Work Text:
"A—what?"
From the top of her head, Nika could count two—maybe three—people she would have expected to find in the hangar workshop so late at night: Chuchu if she was bored, Martin when he got worried about her working too late, and Suletta whenever Aerial had repairs underway.
Not Miorine, though. As involved as she was in GUND-ARM, Inc.'s development process, she wasn't exactly the 'rummage through the workshop shelves in the middle of the night' type of leader.
"A platform."
And yet here she was, rummaging through the workshop shelves in the middle of the night, undeterred by the grease that had smeared along her uniform blouse. Whatever it was she was looking for, it must have been important. The frown of impatience on her face said so.
"What kind?" Nika probed. She was now looking over Miorine’s shoulder, wringing her hands behind her back in curiosity while the other woman stuck her hand into a bin of spare parts. Her tongue was sticking out sideways, and she looked so focused that Nika didn't have the heart to tell her she wasn't going to find anything useful in there.
"Any kind," came Miorine's curt reply. "But preferably around fifteen centimeters tall, forty-five in width, and around thirty in depth?"
Nika crossed her arms, unimpressed. "So, not 'anything'?"
"Well.” Miorine hesitated. “Not exactly, no."
"What is it for?"
"Nothing important."
Nika smiled kindly. Now she was terribly intrigued. "Important enough that you're out here in the middle of the night, Miorine-san. Do you need it fabricated?"
Miorine shook her head. "It isn't for work, so there's no need for me to bother you with it."
"Friends help each other out," Nika said simply, equal parts curious and happy to help. "It doesn't have to be for work. It isn't a bother."
Miorine softened at that, enough to have released her arm from its prison among fabricated metal. Nika hummed her displeasure at the bin, and the many others around the hangar like it. She'd probably have to clean up shop, maybe re-organize? Miorine had suggested getting rid of all their scrap, but... Earth House has a hard time letting things go in a way that Miorine might never understand.
She paused to think about Nika's offer for a minute, then finally acquiesced. "I suppose that you could."
"Great!" Nika liked having problems to solve. "We can start with you telling me what you'll use it for."
Miorine crossed her arms, her frown deep and her glare sharp. "I refuse."
"What?"
And then there it was, the almost-unnoticeable dusting of pink on her cheeks. "And you can't tell Suletta."
"Huh?"
Nika had taken Miorine's opened office door as an invitation to come in, but found herself frozen at the doorway. Seeing Suletta look imposing was definitely... new. Miorine with a look of indignation across her face? Much less new.
"Unbelievable," the smaller woman grumbled. Despite her words, her hands held loosely onto the front of Suletta's uniform. She never really thought that Suletta and Miorine argued, but it certainly looked like they were.
"N—No, Miorine-san." Suletta pouted, fighting to hold her ground, nearly faltering. "Not until you eat something better!"
Ah. Things started clicking into place: the half-eaten bowl of instant noodles that Suletta was holding up above Miorine's reach, the fact that it was now three in the afternoon, the untouched takeaway box on her desk that probably had something green and leafy and much too nutritious for Miorine to ever want to eat. Nika tried to fight the laugh that bubbled from her throat, opting instead to loudly cough, letting them know that she was now standing at the threshold to Miorine's office with a stack of paperwork in hand.
She was expecting Miorine to let go. But she didn't. Now that she thought about it—it wasn't like Miorine had ever shied away from holding onto Suletta.
"Nika-san!" Suletta smiled. It looked like she was about to come over and greet her, but Miorine was still holding onto her, and Suletta seemed perfectly content to let her keep her there, to gently settle her free hand around her waist.
"Hello, Suletta." Nika held up the documents, learning over to try to get a glimpse of Miorine. "And Miorine-san. Is now a good time for you to sign these?"
"Yes—" Miorine started, immediately cutoff by Suletta's nervous "N—No!"
Miorine looked up at her, unimpressed. "No?"
"Eat… eat something good first." Suletta said in a small, panicked voice. And then, softly, added: "Please?"
Nika had never seen Miorine come undone before. But there it was: something gentle, something tender. If not for herself, then for Suletta. It might have only been a split second—a passing moment of fondness in her normally steely eyes—but Nika always had impeccable attention to detail. Miorine's head fell forward and onto Suletta's front.
