Lollygag peered back at the Saix, undisturbed by the rumors surrounding their pathway like quiet ashes and flame, flickering, near and far and undistinguished. The Coliseum loomed before them now, motionless, a reaching wall, great and gleaming and plated with their reflections. He folded his wings neatly against his back and stepped to one side, as if to give their guests a full and proper view of the enclosure. They stood on the outside, overshadowed.
He had kept the way clear–that was easy, given the Team’s reputation, the crimson emblem on his shoulder the a beacon to prove his worth in battle. For no one would cross him, not here, not in the daylight, not when he could so surely raise in opposition the might of his voice and loaded guns and Magnesser Spear. He was small, but keen. His prominence proceeded him.
Burton was very wary–he too carried the pride and esteem of Savage Hammer, though loathed this surge of standing in the spotlight. These were consequences he had to endure for the time being, counting down until they could make their escape. He changed the channel momentarily and radioed the control room, hushed tones, stating name, team, purpose, his Zi Fighter identification number. He retrieved his gauntlet from the glove-box and pulled it over a steady hand, quickly and carefully. The crackling voice on the line cleared his request and told him to standby.
There were still people watching them, wraiths to each side and made to break beneath a turbulent sky. He stared back–a sharp and sour look linking light within his eyes, overcast and alive with his own classified lines of algorithms and moral code. He, now maneuvering the mess of his mission and his mind, would not allow for mistakes and miscalculations.
Both the girl and her Zoid seemed ever vigilant, and rightly so, though he wasn’t quite sure how either would take to their new surroundings. What they’d make of the locals lingering nearby. For what if they said too much? What if they mentioned Blake, the Fury, his affiliation? He feared for a moment that she might overhear all the wrong notes of a long and complicated tune.
Then again, he might be able to twist that to his advantage. Oh, yes, let them talk, spread their stories like a fatal disease, whispers waking in the wind. He could silence them any second, silver bullets to his tongue, and slip away into some muted and uncharted place where the lies and guise of pain could not follow.
He raised a brow, feather-like. “Stalls?” To contain the Lightning Saix, he presumed. “Ah! Hangars, you mean? Why yes, of course. I assure you the Coliseum is completely up to date with security, Zoid and pilot accommodations, maintenance facilities… Do let me know if you have any specific needs.”
With a deep and heavy groan, the gates at last opened for them and them alone. The Gale entered, stepping straight into swathes of artificial light.
“Just through here, if you please,” Burton spoke gently over the comm system. Lollygag made his way methodically into a chasm of cold breath and steel–polished floors, proud pillars on the rim, lines of loading decks that ran parallel in sets. He stationed himself near the wall, where the terminal made a shallow dip around the bend. Without coaxing he aligned his shoulder to the scaffolds.
Burton released his harness and let the Gale settle into place, all sweeping talons and tail like rain clouds over summer seas. Only after careful crosschecks of the dashboard did he step from the cockpit and onto the ledge. There, he stroked the dragon’s snout, and waited.
Estelle stared up along with her mount at the walls that soon loomed over them. So this “Burton” had told that much truth, he had indeed brought them to the stated destination. What’s more, there was no doubting - even for her - that this was an official establishment.
Even Sheba seemed forced into this realization. The aggressive energy stayed, still threatened the cruelest sort of retaliation if anyone dared touch them, but burned cooler. Still drew - though unbeknownst to she or her human - mystified whispers from those that beheld them, about ‘class’ and ‘presence’ and ‘how much do you think that one cost them?’.
Yet she appeared to take her pilot’s directions more willingly. ‘Civility’ was not an adequate term to describe the new tone she took on, merely the closest to being so. But really, it was all another begrudged decision on her part. She hated these kinds of spaces with too many zoids and people coming and going too quickly. Hated the cowardly challenges from passerby that knew man and his servants would interfere before any proper fight was had. As it was mankind who built these spaces, and therefore, here, mankind ruled.
So, reluctantly, she accepted it was wisest to allow her own child of mankind to lead.
Presently, however, that child was not so confident among her kind. She was able to keep track of her companion’s directions only by virtue of their close proximity. She’d not even been able to remember to reply to his reassurance over the accommodations. Her zoid trusted her as guide because she was a human like the few gawking curiously at the newcomer, but right now, she seemed remarkably similar to some frightened beast hauled out of the wastes for the first time. In the passing faces, she didn’t see possible connections or friendly conversations, only potential threats. It was as if she’d forgotten that their species was her own.
Only the stranger’s voice coming again over the com line snapped her out of this bizarre ‘feral’ mindset. “You really have been gone too long” the revelation echoed through her mind.
