Work Text:
“I miss you.”
I write at the bottom of a letter left open on the center screen of my…our… mech’s cockpit.
Our mech.
The Dioskorai.
We’re the best pilots this war has seen.
1,357 Confirmed Enemy Hostiles Destroyed.
945 Successful Dispatches.
36 Major cities recovered by our actions.
Sometimes this war does feel entirely on our back.
This… endless war.
It never gets easier. I don’t know how many of these letters I’ve written at this point. I’m crying by the end of each one every time. I’ll keep doing it though, for you, it’s connection. I do miss you so much. I wish you would write back, but I understand. We live a hectic life.
In these moments, after my shift is done, and the adrenaline is draining from my system, I remember fondly what life was like before, when we were side-by-side every day. Playing around, getting into trouble, you always looked out for me and I never got to thank you because I thought we’d always have that.
I hit enter on the keyboard and the letter becomes a digital sticky note on the main screen. I stare at the monitors for a while. Too long.
Readouts from today’s mission.
Ammo counts before the crew gets to reloading the weapon systems.
Location data reading the location of this hanger, a location I know too well.
I don’t care anymore. I’ve looked over all of this hundreds of times before. It’s just noise that doesn’t matter.
What matters is a screenshot I have up on a side screen. It’s saved from the exterior camera feed. It’s a tree you thought I would want to see on one of your missions. You left it open for me one day.
It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.
I bring it up every time I sit down, before I even buckle in.
Those buckles that I am still hesitating to undo and stand up.
I don’t hesitate out of any diminished amount of love for you! Please don’t get me wrong. I don’t think that’s possible.
I’m just… I’m getting tired. I don’t know how much longer I can keep this up.
I’m dragging my feet and it’s unfair to you, taking a few extra minutes of my own.
I sigh and finally start the process. First the neurolinks retract from the sides of our neck, little needle-like probes severing my mental connection to the machine.
From you.
This is always the scariest moment for me.
I feel furthest away from you during this time. I know you can’t hear me in there but I like to fool myself that you can.
Next is the straps. It’s far too many buckles. All these times in here and I still fumble with these stupid things. I try to go fast so I can to get back to you sooner.
I step out of the chair and feel our feet on solid ground again. Always takes a second to go from the mechanical feel to flesh again.
I stop at the little cabinet that sits on the cockpit wall in the back. Inside is a small patch of Velcro with your name strip sitting there alone.
Lux
The Dioskorai
“Lux.” I say out loud to myself as I do. It’s embarrassing.
I used to say your name all the time for one reason or another.
To call out after you while I caught up. Or before saying “Good night.”
Now I feel like I have to give myself a reason to keep it on my tongue. I could never let that go, it’s too important to me. You’re too important to me.
I reach for my own name sitting above our heart.
Hand hovering over it. There’s that hesitation again.
Cas
The Dioskorai
My name tag reads.
I take a deep breath.
The ripping tear of Velcro fills the air.
I am stripped of my name and my strongest sense of identity.
I press the tag extra hard and smooth it flat with care. It's been falling off the wall so often lately to the point that most days, when our shift changes, I retrieve it from the floor. I take a moment to admire it sitting under yours.
Cas and Lux, back together again. It’s almost enough to make me smile.
Almost.
Until I have to open the hatch to the ladder below.
As I climb down it, into our room now, I pause at the bottom.
I hope you don’t see it, I know we can’t see it. But I still feel awful. This should be easy to give you. The same trade we always make.
I take a deep breath and turn to face you…no…us.
I can’t even remember which one of us was which anymore.
In the heart of this terrible machine, a mangled near-corpse is held strung up in chains, cables, and wires. Snaking in and out through the flesh. They pour out everywhere, cluttering the floor.
I stare at our twisted reflection of our body. The one that wasn’t as lucky on the day of the incident.
Monitors bleep out their reports on statuses. It’s still “alive.”
You’re in there now and I hate it. I hate seeing this half of us.
It’s a reminder.
A reminder every day of our failure.
A reminder every day of our fortune.
I’ll never forget my first time waking up after it all happened.
Both our minds were safe after the incident. Activity normal.
But one of our bodies wasn’t as lucky.
It was paralyzed, broken, mutilated.
The doctors and scientists took a wild chance. Highly experimental systems to save both of us. A way to keep us both here, in some capacity at least.
They said identical twins shared close enough brainwaves and relation to a similar body that the shock of transfer into a different body wouldn’t lead to a complete system shock that would kill the body and mind.
Similar issues arose when the neurolinks first rolled out in the mechs. The settings weren’t tuned right, too much mechanical feedback and the demand of constant computational calculations frying the minds of a lot of good pilots on first ignition.
Things got adjusted over time, scaled back. However, connecting less deeply to the workings of the machine reduced the benefit of doing so at all. Investors had begun writing off neurolink technology as a game with diminishing returns.
