This chapter fought me for like 2-3 days, stuck at 1k words for a while, then suddenly there's an additional 3k there... Like, huh?
Writing is strange.
Accidentally lost track of time. Whoops.
Dalan777 - Thanks, and it's nice to know that cleared things up.
Shadefyre - The former, ehhh, but the latter? Hmm.
Spazzer13 - I think I'll just let it be at the moment, though I'll think about the other two options.
ShadeslayerX - That'll be an interesting conversation to have.
[Taylor's POV]
Riding through the street, I hummed along to the song my Other Half was blasting at full volume and singing, having no care in the world that everyone could hear him and the song. "~Dream machine, Racing Queen, you make my heart heart heart beat, heart heart heart beat!~" I was tempted to sing along, She should, but I wasn't that bold. |Boo!|
Rolling my eyes, I mentally waved that off. |I'm not a good singer for one.|
[Lies and slander!] It made me feel good that he honestly believed that.
That aside, I went on. |For two, I'd rather not do something as unserious as that before a meeting with Brandish.| The woman was a lawyer, and from what my Other Half knew, a 'Hard ass bitch with a tree trunk shoved up her ass.' Sounds about right. That aside, I doubted the woman would have a good first impression of us if we came into the meeting singing a song.
My boyfriend mentally shrugged at me. [We don't need a good impression, we don't even need to do this at all really.] Looking at him out of the corner of my eye, he knew to go on. [What's she gonna say? 'No, I won't allow her to go help the Case 53's' or some shit? If she tries to keep Amy from helping, all we'd have to do is threaten to leak that, and voila, Amy works with us.] I understood the point, Brandish had no real options aside from letting Panacea work with us, but I wasn't going to lead with that. Brandish, and New Wave by proxy, were Heroes, so we didn't need to start off heavy handed. Diplomacy would come first, and everything else could come after. [And this is why I leave the talking to you.]
That made me scoff. |Because you'd smack people in the face with whatever you could, and browbeat them into letting you get away with whatever it was you wanted too do at the time.| My Other Half had an affinity for exploiting and manipulating people, we both knew it, and where it had come from, but it was still Amusing to see or hear how he used that affinity.
[It's less exploitation and manipulating, and more 'Exposing dangerous and somewhat buried facts and threatening people with them to speed up negotiations.'] My deadpan made him huff in Fond Amusement. [I'm all for giving a live demonstration at how effective it is.]
I rolled my eyes. |If Brandish is as unreasonable as she gets portrayed as, then maybe.| The way he perked up in Interest made me roll my eyes. |I said 'Maybe', you goof.|
[And you say 'Maybe' before we proceed to do whatever it was you said that about in the first place.] Blinking, I furrowed my brows, thinking about... Clips about me doing that rolled through my mind, all from his perspective, and I could only grumble about the fact he was right. [Of course I'm right. I'm always right.] The snort that made its way out of me earned a burst of Exasperation from him. Before he could even say anything back, I projected the first time he tried to do a run and jump onto an active Behemoth. He said he could do it, but reality proved him wrong. [I'll admit... That wasn't my finest moment.]
I outright laughed at that. The first attempt ended up with him overshooting and being run over, a moment which Tess and I were never going to let him live down. |As if your second try was any better.|
[I got it eventually!] That was true.
But we both knew when 'Eventually', was. |On the 5th try.|
He huffed, and I snickered at him. We would've kept the back and forth going, but we reached our destination while we were joking around. Cutting the music, and slowing down, we looked for some parking spots, though when we saw that most of the road was taken up, we drove a bit further up the road. [We could just jump off and send them home. No real reason to park them.]
While he sort of had a point, Yuuup, it would be better to not do that. |We need to make a good first impression on Brandish. She's a potential ally, so starting off on the right foot is always a good thing.|
He hummed in reply, Acceptance coming from him. [Then I'll keep my 'Smartass comments' to myself.]