As she was walked onto the neighboring pad to the Gale, the movements of the Saix became stiff with irritability again, but she did not fight. None around her would could know that in the past, this had been one of her favorite moments to thrash when the whim came upon her. Meanwhile, Estelle hailed the control room channel that had since made itself available to them. “Shield required on pad A-3″ Something squirmed awkwardly in her at how strange such mundane communication felt.
Anxious moments ticked by as she waited for the request to process. The fact that a few people now seemed to be drawing in curiously only made things worse. She was about to broadcast a warning before Sheba demonstrated the need for caution herself. Just as the characteristic translucent blue shield rose to the ceiling. Possibly startled into reflexive action, or just for some sort of catharsis, the pearly zoid showed a racer’s ‘trademark’ - she kicked. Kicked with every ounce of rage and frustration she had in her.
The shield held, being made to handle far worse, but the hollow thud and electric crackle were deafening, even inside the cockpit. A chill fell over the girl in the ringing silence that followed, before, after a short delay, the barrier turned red, and the word ‘CAUTION’ began snaking around it. She was going to scold her mount when she realized that, near as she could tell, no one was offended...In fact they seemed almost to enjoy the display. A different world, indeed.
‘Crisis’ dodged, she hurriedly unhooked her harness and disembarked, eager to get this over with before another disaster had the chance to find them. She turned briefly to the zoid already grumbling in anticipation of her leaving, but could think of no parting words. “Be good” seemed an absurdly ineffectual statement at the time.
Hopefully, the worst was behind her, as she made her way towards the man who had become her guide, stopping at a particular, just-out-of-reach distance from him. Her eyes shifted about the space nervously - she was now acutely, uncomfortably aware of the eyes that were now on her instead of her zoid.
“Oh, is that so-?” He spoke quietly, a figure from a distant dream, and hidden in the deepest places, lost to land and to sky, with unwavering eyes and unwavering mind he watched the Gale’s grin across the surface of the water. Just like jewels–uncut jewels, shaped from a sleepless domain far away, somewhere distant. He was a distant man. Though well-versed with the law of conventional conversation, and with the art of ingenious deceit.
He began to suspect, again, that this was some sort of trick–she was testing him, she’d been careful with her words and demeanor. Very deliberate. That much he could tell–it was whatever she was withholding that concerned him.
Content to mimic her formalities for now, he tipped his head to the side faintly, slowly. He knew how to spin his words into silver; he could talk, banish silence which was cold and dark and sure of itself. He knew those black and hollow places.
“It isn’t exactly a common Zoid, a Fury.“ Damn Blake, making messy complications for him. “I can see why that’s caught your attention in particular.”
He deiced to leave it at that for now–lest he reveal too much. It was a tricky thing, and one slippage of the tongue could cost him the whole opportunity. He wasn’t one for taking needless risks, and he didn’t know this girl, where she’d come from or why she was even in the area.
He had to think quickly; he couldn’t let her go wandering off. At the very least, her politeness served to keep her chatting with him, or she hadn’t yet finished purifying her water jugs–he couldn’t quite tell from afar. Or perhaps he had information she was still after, whatever her reasons, and he’d yet to reveal it, at least in any great detail. Like a life cycle he thought through a series of scenarios, and how to wear his aching smile.
The wind went on chipping sand and stone and scattering the pieces into different directions, tender, uneven. Lollygag lifted his wings against its ancient voice.
Burton’s was just as steady when he spoke again, subtle, cordial, a song into the air, and the air into infinite space. “Yes, yes, the battles are quite popular, as I said before, particularly among the younger crowd. Pilots from all over Zi participate, to try their skill–or their luck–however you wish to interpret.”
He had an idea now; he’d have to get her back to Headquarters one way or another, take this one step at a time. Towards the city itself was a decent start.
“And why, there’s a first time for everything, isn’t there? I’m sure you could learn the basics, if it interests you so. Could make for a promising career~ There are a number of Zi Fighters, even professional teams, in Blue City. It’s more difficult to go it alone of course, though don’t let me dissuade you from such aspirations, it can be productive to set high goals.”
Beyond the dust and solar wind his eyes were the vaults of well-kept secrets and well-masked with a cold and guarded gaze.
“You see, it works like this: pilots can apply for their Zi Fighter License–you’d need one if you wish to participate–and then register their Zoid. After which they can issue challenges, even accept them in the Coliseum, enter tournaments… Ah! Have you ever seen a Zi Fighter battle? Why waste your time explaining, when I could very well show you?”
