“Cynida.”

“Huh?”

“Your  hand.”

Ah shit, the coffee’s on the floor. Fuck.

“Is your hand alright? Why the  fuck

FUCKKKK…

The nag of concern and noisy ambience slowly, statically blurs between consciousness and awareness for the cycloptic woman as her singular eye blinks in slowed motion, almost as if everything around her was stopped in time, or passing by too quickly, or even just… warping.

Her pupils, in the hazy state, dilate into a wide gapping void of darkened purple far from their vibrancy. Her eyebrow, eyelids and face opened, shifts clear and in an appealing visual of pretend normalcy for the public’s sight, but there’s nothing behind that thoughtless eyeball of empty knocks. Shifting, drifting, phasing through every inch of her very vessel blooded being before the sudden jolt of chilling cold porcelain fingers comes snapping her out of the dazed state once again, now furious as she cleaned up the swollen patch on Cynida’s burnt hand.

“Seriously, focus for just this second! You could’ve gotten worse… Please. PLEASE, be careful. You may not get another next time, and you need your bloody limb to conduct this train route safely. You are our best captain for a reason, and we don’t got no other else who can do this job well enough alone.”

That was pretty much true.

Besides the captain bit and being good at the job, and the limb-losing proportion of the caring nags. Even if the train could automatically run functionally well on its own, there is always a reason why its mobile technology still requires, humanly speaking, maintenance. Flaws can happen. She knows that, from the war back in the starland Névéglen, to the probable calculated guesses that if hypothetically the train goes rogue in the haywired lows of disastrous highs? Not only will the passengers die or be severely maimed in criticality, but to the divines, dare they know?

For sure, it’s got to be more than just a minor, simple malfunction in the locomotive railway systems or the engine in vehicular structural mass itself. But unfortunately, that’s just her own made-up myth about everything. But deep down, she can sense such an outcome happening in the gut. In no way is she psychic. That’s an arcana reader’s job. But the back of the mind screams theories, and she knows more than she should chew for a mortal being to overthink. Especially when that used to be somewhat of her passion, researching reads. Literature… Writing.

“Sorry, June. My mind’s fucked… I… thought I got myself in order like-”

“I am not of asking for a sorry. I am urging you to be mindful. For yourself. You… You are… not bound to being hard material. You, like everyone else… You are soft and decay, it will definitely come someday. But you are alive now, don’t be reckless because you are not capable of affording it too many times.”

Cynida knows better than to argue with a literal being, built older than centuries themselves. June’s forged mechanical knowledge, whilst palpably strong, holds a lingering wisdom that urges great, undisguised thoughts toward a singular purpose. Sounding almost too bloody and alive for a doll, June spoke with the authority of someone who had seen glaciers melt and stars go out. As the original benefactor who saw the potential in the FSE when it was just a blueprint of steam and steel, June didn't see the passengers or the baggage. She saw the integrity of the route, just as Cynida sees the flaws of the potential outcomes. And right now, her Captain had no structural flaw, but rather internally mangled like wires and pipes fused into an amalgamated loss.

And looked down at the hand June was holding, the contrast was sickeningly beautiful. Porcelain baby blue fingers were a feat of timeless engineering—cold, precise, and soldered with gold that would never rot. Underneath them, Cynida’s skin was pulsing, a raw, angry red that smelled of scorched sugary caffeine and burn, wrapped and covered now in a thick gauze layer for healing. Breaking out of the hazy, warped space of her mind, the scent of the spilled coffee suddenly shifted. It wasn't bean and water anymore; it was the heavy, chemical stench of accelerant as she felt her body grounded back to a term defined close enough to normalcy’s awareness.

Maybe the cabin break room was dimmer than it should be, but a peculiar sight of pulsing gold traces a vague, blurred shape that glows all the way down and up her spinal back. The eye catches on that detailed attention for what it’s worth, for the helpless minocyclis was unable to wander her body, so her eye does the trick and observes any form of brief, hardly traceable things. It’s, while not visibly clear to the eye, significant for the doll’s blouse covering it up. Not in the sense of privacy. Rather, June rarely opens up about her personal history, for as long as the first day of Cynida’s reporting to duties and assigned Captain’s responsible for being under June’s cabin and getting along well with each other’s presence for merely existing and understanding that unspoken yet knowing struggle they kept to themselves. Even if not shared. eyes do not hide, cracks don’t fully heal, and words of politeness hide any kind of messages.

“I’m the Captain,” Cynida whispered, the words feeling like grit in her numbing tentacular hiding mouth that mutters stubbornly. “I’m supposed to be the one keeping the gears from grinding. I do not pry understanding of my state of mishaps… in this moment.”