Rolling my eyes, I found us some parking spaces and projected them to him, I slowed Johanna down and started backing up to put her in standby. |You sure you don't want to just fuck off and do something else?|
Anubis grunted, putting Behemoth in the space I'd shown him. [I do, but we're a team. When it comes to shit like this, where you go I go.] I felt his Love for me at that, and I smiled. I'd probably never get over the fact that I had someone so devoted to me, who I was just as devoted too, in my corner.
Putting t hat aside, we both parked our bikes, and get off. With us no longer on them, we received prompts to put them in standby or not, and we did. Walking away from our bikes, we met up on the sidewalk, and with the practice of ignoring everyone around us, made our way to the home of New Wave.
Since we parked up road, we were a few minutes out, but that was fine. "Could've totally parked down road and walked up." He had a point.
Though I shrugged at said point. "Hindsight."
A grunt was his only response. [By the way,] I looked at him from the corner of my eye, watching as he spun his Wingman. [Hypothetically,] I refused to let the groan come out. He rolled his eyes, but went on. [If we get into a fight, who handles who?]
Instead of answering right away, I stared at him. |Phoenix.| He stopped spinning the pistol. |We are not fighting New Wave.|
...
...
...
[But what if we do?] My eye twitched, but I opted to let out a breath. [It's a perfectly valid question! Negotiations always have the possibility to breakdown into violence.]
Closing my eyes, and relying on my bugs to guide me, I mentally counted to 10, then took another breath. |Just to get this out of the way, because we both know you're going to keep asking, I'll take anyone not named Brandish. That good for you?|
Going by the Interested Amusement, I was going to go with yes. [Yup. Works for me!] I rolled my eyes at the man child I called my boyfriend, [If I'm a child then you're a pedophile.~] I nearly tripped at that, but my training in the Danger Room kept me upright. My head whipped towards my Other Half though, and I was moments away from getting back at him for that, but I was stopped by what he did. Saluting with his Wingman, because of course he would. he spoke." Well hello Brandish."
Putting his Wingman back into its holster and putting both into his inventory, with the rest of his guns and grenades, he mentally grinned at me. (Manipulative son of a bitch.) The Amusement had me mentally clicking my tongue, but I put it aside as I turned back to face the front, looking at the leader of New Wave as I did. I'd noticed her open the door, but hadn't expected the sudden reference so it distracted me from the woman we were here to meet. It wasn't a surprise that she was in costume, this was official business after all, I was just Surprised that there were only three other people in the house. It was a Friday, 1:30PM, but I thought they'd atleast involve Glory Girl or Laserdream.
Brandish gave a small nod to my Other Half, then turned to look at me. Knowing what was coming, I nodded back. "Good evening Brandish."
That earned me a nod. "Anubis, Khepri." Gesturing for us to come forward, we did just that, and followed the woman into her home, muting our thoughts as we did. We, more me really, were going to start talking to other people, so we couldn't afford to be distracted.
The livingroom didn't look that special, couches, TV, table, the normal stuff. Though, the trio of Heroes standing tense and at attention wasn't exactly a normal thing. Lady Photon had her arms crossed, and had a small frown on her face as she looked at Brandish, while Manpower and Flashbang looked ready to act... Well, one of them did, the other seemed to just be in the position, his muscles not tensed enough to move in the event he needed too right away. [If they were all standing behind the couch, I would've lost my shit.] The reference, because that had to be what it was, flew over my head, but that was fine.
We followed Brandish to the dining room table, she sat at the head of the table, while I sat at the opposite end. As I did, my Other Half wrapped his arms around my shoulders and plopped his chin onto the crown of my head. Thankfully my mask hid my entire face, so New Wave didn't see my Surprised blink. |?| He mentally shrugged at me, and I just let it be. It wasn't like I Disliked the current position we were in, and it was a good and blatant form of saying he was with me. So, crossing my legs and resting my chin against my clasped fingers, I looked back at Brandish.
