Post by ZAJ573 on Apr 27, 2018 23:44:44 GMT -8
It was Rivet’s second day in Aster City, and she was already starting to feel homesick.
Maybe “homesick” wasn’t the right word. With her superiors and fellow gunfighters in the Order a phone call away, and with no pressing need to contact anyone in her family (they weren’t on great terms), it wasn’t like she was lonely. But as she sat at her desk and pored over a map of Aster City -- a place far larger than any she had visited before, filled with people she’d have to interact with, talk with, maybe even work with -- she felt overwhelmed, and longed to repack her bags and go home.
“Not...that I could,” she said to herself. Her mission was much easier said than done: visit Aster City, and look for whereabouts of an ex-Order member who had suddenly and mysteriously gone rogue. Rivet’s only clues were the woman’s name and a picture of her face, both of which could be easily disguised. In a city as large as this, with only Rivet and her partner Desmond dispatched here, finding someone like that would be next to impossible. But Rivet had never let the commander down before, and she wasn’t planning on doing so now.
Hovering above the table was a ten-inch-tall black-and-brown object, moving on its own like an automaton. Anyone looking through the window would think it was strange, but to Rivet this machine -- her magical familiar, Pulse -- was the most natural thing in the world. Noticing Rivet sighing in frustration, the machine spoke to her in a highly synthesized voice -- like a virtual assistant you’d find on a smartphone, but even less human. “I have finished analyzing the map. I have an estimate on how long a full search of the city would take.”
“How does it look?” Rivet mouthed the words. That wasn’t a problem for her; it was sounding them out and stringing them into an audible sentence that caused her to stammer. Luckily, Pulse could pick it up regardless.
“It does not look good.”
Rivet pinched the bridge of her nose. There was a time and a place for Pulse’s trademark brutal honesty, but not now. Pulse noticed her reaction and moved in front of her, lightly whirring. “Remember that this is a surveying mission. Our target may not even be in the city. So long as we make a concerted effort to find her, the mission will be a success.”
“I know, but…” She brushed aside the map. “This is the first real, major job we’ve had since training. I don’t want to screw this up.”
“Your worries are unfounded. Undue stress may negatively impact physical and mental perfor”--
Pulse was cut off by what was, in fact, the largest source of Rivet’s undue stress. The front door of Rivet’s apartment slammed open, and in walked -- no, slid -- her partner Desmond. “Oh, man, this place is amazing!” In one fluid, continuous motion, he hung his hat up on a rack, tossed a small silver case on the couch, and announced to her with a huge grin, “Rivet, I’ve decided I’m going to live here.”
Her heart was racing; she still hadn’t gotten used to Desmond’s...energetic entrances. “I thought you--you were going--you were--mmph.” She tried greeting Desmond out loud but tripped over the words, biting her lip and scrunching her face in frustration. Pulse, whose mental link with Rivet was strong, even for familiars, served as a verbal surrogate for her in times like these. “I thought you were going out to get groceries. Where are they?”
“Oh, Raf’s got ‘em.” Desmond pointed his thumb behind him at another strange creature -- a three-foot-tall bipedal cream-colored dragon, whose face was hidden behind several bags of groceries that she struggled to hold. “I got ‘em!” she parroted, her voice enthusiastic but a little strained.
Rivet’s expression changed to confusion, then shock. “Why is Raf out in the open?” asked Rivet, although Pulse’s monotonic voice didn’t properly convey her anger. “Hide her.”
“No, that’s the thing! People here are cool with magic,” he said, gesturing to Raf. “I was walking down the street and I saw some guys fighting with magic swords and stuff! Just right there, in the street!” To drive home his point, he pantomimed waving a sword in the air. “So I figured, compared to that, having Raf out would be no big deal.”
As familiars of Order members, Pulse and Raf had the ability to transform into a magical weapon. In most public places, they spent most of their time hidden in that inanimate form, which was much less likely to draw attention from the general populace. Rivet felt a surge of excitement at the idea of keeping Pulse in his normal form while in the city -- he couldn’t speak for her while in weapon form, so she’d be all but mute otherwise -- but immediately tried to suppress it. Desmond had a tendency to exaggerate things.
