Drawing had seemingly taken precedence in David's life, it was impossible not end up almost accidentally stepping onto sheets of paper with some sort of drawing etched onto the crisp surface. He had got rather short and blunt with both females when they had to try and move about without stepping on something. Unfortunately one if not both failed. And David had got snappy, he didn't go around stepping on things that they had worked on. He certainly didn't go helping himself to the diary which Elizabeth had decided to pick up writing. So, why should she tread on his work?

"David," Alma said one day, David had lost count, was this their fifth day on the ship? Or had they been here longer? He couldn't honestly tell. He looked up though, he had squirrelled himself into a corner in the living room, it seemed apt, though not a conventional living room it was still a room which the three of them lived in. Just minus some comfortable sofas and chairs, a television, the usual.

Around him was all his gathered pieces of work, he had multiple things on the go. He couldn't work on one thing for too long before looking too into it and seeing imperfections. He'd add too much and then he'd ruin the drawing. This had happened a few times already, despite Elizabeth or Alma saying otherwise. Honestly, both were in awe of his ability to draw. It was simply amazing. So detailed, every fine line and mark wasn't without a purpose. Even if some of the things he drew were beyond them. They didn't get the odd humanoid figures. But drawing them seemed to keep him amused. "Yes?" He answered eventually. He lowered his knees, he had them almost to his chest, paper resting against his knees, pen skimming across the page quickly.

"We need a filing system." Alma crouched down, David tilted his head to the side. "For your drawings. Or, at least find a way to put them up." She said while picking one up from the pile and looking it over. Honestly, she didn't know if she wanted to wake and see these weird drawings. There was something rather unsettling about them, she couldn't quite put her finger on it.

"What do you suggest?" He was intrigued. Alma looked about before picking up a large piece of paper and simply folding it. Scooping up the drawings which he seemed extremely protective over, not that she blamed him considering the time he put into them, when he was working on them; David beat her to it and picked the small stack up and put it into the folded paper.

"Pen," she waved her hand to him, David reluctantly handed it over and pushed himself onto his knees and watched her. She had placed the little folder down onto the ground. Smoothing the front over, David watched as she simply wrote: 'David's drawings' on it. "See, that way, if Elizabeth needs another piece of paper to add to her diary, she will know not to nab it from here. Because this paper is already well and truly taken." Alma smiled and gave him the pen back. "What're you working on now?" Alma asked and placed the folder to one side so she could take the stacks place beside him. David frowned and held the paper suddenly to his chest, "David...what're you working on?" Alma prodded him on the arm, yet he remained motionless. Still holding on yet with a smile on his face, he shook his head.

"All good things come to those who wait."

"How ominous of you. I don't like it..." Alma said with a grin while trying to pry his hands away from his chest. She failed, of course. His strength far outdid hers by a long shot. Her attempt probably felt like nothing to him. Yet he pretended, for her sake, he struggled back to make her think she had a chance of succeeding, only to still hold onto the paper by the end of it.

David sighed, "If I showed you now, where would the fun be when I show you at the end?"

"David, you don't tend to show me finished drawings anyway. I end up seeing them on the floor, and you get snarky when I almost step on them. If you get like that, then look after them better."

"Irrelevant statement, don't you think? What with you making a folder for them now, and all that." David smirked and looked down at her as she frowned.

She groaned, "I swear one day...one day, David, I will win an argument with you."

"And as ever, Alma, I look forward to that day." He paused, she looked happy that he'd agree. "If that day ever comes," he added and watched as she looked unhappy, displeased and almost sad. David's eyes widened, "I mean it in the sense that I am rather in tune and able to quip back against most arguments, statements, and comments. Not the fate of yourself."

"Yeah, I know," Alma sighed and nodded. She pulled her knees to her chest and looked up at the ceiling distantly. "The thought of running food down scares me."

"More than hypersleep?"

"Starvation, David."

"I am unable to grasp the feelings you hold towards this. Try as I might, I can't." David looked at her sadly, he could relate to many things, but not something like that, because he didn't need to eat. He could eat, and turn the food into useable energy, but it didn't keep him going, not like food did with humans.

"Induced coma state versus starving...seriously, even you must be able to fathom the negatives of both, and that out of the two, the latter is the more terrifying." Alma looked up at him.

"I won't be much help to you."

"Not unless I turn cannibal." Alma said with wide eyes while looking him up and down.

David smiled, "Wrong person. I believe eating machinery will make you worse."