The team of veteran Heroes took mine and my partner's actions in stride, though I was pretty sure we both saw the small twitch of Lady Photon's lips.
Brandish clasped her hands, and stared at us for a moment. If she was trying to make us Anxious or something like that, which would be petty as all hell considering we were 'Outnumbered' and in their home, she was going to need to try harder. Probably realizing that, the woman huffed, and focused her eyes onto my Other Half. "Are you going to stand the entire time?"
I mentally raised a brow at that. (What about her allies? Are they just chopped liver? And no offering water or something?) That last one was just an observation, one that only came up when I recognized there wasn't any semblance of hospitality here.
Not knowing, but probably having a similar thought, my partner huffed. "We ignoring them?" Said 'Them' didn't even react, taking the hypocrisy as it was.
The woman didn't bother to answer the question, instead deciding to move on with a nod. "Now, this collaboration with Panacea," Frowning, I took note of the small inflection she added to the name. I wasn't going to immediately consider it proof that she didn't like Amelia, but it wouldn't be forgotten. And going by the small twitch from Lady Photon, I wasn't the only one to do that. "What exactly will it entail, what times will she be working with you, and where will this all be taking place?"
Those were all pretty standard questions, so I had no issues with answering them. "Panacea's role would be to ensure the Case 53's will have a stable form after our technology begins working on their bodies. Her times will be dependent on the schedule worked on by Dragon and herself, and depending on the Case 53 this will be happening at The Guild itself or at our base." Which was all true.
Brandish didn't have much of a reaction, her poker face was strong, but she settled for a small hum. Behind her though, Lady Photon and Manpower seemed to be surprised at something, most likely the fact we were going to be showing people our base. "And this technology of yours, how exactly is it going to help these people?"
Another question we expected, and one we had an answer too. "Anubis' gauntlet," Even if it meant nothing to anyone on Earth Bet, we weren't going to freely tell people the name of the Ultimatrix. "Will be responsible for determining how the Case 53's DNA is being effected by their powers, finding the most optimal ratio between said Powers and their DNA, and shifting or repairing their bodies until their form stabilizes." Granted, we weren't entirely sure if it would work, but if the Omnitrix could fix an alien species that had inbred themselves to near extinction, then it could probably fix this.
Silence permeated the room for a bit, our tentative allies seemingly thinking this over. "Question," My Other Half and I, everyone else in the room too, looked over to Lady Photon. "How certain are you that this'll work on the first try?"
An... Unexpected, question, but not that much of a curve ball. "While we're confidant that there will be some form of results from initial testing, we're not going to rely on just that in case it doesn't all work out."
A mental snort went off in my mind at that. [In normal speak, 'Something will happen, good or bad, something will happen and we'll go from there.'] I rolled my eyes at that. He wasn't wrong.
|You do remember that you're the one that'll be in charge of fixing them, right? So anything that goes wrong immediately reflects onto you.| The brief moment of Annoyance meant he hadn't thought about that.
"I see." That response from Lady Photon brought our attention back to her, and we saw as she frowned a bit. "Still, working with their DNA sounds close to...-"
"Bio-Tinkering."
Anubis mentally groaned at the interruption. [And here we fucking go. God, your people are so anal about this.] I agreed with that, even though I understood exactly why Bio-Tinkering was heavily frowned upon. Bonesaw was one scary bitch, and everyone had a very healthy Fear over her and her creations.
|Still, it was expected for this to come up, but damn that was fast.| Begrudging Agreement was his response to that.
Our little chat aside, our eyes went back to Brandish, who had a frown on her face as she stared at us. "What you're proposing sounds like Bio-Tinkering. Fiddling with someone's DNA, even for their own good, cannot be called anything else." Unfortunately for all of us, my Other Half snorted. The sudden action had brought the attention onto him, and given the look on Brandish, and the rest of New Wave's faces, that wasn't a good thing. "Do you have something to say, Anubis?" Ah, of course she had something against my boyfriend, why wouldn't she?
