Scooter 6.3 - Missing

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Welcome back to the Scooters, in an update where, for some reason, I felt like writing a lot of prose. So... cringe warning for that.

 

We begin this update with a quick spare check-in! Back in Strangerville, in the heart of the plaza, where an interesting interview is taking place.

Bree: Thanks for meeting me. This story has haunted me ever since I heard about it as a kid. I mean--why wouldn't it?! Government secrets, alien life forms, and one man in the middle of it all, who saved his town? Incredible!

???: No problem. Just...make sure, again, I remain anonymous.

Bree: Of course, of course.

Destiny Dinh: I wouldn't want it to get back to my father that his own daughter spilled the beans on his past as the Hero of Strangerville. But this is more than his pride.

Bree: Thanks, Miss Dinh. I'm glad you see it like I do.

Destiny: Please! Just call me Destiny.

{A/N: Destiny is the child of Tucker Thursday and Dallas Dinh from the separate story, Tucker and Dallas vs. Evil!}

Back at ye olde Delgado-Scooter home, we have Luca, who is employed as a lobbyist in Mayor Dallas Dinh's political party. And Jamie, who is a nurse at a hospital a whole town away. They're still living with Sully and Ori. And why not? They got some people to care for them in their old age.

Luca and Jamie have had a son, named Emery. He was born without my directing them to try for him, which was great, of course. Loving that the other lines are continuing without my intervention.

Emery is a pretty good mix of Luca and Jamie's genes; unfortunately, Jamie's genes don't translate too well to an opposite-sex child. All of that to say that this is the last time Emery was cute. Bye.

Not sure why Luca's so mad at Ori for but idk if they're mad about something they could always...move out of their parents'...idk...just a thot...

It's getting colder in Evergreen Harbour, which, of course, happens in coastal Canadian towns. By the way, did you know that along the coast of the maritime Canadian provinces where it meets the Atlantic Ocean, you can see icebergs just drifting along? Crazy right?

Anyway that's why Hari has moved his tent inside.

Now that Hari's moved inside, it can be Dami's turn to take naps on the couch.

It is not impressive. Moving on!

Dami got a promotion at work! Now they have the very big privilege of wearing this comically oversized hardhat everyday.

Dami: I could honestly straight up hide a baby in my hat and nobody would ever know.

Is this Hari, COOKING I see? I'm shockéd.

Hari: What? You all want me to pull my weight around here, I am! I'm re-frying McDonald's hash browns. For breakfast.

We are seriously strapped for cash. And so Dami has taken to the applied arts.

Dami: I don't want to know which backdoor trader buys my lineman sketches for thirty bucks a pop but whoever they are, I appreciate them.

...and yet again, Hari's peace is disturbed by violence.

Hari: Can you guys not get blood on my jeans? I literally only have one pair.

After some time, Hari managed to scrape together enough to buy some cheap starter furniture! Dami let him have the spare room.

Hari: (openly sobbing) Bismillah. A real bed. I can't.

Hey, it looks like the community pulled together enough funding to transform Conifer Station into something new: a maker space!

Looks like there was a need for more than one in Evergreen Harbour. This might be the key to revitalising the economy!

But of course, who would be the one to christen it but Matahari Rotan?

Hari: I don't have to hike to the other side of town anymore to make shit! This is great.

Some time later, the two of them headed out to that old railcar saloon in Port Promise. To celebrate.

Dami: It's incredible how much change people can affect if they really want it. That renovation of Conifer Station was pretty quick.

Hari: I told you not to give up on us, bossman.

Dami: (sigh) I think I doubted this place too much at the start. It's pretty cool.

Hari: Glad you see it my way.

Okay miss thing throw it back!

Dami: Bodyodyodyodyodyodyodyody ahh 😜

I guess tonight is undisguised alien night at the bar...?

Dami: Seriously, I go twenty-five years in Strangerville, Strangerville, and only see aliens when I move to Nowhere, Canada? You're joking.

Maybe one too many drinks (from aliens) later, these two had to retire somewhere slightly quieter.

Dami: Holy fuck.

Hari: Holy fuck, what?

Dami: I'm cooooooked. I'm sooooo glad I'm off work tomorrow. I drank too much I think.

Hari: Don't make me have to drag your ass back home.

Dami: You have toooooo.

Hari: (laughing) Okay, drunky. Up you get.

Dami/Hari: ...

Dami: Wait. This is kinda nice.

Hari: (smiling) Yeah?

Dami: Let's just...let's just sit like this for a second. Then we'll go.

Hari: Sure thing, bossman.

And because anything can happen and anything will, they returned home not half an hour later, already desperate for touch barely out of the Uber.

Hari: (giggling)

Dami: Oh shit--watch the desk.

Hari: Should we turn the lights on?

Dami: Fuck it. Let's just go upstairs.

And that was the first time Dami and Hari had sex. Caving to the attention of another person in a meaningful way for the first time, the highs of intense gratification threatened to swallow Damián whole.

The next morning, no less than ten hours later, Damián awoke to a cold, quiet house.

No sounds stirred from downstairs from Hari cooking lunch. Nothing coming from his room just across the hallway. Garbage that hadn't been collected. Plates that hadn't been washed nor put away. Just empty air in a house that creaked with time.

Of course, Dami took no note of this, as they were still nursing a pounding headache. The noise in their own head was so loud, there was no space for anything else. Least of all the silence indicating the absence of a roommate.

Dami: Uh, hello? Hari? ...Hari?

And there was no answer.

Empty air in a house that creaked.

Maybe it was foolishness, Dami surmised, that drove them to keep looking out for Hari in places they thought he'd be for days afterwards. It was so stupid, they thought, so teenage and desperate. It was all kinds of terrible adjectives. But they'd never admit that they felt sad, just as much.

Taking care of the trash, which had de facto been Hari's responsibility, fell to Dami. Sometimes they forgot. But the routine was starting to take shape: the daily meanderings of a single person living by themselves. Something Dami hadn't dealt with before, as--for better or worse--Hari had always been there.

The weeks passed and became a month. A solid, heavy, weighted concept that stuck in Dami's stomach, but wasn't sharp or pointed. It sat within them, the idea that Hari was unreachable on purpose. It started to change in a blunt point of resentment, that knocked around them if they thought about it for too long.

One month became two, became three. Time was starting to slip away into forgotten territory.

They had asked after Hari so unconsciously often to his friends that they kept Dami updated, whether they liked it or not. All the same, they had seen not seen hide nor hair of the vagabond from Malaysia--who had an arresting stare and a curious, gap-toothed grin like sunshine--that had come and gone.

The coming months saw Confier Station start to take shape again, with people cleaning up as the went, and the initiatives to support them along their journey. It was everything Hari would have wanted, Dami thought. As well was that solicitor who had knocked on their door that first day in Evergreen Harbour. Much to their chagrin.

And yet for all of its highs and lows, through the career they built through their efforts, and the changes that they saw unfold before them, it still hit Dami like a gale-force wind when they admitted they felt--and truly, were--alone. An island in a freezing ocean away from the sun-blasted cliffs were their family lived, together.

Half a year of fruitless searching later, Damián Scooter crawled into bed one night, untethered from the anticipation of waiting. The money was coming in, and the portfolio was looking incredible. For all the worldly things they had come to know, the first true heartbreak of their life made them realise that in spite of the success, there was something crucial missing. The human element. Another person's touch.

And they simply had to live with that.

*＊✿❀　❀✿＊*

Well, yikes :( Poor Dami. Well, I'll see y'all next time!