driftfleet | Huntress Mingle!

[After everything was settled, Keith had disappeared from the ship for a bit to visit the Blameless and confirm a hunch... and hopefully find something to bring back, but he was successful on the one he didn't want to be and unsuccessful on the one he did...

So, he was being quiet and moody again.

They were missing others, too, among their own crew, which had also left him feeling pretty down. It was a rough return from calibrations this time.

Keith could be found on the bridge, in the room he shared with Lance, or in the lounge or the kitchen, going over the notes he had taken while on the Marsiva.]

[Veronica hasn't exactly been her normal self since the calibrations, and with the losses that came after that, she's grown even quieter. But she's finally decided to stop moping and do something.

Which leads her to plop down beside Keith where he's sitting in the lounge and sprawl out, propping her feet up onto his lap.]

What's that?

Some of the stuff I saw on the Marsiva, but don't remember. It happened during the last calibrations, too.

[He glanced at her.]

What augment do you have again?

[She's a little surprised that he's so unphased by her using him as a footrest, but okay. Good. He's getting used to it.

she tilts her head to the side slightly.]

Huh.

[She peers over his shoulder to look at it, but it doesn't make much sense to her.]

Oh, I don't. I've only got a tactical support one. Civilian class, I think.

[It must run in the family. He was used to Lance hanging all over him.]

Hm.

[Keith looked thoughtful for a second.]

Did you notice anything weird about the Marsiva? Like, sometimes, people saw things that others with different augments didn't see. And then it would be gone the next day.

[It happens when you have a lot of people in one house. You just end up getting cozy.

She frowns, thinking.]

No, I...don't think so. I heard other people talking about it, but I didn't see anything.

[He nodded.]

After the last calibrations, we tried to compile everything together that we saw... at least, as much as we could. So, I'm trying to do it again to see if there's anything new.

The problem is... I don't remember any of it directly. It's just what I wrote down. I know I wrote it. It's my handwriting. But I don't actually remember it.

[She takes her feet off his lap and instead scoots in closer, looking over at the journal with a slight frown.]

I wish I could help, but this doesn't make much sense to me either. You don't remember doing it at all?

[For the first few days after they return from the Marsiva, Mikleo is completely MIA. He's not in his room, he's not on the Huntress at all, anywhere. Food is left out for Lucen, his leopard kitten, who is thankfully self-sufficient enough to last a few days without him, though he probably spends those days bothering everyone else for attention. There's a shuttle missing, though if anyone tried to investigate its whereabouts, it would be found on the Iskaulit easily enough. Mikleo, though? Gone. As if when Sorey and Zaveid disappeared from the ship, he vanished with them.

Eventually, though, as if nothing at all happened, he reappears and begins to make the rounds, examining the ship and whatever supplies might have survived their long absence, watering the little garden in engineering, checking on the pengyon (who is very disgruntled about being forgotten and has probably eaten all her eggs, if no one's been collecting them).

And then... he makes ice cream. A big batch of it. Most of it goes into the freezer (with a sign on the door for people to help themselves), and he takes a bowl of it into the lounge and curls up on the couch with a book, and just... sulks, and eats. Because he's seen enough of Sorey's dumb romance novels to know that's what you're supposed to do when you can't see your loved one anymore.

He doesn't know if it'll help, but he's going to try whatever he can.]

[Keith shook his head.]

No.

[He looked annoyed, for a second, and then snapped the small journal shut, tossing it on the table in front of him. He sighed heavily and leaned back on the couch.]

Not much I can do about that, though. We just have to hope people wrote down what they found in a way that didn't disappear each night.

[The mood aboard the Huntress was a somber one, for obvious reasons. They'd lost their own, lost those close to them, and Calibrations always did a number on the mind. The loss of Shiro and Pidge was still weighing heavily on Lance, but he knew it was even worse for Keith.

And so he decided to do everything he could to alleviate that pain.

After finding out what Keith had gone looking for in Shiro's room, he puts a little plan together. For an entire afternoon, Lance stands next to the printer aboard the Huntress, printing out picture after picture that Shiro had sent to them in the past. By the time he's done, he has a hefty package of photos. They'd been difficult to curate, but he remembers many of what were in Shiro's room, and...heck, he'd just ended up printing almost anything he didn't already have in his own room.

That evening, he finds Keith on the bridge of the ship. Coming up behind him, he places a kiss to his temple.]

Good evening, babe.

[Veronica hates this stormcloud that seems to be looming over the Huntress. She's seen it before, back at Garrison, and she refuses to let it get her down again. Not when she's finally starting to fight back again. It's taken time, but she's ready once more to tackle her challenges head on.

Between Biffy, Lance, and her own supplies, Veronica manages to put together a little station for manicures and pedicures. She's found a massage chair and a little foot bath, as well as a hand bath, lotion, and plenty of nail polish. She even crafts a little sign to go with it: Free Mani/Pedis!.

Come one, come all! She's got plenty of colors and wants to cheer up her teammates.]

Edited 2019-03-11 20:16 (UTC)

[While Lance is suffering from some of his own losses, he can't begin to think of what Mikleo is going through right now. If Keith had been the one to disappear--

No. Not thinking about that.