Scoffing, said boyfriend lifted his head a bit, leveling a hidden Unamused stare at the woman. "By your definition of 'Bio-Tinkering', giving some fucker a pacemaker should end up with the docs and surgeons going to the slammer." That was a Surprisingly good point. [Why are you Surprised? Brainstorm and Grey Matter are some of my most used forms. Me having good points is bound to happen.] I had to admit, he was right. My own bleed over from the genius aliens was still trickling in, but his naturally higher then mine. I just had to remember that he just chose to act how he did because it Amused him.
"It's not the same, but the comparison does work." The logic seemed to work on Manpower, as well as Lady Photon and seemingly Flashbang who were nodding along.
Though, it didn't work on all of them. Brandish scowled for a moment, and glared at my partner. "No matter what you or some other Tinker make, you're not doctors. You don't truly understand your tech or how it works. The side effects from your tech may not be visible, may not even apply to you, but the possibility that they exist, and can be detrimental to the Case 53's, is there." The both of us blinked in Surprise at that, most likely for different reasons though. "But that's why you want Panacea," There it was again. "For, don't you? Any side effects that may come from your 'Treatments' can easily be removed with her help."
Incomprehensible Bafflement pulsed from the both of us at the woman's question. That had come out of left field, but the... 'Logic', was somewhat sound. No one had managed to fix the Case 53's before, and even with Anubis' aliens and my Hybrid Forms, the idea that the tech could have some downsides made sense. So in that regard, I could Maybe see where she was coming from.
Though the brief surge of Irritation, and the huff told me what he thought of that. [You go, I almost called her a bitch out of reflex.] Saw that coming. [The fuckin audacity to question my tech...] Much mental grumbling was had before he stopped doing it over the Bond and settled for doing it in his mind. It was somewhat Amusing to hear him get defensive over something, but I got it. When I was a Galvan Hybrid, I had a sort of Pride when it came to working on projects or my Johanna, he might've made her but the only one to really work on my girl was ME, so I Understood why he was that way about his stuff.
And sure, the Ultimatrix might not have been made by him, but it was the moral of the insinuation, instead of the thing she was questioning, that hit his nerves.
Shaking my head, and only stopping when his chin was back on my crown, I took over. "While the possibility of side effects is there, all medical procedures," If she was going to play this angle, then I'd play along. "Even the good ones have them, they won't be dire, or even as damning as you're attempting to make them be." Another fact, but it would be a good thing to hammer this home since she brought it up earlier. "And there's a misconception that you seem to be under. We DO understand our tech. We're similar to Dragon in that regard, which is one of the reasons we work so well together." Now, technically, that was all true.
Keyword being 'Technically', considering I didn't actually know or Understand our tech... Well, not yet. Someday in the future, I would, the bleed over from the 'Big Brains', would eventually be enough for me to pick apart the Hard Light Projector and know what I was doing and what I'd have to do to put it back together, but that wasn't today. And we worked well with Dragon not because of that, though it helped and wasn't a lie, but because we saw her as family, and she reciprocated too
Not that they needed to know any of that.
Amused Affection came from my Other Half for some reason. [Aww, lookit you, telling half-truths to our 'Potential allies.'] Ah, that was why. [If I wasn't in the mood to give a bunch of old people a show I'd kiss you for that.] My eye twitched, and I fought off the blush and thoughts that threatened to form, I couldn't allow myself to be distracted now.
|Not now you goof!| He hummed at me in response, Acceptance being all the confirmation I needed.
While that happened, I kept track of the looks on New Wave's faces, specifically Brandish. While Lady Photon, Manpower, and even Flashbang, he seemed to be getting progressively more 'Here' the more we talked, looked interested, it was what Brandish thought that was important.
