(?) Shelly and Nadya

OUTMODEBACK: SHELLY AND NADYA

>Gazing out across the open expanse of the Australian outback at a blazing red sunset Shelly sighed to herself, missing the sight as her synthetic mind was preoccupied with other things. It had been more than a while now since she'd run across a foreign steel robot wandering the open landscape and brought the strange robot back to the informal outmode community she called home. Only a week after she'd found Nadya languishing in the outback a group of outmoded surveyor droids had returned from a walkabout hauling an unusual bit of scrap. A short conversation later the flame-scarred capsule had been chopped up for scrap by the expertly-built hands of Outmodeback's robotic mechanics without question, and evidence of the strange vehicle was quickly turned to unidentifiable bits and pieces to be traded away. Descending a short stairway down into the mostly underground city Shelly passed through several commonplace areas and hallways lines with modest dwellings before she found the public lounge she was looking for. "Oy! There ya are!" she called out with a friendly wave as she passed under a bedrock arch into the circular room. A pair of green optics set in cold steel skin turned to look at her from Nadya's spot on one of three couches flanking a small black and white television displaying the flickering image of a man in a clown getup. "Da? You need something?" Nadya answered, leaning her head back over her shoulder to look at the second of her nandroid saviors inquisitively. Despite the near-stranger's prickly exterior Shelly had done her best to both give the poor outmode her space, but enough time had passed that she felt comfortable probing a little. "Yeah matter-of-fact, a little walkabout, get me out of these tunnels! Think you could probably use one too yeah? Could use the company!" Shelly said as casually as she could, sharply measuring the response in her acquaintance. Nadya winced slightly before giving a strained smile from her position on the couch. "Last time I go out there I almost shut down for good, why for I should go back? Get one of sturdier scavengers to go with you." Shelly expected an initial refusal from the stubborn robot, and simply shook her head in response. "You've been down here for weeks, you sure you're not gettin' mold in your seams? C'mon, you need the change of scenery as much as I do and I'm not gonna take one of the scavvies out on a pleasure-drive," She answered back, a hint of defiance in her otherwise casual tone. Nadya shifted in her couch seat to better see the Australian nandroid without craning her neck. "Long time in small space, not really problem for me Shelly," Nadya answered quietly, and the pair locked orange and green optics for a moment judging one another's stance. After a moment of being stared down by her Australian friend Nadya sighed, closing her optics and hanging her head. "You not taking 'no' for answer, is you?" she asked in a defeated tone. Shelly grinned and crossed her arms over her chest triumphantly. "Roight! I'll come collect ya about, lessay hour before dawn, yeah? Plenty of toime to get our gear together before we head out!"

>The faded army-green Willy's MB jeep rolled across the barren continent following a dirt road that was barely perceptible from the rest of the unspoiled landscape. The sun high above them Shelly and Nadya had been riding for hours, the former stuck with a permanent smile as the former seemed stuck with a permanent frown. From time to time Shelly had pointed out a feature of the landscape to her partner, only to be met with mild disinterest much to her consternation. After a long bout of silence punctuated only by the roar of the engine and sound of the dust yielding beneath the tires, Shelly tried again to engage her morose companion. "So! How's Outmodeback been treatin' ya so far? Haven't heard any complaints so ya must not be ruffling any feathers!" Nadya broke her gaze on the unending expanse before her and gave Shelly a glance at her question. "Is...nice there, other robots all pretty friendly, plenty of power for recharge. Da, is not bad place, all in all," she answered finally after along moment's pause. Shelly took her optics off the dirt road for a moment and shot her friend a smile. "It's like I told ya when I first picked ya up: Outmodeback is friendly to any machine the humans think are beyond their useful loife, we all prove 'em wrong on the daily just by gettin' by, don't we!" She grinned, and Nadya hesitantly began to mirror her expression before turning her optics back to the road and gasping. "STOP!" she called out, optics widening in panic. Shelly turned back to the road just in time to see the obstruction before her and pressed hard on the brake, turning the wheel sharply as the vehicle skidded to a halt mere meters from a large mob of kangaroo crossing as a herd together in front of them. Both robots sat motionless for the moment it took for the last animal to pass, each turning to watch the large group traveling off to their left. "Dang roos," Shelly lightly cussed in annoyance, shaking her head and putting the jeep back into drive. Nadya stayed fixed on the traveling mob even as their vehicle moved forwards once more, straining her neck to keep track of the steadily diminishing marsupials. Though she did not make mention of it inwardly Nadya marveled at the sight of the strange foreign creatures. 'I've never seen anything like that,' she thought privately to herself as the beaten-up old jeep trundled across the expanse of the outback.

>As the sun set and gave way to an astonishing star-lit night, the pair of little robots sat a few meters from their parked ride around an impromptu firepit that Shelly had insisted on constructing. Despite Nadya's protest that they had no need to stay warm Shelly had still gathered up what scattered bits of sun-dried wood scraps she could from the surrounding site and piled the fuel neatly between them. As the stars slowly moved across the sky overhead Shelly recounted a handful of stories she'd held in reserve about some of the more prominent outmodes they shared a town with, laughing genuinely at each one's punchline. Nadya to her credit tried to keep herself interested but found her attention wandering off frequently, and after a few minutes she found that her optics had trained themselves skyward. So much had happened in her short life so far, she thought to herself as Shelly rambled. For a moment she was brought back in her memory not to the moon or even to orbit, but to the factory where she'd been produced in Izhevsk. The feeling of loneliness that had plagued her through her short life so far stemmed from that place, seeming to set the pattern of self-fulfilling isolation which had become her life. Letting her story finish up, Shelly stopped and stared for a long moment at her strange companion, green optics locked on some faraway point overhead. 'Do you wish you were back up there?' Shelly thought privately to herself, stopping from speaking the words out loud tonight. Less than an hour later their firepit smoldered as mere crackling embers, and both robots had tucked themselves into the back of the jeep and plugged themselves into the vehicle's power adapter to recharge.

