The ashen grey tapestry that represented the sky was as present as it was yesterday today, and it would be like that tomorrow, and the tomorrow the day after that.
From the words of the exiles, the sky's hues could be as multicolored as the sides of a sports drink.
But on a planet such as this one, the hue that dominated the sky was the color of brutalist grey.
Glancing up to confirm that there were no ill winds carrying the scent of acid rain, Ester continued to butcher the eight legged muck Eater in front of him, saving the chunks of flesh in pre-prepared cans that had been cleaned in preparation for this.
Leaving the knife stuck into the chitin of the Muck Spider, Ester sealed the cans containing the chunks of flesh before stuffing them into the knapsack. He briefly weighed the bag on his side.
Feeling the weight consisting of several kilograms of cut flesh, scraped together lichen, fungus and the odd insect. Ester grinned.
'With this much we'll be able to eat for a week.'
Talking about the other person in the We, his arm buzzed with a communication request from the woman herself.
Answering the call, Ester made several incisions on the Muck Eater.
"What's up?"
Continuing to peel open the corpse, Ester's left hand rummaged through the corpse's organs. Eva's crackly voice transmitted itself through his arm.
The quality was much higher since he finally had the time to fix her speaker.
[Nothing much.]
The sound of the engine idling carried itself over with her voice.
[It's boring, just waiting for the steam to collect into the filtration system so that I can properly deal with the engine is making me crazy. So how better to deal with boredom than to bother the only other person I can talk to? I'm not interrupting anything am I?]
Ester sensed that the reason Eva called him wasn't just because of boredom, but he played along for the time being.
"Well it's the same amount of nothing on my end, just looking for a specific organ in this corpse."
[What is the species of said corpse?]
"A muck spider."
[Isn't that the thing with the acid sac? Check the space behind its click jaw.]
"Thank you for remembering the placement of a Muck Eater's oil sac several years since we learnt about it."
[I have a good brain.]
"If you have a good brain, then I have an Architect's brain."
[...You just called me stupid didn't you?]
"It seems that your head isn't just for show."
[If I had teeth I would bite you.]
"I'd bite you first."
A loud hiss that could've been Eva's frustration being made audible through her throat or the water being evaporated instantly, carried itself out of his arm.
The odds of it being the first option were higher as Eva changed the subject.
[Can I... confess something?]
Ester unconsciously straightened his back at her uncharacteristically serious tone.
"What happened?"
[I'm worried.]
"...About what?"
[A lot of things.]
A hiss of air that could only be described as Eva's sigh carried itself through the communicator as Ester slowly crawled out of the Muck Spider pit, the melted surface of the pit making it difficult to do so.
"You'll have to give me -Hup- some examples of these things."
Ester carefully adjusted his limbs so that he wouldn't fall mid conversation.
[To start... I'm worried about that prophetic dream you've been having these last few years. When is it to late to escape being eaten by the void?]
"The only clue I have is that the end. Will come soon after you made some alcohol."
[I guess I shouldn't use the distillery for a while.] Eva joked quietly as Ester locked his foot into the pit wall.
[But then there's the Tork family, the Beforetimes, that one Corrupted that all are hunting us with a chance of the Smithsonians being involved when they find out we are still alive.]
Ester hauled himself out of the pit.
[Then there's the matter of the aftereffects of the Super Rocket firing getting worse the closer we get to them and the difficulties of getting the Space flight key from such a place.]
[And then there's the worry of having to run from the Maginum Police when we inevitably kill one or two dozen nobles.]
"That's a lot of worries"
[...Yeah.]
"Do you know what I think?" Ester glanced at the mark he had made on the way away from the Driller before passing it by.
Ester heard the sound of something fleshy hitting something metal.
[Stabbity stab stab.]
"Huh?"
[Autism, just continue.]
Ester looked up at the sky the same hue as his hair as he picked up his previously derailed train of thought.
"I think that... you're looking to far into the future when you worry. I'm touched that you remember that day a month ago when I swore to kill all the nobles responsible for keeping us trapped in a prison but according to the gravitator radar, we haven't even gotten a quarter of the way yet."
Ester scanned the scrap scape on his way back to the Driller.
"And we've always been hunted haven't we? Thanks to the reputation that the old man left behind, we'll always be hunted by those who want his secrets. This is no different" Ester paused as he watched a trapdoor spider ambush a skitterbug. "Well maybe except the Corrupted, that thing just wants to kill us."
"I'm not saying that we should just ignore your worries completely, we of course have to prepare to deal with them."
Ester climbed up a small hill. "But if I spend all my time worrying about every little thing, what time do I have to make sure those worries never happen? We aren't the architects are we? We can't account for every single variable or turn back time, so we can only play the hand that we were dealt."
"So let the present pass by. If we survive today, we have to survive tomorrow, and deal with tomorrow's worries."
"If we survive tomorrow, we can worry about tomorrow's tomorrow and the tomorrow after that."
"The important thing is that we keep on moving in the direction of a goal like murdering those Architect damned nobles instead of wandering around in a spiral of our own worries."
[...]
"..."
[...]
Ester ruffled his hood.
"Aish, are you going to speak or just let me stew in my own awkwardness?"
[...]
"Stewing in my awkwardness it is. Prepare the kitchen, let's cook something together for a change instead of injecting it today."
Eva's voice came out a beat late [...Okay.]
Getting up from his seat while hoisting the bag of foodstuffs over his shoulder. He heard the tiniest fragment of a voice carry through his arm.
[...like you...]
"What did you say?"
[...It's nothing, just come back quickly before I kick your desk.]
"Anything but the desk."
[At least make your cry's convincing.]
"Anything but the desk!"
[...I'm hanging up.]
Hearing the idle buzz on his arm disappear, Ester adjusted the knapsack full of food.
Today's goal was reaching the Driller and eating a meal with Eva.
---
"The payment."
Daniel sat within the room illuminated by a flickering lightbulb, his eyes gleaming as his companion Tell received a box from a hooded grey figure flanked by three others wreathed in a similar grey.
Opening the box in front of both parties, Tell nodded towards Daniel, causing his eyes to crinkle happily as he slid over a device of similar shape.
"The people you are looking for have gotten rid of the tracking device I've given them, but the Handsy Weed isn't so incompetent that we couldn't compile a list of the possible locations they might go to."
Taking the device, a wire threaded itself out of the figures sleeve and plugged itself into the hole besides the box. Red eyes blinked momentarily as a distinctly feminine voice soon rang out.
"The Scrapyard huh?"
The woman's blue eyes gleamed brightly underneath her hood.
"I trust that we're both satisfied Miss thousand?"
"Satisfied?" Miss Thousand let out a laugh. "Oh you have no idea."
Grinning widely, dozens of mechanical eyes whirred coldly beneath both her hood and the hoods of her compatriots.
"It's a pleasure doing business with you new blood."
"As to you Miss Thousand."
---
17 DAYS SINCE PROJECT VOID BUFFER FIRED ITS FLAMES THE SECOND TIME
+++
April fools just isn't the same in a misinformation epidemic.
Also this chapter was very difficult to write out for some reason (5 rewrites of the same thing)