In, Out, Up, Down [open]

[ghost_bait]

Who| Miku and You!
What| Miku tries to adapt herself to her new situation, which means meeting her teammates.
Where| Mess Hall and Around!
When| Post Valor Day
Warnings/Notes|



There had been a schedule at home. In the mornings she’d wake up, feed Ruri, make breakfast and lunch. In the afternoons, she and Rei would go over what work needed to be re-shot, sometimes making plans to travel back to those backwood locales. In the evenings, she’d read Rei’s old photography books and tell her brother and mother’s pictures about her day. It was prosaic and normal, (at least, until it hadn’t been) and Miku missed it.

There was a schedule here, too, though Miku felt a little overwhelmed trying to follow it. Learning about the UP’s myriad cultures and planets was interesting, surely! Miku could even say she enjoyed it. But learning how to fight left a kind of sick sensation in her stomach. She’d never been one for it, and it showed in her movements, uncertain as they were. The first time someone threw a punch at her, they’d run smack dab into her telekinetic shield, surprising them both. It had changed how they taught her, focusing on defense more than attack, which she’d been grateful for.

Still, it was important to adapt, especially now that she’d agreed to help the Legion. She was glad they hadn’t dragged her in and then threw her to the proverbial sharks. Plus, Miku was small enough and nondescript enough that she’d been able to go in and out of several places without attracting much notice, so she'd been able to observe some of the others - too shy to actually approach them.

Adaption also meant having to do things she didn't like. Like meeting new people. Miku watched the groups from the relative safety of her hiding spot table in the mess hall, alternating looks between please notice me and please never notice me.

Miku gave her food a poke and pursed her lips. She'd definitely get up and say hello, she would! ...Right after she finished this meal.

Comments

[ghost_bait]

Miku appreciated the attempt and looked back down at her plate of semi-mangled food. "It is. Trying to sleep when they claimed it was late was... odd."

[turntex]

"Yeah, no such thing as late on a ship like this. The only clocks that actually mean anything here are the biological ones, and I'm not talkin' that instinctive urge to start making babies while you're still young." Dave paused a moment, just to snag a sip of apple juice and a bite of generic space cereal. "Like, shit, arbitrarily assigning Earth-based time systems to a ship full of things besides humans seems pretty fuckin' racist. Am I supposed to believe that all the aliens on board this ship naturally have a sleep-cycle that similar to humans? Hell, I'm mildly offended as a human that had to adapt to a nocturnal species' schedule by virtue of being outnumbered."

[ghost_bait]

He... certainly spoke a lot. Miku tried to think of someone she knew that spoke as quickly and as much as Dave did, but kept coming up blank. She supposed she would have to parse this as quickly as he was.

But it was a little vulgar, wasn't it?

"Is it because they needed a standard way of keeping time, I wonder?" It was a little human-centric, but maybe others had a similar way of keeping time, and that's why things were as they were?

It was a little hard to think about, and beyond Miku's personal experience.

[turntex]

"Probably," Dave agrees, shrugging. "It just figures that even in a universe full of aliens, humans still manage to be the center of everything. Sci-fi movies actually got something right."

Another pause for a sip of that sweet, sweet apple juice, and his eyes cut over to Miku. At least, that's probably where he's looking based on the slight tilting of his face in her direction. The shades make it haed to say for sure.

"You're the hindsight girl, right? Shit, what's the actual word...retrocognition?"

[ghost_bait]

She couldn't help wrinkling her nose a little at the description of her powers, he wasn't wrong, but...

"I am, yes." Miku nodded and poked at something that she was sure was probably a space green bean. It was hard to tell, having poked at it something like seventy-five times before Dave sat down. "It's not that fun, though."

[turntex]

Fuck. This girl's whole body language was anxious and dreary. Dave missed his friends from home. Any of them would have been better at cheering up a sad self-pitying girl better than him, even Rose. But he'd gotten her to actually talk back properly, so it could be worse, right?

"C'mon, it can't be that bad," he tried. "I can think of like twenty fun ways to use something like that just off the top of my head. Touch a spacefuture TV and find out what kind of embarassing soap operas and whatnot people have been watching on it. Grab some wild future tech and get the rundown on how that shit is made. Lay hands on a couch in one of the lounge area and see what the others get up to in there when no one else is around."

Dave paused, thinking that through for a moment, and grimaces.

"Actually, scratch that last one. I wouldn't want a good couch ruined for me by the knowledge of what some of these assholes might have used it for."

[ghost_bait]

Miku shrugged, "It's... it's something. Sometimes I have a little trouble recognizing what's happening in the present and what's happening in the past. The past is a bit... monochromatic, so it helps, but not always." She couldn't help her anxious dreariness. It was part and parcel, along with soul-crushing guilt for being alive.

One learned to live with it.

"I'll be sure to absolutely inform you if someone's ruined a couch. You'll be the first one. I'll seek you out immediately." She smiled, just a little bit.

[turntex]

Jesus, was she trying to be helpful or was she messing with him? He was kind of hoping for the latter because hey, teasing implies some level of levity, but still.

"No, fuck you, don't tell me anything." Dave frowned intensely at his sandwich and shook his head at the very thought of it. "Let me live in blissful ignorance of which couches might have been defiled and by who. I wanna be able to sit my ass down confidently in any and every available seat without that knowledge haunting me, forever kept at the front of my mind by the fear that I'll forget and sit where I shouldn't and realize only when the deed's already done. If I might be chilling in the aftermath of someone's private funtimes then let me do it unknowingly and without fear, dammit. I wanna remain as naively blind to the bitter realities of the world as Princess Giselle."

[ghost_bait]

"Princess Giselle?" Miku questioned, one eyebrow raised. Was that something from where he lived?

And not for the first time, she realized that he cursed an awful lot. Her smile widened just a bit, "I'll spare you if you stop cursing every third word."

[turntex]

(Joke's on you, Miku. He's already been getting plenty of practice not cursing around Kubo's mom, because you gotta listen when moms tell you not to curse, it's just a rule of the universe and even he as a kid who never had a mom knows that.)

"You drive a hard bargain," Dave said, tone and voice very serious. "God, how will I communicate without profanity? Clearly it makes up the vast majority of my obviously limited vocabulary, this'll be an intense struggle. Anyway, do you really not have Disney movies whete you're from? Do I gotta make Wash show Enchanted next movie night?"

[ghost_bait]

Was he upset? Miku frowned a little. But then he seemed less annoyed, "I think the last movie I saw in theaters was..." Miku trailed off a little, in thought. "Castle in the Sky." It had only been a couple of years ago, but it felt like a lifetime away at the moment. She just hadn't had time to go since before Mafuyu had...

Well, since back then. "I have no idea what Enchanted is at all."

[turntex]

"Shit," Dave said, eyebrows arching above the rim of his glasses. "We definitelu gotta have another Disney night. Specifically Enchanted though, Wash made the mistake of showing a bunch of these assholes The Lion King and made some kids cry."

[ghost_bait]

"I haven't seen that, either." Miku shook her head. Maybe he was just making up titles to toy with her. "Just assume anything beyond 1986 is beyond me. It will be easier that way," she explained.