The Living condition

12

Whatever the business the astronaut and the drone had with doll, it was over and done with. They'd both turned around, only for the astronaut to freeze in place.

"Tessa?" N had walked forward toward the astronaut. With no notice, the astronaut had surged forward, trying to lift N up by his face, though she doesn't get him more than an inch off of the ground, squealing at him "N! You remember m–" she lets go of him and bent over, coughing and hacking and muttering something about N being tall "Air's toxic."

Your brow twitches. It wasn't easy to breathe, sure, but it wasn't toxic. You didn't think too much of it. Maybe she just had not given herself the time she needed to acclimate herself to the weather. You can't imagine what it must be like for her, suddenly having to take in so much more effort just to be able to breathe properly. On top of being acclimated–somewhat–within the cryo-pod, you'd had over a month to get used to the new process of breathing. To the point where you didn't have to think about it. It didn't feel like it was a struggle to breathe anymore, not like it had felt when you first tumbled out of the pod.

Tessa had hung one hand up on her knee, looking up as she pointed at Uzi "Who is this little–" She shrieks and sharply pulls her hand away after Uzi bites her.

"Uzi. Why are you here, Human?" you watched the drone's head turn and scoff at J "Real tired of killing this one."

"Effective drones were cloned more." J snarked back in return, twirling her hair between her digits.

"It is you"

"Classic J."

"Cyn disappeared on earth," Tessa starts, before she was interrupted by J chiming in that she had run away. Tessa cleared her throat weakly "We mutually disengaged. Her last known act was siccing you lot on the human exoplanets." That was information that would've been great to know. Not the exoplanets. But the fact that Cyn was responsible for the disassembly drones being this. Broken.

"Why?" N questioned

"That's what we're trying to figure out, Bozo." J sighs, finally retracting her wings and hitting the ground in a solid thud against the ice. Just as she hit the ground, the little bug resting atop Tessa's helmet was stolen by Doll, who spent no time in taking off. J set off into the air,giving the drone chase. V, n and uzi took off into the sky not long after J, leaving you running to keep a pace with Tessa.

"No warm welcome for me?" you'd ask as you ran alongside your old friend. It was disappointing. It was a fresh wound of missing someone just torn right open. Her head cocks back awkwardly as she runs as she answers you.

"The warmest. Promise. My head is–little scrambled–very happy to see you–just hold on." She holds up one finger in a call to give her a moment as she launches herself to run across pipes and keep a similar pace to the four flying drones. She looked like a gymnast doing it, more gangly than you remembered her to be.

Time passes and things change though, you supposed as you slid off of the snowbank and fell onto unsteady feet, walking a tightrope across a pipe as you did your best to follow after the drones and the other human.

You watched while you walked, as J and Tessa, ahead of the others, shot off at Doll. While there may not have been any structural damage to the pipes you were walking across, nor what seemed to be an old water tower and rather large industrial area, the blast of sudden heat from explosions caused by J was not a welcome surprise. Neither was the piercing sound of gunshots, proper gunshots, the ones you'd hear in old videos your mother had told you time and time again not to watch. When it stopped, you slowed to a walk, crossing over to the more..structurally sound area of the zone where Tessa was while you watched V, N and Uzi land on fragile pipes that were long improperly bent.