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RimWorld Legends
Crash Landing: Wraith & Mirage
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The first pair of escape pods entered the atmosphere of the unknown planet approximately fifty-seven hours after being jettisoned from the now derelict transport ship, AGC-2715. Their hardened exteriors were designed for atmospheric reentry and potentially hard landings, and they had been well-protected from the ravages of the wormhole that their late ship had traveled through, so their structural integrity was near perfect. There was little risk to the occupants within as they barreled down to the surface.
It didn't take long before the pods, wreathed in roaring flames and trailing black-gray smoke, tore across the early morning sky. They burst through a blanket of low-lying clouds and, as they neared the ground, six small thrusters flared to life on each pod to arrest their momentum just enough to soften the landing.
Nearby wildlife fled in terror at their arrival by hoof and by paw, some nearly trampling each other in a mad scramble to get away from the extraterrestrial arrivals. Birds took wing and flew off in a wild cacophony of squawking, chirping, and fluttering feathers.
The first pod skimmed across the tops of a patch of trees, bending their trunks, breaking several branches, and causing hundreds of green leaves to fall off as the rush of wind from its passage ripped across them. It impacted an open area of soft brown soil and lush green grass with an echoing boom and carved a rut about seven feet deep and a hundred feet long as it slid across the ground and finally came to a rest beneath the shadow of a mighty oak tree, having torn up some of its thick roots in the process.
The second pod crashed deep in the forest a few miles to the north, breaking through dozens of trees that had long stood amidst its brethren for well over a century. Its booming arrival left a trail of destruction in its wake as it too finally came to a rest. Gray smoke rose from its superheated exterior that still glowed red-orange. The air around the pod sizzled.
Both pods stayed that way for almost an hour, undisturbed and in eerie silence except for the hissing and sizzling of the pods themselves as everything living, even insects, had fled their immediate vicinity. Blinking orange lights near a hatch at the top of the first pod suddenly stopped blinking and turned green. With a few beeps, the pod was depressurized with a loud and sustained hiss from narrow vents that opened up at several points around the pod.
The hatch clanked and whirred, and then slid open with one last hiss.
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Wake up.
Her eyes fluttered open as she sucked in a long and strained breath, as if she hadn't breathed in an awfully long time. Her nostrils flared and her lungs burned with the sudden influx of cold air as she continued to gulp up much needed oxygen, coughing all the while as her body struggled to cope with the sudden awakening from cryosleep.
It was cold. She shivered mightily. She felt weak and sore all over, and her muscles groaned – or maybe it was her groaning? – as she tried to move. Her vision, blurry when she first opened her eyes, finally came into focus and she found herself blinking furiously as the frigid, dry air assaulted her eyes. It looked like she was inside a cryogenic chamber, the same one she had stepped into before her voyage into Outlands space and a new life.
They must have arrived. They wouldn't have taken her out of cryosleep otherwise. Her mind was a jumbled mess, but she took some comfort in knowing that she was one step closer to a new life.
No.
That voice was still there, the one that spoke to her the most. It echoed in her mind, ethereal and mysterious, and yet familiar. She frowned. The muscles involved in the expression twitched and felt stiff. For the first time in a long while, she had actually been blissfully at peace while deep under cryosleep. The voices hadn't been able to reach her there. Only darkness and silence filled the space, and she had been glad for the respite. At least there was only one voice for now. She could manage.
Get out.
She mentally glared at the voice but said nothing as she struggled to move her hand up to where a rather large button, blinking and bright red, was built into the inside of the chamber. It was hard to miss.
OPEN, it read in bold capital letters. She pressed it.
The curved reinforced glass door, frosted from the cold environment of the interior, moved an inch as the sound of breaking ice echoed within the cramped chamber. She shivered again. Then it slid open smoothly and revealed yet another slightly larger chamber with several blinking lights. She squinted, the lights hurting her eyes a bit, and their blinking was giving her a headache. Or maybe she was already getting a headache having just woken up after god knows how long, she wasn't sure.