"That and it wouldn't kill you!"

"Do you want me dead all of a sudden?" David frowned, eyes narrowing dangerously.

"No! I mean how horrid would someone feel if they gave it a shot, and you were still nattering away? Way to make someone trying to survive feel guilty."

David just blinked yet remained otherwise silent. "You wouldn't though, right?"

"The thought of eating another human is disgusting. I would rather starve."

"Reassuring." David paused, "It won't be long, you know?"

"I know." Alma begrudgingly answered. "We have enough food for another month, maybe two if we're sensible..." David watched as she grew distant again, "Sorry, it means I cant sneak you anymore chocolate." She smiled apologetically up at him. Yes, she had been doing this on the sly. What Elizabeth didn't know, wouldn't hurt her. And it wasn't like she was making immediate grabs for the sweet treat anyway.

"I keep telling you to stop sharing with me anyway." David rolled his eyes. "I am grateful you think of me, but it is wasted."

"But you like chocolate..."

"I also like popcorn, but where has that led us?"

"To eating it all..."

"Exactly, and now we're substituting that loss for something else. What will be next?"

"Not those nutrient bars. They taste like cardboard."

"Yet they have all you need in them. You must eat more, if you wish to keep your strength up." David pointed out simply.

Alma sighed, "What's the point? Strength for what? To go to sleep and then wake up on a hostile world? No matter what strength I have, it'll be nothing in comparison to the Engineers."

David looked at her with a sad look, "Defeatism isn't you."

"No. No, I don't suppose it is."

David sighed, looking down at his hands which were still to his chest, he sidelong looked at her. "I suppose," he started, earning her attention. She had been drifting off into her thoughts and staring into space. Blinking and looking up at him, she looked curious over his explanative sounding tone. "I am nearly finished. Or I am finished, should I say. I guess if you saw it now, it wouldn't matter."

"Your drawing." Alma smiled, "Finish it, David. Or else you'll never be happy with it."

He frowned, "If I keep adding to it, then I won't be happy with it either way."

"Valid point. There is no such thing as perfection, and that desperate need to try and capture it probably has driven some artists mad." Van Gogh came to mind for her, but his madness stemmed from something else entirely. She narrowed her eyes, not wholly knowing where the link between the two even came from or where it was going. She dropped it, that was a train of thought going nowhere. She looked worriedly at David when he seemed to still, no longer looking rather excited to share his work. "What is it?" Alma asked while placing a hand on his arm, she watched as he slowly blinked and then smiled, he shook his head and tried to act all casual, only for her to look at him blankly. She knew when something was wrong with him, she knew him well enough by now to know his tells.

"Perfection."

"And?"

"Peter Weyland called me perfect once. I believe that might have been the lone time he had actually complimented me. But, it is strange. To each their own, they are perfect, a singular being wishes to see themselves as perfect, no flaws, but everyone's thoughts of perfection is different. And here you are, saying it doesn't exist." He couldn't help but find that a little amusing. The one person to contradict had to be Alma.

"Because everyone, and everything has flaws, David. That is just life. You wouldn't look at a tree for instance, and say it was perfect. Because when you'd look up close, you'd see all the little imperfections which make it a tree. Actually, maybe a tree isn't the right thing to use for this analogy." Alma frowned in thought.

"A person, then?"

"A person. A person, I suppose aesthetically can look perfect. But then, they could have a horrible personality which contradicts their appearance. Is that perfect? Looking it but acting a right shit? No. I wouldn't believe so. I always presumed people would seek perfection as looking it and acting politely, mild mannered...all that. This has so gone off on a tangent, why is it whenever we start one conversation, it shoots off into something deep and meaningful?" Alma was exasperated. This always happened, and it only happened with David. But then, she supposed, even after all this time he was still learning. Always learning. She didn't know for what knowledge. But it was endless.

He smiled, "Just because."

"Not an answer."

"I know," his smile grew as she sighed and hung her head. "So?"

"Yes! Are you going to hand it over? Through everything we've just rambled about, I'm sure your drawing is as brilliant as the others." Alma shot her head back up and looked at him expectedly. David nodded his head, pulling his hands away from his chest he finally relinquished the paper to her. He sat back and watched as her eyes went wide, her mouth opened in a small gasp as she ran her fingers gently over the page, seemingly half worried to smudge the long since dried pen. The thing with having an eidetic memory was, that, in all fairness to David, he remembered all. Both a blessing and a curse, he supposed. But once something had been seen, or read, or watched, it was in his mind, forever. Stored away, much like his drawings in the makeshift folder. Able to get at any time, if needed. So, of course, when it came to drawing certain things which he was recalling from a reference, it was a lot easier if he had seen the reference before. Just so happens, he had seen it twice. Perhaps one time too many, but it helped nonetheless.

