I'll Rewrite You (If You'd do the Same)

Ink on Our Letter

Cabby slowly wheeled her way across the shore of Indefinite Island, the grimy black sand getting stuck in her casters.

Cabby had been lost ever since she arrived here. Mentally by accident, physically by choice. The day she arrived, unceremoniously catapulted into a withering palm tree, she had been inconsolable.

Not in an erratic way, of course! Cabby couldn't let the others there see her break down so easily, over something so small. Something so... deserved. The pain of the fall, and the sound of the distressed Tea Kettle and Lifering trying to ground her drowned under the ringing of thoughts in her head.

Thoughts wondering why Test Tube had turned against her, how she could have gone wrong. Her actions were justified, right? She had tried to do what she thought Test Tube wanted, any little thing she could.

She apologized for eliminating Fan and shared her knowledge, her files, the very things she dedicated her life to, the preservation of actions, and what could be learned from them.

Yet it hadn't been enough.

Test Tube didn't even begin to hear her side of the story. Cabby could begrudgingly see her grievances with her files, but what other rationale did she stand on? If her files hurt others it was only because she was right.

Her files were immaculate, accurate in predicting others to a fault, they just didn't want to admit it. It scared them, so they became scared of Cabby.

Couldn't they see her passion, her good intentions? How many times had her files aided the team, or served as a learning tool? Yet one object's concern was enough to tear that compassion apart with heroic resolve.

The situation sat bitter in Cabby's chest, like a sick imitation of butterflies in one's stomach.

Once Lifering deemed her well enough to fend for herself she left the small area the other eliminated contestants had turned into what could barely be called a home base and didn't return, and sobbed herself to sleep once she knew she was truly alone.

She had wandered the island since, looping around its melancholy beaches and barren landscape. There were no landmarks of note, and the sun never seemed to shine through the overcast sky.

For most, it was amiss and uncomfortable, but for Cabby's state of mind, it was a welcome bleakness, a blank slate to let her thoughts roam.

In all honesty, Cabby didn't know why she stayed. Rejoining meant going back into the competition where half the objects detested her, but at the same time leaving would mean facing Fan, and the rest of the cast, who very well might have seen her actions and judged her the same as Test Tube.

Test Tube. What could Cabby say about her? She'd had months to dwell on the scientifically minded contestant, to regret, or perhaps try to atone for her actions, yet she still felt just as lost as when she arrived.

Her feelings on Test Tube changed like the tide, now lapping at her wheels as she stared out into the sea. Some days she'd want nothing more than to apologize, to childishly hope for the other's forgiveness, yet become swamped with anger at her the next.

It made Cabby feel foolish, to so badly want forgiveness from someone she had seen make such an ignorant judgment of her, so she pushed her thoughts Test Tube down as often as she could, to at least lessen the soreness she had left her.

However, Cabby's somber reflection was cut short by a hand on her arm, and a voice. Not many people sought her out, if any, she had made it quite clear that she wished to be alone, but of the few objects she had seen Tea Kettle was the kindest of them, who stood beside her now.

The motherly object had taken to checking on her every few days to ensure she was, in her words, "Looking after herself."

Even if the action was unwelcome, Cabby could understand the sentiment and indulge in it for Tea Kettle's sake, knowing how much looking after others seemed to ground her.