Othello Von Ryan (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
thepurpleone) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
revivalproject2024-09-28 10:58 pm
thepurpleone) wrote in revivalproject2024-09-28 10:58 pm
Trying Not To
WHO: Donnie and you?
WHERE: Between and within Orange, Blue and Green
WHAT: Wall
WHEN: Late September
WARNINGS: I was in a write-y mood
It's hard to fix things when it seems that people don't care about having things fixed.
Back home, when things needed to be fixed, there'd be no peace until the problem was corrected. Donnie had slotted himself right into that role and performed it without complaint, and he prided himself in keeping things in working order and up to date. His family could live in comfort and despite having to live apart from humanity, was still fully connected to the world around them so long as the wifi was working.
So of course when he'd found himself dropped into the late snows of an alien planet, once it became clear that there was a problem to be attended to, Donnie assumed that his purpose here was obvious. Could a fourteen-year-old possibly be so arrogant to think he was the solution to fixing the problems of a displaced alien race?
Yes.
Admittedly, after being here for a year and with little actual Storm experience to show for, it had started to temper his ambitions, but Donnie had been much too stubborn to give up. He couldn't give up, because that meant never going home, and for someone who had never been away from his family for so long, this simply wasn't an option.
He'd found his drive again, in spite of the things that had happened, and in other instances, because of the things that happened. He now had his brother to lean on when things got difficult. And things had certainly gotten difficult.
This whole murder witch-hunt however is wearing down on him in ways he'd never considered. The confrontation with Stu had been a disaster so far as he had seen, and the more that had been said, the less he'd felt that putting in an appearance then would have helped matters. All the jumble of emotions had balled up so tightly in his gut and he had no name to any of them, save that he could probably do without the experience. He wanted to be sick, he wanted to just not be there, but every time someone said his name, it just felt like couldn't leave. Maybe he shouldn't have told anyone else. Maybe then things wouldn't have gone so horribly wrong. Again.
What was the point of it all? Any efforts made to try and get them any closer to figuring out what was going on with this planet and their mystery-watchers were being effectively waylaid because someone decided they were going to try killing people for the heck of it. Maybe that was evidence in itself, maybe they didn't really take the situation seriously. But did that really matter? Words hadn't resolved anything yet, which is why Donnie usually let his work do the talking. His confidence was always in his work, and in getting things done. And yet that had brought up another realization.
What's the point of being the tech-guy when anyone can fix things or code things with the touch of a sphere and an instant upload into your brain? It feels like his abilities were cheapened. Sure, he'd been ecstatic when he'd gotten Leo to figure out how to work with and understand code, and it was bad enough not being able to do two things that otherwise went hand-in-hand so far as he was concerned. But those uncomfortable, familiar insecurities have been working their way into his thoughts.
Is he even really needed here? If anyone can figure out how to fix or put together machines or program a tablet with a data point, then where did that leave him? It's a crippling thought that hurts even more than admitting to himself how bad he is with people. It swirls and builds with everything else like a steadily building cyclone and trying to pull anything from it to make sense of it has been an exhausting cycle in itself.
The emptiness that eventually rolls in after is almost welcoming. Maybe that's not quite what it is. Can someone get tired of feelings? Not his area of expertise. At the moment he doesn't particularly care so long as it saves him the discomfort. He has... Well, he thought he had things to do. He doesn't feel very motivated to continue them at the moment, but with the power being unreliable of late due to the strange storm patterns, maybe it doesn't matter too much.
So it's outside that he goes.
It's cloudy out but for the moment it doesn't seem like there's any rain just yet, not that the wet weather particularly bothers him so much as the hints of Storms with a capital 'S'. But with the instability of tech that comes with such Storms, that also means it's probably better not to fly around. Crash-landing from equipment failure seems somehow more embarrassing than getting caught walking around alone despite all the insistence from people not to, but it's one of those rare times where his overthink's not running wild, and he wants to enjoy the silence while he can. The walk out to the space he's planted his test garden is a long one given it's on the opposite side of the city and it's only longer if he doesn't cut through the city center, but at least he's more or less managed to regain his usual stamina since the accident aboard the Agrii ship.
WHERE: Between and within Orange, Blue and Green
WHAT: Wall
WHEN: Late September
WARNINGS: I was in a write-y mood
It's hard to fix things when it seems that people don't care about having things fixed.
Back home, when things needed to be fixed, there'd be no peace until the problem was corrected. Donnie had slotted himself right into that role and performed it without complaint, and he prided himself in keeping things in working order and up to date. His family could live in comfort and despite having to live apart from humanity, was still fully connected to the world around them so long as the wifi was working.