Gritting her teeth from the effort, she sat up in cryo chamber and saw that she was in a slightly larger but still quite small chamber of some kind. It was lit dimly by the flashing lights. There were pipes and wires and long curved panels of smooth metal. She slowly looked around, confused and suddenly feeling queasy.
Where was she? She had been on a ship before, but if her memory served her cryo chamber had been placed in a small room of its own. This was definitely not it. This looked more like the inside of an escape pod. She felt her anxiety rising.
Look behind you, said the voice.
She reluctantly obeyed. It had never been wrong before, even though she was loathe to admit that. It was hard not to feel resentful of a voice that constantly spoke to you when you didn't want it to. But she knew that she wouldn't have survived this long without it. This voice in particular. Not the others. The others were terrible and unhelpful. Her headache worsened and she grit her teeth as she strained her body to turn around.
There was a hatch over there.
She struggled to clamber out of the cryo chamber, hands reaching out to steady herself against the cool metal of the outer chamber as she swung her legs up and over. She shivered. When she reached the hatch, she pressed yet another helpfully labeled button.
This one read: ESCAPE.
She thought it was kind of funny. She had gone on this trip to escape her past, after all. To escape to a new and hopefully better life out in the Outlands. Would she actually find it here? Well, there was only one way to find out. She reached for the button, hesitated for a moment and shivered again, before she pressed it.
The light was blinding. She hissed almost similarly the machinery that surrounded her and squinted mightily as the sunlight assaulted her eyes. Raising a hand to shield her eyes, she waited until they adjusted enough to actually see anything.
Grass. Trees. Dirt. A sky of blue partially obscured by low-lying clouds of grayish-white. A long freshly dug trench of dark brown soil stretched for some distance from where she was. A gentle wind blew warm air into the escape pod, for she realized now that was what it was, and brought with it an earthy scent. She shivered.
With some effort, she pulled herself out of the pod, carefully moving one leg and then the other outside. But the foot of her trail leg caught on the inner edge of the hatch and her other leg, still feeling stiff and weak, was unable to hold her properly upright as she lost her balance. She tumbled into the trench with a soft thud, grateful at least for the gentle landing as she found herself face first in the dirt.
She breathed in the smell of the earth as she lay there for a little while. It felt somewhat comforting to be on solid ground again. Though where exactly she was, and why she had arrived here in an escape pod, was a mystery to her. One that she wasn't even sure she really wanted to find out about.
Her tumble left her feeling dizzy again, and the queasiness in her gut grew stronger. She felt that unpleasant feeling you got when you were about to vomit. Already she could taste bile in the back of her throat. She tried to control it and stamp it back down, with little effect.
Get up.
"Why?" she finally responded to the voice, coughing as her voice, long unused, scraped against her dry throat. Her body felt weary. Her head ached. Her stomach was churning. She shivered, the cold of the cryo chamber lingering in her body even as the warm air of the great outdoors made her feel a little better as the minutes ticked by. She didn't want to move anytime soon. Especially when she felt like she was about to retch.
The other one wakes.
"Other one? What other one?" she asked with mild annoyance, but no reply came. Only silence.
That was another thing that annoyed her about the voices. They spoke when they wanted to and said whatever they wanted, and she had no choice but to listen. Meanwhile, if she spoke to them, most of the time they ignored her. Like right now. It was infuriating.
Huffing, she carefully pushed herself up to her knees, wiping the dirt from her face and her form-fitting body suit. It had been given to her by the corporation that she had signed her life away to with the promise of a greater and better future. She looked around at the trench in the dirt that she was in. Some future this turned out to be, she grumbled.
"So," she said hesitantly as she carefully got to her feet. Her balance still felt off, and her leg muscles ached, but she was starting to feel a little stronger as her body warmed. "Where can I find this other one?"
The forest.
She waited for more information, but as the silence stretched on she sighed. "You're so helpful," she said, her words dripping with sarcasm.