The woman's face had gone neutral, and her posture had gone still. She was looking at us, a focused stare from behind her mask, and we met it back... Well, I was. The chances that my partner had his eyes closed or just plain not looking at her were so high that I didn't bother asking, already knowing the answer. Eventually though, she spoke up. "And if that's the case, understanding your technology," I recognized I basically confirmed I was a Tinker too, even if it was situational, but that was fine. "Then why would you need Panacea?" The flicker of Annoyance came from both of us, but neither of us commented on it and let the woman go on. "Going through clinical trials is a standard part of the medical field. Trial and error would be better then involving an unaffiliated party such as her." My eye twitched, and my Other Half's arms briefly tightened around me.
Letting out a mental breath, I put aside the Irritation I felt, and stayed on topic. "Trial and error is all well and good, but the use of collaborations and outside resources are also factors that doctors take into account when it comes to making advancements in the field and with medical techniques. Panacea is renown for her abilities as a healer, making her one of the most desired Capes to collaborate with in something like this, and could very well provide aide that would speed up the process of healing the Case 53's." Thank fuck that Brainstorm bleed over helped with memory retention and logical thinking.
My response prompted a frown to grow on Brandish's face, and she seemed ready to rebuke the perfectly points, when someone else interrupted. "The points make sense." We looked over to Manpower, who was idly scratching his chin. "Why rely on just themselves when there are others with the experience and capabilities they need to ensure their treatments work?"
[Someone gets it.] I Agreed with that.
Apparently, I wasn't the only one. "It's also a responsible attitude to take. Not doing this on their own is a good sign."
Brandish scoffed. "Or it shows that they're not fully confidant in their technology. They're 'The Changer' and 'The Master', not 'The Tinker' or 'The Bio-Tinker.' They can't do it themselves so they're asking everyone they need for help. Fighting is one thing, but doing something like this is out of their league."
Irritation/Annoyance surged in myself and Other Half respectively, and I bristled. The dismissal and outright underestimation made me tempted to lash out, because who the hell did this bitch think she was to demean US?! (And this is coming from Brandish?! If I pulled half the shit she has I'd be drawn and quartered!) Knowing secrets was sometimes a bad thing, because I wouldn't be as accepting or ready to snap at the woman in front of me if I didn't know about the skeletons in her closet.
That said, I was beat to it by my Other Half. "Fuck a tree trunk, bitch has the Empire State so far lodged up her ass that I can see the goddamn peak in the back of her throat." The vibrations that went against my skull were oddly Comfortable despite what he'd just said.
Due to my Irritation, which was being amplified by his Annoyance, I snorted.
That was the only sound to go off for a bit, but it wasn't the only action to happen. It was hilarious really, the nearly robotic way that heads turned towards us, the shocked looks on the faces of Lady Photon, Manpower, and Flashbang... The massive scowl on Brandish's face was both funny, and a problem. "What did you just say?"
Now, I knew I only had a moment to stop my boyfriend from saying something that would lead to negotiations going down the shitter, but for the life of me, I couldn't think of a good reason to stop him. (Brandish wants to be a bitch? Ok, fuck her, she can deal with Phoenix.)
"What did you just say?" The clenched jaw, tensing hands, and shifting posture, was a sign that fight might just happen...
Which would actually be bad because we, well, we didn't need Panacea, we would just prefer to have her on our side. "You know what I said, don't make me repeat myself." And I was too busy thinking about it to stop him... Well shit.
Predictably, Brandish's scowl deepened, and she stood up. "We don't have to allow you access to Panacea, especially when you instantly default to insults when concerns over your competency are brought up." It would be somewhat intimidating and scalding if she weren't an inch or so shorter then us.
My Other Half lifted his head up to scoff, and since he was already going, I wasn't going to undermine him and stop him now. If he went too far, I would, we couldn't afford to test if the 'Victoria is actually Manpower's daughter' thing was factual or not right now, or the whole Marquis thing, but anything else was fair game. "In the words of my beautiful partner here," Compliments were always a nice thing. "'There's a misconception you seem to be under', since we don't really need your permission."
