"Welcome back techs! Please insert your gauntlets into the main repository to offload all glitches and claim your XP!" As BITT's voice doles out instructions Miko and Five give each other a thumbs up as they watch in awe as the glitches are offloaded. "You have exceeded your XP goal and achieved Tech level two!" BITT says with all the excitement a robot could muster. They receive a round of applause from the other techs in the lobby. Miko takes a bow with Five hugs and fist bumps a few guys. The excitement however is lost as annoyed Brit looks down upon the two.
Scoffing Mitch glares at them "Noobs."
Haneesh and Bergy give him a weird look but decide it's just Mitch being himself and they shouldn't expect him to be excited for others. They leveled up in one day? Amateurs. I can grind 3x as much XP without breaking a sweat. It's not such a big deal. Mitch thinks as he continues to watch the pair.
"You may now preview potential power upgrades." The two gasp sharing excited looks as the demo there chosen upgrades.
Miko smiles "Ha ha! Sparkly hack and slash!" As she gives the blazing gemsword a few test swings.
Mitch chuckles quietly to himself, she's like a bird. Attracted to shiny objects and easily distracted.
"Rocket boots…" Five begins, getting cut off as he activates the boots. He's thrust into the air only to faceplant a few seconds later "surprisingly difficult!" He groans before the boots activate again causing him to crash.
Watching Five be swept across the floor due to the boots Mitch lets out a laugh. Quickly looking around he's thankful no one caught him.
"Yeah, you could each purchase those items with your individual XP points, or pool'em together to purchase unique loot like uh.. oh I don't know… a companion pet." Phil stares at the two techs.
Miko gulps as she and Five try not to let their nerves show "a companion pet?" She tries acting oblivious but it's obviously not working against her boss.
"Yeah you know, like the unauthorized one you tried to hide in your tech van?" As Phil opens the doors as if on cue Ally pops her head out and caws.
"Yeah. Didn't have the heart to zap her after all we'd been through." Five says looking fondly at the npc bird.
"So, we can keep her?" At her question Five also turns to their boss.
"Well, if you want to pool your points together…" giving a non committal shrug Phil looks between the bird and the two techs.
"Let's do it!" Miko gives Five a soft smile full of thanks.
Huh I guess she can have moments other than when she's quiet where she looks nice. Mitch immediately grumbles and runs his hand through his hair. What the hell? Where did that come from? He adjusts his position so he's no longer looking directly at them. Now placing his back to the railing he starts fiddling with his gauntlet to take his mind off things.
"I'm not sure boots were meant to have rockets on them anyways." Five jokes and Mitch's attention is drawn back to the duo.
"Aw, thanks." Punching him in the arm Miko beams as Five chuckles. They both turn to Phil expectantly.
"Now combining XP" a robot voice comes out of Phil's controller before he scans and digitizes Ally, sending her to Miko's gauntlet. "Companion pet acquired."
Miko laughs, bouncing slightly in elation as she got to keep Ally "Yeah!" Fist bumping Five she does a small victory dance. The only thing that could make this better are smoothies. At the thought she quickly makes binoculars with her hands to scan the lobby for Mitch. She deflated a bit not seeing him at first until she continued searching and looked up. After spotting him she smiles, there he is, before turning her attention back to her boss in just enough time to hear him congratulate them. They hug Phil through his complaints.
The two part ways as Five promised to watch some of the kids he helps with gaming. Miko smiles at her partner with a promise to hang and crush the next level in cyber stalkers for another day. She waits till he's gone through the portal gate before making her way to the upper level. Noticing that Mitch is focused on something on his gauntlet she decides to sneak up on him. Waiting until she's practically next to him she inhales before saying "Smoothie Time!"
"Bloody hell!" Mitch whips his head around bringing his face quite close to hers. He jumps not realizing how closed she'd gotten to him. "Do you have a mute button somewhere? And ever heard of personal space?" At this moment he wonders how anyone could deal working with her. She's just got so much energy.
Smiling and rocking on her heels Miko grabs Mitch's wrist once again "nope." Continuing to smile as she answers his questions. "Now let's go. I need to refuel!"
Mitch stops managing to get free catching her off guard. "You don't have to drag me every time ya know. I can walk."
"Does it bother you?" She tilts her head and tries to hide the smile starting to grow on her face.
"Yes," Mitch says pointedly
"Then yes." Quickly grabbing him again. Miko uses her gauntlet to open a portal pulling him through. "Time to conquer some smoothies" still holding onto him the duo power down and walk over to the groovy smoothie. Mitch sighs and resigns to the fact that Miko is just going to do whatever she pleases. "One mad mango and strawesome banana blast."Miko orders and notices like last time Mitch orders the same smoothie. The two stand in silence and it starts to bug her so she turns to look at him. I'm definitely gonna regret this, "farm a lot of XP today?"
