Orville sighs as he walks with you towards the gathering point.
"I can't believe you'll be gone a whole year..."
He's been on this ever since you got your post assignment. You get it. It's hard for you to imagine living without yourself, too.
"That's because you lack imagination, nerd. Come on, I'm gunna write and whatever, too. Hell, I hear they've even got a payphone up there."
He makes a face, nose scrunched up. It's a good look for him.
"Payphones? Gross. Don't they know encoded messages are way safer? I bet they're looking for ways to get your personals AND your money with that junk."
Classic Orville. You expect nothing less from the guy who works with codes for a living. You realized you have to cut this line of conversation off or he'll drag you into a discussion about the beep boops and click clacks, and honestly? You're not really feeling up to it right now.
Besides, you can see the van from here and you can't risk your new coworkers thinking you care about codes. If they do, you might have to bullshit your way through even more conversations you don't care about.
Besides, you can see the van from here and you can't risk your new coworkers thinking you care about codes. If they do, you might have to bullshit your way through even more conversations you don't care about. You elbow your friend and smirk.
"Come on, dude, we're supposed to be saying goodbye, not talking about communications junk."
He huffs and elbows you back. Hah, gottem!
Wait, shit. That's right, you
are supposed to be saying goodbye. Uhhhh, right, right, you've got this.
"Anyways, we should probably do that. You know, the saying goodbye thing."
The two of you stand in silence. Neither of you have had to do a lot of goodbyes. How are you supposed to make this feel better again?
Oh yeah, hugs. You hug the fuck out of Orville. By the time you let go, you feel a lot better about everything and are ready to face whatever the fuck is ahead of you.
"Alright, alright, see you later, Orville. I've got some new nerds to scope out."
He straightens himself out and gives you a smile.
"Yeah, see you later. Remember, letters over phone calls."
You give him a thumbs up and head over towards the van. There's four people already gathered around the van. Maybe you should pick someone to stand by and get to know.
You recognize one of them. He's one of the superiors you've seen around the barracks. You're pretty sure his name is Oliver or something. He looks tired, but you can't tell if that's actually got to do with him being tired or if that's just what people look like when they're older than thirty.
The two at the back of the van have very different demeanors from one another. The woman sitting down is all smiles, and the person standing against the back literally has their hands cuffed.
The guy at the front of the van looks sullen.
Huh. Interesting choices to pick from here.
