Private Finished Cotton Candy Sunshine

It's a beautiful day outside with the sun shining brightly and the occasional fluffs of clouds drifting by to give momentary shielding from the sun's warm beams. In fact, these were the days that had the most picnic goers present at the park, either with their family or their significant other. Kites were flown in the areas with plenty of clear space. Of course, there were others who were on their devices as well, under the shade of a tree. Some would say the latter type of people are wasting the beauty of nature by keeping their eyes glued on the screen. They may be right in some regard, yet that line of thinking always misses a few aspects of why those kind of people even go out.

Sarah wasn't doing any of those things. She was simply sitting on a bench underneath a tree in the most isolated spot she could find. It was one of those days again... the days when she just couldn't help but reflect on what her life had become. It were days like this that she'd try to imagine what could have been if she did things differently, if she had just thought about what she was doing back then, if she had the foresight to realize how dangerous she made things for herself, if her pride didn't blind her.

Sarah, before coming to this island, had never entertained these thoughts. Her job kept her mind busy, keeping her up for days on end. There was no time for reflection, just doing what she did best and enjoying it. But ever since she came here, she had a lot of free time. It all came crashing down on her. Every repressed memory, everything she didn't want to think about, and every regret, it all swirled into a thunderstorm of doubt and anger. It tried to chip away at her sanity, ebbing and flowing like a raging sea against a rickety, wooden pier.

So far it hadn't succeeded.

Yet she'd be lying if she said it didn't affect her. She was on that bench for three hours now, with the remnant of a cigarette long gone in between her cybernetic fingers. It was as if she was in a trance. Her eyes looked straight ahead, but her gaze pierced through everything. If it weren't for her occasional blinks and her calm breathing, she would have been easily mistaken for a dummy in someone's clothing.

@Kyrii

The world passed by without notice. Sarah was still stuck in her mind, despite the fact her joints should have already locked up from being so still. And yet, everything was alright. Eventually she'd snap out of it, give or take a couple more hours, and then she'll be back to her... house. It didn't feel right to be calling it a home. She had rising doubts about that place. She didn't know what, just that it seemed off now that everything was so slow.

Maybe she just-- "Ah-!"

Like being hit by a truck, Sarah crashed back into reality as a body suddenly fell on her. For a moment, she reached for her distress signal to call for help, thinking someone was attacking her, but then she noticed the girl on the sidewalk. False alarm, it seemed. Her heart jumped so much, it was likely to be in her throat. It sure felt like it.

But as her senses reorientated themselves, Sarah was sure she felt a sudden... positivity hit her. Was it... was the threat of death the cause of that?

Sarah shook off the idea and stood up. She leaned over to the girl and extended her cybernetic arm to her. "Are you alright?" she'd ask. There was annoyance in her voice. Understandable, given that she nearly had a heart attack. However, her face bared no signs of anger. Maybe a trace of irritation, but nothing to suggest that she was going to start lecturing the girl. At least not yet. "Are you hurt anywhere?"

Sarah could see the moment the younger girl noticed her augmentations. She couldn't say that she was surprised about the reaction. Most everyone here had the sort of health care that could regrow your limbs, whether it was their own powers, a friend's, or the hospital's. Sarah herself was already used to these machines as her limbs, so having normal ones after so long would have been strange.

As the girl reached out to grab Sarah's hand, the older woman somehow felt fascination about... well, she didn't know what exactly, but that was a feeling she last had when she learned about the denizens of this place. Once again, the feeling of being in a fairy tale rushed through her body. And then it suddenly stopped. For whatever reason.

She looked at the girl looking at her own hands, seemingly in awe. "So that's it..." she thought aloud. Give Sarah a piece of alien hardware, and she could break it apart and put it back together again like a child's shape puzzle. That being said, she was on the opposite spectrum when it came to the magical and supernatural, but she knew enough to say for certain that this girl was manipulating emotions.

Some kind of projection, maybe? Looking at how she reacted to some kind of feedback of her own powers, Sarah gathered that she was new to this. "What's your name, girl?"

"Anna," Sarah repeated to herself. She looked at the girl for a moment, giving Sarah's brain time to familiarize the young girl's face. Faces were something that faded faster than a receipt exposed to heat, but since Sarah was in a much more open environment, that is to say it was almost impossible to run into someone when taking a stroll outside, she had to remember faces more than ever before.

"My name is Sarah," she'd introduce herself before crossing her arms across her chest which gave her a stern disposition. "Explain why you decided to crash into me." She wasn't harboring any ill will, although the soft glow behind her eyes might make them look more sinister than before.

The panic looked genuine. Sarah looked around and indeed saw a pair playing with a frisbee. "I believe you," she'd say, dropping her arms to the side to give her a less demanding posture. As much as she didn't care about her image, Sarah just didn't want to look like a cranky old woman. It'd irk her to no end.

In response to Anna, Sarah shook her head. "I'm fine. You just startled me there. Though I suppose I should thank you for pulling me back to earth. I don't know how love I've been staring into space." Sarah glanced down and saw the girl's skinned knee. It didn't look serious, but it shouldn't be left like that or it might get infected.

"You should take a seat, Anna." Sarah gestured to the bench she had been sitting in before, "Let me take a look at that injury."