2022-02-13: The Damaged and the Repaired
- Log: The Damaged and the Repaired
- Cast: Anser Vulpecula, Shelby Korts
- Where: Copernicus City, Luna
- Date: 2022-02-13
- Summary: Her suit heavily damaged in a recent engagement, Shelby requests the assistance of a certain 'quiet' mechanic. Quiet doesn't equate to silent.
<Pose Tracker> Shelby Korts has posed.
Safehouse, or safe ... garage? It's more or less the same thing when you're dealing in keeping full-sized Mobile Suits hidden from the authorities of varying stripes in a space colony, be it on the surface of the Moon or in a location like Sweetwater. What was supposed to be a pretty straightforward cargo run-- supplies for the colony, that sort of thing-- turned into an all-out brawl outside of Copernicus City, leaving a Mao Industries site to be evacuated, and the Shuffle Alliance to hold the line long enough to organize and execute an evacuation of the staff and as much relevant materiel as possible.
Smaller workbenches exist in a space-efficent alcove adjacent to the area reserved for MS storage, though everyone seems to be gone for the time being. The benches are a little spartan and cobbled-together, with parts small enough to be worked upon either scattered on one side or in the cardboard boxes and plastic crates underneath the overhang. A laptop sits to one side, screensaver showing a pixellated ball bouncing around the four sides and plugged-- both for power and the 'net-- into the wall. And then there's the occupant of that one, specific bench:
Shelby Korts is seated in a creaky old chair, arms crossed and feet up on the footrest for the stool at the bench. Dressed in a plain black t-shirt and compression leggings, her pilot suit is in a loosely-folded pile in a folding chair nearby with the helmet set on top and the boots -- her only pair of shoes, for now-- set to the side on the floor.
Of course, she's not working -- she's sleeping. Her two-tone hoodie is laid over her, hood up to cover her face, while she ekes out precious hours, or minutes, or bursts of napping while waiting.
Waiting for who? Well...
<Pose Tracker> Anser Vulpecula has posed.
Who else, but one of the few people that Shelby can decisively call 'quiet', and mean it in every sense of the word?
Supplies may be limited in Sweetwater, but one thing is a certainty - all units are kept in fighting order, ready to sortie at a moment's notice, and that includes the one that arguably sees the most day-to-day use. Whether she's doing supply runs or running errands of questionable legality - no questions asked - Anser tucked into the cockpit of the Solstice is a common enough sight. All of her forged permits are in impeccable order, and this (and her relatively low footprint in Char's ill-fated rebellion) means that she's able to slip past any federation ships without them batting an eye.
Luna, at least, is not the furthest of destinations. A short flight for a modern ship, especially when L1's in proper alignment. The autopilot is able to do most of the work, allowing the young woman time to stare into the expanse of space for much of the journey, keeping a hand on the manual override at all times, ready to be engaged at the slightest hint of trouble. It is, mercifully, an uneventful trip. Solstice's repurposed racer frame ends up needing none of its armor, overtuned maneuverability that's inarguably too responsive, or any of the welded-on weaponry... which is good, as most of the weapons that rely on conventional ammunition are at 10% capacity or less. She lands without incident at a nearby spaceport, and from there, it's a matter of changing out of her pilot suit into plainclothes, relying on civilian transportation. Rail. Car. The docking and transit fees aren't expensive, but they are an expense.
When she's in Copernicus Proper, it's a matter of ensuring she's not being followed. Of saying the right words to the right people. Heavy, steel-braced mechanic boots tend to make an ungodly amount of noise on most, but on the diminutive Anser, with her typical placid gait, she hardly makes a sound as she approaches. She studies Shelby's sleeping frame for a moment before sighing and reaching into her skirt pocket, sliding a cigarette from its packaging, placing it between her lips, and sparking it to life with a flip and dip of an arc lighter. She takes a breath, and lets it out slow.
"Korts. Wake up."
Her tone is neutral, as ever.
The ambient noise that surrounds her is little more than static.
<Pose Tracker> Shelby Korts has posed.