“...Plus I needed someone to carry the bags,” Desmond added quietly.
“There it is.”
“But look, this place has everything! There’s an arcade. There’s a shopping mall. There’s a park within walking distance. Man, I passed by eight restaurants just on my way back! Eight! That’s eight more than we have back home!”
While Desmond was busy expressing a level of excitement that Rivet neither shared nor appreciated, Raf had put down the bags and was standing in front of the chair, reaching a paw up to Rivet’s forehead. “Miss Rivet, you look like you might have a fever. Can I check?” With big eyes, fur all over instead of scales, and a cutesy, childlike cadence, Raf more closely resembled the mascot of a children’s TV show than a fearsome dragon of legend.
“Sure,” Rivet spoke, smiling softly. She didn’t think there was anything wrong -- her face was probably red from the summer heat, or from resting her hand on her cheek for too long -- but Raf’s earnestness and genuine desire to help were hard to say no to.
“So!” Desmond clapped his hands, recatching Rivet’s attention. “I’ve decided that, in order to celebrate our new life in the big city” -- her heart dropped at the words “new life” -- “we’re going to dine in a big city way. And if I’ve learned anything from the several minutes of research I did, there’s nothing that says ‘big city food’ more than pizza. Tell me what you think when you hear these words.” He drew an invisible rainbow in the air. “Pizza Palace.”
“It sounds like a pizza place.”
“Not just any pizza place. It’s a palace. This isn’t like a Pizza Shack or Pizza Trailer or Pizza Hu”-- Desmond coughed. “It’s gonna be fancy. I got a good feeling about this place.” Brimming with confidence in his choice of eatery, he took out his smartphone and started dialing. As soon as the call went through, Desmond didn’t even wait for the guy on the other end to start talking and announced, “I’d like to order the biggest pizza you have!” Rivet tried to interject, but Desmond was deaf to anything getting in his way of fine dining. “Yeah, that’s right! With every topping!” He turned to Rivet, who was vehemently shaking her head. “Every topping on half. Just cheese on the other half,” he said, giving her a thumbs-up. Rivet felt a sudden sense of remorse for the employees of the Pizza Palace.
Maybe “homesick” wasn’t the right word. With her superiors and fellow gunfighters in the Order a phone call away, and with no pressing need to contact anyone in her family (they weren’t on great terms), it wasn’t like she was lonely. But as she sat at her desk and pored over a map of Aster City -- a place far larger than any she had visited before, filled with people she’d have to interact with, talk with, maybe even work with -- she felt overwhelmed, and longed to repack her bags and go home.
“Not...that I could,” she said to herself. Her mission was much easier said than done: visit Aster City, and look for whereabouts of an ex-Order member who had suddenly and mysteriously gone rogue. Rivet’s only clues were the woman’s name and a picture of her face, both of which could be easily disguised. In a city as large as this, with only Rivet and her partner Desmond dispatched here, finding someone like that would be next to impossible. But Rivet had never let the commander down before, and she wasn’t planning on doing so now.
Hovering above the table was a ten-inch-tall black-and-brown object, moving on its own like an automaton. Anyone looking through the window would think it was strange, but to Rivet this machine -- her magical familiar, Pulse -- was the most natural thing in the world. Noticing Rivet sighing in frustration, the machine spoke to her in a highly synthesized voice -- like a virtual assistant you’d find on a smartphone, but even less human. “I have finished analyzing the map. I have an estimate on how long a full search of the city would take.”
“How does it look?” Rivet mouthed the words. That wasn’t a problem for her; it was sounding them out and stringing them into an audible sentence that caused her to stammer. Luckily, Pulse could pick it up regardless.
“It does not look good.”
Rivet pinched the bridge of her nose. There was a time and a place for Pulse’s trademark brutal honesty, but not now. Pulse noticed her reaction and moved in front of her, lightly whirring. “Remember that this is a surveying mission. Our target may not even be in the city. So long as we make a concerted effort to find her, the mission will be a success.”
“I know, but…” She brushed aside the map. “This is the first real, major job we’ve had since training. I don’t want to screw this up.”
