A rude awakening

[ima_npc]

[You awaken from a deep sleep. You are groggy and cold and feel off in ways that may be initially difficult to place. The door to your stasis pod opens. How did you get here? That's a really good question. Who are you? That's another.]

[Step outside into the warmer (albeit not especially warm) room and you'll see the others, all dressed in a similar style of stasis suits. One or two of them are wearing the same colors as you, though it's perhaps hard to tell with the dim, red glow that fills the room.]

[The doors are closed. There is no apparent way to open them. And a robotic voice intermittently rings through the room:]

Life support is being restored to the facility. Please stand by.

Comments

[whenitrainsitstorms]

It's, ah. It's definitely that.

[scribbly]

[preens!! apparently she's satisfied by this agreement]

...But it isn't colorful enough. [aaand that was an awesome thirty seconds where she was entertained.] When do we get to leave?

[whenitrainsitstorms]

[Huffs a breath.]

That voice said two hours. Apparently the rest of whatever this place is isn't a habitable temperature yet.

[scribbly]

Two hours?! That's so long! [Habitability means nothing to a bored child, apparently.] What're we gonna do for two hours?!

[whenitrainsitstorms]

You could draw, if you still have those color-sticks.

[Yes, I am testing something.]

[scribbly]

[She looks terribly confused for a moment, but that's just because...]

...You mean my crayons? [WAAAIT A MINUTE] It was you! You colored with me!

[whenitrainsitstorms]

So you remember dreaming, too.

[scribbly]

So if you're here now, my dream came true!

[that's totally how it works???]

[whenitrainsitstorms]

Maybe. Or maybe we were dreaming about something from before.

[Considers.]

Or just dreaming.

[scribbly]

It had to have come true, since you were in my dream and now you're here even though I'm awake. [Apparently she'll hear no other theory.] You're a good drawer!

[whenitrainsitstorms]

...thank you.

You seemed like you had more experience, though.

[scribbly]

[proudly puffs out her chest!!]

Coloring's my favorite.

[she says like she isn't just making this and everything else up as she goes along.]

[whenitrainsitstorms]

I imagine so. You were certainly doing a lot of it.

[Pauses a beat. Then:]

Do you have those color-sticks with you? Crayons, I mean.

[scribbly]

[aaand immediately deflating.]

No. There's nothing here! No crayons or anything! It's so booooriiiing.

[whenitrainsitstorms]

Well. It's only two hours... but until then.

[He leans over the glass on one of the stasis pods and huffs on it, so that the glass fogs up. Then he draws a squiggly line with his finger.]

You can always improvise.

[scribbly]

Two hours is so looooong!

[She's obviously deeply annoyed by this, but that dissipates pretty quickly once the distraction of drawing is given. She imitates his fogging up the glass, beaming when she sees that it works, and traces a squiggly flower shape.]

[whenitrainsitstorms]

[Just going to watch her, this time, and not join in; there's not as much drawing space.]

Are you going to remake what you had before?

[scribbly]

[fog fog fog, she can only fit one flower in each breath's worth of makeshift canvas, partially because she's drawing all of these flowers really big.]

I wanna draw a garden. With lots of roses! [some of those...might look like roses if you squint..?]

[whenitrainsitstorms]

[Possibly, if he had a frame of reference for roses.]

Lots of what?

[scribbly]

Like this!

[a lot of effort goes into this next flower!!! ...it just sort of looks like a misshapen swirly lollipop.]

[whenitrainsitstorms]

[Considers it. Something that would go in a garden...]

What color are they?

[scribbly]

Red! Except sometimes they're blue, but other times they're yellow, too, and those are the best ones!

[the tiny blonde child in yellow and gold pajamas can't possibly be biased at all, though]

[whenitrainsitstorms]

Let me guess: yellow's your favorite color.

[scribbly]

Of course it is! It's the best color! But I like red, too, just not as much as I like blue... Or green! Green's really good, too!

[whenitrainsitstorms]

[So charmed by the enthusiasm.]

What if you had something that was yellow and red and blue and green?