"Fine," she said in a muffled voice. "So annoying."
It would have been sweet had Chuchu not barged into the office with a bone to pick with their president.
"Oi, Princess! These stupid spacian customers were—”
She stopped at the door, glowered towards Suletta and Miorine, whipped her head towards Nika who could only shrug, before throwing her hands up in the air and turning a sharp hundred and eighty degrees back out where she came from.
"Never mind. So clingy!" She stomped away. "Makes me want to punch something!"
From: [email protected]
Sent: 11:43PM SEST
To: [email protected]
Subject: Platform & updates
Nika,
See attached article re: microscale hydraulic lifts. I'm thinking of some sort of quick deploy mechanism - let me know if workable.
I appreciate the report you sent on the arm prosthetic. Unfortunately I think it will go over the heads of our investors, but will be great for updates to my father & Dr. Winston. Please ask Till to shoot a demo video instead - perhaps something flashy?
P.S. - here is a photo of Suletta with our new tomato seedlings.
Best,
MR
"Uhm." Miorine blinked down at the food. "Nika?"
"You look hungry," Nika smiled, a little too sweetly. Chuchu was already rolling her eyes. "You should take this and bring the other out to Suletta."
"But it's your food?"
"Yeah, Nika." Chuchu crossed her arms, sending her a pointed glare. "I'm pretty sure one of those boxes is mine."
"This is Suletta's favorite, and you hardly get enough time to eat!" Nika insisted, already pushing her towards the balcony door.
Miorine stumbled forward, confused but not unwilling. "Thank you?"
Suletta had looked up towards them by now, probably hearing the commotion. The sight of Miorine joining her on what was looking like a lovely dinner watching the sunset had brightened her soft smile into something blinding. Nika let out out a satisfied laugh.
"Hey, Nika." Chuchu called.
"Yeah?"
"Ever heard of minding your own fucking business?" she asked lightheartedly.
Nika laughed. "Nope."
Chuchu threw her hands behind her head while they walked away. "Apparently, neither have I!"
"If you want something that releases quickly, a hydraulic-lift type platform like you suggested isn't going to work."
Nika crouched down in front of her prototype. It was a small mechanical platform that had four collapsed legs, and four equidistant springs. Miorine's specifications had become increasingly limiting: apparently it should be lightweight, shouldn't be too bulky, and should be quick to deploy. Miorine had firmly asked that Nika only do it whenever she had the time and felt like it. But it was fun, so she did it anyway even if she didn't.
"You want its compressed state to have the highest level of kinetic potential so that," she pulled away a locking pin—the entire system released with a loud snap, oscillating up and down from the force of its springs. It was so strong that one of the legs snapped at the joint. "It shoots up like this! So, springs work better."
"I see," Miorine nodded in appreciation. "Thank you for looking into my suggestion, though. I'll defer to your expertise. I'm guessing you'll need to mitigate how strong the springs are?"
"Yeah," Nika rubbed at the back of her head with a sheepish smile. "I just put this together as a proof of concept. We'll need to find the right amount of damping, or just change the springs. We had a few classes on this, if you remember? With the free body diagrams, and state-space equations?"
"Oh. Transfer functions."
"Yes! It's all just a spring, mass, load, damper. Though I much prefer doing those in circuitry." She laughed.
Miorine smiled kindly. "I don't know that I prefer to do them at all."
"I think you'd have made a great engineer, actually."
"I don't know," Miorine quipped jokingly. "I quite like telling other people what to do instead."
Nika laughed, noting the irony of hearing that from one of the most arguably workaholic people she'd ever met.
It took all the convincing Nika and Aliya could muster to drag Suletta out of their classes and back to Earth House. They'd never really seen her get sick before—but when she did, she went down bad.
Miorine was there when they arrived, looking over something Nuno had prototyped. Then Suletta came into view looking sick and disoriented, and Miorine forgot everything else in an instant: the prototype, her mug of coffee, the quarterly report that would be due that same afternoon.