Mitch is caught off guard as she asks him the question. He pauses for a minute debating whether he should answer or not. Sighing, he takes another moment to look at her. I guess it won't hurt to indulge her a bit. "Yeah, but it was a bit of a slow day. Mostly low level glitches from old or used games."
Miko smiles not having thought he'd actually tell her. "Cool cool, ya same here. I totally pwnd a massive mega ginko from flunky quest. It was almost an epic disaster when my gauntlet broke trying to capture an npc from Bravestone 12. But the super mega tag team of HI Five an Me-KO were able to totally handle it. And Five helped me realize I wasn't a total fail fish for not focusing and stopped me from being sent to the mung bean field." Smiling through her whole mini rant Miko squeaks happily as their smoothies are ready.
Mitch stands there just staring at her. "I have no idea what you're talking about," paying for the drinks before the two walk out to the parking lot. "Can't you drink those like a normal person? And why order two? You could just get one with all the flavors."
"No can do. Besides it just tastes better this way." She says as if it's the most obvious thing in the world. She follows him as he heads towards his truck.
"Oh before I forget here." Activating his gauntlet Mitch sends her the dlc. Her wristband beeps and she makes a face at him. "What? I'm a man of my word. You won fair is fair." Miko just nods, obviously caught by surprise. He can tell she was expecting him to put up more of a fight. "Get in. You didn't ride your bike today. Come on I don't have all night."
"How'd you know I didn't ride my bike?" she asks after buckling in and relaxing in the passenger seat as he heads to her house.
Oh boosh. He couldn't tell her it was because he pays attention to her. It's only because she's weird and won't reset. Yeah her and that partner of hers are just too annoying not to notice. Sounds like excuses to me. He lets out a breath in frustration as a familiar voice chimes in. Realizing he's been silent for too long and she staring holes in him. " You didn't look like a ruffled up robin when you came in today." When in doubt just use insults.
Loudly slurping her smoothies Miko glares at him "Oh yea then what's your excuse for looking like a cockatiel everyday?"
Mitch just raises an eyebrow at her and holds back a smirk. At least she gives as good as she gets. Miko clearly satisfied at getting to insult Mitch back and him not saying anything sways in her seat while humming some tune he can't place. It's not long before he's pulling into her driveway. "Alright now out of my truck."
Smiling Miko leans over to him "and here I thought we were bonding", she chuckles at his discomfort before hopping out.
"Hey Noob. Good work out there today."
Miko nearly drops her smoothies "did you just compliment me?!"
Shrugging Mitch gives her another disinterested look "doesn't matter no one will believe you if you say anything. Now get inside so I can go."
He's waiting for me to get inside? Did he wait last time too? Is he making sure I'm safe? Miko tilts her head with her brows frowed as she sips her smoothies.
Mitch can practically hear her mind racing "I was brought up with manners. Now get inside" and with that he sees her turn around and walk up to her door. She gives him a big wave and thumbs up before going inside.
Miko goes to the window and peeks out seeing that Mitch just pulled out of her driveway. Smiling to herself she heads upstairs to her room. After changing into her pjs she gets in bed. Illuminated by a gentle string of party lights Miko writes in her journal. Today was totally awesome. Five and I leveled up. We got Ally. oh and Mitch. The Mr. Big shot griefer. 'I'm Mitch Williams' was nice to me. To me. It was super weird but also kinda nice. He also gave me another ride today. And he waited till I was inside even though I could totally handle anything that steps up to Me-KO. I guess he's not so bad after all. Or maybe it's a trick so that he'll catch me off guard and then it'll be a mitchuation. Miko can't help but laugh "pfffft mitchuation so lame."
Suddenly the door to the room she shared with Lexi creaked open.
"Miko?"
"Mama?" Immediately closing her journal and tucking it away. Her mother joins her on the bed, handing her a bowl. Miko thanks her mom with a smile but hesitates in eating, as she waits for an explanation.
"I know you came home late today and I'm proud you're working so hard. I'm also glad that you have a friend like Five, it's good that you're getting out more. I wanted to say hi to him, but he wasn't with you so who was it that dropped you off?"
The gauntlet beeps saving Miko for a potentially awkward and in her mind super weird conversation.
"What was that?"
"Uh…"
"You've got a video game under there don't you?"
Awkwardly laughing Miko hopes her mom won't try to take it from her "no fooling you."
"Well, enjoy it. You work hard, you play hard." Her mom says while getting up "just not too late now."
As soon as her mother leaves Miko releases Ally from her gauntlet. The large avian coos before smashing her face into the snack bowl "save some for me, ya turkey!" Miko laughs as she tries to keep the bowl away from Ally. Hugging the bird, Miko soon forgets about her confused feelings and puts all thoughts of a certain Brit behind her as she continues to play with her new companion.
