Chapter Text
This diner is an assault on the senses.
It feels gross. Every surface is covered in a thick layer of grime, the air is damp and humid, and the coffee he'd spent nearly twenty G.E.O. on tastes like dirt water and is barely lukewarm. Even the mug they'd served it in is disgusting, he can see dark stain lines on the inside, and bits of coffee grounds where the handle meets the cup. The logo on the side, no doubt for whatever chain of diner this is, is so faded that only a ghost of the colors remain.
It's loud, full to the brim with people who talk and laugh and clink glasses, who's chairs screech against the floor and whose boots stomp with every step. Miners skimming the edges of the Hallownest system, harvesting the asteroid belt at its limit for minerals. Traders passing through with goods, restocking the outposts and rest stops all the way from here to Pharloom. And the rest are drifters, pointlessly hoping from outpost to outpost, living on the wind.
He is different from all of them. Unlike them, he's preparing to head straight past that asteroid field and right into the Heart of Hallownest. The system holds glory for all who enter, and he already knows that he's going to be returning from this adventure a living legend.
Of course, that's if he can even get into the system to begin with.
Tiso managed to get to the edge easily enough. Hitchhiking, while exhausting and humiliating, can get you anywhere other people are going. However, you can't hitchhike if no one is going that way. Which makes sense, he doubts anyone has the level of bravery he does... but it doesn't make it any less annoying. He's tried bribing someone to take him into the system with the few G.E.O. he has left, he's tried convincing others of the riches and glory, he's tried arguing with them about how realistic the legends of Hallownest's danger really are. He's tried everything short of begging and just stealing a ship, and seeing as he isn't willing to embarrass himself and doesn't know how to pilot a ship, both of those options are off the table.
Which brings him here, sitting at a table for one in the corner of the rest stop, a map of Hallownest spread out in front of him. He stares down the path from here to his destination in hopes that his glare might somehow manifest a solution. His concentration is broken when another mug gets placed in front of him, nearly overflowing with more of that disgusting coffee. He snatches it up the moment it's placed down, far too late to prevent the ring-shaped stain it leaves. "Your coffee." The robotic waiter beeps in an ear-grating, monotone voice just to top it all off.
Tiso lets out a hiss of frustration. "You just ruined my map." He says, carefully moving the cup away from the map before letting out another hiss, this one of annoyance. "And I didn't order another coffee," He spits, dropping the mug back onto its platter.
"My apologies." It replies, before turning around on its squeaky wheels and rolling away from him. He mutters a few curses under his breath and turns his focus on the map. Nothing important has been damaged, just the name of some swampy planet out of his path getting obscured, but the map is still messed up. He has half a mind to push the damned thing over for this, but doesn't (only because he's sure he'd get kicked out if it broke).
That disruption was good for something, though. It finally makes him realize that this place is too loud for him to get any thinking done. Tiso folds his map up and grabs the half-empty mug to take out to the parking lot, not even bothering to push his chair back in as he tries to maneuver his way out of the packed diner.
His escape is going well until he slams straight into someone trying to squeeze past the opposite direction. The coffee spills all over his clothes and all over the floor, adding yet another layer to this miserable experience. "Oh! Please forgive me, I didn't see you there" the cause of the spill says. It's a robot, slightly taller than him and certainly fancier than anything he's seen this far out. Sleek and shiny with a screen for a face that displays a taunting expression of vague upset-ness. "I'll buy you another one." It says, face changing to an insincere, 'friendly' smile.
The words it says hardly register in his ears. On most days he'd just tell the bucket of scrap off, yell some obscenity in its fake face and move on with his day, but not today. His one relief from the horrible rest stop, from this gross diner, his one break before he gets back on the road, and it's now staining his clothes. It doesn't even matter that the coffee was shit. The metal thing doesn't even have the time to give another annoying apology before he hurls his fist into the fragile looking screen.
It's not normal glass, it turns out. It's much harder, to the point that, while he does manage to put a crack in it, it also manages to send a horrible jolt of pain up his arm. "You asshole!" Tiso hisses, yelling over whatever the robot is trying to say to him. It reaches for him, no doubt trying to restrain him, and he's quick to dodge the grapple.
And in a single moment everything goes from horrible to embarrassing as he slips on the spilt coffee. He feels the impact of the back of his head against the edge of a table, and then everything goes dark.