Trinitite paused, the familiar feeling of uneasiness creeping down her keel as her finger hovered over the screen. Clocking in and out in this place was so… simple. Easy. In some ways, it felt too easy. How did she know this machine was really tracking the time she was working for the fleet? She swallowed, lightly scraping the screen with her finger and clocking out. She'd just have to trust in her fleetmates, and hope that what seemed to work for them would work for her.

That was Friday finished, and the last work she had to do for the week. Unlike the construction site, Shannon wanted Trinitite to work on Sundays, but not Saturdays. She wasn't sure how she felt about that, especially since there were other members of the fleet working on Saturday. Rotating schedules weren't new to her, it was what her crew operated on after all, but it wasn't like they kept this fleet running at all times. In fact, the shifts at Jack in the Box were shorter than those she'd done under MacAulay Construction Group, let alone the Crossroads Fleet. On the surface of it that sounded good, as it meant more time to research, explore, and use the services of other fleets like the laundromat, but with her new fleet's pay system being directly tied to how much time she spent manning a station and with her own supply situation, the abyssal would have preferred some more time behind the grill.

Maybe she could request additional shifts once she'd proven herself in all the posts the job required. Trinitite was dreading the time she'd be ordered to man one of the registers, but if it meant additional money...

After she'd changed out of uniform, The Wo-class found Alex waiting at the breakroom, a large fabric sack resting on his back.

"You ready?" he asked, and Trinitite nodded. "Let's go, then."

As the pair left together, the abyssal caught the gazes of some of her coworkers. They quickly glanced away when they realized they'd been seen, returning to work on their duties.

What was that about? What about Trinitite and Alex leaving together was so strange, and why would her fleetmates be unwilling to confront what they clearly saw as an unusual incident?

"We're gonna have to stop at my house for a moment, first." Alex started, unsecuring his bike from a bush and walking it over to her. "Then we'll take the car there."

"That sounds good." She replied. As much as the abyssal wanted to puzzle out her coworker's behavior, she needed to focus on the present.

Alex and The Wo-class initially walked together in silence, the machine's ticking accompanying the sound of traffic and wind rustling the nearby trees. Trinitite watched the thing as Alex rolled it along, trying to decipher where the noise was coming from. Obviously, it had something to do with the gears in the back, but whatever the source of the noise was hidden inside the device. It probably had something to do with how the gears connected by chain to the pedals in front weren't spinning with the back wheel, but while she could make a few guesses she couldn't pin a specific configuration down. Instead, against her better judgment, she spoke up.

"Do you, uh…" She started, and when Alex looked to her she motioned to the contraption "...like your bike?"

"Hmm?" He looked down, following Trinitite's gaze for a second, before looking back up and nodding rapidly. "Oh, yeah! I've saved a lot of gas money with this thing."

It took the Wo-class a moment to deconstruct the term 'gas money,' but she still managed to do so. Everything ran on some kind of fuel, of course, but the price of petroleum-derived fuels per gallon was exceedingly high. Food, on the other hand, was something Alex had to buy anyway, so it made sense for him to utilize his built-in motor for propulsion. Not as fast as cars, as she'd observed, but evidently cheaper.

"It's better than walking?" She asked, since the comparison between the bike and unattainably-expensive motor vehicles wasn't all that useful to her.

"It's a lot better." He chuckled. "I don't think I could walk between home, university, and work every day and have any time left!"

"Ah." The Abyssal acknowledged noncommittally. How much time did she waste walking between Jack in the Box, the library, and whatever inconspicuous spot she could find outside of the town? The machines were already something she'd been contemplating getting, which is why she'd recognized it so readily, so the opportunity to talk with someone who operated one was one she wasn't going to miss. "How much did that one cost?"

"I got this one for about 250." He started, and the Wo-Class recoiled. Alex's gaze wasn't on Trinitite, though, so instead of reacting he only made the news worse. "With the war nowadays, though, a bike like this would probably go for, like, four hundred dollars."

