#somb.va

The pilot leans back in her chair, foregoing looking through the match's data, or even saving the replay, as she usually does. She's just not feeling it today. Not after getting her ass squarely handled to her on the battlefield just a day prior.

She'd once thought real battles were just like in games, only with much higher stakes. Bouncing back from a lost game is easy. She doesn't even care about lost games anymore – they're good learning experiences. But what's there to be learned from her MEKA being attacked by a virus, from being unable to protect herself after having her gun stolen? From having her life at the whim of some terrorist?

She closes her eyes, trying to push the memory out of her mind, only to have her thoughts invaded by the face of the terrorist in question. She can still see that infuriating smirk, branded into her memory – the whole scene is. Her own gun's barrel centimetres from her face, the dark-skinned woman behind it, wearing that damn smile.

Hana feels disgusted with herself for being so fucking thankful to the woman for not pulling the trigger. It's only natural, or so Doctor Ziegler says, yet it doesn't make the pilot any less frustrated with herself.

Dammit. She doesn't feel like playing any more. What hour is- oh. Is there really much point in going to sleep for two hours? Well, Ziegler will worry if she doesn't. On the other hand, two hours isn't gonna make her feel much more rested than none at all. She doesn't really feel like going to sleep only to wake up so soon... if she falls asleep at all. Maybe it's better she just pulls an all-nighter? Hit up some MOBA, screw around with a troll build?

Hana's attention snaps to her quarter's door sliding open, revealing... nobody at all.

A frown paints itself on her face, and the young woman stands up to look outside. She can't imagine anyone pranking her in this way. Even she wouldn't, but who knows? Maybe there are rats here?

Nothing.

Huh. The keyboard says it's switched to manual. A glitch, she supposes, one fixable with but a press of a button - there, back to automatic. Gotta tell Winston in the morning. The walls aren't that thick, but they do the job when she feels like cursing during a game. She's already had to tune it down, anyway. Noise complaints, the bane of her existence.

The gamer turns back to her computer, only to find it shut down. She can't help but to snort. What garbage – the tech they got here. First the door, now this. Ah well, five years of disuse can do that, she supposes. Or maybe it's the world that's trying to tell her something. Perhaps she ought to listen, every once in a whole.

With the thought in mind, Hana kneels by her bed to recover her jammies from under it. Who cares if it's rumpled? Both Mom and Sergeant are thousands of kilometres away from here, she's going to take advantage of the fact for as long as she can.

Hana begins stripping her day clothes, stopping for a moment when a strange sound - one almost like... choking, she'd say - sounds out in the room, in spite of there being nobody beside her here. Great, so she's hearing things now. She seriously hopes she won't just lie awake for those two hours with her mind making up strange noises. This reminds her too much of the time she stayed up for three nights in a row. Freaky stuff. 8/10.

The young woman finishes changing into her nightclothes before hopping onto her bed, and pulling the covers up to her neck in spite of the warm, Mediterranean air.

(-)

Hana wakes to an unfamiliar sound coming somewhere from her nightstand. What the- is that Portuguese?

She clumsily reaches out to the source of it, managing to knock a few items, a bag of jellies among them, off the stand before she grabs the offending item – her phone, playing the unfamiliar tune as her alarm. Has Lucio been messing with her phone? He usually has better taste than... this.

A long-suffering groan escapes her lips when she finally turns the damn thing off. Ugh, sleeping was a bad idea after all. All she wants to do now is just close her eyes again. Should've known better. Heh, maybe the Russian's shower singing will come in useful for once – she's always so off-tune.

Wait... Why is there a gun on the ground? She keeps a spare under the pillow, but this isn't-

Hana picks the weapon up with a somewhat unsteady hand. Either somebody went through the pain of making a 100% replica of her gun, the loud paint-job, bunny charm and all, or she's finally going insane, and is hallucinating the weapon she'd lost.

That, or it is indeed her gun, having somehow found its way back to her. But how could it...

The pilot springs up and away from the bed, pale faced yet with her heart hammering as if about to burst. She casts a startled look around her room, every shadowy corner suddenly seeming dangerous.

Nothing.

Just like the moments before her MEKA went down. Just like the moments after that woman flickered out of existence.

Just like before she went to sleep.

A cold shiver runs down her spine.