“Your worries are unfounded. Undue stress may negatively impact physical and mental perfor”--
Pulse was cut off by what was, in fact, the largest source of Rivet’s undue stress. The front door of Rivet’s apartment slammed open, and in walked -- no, slid -- her partner Desmond. “Oh, man, this place is amazing!” In one fluid, continuous motion, he hung his hat up on a rack, tossed a small silver case on the couch, and announced to her with a huge grin, “Rivet, I’ve decided I’m going to live here.”
Her heart was racing; she still hadn’t gotten used to Desmond’s...energetic entrances. “I thought you--you were going--you were--mmph.” She tried greeting Desmond out loud but tripped over the words, biting her lip and scrunching her face in frustration. Pulse, whose mental link with Rivet was strong, even for familiars, served as a verbal surrogate for her in times like these. “I thought you were going out to get groceries. Where are they?”
“Oh, Raf’s got ‘em.” Desmond pointed his thumb behind him at another strange creature -- a three-foot-tall bipedal cream-colored dragon, whose face was hidden behind several bags of groceries that she struggled to hold. “I got ‘em!” she parroted, her voice enthusiastic but a little strained.
Rivet’s expression changed to confusion, then shock. “Why is Raf out in the open?” asked Rivet, although Pulse’s monotonic voice didn’t properly convey her anger. “Hide her.”
“No, that’s the thing! People here are cool with magic,” he said, gesturing to Raf. “I was walking down the street and I saw some guys fighting with magic swords and stuff! Just right there, in the street!” To drive home his point, he pantomimed waving a sword in the air. “So I figured, compared to that, having Raf out would be no big deal.”
As familiars of Order members, Pulse and Raf had the ability to transform into a magical weapon. In most public places, they spent most of their time hidden in that inanimate form, which was much less likely to draw attention from the general populace. Rivet felt a surge of excitement at the idea of keeping Pulse in his normal form while in the city -- he couldn’t speak for her while in weapon form, so she’d be all but mute otherwise -- but immediately tried to suppress it. Desmond had a tendency to exaggerate things.
“...Plus I needed someone to carry the bags,” Desmond added quietly.
“There it is.”
“But look, this place has everything! There’s an arcade. There’s a shopping mall. There’s a park within walking distance. Man, I passed by eight restaurants just on my way back! Eight! That’s eight more than we have back home!”
While Desmond was busy expressing a level of excitement that Rivet neither shared nor appreciated, Raf had put down the bags and was standing in front of the chair, reaching a paw up to Rivet’s forehead. “Miss Rivet, you look like you might have a fever. Can I check?” With big eyes, fur all over instead of scales, and a cutesy, childlike cadence, Raf more closely resembled the mascot of a children’s TV show than a fearsome dragon of legend.
“Sure,” Rivet spoke, smiling softly. She didn’t think there was anything wrong -- her face was probably red from the summer heat, or from resting her hand on her cheek for too long -- but Raf’s earnestness and genuine desire to help were hard to say no to.
“So!” Desmond clapped his hands, recatching Rivet’s attention. “I’ve decided that, in order to celebrate our new life in the big city” -- her heart dropped at the words “new life” -- “we’re going to dine in a big city way. And if I’ve learned anything from the several minutes of research I did, there’s nothing that says ‘big city food’ more than pizza. Tell me what you think when you hear these words.” He drew an invisible rainbow in the air. “Pizza Palace.”
“It sounds like a pizza place.”
“Not just any pizza place. It’s a palace. This isn’t like a Pizza Shack or Pizza Trailer or Pizza Hu”-- Desmond coughed. “It’s gonna be fancy. I got a good feeling about this place.” Brimming with confidence in his choice of eatery, he took out his smartphone and started dialing. As soon as the call went through, Desmond didn’t even wait for the guy on the other end to start talking and announced, “I’d like to order the biggest pizza you have!” Rivet tried to interject, but Desmond was deaf to anything getting in his way of fine dining. “Yeah, that’s right! With every topping!” He turned to Rivet, who was vehemently shaking her head. “Every topping on half. Just cheese on the other half,” he said, giving her a thumbs-up. Rivet felt a sudden sense of remorse for the employees of the Pizza Palace.
