(You wanted this damn colab, well here it is!)
Crane's Song
Delta Checkpoint
May 22nd, 9:32 PM
Penny ignored the glances thrown at her by base security as she wandered over to the back of "Delta" Section, having been working in one of the labs directly next to it. That summed up her experience at X-COM thus far - work, work, a smile and a chat, then even more work. She'd been having difficulty trying to theoretically improve the laser weapons, as each attempt she made resulted in the heat being simply too much for the device to handle without something critical melting. It didn't help that she'd been essentially on the same track only a few weeks ago back in Australia with other scientists she knew on a personal level - here, personal levels were as blocked off as the Commander's office, it seemed.
She passed a model of the hologlobe she'd seen when she first arrived at X-COM, smaller and with absolutely no-one looking at it bar herself. As she passed, she grabbed one of the swiveling office chairs and began dragging it with her, a purpose in mind. No one was using it anyway.
Eventually, she reached the back of Delta Section, and placed the chair near the railing looking out into the large abyss that the base was built into the side of. With a contented sigh, she sat down and opened the bottle of ginger beer she'd acquired from the bar, and began drinking. Might not be alcohol, since the bartender had refused to allow her to take some out of the bar, but at least it was called beer too.
This was a tradition with Penny. Every night, when such a view was available, she and any friends or colleagues would grab a drink of their choice and seat themselves at the edge of the view, be it a simple balcony, the edge of a cliff face or a high rise building. It was good to aerate the mind, and such an action was always therapeutic. No matter what the challenges of life had been up until now, they would always disappear in favor of admiration of the scene before you.
Penny laid her head back, resting it on the back of the chair, using her ponytail as a cushion of sorts. Thank god this thing has armrests. Even if they are shitty. She must have been an interesting sight - a scientist, still wearing her lab coat, drinking a ginger beer and seemingly dozing on a flimsy office-styled swivel chair right next to the gaping maw of a cavern. It would probably be even stranger if she'd had her last colleagues with her. For leading particle physicists who had volunteered their time to combat an alien threat, they could carry on like people freshly out of school.
She stayed like that for a while, lost in thought as the sounds of normal base life echoed around her.
Elizabeth walked around aimlessly around the engineering wing of the base and had no inkling where she was. One minute she was treating a serious burn of an engineer in the one of the workshops but now she found herself completely in the unknown. She kept walking with a pouty face on and she finally found someone sitting in a chair by a railing. “Excuse me?”
The voice broke Penny out of her peaceful reverie. With an irritated expression, she turned to address the source of the disturbance. Her expression brightened when she recognised her roommate. “Hey! How are you Ellie? It’s been a while.”
Ellie gave a big smile. “I am sorry Penny, I didn’t realize it was you, how have you been? We haven’t talked much since, well...work.”
Penny chuckled and stood. “Yeah, conflicting shifts are a bit of a pain sometimes. I don’t really mind it though. Been doing some good stuff with the troops’ equipment recently. Progress is always good.” She looked around. “What are you doing out here? Not exactly a sterile environment. Might need you quarantined,” she said with a wink.
Ellie gave a nervous laugh. “You...you won’t really do that...right?” She asked.
“I’d have to quarantine myself,” Penny said. She gazed out into the abyss again. “With a view like this? Not likely. I’d probably demand they put my cell right here, where I’m standing.”
Elizabeth let out a sigh of relief. “Well, at least there are positives to being stuck underground right? Oh and to answer your question, I was helping fix up a bad burn in one of the workshops but I just...sorta...got...lost.” She said embarrassed.
Penny laughed. “Sounds like how I found my way here the first time too. But I came back, just because I was… I don’t know, ‘drawn’ here, I guess. It’s something I’ve done since university. Find a spot with a view, and camp out for an hour or two just… looking. Usually with others. No one with me this time, because no one knows this spot well.” Penny was silent for a moment, lost in memories. “Y’know, if you’re a fan of good views, you could join me up here next time. Have a chat, a drink, whatever. Trust me, it’s therapeutic.” She shook her head. “Sorry, getting off track. You’re lost, you said? Where were you trying to go?”
Elizabeth put a finger on her chin and thought. “Nowhere really, it was my lunch break after that last patch job so I could join you now if you wanted?” She asked wholeheartedly.
With a smile on her face, Penny vacated the chair she had been sitting on. “I’ll go get another one,” she said. She skirted out of sight and returned a few moments later carrying another chair, wheeling it towards the railing. She down again next to Elizabeth with a happy grunt, and resumed drinking her ginger beer.
They sat like that in silence for a while, simply enjoying each other’s presence. After a moment, Penny’s face lit up in a grin. She turned to Elizabeth. “So… who’s your boyfriend?”
Elizabeth brightened a bit and stared at Penny. “Who told you?” She blurted out in a panic.
Penny giggled. “He carried you in one night. He was being pretty gentle with you, so I assumed you two were together.” She smiled evilly. “Looks like I was right, judging by your reaction.”
She pouted and cawled up against her chair. “Yes, he was my boyfriend. His name is Desmond and he is a soldier on the base.”
“A soldier?” Penny frowned. “You get worried about him at all? I hear it’s pretty dangerous out there. Even had someone lose an arm.”
She nodded. “Of course I worry. It was him who lost the arm, that is why I wasn’t coming to the room at all for that long period of time, I was with him…” She let out.
Well, you screwed that one up, didn’t you Penny? Penny remained silent for a moment. “Sorry, I didn’t realise. I asked around and people said you were at the hospital after Moscow, but since you’re a doctor I just assumed they were keeping you busy. I didn’t realise…” she trailed off.
She looked at her roommate. “It’s fine, it’s fine. It is all said and done now. What about you Penny, what have you been doing?”
“Trying to improve our weapons so Moscow doesn’t happen again.” She frowned. “And getting absolutely nowhere. It all gets too hot, damn things practically melt. And we’re still not closer to understanding how the hell the aliens use plasma as a projectile.”
Elizabeth thought for a long while. “Well what if your problem is you don’t have the tech available to find it yet? Maybe, you are not meant to find out the answer yet?” She explained.
Penny sighed, her frustration evident. “That’s true, at least to a degree. We’ve only got the fragments and the occasional weapon to study. Half the time the weapons we do get break because we press the wrong button or something. Then there was that one time someone held the barrel wrong and nearly torched the whole lab…” She shook her head. “You might be right. Focusing on replicating their weapons might be out of our reach for now. Although I am hearing that the biologists are making a few advances in medical tech…?”
She nodded her head. “Yep, all these new procedures and tech really help.
