Work Text:
May 1991
Mean Streak looked into her reflection, and she was terrified.
Her mother was asleep in the other room. Mean Streak would get access to her own room when she officially opened, but for now she still occupied the small room attached to her mother’s. She sat in front of her floor-length mirror, clouds slowly collecting around her head.
She fidgeted with her necklace, rubbing circles into the cold clay cloud with her thumb. Her mother had given it to her as a gift. She said it was so she wouldn’t forget her. She had just nodded her little head and put it on gratefully.
Her hair was matted at the base (she needed to get a haircut soon). Her bangs swept over her face in sad clumps, and she didn’t have the strength to fix them right now.
The familiar smell of lumber and cigarettes did nothing to quell her fears as she slumped onto the floor, letting sleep take her. Tomorrow would be a big day, after all, and she needed rest.
She knew that sleep would not come to her, though.
May 2018
Mean Streak didn’t recognize her own reflection.
Everything about her had changed in some way. She had been asleep for a long time.
How long exactly had she been away? A month? A year? A decade?
Her aching limbs had been cast aside, and only stubs remained of her failing arms and legs. She was outfitted with metal prosthetics that she could take off at will. She hated them.
Her once vibrant and flat hair had turned wavy and brown with blonde highlights that tried to peek out in the sun. Even her skin was a little paler, with fresh freckles adorning her skin in little clumps along her face, neck, and shoulders.
It seems the only things she was allowed to keep were her eyes and now ratty necklace.
Her eyes retained their color after all these years, still the same color as a stormy sea or a thunder cloud, and were now threatening to spill hot tears like a monsoon on a summer’s day.
Gone was her streetwear wardrobe of warm, fiery tones, now replaced with frontier attire, with a cowboy hat to boot. She felt a strong inclination to never take it off. Was that instinct implanted, too?
Even her voice sounded different. A little higher, with a western accent that she tried desperately to suppress. To pretend like she was still Mean Streak, the washed-up piece of shit who spends all day in the forest with her one friend who probably hates her. The nuisance who everyone wishes was dead. The one who truly lived up to her name.
But that wasn’t her name anymore. Mean Streak died a year and a half ago, and she was whatever was left of her.
—
???
The sand was cold and stuck to Dragster like goo. Her hands and face felt like they’re melting off of her bones. Is this hell?
Is this what it feels like to die alone? To have pushed everyone who ever cared about you away? To give in to her own cowardice and gluttony?
She left the used needle in the grass behind her. She could still feel where she injected. Sloppy work on her part.
A voice screamed at her from behind. Is that Millie? Oh. She was crying now. Or was Dragster crying? It didn’t matter. It never did.
The ocean was so warm and inviting. Or was it a lake? No… she had never seen the ocean. She always told Millie that she wanted to see the ocean. To walk out onto that big blue expanse and not come back for a good long while.
No, this had to be the lake. The lake was cold and detached. The lake, which she always would pretend was the ocean. Maybe, if she went in, she could pretend it was the ocean.
She had gotten almost waist deep before she felt a pair of toned arms forcibly drag her back onto the shore and to the ground. It was Millennium.
It sounded like she was asking her if she had a death wish. That wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world, to die. Maybe then she would get to see the ocean.
May 2025
The pavement felt cold under Dragster’s weathered hands. It grounded her as she readjusted to her surroundings and the damp, chilly morning air. How was she alive?
She felt a little strange as she sat on her tracks and inspected herself. She had been asleep for a very long time.
It couldn’t have been any earlier than five o’clock. In the early morning fog, time seemed to blend together like a watercolor painting in a dream you didn’t want to forget.
She had always liked watching the water, but she was nowhere near the ocean right now. She was walking into her station.
Music danced in her ears. A tune she had once heard often, now morphed and remixed and so clearly different from her memory. Had it always been this way, or did it change?
If it did, did it change to fit her or did she change to fit it?
She continued to look herself over as a synth hook she didn’t recognize invaded her ears.
She was a little taller and a little more muscular. Her hair was done up into a high ponytail and had steel grey-ish white streaks in it. If she had a mirror, she would have noticed that half of her bangs were this color, too. She stepped out of the station.
The sun was ramping up its ascent into the cloudless sky. Today would be hot, no doubt.
When she heard approaching footsteps and turned to her side, she noticed Millennium Force, frozen like she had seen a ghost. Their eyes met as each woman tried to make sense of what the hell was going on. There was no dramatic revelation, no crescendo of emotions. Just confusion, sadness, and a strange feeling of peace.
Top Thrill 2 smiled and walked toward the other woman, who was shaking in the cool air. Millie was not happy to see her.