If New Wave wasn't tense before, they were now. And for good reason too, because even though that wasn't said as a threat, the words themselves could easily be misconstrued as one. "Choose your next words very carefully." The lights gathering around her palms was a clear threat.
(Welp, here we go. Note to self, ask Tess for diplomacy lessons.) Granted, I could've stopped this whole situation if I hadn't let him come with me, or Shunted my emotions into the Swarm, which was ever present, but I didn't like either of those options. Doing the former spoke of not trusting my Other Half, which was untrue, we both trusted each other with our lives, while the latter meant shutting out our Bond... And that... I couldn't do that. We were both unhealthily dependent on our Bond, we both knew it, but neither of us wanted to do anything about it. We were both always in each others minds/hearts... To people like us, that was the ultimate reassurance that we mattered to someone, that we were cared for... (Jesus Christ, how did I get here?) Tuning back in, (When the hell did I tune out?) I saw the situation.
My Other Half was humming a noncommittal noise, seemingly ignoring Brandish and looking at me. I didn't need to see behind his visor to know his Curious and slightly Concerned gaze was focused on me. [You good?]
|Yeah, wandering thoughts and all that shit.| He audibly hummed in response, then nodded.
Unfortunately, the moment we shared was interrupted by Brandish, who had what looked like brass knuckles made out of light on her hands. "Well?"
Rolling his eyes, my Other Half looked at her. "You'll just make it worse ya know? We're the darlings of the world at the moment, and you picking a fight with us would probably be the worst mistake of your lives and also social suicide." Brandish scowled, I was starting to wonder if it was just natural for her at this point, while the rest of New Wave jolted at that, understanding the point. Even their leader understood it, which was probably why she looked about ready to smash my boyfriend's face in, but was still holding herself back. Seeing that, he nodded. "Now that the big threat is there, here's another one," He was a menace. "Not letting Panacea work with us would also be social suicide when we posted it on PHO. Just imagine all the outrage that'd be aimed at you all when THAT comes out." A true menace for just saying 'Fuck it' and threatening New Wave...
And I was fine with this. Sure, it was petty, and pretty vindictive, but she of all people had no right to critique us. It was also a viable method of speeding this whole t hing up, but I wasn't going to tell him that.
"Alright, let's take a step ba...-" Manpower was cut off by a glare from Brandish, making him pause and raise his hands. "They're right you know. All they'd have to do is put this up on PHO and we'd have no choice but to let Amy help them."
"... I don't like it, but he's right." And thank you Lady Photon. She ignored the look coming from her team leader, opting to look at us instead. "This was just a common courtesy, wasn't it?"
[Your turn.] Taking the cue, I nodded. Both to my Other Half, and to Lady Photon.
The confirmation made the woman nod, crossing her arms as she seemingly closed her eyes. Though, that seemed to piss off Brandish even more. "So yo...-"
"It makes sense Carol."
We blinked, and looked over to Flashbang, who was looking between Brandish and us. [... I totally forgot he was here.] I didn't even blame him, Flashbang had kind of just been there, and was only now contributing to the conversation.
Apparently, him speaking up was a Surprise to the rest of New Wave as well, since no one said anything, letting him continue. "There's no reason to fight them on this, and we all know what Amelia would choose, so we should just let it happen." He had a point, the way he said it was kind of defeatist though, but knowing his circumstances made it easy to figure out why it came out that way.
Brandish scowled harder, I didn't know that was possible, and looked away to pin the both of us with a glare. Again, it wasn't as effective as it could've been considering we were both more powerful then she was, that was just a simple fact, so we just met the look without much of a reaction. The atmosphere was tense for a bit, the leader of New Wave most likely thinking over the current situation she was in, before eventually scoffing. "Fine. You want her, you can have her."
Annoyance flickered from the both of us again. [I want a trophy. 'I managed to not shoot Brandish', because this bitch is getting on my nerves.]