"Four Hundred?" Trinitite exclaimed, unable to hide her shock. Alex seemed to jump at her shout, looking up to her in surprise. Just how loud had she been? Weakly, the Wo-class added "...sorry for shouting."

"That's fine." Alex replied, "It's a crazy amount to pay for something like that, especially with minimum wage, food, and rent…" His gaze drifted away from Trinitite's face, before he abruptly directed his rangefinders forwards again and shrugged. "Blame the Abyssals, I guess."

To the Abyssal's surprise, a bitter laugh escaped from her lips. The idea that this human would so innocently blame her for her own problems was…

…it was something. She supposed she did share a sliver of blame for this increase in scarcity she'd heard so much about, no matter how unavoidable it had been. She clamped down on the laugh as quickly as she could, regaining her composure and looking back to meet Alex's eyes.

"Yes," She replied, hoping Alex thought the laugh had been a bit more innocent than it really had been. "I think I will."

She was fairly happy to let the conversation die after that. She hadn't expected to react so strongly to the jab about the bike's price, so the less Alex accidentally prodded at that, the better.

Alex's parents had moved here from Austin a few months before he'd been born, so the sight of beige-tinted siding, well-tended lawn, rarely-trimmed hedges, and the decaying remnants of an out-of-season flower bed had been chiseled into the foundations of his mind. With his home being less than a mile from work, the two reached it fairly quickly, leaving him little time to mull over what he was going to do when he actually got there.

…with someone as unbelievably attractive as Sarah right next to him. If Mom saw him walking in with her, she would have some difficult questions for Alex, and the simple truth that he was just giving her a ride might not be enough. There wasn't any hope that she was out on a shopping trip or with a client, either. Her old hatchback was still sitting in the driveway, shadowed from the sun in the open garage.

"Wait there a second," he ordered, pointing to his ancient white Accord. "I'm gonna drop the bike off and pick up my stuff real quick."

"Aye-Aye." Sarah replied, her right hand stopping halfway to a salute. With her hair undone, the loose, slightly-twisty locks brushed against her shoulders as she nodded instead. He'd been a little concerned the girl would be offended he didn't invite her inside, but with an instant's hindsight he'd realized how stupid that was.

Hurriedly, he wheeled his bike around the back of the house, locking it up on the back patio, before sliding the unlocked back door open and hurrying inside. Both the kitchen and dining room were abandoned, to Alex's lack of surprise. Trying to act as nonchalantly as possible, he turned the corner to the living room, only to find his mother there, instead of the office. She must have heard his footsteps, but wasn't paying them any mind, her attention focused as she peered out of the blinds towards his vehicle.

...Damnit.

"Hello, Ma." He greeted, hoping he didn't sound too nervous.

"Hello, honey!" She turned, beaming. He would have been happy to see Mom's brilliant white smile, if there hadn't been so much mischief behind it. "Who's she?"

Crap. He had to say something, and quickly!

"Ju- just a coworker!" He stammered, his pace refusing to break as he hurried past. "She said she was interested in 40k, so I'm giving her a ride to the game!"

Damnit, if he hadn't known that was the truth Alex wouldn't have believed himself!

"Oh?" Mama questioned, a well-cared eyebrow arching. "Is that all?"

"..Yup!" Alex replied, cheeks burning as he hurried up the stairs.

When he came back down, a converted tackle-box filled with his armies in hand, his Mom didn't do much more than wish him well, but her eyes guaranteed further teasing in the future. Hopefully, she really did believe him, but Alex knew she wouldn't let him know that until she'd had a bit of fun with it.

"That's equipment for the wargame?" Sarah asked as he approached, and Alex nodded.

"Yup!" He replied, carefully hefting the tackle box to show it's weight. "There's fifteen hundred points of Mechanicus in here!"

He would have brought his more complete (and better painted) Sisters of Battle Army, but wasn't sure what kind of impression his scantily-clad squad of repentia would have left on Sarah, so it remained in his closet for tonight.