>"Bloody!" Shelly yelled in frustration as she delivered a hard kick to one of the immobile jeep's tires. "Thing!" she continued with another kick making Nadya wince. Both had rebooted in the twilight before dawn, fully recharged and ready to continue on towards a destination only one of them knew. Turning the key to start their ride had produced only silence however, and through quick deduction they'd identified the source of the problem as a dead battery. "How we drain whole thing dry like that? Two of us together not take THAT much draw, nyet?" Nadya asked as she watched the angry blonde nandroid stomp her way around the lifeless jeep. "Nah, not at all! I've done this plenty of toimes, fresh battery can recharge ya for days!" Shaking her head Shelly's orange optics suddenly opened up wide, and she brought a palm to her forehead. "Croiky that derro Carl was s'posed to swap 'em out yesterday! Wouldn't be the first time he shirked work, lazy bogon!" Nadya gulped, a cosmetic reflex she was hardly aware of. "So we are in middle of nowhere with dead car, da?" she said nervously, looking around the wide landscape around them. Sighing, Shelly nodded looking suddenly defeated. "No way we'd make it in time just hoofing it," she muttered, looking off into the distance at something Nadya couldn't see. Frowning the Soviet robot waved her hand in front of Shelly's face. "Hey, what you on about?" Startled, the blond nandroid blinked for a moment before her familiar nonchalant grin returned to her faceplate. "Hey don't worry, just somethin' I wanted to do but we moight still get to see it," turning her attention back to the now-derelict jeep she retrieved a few small items including a well-worn pocket watch and a small wallet stuffed with soon-to-be outdated Australian pounds. "Oi, don't forget your hat or you'll get hot enough to cook on!" she said with a laugh, tossing the extra bush hat like a frisbee. Nadya hesitantly shoved the hat over her already-hot black hair. "You got plan for to get us out of here?" she asked as Shelly turned to begin walking. "Sure do! Next stop: Roxby Downs!"

>Trudging through the outback a second time failed to fill Nadya with the same feeling of hopeless dread she'd felt after her arrival, her plucky partner's optimism and confidence making their eventual escape from this environment seem somehow certain. Several times throughout their walk Shelly had lightly prodded Nadya for funny anecdotes to share, but the steel-skinned robot had remained impenetrably tight lipped. During the long lapses of silence between them each processed their own private thoughts, Nadya's own clouded by the new worries that had occupied her since coming to live on this strange continent. When would someone come for her? Surely space debris such as herself would've been noticed by someone other than junker robots, right? And Outmodeback, the place was just as Tilly had described it yet somehow she still felt disconnected from the community of machines, a visiting stranger instead of a neighbor. 'Always been that way,' she thought quietly to herself as an old image file recalled itself from memory, showing her a distant friend-group of her fellow new robots on the factory floor. She wasn't among them. "Oi!" Shelly's voice snapped her back to reality so fast that the Soviet nearly stumbled. "Huh?" she answered bewildered, turning to see Shelly several paces behind her and staring eagerly down at her now-open pocket watch. "Oi oi oi!" she repeated, looking up at Nadya with a wide grin before turning in place and scanning the horizon with a hand shielding her optics. Nadya blinked in confusion, staring at her companion as if the blonde nandroid's processor had finally broken. "What? Shelly what is wrong?" she asked in concern, but Shelly didn't answer her directly. "Moight take a minute 'fore we can see 'er, but we're definitely close enough that we should be able to!" Even more perplexed now Nadya's shoulders slumped as she gave up trying to pull an answer out of the aussie, instead shielding her own optics from the harsh sun as she stared up into the cloudless blue sky trying to spot whatever had gotten Shelly so worked up. As the pair gazed upward expectantly something small and reflective appeared to rise from the obscured horizon, a bright yellow ember seeming to push it upwards silently. "THERE SHE GOES!" Shelly yelled out suddenly, making Nadya jump in surprise. After a moment of shocked processing Nadya realized what she was looking at, and sucked in a sharp breath. "Bozhe moy, since when down-under have space program?!" Shelly laughed gently as the distant point of light rose through the sky almost easy to miss. "We don't, it's the Brits who run Woomera," she explained as both of them intently watched the far-away rocket arcing high. A low rumble like thunder reached them from across the many kilometers, still lingering a few moments after the missile was gone from view. The two robots kept staring upwards for another long moment spent in a silence that Shelly finally broke when she looked down and closed her pocket watch with a snap. "I'd wanted us to get a lot closer, roight up to the fence maybe, but I'm still glad we got to see it at all." As Nadya's turned back to Shelly she saw the outback nandroid eyeing her with an expectant little grin she found impossible not to match. "Da, me too." she said, then took in a little breath as she spoke again. "Looks a lot different when you're not the one riding it." Shelly's expression burst into an uncontrollable grin, looking near-giddy at getting her friend to finally admit to what she'd known from the start. "We still got a lot of walkin' between here and Roxby, toime enough for a story maybe?" Shelly prodded practically bouncing in her boots. Turning to face the direction they'd been traveling, Nadya gave a little shrug. For good or ill, she wasn't going to hide from her fellow outmodes anymore. "I was built in Izhevsk..."