Ny had, of course, recognized this as a possibility. The Vanguard had not done an amazing job at making and keeping allies among the White Moon. She could understand some bitterness and some resentfulness, and in the immediate aftermath of the ambush, she had even expected that there would be some retaliation. But that was several months ago, and very little had happened in that time. She was grateful that nothing had happened; they were allowed to acclimate in peace. She’d not personally experienced trouble with Order or the Negaverse, and she hadn’t heard much about anyone else with nasty anecdotes, either.
The ‘peace’ had dampened a little of the high-stress of the situation. The need to be vigilant had ever-so-slowly started to shift to the back of her mind in favor of focusing on the mission the Vanguard was here for and helping her Most Important Person adjust. Maybe Ny wasn’t sure of what exactly that entailed, but she’d at least thought she always felt ‘busy,’ somehow…
Her Fysa seemed to go through cycles that she did not know how to help him mediate: some days a manic sort of business that would see him off at class, cataloging samples from the natural history museum he’d secured tentative work from, harvesting DNA sources, or finding a furious interest in some tidbit of Earth culture (food was frequently a source of great complaint and upset). Then other times, he could fester in his room for days- days, with no one but her to see to him.
This was not healthy. Ny knew it wasn’t, but she didn’t know what to do about it besides be near when he was down, and do her best not to impede him when he became frantic.
When he was In That Way, she tried to secure her own Earth niche. She attended classes as her Boy did, though she prioritized a general overview of what knowledge she should know more than specifics. She’d found a martial arts studio to firstly observe, and then participate in when she felt comfortable. Ny had never been vocal, and it felt like something of a detriment on Earth when the dominant species here was so social, but the instructor had taken a liking to her regardless of her inadequacies and had even gone so far as to allow her the opportunity to assist in his teachings. She felt incredibly fortunate that a human could be so generous and patient and understanding.
And then, in the interim between taking care of Fysarius and her general studies and necessary training, Ny spent evenings exploring the city. She’d always had an interest in cataloging locales, mapmaking for the asteroids and worlds she thought she’d get to see. Her artist talents weren’t great, but she was practicing, and even though there were already guided maps for this city, they did not detail what those from the Vanguard might find of use. She could do that, with enough exploration.
If there was danger from the White Moon or from the Negaverse and its monsters, she expected to run into it before her Boy did because she was out more.
How had it not happened that way?
Fysarius barely went out on his own, so how had it happened that he would be the one to run into an aggressive force, and without Ny there to defend him? WIth his fragile mental state and diminutive attention span for anything that he wasn’t immediately interested in, this could have gone much worse! Ny had been maybe just the tiniest bit more offended than she’d actually needed to be and had delivered a punishing whack to the back of his head when she’d been informed that he ‘hadn’t known’ to be too worried.
He hadn’t known!
This wasn’t even the first time he’d recounted running into some powered human and not at minimum being on guard until they were already just before him! The ComTech blipped a quiet warning whenever it caught traces of a powered signature nearby, and her stupid boy should be paying attention to those signals! Because any human could be out to hurt him, especially those that knew what he was- foreign, alien, loosely allied with someone. He’d escaped both times. He was fine. But Ny was absolutely furious that he would risk himself to this degree, when the means to not was directly attached to his person!
Just ignorable, apparently. She’d huffed, puffed, swatted at him, shook his own arm wearing his ComTech in front of his face because why would he be so stupid when he was out by himself? It was one thing when they were together. Ny could be his eyes and ears and common sense when he was distracted with his bugs, but when they were not together, he had no business being so distracted! No business!
But he’d always been a little petulant, and this new, bizarre Earth attitude made him actively reckless. Fysarius didn’t care what happened to himself, but Ny did. She’d never cared about anyone so singularly in all her century and a half of life.
Ny was not the smartest or most creative or most innovative among the Vanguard. She’d always considered herself to be low-tier among her peers: a body to defend them, if they needed it. Her strengths were more in the physical than the mental, and it had been impressed on her quite early that these types of skills were of lesser value. She probably didn’t deserve to be among the Vanguard. Keep quiet, or they’ll come to understand her actual value-
Irrelevant for now. Not what she was working on. She had access to all the resources the Vanguard had here on Earth, and even though Ny could not be at Fysarius’ side every moment of every day, she could work hard to equip him with something more appropriate than a blip of sound that he could (and had) so easily ignored.
She did not need to do anything intricate, just something unignorable.
The design was simplistic, but that meshed well with their uniform. She didn’t want him to be perceived as staying from their values due to something made by her hand: Fysarius could do that for himself. A gray band, fitted with dull glass inlaid with a holo that linked directly to the ComTech. Goggles that Fysarius could wear directly in front of his eyes that would haze the edges of his vision when the ComTech sensed a powered signature nearby. It necessitated that he actually wear them, but Ny expected that she could impress how important this was to her that he do his best to be vigilant when they weren’t together.
Goggles wouldn’t get in his way while he was in the field as Fysarius. He could see through them just fine, and if he couldn’t, then that meant a potential problem was on the horizon and he should be alert and wary. Return home. Message her immediately. Do something besides ignore it.
Ny was happy to present them to him. Pleased with her work, though it was hardly anything he couldn’t do for himself. She was more pleased to see him wearing them regularly, a permanent addition to his uniform and a small sense of peace for her.
Quote:
Backdated to end of June 2022.
WC: 1219
WC: 1219
