[video]

[10_20_15_5_50]

[Sam's collected a handful of cards---some fancy, some simple---and she shuffles through them, one eyebrow up. Still shuffling, she looks to her drone to address it, and the whole of Haven.]

I've gotta say, this something of a mind-screw. I've been here... Seventy-six days. Damn.

[She's taken aback, at least a little, by the tally, but shrugs after swearing and soldiers on.]

That's not the thing that throws me. The thing that throws me is having had Valentine's seventy-six days ago! Keeping my calendar, we'd be two days out of April.

Comments

[10_20_15_5_50]

Not really. One whole year of being a "real adult" behind me, but... it doesn't feel like it.

[a_little_red_in_the_face]

[He’s still gaping a bit here.]

How....long do humans normally live?

[10_20_15_5_50]

Normally? Anywhere from seventy-something to the nineties, though a few live to be over a hundred.

[a_little_red_in_the_face]

..........I...never realized humans lived such a short time...

[10_20_15_5_50]

[She shrugs one shoulder, at a little bit of a loss.]

Been trying to make the most of it. Ars longa, vita brevis.

How long do Cybertronians live?

[a_little_red_in_the_face]

What? [Sorry, they only downloaded local languages when they arrived.]

[He shrugs] Some believe we’re immortal, but I’m not sure I buy that, we wear out eventually. I’m somewhere around six million right now, according to Earth years.

[10_20_15_5_50]

Art is long, life is short.

[A lifespan long enough make 'immortal' even remotely plausible would've had her stare, but to hear six million stated?! Sam's jaw barely has time to drop before she blurts]

Holy shit, you're older than dirt!

[A beat, as she reins in her reaction.]

Or, at least, older than antiquity. Goddamn.

[a_little_red_in_the_face]

Huh.... [he nods....only to laugh the next moment at her reaction. Sorry, Sam, just laughing.]

[10_20_15_5_50]

No wonder you had such a look on your face! Are you yanking my chain? Look like that, I wouldn't think so, laugh and all.

I think it's going to take me a minute to come to terms with this. Just...

[And she turns up her hands, but she's laughing too.]

[a_little_red_in_the_face]

[He shakes his head.] I’m not yankin’ your chain. [He shrugs, still grinning.] Take your time, but not too much, you’ll run out of it.

[10_20_15_5_50]

[Surprise---milder, but still substantial---flashes across Sam's face before she cracks up, Breakdown's little jab-in-jest being somewhere between rude and actually pretty funny, and funnier for the former.]

Ohhhh, for such a tall guy? That is one low friggin' blow. [She blows a brief raspberry---just a punctuating pbt.] You can get bent; I should be fine fifty years.

[She says none of it straight-faced, tone only amiable.]

[a_little_red_in_the_face]

[He chuckles, giving her a big grin.]

What? Fifty years is nothin'.

[10_20_15_5_50]

[She adds onto that sentence:]

But what I've got to find a way to buy myself more time, unless you've got some secret you want to share.

[a_little_red_in_the_face]

Yeah, turn you into a robot like me.

[10_20_15_5_50]

[Pff! But wait.]

Is that even a possible thing? If it is, that's far too Faustian. I mean, man; 'I live inside my skin: I know more beautiful, more ample, more sturdy and more picturesque skins: but it would seem to me unnatural to exchange them for mine.'

So that's out.

But, as you are old enough to be on armchair terms with god, I've got a question.

[a_little_red_in_the_face]

[He shrugs so far unaware of Cylas's fate.] Dunno, but you could always find out.

Yeah? And what's that?

[10_20_15_5_50]

[She makes a non-committal noise, but moves on.]

In all your eons, have you heard anything about the gateways---ground bridges, whatever you want to call them---having accidents where something's gone horribly wrong? And if so, how often?

[Although they are incredibly useful, she's still not quite comfortable with the things.]

[a_little_red_in_the_face]

Accidents? Not really. They can explode, but I’ve only head of that happening a handful of times, and that mostly back when they were first invented.

[He looks thoughtful.] And apparently these ones are designed after the ones we’ve got back home, so they should hold up about the same. Why? You worried it’s gonna vaporize you or somethin’?

[10_20_15_5_50]

Well, no... but that's because I was wondering about the odds of something about as unpleasant but much messier happening. When I first saw one, my first thought was 'there are so many ways this could end badly.'

[She spreads her hands, linefacing a little.]

First and foremost in my mind was some... nasty biomass merger, a la Cronenberg or Carpenter.

[a_little_red_in_the_face]

[It actually takes him a moment to realize he knows those names...and then he makes a face] Eewwww!

No! Nothing like that would happen. Hasn't happened with bots, ever, or humans.

[10_20_15_5_50]

[Sam has a whole new appreciation for pop culture, as it's allowed her to make her point perfectly---as indicated by that 'eewwww!']

And up until now there's my not knowing but that it could happen, maybe. You see why I was worried by the 'but what if,' thinking '...Brundlefly?' early on!

[She grimaces briefly, before turning her attention back to today's important information.]

So it's really, really nice to hear nothing like that's happened, especially from someone who's been around forever and would've borne witness.

/keywords

[a_little_red_in_the_face]

Ugh! You humans have a freaky idea of science. Even, I know that’s now how science works.

Yeah, ground bridges are safe. Even for humans.

Back atcha

[10_20_15_5_50]

How science works isn't the issue. [But she's back to joking, now that her fears have been assauged.] The issue is what happens when science doesn't work.

Thank you. It figured, but I still feel better for hearing there hasn't been a horrorshow.Only explosions.

['Ages ago' makes it alright, strange as it is to say.]

XD C'mon! Let me at least have 5 seconds of true tagvana!

[a_little_red_in_the_face]

[He snorts, but it's clear she's back to teasing, so he's got a smile back on his face.]

Just explosions, not that one of those wouldn't leave you as a horrorshow, but they're unlikely.

Mmm NAH (these guys are too cute)

[10_20_15_5_50]

Given that the gateways are big enough to accommodate guys like you, one exploding wouldn't leave me much of anything, man. But speaking of horrorshows... The Fly? The Thing? They're known to you?