Gumball Wishes and Taxicab Dreams

[thespaceopera]

[On today's episode of the Drift Fleet:

The cargo holds are full of mysterious crates! The crews are filling beyond capacity with new faces! Official alerts are informing the passengers that they are signed to contracts that they've never agreed to! They are docking at the dazzling FS Starlight, but are flat broke!

What are they going to do!? Stay tuned to find out!


...Meaning, this is a kickoff mingle for you all to enjoy the beginning of the latest plot setting. This is a convenient place to start threads relating to the first week of the event-- meeting new crewmembers, reacting to the mysterious cargo, arriving on the station and discovering that you're all broke, etc.

Tag around, start whatever you'd like, have fun. And, as always, feel free to make your own posts and mingles from here on in, as this will be the only mod-posted one for this event!]

Comments

[helladoomed]

It...yeah. It's been a week. It's just...

[Fuck, was she crying? When did she start crying? She let go of Max abruptly to reach up and rub at her eyes with one hand, half turning away as she sucked in a breath. Fuck. Stop crying you're being an idiot Chloe.]

Uh. Yeah. Just you know. Like a week. Stuck on the Marvisa. No big deal, right...

[Okay. Deep breaths. Stop crying. God so much for being a tough ass punk girl...]

1/2

[timelapsed]

[ Max might be oblivious to some things, but not to her bff starting to shed some very real tears.

Jesus, Max, what did you do wrong? ]

[timelapsed]

[ Resume Operation: Hug Chloe. Mission parameters changed to consoling the bff. ]

Obviously it was. I'm sorry. [ Max isn't quite sure why, but. That's not the important thing here. ]

[helladoomed]

[And Max was hugging her again. From the side this time, considering how Chloe was standing, and the older girl makes no move to push away or return it, not at first. But she smiles a little, it's just...sad.]

No, it's not. You didn't do anything Max, oh my god. Fuck I just.

[Except she's not sure she's actually sad. She's not happy either. She doesn't know what the fuck she's feeling and that just makes it worse.]

We could just...okay. [Clearly her clever plan to hide everything was not going to work. But at least she seemed to be getting a handle on the crying. She kind of hooked one arm around the other girl lightly and sighed.]

It's just...complicated, okay?

[timelapsed]

[ wow Max, way to. Screw everything up.

But Chloe takes first priority. As usual. ]

Do you want to talk about it?

[helladoomed]

[If only Chloe could see inside her head and correct that thought. Ah well.]

[The question made her laugh, a quick, quiet noise.]

Fuck no. I want...I want to spend some time with my BFF, SuperMax. [Another sniffle, a breath, and she seemed almost back to normal. She gave Max a squeeze, then squirmed free of the hug.]

My best friend, who is going to pretend I didn't just start bawling like a five year old, right? And show me around this crazy space station instead?

[Hopeful smile.]

[timelapsed]

[ Normally, Max is curious by nature. Curious to the point of breaking and entering. Pressing for more information would be the normal chain of events here.

Buuuut. Chloe's more important than that. For Chloe, she'll play along. ]

Yeah, sure. I can do that. [ Gives her a smile back. ]

[helladoomed]

Great! [Whew.] Look. I'll explain...at some point, alright?

[Maybe. But for now she reaches out and grabs Max's hand.]

So come on, you must've poked around this place already, what's there to see?

[timelapsed]

[ Hand holding, score. ] Uh, right. Sure, let's go.

[ Max will go ahead and lead the way! ]

Okay, so most places around here are, like, places to hang out. Clubs. Bars. Some restaurants. [ Following so far?

Better be you're holding hands. ] All the shops are pretty much tourist traps though.

[helladoomed]

[Chloe couldn't kiss her, couldn't tell her, but hand-holding was perfectly normal for their weird...flirty friendship, right? There had been hand holding on Wednesday she was sure of that.]

[She easily moved along with Max, half-listening and half staring at everything. She did catch that last bit though.]

What do tourist traps in space sell?

[timelapsed]

Shirts, mostly. Cheesy ones. [ Like the one Max is currently wearing, except that one was actually a sponsor drop. ] And magnets. That kinda junk.

Need to figure out a good way to get money if we want any souvenirs though, since I'm pretty sure everybody's accounts got locked down. No novelty shirts or coffee mugs just yet.

[helladoomed]

I could go for some terrible t-shirts.

[She grins jokingly.]

Yeah, my captain...he's a dwarf, which is cool...was tellin' me about that. He told me where I can scope a free dinner though, at least.

But I figure i was probably already broke anyway so all this locked down money jazz isn't really hitting me one way or another.

[timelapsed]

Yeah, we don't show up with any money. But normally I'd treat you to something, you know? I guess that's just not in the cards right now.

[ She pauses a moment. ] So when you say your captain's a dwarf, do you mean as in... he's really short, or as in straight-outta-Tolkien with an axe and giant beard?

[helladoomed]

Aw. You were gonna take me out on a hot date, huh? But I don't have a thing to wear.

[She elbowed the other girl jokingly.]

Little bit of both? Short guy, looks like a Tolkien dwarf, no beard though.

[timelapsed]

[ Max snorts. ] Sure, if shopping for novelty T-shirts sounds like a "hot date."

[helladoomed]

...Hotter than any date I've been on lately, at least.

[A beat and she grins to herself.]

Actually, no, thinking about it, I've totally been on one date hotter than that recently.

1/2

[timelapsed]

[ Wait, what? ]

Wait, what?

[timelapsed]

[ And... composing herself. Jeez Max. ]

Well, I mean, not exactly the highest bar there.

[helladoomed]

[Oh man, that reaction. It was what Chloe was hoping for and she was actually pretty relieved to see it, even if she felt sort of bad.]

Oh this completely topped that bar. See, I ran into this weird girl, knew her forever ago, and we broke into the school pool to go midnight swimming. It was pretty crazy.

[Chloe nods her head sagely, keeping her voice deadpan.]

It's a shame though, cause I am totally out of her league.

[timelapsed]

Oh my GOD. [ She sounds half-relieved, half-exasperated, half-laughing.

Either way, she lets go of Chloe's hand so that she can give the other girl a playful shove. ]

[helladoomed]

[Chloe burst out laughing, shoving her right back.]

Gotcha. I saw that fear your eyes, Supermax. Worried my heart had been stolen away by someone else, huh?

[timelapsed]

[ A HA HA... ha.

It takes her a second to think of a witty retort, but think of one she does. ]

More like worried if they were good enough for you.

I guess that one sounds okay though.

[helladoomed]

Good enough for me. Man, that'd be hard to pull off. But I guess she was cool. In a mousy little hipster chick sort of way.

[And then a grin, and she'll give the other girl a little shove again, light on the shoulder.]

So what about you, dear Max? Six months man, you must've had a least one date out here in space. A Space Date.

[Hmm. Now she's picturing a date out in EVA suits...]

[timelapsed]

Nnnnope. [ Which was actually a bit disheartening since. All of her friends up here were hooking up. Sometimes with each other. Looking at you Alex and Stefan. ]

No space dates, or space station dates. Or planetside dates.

Guess I'm just picky about that kind of stuff. [ Max conveniently ignores all the times she's thought "Oh no, s/he's hot." Which is surprisingly easy when she's with Chloe. ]

[helladoomed]

Max! Picky's good and all, but I'm a little disappointed. [Things that are a complete lie: That.]

You could've lived every nerd's dream and banged some blue alien chick! Imagine how jealous Warren would be.