She climbed up the side of the trench and took stock of her surroundings.
In one direction there was the rocky base of a mountain covered in pines. It seemed small for a mountain, but it was certainly far bigger than a hill as it rose up to meet the sky halfway. Across from it and covering two other directions from where she was standing was a vast plain. There were patches of trees and brush every so often, but for the most part it was an empty expanse of green grass with the curves of some hills far in the distance.
She thought she could make out movement far away. Squinting, she figured they were animals given their vague shapes and the way they were moving. So there was wildlife here. Hopefully they weren't some kind of predators. She didn't have any serious weapons to fend them off with if they decided she'd be a tasty meal. The kunai was sharp and deadly for sure, but there was only so much she could do with it in close quarters against unknown beasts.
The forest was obvious as it covered the entirety of the last remaining direction. Trees of various sizes stood at ever increasing heights the deeper into the forest she looked. And not too far away, though certainly not a quick stroll either, she could see a column of smoke rising into the air. That was probably where she needed to go. Judging from the smoke, and from the voice telling her to find the "other," she guessed that there was another escape pod out there.
She glanced at her own pod. Before she went gallivanting through the unknown forest in an unknown land on an unknown planet, it would probably be best if she scavenged some supplies. And a weapon. Escape pods were supposed to have such things stored away somewhere.
Interlocking her fingers, she stretched her arms forward and flexed them, feeling the muscles in her fingers and hands stretching. It felt good. She sighed and slowly walked over to the pod to begin her search, fighting off a bout of nausea that was beginning to creep over her.
It didn't take long for her to find the storage compartments near where her cryo chamber was secured. Inside them were some supplies, and one compartment actually contained a backpack fully stocked with everything she needed to survive for some time. For food, there were twenty-four tubes of nutrient gels, twelve packs of ready-to-eat meals designed to last an untold number of years – perhaps even decades, and two dozen nutrient bars. Secured to either side of the pack were two metal canisters filled to the brim with water and with built-in water filters that ran on batteries charged by solar power.
She also had a few foldable tools to work with, like a pickaxe, a shovel, and an ax. They also came with materials to make a fire. She was particularly pleased to find her own personal dagger had been stored in a small compartment at the base of her cryo chamber. The razor-sharp kunai was made of a high-grade metal alloy with a blade about six inches long.
She expertly twirled the kunai around in her fingers, feeling its familiar weight and balance before tucking it away in a slot built into her suit specifically for the weapon. As a bonus, she found a nice thermal sleeping bag that she was definitely going to make use of when the time came to get some rest.
Unfortunately, there were no guns to be found, but at least she had her dagger.
She shivered, the cool darkness of the interior of the pod still far colder than it was outside. With one last check to make sure she had gotten what she could out of the pod, she stepped back out into the world beyond and tried to fight the increasing nausea she was feeling.
The queasiness in her stomach would not go away. She knew it was probably the aftereffects of the cryosleep she had just woken up from and decided against using any of the medicines she found in the pod to alleviate her symptoms. She had a feeling she was going to need them in the future.
"This better be worth it," she muttered as she made her way to the edge of the forest.
The underbrush grew thicker the deeper she went, and the trees grew closer together. Many of them had trunks so thick around she couldn't touch her hands together if she tried to wrap her arms around them. Their heavy limbs intermingled with the other trees around it, obscuring much of the sky in a ceiling of green leaves and dark branches.
With each step closer to the other pod, she grew increasingly wary. Anxiety began to eat away at her, thanks in part to the stillness and strange quiet of the forest around her. She tentatively reached for her dagger, fingering the metal loop at the end in case she needed to draw it out quickly. Why was it so quiet?
She had no idea how long she walked or how far she managed to go before she reached a freshly dug trench in the earth not too dissimilar to the one her own pod had made. Except this one included the broken and shattered remains of trees and other brush all along its length. Carefully, she walked along the edge of it towards the column of smoke in the distance.
