***

Stumbling forward into the night’s air, after being spat out by the wall, was among the things that Stark just didn’t prepare herself for tonight.

She asked her A.R. directory “let her outside”—but it was the wrong choice of words because it just told the building to morph a doorway. Okay—she’s bad at words—so “can she get some fresh air”—and before she could turn around—a blast of ventilated air blasted in her face. “W-what’s the bestest view?” It literally showed her.

Cotton-mouthed, drained, defeated—she was finally offered one of the observatory suits—which she guessed is “new era” for balcony. She stood on the thick bands on the outside of the globe-like structure of the center, with reinforced, but slim glass shell that acted as railing.

She took her time, walking towards it.

Once she made it over, she gripped at the near-invisible gate. Peering down at what was a preview of what life is becoming.

Around the conference grounds, the theme was showcasing “The First Steps”: a block of the smart city of their tomorrow. Buildings coated in hard-case, black shells. And those were the physical ones—as there were A.R. constructs that shined and boasted an unhealthy light. Practically neon signs, but why too complicated as the strobe-light designs were too thin to be too bloated. But the central idea was that the actual building was underground—and walking into the light will teleport you to the hub of it. Streets, crosswalks that have plates in them as well, with deep rivets that allows the ground to move in case of emergency.

Even crosswalks are a thing of the past—as A.R. constructs flare up and make themselves into a gate flashing warning signals depending on the situation.

Automatized. Optimized. Fortified.

She took it in. Stark truly took it all in.

So wrapped up in doing so, she didn’t feel the much-needed warmth pressing onto her back.

She greeted Grace’s arms, wrapping around her from behind, with a hand on one of them.

“Sorry that the humans took your favorite place away. I should fry ‘em for it~”

And with a soft kiss blessing her cheek, Stark couldn’t help but to follow up with a kiss of her own, as her goddess of a lover came back for more.

Grace quickly ripped away, but not far away by much. “Making me demonize you, literally the only good person in this world—"

The two couldn’t be more different, yet their exchange and mingling of lips proved that they were together for a long time.

Stark was the first to rip away after the second exchange, looking forward again.

“Is something wrong…?” Grace immediately asked, raising her head and loosening her arms away from her lover.

Grace then quickly dopeslapped herself. “y-y’know, other than—"

But Stark quickly grabs one of her hands, stroking it with her thumb and putting both close to her chest.

“I’m worried about how this is going…”

Grace put her chin lightly on the girl’s shoulder, keeping an even tone. “It’s better than where we were…”

“Of course… I guess the more uh—correct phrasing is that I’m afraid of where we’re going—”

Stark felt herself being turned around, facing her girlfriend.

She was always so assured. Always so confident but it wasn’t ego—ego was something she played up—it always came from a place of observation and trust. Combine it with her soft features, her heavenly face…

Is there any wonder why she’s considered to be a real-life superhero?

“You always told me that things have to be rebuilt after devastating trauma,” Grace recalled, rubbing Stark’s cheek as she does. This is no different… It’s just messy and weird and, well, overwhelming because it’s society at large…”

She then stuck out her tongue, briefly, but she did.

“So you basically check-mated your own self, you sad woman—”

Stark’s eyes squinted behind the lens of her glasses. “…You devil woman—”

Grace smirked wickedly. “I can’t help it—whenever I get a win over you, I have to brag a bit~”

Stark’s amusement was sucked away from her face.

Grace’s expression quickly turned into tired worry. “Damn my personal hubris—”

The woman in white quickly brought Stark closer to her. “Listen, dear—compared to everything else, all of the things that happened before we were born, the things we lived with ourselves—adapting to this has to be the good move, right? What’s the harm in that…?”

“Becoming one with the force that’s been destroying everything in its wake, something by its definition inhumane…? And adopting that into the culture? It's still spreading. It's still letting that win.”

