xp_logs | Kyle and Topaz, post trauma milkshakes

Kyle runs into Topaz while doing his post-trauma milkshake drop off. They talk about the nanite incident, their weird lives, and friendship.

Kyle's box of frozen yogurt milkshakes was mostly handed out - one for Doug, and one dropped off outside Laurie's room with a note. One for Doc Jean, one for Darcy, one for Maya, one for Clarice - his phone had blown all the way up, and he'd gotten a few extra because people were stressed.

He was leaving a note, in his rough handwriting on the kitchen table saying "milkshakes in the walk-in" when he caught the smell of paper and tea and since it didn't come with the faint stink of tobacco, he grabbed one of the spares - vanilla and smashed Oreos and sprinkles, and shoved a straw in it. "Yo, milkshakes!" He called, popping out into the hallway.

Topaz stopped abruptly, looking up from her phone. Her bag was thrown over her shoulder, earbuds in, all signs she had planned on going somewhere and avoiding human contact for the rest of the night. She popped one of the buds out, raising an eyebrow. "I didn't put in an order for one," she said, pointing out the obvious.

"And I got a bunch extra anyway." Kyle held the cup out, waggling it slightly. "Also got a picture of Doug totally stoned out with his, so, you know. Worth every penny."

Topaz stared, unimpressed, before grabbing the offered cup. She wasn't stupid enough to say no to free treats. "How's he doing? Besides spectacularly high."

Kyle shrugged, and took a pull off his own milkshake - strawberry, with extra strawberries. "You know. Dude lost half his arm, and I'm not entirely sure he's caught up to that because I'm pretty sure he tried to hit me when I was down there stealing his phone."

"Probably wouldn't be a good idea even with two arms. I can't imagine he can throw a good punch with that many drugs in his system. Without hurting himself. Again." Topaz sipped her own smoothie for a minute before deciding to push forward. "You don't need to check after me, you know. I'm fine. Relatively."

"Uh-huh. I mean the fact that you think that's what I'm doing kinda says something else." Kyle said. "I legit wasn't gonna, right up until you were like "nope I'm fine totally fine why would you ask." He pointed with his free hand at Topaz, making finger guns. "I mean. I was gonna but I was gonna give it a few days. I voluntold myself to help with medlab laundry and errands, so."

"But you were going to ask." She tilted her cup at him. "I know the drill, and there are too many other things that need to be taken care of. I mean, I'm annoyed that bloody bastard has been alive this entire time, but I think I did enough damage to fry some mental nerves so I can live with that."

"Yeah, I was gonna ask. You're my friend, that's like. That's how people do." Kyle retorted. "I mean, you had to scramble the brains of a dude you thought was dead, a whole lot of people are fucked up because of him, he got like..." He held up one hand, thumb and pointer finger a hair's breadth apart. "this close to actually fucking up the mansion. Yeah. Check ins and milkshakes for everyone. I checked in on Molly too, and I sent a text to Clinto's weird Starbucks card guy."

"That part wasn't entirely fun," Topaz admitted, taking another sip of her milkshake. "This entire day sucked."

Kyle gave a quick tip of his milkshake cup, and took a sip before answering. "Yeah it did. What's fucked up is that in the list of shitty days, this is only in the top five, and only because of how many people are injured."

"Yeah, he ratcheted up a fair amount of those, didn't he," Topaz mumbled, lightly kicking the floor. She wasn't necessarily blaming herself for him being alive, but it was definitely driving her a bit mad that he had somehow survived to pull this.

"Yeah, worse than last time, and how the fuck is he a robot? I mean, I'd wonder if it's the same guy, but you're pretty sure it's the same guy, right?" Kyle scratched his neck a little anxiously. "I mean he recognized us, are we totally fucked that he knows where we live now?"

Topaz narrowed her eyes slightly, staring at the floor. "He said I'm the one who killed him, so yeah, definitely the same guy." You killed me, I recall. "He recognized me. He said he died." She looked up again. "I don't know. I can't say for sure he won't remember where the mansion is, but hopefully I messed up enough for the details to be blurry. I hate depending on maybes and what ifs and hopefully, but.... it's either that or just lose our minds worrying."

"And I guess we beef security. Once, uh, our computer guy is awake, and uh." Kyle shrugged. "I guess gets a good prosthetic like Laurie's, I dunno. Dude lost an arm, that's some fucked up shit."

"Yeah." She took another sip of her milkshake, mostly to give herself something to do. "I'm sure he's going to love that."

"Ell Bee Are, he's gonna whine about it, and then hack it so that it'll give you the finger whenever someone tells him he's gotta stop whining." Kyle grinned, a little falsely. "Damn though." He said, thoughtfully. "Man if I had a nickel for every friend with a robot arm, I'd have fifteen cents, which isn't a lot, but fuck, it's weird that it's happened three times."

"Is it?" Topaz asked, gesturing around them. "I think I accepted that nothing is too weird for this place when Stephen and Clea bought a cursed card game."

"Robot arms are winning over summoning cursed spiders. We live really weird lives."