ArchivedLogs:Badly Designed

Badly Designed
Dramatis Personae Paige, Scramble
In Absentia	Takes place after ArchivedLogs: Die Together "Oh, of course, that'd by funny. I guess I kind of look like a qunari now."
Location <NYC> Harbor Commons - Second Floor - Lower East Side
The stairs and the elevator here unload people onto opposing sides of a balcony, a wide sweep of space overlooking the foyer below. Above there is a clear view up to the balcony on the next story up, and the roof skylight pours light down through all three floors of the building. The rooms here wrap themselves around the central balcony, with the lounge-like game room on one side, flanked by a children's playroom and an entertainment center for more electronic forms of recreation. The entertainment center and the playroom each have a single-user gender-neutral toilet adjacent to them.Two sides of the balcony hold an entrance into the large climbing-maze that leads both up and down through the center of the house, for those who think the stairs or elevator is too prosaic. The cheerful noise from Game Night is quieter out in the hallway, though even here folks have gathered in twos and threes to converse while they decompress. Scramble has just returned from downstairs, threading her way gracefully through the climbing maze despite the fresh beer in hand -- open, no less. She does not exit the sculpture altogether, but perches herself on one of the platforms to enjoy her brew. She has left her jacket back at the table, and looks somewhat younger and less dangerous without it. The game ended a while back and Paige had eventually managed to excuse herself from the table. Besides, crowds make her feel on edge and super self-conscious regardless of her physical mutations. Being surrounded by so many people at once just tends to make her skin crawl. Thus, the young woman has recently extricated herself from the Game Room, eyes glancing around to take in the hallway scene. She seems ready to head towards the stairs when she notices Scramble sitting alone in the climbing structure. Navigating her way over to the other girl, the horned woman waves upwards with a proffered, "Hey." Scramble replies with a quick upward tip of her chin. "Yo! If it isn't our intrepid Climber." Her grin is broad and bright, her voice /just/ a touch louder than is probably necessary to be understood, though not quite loud enough to draw any eyes. "Good show for your first time playing -- we had that airship almost half-assembled! Didja have fun?" "I -uh, yeah!" Paige responds with a blink as she rubs her right arm, seemingly caught off-guard. "Yeah, I did." This comes with a slight grin. "Thanks. For all the instructions and the encouragement and everything," she says as she gestures with her hands. "So...uh, how about you? Did you have fun?" Positioning herself next to Scramble, feet-things on the ground, she leans against the climbing structure. "Not sure I really understand how we didn't win, but it was cool." Still smiling, a good thing. "No problem, I love tempting people into new gaming addictions." Scramble grins even brighter, somehow. "Also love telling white people what to do, so yeah. Great fun." She takes a long pull from her bottle. "We died cuz that game is fucking /brutal/ and even experienced players often only scrape through partly on luck. We died of thirst, also partly bad luck, but see --" She leans toward Paige and lowers her voice conspiratorially, "-- it's a /challenge./ So! Any other games you like?" Paige glances at Scramble, a confused look on her face. "Yeah...I, um...I'm not exactly sure what me being white has to do with it, but I'm fine with being ordered around. It kind of helps me focus on what I need to do. Being left too much alone with my thoughts...can be...bad." A slight shake of the head and she lets out a sigh. "As for games...I, uh, I'm mostly into single player games. Usually...not board games. I've never really had anyone to get into those, uh, things with." She frowns a bit, eyes staring ahead. "One of my favorite games is Dragon Age." The horned woman then snorts in amusement. "Oh, of course, that'd by funny. I guess I kind of look like a qunari now." Scramble cocks her head to one side, half quizzical and half amused. "Oh, it's not you specifically, just...white people in general." She sets her beer down beside her on the platform. "Probably got something to do with white people telling me and all my ancestors what to do for hundred of years in this country." She says this very lightly, matter-of-fact. "Oh hey, if you're into video games, we've got plenty of those here, too, single-player and otherwise. Dragon Age is great fun, but I lean more toward Mass Effect as far as Bioware RPGs go." Reclaiming her beer, she gestures vaguely in the air with the bottle. "Anyhow, you come to the right place if you like games and don't like being alone with your thoughts. Pretty much any given night you gonna find some folks in the media and gaming rooms, even if you're off playing your own thing. It ain't the Qun, but it ain't lonely, either." Takes a healthy swig of beer. "Well, and then there's Hive." "Hive." Paige echoes. "He does something with, uh, peoples' minds, right? I don't...telepaths are...uncomfortable. Like...I don't have much. I've got the clothes on my back and that's, like, it. My body isn't," here the young woman struggles. "My body isn't...right. Those