Drabble 1

The Soul Diver opened with a mechanic hiss, and a young Pekoponian dragged himself from the interior out into the murky laboratory. If he had not been in something of a state of shock, he would have lacked the energy to stand, but as he was, even the kind of rest that would be brought about if he collapsed was impossible. He felt entirely muted, it was as if his heart wasn't beating, and the machines' own steady, pulsing beeps could do nothing to break through. It didn't seem to him that the machines had much power left, now that their creator was gone.

Everything reflected to weakly on him for this to be reality, and so he could ignore any sickness for the moment. That was too genuine to matter. To an outside observer, he would have seemed as dead as he supposed his Keronian companions to be, and as such, when Pirarah saw him, he exclaimed softly, “What... Saburo, can you hear me...?”

In fact, the boy had been slow in emerging. Kururu had engaged himself in shutting down the device and monitoring the figure who remained inside, checking to be certain that it had worked properly, while during this time, Pirarah had picked his way through the wires to the door of the machine. It had been one of those minute-or-so-long waits that felt significantly lengthier, for both of them, but eventually, it looked as if they received favorable results.

For Saburo, those words restored life, though it was hard to say whether this was a good or bad turn, as the leap his heart took sent a rush of blood and adrenaline coursing in him. It seemed to be too much for his veins to contain, and the first thing that came out of his mouth was a gout of blood. However, he barely registered it, because Kururu spoke at the same time. “Tch, don't keep people waiting. Don't you know how annoying that is? Kuku...”

“I'm sorry...” He gasped, due to both an actual shortage of breath and the suddenness of his return to full awareness. He didn't think he had any words of his own to honestly describe this for himself, there was too much delight, relief, electrifying shock, worry, guilt, something he couldn't name that clenched his stomach. Now that they could hear him, speaking for that reason no longer seemed pointless; it was the most important task he had. “Sorry... didn't think it would... thought you were... but y-you're not...” He smiled, laughed, fell onto his knees again and pulled Pirarah into a hug just because he was close enough and he needed to be reassured of the physical presence of someone with him. “I'm sorry, I'll... be okay...”

A few deep breaths later, he had calmed himself, relatively speaking, and released the piranha Keronian, who had mostly just murmured what he hoped would be comforting things, despite being thoroughly startled by that reaction. Saburo turned over to Kururu, or at least, to the direction that Kururu had spoken from before.

“Anyway... you know... it might take a little rest...” He sighed, a sound that held both tired emptiness and blood, which he wiped away thoughtlessly, and swayed where he sat. The motion cost him his balance, and his consciousness as he fell to the floor, half simply falling asleep, and half passing out.