Forgetting You Have No Name - II AU

Introducing Myself Again

Lightbulb hopped out of her car, slamming the door shut as she stepped onto the curb, humming to herself. Rummaging through her purse for her wallet, she glanced at the car, briefly admiring her parking before turning her focus back towards the search for her wallet.

She chuckled to herself, remembering the look on her friends’ faces when they (and she) collectively discovered that the bulb was… actually a competent driver! Not that she really understood most of the rules of driving.

…No wonder Test Tube and Fan always seemed anxious when Lightbulb was the one behind the wheel.

But that didn’t matter at the moment! As Lightbulb inserted a few quarters into the parking meter, she remembered her current mission: get coffee for her buds and herself.

The girl walked towards the cafe, resuming the tune she had hummed earlier. As she opened the door, just about all of her senses were slapped on their metaphorical faces at once. The overlapping chatter, the scent of coffee, the air conditioner making the room almost uncomfortably chilly, the list goes on! Shoving aside her thoughts for a moment, Lightbulb confidently walked up to the cash register, an employee waiting behind the counter.

“Hi! What would you like to order?” The cashier beamed with a likely mandatory smile but appreciated by Lightbulb nonetheless.

Leaning on the counter ever-so-slightly, Lightbulb opened her mouth with an ‘uhh’, racking her brain for her friends’ orders. After a moment, she spoke up with an equally cheery tone.

“Can I get a black coffee, a caramel frappuccino, and an iced mocha?”

The cashier nodded, putting the order down on… whatever device that was back there. Lightbulb had always wondered how it worked. Her eyes darted to the side, noticing how many people were occupying the cafe.

Ah. She dreaded the inevitable next question, the one only asked when places like these get busy like that.

“And a name for your order?”

…Yep.

“Lila.”

There it was. Lightbulb had blatantly lied once more. Lying to some random stranger’s face, it made her feel horrible! Like that time she ate a pizza slice that was left out for too long. ...That wasn’t exactly her proudest moment.

She could still vividly recall the time she sat on a blow-up mattress in her new apartment, pouting as she stared at her birth certificate.

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It freaked her out to see information about herself that not even she knew. Her supposed date and place of birth, information for parents she didn’t even have, and a legal name. Not ‘Lila Bulb’, like it is now, but both felt equally foreign to the girl who sat dazedly on the mattress until a voice caught her attention.

“Lila!” Test Tube snapped her fingers, causing Lightbulb’s gaze to snap up in her direction.

“...Lightbulb,” she corrected quietly, feeling unusually… uncomfortable with her current predicament.

Test Tube sighed, pressing her fingers against her glass forehead. “Not anymore, unfortunately. Right now, you’re Lila, I’m Tessa, and he’s Dan,” she gestured towards Fan, who had just hauled a box into the apartment room. A look of confusion painted his face at the mention of his new, fake name.

“Well, buh- uh, I,” Lightbulb stammered, Test Tube’s condescending tone irritating her, “I-it doesn’t even make sense!! I’m a lightbulb, not a ‘Lila’, whatever that even is!”

Test Tube’s expression softened, starkly contrasting the increasingly vexed Lightbulb. The scientist placed a hand on her friend’s shoulder.

“Hey, look. I… I know it’s tough. We got killed by that MePhone, and the next thing we know, we’re in the city with these… predetermined identities. But we have to follow them, you know?”