HtH117 – A Room Of Her Own
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: Happiness.
"Is that... is that a manhole cover?"
Underneath the rug in Minara's tiny broom closet is a flat, round structure made of blackened steel, it juts out just slightly above the wooden floorboards. However, this was no manhole cover, for upon closer inspection, there are footpads indicating where a user can stand!
This looks... awfully suspicious.
A circular platform?
What for?
"So it happens, Mistrál designed it so two people could fit in it!" Our blue-haired tinkerer comments, hurrying her friend to step on the awfully familiar footpads, herself stepping right behind Minara with a mischievous grin. "You might want to close your eyes for this one too!"
There are a pair of hydraulic clamping sounds, the metal footpads clamping onto the bottom of Minara's feet! The mechanism a little too familiar to her;
"What the... This is part of a divepoooooo...!!!"
Whoosh!
Before the girl can finish her sentence, it feels like the entire floor gives way, the metal platform hurtling downwards into the darkness at high speed!
Rover, the flying drone, follows behind, before the top of the platform seals itself shut once more!
The girls' descent is a quick one. With the hurtling speed of a bullet, the modified lift reaches the bottom of the shaft with a tremendous thudding sound! While she has experienced this before in VR livestreams, this is real. In the complete darkness, Minara fumbles around for words, her golden eyes throbbing rapidly,
"You... you recreated a Hxllpod?!"
"A hydraulic propulsion system is not entirely out of reach for Mistrál, especially with such excellent salvage parts!" The girl hops off the Hxllpod-like lift, wandering inwards wherever this lift has led the pair of them. The locking mechanisms disengage themselves, and Minara gropes blindly in the dark, unsure where Mistrál went.
"Mistrál, you went through all this trouble to connect my room to your basement room?" The girl is still trying to feel her way around unfamiliar territory. Perhaps this was the inventor's way of trying to make her feel better. Certainly, it was a nice gesture. It would make visits a little easier. But even before she could utter out an uncharacteristic 'thanks', her blue-haired friend spoke first.
"Not Mistrál's room, it's yours."
There is a click of a light switch.
Light floods into the room, and what greets Minara's eye is...
... a bedroom.
The room is unlike all the other rooms she had seen in the house. The interior is sleek and smooth, glossy black and white surfaces. It is certainly a future-looking room! At the same time, the furnishing retains a small gothic element. The bed frames have little latticed spikes, padded black velvet makes up for the queen-sized bed in the center of the room. Long lighting strips installed into the wall emanate a warm orange-gold, the light bouncing off the chic black furniture.
Minara's belongings have been moved here as well, the old beanie couch sits in a corner with a small teatable and chairs with ornate carvings. Special care had been taken to position the monitor at the foot of the bed, with just enough distance that bedtime gamer sessions are perfectly viable! For most part though, the spacious room is empty --- waiting to be lived in.
It's a room made for a specific person in mind.
That specific person is now moving her hand across the polished cabinet frame, blinking in her golden-eyed reflection.
It is a surreal moment, and she tugs at the hem of her favorite black and white skirt...
"Mistrál would like to show one neat trick, if you turn the knob here, the lights change color from green to pink to yellow to..."
The girl never got to finish her sentence, for she is toppled over by the other girl!
The two blue-haired girls land atop the black and white themed bedsheets, Minara burying her face of emotions into them.
Caught in the big girl's embrace, Mistrál watches the interior lighting change colors, from a dainty green, to soft pink, then to bold yellow...
"Hey," Minara's muffled voice comes from within the bedsheets.
"I'm here, Minara."
"How long exactly have you been planning this?"
"Ah Minara, we experience time differently, but would you believe me if I said 'before winter'?"
Those words cause Minara to start, and she lifts her body up from the bed to look directly at her friend,
"You're serious?? You kept something like this from everyone else for so long???"
"Why, Mistrál even had to slow down construction a fair amount to keep Eclair from complaining about the construction noise," [HtH62] the girl nods in remembrance of that long time period where Eclair complained about sleepless headaches from an unknown source! "But in the end, nothing beats a good portable piledriver!" [HtH112]
She laughs, and collapses face-up beside Mistrál, both blue-haired heads close together.
Between the both of them, Minara's hand clasps a lab-coated hand tightly.
The two girls stay, for just a while longer.
Recall
[HtH62] - When Lumi and Eclair met in the middle of a sleepless night, little did Eclair know that there were multiple construction projects going on in the vicinity of the house!
[HtH112] - Jules finds Mistrál wandering around the house in the early morning with construction tools...
We are trying something different! This is a simul-posting at the same time as the Scribblehub release! Go check out the entire series at this link!