Despite absolutely having a bed somewhere, even somewhere in this small hangar-safehouse, Shelby sleeping in weird places or in weird poses is nothing new. She breathes softly even with the occasional tic of her eyebrow or closed eye, the occasional wince or soft noise as the things that run roughshod through her mind continue to do so even when she's unconscious.
Her eyes pop open, but she does not dramatically start, and then with a shift her feet curl back close so she's not putting them down on the floor for too long of a time -- lord knows when the last time the floor was properly swept. "Anser." It takes her a moment more to move, eyes scrunching shut as though she's trying to re-adjust her senses to focus on the quiet noise versus the loud noise of Copernicus.
The hoodie-blanket is pushed away to her lap, fingers digging at the corners of her eyes. "Thank you. ... for coming, I mean. I. um." It's like she's looking at flash cards. "How was your flight?"
Standing, the hoodie is thrown over her shoulder while she lightly pads over to slip her feet back into the normal suit's low boots. "Sorry to drag you out. Um, all the way over here," she says, speech cadence clipped. She looks, past the alcove and out into the repair bay, the smell of metal and industry digging into her nose. "Figured you would want to take a look while the damage was fresh."
<Pose Tracker> Anser Vulpecula has posed.
Warmth is not something one can associate readily with Anser. It's only when she gets heated with Maddie that sparks tend to fly, and even that is a fairly new development. For the first year that Shelby would have been aware of her presence, the mechanic kept entirely to herself. Just a journeyman mechanic, only noteworthy for her quality workmanship and her small stature. Never far from a ladder, but when it comes to servicing Mobile Suits and planes, who's truly tall enough without a tall ladder or scissor lift? Height hardly matters, and her narrow arms and nimble fingers always proved a boon.
After their defection, they didn't have much overlap. It's only been in the last year that Nanai has drawn Anser into the 'inner circle', mostly due to her technical expertise and her seemingly bottomless thirst for scientific progress. It's been an entire year, and the engineer is still largely an enigma. She talks. She converses. But she keeps things clinical, professional. Distant.
She's easy to be around, though. The big thoughts and emotions that others have, she seems to keep locked down. It's not silence, but it's... quiet.
"Uneventful," She murmurs, matter-of-factly, "...No issues. Some fuel, some transport fees. Nothing that we can't recoup by tightening up your rations." She deadpans, taking another drag from her cigarette and looking down the hall, following Shelby's gaze toward the repair bay. She starts walking, expecting that since Shelby is up, she'll follow in short order.
"...It's easier this way. Someone else patches it up, I have to rip up their slipshod welding job, undo all of their half-assed repairs. This is preferable."
She burns her way through the cigarette at a clip - the reasoning simple. When they step into the repair bay, she draws out a small, clouded glass vial, uncorks it, and drops the cigarette into it. No flammables near volatile chemicals. Other mechanics ignore that rule, certainly, but she's by-the-books, to a fault.
"Couldn't help but notice you didn't tell me the extent of the damage in the communication. We talking a small patch job, or--"
They come within view of Shelby's Jagd Doga, and Anser stops in mid-sentence, closes her eyes, and drags a sigh. She stops in her tracks, and gives Shelby The Look.
"...Right. I see why you called. Tell me the story, so I know what to look for." She quietly unzips her hoodie and tosses it over the rail of a nearby scissor lift, and cranes her head to Shelby. "Hop on. I won't take her up just yet, but we've got to position her, and it'll be easier to hear you if you're next to me."
Largely because they're in a repair bay, and it's not much of a leap to understand that Shelby is unlikely to tell this story very loudly.
<Pose Tracker> Shelby Korts has posed.
From the Rewloola to now, it's fair to say that Shelby has not changed a lot, from the surface. Awkward, strange speech cadences that seem to come and go, distraction and razor-sharp focus in equal measure... but also, far less angry than she used to be. And now, she's looking apologetic before they can even get out of the alcove. Is it a sign of things to come?