This was a new chance. A buffer between the machine and its pilot without the downsides.
One of our minds would stay in the broken body. Built into the heart of the machine itself. Life-support systems keeping enough of the important functions alive to keep the brain functioning.
It would still be intense for the sister in the machine. Overwhelming data pouring in from every sensor, signal, and feed on the Dioskorai. Analyzing each choice and plan to be made and feed it back to the sister in the cockpit.
We’d have to take turns in the roles to prevent a mental burnout though.
One in the system, one in the seat.
Harmony between now truly inseparable twins.
They said it would be easier though. They said we would be even more efficient in combat.
As I look my shattered mirror reflection of my twin dead in the eyes, I question just how much “easier” this has been.
To no longer exist at the same time. I feel myself grieving for someone who is still technically alive. We spent 20 years in each others company and to just lose that one day, I still don’t think I’ve really come to terms with it.
Does it matter that we can process information in a fight one second faster than other pilots?
Does it matter that we can’t hold hands and skip through the fields again?
They cheer for us and slap awards on our chest, but I just want my fucking sister back.
I know I need to take your burden right now. How much you must be burning up in there after today’s mission. The computational pressure, the feeling when we get hit, the heat of the engines that engulfs everything, it’s all so much.
I’m weak, I know it, you were always the better twin.
I should have just died that day. I feel like a burden on you.
If I stay out here though, I’d be leaving you in that pain. I could never hurt you like that.
We share this burden. We continue to be heroes together.
I just wish it was still side-by-side.
I finally take a deep breath and reach for the cable beside us, plugging them back to our neck for transfer.
“I’ll see you on the other side, sister.”
The ripping tear of Velcro fills our mind.
You open your eyes to a sight you are all too familiar with.
Your sister’s failure of a body, staring back at you.
A prison you are forced back into every other day.
Paying the price of her actions and inabilities, as you always have your whole lives.
It should just be her in there, screaming in silent horror at the demand the systems pile on top of her. Thousands of calculations made every second to ensure that the mech continues its perfect service record.
When you are stuck in there you do everything to make sure this failure doesn’t fuck up and do something that would ruin your remaining working body.
But without her now, there is no mech, there is no one second advantage that keeps you the best of the best.
One day though, you tell yourself, you’ll be your own person.
Just, Lux. No longer Lux and Cas, or the Girls, or any other combination of the rest.
You gather yourself. You take deep breaths, the feeling of air in your lungs always feels so good when you come out.
Before you turn to leave though, you are particularly worked up today from the mission. Her reactions were so slow to use the information you were feeding her.
It was embarrassing.
She made you look bad.
You’re going to have to step it up on this next one to keep yourself above all the rest.
You spit on her face. You know she can’t feel it, can’t see it, or take in the feedback you are giving.
You used to hold her head underwater when she made you look bad as kids. You miss that tactile feel of correction. You miss properly taking your frustration out.
You turn to leave, spit slowly sliding down her face, and head back up the ladder. Your body aches with each step up. It’s crying out for rest but you ignore it.
You are quick to grab your name tag from the cabinet and slap it on your chest. You don’t want anyone getting the wrong idea.
“Are you Cas or Lux?”
Again and again, even with the fucking name tags.
This whole situation just made it worse.
You’re Lux. The only Dioskorai twin that matters.
You take a pause to also tear off her name tag from the board and drop it on the floor again with a stomp. A childish tantrum but it feels good to get it out of your system every time.
As you reach your cockpit chair you already notice the sticky note on the center screen and roll your eyes.
You take your proper seat and quickly click in all of your straps and buckles. You’ve done it enough times that you don’t even think about it anymore, its just second nature.
The neurolinks find their way home back into your neck.
You anticipate the prick of another needle at your thigh. This one never fails to really wake you up. Amphetamines to keep the focus, Caffeine to keep the body awake for another two day mission stint, and a pain killer cocktail to hush the aches.
You check the read outs. The crew has finished reloading the weapon systems. The damage she let happen has been patched up. Her mission performance allowed two hits to land, that is simply unacceptable. Even if in the end it was successful.
Everything starts warming back up, and you take a moment to look over the rest of the screens.
You see that stupid tree photo you accidentally took one day and have been meaning to delete.
Now is as good a time as any to do so.
It’s gone with a simple keystroke.
You look again at that sticky note from her. She always leaves these letters of her day and what happened.
If you cared you would watch the logs.
Another simple deletion and your screen is clear.
1,357 Confirmed Enemy Hostiles Destroyed.
945 Successful Dispatches.
36 Major cities recovered by our actions.
And more than half of that was you in the pilot seat.
You carry her and the war on your back.
Green light to dispatch turns on and you head out for the next mission.