"I know. And yours is Vibe. Nicknames are fun, though. I pretty much nickname everyone I see. Abyss is Santa Claus, Michael is General Shield, Isabel is Win..."

Vibe snorted. "Childish. And Santa doesn't have a tail."

"I guess I could actually use your real names, if you want."

"Whatever." She flicked a finger in the water, making a larger ripple.

"Umm, this is probably a stupid question, but didn't you used to not... talk? I mean, you were using that computer-thing at the Resistance meeting."

Vibe's frown deepened. Her hand automatically went to her throat, and the gold pendant hanging there. What would Amp have thought? She had her own voice now. Even if it was an electronic voice. But yet, she still didn't feel whole....

"Doc J gave me a new voice." She spoke this time without moving her lips. "Not sure how. But it works." She paused, then added softly, "It's not the same though."

~ "Childish. And Santa doesn't have a tail."

A brief burst of a purr came from the tiger. "But he should." As to the childish comment: yeah, he got that a lot. Was it really such a bad thing?

~ "Doc J gave me a new voice." She spoke this time without moving her lips. "Not sure how. But it works." She paused, then added softly, "It's not the same though."

For the first time, Slate took an interest in the conversation. That is beautiful.

What, talking through a necklace?

Not having to move your mouth when you speak. It is more... serene. Now, if only speech were not so noisy...

...That's kind of the point of speech, Slate.

It is displeasing, though.

...Yeah. That's... yeah.

As usual, his little internal dialogue had taken less than a second. "That's kinda cool," the tiger commented, one of his ears flicking. He wasn't agreeing with Slate; he was just acknowledging that it was a nifty gadget. Nifty gadgets deserving acknowledgement. He finally turned his head back to her, whiskers fanned, at that last part. "What's not the same?"

. "That's kinda cool. What's not the same?"

The shine returned to her eyes. Had she been able to talk normally, she may not have been able to reply. As it was, her 'voice' grew even softer.

"Amp used to be my voice. She was my everything..... We've only been separated once before."

Being in a swimsuit was the only time the scar on the front of her right leg was visible. It peeked out from under her shorts, barely visible against her pale skin as a pink smudge. Amp had an identical one, on the back of her left leg and hip. It had been there so long, neither of them notice any more.

The tiger swiveled both of its ears towards the Bad Twin as her voice dropped a notch.

~ "Amp used to be my voice. She was my everything..... We've only been separated once before."

Calley lazily stretched out his forelegs further over the edge of the pool, letting them dangle into the water. As long as the bulk of him was up here, it wasn't too bad for his paws to be down there, in that innocuously chlorinated death trap. The closeness to someone else, and the depression if they were gone... he didn't get that. He'd missed his sister for awhile after he'd been spent packing, but she obviously hadn't tried very hard to look for him, so his own feelings were pointless. He'd missed his mom, but she was dead. Dead was dead was dead, and that was that. Again: feelings? Pointless. His father... he hoped his father was happy with his stepmother, and he hoped his stepmother was getting fat. Really fat. Roll-down-stairs fat. There really wasn't anyone else to care about. Issie was fun, but she could take care of herself. She was probably in the Camps right now, stabbing guards with plastic cafeteria-issued sporks and bludgeoning them with her own shoes. Abyss was awesome and monkey-tailed and fun and he knew just about everything there was to know about Calley and he still didn't hate him, but Calley's life didn't exactly revolve around the guy. The closest thing he had to what Amp and Vibe had was Slate. If he lost Slate...

...Heh.

...Likewise.

Yeah. Calley didn't get what Vibe was going through. But it looked painful, and he got pain. He didn't really know what to say. Fortunately, there was an easy way around that.

The large tiger got to its feet (shook its paws off), padded a few feet to the right, and sat down next to Vibe. "We'll get her back." He stated it like the fact it was. Hunter was insane and in severe need of killing, but the Resistance was his, and the Boss Man did tend to get things done. Usually with gratuitous violence. The tiger nuzzled his head against Grumpy's shoulder, with a reassuring rumble that took a minor switch in vocal chords to pull off. Or he tried to, anyways. It was anyone's guess whether the twin would sit still that long, with a tigger next to 'er.