So of course when he'd found himself dropped into the late snows of an alien planet, once it became clear that there was a problem to be attended to, Donnie assumed that his purpose here was obvious. Could a fourteen-year-old possibly be so arrogant to think he was the solution to fixing the problems of a displaced alien race?
Yes.
Admittedly, after being here for a year and with little actual Storm experience to show for, it had started to temper his ambitions, but Donnie had been much too stubborn to give up. He couldn't give up, because that meant never going home, and for someone who had never been away from his family for so long, this simply wasn't an option.
He'd found his drive again, in spite of the things that had happened, and in other instances, because of the things that happened. He now had his brother to lean on when things got difficult. And things had certainly gotten difficult.
This whole murder witch-hunt however is wearing down on him in ways he'd never considered. The confrontation with Stu had been a disaster so far as he had seen, and the more that had been said, the less he'd felt that putting in an appearance then would have helped matters. All the jumble of emotions had balled up so tightly in his gut and he had no name to any of them, save that he could probably do without the experience. He wanted to be sick, he wanted to just not be there, but every time someone said his name, it just felt like couldn't leave. Maybe he shouldn't have told anyone else. Maybe then things wouldn't have gone so horribly wrong. Again.
What was the point of it all? Any efforts made to try and get them any closer to figuring out what was going on with this planet and their mystery-watchers were being effectively waylaid because someone decided they were going to try killing people for the heck of it. Maybe that was evidence in itself, maybe they didn't really take the situation seriously. But did that really matter? Words hadn't resolved anything yet, which is why Donnie usually let his work do the talking. His confidence was always in his work, and in getting things done. And yet that had brought up another realization.
What's the point of being the tech-guy when anyone can fix things or code things with the touch of a sphere and an instant upload into your brain? It feels like his abilities were cheapened. Sure, he'd been ecstatic when he'd gotten Leo to figure out how to work with and understand code, and it was bad enough not being able to do two things that otherwise went hand-in-hand so far as he was concerned. But those uncomfortable, familiar insecurities have been working their way into his thoughts.
Is he even really needed here? If anyone can figure out how to fix or put together machines or program a tablet with a data point, then where did that leave him? It's a crippling thought that hurts even more than admitting to himself how bad he is with people. It swirls and builds with everything else like a steadily building cyclone and trying to pull anything from it to make sense of it has been an exhausting cycle in itself.
The emptiness that eventually rolls in after is almost welcoming. Maybe that's not quite what it is. Can someone get tired of feelings? Not his area of expertise. At the moment he doesn't particularly care so long as it saves him the discomfort. He has... Well, he thought he had things to do. He doesn't feel very motivated to continue them at the moment, but with the power being unreliable of late due to the strange storm patterns, maybe it doesn't matter too much.
So it's outside that he goes.
It's cloudy out but for the moment it doesn't seem like there's any rain just yet, not that the wet weather particularly bothers him so much as the hints of Storms with a capital 'S'. But with the instability of tech that comes with such Storms, that also means it's probably better not to fly around. Crash-landing from equipment failure seems somehow more embarrassing than getting caught walking around alone despite all the insistence from people not to, but it's one of those rare times where his overthink's not running wild, and he wants to enjoy the silence while he can. The walk out to the space he's planted his test garden is a long one given it's on the opposite side of the city and it's only longer if he doesn't cut through the city center, but at least he's more or less managed to regain his usual stamina since the accident aboard the Agrii ship.
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"-I will forgive you that one because Woo! Look at it go!" he says excitedly. It's the first time he's pulled something off this big on his own and he's absolutely fascinated by it, being able to really see it in motion as opposed to whipping up some sort of weapon on the fly.
The debris pile shudders and shifts as the excavator claws through the top layers, depositing things to the side. Parts of it begins to flicker like the bad reception on a television screen and it seems to get stuck mid-way through scraping back another load as Donnie staggers. For a moment he tries to stabilize the construct, but it inevitably begins to decompile in a flutter of glowing purple pixels.
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He gets closer to help stabilize Donnie, if he needs it, grinning as he does.
“Hey, nice! You made a pretty big hole.”
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"Yeah, but...so far it still seems like it's just more rubble underneath. It will probably take a while to dig any further but who knows if we'll find anything," he says, rubbing at a spot between his eyes. Note to self, probably not a good idea to generate large mystic-tech on low fuel.
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"Eh, probably not worth it. Too bad we didn't find any treasure though."