Yes. "Sorry. I didn't want to mess up. I've been ... distracted."
The machine would be a pristine combination of knockout pink and a matte black that tries to just eat the light right up; a regal machine of swooping curves and sharp edges. At the moment, the paint on the left side of the face is largely scorched off, with similar markings shearing off the color at various locations from the broad chest to the bulk of the left thigh. The right limb is more or less intact, aside from some nicks and dings.
Climbing up onto the scissor lift, Shelby zips her own hoodie a few inches rather than holding it closed herself. "Basic damage. Didn't affect the performance," she says, indicating to that side of the machine.
The worst of the damage is a gouge in the skirt armor around the left hip -- a hole since cooled. The round shield is an absolute mess of alternating layers: The beam coating absolutely did it's job by soaking up a great deal of the damage dealt, but at the cost of ... a lot. "Twin beam saber mount. Shield deflected the first part of the thrust but it still got a bite. The hip actuators seem to be okay but I'm really not that good of a mechanic."
The left shoulder in general looks like a frayed mess of metal, with blown-out conduits and cabling hanging out from chunks and segments surrounding the large directional thrusters mounted at the corners. The large plate-shield bolted onto the shoulder at an angle, where the funnels are mounted, has some definite scorches, digs, and tears, but at nowhere near the same level of damage as the round-shield mounted on the left forearm. "It looked like a Doven Wolf, though stripped down a bit. Had a large-scale megaparticle gun in it's torso. Shield ate almost all of it but the verniers got sticky. It threw the balance off a lot," she says, one hand lifting to tilt and lean back and forth with a gesture.
Shelby frowns, glancing down to Anser. The glasses-wearing young woman is a bit taller, but not by leaps and bounds. "They were all Zeon units attacking the site."
<Pose Tracker> Anser Vulpecula has posed.
The scissor lift is a fairly standard thing, one that's driven by poking a few buttons and then operating it by a wiggly little joystick that wouldn't look out of place on an ancient game console. The technology hasn't changed much over the years. If it's not broken, why fix it? It really only exists to be moved a few hundred yards and then to extend the platform up and down without the whole thing buckling over. As Anser punches it to life, it start emitting a shrill warning beep to alert people in the area that it's in motion, which she squelches immediately with a rapid series of taps between two of the buttons, disabling the safety feature using a factory-debug code. It makes it quite a bit less unpleasant to operate when it's not squealing every two seconds that it's in motion. Anser's neck cranes upward as they approach the Jagd Doll, listening to Shelby's description of the events that transpired while appraising the overall damage that she can see for herself.
"They got coffee here?" She doesn't wait for a reply, before squinting, "Going to need coffee."
The joke of her genetics means that she's forever plagued by people thinking she's far younger than she is, but at least when she's chain-smoking and has heavy bags under her eyes, people question it less. Really, it's enough to make one wonder if she actually enjoys either of them and more enjoys the deflecting quality that both provide.
Somewhere in the middle, maybe. No one's asked.
"Energy damage only, then." She looks thoughtful, "...Frustrating, but predictable. Less digging for small pieces of shrapnel in the joints."
The mention of Zeon gets silence from Anser for a time.
Perched suddenly next to Shelby on the scissor lift, a placid black fox, dripping with oil and tar stares back at her. A blink, and it's gone.
"...Zeon pilots, or salvages?" Legitimate question. War puts all manner of technology in the hands of all manners of factions. She doesn't wait for the answer, looking back to Shelby, "...You coming up with me, or staying down? Never asked if you were afraid of heights."
There's been no cause to. Besides, it's a rare trait in pilots. Not unheard of, but rare.
<Pose Tracker> Shelby Korts has posed.
Shelby's weight shifts back, resting against the rail while her hands keep her steady. "Yes," she says, eyes lidding halfway. "I-I mean, both. Decorated arms. The suits were ... honestly, pristine. I've got everything logged, so does Doctor Mass and the third agent we had out there. One was definitely a newtype, I could feel that much from her presence alone."
"Looks like they were from the Sleeves."
