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Chapter Two: Perpendicular
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After Excel gathered her long-lost friend up, and cleaned up the blood with some paper towels in Hyatt's cart, and Hyatt managed to revive herself, the two, without taking their food, went to a cafe, to talk, and laugh, like the other old friends were.
While Hyatt sipped her heavily medicated coffee, and Excel gulped down her (free) water, an awkward silence washed over them. Neither knew where to start.
"I quit," Hyatt began, after a while. "When I heard."
"I did too," Excel said. "Not for the same reasons. Well. Maybe."
She smiled, but it was weak and sad. Hyatt smiled back, more sincerely.
"I missed you, senior."
"Yeah. I missed you too."
After that, conversation flowed out. The two were buddies; it was something that would never change, dead of alive (literally). Hyatt told Excel how she got a job and did very well despite her dieing spells, and how her new apartment was bigger and nicer and how she hadn't seen Menchi since that day the city they once lived in was laid to ruin. Excel told her how she managed to blow up the last place she worked at, and how sometimes she pretended to be homeless for spare change, and how she was currently going without electricity and working at a car wash. They talked for a while, until the café closed.
As they left, the air crisp, and cool, Hyatt grabbed Excel's arm, which, for a moment, thought she was going to die.
"No, no, I'm quite fine," Hyatt said, her normally pale cheeks rosy. "Senior, you didn't tell me about your apartment? Are you fine there?"
"You shouldn't call me that."
"Eh?"
"I'm not your senior anymore." They paused in their walk, Hyatt still clutching her friends arm.
"What should I call you then?"
"I… don't know."
"What's your real name?"
"Ha-Chan, I've long forgotten it."
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