Not that he really thought they would, but it would have been cool. Though who knows what they would have done with it...
"Want to head to the power station now?"
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"Yeah. Lame, huh? That would've been something." Not that Donnie figures there would have been any treasure either but digging a hole hadn't really answered why the whole place had been demolished.
"...we can do that, yeah. Who knows, Scuttle might've actually beat us to it."
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"Well, it's not like we can't come back! We're gonna be here a few days."
He tosses his arm around Donnie's shoulders and wheels them around the other way, opening a portal that can at least get them back to the hotel area.
"No way Scuttle beat us. Buuut if you wanna place a bet..."
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"-you know what, I am going to pass on that. He may not be completely my design but I know his personality matrix by now enough to figure he'll likely find some way to make it a longer trip."
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He laughs at Donnie's assessment, letting the portal close behind them. From this point he can portal them short distances, but without a clear picture in his mind they're going to have to do some walking.
"Eh, well, it's good for him to stretch his legs and see the world, right?" Leo has no idea, actually.
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"I guess? I mean, he is technically supposed to do recon." Donnie grins at his brother then. "You're just happy that he's not nesting in your bed."
The rooftop route is definitely more scenic, and he's not going to complain for the shortcut because it is a long walk no matter how you sliced it.
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Leo huffs. "Well, yeah. Who wants to share space with a bucket of bolts, anyway?"
He is taking time to take in the scenery as they go. This place is even more of a ghost town than Temba, but the truly strange and unfamiliar architecture makes it interesting.
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Donnie snickers. "Maybe it's some remnant of his original programming that makes him particularly susceptible to annoying people represented by the color blue."
While he's been through here a few times, there's always been something different about being able to take things in with someone. It's not camping, it's kind of like when they were wandering around the spaceport, exploring an alien civilization...or at least the remains of what used to be one.
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Leo gasps dramatically, putting his hand to his heart. "So he's a discriminatory robot!" For shame! For shame!
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"At least they managed to come to a truce. For all the good it did. Cool as that chaos emerald is that was left behind, it's still susceptible to the same problems as we experience in storms, so using it as a backup source of energy's out of the question..."
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At the question, Leo just waves a hand. "Mikey thinks that since Draxum made us, we should let him into the family. Even calls the guy "Dad"." Leo shrugs. "I guess he's not evil anymore, but he's still an annoying jerk. Never apologized for dropping me off that roof..."
He will never let it go.
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And now to soak in these Draxum tidbits. Should Donnie be surprised that it was a Mikey idea? Not in the slightest. To call the guy dad, though? He looks a little dubious.
"...ow, that hurts my brain. Kind of hard to make that leap when literally the last thing I remember that guy ever tried to do was kill us."
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Though he can definitely relate to Donnie's reaction to that. "That's what I said! But I dunno, he took Raph and Mikey to Coney Island and they had a not totally terrible time, and then he helped us save the world, so..." Leo shrugs again.
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"Wait, they took him to an amusement park???" The imagery threatens to send him reeling. "I really, really must have missed a lot. Or...I guess that wouldn't be accurate since it's more that I haven't yet experienced it." He grimaces at the thought. There's a lot of things that he's not sure he looks forward to, there.
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Ah, there's no reason to look like that, though! Leo claps him on the shoulder, though not with any force - Donnie looks like a stiff breeze could take him out.
"Hey, don't make that face! It's not all bad! There's plenty of fun stuff coming up for you to live through, too!"
Just... less of it, lately, but still some!
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Donnie still takes a bit of a step to the side, but though he makes a different face at the gesture, he doesn't make a move to displace Leo's hand from his shoulder.
"What a choice of words..." he notes dryly.
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“I think it was fine.” He’s so good at words, he has the best words.
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Had Donnie told Leo about that? It's been a while since he's really talked to anyone about storm technicalities, but then that discovery had been what had prompted his weather balloon experiment among other things.
"Uh-huh." He isn't much in the mood to argue and it seems a silly thing to fuss over anyway.
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“Yeah… Well, I was thinking anyway, if this place was more fixed up, it’d be a better safe zone than staying in Temba.”
Though it sounds like it would make studying the storms harder too, so… who knows. Not Leo. This isn’t his thing.
He sighs.
“I meant it, you know? It’s gonna be alright.”
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Donnie shakes his head. "It might just be a temporary shelter. I haven't really asked about the potential of Sh'ka."
He looks at Leo before bumping his shoulder into his. "I know. It's just been... I don't know. There's not really a very reliable scale for how bad things can get around here. But we're both here now so...that's something, right?"
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