Might've been a bit much, but I got it. |Same... The nerves part, not the shooting part.| He mentally shrugged at me, and I nodded at Brandish. "Thank you for your cooperation." The snorts from damn near everyone in the room went ignored. That said though, my Other Half unwrapped his arms from my shoulders, and stepped back, allowing me to get up. Giving a cursory look to the rest of New Wave, I mentally nodded, and turned and started walking towards the door. "We'll be in touch."
My partner walked by my side, Amused at something. [Should've waited when we had a foot out the door, more dramatic that way.] I rolled my eyes, because of course that was what he was thinking. [Still, maybe we should just threaten people with their dirty laundry or the high ground more often, we saved who knows how much time that way.] That got an eye roll. Like hell would I let that happen, he'd probably get us into a fight if he did.
His comment aside, we walked out of the New Wave home, and made our way to our bikes. The small crowd of people looking at our rides, as well as taking pictures with them, were something I dismissed out of hand. I'd gotten used to the idea of people gathering around us, and our stuff, but they hadn't been doing anything bad, so I didn't pay them too much mind.
With this whole issue settled though, we were free to go patrolling or anything else like that...
Though, we hadn't planned for what. Sure, I was going to meet up with Dad and Aunt Zoe later, but I did like spending time with my boyfriend... (An obvious choice could be going on patrol, keeping the Nazis in check would be good, and taking out anyone we can would go a long way in dismantling the E88. They'll slip up eventually... But if they see us on patrol, they'll squirrel themselves away... God, being too effective might be a bad thing.) Granted, we could go raid Medhall, it still Surprised me how no one connected Medhall to Mead hall with the Nazis here, but if we rounded them up in their civilian aliases, then that'd break the Unwritten Rules. (Not like we care about them, it would just blow back on The Guild and Dragon if we did so.) Considering we didn't want that to happen, we left them be for now.
Shooing that thought off, I walked up to Johanna, not at all bothered by the small crowd recording or taking pictures of our bikes, they were amazing, and got on. With an acceptance, my girl purred to life, Behemoth rumbling on a moment later. That done, I started backing out a bit, "Badass biker bitch on a badass bike in skin tight latex... Best day ever." Only to get distracted by a muttered comment from someone nearby.
I managed to keep myself from reacting, but my boyfriend, despite being across the fucking street, was another story. "That's MY 'Badass biker bitch', thank you very much!" The guy who said the initial comment choked, while my Other Half and some of the nearby people snickered. As they did, I felt my lips twitch a bit, the verbal 'Claim' being a nice thing to hear.
(Still though...) I shook my head. (No, don't question how he heard it, just don't.) I'd already had some kind of answer anyway, so it didn't matter.
That decided, and after I revved Johanna's engine, the both of us drove forwards, seamlessly sliding into traffic. As we did, I let my thoughts slip away, and immersed myself into the drive.
Hearing Red Line come back on from Behemoth, blasting at full volume with no care for anyone else, I let myself Relax. |At some point in our lives, we should drive around some mountain route at night. No worries about the world, our endgame, just us, our bikes, and the road.|
There was a bit of Surprise at how sudden that was, but the greater surge of Contemplation was a good sign. [... Yeah... Should we make it a thing?] Now that was Interesting. Knowing what I felt bout that, he went on. [Maybe once a month, something like that?] Thinking about it, I couldn't help but find the idea of making that a tradition Pleasing. [It's a date then.]
I rolled my eyes at that. |We went on a date earlier.| It wasn't a complaint or anything like that, I'd never complain about a date with my boyfriend, just an observation.
Reaching a red light, we slowed down, giving him the opportunity to shrug at me. [Eh, I'll figure something out.] I blinked, looking over to him at the small pulse of Interested Mischief, wondering what he had in mind. I could've asked, but I decided not too.
Whatever he had in mind would probably be more worth it if I didn't know what it could be.
So, good talk with New Wave... Well, not really, but good enough.
Also, sole Taylor POV. I thought about putting a Phoenix POV or even a Dragon one, but it felt wrong, so just her for this one.