The Portal
08-18-2018, 03:36 AM
CONNOR
{Name Blank}: Hostile
Connor’s expression remains that same replica of inexpressive neutrality even as the words cross the upper corner of his HUD. The stranger continues to stalk closer, heedless of their immediate surroundings, the still falling snow, or the below-freezing temperatures.
Connor was not.
He was very aware of the negative ambient temperature. Should he remain here, his biocomponents would be in danger of imminent shutdown, the thirium that pumped through his veins capable of freezing after prolonged exposure. It was a risk he could not afford to take, not when he was offline from the main network and could not reach any form of repair technicians. He was no closer to discovering where he was or what had happened to corrupt the last 42.5 hours of his memory, but it was becoming obvious that this stranger would be no help.
’Is that so?’ A low question. Rhetorical. Carefully enunciated with barely concealed anger and other emotions that Connor had no notion of replicating or understanding. The said male halts in his pacing, standing almost unnaturally still for a creature made of flesh and blood. He answers without inflection.
”Correct.”
It was a moment. A single moment that seemed to stretch for both a second and a year. Longer, perhaps. Connor doesn’t know. What he does know is that in one moment, the dark stranger is standing stock-still, frozen by whatever complex emotions make up his person. In the next, the stranger is lurching forward, ears pinned, teeth bared, and his horn - warning, warning, warning - is poised to strike.
LED flashing a bright, distressed red, Connor moves. His physical expression does not change. Ears forward and alert, doleful brown eye remain impassive, dark lips twisted in a neutral look. He appears, to the outsider, completely unhindered and strangely at ease by the sudden attack. The bay shifts, wings tightening, as he draws himself through the snow to the left in order to avoid the dangerous point of the stranger’s horn. It slashes through the air only millimeters from where he had just been standing, and Connor swings around so that he remains facing the young male. Anticipating another attack, preparing himself, adapting, adapting, adapting…
Only then is there a change in his expression, a downward twist of the lips and the narrowing of deceptively gentle mahogany eyes. “You are being very disruptive towards my mission,” the artificial bay states, ”Fighting you is not my primary directive.” Nor was it even a secondary directive. Straightening, Connor rolled a shoulder, lifted his jaw, and relaxed. Proper, collected, poised.
”If you will not assist me by providing vital information as to where this is or what I may be doing here, then I will be going.” And that was that.
@Virga
