Starcraft Fan Fiction ❯ Interstellar Explorers ❯ Uρgrαdiηg τhε Drαmα-Βσmβs ( Chapter 5 )

It's two in the afternoon and I'm still in bed. It sure takes a while to write one stinking chapter! Don't judge me, I work night shifts!

~ Uρgrαdiηg τhε Drαmα-Βσmβs ~

Milo and Elliot stood in silence while Paige busily set up her equipment. Milo looked around at the broad room with the varying benches and puppet-like robots that hung from the ceiling. The strangeness of these rooms never really wore off on him. Elliot was in deep contemplation about something and Milo found it a little disconcerting, so he let him be. Soon the ajar door swung open and Juno waltzed in.

"Alright! Time for that upgrade! Hope you built me that-"

"I didn't make you a bloody flame thrower." Paige spoke tiredly. "We were lucky enough the school let me build you a super strong arm as opposed to them getting you a normal prosthetic. Now get down here."

"A'ight. Cool your jets." Juno turned down the stairs, her metal hand clanking as it slid down the handrail. She adjusted her eye-patch "but seriously, Paige. Did you build it anything cool? Any new surprises?"

"Well..." the smaller girl walked over with her bionic screwdriver. "This should make movement and the rotary socket smoother. Is that surprising enough?"

"It's better than nothing." Juno spoke as Paige fiddled with the bolts on her arm. Soon there was a click and the arm popped off.

"Cripes!" Paige almost crumpled under the weight and Juno helped her carry the limb to the table. "Phew, I forgot how heavy that thing is."

Milo walked over to them "You carry that weight all the time, Juno?"

"I have to take it out several hours a day. At first it was a real hit to my balance but I've adjusted. Now I feel unsteady without it, so I'm gonna find a seat somewhere."

Milo found himself ogling the circular hole where her shoulder should be with fascination and disgust. Juno ignored him and wandered around towards a stool at the back end. Paige's deep blue eyes peered through her round spectacles as she got to work on the task before her. Juno pulled the stool closer and then hunched forward, her elbow on the table and her face in her hand.

"So Juno," Milo began, walking over with his hands behind his back. "I heard Lauren asked you out?"

"This is not a conversation I wanted to have with you, Milo." she groaned. "But yes, I mean I guess I could see why she thought I'd be on her team. Both of us are pretty tough gals. But just because I have a record of dating girly guys like you doesn't mean I'm secretly a lesbian."

"Hey!" Milo called out at the low blow. Elliot scoffed somewhere behind him.

"I think you're plenty manly." Paige spoke with a smile while her eyes remained on her work.

"Thank you, Paige." Milo crossed his arms.

"But yeah," Juno continued. "I think things'll be normal again in no time. Lauren wasn't crushing on me for a while or anything, she just can't help those feelings sometimes."

"Sounds to me like she's just unlucky with love." Milo commented.

"Well having a homo crush on a straight friend doesn't make her too out of place in this group." Juno began "Paige, weren't you recently rejected cause Amelia found out you were crushing on her hard? What with all her pseudo psychology nonsense."

Milo's eyes widened and Paige straightened, turning away from the robotic arm.

"Private! That was private knowledge, Juno! Goodness, I ought to sabotage your arm for that!" she waved a spanner threateningly.

"My bad, calm down." Juno laughed.

Milo wasn't sure what he was feeling, crushing disappointment? Did Paige still have feelings for someone else? He didn't want anyone to notice his sudden change in mood, he changed the subject.

"I wonder what the assembly after lunch is going to be about."

"Reaching the system, duh." Juno answered snappily. "They're probably putting us in our crews. I heard there's nine students per crew and they decide the teams based on the people we did group projects with as far back as the Stem."

"Well that means we're all probably together." Paige mumbled, still recovering from her embarrassment. "The excursion is supposed to take months and be very dangerous."

"Well yeah, it's just going to be us exploring planetoids with no teachers to tell us what to do! It should be great!" Juno spoke excitedly.

"I have to admit I'm excited about it too." Milo chipped in. "I have been for a while."

"Just nine of us, free to do whatever. Alone and cruising in space," Juno stared up wistfully.

"I wonder if Lauren will be acting weird." Milo pondered.

"She won't," Juno answered dismissively. "And we don't even know if us six and you boys are going to be in the same crew yet anyway."

"Well," Milo started "I can't imagine the six of you not getting put together, and I have a class each with most of you plus Elliot's my room mate."

"Shit yeah, we'll be the A team!" Juno agreed boastfully.

Milo then became aware that neither Elliot or Paige were joining in on the conversation, it was just the two of them. He didn't really feel like speaking anymore either. There was a silence and Juno sighed before saying "I guess this could also mean that guy might be put on the same crew as us." The next pause hung thickly around the two girls.

"They wouldn't do that. You might kill him." Paige responded through her tinkering. "Or any of us, any of us might kill him."

"We wouldn't kill him if we wanted to pass." Juno grumbled. "This excursion has a lot of weighting on our final grade."

Milo had never asked about the seventh ex-member of their band of friends. He always got such ominous feelings about whatever happened and preferred to avoid the topic of discussion.

"Well," Paige almost whispered. "If the eight of us are together we better hope that the ninth crew member is some other guy."

"Yeah, being out at space for how many months" Juno replied "Sayuri would probably need a cute guy she can make out with when the impulse hits her." she turned to Elliot. "I guess you'd want that too, huh Elliot?"

"What?!" he retorted.

"Although come to think of it, I've never seen you date anyone."

"Paige!"

"I said nothing to her." she responded quickly.

"Milo!" Milo flinched.