By the time she was close to the pod, she discovered that the smoke was from a few small fires that had erupted close to the pod. Luckily, they were dying down and were quickly becoming nothing more than dark patches on the ground. Though she found it strange that it had not turned into a roaring forest fire. That would have been a problem if it had.
Her eyes looked upon the pod itself and she discovered that the hatch was already open, but there was no one in sight. She crouched low, body tensing as the kunai flashed in her hand. Her eyes tightened while she scanned the area around her.
"Hello?" she called out tentatively. She mentally prodded the voice for any assistance it might give her, but there was only silence. Typical.
She edged closer to the pod; all of her senses heightened. Or as heightened as they could be given her weakened state. The nausea was coming back stronger now, and her gut squirmed.
CRACK.
The sound of a twig snapping close behind her made her jump up and spin around, throwing her leg out into a kick on instinct.
"Ow!" cried a decidedly male voice as her leg connected with something solid. "Well that hurt."
Yet there was nothing there except air. Not that she could see, anyway. But then she saw it. The faintest shimmer of movement in the air. Her eyes widened slightly before narrowing again as the realization struck her. This other one was invisible!
Tensing her body, she jumped and kicked at the invisible person again, ready to follow up with a strike with her kunai, but this time her attack had been anticipated and her kick missed its mark. A pair of hands grabbed her outstretched leg in a strong grip and she yelped in surprise as the invisible assailant spun her around and then threw her against a nearby tree trunk.
Her back slammed into the tree hard, breaking off some bark, though thankfully the backpack absorbed most of the blow. There was nothing easily breakable in the pack save for the nutrient bars, and even if they were broken up, they would still be useful, just a bit harder to eat.
She still felt some of the wind get knocked out of her as her head snapped back a bit. Dull pain ran across her back while a sharp pain erupted around her neck like whiplash, momentarily blinding her as she slid down to the ground heavily.
Growling with both pain and anger, she scrambled to her feet and readied to stab with her kunai as the man shimmered into view a few feet away.
He was much taller than her, with sun-kissed tan skin and black hair in a disconnected undercut style that left the sides shaved short while the top was long and wavy with gold highlights. His square face and sharp features were framed by a dark, neatly trimmed full beard and mustache with goatee. He had golden ski mask goggles, of all things, though he was not using them as they were pressed up against his forehead. The glass was tinted purple, which actually looked rather nice with the golden frames.
What really drew her attention, though, was the gaudy gold and gray bodysuit that he was wearing. It was similar in some ways to her own, meaning that the same company had probably made it for him, but unlike hers his suit had strange clearly electronic plugs coming out all over his arms and shoulders. They looked like holographic projectors, and she figured they were probably how he was able to go invisible.
He spread out his arms to either side, gloved palms open and facing her.
"Well, hellooo beautiful," he said in a confident voice as his chocolate brown eyes stared at her with amusement. "When they told me this gig involved pretty ladies throwing themselves at me, I definitely thought they were just lying. Admittedly, maybe part of the reason I doubted them was because I have trust issues," he mused, chuckling. "But hey! I guess they weren't lying after all! So that's speck… spentangular? Spackular? Uhhh… Anyway, it's great! Yeah, real great."
He smiled at her, revealing perfectly straight pearly whites that she now wanted nothing more than to break with her fist.
"I know, I know. How can someone look this good? I mean, I did my hair for this and everything, so I know I'm lookin' good right now. Do I feel good though? Not so much, actually…"
Her fists shook, mouth tightening into a thin line. Arcs of energy crackled along her clenched fists as she felt power from the void starting to fill her, intermingling with her rising anger.
"Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!" said the man with alarm, taking a step back as he made sweeping gestures with his hands. "Hold up, lady! Calm down! Your eyes are looking kinda freaky right now, ya know? Listen, I'm not trying to hurt you… anymore, at least. And I didn't even really mean to hurt you earlier, it's just… I mean you did kick me first, ya know? So I was clearly just acting in self defense when I threw you against that tree." He cringed. "That probably hurt, didn't it? Err… Sorry?" he offered weakly as he raised his hands in surrender.
