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[tenthtimeisthecharm]

There is a brief pause filled with audible clicks and thuds, followed by the slightly echoey acoustics that come from someone recording audio in a large room. "Hello hello! You've reached Dr. Velocity! Feel free to leave a message or a video or whatever here, and I'll do my very best to respond promptly! And if it this is about the stickers, Ratchet, I didn't do it! Love and love and love!"

text | voice | video | action

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[tenthtimeisthecharm]

[Velocity reaches out automatically to take what's been handed to her, and it takes a second for her to realize that this probably means she isn't in trouble. Probably. Then she nods with a quick, mostly genuine smile and turns back into her hab, assuming Skywarp will follow]

You don't mind sparkly glasses, do you? All my good ones are um. Broken.

[There are obvious signs that Velocity has been isolating in here and she is making a concentrated effort to avoid making eye contact with the trash basket full of broken glass, but it's clean enough. The glasses she retrieves are, indeed, double walled and filled with liquid glitter that shifts when she moves to generously fill each one. She then moves to her small table and sits one on each side with the bottle in the middle before she sits]

[Velocity starts to open her mouth to ask a question before hesitating and instead sipping the wine. It was good, and she hums appreciation]

[telepro]

If she recognises these signs from the many people she's known through the war who struggled for one reason or another, Skywarp doesn't comment. In fact, she doesn't care at all. She gives the bin a kick as she goes past, not enough to send it flying, but enough to rattle the broken glass in it.

For once, she has no comment and just sits down in the slightly too small chair and grabs the bottle to take a good chug.

Finally: "This fucking ship, whatever-your-name-is! What the hell is wrong with it and everyone on it?"

[tenthtimeisthecharm]

Velocity winced at the rattle of glass, but didn't look away. She was surprised at where Skywarp was going with this, but wasn't offended at Skywarp not knowing her name. People had always found reasons to leave her behind before, at least this seemed to be genuine.

"People have been talking with you on the network," Velocity said slowly, hazarding a guess as to what all of this was about. "But not the way you wanted, maybe? So what did you want, instead?"

[telepro]

"No, it's not that. I don't care about arguing with a bunch of idiots on the network. None of that is important." She says, leaning back, expression scrunching up. But, but she is here, she has taken up Velocity's offer (even if she never got her name). There's a reason. That part of it sank in.

Skywarp bites her lower lip for a moment, then throws back her glass.

"Okay. Okay. Can I admit something really bad that I need to get off my chestplate before I explode or something? I don't care if you judge me or whatever."

A beat.

"It's not about a murder. No laws were broken, so don't worry about that."

[tenthtimeisthecharm]

Velocity was already nodding. "Whatever it is, it's better getting to say it to somebody. Knock Out used to tell me these things sort of... boil if you keep them locked in your spark."

She was well aware of the irony considering how very closely she'd been holding things to her chest lately, but that wasn't under discussion right now.

"Besides," she said with a weak attempt at a joke, "you brought me something that tastes good. That deserves at least few minutes of my time, right?"

[telepro]

"Yeah, I guess. I don't need more weird spark feels," she grouses. Then opens her mouth, then stops. Opens it again. Growls and teleports out her seat and across the room, then back. "Why is this so stupid hard!"

It takes some more effort before finally - and it's not wholly clear why she's even struggling so much with getting this out - "I feel guilty going flying now! Ever since Nova had her wings taken off her it just makes me feel really garbage and stupid and guilty and I hate it!"

[tenthtimeisthecharm]

Oh. Oh, that did sound stupid hard.

Velocity didn't respond right away, knowing very well that the things she said off the cuff could be annoying or not come across well. And this mattered. It was important.

"You're twins. Of course you're upset. Why do you think how you feel about it is stupid? Just because it happened more directly to her doesn't mean it isn't awful for you, too."

Velocity frowned, and topped off Skywarp's glittery cup. "Keep going though, if you want to. What else do you need to say about it?"

[telepro]

"Because it hasn't happened to me. Evidently wherever I was when it went down was all warm and safe and not with my sister!"

Skywarp is in an odd spot where she feels horrible about what's happened, but despite her words doesn't fully blame herself for it. She's always been very in the moment, and thus finds it difficult to understand something that's happened Nova but not for her. It wasn't an issue before, when it had already happened for her but not Nova... she's not an unintelligent mech, but this whole timeline weirdness is new for a lot of them.

"I don't want to talk about it. I want to just shove it back down where I can ignore it and then take it out on someone like Moron Prime and his hideous face."

She leans back in the chair, kicking her boots up and pushing back on the back two legs.

"You look like scrap, by the way. Super disheveled. It's not not doing it for me? You wanna make out?"

[tenthtimeisthecharm]

Velocity opened her mouth to respond to Skywarp saying she didn't want to think about something by relating it to her own experiences, then let out a startled, beeping squeak.

"Um? Should I say thank you? Or thank you for noticing, maybe? It's-" She cycled her optics further but couldn't think of a compelling reason not to, and Skywarp was pretty? Those were the main criteria for deciding on whether you wanted to kiss someone you'd barely interacted with before, right?

"Sure, that would be nice."

She then paused, reciprocation Lottie, and added hurriedly, "You look very nice, too!" She tried to think of the things people generally said were attractive, which she only agreed with about people after she'd gotten to truly know them and feel affection for them, so... "Your um, everything? Your paint is very shiny and I like your hands?"

[telepro]

"Heh. Nice."

She leans back as Velocity speaks, evidently finding it quite endearing from her expression.

"Medic with a hand thing, huh? That makes sense," Skywarp lifts a big hand up and wiggles her fingers suggestively. "Alright, up on the table. Let's do this, if you're into it."