“Then pull the stick out of the engine, and let the metal hiss its gas,” June countered, her porcelain voice clicking with a finality that echoed off the metal walls. “You aren’t fucking meant to always fix burdens that you are not of fault for. Sometimes, it happens, forgive yourself. Take it easy… But importantly, be careful.”

The grip didn't soften, but her voice had a natural, even if calculated, type of grace, the kind learned from centuries of maintaining engines that didn't have the luxury of healing the blood and organic way. To June, Cynida wasn't just a work friend. She was as important as the most fragile component of the Forestar Express. Not glass, not even a button. She was just as needed as the blobs are. That’s the fuel. And like the floating little critters of innocence, Cyndia is like logical fuel to everyone’s senselessness.

“Does the patch hurt? I believe I tied the wound in such a way that any possible infection can’t break through. The skin should still be able to breathe and heal.”

“It’s not as stingy as it seems, but I appreciate your forethought… And care. Thanks.”

“The shit do you mean that’s how it always looks? Do you even supposedly  function? Do you even do your  FUCKING providing useless, lazy HEAD!”

Amidst the shuffling of bags and the mindless chatter, a specific voice cut through the cabin air— sharp, nasal, and dripping with the kind of entitlement that only the "sheltered" possess. It belonged to a man in a pinstriped vest, arguing with a porter about just about the most minuscule of darn nonsensical things. The bedsheet wrinkles, the placement of a hatbox, fuck. Even the fizz in the carbonated beverage is too much of ‘pop’?

What the actual fuck.

Cynida’s singular eye didn't just blink. It locked.

She recognises the crest on his luggage. The 4th Street Gables**.** She knew that building. She knew the way the moonlight hit its brickwork before she had turned it all into a funeral pyre of orange and ash. He was a resident of the complex directly opposite. A witness to the night that she, as a drunken and logically for justice she can impulsively act on to get, decided that the law was too slow to protect Celina. And acted accordingly to get to where she was now.

The man’s apartment had been the "front row seat" to her felony. He had seen the flames lick the rafters of the unit where Celina’s ex-partner lived—the man who thought he could bruise her sister’s spirit and walk away with a smile. Cynida had ensured he didn't walk away with anything at all.

1st Degree Arson.

The passenger’s voice grew louder, complaining about the "quality of service" in a tone that suggested he’d never seen a real tragedy in his life. Cynida felt a surge of cold, righteous fury.  You watched a building melt for my sister's sake,

…  and you’re whining on about the fucking bedsheets wrinkles creasing in your suite?

The urge to snap. To let the "Captain's Mask" slip and show this man  exactly

But.

If it weren't for the sudden, grounding chill of June’s porcelain touch to her unharmed hand, she might have actually smelled smoke again. Thank to the divines that cold grips are, for once, not a bad thing in this gunkhole. Almost in that moment, Cynida just knew that her held emotional compressions in her would have destroyed beyond just the man himself. The tenaculum appendages would have. Even without saying so, June knew. Knew nothing of her physical nature’s capabilities but just had the well-rounded tinker in her hindering troubled consequences in prediction. And while the fragile-skinned lady can afford that in cash, she is not confident that the commendation of everyone’s well-being if the cycloptic lady executed the likely outcome of motivated mayhem and spited disorder.

“Cynida.”

“June… I am aware, and I appreciate you holding me back. But given you are capable of assessing situations, you can clearly see staff mistreatment.”

“Affirmatively, I am beyond knowing what’s happening. But I am not going to gamble your sanity on them. Stand down.”

“But-”

“I am mandling this.”

This was pretty new to anyone who knew June personally in the network of circling folks. Staff of all acquaintances knew Cynida usually took the reins to lead with slick calmness and charm layered to guise before separately resolving the diffused problems. But this takes the cake, for they — even Cynida — are among the first to witness the moonshine of the train’s success, the in-house technician, and the owner of this very running ancient piece of locomotive blast her own numerical of words, or act upon justice toward the targeted common man.

And it was a spectacle watching the stoic-like blue porcelain woman step on her gold heels, letting her march towards the man with much grace in demanding authority with a narrowing, speedy, hellbent approach. The silence of the cabin when June starts walking—the rhythmic  clink-clink-clink

Oh word.

Blink, and you’ll miss the second. Down to the carpeted ground and knocked out peacefully, cold as she grips his wrists firmly around and back on his behind, whilst he lay.

June, as she spoke earlier in determined promise, mandles him.

Abrupt Arrival to Aesteria, please hold as we are currently experiencing in-board apprehension troubles during this very moment. Apologies for the schedule delay!