Yeah. She really wanted to break his face in now. Maybe stab him a few times while she was at it and watch the life drain from his stupid handsome face. Wait, what? She blinked for a moment, then shook her head as she tried not to think any more on it. She was going to make him wish he had never been born.
"Oh-kayyyy then," he said warily, "You're mad. I get it. We all get mad. Shit happens, right? I get mad a lot, you know. Sometimes. When I'm angry. Because being angry means you're mad and… wait, what was I saying?"
She had had enough of his nonsense. She roared and lunged at him with her kunai with surprising speed, but he was far enough away that he was able to just barely dodge her strike by sidestepping and leaning to the side.
"That was sooo not cool!" he said as he backed off and held his palms out to her. "Please, can we just talk? Peacefully? Without sharp pointy stabby things coming at me?!" He implored.
She spun around and closed the distance between them again, kunai in a dangerous position.
"Ah shit," he said as she came at him with a flurry of blows and kicks, interspersed with a few slashes and stabs with her dagger.
She was a skilled fighter, but surprisingly so was he, and now that they were fully engaged in a fight, both of them were finding it hard to land convincing strikes against each other. Though it was more her attacking and him defending at this point. Her strikes flowed into each other one after another in an impressive display of skill. Her dagger eventually slashed a thin line across his suit, though it didn't penetrate the armor underneath.
"HEY!" he yelled angrily as he jumped back out of reach of her arms and legs and glanced down at the cut she managed to land. "Do you have any idea how much this suit cost to make?!" he asked incredulously. Then quickly followed with, "Not that I actually know that, but that's not really… what I'm trying to say is I designed this suit myself, ya know. You wouldn't believe how many hours I spent coloring all the little drawings they gave me. And you definitely wouldn'tbelieve how many times I had to redo it to get it just right. I mean, this is my baby. My pride. And you've scratched it. So you better apologize right now for this… uh… this tragedy, or… or else!"
He pointed at her warily as he finished speaking and tried to put on a menacing face, though it didn't really look all too menacing in her opinion. He did look kind of angry, but the absurdity over being angry at having cut his suit up a little as opposed to being angry that she was trying to actually hurt him in general baffled her. Then he gave up on his attempt at looking menacing and decided to flash her another million-watt smile.
She frowned, eyes narrowing even further at him. Why the hell was she going to apologize to him? There was no way that was going to happen. He was the one sneaking around trying to surprise her from behind like some creep so he should be apologizing, not her. She cursed that stupid voice in her head for making her come here. She was about to attack him again, having had enough of his foolishness, when he yelled at her to stop.
"HOLD IT!" He yelled so loudly and abruptly while holding up an index finger at her that it actually effectively caused her to freeze just long enough to watch as his eyes rounded to a troubling degree while his other hand clutched at his gut.
Then he stumbled slightly off-balance over to the side and proceeded to vomit unceremoniously into a nearby bush. Loudly. The sounds of splattering liquid accompanied by the violent rustling of leaves reached Wraith's ears.
Her face twisted in disgust as she averted her eyes, not wanting to see any part of that, let alone hear it. Her anger quickly dissipated, and she suddenly didn't feel the urge to outright kill him anymore. She still held her kunai firmly in her right hand, but as her breathing slowed and the adrenaline levels in her blood lowered, her bloodlust slowly ebbed away. It was hard even for her to stay murderously mad at an unarmed man who was helplessly vomiting his guts out into a bush.
"Ughhh…." He groaned, gasping for air. Then he vomited again.
The revolting smell of his vomit wafted over to her and spiked the light nausea she had been feeling since she had awoken, and she stepped farther away to prevent herself from throwing up too.
"Is that… Is that porkchops?" he asked weakly.
Okay, that was definitely gross. Why did he have to say that? There was absolutely no need to say that out loud. She could taste the acid in the back of her mouth now. This was not going to end well. Not at all.