When she looks back again, she's looking a black fox in the eyes. The visual is... most definitely not what she was expecting. Her eyes grow distant and unfocused, and it isn't a sight that's exactly foreign to other members of Nanai's team. The moment hangs, perhaps briefly too long. Her mouth opens a little, but then her eyes press closed as though it's taking actual, conscious effort to do so.
As black as pitch. Shelby sucks in a deep breath, feeling the tingle on the edge of her senses. She pinches the bridge of her nose, glasses shifting up before she adjusts them back in place.
The pink-haired young woman tries to shake it off, but still sounds a little distracted. "I-I saw a hotplate, but I'll look for a percolator or something if you want. I-It probably won't be any better than what we've got at the warehouse."
Not that Shelby drinks the coffee at the warehouse. Or much, ever, given what it does to her.
<Pose Tracker> Anser Vulpecula has posed.
"Point never really was the taste. It's just going to be a long job. Plenty of sleep before I left, but I think it's going to be..." She grunts, and indicates with her arm, "Going to be a long job. Still, we've come back from worse. It's undoing the heat-welds that's going to be the real pain. Luckily, they're pretty exposed. Enough to cut off and cobble together."
With no protest from Shelby, Anser blandly causes the scissor lift to ascend. A grinding, squealing noise that elicits a slight flinch and a dissatisfied noise from the woman who's currently wearing her 'mechanic' hat rather than her 'engineer' hat.
"Buhhh. They need to maintain their tools better."
A common gripe, coming from her.
The fox doesn't return at the mention of the Sleeves. Whatever that was about, it's not something that Anser dwells on long enough for it to make a resurgence. She starts methodically. Top to bottom. Left to right. Examining the ruin of the left shoulder. She traces the damage with a gloved palm. "Not going to chastise you about it twice, Korts," Still on a last-name basis, as she is with the entire crew, despite not minding that they call her by her first name, "...so ease up. They're tools. And it's painful to see my work damaged, but not as painful as it would be to see it destroyed." The military taught her a rigid structure, and it's a recent development that she's stopped prefixing everyone's name with their former rank. Progress is progress.
"We're already getting caught up in our Alliance's fighting, though. Sooner than I'd hoped. I hope we're getting something back from the arrangement."
The cynical woman murmurs, dropping her backpack with a loud clank, and beginning to dig around inside for the tools she needs to get started. Detail work first. She goes for some manual snips rather than breaking out the more modern energy cutters just yet. She climbs off of the scissor lift entirely and braces herself in the wreckage. Like any self-respecting woman with a skirt in space, she's wearing biker shorts underneath of them, so it doesn't present any problems to anyone who might be watching the repair with less-than-pure-intentions, of which there are too many in the mechanical and engineering fields. The field still skews male.
She offers absolutely no small-talk, as usual, creating a void of conversation that could be seen in turns as comforting or awkward by someone who knows small-talk usually should be happening at a time like this.
<Pose Tracker> Shelby Korts has posed.
"Oh. You're right. Sorry. I get it." Shelby's index fingers trace short circles in the air before tapping on the sides of her head. "Keeps you awake."
"I think there's some extra conduit if you need to shield the lines," Shelby says, bending over the railing to look down at the floor below. "It doesn't have to be pretty. As long as I can get back to Sweetwater in one piece and slip in without getting caught, we should be fine, right?"
She turns back again, half-expecting to see the fox looking back at her again, but it's not there. The smell-- the taste-- of black tar and pitch lingers in a way that redefines synesthesia. Drawing in another deep breath, as though she's trying to get one smell in her lungs over another, Shelby steps across the scissor lift to make sure Anser makes it to her perch without issue. "Tools, yeah. You're right. ... Sorry."
Dropping into a squat, she silently lets Anser work for a time, staying ready in case something from the backpack is required. The silence is allowed to hang for a time before her head lifts. Something Sayla was feeling. That name...? Something's nagging her about it. "... also, um. Doctor Mass is working on getting assistance to Sweetwater. The kind of stuff we need to make sure people are comfortable. It's ... i-it's the least we can do, right? Helping us help our home."
