[color=00FFFF]Aki.[/color]

Today wasn't cold, but something about it made Aki shiver. Like any day, she expected the dry burden that built out her cycle of life to continue. She would wake up to an empty house, maybe with a signed post-it note listing groceries to pick up if she was lucky. If her parents were in a [i]really[/i] good mood, there might even be a smiley face on it. She'd burn a slice of toast and spray it with zero-calorie I Can't Believe It's Not Butter, and she'd rush to the skating rink to start her workday.

At the rink, she'd yell at smelly junior high kids to stop climbing on the props and would empty the ticket counters in the arcade. At the end of the day, she'd pick up her paycheck from the rink manager, which would suspiciously miss a few hours pay. "These old things break down all the time. Can't be helped." He would say. Too anxious to make any more fuss about it, Aki would take the deflated check to the bank and stop by Sam's Club on her way home, using her parents' membership.

Once she got home, probably around 7 PM, her dad would ask her about work and once again if she had decided what she wanted to do. Where she wanted to go to school. How she could make her life worth something. He always thought he was trying to help, but the constant pressure only worsened her anxiety. Aki would wave his concerns away, only allowing "I'm thinking about it" to surface from the knotted tangle of anxiety and dread that threatened to further tighten as each day ticked away. She would finish dinner early, citing "I'm not feeling very good" as her excuse and crash in her room to worry about life while pretending to watch Netflix, which blared too loudly in the background. As her shows streamed from one to the other, so would her thoughts, dreading the start of the next cycle, the next customer, the next question. Whether she would find a school, or even qualify for one. If there was anything she was good at, whether she would someday bring some value to the world. If she was just leeching off of other people's work, and if everything would be better if she just weren't there to begin with. If—

[color=00FFFF][i]A͑k̠i͒̎![/i][/color]

The grinding bits in the navi's voice abruptly ripped the turtled girl out of her innermost sanctuary. The world came flooding back. The viruses. The fight. The heat. This absolutely wasn't the time to space out!

[color=FF7276]C-Ciel! You're okay![/color]

[color=00FFFF]"Okay" is an overstatement, but I'm not deleted yet.[/color]

The navi forced her joints back into place with a horrible grating sound, causing Aki to wince. Ciel limped to where the teen stood and dropped a hand on her shoulder. She flinched, waiting to be scolded for once again being inattentive and useless.

[color=00FFFF]Good job out there. Keep operating like that and we just might make it out of here alive.[/color]

Good... good job? After failing to protect Ciel from that beast thing? After spacing out?

[color=FF7276]I didn't do all that much... you were amazing out there.[/color]

[color=00FFFF]A navi's duty is to protect their operator. For me to do that, we need to be in sync.[/color]

The program glanced between the worn out entourage.

[color=00FFFF]And not just us... The lot of you, we need to stick together and come up with a plan. What do you know, and what can you do?[/color]