"You idiot," was the first thing Miorine said, but the way she gently reached up to lay the back of her hand to Suletta's forehead carried a gentleness so sincere that Nika suspects she simply didn't know the words to convey it. "No fever, but you look like shit."
"I-I'm fine—" Suletta stuttered. Her head was bowed low enough that Miorine could brush back her bangs, damp with cold sweat. "It's nothing."
She must have said something wrong because Miorine drew a sharp breath and shook her head. If Nika didn't know better, she'd think she was angry.
"You promised," Miorine's voice was firm, her eyes intense while her hands fell to squeeze Suletta on the shoulders. "You promised me that you'd tell me how you were feeling."
"I—" Suletta started. She swallowed, nervously looking away. "I did. I have a headache... I don't feel well."
Miorine stared at her a little longer before finally softening, holding Suletta's face with both hands while she scanned it for anything that might be wrong. "Did you stay up studying again?"
Suletta gave her tired, guilty smile.
"Your immune system will tank if you don't get enough sleep."
Suletta pouted. "You don't either."
Miorine scoffed, annoyed. "Two wrongs don't make a right."
"Mhmm." Suletta mumbled. "Two lefts do."
Miorine, taken by surprise, actually laughs a little. "That doesn't make a lick of sense, you blockhead. You're finally delirious."
"You looked so worried," Suletta mumbled softly, face flushed by either a fever finally setting, or something else entirely. Her hands had pitifully come up to the hem of Miorine's uniform, holding onto it. "I—I wanted to make you laugh."
"If you don't want me to worry, then take care of yourself."
"You're right," Suletta leaned into the warmth of Miorine's hand on her cheek. "I'm sorry."
Miorine slowly brushed back her hair again. Her fingers followed the line of Suletta's brow, slowly rubbing circles along her temple with her thumbs. Suletta practically melted in relief, her eyes fluttering closed, her tense shoulders slacking. They kept this up for a moment, but Miorine had to reach up so high that eventually her arms wavered.
"So frustratingly tall," she mumbled.
Nika, feeling a little awkward to just be standing there, scratched at her cheek. She turned around, locked eyes with Aliya, who up until now was just staring at some interesting corner of the ceiling. "We should go," she mouthed out.
"Totally." Nika agreed in a hurry before turning towards Miorine. "We'll grab some medicine and drop it off here, okay?"
"Thank you," Miorine said lightly, already motioning for Suletta to lay down on the couch. "That'd be great."
The last thing they saw was Miorine pulling Suletta's head onto her lap, whispering something featherlight and soft while she rubbed away the pain, their hands threading together.
It made Nika think that maybe Miorine did know the words, after all.
It doesn't take long for them to realize that Miorine was most comfortable expressing anything she ever felt by getting angry. That included worry, and that might have even included care. So they (at least most of them, excluding Chuchu) tried to be understanding when Miorine spent most of the day short-tempered and aggravated, tried to take the loud and angry typing in their common room in stride.
"I almost feel bad for her," Chuchu grumbled, leaning forward on the table with her elbows and looking towards Nika. "It's just a flu. Suletta's going to be fine. Why do I feel like Miorine isn't?"
"That's probably because we banned her from staying inside the room too long," Nika said with a sigh.
"Makes no sense to me." Chuchu rubbed at her temples, leaning against her chair until it tipped dangerously back on its hind legs. "What good would it do if both of them got sick?"
"She's just worried." Nika paused contemplatively. "I wonder when the last time she worried about someone this much was."
There was a rare glint of empathy in Chuchu's eyes, and Nika knew that somehow, she understood.
Then Miorine stood up, snapped her laptop shut, and pushed her chair back so forcefully the sound of it scraping against the floor was enough to make the farm animals unsettled.
"Miorine-san!" To everyone surprise, it was Lilique who had set her food down, hands on hips, and stood in front of Suletta's door. "You need to let her rest."
"I just want to make sure she's finished her food."
"It's only been a little while, you can check on her again later on, okay?"
"She might be hurting."
"Miorine-san..."
