1-Center

[ninelivesonce]

[from here]

The main corridor was dark, and no sounds came from the sun room, even when Taura pressed an ear to the doors. That didn't mean much, but it gave her something to do while she waited. Then she switched to jogging back and forth along the length of it. Staying in one place had proved more dangerous than making a visible target of herself; she didn't like waiting.

[Rita]

Comments

[ninelivesonce]

Taura shook her head at Rita -- whatever the note was, she hadn't gotten one, and before she could do more than glance at it, Goku bounded up.

"Goku! You're...alive!" It was a foolish thing to say -- of course he was alive, if he was standing right there, trying to describe something in the way only he could. Trying to describe a radio. "You have a radio?" she added, pulling hers out. Then her eyes narrowed again, as she refused to be distracted. "Where have you been?"

[overlimit]

When the door burst open, Rita was immediately on guard, reaching for her weapon… when she saw a familiar, dopey-looking face.

For a few seconds, Rita was completely stunned. Goku was dead. She should know. She was the one who killed him! And Rita wasn’t an idiot; she actually checked the body before declaring him dead. There was absolutely no way that he could be walking around and talking to them. And yet, he was.

“I – I wasn’t lying,” she stammered at Taura, still partly in a daze. Then, she looked to the kid himself, gritting her teeth as she blurted out, “How the hell are you still alive!? I… I saw you…”

Rita wasn’t even sure what she was feeling at the moment. Relief at seeing that the brat was alive? Shock? Anger? Annoyance? Shame from facing someone she’d killed without meaning to? It was a lot of things, and Rita wasn’t about to acknowledge a good half of it.

[monkeyboy]

"You saw me?" Goku asked, not quite sure what she saw. Well, she saw him, but of course she had! He was standing right here! He had been seen quite a lot with them for a lot of nights. What had changed? Really, Goku had no clue. Maybe she was just being a silly girl. They did that sometimes.

Well, there were more interesting stuff to talk about than Birdy's obvious confusion. Setting down his satchel, the young boy took out the same device Taura was holding. It was hard to grip in his stubby little hands, but he offered it to the girl all the same. "Want one, Birdy?" he asked briefly after Taura questioned him. He hoped someone wanted them or else this was going to be a long, uneventful day of just wandering around.

"Farwell." As if that one word should explain everything.

[ninelivesonce]

I didn't think you were, Rita -- she'd been there too, after all, though a little further away. And while there were things that could be done for those kinds of injuries, they hadn't been. Then again...TK-622 had thought he'd arrived here after dying, or just before dying. And other people had reappeared, at least if the bulletin board could be believed.

But how didn't matter. He was alive, and here, and handing Rita a radio. And talking about a place called "Farwell".

"Where's that?" Or maybe not a place; it sounded a lot like farewell, so it could be a hospital? A real medical one, not like the Institute. "Are you staying here?"

[overlimit]

Rita remained stunned. Maybe Goku didn’t remember anything after transforming into a monster. He didn’t seem to have a clue what she was talking about – though that described a good lot of their interactions.

He was holding something out to her, and Rita reluctantly took it and examined it. It was a radio, like Taura had said. Unlike the one Rita already had, this one appeared to be built not just for listening, but for the user to speak into it. Could they use these to communicate across large distances…?

“Is that where you got these?” Rita interjected along with Taura’s questions regarding ‘Farwell.’ What she really wanted to know was how a dead kid was talking to her, but maybe getting those details could give her a hint, as Goku seemed oblivious to his own circumstances.

[monkeyboy]

"Yeah, they gave them to me," he explained, nudging the satchel with his foot. "I dunno why... To, uhmm, help get everyone talkin' to each other I guess? I was comin' back anyway, so they said I should help this way. Besides..." The little boy looked at Taura as he spoke. "I don't think they like us stayin' there. That's fine, 'cause there's not a lot ta do there! Kinda borin', ya know?" Goku laughed at that as he put his hands behind his head.

[ninelivesonce]

Rita looked lost. At Goku coming back to life, or at the idea of radios, or even at something else entirely, Taura didn't know, but standing around here was going to get them killed. Or worse, get someone else killed. Even if it wasn't, uh, always permanent. Farwell, on the other hand, that sounded important. Was the they in they said Marc and the rebellion? Aguilar? Or another player, new to the game? But if so, why wasn't there much to do?

"Less to do than here?" Taura was aiming for wry, but it came out more like bitter. "Here, let me see," she added, to Rita, lifting up her new radio and finding the number. She tuned her own, and spoke into it. "Sergeant Taura to Magician Rita, we've got a crystal to place and not a lot of time, yeah?" Then she switched it off, and went back to Goku. "Want to see what we've found?"

[No damned_radios linking needed since both radios are in the same thread.]

[overlimit]

So Farwell was a place, but who were ‘they’? As usual, Goku wasn’t being all that helpful.

Rita lifted the radio when Taura decided to test it out, and her companion’s voice echoed through the speakers loud and clear. The titles were unnecessary, but message itself was true enough. With a heavy sigh, Rita lowered the radio. “Right. We should get going.”

She didn’t have much to say about Taura’s invitation to Goku. On the one hand, she did want to know more about ‘Farwell’ and how he came back from certain death. On the other, Goku was Goku, and they were going somewhere with a lot of valuable and potentially delicate machinery. What if he broke something?

[monkeyboy]

Eh? Found? Yeah!" Goku shouted eagerly. This night was starting to finally look up, and all he had to do was give out one radio--

Oh.

"Ugggh, I can't right now! I hafta keep givin' these out." Impulsive or not, the young boy had made a promise to help everyone he could within the institute. If he wated all his time out here, the monkey child wouldn't be any closer to his goal. "Tomorrow," he promised. "We can meet up tomorrow night!" Then they could tell him all about what they found.

[ninelivesonce]

"Yeah," Taura breathed, her eyes lighting up. "I'll meet you right here." I, not we -- she wasn't sure coming back from the dead would help Rita's patience with the boy, but she liked him. "Make sure to keep a radio for yourself, too." She stretched out a hand, and when he didn't flinch away, ruffled his hair.

[to here]