whitevioliin:
SO : there was a vegan health good store where her apartment used to be, the man who gave her the daddy issues she’d spent years in therapy for was no longer her father, and to top off all of this, GUSTAVE EIFFEL - a villain vanya had vivid memories of meeting a very final end about twenty years ago - was terrorizing new york city. great.
they were only a month into a brand new timeline that had already thrown so many spanners into the works, on top of all of the things that the original flavor hargreeves had already been dealing with. ALREADY, PREDICTABLY : THINGS WERE GOING DOWNHILL. when vanya emerged, glumly, from her favorite antique store on sixth ( unchanged on the outside, but manned not by the familiar grey haired wendy she had come to know and love but instead the burly RUSTY who introduced himself in pleasant, dulcet tones on her entry ), the last thing she expected to find, and frankly, hoped to see, was the opposite tv stores window showing an URGENT NEWS REPORT. the rolling footage of the eiffel tower, now relocated to the center of times square, had many a person stopped stock still and slack jawed on the side walk. for VANYA, however, it was the cherry atop a rather unappealing sundae.
kind of like the one she imagined the vegan store that had replaced her humble home would serve.
“OH, COME ON-” her loud exclamation catches the attention of a few of the people nearest to her ( and startles a doltish pigeon that had been otherwise minding his business ). everyone reached the limit of ‘bullshit they could handle in the third new timeline created by their wacky family’ eventually though, right? she’d always thought diego went a bit too far all those years ago, but… “not one person thought that the zombie-robot might be better off DEAD in this timeline?”
...
It had been a long day, and all Natalie had wanted when she got home was to play away on her keyboard until the sun had long set. She had a new song she was working on, and someone had noticed her humming at work. Someone had insinuated that maybe if she hadn’t been singing, she wouldn’t have mixed up the soy milk and the almond milk and they wouldn’t have to be late to a very important meeting to get their drink remade. Natalie’s boss had given her a look, and she apologized profusely and remade the drink with false sheepishness and sad eyes, but the customer still left in a huff. It was one of those interactions that colored the entire rest of the day, even though every other customer had a relatively neutral time in the cafe. Yes, Natalie was ready to go home.
But the prechorus of the song just wasn’t flowing quite right - she was trying to determine if it needed a key change or if there was any other easy fix she could make. She wasn’t the music theory mind of the group, and she hated having to ask for help. It made her feel like the weak link in the chain, the one they could kick out if they need to replace anyone.
So maybe that was why she ended up at the music store, picking up guitar strings as a favor to her roommate/bandmate, who had apparently also had a bad day and didn’t want to move from the couch. Dana had cried when the D string snapped, clearly at the end of her rope, so Natalie had said of course it was no problem and left the comfort of her keys for the crowded city sidewalks.
It’s as she exits the music store that she hears someone scream. For a moment, Natalie isn’t quite certain what she’s hearing, and thinks perhaps she’s eavesdropping on a phone call, but no, the girl is by herself, seemingly having just as bad a day as everyone else. She’s going to avoid it like she avoids every crazy in New York, but the words only barely don’t make sense, and Natalie says, before she can help herself, “What do you mean this timeline?”