6 💔 audio

[dragony]

Well.

I suppose every streak has to break sometime.

[ Do you miss this voice, comrades? Or perhaps you don't recognize it; that's the reaction she'll expect. The speaker is a girl, somewhere in her late teens or early twenties, her voice middling-low in pitch, steady in cadence. Even at a single syllable, there's a drawl of bored irritation that only seems to drag on as she goes. Her accent places her as someone not originally American, but the amalgamation makes it difficult to place. ]

Can't say I much enjoyed the vacation from existence, but I suppose an actual coma would have been worse. I got to skip the holidays, though, that's always nice; if I had to lose any season, I should be grateful it was winter.

So, how badly have you guys fucked things up while I've been gone? I mean, the world still exists, so you certainly could have done worse, but I'd rather not strain myself this early in the day, trying to back-read my RSS feeds to figure out the full damage.

[ Cheerful. ]

Comments

permavoice;

[exceptfebruary]

[ He vaguely recognizes her in that "spoke to her one time" and "she has green hair and an eyepatch that's pretty memorable" sort of way. But even if he didn't, there's something important here he has to address: ]

Why would skipping the holidays be nice?

[dragony]

Have you seen how much people spend at Christmas? And the awkward moment, when someone sends you a gift when you hadn't even considered putting them on your list of people to give favor towards? No thank you.

[exceptfebruary]

I would not mind not receiving a gift in return. [ Probably because he can count on one hand the number of Christmas presents he's gotten. ] The point of Christmas is to give, without thought of return. Monetary or otherwise.

And if they hate you for it, so be it.

video

[crapbearer]

Well, most recent fiasco is when Russia kidnapped a bunch of ImPorts and a bunch of others went on a whole military mission to get them back. That was a pretty stressful start to the new year.

audio;

[dragony]

Great.

[ She sounds so concerned. ]

What'd they kidnap them for?

audio;

[crapbearer]

To use as weapons. Eventually they were planning to collect the whole set.

[ Said very casually, because Max handles upsetting things better when he treats them like jokes. ]

audio;

[earnedmystripes]

Hey, welcome back.

[Do they...have to talk about all the bad things that have happened this winter season tho. There's. So much of it.]

What's the last thing you remember?

[dragony]

I was on a deadline, so I wasn't checking my messages for a while before my metaphoric vacation in a black hole. Let's say Thanksgiving.

[ She's been gone longer than that, but details. ]

video;

[hoboagogo]

[Shinjiro begins with a big ol' shrug.] Depends on how long you were gone.

But just this year we got war declared on us and had to take a trip to Antarctica. We stole a few ships and subs, though. Back before that, Heropa turned into a huge clusterfuck and some asshole ripped another guy's heart out on the network. And about a month before that peoples powers got all mixed up-

So yeah. I guess we coulda used the supervision.

text; comm tag is "Tadashi"

[tadeadshi]

That's an understatement to be sure.

audio;

[dragony]

[ She'll appreciate this shrug, but, like usual, she hates showing off her face. ]

I can't say I missed gore vlogs, that's for sure. Power mix-up I missed, too, though it sounds like that was only temporary, is that right?

permatext

[hypnotherapy]

I see others have already filled you in on the sordid details, so I don't need to summarise.

Welcome back. As much as anyone can be welcome in this climate, I suppose. [ He feels he should offer a 'welcome back', anyway. It seems polite. ]

[dragony]

I'll find out they've left off some important detail to spare me the heartache, I'm sure, but I suppose that can wait.

I'd rather exist than not, surprisingly, so I'll take it.

voice;

[infomodder]

You've figured out the short answer to your question is "pretty badly" by now, I assume?

[Straight to the point: things got fucked up. Ruka called it. HOW COULD SHE HAVE KNOWN oh wait.]

[dragony]

[ oh wait. ]

It's certainly sounding that way. If this is the extent of it, though, it seems like you got off pretty light.

[ Ruka fifty people got kidnapped—
—but they're fine now so who cares. ]

audio

[dumbfound]

I don't think anyone fucked anything up that badly.

[ But he also has no idea who this girl is, and how long she was gone for, so maybe things used to be really good here, and now aren't as much. ]

... Also how come you don't like winter?

[ That as the main thing bothering him, but he felt he had to answer her question first. That's how it works, right? ]

[dragony]

Winter? It's dark and it's miserable, mostly, and it's cold, and the snow is awful, and the holidays are all terrible.

[ Bad associations, really, but it's easier to pick on the superficial things. ]

What's there to like about it?

permavid

[neatniks]

Oh. Hey.

War was declared.

audio;

[dragony]

Oh. That sucks.

[ She makes it sound like someone else's favorite show got canceled. ]

video

[viced]

You didn't learn that kind of language from me.

Just so everyone's clear.

[dragony]

That's quite the ego, to presume anyone would attribute anything of mine to you.

voice

[dramaking]

How often does something like this happen?

[dragony]

Depends on what you mean by "something like this." The, me losing a few months part, or the, ImPorts screwing things up so badly that we need a collective sabbatical from society?

audio, comm ID "Spider-Man"; so late!

[shutterbugged]

I'm thinking you've gotten all the exposition, so ... welcome back? Nice to be bumped back down the Old-Timer's List.

[dragony]

Some of it, at least. Next month I'll find some glaring omission to the report, I'm sure, so I'll be certain to blame you for the lapse.

But, don't fret too much. You'll always be an Old-Timer to me.