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Amir was bored.
He didn't know what he expected. Maybe their world had been tipped upside-down and inside-out, but Höllvania was still Höllvania and its boring old streets still needed to be patrolled for boring old Scaldra and not even the addition of a time traveling war machine could stop it from being—you guessed it—boring.
Not to say that it was the time traveling war machine's fault. If anything, it was Arthur's for holding them up in a dead district with nothing to do. He could only flip through old Kinepage messages so many times, and if he tried to feed his TammPet again today she would probably keel over and die.
Bored.
Boredddduh.
Bored bored bored bored.
At least he wasn't alone in his misery.
While their dear skana wielding leader attempted to confirm whether or not they were following some civvies around—ugh, escort quest—the Drifter had taken to stalking up and down the street.
Once he had tired of that, he stood a little ways off from Amir and quietly fidgeted in a way that would have put baby teenaged Amir to shame.
Their frame of choice was angular and strange, bouncing on agile, metallic feet while its hands jittered in the air. Little doodads atop its head twitched and twirled. Abruptly, it would drop to a crouch, like it was about to start doing squats or bolt across the street like a madman.
Which gave Amir an amazing idea.
He sidled closer. They were still in the fuck around phase of this new, tenuous, post-not dying in a nuclear explosion relationship—and he wasn't about to find out what it took to spook their mysterious time traveler into stabbing him just yet.
"Sooo," Amir said. The weird... antennae? atop the frame's head swiveled in his direction. Holy shit, were they ears? "How fast can you go in that thing?"
From within the swordsteel carapace, the Drifter's voice was raspy and carried a strange echo. "Oh, you know. Fast enough."
Fast enough. Amir cocked his hip and hooked his thumb back at himself. "I betcha you're not faster than me."
A sound came from the warframe. It took a moment for Amir to register it as a laugh.
"I don't know about that." Drifter said. She had turned fully to face him, which he counted as a win even as indignation reared its head.
"Oh yeah? Prove it." Amir jabbed a finger in their direction, grinning. "Race me."
The warframe's head tilted. "...y'might be biting off more than you can chew."
Oh, it was so on.
"Oooh sounds like you're scared to lose to the fastest thing in Höllvania, and—not to brag—possibly the whole world."
The antennae went flat against the frame's head. Like a cat's ears. A moment of absolute stillness in which Amir almost held his breath before they flipped forward again with determined speed.
"Alright, but you asked for it."
Got em.
"Where do we start? The races I've been in... weren't here." The Drifter prompted, after he was done subtly pumping a victorious fist in the air.
Other races?—no, focus. First he'd show the time traveler how it was done, then he'd pester her about that. He turned back to the road before them.
Nothing but a scattering of turned over shopping carts and busted up automobiles as far as the eye could see. The perfect race track.
"Here to the intersection at the blockade." Amir shot them a sideways glance, "Unless... you can't handle that."
Amir knew he could. In his sleep. Easily.
"A straight shot." Drifter said. Amir was sure they were smiling. If they could smile in that thing. Wait, could they- "You sure you don't need a head start?"
"Pbbbbt," Amir blew a disbelieving raspberry. He made a show of cracking his knuckles and rolling his shoulders before expertly pushing his glasses into place. He was about to look so fugging cool. "Go on three?"
The Drifter braced. "Roger."
"One... twoooooTHREE-!"
Before he was even done speaking, he was off.
Electricity threw up sparks behind him. Across his skin. Under it. It still itched, but it also bolstered him in a way he had never felt before in his life as he tore down the Höllvanian streets. Like he was a superhero.
Though... superheroes didn't tend to use cheap tricks to win, he thought, a little guiltily. Maybe he should circle back and do a few donuts around Drifter so they didn't feel totally trounced. Hell, he couldn't even hear her behind him.
He swiveled his head around to look as he ran—he was getting good at that. He hadn't run into a traffic pole in a week.
They hadn't moved from the starting line.