Standing back up, she paces the length-- and back-- of the scissor lift. She's there to hand or take tools from Anser if she needs them, too.
The low static isn't unwelcome company. It really does help drown out the sound of the entire city.
"She ran great, though. The other guy -- Sagara?-- he was tangled up in a nasty fight, too. And Doctor Mass told me to hold the line, and I did."
<Pose Tracker> Anser Vulpecula has posed.
Pieces of charred and melted wire are cut through at a precise but rapid clip, trimmed away by a steady hand that's used to both this sort of damage and this line of work in general. She's not shy about clambering all over the robot's insides. She certainly has absolutely no fear of heights, watching her clamber about well away from the safety of the scissor lift's platform in order to reach more surfaces. It's not unlike watching someone free-climbing, except she pauses every few meters to brace herself somewhere new and contort down to snip-snip-snip burnt wire away in order to create easily-patched connections.
She turns her head, and regards Shelby from her perch, gesturing to her bag, "...Here, catch." She locks the snips into position and tosses them toward the lift. Very easy for someone to cut themselves if they catch them exactly wrong, but it's not terribly likely. "Yeah. This is is going to take me days to patch up proper, and I'd rather do it close to home, where we know the tools we've got." She pauses, and murmurs, "...But we'll take the pricier components if they have them laying around, here. They got their pound of flesh from you joining the fray. Only right that they contribute to the repair costs."
She makes a grabby motion with her hand, "...Toss me the cutting torch. Safety's on, so it won't engage by accident, or anything." She waits, patiently, for the tool to be tossed her way. The irony of repairing burn damage with heat is palpable, but necessary for the parts that will otherwise take her a hell of a lot of time to hack away at with a manual tool, "Should also be some eye protection in there. Goggles. When I fire her up, make sure to look away. Last thing you want is metal in your eyes. Bright as hellfire, too."
She realizes she hasn't responded to any of Shelby's small-talk and carefully considers. "...What's your take on Doctor Mass? It's not my call, so it's irrelevant, but... I suppose I'm curious." Her red eyes owlishly blink.
<Pose Tracker> Shelby Korts has posed.
She cannot help but respect the ability to maneuver around so easily on the low-G surface of the Moon, clinging and bending and twisting to get exactly what she wants to get and what she needs to handle. When prompted, her hand extends to catch the snips (at the right angle!) and squats down to place them inside the backpack, expecting there to be a call for another tool.
The torch is fished out of the bag, and safety or not, Shelby tosses it over with the trigger away from Anser. Next, she takes out the goggles, tossing them over in a light underhand. Take the pricy parts? "Right." Hide her eyes? "Right-Right."
Adjusting her glasses as she stands back up, she turns away from the mechanic at work and rests her hands on the rails, leaning forward and against it. The pink-haired young woman turns her head slightly to keep Anser at least in her prehiphery as she expects the torch to fire up at any moment.
Her take on Doctor Mass. She considers for a moment, lips pursing as her gaze drifts to the far wall. Nanai gave her the task of feeling things out, and ... starting from the top is just as good as a place as any to start.
"I... I believe her when she says she wants to help Sweetwater. She's earnest, and been honest with me. She relied on me even with how little she knows me in a life or death situation. I got to talk to her a little bit back home, awhile back. She reminds me of Nanai, a little."
"Makes me feel like... like..." Shelby's head tucks toward her shoulder as her eyes close. A spark of something, somewhere? There's a brief, irritated noise that passes her lips before her eyes open again, the twinge of pain gone. "She also has a lot on her shoulders. I think we'll be okay to trust her."
<Pose Tracker> Anser Vulpecula has posed.
The torch is caught adroitly, and Anser waits for the goggles to head up as well, snapping them up with an easy motion and sliding them up and over her head, easing the strap over the back of her ponytail and then letting it snap into place. The world becomes a far darker place, until it becomes an overwhelmingly brighter place. Even the reflection in the matte handrails is a bit hard to look at. An intense flickering as Anser cuts through ruined metal to leave areas that will be easier to join once she's gathered the right materials for the job. All things in time. It's going to take a long time to repair, and this is all just prep-work to the actual repair job.