"I thought, considering the tablet is soon to give up the last of its battery. You would like to have a copy, on paper and to hand." David explained, he had drawn the photograph of herself and her father. Terrifyingly close to the original, if Alma wasn't mistaken it could've been the original, just with some sort of filter effect plonked on top of it.

"This might be one of the nicest things anyone has ever given me." Alma said quietly, David watched curiously as she held the drawing to herself. He frowned, he didn't get what that would achieve. He didn't understand that it could be a comfort thing, like what any other person would do to a photograph of a loved one. Hold it close, and you could just about imagine them holding you right back. "You are seriously very good, David." His eyes lit up at that and a wide smile appeared on his face, no longer confused over the paper hugging. "Thank you," she looked up at him with slightly teary eyes, she held her arms up and he happily turned and knelt in front of her again, before taking her into his arms too.

He pulled her up and against himself, and she more or less just ended up sitting in his lap. David didn't seem wholly fussed, even if she let out a sudden surprised noise from it. He kept a firm hold on her as he turned and leaned back against the wall. Stretching his legs back out, he rested his head on top of hers as hers nestled under his. "There is no need to cry, Alma." He could feel her shaking in his arms. He didn't mean to upset her, honestly he didn't. He just thought he was doing a nice gesture.

She leaned away from him and wiped at her eyes, or tried to if she wasn't beaten to it by him. He cupped her face and smiled lightly. Alma let out a strained laugh and sniffled quietly. "I didn't know you could draw, until the other day. I had even less of a clue that you could draw so well. You are seriously good, David."

David narrowed his eyes and childishly tapped her on the nose. "See, it isn't just you humans who can create detailed portraits."

"Well done."

"Thank you."

"Is this the only piece you're working on?" Alma asked while looking to the side where more in the corner there was secreted away paper. David tried to shoo her hands away as she flicked through. He looked rather unhappily at her for snooping, yet paused when she came across more portraits. "You drew me? I mean...me-me, not child me..." Alma looked at the drawing in her hand, "And Elizabeth too! Why've you kept these hidden? You're a very secretive fellow, David." Alma pouted as she flicked between the two drawings.

"It's rude to go through other people's things." He said firmly, her eyes flicked up and looked at him. He crossed his arms and frowned her way. "Secondly, I was going to, when they were finished. That's why they're in that pile." He said shortly, Alma just raised an eyebrow. She hadn't seen David get so tetchy over anything really before. She smiled slowly, which caused him to look even more unhappily at her. He didn't see the humour in this moment. She got it, the annoyed feeling of someone eyeing up something creative when it wasn't ready. It was just a little endearing to watch him have a slight strop over something she had suffered with numerous times before.

"You're adorable, David." His serious disposition slackened and disappeared then. He looked thoroughly miffed. "Sorry, as someone who's had their own work rifled through, I should know better. But it's exciting! To see what you draw next. You're still forever a bundle of surprises."

"I don't understand how that makes me adorable." He didn't. He didn't get it at all. Took it as a compliment nonetheless, yes, but still confused.

"Because you're being possessive over something which is solely yours. It's your work, yours. And no one as yet has the right to see, sorry, by the way, or hold it, sorry again, until you're ready. You trying to express this emotion is just...cute."

"Are you feeling okay?" He asked worriedly, thinking she was having some sort of odd turn.

"No, not really. I'm still feeling slightly emotional over my drawing." Alma looked back at the one of her father and herself and smiled wistfully. "He would've liked you, stick by it."

"And I probably would've liked him," David said while pushing her hair over her shoulders and keeping his hands lightly on her arms. He did look down at the two portraits of his human companions, he looked slowly back up at Alma. She was still admiring the drawing in her hands, David couldn't help but smile sadly. He would rather remember them both as they were now...not as what they were likely to turn into once the lack of resources well and truly kicked in. That was a memory he would rather eradicate, when the time came, yet he knew he wouldn't be able to, because it was impossible. Alma may have disputes over perfection and what have you, but even she couldn't possibly disagree over the fact that David's mind was the perfect time capsule of just about everything.

——

(Edited: 4/March/2021)