Grace didn’t respond. Stark wasn’t sure if she was letting her talk or didn’t know how to respond to that. All she did was bite her own bottom lip softly, before returning attention to her.

“There’s no fault in innovation—it’s just that—it’s all based, everything we do is based on the fear that it’s not enough, when it clearly is.

There was a subtle rocking, the duo quickly tensing.

Before the balcony they stood on started to rise upwards, the band that it’s located on moving and rearranging self from the inside out, the balcony itself becoming a cradle. Soon, the couple was up top of the conference building.

Stark waved her arms, “W-was that necessary? Is that—like, how does this serve the bare minimum of protecting against Shifts--?”

“This place is just, y’know, pageant flair!” Grace exclaimed with a lilt in her tone, trying to calm her lover down. “It’s not going to be the 1:1, that’d be insane if they did!”

“… But what’s stopping them from using this as an excuse?” Stark glumly asked. “‘Things are weird, so no hold’s barred?’”

Once again, Grace just looked at her lover. Her expressed concerned.

And it wasn’t just a thing of seeing Stark distressed—she had just a big of heart about everything.

“No… Reestablishment… Everything I’ve seen so far is this… Weird-messed up way of saying, ‘that was us then—now we’re really gonna make this work’. This broken, mean-spirited attitude, lashing ourselves because we don’t know, we are afraid… Rebuilding from tragedy doesn’t mean using it as a baseline. It’s… Reaffirming life. Not looking at the past rules and scoffing because we made them in the first place… Throwing EVERYTHING away…”

“…Is that such a bad thing…?”

It was Stark’s turn to give a worried yet unreadable face.

Grace looked at her, her hands to her sides, her brow tugged down in sympathy, sadness.

“At the end of the day… This life of ours wasn’t at all perfect. Everything, like… The good we achieve, it’s so interlaced with the bad, to the point that hey—maybe… Maybe that was the problem after all. Now here’s this new opportunity to bury that away. We’re gonna have new problems—hell, we’re dealing with that right now… But this is the closest in human history of a fresh start. Maybe it’s the thing we needed. And unlike the big stuff we had to handle before, we can deal with these things as they come.”

Stark looked down, and then faced the naked black skies before them.

“…I like how you downplay yourself,” Stark began. “You act like that I shut you down when I get all brain-drain-y. But you can counter me instantly…”

Grace walked over to her side with a smile, her cheeks once again making her eyes do the same.

“I’m rooting for you baby,” Grace grabs Stark’s hand and squeezes it. “I’ll be there every single step of the way, cheering you on for making the world see sense.”

Stark closed her eyes, trying to smile herself.

“And I’ll smooch your bruises after a long day of beating people up,” Stark squeezed back.

“You better—”

“C’mon, how is that remotely sexual--?” Stark snapped her head at her with a pout.

Grace only shook her head in a teasing fashion.

Stark sighed, but at least this one didn’t feel like pushing a weight off in vain. She looked to the skies again, seeing reality itself, still flickering.

“…I wish it wasn’t just us,” Stark said softly. “But I know that’s a long battle to get here…”

***

Within the bathrooms of the Shift Terrain Vehicle, the girls were putting on makeup to cover their scars.

Digging away the Nulgarrt residue, putting creams over the siVis-infused bruises, and finally reapplying what was planned to be their respective looks before getting caught up in bullshit again.

Their outfits weren’t so lucky, each of them looking of green tide-dye, waves, and warp due to their siVis use causing an exotic yet messy attire. Some of which were their fancy clothes when that sort of thing mattered, yet another thing destroyed by the Shifts somehow.

Each of them looking at their reflections, hating every second of it. Due to their latent, passive ability to perceive better than they did before, seeing everything wrong about them—physically and what they chose to do in these terrible months. Mistakes, staring back at them.

They weren’t ready. It’s been spelled out over and over that they can’t ever be if they tried.

Glancing at each other, they walked out one by one, doing what they set out to do regardless.