Chapter 6- Bullies and Allies
Despite being the granddaughter and direct heir of one of the two Commanders, little Mimi still gets pushed around a lot- mostly because she can't exactly fight back, even if she wanted to, and it's pretty easy to threaten her not to tell. And, surprise surprise, it's happening again. This time, by two Elites over the otter plush she's clutching so close to her chest, and quietly sobbing into.
"Some future soldier you'll be!" One of them laughs, reaching out to yank the plushie away, but misses.
"Spoiled brat- just cause your grandma is the Commander, doesn't mean you should get special treatment." That's exactly what it means, but you know. Jealousy, probably.
The other one attempts to snatch it from her this time, and while Mimi almost keeps it away from them, they succeed. "Yeah, exactly- I'm pretty sure soldiers don't play with toys anyway, kid."
"G- ...Give that back!"
"You want it back, huh? Here you go!" They hold it above her head, but she's too short to grab it from them- it only leads to more crying, and a few snickers from both of the Elites.
That's just when the priming of a charger can be heard- and not just any charger, something high-tech. Something that can store two charges, and that was the second one. The tall lead scientist comes into view, immediately standing side by side with the child. Mimi hides behind Aireen quickly, still quietly sobbing- but really, really happy to have help, and a chance of making it out of here with her otter still in-tact-
"I-Is there a problem here?"
"Not at all, heheh, just..." They trail off, elbowing their partner for some excuse or another.
"Just trying to teach her.. uh, discipline..?" The first Elite manages.
Aireen narrows their eyes, giving them the over the glasses look. Really, that look from a cinnamon roll isn't that intimidating… but from a cinnamon roll with a charger pointed very close to you, it does the job.
"Give it back and I might let this slide past Commander Sage's attention. Who knows what discipline you'll learn from her." Woah, they held their level voice. They're serious.
After a moment of mildly stunned silence, the second Elite reluctantly hands the plushie back to Mimi. She then hugs the plushie like her life depended on it, mumbling a tiny "Thank you-" up at Aireen.
The first Elite tugs her comrade away, and Aireen watches on guard until they're gone. After they are, though- they kneel down in front of her, setting their charger to the side.
"Now, they're alright, yes?" They smile, patting the toy otter's head. "Wh-what's their name?"
She nods with a small sniffle, but smiles back shortly after. "Butter..." she replies shyly, nestling her face into the soft plush otter.
"Aww- cute!" And then, something she probably wasn't expecting at all- they pull a small plush frog from an inner pocket of their black lab coat.
"This is Rain. He needs friends- do y-you think Butter would like that? To be his friend?"
You can see her light up just the tiniest bit more. She wasn't expecting that by any means, but loves it- and this saving scientist- all the more.
She nods again, more excitedly. "I-I think Butter would love being friends with Rain-"
"Then he'll treasure that friendship forever-" They make their plushie do a little waving motion.
But then, they stand. It's best they get back to work, and, "It's best you get back to the Commander soon. Understand?"
"I will- thank you again!" She waves, making her plushie do the same in return- then running off towards Sage's office. She liked them… she hopes she'll see them again soon, too.
Very soon, hopefully, Aireen would be requesting some time with the kid- there's something they want to show her.
It was good they were the lead scientist, because otherwise this little rendezvous probably wouldn't have been allowed. They were also allowed short breaks to do this sort of thing in- with his team handling the rest of the project very well, and Commander Sage having… er, something to do, the role of babysitter finally fell to them.
So Aireen brought little Mimi someplace very special- their private sleeping quarters. Other words, their room. Most were mass shared, but important people got their own. And it wasn't an overstatement to say Aireen's room was the coziest place in the Metro.
They had all sorts of things they had found and collected here, strings of lights hanging from the ceiling, glass mason jars, a couple broken plastic toys and game pieces, pillows, a beanbag chair somehow, and most importantly, plushies. The visible ones on their small, neat bed were a crow, a squid, one of those common Octarian ones, something that looked to be an octo and a squid sewn together, and Rain the frog.
"Ta-da! What do you think?"
You can see the little girl's eyes light up- literally, with catching all of the soft light in here- she's never seen anything like this…
"This is yours...?!" She hadn't really seen very many private quarters, to be fair, besides Sage's. But she doubts any were like this, not even her 'mom's' was this nice.
She loved this. Like, a lot.
"Well, it was very plain, but I made it mine!"
Located a back hallway down from the Central Lab, it was very private- not even Tartar had seen it since he assigned them there. It was pretty small, though. The beanbag chair was mostly an extension of their bed on one side, a miniature desk and one shelf were all else that fit in there, and you had to watch where you stepped.
Regardless, they loved it too. It was home, whatever that fleeting word meant.
They pick up Rain from the bed. "He's happy to see you- he hasn't quite bonded with the others, so he's glad to have some friends here!"
"I'm happy to see him then, too!" She giggles, carefully patting the plush froggy.
An Autobomb lets out a weak beep from the shelf. "Yes, I'm coming Tock-" they hand Rain to Mimi with a little pat-pat on the head, then taking the busted Autobomb down.
"I… I found this defective one running around in circles-" they explain, "reprogrammed it, but recently its walk track broke- an-and I've been too busy to fix it…"
Aw, friend Autobomb! But it's broken… "It can't walk, then...?"
It's cute too, stickers pasted on it… You could never get too close to these things before they explode, but this one is a friend-
"Y-yeah.. I was going to try fixing it on my next break-" which was now- "but I wouldn't want to bore you! We can play if you'd rather-!"
Tock makes a semi-offended ticking sound, demonstrating what's wrong. But it stops after Aireen shushes it, scolding it for wearing down the track even more.
"No, no, it's okay! It sounds like it wants to be fixed by now-" She secretly does wanna play with someone, but the friend sounds like it's about done with being broken- and if they have time left, maybe she can play with the Autobomb too!
They smile bittersweetly. "Alright- I'll do it! Feel free to play with anything else- Mr. Crow seems interested in you too-" Giggling a little, they set to work.
She nods with a smile, going over to quietly play with the plushies- Mimi's a silent, good child, she doesn't hurt toys, or anything really. So she'll just be quietly there with the toys in the beanbag until they're done.
And Aireen tries to work quickly- they feel bad now, both for Mimi and Tock. But they kept glancing over at her, she seemed to be having fun and relaxing- she needed that. Having the chance to be a kid in Kamabo was pretty non-existent.
Soon enough though- "Done! Would you like to help me test it?"
She sits up attentively from her game, nods and puts down whatever she was playing with. "Okay!" The scurrying motion she makes to get over there pulls a silent laugh out of Aireen.
They set it down, it beeps in a rising power-on trill, and then- it takes a step. Excitedly, it takes another, then starts dashing between Mimi's feet, beeping happily all the while.
Aireen laughs fully now, it's been a while since they've done that. "Want to help it fully recover?" They hold a bandaid out for her to stick onto it. Still important to make the child feel special.
She giggles and nods again, setting the little Autobomb in her lap to gently stick the bandaid on it.
"All better! Happier now?" She asks the friend, setting it back on the floor to continue running around.
It beeps in response- that means yes. But instead of doing more running, it just wants to stay close to Mimsy now, resting by her ankles. Aireen sits down on the bed next to her and watches, very happy everyone made friends today.
She reaches down to pat its shell, then smiles up at Aireen. She's happy to have made friends, too! Mimi likes friends- she doesn't have a lot of them, but Mx. Aireen seems to! And she likes those friends. That's good enough for her.