"Mechanicus?" His coworker echoed, her brow furrowing as she tested the word. Going into a big lore dive before even getting into the car sounded terrible, so instead he tried to dodge the question.

"Well, you know…" he started, his old car beeping as he unlocked it with his key fob. "...Tech priests… Skitarii… Toaster-" He stopped himself, remembering he wasn't joking around with one of his friends. "...worshipers…"

As the still-confused Sarah slipped into the passenger seat, he hoped he wasn't about to make the game night too awkward.

The only other time she'd been in a car had been with that man from the state patrol, but between the darkness, his ominous warning, and The Abyssal's own post-landfall confusion Trinitite hadn't been able to study the vehicle in detail. During this drive, however, she'd seen everything in good light, from the intricate ventilation system to the way Alex interacted with the vehicle's transmission. It was no airplane, of course, but she'd admit the ride was a lot more comfortable then what her hell divers could provide.

During that time, she tried to get some more intel on the upcoming wargame, but success had been limited.

"So, this army…" She started, looking skeptically at the container he was bringing with them. While She could see it carrying ammunition, probably, it clearly wasn't referring to quite the same type of army she knew of from her intelligence-gathering missions at the library. Perhaps it was some sort of abstraction of a real fighting force, similar to using rock or fairies to represent ships when explaining an operational plan or formation. "...is made out of engineers, builders, and mechanics who… 'worship' technology?"

The word was something she'd heard before, at the African Port Princess's abode, but to be honest she'd been happy to try and ignore that fleet's… unique oddities. If she was still alive, Hypocenter probably could have explained the term to her.

"Yeah." He chuckled, eyes still glued to the streets he was navigating the car through. "Stuff like them offering prayers to appease the machine spirits and the like. It was supposed to be ridiculous, but considering how things are now…"

"Supposed to be?" She echoed, her confusion only deepening. "Why would anyone join an army that was supposed to be ridiculous?"

Maybe it was because the idea of people voluntarily joining with other fleets was pretty new to her, but she wasn't sure why anyone would logically join something with intentionally poor… foundations? Doctrine? She wasn't sure what the correct word would be.

"I mean, when GW came up with them, they were supposed to be ridiculous, but in the setting they're in everyone takes them completely seriously."

When GW 'came up' with them? Did this entity start the Mechanicus, or…

A memory of a mysterious, unreadable circle-shaped book suddenly returned to memory, and everything suddenly clicked into place!

"Oh, they're a fantasy!" The abyssal exclaimed, unable to hold her satisfied revelation in. "Like The Neverending Story!"

It would certainly explain why she'd never heard about this force of half-human, half-machine enemies before.

"...Yeah." Alex replied, but not until he'd paused for a moment. "Exactly like The Neverending Story." Trinitite wasn't sure if she'd said something wrong, or if he was just too focused on navigating the vehicle through the intersection they were in, but she was happy enough about finally figuring out what he was talking about that it didn't bother her much. However, it did lead to another question...

Why would they perform wargames of conflicts that couldn't happen, when there were plenty of real ones they could be preparing for?

"Here we are!" Alex announced, banking the car into a spot in the building's vehicle pool. "Our friendly local game store."

Trinitite nodded, although she knew her fleetmate was too busy operating the vehicle to see it. The drive had been short, too short for her to compose her new question, but she figured it wasn't that urgent.

Hopefully, she'd be getting the answer to that soon.

I wasn't really planning on writing this chapter. The intention was to write one or two paragraphs about Trinitite getting to the games store, then jump right into my outline, but I really couldn't pass up the opportunities for character interaction that we'd see along the way. Plus, it meant I could tease Alex's Mom a bit more before she became a bit more plot-relevant, which was nice.

Not much to say beyond that, really. Wasn't expecting to reference The Neverending Story in this fic again, either, but the muse is a fickle thing... Hope you enjoyed!