A surgeon, cutting away the rot to leave the clean flesh behind.
She disengages the torch after each cut, which leaves plenty of time for Shelby to get words in edgewise. The low-gravity environment means that she's able to lob debris off to the side, keeping well within the marked off safety lines that designate the 'stay the fuck out of this spot if you don't want to risk being hit by things' radius for any other visitors to the repair bay.
"It's hard not to have a soft spot for Sweetwater," She murmurs, between cuts, "But what's good for Sweetwater isn't always in direct alignment with what's good for our cause. Think of all the humanitarian aid that went out during the wars. Sometimes, it can just be a way to stoke the fires of uncertainty within the general populace. Make them doubt you, by humanizing the enemy." She grunts, "...Not that they're not human, but... you know what I mean." She moves about again, propping herself against the shoulder joint and preparing to take another cut. There's a brief squealing sound and a crunch as Anser's foothold gives way beneath of her. She does the right thing and freezes up, lets her momentum carry her further down into the guts of the machine. At low gravity, it's more of a gradual fall than anything.
A sigh might be expected, and a sigh is indeed what's issued. Though, her voice tremors a touch.
"F-fucking thing."
She twists her body and wrenches a few times. Her leg's pinned down. Wedged. An inconvenience more than anything.
But it's more than that. Dripping and staring down at Shelby, the fox returns, staring with indifferent crimson eyes from its new perch atop the Jagd Doll's metal-rent guts. Pupil-less, a miasma rising off of it that makes the air around it seem to shimmer along with the way the light catches the oil souring its silver fur.
Dizziness. Disorientation. Feeble hands pounding against thick glass as eardrums ache, cramped. Close. Too close. Scared. Scared. Scared.
Anser extracts her leg from its temporary prison and clicks her tongue, muttering to herself as she pulls herself up again, "...Right. Step on the parts that aren't falling apart. I always forget that part." Dry humor.
The fox stares placidly at Shelby. Drip. Drip.
<Pose Tracker> Shelby Korts has posed.
Talk, pause, cut, and the loud crash of shrapnel hitting the floor. Talk, pause cut, crash. Fingers slipping back and forth on the railing and getting a good tactile feel that helps keep her focused, Shelby's mouth falls to a flat line. Demonstrating her reasoning skills, and refined speaking ability, she finally lets out a, "... Yeah, I guess."
"I just ... think... I dunno, I--"
'F-fucking thing.'
Twisting around, the pink-haired newtype starts to get out an, "Are you o--" before her eyes drift up a bit further, to the fox looking down at her. Or... on her? Viscous oil staining the silver sheen, misty and thick and almost making it hard to breathe. Her breath hitches in her chest; her fingers tighten around the railing tighter and tighter until her knuckles start turning white. She's lost, caught up in that single moment--
Drip, drip, drip.
Who is this? What-- is this...? Why is her heart pounding at a mile a minute? Is this ... somehow, Anser? No-- or is it?
Drip. Drip.
It's like before, but a little worse: Shelby Korts seems to just lock up in a manner that hasn't been this fierce for awhile. Her breathing is irregular, and the tightness of her grip causes her arms to tremble a bit. You could probably take her pulse from a glance at the side of her neck. She's ... scared?
Drip, drip, ... drip.
Drip ... drip... drip.
<Pose Tracker> Anser Vulpecula has posed.
The fox slowly hops down to the scissor lift's railing, leaving behind a trail of that sticky oil and tar as he pads slowly, implacable but indifferently towards Shelby, its burning, empty gaze fiery and oh-so-bright.
Oblivious, Anser has gone on with cutting and trimming at the metal she can reach, swallowing down a lump in her throat and leaving it at that. She doesn't think to look back to Shelby until it's time to throw the next bit of scrap off to the side, where she sees the woman staring into empty space - and more importantly, in the direction of the cutting torch.