Miorine grabbed at her arm, her body language visibly anxious but much less angry now. They couldn't see Miorine's expression from where they were seated, but Lilique could, and her face, for a moment, had a shadow of surprise before settling into something soft and mellow. She stepped closer in empathy, a friendly hand on Miorine's slight shoulder.
"Okay." Lilique sighed in defeat. "Just for a little bit."
In just two short days, Suletta had recovered completely.
Not a day later, Miorine started sneezing.
"Miorine-san?" Nika looked into her office, Chuchu trailing right behind her. She was excited. Things were exciting! She always loved this feeling, the rush of accomplishment whenever a project finally reached an acceptable point of completion by her standards, when it was ready for the client to see. The springs were balanced perfectly, the joints were sturdy and snapped into place once the device was released and triggered. It was lightweight, easy to deploy, and purely mechanical so it didn't need to be powered. "I finally—oh?"
"Oh, they're at it again." Chuchu deadpanned, used to it at this point.
Miorine was trying to wrestle her noodles out of Suletta's hands, pitifully out of her reach. Suletta actually didn't look scared of her for a change, instead sporting a look of determination as she yet again reminded Miorine of the importance of actually eating healthy things for a change.
"That's cheating!" Miorine barked, but there was no venom in her voice, no strain of actual anger. If anything, it almost looked like she had the ghost of a smile—maybe she didn't even realize it. It happened a lot around Suletta.
"I-It's not!" Suletta squeaked. "It's called a natural advantage! Please, Miorine-san, I thought you liked stew!"
"Hey!" Chuchu yelled, crossing her arms. "Why do you two even bother with this? You always give in to Suletta anway—"
Miorine turned, eagle-eyed, and saw the slim package in Nika's hands. "Um." Nika swallowed. "It's... done?"
And then she honest to goodness dashed—and tripped a little, and nearly fell—grabbing the box out of Nika's hand and startling Suletta into a confused daze.
"Wuh?"
Miorine threw the box onto the floor, right at Suletta's legs. In a wonderfully smooth motion, it released the locks on the springs and fully extended itself upwards. It all happened so fast, Suletta had no time to react, and soon Miorine had ran back up towards her and stepped on the platform, drawing herself right up to Suletta's full height. Miorine grinned, "Gotcha!"
Nika, who had been stunned into silence, broke out into a laugh. An honest, full-bellied laugh. She couldn't believe it! Of course this is what Miorine needed something so particular for!
"What's going on in here?" Aliya and Till appeared from behind the door.
"M-Miorine-san!" Suletta whined, beset by sudden panic at her sudden disadvantage. She couldn't step back to avoid Miorine's attempts to steal back what was rightfully hers. Suletta had let herself get pushed back against a wall. "That's cheating!"
"It's called a tactical advantage!" Miorine tip-toed, motioning to grab the noodles that were now almost within reach. Almost! Suletta still had longer arms, despite them now standing on equal footing, but all Miorine needed was to push herself a little more, just the tiniest bit more, and—
A 'little more' turned out to be too much.
She lost her balance, and was about completely fall over if not for Suletta's free arm coming to wrap around her waist, keeping her steady on her over-engineered stepping stool.
"Careful, Miorine-san!"
"I—"
"Oho." Aliya blinked, eyebrows shooting upwards and before locking eyes with Nika.
Miorine, who for the first time was now at eye-level with Suletta, had braced herself against the wall with one hand beside Suletta's head, and looked like she just lost all her ability to function.
"Miorine... san?"
"Suletta—"
Miorine’s expression, unreadable at first, had slowly turned into one of the most genuine displays of wonder Nika had ever seen in her life. Her brows furrowed a little, her mouth opening and closing uselessly, her eyes transfixed on Suletta's. For the first time, the very first time, it looked like Miorine Rembran didn't know what to say.
"A-are you okay?" Suletta started fussing over her, visibly burning up under the intensity of Miorine's gaze.
Miorine didn't look that much better though. A flush rapidly crept from her neck up to her ears, which were now uncharacteristically red.
"Suletta." She muttered again, a little softly, like it was the only word she knew.
(Aliya covered Chuchu's eyes, Till had turned around, and Nika decided it was time to find the way out the door as fast as possible.)
"Your eyes... are beautiful."