He pulled up his aeronautical charts on the dashboard, looking them over, small reminders to himself, tracing the route with a hand from their point at the springs. “Didn’t you mention you were considering a trip to the city? I’m headed there myself, you know; I assure you it wouldn’t be any trouble at all.”
Lollygag chirped in concession and fluttered both wings, an open invitation. He was watching them intently now form his place far on the other shore.
Burton too glanced up from his charts, still uncertain she would agree to such terms–he was a stranger, after all, though a master of more tricks up his sleeve.
“So what do you say, Miss Estelle?”
Her body stiffened immediately at his invitation before she was even sure in her rational mind of how she should feel about it. The current level of distrust she held for all other living creatures had made it a reflex.
That in mind, it was to be expected that the first, gut response to echo through her head was a strong and equally reflexive “NO”. So caught up in her own frazzled nerves was she that her muscles nearly acted upon it, nearly visibly twitched as if to bolt for the cockpit, before she could catch herself.
Yet something stopped her. She could do that, she could run again...and again...and again. She knew that would be the case if she did embrace that momentary ‘solution’. Then, the more she thought about it, the clearer the truth became - would such an ‘escape’ really be an escape at all? Or was it just perpetuating a vicious cycle now?
For a seemingly endless string of days, she’d draw near to the city, she’d see a local or two, they might grow curious, might attempt to speak with her, the Fury would track her down, chase them away, she’d run. Repeat. Certainly it was horrifically risky to just waltz away with this stranger into a strange city, but really, how much longer could she go on with the alternative? How much longer could she bare this predator-and-prey routine out here alone? What was the point of baring it anymore?
Not forever.
You can’t do this forever.
The true answer came at last. She didn’t come here to hide in the sands somewhere between the pinnacle of civilization and barren wilderness until she wasted away. She chose to come here not just to survive, but to live...or at least, attempt to. She had to take the plunge eventually. Be that by herself, or with someone that, whatever his personal intentions might be, clearly knew more about the world she was trying to enter than she did.
And so, after a long, agonized pause, Estelle committed to an action that always had a way of terrifying her - taking the ‘chance’. She couldn’t be bothered to stifle the defeated sigh that escaped her. Her resignation to a particular course lifted some of the immense burden of caution, and her own ever-intensifying exhaustion weighed down in its place. Not forever, indeed.
“I...I think I’ll accept that offer, mr. Deverell, thank you.” She breathed, a slight bow of her head accompanying the words.
((OMG I AM SO SORRY THIS HAS TAKEN SO LONG. I…think I found the meme for this? It’s a headcanon thing isn’t it? The symbols match up anyway lol ✚ - one of my muse’s prized possessions: I’m not sure how much weight Esie puts on possessions, she’s not overly sentimental, which would have been kind of a drawback earlier on in her little ‘journey’. But then again it could be said she didn’t have much to be sentimental about. I think maybe the closest thing might be her zi-fighting glove once she gets it? Being something that sort of symbolized her ability to achieve at least that much with just herself and Sheba? And…I did kind of have a nagging little headcanon that while she wasn’t able to get very close to her mother, one seemingly inconsequential thing she ‘inherited’ and hung on to was a gold-plated compact mirror (actually seen in an old piece of art - using it to clean a cut/scrape on her face. Juxtaposition! lol). I imagined while she doesn’t let on about it, there’s something of an underlying attachment to it. And I guess it makes sense, distant doesn’t mean ‘no attachment whatsoever’. She probably inherited other things, jewelry, clothes, etc. but the only thing that would have been potentially handy to take with her would have been something like that mirror. And thus it would ultimately become something of a ‘the only thing she has left of her’ object. A decidedly lowkey sad post-series hardship-illustrating situation was there being a point where funds are particularly low, and she finally has to pawn it off as it would be, in fact, quite valuable. Sad, but also can be looked at as one last service well-served.
✿ - a happy memory: Well, I have that headcanon (that was illustrated) that the kids at one point have a bit of a ‘bonding moment’, under that meteor shower. It was maybe one of the first times they have where they briefly catch that ‘this my fam’ feeling. And yeah along with the slightly more poignant feeling of “almost normal”, like a sort of “This is kind of what normal kids do, isn’t it?”. Which was the reason the lyrics posted with the illustration were chosen, the song they were pulled from (Miss Atomic Bomb) is otherwise unrelated, but that excerpt kind of captured the same feel found while headcanon-ing that situation -
“Racing shadows in the moonlightThrough the desert on a hot nightAnd for a second there we’d wonYeah, we were innocent and young”
☼ - a dream headcanon: She has a lot of bad dreams when stressed (which is…well…often lol) but not vivid night terrors or anything. A lot of those half-formed, vaguely threatening things where one is almost more trapped in a feeling rather than a clear situation with a clear object of their fear or stress. “Nameless/formless terror” one could say, I guess. Though thankfully they’re not usually quite as severe as the word “terror” might imply.