The sound of him dry heaving made her shiver as she tried to control herself from doing the same. She took a step and almost fell into the nearby trench, catching herself just enough so that she simply fell to her knees along the edge of it. But the sudden motion caught her by surprise and broke her concentration, and then she couldn't stop it from coming out anymore.
She felt terrible, and the smell of it was awful. It continued for a few minutes until she was spent, her body weak and tingling. She felt lightheaded, and the world around her was as unsteady as if she were aboard a ship sailing across a turbulent sea in the midst of a maelstrom.
"You too, huh?" said the stranger suddenly close by and apparently finished with his bout of vomiting. He sighed and leaned over her, peering over the edge and down into the trench. "Huh. You did not eat porkchops," he noted.
"What?" she asked incredulously, her voice sharp but barely above a whisper.
"You didn't eat porkchops," the man repeated helpfully.
"Why does that even matter?" she asked, not following.
"I love porkchops," he said simply.
She took a deep breath. Whoever he was, this man was clearly an idiot, and his voice was starting to annoy her. It was almost as bad as the voices in her head. Almost. She cursed them both.
"Wait! You can speak!" he blurted out with a stunned expression, causing her to glare at him as the sudden increase in volume while he was so close to her was discomforting.
She didn't bother responding to him. The acid burned her throat and her mouth, and it tasted really bad. She shrugged off her backpack and grabbed one of the bottles of water. Twisting it open, she put the end to her mouth and drank from it greedily. The cool liquid washed away much of the acid from her mouth and felt soothing as it cascaded down her throat and into her now completely empty stomach.
"Is that water?" he asked, "That's water isn't it? Water's good. Water is great! I mean, who doesn't like some good ol' H2O, am I right? I like water. It's refreshing and we need it to survive and all that. I love beer though. Beer tastes great. And beer has water in it, so it's a win-win if you ask me. Do you like beer? Please tell me you like beer. But it's cool if you don't too. Just sayin'." He shrugged noncommittally.
She didn't respond as she finished drinking and shut the bottle before returning it to her pack. He eyed it closely and fidgeted.
"Uh… can I have some? Please? Pretty please?" he asked hopefully.
She gave him a withering glance. "Go get your own."
He seemed taken aback by her hostility and sighed. "Wow. Okay. Time out." He formed a 'T' with his hands. "You're still mad at me then? I'm sorry. Really, I am. You know I think we got on to the wrong foot. Or... got off on the right foot? No, that doesn't sound right either…" he trailed off into a mumble until he simply fell silent for a few seconds, looking deep in thought with fingers tapping his lips. Then he blinked, shook his head, and smiled that pretty-boy smile of his.
"Anyways, how about we start with introductions then? Since we're here and, you know, we're probably going to be working together or something like that. Squadding up, as they say. That is what they say, right?" he looked at her uncertainly. "Well, whatever. What I'm saying is we signed up for the same gig. I mean, why else would you be here, right? So we're in this together. My name's Elliott, but you can just call me Mirage. Everyone calls me Mirage. So feel free to do that. Everyone except mom calls me that. But that's because she's my mother, you know? She knew me well before I was ever known as Mirage. Pleased to meet you."
He extended his hand and flashed her a winning smile.
She eyed it suspiciously and with disdain but said nothing nor made any move to shake it as he was apparently hoping she would do.
After a few seconds, his smile faltered and he laughed awkwardly, retracting his hand and flexing his fingers a little. "Ohhh-kay. No handshakes then. Got it. I'll just settle for a wave then." He gave her cheerful wave as she continued to stare coldly at him. "So what's your name, miss blue eyes? Can you at least tell me your name? If you don't, I'll just have to call you scary lady with the blue eyes from now on, and I doubt you'd want that. So please tell me your name, scary lady with the blue eyes. I promise not to make fun of it, unless it's... you know... really funny. But I'll only do it once."
Speak to him, said the voice in her head.
"Oh now you want to say something?" she commented dryly.
