@int65 asked: vega's words are metal screeching and static, hotaru is one of the few he with whom he speaks the language that comes most naturally to him. ‘what will you do now, with the chance for a future we have won?’
to the untrained ear, it might just be screeching and static - but to hotaru, it's the comforting voice of her old friend , floating through her mind and causing the wings at their ears to twitch. they sit at the edge of the lost city , shoulder to shoulder underneath the nostalgia-filled sky , the atmosphere lighter as the traveler breathes a sigh of relief. it takes hotaru a moment, but they respond in kind - a series of chirps and static, hums and warbling scratches. < honestly ? i-i don't know . i didn't even think i'd make it this far ! it does feels kinda weird that the last city just started getting used to... > they gesture , hopelessly, to all of themself before the warlock continues, < well, me, and here i've gone and changed again. >
they flex their new arm - bulky metal burnt & molded & re-forged by the burning light of the traveler that once spiraled & coursed through their veins into something more organic than techno-organic: a metallic wing wrapping and spiraling around something more akin to flesh, a reminder fashioned from the light of a being they once called and cursed as a god. but it's not - it still ends in clawed fingertips , it still has those blue lights shining between the cracks, it is still metal that coats their arm with those new pretty plates. maybe , much like prismatic, the line between what hotaru is and what they aren't is endlessly blurred - no thin line , only what is. & despite everything they've been through, it's still them. it's always been them. & isn't that enough ?
the warlock's legs swing idly over the city of nostalgia's past as they mull all of this over : the struggles, the change, the road that lead them here & the road to be forged ahead , before responding: < i think.... i'll do what i've always done : help people. but do you wanna know a secret? well, it's not exactly a secret, > hotaru confesses, a too-human laugh bursting through the static, < but whatever the future brings, vega - i'm excited to face it with you. so.... what about you , my dear friend ? what will you do with the chance we've won? >