Waiting for Calibrations

Zina fidgeted. They were doing something to berserker, so she wasn’t allowed to play with him for the time being. And time to play with Berserker was important to everyone, apparently, so they were going as fast as they could! But until then…

”You can wait in here, Zinaida,” the man in the labcoat says. ”I’ll get you as soon as we’re done the diagnostics with Berserker.”

Zina nodded, and sat at the table. She had plenty she could do. Paper, pencils, books and magazines… Busy work. Boring busy work. Just something to keep her out of trouble, like what mama and papa used to do.

Reaching over and grabbing a piece of paper and pencil, she begins doodling her old house. She still knew it by heart, but… She had a new family now. Crumpling the paper up and tossing it away, she grabs another piece of paper. Her new brother, Ivanka, her aunt Marynia, her friend Berserker, and that strange man… What was his name again?

Another paper now. This time, Berserker. Why? Because he’s awesome. Steps that make the ground shake, fists that protect their glorious republic, and… Berserker didn’t have much, did he?

”You need something new,” she says to herself. Lasers? Missiles? Machine guns? Something… intimidating. Electricity, maybe? That was cool.

Drawing some squiggly-lines around his hands, she happily labeled it “Fist of the North.” The first of many steps in making Berserker a better protector? Maybe. But it was fun to imagine what he could become.

Aye, life had been lively for Nyx, of late. She did, of course, still need to speak with Aurel about a few things, and it was a little irritating that he was always stuck to Hild like that. This, in itself, confused Nyx; she'd always idolized Hild, and now she was more annoyed by her than anything. So of course, Nyx didn't really understand that bit. But after their lunch in Aerugo, MORE stuff had gone down, and Hulk-man had burned her playhouse down. Not exactly a playhouse, anyways, but they should still write a song about it. Probably the Proclaimers should do it...

But NOW, the small right hand to the grandmaster of the world was walking about Moscow, looking for something to do. It was always so boring when she had nothing to do... She kind of wished Aurel could make SOME use of her outside of combat... Ah well, boredom would subside. But as she approached the site of the Kremlin, she noticed something peculiar; there was a freaking giant robot not too far away!

At first, Nyx didn't know what to make of it; was it an enemy of Drachma? Or was it of Drachman make? Approaching cauiously, she noticed the men working on it. As she came closer, she glanced into the room, looking around. An engineer-guy turned around in surprise, but nodded briefly to Nyx, who was curiously inching closer to the machine. "Hello Lady Nyx." Ah, Nyx would never get used to that! It felt so strange to be among RIOTE's highest ranks if everyone below her addressed her so weirde! "This is Berserker, Nyx. Surely you have seen it before, no?" Nyx shook her head, gingerly poking its metal leg. "Nope, never seen it before. What's it do?"

The guy smiled, and Nyx was a tad confused. THIS IS ALWAYS WHEN A TRAP DOOR OPENS UNDER THE HEROIC PROTAGANIST!! "Lady Nyx, come with me; there's someone you should meet." Orrr.... Maybe not? Nyx trailed along behind the man until she reached a room, which contained a child, maybe a year or two younger than her, who was doodling pictures. "Hello Zinaida. This is Lady Nyx of RIOTE. Nyx, this is Zinaida; you know Berserker, right? Well this is the girl who we put inside it." Nyx was a bit taken aback that a little girl like this was capable of controlling a ginormous freaking robot- but then she remembered that she herself happened to be capable of many incredible feats, and she felt silly for being surprised. Smiling, she walked over and sat near Zina. "Hello~" Glancing down at the picture of Berserker, Nyx examined it before grinning and pointing at it. "That looks really cool! Did you draw it?"

"Hello Zinaida. This is Lady Nyx of RIOTE. Nyx, this is Zinaida; you know Berserker, right? Well this is the girl who we put inside it."

”Hello~”

Zina whipped her head around, greeting her visitor with a smile. ”Why hello there!”

”That looks really cool! Did you draw it?”

Zina smiles even wider and nods. ”Uh-huh! Berserker’s already good at protecting our glorious union, but I think these improvements could help,” she says, adding a rocket pod to one shoulder. ”So, are you waiting for calibrations too?” she asks, looking Nyx over. ”Or… Are you doing an inspection like that other lady from RIOTE? The dark skinned one?” She liked that lady. She couldn’t understand what she said, but she seemed nice. Reminded her of mama.

She stares at Nyx’s wings for a moment, pondering. Berserker should have wings. She could call him Super Berserker then! But the men in the white coats didn’t like that idea, and it made their heads hurt. Maybe Aunt Marynia could help with that… She always wanted to do crazy things like that!

”So, Lady Nyx? How do you like your wings?”

As Nyx curiously watched Zina work her little magic on the paper, the somewhat younger girl explained what she was drawing. "Well that's good! Drachma needs stuff like Berserker to protect it from all the mean, bad stuff that doesn't like Drachma." Nodding matter-of-factually, she carried on looking at the picture. "Hmm... Ooh!~ Maybe he could have laser eyes! Then he could just pew pew! And it would stop anything that was trying to do bad stuff!"Grinning, she spouted off her idea as excitedly as she could. As Zina asked why Nyx was there, she blinked, before answering. "Calibrations? Hmm... I don't think so... Mostly, I was just walking around and I saw Berserker through an open door where they were doing stuff. So I went to go get a better look. Berserker's really, really cool, by the way." Well now, Nyx was wondering firstly what calibrations even were, and secondly who it was that Zina was talking about in RIOTE. Perhaps she'd have to meet this woman...

Snapping from her thoughts at the sound of a question, Nyx was put a tad off guard. Her wings? To be fairly honest, Nyx hated them. They were constant, nagging reminders of how she had been caged up for three years, how she had been taken away from her good life when she was only seven, how utterly inhuman she was, ever since Gregory performed his demented alchemical spell on her. But that wasn't exactly what one would tell a twelve year old girl, right? "These things? Oh, they're kinda dumb. I can't even fly! They just flop there and do nothing." Giving a little chuckle, she spoke up again, smiling cheerfully to Zina, thoughts of her wings having faded. "Oh, and you can just call me Nyx~ Dunno where everyone gets the whole Lady Nyx thing from, hehe."

archiving (Shu it's been two weeks; you don't bump)