"Huh?" said Mirage, looking confused. "I've been talking this whole time. At least, I'm pretty sure I've been talking… oh god, am I... am I mute and just imagining that I'm talking? Is this… Is this all happening in my head? Is any of this even real?" He started to pat the sides of his head strangely, like he was making sure it was still there. He turned to Wraith with wide eyes. "Are you real?" He reached out a hand to touch her and she quickly slapped it away.
"Ow!" He stared at his hand for a moment, and then without warning he slapped himself, hard, with a satisfyingly loud smack. "Ow…" he groaned again.
What the hell was wrong with him? She sighed and rubbed her face tiredly. "Wraith," she said finally.
"Excuse me?" he asked, rubbing his cheek where he had smacked himself. "What was that? Sorry, I didn't quit hear you. You're kinda whispering, you know. Almost like you're telling a secret, and ohhh let me tell you, I like secrets. I've got a lot of them. Way too many. I used to work as a bartender, you see, and you wouldn't believe what people are willing to tell a bartender. So many secrets. You probably have some too. People usually have secrets. I'll have you know that I keep them pretty well if you're feeling inclined to tell me any. Feel free to let loose as many secrets as you want. Take a load off. Or… uh, tell me none at all, your choice of course. Totally free to say what you want. Or not say anything. I won't force you to speak. But if you want t-"
"Wraith," she repeated louder, cutting him off before her headache got any worse. "Just call me Wraith."
He flashed the biggest smile she had seen on his face yet, and there had been more than a few of those already. "Wraith, huh? Wraaaaith," he drew out her name to test how it sounded with his own voice. "It suits you. I think. Did you come up with that yourself?"
She snorted but said nothing.
"Sooo… Wraith. Beautiful, dangerously scary but totally badass and awesome Wraith. Since we're now friends and all… Can I please have some of that sweet, sweet water? Throat's getting a little bit parched here."
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Twenty minutes later and Mirage had scavenged his own pod for supplies. Unsurprisingly, his pod had exactly the same stuff as hers did, and soon they both had sizable backpacks hanging over their shoulders. When the pod was picked clean, he met up with her some distance away where she was waiting for him with her arms crossed over her chest, fingers drumming against her biceps.
The entire time he was in the pod getting his stuff together, Mirage would not shut up. He spoke loudly enough to be heard all the way outside to where she was standing, and he didn't seem to care if she was even listening. It was clear to Wraith that he appeared to like the sound of his own voice, while she was beginning to foster a growing hatred for it.
She didn't respond to anything he said in that time, even when he asked a few questions, all of which she didn't find remotely important enough to actually answer. And she was starting to think that she should just leave him and go her own way so as to be rid of the constant headache he appeared to be. There was certainly ample opportunity to do just that.
He can help you.
"Shut up," she growled dangerously at the voice in her head.
"What was that?" asked her new companion as they trudged through the forest. The voice had told her to go north, so after getting their bearings they made their way in that direction.
When Mirage had asked why they were going north, she simply said "because" and he had surprisingly accepted that as a legitimate answer and didn't ask any more about it. She had no idea how his mind worked and figured she probably would never find out. Not that she really wanted to in the first place. She mused that any attempt to do so would probably lead to actual insanity.
"Hey Wraith. Did you say something?" asked Mirage, louder this time as if he thought she hadn't heard him.
"No."
"Oh. Alright. That's so strange," he let out a quick laugh. He really liked to laugh. Half the time it sounded obviously forced, but he did it anyway. Perhaps it was to fill the silence. It grated on her nerves, not that he noticed. "You know, I thought you actually said something, but I guess not. Huh… maybe I'm just hearing voices. That would be so weird, wouldn't it? But also kinda cool. And also hilarious, I think. Assuming the voices were funny. Hmm… I wonder what kind of voices I'd hear?"
Her fists clenched. It was taking all her willpower not to turn around and clock him in the face right now.