But it was clear as day that Sorey meant the universe to Mikleo. While the seraph takes time to himself (a glance to the roster list shows that he's still aboard the fleet, even if he won't show himself), Lance makes sure to take care of his pengyon while he's in there looking after Kaltenecker.

He makes a big batch of cookies to try and cheer people up. When Lance finally spots Mikleo out of his room, he heads over with the container.]

Room for another?

[Mikleo's gaze flits towards Lance, and while there is a moment of hesitation, he is in a public space for a reason rather than hiding out in his room or on the Iskaulit again. He can't isolate himself or he'll go insane... or malevolent, which would be worse.

So he nods, gesturing at whatever empty space is available.]

Sure.

[She watches him for a few moments, quiet and contemplative.]

What were you hoping to find?

wtf mickey where the hell are you??? i kno ur like spooky invisible 99% of the time, but srsly we got work to do??? dont u dare literally ghost me

[continues to literally ghost him for a few more hours]

[Mmmmkay. No reply?

Fine. Let's do this. Taako cracks his knuckles and starts sending messages every twenty minutes or so.]

yo mickey copyright infringement!! im talkin 2 u!!

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u better answer my texts or im gonna do some dumb shit

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im going to dye your apron puce colored

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i totally did that thing. holy fuck its ugly

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okay no i changed it back bc jeezy creezy that was a bad color

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its now tie-dyed and making my eyes want to bleed

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yeah thats a perma-change whoops cant undo that one

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MIKE DID U DIE I STG I WILL KILL U IF U DIED

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nope checked with krav and not dead

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so ur just being a turd good to know WHERE R U

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i hate making ice cream why is this so hard 2 do

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haha i made a snow dick outta ice cream
[A corrupted image file is attached and won't open]

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shit did that not go thru?

--

[There are twelve texts of the same corrupted image in rapid fire, none of them will open.]

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eh whatever i ate it so u missed out

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srsly r u ded? ur legally obligated 2 tell me if u are

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hellooooooooooooooooooo ghoooooooost booooooooooooooooy

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hey?

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did something happen??

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what's goin on? r u ok????

--

Fuck it. I'm coming over in 10 minutes if you don't answer me and I'll tie-dye your entire room horrible shades so even in the Astral Plane you won't have any rest of this eye-searing rainbow horror.

Answer. Me. Mikleo.

[......

taako what the fuck

Mikleo stares down at his communicator as the last message (and the very clear threat) chimes its arrival, debating for a long moment if he ought to just continue ignoring it. But if Taako is actually going to bother coming over then not answering him will do very little good.

He... probably means well. Probably.]

I wasn't ignoring you intentionally. I turned my communicator off.

The Huntress lost people when we returned to the ships. I apologize for not messaging you about the restaurant.

[It's more formally written than how he normally speaks with Taako, but he's not about to delve into his misery over text. No thank you.]

[Okay, thank the gods, there's an answer. He was really not looking forward to having to get up and put on presentable clothes and prepare a speech about shirking responsibilities despite him always doing it and UGH it was so much work. But then his phone beeped and he was relieved to see the sender was, in fact, his errant boss/partner/employee, Mikleo himself.

Or, he was relieved, until he saw the uncharacteristically formal message and realized what this could mean. The Huntress was his ship and the people he lived with? ...Well, actually, Taako had no clue, but it wasn't difficult to look up the ship's roster and see a very conspicuously absent name.]

...Well fuck.

[It takes him a bit to compose the reply, but after a few minutes he shoots back:]

you want some booze? can u get drunk? fck it i'll bring booze

[And then a moment later:]

unless u wanna b alone. i get that

[Good thing this is text, because his gut reaction is a big NOPE. But that's... kind of rude, and he needs to stop isolating himself. And that was weirdly nice for Taako, so... maybe he ought to see where this rabbit hole goes.]

I've never been drunk.

I do have ice cream here, though.

non

non-phallic

[It's not a no...?]

then hold onto ur butt bc we're gettin u drunk af
best way to deal w/ this shit honestly
that and non-dick shaped ice cream even if thats honestly the best shape

b there in 20?

Edited 2019-03-13 04:49 (UTC)

I'm sure I'll regret this, but sure.

I'll be in the Huntress lounge.

[Still kind of sulking with a book, but at least with a bin of ice cream chilling in an ice bucket nearby now.]

get sum water ready then!!

[And some carb-heavy foods, which he can bring. He does have to think of what will go well with ice cream though. His go-to of vodka and whiskey are a little too harsh. But chocolate liqueur? Fuck yeah. Bailey's? Deffo.

He just has to steal a bottle or two from the bar and?

About 30 minutes later, he shows up in the lounge though. Ten minutes late, but with a bag of french fries in one hand and two (mostly) full bottles of liqueur in the other. He's going to inject some cheer into Mikleo's shitty life if he has to get alcohol poisoning to do it.]

Fuckin'! Time to get lit and forget your troubles!

[But... he's a water seraph, why would he have to- sigh. Alright, he'll cross that bridge if they come to it.

It's a good thing he is a water seraph, though, because otherwise the ice cream would definitely have melted by then. He looks up and tucks a mark into his book when Taako arrives, looking... well, mostly confused, but at least not bawling his eyes out.]

I'm not sure that's how it actually works, but okay.

Huntress Mingle!

Keith

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Veronica

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text; a few days after the return to the ships

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