Void sat cross-legged on the cold tile of her lab, a can of half-drunk energy drink slowly losing its fizz beside a half-eaten bar of raw instant ramen. She wasn't even wearing pants - just a hoodie and a vague sense of shame - as she stared at Eitria's disassembled guts like they might offer her some kind of answer. The printer sat silent, mid-surgery, gantry half-stripped, Bowden tube dangling like a vein from the extruder's throat.

"You ever think maybe I keep fixing you because it's easier than fixing myself?" she asked, yanking the zip tie from the wiring loom. "No? Just me?"...

The screen flickered softly in the dark. Void leaned back in her chair, half-drunk mug of something-caffeinated (as always) at her side, the glow of her monitor painting magenta shadows across the metal shelves and scattered soldered scraps. The call was already on, audio-only. Dee never liked showing her face unless she was in control. Void got that. Hell, she was that, in so many ways.

She lit a candle regardless. Lemon. For her. For them...

The morning sunlight filtered through the thin blinds like weak tea - golden but watered down. Dee stirred under her soft quilt, one habit she hadn't managed to fully kill yet. Miso was already up, curled in a loaf at the edge of the bed, blinking lazily with those judgy little amber eyes that seemed to say, "Oh, you're still alive? Impressive."

Dee exhaled. Not a sigh, not quite. Just a breath with some history behind it...

Void trudged along the riverbank, boots dragging through damp gravel. She glanced at the water, moonlight pulling silver smiles out of the dark surface. "A month," she muttered. "Over thirty days I sweep this place, wearing her coat like it's some consolation prize for surviving." She tightened the oversized sleeves, fingers fumbling with edges that hang past her hands. "It doesn't fit. It never will. And neither do I."...

2:19 AM.

Void stared at the ceiling like it had personally betrayed her. Again.

Sleep, the elusive little bastard, had slipped through her fingers hours ago, probably off to cuddle some emotionally stable straight girl who didn't flinch when someone said the word "future."

She shifted under the sheets, blanket twisted around her leg like a snake trying to strangle the last shred of her dignity. "God, even my bedding's clingier than anyone I've dated," she muttered, then laughed. Dry. Bitter. Like oversteeped tea.

It was always like this. These nights where everything in her life felt like a punchline to a joke she didn't remember telling. Void: pretty face, sharp mind, a touch of 'don't touch me,' and allegedly - if enough exes could be trusted - "a captivating personality." Captivating like a cursed mirror, probably.

"I'm like a collectible card that looks cool but no one actually wants in their deck," she muttered to the ceiling. "Rare, beautiful, wildly impractical, and prone to catching fire."...