"I don't know if you've noticed," said Mirage after a few minutes of blissful silence, "But it's been super quiet in this forest. Like, super duper quiet." He paused. "It's kind of weird, right? I mean, forests aren't supposed to be this quiet. Are they? I mean, not that I would really know much about forests or anything. I'm not a forest kind of guy. More of a big city man. Or a small city guy. Any city, really… But aren't they supposed to have all kinds of animals and bugs and stuff out here? Of course, I don't want there to be bugs. I just thought there would be some out here, you know? What do you think, Wraith? Wraith?"
Look up, said the voice in Wraith's head.
She froze and her head whipped up. There was a dull roaring sound coming from above. She tried to peer through the forest canopy, but it was hard to make out the sky beyond it, but now she was sure something was up there. She immediately broke into a run in an effort to find an area that would allow her to see better.
"Hey! Wait for me!" Mirage called after her, but she didn't slow her pace.
She ducked and weaved around bushes and low-lying tree branches and jumped over gnarled roots and rocks as she sped through the forest.
"Why… are we… running?" asked Mirage between haggard breaths as he tried to keep up some ways behind her. She heard the thwack of a branch hitting him behind her and he cried out in mild pain. She didn't stop.
Eventually, she stumbled upon a river wide enough that she couldn't just jump across even if she had a running start. It didn't appear to be too deep. The clear water gently moved along, bubbling and gurgling lazily.
The river cut a swath through the forest, and she could see a good portion of the sky because of it.
"Oh good," Mirage said as he caught up to her, breathing heavily, "We're done running." He bent over, catching his breath, and then noticed the river nearby. "Hey, uh… we're not going to try and swim across that, are we?" he asked nervously. He reached up to rub the back of his head as he looked away. "Because, uh... not gonna lie... I can't swim. I mean, full disclosure, I do lie. Sometimes. Who doesn't? But not this time. I really, really cannot swim. And I'd really prefer not to drown, if that's okay with you. I mean, that would totally be a terrible way to die. Right? Right." He nodded assuredly to himself.
She ignored him, as she was getting used to doing even though they'd only been together for probably an hour at most. It felt like days already. Her eyes trained at the sky, watching as the dark streak of something entering the atmosphere at high speed moved across her vision.
Mirage, realizing she wasn't paying him any attention, followed her gaze and let out a whistle. "Wow. That's pretty cool. You don't see that every day. Or maybe you do, but I don't. Usually because I stay indoors half the time. Most of the time. Anyways... that's another escape pod, isn't it? It has to be. And it looks like it's going to land kinda far from us. We should check it out! It'll be so much fun."
He sounded excited. But then he frowned and gave her a panicked look. "Unless… you don't think it's an actual meteor, do you? Because if it is, we probably should be running away, like, right about now." He gulped.
"Come," she said curtly as she moved along the riverside trying to find a way across without having to wade into it. She wasn't sure how waterproof the packs were, and they were heavy enough that it would make any crossing potentially dangerous and difficult.
Besides, she didn't want to get soaking wet. Especially not when they had no way of properly drying off. There was a small towel rolled up in her pack, but it was nowhere near large enough to fully dry her whole body. And wet clothes were one of the many things she truly hated.
"Ya know," Mirage said with amusement a few seconds later as he followed her, "If I weren't such a dashingly handsome gentleman, I would've totally made a crude remark about your word choice just now. But I didn't. I thought about it, but I didn't. You should be proud of me. I know I am. My mom definitely is. So, uh, you're welcome. Ha-ha!"
She could practically feel the massive grin on his face behind her right now. Somehow, she could sense that the voice from the void was laughing at her predicament, and for the fifteenth time since they started walking together through the forest, Wraith resisted the urge to punch Mirage in the face.
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AN: Wraith's outfit is Void Specialist (without the mask for now. Although she can put it on if she wants, it's tucked away somewhere). Mirage's outfit is The Revenger. Just FYI, I've changed Wraith's backstory to better fit my needs. This is a lot more fun to write than I thought. Onwards, friends!