"Jeez, Sayuri told me." Juno placated. "I didn't realise it was supposed to be a secret. She keeps telling people cause she said she's shocked a guy as cool and hot as you only likes dick." Elliot fumed and didn't appear to be listening to Juno while she continued "I mean, you're pretty good looking Elliot. I might've considered you since we have a lot in common, but you've always been distant and kinda angsty-"

"I'll kill her!"

"Sayuri's a very nice and loyal friend." Paige spoke over her shoulder. "She only does what she thinks is best for everyone, it's just that she doesn't always think things through. You shouldn't get too angry at her, but for what it's worth I'm sorry things turned out this way."

"Do you really care about this?" Juno blurted in surprise. "You don't really care about anything, or so I thought?"

"No," Elliot stopped and visibly calmed himself down. "I'm fine. I don't care, really. I just don't like that this didn't come out on my terms, like I'm going to turn into a topic of gossip or something. I need some fresh air." he went for the stairs and the two girls looked at Milo warily.

"I'll go with him." he told them and then headed after his friend.

Milo caught the swinging door and closed it behind him.

"So buddy..." he tried keeping up with his friend's pace. "You're not going to do anything bad, are you?"

"No, Milo. I'm not angry."

"Okay... cause it sorta looks like you are."

"Fine. I'm angry. I'm just going to tell Sayuri to stop blabbing about things that aren't her business."

"Well alright... you're not going to our room first though? Not going to grab the zweihaender or something?"

"Don't be stupid."

"Just trying to lighten the mood..."

They went down the stairs and walked toward a small group of people waiting for the trolley to come back. At that moment Milo's IM Buzzer started vibrating in his pocket. Pulling out the small round device he saw a message on the oval interface.

-'HELP! ! ! ! ! ! ! !'

He sighed at Sayuri's message. Juno just had to warn her... Sayuri was notoriously terrified of conflict, now everything was going to be so much more of a big deal than it already was. Turning around he pressed a button and turned a dial, shrinking the holographic keypad so he could type with his back to Elliot.

'where are u?'

-'In the atrium behind a tree! Im so scared! Omg ur not bringing him r u? ? ?'

'no. calm down ffs, ill be there soon'

Milo shut off his buzzer and turned to Elliot whose gaze was fixed on the approaching trolley.

"Hey Elliot, wouldn't she probably be here in the Study Dome?"

"She usually eats lunch in the Atrium with the others."

"But half the time she's in the rec room, playing on the arcadium games." Milo watched Elliot consider. "I'll take the trolley trip and if I see her I'll send you a buzz."

"Okay, whatever." he moved away, slower but still determined. Milo itched his head as he followed the people boarding the tram.

His buzzer went off a few more times but Milo didn't check it until he got off at the Atrium Dome. As he expected, they were just pointless panicky messages as Sayuri slowly began reaching hysteria. He walked off the path and onto the grass, various students lounged about and ran around in their various social groups. Milo couldn't see Sayuri or the other three girls she should have been sitting with. He got another message from his friend stating she could see him. As Sayuri refused to pop out from behind whatever tree or bush she was hiding behind, what followed was a ridiculous game where Milo had to follow written instructions to find her. It lasted a few minutes and in the end he was close enough for her to duck out and wave him over.

"Do you realise that this is incredibly fucking stupid?" Milo asked as he walked over. "There's no way he'd actually hurt you, you know that right?"

"Yeahhhh..." she remained crouched behind her cover. "But he might yell a lot. I don't like people yelling at me." Her straight black hair was just a little shorter than Paige's and had a hot-pink dye streak through it "Has he buzzed you yet asking where I am?"

"No, but he'll probably be in here at any moment-" Sayuri shot up and gripped Milo, flipping around she heaved him behind the large tree. "Fuck, you're a psycho." Milo muttered as she peered around the trunk.

"Your hair's getting longer, it's starting to go curly." she brought up randomly when she turned around to face him.

"I know," he muttered, feeling the back of his head subconsciously.

"I always thought your short commando cut looked hella sexy, haha!"

"Thanks, Sayuri." He responded awkwardly. The two of them had made out once at a party but didn't have feelings for each other. Sometimes Milo thought that was weird, but she was never made awkward by anything.

"Urrghhhh," Sayuri pulled out her pink buzzer when it went off again. "He still wants to see me, I've said sorry to him like twenty times. I shit you not." Milo didn't have a hard time believing that at all.

"You know, if you keep acting like a scaredy cat to get out of it he's just going to get angrier and angrier."

"Maybe I should cry." she looked at Milo seriously.

"No. Don't fucking cry."

"I could do it, it would be really easy. He can't get angry at me then."

"Why did you start telling people he was gay anyway?"

"I didn't know it was meant to be on the down-low!" Sayuri's pitch raised like it usually did in situations like this. "I was just so impressed, cause you know like I always wanted a gay best friend anyway. I mean Lauren's gay but a gay guy. One I can gossip with and talk about clothes and boys, but Elliot's not like that. He's always been so hot and assured and that's why I was so keen on making out with him. But he didn't really seem into me, and I guess cause I didn't get it out of my system it turned into a crush, sorta..."

"Wait, Paige didn't tell you it was a secret?"

"Well... no? I don't think so."

"Then why are you hiding behind a fucking tree? You did nothing wrong."

"Does it matter? He's still angry at me! And stop fucking swearing at me, Milo! I'm about to throw a fucking bitch freak out!"

Milo rolled his eyes and pulled out his buzzer "Don't worry, I'm going to try to fix this before it gets any more ridiculous."

Haha, I didn't want this situation to be too serious. Just a little bit of comic relief. Feedback is obviously always appreciated. The excursion should be when things start getting intense!