"Korts." Anser chastises, immediately, "Look away from it while it's in operation. I don't have a spare pair of protection, so either take the lift down and get yourself some, or turn away."
As she speaks in that authoritative tone, the fox treads backwards along the railing. A throbbing headache. Difficulty breathing. Fists gradually becoming bloodied, blurred through a veil of tears and choked sobs.
"Korts? Hey." Her tone softens. "...Korts? Are you alright?"
The visage of the fox is gone again, that inky feeling of dread, the difficulty breathing, the headache, the gauzy vision, the nausea, it all disappears along with it, like flipping a switch.
Anser waits, quietly, for Shelby to answer her. She sure as hell isn't reactivating the torch until she gets a response.
<Pose Tracker> Shelby Korts has posed.
the eyes are so bright they're looking straight at her
no through? they're so empty but they're so direct
there's so much going on why is it so hot here the air
is so choking can't breathe face why my eyes it's all
just--
there's--
so--
It's not the harsh voice, but the soft tone that snaps her out of it.
On cue, it's like someone cuts her strings from front to back. Shelby stumbles back a step before her weight goes back, hitting the corner of the guardrails and protection from falling down the side of the scissor lift. Her glasses fall off somewhere along the way, clattering to the floor between her feet as the young newtype takes deep, gulping breaths of air and her eyes struggle to re-focus.
Sweat clinging to her brow, she looks up at the red-eyed engineer, blurry though she may be. "A-- Anser...? What just ..."
Shelby's neck twists again, wincing as acute pain is traded for the-- duller-- ocean of noise and chaos she's far more used to.
"I'm ... I'm sorry... I'm sorry... s-sorry..." she stammers out, catching her breath.
<Pose Tracker> Anser Vulpecula has posed.
Anser snaps the safety on to the cutters and sure-footedly props herself about until she's positioned above the lift, vaulting down to settle down on the scissor lift. Her brows are subtly lifted, but it's difficult to call her expression empathy, at least in the classical sense of the word. She reaches out and seizes Shelby by the front of the loose fabric in front of her, balling up her fist to tightly hold the fabric, and reaches back to punch the 'descend' button. Only then does she reach up and lose those impossibly dark goggles, propping them up over her eyes to gaze back at Shelby, her tone measured. Almost-sympathy. Almost-nurturing. Almost. But not.
"...You've been through a lot, Korts. I ought to have let you sleep. Look - you clearly need a break. I can handle it from here. You've delivered your report, I know what to look for. Just... have a seat on the bench, catch some more sleep. I'll find myself some coffee, and get to work on the rest of all this. I'll let you know when it's up for the flight home. Twelve... sixteen hours? It depends on what they have on hand."
She doesn't have Nanai's way of deescalating this particular phenomena, but she at least doesn't cruelly dismiss it.
It's an anxiety attack, after all. Easily explained.
<Pose Tracker> Shelby Korts has posed.
With her eyes unfocused and breathing slowly starting to catch up, Shelby focuses on Anser's face until things stop churning around in her head. The visions are over, but that doesn't mean her brain isn't churning trying to just process what she had seen.
The jolt and shake of the scissor-lift as it descends helps her get her focus, as well as the hand gripping her shirt and hoodie. Anser speaks, and all the pink-haired young woman can do is nod. "Y-Yeah. I... okay... I... I'll do that."
Shelby reaches down to pick up her glasses, pushing them back on her face. She'll worry about addressing the smudge on the lens later -- for now she's more focused on holding the rails to get herself back upright. Moving to the edge of the lift and dismounting once it's down, the mysterious young woman's breathing better, and wiping the sweat off her brow with her sleeve.
"I'll ... yes. Thank you, Anser. I-I'm ... i-if you need me, just ... I'll be over there," she says, pointing back to where her discarded normal suit is. She returns to the alcove in short order, sitting back down in the chair, though...
She's not gonna get much sleep, now... is she?