horns, they're not...they're not mine. Neither are my ears...and don't even get started on my feet - I don’t' even know what's going on with those." She sighs, turning her gaze downwards. "I guess what I'm trying to say is that I just want my mind to be mine, it's the only thing that isn't...wrong." "But, uh...Mass Effect? Really?" It appears Paige is trying to make some sort of quick recovery from talking about her feelings. "That third one was just awful. Only the second one really shines. At least with Dragon Age, your decisions in each game -actually- affect the outcome. And some even transfer over to the next game. Sure, the second one has it's large share of problems, but it's still a -good- game. Besides, the first and third games totally make up for its faults." She snorts again. "And maybe the Qun would be -good- for me. Too bad it doesn't actually exist." "Hive /is/ people's minds. He doesn't make your mind less /you/ so much as he..." Scramble trails off, swishing the remainder of her beer around the bottom of the bottle and frowning. "Look, just ask him sometime. About the Qun. Trust me." She winks at Paige. "But your body -- maybe it don't feel right cuz you been too many times it ain't, maybe your brain just don't match up with how your body's changed, maybe it's some combination or something else. I can't speak to that, but it sounds rough no matter why. There's folks can help you navigate that, though, whether it's therapy or just relevant life experience." She shrugs, but the gesture doesn't look unsympathetic. "Yeah, Mass Effect's plot progression is kinda railroady, and the ending was a goddamned joke, but I like the combat mechanics." Her grin has returned. "/And/ the multi-player mode." Paige's brows are furrowed and a look of confusion plagues her countenance. "I don't...what do you mean my brain doesn't match up?" Her tone isn't defensive or aggressive, simply perplexed as she struggles to understand what Scramble means. "I mean I get it," she says, closing her eyes. "I've...I have horns. Horns growing out of my skull. And my feet...my feet are like...I don't know how to explain it. They're longer and I can't put my heels down. My toes are sort of...sticking together. But not like---I'm scared, okay?" The confession comes as her head droops and the corners of her mouth twitch. "It's like in Mass Effect when you discover that the Protheans were corrupted, changed into the Collectors, you know? Scary." Paige's mouth contorts into a sad frown. "I'm afraid of what my body is doing, what it's becoming. I have no idea what's going on. I'm -terrified-." "Brains are complicated and, frankly, kinda badly designed," Scramble explains, downing the last of her beer and setting the empty bottle aside. "/Sometimes/ that's why people feel like their bodies aren't their own, or aren't right. But not always, and in our shitty fucking society there's so much bullshit telling us how we should or shouldn't be that it's often impossible to separate social dysphoria from something neurological." She hops down from the platform the stand beside Paige. Looks into her eyes. "Point is, there's a lot more shit going on with you than just growing horns, it's ridiculous to expect yourself to understand what's happening, and you're /allowed to be scared./ No one should have to wade through all that alone." When Scramble hops down from her perch, the horned woman's eyes shift from the floor to her. Thus, when she looks into Paige's eyes, Paige is looking back. Her expression softens while she listens, relief beginning to drape over her as her feelings are validated by Scramble. "Y-you mean that? I thought...it's just been so much. I've been...Thank you." she whispers quietly, her face flushing with emotion. "Oh fuck," she snorts in amusement as her eyes well over. Though she tries to hold them back, she lets out a couple of choked sobs. After a few moments, Paige manages to recompose herself with a few sniffles. Rubbing her eyes with the fabric of her sleeves, she appears rather embarrassed. "Sorry." The white girl stares at her boots. "That thing you said earlier. Do you remember it? You said something about it being okay to ask for help." She draws a sleeve across her slightly runny nose. "Do you think we could be friends? I...I think I need some help." "Hell yeah, I don't say what I don't mean," Scramble says simply, though her eyebrows lift up slightly when Paige starts crying. Leans back against the platform and picks up her empty bottle. Waits. "It's fine to ask for help, but I ain't here to do your emotional labor for you, girl." She doesn't sound particularly put out, for all that. "Here to have fun and play games." The smile comes easily as she turns to go, but she pauses, looks back. "And sure, I think we could be friends. But you're gonna have to work on that, too." Paige pushes herself off the structure into a standing position. "No, sorry. It's just...really nice to hear that my feelings are..." Here she gestures as she searches for the right word. "Are normal." The white girl sighs. "Yeah, I need help. But I'm not asking you to you to carry my burdens or tell me how to deal with my fucking feelings or any of that shit. What I meant was...just doing -normal- things with, you know, a friend." The horned woman shrugs, stuffing her hands into her sweatshirt pocket, before heading towards the stairs. "See you later, Scramble."