Aw, jeez. They were upset he'd cheesed the race. He began to slow, but as he did so, her frame went low, angular body bent in a crouch with both hands to the pavement.
It tensed.
Then the frame shot forward in a kaleidoscope of technicolor.
A blowback of debris kicked up. The air whistled, high pitched and panicked like a tea kettle about to blow. The warframe became a speeding bullet. Amir had sped back up—in panic—but it had caught right up to him.
For a moment, they ran side by side. The strobing lights from the frame dancing off his glasses, blinding. They were going so fast and the blood in his ears was beating so loudly that time seemed to slow as he turned his head to look at them.
They looked back and sketched a two finger salute.
The warframe screamed off, shattering every window they passed and popping Amir's ears as it went, reorienting the flow of time as it left him to eat their dust. They became a streak of green and blue light ahead of him. He didn't have a chance in hell of catching back up to her. For the first time since he'd taken the forbidden juice, Amir felt slow.
The Drifter soared over the finish line—and didn't stop. At the speed they were going, Amir wasn't sure they could. They veered hard to the left, and several weeks worth of trying and failing to control his own newfound speed came rushing back to him with a wince as Drifter crashed straight through a storefront display.
He found the warframe amidst a sea of furniture carnage. No table or chair was spared, not even the futon, which the frame had bisected before smashing into the wall.
It was smoking or emitting steam, or both. It was still twitching and jittering with that same restless energy, which was unsettling as the Drifter was standing beside it.
He was alternating between leaning casually against the pulverized wall to posing with a hand on the jiggling warframe's shoulder, to standing with crossed arms and a cool look—because of course they looked cool with their future clothes and cool future tech and cool future face that didn't look nearly as sweaty as Amir's face felt-
"What the hell was that?" Amir squawked.
The Drifter startled. Apparently, he'd been too busy looking cool to notice Amir's approach. They recovered quickly.
"That was Gauss." Drifter said, oozing confidence as she placed a hand on her hip and used the other to pat the warframe on the flank like a dog. "Gauss Prime, if you want to get specific. He's my favorite."
Amir tempered a little scowl at that. Why would he care about which war machine was their favorite? He didn’t. Why'd he care about how they were now petting the warframe? He didn't.
"They, uhm, they don't all go that fast do they?"
"Ehhh, Titania gets up there." Drifter drawled, thoughtfully. They grinned, but took mercy on him upon seeing his expression. "Don't worry, you're not out of the job. Volts are still faster than light... when they aren't trying to show off."
Relief washed over him—just as quickly as embarrassment.
"Show off? Me? I would never-" Amir sputtered.
"Hey, I didn't say it was a bad thing."
Amir squinted.
“You…” He pointed an accusing finger at the Drifter. "You were doing it too!!"
The Drifter made a sound. This time, it was easier to tell it was a laugh when he could see her face. They raised both hands in mock surrender. It was painfully attrac—annoying.
Eyes half lidded, the Drifter leaned forward.
"Did it work?" They asked, with a coy tilt of their head.
Amir almost took a step back. They were... joking. Right? Right? Every brain cell felt like it had spontaneously been scrambled. He was just standing there, gaping wordlessly, as their leer became a toothy grin that was so infuriating Amir wanted nothing more then to—ohokaywowokayyepjustgonnaburythatthoughtfornow.
While Amir continued to do nothing but stand there and make increasingly high pitched noises, the Drifter straightened up while clearing their throat. An uncertain expression crossed their face.
"Anywhos! Arthur radioed in while you were catching up." He said, rapidly. "No need to hang around, Aoi's got the civvies and Quincy's covering her."
"Oh. O-oh, right." Amir said, scrambling to regain his footing. "We should- go back to the mall?" He began bouncing on his heels. "Race you again? Round two? Promise I'll wait til three?"
"Yeaaah," Drifter rubbed the back of their neck, looking sheepish. "Just one teensy little problem...."
"Whazzat?"
"Gauss is stuck in the wall.”