Null Protocol || Ramattra x Reader

☙Chapter Twenty-Four❧

"But I..." Words failed the girl and Laylani broke out into a laugh, the sound beautiful like birds chirping on a sunny morning, and rested her clasped hands in her lap.

"You're as white as the mongo shells back home! There is no harm in passing along a symbol of affection - if anything, it should be encouraged." (Y/n) fiddled with the lei around her head nervously, not quite sure she wasn't stepping on any toes but doing her best to smile. Sometimes she wished she knew even a lick about the outside world; perhaps then she wouldn't make a fool of herself so readily. "Before it was changed, my name was spelled like the beautiful crown you wear: Leilani." She rose a metallic hand to her own glass crown with a tilt of her head like she was raising an eyebrow. "So the rabble - as Rama likes to call them - decided to add a permanent addition to my body that would, in Rama's words, 'scar me forever'." She giggled to herself like the entire idea was rather amusing.

"Why were you forced to change your name?" The flower crown was a beautiful addition, but her name being changed felt more personal somehow.

"Turns out tourists still struggled to pronounce my name correctly first try, so they changed it to 'Laylani'." She lifted her shoulders up in a shrug as she leaned back. "Another affront to omnic-kind, if you ask Rama, but to me? It changes nothing about who I am." Her hand fell from the crown, glancing briefly over the spot in her head that granted her sentience almost unknowingly, then it returned to her lap demurely.

"That's so..." (Y/n) stopped herself short from letting 'sad' slip from her lips, and the small omnic swung her legs and tilted her head curiously. "You and Ram couldn't see the world more differently," she said instead, earning a soft hum from the omnic. Silence permeated the air for a beat, and increasingly frantic to fill it with something, the mechanic cleared her throat. "So, you and Ram?"  

Laylani laughed, the sound beautiful like birds chirping on a sunny morning, and she shook her head in amusement. "There is no me and him. Don't worry, wahine, he only has eyes for you." The relief that immediately washed over (Y/n) confused her – why did she care if the two omnics were together anyway? – before the rest of the small omnic's words registered and she startled, stumbling back into the Nulltrooper and nearly tripping on the remains of its legs scattered across the floor.

"He don't have no eyes for me! He barely even looks at me, and when he do, he's always madder than a wet hen." It was a flimsy excuse like she knew she was grasping at straws, but the thought flustered her more than she wanted to admit. She scrambled to recollect herself as she turned to throw open drawers in search of a clean rag in the hopes Laylani couldn't tell.

"He wouldn't bring a human aboard his ship if they didn't mean something to him." The words hung in the air with all the implications practically swirling around them, but the girl pointedly kept her head down. Sensing she wasn't going to get a response – or maybe seeing (Y/n)'s red cheeks – Laylani leaned forward, hands grasping the edge of the counter as she swung her legs back and forth. "Do you usually talk to yourself?"

"I was talking to McCree," (Y/n) mumbled, the excuse as flimsy as her last, but it was like the omnic knew every single button to push to fluster her.

The bot's head rose at its name and Laylani noticed, clear amusement slipping into her tone as she giggled, "The C-455 can't reply, that model doesn't have a voicebox."

"He's a mighty fine listener." (Y/n) finally found a rag to try to wipe the grime off her face, wincing when she could feel it spread across her cheek. "Heavens to Betsy..." Feeling curious eye lights on her, she tried to act nonchalant even as Laylani's shiny, unblemished metal seemed to wink at her out of the corner of her eye. She looked like a mess in comparison and she felt like one too – which her stomach kindly reminded her of. She slapped her hands over it like that would silence it, the dirt and red coating her face competing to take up more of her (s/c) skin. "You, uh, have any idea why Ram would forget to get food for me?"