#askers

They were sat on a couch, the room looking almost like a doctor's office. Therapy, perhaps, or more likely some twisted version of it.

"You can remember," N said, a hand on Chuuya's head in something similar to comfort.

The young Chuuya shook his head. "It was too scary."

"Try."

Crackling static, the sound of him taking a deep, shaky breath. "Okay. Um. It was scary."

"Good," N purred, the hand on Chuuya's head stroking it affectionately, encouragingly. It was clear how Chuuya responded to the praise and the touch: leaning in to it, his breathing a little easier.

"Go on," N encouraged after a few minutes where the only sound was the low droning.

"Uh," Chuuya hesitated, though he was clearly trying to figure out how to say what he was thinking. He probably didn't even have the vocabulary to describe his nightmares at that age. "I remember it being dark… and I was big."

"Big how?"

"Scarily big? I think I was a monster."

"What kind of monster?"

Here, Chuuya hesitated. You could see it in the tension in his frame; he knew what he wanted to say this time, he knew how to say it. There was another reason he was keeping his mouth shut.

"A-258, tell me."

"……Arahabaki."

"You ARE Arahabaki," N said.

"No," the younger Chuuya shook his head frantically. "No I'm not, I'm—"

"Who?"

"I—I'm—I'm…"

"See? You can't even tell me. Because you aren't anything else, A-258."

"Arahabaki is a MONSTER!" Chuuya screamed. "I'm not a—a monster, I'm just…"

"You are Arahabaki, no matter what else you say. Your words will not change the truth." N shifted, turning to look at where Chuuya had moved away from him on the couch. "Come here, young one."

It didn't take long before Chuuya was back by his side, legs pulled up on the couch, curled as small as he could make himself. Small sniffles could still be heard through the static.

"But it's a monster," Chuuya cried. "I don't want to be a monster."

"Arahabaki is a part of you. A very powerful part that will help a lot of people."

Heartbroken: "Why did you make me like this?"

"I didn't make you anything, A-258. All I did was help you bring out what was always there."

"A monster?"

"If that's what you want to call it."

in essence tua does pass first. she lives a very long time due to her time spent in cryogenic storage, but after a brief bout of pneumonia one winter she passes away in her sleep and nick enters spring alone. by this point mira is in her early twenties and working in new vegas (as she, like her mother, insisted on leaving home as soon as possible) where things have taken a turn politically. after nick delivers the news that tua has passed away, mira asks for help getting back home. he ends up traveling across the US to get her. there is a mutual understanding that nick does not plan to live very long, as he doesn’t want to wait to lose his memory entirely.

on that note, nick in his old age is very afraid and forgetful. after burying tua (beside her sister, at kingsport) he is very reluctant to leave the house at all. especially toward the end he becomes a little more religious in the sense that he believes people go somewhere when they die, but he can’t reconcile that with the fact that he’s a machine and he might not go where his loved ones go when he dies. it’s a heavy thing for him to process and the journey to bring mira home helps him do that.