In another version of the Grid, they meet in the Garage. Cutler’s lightcycle is on the fritz, again, but the place he usually goes to has some kind of error that’s making the floor Simply Not Exist Anymore. So this time, he stops at Able’s. Besides, he’s had a couple friends tell him that the mechanics there are kinda cute. Not that that made any sort of impact on his decision. Not at all.
Well, his friends are right, anyway. He finds himself a little distracted as he moves farther into the garage. But there’s one mechanic in particular who catches his eye: a dark-haired program who’s leaning casually next to a teal-haired one, both playfully—and obviously—bothering another program who’s working on a bike and somehow making a bowl cut look cute. This isn’t why Cutler had come here. Really. Honestly.
But at the same time, he’s not the kind of program to let an opportunity go to waste.
He approaches the group as smoothly as he can—he’s tripped on flat ground before and he’s not eager to repeat that now—and keeps his voice from cracking as he says, “Hey.”
Teal sees him first. She goes into Customer Service Mode and straightens her posture, puts on a guarded smile. Dark-Haired, though—he glances at him, looks away, does a double-take, drops the tool he wasn’t using, and scrambles to pick it back up.
“Hi, what can we do for you?” Teal asks.
“My lightcycle could use an… expert’s touch,” Cutler replies, and deliberately makes eye contact with Dark-Haired.
Bowl Cut makes a gagging noise that Teal and Dark-Haired both ignore, but Teal’s grin becomes brighter and more genuine as she turns to Dark-Haired.
“Well, Beck’s available!” she exclaims, smacking him on the shoulder. “Aren’t you, Beck?”
“I—yeah? I’m—yeah,” Beck—a nice name, Cutler thinks—says, and puts on a smile that no doubt works on everyone he meets. (And Cutler can say—yes. Everyone.) “So, what seems to be the problem?”
And in this version of the Grid, Cutler replies, “Well—just that I don’t know where you’ve been all my runtime.”
In this version of the Grid, Teal gushes about love at first sight.
In this version of the Grid, Bowl Cut tells them to get a room.
In this version of the Grid, they know happiness.