on putting her in an Pacific Rim AU situation...

[silentstar]

[Someone is very upset with her mun right now, enough so that she's actually taking the time to write a note, tidy block print on a well-worn notepad]

Are you [here there is at least one curse word thoroughly scratched out] serious right now? How in the HELL is giant aliens from the depths any better than Terminators?

And making me older, so that I actually REMEMBER them dying, that's just great. Not like that wasn't a horrific enough experience in the first place, no, you had to go and make it worse.

[also crossed out, but not as effectively:] repairing machines like those isn't even close to balanced compensation.

Comments

[godelsolution]

Maybe the giant aliens from the depth are easier to get rid of than Terminators.

[silentstar]

[A hastily scrawled note, quick, but that same tidy block print] Doubtful. Kaiju are about a billion times bigger than Terminators.

[godelsolution]

Bigger doesn't mean better. Or infallible.

[silentstar]

[She thinks that one over for a moment before shrugging, writing another quick reply on a fresh page] There's countermeasures in place by way of giant robots. I'm sure you can see why I don't like the idea.

[godelsolution]

Believe me, I can understand that.

[silentstar]

[She sighs, clearly exasperated, complete with a theatrical eye-roll, she shakes her head again writing down a new response:] Not really anything I can do about it either way. Guess I'll just have to see how it goes.

[godelsolution]

Nowhere else you could go?

[silentstar]

[A sad little head-shake] Not besides memes. She doesn't have time for a 'real' game, this one's a sandbox-style.

[godelsolution]

Well that sucks. I'm sorry.

[silentstar]

[An easy, rolling shrug, it's an eloquent movement] I don't mind, keeps me out of trouble.

[godelsolution]

I suppose so.

[oldmanstriker]

Trust me, they're probably worse.

[silentstar]

[She eyes him a moment before scribbling down a reply, able to write at almost the same speed most people speak:] I'm pretty sure you're right. Bigger, for one. A lot bigger. Just as hell-bent on the destruction of humanity, though.

[oldmanstriker]

Size sometimes is the answer. [A wry smile there.] So, I take it your mun is planning on letting you be an engineer?

[silentstar]

[She nods, though her expression is still a little flat. She does like fixing things, making them run better, but she's still leery of the 'giant robots' idea. Another quick reply gets jotted down:] Yes, for a sandbox-style game that's coming up.

[oldmanstriker]

Oh? [A chuckle, there.] You should've seen my mun perk up, there.

You don't seem too excited about the idea. Rather be piloting?

[silentstar]

[The horrified expression at that suggestion quickly gets toned down to something more neutral as she holds up a finger in a 'please wait' while working on a somewhat longer reply:] Heights and me don't get along very well, I'm a ground-dweller by nature and by necessity in my home universe, I don't imagine that much will change just because she's altering the backstory to make way for giant aliens instead of sentient robots.

Besides that, the trauma of the whole family-getting-dead thing kind of knocks me out of the pilot pool anyway, since it's psychological instead of physical, it's not something medical would want me getting on anyone else.

[oldmanstriker]

We've had pilots who have had their families killed before, but I hear you on the height thing.

[Herc totally doesn't mind waiting for the writing. This was the era where humans put aside their differences, after all. Besides, you didn't need to talk in the drift.]

[silentstar]

[She cocks her head, mulling that over for a moment:] Most pilots/people don't stop talking when their families get killed though, right? And never start again? Because it's been about five years, little longer I think. Some of the early years are fuzzy.

[oldmanstriker]

We all handle shock in different ways. Talking doesn't matter to be a pilot, anyway.

Besides, you seem mentally sound. And the PPDC was getting kinda desperate where I'm from. [But, hell, he managed to pass psych evaluations despite what happened. There probably weren't many people in the PPDC who hadn't lost family in the early days of the Kaiju war.]

[silentstar]

[She shrugs, it's a surprisingly eloquent gesture, she's had a half-decade at least to perfect it] Apparently things weren't that bad yet, where I'll be coming from. Which is a little more hopeful than where I am in my home-universe.

[oldmanstriker]

Always good to hear.

Still, it'll be good to have more engineers around.

[silentstar]

[That, at least, earns him an actual smile, small, crooked, but a smile all the same. She gives an easier shrug, more loose-jointed than the last, amused, now.] I am pretty handy with a monkey wrench.

[silentrunning]

[There's someone scrawling a message in a notepad almost as well-worn as yours and shoving it in your direction. The message is simple.]

That is terrible! I am so sorry.

[silentstar]

[Someone who speaks her language! She can't help but smile a little, even as she shrugs] I'm already used to everyone being dead. I guess this won't be TOO different.

[silentrunning]

[She writes back.]

I understand that. I remember none of my family.

[silentstar]

That's how it usually is for me, it was just me and Kyle forever. But that's because normally I was too young to remember otherwise. This time around I'll be old enough to remember them.