◊ - A headcanon of the mun’s choice: Estelle greatly dislikes the city, not just for more obvious reasons like the greater number of people there, noise, etc, but the physical nature of it itself. Situational awareness becomes a terribly stressful chore with so many obstructions around. She’s come to prefer wide, open spaces, where it’s that much harder for things to sneak up on her. She has no choice but to work and live in Blue City, but, in many ways, she is in fact more comfortable in that ‘bleak, cruel desert’ than anywhere else.
“Listen well: You are going to make it. But you have to learn how, and when, to stop running--the past has a funny way of catching up to us no matter how far we go, and I can almost guarantee it won’t be pleasant. Pace yourself, Estelle. Pace yourself, and don’t let them scare you.”
((response to this meme :) - X - yes it’s still open if anyone else wants to send a thing
“Oh, yes, ‘it’s just a small cut,’ you say.” Burton was shaking his head, examining said cut with what was in fact a very serious expression. “But even ‘small cuts’ can become severely infected.” He shrugged, evenly, bluntly, though his eyes were still focused on the wound. There was a bitter-sweet note to his voice when he spoke again, “You know that, don't you? Really, it's not worth the risk, Princess, so swallow your pride and do the smart thing. We’d best get you all cleaned up~"
“I..I don’t know…” The girl began tentatively. She was realizing just how few details she remembered from that final night in Ambrose. Instinctive reflex wanted her to withhold this kind of information. But the fact that she’d been asked this directly meant that they already knew the story. For some reason, they just wanted to know it from her perspective. She took several moments to reflect - The waiting for hour-like minutes for the last workers to leave the estate hangers. Her heart hammering in her ears as she clamored into the the cockpit in the darkness. Taking Sheba’s yoke into trembling hands for the first time. - She labored to find words for all these things…But it seemed impossible. They were sensations that belonged to the realm of feeling, not words. “We just…ran…I don’t really know how else to describe it. I knew the worker’s schedules, so I waited until they left, and we ran.”
“I guess I blacked out, as people say. I didn’t realize how long we’d been traveling until I noticed day was breaking…that’s when I saw no one was chasing us anymore… ” It was perhaps a disappointing recount, but she’d done her best.
“..You know..One of the strangest things that happened out of the whole thing - I never set a course when we started..” Her words took on a pensive tone as she followed the thread of one final recollection.“… I hardly gave her any input, just let her run, I was too panicked. But when I finally stopped and checked… Sheba had been following the exact path I would have chosen If I’d had the mind for it. It - it really was like she knew…but of course, that’s impossible…isn’t it?”
🌴 = a favorite canon character in my fandom : I’m guessing I should go with fuzors verse? and in that case you know me and you know where this is going…so…About Blake again.- I love the whole main group of SH in general though of course. My little dysfunctional pseudo family unit. lol - But anyway I’ve written at considerable length about why I like him before, so I’ll try and spare you some of my annoying rambling. Basically I like that he’s one of the ‘token teenage rival’s that’s actually pretty damn fierce and yet kind of doesn’t look like it. Clearly illustrated as a ‘pretty boy’ visually, but aside from the pretty eyelashes (lol) and a relatively thin layer of ‘cool type’ composure, there’s nothing delicate about him. He’s a legitimately unrelenting and deceptively dangerous little sh** when crossed and I love it XD. freakin mancub.
🌷 = a song I identify with my character : ...God this is still such a hard one to answer. I’ve answered it with music before, but there are still very few actual songs I’ve found that really match with her - in any verse. Idk, a more recent find was Lebrock’s ‘Call Me’ which would have to be from the perspective of...idk someone who at least somewhat gives a sh** about her ? lol I guess if one goes with the relationship they built in the post-series play and brainstorming it could kiiind of be Blake or something? But yeah the general impression of a kind of unassuming person trying to survive in rough/hostile environments kind of works. I guess? dunno, I guess she’s just more of a ‘score’ character :P
🌼 = a song I identify with your character : ….Honestly good ol “My songs know what you did in the dark” still registers as a Burton song with me. lol I mean it’s also kind of a good SH song in general and there’s still art concepts that I’ve yet to draw that generated while listening to it, but it still aligns most closely with the overall Burton ‘feel’ in my head.
